Feedback on Hammertime:
What it is:
It's quite a fun skill that throws lots of hammers into the direction of opponents, just like the trap rat skill, but with more damage. It can only be found on
The Flying Anvil
The Flying Anvil
Great Maul (4)
Two-Hand Damage: (14 - 17) to (19 - 41)
Required Level: 11
Required Strength: 117
Item Level: 29
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
20% Attack Speed
+(1 to 20) to Maximum Damage
+50% Damage to Undead
+(24 to 43)% Enhanced Damage
+1 to Hammertime
+(16 to 25) to Strength
Elemental Resists +(11 to 15)%
(11 to 15)% Bonus to Defense
Socketed (2)
Two-Hand Damage: (42 - 47) to (73 - 98)
Required Level: 29
Required Strength: 168
Item Level: 40
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
40% Attack Speed
+(21 to 40) to Maximum Damage
+50% Damage to Undead
+(64 to 83)% Enhanced Damage
+(4 to 8) to Hammertime
+(36 to 45) to Strength
Elemental Resists +(16 to 20)%
(21 to 25)% Bonus to Defense
Socketed (4)
Two-Hand Damage: (93 - 102) to (153 - 193)
Required Level: 48
Required Strength: 326
Item Level: 67
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
60% Attack Speed
+(31 to 60) to Maximum Damage
+50% Damage to Undead
+(104 to 123)% Enhanced Damage
+(10 to 14) to Hammertime
+(56 to 65) to Strength
Elemental Resists +(21 to 25)%
(31 to 35)% Bonus to Defense
Socketed (5)
Two-Hand Damage: (109 - 119) to (209 - 262)
Required Level: 55
Required Strength: 640
Item Level: 85
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
80% Attack Speed
+(41 to 80) to Maximum Damage
+50% Damage to Undead
+(124 to 143)% Enhanced Damage
+(15 to 20) to Hammertime
+(66 to 75) to Strength
Elemental Resists +(26 to 30)%
(36 to 40)% Bonus to Defense
Socketed (6)
. The skill itself costs 50 mana to use +10 mana per level. The duration is also increased per level, which means you throw more hammers the higher the level of the skill.
Why my opinion should matter:
I tried making this into a build. First I began with necro, because necro can reach the lowest frames of attack speed easily. Necro had lots of ll and + %HP, which gave him the ability to survive quite well. I respecced several times to find the best possible build and got stuck in the end with: maxed embalming, death ward, Famine, Blood skeletons, resurgence and Rathmas Chosen.
However, no matter how much I tried, I always lacked either damage or defense. Even with the charms up to level 110 in my inventory, I still only had about 80 k defense which was simply too little to continue further.
As for gear, I focused on ias on my armor in order to reach the goal of 232 ias. Later on I switched weak gear options for jewels with ll and ias. But it was still not enough.
Then I tried a barbarian with this skill. While I reached the desired defense of over 430 k, Barb had a whole lot of other issues. I used Wolves + the passive for wolves, Wolf stance, Mountain King and Runemaster. Again I tried around some, but sadly my barb got stuck, too, despite being able to focus the gear not on attack speed only.
The problems:
During my playtime, even though I enjoyed it, I found out that the skill has too many restrictions to be useful later on.
First of all you have the high mana cost. 270 per swing makes you want to get mana leech on your weapon asap.
But you lack lifegain, so you also need lots of life leech on your gear.
You also have to focus at least a little bit on dexterity in order to gain back mana and life, since 20 k AR are simply not enough from level 110 on to hit bosses consistently to get enough mana back to attack consistently.
Then you also need lots of attack speed because the weapon needs a lot to get to a low frame count.
And of course, you want to deal enough damage since you are restricted to only this single weapon.
And worst of all: Most of these stats can only be obtained on the weapon apart from AR (skills not included).
To sum it up: The issue is that you need too many stats on your weapon via mystic orbs, which you can't get all until later in the game.
And the second problem is that there is no endgame option. You can't craft, get a set or a Su and you can't get a runeword. The skill hammertime simply doesn't exist elsewhere, which is sad to see, since it's really fun to use.
For reference: I always used 25% mana reg on each piece of jewelery, and 25% mana leech on the weapon, else this build is simply unplayable. And I always had at least 20 k AR. With barb I reached 8 frames per attack and with necro 7, which was really okay in terms of attack speed for kiting.
The solution:
I think there are some things you can do to improve that build.
First of all, you could make the item always spawn with 200 ED. That way you don't need to put 5 mystic orbs on the weapon to get enough DPS. That also frees up more space to get ml, ll, or even %AR. That would be really helpful to improve that build.
Then you could also reduce the mana cost. I mean, sure, it's possible to build for the mana cost. But when you consider that you also want to get attack speed and that you lack a midgame/endgame option, the mana cost just makes it harder to make the build successful, since you have to focus on too many stats and still lack enough mana against basically every boss. Even against mini bosses like the smith, Radament and so on.
As for the necromancer: I shredded the build because in order to make it successful, I'd have to focus also on minion gear in order to keep up the skeletons.
I will try a bit more to see if I can go on with eagle stance instead of wolf stance on my barb, but I think the damage is too low to do that. I could also change some of the defense runes to ELD runes so I can free up more sockets in my weapon for jewels or more damage. Or I could get a wormtongue instead of my deadfall for more ll. There are still a few things I can test out to see what works best. But even then, I think the lack of mid/endgame weapon will block me from reaching 120 or even 125.
Well, that's it.