Titan Slam Discussion - non-Hulking Form viability - Theorycraft

Updated: December 10, 2024
Currently level 21

Greetings Exiles, I am a long time player, first time forum poster. I wanted to start this discussion before I begin my Titan Slam character. It will be inspired by Alkaizer’s slam playstyle, but one thing I wanted to discuss was Hulking Form. Now I have read that many players are eyeing it and I agree that node seems juicy for the endgame. However my lament is I really want to avoid Colossal Capacity. I personally do not have an interest in inventory space and will try and avoid spending the points for it.

So my proposal is going for more of a Slam play style with Stun and the potential to shotgun slams with Aftershocks and maybe Seismic Cry. I am on vacation until Sunday so I just wanted to start the conversation and get the thread going so I can update it later.

My initial thought for Ascendancies are: Crushing Impact, Surprising Strength, Earthbreaker, and Ancestral Empowerment. I have not sat down and planned my Passive Tree but I wanted to start there and see if I can get away without Hulking Form. I will be updating this thread as I start and begin my journey.

Cheers all! Glhf

Leveling
Rolling Slam w Fist of War and Overpower
Basic Attack with Fire Infusion
Herald of Ash
Shockwave Totem

Passives:
Start: Relentless, Sturdy Metal, Brutal, Smash

Optional: Burning Strikes and Burn Away (personal choice since I am using Fire early, will respec)

Good nodes to work towards: Internal Bleeding, Giant's Blood, Unnatural Resilience, Urgent Call, Skullcrusher, Irreparable, etc. and other good nodes are all in the bottom left of the tree.

Ascendancy:
(1) Crushing Impact
(2) Surprising Strength
-?-?-?-?-?-?-?-?-?-?-?
(3) Earthbreaker(?)
(4) Mysterious Lineage vs Ancestral Empowerment(?)
considering Mysterious Lineage over 20% more dmg for survivability

Core Skills:
Armour Breaker w Rage and Martial Tempo (dual wielding maces)
Earthquake w Fast Forward and Lacerate
Infernal Cry w Premeditation
-----not there yet------
Leap Slam
Hammer of the Gods
Seismic Cry
Supercharged Slam, post-nerf (?)

Gear
Dual Wielding Maces for Armour Breaker, +1 melee skills
2h Mace - Increased Phys Dmg of course
- nothing else required atm, I got lucky with Corpsewade boots drop but, just use best in slot gear

Playstyle
1. Infernal Cry and Herald of Ash for clear (swap Seismic Cry when in party with my Cold Sorc friend because Infernal Cry doesn't explode on death when cold/frozen)
2. Pop an Earthquake and Totem down first since those take 4-5 seconds to hit
3. Rolling Slam/Basic Attack
4. Armour Breaker on Bosses/Rares

Future Goals
Stun
Respec Fire into Bleed

Thank you for reading this far and I appreciate everyone's feedback!

Addendum
As of December 10th, I noticed on Alkaizer's latest video he respec into Hulking Form. So that will be further discussion later after I get to endgame

Greetings,

since I had similar thoughts and came up with somewhat the same build I want to share my thoughts - just to add my view.

Summary of the build idea: Crushing Impact, Surprising Strength, Ancestral Empowerment and Earthbreaker. Work with Slams, AoE and Stund for CC, Damage and sustain via leech and Regen. I wanted to avoid Warcrys just because i dont like the mechanic very much.
I havent planned anything and thought i just wing it.

My game journey so far: took me almost 10h to get throu act 1, with dual weelding 1h Mace but basecally both out of the first areas playing Armourbrake and Rolling slam for "mapping" Earthquake+Totem on heavy targets for stun buildup. biggest problem: not enough damage to make an impact during stunwindows. In act 2 i stuggled further till lv 28. at this point i ascended anf took crushing impact. after 20+ tries on the bone Mammoth i found a really nice 2hander with ~100 phys damage. Then i took some time playing around with the automatic weapon swap and set the weaponset skillpoints to Impair/Reaving and Singular Purpose/Shockwaves respectivly. Last change was Harald of Ash. After that it was smooth till 2nd part of dreadnought and i beat the actboss on the 3rd try (around lv 35).

Passive nodes: Skullcrusher and Irreparable felt big. Pile On and Aftershock are also nice i guess.

