Hello, today I’d like to introduce a new warrior, designed specifically to farm Legends, and Eternal Legends at floors 750-800, with a Wizard hireling. Using this build, designed to farm, I frequently multiple see 350-400k whirlwind hits in a row on anything I run through.
This is actually based on Dieter’s old Gyroscopic Slug build, the most fun build I have ever played, which is sadly now extremely outdated. It is also similar to the Knight’s Charge Build, but is much more powerful, since’s its designed for farming 751-800 rather than 501-550 (but loses the epiphany bonus), and in my opinion whirlwind is a lot more fun than charge. Your experience may vary.
Goals when creating this build:
- A Warrior build able to easily and quickly farm the highest item tier in the game (750+ wizard legendary items, currently). He’s very viable farming 751-800 mythic 3, and tears through 501-550 effortlessly, which is the second highest tier for those that don’t care about those 3-4 wizard-only 750+ legendary drops
- A build that, above all, is FUN to play, and makes you want to keep playing the game, rather than making you hate grinding items.
My goal was to make an enjoyable, viable warrior farm build, and I think I’ve succeeded. I love playing this character, and speeeeeding through everything on the screen is a blast. Basically, all you have to do is hold down whirlwind, then run through enemies as fast as you can. With max movement speed, momentum, plus an always running sprint proc, you can clear an entire map in a couple minutes, whirlwinding all the way! (then sprint back through a second time for missed drops because you were running too fast to get them the first time). Taunt large packs into a pile for fun with explosions (assuming a hireling with explosive), whirlwind, or poison clouds from your hireling (careful with this, you may lag out your device). Use mana potion after taunt if needed to keep your energy pool high. If you seem to be dying randomly in the middle of maps, you’re probably 1) running into TNT props (bad!) 2) standing still and letting 10000 fireballs feed on your face on maps with extra bolts+damage+bolt speed+pack size (keep moving! Small circles around mobs if needed.) 3) standing in or on the edge of giant red circles of DOOOOM! (stop that!) If all else fails, keep you hireling resurrected and let him (frequently) die instead. I personally find skyfall and on-hit nerf map mods annoying, so tend to reroll those, but you can do them if you want.
Eventual stats:
55% crit
350% crit damage
0% attack speed (does not affect whirlwind)
100% high voltage
2 extra attacks
0 multiattack (does not affect whirlwind)
+10 all skills
+4 all sets
+100% weapon damage
+5000 weapon damage
+45% block
50% sprint proc
+45% move speed
+200% shock damage
+1% hp on hit
+750 all resist
+75% hp
Ignore resist
max luck, item drop
+10000 HP
30% elemental critical
+5 whirlwind
- pet bonuses (optional)
Energy mythic
Item natures: 6x of the elements (maximize damage)
Item talents: might, fustigate (stun), zealous, wrath (useful for breakables and explosion triggering)
Item sets: momentum, defiant, plagued, adventurer, faun’s gifts, eternalized, rage
Stats: all hp
Talents: str/dex/int/fortune/whirlwind
Don’t bother with attack speed, it doesn’t seem to affect whirlwind damage. This saves a few affix slots.
Things to be aware of:
I don’t have sanctuary, frozen immune, or stun immune in the default build. This isn’t a problem, but it does require you not to be stupid. If you have exploding props, don’t run headlong into a large group of crates. When bosses cast giant red circles of doom on the ground, move out of them, taunt them away, and keep spinning, don’t just stand there. Fire is bad, m’kay?
Useful Legendaries:
Ragnarok hammer (defiant, weapon damage)
Insolence skull/trap (defiant, %shock damage, convert to horn for sprint+taunt)
Aether wrap (% shock damage)
Cognition ring (% shock damage)
Aether cover (% shock damage)
Nadroji equipment (%shock damage, save on +sets/skills mythstones)
Boundless cap (eternalized) (or other eternalized legendaries)
Loop of epiphany (epiphany, not in base build)
Plenty of other weapons out there with % weapon damage, and other offhands with %shock damage: just make sure your weapon has %weapon damage, your offhand or mainhand has defiant, and you have 200% shock damage (300% if you are making a climb build version). Your mainhand should be a hammer, crystalled to have whirlwind, for maximum damage.
Likely questions:
Why no crystalline affix?
Due to my Farming Rogue I already have more crystals than I know what to do with, and getting more takes minutes. Getting crystals was not the primary goal of this build. Even without crystalline, however, this build will still give you more than enough high-level crystals to craft at any level above 500, just not quite as quickly as with the rogue. The only downside to not using crystalline is that you have a lower chance of finding eternal crystals items, but those are so incredibly rare I’m not sure it’s worth losing another set just for that. In any case, if you need to, you can use crystalline, just get rid of adventurer. Using crystalline becomes more problematic if you don’t have a legendary pet, as you’d then have to drop adventurer AND probably defiant (or momentum to trade damage for survivability), which would hurt your ability to farm at 750. You could probably still do 550 no problem.
Why no epiphany affix?
