However, with the new mechanics and locations of Vaal Pact, we can still get sizeable life leech rate and more life. With Vaal Pact & Soul of Arakali (50% Increased Life Recovery Rate after Immortal Call proc on Blood Rage), we will have 60% Maximum Life Leech Rate.

 


1. Introduction

Welcome to the guide exile. Are you looking for a reliable boss killing build? A boss killing build can do not only kill bosses but do clear maps quickly without gem swaps? Do you have an itch to relive a Brutus Lead Sprinkler build? Maybe on a budget, not even requiring a Brutus Lead Sprinkler or Xoph’s Blood amulet! Or perhaps you just like to douse your enemies in hot magma balls that spill from your weapon! If this is the case, you will most definitely want to check out this Ngamahu's Ball Toss Berserker, utilizing the Ngamahu's Flame unique AXE.

This AXE quickly became one of my favorite uniques upon its release, and I have played around with a few different build styles with it. This AXE is mighty due to the fact it has a built-in Molten Burst skill that has a 20% chance to proc on hit. This Skill is very similar to Molten Strike, tossing three molten balls out on proc. Now since this skill gem is built into the weapon, we can place six support gems into the Weapon UNLINKED, and they will support the molten burst. Giving you a useful 7 Link!

Now after making my Brutus Lead Sprinkler build back in 2.6 and a Ngamahu's Cyclone in 2.5, I wanted to see how will this AXE's Molten Burst synergized with Molten Strike, mainly to see how many balls per second we could get! So along with the AXE, we will be using two Wildfire jewels to add even MORE balls to the mix! I will get into the specifics of how many shots we will be throwing out in the coming section, but for now, let’s get into how this build works and what it is capable of!

As a note, all of the footage seen in this video is done on a four-link Cyclone with Fortify and a six-link Molten Strike swapping Fire Penetration for Fortify in some scenarios, along with a+3 Molten Strike Projectiles helmet and average gear to keep it budget friendly.

2. Build Summary

The Ball Toss Zerker is a solid build for pretty much all walks of content and is exceptionally high at killing bosses (especially with the new boss life totals). It has a very cheap introductory cost, only really requiring the Ngamahu’s Axe and Wildfire jewels, and can scale very well with the more gear investments that you make, having a very high damage ceiling.

Offensively, we will be making use of two skills: Cyclone & Molten Strike. A cyclone is used for mapping to proc the Molten Bursts over enemies, while Molten Strike is used for single target or boss killing. We will also be using Avatar of Fire from the tree, since the Ngamahu’s Flame Axe converts 50% of our physical damage to fire, to perform 100% converted Fire Damage, allowing us to make full use of elemental penetration. (We need Avatar of Fire to save our Cyclone and Molten Burst thoroughly, but not our Molten Strike). We will also be grabbing:

Elemental Overload for a more elemental damage multiplier.
Iron Grip for applying our strength bonuses to our projectiles
And Point Blank to gain another more multiple to our missiles, since they do not travel very far.

Finally, we make use of Anger and Herald of Ash to gain more base fire damage, a Wise Oak flask for elemental penetration and an Ancestral Protector to grant us more attack speed when up.

Defensively, we are a Berserker, so we will mainly be making use of Cloaked in Savagery paired with Vaal Pact to keep our health pool flickering just how we like it. Along with these, we will have a Cast when Damage Taken setup with Enfeeble, Blood Rage and Immortal Call that will trigger on a Savage Hit. This weakens the offending monsters and triggers our Soul of Arakali for increased Recovery Rate to buff our Maximum Leech Rate. Depending on the map, we can also make use of Fortify on one of our links to provide users some more defense. Finally, we will be trying to get as much life on gear as possible!

With all of this, we tear through maps and shred all bosses. As always, mapping with the Ngamahu’s Axe is a blast and very satisfying. Once we get to Bosses, we throw down an Ancestral Totem and cover the boss in hot molten balls.

