Overview
The Spin to Win Martial Artist is built entirely around Hollow Form, the Monk skill that spawns astral images which cast a socketed skill on your behalf. Whirling Assault is the skill of choice, and the pairing solves a problem most Hollow Form setups run into: Hollow Form applies 30% less attack speed to its clones, but Whirling Assault’s damage comes from a multi-rotation animation that attack speed barely touches. A single Hollow Form press produces a full Whirling Assault rotation, so this is a tap-and-move build rather than the slow channelled slog people assume it to be.
What makes the loop self-sustaining is Lacatonial’s Caress. With Way of the Stone Fist equipped, the gloves’ affixes are rewritten to grant a chance to give power charges to allies in your presence — and because the astral images are technically not you, their hits feed you power charges. Every power charge spent on Hollow Form spawns two additional images, which generate more charges. One common ritual unique gives the build infinite power-charge sustain with no quality investment or non-consumption stacking.
This is the creator’s own league-start build from the previous league, revised with a full league of hindsight. The final version reached over 100,000 effective HP with boss damage in the millions, and the core items never rose above an exalt or two for the entire league.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Core enabling items are common ritual drops and stayed cheap all league
- Infinite power charge sustain from a single glove slot, no supporting investment
- Enormous effective HP ceiling — over 100k EHP on the finished version
- Freeze from physical damage provides survivability from the moment the helmet is equipped
- Comes online early and scales smoothly from level 1 to endgame
Cons
- Mana sustain is the build’s real weakness and needs deliberate solving (see below)
- Clones cannot leech, cannot proc mana on kill directly, and cannot generate mana remnants
- Stacking +levels on the quarterstaff raises mana costs faster than it helps; +3 to attack skills was the practical endgame ceiling
- A 0.5.5 patch note about weapon-set skill usage may affect some tech — untested until launch
Key Skills
- Hollow Form — the engine; spawns astral images that cast your socketed skill
- Whirling Assault — the socketed payload, chosen because its rotation ignores the clone attack-speed penalty
- Hollow Focus — ascendancy skill that auto-summons bells; critical for mana sustain via secondary procs
- Shattering Palm — movement plus ice coating; its detonations proc mana on kill and mana remnants
- Well of Power — returns 5% max mana per power charge consumed and adds crit damage
Gear & Anointments
Two items define the build. Lacatonial’s Caress is mandatory — with Way of the Stone Fist it becomes the power charge engine, and it was roughly one exalt for most of last league (four exalts at league end). Heavy Frost helmet is not required but is very strong: it makes physical damage from hits contribute to chill magnitude and freeze buildup, which turns your physical Whirling Assault into a freeze machine and unlocks the Heavy Frost node’s ignore-resistance behaviour on frozen enemies. That last part matters because it makes Rakiata’s far less mandatory early, even though the build takes it eventually.
Support-wise, Urok’s Smelting plus armour break drives the armour explosions that clear packs and, crucially, proc your mana recovery. Stack a reasonable mana pool to make Well of Power’s 5%-per-charge return meaningful.
Endgame Notes
The mana problem is worth understanding before committing. Clones are not you, so kills they make do not trigger mana on kill or mana leech, and they cannot create mana remnants. The workaround is to build around secondary effects that can proc for you: Hollow Focus bells auto-spawn and are detonated by your screen-wide Whirling Assault, breaking armour and triggering armour explosions; when those explosions kill, they do proc mana on kill and mana remnants. Shattering Palm’s ice detonations do the same. Get this loop working before chasing weapon levels.
Credits & Source
Build credited to Moxsy. See the source video for the full build’s gameplay footage and voice commentary: Best League Starter I’ve Played — Spin to Win Martial Artist.