



Introduction:



WARNING: LONG AND INDEPTH



USE CTR+C to copy the Table of Contents Code, and use CTR+F

(Saves time when time = money)





Unfortunately the YouTube video I made was plagued with mic problems and therefore is once again delayed. As a result I decided to do a text version of the build and release the video of the build later.



I primarily got my inspiration to make an update to the build from ZiggyD, fellow YouTuber that makes great content for Path of Exile who also made a similar rendition of Infernal Blow.

You can check out his build here, and I'll link mine when it's ready:

Spoiler http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPzI0hEMbuA

His build is pretty good, but I decided to +1UP his and contribute my part to all you Melee Templars out there. Without further delay, LETS GET TO IT.



Current Passive Tree:



Spoiler http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUABLMFLQVbDH0OPA6tD1QPzBB_FCAUTRRxFVAY2xkuGYUZ6Ro4GmwhYCSqJ-0otSlPKaUyCTKJNuk6UjrYQKBBP0OcRHJG103YUEdR5lRJValWBFcNV-JZ82BLYIhhUnKpdO108Xbnd-V673zZgpuDOIOxhMSGYIiPinSLjIx2kFWXtJwnnYCdrp65ns2fy6CdogCmZKcIpzCnhKlorKqsurQvuJO53cAaxp7JmNIh1I_ZYd7B4XPh2uNq5CLkredS7DjtIO4U7w7vTu988B_yL_Pd



Last Update: 7/9/2013



Table of Contents:



Ia)Pros and Cons



IIa)Main Skill/Support Gems



IIb)Auras/Utility/Curses/Weapon Swap Gems



IIIa)Passive Tree Analysis



IVa)Gearing Your Character



V)Elemental Reflect



VI)Conclusion



Zarithinor's Infernal Templar Build:



Ia)Pros and Cons



Pros:



Provides a very satisfying experience when you blow the entire screen up

Requires very little gear to do sufficient damage due to the way of how Infernal Blow works.

Can do every single map mod in the game but one; Elemental Reflect.

Run several auras; optimally 5 without sacrificing crucial parts of the build

Very high armor ~6-8k depending on gear. Molten Shell brings this to 10k+

Access to Frenzy and Endurance Charges

No mob will be immune to your damage

Possibly one shot solo map bosses from the mob explosions(66-69Maps)





Cons:



Not a critical strikes build, does not run on accuracy

Not for the inexperienced, makes you complacent in certain situations

Requires a lot of min/max and experience to know when to amp up your damage relative to your survivability

Not a blood magic build, runs on mana

Requires a very specific set of parameters when it comes to gear; can be hard to find

Prone to all melee vs ranged disparity problems such as desync

Meant for only 2H Weapons

Requires Mana Leech

Low Mana Pool, requires Mana Leech from gear/Warlord's Mark

High mana costs, some cases require reduced mana passives

Gear requirement becomes HIGH if you want to survive reflect and still do tons of damage





IIa)Main Skill/Support Gems



Skill/Support Gems:



You will need at least a 3-link to pull this build off effectively, but having a 6 link is desirable. I understand not everyone has one, it took me several months to get my hands on one so I feel your pain when it comes to RNG Gods. The biggest amount of damage of this build comes from the explosions caused by the debuff from Infernal Blow, not for how much you hit them for.





Note: Your mana costs to use Infernal Blow will sky rocket as you 5 Link and 6 Link(7 Link for Marohi Erqi), and it is completely up to you to manage that mana cost. I circumvent this by grabbing reduced mana cost nodes in the skill tree.



3-LINK:





I)Infernal Blow

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Infernal_Blow



NOTE: The URL has an error, the explosion part is not 20% of corpse HP as fire damage; it's 25%.



Quality?



Yes





This is the center piece of this build, you should aim to have quality on this gem because of the 1% Area of Effect Radius for each percentage of quality and this will increase your splash radius of the explosions.



The skill is one of the few skill gems that apply fire penetration after your initial hit on the mob. Meaning that the explosion that occurs from the debuff, 25% of the corpse's maximum hp also applies fire penetration.



As a result, this skill not only does very well in solo play, but scales to monster base values(does not benefit from the 50% monster hp/player increase).



NOTE: Not confirmed until developer post is in place, but it seems to work like so for Detonate Dead.



eg. Power Siphon Culling Strike on a mob with <10% hp with Infernal Blow debuff...



Equals to PoE version of the atomic bomb.



II)Melee Splash

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Melee_Splash



Quality?



Yes



The next support gem that makes this build what it is. Due to the recent changes in 0.11.0 and 0.11.1 patch, this skill gem has received some buffs since it's release. Notable changes can be found at the bottom of the link in the spoiler above.



Increased and Decreased are damage modifiers that are additive, while More and Less are multipliers. In short, multipliers have a large impact on your damage overall. You should also try to get quality for this gem, it is necessary for this build to function properly just because it allows you to at least half the screen if not the entire screen.



III)Fire Penetration

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Fire_Penetration



Quality?



Yes for the late game, but not a priority



There has been a lot of debate on whether this is a good gem to use for this build and I can tell you that you have to trust me that this gem is responsible for a large part of your damage efficiency in later parts of the game. You can see more here on how penetration works



Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Fire_Penetration



For my YouTube video on how this works, click here:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-fxsHs2Z8U



Quality is not a priority here, really insignificant damage increase but it's nice to have.

Recall back to Infernal Blow, Fire Penetration also applies to the explosion. Because most of your build is primarily physical and fire damage, having this skill gem enables you to tackle high resistance mobs. Of course, if your group is using elemental weakness or flammability, it's not uncommon to bring monster fire resist to below 0. This potential increase in damage will never show up on the misleading tooltip and I'll go more in depth about the tooltip later.



