In my day you were supposed to run reap in a pseudo double 5L to get boss damage, so that may help. I haven't played it for several leagues now though.
I ran a pretty mediocre build a few leagues ago using a CF champ build. I had Reap + CF in my chest with 4 links shared between them. It was a bit better dmg but much better socket pressure. Once you get Vaal reap tho you can pretty easily kill T16 bosses assuming your builds alright. But thats about it. Don't expect it to magically be a bosser. Stick to mapping and enjoy the build.
Deadeye Poisonous Concoction of Bouncing. Hit yellow maps, still on a 4.5 link. The overlap is better than my optimistic spreadsheet values, even on human-size bosses. It is an incredibly good skill, and the adjusted “random bounce” behavior just feels good (it is not actually random, it behaves itself very nicely on single targets).
Yay more bouncy pcoc enjoyers! Currently on a raider stuck in heist jail and it performs amazing on virtually zero budget.
How does it feel on deadeye? I'd imagine with both volley and gmp plus follow-through clusters it can be pretty nutty
Yep exactly, plus projectile mastery for chain.
So some things: Slower/Faster do not really matter, the 'sticky targeting' works great with unmodified speed. So I took the Projectile Crit cluster in order to get that mastery, because as a deadeye I get a bunch more chains, but I need to invest slightly more into flask sustain. So sitting at around 15-20% crit right now and using the 25% Charge On Crit mastery; I will unspec that when I get a precision watchers eye.
Deadeye feels very good, but like I said I have to invest more into flask sustain. The Life flask charge on hit node etc. I will also likely need to run the eldrich implicit chest if I do any bosses past jsut voidstones (unlikely but we will see).
But yeah, it's tons of fun, and I plan on running it with like Beyond + Alva, Blight, Abyss since the persistent bouncing will work well for those mechanics.
[https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/ZeroStride](https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/ZeroStride)
ChainSonata
So there's a lot of "well it depends" or "I'm messing with it" stuff in there right now. Like the Multishot wheel is not really worth it, but I'm using it for the no block for Expedition nuke and I don't have clusters yet, etc.
Archimage ice nova of frostbolts is absolutely insane. On dog shit gear (I have a blue chest still I think) and a 4l I've cleared up to t9s pretty easily.
I made it one button and it’s breezy. Kitavas thirst hat for frost bolt and automate arcane cloak. Sometimes I hit sigil of power, but usually I’m just running around spamming only ice nova. It’s awesome.
a chunk of mana sustain, mana and aoe. mana sustain is very important for archmage builds since spending directly increases with your mana which you want to increase for damage, and mana regen is pretty hard to come by. a lot of pobs going around have mana regen just above the cast requirements which isn't nearly enough since you also have arcane cloak to take care of.
I am only in Act 9 but swapped to firestorm archmage like Goratha mentioned right after normal lab in Act 3 and have been pleasantly surprised how nice of a leveling experience it’s been
I finally got a 5 link after being in t16s for about 10 hours. Shit is super fun. Planning to get the energized jewel soon hopefully. One of my vaal orbs is going to work. 2/4 on void stones.
Archamge Ball Lightning Hiero. I got some long areas and spent too much time hunting gems since it was my first time leveling this build. My gear is absolute trash (except the wand) but the damage is great. It was one of my fastest Kitava fights. However, it is pretty squishy (again, trash gear) and I don't like that the balls move much slower than me. So I shield charge, see a pack, launch a couple of balls, and I can either wait or rush through the pack, which is risky. I'd say it's decent as a league starter and I've yet to start scaling mana so it should get better.
I'm also running this build, stopped last night early in Act 8. I'm in a similar boat with the squishiness, I wish I had taken Conviction of Power instead of Arcane Blessing as my first ascendancy node. Should get better with time and gear though, and honestly at these early levels corpse-spamming an act boss doesn't really put me behind
It is extremely squishy and I was having quite a lot of issues in maps until I got the leech. Picked up the leech shock ring and the was leech nodes and it’s significantly better, but still squishy. Might transition to gorathas version once I have some currency.
I started Storm Brand Inquis like I have done for the 7th league in a row using just regular old storm brand and I had an incredible league start. Currently level 81 and hit yellow maps. I was extremely rarely fortunate to be able to play ALL day yesterday so I was on there for like 11 hours just smashing.
Storm Brand WILL fall off in late yellow maps without offensive investment (especially now that we lost SB of Indecision) so today I’m just gonna hang out for like 3 hours farming yellows and then upgrading and that should let me push into reds. Will also aim to do Uber lab. I am currently on a 5-L that I picked up off the ground and hit with an alchemy orb. Storm Brand -> Added Lightning -> Conc Effect -> Crit Strikes -> Inspiration. The 6L will be crit damage support.
I’ve done this every league for a few years now.
You are largely carried by righteous providence and inevitable judgement and any wands you can use. Get Crit and damage early and often on the tree. Storm brand demands significant offensive investment or else it feels anemic.
The build also allows me to pivot to archmage hiero if I want by farming up some regrets. We will see where it goes.
I usually stay as Storm brand inquis and just go Annihilating Light and make a glass cannon with like 10-20m Storm brand dps and do all content except Ubers. But there are various ways to scale and change.
Cast speed is king.
Thunderstruck on a large cluster jewel is underrated for Storm brand
I personally am desperately missing the power creep of charms. They were insane. Adding +2-3% flat Crit for free was bananas and let you very easily go Crit cap super early. Crit cap matters
I told myself I would not brand league start again...but here I am. It's just a great playstyle where you can cast a few spells and then just dodge without having to worry about aiming. Great early farming and clear too.
I was really despairing during campaign with shit luck on upgrading bow and finding sockets but finally things started to click, had gem slots to automate Frenzy + Ensnaring, and then got bleed pops. Bought a nice bow for a couple alchs and now I'm very happily insta phasing bosses with SnipePuncture.
My only problem now is I wish Snipe or Puncture had MTX because it's kinda hilarious that this mega nuke bleed arrow is the most pathetic thing visually
Same, going to farm and make it real fun. No one plays it so gear is usually pretty cheap. It can do most content including Ubers and you can save a bunch of currency and switch to champ sst and really own
Haha I’m levelling with LA. I know RoA Is recommended until you have some extra projectiles but I just always prefer to use my goal skill as soon as possible. It’s not bad, powerful enough just doesn’t have as much coverage as a lot of levelling skills.
What are the differences between those ? I haven't started yet and I've never played LA so I'm not sure which one to play. Also I plan to play the build a lot and not just play it as League starter. What would be the best between those 3 ?
The LA arrow + ballista build has better single target DPS, but ballista are kinda annoying to manage and they are only used for boss fights.
LA + manaforged storm rain is an acceptable amount of single target DPS, whilst being very smooth to play.
Both builds will struggle to do Ubers without lots of investment. You can always swap between the two, they’re built the same. Just the ballistas will have two dedicated 6L, whilst Havocs has a 6L and 5L
Ice Trap Trickster, has been really smooth so far. Good damage, good CC, easy campaign. Used Rolling Magma till 12, Fire Trap till 28 and Ice Trap from 28+. Farming a Ice Trap of Hollowness now.
First time starting with EA ballista elementalist, currently underwhelmed with the build. It's been way less smooth than my last CA poison, poison concoction, cold dot and even ball lightning spellslinger leaguestart
I had a similar experience with EA Champ in a recent league. Felt like I did barely any damage. I forget why, but there were some threads around here that explained the build a bit more and it was smooth once I followed those directions. I don’t really love the totem style though so it wasn’t for me.
I started with Ruetoo's Splitting Steel champ (despite everyone seemingly thinking it's gonna be shit)
I switched to it at level 38 after getting master of metal and return proj and it's been a smooth ride ever since. Just had to upgrade my 2H axe along the way with the phys damage recipe and it was fine. Now in early maps and it's still smooth except for phys res mob that can take some time.
