[3.13] Doomfletch Split Arrow Mines - Starter Viable - End Game Capable - High Damage, Low Budget

                                               And now, for something completely different


                               


NO LONGER MAINTAINED - LAST UPDATED 3.13

Welcome to Doomfletch Mines. One of the most unique builds I've managed to create in my many years of playing PoE, and one of my proudest achievements. I took a pre-league "MSPaint Meme Build", and turned it into an endgame rolling, boss stomping, name taking and gum chewing monster.

Don't want to read? Full video guide in the spoiler below



- What is it?

Doomfletch mines is a Bow Projectile mine build that relies on the crazy efficient interaction between 2 uniques, both underutilized (and consequently, very cheap).

Doomfletch's Prism

and

Coated Shrapnel

It may not seem like much, but Coated Shrapnel, a trash tier gem, allows us to stack crazy physical damage at the cost of jewel slots. Use 3-4 well placed Coated Shrapnel with Doomfletch's Prism's for a weapon that has 90-250 base physical damage. That's fine, but not that great. The real kicker? Look at the unique line on Doomfletch's Prism:

"Gain 100% of Weapon Physical Damage as Extra Damage of each Element", .

Our weapon now does 175 average Fire Damage, 175 average Cold Damage, 175 average Lightning Damage, and 175 average Physical Damage. That's a bow with 700 base damage. Now, consider that every single point of added damage, every single multiplier and every buff will modify that base damage. Yeah, it gets crazy.

Not only that, but we rock the recently buffed Split Arrow, which adds its own base physical damage, frees up a link for clear, and synergises EXTREMELY well with Barrage for amazing single target focus DPS.

It's flat physical damage scaling that would make a Facebreaker character cry themselves to sleep.

- Pros and Cons
Spoiler
Pros

- Relatively Cheap. Does require money to optimize, but the build can get rolling into reds for 5-10c.
- Lots of Damage. Like, a lot. My math says 30m Single Target Shaper DPS, 10m Clear DPS on my old Metamorph Character, and our Harvest league changes should make us 20-30% stronger than that.
- Fairly good defenses. While not a "tanky" build, we do have a few defensive layers. We take Acrobatics and Phase Acrobatics, Wind Dancer, Berserk, Blind on hit, take 10% less damage from blind enemies, use a Kaom's Heart, and sit at around 6k life.
- Good Clear. Split arrow covers screens, and minefield leaves very few gaps.
- All content capable. I've done A8 Sirus deathless, Shaper, Elder, Uber everything, T15 Blighted maps, 100% Delirious T16's, 5 way legions, and everything else under the sun.

Cons

- It's a mine build. I'll get this out of the way right now. If you don't like mine builds, this one might not change your mind. Sorry. :(
- Limited HC Viability. Despite our reasonable defensive layers, it's starting to not be enough in the "one shot" meta. We don't get MoM, we don't use ES, we don't use Fortify or Endurance charges or any other temp buffs.
- Limited SSF viability. The build REQUIRES The Doomfletch's Prism bow, and 3-4 Coated Shrapnel jewels. You can farm cards for the Doomfletch, but there is no similar option for the Jewels. Without them, the build doesn't work very well. That makes it hard to run in SSF.
- Late Game Cost is very economy dependent. The build basically requires 2 6L Doomfletch's Prism's to reach full power. In Metamorph, these bows were under 15c for a 6link. In Delirium and Harvest, they were around 30c. If they are expensive in the current league, getting the build to full power will cost significantly more.

- How expensive is it?
Spoiler
Long story short - Cheap to start with, but scales well with investment.

Long story long - The build can get into maps with 5c of required uniques. Get a Doomfletch's Prism and 3 Coated Shrapnels, and you can get into low reds on a 5link. Your survivability will rely on the rest of your gear, but that's the case with every build. Fact is, the core of this build is easy, cheap, and progressive. Aside from the Bow and Jewels, you can fill in the rest of the slots as you can afford them.

Below, I will only cover Uniques. Rares can fill every other slot, just aim for resists, life, and Flat Phys where possible. For damage, it doesn't matter if your rares are garbage, the Uniques will carry you. Even the "Early Budget" stage will do early red maps with ease, and the stage 2/3 will take you to T15.

Early Budget - 5c. 3 Coated Shrapnel, a 5link Chest, a Doomfletch's Prism.
Stage 2 - +20c. Add a Nomad Belt, an Atziri's Promise, and a Drillneck Quiver.
Stage 3 - +40c. 20% Quality Minefield and Blastchain Mine supports.
Stage 4 - +100c. Add a Circle of Guilt Ring and a +3 Split Arrow Projectiles helm.
Stage 5 - +300*c. 2 6link Doomfletch's Prism's, 2 Level 21 Split Arrows. NOTE: This is subjective. 6l Doomfletch's tend to be very cheap, under 30c in the last 2 leagues, but I don't know how expensive they will be in this league. If they're still cheap, move them to stage 2.
Stage 6 - +500c. Kaom's Heart, "Point Blank" corrupted Drillnecks
Stage 7 - +A lot. Level 3/4 Enlighten, a near perfect Ryslatha's Coil, corrupted Kaom's Heart, good implicits on Circle of Guilt, quality everything, Enchanted Doomfletch, and Awakened Supports.

Stage 7 can get expensive, if you bother to get there. Most of my time was spent in Stage 6, because I hate spending money. Lol.

The post below the guide contains a gearing example from Harvest league, where I documented my gearing progression from level 68-91. Campaign completion to my first T15+ red maps.

- How do I play it?
Spoiler
It plays like a standard Blastchain Mine build, if you've ever played mines before, you know what you're getting in to.

If not, here's a high level overview:

We rely on the Blastchain Mine skill to convert our main attack skill, Split Arrow into a mine skill, instead of a bow attack. The skill throws mines on the ground, which we can detonate at any time to release the arrows in quick succession from each mine in the ground (A single "Detonation Chain").

