Impair based Survival build using Hammer and Chaos by Kallypso

By Ryahl | August 7, 2012 - 6:32 pm | Blue Mountain Special, Builds, Chaos, Hammer, Survival

Impair based Survival

Hammer and Chaos Build

by Kallypso

This impairment oriented hammer and chaos build was submitted to us by Kallypso using our Build Submission Tool. This build is designed to handle solo fights in the Blue Mountains and on. The build is designed to advance a My First 60 tanking build and evolve it towards more solo play as your ability points open up.

Active Abilities

Escalation
Razor Shards
Call of Eris
Trucker
Furnace
Domino Effect
Amor Fati

Passive Abilities

Chaos Adept
Paradigm Shift
Brick Wall
No Pain No Gain
Pressure Point
Breakdown
Forged in Fire

Export this build

Follow this link to see the build in Drakkashi’s Deck Manager. From there, you can export the build (Deck Panel, Export) to TSW using Viper’s Deck Manager (assuming you are using the excellent VDM add-on).

Key Features

This is the build I used to solo Dawning of an Endless Night, even Tier 15/18 is doable solo with this, but I got some help halfway through. (did the first step solo and halfway through the second step I got help, during the 3rd step I was the help, try not to draw aggro from all the enemies at once and you should be fine during all steps) The equip I had where QL6 Blue weapons from the Venice vendors in Blue mountain and random QUL 5 and 6 Talismans I picked up while questing in Savage Coast and Blue Mountain.

What makes this build tick?

Forged in Fire!
I recommend getting this as fast as possible, I died numerous times during questing in very close fights, most of those wouldn´t have happened if I had Forged in Fire. This is probably one of the best solo abilities in game.

I would recommend to go for the Hammer/Chaos tanking build from the My first 60 Section first and put all points into Battering Works from there. So, just do all the quests in Kingsmouth until you have the tanking build and then hit Polaris a few times and then continue to Hell raised. With the equip from Hell raised and Forged in the fire you shouldn’t have any problem doing the quests in Savage Coast and Blue Mountain. (Disclaimer: I didn’t do this, I only did Polaris once, so my equip is worse than what you get from Hell raised, but was enough to finish Dawning of an Endless Night)

If you are hell bent on solo play (this is a solo build after all) you can replace Razor Shards with another Hammer finisher like Hell to Pay as you won´t need the hate generation.

The main purpose of the build is to survive solo encounters by using some self heal and Impair/Weaken abilities and AOE attacks to survive multiple enemies. Feel free to try out other abilities like Gnosis, Intensity or Stonewalled. After finishing this build you can go and get Karma for more self heal in group situations, but on single targets the big damage of Call of Eris is better imho. From this build you should be able to work towards any of the Chaos/Hammer tanking build in the build section without man problems.

I now just entered Egypt, I might write an update to the build once I finished the next storyline as well. (or write a warning if I failed miserably, lol)

If you got questions or suggestions I would be delighted to hear them, you can also find me on Twitter under @VeganCATS

Gearing Needs

Block rating is the only thing your abilities actually need, so you are free to pick what you like, just make sure to take enough +hit so that you actually hit the targets and don´t glance, but Amor Fati helps out with this a bit.

If you can get enough Penetrate going you could try the immortal Spirit Passive from the Blades Technique tree as it only costs you 1 AP and might be better for a passive heal than No Pain No Gain. (or just use both, I haven´t tried it yet)

Otherwise just use a mix of Health and Atk Power giving items.”

Rotation

Start the fight with Trucker into Razor Shards

Save Trucker for later when fighting enemies that try to get away from you to close the distance faster.

Then 5x Escalate -> Razor Shards -> Call of Eris

Use the other cooldowns early in the fights when needed so that you can reuse them faster, but be careful when using Domino Effect, use it after the Brick Wall and Pressure Point Impairs happened and when you can get healing from No Pain No Gain. Disrupting an Enemy cast with the impair is also nice.”