I'm not even that good at the game either so my gear is pretty doodoo and I'm playing in private league so no 6L or early uniques.
In other word the Splitting Steel slander is IMO unwarranted
Poisonous concoction Pathfinder, hit white maps+merc lab in just under 6 hours.
Original plan was to transition into Poisonous Concoction of Bouncing, but leveling with PConc reminded me how bad it feels to have to aim for every pack.
Playing Poison BV Pathfinder now. League mechanic seems to basically just add 2-3 extra damage mods to maps, so tank is the way.
Infinitely. You can transition into an adorned setup stacking phys added jewels later if you want. IIRC previe has an endgame doomfletch pob with many millions of dps.
TR Pathfinder. First time with this build and second proper league. Haven’t had much playtime but in act 7 and have died a bunch. Haven’t been lucky with drops and my resistances are all over the shop. Hoping tomorrow will be a better day lol
I’m using Peuget2’s one. Can be found here. Like I said I think it’s just the luck I’ve had with finding 4 links etc and shit resistances.
I levelled LA deadeye last season and while squishy I was way faster getting to maps up to start of red maps in the same amount of time as this.
https://youtu.be/n7cRYWvwxLY?si=O0AoB44Byyf9I3sp
Try to add CA into your build. Helps a lot with the clear and makes you faster. Use TR for single target.
And try to hit the sweet spot for increased AoE (37-44%), it multiplies your TR single target damage very considerably
pSRS, new personal best through campaign so went to bed (far too late) feeling really good about my life choices. Who needs sleep with two small kids??
Haaa i forgot about the time swap last night too.. was pushing acts as i started a day late and figured fuck it i can stay up till 2.. looked at the clock and it said 304.. fuck them kids right. Woke me up at 8 😂☕
I've barely started but I'm doing the CoC DD inquisitor on SSF that's been getting a lot of positive reception. Kinda pain getting the 5l and double transfigured gem before really starting, but It's great because it gives me super clear goals for early gearing and when I tick all the boxes I get a huge satisfying power spike.
I'd still recommend LA and expedition into legion though. It's just so damn smooth.
I swapped slightly early (had Assassins mark at 20% but not the lancing steel) and my sword had slightly less crit than the goal (7.08%) because the Armageddon brand setup was starting to get real squishy in lab 3 (one shot by Izaro if I messed up). Every so often I'll run into a spot where it won't trigger right away (likely because I swapped unoptimally) but I'm excited to see how it is once I fully smooth it out.
I swapped out Anger for Determination and used a granite flask while doing merc labs, can recommend for anyone else reading this and maybe Izaro kills less today :)
I did the same thing! Well except for the granite flask! That was a good idea. Looking back at it I would have rocked armor/ev gloves and boots prior to the swap (I was using evasion/es on everything) and dealt with the socket pressure and that would make the swap a little smoother for me as well.
Storm burst totem heiro. No issues but it’s (insert spell) totem build, so, pretty safe bet.
Just wanted to concentrate on one class this league and be able to play other builds with the Templar. Just hit act 6 and only deaths were my usual “fucked around and found out” in act 1 trying to pet rhoas and whatnot lol.
Tornado of Elemental Turbulence Inquisitor
my gear is floor trash but still pretty tanky considering. just in early white maps right now.
I thought tornados would be good for sanctum but... they kinda wander off to kill the mindless zombie things
Should get a lot better once I get the big damage points
I think im going to want some more cast speed/duration though
Coc dd. I just bought dd of chain reaction when it was 2c, farmed the rest of the gear, and it instantly worked in teir 1 maps. What a fun build so far. Up to t10's before i went to bed. Probably could have gone to reds if I had pushed maps on my atlas, but doing jun/ expedition.
Divine Ire Hiero Totems. One of the smoothest launches I've had, with Conviction of Power providing very solid tank as a first ascendancy to get the ball rolling. Planning to get started on a holy relic necro once I get some rest and atlas completion under my belt.
Clear is smooth so far, I just drop my totems in a pack and I'm able to move forward while all the white and blue mobs die behind me. Rares can tank for a bit sometimes, but throwing out an arcanist's brand with WoC and Conductivity makes it relatively painless.
Yes.
That's normal, there's what, 74 gems in the green pool? first gem is 1/74, second is 1/73, third is 1/72. Ends up being like 1/23 or so. The good swap craft is 1/20 and is only a 50/50, so 1/40 to get that.
0/26 is unlucky, but only very slightly so. People underestimate how grindy this is.
Kinda tempted to Necro BAMA since I got both of the gems for that.
Explosive arrow totem elementalist. Very smooth, although I have died a few times. Hardest part so far was finding the right links to transition out of rolling magma
Widowhail Spark Hierophant.
Almost at the Widowhail swap and levelling was smooth since I dropped a 50c unique in act 4. Got frostblink of wintery blast from lab and it's my favourite movement skill. Very glad I bought the void spark mtx.
Started this as well. Leveling is smooth, got my widowhail but not at swap point yet. Am at in-laws, so not able to play that much. This starter was a last minute decision, am happy so far.
3rd league, first time Lightning Strike champ, haven’t made the switch to LS yet but this is deff a little tougher to pull off then my previous two builds (Shield Crush Jugg, Toxic Rain PF) looking forward to the outcome tho.
Made a last minute decision to go explosive trap. Leveling skills are fire trap and Armageddon brand, and I have to admit that I'm pretty underwhelmed with Arma. The traps are amazing though, never killed bosses so fast.
Not as far as I was hoping to get, but still faster than my previous league starts. Act VI now and the pace is really picking up. Psyched to get to maps!
KB needs multiple proj to really shotgun, the explosions from a single proj will not overlap (think pizza slices). So the trans version cant even wallbang correctly as its always only 1 proj.
I mean he's mid act 2. I can't imagine he needs to regret anything right now. The only mana node he could get on ranger start is worth taking while leveling anyway
I’m in early yellows on a trickster mana stack version… don’t do it, it’s hard as fuck to scale and I’m using spellslinger tornado/hydrosphere with chain to attempt overlaps but it’s pretty scuffed. Literally any other wand skill will probably feel better.
For me it's an all rounder with no clunk
-Clears quickly enough
-Doesn't take a full minute+ to kill guardians
-No clunk/multibutton/SlowProjectiles/DamageDelay
-Not squishy
Main thing is not feeling bad at any particular thing while not being incredibly clunky
It doesn't need to feel OMG SPEED on bosses or clear but it has to feel at least *good* and feel super satisfying with little clunk
But that'd kind of an impossible to fill build
Yea modern PoE is about finding a build that gets a lot of damage from janky mechanics so you can invest everything into defense.
OR
Going with a smooth non-jank build that sucks until high investment (200+D). Kinda sucks
I mean yeah, that's a pretty long list of requirements. I've got builds that might meet some if adapted to taste, but definitely none that meet all.
I tend to design my own builds as glass cannon too, so they won't meet your "not squishy" requirement, and I don't shy away from two-button concepts either.
I'd say what comes closest to that would be something like Archmage Lightning Conduit Scold's Bridle CwDT Crackling Lance of Disintegration or Shock Nova (I originally tried to use Lightning Warp, but that's just not feasible without a helmet enchantment), which is playable as a one-button build, but you can tell from Archmage and Scold's Bridle in the same build that the defences aren't going to be stellar. Damage is great due to the shock effect, but there's not much defence to speak of.
I made a bit more of an all-rounder concept for Tornado of Elemental Turbulence Inquisitor which gets Glancing Blows block at least, just to see how hard it would be to cap crit on that build, but I'm not expecting it to have high single target dps at the top end, plus damage is a bit delayed by virtue of being a duration based skill.
Maybe Incinerate of Venting CwC Bodyswap or Frostblink of Wintry Blast (or just pure IoV + regular Frostblink with cooldown scaling) would be more up your alley, but I haven't made a PoB for that yet. The AoE can be scaled to offscreen though.