For AoE clear, we leave Split arrow alone, adding only damage supports to the links. This will clear screens of enemies without breaking a sweat.

For single target boss preloading, we swap one of the damage support gems for Barrage Support, making all of the arrows of Split arrow fire at a single target... And split arrow fires a LOT of arrows.

We wear 2 6link Doomfletch's Prism's, to allow for quick swapping between Single Target and AoE clear links, and fill in our gear with optimized sources of additional flat physical damage to beef the damage up even more.

As a note, Blastchain Mine does have one unique function - The more mines you detonate in a single detonation chain, the more damage you do, 5% more for each mine. This means detonating a single mine will do 100% of the damage of the mine, but detonating 20 mines will leave the last mine in the chain doing 200% of normal damage.

Trust me, it adds up.

- What are my skill links?
Spoiler

All links in PRIORITY ORDER. If you only have a 5l, or don't have room for a skill, remove the abilities at the end of the link. If you have none of the mine throw speed crafts or Gem quality, there is also an alternate 6link that does not use minefield, and makes the build feel smoother. Once you get your crafts and quality, I would recommend switching back to Minefield.

AoE Clear:
Split Arrow - Blastchain Mine - Minefield - Vicious Projectiles - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Trap and Mine Damage

AoE Clear Alternate (Use this if Minefield feels slow):
Split Arrow - Blastchain Mine - Charged Mines - Vicious Projectiles - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Trap and Mine Damage

Single Target:
Split Arrow - Blastchain Mine - Barrage Support - Minefield - Vicious Projectiles - Elemental Damage with Attacks

Buffs:
Precision (Anomalous is a plus!)
Skitterbots
Herald of Purity
Clarity
Summon Ice Golem
Berserk

As a note: You cannot use berserk until you gain Rage generation from a Lethal Pride that converts a Keystone into Chainbreaker! Please see the "Chainbreaker" section for gearing requirements related to Chainbreaker.

Link the highest cost buffs to the highest level Enlighten that you can affford. Drop Precision or Clarity if you don't have enough Mana.

Movement:
Your Choice (I like Dash) - Link your move skill to Second Wind

CWDT:
Cast When Damage Taken - Guard Skill (your Choice) - Curse/Mark (Optional).

NOTE on Curses: The best 2 options are Assassin's Mark or Sniper's Mark (Formerly Projectile Weakness). Use PoB to figure out which is best for you. End game, you will likely want to get a curse on hit ring. Considering that Mark skills on hit no longer work with mines, you will need to run Elemental Weakness on hit in your ring if you want a curse on hit ring setup.

Alternate Quality Options:

Spoiler

Split Arrow alternate qualities are all a trap, unless you're minmaxing and have tons of money. Remember, Split arrows gains +1 arrow and 5 flat damage going from 20-21. This means the only way an alternate quality Split Arrow beats a 21/0 normal Split Arrow is if the alternate quality is also 21/20. That will likely be EXTREMELY expensive.

Anomalous Precision is very nice for helping our very precarious mana balancing situation.

Anomalous Trap and Mine Damage is a good option if you have the money, as it negates the need to take the extra mana reservation reduction nodes as noted in the Chainbreaker section.

All the other gems offer very little of an improvement, at most 10% increased damage versus their normal counterpart. The money is better spent elsewhere, IMO.


- What's the tree?
Spoiler

This is my recommended level 97 tree: www.poeurl.com/cT8L

Level 90 tree: www.poeurl.com/cT8Q

There are several options for points to take as you level past 90. See the "How do I level it?" section.

- How do I gear it?
Spoiler

* = Required Unique
+ = Very beneficial unique


*Weapon
Spoiler
It's in the name. Grab a Doomfletch's Prism. Early game, it doesn't need to be 6linked. End game, you will want 2 6 links in order to weapon swap. Aim for high added Physical damage, attack speed is pointless.

As a note: Doomfletch's Prism is a fated unique. if you buy a Doomfletch (not a Doomfletch's Prism), and use the Prophecy "Ancient Doom" to upgrade it, it will keep ALL of it's current stats. Including Links, Colors, and Damage Rolls. Upgrading a good Doomfletch is usually significantly cheaper than buying a Prism straight up.

Additionally, with the release of Heist league, weapon enchants were introduced. If you can get a +Physical Modifiers enchant on your Doomfletch, this makes a HUGE difference, as it affects both the unique line "Gain 100% of physical damage as damage of Each element" (raising it to 106-115% depending on enchant), and the +16-24 added Physical Damage roll.

So far, the easiest way to aquire this enchant on a Doomfletch is to buy a Royal bow base with the enchant already on it, and Scour/Chance it to a Doomfletch.

Finally, when you've got a really good Doomfletch with 6l and good rolls, you can use a beastcraft 30% quality corruption to finish it for a small amount of free damage. Note: This will corrupt the item, so make sure it's finished, and you don't want to make any changes to it!

+Quiver
Spoiler
Drillneck is always the answer. Grab a good Drillneck with a high Phys roll and good life. The attack speed is useless. Later on, buy one with a "Point Blank" corruption. That adds tons of damage.

Helmet
Spoiler
Get a rare helmet with "Split Arrow fires 3 additional Projectiles" enchant. It's a HUGE damage boost. Fill in resists and life here. I buy a white base and spam with +Life essences till I get something good. Make sure to have an open suffix to craft Mine Throwing speed at the bench. The usefulness of that stat cannot be overstated!!

Body Armour
Spoiler
Early game, just grab any 6link, and use your bow link in here until you have 2 6l Doomfletch's. Late game, we have a few options. Kaom's heart is probably best in slot for the build, as we don't need links, since we have it in the bow. Other options are: Loreweave, if you like damage. Kintsugi if you want a more evasion based chest, or Eternity Shroud if you want to spend a lot of money on the build. If you have lots of money, a Replica Shroud of the Lightless can be an option as well, with 6 abyssal jewels with Life and Phys Damage to Bow Attack rolls.

