RANGER SMITH IS BACK-3.4 mirror/blink arrow deadeye(Video guide)

Some people may remember when blink and mirror arrow first came out. back before ascendancies, and before kitava, there was a build I dubbed Ranger smith. It was a blink/mirror arrow build using deerstalker boots and minion damage.

then it grew with the use of the necromancer ascendancy and null's inclination.

Now it can continue with the Deadeye, and return to its roots as a ranger.

Ranger smith is back, and she has a lot to say.

So the build is basically make a clone army of yourself.

There was a long process that went into the making of this, and it works FAIRLY well as a necromancer. But then my buddy said something to me.

He said why don't you try deadeye and get the 100% cooldown reduction for the skills?

And much like when the fire nation attacked, that's when everything changed.


I am still messing around with the build and fine tuning everything, but it is exciting how possible this is now.


The meat and bones of the build:

Items:
Spoiler
Weapon

Ive tested with mirror tier phys bow, mirror tier ele bow(in pob, im not rich) and this bow. This bow is the best damage you can get for your clones period. It is absolutely best in slot with this setup, and the only way i could improve my clone's DPS currently is to get an additional arrow corruption on the bow. I highly recommend getting a well rolled hopeshredder (25% attack speed is VERY important) and if you can get one corrupted with either additional arrow or flat ele dmg corruption you will be sitting quite pretty. :P


For our main clear bow, we want high elemental damage to attacks, additional arrow, and attack speed. Those are the main stats you worry about as your clones will be getting all their damage from the bow and quiver and the tree.(it doesn't have to be as good as this quiver by any means.)

Something like this will work absolutely fine.


For bossing, you want to use a shuddering fossil crafted quiver that gives your clones frenzy charge on hit against rare or unique monsters. Its a huge dps boost for your clones to have frenzy charges

other gear:

For helmet i definitely recommend alpha's howl. The boost to auras is big as well as the reduced mana reservation. I highly recommend reduced clarity reservation for the enchant, I know it sounds weird but it makes playing the build much much smoother. You can absolutely enchant it with increased mirror arrow/blink arrow damage or increased cooldown recovery speed, but since that only affects one of the skills, its not as important as it may sound, and it really improves qol to have the clarity reduction.

A corrupted belt with increased skill effect duration. Absolutely the best you can get. Other than that we want life/resists.

Elder boots with increased skill effect duration. Again, other than that just life/resists.

I really prefer to run an elder ring with poacher's mark on hit. It is optional as you can run both poacher's mark and proj weakness in your curse on hit with rain of arrows, but then you lose out on your mirage archer, which is very helpful in bossfights(where poacher's mark doesnt do much for us.)

As for the rest of the gear, high life and resists as well as filling out any stats for requirements are all we need, although id highly recommend getting gloves that have room for %increased minion damage.

Jewely jewels:

pretty straightforward, for abyssal jewels you want flat ele dmg to minion attacks, life, and %increased minion dmg when you use a minion skill(which we are constantly doing)
For regular jewels, increased minion damage and % increased life. If you need to it's also a good place to fill out any resists or extra stats you might need.


Probably the only build I'll ever suggest you run two mana flasks in. We don't do a lot of direct damage, so our mana gained on hit/leech is pretty much nonexistent and we spam a lot of abilites, so it's important that we always have mana available.



Gem links:
Spoiler

mirror arrow>added cold damage>elemental damage with attacks>added lightning damage>elemental focus>minion damage

blink arrow>added cold damage>elemental damage with attacks>added lightning damage>elemental focus>minion damage

wrath>flesh offering>generosity>vaal haste
Run these auras in your alpha's howl

rain of arrows>projectile weakness>mirage archer>curse on hit
I suggest running the curse on hit setup in your boots.

Cast when damage taken>immortal call>increased duration>clarity



Path of Building stuffs:
Spoiler
https://pastebin.com/7BXfMNPi


Pantheon:
Brine king for major, your minor one is pretty much up to you, I tend to run ryslatha for boss fights, but it's really just preference.