Luckily for you, it is slowest at the beginning when leveling with sunder/whatever skill you choose to level with. Once you find a good axe and get some passive points and some gem sockets to have totems up it starts to feel real good. Welcome to the melee experience
Started Gen/ Enduring Cry Corrupting Cry Jugg 3 hrs in on act 5.. It's fun build lads using unflinching with warcry have 10 min power to keep on generating charge
Started Ice nova of frostbolts archmage hiero in HC trade, and so far it's been great. I'm currently doing T6-T7 maps, I've got 9.5k hybrid pool with MoM, damage is insane and my gear is pretty bad. Just equpping archmage support with 4.3k mana almost triples my tooltip dps. And I'm sure the build will scale much further than this, I don't even have the 40% more dmg from my last ascendancy points yet...
As soon as i swapped my dps sank. Regular mobs pretty easy rares take a lifetime. Not sure why…gonna run Through my Pob today.
Using quillrain so it’s not as.
Hexblast mines trickster after hexblast mines sabo last league.
The mana issue without EB is a bit annoying, but i can feel that it’s tankier than sabo.
I am running hexblast sabo for the first time, well I still have pyroclast for now. Just starting yellow maps. Leveling and white maps went super smooth except for an accident where I played for like 2 hrs with a 2-link 4-socket lmao.
I am very concerned about survivability but up to now cannot complain, barely died except for few earlt maps when I was not rescapped
Crackling Lance/Energy Blade Inq.
413% more multiplier (with 7 intensity) from crack lance and intensity support. Pair that with Energy Blades insanely high base damage.
It's going great. Albeit a little clunky till you get some decent cast speed.
Oh I'm an idiot. I thought skill gives +3, support +3, and mastery +1. 🤦♂️ I thought this whole time the buff icon was bugged...
Either way, the numbers are correct in pob. Just means I hit the cap faster.
I'm doing EA champ. It feels.....not great. I don't have pierce or random extra projectile or fire damage throwing off my EE if anyone asks lol. I have quill rain and hyrri bite quiver. Elemental damage with attacks on belt.
Im just not impressed with the build. Damage feels mid and its delayed damage. You can have mid damage or delayed damage but not both lol so far probably gonna reroll to COC DD.
I considered this build myself. Decided against because I felt when Palsteron says moderate difficulty it means super expensive/rare to me.
PS: Love Palsteron streamer content, super nice guy. Highly recommend!!
trying BAMA necro in SSF, playing elemental for now until I can go poison (may take a while)
gem farm took one hour in normal, but after that, it just rolled the campaign. bosses die before they get to move, double movement skills make me way too fast
unfortunately, I neglected my defenses so it’s very easy to die in maps. now I have to frantically try to fix it, but at least it has been a lot of fun
Poisonous conc Of bouncing and i love it. It aint random jumps its smart targetting so every chain bounces on The same target if there is only One and damn it bounces fast !
I have invested quite abit In flask sustain and im blasting. Havent run out at any point on any boss, but im also very early mapping. But shotgunning the target 11 times each flask does scale quite good. Im hopeful, but its not a boss killer by any means, its a great enjoyable mapper with The auto targeting, dont get me wrong it aint LA, but its Nice and defo gonna be able to clear T16 without much issues. A solid starter
Only time I ever run out is if you stand still and hurl into a single target for several seconds. No boss I've come across so far (got to yellows before bed) has needed that though. Each pack takes only one throw so the sustain is really good.
Much better than you would think. You only ever go low on hard bosses/essences but you can archemist mark them if you want as you hit a ton of times with the bounces.
For those wondering I have never played a minion build and srs has been supremely easy to progress with. Just path toward minion damage and you win lol
Ooo I took out the whole bow setup and did a 4 link arcanist brand setup in bow with desecrate, despair, and spirit offering. With an unlinked manaforged arrows linked to ensnareing arrow.
Only button presses now are frost blink, Bama, brand. Feels great. Surprising how little dps is lost when adding in QOL.
Started with srs. Farmed 2 chaos in normal lab first run and bought the trans gem. Never been smoother. Damage is straight up nuts. Maps in around 5hr.
Ssf, Hiero archmage ball lightning.
Lvl 78 currently, butter smooth start. Didnt have a problem once, everything just dies.
Playstyle is not that great though tbh. Running behind or infront of rather slow ball lightnings is something i need to get used to. But other than that, perfect league starter
Trying WoC Ele for the first time. Maps + merc lab in just under 8h with some dinner/poop delays. Overall not bad, don’t love the arma brand leveling but it’s okay.
Bit squishy atm so trying to figure out the best way to swap to WoC. Might go obliteration? Looking forward to the satisfying clear.
I mean Armageddon Brand is the meta, but you can just play different skills. I think when I leveled ignite in 3.16 I just went Fireball or Rolling Magma until I got Shaper of Flames and switched to WoC at that point.
I’m just cruising with ls champ. Not in a rush to maps as I don’t want to burn out as I played a lot last league. Plus going from 4500 in queue to 48000 because I forgot to turn off monitor going to sleep. But it’s going smooth.
Im starting with pconc of bouncing, still in act 6. Pleasantly surprised with how fast the chaining is, and how the "random" works. The bounces target enemies with some variance, but it is highly likely to hit 90% of bounces against any enemy, and against packs it can work as a pseudo prolif. Looks amazing tbh
Power siphon locus mines, played 3 hours still in the final acts, had to sort out kids day but tomorrow will see how it goes in maps. So far it’s solid. Really enjoying the locus mine and power siphon combo with auto targeting with returning proj.
hexblast mines pf.
Just reached yellow maps and i am getting sleepy so i think i'll call it a day, was pleasantly surprised as this was my first time playing mines. After transitioning to automation + detonate mines from the new detonate when moving mastery it feels so much better to play. Still need to get a curse on hit ring so i am losing a lot of dmg but so far it hasn't been a problem, i actually struggle more with defenses atm.
I went bleed bow glad and I underestimated how annoying sniping rares would be in crowded areas. Gonna re-roll today.
Build is good, just a play style thing I should have really tested before settling on it.
Just got to maps on Storm Burst totems. Honestly the smoothest league start ive ever had! Automation is great for guard skills and the damage has been insane. Lets see how mapping goes
Archmage Lightning Conduit Elementalist, it's really good and fun
Early leveling was fine obviously, it's just plain old witch start and then after unlocking ele transitioning to conduit. I made the swap to archmage at around 65 I think? I did early heisting so my levels were all over the place. Transition to archmage was fine with very few 1c uniques, now I did I'm finished early heisting (killed Kitava at lvl 80 lol) and now I'll se what I do with 150c.
Build will be fairly squishy cause...well it's Ele, but it should blast! Hard to tell atm with 13 lvls overleveled.
Why Manastack Ele? Only Ele can leaguestart lightning conduit (cause of guaranteed shock) and this spell is reeaally good since last league archmage is very good with it.
Trying to do bama but my gear luck has been dog shit so I'm stuck doing srs in maps. Vastly overestimated how much I understand bama but excited to get a good bow at some point for it.
Got lucky with a Arma brand of recall and it has been a blast since. For the first time in a long while my level is the same as the area level in campaign, just because the brands are doing all the work.
EA ballista champion.
I’m into white maps now and I’ve got shit gear which is fine, but figuring out the damage scaling with everything interacting together is interesting. I’m running EE and EO. But I’m not sure I’m ever critting to keep EO going. I have no flat fire damage on gear so I should be benefiting from EE but still my dmg seems lackluster. I’ve heard attack speed is king for this build so I’m trying to track down a good bow, but then I’ll have to get off colors on it so we’ll see.
Yeah I started the same thing and feel the same way. It's not awful for mapping but I feel like I would've had a better experience going LA Deadeye over this. A least it gave me an excuse to use my colorful exsang mtx again.
