[2.6] Popsicle Sticks - Over 60k freezing DPS! (3.0 WIP)

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Isscray wrote:

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Hi, you will update this build to 2.6? Wanna try it in new league.

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grimjacked wrote:

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Interesting build, I went elementalist and use the Halcyon. Clears trash like a dream, not a fast boss killer, but does the job. Well done.

Note that I enjoy the odd builds, you said something about odd ranged totem builds. I made a quad blast rain totem with knockback with Empire's Grasp. Worked well and locked bosses in place.

Look forward to more builds from you.

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cipher_nemo wrote:

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Thanks, OP. Will be rolling my own tweak of this concept in the Legacy league soon.

Nuro and Skirmish should be rather easy to get, but Pandemonius will take some effort having to add Breach stones to areas or just trade for it. But I can always add heavy chill and freeze in other ways.

For my gameplay style I'll probably use a different CWDT (Arctic Breath will work nicely with this) and movement skill setup, and will most likely layer defenses a little different. But definitely using your Ice Shot and Ranged Attack Totem setup for the Scion. I want to play a Scion to unlock its achievements, because the Scion and the Duelist are the two characters I haven't run yet.

Also, I'll probably head directly to Ancestral Bond to run dual totem, then spec out of it when I get a Skirmish. I'd prefer to run dual totem and have the ability to dish out my own damage as well with other cold spells. A side of Cold Snap to always freeze, or Ice Storm might be nice. Perhaps I'll experiment with a CoC to trigger one of those with the totem ice shot (since it's also an attack).

Regardless of how I progress with it, thanks for sharing your build! Good concept. :-)

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chomak wrote:

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Hi OP, thanks for the build its been a lot of fun!. I didnt play since beta so its really fun! haha :)

I managed to get a nuro harp 6l , which chest should i get? Any Unique?. I have been extremely lucky and i have like 2 exalted.

Thank you again, sorry for my writing.

Also where i can see your character, i want to check the roll in your gear. Thank you

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174nana wrote:

[2.5.0 & 2.6.0] Popsicle Sticks - Keeping it cool in Wraeclast

Note: I am currently updating this build for 2.6.0 in general and more specifically for Legacy League. Should finish updates 1 day before the Legacy league launches, check again for more updates, thanks.

I was quite amazed at how much fun I had with this build as my league starter in Breach. If you are looking for a non-meta and fun build, click on the spoilers below and have fun checking out this build, thanks :)



Build concept

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Using Nuro's Harp unique bow to deal a shattering amount of Cold Damage through multiple Ranged Attack Totems firing Ice Shots AKA "Popsicle Sticks".

Build idea is to use things that most players don't use (causes it to be undervalued) and go anywhere near current meta builds. I know some will say a totemer is meta but please show me a recently famous ranged attack totem build.

Anyway, this build is cheap, fun, easy to get going and efficiently effective once its hits maps, so read on if this interest you, thanks : )


The Reason behind Scion and its Ascendancies

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This build shines especially after the 2.5.0 patch notes that buffed Nuro's Harp to have an additional property "40% increased effect of Chilled Ground" and also the overall Totem buff with more life, resist and improved nodes in the passive skill tree. High cold penetration and Frostbite results in most enemies having zero to negative cold resist.

Scion is chosen as it has an easy reach between totem nodes and weapon elemental nodes that is key to helping this build scale its damage.

Deadeye is chosen first to grant an additional arrow (coupled with a corrupted +1 arrow quiver to get a total of 3 arrows, there is no need for LMP or GMP support), Farshot to compensate some of the damage lost due to Point Blank keystone and some free piercing chance never hurts.

Assassin is the second ascendancy for the primary reason of getting Maims on crits. As Nuro's Harp is a harbinger bow with good base crit, this build crits fairly often which causes most monsters to suffer Chill (-30% overall speed) & Maim (-30% movement speed) resulting is very slow moving monsters. The extra 1% and also more crit multiplier to full life monsters greatly increases freeze duration (if it crits) on first hit.

Slayer seems interesting for more damage against rares and bosses but offers nothing much else. Elementalist and Inquisitor gives a damage boost but not by much and can be easily obtained with a good rare jewel.