4-LINK:



IV)Faster Attacks/Multistrike

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Faster_Attacks

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Multistrike



Quality?



Yes



Be wary that if you aim for quality with this gem, it's often very inflated. If you play in softcore, all the more reason you should take note of this. It costs 20 GCP for a gem to be 20%, so never pay more than that. Often I've had to buy Q10-Q15 gems for around 2-3 GCP, and then spend GCP to roll them to Q20.



There is a lot of debate here on which gem to use and there is no right or wrong answer, and it comes down to preferences. Here is why I choose Faster Attacks over Multistrike.



Both these gems enable you to avoid desync issues because of the inherent terrible weapon animation of most 2H Weapons, using the example of the Marohi Erqi that has a local weapon attack speed of 0.85. Basically to describe the agony, the templar slowly winds the mace back, and then slowly swings at the mob. This results in a lot time in between inputting the command to hit the mob and for the attack to actually hit the mob. The result is that you will miss almost half the time due to desync regardless of whether you use the keystone passive Resolute Technique(100% Accuracy, Never Deal Critical Strikes).



Chris Wilson, explains the situation quite well:

Spoiler http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/318115



Faster Attacks doesn't reduce the base amount of damage you do unlike Multistrike. Also, Faster Attacks has no problem making the slowest two hander in the game you can ever use to consistently apply the Infernal Blow explosion debuff. Also, Multistrike locks the character in place for the entire duration of the attack animation(you can't move or do anything until those 3 strikes are done)...so as a result, a lot of control is taken away from the player and prevents the player from avoid nasty situations that could be otherwise circumvented by using Faster Attacks. Sometimes, it doesn't take the entire 3 hits to kill an entire pack of mobs, therefore if the player clicks again, the character will go into the 3 hit animation before further player input. When it comes to life leech, if the player only has physical life leech and not the support gem, Multistrike will reduce the amount of life leeched just because of the reduced damage multiplier while Faster Attacks will not.



On the other hand, people claim Multi-strike increases their damage on the tooltip and it does, provided all 3 hits connect and you don't waste it by hitting nothing(which occurs frequently). Also, it applies the explosion debuff much faster and much more frequently than using Faster Attacks. When used with Melee Splash, the reduced damage multiplier from Multistrike + Melee Splash is quite significant and therefore it's difficult for me to recommend using Multistrike over Faster Attacks.



5-LINK:



V)Melee Physical Damage

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Melee_Physical_Damage



Quality?



Yes, but not a priority



The goal here is to do as much physical damage possible so that Infernal Blow's 50% physical damage conversion converts it to fire damage and allows Fire Penetration to do it's job.

Overall, a great way to increase life leech from physical damage and more damage.

Quality is not necessary here, but it's something to aim for in the later stages of this character.



6-LINK:



VI)Life Leech



Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Life_Leech



Quality?



F*** Yes!



I understand that it's really hard to get a 6L, but it is something everyone should aim for the late game. In order to survive reflect as a life character, it's really important to have high life leech along with a high health pool.



I highly stress you get the gem to be 20% because it increases the rate in which you leech back health. Life Leech works as a short duration regeneration, and you want to be regenerating in the heat of the battle, not after it.



If you do find yourself needing a ridiculous amount of mana, a Blood Magic gem would be a suitable replacement if you have enough life leech from physical(10%+).





IIb)Auras/Utility/Curses/Weapon Swap Gems:



Auras:



Before I start here, I highly recommend you guys to pick up these following Uniques, although not necessary to remain effective:



Spoiler





These uniques allow you to reserve less mana and less life when you run auras, but you can always use a standard Blood Magic gem and swap your Quality Reduced Mana around.



Note: There was a developer post on how they were planning to change how these function with swapping gear in and out to min max your auras, so be warned that investing in these items also comes at a risk in which the functionality will be nerfed/changed in the future.



To clarify, the quality on the Reduced Mana gem doesn't reduce the mana reserved so hopefully you guys are clear on this, other people have pointed out that it looked misleading.



Reduced Mana

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Reduced_Mana

Highly recommended to use Quality with this, you only need one to shuffle it around your sockets for it to be effective such as for curses and skeleton totems.







Reserved on Life:



Anger

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Anger

Grace

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Grace

Clarity

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Clarity

Wrath(Optional)

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Wrath



Reserved on Mana:



Hatred(Situational)

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Hatred

Determination/Purity/Haste

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Determination

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Purity

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Haste





Quality?



No, quality on Auras only increases their effect area; not it's effects.





Anger is a all-round good way to increase your DPS for a little bit of health.



Grace is used because you use Iron Reflexes in this build and having extra evasion = extra armor. More survivability is always a boon.



So I don't recommend using Wrath because it applies very negligible damage increase for the amount of life reserved. However if your gear happens to have %increased Lightning Damage, it doesn't hurt to use it.



Clarity is necessary because you need some mana regeneration to cast curses and other skills explained later. I only recommend to level it up to 2-3 and keep it there because every additional level adds an additional 20 reserved mana.



Hatred is listed as optional only if you don't need the extra survivability from running Purity(I highly doubt it). It does provide a substantial amount of DPS increase, but it makes reflect more dangerous so keep this in mind.



Purity in my opinion is necessary because this basically makes you able to do all the elemental reflect maps with no problem provided you pick up the Elemental Adaptation keystone passive along with a Ruby Flask.



Determination is used if you feel you are lacking armor from your gear and/or curses in certain maps make you feel uneasy in damage mitigation.



I use Haste as a general DPS increase, allows you to cast your curses/buffs much faster and attack faster so that you're less prone to desync.



Utility Skills:



Quality?



Not necessary/waste of currency





Summon Skeletons with Spell Totem

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Summon_Skeletons

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Spell_Totem



Skeletotem Imba = Best Tank. Nuff said.