Gloves
Spoiler
Rare again in this slot. Get +Life, high resists, accuracy and leave an open prefix to craft "25% of Physical Damage converted to Cold Damage". Don't bother enchanting these, most glove enchants have a chance to ruin our boot enchant uptime.

Boots
Spoiler
Basic boots in this slot. Life, move speed, resists, and a strength roll for being able to equip a Kaom's heart if you choose to go that route. As for enchants, we REALLY want the "120% increased critical strike chance if you haven't crit recently". This has permanent uptime as a miner, as long as you don't use a movement skill that can hit.

Amulet
Spoiler
Just a normal physical damage amulet here. Life, Flat Phys, Crit Chance and Crit multi. Try to not use this slot to fill resists or stats, as the damage affixes on the neck are too good to lose out on. Leave an open suffix for Mine throwing speed, and annoint "Blast Cascade".

+Rings
Spoiler
One of your rings should be a Circle of Guilt, with +Physical Damage while affected by Herald of Purity and -Mana Reservation of Herald of Purity. This will add a little bit of extra % damage while using HoP and also allow you to run more buffs. Implicits are a crapshoot, but aim for something useful like %Life or Crit Multi.

Mark of the Elder is also a good second option in the ring slot, as it offers slightly more damage than a Circle of Guilt, at the cost of the mana reservation effect, but it does require you to have a Shaper ring in your other ring slot.

Second ring can be rare, use it to fill out required stats and resists, but try to get a flat phys roll on it. If you end up with the money, get a Hunter ring with Elemental Weakness on Hit.


+Belt
Spoiler
Early game, use the Nomad with high damage rolls. Later on, you will replace this with a well rolled Ryslatha's Coil. A perfect rolled Ryslatha's Coil is a 20% damage increase over the Nomad, though do note that this upgrade scales with your equipment. If your gear isn't great, Nomad might be better. As your gear gets better, the gap between Ryslatha's Coil and Nomad grows significantly.

Flasks
Spoiler
- Atziri's Promise is a good cheap source of damage.
- Diamond Flask with an "of the Order" suffix for 80% increased crit damage (unveiled from Catarina) is VERY important.
- Wise Oak if your resists are balanced.

Other options -

Dying Sun only adds 2 arrows, which isn't worth it in this build
Bottled Faith is barely better than other options, and significantly more expensive, PoB it before buying.

*Jewels
Spoiler
3-4 Coated Shrapnels. Get ones with a 3-6 roll. They're so cheap, and a bad roll is significantly less damage than a perfect roll. Late game, get ones corrupted with neat things like Corrupted Blood Immunity. Place these in the 3 Jewel Sockets on the right side of our tree, not the socket near Perfect Agony. If you take the socket below Melding, you can place a Coated Shrapnel here as well, but you might be better off using a defense focused rare jewel, or a Watcher's Eye with Precision Crit Multi (Use PoB to check before spending money!).

Lethal Pride, Timeless Jewel (of Akoya). Grab one of these that converts Keystones to Chainbreaker, and socket it near Perfect Agony.


- How do I level it? (Including Pantheon and Bandit choices)
Spoiler

Once you hit level 28, the build starts working. You switch to a Doomfletch, and run Split Arrow Mines. Getting there is the hard part.

There are 2 options for leveling the build to 28.

1: As Stormblast/Icicle Mines.
2: As Split Arrow attacking.

If you have "twink gear" (Silverbranch, Roth's Reach, or any good low level bows), you can level as Split Arrow. If you do not, leveling as Split arrow is VERY painful (My Act 1 Merveil fight took 5 minutes. Ew.), instead, I strongly recommend that you level as Stormblast/Icicle mines, and switch to Bow Mines at 28.

Mines 1-28

- At 2, equip Stormblast Mine
- At 4, complete "Mercy Mission" and link Swift Assembly
- At 8, complete "The Caged Brute" and link Added Lightning Damage (additionally, link Added Cold Damage, if you have a 4 link)
- At 12, complete "The Siren's Cadence", at this point you have the option to replace Stormblast Mine with Icicle Mine, but play with both and see which you prefer. They are very similar in power and clear.
- At 18, complete "Sharp and Cruel" and socket Trap and Mine damage as your 4th link (when you have a 4l item available). Replace Added Cold if you're already using it.

Your leveling 4 link should now be Stormblast or Icicle Mine/Added Lightning/Swift Assembly/Trap and Mine damage.

For gearing this build as you level, you will want to use wands and focus on spell damage and flat damage to spell rolls, as both leveling mine skills count as spells. See Tytykiller's excellent video about crafting wands for leveling to make this process extremely easy.

This 3/4 link should work until 28. If you do not have, or can't afford a Doomfletch/Coated Shrapnel once you hit level 28, this 4 link will actually work for a long while, but the gearing moves in a completely different direction than Doomfletch mines, so I would recommend swapping to Doomfletch as soon as you have the option.

Split Arrow 1-28

- At 2, equip Split Arrow, link to Lesser Poison Support
- At 4, complete "Mercy Mission" and link Pierce Support (Remove Pierce if you use a Roth's Reach, instead: Keep Lesser Poison from the level 8 Suggestion)
- At 8, complete "The Caged Brute", remove Lesser Poison Support, link Added Lightning Damage (additionally, link Added Cold Damage, if you have a 4 link)

This will work till 28.

Doomfletch Split Arrow Mines 28+

- At 28, equip Normal Doomfletch (Doomfletch's Prism has a lvl 40 requirement). 4link Split Arrow / Blastchain Mine / Elemental Damage with Attacks / Vicious Projectiles and equip one Coated Shrapnel in your tree.
- At 38, swap Elemental Damage With Attacks to Minefield, or add it as a 5th link if you have it.
- At 40, put on a Doomfletch Prism, and coast to end game while melting everything.