Pros & Cons

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Pros
● Non-meta build - Nuro's Harp & Ranged Attack Totem?
● Freeze/Chill everything - coupled with Maim, nothing much can get to you
● Good damage and clear speed - about 60k - 70k DPS with 3 Popsicle Sticks at Point Blank.
● Destroy corpses (most) - screw Avian monsters
● Safe playstyle - totems do all the work & refer to 2nd point
● Atziri easy kills & no problem with most map mods
● Low Cost - uses cheap items that isn't part of meta builds (good league starter)

Cons
● Life build - Deal with it, ES meta is so distasteful
● Only around 5k life at most - some damage nodes can be swapped with life nodes if needed
● Not above 100k DPS - Sorry, the DPS can only get so high with this build
● Minimal Defensive layering - asides from the totems, you are quite squishy
● Not the fastest clear speed - this ain't no 30 second clearspeed build (average 5 minutes per map)

Build Enablers

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Nuro's Harp Bow
A must for this build as there is nothing else that packs this much "ice" in a bow.

Skirmish Quiver
A must in my opinion as it let's the Scion have up to 3 Popsicle Sticks active at a time (not taking into account the Hierophant ascendancy for Scion). One can do without this quiver in place of a quiver with high Weapon Elemental Damage and Max Life, but after some testing, 2 totems lacks the clear speed and the lost of a potential 1/3 of total damage output is not worth it. End game would be to get a corrupted Skirmish with +1 Arrow.

The Pandemonius Amulet
This new unique item from Breach League is the finishing touch to this build which adds just the right amount of flavor. Having 100% chill means anything the Popsicle Sticks shoot at will get slowed, blinded and the subsequent shot will cut through 20% of its cold resist. On Standard, a good WED & Crit amulet will work quite well too.

Extras to boost this build

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Static Electricity Unique Jewel place on the Jewel slot between Scion, Ranger and Duelist grants a crazy amount of flat Lightning Damage (up to 40 Lightning damage). Even though this build is mostly trying to do cold damage, there is only so much cold damage this game has to offer so Static Electricity provides a good source of Lightning Damage which scales very well with this build.

Mantra of Flames Unique Jewel is another cheap jewel which can provide a good amount of flat Fire Damage. At any given time, this build will have about 4 buffs (2 Heralds, 1 Clarity and 1 Golem) granting up to 34 Fire damage.

Passive Skill Tree, Keystones & Bandits

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Keystones

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● Ancestral Bond (Only taken at level 68) is key to hit 3 Popsicle Sticks.
● Point Blank (Only taken at level 68) provides 50% damage if the enemy is in front of the Popsicle Sticks which kinda means always as you will be dropping it in the enemies faces, force feeding them some tasty Popsicle.

Bandits

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Normal : Help Oak (+40 Life)
Cruel : Help Kraityn (+8% attack speed)
Merciless : Kill all (mercilessly kill all to get +1 Passive point)

Passive Skill Tree (Level 50)

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http://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-passive-skill-tree/AAAABAABAfKXm12omkrIe8NuqmSEBqD5vbXyNZIVIC2DGbS-p3XL6mJlTb02R37Yvf4Ktz6DzDwtg1_Gru0ggpvhc6IA8B8EsyzphrMA7ipNR-Ii4qQ5PyfyRTrhplf-j03jGF1o8q9sC2E8725p1fiQEYqvguQ7KN0NW68hdobOwTOLqg==

Passive Skill Tree (Level 70) (6 Ascendancy Points)

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http://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-passive-skill-tree/AAAABAABAfKXm12omkrIe8NuqmSEBqD5vbXyNZIVIN0NW68UdSF2hs7BMy2DGbS-p3XL6mJlTb02R37Yvf4Ktz6DzDwtg1_GrnflJy-QVRo4cg9mnljlKhNaK6PyV-LtIIKb4XOiAPAfBLMs6YazAO4qTUfiIuKkOT8nMonyRTrhplf-j03jOtg7KKTCWfMYXWjyr2wLYTzvbmnV-JARiq-C5MjM74_fb3fXVvrdRmOnEYF_KzB8jX0j9k2SOdR294uqsVumMgMEqHJ7bpchwXyHBw==

Passive Skill Tree (Level 90) (8 Ascendancy Points)

