Patriarch TheSpeedyBros, Dual Crescent Moon Frenzier (D2R)

[TheNix]

Patriarch TheSpeedyBros, Dual Crescent Moon Frenzier


Level: 87

St – 114 (162)
Dx – 110 (159)
Vt – 296 (338)
En – 10 (15)

HP 1577 (3380 after BO)
Mana 141 (315 after BO)

Damage

Frenzy: 936 – 1379 @ AR 8898 / 918 – 1370 @ AR 8898 (After Fanatism)


Resists:

Fire: 75
Cold: 75
Ltning: 75
Poison: 75


Skills:

Frenzy: 20/29
Sword Mastery: 20/28
Battle Orders: 20/27 (31 on switch)
Taunt: 16/22
Double Swing: 10/18

Leap, Leap Attack, Double Throw & Stun: 1/9
Howl, Shout, Battle Cry & Battle Command: 1/7
Increased Stamina, Increase Speed, Iron Skin & Natural Resistances: 1/7


Equipment:

Weapon 1:

“Cresent Moon” Phase Blades x 2

Weapon 2:

Mang Song’s Lesson

Arreat’s Face (Rare Jewel, +30 Lightning Resist, +8 Minimum)
“CoH” Dusk Shroud
Laying of Hands
Gore Rider
Verdungo’s Hearty Cord
Mara’s Kaleidoscope
Manald Heal & Raven Frost

Bone Break and Crack of the Heavens

Merc (Act 5 – Frenzy)

Eth Arreat’s Face
Eth Shaftstop
“Lawbringer” Cryptic Sword & “Hustle” Cryptic Sword


Random musings:

After chasing my merc everywhere when playing RayDeEnt, I decided to see if I could keep up to him if I was playing a Frenzy barb. I always liked the look of the ctc Static Field on the Cresent Moon runeword, so I thought I’d put them together and the TheSpeedyBros was born.

I didn’t note the early game equipment and since MrsNix and I took a birthday holiday and we were away for a while, so I forgot exactly what I did for the first two-thirds of the build. I do remember that it worked very well. This was a curiosity build (I wonder how fast I can get SF to proc, I wonder how fast I can go with the merc’s help, etc.) and I didn’t really have huge expectations for him once I got to Hell difficulty, but he worked out rather well.

I ran on /players8 all the way through to the middle of Act 2 Hell after which I dropped it down to /players3 where I stayed until the end. The last half of Act 5 was no picnic, but it wasn’t a pain either. I had two deaths, one in mid-nightmare and the other in early-hell, and both occurred when I let Battle Orders expire so the fault lies with me and not the build.

Gameplay wise, the chain lightning and static field proc’ed a little less than I had hoped considering I cracked 4fps (according to one of the weapon speed calculators I used) and had both weapons going. I think even a small increase in the ctc chances would make this build a lot better. Once I equipped my merc with his gear I think I could count on one hand the number of times I had to resurrect him, and two of those were because I died. He had the firepower to be left alone fighting a pack while I Leap Attacked away to deal with ranged attackers or resurrectors, but it was when we fought side-by-side the build started to shine. I’m still a little unsure whether the Sanctuary aura was a good thing or bad, I’ll need to think on that one.

I had far more trouble with packs of ranged attackers, especially when there were a couple of them with complementary auras, than I did with bosses. For these packs I usually Leap Attacked in, dropped a few Howls to break up the packs and lay into the big boys. I would then Taunt small groups back to deal with them at my leisure. For the Bosses, the Ancients, Baal waves, etc. the merc and I just wailed on them until they died, and I hardly even needed a fat purple.

Spoiler

 

[little birdy]

Sounds like a fun play through. Nice Pat!

I think even a small increase in the ctc chances would make this build a lot better.

Have you got a a couple of Stormlash kicking around to compare against the ‘Crescent Moon’ swords? Stormlash doubles your ctc Static Field, and adds in Crushing Blow. Repairs might get annoying compared to using indestructible Phase Blades… and you lose the -enemy lightning resistance. Might be an interesting experiment though.

 

[DariusTriplet]

Cool build! If you have access to 1.10a gear, Crescent Moon from there has 20% CTC Static. I used one on a Tesladin and really felt the difference. With a Frenzy merc you could go all-out with 4 of them (although you probably need Fanaticism to hit 4 frames).

 

[TheNix]

Have you got a a couple of Stormlash kicking around to compare against the ‘Crescent Moon’ swords? Stormlash doubles your ctc Static Field, and adds in Crushing Blow. Repairs might get annoying compared to using indestructible Phase Blades… and you lose the -enemy lightning resistance. Might be an interesting experiment though.

I've got a pair of Stormlashes but since you cannot use them until clvl 82 it almost feels like the build is complete before you can use them. That's one of the reasons I'm sort of in two minds about making a wolfbarb as wolfhowl is a clvl 79 item. I might respec him and see how the dual Stormlashes go.

Cool build! If you have access to 1.10a gear, Crescent Moon from there has 20% CTC Static.

A 20% SF would make this build really shine.

 

[little birdy]

I've got a pair of Stormlashes but since you cannot use them until clvl 82 it almost feels like the build is complete before you can use them. That's one of the reasons I'm sort of in two minds about making a wolfbarb as wolfhowl is a clvl 79 item. I might respec him and see how the dual Stormlashes go.

For a Wolfbarb: You can push a character to level 79 pretty quick and easy in p8 NM Terror Zones. Then you’d at least get to play all of Hell difficulty with Wolfhowl. But I get what you’re saying. I also am not a huge fan of builds based on high clvl items because you mostly don’t get to use them while questing.

 

[TheNix]

For a Wolfbarb: You can push a character to level 79 pretty quick and easy in p8 NM Terror Zones. Then you’d at least get to play all of Hell difficulty with Wolfhowl. But I get what you’re saying. I also am not a huge fan of builds based on high clvl items because you mostly don’t get to use them while questing.

I didn't think of that. I think you just made up my mind for me about my next build once I finish my Fire Amazon.

 

[thefranklin]

Nice build! Love the use of hustle!

My favorite part of being a barb with a barb frenzy merc is I could just switch his lawbringer out for whatever I was using and enjoy sanctuary when I needed it for undead PIs.

And +1 for leveling with nm TZ for high level requirements. I also allow pit leveling and have used it to get to 85 for arkaines valor / azurewrath / whatever. It goes pretty fast and gives you a good chance to test out different gear/adjustments for your build.

 

[little birdy]

I didn't think of that. I think you just made up my mind for me about my next build once I finish my Fire Amazon.

I look forward to reading the Pat thread!

 

[LouB]

Wolfbarbs rock! My Wolfbarb, ARGH, used no respecs and had one point in bash and one point in Double swing. The trick for me was to equip Beast at level 64 and then play as a Bear till I reached level 79. This way I could take advantage of all of the skill points that a Wolfbarb uses 15 levels earlier. ARGH is now semi retired at level 99.

I finally ended up pairing him with a Frenzy merc and never had an issue with him wandering off on his own as I was moving around and he had to keep up with me most of the time.