Insane marauder win

[random_pal]

Hello, I recently won with an ogre marauder and I wanted to say I had a blast with this build. I took windblade as my first prodigy and then legacy of the naloren. Now, at first I thought that maybe legacy + flexible combat could have been a better combo, but after I got legacy of the naloren I didn't regret my choice. With GWF on, getting a second windblade was devastating, by endgame I was hitting for 4-6k with a single windblade (I unlocked overpowered in high peak). This also has great sinergy with unstoppable as you can be sure you kill a lot of trash mobs. I had to invest a bit into combat veteran because total thuggery drains stamina for every mob you hit and a single windblade was draining too much stamina. Unending frenzy took care of that.
I didn't even use unstoppable in my last fight. I got in, I used windblade and Elandar was left with 25% hp. One flurry took him away for good and I was even able to save Aeryn.

I went on to kill athamaton (had many turns of unstoppable left) and Linaiil too.
I was almost (almost) able to clear the room of death during a single unstoppable as the first windblade killed all 4 dragons in the center (lol).

Now, I had great gear and all, but this was awesome. None of my other insane winners had such insane damage.

This class is pretty weak early on and midgame is not much better because you have poor life rating and no defense untill you get unstoppable. Even then, it's very hard to use it because you're left with no stamina.
I died many times during this run, things started to get better once I got a "second wind" armor to manage stamina.

Overall, the class felt very well designed as the trees have great synergy and once you get around lvl 35 you really start to have a lot of fun. I'm a bit sad marauder got changed completely (and ogre got nerfed) in 1.5

Here's the char if someone is intrested: https://te4.org/characters/207170/tome/ ... 7544bff5e4

Edit: I liked the class gameplay so much I decided to do another run. This time I picked cornac as you can unlock Battle tactics and Bloodthirst while still having 4 inscrtiptions. Cornac allows your build to be ready much faster and not having to wait for legacy of the naloren I went 5/5 in weapon and dagger mastery which made my damage very good from start to finish. The run was much easier and I never died until lvl 33 or so. My deaths were all due to overconfidence rather than hard situations. I played very carefully early game then when I got my build going I started making bad calls because I felt "unstoppable"
A big mistake I made in the previous run was not unlocking harmony but I had very few generics to spare since ogre needs big investment.
By endgame I had 7k DPT and 20k flurry, when I killed the final bosses I had 2 turns of unstoppable left (at 200% blobal speed and 150% attack speed, so I had 4-5 bumps left which is a lot of damage).
When Athamaton died I still had 4 turns left.
I killed Linail before doing all the prides because I felt like doing something stupid. I died once but I got her down even if I had bad gear at the time. I guess this tells how powerful this build is .
I found out you don't really need a "second wind" armor. I invested into will to increase my stamina pool and into adrenaline surge. Adrenaline surge will not allow you to use your abilities if you get at 1hp during unstoppable but your sustains will not deactivate. So by mid game you have the stamina to pop unstoppable, DF, flurry and cripple. After that you'll probably be at 0 stamina but high global speed and adrenaline surge will keep total thuggery and momentum up while you bump everything to death!

Overall, this char was stronger during both early game and endgame. The damage output was higher but since I had elemental harmony I can't really compare the two. Maybe legacy of the naloren + flexible combat is a superior single target combo but windblade is just too useful. Every time I had to go upstairs in High peak I would buff as much as I could and even when I got crazy spawns with 2-4 rares and a unique I could just nuke the whole room killing everything so that I could deal with the strong one.
I guess my next serious run will be a cornac marauder in 1.5!

