The Blender 2.0 Build Guide

Excellent AoE clear thanks to Echoes and PrefixIncreased Warpath Area

High move speed from Darkstride and PrefixMelee Void Damage stacking

Solid Single Target largely due to Maw of the Deep

Wings of Argentus and Throne of Ambition make it very tanky

Immune to stuns thanks to Warpath

New Player, Disability, and SSF friendly

High performer with all content (Monolith of Fate, Arena, Dungeons)

Not a very involved playstyle. Most of the skill comes from player positioning, not skill timing and CD management

Gameplay

This may be the easiest build to play in the game, with a 2 button rotation creating 90-95% optimal gameplay, and a slightly more complex rotation reaching 100% optimal. I'll also discuss an alternative that may seem like a significant damage buff from Volatile Reversal in exchange for a bit of risk, but is actually not worth it.

90-95% optimal rotation: Channel Warpath100% of the time. Only stop channeling to pick up loot, and don't do so unless you're sure there are no enemies around. Dropping Warpath means you lose 40% DR from Wings of Argentus, a ton of armor from Grand Patience of Herkir, and your resistances from SuffixAll Resistances While Channelling. Alternatively, it is possible to pick up items while still channeling, but the constant movement makes this more difficult. When confronting tankier enemies, use Anomaly on the enemy to increase the damage they take. This is an instant cast, so channeling will be maintained. Tankier enemies should also be 'orbited' by circling around the fringe of their hitbox, just enough so Warpath is connecting but not so much that they can easily hit you. Avoid telegraphs by changing direction when necessary, or moving out and quickly moving back in as soon as possible.

100% optimal: At the start of the encounter and before engaging enemies, cast Sigils Of Hope until reaching max stacks, then immediately use Volatile Reversal to get mana back. From here, continue to follow the above rotation.

High risk alternative: This section is mostly to address the inevitable questions about adding Volatile Reversal into the build by explaining the issues with the strategy and therefore why I don't recommend it. The way you would typically run this is by speccing into VR (you have two free slots, so no downside) and taking Terminal Void Rift, Incipient Void Rift, and Harbinger of Dust 3/3. Use Volatile Reversal on tanky enemies, and if you align both Void Rifts properly, they will take 60% increased damage. Unfortunately, there are three problems with this strategy.

1. The increased damage from Void Rifts is additive with any increased damage from Anomaly, so if both are up at the same time the damage isn't as impactful.
2. The playstyle is risky due to Volatile Reversal not being an instant cast skill, so using it will reposition the player while also dropping most of their defenses for a split second, leaving them exposed to possible one shots.
3. Because Reversal isn't instant cast, there's a major offensive downside that pretty much negates any benefits, and that is because of how echoes are generated by Warpath. In order for echoes to proc from Warpath, the player must have already been spinning for two full seconds. However, whenever we use Volatile Reversal it breaks the channeling of Warpath, which causes the two second timer to reset. Echoes only last for two seconds, and the debuff from Volatile Reversal that increases damage taken only lasts for four seconds, so this means that at max echoes will only be generated for half of the time that the debuff is on the enemy, and for the other two seconds you'll almost certainly be doing much less damage then if you never used Reversal in the first place.

For all of these reasons, I cannot recommend using Reversal to buff damage in this build.

Mechanics

The build takes advantage of a number of synergistic mechanics that I will outline below, divided into offensive, defensive, and clearing sections.

Offense

The #1 reason this build works so well is due to echoes from the Void Knight skill tree. They act as both a damage multiplier (since multiple echoes can hit the same target) as well as providing incredible clear that lets the player zoom through content. Because of this, Echo Knight 1/1 in the Warpath skill tree and Echoing Strikes 5/5, Time Legion 10/10, and Avatar of Regret 1/1 in the Void Knight passive tree are all mandatory.

The second reason this builds works is due to Maw of the Deep 3/3 in the Warpath skill tree. This node provides an incredible 180% damage multiplier when enemies have capped Time Rot on them. Because capping is so important, we'll also be taking Rot Ripples 6/6, Rot Grip 5/5, and Time Legion 10/10 in the Void Knight passive tree. Because Warpath has 40% less chance to apply ailments, we're going to want a bit more Time Rot chance, so we'll take advantage of Apoclypse Whirl's conversion of Ignite to Time Rot and also pick up Phoenix Strike 10/10 from the Paladin tree.