Molten Shell

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Molten_Shell



Great way to increase your armor and mitigate damage if you choose to use this. Might want to attach Faster Casting.



I personally use this because it has a great synergy in the same gem orientation in my gear and provides additional survivability via armor and damage mitigation.



Weapon Swap Skills:



Here you want to use a 3-Linked weapon, with very fast attack speed, hopefully 2.07 attacks per second on a Corsair Sword with 25% Increased Attack Speed.



Frenzy, Leap Slam, Faster Attacks

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Frenzy

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Leap_Slam VERSION: MKII(0.11.1): LONG AND INDEPTHUSE CTR+C to copy the Table of Contents Code, and use CTR+F(Saves time when time = money)Unfortunately the YouTube video I made was plagued with mic problems and therefore is once again delayed. As a result I decided to do a text version of the build and release the video of the build later.I primarily got my inspiration to make an update to the build from ZiggyD, fellow YouTuber that makes great content for Path of Exile who also made a similar rendition of Infernal Blow.You can check out his build here, and I'll link mine when it's ready:His build is pretty good, but I decided to +1UP his and contribute my part to all you Melee Templars out there. Without further delay, LETS GET TO IT.7/9/2013Ia)Pros and ConsIIa)Main Skill/Support GemsIIb)Auras/Utility/Curses/Weapon Swap GemsIIIa)Passive Tree AnalysisIVa)Gearing Your CharacterV)Elemental ReflectVI)ConclusionProvides a very satisfying experience when you blow the entire screen upRequires very little gear to do sufficient damage due to the way of how Infernal Blow works.Can do every single map mod in the game but one; Elemental Reflect.Run several auras; optimally 5 without sacrificing crucial parts of the buildVery high armor ~6-8k depending on gear. Molten Shell brings this to 10k+Access to Frenzy and Endurance ChargesNo mob will be immune to your damagePossibly one shot solo map bosses from the mob explosions(66-69Maps)Not a critical strikes build, does not run on accuracyNot for the inexperienced, makes you complacent in certain situationsRequires a lot of min/max and experience to know when to amp up your damage relative to your survivabilityNot a blood magic build, runs on manaRequires a very specific set of parameters when it comes to gear; can be hard to findProne to all melee vs ranged disparity problems such as desyncMeant for only 2H WeaponsRequires Mana LeechLow Mana Pool, requires Mana Leech from gear/Warlord's MarkHigh mana costs, some cases require reduced mana passivesGear requirement becomes HIGH if you want to survive reflect and still do tons of damageYou will need at least a 3-link to pull this build off effectively, but having a 6 link is desirable. I understand not everyone has one, it took me several months to get my hands on one so I feel your pain when it comes to RNG Gods. The biggest amount of damage of this build comes from the explosions caused by the debuff from Infernal Blow, not for how much you hit them for.Note: Your mana costs to use Infernal Blow will sky rocket as you 5 Link and 6 Link(7 Link for Marohi Erqi), and it is completely up to you to manage that mana cost. I circumvent this by grabbing reduced mana cost nodes in the skill tree.3-LINK:I)NOTE: The URL has an error, the explosion part is not 20% of corpse HP as fire damage; it's 25%.This is the center piece of this build, you should aim to have quality on this gem because of the 1% Area of Effect Radius for each percentage of quality and this will increase your splash radius of the explosions.The skill is one of the few skill gems that apply fire penetration after your initial hit on the mob. Meaning that the explosion that occurs from the debuff, 25% of the corpse's maximum hp also applies fire penetration.As a result, this skill not only does very well in solo play, but scales to monster base values(does not benefit from the 50% monster hp/player increase).NOTE: Not confirmed until developer post is in place, but it seems to work like so for Detonate Dead.eg. Power Siphon Culling Strike on a mob with <10% hp with Infernal Blow debuff...Equals to PoE version of the atomic bomb.II)The next support gem that makes this build what it is. Due to the recent changes in 0.11.0 and 0.11.1 patch, this skill gem has received some buffs since it's release. Notable changes can be found at the bottom of the link in the spoiler above.Increased and Decreased are damage modifiers that are additive, while More and Less are multipliers. In short, multipliers have a large impact on your damage overall. You should also try to get quality for this gem, it is necessary for this build to function properly just because it allows you to at least half the screen if not the entire screen.III)There has been a lot of debate on whether this is a good gem to use for this build and I can tell you that you have to trust me that this gem is responsible for a large part of your damage efficiency in later parts of the game. You can see more here on how penetration worksFor my YouTube video on how this works, click here:Quality is not a priority here, really insignificant damage increase but it's nice to have.Recall back to Infernal Blow, Fire Penetration also applies to the explosion. Because most of your build is primarily physical and fire damage, having this skill gem enables you to tackle high resistance mobs. Of course, if your group is using elemental weakness or flammability, it's not uncommon to bring monster fire resist to below 0. This potential increase in damage will never show up on the misleading tooltip and I'll go more in depth about the tooltip later.4-LINK:IV)Be wary that if you aim for quality with this gem, it's often very inflated. If you play in softcore, all the more reason you should take note of this. It costs 20 GCP for a gem to be 20%, so never pay more than that. Often I've had to buy Q10-Q15 gems for around 2-3 GCP, and then spend GCP to roll them