What is the Strongest Brute Build You've Made?

[TeddyNinja]

I love my hammer swinging fix it man and have been playing around with all the different specialization options. I certainly have my favorites, but it seems like this is a class where all of the abilities can be valid.

My favorite build has to be going Smasher, because the Brute is shockingly better at applying damage over time effects than the Ranger.

The build starts with the Legion 2 handed hammer which I think is the best weapon for the Brute even in the face of Legendary and more rare weapons being available to them. It applies bleeding on the basic attack when hitting enemy armor.

Once your enemies are bleeding you follow up with Poisoned Impact. Very Vpoint heavy, yes, but we can mitigate that by taking the Vchain passive to get the two points back. The Poisoned Impact tool tip is miss leading, what the ability does is apply two stacks of poison per bleeding enemy hit to all enemies hit. That means if you hit 1 bleeding enemy they get 2 poison stacks, and if you hit 2 bleeding enemies (what we are obviously going for) they get 4 poison stacks. With the bleeding and poison mastery knowledge points this means our enemies will be taking 49% of their health as damage at their end of their next turn and absolutely puts the damage on this build through the roof. You can go all in here and add an oil to the weapon to get a good chance on applying yet another stack to these unlucky guys and it'll be lights out for them in two round whether they still have armor or not.

The final choice of passive can go any which way honestly. I like Opportunism because I naturally play with my Brute around the center of the fighting and he can easily always have protection up, and often get the damage bonus as well after applying the skill mastery to the passive.

Rounding out the build I like leather straps as a belt accessory because with medium armor and a two handed weapon the durability on my brute feels a little low and the extra 5% guard helps patch it up.

I have a video showing this build off (and breaking down the other abilities and their upgrades as well) if you want to watch it:
https://youtu.be/GEscuxdcoI0

[Maverick]

👍

[Robin of Spiritwood]

Saw the video, and recruited a new brute to try it out. Even had a Lv5 Legion Hammer in the stockpile to use right off, but feh, the new guy is Lv3.

Still, used him with a Bec de Corbin as a backup for the other Brute, and can confirm the math:
1 enemy = 2 stacks of poison.
2 enemies = 4 stacks

Extremely OP. Also fun. To get the max use though, you need to be very mobile.

Poisoner Rangers with firebombs and fireproof ointment, and Whirlwind Poison Ringleader daggers also ignore the armor, but can't get the Bleed damage. The Brute build does it in one shot too with the hammer, but the Rangers get to throw a knife and just run off after.

[Paranoiac]

It's interesting to me how many different ways people spec their teams. I tend to only run one Brute, and as a tank, using Destroyer paired with Opportunism. Not the strongest in terms of damage, but he can take some damage and hold the line.

As an aside, I've watched your YouTube videos, Teddy, and I wanted to say thanks for putting together guides for builds and quests. It's been very helpful while I jumped into Wartales. Keep up the good work!

[Aramyl]

This build seems really funny but for me critical hits run the game so my damage characters are my 3 fighters and my brutes are my tanks. And beside I prefer the Gard that give the shield. I finish the ennemy so fast they are not regroup enough faster to be smash with a 2 handed weapons.

[TeddyNinja]

Originally posted by Paranoiac:

It's interesting to me how many different ways people spec their teams. I tend to only run one Brute, and as a tank, using Destroyer paired with Opportunism. Not the strongest in terms of damage, but he can take some damage and hold the line.

As an aside, I've watched your YouTube videos, Teddy, and I wanted to say thanks for putting together guides for builds and quests. It's been very helpful while I jumped into Wartales. Keep up the good work!

Glad you like the videos! Depending on the rest of your team comp, having your Brute fill a tanky role can be the best thing.