The Undying Axefury Viking

Intro
This guide should help anyone playing The Viking up into the higher levels.

The name is pretty selfexplanatory. This Viking is pretty much undying, he chops things with an axe and he is furious.

The Viking is just awesome.

GeneralEdit
To be set up for the higher levels, you should focus on the passive skills as The Viking will deal roughly 70 to 80% of his damage with the basic attack (I like to call it the "Chopchopswuussh"). Also, spending points onto The Viking's active skills in the beginning is not worth the effort, as those skills scale pretty strong with the attribute points in strength and thus are mercilessly powerful with just a single skill point invested.

AttributesEdit
Simple route. All into strength.

Reasoning:

1. Chopchop damage   2. Insane active scales    3. Vikings have to be strong

SkillsEdit
Spend one point onto every skill to unlock it. Then spend your points onto Zeal and Critical Strike in whatever order you like. You will max these two skills at level 67. This will give you a huge chunk of damage, as The Viking will have a 40-45% chance of dealing a critical strike which deals about three times the damage of a normal hit.

Also you will have great sustain due to the naturally big hit point pool of The Viking and Zeal, which will give you a 35-40% chance to heal you for about 50+% of your health on every single hit!

At this state The Viking can already face tank and mow down most of the stuff that is being thrown at him. Just make sure not to take too many hits at once. If you get oneshot, not even the best healing source can save you. This is especially the case if Stoneskin is not active. Should you drop low on hp, get some distance, dodge projectiles and try to land some swings onto a single foe just to trigger Zeal.

After that we go ahead and spend our points onto Stoneskin and Pummel. This will make The Viking become "Undying". Stoneskin uptime and it's armor gain will be improved greatly, you will end up mitigating 70-80% of all incoming damage. Looks OP in numbers, is OP in practice.

Pummel will keep the evil foes from doing.

Doing what? Anything. It deletes the annoying part of dodging spells which could theoretically be dangerous. Well, it basically deletes the spells. Considering you engage even more directly and cold-blooded than before.

I also simply like the idea of shredding stuff that can't do nothing.

At this point your everyday Viking has become The Undying Axefury Viking!

Now the way of progression is up to you. You could go ahead with Berserk as the last passive skill. You could go with Shockwave to increase the damage of your only range attack.

I go with Seismic Slam first, as I use it the most. Compared to Odin's Fury, Seismic Slam does not delay my auto swings. This makes Seismic Slam a straight net DPS gain plus stun. It also has a shorter cooldown, making the damage gain come into count more frequently.

Secondly, I take Odin's Fury. I use this one only as a finisher for the group I am currently fighting and in the rare case I want to get the enemies away from me (Why would I want that?).

After that I am going for Shock Wave. This skill is very situational, the foes have to line up very straight for it to be really effective. It also pushes enemies further away from my axe and I usually don't want that to happen.

Then I go for Charge due to the lack of alternatives.

Lastly I take Berserk. This skill has a problem. The "below 10% hp" condition is very unstable and impossible to maintain. Therefor this will have nearly no impact.

PlaystyleEdit
Keep track of the quantity and type of mobs inside the group you want to engage. Dodge certain dangerous abilities (Multishot of the bees, multiple exploding flayers etc.). Time your active stuns properly to obtain the maximum amount of time to savely land your blows. Dodge freezing spikes. Always keep swingin' (for the Stoneskin uptime). Know when to pull back (jk).

Develop a feeling for the unique art of Shredd'n'Choppin'.

PrologEdit
I will add some photos in the near future.

Thanks for reading. See you on the slaughtergrounds fellow axe wielders.

Keep Swingin'

Scunon