Here's the path you should take your tree, color coded, in "rainbow" order:



Red
Orange
Yellow
Green
Blue
Purple

Note: Take the Jewel slot and Perfect Agony ONLY once you have a Lethal Pride Timeless Jewel that converts Perfect Agony to Chainbreaker.

Level 90+ options:



I recommend taking the options marked in green, and placing a defensive focused Jewel in the socket under Melding.

Ascendency Order: Pyromaniac, Born in the Shadows, Explosives Expert, Bomb Specialist

Alternate Ascendency Order (High DPS, you'll die a lot more): Explosives Expert, Pyromaniac, Bomb Specialist, Born in the Shadows

Bandits: Alira

Pantheon: Arakaali, Shakari. YMMV, pantheons aren't very powerful, so take whatever you want.


- How does Chainbreaker work?
Spoiler

Chainbreaker is a new Timeless Jewel notable added in Patch 3.11. By getting an "Under Akoya" Lethal Pride, and socketing it in the tree, it will convert any keystones in it's radius into Chainbreaker. DO NOT TAKE PERFECT AGONY UNLESS IT IS CONVERTED TO CHAINBREAKER!!!!!

Chainbreaker reads as follows:

Regenerate 3 Rage per second
Increases and Reductions to Mana Regeneration Rate instead apply to Rage Regeneration Rate
Lose 5 Rage when you Hit an Enemy, no more than once every 0.3 seconds

Because we never hit (our mines do), we never lose rage. This gives us "free" rage, and also allows us to use Berserk. The downside? Mana regen becomes a problem. The mana regen rate being converted to Rage Regeneration rate only applies to percentage regeneration however, so if we stack enough flat "Regenerate X mana per second", and take the reservation reductions available on the tree (Volatile Mines cluster, Anomalous Trap and Mine Damage, Efficient Explosives cluster) we can still get enough mana regen to keep throwing mines. How do we get that?

Below is the math for balancing your mana regeneration:

Spoiler


With the nerf to Mine Reservation Reduction in the Saboteur tree in 3.13, we now need more mana regen to sustain throws with Chainbreaker. Thankfully, we are already very close to a breakpoint with Efficient Explosives. One single point in Reduced Mana Reservation Reduction in the Volatile Mines cluster will take us from 6 mana per mine to 5, which makes Chainbreaker sustainable. You can also take Anomalous Trap and Mine Damage instead of the point in the Volatile Mines cluster, but that is an expensive option. Math is still the same, as we reach no new breakpoint.

Therefore, once you spec into Chainbreaker, I STRONGLY recommend taking a point from elsewhere (Probably a life node) and putting it into a mana reservation reduction node.

Math is as follows, assuming you have taken that node:

42.2 Mana Regen is required to maintain mine throws indefinitely at the maximum throw speed that the build gets with minefield (Quality, Tree nodes, Sab nodes, Helm/Ammy crafts). We throw 8.43 mines per second, with a cost of 5.

This is fairly easy to hit to reach without Chainbreaker's mana regen reduction, meaning that once you have Alira and Efficient Explosives, you can probably turn off Clarity until you get the Timeless Jewel.

Mana regen math is as follows:

Without Chainbreaker - Base Mana regen is .018*mana pool + 5.0 (Alira) + Clarity Base regen) * 1.8 (60% from Doomfletch, 20% from Coldhearted Calculation).

This means we can sustain max speed throws without Clarity as soon as we have 1,024 mana. -NOTE- This assumes you have max throw speed. If you are still missing throw speed crafts or quality (which is probably the case for a lot of people early league), you will need less mana regen.

With Chainbreaker - Our mana regen loses the 1.8 multiplier, so we only apply base mana regen. This means our mana regen calc becomes .018*mana pool + 5 + Clarity Regen. In order to figure out what level your clarity needs to be, use the following formula: 42.2 - 5 - (.018*Mana Pool) = X. X is the mana regen that your Clarity will need to provide.

In this example, lets say I have 800 mana. 42.2 - 5 - (.018*800) = 22.8. To sustain mana regen, I will need a level 13 Clarity, which provides 23.5 (though level 12 Clarity is probably fine, it's 22.0).

Also note that any other sources of flat mana regen (Such as Temple rolls or crafts) will be subtracted from this requirement

So why does this matter? Our mana pool is really tight. We need enough mana to drop 23 Barrage mines, so overleveling Clarity is a big no-no. This also lets us level up Precision a few more times.

TL;DR. Get 42 mana regen/second with chainbreaker. Have a big enough mana pool to drop 23 Barrage mines (7x23=161).


- But my DPS is low!
Spoiler
Git Gud.

Just kidding. The build relies a lot on interactions between damage affixes on gear that don't seem nearly as significant as they really are. Take the recommended 120% Crit boot enchant for example. It seems minor, and how often is it up anyway? All the time, actually. Getting that adds about 10% to your total DPS, which is nuts. There are also a few "oopsies" that can cripple the character.

1. Make sure your bow is a Doomfletch's PRISM, not just a Doomfletch. Prism is over 2x the damage of a Doomfletch. You'd be surprised how many times this has been the problem with people's builds.

2. Get well rolled Coated Shrapnels. 3-6 only! Don't settle for anything less. Even a 3-5 roll is a 5% total DPS loss.

3. Mine throw speed is very important! Quality your Blastchain and Minefield gems, and make sure you can craft it on your helm and amulet.

4. Enchants and Crafts for crit. Doomfletch has a really low base crit, so we rely heavily on good crit rolls from gear. This means make sure that you have the 120% crit boot enchant, a Blast Cascade annoint on your amulet, and the 80% crit craft on a flask. Combined, those are 20% of our damage.

5. Point Blank is good. Either spend 2 points for it, or get it as a corrupt on your Drillneck, depending on budget.

6. Level 21 Split Arrow. It adds one extra arrow, better base damage, and more flat phys. It might be expensive, but it is well worth it!

