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I just want to add comment about Lab.
You should not let your dislike of Lab impair your play. There are hundreds and thousands of people that do not like Labyrinth but they still run it at least 2 or 3 times to get some Ascendancy points. There are also people who are dedicated to Lab running and make good profit there.
I'm pretty neutral on Lab. I run it to get 6 and often full 8 Ascendancy points. How annoying Lab run is largely depend on what build you use. Gear has less of an impact until End-game Lab where you need solid gear to be able to survive Izaro.
I would suggest that you get at least 4 Ascendancy points from Normal and Cruel Lab. If I have less than optimal build for running Lab--read as any character without maximum physical mitigation--I tend to run two starting labs at the end of Cruel or even mid-Merciless difficulty. You will have far better gear and lots of levels above Normal and Cruel Lab at that point, which will make the runs much more manageable. 4 points are good enough to get any major effect in an Ascendancy. In your original case, you would be able to get Beacon of Ruin that allows you to proliferate burns for free to nearby enemies--this is core of the build, rest of points would make you stronger or safer but those are just incremental improvements rather than build-defining effects.
Another observation is that the more you run Lab, the less irritating it is. You will get used to lay outs, learn how to handle various traps and get better handle of how to deal with Izaro.
Absolute necessities to run Lab: Basalt flask, 2 or 3 health flasks, movement skill that let you go over gaps and Enduring Cry.
Nah I don't let my dislike of Lab impair my play, I just ignore it, the only time I realize it's there is when it's on a build video. I don't miss it because I don't even know what the skills on the trees there are, never looked at them.
I don't want to focus on my thinking on lab, it's just that with a lot of builds they say ascendancy skills are "needed" but I can't really tell if that's needed to run high end maps or needed and it will break the build if you don't have them that's the only reason I even mentioned it here because it's the root of my question. Is this build realistically viable without the ascendancy nodes through merc play or would I be better off using another build to satisfy my AoE fire burn everything to the ground play through.
It's the same thing as trying to avoid a build that looks great, but then you realize if you don't have five build specific items the build simply doesn't work, I'm just trying to avoid that situation given the build maker clearly shows that the build is viable to end game, BUT with XYZ skills I simply won't have, BUT I'm not going to be doing hardcore end game.
So I guess the question is when would this build stop being something that's useful, if I take out the skills from Ascendancy or would it not be useful at all. It seems I can adjust it enough (maybe with some gear normally not needed at per maps levels) to be fine?
