[3.9] Reverse Shockwave Homing Totems Ice Chieftain

Greetings,

Oh look! A disco map device!



Ok, for as long as I have your undivided attention let me present you with my 'Reverse Shockwave Homing Totems Ice Chieftain' Marauder build.
This build is all about utilizing multiple whacky mechanics and quirky items [section: Gear] to simply achieve a satisfying totem gameplay.
Plus if you like totems automatically taking care of the business, this is it.

Skill gems:

[4] Shockwave Totem + Faster Casting + Controlled Destruction + Inc AoE/Conc
[4] Frost Bomb + Inc AoE + Inc Dur + /Faster Casting
[4] CWDT(9) + Immortal Call(11) + Phase Run(11) + Inc Dur
[3] Frostbite + Flame Golem + Faster Casting
[3] Leap Slam + Faster Attacks + Fortify
[6/5] Hmmmm Hatred

- My gear (for easier visuals):


Choice of gems:

Mainly swaping to Conc Effect instead of Inc AoE against bosses but you can also try it out in general playstyle and see if you like it.

Switch Immortal Call to Steelskin or Molten Shell but if ur stubborn you can stack endurance charges with your golem or take Enduring Cry.

You can put Vaal Haste somewhere (in chest) since we don't use souls for anything.

Also I didn't experiment with the Meat Shield gem much, otherwise you can buff up your golem with Minion Life and Minion Speed.

Endurance Charge On Melee Stun could do nicely if you 4socketed Leap Slam, altough I don't know how it cooperates with the fact that we don't deal dmg ourselves ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Wanted to do (Vaal) Blade Vortex Totems in 6link for bossing but didn't work too well v_V (figures).
So now it stays empty.

Gear aka why those legs:

2x The Princess - +30% phys as extra cold speaks for itself, but as it comes out they also have very good attack speed which benefits quick Leap Slamming - which is an unusual movement skill for a totem build (+ I really wanted to use them in a build just one time).
*You can find some pretty insane corrupted versions out there trading, or if you can try vaaling them yourself (Inc AoE/Onslaught/Fortify/Attack Speed).

Empire's Grasp - one of the pillars of this build, f̶o̶r̶c̶e̶s̶ ̶u̶s̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶g̶o̶ ̶4̶l̶i̶n̶k̶ (note: it doesn't) b̶u̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶s̶t̶e̶a̶d̶ gives our totems bonus knockback and makes them insanely good crowd controlling devices, pulling enemies towards them.

Astral Projector - another fundamental item, causes your totems to shoot away, blasting homing novas whenever there is an enemy in sight.
*(I'm not sure if totems' range on shockwave novas works as intended but shhhh.)

Torchoak Step - totem placement speed, enough movement speed and as with every unique they look cool. Aswell as make totems reflect 25% of their max life as fire damage when hit after the enemy have been pulled in to them.

Carcass Jack - AoE.

Clear Mind - first go-to unique when we get Mortal Conviction. A great dmg boost for cheap.

All of the above uniques are relatively cheap so you can spend a little more to get perfect rolls.

Rest of inventory slots is for rares with Life and Resistances.

I've been slacking on flasks so they are currently work in progress...


Prefered mods on gear:
- Life
- Resistances
- Dmg to spells
- Cast speed
- Cold damage
- Spell damage
- Phys damage
- Area damage
- Inc damage
- Dex to equip Phase Run
- Int to equip Frost Bomb

Skill tree:


Things to prioritize in a tree:
- Totem damage
- Cast speed
- Cold damage
- Spell damage
- Phys damage
- Area damage
- Elemental damage
- Inc damage
- Life
- Resistances
- Knockback
- Dex to equip Phase Run
- Int to equip Frost Bomb
- Light radius

*̶I̶ ̶r̶e̶a̶d̶ ̶s̶o̶m̶e̶w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶S̶p̶i̶r̶i̶t̶u̶a̶l̶ ̶A̶i̶d̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶a̶b̶l̶e̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶o̶t̶e̶m̶s̶,̶ ̶g̶o̶t̶t̶a̶ ̶t̶e̶s̶t̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶s̶o̶m̶e̶t̶i̶m̶e̶.̶

Bandits: help Oak.

Ascendancy:
Chieftain.
Why Chieftain?
Because we're doing an ice(/a nice) build. Obviously.

For gameplay video purposes:
https://www.twitch.tv/dungo4th
If I'm playing something else - speak up, I can do a request of a showcase.

Happy huntings, Dungo

Question - Does emperor's grasp require the totem to be socketed for the knockback is reversed? If not - you could wear those gloves but have a much higher scaling capability using a 6L and just using knockback support.