7. Mana balancing and buffs. Make sure you have enough mana leftover to drop all 23 of your mines! Each Barrage mine will cost 7, so you'll need 161 mana leftover after buffs. Do your best to link high reservation skills to Enlighten, and try to find some mana in spare gear slots for extra space to run flat reservation auras (Clarity and Precision). Anomalous Precision can help here, as it's quality gives us 10% reduced mana reserved at 20%.

8. Rare gear. This can get expensive, but try to get flat phys in every slot you can, crit and crit multi on amulet, and high resist rolls on the other slots to make it easier to use high DPS rares without dropping below resist cap.

9. Crit is VERY important! Aim to get 75% crit in PoB (~50% in game tooltip with power charges up), with the diamond flask enabled, and 480%+ Crit Multi. If you've reached end game and are wondering why your DPS is lower than mine despite similar gear, this is probably the reason. I find that 75% is the magic number for a crit based build to feel good. This also leads us into the next section:

10. Accuracy! Since we're crit, accuracy plays a double role in our DPS. We need high accuracy not only to hit, but to confirm criticals. You should be as close to 100% accuracy as possible! A 20 Ice Golem and a 21 Precision (Requiring a level 4 Enlighten) will get you to about 95-96%. From there, you only need 370 Accuracy on your gear to get to 100%. I wouldn't want to be anywhere below 98%.


- But Barrage is SO SLOW!
Spoiler
Yes, it is.

Here's the thing with Barrage, as I have it set up in this build: It's good at one thing, and one thing only. Absolutely destroying enemies the MOMENT they come out of an invulnerability phase. In situations where the enemy is sitting there monologuing, or offscreen and inactive, you're plotting their swift demise, and you'll DELIVER.

For everything else? Don't use it. Your clear Split arrow link can reach up to 7-8m single target DPS if you stack a full set of mines. That'll cover your bog standard map bosses no problem.

Barrage really has two problems that prevent it from being a viable option against normal bosses.

1: The throw speed. Minefield+Barrage just takes SO LONG to throw. You'll end up dying if you stand still that long in most tough fights.
2: The REAL problem. Barrage does not aim after the initial shot. You can fix problem 1 by not using minefield, by switching supports, by stacking massive throw speed, but you can't ever fix problem 2. If a boss takes so much as a single step to the left, all your arrows miss and your DPS is 0. This happens a lot.

So what do we do with this? Well, we take it as it is. Barrage is very good at killing enemies that don't move, when we have ample time to throw mines without being in danger, and really bad at bosses that move or try to attack us. So save it for those instances.

Barrage is basically a neat party trick. It has a lot of practical application, but the use cases are limited.

- Can I see your character?
Spoiler

PoB:
Spoiler
https://pastebin.com/Esn7w9VF

Some notes on comparing my pastebin to yours, and troubleshooting the difference!
Spoiler

I get a lot of questions on why my PoB looks good, and I find most of the time the biggest difference is in how they have PoB configured, or their Accuracy/Crit. Here are some individual steps to consider when comparing PoB's:

GENERAL

Make sure you're using the commuity fork of PoB, not the original. Some stuff just doesn't work (Ryslatha) or is wrong (Shock) in the original release.

Look at my crit chance, hit chance, and multi versus yours. If you aren't at 75% effective crit Chance (With Diamond Flask, but without Assassin's Mark) 480+ Multi, and 100% accuracy, work on getting there. Crit is HUGE, and this build doesn't do well without the right crit numbers. If you can't hit those numbers in PoB, it might be config, or it might be your gear.

My PoB gear is really good in general (An import of my Metamorph character with some changes made to account for nerfs/legacy items and changes). It might not seem like much on an item per item basis, but the small differences add up. I've still never reached the gear level that I have in my Metamorph PoB, even though I've started this build in 4 different leagues. Even my own characters don't match my original.

CONFIGURATION TAB

-Do you use Power Charges: Checked. We should be getting power charges via Blast Cascade annointed on the amulet.
-Rage: 50. If you have Chainbreaker, you should always be at or near 50 Rage, and it should regenerate to full after about 6 seconds of Berserk ending.
-# of Mines detonated recently: 10. This gives us the maximum effect of Successive Detonations, enables Bomb Specialist and Pyromaniac, and considering 10 mines is only 2 throws with minefield, is pretty reasonable in practice.
-Projectile Travel Distance: 0. This maximizes the effect of Point Blank. Against tough enemies you should be throwing mines at their feet, and Point Blank has maximum effect up to a range of 10, so this should be pretty reliable. When clearing trash, you may have mines further away, but enemies will still die in one hit.
-Is the enemy Burning/Chilled/Shocked?: Checked (all 3). Burn will come from crits, Chill and Shock will come from Skitterbots against bosses, and Crits vs. smaller enemies. Also, we can minimum shock/chill A8 Sirus with a good crit on a geared build anyway.
-Is the enemy a Boss?: NO. Some people think this is sketchy, but the PoB is for comparing the damage of the normal Split Arrow, which is primarily the clear skill. Any time I mention Boss DPS in the guide, I'm using the Barrage Split Arrow, with Shaper/Sirus DPS enabled. Unfortunately, PoB STILL doesn't do the math for Barrage or Blastchain Mine's damage ramp, so there's no real point in showing it (70k Barrage Split Arrow "Average" damage = 20m preloaded Shaper DPS. Yeah, that's real intuitive...).