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http://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-passive-skill-tree/AAAABAABAfKXm12omkrIe8NuqmSEBqD5vbXyNZIVIN0NW68UdcjM74_fbyF2hs7BM3fXVvrdRmOnEYF_KznUdvcx-qCfLYMZtL6ndcvqYmVNvTZHfti9_gq3PoPMPC2DX8auEMz4k3sg_od35ScvkFUaOHIPZp5Y5SoTWiuj8lfi7SCCm-FzogDwHwSzLOmGswDuKk1H4iLipDk_JzKJMHyNfSP2TZLyRTrhplf-j03jZlQ62DsopMKUb1nzGF1o8q9sC2E8725p1fiQEYqvK7YDlm49voBxhVcpRtcwlzmKsUINjYd2459KfYLki6qxW6YyAwSocntulyHBfIcHpq-pSA==

My Gear Setup & Recommendations

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My Current Gear

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Recommended gear setup & Stats on gear to look out for

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Helmet : Lab Enchantment for "40% Increased Ice Shot Damage". Life, Ele Resist & Accuracy

Body Armour : 5 to 6 link. Armour & Evasion or Pure Evasion is preferred for easy slot coloring. Life & Ele Resist

Gloves : Gripped Glove: Attack Speed (>10%), Cold Damage to Attacks (as high as you can go), Life & Accuracy (Ele Resist if possible)

Boots : Movement Speed, Life, Ele Resist & preferred "% increased Movement Speed if you haven't been Hit Recently" Enchantment

Belt : Weapon Ele Damage, Life, Ele Resist

Main Hand : Nuro's Harp

Off Hand : Skirmish - End goal would be a corrupted Skirmish with +1 Arrow

Ring #1 : Weapon Ele Damage, Life, Cold Damage to Attacks, % Cold Damage, Ele Resist

Ring #2 : Weapon Ele Damage, Life, Cold Damage to Attacks, % Cold Damage, Ele Resist

Amulet : The Pandemonius or Life, Weapon Ele Damage, Crit Multi/Chance (if Standard League)

Jewels (unique) : Static Electricity, Mantra of Flames

Jewels (rare) : Cold Damage, Totem Damage & Projectile Damage (cost ~5c) or Cold Damage, Projectile Damage & % Life (cost ~10c)

Flask

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My Current Flasks:

Recommended: Instant Life Flask x2, Atziri's Promise, Granite/Basalt Flask and Quicksilver.
Note: Anti Bleed, Anti Freeze and Anti Curse on any of the non-unique flask.

Skill Gems & Links

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Main Skill
Ice Shot + Ranged Attack Totem + Added Cold Damage + Hypothermia + Weapon Elemental Damage + Faster Attacks

Movement
Blink Arrow + Faster Attack

Golem
Ice Golem + Fortify + Culling Strike(Optional)

Heralds
Herald of Thunder + Blind / Herald of Ice + Hypothermia

Aura
Clarity + Enlighten(Optional/Not required)

Curses
Split Arrow + Curse on Hit + Chain + Frostbite

Defenses
Cast when damage taken + Immortal Call + Vortex

Extra (vaal)
Vaal Summon Skeletons or Vaal Haste

*Untested: Frost Bomb + Faster Casting (+ Inc. Area + Inc. Duration)
I have yet to test this build with Frost Bombs but it should be quite effective to help reducing boss cold resist significantly.

Leveling Guide

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Leveling up as a split shot archer (bow + quiver) seems to be quite efficient from what I went through as I breezed through normal and cruel while only slowing down during merciless due to general gearing problems (not wanting to upgrade my gear until I hit level 68 for Nuro's Harp)

Normal Mode

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Use Split Shot, get your hands on a Doomfletch and you should get through Normal in no time. Make sure to get a Lioneye's Paw too for the fire damage and movement speed. For everything else, level as you would normally as an archer.

Cruel Mode

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Time to upgrade to a decent level appropriate bow with elemental damage or get a Doomfletch Prism. Make sure to keep your life at least around 2000s and with acceptable resistance, you should level smoothly into Merciless.

Merciless Mode

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Doomfletch Prism remains as it can carry you all the way to level 68 when you transition into Nuro's Harp and Ancestral Bond. Try to get your hands on a Lioneye's Vision at level 59 as it would grant you some sort of a free 5link for a low price. I used a 4 link Lioneye's Vision all the way until I got a 6link body armor. Your goal would be to get as much life and elemental resist on your rare gear as all the uniques used does not provide any life and barely any resist.

