Are pure physical attack builds even a thing?

I don't really see the problem here?

Hatred and Herald of Ash are both designed to reward Physical builds. They don't convert, they add extra damage. And you're not inclined to go elemental passive's to improve their aspects, you go all-in increased physical damage.

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Snowflake85 wrote:

I don't really see the problem here?

Hatred and Herald of Ash are both designed to reward Physical builds. They don't convert, they add extra damage. And you're not inclined to go elemental passive's to improve their aspects, you go all-in increased physical damage.

He means dealing pure physical damage, no added elemental damage.
I'm in the same boat as OP, we really need some kind of added phys damage aura or smth.
I'm trying something like that atm, with blasphemy vulnerability and bleeds. only lvl 40, will check back with dps stats when I reach endgame.

Poison is a viable option now in place of elemental scaling, especially for projectiles attacks that have more double dipping options. Vulnerability curse works very well with this sort of build. The op-ness of the elemental -> chaos conversion items and Bladefall took the limelight from this type of build in the current patch, we'll see how it turns out in Ascendancy.

This sort of build will likely be more defensive and slower than an elemental conversion build, due to the nature of poison damage, and aura space being used for defenses. That's also something largely unwanted in the current state of the game, most players want to snowball on damage with minimal defenses.

CI attacker may be another stlye where you use your aura space for defenses (Discipline+Grace) and your support slots for augmented phys damage (Melee on Full Life, Conc Effect with Witch area nodes to compensate) resulting in high physical scaling instead of elemental conversion. But this sort of build starts to benefit even more, if it can get the elemental scaling from somewhere else (Taste of Hate, Hatred from party member etc.). So it doesn't make the most sense, when the extra defenses from auras are simply not necessary when mobs are falling over instantly.

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Snowflake85 wrote:

I don't really see the problem here?

Hatred and Herald of Ash are both designed to reward Physical builds. They don't convert, they add extra damage. And you're not inclined to go elemental passive's to improve their aspects, you go all-in increased physical damage.

It just seems counterintuitive to me, that's all. I would have thought that the utility of elemental status ailments is something you buy at the price of reduced damage when compared to pure phys. Conversely, if you wanted to maximize your damage, you'd have to go full phys and give up status ailments. From a design perspective, that would make more sense IMO. As it is, there's very little reason not to get some added/converted elemental damage, which kind of limits the space of viable builds.

The problem with this would be that phys reflect mobs would be deadly.
Most hard hitting phys builds opt for Physical to Lightning... It helps with reflects, and shock is a nice bonus.

I'd like to see Herald of Blood, though... It could add physical damage (a small ammount, due to scaling) and cause monsters to explode on death, making nearby monsters bleed.

It won't happen, though... We're stuck with hatred.

Seem's like you desire a very booring, grey world, without interesting synergies...

Heavy Strike, Supported by - More Physical Damage - More Physical Damage - Some More Physical Damage.
And for desert, Aura of Physical damage combined with Aura of Some More Physical Damage.

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Snowflake85 wrote:

Seem's like you desire a very booring, grey world, without interesting synergies...

Heavy Strike, Supported by - More Physical Damage - More Physical Damage - Some More Physical Damage.
And for desert, Aura of Physical damage combined with Aura of Some More Physical Damage.

There are still a few interesting mechanics available to a pure phys theoretical build. Stun and bleed spring to mind. If it really bothers you that "add elements and crit, get ailments lol" won't add to the complexity of a pure phys build, there is always the possibility of adding knockback-based and/or other positioning mechanics.

Plus defense mechanics still need to be layered on.

Hardly seems like a boring grey world to me.

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Snowflake85 wrote:

Seem's like you desire a very booring, grey world, without interesting synergies...

Heavy Strike, Supported by - More Physical Damage - More Physical Damage - Some More Physical Damage.
And for desert, Aura of Physical damage combined with Aura of Some More Physical Damage.

You can get great synergies within one damage type. I have a templar who does 100% lightning damage, no physical, and all skills revolve around that. Skills to shock, skills to take advantage of the shock to do extra damage, and lightning skills with CoH to apply elemental weakness/conductivity to increase the damage even more. Of course the damage starts out as physical from a sceptre (Static Strike), but with 100% conversion.

The problem is, there is no real equivalent in pure physical damage, you have to convert or add other damage types, and there isn't much synergy between different physical skills.

They should introduce a gem simmilar to hypothermia:

%more melee damage against maimed enemies

Then getting maim would actually make sense for melee, it would still require building around and melee would get more scaling options :P