[3.13] Phoenixscales Cold BV Inquisitor - All Content ready - including Video Showcase/Guide!

Heyo!


VIDEO SHOWCASE/GUIDE IS HERE!

https://youtu.be/HmPiZZaiJ-c

Leaguestart Update
https://pastebin.com/1BeTbZYW

NEW
3.13 Update
- Ascendancy Changes: Losing a bit of damage, increasing survivability a bit via es regen. Ascendant is now a strong viable option. Endgame Goal: https://pastebin.com/dQ8KL6Ln
- Harvest is back: Crafting is easy now. Maven Orbs introduce powerful new options on all Armour Slots. We gain far more damage through this.
- 3.12 changed the Tags of certain Mods. This affects us mainly on Gloves & Helmet Slots:
Gloves will be Hrimsorrows earlygame, Lategame the expensive 25% Cold Conversion Implicit Gloves from Synthesis Bases (~18 Ex). The reason being that two of the same conversion mods now cannot roll anymore on the same item as prefixes/crafted prefixes.
Helmet will probably lose either Unleash or Shaper's ele damage taken mod until I figure something out for this. The reason being that the Unleash Modifier lost its Caster Tag.

Introduction

This will be a comprehensive build guide for my favourite character in harvest league, a Cold BV Inquisitor. It has been a blast to map and boss with, and I hope I can inspire you to make something similar to this!
All my gear is selfcrafted, and while the super endgame version is in the 50ex+ range, you can certainly do everything with far less currency to start with, as it maps very fast and safe to ramp up your currency and garden crafts!
With Harvest returning to the game in 3.13, I think this build is revived and should be as strong as ever! Alternate Quality Gems & Eleveated Maven Mods will add another layer of madness, I will
check and update this whenever I can.

If there are any questions, don't hesitate to ask here on the forum or ingame. I can also help with bench mastercrafts, as I have most of them unlocked.
TL;DR: Path of Building
Spoiler

Current version, 19.3m Shaper DPS: https://pastebin.com/xLN4THpm
Endgame goal & leveling Progression, 24.3m Shaper DPS: https://pastebin.com/Cxh8pR2T


Build Concept
Spoiler

Offensively:
- Level 28 Blade Vortex (21/5/1/1 from Gem/Staff/Body/Amulet).
- 150% Increased Effect of Hatred, 40% Increased Effect of Auras on you, 22% Increased Effect of Non-Curse Auras, with a Level 24 Hatred (21/2/1 from Gem/Staff/Amulet).
- Ignoring Enemies Elemental Resistance on Crit, 100% Crit Chance.
- Sources of Increased Damage Taken from Ascendancy, Helmet, Flask.

Defensively:
- Staff and Glancing Blows for an easy 75%/50% Attack and Spell Block.
- Taste of Hate and Helmet Mod: 30% of Physical Damage taken as Cold.
- Enduring Cry gives 3 Charges as well as 2k Life over 1 second, with 2 uses for solid sustain without Leech/Flask Charges.
- Permanent Tailwind/Elusive for some Attack/Spell Dodge as well as Movement Speed.
- Damage is taken as 50% Life and 50% ES, increasing the effective Life Pool.
- Capped Elemental and Chaos Resistance.

Utility:
- Curse is applied automatically (Ring on hit).
- Curse & Ailment Immunity when on Consecrated Ground, which is always since we're an Inquisitor.
- Corpse Explosions to avoid On-Death Effects (Porcupines, ugh!).
- Elemental Reflect Immunity.
- Relaxed Unleash Blade Vortex Playstyle, having to press BV only every ~3s.




Why does this build feel amazing to play?
Spoiler

- The playstyle of this build is very worry-free. There is no need to pay attention to a Curse Flask, you are Elemental Ailment Immune, on Death Effects are limited to Storm/Flame/Frost Bearers and Volatiles.
- It maps very fast and satisfyingly due to the Explosions scaled by Hatred and spread by Herald of Ash.
- You always have something to upgrade. Every Item is a rare item, which gives the opportunity to use Harvest to its fullest extent. This gives a very good sense of progression and satisfaction once you complete your next upgrade.