TSW Build Page

By Aela | July 27, 2012 - 5:53 pm | Assault Rifle, Blade, Blood, Blue Mountain Special, Builds, Chaos, DPS, elemental, Elite, Fist, Hammer, Healer, list, My First 60, Nightmare, Pistol, Shotgun, Support, Survival, Tank, TSW Guides

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TSW Guides – Build Listings

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Our “My First 60″ builds are targeted for about 60 ability points — Q2/3, Kingsmouth obtainable. They represent the initial builds for a player starting the game, but wanting to play a focused role. Thus, My First 60 builds are incomplete and NOT intended for mid-game or later play.

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TSW Build Listing: “Blue Mountain Specials” – 400 (Q6) point builds

We developed our “Blue Mountain Specials” to address the increased difficulty players encounter as the leave Savage Coast (Q4-Q5) and enter Blue Mountains (Q5-Q6). These TSW Build types are designed to enhance survivability when soloing.

Single Target Elite Dungeon: Chaos/Hammer

By Ryahl | July 24, 2012 - 5:55 pm | Builds, Chaos, Elite, Hammer, TSW Guides

1 Comment

Elite Tanking – Weakened Build

Hammer and Chaos Synergy

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This build uses a weakening trigger to synergize a number of damage and mitigation effects. The build has worked well through elite dungeons. It is a relative easy build to put together for those on an AP budget.

Active Abilities

Smash (Hammer) – 1AP

Escalation (Chaos) – 1AP

Razor Shards (Hammer Pit) – 9AP

Call for Eris (Chaos) – 1AP

Stoicism (Turbulence) – 50AP
Reality Fracture (The 4th Wall) – 27 AP

Blowout (Hammer Pit) – 34 AP

Passive Abilities

Turbulence (the Fourth Wall) – 21AP

Forged in Fire (Battering Works) – 50 AP

Below the Belt (Hammer) – 1AP

Intensity (Chaos) – 1AP

Paradigm Shift (Chaos) – 2AP

Inevitability (Building Blocks) – 12AP

Agitator (Turbulence) – 12AP

Key Features

This build uses two builders, since both contribute useful weakened effects. Smash (with Below the Belt passive) provides one of the easiest accesses to the Debilitate debuff (target damage output weakened up to 30%).

Escalation (with Intensity passive) provides pbaoe hate generation, access to the Exposed debuff (target takes up to 30% more damage) and keeps a near constant minor ward (7.5% reduction from all damage sources). Escalation also triggers the Turbulence passive, giving you roughly 150 bonus to your evasion.

Additionally, since your builders both generate the weakened effect, you are routinely triggering Paradigm Shift (up to 150 bonus hit rating) and Inevitability (flat 10% bonus to evade).

The Razor Shards finisher is a hate generator which also boosts the hate level of your next attack. Use Razor Shards and follow it up with either Call for Eris or Smash to significantly boost hate without burning a taunt.

The build also features Stoicism (hate generation with increased mitigation). Stoicism works wonderfully at the opening of a fight and between transition phases to pickup extra agro. While it also provides some survivability, it’s real power is that boost to hate generation.

Blowout extends your health bar and Forged in Fire gives your healer a bit of help for those fights where you take some spike damage.

Rotation

Open with stoicism and razor shards since it should be at full resources outside of fights. From there alternate Smash and Escalate until 5 Resources, use Reality Fracture and Blowout on your first cycle (this is when it’s completely safe for DPS to go all out). From that point on cycle your builders with Razor Shards and Call for Eris (depending on your chaos finisher, Razor Shards may be best used last). After the initial round, use Reality Fracture and Blowout on cooldown, even if firing with less than full resources.

Alternatives

I often rotate the Call for Eris active depending on the situation. Karma provides pbaoe damage with a heal to next target.