Defense

Thanks to two incredible uniques and a blessing that is almost solely valuable for Warpath, we have multiple layers of defense that allow us to have near similar DR to shield builds while using a 2 hander. First, we have Wings of Argentus which , since Warpath is classified as a movement skill, provides us with a permanent 40% DR to all sources of damage. We also have Throne of Ambition, which when combined with Grand Patience of Herkir, can reach over 10k armor against bosses, which equates to about 75% DR against physical hits and 55% against non physical (level 100 zones). SuffixAll Resistances While Channelling also makes it easier for us to get resistances, which opens up some available suffix slots for other defenses (although we'll have to overcome Reckless Spin). Armour Clad 5/5 also provides a nice defensive boost against nearby enemies, which will almost always be the case for tankier enemies, including boses.

Clear

Our ability to clear in the Monolith of Fate quickly and efficiently is powered by three things. First, the fact that our echoes will spin in place behind us means we can continue to run towards the objective while still killing enemies along our path which will provide us with bonus stability. Second, one point in Battlemaster's Blade 1/2 and Iron Reach 1/3, along with 3-4 idols with PrefixIncreased Warpath Area makes for a sizable warpath area, which the echoes themselves will replicate. Third, the use of the movespeed buff from Darkstride along with a copious amount of PrefixMelee Void Damage from sources which include Void Blades 8/8, Apathy's Maw, and Shattered Chains, coupled with the haste buff from Wings of Argentus, allows us to move at over 100% movespeed when well geared at endgame. But even before that, 75+% is well within reach fairly early on. If that weren't enough, we also can't be stunned while channeling Warpath, and as a hidden benefit, Warpath has a 'pass through' effect on enemies that is similar to Illusory Boots from Diablo 3.

Leveling with Warpath is a pretty fun and generally relaxing experience. Stuns in the early game can be particularly frustrating, but you cannot be stunned while channeling Warpath, so a major point of annoyance for many players while leveling is completely avoided. Prioritize getting a weapon with SuffixHealth On Melee Hit as soon as possible (you can use any melee weapon type, but a two hander will be the highest damage). This will easily carry your sustain all the way to World Eater and can even supplement it while you work on building enough damage to fully benefit from leech. Filling the other suffix slot on your weapon with a DoT (SuffixChance to Poison on Hit, SuffixChance to Ignite on Hit, SuffixChance to Bleed on Hit) is a big dps bonus that will help with bossing in particular. Added melee damage of any type (i.e. PrefixMelee Physical Damage) and PrefixMelee Attack Speed are also good choices. As for the rest of your gear, focus resistances (especially phys and the main resistance type of that chapter) and health. Jade Amulet and Mournful Pennant are nice base types to seek out early on. Try to get boots with PrefixMovement Speed and continue to upgrade to the highest movespeed possible. Everything else is a bonus.

In the Warpath tree, you can go one of two ways. You can either pick up Reckless Spin early and accept the increased elemental damage taken but be able to spin freely (not recommended in HC), or jump in and out of Warpath while using a no/low mana skill like Vengeance, Rive, or Hammer Throw as a filler. Once you have access to Time and Faith, you can use Vengeance or Rive to generate your mana quickly, minimizing the amount of time you'll be out of Warpath. Pick up at least two points in Quicksilver Wind relatively early to speed up your clear, but also focus on getting to at least Echo Knight in the void side of the tree by the time you get your mastery, so that you have access to echo procs.

By the time you're in Monos (or chapters 8-9 if you choose to do those) you should be focusing on getting your echo chance and Time Rot chance as high as you can. Make sure to pick up Maw of the Deep 3/3 along with Rot Ripples 6/6, Rot Grip 5/5, Echoing Strikes 5/5, Time Legion 10/10, and Avatar of Regret 1/1 (don't skip over World Eater 6/6 on the way). Once that's done, you can push the Paladin tree to get access to Sigils Of Hope. At this point, the main mechanics of the build are fully functional and you can fill in the rest as you gain levels.

