[3.10] LL Archmage Storm Brand MoM Hierophant (RETIRED)
 I'm retiring this build as of 3.10. There's better guides for this build I'm sure since the build is so popular right now. I'm personally not very motivated to update the character and I don't want to recommend a character that I haven't tested the endgame with myself. Please feel free to use the template and ask questions. If you need help, I'll try and answer. The following changes are experimental and untested: Archmage PoB: https://pastebin.com/xumvUgyb (This is LocalIdentity's fork, might not work on Openarl's fork) Get as much mana and fevered minds as possible while having 8k+ ES. The crafted mana wand + Prism guardian seems to be popular, I'm not sure if the playstyle is comfy without the multi brand cast from greater spell echo of Pledge of Hands. Probably is via Brand recall spam. In that case, you switch out from Pledge of Hands, probably drop a lot of life nodes on the tree (which were needed for LL reservation issues), get more mana, ES, jewel sockets. Note: Please post all your questions in this thread or come by the stream, don't pm me in game. Make sure your profile is PUBLIC before asking for help so your character is visible. If you have issues with the trees and you're loading them into the poe website, don't. Import them into Path of Building. Please check out the FAQ section before asking questions. I don't claim my guides to be original or super efficient. I write guides to share characters I'm fond of. Gameplay on youtube, or if I stream. ======================================================================= Pros: Really fast map clear. Easy to play. Good single target. Easy to get going, but scalable with currency. Cons: Squishy. Introduction
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You can play storm brand many ways. Life, CI, LL. I hate totems so I've stayed away from Hiero for a long time, but brands are less boring so here we are. This is a pretty standard caster build. EB, max out ehp, HP and ES sustained through leech. Completely ignore mana leech/regen cause its too annoying to get. Playstyle is stupidly easy. You play brands and run around pressing Brand recall near enemies while everything dies. Since you just have to place brands for dps, makes dodging a lot easier for tougher bosses. Hiero gives a lot of Qol as perma arcane surge while going EB, elemental ailment immunity, spell leech and faster brand recall. That being said Inquistor or Elementalist are probably better options for damage. PoB
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Final Tree
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Bandits
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Alira Ascendancy
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Sign of Purpose > Illuminated Devotion > Arcane Blessing > Divine Guidance Increasing the number of brands early on helps a lot. So does cast speed. Cast speed also increases the activation frequency of brands, so its a good investment. You might wanna use arcane surge for levelling till you get arcane blessing. Pantheon
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Brine King and Gruthkul/Shakari. Current Gear
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Jewels: Gear slot analysis:
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Weapon:
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Ideally you want x2 of the rare wands as your final setup. Void Batteries are more than enough for everything though. For the rare wands you ideally want a subset of the following mods: 109% increased Spell Damage 25% increased Cast Speed 109% increased Critical Strike Chance for Spells +38% to Global Critical Strike Multiplier +1 to Level of all Spell Skill Gems +1 to Level of all Lightning Spell Skill Gems Helmet:
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Get a crusader base with the enchant/a normal enchanted base then slam it with crusader's ex. Fossil craft it with Dense and Metallic fossils till you get the -9% nearby roll with a good life roll. BIS - Storm Brand Penetrades 12% of Branded Enemies Lighting Resistance. Budget option: Any rare with life, resist. Chest:
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Expensive, but ridiculous for clearing. I was using Herald of Ice instead of Wrath for the most part before I had this chest. Budget option: Any rare chest, Tabula Rasa. Gloves:
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Life, resists. Fingerless best base. Bonus: 10% chance to Unnerve Enemies for 4 seconds on Hit (from hunter gloves) Boots:
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Get as much life as you can and lots of movement speed. BIS - 16% increased Attack and Cast if you've killed recently. Bonus: Tailwind from hunter boots and/or Elusive from redeemer boots. Amulet:
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Look for max mana roll. Anoint: Constitution Budget option: Anything with life, multi, res, dex. Belt:
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Bonus: % max life from hunter belts. Rings:
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Life, resists, dex. Look for free prefix to craft 'damage taken gained as mana'. Flasks:
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Main clearing setup. If you have one. Could replace the quicksilver for it, during bosses. Get balanced resistances for Wise Oak. Jewels:
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If you have one. The goal is to get Inner conviction for damage. The jewel socket under melding is a good spot to use Pain attunement for it. You could get a watcher's eye with 'Gain % of Maximum Mana as Extra Maximum Energy Shield while affected by Clarity' for more ehp. Ideally you want it paired with a damage roll for wrath. Pen is the best. Gem Links
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Chest: Use chain instead of conc for clearing. Get one white socket from vorici in research on your 6B chest to swap in chain for conc effect. Remaining links (put them wherever you get the right colors): - Arcane cloak - Increased Duration - Second Wind Unlinked: Videos:
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FAQ:
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I don't have the wrath leech watcher's eye you have.
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You don't need it. I just don't have a wrath pen + clarity ES one so I'm using this one.
Changelog:
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Added guide? Updated for 3.8 Updated for 3.10 Retired. I make build guides for fun. YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/cent664 Twitch - https://www.twitch.tv/cent664 Last edited by cent664 on May 4, 2020, 4:27:25 AM Last bumped on Mar 20, 2020, 5:31:56 PM
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Hello Mate, I tryed youre build, but i got a lot of problems, can you please check if i got some mistakes on it, or something ? Thank you very much :)
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" Seems okay, what problems do you have? I make build guides for fun.
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/cent664 Twitch - https://www.twitch.tv/cent664 | |
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Hey, when the immortal call is progging and i killed all enemys, the life goes down to 1, i cant stop ist, so i die on the next creep wave :( if my potion is empty . do you know where my mistake ist ? Excuse my bad english, i am from germany. Thanks for answer have nice easter time !
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" Seems like you're dying from the shimmeron degen, which you shouldn't be because you should be leeching most of the time. You might die in ele weakness maps if you're not leeching and taking shimmeron degen, cause you lose life really fast without capped lightning resistance. I think that's the problem anyway, so you should run a warding flask for those maps. I make build guides for fun.
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/cent664 Twitch - https://www.twitch.tv/cent664 | |
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I missed the OPOP boat on Brand, but still want to try it. How is it handling the Legion packs? My last build was... questionable on clearing them.
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" I'm not playing this build in legion so I'm not really sure. Clearing didn't get much worse as far as I could tell in general but for legion mobs I guess you'd need really good gear. I make build guides for fun.
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/cent664 Twitch - https://www.twitch.tv/cent664 | |
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Playing something similar atm, in general Storm Brand is still amazing, nerf barely made any difference with proper setup (chain support is OP btw).
Currently farming high quant (Elder Wharf atm, 140+ usually with crazy mods) t16's for sulphite and I have no issues fully clearing legions, including releasing generals. And that's on version of build where I've sacrificed a ton of damage for defences and qol. Recently there was also change that enabled inpulsa explosions when releasing Legion mobs, I was already releasing them all without issues, but it made it quite a bit faster. Last edited by Lirhtim on Jul 1, 2019, 9:29:24 AM
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" I'll try out chain. Thanks! Good to see someone confirm storm brand does okay with legion content. I make build guides for fun.
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/cent664 Twitch - https://www.twitch.tv/cent664 | |
" Chain seems nice but what green gem would you swap in for single target unless you have a white slot? Only thing I could think of is hypothermia and use something like Frost Breath / Vortex / WO to keep chill up. |
