[0.5] Lexd's Nightfall Titan Shield Warrior Build feat. The Coming Calamity!

Nightfall Titan Shield Warrior Build: Skill & Support Gems

Soaring Midnight and Embrace the Fall are the star players here; the first portion of the attack is the thrown, projectile portion, and the second part of the attack is the teleport and slam down. We are mostly interested in beefing up the teleport + slamdown, so we socket it with things like Aftershock II and Fist of War III (the latter support gem we actually bypass the 14 second cooldown quite often with how we are spec'd).

Momentum is a very strong support gem, allowing us to gain 40% MORE damage if we move far enough while using the skill, which is 2 metres. Melee range is basically ~1 meter so this requirement is basically a non-factor, though I have heard reports of this potentially not working so I will update the guide after some testing if this is not the case. Verglas gives us a strong "Gain % of Damage as Cold Damage" buff everytime we destroy our Grim Pillars, which we should be doing EVERYTIME we Slam to reset the cooldown. This buff also scales with Ice Crystal health, hence why we have some support gems and our annoint aimed at boosting that up.

Grim Pillars, we are spamming this all the time. Always always ALWAYS cast this before you Slam so that you reset the cooldown. There may be situations where you forget, or it may be a little harder to cast them, but you should be hitting them 99% of the time with your slams, or else you have to wait ~4 seconds for the next Embrace the Fall to be usable. Astral Projection is important so that we can cast this wherever we want via our mouse cursor, Spell Cascade is also important so that we create enough Grim Pillars to destroy; without Spell Cascade sometimes enemies can wipe them all out before you have a chance to destroy one. Lastly, Glacier for boosting up their health and therefore our damage through Verglas.

Herald of Ice is granted to us for free from The Coming Calamity, and it is here to help us clear more efficiently; we are freezing and shattering things all the time with Embrace the Fall, and it is socketed in a way to increase it's AoE and damage. There is an alternative route here; if you wanted to create the classic Herald of Ice "chaining effect," you would socket this with Armour Explosion, Stun II, Armour Demolisher II and spec into Shattering Blow with Weapon Set 1 points. You may need to grab some "Phys Damage Gained" on your weapon instead of Cold Damage, but this will create a chaining effect that will assist your clears EVEN MORE, though clearing is already feeling like a breeze.

Herald of Thunder and Herald of Ash are also both granted to us for free from the same chestpiece, and both are socketed to just help with clear once again. Blind II is on Herald of Thunder just for a bit of pseudo-survivability and clear assistance, making mobs less likely to hit and less likely to Evade, while Herald of Ash is just obviously socketed for AoE, Damage, and a longer duration on enemies via Prolonged Duration II.

Freezing Mark is something I am casting quite often while clearing, it is very easy to freeze things everytime your slam and even sometimes with the thrown portion, Soaring Midnight. It's mostly socketed for utility, though Charged Mark is a strong inclusion so that targets create Shocked Ground beneath them when they become Frozen, which is just a huge damage boost for all types of damage.

Breachlord's Rift and Mark for Death II are here as well, for a way to increase our damage against targets with Fully Broken Armour since this will now apply to our Cold and Lightning Damage. However, as someone pointed out, I think it may make sense to swap Breachlord's Rift into Resonating Shield since that effect is not tied to the Support Gem "actually triggering" or anything, just any supported skill that Fully Breaks Armour will make that debuff apply to Cold and Lightning damage. Will update in the near future if this is the case.

Infernal Cry to boost up our Slams, that's basically it. Socketed for mostly utility, though Vruun's Aftermath is a strong inclusion that let's us gain many more Empowered Attacks if we hit enough Grim Pillars while shouting.

Refutation is doing a lot of heavy-lifting with the survivability here, until I can get more life! Socketed for pure cooldown reduction and utility; I use this one riskier Slams or if I get cornered in a bad situation, this doesn't make you invulnerable, but it will save you many times since you are blocking all hit damage from all directions while the buff is active. It also inflicts the "Parried" debuff on targets, making them take 50% MORE Damage, which can assist greatly by helping you wipe out some stronger targets in those high-risk situations, and if you can manage to time this during boss fights as you are slamming, you will also be critting them down a lot faster too.

Resonating Shield is mostly used in boss fights, to Fully Break Armour and buildup Rage in the process. We're not leaning that heavy into Rage on this build but it's still a strong damage boost. Very flexible sockets here, throw in what you want, though I think Rage III is a must, and feel free to try out Breachlord's Rift as we discussed earlier.

Time of Need feels like it contributes to survivability more than other Spirit Gems, though I think I may give Wind Dancer a whirl at some point as well.