[3.3] Vaal EQ Frostbreath Elementalist - Uber Elder done | Decent League starter

i like this meme build, pump up :D

Always loved Frostbreath as a weapon, pretty good scaling for such a cheap weapon.
Don't know if you're building it seriously but i'd go Lycosidae + Elemental Overload instead of Prismatic Eclipse.

The attack speed loss can be compensated elsewhere probably and would put less strain on the helm enchant need.

Going with an other Ascendancy may be an option aswell considering Elementalist's squishiness.
Like Ascendant Pathfinder/Elementalist (Flask usage/penetration/buffed HoI/MS/Anti reflect and can still shock)

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Iyacthu wrote:

Don't know if you're building it seriously but i'd go Lycosidae + Elemental Overload instead of Prismatic Eclipse.

The attack speed loss can be compensated elsewhere probably and would put less strain on the helm enchant need.

Lyco is a much more expensive option at the beginning of the league. In my opinion is also not optimal, since the AS you get from the Eclipse helps us with being able to dodge out of attacks. Also Shield Charge does not exactly work as you'd expect from it, since there is a Step Cap, making you just Charge through enemies, sometimes completely missing them. Lyco is definitly an option tho. I just tried it and didnt like it.

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Iyacthu wrote:

Going with an other Ascendancy may be an option aswell considering Elementalist's squishiness.
Like Ascendant Pathfinder/Elementalist (Flask usage/penetration/buffed HoI/MS/Anti reflect and can still shock

The biggest reason why I take Elementalist is because it allows me to chill big bosses with little cold damage, freeing up the gear requirement on jewels by a lot. Otherwise you might end up not chilling a Guadrian and hit him for a third of the damage.

Interesting build, was looking for exactly something like this a melee build that has great clear speed and single target. How's the movement though if im thinking of just leap slamming into packs with vaal EQ

You run into them with your 60% increased movespeed from the quicksilver, it's really safe, as you stun any enemy with your steps.

Cool build idea - few questions to whoever might be interested. I am attempting this on HC. Currently entering maps, damage is good however i feel very weak even with 4.5k health. I should be able to bump that to 5.5-6k but I'm still worried about lacking that natural tankiness. Any suggestions on optimizing this with HC? Should i grab paragon of calamity vs beacon?

Thanks for any tips or advice.

I'll be honest, this is a fairly squishy build for HC.

Don't drop beacon as you need the chill, rather invest more into life jewels instead of full damage ones, you'll still end up with ~600k dps+, but with 1-2k more life, since this build ends up with ~230% increased health. Without beacon, you'd have to fully stack cold damage jewels and even then, it might not end up being enough to chill high health targets. Beacon is the reason why I chose elementalist over other classes. Chill is also an amazing defensive mechanic and so is the freeze spread.

Also run a Granite Flask instead of Sulphur, physical damage is our biggest problem. Drop a few nodes to get Iron Reflexes, unless you are not using Kaoms. You can also additionally take Acrobatics, as Kaoms only prevents evading, not dodging.

Then don't run avoid ailment maps, you need to chill in order to stun rares.

Instead of a %AS corruption, get a fortify on hit one. Also run a more defensive CWDT setup with enfeeble.

If you see spiky bois, open a new map. Do not gamble on the spiky bois.

If something else concerns you, you can also write me on discord Fluffy#2381

Thank you - good advice. Have you considered running 2 EQ setups? One long duration vaal and one short duration. I dont know the feasibility.

I didn't consider it, as we don't have that much gem space. We have 2 in our Gloves for Leapslam/Faster Attacks, 3 in our weapon for Heralds and one is free(technically you could 3l the Leap Slam there with Fortify/Blood Magic) 4 for our CWDT Setup and Phase Rush and Immortal Call are too valuable to give up for clearing, as phasing prevents you from getting stuck. In out weapon we have 3 green sockets, which we use for HoI and AA, leaving us with only our body armour for our EQ setup.

Also the damage is sometimes needed for Vaal EQ in order to not having to circle around ceretain enemies to kill them.

Switching both an inc duration and an helmet takes 1-2seconds, which is definitly worth the CWDT setup.

Hi there,
I can see you discussed the possibility of regular EQ setup for both mapping and single target. Was there any conclusion to this? Personally I like the EQ mechanic with slam + aftershock. Do you have a recommendation of how to tweak this build to keep a viable mapping speed with regular EQ? It would be awesome if the herald explosions were still effective enough to help with trash clearing, but maybe that is not possible without losing single target damage?

Thanks in advance