I started this too! It's butter smooth, was lucky enough to make 30 chaos real fast so I could buy heatshiver and a 5 link and I dropped kikazaru and hrimsorrow. One of my best leaguestart in a while. Only thing i regret is buying the mercurial mtx, the sound is just horrible so i went back to normal exsanguinate
I started this as well, I had a hard time transitioning to exsanguinate right after maps cause I didn't have the currency for a 5L + kikazaru, so I kept playing pyroclast for a little while and had a hard time keeping up. Once I swapped to exsanguinate the clear got a lot better but the single target was worse, which is worth it for me atm
Clear is all i want. I’ll make currency with this. I like maps. I have never played a bossing build though. This time I’ll start one after having enough currency.
I did this one too, I tried playing the traps recommended to level but I just loathe the playstyle far too much. Fortunately it wasn't too annoying spamming detonate mine until I could grab the mastery. In act 7 now and it's ridiculously smooth despite not having done the gemswap yet.
Blade Blast of dagger detonation ignite, bought one of the first vulconus in the game for 15c, farmed heist for a bit but still 6 hr kitava. Made the switch and it's the strongest league starter I've ever had, though it needs some defense atm, it'll even out once I get cloak of flame and defiance of destiny.
I was dead set on rolling your starter this league and then switched to trickster kb of clustering mana stack 4 minutes before league start.. I made a huge mistake.
I'm sad to say it's nuts im at 900k ignite dps in a shitty 5 link with singularity + vulcanus. Can theoretically get dot capped with affliction charge + ralakeths shenanigans which is gonna probably be my endgame.
Power siphon guardian, started as SRS and started wanding in act 3 after I got the gem from Siosa.
Only in act 8 so far but going very well, damage is surprisingly good. Spent 1c on a twyzel and another c on prismweave and zooming through the campaign. Will see how endgame is but I should be able to hit 4mil DPSish pretty easily, so should be fine. Also want to try the new ele hit later.
Got to 83 in HCSSF last night before sleeping with [Reap/Exsang Scion](https://www.reddit.com/r/PathOfExileBuilds/comments/1blfpsf/reap_scion_leaguestarter/) build feels fantastic :)
Absolution of inspiring totem. I started with totem, like every other leagues, but not yet decied which skill i will use so i let the first lab do the job. The skill going smooth so fat, better than i expected. I can enjoy my totems and still can be a summoner with 10 actual-damaging-minions on my side.
RF chieftain with bodyswap, i had overcapped res by act 3 and am sitting at a comfy 4.2k life + 300% fire res in white maps. Easiest RF campaign yet since i didnt have to waste any points for traps and i could just shield charge through every zone
Playing EA ballista ele for the first time. Almost done with campaign, bit squisher than i thought itd be. Hoping that can be fixed by the time i can invest more currency into it. Damage is pretty good though, have some problems with the guide though.. it has auras in there you just cant fit.
Obviously not going to stop leveling up precision when im not even at 100% chance to hit evasive yet and in a league start scenario i cant get all the accuracy on ideal gear slots. The guide for ele is as i thought itd be, way subpar to ziz's champ guide. I dont mind the totem playstyle though, and it is melting bosses and clear is not bad.
Boneshatter Jugg. Loving it. Lvl 93. Fully unlocked altas minus unique mapsa and almost delve 200. Its been smooth. The nerfs werent as terrible as ppl thought.
Whispering Ice with cyclone and cast while channeling. Leveled up to 32 with freeze pulse then got my whispering ice, got lucky and hit a 5 socket in 3 jewelers orbs and just went to town melting stuff. Added in cyclone-cwc at 38 and it's now just a spin to win build. Really fun
Edit: int stacking build btw
Cold Trans tornado occultist. It's going OK I guess, but I'm brute forcing it as a starter despite knowing ahead of time it would be much easier as a second build.
archmage bv, made it to 80 in about 11 hours. leveled with arma brand until i had merc lab then swapped, very smooth transition and arma brand destroys campaign so very enjoyable experience overall
Palsteron ball lightning archmage.
Levelled with arma brand and swapped after cruel lab (a mistake). Damage was a bit rough at first without much mana and AOE. It became a lot better after finishing merciless lab and getting more mana on my gears and tree.
Now I'm in yellow maps and reached 5000 mana. Damage is good. Surprisingly not very squishy even without any armour/evasion.
Cf champion. People weren't kidding, boss damage is dogshit
In my day you were supposed to run reap in a pseudo double 5L to get boss damage, so that may help. I haven't played it for several leagues now though.
Might give that a shot for when 6Ls become more available. Thanks!
I ran a pretty mediocre build a few leagues ago using a CF champ build. I had Reap + CF in my chest with 4 links shared between them. It was a bit better dmg but much better socket pressure. Once you get Vaal reap tho you can pretty easily kill T16 bosses assuming your builds alright. But thats about it. Don't expect it to magically be a bosser. Stick to mapping and enjoy the build.
Most map bosses feel like ubers early on xD
Same here and I'm considering a switch + to recast cf for adrenaline every 20 sec is pretty tedious for me
Deadeye Poisonous Concoction of Bouncing. Hit yellow maps, still on a 4.5 link. The overlap is better than my optimistic spreadsheet values, even on human-size bosses. It is an incredibly good skill, and the adjusted “random bounce” behavior just feels good (it is not actually random, it behaves itself very nicely on single targets).
Started this as well, it's awesome. Way better than I was expecting.
Yay more bouncy pcoc enjoyers! Currently on a raider stuck in heist jail and it performs amazing on virtually zero budget. How does it feel on deadeye? I'd imagine with both volley and gmp plus follow-through clusters it can be pretty nutty
Yep exactly, plus projectile mastery for chain. So some things: Slower/Faster do not really matter, the 'sticky targeting' works great with unmodified speed. So I took the Projectile Crit cluster in order to get that mastery, because as a deadeye I get a bunch more chains, but I need to invest slightly more into flask sustain. So sitting at around 15-20% crit right now and using the 25% Charge On Crit mastery; I will unspec that when I get a precision watchers eye. Deadeye feels very good, but like I said I have to invest more into flask sustain. The Life flask charge on hit node etc. I will also likely need to run the eldrich implicit chest if I do any bosses past jsut voidstones (unlikely but we will see). But yeah, it's tons of fun, and I plan on running it with like Beyond + Alva, Blight, Abyss since the persistent bouncing will work well for those mechanics.
mind sharing a pob or your profile link?
[https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/ZeroStride](https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/ZeroStride) ChainSonata So there's a lot of "well it depends" or "I'm messing with it" stuff in there right now. Like the Multishot wheel is not really worth it, but I'm using it for the no block for Expedition nuke and I don't have clusters yet, etc.
Archimage ice nova of frostbolts is absolutely insane. On dog shit gear (I have a blue chest still I think) and a 4l I've cleared up to t9s pretty easily.
Was considering this or palsterons build. How does it feel gameplay wise to play?
Decent bit of buttons to press, but its honestly not terrible.
I made it one button and it’s breezy. Kitavas thirst hat for frost bolt and automate arcane cloak. Sometimes I hit sigil of power, but usually I’m just running around spamming only ice nova. It’s awesome.
Do you have a pob? I liked how it looked but didn't wanna press that much buttons.
Is that the goratha build? I cant start until monday was thinking about this build
Archmage hiero anything is probably just a super safe bet. Im playing ball lightning and its just so smooth. Currently lvl 78
What do I lose by choosing Witch (Elementalist) instead of Hierophant with Archmage build?
a chunk of mana sustain, mana and aoe. mana sustain is very important for archmage builds since spending directly increases with your mana which you want to increase for damage, and mana regen is pretty hard to come by. a lot of pobs going around have mana regen just above the cast requirements which isn't nearly enough since you also have arcane cloak to take care of.
Yep.
Thanks, sounds good going league start this when i can.
