Anyone 2-handing in act 3 & 4 inferno?

[Tom_S]

Was doing ok with my 2H 'till Act2. Changed to shield afterwards but it does not feel natural (to me) so trying to improve my stats to go back to my 2H axe. Frenzy/maniac + Leap + WoTB + EQ + Revenge + Warcry is my build, but will try Cleave/Broad instead. I have to increase my DPS as im only around 20k :/

@Slax no revenge? Wouldn't revenge do you better then IP?

[Lhur]

I managed to finish Inferno as a 2hand and I found that LoH is useful up until the end of ACT 2, but you simply take too much damage in ACT 3~4 to regain enough life back. I ended up dropping most of my hp regen/life on hit and focused everything on DPS/AR/Crit/Crit Hit.

I had to change to Cleave instead of Frenzy to survive in Act 3 onwards, it is either kill or be killed situation, so a few big heavy hits are a lot better than single target DPS.

I got a Mighty Weapon as well, I thought Weapon Master would provide me bonus with Axe/Fury regen, how wrong I was =(, so I would recommend finding an Axe if your crit hit is at least 200%, or go for a Sword.

Resist is a must for us, ACT 1 = ~200, ACT 2 = ~400 and ACT 3~4 I run with 700 AR with 1000 for Fire/Physical. You will need to always have Leap (iron Impact) and Ignore pain(Ignorance is a bless or the duration rune) up even for some white mobs.

The guide line I used for myself is, if I can't kill an elite within Ignore Pain/Earthquake/Wrath, I can't do this act yet. Or if you can't kill white trash within Leap/Ignore Pain/Leap.

You must have Relentless as a passive, it's such a great skill!

Act 1 I can pretty much spec anything
Act 2 I need to run with Overpower (Crushing Advance) with LoH, Wrath, Leap, Frenzy, War Cry and Revenge (Provocation)
Act 3/4 Ignore Pain, Earthquake, Wrath, Leap, Cleave and War Cry

Diablo: No I can't kill him with 5 NV! I need Frenzy (Side arm) instead of Cleave and Ancient Spear with Healing (instead of Earthquake)

Passives are always: Tough as Nail (this gives me more armor than the Vitality one, pick which ever gives you more armor), Berserker Rage (If I can get a different type of weapon I would prefer weapon master) and Relentless

If I get surrounded, I will die! So it's a lot more positioning compare to tanking build for sure, which is what made it fun!

So my current set up is.

40k DPS

8000 armor (buffed)
700 AR (buffed)
1000/1000 Physical and Fire (buffed) you will need it to survive ACT 3/4
300 Life regen
274% Crit hit
30 Crit chance

35k HP

I am using a 1200 Axe with 252 STR and 100 something Vitality + open socket with 70% emerald. A steal at 500k!

I found that when gearing, Str/Armor > Crit chance/Crit Hit > AR > Vit (provided you have at least 30k)

I am using a similar strategy and so far I am being relatively successful. I did not finish inferno yet, but I can manage act 3 without many troubles at least until siegebreaker (I am currently doing siegebreaker runs and plan to finish up inferno later). I have only one major difference from the strategy slax use. I am kind of skipping critical (I know it sounds weird...) because everything good with “crit hit/ crit chance” seems too expensive. I currently have only 21% crit chance (+8 gloves, +3 ring, +5 helm, no passives) and 115% crit hit (rings + gloves, no passives as well, no crit hit on the weapon). This turns down my damage considerably, but leaves me room to increase my defense statistics/strenght without paying fortunes for it. For example, my weapon does not have a socket or crit dmg. But it gives me 300 str, 100 vit and 1300 base dps (its a mace). I could buy it for 2 mil a week ago ( I believe that if it had all that and crit or LoH it would cost 15 mil ++, correct me if I am wrong on this)

My current set up is the following (I use all defense passives: superstition, tough as nails, the vitality one and enchantress aura)


24k dps
50k hp
1,6k str
20% crit ch
115% crit dmg
9500 armor (buffed)
1150 all res (buffed)
10% melle reduction (6% bracers, 4% chest)

