Crystal Skin & Its Associated Skill Nodes (Viable Build)

I really like the idea of Crystal Skin and it's associated skill nodes (% chance to avoid elemental status ailments) and their cousin skill node: Avoid Stun.

I was thinking of making a build that capitalizes on this, but as I went through, I found myself investing at minimum, 26 points for all of the "Resist [elemental effect]" and 30 points to get all of the nearby "Resist Stun" nodes too.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to find much information about these passives. I tried checking here on the forums and on the Path of Exile wiki, but to no avail.

What am I checking for? To see how much of a benefit these actually are to survivability.

I mean...if I invest 30 points just to get all of these nodes, that leaves me with a lot of dexterity (which is nice) - but no investment on health, offensive capabilities, physical evasion, or resists.

Will I actually need to invest in resists with such a build? It says it gives you a chance to avoid the status ailment, but it doesn't mention anything about elemental damage - so my guess is that YES, I will need to also invest in elemental resistances.

So here's my build so far

Crystal Skin Build: 30/111

I'm not really sure where to go from here, or if this is even VIABLE for entering the cruel difficulty. I'm sure I will see a very nice benefit's to my EVASION due to nearly half of those 30 skill points being spent on +10 dexterity nodes. I'll also pretty much never miss a shot. But what about my damage and low HP pool? What about my low resists at that point?

I don't know....I'm not exactly sure how to tackle the situation, besides playing in a group.

What say you? Any experience with "Crystal Skin"? Any suggestions? I'm assuming that Ranger is the best class to pick for this build, since it's so close to everything for it.

Edit:

Crystal Skin Build: 50/111 <--Much more tank for 20 more points. Still no offence but MASSIVE dexterity.

Edit: I just rolled with it and ended up with a high-mobility, tanky Ranger:

Crystal Skin Build: 88/111

Looking at 88/111, I can see that this build lends itself well to Frenzy Charges. All of the points along the way take you near the Frenzy Charge Keystones! :D So I just went ahead and let that become part of the build.

I'm not sold on stun avoidance/status avoidance, for a few simple reasons.

1) If you have 50% chance to evade and 30% chance to dodge, you already have 65% stun avoidance. 35% of all attacks are even capable of stunning you. 12% increased chance to avoid stun kicks that down to 31%. Not a terribly strong skillpoint.

2) In the same way, if you have 50% chance to evade, 30% chance to dodge, and 36% chance to block - and monsters have 10% chance to crit - their effective crit rate is only 1%. So crystal skin has about zero effect on half the status effects you're gaining (the ones that come from an attack and while you aren't cursed with +%increased chance of status)

For the other half of the status effects, you can sidestep (spells) or just be cautious (under an elemental curse). It's the completely random invisible ones that kill (crit from an attack).

Anyway I think that the stun/status avoidance talents need a substantial buff, otherwise they're usually a poor investment.

Thank you for your insight. So what exactly is the difference between dodge and evade? I read this page on the subject: http://en.pathofexilewiki.com/wiki/Evasion

So is it just that evasion is what you normally get from armour, dex and some passive nodes. And dodge comes from some of the keystone skill nodes?

You know, there's a bit of bad logic in my second line of reasoning. Diamond skin itself might actually be worth it but I still wouldn't buy the surrounding nodes. I also still wouldn't take stun avoidance unless you're actually having a big problem with stuns. The 12% passives just don't do very much.

Dodge and Evade are just different mechanics. You get evasion rating from gear, dodge from passives. A little bit confusing I know, but labels and names are very precise in PoE.