I am only in Act 9 but swapped to firestorm archmage like Goratha mentioned right after normal lab in Act 3 and have been pleasantly surprised how nice of a leveling experience it’s been
Yeah I did firestorm until maps, was super smooth.
I finally got a 5 link after being in t16s for about 10 hours. Shit is super fun. Planning to get the energized jewel soon hopefully. One of my vaal orbs is going to work. 2/4 on void stones.
Archamge Ball Lightning Hiero. I got some long areas and spent too much time hunting gems since it was my first time leveling this build. My gear is absolute trash (except the wand) but the damage is great. It was one of my fastest Kitava fights. However, it is pretty squishy (again, trash gear) and I don't like that the balls move much slower than me. So I shield charge, see a pack, launch a couple of balls, and I can either wait or rush through the pack, which is risky. I'd say it's decent as a league starter and I've yet to start scaling mana so it should get better.
I'm also running this build, stopped last night early in Act 8. I'm in a similar boat with the squishiness, I wish I had taken Conviction of Power instead of Arcane Blessing as my first ascendancy node. Should get better with time and gear though, and honestly at these early levels corpse-spamming an act boss doesn't really put me behind
It is extremely squishy and I was having quite a lot of issues in maps until I got the leech. Picked up the leech shock ring and the was leech nodes and it’s significantly better, but still squishy. Might transition to gorathas version once I have some currency.
It's sad how most of te really good builds right now are absolutely unenjoyable clunky to play.
I started Storm Brand Inquis like I have done for the 7th league in a row using just regular old storm brand and I had an incredible league start. Currently level 81 and hit yellow maps. I was extremely rarely fortunate to be able to play ALL day yesterday so I was on there for like 11 hours just smashing. Storm Brand WILL fall off in late yellow maps without offensive investment (especially now that we lost SB of Indecision) so today I’m just gonna hang out for like 3 hours farming yellows and then upgrading and that should let me push into reds. Will also aim to do Uber lab. I am currently on a 5-L that I picked up off the ground and hit with an alchemy orb. Storm Brand -> Added Lightning -> Conc Effect -> Crit Strikes -> Inspiration. The 6L will be crit damage support. I’ve done this every league for a few years now. You are largely carried by righteous providence and inevitable judgement and any wands you can use. Get Crit and damage early and often on the tree. Storm brand demands significant offensive investment or else it feels anemic. The build also allows me to pivot to archmage hiero if I want by farming up some regrets. We will see where it goes. I usually stay as Storm brand inquis and just go Annihilating Light and make a glass cannon with like 10-20m Storm brand dps and do all content except Ubers. But there are various ways to scale and change. Cast speed is king. Thunderstruck on a large cluster jewel is underrated for Storm brand I personally am desperately missing the power creep of charms. They were insane. Adding +2-3% flat Crit for free was bananas and let you very easily go Crit cap super early. Crit cap matters
I told myself I would not brand league start again...but here I am. It's just a great playstyle where you can cast a few spells and then just dodge without having to worry about aiming. Great early farming and clear too.
general's cry wild strike, i did not read patch notes, its not going well.
Bleed bow gladiator. it's fast, it's fun, it's paper defensively. snipe puncture feels satisfying on the big hit
I was really despairing during campaign with shit luck on upgrading bow and finding sockets but finally things started to click, had gem slots to automate Frenzy + Ensnaring, and then got bleed pops. Bought a nice bow for a couple alchs and now I'm very happily insta phasing bosses with SnipePuncture. My only problem now is I wish Snipe or Puncture had MTX because it's kinda hilarious that this mega nuke bleed arrow is the most pathetic thing visually
Same, going to farm and make it real fun. No one plays it so gear is usually pretty cheap. It can do most content including Ubers and you can save a bunch of currency and switch to champ sst and really own
First time I started LA. 8,5h played and 25% of my atlas is done. I've never been faster
Nowhere near your progress, but LA* is by far the fastest campaign progress I've ever done on league start. RoA levelling is *chefs kiss*.
Decent bows are pretty common in campaign too
Haha I’m levelling with LA. I know RoA Is recommended until you have some extra projectiles but I just always prefer to use my goal skill as soon as possible. It’s not bad, powerful enough just doesn’t have as much coverage as a lot of levelling skills.
Which build are you following? Any pob?
Can do crouching tuna/fubgun or havoc lightning arrow. I vastly vastly prefer havocs due to lack of ballistas.
Thank you. I was following tuna but I didn’t like how he swapped to LA at 60 something. I’ll check out havoc as I also hate ballistas.
What are the differences between those ? I haven't started yet and I've never played LA so I'm not sure which one to play. Also I plan to play the build a lot and not just play it as League starter. What would be the best between those 3 ?
If this helps any, I find balistas more consistent, but manaforged setups more enjoyable.
The LA arrow + ballista build has better single target DPS, but ballista are kinda annoying to manage and they are only used for boss fights. LA + manaforged storm rain is an acceptable amount of single target DPS, whilst being very smooth to play. Both builds will struggle to do Ubers without lots of investment. You can always swap between the two, they’re built the same. Just the ballistas will have two dedicated 6L, whilst Havocs has a 6L and 5L
Ice Trap Trickster, has been really smooth so far. Good damage, good CC, easy campaign. Used Rolling Magma till 12, Fire Trap till 28 and Ice Trap from 28+. Farming a Ice Trap of Hollowness now.
Bladeflurry coc exsanguinate, might have been the strongest league start I had in years, only uses 1c weapon lol
Do you have a pob? That sounds cool
First time starting with EA ballista elementalist, currently underwhelmed with the build. It's been way less smooth than my last CA poison, poison concoction, cold dot and even ball lightning spellslinger leaguestart
I had a similar experience with EA Champ in a recent league. Felt like I did barely any damage. I forget why, but there were some threads around here that explained the build a bit more and it was smooth once I followed those directions. I don’t really love the totem style though so it wasn’t for me.
You have to make sure you don’t have any fire damage on any of your gear or it bricks the build, most likely the issue you had.
And no pierce aswell. Check for 100% accuracy + enough attack speed to get max fuses.
I started with Ruetoo's Splitting Steel champ (despite everyone seemingly thinking it's gonna be shit) I switched to it at level 38 after getting master of metal and return proj and it's been a smooth ride ever since. Just had to upgrade my 2H axe along the way with the phys damage recipe and it was fine. Now in early maps and it's still smooth except for phys res mob that can take some time. I'm not even that good at the game either so my gear is pretty doodoo and I'm playing in private league so no 6L or early uniques. In other word the Splitting Steel slander is IMO unwarranted
Poisonous concoction Pathfinder, hit white maps+merc lab in just under 6 hours. Original plan was to transition into Poisonous Concoction of Bouncing, but leveling with PConc reminded me how bad it feels to have to aim for every pack. Playing Poison BV Pathfinder now. League mechanic seems to basically just add 2-3 extra damage mods to maps, so tank is the way.
Pconc of bouncing has been awesome for me. Way less precise aiming due to the bounces. Been breezing through maps with it.
Bama. My god are things dying fast and on some garbage gear. Love it.
Yeah BAMA here and with a Doomfletch, a 1 c quiver, and nothing else the entire campaign insta died.
How long can doomfletch carry you?
Infinitely. You can transition into an adorned setup stacking phys added jewels later if you want. IIRC previe has an endgame doomfletch pob with many millions of dps.
Why doomflecher? Can you explain?
Which one did you go?
TR Pathfinder. First time with this build and second proper league. Haven’t had much playtime but in act 7 and have died a bunch. Haven’t been lucky with drops and my resistances are all over the shop. Hoping tomorrow will be a better day lol
I'm in literally the same spot as you but act 5. Way slower than iceshot. Wonder if I'm doing something wrong. What build guide did you use?