to Q20.There is a lot of debate here on which gem to use and there is no right or wrong answer, and it comes down to preferences. Here is why I choose Faster Attacks over Multistrike.Both these gems enable you to avoid desync issues because of the inherent terrible weapon animation of most 2H Weapons, using the example of the Marohi Erqi that has a local weapon attack speed of 0.85. Basically to describe the agony, the templar slowly winds the mace back, and then slowly swings at the mob. This results in a lot time in between inputting the command to hit the mob and for the attack to actually hit the mob. The result is that you will miss almost half the time due to desync regardless of whether you use the keystone passive Resolute Technique(100% Accuracy, Never Deal Critical Strikes).Chris Wilson, explains the situation quite well:Faster Attacks doesn't reduce the base amount of damage you do unlike Multistrike. Also, Faster Attacks has no problem making the slowest two hander in the game you can ever use to consistently apply the Infernal Blow explosion debuff. Also, Multistrike locks the character in place for the entire duration of the attack animation(you can't move or do anything until those 3 strikes are done)...so as a result, a lot of control is taken away from the player and prevents the player from avoid nasty situations that could be otherwise circumvented by using Faster Attacks. Sometimes, it doesn't take the entire 3 hits to kill an entire pack of mobs, therefore if the player clicks again, the character will go into the 3 hit animation before further player input. When it comes to life leech, if the player only has physical life leech and not the support gem, Multistrike will reduce the amount of life leeched just because of the reduced damage multiplier while Faster Attacks will not.On the other hand, people claim Multi-strike increases their damage on the tooltip and it does, provided all 3 hits connect and you don't waste it by hitting nothing(which occurs frequently). Also, it applies the explosion debuff much faster and much more frequently than using Faster Attacks. When used with Melee Splash, the reduced damage multiplier from Multistrike + Melee Splash is quite significant and therefore it's difficult for me to recommend using Multistrike over Faster Attacks.5-LINK:V)The goal here is to do as much physical damage possible so that Infernal Blow's 50% physical damage conversion converts it to fire damage and allows Fire Penetration to do it's job.Overall, a great way to increase life leech from physical damage and more damage.Quality is not necessary here, but it's something to aim for in the later stages of this character.6-LINK:VI)I understand that it's really hard to get a 6L, but it is something everyone should aim for the late game. In order to survive reflect as a life character, it's really important to have high life leech along with a high health pool.I highly stress you get the gem to be 20% because it increases the rate in which you leech back health. Life Leech works as a short duration regeneration, and you want to be regenerating in the heat of the battle, not after it.If you do find yourself needing a ridiculous amount of mana, a Blood Magic gem would be a suitable replacement if you have enough life leech from physical(10%+).Before I start here, I highly recommend you guys to pick up these following Uniques, although not necessary to remain effective:These uniques allow you to reserve less mana and less life when you run auras, but you can always use a standard Blood Magic gem and swap your Quality Reduced Mana around.Note: There was a developer post on how they were planning to change how these function with swapping gear in and out to min max your auras, so be warned that investing in these items also comes at a risk in which the functionality will be nerfed/changed in the future.To clarify, the quality on the Reduced Mana gem doesn't reduce the mana reserved so hopefully you guys are clear on this, other people have pointed out that it looked misleading.Highly recommended to use Quality with this, you only need one to shuffle it around your sockets for it to be effective such as for curses and skeleton totems.Reserved on Life:Reserved on Mana:Anger is a all-round good way to increase your DPS for a little bit of health.Grace is used because you use Iron Reflexes in this build and having extra evasion = extra armor. More survivability is always a boon.So I don't recommend using Wrath because it applies very negligible damage increase for the amount of life reserved. However if your gear happens to have %increased Lightning Damage, it doesn't hurt to use it.Clarity is necessary because you need some mana regeneration to cast curses and other skills explained later. I only recommend to level it up to 2-3 and keep it there because every additional level adds an additional 20 reserved mana.Hatred is listed as optional only if you don't need the extra survivability from running Purity(I highly doubt it). It does provide a substantial amount of DPS increase, but it makes reflect more dangerous so keep this in mind.Purity in my opinion is necessary because this basically makes you able to do all the elemental reflect maps with no problem provided you pick up the Elemental Adaptation keystone passive along with a Ruby Flask.Determination is used if you feel you are lacking armor from your gear and/or curses in certain maps make you feel uneasy in damage mitigation.I use Haste as a general DPS increase, allows you to cast your curses/buffs much faster and attack faster so that you're less prone to desync.Skeletotem Imba = Best Tank. Nuff said.Great way to increase your armor and mitigate damage if you choose to use this. Might want to attach Faster Casting.I personally use this because it has a great synergy in the same gem orientation in my gear and provides additional survivability via armor and damage mitigation.Here you want to use a 3-Linked weapon, with very fast attack speed, hopefully 2.07 attacks per second on a Corsair Sword with 25% Increased Attack Speed. IGN: Zarithinor

