[1.3] Wanderfully Balanced Kinetic Blaster

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Level 71 with this build in bloodlines.

I have a few questions.

My tooltip dps is like 2.3k. But it feels like I'm doing a 10 times that. Why is that? I think I read that the tooltip damage doesn't reflect the actual damage its doing. I've seen a few other builds with almost the same skill tree and their tooltip dps is like 30k. Does this have to do with different links or something to kinetic blast?

Also, I don't seem to have any problems with reflect, it does no damage to me. Is that because my damage isn't high enough? I'm still farming docks and every group is practically one shot. But my single target seems to be lacking, even with the whole frostwall thing.

Have I just not built up my DPS enough for single target to not be strong enough and reflect not be dangerous?

What is your tooltip dps? (just curious)

edit: oh, and I should say that I don't have much crit. no crit gear yet and I think with 4 power charges, my crit chance is a bit below 30%

How have you prioritised the nodes? I'm looking at the tree now and it seems a bit wonky for Bloodlines, going into all directions with good stuff on the end of each branch.

Also, when did you take Vaal Pact and start using Blood Magic?

Could you add a helmet to your recommended gear and your current gear is also missing one.


Thanks this is an amazing build.

@Kryteck

Personally I think A3 Merciless Docks is pretty much when you really need that Vaal Pact (as you usually farm it a bit before going for Piety/Dominus as well as maps - and it tends to have regular reflect mobs.

It depends a lot on your Life vs DPS in the end, how confident you are with flasks etc. A lot of those instant recovery flasks are borderline OP in my eyes now after the patch where those level 70+ Flasks were introduced.

@Bawtzki

I have edited the guide so many times and it has this weird "Draft" functionality which I didn't realise until recently. I definitely know I had put them in there I swear! I have updated it all now. Let me know if anything is missing.

I've been playing this skill tree, but I think I got a bit too hung up on the Acrobatics portion of the tree. Specifically, I look at the fact that Acrobatics halves armor and energy shield, so I've mostly been sticking to evasion, and hoping for items with the right socket mix to drop. (This build is very much a slave to its sockets.) I don't even want to think about how many chromatics I've gone through. :p

Obviously, evasion gear with all the blue and red sockets this build requires are harder to find than three-legged ballerinas, so I guess I'm asking: should I be concentrating more on armor and/or armor/energy shield, and just counting on the build's other strengths to make up for what it loses in defenses thanks to the Acrobatics keystones?

In the meantime, I've grunted this one nearly up to level 50 with pure evasion gear, LMP Spectral Throw and have been using Vaal Pact for a while now. It works pretty well, especially with this...



...but it's still pretty squishy (6 deaths so far as of early Act 3 Cruel). Still, running Hatred and Herald of Ice with an Elreon's amulet has been pretty fun offensively. It's just the defenses that I'm not too happy with so far.

Just an update after playing this build for the past week. I felt too squishy at 3.6k life so I swapped out Rat's Nest for a rear helm with life, resist, and accuracy, this allows me to use a different ring with more life and accuracy. My life total is now at 4k and my chance to hit went from 80% to 88%. My tooltip dps drop by about 2k, but I don't really notice the lower dps. I changed some of the gems to suit my play style. I took out the curse on hit attached to HoT because I rearly ever see the lightning bolt and everything dies before they can be curse. I also rarely ever use lightning warp so I took that out also.
In its place I added CoDT linked to enfeeble, I figure if they're close enough to set it off I might as well have them do less damage. I also added Frost Wall in place of Inc Duration on the 4L CwDT, in reflect maps it is constantly being cast. And lastly I added Vaal Grace for opening boxes and a little more protection when I need it. Here's my gear


Thanks again for a wonderful build. It's literally a Blast to play :)

How do you manage to get three heralds and a hatred with 99% reserved, (25+25+25+60)*0.75 for a level 16 reduced mana gem is 101% mana reserved. I don't see any mana reserve nodes or uniques for that last 2%, what am I missing :(

@Gruentod

Sockets can be a pain but luckily it isn't as bad with Voll's or Belly of the Beast - I have managed to get the colours on a Carcass too but it is harder!

As we are playing a ranged class - and one that can kill off-screen very easily, I wouldn't worry about trying to get your evasion high. Just rely on the block/acrobatics and the instant life leech a long with well placed frost walls.

As the generic tree goes to 147% life, I think that is quite a good amount of health for a build with such range (if you look around other guides, some have lower, or not much more for a melee build). You can even go the 167% or even adjust it to 182% if you feel really squishy as something tells me you will kill so fast you won't notice the difference.