That which doesn’t kill me – Blade/Hammer mitigation

By Ryahl | July 18, 2012 - 11:19 pm | Blade, Builds, Elite, Hammer, Tank, TSW Guides

3 Comments

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This is a work in process build. I am considering moving towards a blade/hammer build to improve overall mitigation against bosses who have a high penetration (block helps here). The build has not been tested, yet, but I intend to run it through some dungeons fairly soon.

It is a very expensive build, clocking in at well over 700 points to get up and running. Additionally, there are very few build synergies between hammer and blade, so there are few build paths that will be useful as you move towards this build.

Active Abilities
Rupture
Brandish
Aftershock
Trucker
Stoicism
Crimson Theater
Blowout

Passive Abilities
Improved Blasts
Bullheaded
Brandishing Support
Agitator
Shadow Play
Brick Wall
Sixth Sense

Key Features

This build uses a single column attack builder, which may make it problematic in fights with extensive kiting. However the builder, Rupture, is placing AOE debilitates thanks to Improved Blasts and it is also bumping up your physical and magical mitigation thanks to Blowout.

You have two short duration closer, Aftershock which can provide a minor ward and Brandish which gives you substantially reduced incoming damage on use.

You have two moderate duration closer abilities. Crimson Theater, which helps with AOE threat and also provides additional chances of glancing thanks to Shadow Play. With all that defense coming in, Sixth Sense should be firing off fairly frequently, dishing out AOE damage and a 10% self heal. Blowout is your long duration hammer closer and it stacks 25% more hitpoints onto you since everything is already debilitated.

You have two utility abilities, each on 30-second recycles. Trucker gives you a closer ability which also buffs your block ability. The increased Blocks give you a better chance of processing Brick Wall. Stoicism takes the final spot in the build, giving you a dependable hate generator and damage mitigator.

Threat comes from Stoicism, Agitator, Crimson Theater and Brandish.

Rotation

This will be a bit of a tricky rotation to manage.

Open combat with Trucker, this picks up your block chance and gives you some opportunities to impair. Immediately fire off a single Rupture to get the Debilitate effect in play (use a second if weakened is resisted). Now its time to fire off Stoicism to help with your hate generation. Then use your long duration consumers, Crimson Theater and Blowout.

Your regular rotation will be Rupture x5, Aftershock, Brandish. Use Crimson Theater and Blowout on cooldown, even if you have minimal resources up (1 is fine). Fire off Trucker on cooldown to keep your block rate high.

Stoicism can be used on cooldown in non-transition fights. In engagements with transitions (or phases where a boss is inactive), save Stoicism for the bosses return to action. Make sure to use Stoicism before engaging in these situation.

Alternatives

There are a few different modules possible with this build. First, consider swapping out Sixth Sense with Forged in Fire if you anticipate taking a single major spike of damage in an engagement.

I also debate between the use of Brick Wall and You’re Next. Particularly for Impair immune encounters, Your Next is clearly better.

If you are not blocking often enough to take advantage of Brick Wall/You’re Next, consider Enervate to help your damage output.

Gear Considerations

Unlike my other tank builds, this one generates no +hit as the combat progresses. Therefore, you need some +hit on your gear to avoid glancing. Additionally, this will be a low damage output build, you might need to go 30% or more attack rating talisman to offset the lower damage output.

You want +defence both for the mitigation benefits but to also increase cycles of Sixth Sense.

Additionally, you want +magic defense or +physical defense depending on the damage type of the encounter.

Finally, consider some +block. Other than Trucker, nothing in this build improves your block rating. However, unless (a) you have every other stat well covered or (b) you are facing a high penetrate boss, +Block is your last gearing concern.

Hard to Kill – Agro and Mitigation from Hammer and Chaos

By Ryahl | July 8, 2012 - 7:22 pm | Builds, Chaos, Elite, Hammer, Tank, TSW Guides

7 Comments

This is an upgrade to my elite Hammer/Chaos build. The build continues to work from the weakened synergy, but now benefits from a number of outer wheel abilities.

