Chthonian's 1.3 Elemental Ice Shot Bow Templar

Hey guys, I'm currently not very high level with this spec, and this is the first time trying out something like this, however it has been going so well that I've decided to do a write up for my build. Oh keep in mind, I'm new to doing something like this so some criticism is welcome and this write up is subject to change as I level or find new gear.



This build so far has been incredibly cheap, as I can pick up the highest damage bow I can find, but since I'm not going for crit and not really making use of attack speed, this increases the range of bows I can choose from, and sometimes at better prices. The main things I would look out for is high phys, and added elemental damage supplemented quite well. I've never played a bow build before, but I've noticed non crit bows usually sell cheap, and I like cheap. The only thing I would likely drop a fair amount of currency on would be a 5L Belly of the Beast, or a 5L Cloak of Defiance and drop my Determination aura, which is currently not doing much for me.

Essentially this build was just an excuse to make use of a couple of things. Primarily the new physical to lightning support gem, as well as a few recent additions to the passive skill tree such as Storm Weaver, Celestial Judgement, and Celestial Punishment, and it turned out pretty decent. Only trouble I ran into was around level 60ish when I was struggling to get my next bow upgrade as I was being carried by an amazing level 38 5L bow. I had purchased my next upgrades for when I was 62, but it started to get slow, and I had to juggle around some gear and passives to get the dexterity required for it when I got there.



This was just something I found with an other character, threw an alchemy on it, dropped maybe 3 chaos on it to get something decent, and spent a few alchemy orbs for the flat phys. Not bad, since this thing carried me to 60, although the last few levels were slow. I used Ice Shot, LMP, Physical to Lightning, Weapon Elemental Damage, and Physical Projectile Attack Damage, when things got slow and since I was already dual cursing I switched it to Lightning Arrow, LMP, Curse on Hit, Elemental Weakness, and Projectile Weakness and supported a friend's wander for the last 2 levels. Before this bow, I was using a 4L with Ice Shot, LMP, Weapon Elemental Damage and Physical to Lightning.



The bow was 5 chaos. Pretty damn cheap, I could probably do better, but at the time, this thing was the biggest bang for my buck.
The most expensive piece of gear so far has been an additional arrow corrupted quiver at 15 chaos, but I did not mind as it allowed me to keep some AoE, but remove the LMP gem for much higher damage, and replace it with Cold Penetration, my alternatives would be Life Leech, or Iron Grip if I had a red slot. (my current chest is corrupted). The particular quiver, Blackgleam, is not ideal, as it actually reduces the amount of cold and lightning damage I do (because it brings the physical damage conversion over 100%), but it's all that was on the market, and overall it gave me a damage increase as I now do 100% elemental damage, and the extra arrow was definitely worth it. This will be the first thing to go as soon as I can find a replacement. Perhaps I'll go on a Vaal Orb spree on some quivers.
Everything else I'm currently using was either self found, or purchased for a couple of chaos or less. I forget how much I paid for the chest, but it wasn't more than a few chaos.
The build so far feels pretty tanky, for a bow user anyway (I've played evasion and ES builds before), but it is starting to struggle with taking physical damage, so I'm currently scheming up some defense options.




I've mostly just rushed life, Dex, and some ele damage, and the freeze/ele status effect chance nodes.
So far I'm at 20% chance to freeze and I'm looking to get up to 30%. So far I can freeze a fair amount of bosses for a second or two.

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