I'd make the switch to Kinetic blast now though, I think it makes you feel a lot less squishy then Spectral Throw due to the instant nature of freezing and killing things from afar.

@IchiMorghulis

I think 3.6k life is pretty decent on the basis that this build has tremendous range - if it was melee or let's say Freezing Pulse/Ethereal Knives which doesn't have that much range I probably would be hesitant.

After having experimented around with a 117 pDPS wand, I am confident you can make this a 5k hp build and still clear pretty damn fast if you really want to though.

Interesting changes to the sockets - I kind of agree that the Assassins Mark rarely comes in to play for the majority of mobs, I have kept it to curse mini bosses or bosses which have not died by the time I have arrived to the scene, making the bosses fall a lot quicker - but i probably wouldn't notice the difference if it wasn't their I guess.

The enfeeble on COTD I can see as being pretty useful though, as mentioned in the guide, I think it is certain melee enemies which are the most dangerous now in PoE, rather than ranged which do not trouble this build. Potentially could even link the enfeeble to HoL for bosses.

@NightTimes

The mana reserved are calculated by PoE individually on each aura/herald. As a result, hatred takes 45% and the three heralds end up reserving 18% each. See https://poe.mikelat.com/#auras=1&name%5B1%5D=Aura+Group+1&cla%5B1%5D=&hat%5B1%5D=1&hoa%5B1%5D=1&hoi%5B1%5D=1&hol%5B1%5D=1&bmg%5B1%5D=&rmg%5B1%5D=16&mul%5B1%5D=100&rms=0&life=1000&mana=1000 for more info.

Hi,
I want to play a wander in Hardcore. Do you think your build is good for Hc or just a sc build? if so do you know about any good Hc wander builds?

Ty

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Fubnub1 wrote:

Hi,
I want to play a wander in Hardcore. Do you think your build is good for Hc or just a sc build? if so do you know about any good Hc wander builds?

Ty

I'd say this build is very viable for Hc. It doesn't waste nodes on aura's or mana sustainance, allowing you, if you wish, get as much as 182% life, acrobatics and ondar's guile. People are managing to play melee in Hc so this build should be a walk in the park in Hc compared to them.

You also do not need great gear for good clear speed.

Just wanted to put in my two cents on this build. For starters, I love it. It is one of my favorite builds I've ever played, and I've played a lot of them as I'm somewhat of an alt-aholic. The clear speed is great. My experiences so far, in no particular order -

-The build really starts to shine once you invest in the wand nodes at the top of the witch section. Prior to this, I had not taken really any DPS nodes and while I could still do OK, I did struggle quite a bit with some bosses like Oak, Vaal, etc. I finally made my way up to there in my mid-late 50's and I've whizzed through ever since.
-Early on, particularly if you have low life, Kinetic blast + BM + links can be quite resource intensive. Make sure you have good HP flasks at your disposal as you will need them until the BM gems level up and you get more HP.
-Single target damage is still somewhat inconsistent. The Frost Wall technique helps to improve this significantly, but unless I'm in a tight corridor, it can at times take a small bit of time to get them down. I think this "extra time" is perceived as amplified due to the fact that you will one shot most groups of mobs while clearing, so the fact that bosses don't insta-die makes it seem like they take a while to get down.
-iMbaQ has shown several ways the build can become tankier with skill point changes. I have stuck to his original build and the only mobs that give me issue are hard hitters, particularly fast moving hard hitters like flicker strikers or the leaper mobs. I think I may try to change my gems to incorporate Inc Duration on my CWDT/EC/IC combo to see if this helps at all, and I will probably try a CWDT+enfeeble combo as was suggested by IchiMorghulis.
-To continue the last point about reworking the skill links, I agree with IchiMorghulis that few things live lone enough for the CoH+HoT+assassin's mark to make much of a difference. I will probably leave AM in a link to self cast on bosses/tough mobs.
-Crit and Crit multi really make this build shine, so do not neglect those. Currently trying to get the right colors on my Maligaro's (4 off colors is tough!), after which I think the character will be nigh-unstoppable.
-I have not attempted Atziri, but I am very curious to see how this will perform considering single target damage is the only (slight) drawback of this build. I hope iMbaQ can show us a video of him continuing his destruction of end game content, not only with Atziri, but I'd also like to see a video of Piety and Dominus, just to get a feel for how well you do against these single targets that I seem to somewhat struggle with at times.

Again, great build iMbaQ. Thanks again for the time and effort you've put into it.