In order to use an eternal affix, I would have to give up an existing affix slot for eternal and several other slots to take advantage of increased luck and item drop caps. When I tried it, I found that my damage and survivability took a hit. I could still clear, and received more legendary items per level, but the loss of a set bonus to increase the cap on stats that are barely capped without it meant that I was actually losing on legendries-per-minute, and the survival hit made the build less fun to play.
Can I use this in PvP?
Well, you don’t die immediately, and might do okay at some of the lower tiers. It is very much NOT a pvp build though, and by the time you got anywhere within attacking range of a real PvP build, you’d be dead. So no, not really.
Can I use this to ladder climb?
Yes! With some modifications, the build becomes a whirlwind of death, able to handle high level maps with ease. Replace eternalized with epiphany. Replace all luck and item drop affixes with damage and survival. Useful affixes include: (for damage) crit chance, crit damage, +shock damage, 100% shock damage (for survival) dodge, +hp, %hp, salvation. Don’t bother with armor, as your sets give plenty.
Hireling requirements?
If farming on floors 500-750, hireling choice does not matter, as long as they have max luck and item find. If on 751-800, you want a wizard with luck and item find. Stats do not matter, but I find a green garden wizard, modified with luck and item find, to be quite helpful, and synergize will with taunt. Give him barrage (use normally), skulldraga, skull shield (use as often as possible), stay within 1 yard of you, never run away. He’ll die A LOT after level 650 or so, but it’s only 10k a rez for him, which doesn’t matter at all on later maps, and 1 billion damage crits in green poison clouds are fun to watch, and a good way to handle those nasty thorns mythics. This build also works well as a hireling itself, and keeps enemies off you if you’re a ranged character.
Difficult enemies?
The only thing this build really has to watch for are the occasional really nasty legendary/mythic spawn at floor 750+ especially if spawning with extra damage and thorns. Anything else you can just stand there with your finger on whirlwind (run out of giant red circles please). If you get a rare triple thorns + extra damage shrine spawn (via hunter perk or mythic), either taunt them into a large pack or kite and separate, then kill one at a time. Nasty worm epic+ enemies may be able to oneshot you without sanctuary, but they’re not actually a problem, just whirlwind in circles around them, and they’ll never hit you, due to their aiming/firing delay. Using your hireling as cannon fodder helps on all of these, as you can revive him infinite times without the mythic you’re fighting regaining energy
No legendary pet?
No problem, just pick whatever pet you have with good stats. If you have to lose an set, I suggest that Adventurer be the first one to go. Replace Adventurer with Momentum (currently on my pet). You’ll still have max speed for momentum, so all you’re losing is a slight damage boost. If you are using this build for a hireling and need an imp, try terrashaper maybe?)
How to play?
Hold your finger down on whirlwind, and run through mobs. That’s it. Energy ensures that you’ll never run out of resource. For additional fun, you can hit taunt and watch as everything on the screen forms a giant cuddly pile and dies to explosions (from hireling)/whirlwind pile, while you hit the mana potion button to top up and go back to whirlwinding. Wrath takes care of any breakable objects near you, so you don’t have to worry about TNT props, and starts explosion cascades. For more powerful enemies, do more of the same, but dodge red circles. With maximum movement speed, you’ll clear levels in a couple minutes, then have to walk back through the whole thing once again, while your imp takes 5x as long as your cleartime to pick up all the yellow drops. (if you don’t go the imp item conversion route for your hireling, you can just quickly sprint through to pick up any missed drops, which doesn’t take long at all, with maxed out movement speed)
Comparison to:
1012% Lightning Farm Rogue
MUCH more powerful, lower crystal farm rate, slightly higher legendary-per-minute rate (believe it or not) due to increased speed and decreased kill time. While I still use my rogue for crystal farming, and it does great at 501-550, the rogue starts to get iffy above floor 550, and is really not fun at all to play above 600. The warrior is much more viable on high floors, more fun to play, and even at 501-550, clears MUCH faster, giving more legendary drops per minute on average, even with the lower luck/item drop. Crystal drop rates are still more than enough for crafting, just not quite as ridiculous as running on the rogue at 501-550. I don’t care too much about gold find, so didn’t check this comparison (I removed goldfind from my rogue too, in favor of damage boosts).
Green Garden Wizard / Permastealth Rogue
Less powerful, but a LOT more fun to play. If you drop the item find/luck/eternalized affixes and add in epiphany, the warrior’s power level is comparable to a green garden wizard, but again, MUCH more fun to play, with greater survival, and without the ramp-up time. The warrior will also clear much faster, with max movement speed, and makes a stronger overall build, I feel. It doesn’t have permanent invincibility, like the stealth rogue, so it’s more difficult to compare it to that, but it’s also not reliant on a gimmick, so should be viable even if stealth is eventually nerfed.
Special thanks to Dieter, for the original build, and to Msiiek for helping me Finalize things
on 3.0, and that was in 2017, not 2016. but just looking at the affixes on the Build, it should still do well in todays DQ. the +5000 WD could probably be changed to +50% WD with an Endow Myth Stone for even more damage, since the weapon being used is a Hammer. would have to have a few points in Power to make the change worth while.