Link to the char: https://te4.org/characters/207170/tome/ ... 3060e67506


Edit: so I have even another winner, another cornac marauder. I guess I'm in love with this class. Nothing new with this build. I didn't have any great item so I skipped charm mastery and invested a bit into the mobility tree. I found out Light of Foot is pretty effective as you have step up so you walk around a lot.
Link to the char: https://te4.org/characters/207170/tome/ ... df5d4ecb32
If you want to see why I love this class so much, here's some videos to show how crazy the damage can get:

Lina: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC-o7yvfOfo
Athamaton: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tfq2hWM ... e=youtu.be
Final bosses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6T2XquZ ... e=youtu.be

[Tasidar]

Grats! Inspiring. I'll have to try it out on my nooby normal rogue difficulty!

[random_pal]

Grats! Inspiring. I'll have to try it out on my nooby normal rogue difficulty!

Thanks! I would strongly recommend to pick cornac, I did even another run as a cornac marauder and I'm pretty sure it's the best choice: easier early game, flex combat + windblade is the best combo and you can have 5 inscriptions. Quick leveling also helps a lot since marauder gets stronger and stronger as you level up.
Be sure to use a 1h weapon + dagger and put points into both weapon and dagger master as soon as you can. Riot born and unflinching Resolve are important but killing everything in 1-2 actions does a lot more to help you survive .

Windblade is the best choice for a first prodigy. I'm sure many people would disagree on this but after 3 wins I feel windblde has more utility than flex combat unless you have amazing gloves (which is not likely at lvl 30).
Also, when you get elemental harmony, be sure to have an item with fire wall in your inventory. The way you use elemental harmony is by hitting yourself with a wand as your first buff since it lasts 10 turns.
If you want to see what a marauder endgame looks like I linked a couple of videos. I'm not a youtuber so there's no editing, nothing fancy, just unlisted 1m videos.
Last notes: you should unlock battle tactics as you first category as step up and GWF are both amazing. Keep some points floating into backstab so you can crit a lot even during early game.

GWF ---> stun your opponent so you get more crit chance from backstab ---> flurry. Every dangerous enemy should die with this

Very important: unstoppable works better if you use it before engaging. It's not something you want to use when you're getting low on health. First, you might find yourself without enough stamina to use it and second, your inscriptions need to be off cooldown when unstoppable ends, in case you didn't get the kill.
The way you survive after unstoppable ends is by stacking as many hit-points as you can (shield+heroism+regen) and running until it's safe to engage again.
Windblade helps a lot even in these situations: I killed some tanky melee randombosses by just equipping 2-3 +movmenent speed items and running around waiting for windblade to come off cooldown. Since it has a big range you can hit stuff outside of weapon range and after you hit them they're disarmed, which means you have some turns you're sure they're not going to be able to do a lot of damage.

[ster]

ogre is probably the best race given that you want to do big damage while unstoppable and Naloren/Sawrd do big damage

[random_pal]

ogre is probably the best race given that you want to do big damage while unstoppable and Naloren/Sawrd do big damage

I thought the same, that's why my first win was an ogre marauder. But since I consider windblade mandatory, I'm comparing legacy of the naloren + windblade to flex combat + windblade and single target damage is not that different when you compare the two. You also lose a lot of your you off-hand damage by picking ogre, so...
Sawrd is another matter of course


Now, I loved my ogre marauder, but picking cornac makes early game easier, your build gets going faster and you're going to do a lot of damage anyway.

[posetcay]

Damn Sawrd ruining the viability of 1h builds and somehow it still didnt got nerfed. I suspect Sawrd was the reason they nerfed Ogre too.

[Micbran]

I should hope the Sawrd isn't taken into account with balancing considering how blatantly overpowered it is.

#RemoveSawrd

[tabs]

Thanks to your ideas I had this nightmare win. A few things have changed with Marauder in 1.5.0+ (e.g Parry and Trained Reactions) but the solid core of Unstoppable, GWF, and Flurry remains.

I really liked getting Windblade at 30 while delaying Flexible Combat until 42. The AoE was very helpful against the Master/Ambush/etc. With endgame equipment I could reliably hit 10k on a Flurry and nearly 6k on a Skullcracker.