I got word from the questions thread on reddit that you don't need to use the gloves for your sockets!

https://www.reddit.com/r/pathofexile/comments/er4tke/questions_thread_january_20_2020/ff3giib/?context=3

This means that using a 6L carcass jack will be your ideal state. I don't think you can get worthwhile knockback for totems through jewels or anything, but ideally if you can find 20%~ knockback for totems outside of a support, you'd have a real 6L. Otherwise, i'd expect to use a 6L with 1 gem being knockback support, so nothing terribly amazing in that regard, but an extra gem like added fire is a huge amount of damage.

Potentially, if you wanted to save up 3-4 Ex, you can get a 6L chestpiece with +1 active skill gems, which might be better overall DPS increase but you'd lose the QOL of carcass jack increased AOE of course.

Also i think tukohama's shield is a better choice for a 2nd weapon over princess with the right $$ because it gives you an extra totem + blood magic so you can reserve all of your mana (or none of it and use clear mind cause it gives mortal conviction) - overall this would give you 4 points on the tree back, but it's hard to obviously get 20% life for 4 points - but idea is that you can spec 3 into an extra jewel node, and then another point into the 4% life 3% rez node.

nice build i like it a lot :)

Last note, What would you annoint for an amulet? Instead of the current amulet, potentially you could use impresence to get a free frostbite curse, and then annoint it with Ironwood or heart of ice. Thoughts?

Last thought I am thinking about - best helm enchant. I'm curious if cast speed or damage is better DPS increases. In my head, cast speed is nicer the lower knockback chance you have. So if you run this as a normal 6L, with no knockback gem, that attack speed helm enchant will be nice to make sure you're getting the highest knockback procs as possible.

@draktok
Thank you for excellent advice and thoughts.
If it does work - we can definitely switch main gem setup to our chest.
Regarding the shield - as you said Tukohama's Fortress will most likely be a damage buff but I will stick to double Princess just for giggles, that cold specialization, faster leaping and the fact I left some dual wield nodes on a tree.
Yes, we're definitely going for Clear Mind as long as we have Blood Magic (should have mentioned it in Tree section), besides that jewels with as many damage bonuses as possible.
Amulet - yeah that's a good idea. I'm wearing mine for now because of that sweet dex. For annoiting I'd maybe test Spiritual Aid, Watchtower, Ironwood, Panopticon, Surveillance, Heart of Ice, Arcane Expanse, Blast Radius, Revenge of the Hunted, Fangs of the Viper, Will of Blades, Force Shaper, Cruel Preparation - are all legit choices.

Your feedback is much appreciated.

I’ll level the build over the weekend and try to give better feedback too with your swords and dual wield vs tukohama and shield! I think it must be strong either way. What tier map are you on yet?

"

draktok wrote:

I’ll level the build over the weekend and try to give better feedback too with your swords and dual wield vs tukohama and shield! I think it must be strong either way. What tier map are you on yet?

I didn't push very hard yet, I did around 12 so far but with ease.

Totem does not need to be socketed in gloves, so you should swap them to the chest.

Also wouldn't a shaped scepter/want with phys as extra ele be a much better for option? I know the princess is cheap, but you can get another 10% more ele damage from shaped weps.

Thanks for posting about this build - I've tried several variations of this prior to yours and yours is what I've had the most success with. That being said, I want to love the build so much yet it just doesn't seem to have the "oomph" behind it. Admittedly it could just be me and if so then I'd love any tips on how to improve it!

I've tried to emulate most of the gear you've mentioned, and even had a little extra currency so I got a 6L Carcass Jack & Tukohama's shield to try and get as good gear as reasonably able. I don't know how to use PoB that well so I can only go by the stats I see in game, but with the 2 princess sabres my totems were capping out at about 53k dps, and with 1 princess sabre & tukohama's shield they were about 41k but had the extra totem. (On a side note, I can confirm that you can socket the Shockwave totem gem in the chest and still benefit from the gloves.)

I was able to run up to about T8-10 relatively easily depending on a few mods but noticed that it still took quite awhile for yellow & red mobs to die, let alone trying a metamorph (which took upwards of a minute-ish.)

The other variation I tried of this was via an Ascendant that converted all the physical dmg to cold, but with that I couldn't seem to get more than 30k dps.

If you're doing more damage then I'd love to see the build in action to see how amazing it could be!

Tyz, per someone’s above comment you could look for a shaped weapon with more phys to X + spell damage to increase stats more.

Also look for a hunters amulet with +1 strength gem to get more damage. And lastly buy a level 21 shockwave totem.

What supports are you using? Have you anointed your amulet for more damage? These are all things that would help.

If you go tukohamas shield, where are you putting the extra points for damage? The OP has 5 points in dual wielding you could unspec and get more points into further tree damage or another jewel slot. Let me know!

Another idea - enchant rings with essence of (horror? Delirium? Sorry I’m in bed don’t remember exact name) - it gives “gain 10% of phys damage as extra fire damage” - two of these enchants could go a very long way for extra totem damage :)