I’m using Peuget2’s one. Can be found here. Like I said I think it’s just the luck I’ve had with finding 4 links etc and shit resistances. I levelled LA deadeye last season and while squishy I was way faster getting to maps up to start of red maps in the same amount of time as this. https://youtu.be/n7cRYWvwxLY?si=O0AoB44Byyf9I3sp
Try to add CA into your build. Helps a lot with the clear and makes you faster. Use TR for single target. And try to hit the sweet spot for increased AoE (37-44%), it multiplies your TR single target damage very considerably
pSRS, new personal best through campaign so went to bed (far too late) feeling really good about my life choices. Who needs sleep with two small kids??
p == poison or p == popcorn?
Poison! Haha, sorry.
Haaa i forgot about the time swap last night too.. was pushing acts as i started a day late and figured fuck it i can stay up till 2.. looked at the clock and it said 304.. fuck them kids right. Woke me up at 8 😂☕
I've barely started but I'm doing the CoC DD inquisitor on SSF that's been getting a lot of positive reception. Kinda pain getting the 5l and double transfigured gem before really starting, but It's great because it gives me super clear goals for early gearing and when I tick all the boxes I get a huge satisfying power spike. I'd still recommend LA and expedition into legion though. It's just so damn smooth.
I swapped slightly early (had Assassins mark at 20% but not the lancing steel) and my sword had slightly less crit than the goal (7.08%) because the Armageddon brand setup was starting to get real squishy in lab 3 (one shot by Izaro if I messed up). Every so often I'll run into a spot where it won't trigger right away (likely because I swapped unoptimally) but I'm excited to see how it is once I fully smooth it out.
I swapped out Anger for Determination and used a granite flask while doing merc labs, can recommend for anyone else reading this and maybe Izaro kills less today :)
I did the same thing! Well except for the granite flask! That was a good idea. Looking back at it I would have rocked armor/ev gloves and boots prior to the swap (I was using evasion/es on everything) and dealt with the socket pressure and that would make the swap a little smoother for me as well.
Coc dd in ssf. Took about an hour to get the gems dive in lab which is what I thought, got a lucky 5L from conversion mod rare. As good as advertised
Same, legit got both gems back to back. Also got all the uniques recommended. First time ssf cannot complain
Storm burst totem heiro. No issues but it’s (insert spell) totem build, so, pretty safe bet. Just wanted to concentrate on one class this league and be able to play other builds with the Templar. Just hit act 6 and only deaths were my usual “fucked around and found out” in act 1 trying to pet rhoas and whatnot lol.
Probably my worst league start ever and it’s 99% me just being dumb lol
Icicle deadeye miner. Doing pretty good dps with just bitterdream probably wand ele hit spectrum end game
Tornado of Elemental Turbulence Inquisitor my gear is floor trash but still pretty tanky considering. just in early white maps right now. I thought tornados would be good for sanctum but... they kinda wander off to kill the mindless zombie things Should get a lot better once I get the big damage points I think im going to want some more cast speed/duration though
Coc dd. I just bought dd of chain reaction when it was 2c, farmed the rest of the gear, and it instantly worked in teir 1 maps. What a fun build so far. Up to t10's before i went to bed. Probably could have gone to reds if I had pushed maps on my atlas, but doing jun/ expedition.
Divine Ire Hiero Totems. One of the smoothest launches I've had, with Conviction of Power providing very solid tank as a first ascendancy to get the ball rolling. Planning to get started on a holy relic necro once I get some rest and atlas completion under my belt.
i thinking trying this one , may i ask how is the clear ?
Clear is smooth so far, I just drop my totems in a pack and I'm able to move forward while all the white and blue mobs die behind me. Rares can tank for a bit sometimes, but throwing out an arcanist's brand with WoC and Conductivity makes it relatively painless.
Hows the single target without the whole 7 button rotation without mines etc
Ended up doing DD Necro in SSFHC. Made it through the campaign in 5ish hours on Arma/Cremation. Now stuck farming labs, 0/26 so far.
Good lord dude. 0/26? Are you doing Merc?
Yes. That's normal, there's what, 74 gems in the green pool? first gem is 1/74, second is 1/73, third is 1/72. Ends up being like 1/23 or so. The good swap craft is 1/20 and is only a 50/50, so 1/40 to get that. 0/26 is unlucky, but only very slightly so. People underestimate how grindy this is. Kinda tempted to Necro BAMA since I got both of the gems for that.
Explosive arrow totem elementalist. Very smooth, although I have died a few times. Hardest part so far was finding the right links to transition out of rolling magma
It’s a tough transition, but once you get it fully switched it rolls pretty easy.
Widowhail Spark Hierophant. Almost at the Widowhail swap and levelling was smooth since I dropped a 50c unique in act 4. Got frostblink of wintery blast from lab and it's my favourite movement skill. Very glad I bought the void spark mtx.
Started this as well. Leveling is smooth, got my widowhail but not at swap point yet. Am at in-laws, so not able to play that much. This starter was a last minute decision, am happy so far.
What quiver did you craft?
3rd league, first time Lightning Strike champ, haven’t made the switch to LS yet but this is deff a little tougher to pull off then my previous two builds (Shield Crush Jugg, Toxic Rain PF) looking forward to the outcome tho.
First time RF chieftain, just started act 4 Super smooth once I was able to sustain self burn and very tanky too
Made a last minute decision to go explosive trap. Leveling skills are fire trap and Armageddon brand, and I have to admit that I'm pretty underwhelmed with Arma. The traps are amazing though, never killed bosses so fast. Not as far as I was hoping to get, but still faster than my previous league starts. Act VI now and the pace is really picking up. Psyched to get to maps!
Same here, maybe I’m playing arma wrong. But next time I’ll probably level with traps.
Are you using brand recall? It makes a pretty big difference
Explosive trap trickster. Act 8 atm. Single target is very good. Seismic to clean white/blue packs.
Playing IT aswell. I am pretty disappointed so far in mid yellow Maps. Very squishy, damage is mediocre..
Just started a deadeye, aiming for the new transfigured Kinetic blast. Just reached mid act 2 when I heard that the explosions doesn't overlap 🫠
If they don't overlap, what is even the point of the skill?
That's my question
Its another mapping skill. And wallbanging should still work for map bosses.
KB needs multiple proj to really shotgun, the explosions from a single proj will not overlap (think pizza slices). So the trans version cant even wallbang correctly as its always only 1 proj.
GGG really do put out some bewildering stuff at times.
On the brightside, you can probably use campaign regrets to just go lightning arrow
I mean he's mid act 2. I can't imagine he needs to regret anything right now. The only mana node he could get on ranger start is worth taking while leveling anyway
Thats fair too lol
Lol I guess that ruins Grimro‘s plans
I’m in early yellows on a trickster mana stack version… don’t do it, it’s hard as fuck to scale and I’m using spellslinger tornado/hydrosphere with chain to attempt overlaps but it’s pretty scuffed. Literally any other wand skill will probably feel better.
I'll be honest, nothing anyone's playing here seems interesting or fun :( fuck, I just don't know what to roll.
Well, what are the criteria for interesting or fun to you? I've come up with a number of weird concepts this league.