Gear
Spoiler

Staff:

Body Armour:

Helmet:

Gloves:

Boots:

Amulet:

Rings:

Belt:

Jewels:

Flask:







Gems
Spoiler

Intelligence Gems, Strength Gems, Dexterity Gems

Staff: Auras
Enlighten 4 - Zealotry 21/0 - Hatred 21/0 - Herald Of Ice 21/20+ - Herald of Purity 21/20+ - Herald of Ash 21/20+

Body Armour: Vaal Blade Vortex
Vaal Blade Vortex 21/20+ - Hypothermia 21/20+ - Awakened Unleash 5+/20 - Energy leech 21/20+ - Awakened Controlled Destruction 5+/20 - Awakened Area Of Effect 5+/20 OR Concentrated Effect 21/20+

Helmet: Support, Blood Rage & Cold Snap
Cold Snap 21/20+ - Bone Chill 21/20+ - Arcane Surge - 2/20+ - Blood Rage 20+/0+

Gloves: Support, Cwdt Immortal Call, Precision, Vaal RF
Vaal Righteous Fire 21/20+; Cast When Damage Taken 20+/20+ - Immortal Call 20+/20+; Precision 1/0+

Boots: Movement, Enduring Cry
Dash 20+/20+ - Second Wind 20+/20+ - Urgent Orders 20+/20+ - Enduring Cry 20+/20+



Skill Tree Progression
Spoiler




Budget Gear
I will give some examples for each slot that increase in effectiveness and cost.
Spoiler

Staff:
Spoiler


A staff like this can be incrementally improved. Start with just the temple mod "Spell Damage & Non-Chaos as extra Chaos", upgrade to +1-2 Level of all Spell Skill Gems, and work your way towards +3 Physical Spells. Afterwards I would suggest Crafting Crit Mods and the last Redeemer mod. (see crafting section for crafting advice)


Body Armour:
Spoiler




Helmet:
Spoiler



Any helmet will do for starters, get Life and resists. On a redeemer base you can start with Reforge Caster for a Unleash mod, and then work your way from there.


Gloves:
Spoiler


Hrimsorrows are very good on a budget for the cold conversion of 50 percent, and you should work towards Temple Gloves with 25% Cold Conversion and Slam a crusader mod.


Boots:
Spoiler

I suggest getting a hunter Base and Reforging Crit from T2 Viper seeds. This will guarantee you Tailwind Boots, and you can simply reforge and try for better secondary stats such as Life, Resists and Movement Speed. Once you have the money go for an awakened Hunter/Redeemer Base and Reforge with Crit or simply find good secondary mods like 35% MS, Life or Attributes and Augment Crit twice to guarantee bothTailwind and Elusive.


Staff:
Spoiler



Hrimsorrows
Cold Conversion Watchers Eye
Tacati Staff
Explodey Chest: Roll Phys taken as Lightning on a ilvl:85+ Crusader Base, 2* Remove Non-Phys Add Phys for guaranteed Explosion Mod
Unleash Helmet: Reforge with Caster Modifiers on a Redeemer Base
Tailwind Boots: Reforge With Crit on a Hunter Base for guaranteed Tailwind Mod
Dexterity and Strength on Gear: You will need 155/159 Dexterity somehow.


Crafting
Harvest is needed for this Level of Gear/Crafting!
It might not be possible to obtain the same Level of gear within reasonable time for casual players. The build works fine without perfect items on every slot!
Harvest Crafts are in Blue, Metamods in Orange.
This will show the Crafting Process for the Endgame Gear.
Spoiler

Staff:
1. Staff Base was bought with the Temple Mod 'Tacati's' (105-110% Spell Damage, 5% of non-Chaos as Extra Chaos) and '+1-2 to Level of all Spell Skill Gems'.
2. Clear Suffixes and the last Prefix to have a clean Base.
3. Metacraft Cannot Roll Attack Modifiers. This allows only '+1-2/3 to Level of all Physical Skill Gems' and 'Gain % Physical Damage as Extra Chaos Damage' to roll as the last Prefix.
4. Augment a Physical Modifier.
5. Remove Physical -> Add Physical until hitting '+3 to Level of all Physical Skill Gems'.
6. Metacraft Prefixes cannot be changed.
7. Craft Critical Strike Chance for Spells. and Augment a Crit Modifier for guaranteed Crit Multi.
8. If not T1 or unhappy, remove the crafted Mod and Remove a Critical Modifier. Repeat Step 7.
9. You should have Crit Multi T1 and a crafted Critical Strike Chance for Spells now. Simply craft Remove Caster -> Add Caster until you hit T1 Spell Crit, it should take about 12 attempts on average.
10. Redeemer's Exalted Orb and pray for 'Hatred has % Increased Effect' T1. If you don't hit this mod on T1/2, go to 11. Otherwise just divine and you're done.
11. Remove Influence -> Add Influence until T1 (Chance to hit T1 is ~7%).
Note: Up to date for 3.13