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Active Abilities

Escalation (Chaos Inner)

Rupture (Hammer Pit)

Consequence (Building Blocks)

Razor Shards (Hammer Pit)

Stoicism (Turbulence)

Reality Fracture (The Fourth Wall)

Blowout (Hammer Pit)

Passive Abilities
Improved Blasts (Excessive Damage)

Bullheaded (Hammer Pit)

Fixation (Shell Game)

Gnosis (Inner Chaos)

Turbulence (The Fourth Wall)

Inevitability (Building Blocks)

Agitator (Turbulence)

Synergies

Escalation applies exposed and Rupture with Improved Blasts applies Debilitate. Both weaken multiple targets, meaning you should have your opponents doing 30% less damage and taking 30% more damage very quickly. Rupture is also causing Bullheaded to process gradually increasing both your magical and physical protection.

Since everything is weakened, Gnosis will trigger more damage and Fixation will make sure you hit plenty often. Inevitability is also firing off improving your evade chance, while escalation as a frenzy is causing Turbulence to process stacking up your evade rate. Since these are different buffs to evasion, you get both benefits.

BUILD UPDATE – If you are facing smaller pack fights (e.g. three or fewer mobs) consider slotting Gunsmoke instead of Gnosis. For small fights, Gunsmoke does 2x the damage of Gnosis. For larger pack environments, Gnosis outperforms. Hell Rising – Gunsmoke, Darkness War – Gnosis, Ankh – Gunsmoke, Hell Fallen – Gnosis.

The build features several threat generating skills. Agitator is a nice passive hate increase while Stoicism on a 30-second cooldown also provides a healthy agro increase. One of your long finishers, Reality Fracture gives you a targeted AOE pulsing hate field, while your Razor Shards instant finisher gives a PBAOE hate gain and provides a bonus hate to your next attack – which should be Rupture since it benefits from firing with no hammer resources.

The build also carries an abundance of mitigation benefits, beyond those already mentioned. Stoicism gives you a reliable 30-second mitigation buff. Consequence, similarly should keep a mitigation buff up between long recycle closers. Finally, Blowout doesn’t add mitigation, but it extends your hitpoint bar since it’s hitting weakened targets. With all that stacked mitigation, that’s a lot of effective hitopint acquisition.

Rotations

This is a fairly complex build, since it features three long-recycle abilities with different lengths (Stoicisim, 30 seconds; Blowout, 15 seconds and Reality Fracture, 10 seconds).

Open with a Razor Shards, since you get free hammer resources. From there, fire off Stoicism to begin hate acquisition. Alternate Rupture and Escalation to begin applying debuffs. On your first closer cycle, use Blowout and Reality Fracture. Return to rotation your Escalation and Rupture builders. Replace instant closers with Reality Fracture and Blowout on recycle. Also work in Stoicism on recycle.

Alternate Ideas

Consider dropping Inevitability in favor of Forged In Fire for passive hitpoint regeneration. Additionally, consider dropping Gnosis for Crap Shoot (Hunkering Down) in fights where purges are important.

Ashardis’ Hammer/Shotgun DPS build

By Aela | July 6, 2012 - 2:29 pm | Builds, DPS, Elite, Hammer, Shotgun, TSW Guides

10 Comments

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Ashardis’ Hammer/Shotgun Build To Blast!

This build is a pure dps build that depends on Blast AoE & Weakness stacks build to give you buffs with some interesting CD’s.

Active Skills :
1. Rupture. (Hammer) – Main resource builder. 4x5m Blast AoE. Does more damage with 0 Hammer Resources which you’ll make sure you never have by spending it all right away!

2. Hell To Pay. Hammer Spender. 4x5m Blast AoE. The go-to spender when you used No Mercy and you’re starting another pack. Does ~5% more damage than No Mercy without the autocrit buff.