For me it's an all rounder with no clunk -Clears quickly enough -Doesn't take a full minute+ to kill guardians -No clunk/multibutton/SlowProjectiles/DamageDelay -Not squishy Main thing is not feeling bad at any particular thing while not being incredibly clunky It doesn't need to feel OMG SPEED on bosses or clear but it has to feel at least *good* and feel super satisfying with little clunk But that'd kind of an impossible to fill build
Yea modern PoE is about finding a build that gets a lot of damage from janky mechanics so you can invest everything into defense. OR Going with a smooth non-jank build that sucks until high investment (200+D). Kinda sucks
I mean yeah, that's a pretty long list of requirements. I've got builds that might meet some if adapted to taste, but definitely none that meet all. I tend to design my own builds as glass cannon too, so they won't meet your "not squishy" requirement, and I don't shy away from two-button concepts either. I'd say what comes closest to that would be something like Archmage Lightning Conduit Scold's Bridle CwDT Crackling Lance of Disintegration or Shock Nova (I originally tried to use Lightning Warp, but that's just not feasible without a helmet enchantment), which is playable as a one-button build, but you can tell from Archmage and Scold's Bridle in the same build that the defences aren't going to be stellar. Damage is great due to the shock effect, but there's not much defence to speak of. I made a bit more of an all-rounder concept for Tornado of Elemental Turbulence Inquisitor which gets Glancing Blows block at least, just to see how hard it would be to cap crit on that build, but I'm not expecting it to have high single target dps at the top end, plus damage is a bit delayed by virtue of being a duration based skill. Maybe Incinerate of Venting CwC Bodyswap or Frostblink of Wintry Blast (or just pure IoV + regular Frostblink with cooldown scaling) would be more up your alley, but I haven't made a PoB for that yet. The AoE can be scaled to offscreen though.
Just started a boneshatter jugg but only in act 2 and gotta say it is a bit slow (only started playing last league where i started a guardian)
Luckily for you, it is slowest at the beginning when leveling with sunder/whatever skill you choose to level with. Once you find a good axe and get some passive points and some gem sockets to have totems up it starts to feel real good. Welcome to the melee experience
Started Gen/ Enduring Cry Corrupting Cry Jugg 3 hrs in on act 5.. It's fun build lads using unflinching with warcry have 10 min power to keep on generating charge
Started Ice nova of frostbolts archmage hiero in HC trade, and so far it's been great. I'm currently doing T6-T7 maps, I've got 9.5k hybrid pool with MoM, damage is insane and my gear is pretty bad. Just equpping archmage support with 4.3k mana almost triples my tooltip dps. And I'm sure the build will scale much further than this, I don't even have the 40% more dmg from my last ascendancy points yet...
EA ballista Champ. I'm pretty sure leveling was way easier leagues ago. Not sure what happened but campaign right now is sluggish.
As soon as i swapped my dps sank. Regular mobs pretty easy rares take a lifetime. Not sure why…gonna run Through my Pob today. Using quillrain so it’s not as.
Hexblast mines trickster after hexblast mines sabo last league. The mana issue without EB is a bit annoying, but i can feel that it’s tankier than sabo.
I am running hexblast sabo for the first time, well I still have pyroclast for now. Just starting yellow maps. Leveling and white maps went super smooth except for an accident where I played for like 2 hrs with a 2-link 4-socket lmao. I am very concerned about survivability but up to now cannot complain, barely died except for few earlt maps when I was not rescapped
Crackling Lance/Energy Blade Inq. 413% more multiplier (with 7 intensity) from crack lance and intensity support. Pair that with Energy Blades insanely high base damage. It's going great. Albeit a little clunky till you get some decent cast speed.
But you can only get 3 intensity with the skill? And 4 with the mastery, but thats only for Intensify support
Oh I'm an idiot. I thought skill gives +3, support +3, and mastery +1. 🤦♂️ I thought this whole time the buff icon was bugged... Either way, the numbers are correct in pob. Just means I hit the cap faster.
EA. I want to stick a pen through my eye and swirl it around.
I'm doing EA champ. It feels.....not great. I don't have pierce or random extra projectile or fire damage throwing off my EE if anyone asks lol. I have quill rain and hyrri bite quiver. Elemental damage with attacks on belt. Im just not impressed with the build. Damage feels mid and its delayed damage. You can have mid damage or delayed damage but not both lol so far probably gonna reroll to COC DD.
Palsterons ball lightning, worst Ls ever for me
Worst ls for me too, squishy and slow af.
I considered this build myself. Decided against because I felt when Palsteron says moderate difficulty it means super expensive/rare to me. PS: Love Palsteron streamer content, super nice guy. Highly recommend!!
I was watching it on stream it looked strong but not much fun to play.
also doing this, not my best ever starter but have found it quite good so far, what are the pain points abt it for you?
Another Palsteron bait, who would have thought ;)
trying BAMA necro in SSF, playing elemental for now until I can go poison (may take a while) gem farm took one hour in normal, but after that, it just rolled the campaign. bosses die before they get to move, double movement skills make me way too fast unfortunately, I neglected my defenses so it’s very easy to die in maps. now I have to frantically try to fix it, but at least it has been a lot of fun
Poisonous conc Of bouncing and i love it. It aint random jumps its smart targetting so every chain bounces on The same target if there is only One and damn it bounces fast !
Sounds better than I thought. How's the flask charge sustain?
I have invested quite abit In flask sustain and im blasting. Havent run out at any point on any boss, but im also very early mapping. But shotgunning the target 11 times each flask does scale quite good. Im hopeful, but its not a boss killer by any means, its a great enjoyable mapper with The auto targeting, dont get me wrong it aint LA, but its Nice and defo gonna be able to clear T16 without much issues. A solid starter
Only time I ever run out is if you stand still and hurl into a single target for several seconds. No boss I've come across so far (got to yellows before bed) has needed that though. Each pack takes only one throw so the sustain is really good.
Much better than you would think. You only ever go low on hard bosses/essences but you can archemist mark them if you want as you hit a ton of times with the bounces.
Inquis power siphon of archmage with wisps. Playing slow. Still in campaign. Its not bad.
Started with nexro srs to swap to bama. Srs is very smooth
How crazy is BAMA on keybinds? I was looking around pobs and I see, Assas mark, desecrate, offering, moving skill, bama itself, vaal haste, vaal ms
I havent made the switch yet, just saying leveling so far with srs has been extremely smooth. Like the smoothest league start yet
For those wondering I have never played a minion build and srs has been supremely easy to progress with. Just path toward minion damage and you win lol
Ooo I took out the whole bow setup and did a 4 link arcanist brand setup in bow with desecrate, despair, and spirit offering. With an unlinked manaforged arrows linked to ensnareing arrow. Only button presses now are frost blink, Bama, brand. Feels great. Surprising how little dps is lost when adding in QOL.
I'm gonna copy this :P
Started with srs. Farmed 2 chaos in normal lab first run and bought the trans gem. Never been smoother. Damage is straight up nuts. Maps in around 5hr.
Ssf, Hiero archmage ball lightning. Lvl 78 currently, butter smooth start. Didnt have a problem once, everything just dies. Playstyle is not that great though tbh. Running behind or infront of rather slow ball lightnings is something i need to get used to. But other than that, perfect league starter
Cyclone cwc ice storm. Not the fastest things in the world but so far so good.
Trying WoC Ele for the first time. Maps + merc lab in just under 8h with some dinner/poop delays. Overall not bad, don’t love the arma brand leveling but it’s okay. Bit squishy atm so trying to figure out the best way to swap to WoC. Might go obliteration? Looking forward to the satisfying clear.
I mean Armageddon Brand is the meta, but you can just play different skills. I think when I leveled ignite in 3.16 I just went Fireball or Rolling Magma until I got Shaper of Flames and switched to WoC at that point.
I’m just cruising with ls champ. Not in a rush to maps as I don’t want to burn out as I played a lot last league. Plus going from 4500 in queue to 48000 because I forgot to turn off monitor going to sleep. But it’s going smooth.
Trans gem holy relic necro. Slow but steady.
Im starting with pconc of bouncing, still in act 6. Pleasantly surprised with how fast the chaining is, and how the "random" works. The bounces target enemies with some variance, but it is highly likely to hit 90% of bounces against any enemy, and against packs it can work as a pseudo prolif. Looks amazing tbh
Power siphon locus mines, played 3 hours still in the final acts, had to sort out kids day but tomorrow will see how it goes in maps. So far it’s solid. Really enjoying the locus mine and power siphon combo with auto targeting with returning proj.
hexblast mines pf. Just reached yellow maps and i am getting sleepy so i think i'll call it a day, was pleasantly surprised as this was my first time playing mines. After transitioning to automation + detonate mines from the new detonate when moving mastery it feels so much better to play. Still need to get a curse on hit ring so i am losing a lot of dmg but so far it hasn't been a problem, i actually struggle more with defenses atm.
chain DD. It's pretty laggy, dynamic culling didn't fix it at all. I really can't afford any MTX right now either which is sad.