I am using with WotB + EQ combo without much LoH (I have 500 from rings + amulet) or life regen (only 300). I use vengeance and furious charge with dreadnought for healing, frenzy as main attack and no ignore pain. The idea behind this set up is to mix a good enough dps (though not uber-crazy) with some defensive stats (even though I have no shield or good LoH) that allows me to survive without ignore pain efficiently. I want to kill things fast to be able to farm efficiently (24k dps allows me to farm act 1 and 2 pretty quickly) but I don’t want to be over dependant on it (with my defensive stats I can stand a few hits from act 3 mobs and fight elites without WotB and EQ for some time…). So far, it is working!

[Snerra]

LoH doesn't seem as good for a 2hand weapon user, compared to someone using a 1hander+shield or dual-wielding, because of the slow attack speed. Wouldn't life steal and life regen always be preferable?

[SlaX]

Was doing ok with my 2H 'till Act2. Changed to shield afterwards but it does not feel natural (to me) so trying to improve my stats to go back to my 2H axe. Frenzy/maniac + Leap + WoTB + EQ + Revenge + Warcry is my build, but will try Cleave/Broad instead. I have to increase my DPS as im only around 20k :/

@Slax no revenge? Wouldn't revenge do you better then IP?

I can use Revenge up to ACT 2, but I find that ACT 3~4 monsters just hits too hard for my Revenge to be able to heal me back up to full, I found the life steal From Ignorance is a Bliss a lot better, I wish I could keep Frenzy on for Act 3+ but without Revenge, I needed an AOE DPS so Cleave's picked.

My build is not as sturdy as Lhur =P, simply because I found gears with crit/crit hit too expensive with AR, so I ended up pumping crit/crit hit/strengh and only picked 2 Resistances to go pass 1000.

LoH doesn't seem as good for a 2hand weapon user, compared to someone using a 1hander+shield or dual-wielding, because of the slow attack speed. Wouldn't life steal and life regen always be preferable?

I don't know if they will fix it, but Overpower (Crushing Advance) makes LoH a god send against Molten/Plague/Poison people, that's why I need it for Act 2 =P

[mongol]

I don't know if they will fix it, but Overpower (Crushing Advance) makes LoH a god send against Molten/Plague/Poison people, that's why I need it for Act 2 =P

This.

Get enough crit %, hit fast, and it will recharge every 4 seconds too.

Go dual wield. Double up on important mods.

[skedastic]

I can farm Act III moderately well with my 2H setup. It differs somewhat from that described above. Most of the time I use:

Frenzy (Sidearm)
Overpower (Crushing Advance)
War Cry (Impunity)
Revenge (Provocation)
Ground Stomp (Wrenching Smash)
Ignore Pain (Ignorance is Bliss)

and for passives:

Superstition, Weapons Master, Ruthless.

My unbuffed (but including passives) stats with this setup are: health: 60k, DPS: 46k, armor: 5k, resists: ~480, crit %: 30, crit dmg: 228, attacks per second=1.25. My weapon is a 1,440 DPS polearm with ~300 strength and ~500 life on hit, but no critical damage nor a socket (base attacks per second=0.95).

This setup is designed to kill elites and bosses---about half of them in Act 3 go down in less than 15 seconds. The biggest issue with 2H weapons is the slow attack speed, which I've improved with Frenzy, IAS on weapons, and the boost to polearms from Weapons Master. With full Frenzy I get 2.0 attacks per second, which is enough for LoH to matter, although LoH is mostly useful because it's triggered by the reflected damage from Overpower.

To kill elites, I rely on the enormous single-target damage from Frenzy, using Ignore Pain or Overpower as panic buttons and health boosts. To kill groups of white monsters, I run into the middle of them and hit Stomp to pull the group towards me, then Overpower and Revenge. Due to the enormous damage per hit from the polearm, this combo explodes groups of less powerful monsters and seriously cripples more powerful monsters.

Sometime I swap Wrath (Insanity) for Stomp, which is more fun but probably less effective overall. Wrath also creates tedious downtime, since I often feel compelled to wait for its very long cooldown before re-engaging some difficult enemy.