3. Both Barrels. Shotgun Spender. 60° 7m Cone Blast AoE. 4s CD. The OTHER spender. I will explain below. Does same damage as Hell To Pay.

4. No Mercy. Hammer Spender. 4x5m Blast AoE. It will autocrit if you use it within 30s of killing another mob. This makes it a very nice finisher when the mobs start dropping as you’ll crit each time from then on, critting = maybe killing one more. Rinse n repeat

5. Pump Action. Shotgun Resource builder. Mainly used for single target damage, since some things doesn’t take AoE damage to well. Easily replaced.

6. Touchdown! Mainly a mobility CD. 20s CD. Does 50% more damage AoE, although not Blast, than the other spender skills and you move to your target.

7. Shockwave. 4x8m AoE. Big damage Elite skill. 30s CD. Has an Impair component that makes it attractive for interruptions

Passive Skills :

1. Improved Blasts. This is the key passive for this build. Builds Weakness stacks when you hit mobs with Blast effects for less damage done.

2. Punishment. Builds Crit Power stacks whenever you hit a Weakened mob aka. all the time.

3. Paradigm Shift. Stealing a little from Chaos/Theory, this builds Hit stacks whenever you hit a Weakened mob aka. all the time.

4. Hard Impact. Hammer attacks does 10% more damage.

5. Tenderizing. Does X extra damage whenever you hit a Weakened mob.

6. Dead on Target. Shotgun attacks does 10% more damage.

7. Brawler. Gives you 15% more Crit Power.

Key Features.

Everything pretty much does AoE for loads of damage on packs of mobs. Weakness stacks on the mobs for less damage done, +Crit Power and +Hit stacks on you! Strong finish on dying packs that are low on health, since No Mercy will automatically Crit.

The way I play this is like this : 1 2 1 2 3. So builder, spender, builder, spender, spender. Note that I can use the Both Barrels after Hell To Pay because the blasts also builds Shotgun Resources on the target, making it possible to use 2 “Consume All” spenders in a row for Big Damage. HtP uses all the Hammer Resources, BB uses the Shotgun ones. If I had killed something just before I engaged a pack, I’d push : 1 4 1 2 3 and then return to normal rotation.

There are many ways you can go with this build. If you think No Mercy is too weak for it’s limited use, you can replace it. Same with Pump Action, although if that’s taken away, you’d need to find something other single target’y. If this isn’t a Shotgun attack, consider replacing Dead on Target aswell for some other useful passive.

Perhaps an defensive stacker like Bullheaded/Hardcase (Physical/Magic Protection) Offensively, you could go for Gunsmoke (Shotgun/Control), essentially another “Tenderizing” for more damage per hit.

Thanks for reading

Crafting in TSW

By Aela | July 3, 2012 - 10:15 pm | Assault Rifle, Blade, Blood, Chaos, elemental, External Links, Fist, Gear, Glyph, Hammer, list, Pistol, Shotgun, Signet, Talisman, TSW Guides, Weapons

14 Comments

Crafting in the Secret World

Using Assembly for Glyphs, Talisman, Weapons, and more

Welcome to our updated assembly information page. All assembly works from your crafting interface (Y by default). Assembly is used to create, deconstruct, or improve a number of the items that drop in the game world.

Crafting should not be overlooked as (a) much of the best gear in the game comes from crafting recipes, (b) crafted gear is far more customizable than dropped gear and (c) some quests in the game require crafting steps to complete.

The crafting interface is very simple. As you can see below, there are three main areas of the crafting interface. The first area is a 4×5 rectangle. This is where you place materials used in crafting and it is also where you find the materials gained form deconstructing items.

Below the rectangle are two boxes. The first is the TOOL box. This is where you place your crafting kits. Each kit (weapon, talisman, consumable, glyph or gadget) is used to create items of its specific type.

