Updated for Patch 3.20
The Best Crafty Guides by Odealo
Guide notes |
September 03, 2021 -Build created January 13, 2023 -Updated for Patch 3.20 |
Build overview | |||
Tags: [MELEE] [PHYSICAL] [IMPALE] [LIFE] | |||
Budget: Defenses: |
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Boss DPS: AoE: |
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Boneshatter is a Melee Strike restricted to Axes, Staves, Maces, and Sceptres. It has very high base damage, but the downside is the attacker is also getting hurt in the process, not as much as the enemy, but the damage received will increase for the parties at both ends of the weapon. This status is called Trauma and it lasts for 6 seconds - as the character you're playing is extremely tanky and can mitigate a lot of Physical Damage, you want to increase this bonus to its limit. Juggernaut is the ascendancy that specializes in Physical Damage mitigation and enhancing the Endurance Charge perks. With the proper setup, the character can reach 7 to 10k of Maximum Life, have an additional reduction in Physical, Elemental, and general Damage it takes, and a huge amount of Resistances. with such defenses, the Boneshatter's damage will have little to no effect on you. You can even reserve your Life to reap the benefits of Bloodthirst, but that requires a lot of Maximum Life.
Builds that stack basic Attributes are usually very expensive to min-max. When it comes to stacking Strenght, a lot of best-in-slot items are Uniques which lowers the overall cost of the build quite significantly - your Gloves, Boots, Amulet, Body Armour, and Weapon can be Unique Items that are cheap and common. Having a lot of Strength is particularly useful for this build not only because of its inherent stats - Maximum Life and Melee Physical Damage but also because of the benefits granted by the weapon Pillar of the Caged God - it increases your Physical Weapon Damage by 16% per 10 Strength, meaning 1600% at 1k Str, that's twice the amount of Fecebreaker at its highest roll. With the Iron Fortress, the inherent Strength bonus for Melee Physical Damage is boosted by one-third, and it grants you an additional, substantial layer of defense. Undeniable Notable from your Ascendancy Tree will cover the need for Accuracy Rating. It's a popular build among players valuing survivability.
As of Patch 3.18, we introduced numerous minor changes - the build now uses an Anomalous version of Boneshatter which reduces the Stun Threshold, making it possible to permanently Stun any opponent in the game. It comes with some changes to the Skill Tree, Gem setups, and additional gear options, but overall the build remains very similar. It's Still a low-life Strength-stacking build.
For patch 3.20, we added a lot of other options to gear up the character, which includes Precise Technique Keystone and Divergent Boneshatter. We also added a version that puts less emphasis on Strength Stacking, it would allow you to have all your Items of Rare quality, which is a good thing in a long run.
You can also check our other Path of Exile builds right over here Odealo's Crafty Guides - Full List
This is the type of Melee build you would normally expect a Juggernaut to be. Kind of slow, but tanky as hell, with tons of Physical Damage mitigation and devastating melee hits. The main idea of this build is to maximize your Physical Damage mitigation so that you can ignore the damage received from Boneshatter's Trauma stacks, which can greatly increase your maximum DPS. In this build, you are also going to play as a Low-Life character with Petrified Blood and Banner/Stance Spells that reserve your Life with Blood Magic notable. Your Life will be capped at around 4,000, but the damage will be greatly reduced by all the buffs and passives, allowing for a very safe playstyle. You are going to cast many of your Spells manually, including Blood Rage, Ancestor Totems, Molten Shell, and AncestralCry, but in most cases, these will be needed only against Bosses. There is also another interesting triggered mechanic. You can use Phantasmal Vengeance linked with Rage Support and Enhance, to generate Rage at a very fast rate, further boosting your damage. In the following setup, the same Vengeance Gem will be used to apply your Curse via Hextouch Support.
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PROS |
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CONS |
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You can start leveling with any Melee Physical Attack for blunt weapons such as Ground Slam or Sunder for example. it heavily depends on your gear and preferred playstyle when you want to switch to Boneshatter - you need to sustain the Trauma damage, so the setup has to be at least somewhat developed accordingly to this Skill. A lot of Maximum Life and Armor will be needed. To level up you will need basically only these stats mentioned above and Melee Physical Damage, your best option is to already start using 2-handed Staff from the start. Seek Unique Leveling items, use Vendor Recipes, and get some Essences of Contempt or Rage.
