Build advice for a beginner, with a particular weapon in mind.

"

Darestine wrote:

"

symban wrote:

-snip-

I'll check the wiki etc. but I'm way too new, I don't know how to get curses, how to cap stuff, let alone play around reflect etc. I'm trying to learn, but there are lots to learn and not many guides teaching it. I'll keep playing the game and learn new stuff for a long time, and then I'll start making my own builds, have fun and lucky drops :)

Still, you wont enjoy things much if you just try to follow a build without knowing what/how it does.

As others said; you need to trip/fall/stand up on your own to get a hang of the game.

Here are better explanations of things you mentioned as unclear:

- Capping resists: Bring Fire/Cold/Lightning resist to %75 at merciless difficulty. Each difficulty will lower your base resists so, you need more total resists to reach %75 at merciless than normal/cruel. And over capping means going roughly %105+ for each resist so that when an enemy applies elemental curse that lowers resistances, you still have capped resists.

- Curses are simple: http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Curse Apply methods are;
-- Cast manually
-- Use http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Blasphemy to reserve mana for aura like curse effect
-- Link your curse to a skill that HITs enemies to apply the curse via http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Curse_On_Hit

- Playing around reflect is also not rocket science http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Damage_reflection. You need either;
-- Have an instant sustain to recover from the damage you receive from reflect (life gain on hit / or instant leech)
-- Divide your damage into smaller portions so that instead of dealing a ***BOOM*** you deal *boom* *boom* *boom*, so that your leech over time can recover between those partial reflects
-- (Reflect does not apply instantly, it HAS TO overcome your personal defenses. So your attack stats vs your defense stats). Make sure you have relevant defense stats that counters your personal attack stats. (ex: block vs physical attack, resists vs elemental attacks, evasion vs crits etc)

This is turning into a great thread for tips for new players. Hope this keeps up.

On a slight tangent: I've found that people Have different thresholds of enjoyment when it comes to initial learning curves. Some people like to get out in new territory and explore everything (a.k.a. they like to explore and map themselves).

Some people like to have a map initially, then flesh out that map as they go along. It's hard to say where someone stands as each player is different. I'm in the middle...I like to explore some things initially, but I also like to know that I have some direction available as well. My first character didn't make it past the 40's. I started looking at guides, and my first toon to make it past 80 was based off of a guide.

I will say this though: PoE is a game that rewards those who like to research. The skill tree is NOT friendly to random exploration. I personally found this out the hard way. I think that many of us experienced players forget what it was like to come to PoE after a game like D3 or WoW or (insert said themepark game) where they literally hand you your skills in a very controlled and concise way.

My first intro into PoE from those environments and I was overwhelmed. It frankly put of my gameplay initially...until I got some information and found some guides.

So I don't think it's bad if someone asks for a quick and easy initial "roadmap". if they like the game, they will eventually start exploring on their own. I really didn't start making my own skill setups until 2-3 characters into the game. my first few real successes were pre-made by others.

So to each their own. But I think the combination of direction and free information were giving here is good for new players.

About the skill tree... it's not as important as people make it out to be. But every player should decide a basic ration of defense to offense that they want to get out of the tree. Mine is about 2:1... and others go as far from that as 1:2. Depends on your playstyle.

Pick specific targets on the tree and don't get too distracted by getting there.

With that sword, kill everything before it kills you; Beast Mode: ON.

Thanks everyone, very helpful and great advices, I started off as a dual wield atm, but still not sure, currently the dps is great for my level, but I didn't play much yet, I might create a new character and go S/H, but currently I'm aiming towards bleed enhancing stuff with duelist, I'll get all 3 Bleed nodes(2 neut 1 sword) and I'll also get the Gladiator Blood in the Eye etc. We'll see how it goes, and the sad thing is even my highest lecel character (24) didn't find a 4-link yet. We'll see how it goes, I have lots of socket adders and 9 link adders but I think those are expensive stuff so not gonna waste on shit I'll leave behind 3-5 levels later, playing along with Witch friend and we clear fast, his DPS is shit atm though, he went for life first. I really want to start using Reave but I dont have any green-red-red links, only red-red-red.

Thanks for the advices again, happy to know I have a beast ;)

Have fun!

"

Darestine wrote:

and the sad thing is even my highest lecel character (24) didn't find a 4-link yet.

There are some 4-links as quest rewards in Cruel difficulty. Their rolls will most probably be shit but if you insist on going self-found they may help you.

"

silumit wrote:

"

Darestine wrote:

and the sad thing is even my highest lecel character (24) didn't find a 4-link yet.

There are some 4-links as quest rewards in Cruel difficulty. Their rolls will most probably be shit but if you insist on going self-found they may help you.

I don't insist on going self-found but I'm really new and not sure what to buy etc, I really need a guide, I went dual-wield for now but I really wanna change to sword and shield reave build but no build I checked suits me(no swords used or nothing about bleed taken from tree, or taken something like resolute technique which would be really bad for this sword)

Four links don't drop until the end of act II, and even then only from bosses.

Also make sure you do as many of the masters quests that come along. get a Hideout made, and get Vorici up to lvl 3 to get his crafting station available. He can craft 4 links for you for a moderately cheap cost. check out the Masters page in the wiki for details.

To be honest, just about any build works through normal. the deficiencies of a build don't necessarily start showing up until mid/end cruel. If you hit a stonewall in a4 cruel, it's most likely something with the build, or your using gear from your 20's.

EDIT: note on Vorici. He's one of the two masters found in Act 3. Though his quests can be irritating at times (too easy to kill the wrong target on some quests), his crafting bench is one of the most beneficial to have in your Hideout. it crafts extra sockets, extra links, and allows you to control the colors of sockets.

the more sockets you play with however, the higher the cost. As an example, to craft a piece of gear with 5 sockets and all of them linked will take 70 jeweller's orbs and 150 Orbs of Fusing. not cheap for the casual player, but well worth it if you have a special piece of gear in mind.

4 sockets is drastically cheaper (10 jewel/5fuse). so 4 sockets is well within the range of anyone as they level.

Beware of using too many links at first too... 5Ling your main skill too early can make it cost too much mana to be effective.