The Toolkits used in TSW Crafting

Weapons create all nine types of weapons,
Talisman create all seven types of talisman
Consumables create both potions and animas
Glyphs create all nine base types of glyphs as well as all of the 36 possible 2-effect glyphs
Gadgets create the three types of gadgets as well as the various kickback gadgets

The final box is context specific. When you are crafting, this is where you see the Result (as in the picture below). However, when your assembly window is empty, this is where you place items you wish to deconstruct.

Crafting in TSW – Assembly Recipe Patterns

The following spreadsheet contains all known recipes in the game. The recipe PATTERN remain the same regardless of the quality level of the utlimate item or the echelon (green, blue or purple). However, the material quality increases with both the quality level of the item AND in some cases, the echelon of the crafting kit.

Additionally, there are potions that can be crafted that can last through death. They can be made for Hit Points (water), Attack Rating (Fire), or Healing Rating (Dust). They use the pattern shown below in the third tab (under Potions).

My First 60: the Boom Tank-Support Build

By Ryahl | June 26, 2012 - 9:37 pm | Builds, Hammer, My First 60, Shotgun, Support, TSW Guides

8 Comments

4 votedEnjoy this build? Vote for IT!Enjoy this build? Vote for IT!

Inner Wheel Support – A shotgun tank starter deck providing decent dps and group support through Polaris (and on).

Build Notes: Our My First 60 builds are targeted for about 60 total points. They represent the initial builds for a player starting the game, but wanting to play a focused role. Thus, inner wheel builds are incomplete builds and NOT intended for mid-game or later play.

This build explores a hybrid combination in TSW, putting together the support functions of shotgun with the tanking functions of hammer. Depending on your specialization and gear, this build also provides some potent burst damage opportunities. I have used this build successfully delaying weaponized Mayans in the Wayab-Xul fight (Darkness War) and also for the first Malothep fight (Ankh).

Active Abilities

Pump Action (Shotgun)

Out for a Kill (Shotgun)

Hell to Pay (Hammer)

Breaching Shot (Shotgun)

Shockwave (Hammer)

Haymaker (Hammer)

Stonewalled (Hammer)

Passive Abilities

Sawed Off (Shotgun)

Gnosis (Chaos)

Breach Party (Shotgun)

Paradigm Shift (Chaos)

Hit & Run (Shotgun)
Authority (Shotgun)
Street Fighter (Hammer)

Key Features

I often use this build when straight up tanking isn’t possible, but being “tank-ish” helps. It’s a good off-tank build and a build that supports a tank very well. Pump Action and Sawed Off take the bite out of your opponent (reduces incoming damage by up to 30%) and you can push that a bit higher by supporting your defensive target (shotgun support passive provides mitigation as well).

But this build isn’t all about support, it has some reasonably good damage potential. Since sawed off weakens everything it hits, Gnosis should be processing regularly, passively bumping your damage output. Additionally, Paradigm Shift synergizes off of weakened too, increasing your hit rate and thus reducing your misses and glances.

Whenever facing packs of mobs, you want to score a kill with shotgun resources still active. This makes sure Hit & Run fires off, giving you another round of passive damage.

The build also features the ability to Impair in a column, using Shockwave. That’s a nice interrupt/stun, but it’s also one piece of the builds burst damage. Street Fighter gives you a damage burst the moment you apply impaired. Additionally, Haymaker hits impaired targets harder, making it the finisher to use after you knock things down. But, since you are about to knock something down and punish it, maybe you should start the sequence off with a Breaching Shot to bump your penetration rate. Breaching Shot is modified by Authority (more effective) and Breach Party lets you use this combination more often.

Rotation

Your bread and butter rotation is Pump Action x5, Hell to Pay, Out for a Kill. Use OfaK to soften up, not finish a target. Your rotation is much better when your kills come from Pump Action or Hell to Pay. Also, remember that you build shotgun resources on multiple targets. That means you can use Out for a Kill more than once a rotation.

Your burst rotation begins with Breaching Shot, followed by Shockwave and Haymaker. Make sure you have hammer resources before starting this chain.