Timezone: PST

YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/user/krithusful

Infernal Blow Templar Guide: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/441227

Zarithinor's Mirroring Service and Shop: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/434938 Last edited by kchow123 on Jul 9, 2013, 3:16:49 PM Posted by

kchow123

on on Quote this Post

Quality?



No; not important





This is really useful because if you have something like a Marohi Erqi that has a -10% movespeed, Leap slamming around is great fun when coupled with Faster Attacks, enabling you to move around the map while keeping up with your teammates at a simple switch of weapons.



Frenzy enables you to have Frenzy Charges, so swap to your Corsair Sword, whack at the mobs really fast for 3 quick Frenzy Charges, and then swap back to your main hand to maximize your efficiency. Not necessary but it is something useful.





Curses:



Quality?



Yes/No, only if you have extra currency lying around



Warlord's Mark/Flammability

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Warlord%27s_Mark[/url]

Spoiler http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Flammability



Warlord's Mark is a great way to deal with the mana requirements of this build because of the inherent small mana pool of this build. Also, it grants you the ability to regain Flask Charges at a very fast rate, and overall some additional survivability offered by life leech from physical damage and endurance charges.



Flammability is optional, you don't necessarily need it because in groups, chances are people are already running curses that reduce elemental resistance. This is just for increasing your kill speed in solo play when you don't need Warlord's Mark











IIIa)Passive Tree Analysis:



Spoiler http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUABLMFLQVbDH0OPA6tD1QPzBB_FCAUTRRxFVAY2xkuGYUZ6Ro4GmwhYCSqJ-0otSlPKaUyCTKJNuk6UjrYQKBBP0OcRHJG103YUEdR5lRJValWBFcNV-JZ82BLYIhhUnKpdO108Xbnd-V673zZgpuDOIOxhMSGYIiPinSLjIx2kFWXtJwnnYCdrp65ns2fy6CdogCmZKcIpzCnhKlorKqsurQvuJO53cAaxp7JmNIh1I_ZYd7B4XPh2uNq5CLkredS7DjtIO4U7w7vTu988B_yL_Pd



Look, this passive tree isn't a end all best tree out there, it is a rubrick or guide for you to build your own passive tree. Some nodes I will explain later are very important to this build, and the unexplained ones are generally left up to you. It's all about building the passive tree around the goal you're trying to reach. In my case, I built this passive tree with my gear in mind. I re allocated my passives spending regrets and quest re allocation points to constantly adjust it to my gear.



Example:

Before I had the Kaom's Heart unique, I was stuck with a crappy 4L chest. Therefore a lot of my passives were into life/regeneration and armor nodes. After Kaom's Heart, I re allocated a lot of the points out of survivability and into more damage/killing efficiency/utility.



Use this formula to optimize your build:



(%total value of passives(eg.life) / total # of passive skill points required)

= average % per passive skill point invested



eg. I want to get a batch of 6% life nodes that lead up to a 12% life node. Say it takes me 3 nodes.



(6+6+12)/(3) = 8% life per passive skill point invested.



Compare and contrast with other skill paths to min/max your passive tree accordingly.



Inner Force is optional, it's not necessary if you do not wish to run it, but I feel it's still really good after 0.11.0 nerfs, prior to which it was OP. Because of so many auras you run, I feel it is necessary to get it.



In general, you do want to get as many health passives as possible like any other build, and I also want to bring up the reduced mana nodes. These are taken depending on your reliance on mana leech, if you find yourself not having enough mana to support Infernal Blow, you're going to have to place some points here.



I think I am confusing some people here, but I picked up reduced mana nodes just because I attack at around 0.5 attacks per second, and if it costs me over 100 mana with a 6L/7L(if Marohi) per attack...it's not sustainable. Hopefully that cleared things up for you guys.

Keep in mind as some users have pointed out that Reduced Mana is not the same as Reduced Mana Reserved, those are completely different. Hopefully you guys didn't find it too confusing.





Elemental Adaptation is optional but many people still choose to use it since it's nerf. It's still an amazing keystone and I recommend you get it if you want to attempt to negate reflect.



Bandit Quests:



Normal: Help Oak

Cruel: Help Oak

Merciless: Kill All





IVa)Gearing Your Character:





This link will send you to the official Path of Exile webpage where you can browse all the possible affixes being rolled on weapons under the Prefixes and Suffixes section.

Spoiler http://www.pathofexile.com/item-data



Before we begin, I would like to point out the fact that you don't necessarily need the gear that I'm about to showcase, it's simply there as an example/guideline as to something you guys should aim for. I understand that not everyone can afford over 100 Exalted's worth of gear, but I feel for those of you who want to push the build to it's limits, this is the gear that you want to strive for. Of course, there is always better gear besides for select pieces but I'll let you be the judge of that.



Spoiler

Armor:





Misc:





Main Hand:





Weapon Swap:





Armor:Misc:Main Hand:Weapon Swap:



Once again, you don't necessarily need the same gear level, recall that I did say you can pull this build off easily with just a 3-Link. ZiggyD pulled it off with a blue maul, you can too.



Main Weapon:



Aim for high physical damage, something on a Karui Maul/Chopper is preferable due to them having the largest base damage.



You want to look for affixes such as Increased Physical Damage, Hybrid Increased Physical Damage and Accuracy, flat added Physical Damage, Increased Attack Speed.



The Marohi Erqi is probably the best maul for this build, simply because it is one of the few items in the game that are capable of a 7-link because of the slotted gems being supported by a Level 15 Increased Area of Effect gem. Unfortunately, you cannot this maul if the rest of your gear is not up to par. Reasons being is that the drawbacks are huge from the fact that you attack very slow, lowered accuracy, higher mana costs from the inherent gem bonus, and reduced move speed.



Skill Link:



RRRRRG or RRRRRR



Infernal Blow->Melee Splash->Fire Penetration->Faster Attacks/Multistrike->Melee Physical Damage->Life Leech



Weapon Swap:



Aim for a Corsair Sword, nothing fancy, just get it to have 25% Increased Attack Speed.



Skill Link:



GGR



Faster Attacks->Frenzy->Leap Slam



Helmet:



You really only need a life roll and resistances as primary affixes to aim for, although getting Chaos Resist and subsequent Armor rolls are preferable.



Skill Link:



RRRB



Warlord's Mark->Molten Shell->Faster Casting->Reduced Mana



Chest:



Honestly, Life-based builds suck since the 0.11.0 nerf to life nodes in general. Any chest with a health roll, some resistances and if you can, armor. The best base item for this Astral Plate, which gives an inherent +12% to all resistances.



For those of you who can afford it, Kaom's Heart is the way to go for this build but not mandatory



You notice that a lot of my gear has really low health roles, and in the case of my jewelry, 0. I make up for this by using Kaom's Heart, but once again, it's not mandatory.