So how many balls are we throwing out? Well, with an endgame setup, as you see here with the Molten Strike Projectile Enchantment we will generate the following:

We are attacking at about nine attacks per second. That means from our Molten Strike we are producing a total of 90 balls per second (3 + 2 + 2 + 3 = 10 * 9 = 90).
Our Ngamahu’s has a 20% proc chance but an internal cooldown of .15 seconds, meaning it can only occur 6.6 times a second. Since we are attacking faster than this, if we get entire procs, we produce a total of 46 balls per second.
Together, this is around 136 balls per second with perfect procs.

If we add a Dying Sun to the build, it will be:
Molten Strike: 3 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 2 = 12 * 9 = 108
Ngamahu's: 7 + 2 = 9 * 6.66 = 60
Total: 168 balls per second!

Now, of course, this is perfect scenario calculations, for the most part, it will be closer to 113 balls per second with no Dying Sun accounting for average Ngamahu’s procs.
Now if you want to experiment with the build, the Passive Trees and Path of Building Pastebin are included in the Description: https://pastebin.com/Z4mgMPGg

3. Pros & Cons
Pros:
Powerful boss & single target killer
Acceptable to fast clear speed
Low entry cost, with high gear and damage ceiling
Berserker. What else is there to say?

Cons:
Vaal Pact can be uncomfortable (not Labyrinth friendly, but there are workarounds mentioned later)
Berserker Increased Damage Taken

Class & Ascendancy Options
Of course, as mentioned previously, we are going to be going to the Marauder class with the Berserker Ascendancy. We get access to universal damage life and mana leech with Pain Reaver. Cloaked in Savagery provides us with 100% of damage leeched upon taking a savage hit, increased generic damage and attack speed. This will help ensure we also hit our maximum leech rate cap as quickly as possible. Crave the Slaughter, and the smaller nodes, provide us with more mobility speed for our Cyclone if we have not been hit, or increased attack speed to proc more Ngamahu’s Molten Bursts. Finally, Aspect of Carnage provides us with a juicy 40% more multiplier, basically giving us another gem link! But this comes at the cost of taking 10% increased damage from all sources, which we do our best to mitigate.

For Ascendancy Progression, I would follow this order:
Pain Reaver
Crave the Slaughter
Cloaked in Savagery
Aspect of Carnage


4. Passive Tree & Progression

Within our passive tree, we grab the next Keystones:
Avatar of Fire - To fully convert our Cyclone and Molten Bursts from our Ngamahu’s Axe to Fire.
Elemental Overload - For the 40% more Elemental Damage Multiplier
Iron Grip - To apply all of our melee physical strength bonus to our Molten projectiles
Point Blank - For a 50% more multiplier for our Molten missiles, since they will be used with Concentrated Effect.
Vaal Pact - To keep us leeching to full life at all costs!

Here is the complete endgame passive tree:
No Xoph's Blood: http://poeurl.com/bD4m
Xoph's Blood: http://poeurl.com/bD4o

Slayer: http://poeurl.com/bD7o

Defensively, we mainly are looking to get as much life as possible.

Offensively, we pick up some Axe nodes, but we mostly focus on scaling our attack speed, projectile damage and elemental damage to best benefit our molten projectiles. We also get five jewel sockets for more life and offensive stats.

I would follow this tree progression into the final tree:

Level 30:http://poeurl.com/bD4v

For Bandits, we will be killing all of them for the extra 2 Skill Points.

You will want to get the two Wildfire jewels socketed as soon as possible to make Molten Strike feel good while leveling. These are socketed in the jewel sockets to the left and right of the Marauder start!

We also grab Resolute Technique just for leveling purposes.

Level 50: http://poeurl.com/bD4u

Here you will want to be set up to grab Avatar of Fire at level 55 when you can equip your Ngamahu’s Axe!

Level 70: http://poeurl.com/bD4r

Around this level, you will want to drop Resolute Technique for Elemental Overload and will want to ensure you start getting accuracy on gear.


5. Pantheons

Some useful Pantheons for the build include:
Major:
Soul of Arakali - To increase our Life Recovery Rate
Minor:
Soul of Tukohama - For when sitting stationary against Guardians or Shaper.
Soul of Gruthkul - For general physical mitigation in map or bosses.
Soul of Yugul - For dealing with reflect. However, it should be mostly the non-issue with Berserker leech.