The last thing to talk about is ascendancy. Deadeye is the choice, mainly for the cooldown reduction of both blink and mirror arrow, as well as tailwind. this buffs us and the minions. The last two points really do nothing for the minions so youre free to take whatever you feel is best for you.


LEVELING:

Spoiler

For leveling, i highly suggest running zombies at least, if not skeletons until you hit about 50 or 60 and can really have enough of the important parts of the skill tree filled out. I like to level with:

its a nice dps bow and will last you pretty well until you get hopeshredder.
As far as quivers go, if you're running death's harp use:

if you're running something else you could always use:

Once you get to level 60-70 you should be able to completely drop your zombies and transition to pure mirror/blink arrow. and then the fun begins.


VIDEO GUIDE:
Spoiler
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqrnqsxD7gM&feature=youtu.be


Other possible items to use(but you'd have to change a large part of the skill tree and build):


Could very easily change this build up and do one more focused on abyssal jewels and use victario's influence and speaker's wreath or a well rolled bone helm.(not saying that one is) but the problem here will be you lose a six link for one of your clones and it also will affect your mana heavily, and having enough mana/mana regen to comfortably pump out your clones is VERY important. It absolutely could be done, but i think my setup is simpler in terms of making the build feel smooth.

Please enjoy and feel free to leave any comments here or message me in game @ ExponentialPoison

Last edited by Naeblis720 on Nov 17, 2018, 3:26:38 AM
Last bumped on Jan 4, 2019, 9:27:34 AM
Updated the guide to its final state for the time being, SHAPER IS DOWN. video guide up!
Last edited by Naeblis720 on Nov 17, 2018, 3:50:43 PM
Can you please upload a demo video of the build in action? (you can use OBS to do it, it's free).
"
katmos wrote:
Can you please upload a demo video of the build in action? (you can use OBS to do it, it's free).


it's on its way.
Thanks for the guide, I haven't seen another build with Hopeshredder mirror arrow and very glad it's working!!

Not sure how good these suggestions are but there's some theorycraft that might be interesting for the next league. The first one is an improvement but the second and third ones might come with some drawbacks that are too big:

For minion accuracy, the new Command of the Pit gloves can increase your minion's accuracy by +1000. I've tried it with your PoB and it increases your accuracy from 88% to 94%.

Another thing is very clunky but you can actually run elemental equilibrium if instead of cursing with rain of arrows, we use another skill that only does fire damage. This could be some fire spell (may be pretty bad because we aren't scaling any cast speed), or EleHit that blocks the ice/lightning components (also pretty bad because we're sacrificing two jewel sockets and use GMP so we replace mirage archer). This would increase the DPS per clone from 140k per clone to 240k per clone, but debatably this takes too much effort to carry out.

Also how much % of the time do the minions actually have frenzy charges during bossing? They receive 4% chance to get frenzy on hit and the poacher's mark only gives charge on the killing blow. There's two ways to get more frequent frenzy charge on minions, one is using Animate Guardian with Victario's Charity shield which gives % chance for the AG to give frenzy charge to nearby allies when it hits an enemy. The other thing is using a high level ape spectre (the ones in act 2/7 which gives frenzy to allies). I don't know how tanky these are especially during boss so this might not be reliable. Also because both methods take up too many sockets, you might want to Hungry Loop it.
didn't think about the gloves. I'll add them to the possible items section of the guide.

Honestly, adding any other active skills to the build has a chance to muddy the waters, but guardians or spectres are a possibility, it just means more investment in gear to make it possible. I'll look at updating it right before betrayal. Currently taking a little break while I wait for league launch.
Still work in 3.5 ?
absolutely viable. I will be making this build again soon, but I'm trying out the new skills for league start. xD
https://pastebin.com/i17bkgAR thats my build cheaper and stronger

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