Suggested leveling Gem setups:
Eartshatter setup | |
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Ground Slam - use a Physical Melee Attack that suits your playstyle the most, Ground Slam is a great option |
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Melee Physical Damage Support - the best-in-slot Support Gem to increase your Melee Physical Damage |
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Maim Support - it's a low-level Support Gem that can apply Maim debuff on enemies |
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Fortify Support - increases your damage and grants you Fortify - one of the best buffs out there |
Aura and Banner setup | |
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Pride - The best option for an Aura as it increases your Physical Damage |
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War Banner - Banner that grants Accuracy Rating and Physical Damage |
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Blood and Sand - increase your Area of Effect or Area Damage - depending on your Stance |
Warcry and Ancestral Totems setup | |
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Enduring Cry - Warcry is used to quickly recover a portion of your Maximum Life |
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Ancestral Warchief - a Totem that increases your Attack Speed as it stays active |
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Ancestral Protector - a Totem that increases your Melee Damage as it stays active |
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Multiple Totems Support - with this Support Gem you will be able to have both Ancestral Totems active at the same time |
Mobility setup | |
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Lifetap Support - before allocating Blood Magic use Lifetap to save Mana |
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Faster Attacks Support - increases the Attack Speed of your Leap Slam, making you move faster |
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Leap Slam - great mobility Skill that can be used to move around and jump over ledges |
Bandits:
you should kill all three Bandits for two additional Skill Points
Leveling Skill Trees:
32 Points Skill Tree
pick all the Life notables in your close proximity and then some nodes for more damage
69 Points Skill Tree
make a path to the Tribal Fury, pick some more maximum Life, and 2-hand nodes
Recommended leveling items:
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+100 to Strength 10% increased Global Physical Damage (40-60)% increased Armour Regenerate 2% of Life per second with at least 400 Strength |
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Adds 1 to 80 Chaos Damage to Attacks +(180-220) to Armour +(9-12)% to Chaos Resistance 20% increased Movement Speed +1 to maximum number of Skeletons (15-18)% increased Strength |
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+(30-50) to Evasion Rating 10% increased Rarity of Items found +(30-40)% to all Elemental Resistances Reflects 4 Physical Damage to Melee Attackers Level Requirement reduced by 100 (Hidden) |
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Item has no level requirement and Energy Shield (Hidden) Item has 6 White Sockets and is fully linked (Hidden) |
Final Skill Tree:
116 Points Final Skill Tree (doesn't include Cluster nor Timeless Jewels)
123 Points Path of Building (PoB) link
Ascendancy points:
Preferably in that order:
Pantheon:
Major God: Soul of Lunaris: 1% additional Physical Damage Reduction for each nearby Enemy, up to 8%; 1% increased Movement Speed for each
nearby Enemy, up to 8%
Minor God: Soul of Gruthkul: 1% additional Physical Damage Reduction for each Hit you've taken Recently up to a maximum of 5%
[DPS] Boneshatter setup | |
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Anomalous Boneshatter - It's the only DPS skill here, the variety in which you can assemble the Support Gems setup is huge, you can even create two different setups and swap a weapon mid-fight. Use the Anomalous version to reduce the enemy Stun Threshold or Divergent Version for more Damage. |
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Brutality Support - With no focus on added Elemental damage and with no conversion it remains the best Support Gem for such builds. |
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Endurance Charge on Melee Stun Support - It's used to gain more Damage per Endurance Charge, generate Endurance Charges, which will be needed at their maximum all the time, reduce Stun Threshold, and increase Stun Duration. If you don't use Endurance Charges (you haven't picked Unflinching), take ![]() |
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Ruthless Support - Every third Attack is much more powerful, and your base Stun Duration is set at 0.8 seconds, which is good. |
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Melee Physical Damage Support - Increases Melee Physical Damage, but reduces Attack Speed. It's still one of the best Gems. |
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Fortify Support - Melee Hits Fortify and you gain more Damage. If you already have a different Fortify source, use ![]() |
[MOBILITY] Leap Slam setup | |
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Leap Slam - This allows you to jump over obstacles and move around much faster. |
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Faster Attacks Support - Increases your mobility when linked with Leap Slam. |
[UTILITY] Life Reservation setup | |