ITEMS TAB

- General: My gear in the PoB is generally pretty good. If you want to see what the difference is, import your own character's gear. (Import/Export Tab in PoB, point to your PoE account in the Character Import section, start, select your character, import Items and Skills.) Once you have it imported, swap back and forth between my gear and yours to see the individual differences. Otherwise, here are some of the big hitters:
- Belt: Seriously, a PERFECT rolled Ryslatha is so good. A bad rolled one will be bad, sometimes even worse than no belt at all. Also, this scales with your gear. If a 48/36 Ryslatha isn't a damage boost for you versus Nomad, it means you don't have enough flat phys elsewhere (or you aren't using the community branch of PoB).
- Gloves: Jesus, that's a lot of accuracy. Delete this roll in PoB and watch my damage collapse. Haha. Seriously though, get 100% accuracy. Just do it.
- Quiver: Make sure it's a Drillneck with Point Blank or that you take Point Blank on the tree.
- Flasks: Check em all. Everything is dead before they wear off anyway. THe build is Crit reliant, so the diamond flask is a big help. Yours should have the Crit craft too. I am also Balanced in resists for Wise Oak, you might not be.
- Jewels: Perfect Coated Shrapnels are huge, Lethal Pride enables Rage/Chainbreaker/Bersers, and the Watcher's Eye is really good for the build late game when you have high crit (75% plus)
- Boots: Get the crit enchant. Just do it. It's good.
- Amulet: My amulet is really good, apparently. I dunno, I paid 1ex. Scam of the century? It also has Blast Cascade annointed on it. If you don't have Blast cascade, you don't have power charges. Get blast Cascade.
- Ring: I have an Elemental Weakness on hit ring. Having a 100% uptime curse is huge, and it means I can calculate my PoB damage as if the enemy is always cursed, without feeling bad about it!

SKILLS

- Berserk: Yes, I do have 50 Rage AND Berserk checked at the same time. We have a lot of rage regen, so when we hit Berserk, we have ~4 seconds where this is true (Or we have at least 45+ rage). Otherwise, it's sort of a sliding scale where we have less rage as berserk goes on. There's no real winning here. Paper DPS checkbox? Yeah, a bit.
- Precision: I manage to fit a 21 precision in here, you might not be able to without crazy gear levels. Crit is good, accuracy helps crit. Try to fit this in your build.
- Ice Golem: Self cast. Yes, I do self cast my golem. It helps accuracy and crit. If you don't bother to self cast your golem, you won't see these buffs as much.
- Awakened Gems: More damage! Might as well get them. Our awakened gems aren't that expensive anyways.

CONCLUSION

Once you've looked at all this, the next biggest contributors are gem level, quality, and gearing. As a personal thought, if you're hitting 300k damage per arrow with the right config, that's where T16 Guardians and Sirus just melt, so that should be your goal, not my nutso 680k. 300k is about where I reach before considering the character "done" and switching in new leagues.

Also, if your DPS feels bad because you're using Barrage versus mobile bosses. Stop doing that! Barrage mechanics are bad for mobile bosses. Just use normal Split Arrow.


Gear:
Spoiler
Metamorph League
Spoiler

Delirium League
Spoiler

Harvest League
Spoiler

Heist League (Quit early, only made it to level 75)
Spoiler



- Cluster Jewels?
Spoiler

No

- Patch Changes
Spoiler
3.9->3.10
Spoiler
Base Mine throw speed slowed from .25 second to .3. Because of Minefield and other interactions, this only costs us ~5-10% sustained DPS from the Metamorph version of the build. Still totally viable, and will be my league starter.

3.10->3.11
Spoiler
Lots of changes!
Tree nerfed, and subsequently rebuilt
Circle of Guilt Nerfed
Herald of Purity changed (Technically a nerf, but beneficial for us!)
We can now gain rage (And use berserk) via the Chainbreaker Timeless Keystone
Build got stronger.

3.11->3.12
Spoiler

Very little changes. Alternate quality is interesting, but nothing build defining. No relevant Replica Uniques have been announced yet, time will tell.
Assassin's Mark - changed to be single target only, and more powerful vs bosses (this is a buff)
Projectile Weakness - renamed to Sniper's Mark, changed to be single target only, and more powerful vs bosses (this is also a buff)

Edit: These no longer proc off of mines, if using Sniper's Mark or Assassin's Mark on hit rings. This may be a bug. Do not use the "On Hit" versions of Mark skills on rings for now.

Precision Crit Multi Watcher's Eye - Nerfed from 30-50 Multi to 20-30 Multi

3.12->3.13
Spoiler
Ascendency Changes:
Nerfs:

- We lose 20% mana reservation reduction of Mines from Pyromaniac, which will almost double our mana regen requirement. Might make gearing up for Chainbreaker extremely difficult. Probably will need to take the 5% res reduction nodes in the Volatile Mines cluster now.
- We lose 8% reduced incoming AoE damage from Explosives Expert.
- We lose a total of 70% increased Damage between Bomb Specialist and Born in the Shadows (40% if Detonated Recently, 30% vs Blinded Enemies)

Buffs:
- 10% increased Crit Multi from Explosives Expert (30->40)
- 5% Mine Throwing Speed and Detonation Speed from Explosives Expert (20->25).

Overall, a small nerf. Likely in the 4-5% range. The biggest pain point is the loss of the Mana Reservation Reduction. Everything else is just numbers.