My Skillloop now:
for (small) white packs: just Rolling Slam oneshot or armour break+single autoattack with the 1handers
for bigger mobs: run half way towards Pack attracting more an laydown earthquake, slightly retreat and rolling slam in the whole mob. somthing will die and harald of ash do the rest. by the time the rolling slam is done earthquake goes off an kills stuff that didnt got hit till now.
bossing or rare mobs is the same Earthquake + Rolling Slam for damage and stun build up keeping the armourbrake with fast hits with weaponswap inbetween.

next thing i plan to do is going Burning Strikes via Ignite chance for better constancy. Also i thought about using Sunder but i need to figure out a way to get the Armourbrake form a distance..

your build looks fine for me, but i am worried about the defences later in the game for both of us.

sorry for writing errors ;)

Hey!

I am level 15 coming close to ending Act 1 and winging my Passive Tree also. It seems pretty easy to respec the regular tree. The Ascendancies each cost about 2k gold so, will avoid slipping up there. The character is super tanky and fairly easy to play. I got lucky with drops and have some serious Increased Phys damage on gear. It is very bad when you get surrounded because attack speed is so slow they can swarm easily and kill me. But I'm only 3 deaths so far and 2 are from Draven the Eternal Praetor. So it's very safe.

I really have no idea how the Weapon slot passives work. I'll need to research that, right now just saving a bank of them. I imagine it'll be nice for min/maxxing

Passives:
Like I said, I'm modeling the build after Alkaizer so I have to prop up what he suggested: Internal Bleeding, Giant's Blood, Unnatural Resilience, and Urgent Call. I see Skullcrusher and Irreparable, etc. and they are all in the bottom left of the tree. So I'm definitely going to make a straight shot down there after I pick up some Fire nodes for early lvling, will respec out into Bleed after some time.

We have a similar playstle I just am using Infernal Cry early instead of HoA. HoA may be nice easy way without the Cry. One minor note is my friend is a Cold Sorc and Infernal Cry doesn't seem to work with his Freeze. So I will get Seismic Cry when I play with him.

I suppose to combat our high damage low defense I will skip Ancestral Empowerment and get the 15% life one for Hp. I'm slowly updating this thread. Still in Act 1, but feel free to give feedback as you see. Eventually I'll upload a passive tree

Cheers

Here's my notes from his build after suffering through his recordings and some of his streams.

Ascension
Crushing Impacts > Surprising Strength

Skill Tree
brutal > sturdy metal > relentless > sturdy metal > smash > singular purpose > after shocks > beef
beef > vocal empowerment > crushing verdicts > socket > split the earth > skullcrusher (L) > urgent call (L)
urgent call (L) > devastation > mass hysteria > battle hardened > bloodletting (R) > Overwhelm > Colossal Weapon

Early-Game Skills
OP handled this.

Mid-Game Skills
EQ > fast forward > lacerate
rolling slam > fist of war
infernal cry > corrupting cry/premeditation
totem > persistence
leap slam
auto attack > momentum > rage

after level 8 gems start using armour breaker for bosses
armour breaker > faster attack > rage

level 9 skill gems
EQ > fast forward > fist of war
sunder > hourglass > lacerate ( this becomes a big CD )
scavenged plating > vitality

first jewelers orb on earthquake
earthquake > fast forward > fist of war > fire infusion

level 11 Gem Supercharged Slam, Seismic Cry
supercharged slam > heavy swing > concentrated effect

2nd Jewelers for Supercharged Slam
auto attack >
earthquake > fast forward > fist of war > fire infusion
supercharged slam > heavy strike > concentrated effect > close combat
seimic cry > enraged warcry
armour breaker > overpower
infernal cry > premeditation > inspiration
seismic cry > raging cry
leap slam > martial tempo > rage > momentum
scavenged plating >
overwhelming prescence >

level 13 gem > hammer of the gods
hammer of the gods > second wind > lacerate

Level 3 Support Gems > ingenuity > dazing cry
hammer of the gods > second wind > ingenuity > lacerate
internal cry > premeditation > dazing cry

Notes
- In Act 3, keep an eye out for Construct Hammer "Causes Daze Buildup equal to 100% of damage dealt" on 1handers on Ogham vendor.
swap to two of these 1handers, expect to use them till you get cruel versions ( advanced construct hammer )
- Singular Purpose benefits 2H only, so your swap points set can instead use Impair + Reaving. Just notice the +15 dex and don't let it de-equip things when you use 2h for slams.
- I run vitality + precision slotted into scavenged plating instead of overwhelming prescence
- I run martial tempo > momentum on leap slam because I get lost in every zone.
- Make sure you set specific abilities to use your 2h weapon set. The only ability that should use the 1handers is armour break. Use the > arrow on the gem tree, then select the weapon set in the bottom.