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Herald of Purity - It adds extra Physical Damage and creates Minions. |
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War Banner - increases your Accuracy, Physical Damage, and when placed - AoE and Adrenaline. |
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Arrogance Support - With the two linked Mana-Reserving Skills listed above and the Mastery with Increased Life Reservation Efficiency your life should be always slightly below 50%. If you don't plan to Reserve Life and use Bloodthirst, don't link it. |
[UTILITY] Aura setup | |
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Pride - Pride increases the Physical Damage your enemies are receiving. |
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Determination - Adds and increases your Armour for better Physical Damage mitigation. |
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Precision - Adds Accuracy and increases Critical Strike Chance, both are good in most cases. |
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Enlighten Support - Increases Mana Reservation Efficiency for linked Skills. |
[UTILITY] Molten Shell | |
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Molten Shell - your Guard Spell that's heavily based on your Armour which you should have a lot of |
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Cast when Damage Taken - We've used Ancestral Cry as a movement key, so it's good to have Molten Shell cast automatically if that's the case. |
[UTILITY] Curse setup | |
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Warlord's Mark - Mark that reduces Stun Threshold, and grants Endurance Charges, Rage, Mana, and Life Leech. It's good if you can stun bosses with Anomalous Boneshatter, but if you can't, and if you're using Divergent Boneshatter, ![]() |
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Mark on Hit Support - Applies Warlord's Mark on Hit against Rare and Unique enemies. |
[UTILITY] Ancestral Cry | |
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Ancestral Cry - A Warcry which specializes in increasing Strike Attacks, making them more powerful, able to target two additional enemies, and have increased range. It's optional. |
[UTILITY] Petrified Blood | |
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Petrified Blood - Reserves your Life and makes some portion of received Hit Damage deal DoT instead. It's optional. |
[UTILITY] Totems setup | |
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Ancestral Warchief - Increases your Melee Damage. |
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Ancestral Protector - Increases your Attack Speed. |
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Multiple Totems Support - Allows you to summon both Ancestral Totems. |
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Maim Support - Maims enemies, reducing their Movement Speed, and making them take more Physical Damage. |
[UTILITY] Blood Rage | |
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Blood Rage - Dreatly increases your Attack Speed, Life Leech, and generates Frenzy Charges for you while draining your Life. |
[UTILITY] Berserk | |
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Berserk - Rage accumulated from Vengeance can be spent to increase your Damage, Attack Speed, Movement Speed, and to reduce the damage taken. Rage can be also generated by an Eldritch Implicit. |
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If you're using Pillar of the Caged God, then the build focuses on accumulating as much Strength as possible - to do so several Unique gear pieces are heavily recommended or straight-up mandatory. Your Belt, Helmet, and Rings should be Rare - you can find some very useful mods there, especially when the items are Synthesised. The build follows the usual drill - Maximum Life and Elemental Resistances will be the two main stats to keep your character alive so you should seek these. If you're using a Rare Weapon, you will still want to have some Strength due to the Undeniable Keystone, but don't go out of your way to get it. If you plan to go for the Precise Technique, be sure to have a lot of Accuracy (which is again, sourced from Strength).
Our recommended items will:
Stat priorities on items:
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Min. requirements: Gain Accuracy Rating equal to your Strength Nearby Enemies take 9% increased Physical Damage (Elder Suffix) + 70 to Maximum Life Optional affixes: Elemental Resistances Strength Armour Chaos Resistance 1% increased Critical Strike Chance per 10 Strength (Elevated Wardlord Suffix) |
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+(20-25) to all Attributes Adds 40 to 60 Physical Damage to Attacks +(100-125)% to Melee Critical Strike Multiplier (100-120)% increased Armour (40-50)% increased Physical Damage taken |
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Helmet enchantments: Boneshatter enchantment |
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+18% Chance to Block Attack Damage while wielding a Staff 1% increased Area of Effect per 20 Intelligence 1% increased Attack Speed per 10 Dexterity 16% increased Physical Weapon Damage per 10 Strength |
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Min. requirements: At least 700 Physical DPS added/increased Physical Attack Damage increased Attack Speed Optional affixes: Chance to Impale Reduced enemy Stun Threshold |
