My Brands - Brand of Deception & Subjugation Runemaster Build Guide

• Highly mobile & large skill coverage makes it a great Monolith Farmer
• Low APM required. 80% of the time it's simply Fireball once, Flame Rush, repeat!
• Prefer to use one button instead? Fine, just spam Flame Rush, you go king/queen!
• Scales very well with SuffixChance to Shock on Hit and SuffixChance to Chill on Hit items
• Low offensive requirements in passives and skills means you can focus on Health, Ward and damage reduction through Reowyn's Frostguard and Flame Rush's Runic Eclipse 3/3
• SSF friendly - no uniques required for build to function

• Major boss damage - while significant - requires prep and has downtime, it is reliant on 200 charge Static (not required for regular bosses)
• Does not generate as much ward as cast speed stacking Runemasters; as such it needs item investment to stay alive against more challenging content like T4 Bosses
• Does not like to remain stationary; Flame Rush is a significant source of ward and damage reduction

MY BRANDS gameplay loop:

1. Throw an unspecced Fireball.
2. Flame Rush in the same direction, triggering an orbiting Static Orb, which triggers Brand of Subjugation and Brand of Deception.
3. After accumulating 200 Static charges, pop it on a large boss, triggering a 800% more damage Brand of Deception.
4. For defenses, use Runic Invocation for Reowyn's Frostguard.
5. Use Flame Ward just before using Flame Rush if available.
6. Enjoy!

Mechanics

The build relies heavily on stacking SuffixChance to Shock on Hit and SuffixChance to Chill on Hit modifiers to scale Brand of Deception and Brand of Subjugation. Order's Imposition 6/6 allows the former to scale with shock chance; Branding Cold 1/1 allows the latter to scale with chill on hit chance. The ailments scale via the applying skill's More damage multipliers and provide 1-2% more damage per 1% shock/chill on hit chance.

Since Brand of Deception is flexible on what applies it and merely has a requirement of 15+ mana cost, I use a weaker version of it via Static Orb for clearing and use Static with its massive 4% more damage multiplier per Static charge (up to 200 charges/800% more damage!) for bosses.

Mechanically, mind that Brand of Deception or Brand of Subjugation do not scale with conditional shock/chill chances, such as PrefixChance To Shock On Hit With Lightning Skills or Circle of Elements but only generic chance. If the shock/chill chance does not appear on your character sheet, it does *not* work with the two. Yes, this means The Invoker's Static Touch does *not* scale Brand of Deception!

Until level 30~, use a different skill such as Fireball with Conflagration 4/5, Spreading Inferno 4/4 and Wildfire 5/5 - Just a suggestion, but feel free to use another skill if you're willing.

Once available, switch to Flame Rush. Brand of Subjugation should get you going for the campaign.

Then, layer Static Orb and Static once you have access to Brand of Deception, around level 50.

End-game goals involve:

1. Hunting for Grand blessings via Corrupted timelines.
2. Cap out your critical strike avoidance or critical strike reduction via SuffixArmour and Reduced Bonus Damage from Crits modifiers on Belts, Gloves and Boots or SuffixCritical Strike Avoidance in combination with Grand Survival of Might.
3. Finding uniques with SuffixChance to Shock on Hit such as Stormcarved Testament, Oceareon or Vilatria's Storm Crown.
4. Finding said shock chance uniques with Legendary Potential and gamble at them with Temporal Sanctum. Prioritize PrefixIntelligence and PrefixElemental Damage Over Time on them.
5. Acquire more Ward via rare dedicated Ward uniques. You got a lot of options here, e.g. Twisted Heart of Uhkeiros, Frostbite Shackles, Vessel of Strife and more. Adjust as needed if you feel like you need more ward.

Feel free to use the Build Planner loot filter; personally I sought items that had least one affix I needed, then two, then filtered out items that do not have at least one affix I needed or class-specific items. I recommend you build it as you go and narrow it down according to need.

Spine Rod, Argent Sceptre and a high penetration Crescent Axe are great weapon bases for this build.

What about Brand of Trespass?

While Frost Wall is a decent applicator, generic ignite chance is not as available on uniques. I find it a bit too mana costly and unwieldy, personally.

If you wish to pursue this path, swap Flame Rush for it, swap SuffixChance to Chill on Hit modifiers with SuffixChance to Ignite on Hit modifiers and use Static Orb manually.

Personally, I'd recommend using Maehlin's Hubris and bleed chance sources to have a dedicated ignite + bleed chance build.

What are some other Runic Invocation options?

Plasma Orb has great coverage and uptime.

Covenant Arc gives you valuable shock chance, but its range is stubby and the limit on targets makes it awkward to use outside of a single-target scenario, in which case I'd rather have a defensive option.

Trinity of Elements is great early on, however since we do not scale any spell damage, it will eventually fall off.

Do I need Brand of Subjugation? Why not focus on just one element?

While you should primarily focus on hit SuffixChance to Shock on Hit, it's not necessary to focus on both brands. In that case, get SuffixChance to Slow on Hit on your weapons as your secondary suffix as an alternative.

I need *more* shock chance! Where can I get more?

Static Orb provides up to 100% via Charged Allies 5/5.

Glyph of Dominion provides up to 80% via Shocking Grasp 4/4.

Covenant Arc gives 100% per stack. It technically stacks , but since each stack lasts only 4 seconds, you can rarely get more than that. I find using Runic Invocation and applying my source of damage only every third and fourth cast way too clunky.