Is DoT/Trap viable?

So after getting my ass completely handed to me by yet another rogue exile, I'm starting to wonder if my build is even viable. I'm running Chaos/DoT damage with high evade, Acrobatics, and Ondar's Guile with key skills of Poison Arrow, the core DPS, Bear Trap for single target, Vulnerability, and Decoy Totem. Desecrate for added DPS when I can.

I wouldn't say I'm raping things, but I'm doing very solidly at levels slightly above mine. That is, except for several of the boss types. I'm finding that things like rogue exiles tend to blow up my totem within a half second of placing it, and as a result I can't deal any damage. Even with max resists except chaos, 50% evade, 40% dodge, 30% spell dodge, and 95% projectile evade, if I stand still I'm dead in a heartbeat.

Is evade really this bad? Are a lot of the map bosses ridiculously fast and mobile? Should I try and reroll my tree into armor? I hate to think I've spent the last week on this character for a complete failure right when I get to the interesting stuff...

Evasion definitely isn't bad, and when combined with acro/phase Acro plus a large hp pool it's awesome. You didn't mention your health, and I have a feeling that's the problem right there. You probably haven't specced into enough life nodes and/or are not getting enough flat life from gear. I play hardcore only, and prefer to make my builds always with 180%+ life from tree. For softcore, I would say you should have at least 130-140%.

For example, my evasion/Acro/ondars kinetic blast shadow had a little over 5,000 health at level 83, which still isn't that great, but I try to get all of my chars to ATLEAST 5,000 health by level 80.

As for poison arrow, I've never made a build around it, but have researched it before. It's most cetainly viable, even can be very powerful. Are you using your poison arrow supported by the "trap" gem? From what I understand, this is the best way to use it. There's not many options to scale chaos damage on the tree, so by putting it in a trap, you can then spec into trap nodes to scale the damage further.

I think people here would be able to help you way better if you post your current skill tree. Go to Poebuilder.com, pick your class, and put your tree in. Then copy the url and post it here.

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Nerdicide wrote:

I think people here would be able to help you way better if you post your current skill tree. Go to Poebuilder.com, pick your class, and put your tree in. Then copy the url and post it here.

There's an easier way to link your tree. Just click the character portrait at the top left of this page, find your character in the list that pops up, and click the grey skill tree tab down the left side of the popup.

I agree with everything Nerdicide said though. Your problems are likely due to the specifics of what you've done rather than build choice.

OH! I never thought about the added damage you could apply to poison arrow via the trap/totem gems... That said, DPS isn't my issue (If something stands moderately still, I can easily top 3k/second, perhaps 3.5k, or 2-2.5k that ignores energy shield.) I also wasn't sure if you guys could easily see my build via a profile link (I'm pretty new to these forums) Here's my poebuilder link. It is planned out to level 80 (101 points, if my understanding is right and I kill all the bandits). Here's my current tree.

I am a little light on HP, at just under 2k at level 66, but those boss types, ESPECIALLY rogue exiles, do so much damage I feel like I would need 10x my life to stand a chance standing still for more than a couple seconds...

After posting the OP, I ran my first map, a level 66 island with fire everywhere, and pretty much roflstomped it because it didn't have any of the "pounce" mobs or a boss that moves at mock 6.

Is it possible to link my gear profile too? I got a really nice chest piece (nearly 1.2k evasion), but overall my gear is pretty meh. No uniques. Perhaps I should just do Piety runs (highest level boss I can do without insta death, since her damage is all elemental and projectile) for maps and farm low level maps until I get better gear?