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Min. requirements: +120 to Maximum Life +60% to Elemental Resistances Strength Increased Strength Optional affixes: enemies you Kill have a #% chance to Explode, dealing a tenth of their maximum Life as Physical Damage Maximum Life % You Can Apply Additional Curse |
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+1% Chance to Block Attack Damage per 50 Strength Chance to Block Spell Damage is Unlucky +(60-120) to Strength (80-100)% increased Armour 10% reduced Movement Speed Strength's Damage Bonus instead grants 3% increased Melee Physical Damage per 10 Strength |
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(350-400)% increased Armour +(1-5)% to all maximum Elemental Resistances Strength provides no bonus to Maximum Life Take no Extra Damage from Critical Strikes |
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Adds 1 to 80 Chaos Damage to Attacks +(180-220) to Armour +(9-12)% to Chaos Resistance 20% increased Movement Speed +1 to maximum number of Skeletons (15-18)% increased Strength |
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Min. requirements: +60 to Maximum Life +60% to Elemental Resistances 25% increased Movement Speed Optional affixes: Attributes Armour Chaos Resistance |
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+100 to Strength 10% increased Global Physical Damage (40-60)% increased Armour Regenerate 2% of Life per second with at least 400 Strength |
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Min. requirements: +60 to Maximum Life +60% to Elemental Resistances Optional affixes: Attributes Accuracy Rating Attack Speed Added Physical Damage Chaos Resistance |
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Min. requirements: +100 to Maximum Life +80% to Elemental Resistances +30 to Strength Optional affixes: increased Maximum Life increased Damage |
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(20-30)% increased Stun Duration on Enemies +(20-40) to Strength (30-40)% more Maximum Physical Attack Damage (40-30)% less Minimum Physical Attack Damage Adds 1 to (15-20) Physical Damage to Attacks +(80-100) to maximum Life Gain 50 Life when you Stun an Enemy |
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(20-30)% increased Stun Duration on Enemies +(40-50) to Strength +(20-25)% to all Elemental Resistances 50% increased Flask Charges gained 10% chance to deal Double Damage while you have at least 200 Strength 5% chance to deal Triple Damage while you have at least 400 Strength |
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+(10-16) to all Attributes +(80-100) to all Attributes -4 Physical Damage taken from Attack Hits |
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+(10–16) to all Attributes (5–10)% increased Experience Gain of Gems (10–20)% increased Reservation Efficiency of Skills +1 to Level of all Skill Gems +(20–30)% to Quality of all Skill Gems |
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Min. requirements: +50 to Maximum Life +50% to Elemental Resistances Optional affixes: Attributes increased Strength increased Attack Speed Accuracy increased Damage per 15 Strength increased Mana Reservation Efficiency of Skills Pride/Determination has increased Mana Reservation Efficiency Non-Channelling Skills have -7 to Total Mana Cost (crafted) |
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Recommended Anointments: Cruel Preparation Charisma Titanic Impacts Dismembering Panopticon |
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Min. requirements: +60 to Maximum Life +80% to Elemental Resistances +40 to Strength Optional affixes: Adds Physical Damage to Attacks Accuracy Rating Crit Strike Chance/Multiplier increased Attack Speed |
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Min. requirements: increased Maximum Life increased Attack Speed Elemental Resistances increased Global Physical Damage Strength |
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Commanded leadership over (10000-18000) warriors under (Akoya-Kaom-Rakiata) Passives in radius are Conquered by the Karui Historic |
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(4-6)% increased Dexterity (4-6)% increased Strength (15-10)% reduced Intelligence |
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(4-6)% increased maximum Energy Shield (4-6)% increased maximum Life (4-6)% increased maximum Mana <Two or Three random aura modifiers> Recommended Aura modifiers: Impales you inflict last 2 additional Hits while using Pride (40-60)% increased Attack Physical Damage while using Pride |
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Recommended affixes: 1 Added Passive Skill is Overlord 1 Added Passive Skill is Devastator 1 Added Passive Skill is Martial Prowess 1 Added Passive Skill is Master the Fundamentals |
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This Jewel's Socket has 25% increased effect per Allocated Passive Skill between it and your Class' starting location Recommended modifiers: +5 to Strength (obligatory) +40 to Accuracy Rating +5 to maximum Life |
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+1500 to Armour Adds Knockback to Melee Attacks during Flask effect Knocks Back Enemies in an Area when you use a Flask 75% chance to cause Enemies to Flee on use (7-10)% more Melee Physical Damage during effect |
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Other suggested Flasks:
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If you have any other build requests please leave that in the comments below. We are always open to suggestions and constructive feedback.
Pictures used in this article are the intellectual property of Grinding Gear Games.