Gearing

Once you've hit endgame (reached MoF), there are several items you're going to want to acquire as soon as possible Here is a general strat, in order of how quickly you can start to farm them.

Siphon of Anguish is a very common drop off of Shade of Orobyss, which you will encounter often while pushing through a timeline web. Take him out early, and you'll likely find one on the first kill. You can also farm him for versions with legendary potential, but I suggest waiting until you've reached empowered timelines before worrying about making legendary items.

PrefixIncreased Warpath Area idols provide a lot of benefit and don't require a lot of effort to farm. Completing echoes with idol rewards is your best option, and it's worth deviating a little bit on a web in order to get these. If you happen to get Pride of Rebellion on your Abomination kill, that's a bonus.

Darkstride is a common world drop, meaning there is no specific boss to target. If you happen to get a Rune of Ascendance, this would be a good place to use it. Otherwise, you can farm it off of the Spirits of Fire timeline (preferably empowered).

Wings of Argentus and Throne of Ambition drop from the same boss: God Hunter Argentus in The Stolen Lance timeline. Wings only drops in empowered, and Throne benefits from corruption, so I highly recommend farming them together. You can either choose to farm these as soon as you hit empowered or pick up a few blessings first. Grand Patience of Herkir

and Grand Survival of Might are good choices if you decide to go the blessings route.

Apathy's Maw also drops off of Shade of Orobyss. It requires 50+ corruption in order to drop, which effectively means you'll need to wait until empowered timelines to farm this. As soon as you hit empowered, I recommend focusing on it while doing Wings and Throne runs.

Shattered Chains drops off of 120+ corruption versions of Shade of Orobyss. It isn't a particularly necessary part of the build, and doesn't gain nearly as much benefit before you have Grand Patience of Herkir. It should drop naturally as you're killing shades while farming blessings once you get over 120 corruption.

Strategies

Monolith of Fate - Due to the nature of how timelines work, there are currently two highly desirable rewards from completing each echo. First, the echo reward itself, which is specific to each echo and clear to the player before they enter the echo. Second, stability, which is gained both from killing enemies in an echo and from completing the echo. It turns out that both of these rewards encourage completing echoes as fast as possible, especially on this particular build. Completing echoes quickly gives the player more echo rewards per hour. Additionally, since each echo rewards a baseline level of stability, the more echoes that are completed, the more of the stability reward is earned. Furthermore, echoes that are further from the center reward more stability and give better echo rewards, so pushing outwards as fast as possible grants access to the better rewards sooner. And if that weren't enough, we also want to push through the timelines as fast as possible to get to empowered and begin to farm our blessings and other rewards that are only available in empowered.

The one downside typically from going fast is that we lose out on bonus stability from ignoring enemies in our way. However, with this build, our echoes will clean up basically anything that is chasing us, mitigating this problem completely. It's also not really worth deviating from the objective since it actually slows down stability gained per hour due to getting fewer echo stability rewards (we also get fewer general echo rewards). All of this is to say that generally, the most efficient strategy for the Monolith is to run directly at an objective as fast as possible and complete it as quickly as possible, only maybe stopping to kill a rare here and there that might not die from our echoes alone. The one downside to this strategy is that some items will drop off screen (since the enemy died off screen) and if it's not a unique we won't know about it, but this is a more than acceptable loss since the echo rewards are a much better source of items than random enemy drops anyways, and we'll get more echo rewards with this strategy.

Arena - There are two strategies to dealing with enemies in the arena. The first is to orbit enemies, allowing our substantial area with Warpath to hit enemies while staying out of melee range. This also allows echoes to be created, which require the player to move a certain distance in order to work (moving back and forth generally will not generate echoes unless the movement is far enough). This will work for most enemies, but at higher waves some may be too dangerous and require the player to have substantial distance between them and the enemy in order to counter any projectiles or telegraphs. In this case, the player can just run directly away from the enemy (while avoiding projectiles and telegraphs) and allow the echoes to do all the work. Since enemies will always run directly towards the player, they will always end up running through the echoes, which will also maintain leech uptime for the player.

This filter adjusts as you level. Especially valuable affixes are highlighted in red. I very recently tested it in a SSFSC run to empowered, so everything should be solid.

https://pastebin.com/ZMCSEVXx