Another key element is that a lot of my gear has added physical damage, and this is because in 0.11.1 patch, added physical damage is now scaled with any increased physical damage bonuses you have. Therefore, that makes the belt I'm wearing bests most of the best in slot Rustic Sashes out there with increased elemental damage. The health bonus is huge from this unique belt, much greater than any leather belt with a max health roll only when you use in conjunction with Kaom's Heart.



Gloves:



Hard to find good gloves, but just find the best you can afford with +Life and +Resists.



Skill Link:



Interchangeable with Boots



Haste->Purity->Double Strike->Reduced Mana



GGBR or RRBG



NOTE:



Noticed I put Double Strike in here, I used this just to have a better alternative to my auto attack. It's fast and it does it's job in eliminating dangerous reflect mobs if you don't have enough survivability. You can use any single-target pure physical skill gem here, like Heavy Strike. Don't like Heavy Strike because it pisses me off to have to chase mobs as they get knocked back.





Boots:



Get the best you can afford with +Life and +Resists, as you get them with Armor/Evasion rolls with Movespeed, these will get very expensive.



Skill Link:



Interchangeable with Gloves



Clarity->Anger->Grace->Reduced Mana



RRBG or GGBR



Flasks:



Spoiler



Get the ones I have above, at least similar. Spend some Alterations :D



V)Elemental Reflect



This is probably the build's biggest downfall and the reason why this build can require a lot of gear if you want to negate Elemental Reflect/usable in Hardcore Leagues.



Reason:

You cannot control how much damage you do, and therefore cannot avoid dying from any sort of Elemental Reflect without . The point that I want to make is that whether you do 1 damage per hit or 1,000 damage per hit, you will die from the explosion damage from Infernal Blow's deubff if elemental reflect is present. The damage is completely based off of base mob hp, and when you do high level maps with this build with groups it is still apparent. Keep in mind the damage still scales off map affixes and mob affixes that give them bonus health. So therefore you want to be really careful when going against blue packs and multiple rare mobs as the explosions will deal multiple times the damage of regular white trash mobs.



The explosion itself inflicts 25% of the corpse hp in fire damage

A mob has 20,000 HP in a 6 player map for example.



.25(20,000) = 5000 damage as fire.

Reflect is 18% or 20%, let's use 20% for the sake of numbers.

.2(5000) = 1000 damage is reflected to the player before resistances are accounted for, for each mob hit by the explosion.



How to Survive Reflect:



First of all, mobs have way more health than just 20,000. So to counter this one must use a Ruby Flask, Purity, Elemental Adaptation, and Inner Force to avoid instantaneous death against any sort of elemental reflect. You will attain 90% Fire Resistance, which makes a huge difference compared to 75%.





I highly recommend that you avoid elemental reflect map affixes altogether if you're inexperienced or just don't have the requirements above.





VI)Conclusion



To be upfront and honest, melee in it's current state sucks. Everyone at GGG and their mother knows this. This build, in some people's eyes is not viable and also may even suck. I totally understand their perspective by addressing this issue and looking at it from both sides. However, I've always been a die-hard melee class in every single action-rpg I've played. I find something fun, optimize it and make it work. This is an example of that. One might think, "Why are you wasting over 100 EX in currency for something that ranged builds can do better?" The expectation that GGG will deliver in time is what keeps me playing this character and investing all my currency in it. Don't misunderstand, I have a ranged character, I've experimented with many different classes, such as a RoA Marauder, EK, Summoner, and Cold Snap Caster.



GGG's undying passion to make this the best action-rpg ever is the kind of attitude I feel not many gaming companies have today. They aren't P2W and they want to kill your character. Knowing that they understand the problem and incrementally improving the situation is the biggest difference between this small indie company and the one that starts with a letter "E" and ends with a letter "A." GGG is a company that delivers. Whether it maybe balancing or finding ways to cause forum threads of "I quit because this game is too hard."



Update Log:



6/28/2013:



Released.

Corrected some key errors such as Bandit Quests

Cleared some areas of confusion



6/29/2013:



Changed the Infernal Blow Section and Reflect section to reflect how Infernal Blow explosions work in a similar way to Detonate Dead. Not confirmed by developers but will update if I receive further news. My testing shows that I can one shot map bosses solo, but not possible with party...so perhaps there is truth to this.



7/9/2013:



Release Ver. MKII

Updated and refined certain parts of the guide, made it more concise, and fixed various errors. Made the build Hardcore proof.



Suggestions and Feedback Section:



If I made any mistakes here, feel free to point them out. If it is something factual aka not a typo, make sure you provide proof via a URL either linking to a developer post or a primary source material such as the Path of Exile wiki.



Special Thanks and Credits:



http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com:

for an outstanding resource for Path of Exile!

ZiggyDStarcraft:

for being a great inspiration on YouTube and creating content for the community.