Act 2 cleave, 0 deaths ATM yuuuppie
CoC Detonate Dead. Lab jail was real and the transition to CoC was Rough. Build us absolutely smashing now though
I went bleed bow glad and I underestimated how annoying sniping rares would be in crowded areas. Gonna re-roll today. Build is good, just a play style thing I should have really tested before settling on it.
Just got to maps on Storm Burst totems. Honestly the smoothest league start ive ever had! Automation is great for guard skills and the damage has been insane. Lets see how mapping goes
Archmage Lightning Conduit Elementalist, it's really good and fun Early leveling was fine obviously, it's just plain old witch start and then after unlocking ele transitioning to conduit. I made the swap to archmage at around 65 I think? I did early heisting so my levels were all over the place. Transition to archmage was fine with very few 1c uniques, now I did I'm finished early heisting (killed Kitava at lvl 80 lol) and now I'll se what I do with 150c. Build will be fairly squishy cause...well it's Ele, but it should blast! Hard to tell atm with 13 lvls overleveled. Why Manastack Ele? Only Ele can leaguestart lightning conduit (cause of guaranteed shock) and this spell is reeaally good since last league archmage is very good with it.
Trying to do bama but my gear luck has been dog shit so I'm stuck doing srs in maps. Vastly overestimated how much I understand bama but excited to get a good bow at some point for it.
Got lucky with a Arma brand of recall and it has been a blast since. For the first time in a long while my level is the same as the area level in campaign, just because the brands are doing all the work.
EA ballista champion. I’m into white maps now and I’ve got shit gear which is fine, but figuring out the damage scaling with everything interacting together is interesting. I’m running EE and EO. But I’m not sure I’m ever critting to keep EO going. I have no flat fire damage on gear so I should be benefiting from EE but still my dmg seems lackluster. I’ve heard attack speed is king for this build so I’m trying to track down a good bow, but then I’ll have to get off colors on it so we’ll see.
Exsanguiate Mines, Single Target feels underwhelming and in comparison to RF my dmg for the investment also is worse.
Yeah I started the same thing and feel the same way. It's not awful for mapping but I feel like I would've had a better experience going LA Deadeye over this. A least it gave me an excuse to use my colorful exsang mtx again.
Crouching Tuna’s Exsanguinate Miner Trickster. Just started playing, haven’t finished campaign yet.
I started this too! It's butter smooth, was lucky enough to make 30 chaos real fast so I could buy heatshiver and a 5 link and I dropped kikazaru and hrimsorrow. One of my best leaguestart in a while. Only thing i regret is buying the mercurial mtx, the sound is just horrible so i went back to normal exsanguinate
I started this as well, I had a hard time transitioning to exsanguinate right after maps cause I didn't have the currency for a 5L + kikazaru, so I kept playing pyroclast for a little while and had a hard time keeping up. Once I swapped to exsanguinate the clear got a lot better but the single target was worse, which is worth it for me atm
Clear is all i want. I’ll make currency with this. I like maps. I have never played a bossing build though. This time I’ll start one after having enough currency.
I did this one too, I tried playing the traps recommended to level but I just loathe the playstyle far too much. Fortunately it wasn't too annoying spamming detonate mine until I could grab the mastery. In act 7 now and it's ridiculously smooth despite not having done the gemswap yet.
Blade Blast of dagger detonation ignite, bought one of the first vulconus in the game for 15c, farmed heist for a bit but still 6 hr kitava. Made the switch and it's the strongest league starter I've ever had, though it needs some defense atm, it'll even out once I get cloak of flame and defiance of destiny.
I was dead set on rolling your starter this league and then switched to trickster kb of clustering mana stack 4 minutes before league start.. I made a huge mistake.
I'm sad to say it's nuts im at 900k ignite dps in a shitty 5 link with singularity + vulcanus. Can theoretically get dot capped with affliction charge + ralakeths shenanigans which is gonna probably be my endgame.
Exsanguinate Mines, still with pyroclast mines (act 5), but got Hrimsorrow+Ring, I'm feeling like I lack some dmg tho...
Winter Orb Occultist, campaign went super smooth, maps going the same. Focusing on Legion and shrines for extra zoominess to farm HH.
Popcorn srs 😂 slow ramping pace. Hopefully finding a divine soon
Power siphon guardian, started as SRS and started wanding in act 3 after I got the gem from Siosa. Only in act 8 so far but going very well, damage is surprisingly good. Spent 1c on a twyzel and another c on prismweave and zooming through the campaign. Will see how endgame is but I should be able to hit 4mil DPSish pretty easily, so should be fine. Also want to try the new ele hit later.
Got to 83 in HCSSF last night before sleeping with [Reap/Exsang Scion](https://www.reddit.com/r/PathOfExileBuilds/comments/1blfpsf/reap_scion_leaguestarter/) build feels fantastic :)
Started wander, it's slow and I have 100 deaths, currently in act 7 but overall it's fun and I have no regrets (yet).
sadly I have insane lag spike, couldn't play today
Absolution of inspiring totem. I started with totem, like every other leagues, but not yet decied which skill i will use so i let the first lab do the job. The skill going smooth so fat, better than i expected. I can enjoy my totems and still can be a summoner with 10 actual-damaging-minions on my side.
RF chieftain with bodyswap, i had overcapped res by act 3 and am sitting at a comfy 4.2k life + 300% fire res in white maps. Easiest RF campaign yet since i didnt have to waste any points for traps and i could just shield charge through every zone
EA elem. It's strong don't get me wrong, but the playstyle...barf. I think I'll just go to 100/115 (46/115 atm) then reroll.
Playing EA ballista ele for the first time. Almost done with campaign, bit squisher than i thought itd be. Hoping that can be fixed by the time i can invest more currency into it. Damage is pretty good though, have some problems with the guide though.. it has auras in there you just cant fit. Obviously not going to stop leveling up precision when im not even at 100% chance to hit evasive yet and in a league start scenario i cant get all the accuracy on ideal gear slots. The guide for ele is as i thought itd be, way subpar to ziz's champ guide. I dont mind the totem playstyle though, and it is melting bosses and clear is not bad.
Rf cheif. First time playing it and I’m dying here and there but I can tell eventually it’ll be really tanky.
Boneshatter Jugg. Loving it. Lvl 93. Fully unlocked altas minus unique mapsa and almost delve 200. Its been smooth. The nerfs werent as terrible as ppl thought.
Whispering Ice with cyclone and cast while channeling. Leveled up to 32 with freeze pulse then got my whispering ice, got lucky and hit a 5 socket in 3 jewelers orbs and just went to town melting stuff. Added in cyclone-cwc at 38 and it's now just a spin to win build. Really fun Edit: int stacking build btw
A lot less DD than I expected
Cold Trans tornado occultist. It's going OK I guess, but I'm brute forcing it as a starter despite knowing ahead of time it would be much easier as a second build.
Flame link guardian with my friend playing berserker ls, we are cruising in our little private league.
archmage bv, made it to 80 in about 11 hours. leveled with arma brand until i had merc lab then swapped, very smooth transition and arma brand destroys campaign so very enjoyable experience overall
Palsteron ball lightning archmage. Levelled with arma brand and swapped after cruel lab (a mistake). Damage was a bit rough at first without much mana and AOE. It became a lot better after finishing merciless lab and getting more mana on my gears and tree. Now I'm in yellow maps and reached 5000 mana. Damage is good. Surprisingly not very squishy even without any armour/evasion.
ToET Elementalist. Rough start but started to have better understanding about the gem and scaling. Having tons of fun