When supporting a tank, or if you have a healer/dps taking damage, focus fire Pump Action repeatedly at the hostile target while using your defensive target on the group mate taking damage. A fully debuffed debilitated opponent coupled with your shotgun support can provide an effective 35% mitigation (or more at higher levels), stretching out those hitpoints quite a bit. The same applies to you when you are taking the damage. You also can fall back on Stonewalled if you are taking hits.

Alternates

If there is one problem with this build, it’s that it tries to do too much. It has some DPS, a lot of support and some tankishness (without agro generation though). You might be better served dropping Stonewalled altogether and just picking up Buckshot or Both Barrels for an extra shotgun finisher.

My First 60: Inner Wheel Tanking

By Ryahl | June 24, 2012 - 2:11 pm | Builds, Chaos, Hammer, My First 60, Tank, TSW Guides

25 Comments

My First 60 – Tanking Build for New Characters

Hammer and Chaos Weakened Synergy

A functional tank build for the Polaris (Q3) and Hell Rising (Q5)

9 votedEnjoy this build? Vote for IT!

Build Notes: Our “My First 60″ builds are targeted for about 60 total points. They represent the initial builds for a player starting the game, but wanting to play a focused role. Thus, inner wheel builds are incomplete builds and NOT intended for mid-game or later play.There are far better tank builds out there, but they all require working out into the advanced cells. For a player wanting to be a reasonable tank in the Polaris instance (quality level 3), they simply lack the points to get there. I have used this build to successfully tank the first two instances in the game. The build features three builders, two specifically to help with hate generation and one to help with the lack of mitigation common to low level tanks.

This build also provides an excellent foundation for developing into the weakened hammer/chaos build covered in another guide.

Active Abilities

Smash (Hammer) 1AP

Escalation (Chaos) 1AP

Grand Slam (Hammer) 1AP

Razor Shards (Hammer Pit) 9AP

Call for Eris (Chaos) 1 AP

Stonewalled (Hammer) 2AP

Illusion (Chaos) 2AP

Passive Abilities

Below the Belt (Hammer) 1AP

Intensity (Chaos) 1AP

Gnosis (Chaos) 1AP

Paradigm Shift (Chaos) 2AP

Cool, Calm and Collected (Hammer E) 7AP

Hard Impact (Hammer) 4AP

Chaos Adept (Chaos) 4AP

Key FeaturesThis build requires 47 points spent in Hammer and 17 points in Chaos. A player can put it together with about 20 total skill points, roughly where they will be when they put on all Q3 talisman and weapons.

This build uses three builders, since two contribute useful weakened effects and two contribute to your hate gain. Smash (with Below the Belt passive) provides one of the easiest accesses to the Debilitate debuff (target damage output weakened up to 30%). Escalation (with Intensity passive) provides pbaoe hate generation, access to the Exposed debuff (target takes up to 30% more damage) and keeps a near constant minor ward (7.5% reduction from all damage sources). Additionally, since your builders both generate the weakened effect, you are routinely triggering the Gnossis (bonus damage) and Paradigm Shift (up to 150 bonus hit rating).

The build lacks a direct taunt. While Provoke is available in the Turbulence tree for the same cost as Razor Shards, the 40-second recycle on Provoke makes it difficult to carry this early in the game. Rather, the build uses its hate generating abilities to passively build up hate. Escalation always generates PBAOE hate. Grand Slam builds PBAOE hate when it strikes a weakened target – the rotation for your builders should assure this always happens. On top of that, The Razor Shards finisher is a hate generator which also boosts the hate level of your next attack. Use Razor Shards and follow it up with either Call for Eris or Smash to significantly boost hate. Finally, the Cool, Calm and Collected passive generates hate on blocks. Start a fight out by triggering Stonewalled for increased block chances and early hate generation.