- Additional Videos


Last edited by BlaydeX15 on Apr 12, 2021, 6:46:24 PM
Last bumped on Jul 27, 2021, 3:06:55 AM
CHANGELOG:

Spoiler

3/12/20 Guide Version 1.0
Spoiler

Original Guide

3/23/20 Guide Version 1.1
Spoiler

-Added a section about Barrage mines, their clunkiness and DPS.
-Added a secondary option to the clear 6link for early league, when you don't have mine thrwoing speed in your gear.
-Reworked the leveling section, added suggestion to level as mines instead of split arrow until 28.
-Changed Ascendency order.
-Added Pantheon suggestions.
-Added Recommendation that Second Wind be linked to move skill.
-Added another option to Gear section, +Physical Damage on Circle of Guilt is as good as +Buff Effect

6/18/20 Guide Version 1.2
Spoiler
-Added Tytykiller's Wand crafting guide into the leveling section.
-Completely rewrote the 1-28 leveling guide, after running a test character to that level on Standard. Leveling the build is significantly smoother now.
-Added tip about buying Vile Power div cards instead of the Ancient Doom prophecy early league.
-Added Shaper kill video link.
-Added 3.11 build video guide.
-Updated references to "last league" to include Delirium/Metamorph
-Updated Circle of Guilt recommended rolls
-Updated Unique chest and Jewel options
-Updated Pros and Cons sections to match new tree and nodes
-Clarified the role of Barrage in the "how do I play it" section
-Updated "Skill Links" section to cover new changes
-Added Skill tree link and leveling skill tree guide
-Updated Pantheon choices. Alira is king (queen?)
-Added 3.11 subsection in the "Patch Changes" section
-Split out gear subcategory to show different gear in different leagues
-Added section for cluster jewels. Yes, it is accurate
-Added a note about the Chainbreaker Keystone in the Skill Links section, explaining that Rage/Berserk does nothing until we have Chainbreaker.

9/17/20 Guide Version 1.3
Spoiler

-Added a 3.12 change section to the "Patch Changes" category
-Updated the Pros/Cons section to more accurately reflect the current state of the build
-Added a reference to my gearing example in post #2 in the gearing section of the guide
-Updated the Skill links section to refer to new curse names, and reference the new "chainbreaker" section of the build guide
-Added a "Chainbreaker" section to the build guide
-Updated the Gear section to reflect new information
-Added Harvest Gear to "can I see your Character" section.
-Updated the Alt QUality section.
-Added info about Mark on Hit rings not working with mines as of 3.12 to relevant locations.
-Added info about Heist Weapon Enchants.

1/21/21 Guide Version 1.4
Spoiler

-Added a 3.13 change section to the "Patch Changes" category
-Added a temporary section about the 3.13 changes
-Added Heist gear
-Added notes on changes to curse on hit in the rings and skill links section.
-Added the Nomad belt to the Belt section.
-Updated the alternate quality gems section with some good options.
-Adjusted the Chainbreaker section to include new mana numbers and passive suggestions.
-Added sections detailing the importance of crit and accuracy to the My DPS is Low section.
-Adjusted references to mine mana cost throughout the guide. They should all now reflect the newe reservation cost.
-Updated the PoB to remove legacy items and include Chainbreaker/Rage now that it is supported.
-Added an entirely new section under the PoB link to detail the porcess of setting up the PoB correctly for comparisons, as well as information on items that impact the PoB significantly.


Planned changes:

The guide is currently up to date for 3.13.
---

Example Early-Game -> T16 Maps Gear Progression:

Spoiler
Day 1
Spoiler
Level 1-67 (Just beat Kitava)Total spent: 1c Doomfletch, 1c each 3 coated Shrapnel, 5c DOomfletch Prism Prophecy

Day 2
Spoiler
Level 67-85. Made it to T7 maps. Was lazy, only bought 1 item. 3c.

That means, yes, I did make it to level 85 with under 4k HP (Only 1 mapping death). Lol

Day 3
Spoiler
20c Gloves, 3c Boots, 34c Chest base (Also 1 Screaming essence of greed slam, 100 chrome to color), 5c 16q Minefield, 2c 16q Blastchain Mine, (Used my own GCP to 20Q each), Nomad 7c total. (2c Base (Magnate), 5c Prophecy) My tooltip today has increased from 2600 to 5300. FeelsGoodMan. Got into Red maps today.
Day 4
Spoiler
Level 85-89 99c Timeless jewel (2 Divine to Reroll), 1 ex Kaoms, 70c 6l Doomfletch, 45c Corrupted Drillneck, 35c Split Arrow Helm Base (still crafting myself), 10c Sinner Tricorne to fix resists from Kaoms, Circle of Guilt 50c.

Day 5
Spoiler
3x perfect Coated Shrapnel, 10c each. 10c and many, MANY hours crafting an assmark base for the ring slot.

Day 6
Spoiler
Self Crafted

Day 7
Spoiler
Amulet 1ex, Helm Crafted to be usable (bought earlier), Lvl 3 Enlighten - 130 c, level 21 split arrow Self corrupted
Day 8
Spoiler
1ex Boots, 2ex Ring (life roll = good!)
Last edited by BlaydeX15 on Jan 21, 2021, 1:09:27 PM
This actually looks like a ton of fun, especially for Delirium. May look to use this as a starter. Anything stand out at you from cluster jewels?
"
Endcurry wrote:
This actually looks like a ton of fun, especially for Delirium. May look to use this as a starter. Anything stand out at you from cluster jewels?


Nothing on the offensive side, unfortunately. Our existing jewels are such a huge part of our damage that they can't really be replaced, and the offensive cluster jewels will have a hard time beating a Coated Shrapnel if you path to another jewel slot.

The defensive ones might be good though, depending on the small nodes. Could be worth respeccing out of some inefficient life nodes to take a good defensive cluster, but it will be on a case by case basis.
Hello there. Lovely written guide to the lovely video. Props to you!

I have been playing out different miners for the last few years and when your video came up on, wanted to try it. Can confirm 4L prism with leveling rare gear can easily handle early red maps on A8. So very successful!

However, using barrage support adds throwing time to the mines and felt especially bad whencompared to say Ball Lightning or Pyro mines for bosses; mostly because you are stuck in animation and have trouble dodging stuff. I believe this is going to be even more of a problem in 3.10 due to the mine throw time increase 0.25s->0.3s. What is your opinion on this?

At work atm so can’t PoB but how worse would it be to use barrage (Actual attack) and use another support for bossing instead?
I played this build in 3.9 and one shotted every piece of content with it, so I'd like to add my thoughts.