Gem Links
Here are the following gem links for the build. Support gem links are shown in order of importance. 4 Relationships can go in Helmet, Gloves or Boots. All gems should be leveled to 20 unless labeled otherwise. This is generally to ensure that they are triggered by Cast when Damage Taken, as it has gem level requirement restrictions.

6 Link
Molten Strike - Multistrike - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Concentrated Effect - Elemental Focus - Fire Penetration

This is your central single target damage. As mentioned previously, you can swap Fire Penetration for Fortify if you are running a dangerous map.

6 Socket (Ngamahu’s Flame Axe - Doesn’t have to be linked)
Physical Projectile Attack Damage, Greater Multiple Projectiles, Elemental Focus, Concentrated Effect, Elemental Damage to Attacks, Fire Penetration

These supports are to be placed in your Ngamahu’s Axe and will just be supporting the Molten Burst. They do not need to be linked.

4 Link
Cyclone - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Increased Area of Effect - Melee Physical Damage/Fortify

This is your primary map clearing skill. It does not need many damage supports, due to how active the Ngamahu’s Molten Burst is. This allows you to link Area of Effect and Fortify in place of Melee Physical Damage for the quality of life and defense.

4 Link
Leap Slam, Ancestral Protector, Anger, Herald of Ash

These do not need to be linked and are supports to your primary damage skills.

4 Link
Cast when Damage Taken (lvl 1) - Blood Rage (lvl 7) - Immortal Call (lvl 1) - Enfeeble (lvl 6)

This is your Cast when Damage Taken. It will cripple monsters and Increase your Life Recovery Rate.


6. Gearing
Uniques
The only Required uniques for this build include:

Ngamahu’s Flame - This is of course required for the synergy we are making between the Molten Burst and Molten Strike combo, efficient damage conversion and original map clearing.

Wildfire Jewels - You will need 2 of these jewels to get the most efficiency and damage from your Molten Strike.

Useful, but not required uniques include:

Devoto’s Devotion - A very nice helmet for the increased attack and movement speed. It also provides some chaos resistance, but unfortunately no life. This is an adorable QoL helmet for mapping and cyclone.

Starkonja's Head - An excellent all-around helmet. It provides attack speed, critical strike chance for our EO and of course an superb life roll.

Rat's Nest - Is much like a hybrid between the Starkonja’s and Devoto’s, but does not provide any life.

Belly of the Beast - An excellent choice for getting more life on your build over a rare chest, while still allowing you to use a 6-link.

Belt of the Deceiver - Since we are not applying any other “Enemy Takes Increased Damage” modifiers, this belt acts as a 10% more multiplier to our damage, as well as providing safety against critical strikes, physical Damage, life, and resistances. A good starter belt until you get a robust life-based belt.

Xoph's Blood - This is a very expensive amulet, but provides Avatar of fire, Fire Penetration, % increased maximum life and covered enemies that hit you in ash, making them take 20% increased damage. This is the best in slot amulet, but is in no way required for the build to work!


7. Rare
For Rare Gear in general, we will be looking for gear with a lot of life, elemental resistances along with offensive stats such as added low fire damage, elemental damage with attacks and fire damage. The base type of the gear only matters for the socket colors and affixes you are trying to get. Here are the specific affixes that we want to look out for on our equipment:

Offensive:
#% Elemental Damage with Attacks or #% Fire Damage
# - # Fire Damage to Attacks
# - # Physical Damage to Attacks
#% Attack Speed
+# to Accuracy

Defensive:
+# to Maximum Life
+# to Maximum Life / +# to Innate
+#% to Elemental Resistances

Jewels
For Jewels we want to look for the following Affixes:
#% Fire Damage
#% Increased Physical Damage (Two-Handed/Axes)
#% Increased Maximum Life
#% Attack Speed (Two-Handed/Axes)
#% Increased Area Damage

There are only a few requirements for your race gear:
You will want to get at least 500+ total flat accuracy on your jewelry, gloves or helmet. This is so that you are at or above 85% chance to hit as we do not have resolute technique. I like to try and aim for 90% chance to run, as it makes our hits and critical strikes occur without much fail.