RNG Gods AKA Chris Wilson This is really useful because if you have something like a Marohi Erqi that has a -10% movespeed, Leap slamming around is great fun when coupled with Faster Attacks, enabling you to move around the map while keeping up with your teammates at a simple switch of weapons.Frenzy enables you to have Frenzy Charges, so swap to your Corsair Sword, whack at the mobs really fast for 3 quick Frenzy Charges, and then swap back to your main hand to maximize your efficiency. Not necessary but it is something useful.Warlord's Mark is a great way to deal with the mana requirements of this build because of the inherent small mana pool of this build. Also, it grants you the ability to regain Flask Charges at a very fast rate, and overall some additional survivability offered by life leech from physical damage and endurance charges.Flammability is optional, you don't necessarily need it because in groups, chances are people are already running curses that reduce elemental resistance. This is just for increasing your kill speed in solo play when you don't need Warlord's MarkLook, this passive tree isn't a end all best tree out there, it is a rubrick or guide for you to build your own passive tree. Some nodes I will explain later are very important to this build, and the unexplained ones are generally left up to you. It's all about building the passive tree around the goal you're trying to reach. In my case, I built this passive tree with my gear in mind. I re allocated my passives spending regrets and quest re allocation points to constantly adjust it to my gear.Example:Before I had the Kaom's Heart unique, I was stuck with a crappy 4L chest. Therefore a lot of my passives were into life/regeneration and armor nodes. After Kaom's Heart, I re allocated a lot of the points out of survivability and into more damage/killing efficiency/utility.Use this formula to optimize your build:(%total value of passives(eg.life) / total # of passive skill points required)= average % per passive skill point investedeg. I want to get a batch of 6% life nodes that lead up to a 12% life node. Say it takes me 3 nodes.(6+6+12)/(3) = 8% life per passive skill point invested.Compare and contrast with other skill paths to min/max your passive tree accordingly.Inner Force is optional, it's not necessary if you do not wish to run it, but I feel it's still really good after 0.11.0 nerfs, prior to which it was OP. Because of so many auras you run, I feel it is necessary to get it.In general, you do want to get as many health passives as possible like any other build, and I also want to bring up the reduced mana nodes. These are taken depending on your reliance on mana leech, if you find yourself not having enough mana to support Infernal Blow, you're going to have to place some points here.I think I am confusing some people here, but I picked up reduced mana nodes just because I attack at around 0.5 attacks per second, and if it costs me over 100 mana with a 6L/7L(if Marohi) per attack...it's not sustainable. Hopefully that cleared things up for you guys.Keep in mind as some users have pointed out that Reduced Mana is not the same as Reduced Mana Reserved, those are completely different. Hopefully you guys didn't find it too confusing.Elemental Adaptation is optional but many people still choose to use it since it's nerf. It's still an amazing keystone and I recommend you get it if you want to attempt to negate reflect.Bandit Quests:Normal: Help OakCruel: Help OakMerciless: Kill AllThis link will send you to the official Path of Exile webpage where you can browse all the possible affixes being rolled on weapons under the Prefixes and Suffixes section.Before we begin, I would like to point out the fact that you don't necessarily need the gear that I'm about to showcase, it's simply there as an example/guideline as to something you guys should aim for. I understand that not everyone can afford over 100 Exalted's worth of gear, but I feel for those of you who want to push the build to it's limits, this is the gear that you want to strive for. Of course, there is always better gear besides for select pieces but I'll let you be the judge of that.Once again, you don't necessarily need the same gear level, recall that I did say you can pull this build off easily with just a 3-Link. ZiggyD pulled it off with a blue maul, you can too.Aim for high physical damage, something on a Karui Maul/Chopper is preferable due to them having the largest base damage.You want to look for affixes such as Increased Physical Damage, Hybrid Increased Physical Damage and Accuracy, flat added Physical Damage, Increased Attack Speed.The Marohi Erqi is probably the best maul for this build, simply because it is one of the few items in the game that are capable of a 7-link because of the slotted gems being supported by a Level 15 Increased Area of Effect gem. Unfortunately, you cannot this maul if the rest of your gear is not up to par. Reasons being is that the drawbacks are huge from the fact that you attack very slow, lowered accuracy, higher mana costs from the inherent gem bonus, and reduced move speed.RRRRRG or RRRRRRInfernal Blow->Melee Splash->Fire Penetration->Faster Attacks/Multistrike->Melee Physical Damage->Life LeechAim for a Corsair Sword, nothing fancy, just get it to have 25% Increased Attack Speed.GGRFaster Attacks->Frenzy->Leap SlamYou really only need a life roll and resistances as primary affixes to aim for, although getting Chaos Resist and subsequent Armor rolls are preferable.RRRBWarlord's Mark->Molten Shell->Faster Casting->Reduced ManaHonestly, Life-based builds suck since the 0.11.0 nerf to life nodes in general. Any chest with a health roll, some resistances and if you can, armor. The best base item for this Astral Plate, which gives an inherent +12% to all resistances.For those of you who can afford it, Kaom's Heart is the way to go for this build but not mandatoryYou notice that a lot of my gear has really low health roles, and in the case of my jewelry, 0. I make up for this by using Kaom's Heart, but once again, it's not mandatory.Another key element is that a lot of my gear has added physical damage, and this is because in 0.11.1 patch, added physical damage is now scaled with any increased physical damage bonuses you have. Therefore, that makes the belt I'm wearing bests most of the best in slot Rustic Sashes out there with increased elemental damage. The health bonus is huge from this unique belt, much greater than any leather belt with a max health roll only when you use in conjunction with Kaom's Heart.Hard to find good gloves, but just find the best you can afford with +Life and +Resists.Interchangeable with BootsHaste->Purity->Double Strike->Reduced ManaGGBR or RRBGNOTE:Noticed I put Double Strike in here, I used this just to have a better alternative to my auto attack. It's fast and it does it's job in eliminating dangerous reflect mobs if you don't have enough survivability. You can use any single-target pure physical skill gem here, like Heavy Strike. Don't like Heavy Strike because it pisses me off to have to chase mobs as they get knocked back.Get the best you can afford with +Life and +Resists, as you get them with Armor/Evasion rolls with Movespeed, these will get very expensive.Interchangeable with GlovesClarity->Anger->Grace->Reduced ManaRRBG or GGBRGet the ones I have above, at least similar. Spend some Alterations :DThis is probably the build's biggest downfall and the reason why this build can require a lot of gear if you want to negate Elemental Reflect/usable in Hardcore Leagues.Reason:You cannot control how much damage you do, and therefore cannot avoid dying from any sort of Elemental Reflect without . The point that I want to make is that whether you do 1 damage per hit or 1,000 damage per hit, you will die from the explosion damage from Infernal Blow's deubff if elemental reflect is present. The damage is completely based off of base mob hp, and when you do high level maps with this build with groups it is still apparent. Keep in mind the damage still scales off map affixes and mob affixes that give them bonus health. So therefore you want to be really careful when going against blue packs and multiple rare mobs as the explosions will deal multiple times the damage of regular white trash mobs.The explosion itself inflicts 25% of the corpse hp in fire damageA mob has 20,000 HP in a 6 player map for example..25(20,000) = 5000 damage as fire.Reflect is 18% or 20%, let's use 20% for the sake of numbers..2(5000) = 1000 damage is reflected to the player before resistances are accounted for, for each mob hit by the explosion.First of all, mobs have way more health than just 20,000. So to counter this one must use a Ruby Flask, Purity, Elemental Adaptation, and Inner Force to avoid instantaneous death against any sort of elemental reflect. You will attain 90% Fire Resistance, which makes a huge difference compared to 75%.I highly recommend that you avoid elemental reflect map affixes altogether if you're inexperienced or just don't have the requirements above.To be upfront and honest, melee in it's current state sucks. Everyone at GGG and their mother knows this. This build, in some people's eyes is not viable and also may even suck. I totally understand their perspective by addressing this issue and looking at it from both sides. However, I've always been a die-hard melee class in every single action-rpg I've played. I find something fun, optimize it and make it work. This is an example of that. One might think, "Why are you wasting over 100 EX in currency for something that ranged builds can do better?" The expectation that GGG will deliver in time is what keeps me playing this character and investing all my currency in it. Don't misunderstand, I have a ranged character, I've experimented with many different classes, such as a RoA Marauder, EK, Summoner, and Cold Snap Caster.GGG's undying passion to make this the best action-rpg ever is the kind of attitude I feel not many gaming companies have today. They aren't P2W and they want to kill your character. Knowing that they understand the problem and incrementally improving the situation is the biggest difference between this small indie company and the one that starts with a letter "E" and ends with a letter "A." GGG is a company that delivers. Whether it maybe balancing or finding ways to cause forum threads of "I quit because this game is too hard."6/28/2013:Released.Corrected some key errors such as Bandit QuestsCleared some areas of confusion6/29/2013:Changed the Infernal Blow Section and Reflect section to reflect how Infernal Blow explosions work in a similar way to Detonate Dead. Not confirmed by developers but will update if I receive further news. My testing shows that I can one shot map bosses solo, but not possible with party...so perhaps there is truth to this.7/9/2013:Release Ver. MKIIUpdated and refined certain parts of the guide, made it more concise, and fixed various errors. Made the build Hardcore proof.If I made any mistakes here, feel free to point them out. If it is something factual aka not a typo, make sure you provide proof via a URL either linking to a developer post or a primary source material such as the Path of Exile wiki.http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com:for an outstanding resource for Path of Exile!ZiggyDStarcraft:for being a great inspiration on YouTube and creating content for the community.RNG Gods AKA Chris Wilson IGN: Zarithinor