Playstyle
Node has three nodes into defense (sturdy metal, relentless, battle-hardened ). Like most PoE builds, defense is best done by investing in damage so they die so fast they don't get to hit you.
If this sounds confusing, Palsteron just dropped a great vid covering this.

- Boss Combo: Break Armor and SS/EQ to start stun > Both Shouts > EQ (which aftershocks) > Supercharged Slam > Hammer. This should truck basically anything. You're going to train to automatically seismic cry whenever you see a stun nearby.

- Trash Combos: Hit the enemy causing a stun ( leap slam or eq ) > seismic > slam with aftershocks. This can be repeated pack to pack. I also weave in infernal cry when i want some of that damage to spread.

That's as far as I've taken it. You would have to suffer more of Alks streams or videos to find what he did after Colossal Weapon on the tree.

I am currently doing Titan with Sunder as main ability. Currently lvl 59, 410 STR, just started Cruel Act 3. Currently my plan is to get some more Attack Speed to make the clear more enjoyable and if it doesnt work out i would probably stick to Boneshatter for clear and build as much damage into Sunder to one shot bosses.

Ive picked quite some Armor and regen nodes, but mostly inc Mace Damage, inc Melee damage, inc Damage with 2 handers and of course a lot of STR.

Easily killing any boss on my way, usually takes around 2 heavy stuns to kill a boss.

Not sure how well it would work out, especially considering how slow i attack (2.04s with mapping gems, 2.33s with bossing gems on Sunder), but so far i am tanky enough to just stand still and avoid the big stuff only, regen is decent.

Thanks Kaerthon and Menteto, will save this info and work towards your suggestions. I'll look into adding Sunder. I previously did not consider it. Cheers

PS - Extra shoutout to Kaerthon for your work transcribing down Alkaizer's strat

Hey, since the thread is quite active I though I'd drop some bits and pieces for new/leveling players, as there is not much knowledge around here for Titan.

I'm level 60 and Sunder with Upheaval support (+ Brutality, Heavy Swing, Aftershock) melts absolutely everything, bosses included - one stun is usually enough.

Grabbing "Bolstering Yell" (Empowered Attack Damage), "Vocal Empowerment"(Two Empowerment instances), as well as "Premeditation" support gem for Seismic Cry are mandatory. Boneshatter uses "Impact Shockwave" and "Devastate" (BS can be replaced with Rolling Slam for stun prepping with Overpower and Devastate, if you decide to grab Crushing Blows ascendancy node). Leap Slam for movement ("Holy Descent" is pretty cool). Ancestral Warrior Totem uses Armor Break supported by "Devastate".


As for Ascendancy choices, I feel like the rightmost Titan tree is not as strong as the other one. Aftershocks seem much stronger after having tested both paths. I know this is a thread for non-Hulking Form viability but I think it's a good choice for the second branch regardless, once it gets fixed and includes travel nodes in its bonus stat calculation.

Welcome Shoutenkou. Thanks for posting and I appreciate the leveling tips since I am around lvl 18.

Can you clarify what you mean in the paragraph you talk about Ascendancy? (right and left tree, etc)

Lastly, one of the aspects of my build was that I was drawing inspiration from Alkaizer. On his latest video “poe 2 when the exalt hits just right” I caught a glimpse of his Ascendancy tree and I noticed he respec to Hulking Form. I will probably still take my character to maps as is and when I hit a wall I will grapple with that decision. He also finally went Giant’s Blood and is using a 2h mace and Shield. I am not quite that far, but it gave me something to consider.

I’m going to review my char and update the body of my text soon. Cheers all, thanks for pulling through

I've only gotten 4 ascendancy points so far.
My initial choice was Crushing Impacts -> Surprising Strength; however, once I realised how powerful Aftershock effects are I immediately respeced into Earthbreaker -> Ancestral Empowerment.

Although let me make myself clear - this is purely anecdotal. I'd love to see some math behind it but we're not here yet.

"

devastation > mass hysteria > battle hardened > bloodletting (R) > Overwhelm > Colossal Weapon

Just some thoughts: at first glance going mass hysteria looks far off to me. i was looking for some attack speed too and i am currently on my way to blured motion. In your case that would be 12 % speed instead of 15% for equal number of points - plus you get dex, %dex and accuracy (and the possibility to get Cruel Methods for the 1h dual wield setup). or do i misjudge the power of battle hardened? to me it seems that you can get armour cheaper elseware.