8. Enchants

 

Here are some great enchantments to work for on gear. These are of course not required and will not break the build if you do not have them:
Helmet - You will want to try and get the “3 Additional Molten Strike Projectiles” enchantment on your helmet. This adds roughly 50% more damage to molten strike. Again you can try and find this on the listed different helmets or a regular base and craft it with some life and resistances.
Boots - You will want to get “Damage penetrates 10% of enemy resistances if you haven’t killed recently”. This is a great enchant for single target fights, such as guardians or shaper, where you will not be killing monsters that frequently.


9. Flasks - Recovery


For Recovery Flasks, we will want to ensure that we have the following:
Life - Divine Life Flask
You will want this to be an instant flask, either Bubbling or Seething versions.

Utility


For Utility flasks, you will want to make use of the following:
Quicksilver Flask - This is for quick movement with Cyclone in mapping or for quickly dodging boss moves. You will want this rolled with the Adrenaline suffix for a total of 70% movement speed from a single flask!
Basalt Flask - This is the flat physical mitigation to help us defensively.
Silver Flask - This is for an onslaught, providing us more attack and movement speed for our cyclone and molten strike.

Unique
Here are some Unique flask options for this build:
The Wise Oak - This is a great cheap flask that provides a maximum of 15% elemental penetration. This container works such that it will penetrate for your highest uncapped elemental resistance. So for us, we want our fire resistance to be the highest uncapped resistance. Make sure to watch my Damage & Elemental Resistance video for more information on how resistances work and are named.

Dying Sun - This is an AMAZING flask for this build as it not only provides us some defense for reflecting monsters as it is a ruby base but two more projectiles for both our Ngamahu’s Molten Burst AND Molten Strike, bring us to 4 more shells! As mentioned previously, this seriously amps up our damage output to a maximum of 23.5% more damage!

 


10. Leveling Tips


Leveling this build is incredibly smooth and very fun. I recommend using the following unique items while Leveling when you can, to get the best results:
Level 1: Get Cleave - Molten Strike - Ruthless, along with two axes
Cleave works very well for single target as well, until we get our Wildfire Jewels Socketed
Level 4: Get an Ancestral Protector for unique target support
Level 10:
Pick up Leap Slam for movement
Cleave/Molten Strike linked with Ruthless & Maim
Level 12:
Get Sunder connected with Ruthless & Maim
Drop Cleave
Level 18:
Sunder - Ruthless - Maim - Melee Physical Damage
Molten Strike - Melee Physical Damage - Added Fire - Elemental Damage with Attacks
Begin using a Herald of Ash
Level 24:
Get Anger and begin leveling it, but don’t use it yet
You can also get and use a Hatred if you can manage your unreserved Mana with a flask. Hatred will do more damage than Anger until you have Avatar of Fire.
Level 28:
Get Cyclone - Melee Physical Damage - Ruthless - Added Fire
This is used for clearing regular enemies from here on out!
Level 38:
Molten Strike - Multistrike - Elemental Focus - Elemental Damage with Attacks
From here, you will want to fill out the rest of your gem links and supports as listed previously, using your elemental supports more as you gain added sources of elemental damage and Avatar of Fire. If you make use of the leveling uniques and proper supports, you will be cruising through leveling, and demolishing bosses. A very very fun build to level.
Note on Labyrinth: Since we are a Vaal Pact build, running Uber Labyrinth can be a pain. I recommend that you either:
Take a few more life flasks and make use of the Soul of Ryslatha minor pantheon to regenerate life flask charges for traps.
Or, Unspec out of Vaal Pact for trap sections and spec back into it for Aspirants Trials, costing three respec points in total.


11. Conclusion


All in All, this has been an enjoyable build to play. It brings a lot of damage to the table and satisfies that face tank playstyle, while also allowing you to cruise through maps! I cannot recommend playing around with the Ngamahu’s Axe enough; it just brings so much to the table. The Ball Toss Zerker is a great build and even maybe a good league starter if you can get your hands on an early Ngamahu’s, while also allowing you to expand its power through really enchants and solid rare jewelry and jewels. As always, thanks for watching and I’ll see you in the next one exile.

 

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