Timezone: PST

YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/user/krithusful

Infernal Blow Templar Guide: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/441227

Zarithinor's Mirroring Service and Shop: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/434938 Last edited by kchow123 on Jul 9, 2013, 3:10:50 PM Posted by

kchow123

on on Quote this Post

Reserved IGN: Zarithinor

Timezone: PST

YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/user/krithusful

Infernal Blow Templar Guide: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/441227

Zarithinor's Mirroring Service and Shop: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/434938 Posted by

kchow123

on on Quote this Post

This should also be posted on exile pro Posted by

MperorM

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I've been playing with an IB Templar for the past few weeks. Is there any reason why you used maces instead of axes? Posted by

Liontari

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http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUBBVuLjOFz7SBG14TERHKKdA9UqWgUTQSzMol35Vfi7DgpT4Kb1HznanrmGjinhJBVwBpZ86yqcqn3MvjrQaoUcacwns125wHnNuhkoxpVYSGHapBsqZSE2WVNR36rxb2BmSuHKSftGS7Uj7nd8i_vDudSVElfP_ZIjM9QUFhjWK_iYTB3lZtlpyb4Zp5xTZrPQ2O3MVj1fNmiAGRSME_BoxNMYLt27kSyqRqdxAYOA8b9C2P9Ja0J9q5QhO907XrvYEsFLQ==



This is the build I made and have been playing with.







I also use Molten Armor and a Decoy Totem.



I haven no problems bashing down enemies, but my survivability has also gone down the crapper. I'm sitting at 1300Armor, almost max resists and 1200ish HP (from what I recall). Any advice would be very helpful. This is the build I made and have been playing with.I also use Molten Armor and a Decoy Totem.I haven no problems bashing down enemies, but my survivability has also gone down the crapper. I'm sitting at 1300Armor, almost max resists and 1200ish HP (from what I recall). Any advice would be very helpful. Posted by

Liontari

on on Quote this Post

" kchow123 The damage is completely based off of mob hp, and when you do high level maps with this build, each additional player adds 50% increase mob hp. With 6 players, that's a 300% increase in mob hp without any other additional mob affixes that increase mob hp.

Both Infernal Blow and Detonate Dead do not scale with the life bonus granted to enemies in a party.



I mean, I still think you'll die to elemental reflect, but it's not quite as bad as you'd think. It also means that playing in a party hurts your predicted damage quite a bit. Both Infernal Blow and Detonate Dead do not scale with the life bonus granted to enemies in a party.I mean, I still think you'll die to elemental reflect, but it's not quite as bad as you'd think. It also means that playing in a party hurts your predicted damage quite a bit. Posted by

pneuma

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Are you sure you don't mean "help Oak"? Posted by

Korinthian

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