Body Armour:
0. The base for this Body Armour was a clean ilvl 86 Astral Plate, 30% Quality and 3-6 white sockets linked. Awakener Orb was used with Crusaders Explosion Mod and Shapers '+1 to Level of Socketed Active Skill Gems' Mod.
1. Clean all mods except for the Explosion Mod and the +1 Mod with Annuls or Remove a random xyz Modifier.
2. Augment a Caster Modifier. This will 100% be Spell Critical Strike Chance.
3. Remove Caster -> Add Caster until you hit T1 Spell Crit (1-1.5%).
3.1 Reroll the Values of all Caster Modifiers until you are close to 1.5%.
4. Augment a Critical Modifier. This will 100% be Power Charge on Crit if you followed Step 4&5.
5. Craft Dexterity/Quality if you need Dexterity, Augment a Chaos Modifier & Remove Chaos -> Add Chaos if you need Chaos Res or any other resistance.
6. Augment a Life Modifier.
7. Remove Life -> Add Life until you hit T1, finishing all Prefixes.
7.1 Reroll the Values of all life Modifiers until 129.
The Reason for Rolling Life this late is to block all Suffixes that have a Life tag, namely flat regen. (Saves a couple of Rerolls)
8. Enchant the Body Armour with an enchant of your choice: Quality Grants +1 Maximum life per 2% is quite nice, gives 24 flat Life.
Note: Up to date for 3.13

Helmet: Not currently craftable with harvest like in 3.13, due to the loss of a caster tag on the Unleash Mod!
Spoiler
Helmet: to REVIEW; 3.12 Tag Changes
0. The Base for this Helmet is an ilvl 86 Helmet with the BV Duration enchant. Hubris Circlets or other ES Bases are really expensive, so don't be picky with the Base. 30% Quality is optional. Awakeners Orb was used on Redeemers 'Reduced Mana Reserved' with Shapers 'Nearby Enemies take 6% increased Elemental Damage', as all other mods can be forced with harvest.
1. Clean all mods except for the Awakened Mods with Annuls or Remove a random xyz Modifier.
2. Augment a Resistance Modifier (Not Cold!). You can always swap Fire/Lightning -> Cold with Harvest if you need to later.
3. Remove Fire/Lightning/Chaos -> Add Fire/Lightning/Chaos until you hit T1 (46-48%/31-35%). Suffixes are now Finished.
4. Augment a Caster Modifier.
5. Remove Caster -> Add Caster until you hit Redeemers Unleash Mod.
6. Augment a Cold/Physical Modifier. Both can hit Phys taken as Cold Damage, use the one you have plenty of.
7. Remove Cold/Physical -> Add Cold/Physical until you hit Redeemers Phys taken as Cold Mod.
7.1 Reroll the Values of all Cold/Physical Modifiers until 10.
8. Augment a Life Modifier.
9. Remove Life -> Add Life until you hit T1, finishing all Prefixes.
9.1 Reroll the Values of all life Modifiers until 99.



Gloves: Need to take a look at, might not be doable atm in 3.13.
Spoiler

1: Get Base with Temple Mod. Hopefully one that is easy to clean up.
2: Clean it down to Temple mod and 2 suffix OR Temple Mod + Cold Resist +1 more suffix. Hopefully this suffix is an easy clean, but if not no biggie. We just want to fill the suffix slots.
3: Craft Cannot Roll Attack Modifiers.
Step 4: Augment Cold to Get Cold Resistance if it's not already on the gloves.
Step 5: Slam a Crusader Exalt and hope you get the 25% conversion already, if not that's okay, the rest is an easy remove.
Step 5.5: Remove the extra crusader mod if its not 25%. The ONLY ONE THAT CANNOT be removed is +Maximum Cold Resist, but thats ok if it is on there.
Step 6: If it is maximum cold resist, simply Augment Cold for the conversion.

Here is where it gets expensive.

Step 7: If conversion is T2, and you do not have Maximum Cold Resist mod then Augment Cold again and it will always hit it. Now we have to use a Mavens orb. If it eats the Resist it will bump the T2 Conversion up to T1. Yay!

If it hits the Conversion we Augment Cold again and get conversion. This can be repeated indefinitely until we have T1 or even Elevated Conversion mod if we want.

Viola. 50% conversion gloves on any Temple base.


Boots:
Helmet:
Helmet:


Videos
All videos of this build are compiled in this playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBL6tw_-VTywwz92LRNS0KQGhtX3RZdQn

Changelog
Spoiler

- 02/02/2021: updated 3.13 Changes, 3.13 Ascendant PoB
- 13/01/2021: Filled Gem Section, Added Crafting Guides
- 13/01/2021: New Videos, added new playlist, updating the build to 3.13
- 17/08/2020: Added leveling progression (sort of), new videos
- 15/08/2020: Uploading Videos.
- 02/08/2020: Further additions have been made to all topics.
- 01/08/2020: Initial post creation and additions over the day.
Last edited by Saevarna on Feb 3, 2021, 6:20:59 PM
Last bumped on Feb 11, 2021, 7:41:28 AM
Reserved
Hey there, any specific reason you picked inqui over assassin ?
"
Blaidan wrote:
Hey there, any specific reason you picked inqui over assassin ?

Hey there!
I think it mainly comes down to a choice between the Main Defensive Mechanic, ease of gearing and QoL features you want.