Videos

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Sorry for the funky video quality as I recorded it on 2k resolution on my outdated 280x GPU (using a 4k monitor) and also the mouse position is off, need to find out why.

Normal Atziri run
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrdwpsvNwyg

Tier 9 Rare Promenade
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_pEZcfesTY

Will upload higher tier once I reach there.

This is a Modular build

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I think this build is fairly adjustable to fit other playstyles. Some options that I can think of or have tested.

Multi Curse
Frostbite, Elemental Weakness and Temporal Chains would increase freeze time and cause enemies to have high negative cold resist. Just swap in a Windscream or Doedre's Damning and adjust stats on other gear accordingly, but overall life would surely drop.

Voltaxic/Windripper
Not taking Fangs of Frost on passive tree and changing the bow to another high elemental damage bow means that it can also be turned into a Voltaxic Totemer or MF Windripper Totemer.

Hardcore(most definitely hardcore viable)
If a 6link Nuro's Harp is available, a Kaom's Heart can be swapped in and taking more life nodes (Purity of Flesh wheel, Golem's Blood wheel), easily bringing this totem build well over 6k life.

Misc.

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● Always drop Popsicle ahead of where you plan to go, let them do all the work and stay at a safe distance
● Safe to do practically any map mod - Just drop Heralds and Clarity if Blood Magic, bring Mana flask if no mana regen mod, ignores reflect mods as Popsicle will die for you
● Effective Popsicle placement is key to survival with this build as it has less than 5k life. Even with this little life, I have only died once since I started mapping
● Always make sure Popsicle are between the enemy and you while you keep on running around dodging and collecting loot
● Hold Shift when summoning Popsicle to avoid walking too near to the enemy and possibly getting killed. Popsicle summoning range isn't that great

2.6.0 Changes for Legacy League (Work in Progress)

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With the changes to the passive tree, especially near the Ranger side which saw a lot of Weapon Elemental Damage (WED) nodes being added, the overall damage outcome of this build should increase significantly in 2.6.0.

Temporary Level 90 skill tree

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http://poeplanner.com/AAYAAP8QCwB98pebXaiaSsh7w26qtfI1kti9_gryRTrhpldN4_6Ptz6DzDwtxq4QzPiTg1935TrYJy-QVRo4WfNyD2aeWOVaK6PylG9mVFfi7SCCm-FzogAEs_AfPycqTQDuLOmGs0fiIuKkORUg3Q1brxR1pMLIzO-P32-Hdkp9IXaGzsEz7g4j9k2SjX2BrDOSQxPkaql5fyv9bn7dePmNuTnUb_Kgn2eg459khAag-b3vetN-fXX-urvjxKKn1P7IeyD-h8MTVvp316OKxPavpxzOK1ANzf5UcqmsqjKJiq-QEXGF8xGxQlcpRtexW6YyAwSocntulyHBfIcHpq-pSAAAAAAA

Thanks for checking out my build and hope you enjoyed it.

Feel free to leave your comments or questions and I will get to it when I can : )

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chomak wrote:

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Hi again! Thank you for the advice, i have two questions.

First one: I cant see the value of cold damage to attacks in the rings, its only 10-24 damage. Isn't better item rarity? Unless this 10-24 damage multiplies or something haha.

The second one: I been trying Rain of Splinters Jewel. It only reduces totem damage by 30% and adds 2 projectiles, isnt 4 better than 2? Or im doing my math wrong or didnt count crit base or crit multiplier or other mechanich (im new).

Thank you again, and i cant find your character in your profile, it only shows Coin_maker and Bone_Spear

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chomak wrote:

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Hi! Thank you for the update for 2.6.

Just one thing. Now i have like 40 or 50 intelligence less and i cant use Herald of Thunder nor Curse on Hit, or Vortex. It changed of 150 intelligence to 106 because of the changes in the skill tree. What should i do ?

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omgMajk wrote:

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I ran this build in Breach but didn't have a chance to go total totem (ice shot with lesser multiple projectile without totem worked fine all the way into merc). Noobie question, where is the best place to farm Nuro's Harp and Skirmish? I've gotten my hands on lower level harps but always with bad stats from the labyrinth on normal - but it seems your harp is alot higher level. Continue with the labyrinth farming?

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darccyde wrote:

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Quick question. Why link blind to HoT? I'm doing significant lightning damage, but I never seem to trigger the lightning bolts.