W/R Steady Stance Pet Hammer (Never Rampage Alone)

Описание: ...is nigh unplayable. I tried to get relevant value out of a build ernestly designed around steady stance. It is a pain and hassle.

► IAS. Steady stance is a stance so it cancels stance IAS every couple seconds. But IAS is mandatory to be effective as a melee. Few options remain.
• Aggressive refrain. Requires primary paragon. (Maybe like this: OQGkgmmlEXhEPxbpF2QRpWbk7GAA)
• Weapon of aggression. Consumes many attribute points and all your energy. Incompatible with splinter weapon.
• Critical agility with a weapon of the assassin, 15 tactics and "fear me!". Unreliable and I got so fed up with babysitting my IAS that I switched to the last option:
• Never Rampage Alone. Consumes almost your entire energy, blocks two skills slots, locks into an otherwise useless secondary profession, adds the risk of your pet dying, adds additional strain on your communing prot, is cumbersome to play and only gives 25% IAS. This is the best option. Yuck.

► Consistent value. Steady stance triggers on knock downs. For a general use build you'll need to bring self-knockdowns. Tactics has two of them, they cost energy and have a recharge time of 7 seconds. The build is about steady stance so we bring both.
• Steady stance now blocks five skills just for its core functionality.
• The self-knockdown only triggers on successful hits. You need asuran scan.
• All these skills are energy intensive. We don't have energy, so we need to play a hammer and invest all adrenaline into auspicious blow. Axe and sword users need to stick to the madness that is maintaining critical agility with just 5 critical strikes but no energy for malicious strike. Scythes lack an IAS.
• Auspicious blow does not suffice to manage this build's energy. Add "of the necromancer".
• 5 SR does not sufficiently bridge issues such as: Your target dying during attack skills. Energy denial. Blocks. Not preparing your energy skills 12 seconds before combat. Add manual BiP usage.
• We're now at 7 skills and micro management for the build's core functionality.
• Steady stance gives us nothing in return. All the effects of steady stance are to lower the suffering inflicted on self by trying to build around this elite skill. At a loss. You get more suffering out of this elite skill than value. We just invested 7 skills, specialized equipment and micro management to barely be able to use a skill for the sake of using this skill.

► The elite's core functionality blocks 7 slots and my build still does barely anything!
• "Brace Yourself!" still triggers with steady stance. At a recharge of 4 seconds we can get 63 armour ignoring damage in the area on every self-knockdown.
• This is decent damage, but still less than the value of a proper warrior build. (And it interacts with self-KDs, not steady stance. But shush.)
• We need to selftarget and micro manage the skill every 4 seconds.
• If there's anything preventing the hero from successfully using the skill when microed, the AI shuts down. The hero will not use skills. Nor move. If you're lucky, the hero may auto attack. If you don't notice that this happened, you've just triggered the hero's kill switch so you're 7/8.
• You are a melee. The hero is a ranged character. Being out of range is a common cause for this hero shutdown.
• Giving the hero as little skills with an activation time and equipping them with a spear (of the necromancer) helps a little bit. But now this hero steals splinter weapons. Team building cost: Might need to bring multiple splinter weapons so you get one when it matters.
• Primary paragon with 16 command is not worth it. I tested it. The ritualist achieves more, even with a spear.
• I first wanted to show this build in Gate of Madness. Well of Silence is another cause for this hero shutdown. (Vocal minority will be the same.)
• Lack of energy is yet another cause for this hero shutdown. Coincidentally the hero lacks energy.

► The 8th skill slot.
• Steady stance has cost me so much that I didn't want to further improve the build. I kept "to the limit!" from the previous critical agility experiment. Upside: +60 health points help offset the lack of a shield and the need to run two superior attribute runes to get something out of this build.

► Lessons to learn.
• Some elite skills might be bad beyond saving.
• A true masochist will get value out of "brace yourself!" microed every four seconds combined with self-KDs.
• Steady stance is not the elite skill to play with such a build.
• If you want to suffer steady stance some more: Cancel/renew flail every 4 seconds for a less dire energy situation. Draft: OQATEtJXXin4tMxZooUrNivCAA
• It's smarter to replace staedy stance: "I Am Unstoppable!" as anti-KD, Seven Weapons Stance for IAS, attribute compression etc, scythe of the necromancer for cleave, radiant scythe for energy management, reap impurities for actual damage. Draft: OQojExVbqRvlXFcftRDFOXi10k

► Video Template
Don't copy: OQITEnJXZin4tMxZooUrNiHk2AA