I would characterise the Inquisitor version as follows:
- Main Defense is Glancing Blows Max Block (75%/50%) which mitigates about 30% damage on average.
- Ailment Immunity, Ignore Monsters Elemental Resistance.
- Higher possible EHP pool (about 6k-6.5k Life and ~2k ES with good gear).
- Ease of Gearing: Only requires 1 Weapon to be Harvest Crafted
- Damage Ceiling of perhaps 12m-15m DPS with good Gear, 25 with insane Gear.
- One additional Aura (Zealotry), opening up additional Watcher's Eye options.

I would characterise the Assassin version as follows:
- Main Defense is Dodge with about 40-60% Attack Dodge and 30-50% Spell Dodge, depending on Elusives uptime.
- No extra Damage from Critical Strikes.
- Lower EHP Pool, perhaps raisable with more conversion of Life Nodes to ES, about 5.5k-6k Life + 2k-2.5k ES.
- Ease of Gearing: no Dexterity on Rings needed, no Elusive on Boots needed, no Reduced Mana Reservation on Amulet & Helmet.
- Damage Ceiling of perhaps 20m-25m on really good gear, and 30m-35m on insane gear.
- ~35% additional Movement Speed compared to the Inquisitor due to Elusive and the Ascendancy.

My choice fell on Inquisitor mainly because I value defense and QoL very highly. Ailment and Curse Immunity make for a very relaxed and safe playstyle, and I don't like being one-shot from an Attack/Spell I didn't dodge by chance. Since I stack additional damage reductions on top of glancing blows, in my opinion mitigating damage is a bit more consistent than just trying to dodge.

Also, sorry about the long response time, I was busy with life stuff for some time.
Last edited by Saevarna on Aug 15, 2020, 9:19:11 AM
Is there a certain way I put points into the skill tree? I have no idea what to go for first. Kind of dumb when it comes to looking at skill trees without the level progressions on POB
Heyo,

most parts of the skill tree are really Gear dependant. I would follow the progression in the updated pob either here: https://pastebin.com/Cxh8pR2T or in the first post.

Once you reach this progression, I would prioritise the skill tree as follows:
- Allocate the Jewel Slot for the Doryanis Timeless Jewel and the Agnostic as soon as you have the jewel, its really good.
- Allocate the Cluster Jewel nodes as soon as you reach 67 and can spare the 7 points for 2 Jewel Sockets and the Life leech. The build is fine without it, but its just an added Defence.
- Allocate the Thread of Hope as soon as you have one. Those 3 Nodes are probably the highes damage increase apart from the PH Clusters.
- The Herald Reservation and Spellblock/Mana Regen Nodes are the most important ones in the Intuitive Leap circle and should be allocated first.
- Go for the Staff nodes and Glancing Blows once you have a Staff equipped. Since I could equip mine at Level 52, thats when I did that. If you choose to level with a staff, you can allocate them earlier, as they are very good damage nodes.
- I chose to allocate the scion life wheel from levels 88-94, as I felt comfortable with my EHP Pool until then. You can choose to sacrifice some damage if you feel you lack tankiness via EHP.

If you feel like you don't know what to start with crafting or buying in the jewel slots, I'd recommend starting with the Thread of Hope, an Elemental Damage or Cold Damage Large Cluster Jewel and the Intuitive Leap. The Large Cluster Jewel is easily rerollable with the "Reforge Life" from Vivid T1 Seeds, which guarantee a Life roll. The PH Cluster jewels are harder to craft and the bases are a bit more costly, you can stick with only Vengeful Commander on a budget.
Last edited by Saevarna on Aug 18, 2020, 4:23:19 PM
I am staring this build now.

Some of the parts of the guide seem to be missing, but I think I can get most of the I go from the PoB. Will let you know how it goes. First time playing BV, but love cold dmg in general. Cheers

Are you planning on updating this for 3.12? Apart from cluster jewel changes, doesn't seem like a massive hit to anything related to BV.
Is this viable as a League starter?
Hey, if you are interested in a 3.12 LS update for this build, I'll probably update it tomorrow when I have some spare time.

When looking at the patch notes, the Cluster Jewel with Vengeful Commander and the item crafting are probably the most affecting changes, and the high-end of damage will probably suffer quite a bit. Overall the build should still perform very well and scale well into the lategame, just like in harvest.
Sidenote: apparently, multi conversion glove crafting has been changed according to patch notes, it might be necessary to use a phys to lighting gem after these changes.

I probably won't leaguestart with this, since I rarely replay last leagues' builds, but keep an eye out for the leaguestart section or tell me if you want a dm once I update it.
It should be a solid leaguestarter if you can get your hands on a pair of hrimsorrows and some dex gear, and in my experience bv has always performed well on leaguestarts.

Greetings, Saevarna
Last edited by Saevarna on Sep 17, 2020, 2:05:40 PM
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