First of all thanks for the great build, I noticed it on reddit and instantly fell in love. Once you get used to switching the weapons for aoe/single target it plays & feels very good. That said, I'm not sure how great of a league starter this will be day 1. It's mostly because you really need the jewels for your damage to shine and of course you need your doomfletch, which may be pain to get. But if you manage to get your uniques, or you don't plan to start on day 1 then play this build. It's op as hell (my lv 83 drox kills took 1 second) and it costs almost nothing.


Here's the endgame equip I used in 3.9. Nothing min-maxed, but some currency was put in. You definetely don't need the things like max res on kaom's (damage is better anyways lol) or bottled faith, I just used it since I dropped it myself. By the way, the helm affix +level of socketed minion gems works for herald of purity, which is amazing.

Spoiler
Last edited by demondragon818 on Mar 12, 2020, 9:53:53 AM
"
alpish wrote:
Hello there. Lovely written guide to the lovely video. Props to you!

I have been playing out different miners for the last few years and when your video came up on, wanted to try it. Can confirm 4L prism with leveling rare gear can easily handle early red maps on A8. So very successful!

However, using barrage support adds throwing time to the mines and felt especially bad whencompared to say Ball Lightning or Pyro mines for bosses; mostly because you are stuck in animation and have trouble dodging stuff. I believe this is going to be even more of a problem in 3.10 due to the mine throw time increase 0.25s->0.3s. What is your opinion on this?

At work atm so can’t PoB but how worse would it be to use barrage (Actual attack) and use another support for bossing instead?


Barrage definitely feels slow, for sure. After playing for a while, I ended up only using Barrage if the enemy either A: Was inactive, and I could throw mines while they talked mad shit to me, or B: If the enemy regularly locked themselves into a casting animation, and I could stutter step mines in between casts (Think Sirus's laser-laser-die phase). Edit: As for the nerf, it's basically 20% slower throw speed across the board. Annoying, but not terrible.

I think the best QoL for the build is being able to switch 6l on the fly, and using Barrage way less than you think you should. Haha.

As far as switching out the single target setup, using normal Barrage is actually a DPS loss versus just throwing out a regular split arrow mine. I think the only DPS increase ST setup you can run that isn't clunky like Barrage Support is Puncture, but then you lose major DPS if any of the arrows miss.

Towards the end of the builds "power curve" regular Split Arrow melts your regular map bosses anyway, and Barrage just sits in your back pocket, specifically for the purpose of preloading damage while the boss isn't trying to kill you.
Last edited by BlaydeX15 on Mar 12, 2020, 9:50:04 AM
"
BlaydeX15 wrote:
"
alpish wrote:
Hello there. Lovely written guide to the lovely video. Props to you!

I have been playing out different miners for the last few years and when your video came up on, wanted to try it. Can confirm 4L prism with leveling rare gear can easily handle early red maps on A8. So very successful!

However, using barrage support adds throwing time to the mines and felt especially bad whencompared to say Ball Lightning or Pyro mines for bosses; mostly because you are stuck in animation and have trouble dodging stuff. I believe this is going to be even more of a problem in 3.10 due to the mine throw time increase 0.25s->0.3s. What is your opinion on this?

At work atm so can’t PoB but how worse would it be to use barrage (Actual attack) and use another support for bossing instead?


Barrage definitely feels slow, for sure. After playing for a while, I ended up only using Barrage if the enemy either A: Was inactive, and I could throw mines while they talked mad shit to me, or B: If the enemy regularly locked themselves into a casting animation, and I could stutter step mines in between casts (Think Sirus's laser-laser-die phase).

I think the best QoL for the build is being able to switch 6l on the fly, and using Barrage way less than you think you should. Haha.

As far as switching out the single target setup, using normal Barrage is actually a DPS loss versus just throwing out a regular split arrow mine. I think the only DPS increase ST setup you can run that isn't clunky like Barrage Support is Puncture, but then you lose major DPS if any of the arrows miss.

Towards the end of the builds "power curve" regular Split Arrow melts your regular map bosses anyway, and Barrage just sits in your back pocket, specifically for the purpose of preloading damage while the boss isn't trying to kill you.

Definitely agree, you just use barrage for the chonkiest boys out there and only if you have a window to throw the mines. Mostly conqs/T14+metamorphs.
"
I played this build in 3.9 and one shotted every piece of content with it, so I'd like to add my thoughts.

First of all thanks for the great build, I noticed it on reddit and instantly fell in love. Once you get used to switching the weapons for aoe/single target it plays & feels very good. That said, I'm not sure how great of a league starter this will be day 1. It's mostly because you really need the jewels for your damage to shine and of course you need your doomfletch, which may be pain to get. But if you manage to get your uniques, or you don't plan to start on day 1 then play this build. It's op as hell (my lv 83 drox kills took 1 second) and it costs almost nothing.


Here's the endgame equip I used in 3.9. Nothing min-maxed, but some currency was put in. You definetely don't need the things like max res on kaom's (damage is better anyways lol) or bottled faith, I just used it since I dropped it myself. By the way, the helm affix +level of socketed minion gems works for herald of purity, which is amazing.

Spoiler


Glad you enjoyed it!

It should be fine as a starter as long as you're not trying to be the first to maps. You won't be in the top 100 with it for sure, but I started it in Metamorph. Doomfletches are available for 1 alch about 2 hours into the league, same with Coated Shrapnel. The "Ancient Doom" prophecy might be hard to find, but if you set up a woop on trade, you can snatch one up by the time you hit 40.

Good to know on the + Minion gems helm, I didn't even think about that. Will be another target on my end game min/max attempts!
Last edited by BlaydeX15 on Mar 12, 2020, 12:00:21 PM
Won't high-impact mine be more damage than blastchain? Also what about switching minefield for swift assembly on single-target setup for less clunkiness,we lose two prefire mines, but mobility will be much better,especially since we are not using demo-specialist?
Last edited by knehtq on Mar 12, 2020, 3:15:40 PM

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