Your party has to work with you, though. If you lose hate in this build, you can’t just pop it back to you as you might in another game. Ask your team to give you at least one full rotation to get your hate built up before they jump in. Make sure people understand that they need to pull adds over to you for your agro to pick them up. However, given the relatively low dps at this stage of the game, you shouldn’t be losing hate to anyone, easily (if they are patient).

Rotation

Open with a Stonewalled to get some blocks and hate going. Fire off your first Razor Shards immediately (hammer starts with 5 resources each fight). From there, Smash, Escalate, Grand Slam, Escalate, Smash, Razor Shards, Call for Eris is the default rotation. Cycle in Stonewalled and Illusion on cooldown to help keep your defensives high.

Alternatives

There isn’t much you can do this early in the game. The build lacks an active elite, but both Shockwave and Domino Effect have long recycles and the build already has two long recycle abilities. You might find that Schism performs better than Call for Eris as a finisher, but in my experience, CfE has been outstanding.

Weakened Tank Build – Chaos/Hammer

By Ryahl | June 23, 2012 - 9:10 pm | Blue Mountain Special, Builds, Chaos, Elite, Hammer, Tank, TSW Guides

10 Comments

Elite Tanking – Weakened Build

Hammer and Chaos Synergy

8 votedEnjoy this build? Vote for IT!

Active Abilities

Smash (Hammer) – 1AP

Escalation (Chaos) – 1AP

Razor Shards (Hammer Pit) – 9AP

Call for Eris (Chaos) – 1AP

Provoke (Turbulence) – 9AP

Mockingbird (Turbulence) – 27AP

Stoicism (Turbulence) – 50AP

Passive Abilities

Turbulence (the Fourth Wall) – 21AP

Gnosis (Chaos) – 1AP

Below the Belt (Hammer) – 1AP

Intensity (Chaos) – 1AP

Paradigm Shift (Chaos) – 2AP

Inevitability (Building Blocks) – 12AP

Agitator (Turbulence) – 12AP

Key Features

This build uses two builders, since both contribute useful weakened effects. Smash (with Below the Beltpassive) provides one of the easiest accesses to the Debilitate debuff (target damage output weakened up to 30%).

Escalation (with Intensity passive) provides pbaoe hate generation, access to the Exposed debuff (target takes up to 30% more damage). Escalation also triggers the Turbulence passive, giving you roughly 150 bonus to your evasion.

Additionally, since your builders both generate the weakened effect, you are routinely triggering the Gnossis (bonus damage), Paradigm Shift (up to 150 bonus hit rating) and Inevitability (flat 10% bonus to evade).

BUILD UPDATE – Consider slotting Gunsmoke instead of Gnosis. Gunsmoke does 2x the damage of Gnosis.

The build also features Mockingbird (hate generation with a small self heal) and Stoicism (hate generation with increased mitigation). While there are better “pure defense” utility abilities in the game, Mockingbird and Stoicism both extend the tanks health bar while adding hate generation. On top of that, the abilities each have relatively short recycles. The 20 seconds uptime on these combined buffs means that you can theoretically keep a hate generation and extended hitpoint effect on yourself roughly 70% of the time. Provoke is there for those situations when you absolutely have to get agro.

Rotation

Alternate Smash and Escalate until 5 Resources, use Razor Shards and Call for Eris (depending on your chaos finisher, Razor Shards may be best used last). Open with Stoicism first, fire Mockingbird when Stoicism effect ends. After that cast your hate builders on recycle.

Alternatives

I often rotate the Call for Eris passive depending on the situation. For large add fights, Reality Fracture provides a targeted aoe finisher with still more threat generation. Karma provides pbaoe damage with a heal to next target. Consequence is a good choice if you face a boss with significant damage output.

The build does not feature a passive elite ability. Shield Formation (Hunkering Down), Forged in Fire (Battering Works), Prodigal (Shell Game), or Close Quarters (Restricted Access) are all potential fits to this build. Consider replacing either Inevitability or Turbulence with an elite passive.

Category Archives: Hammer