Trajectory of a true casual
Edit: moved old context and questions below. New ones up here. This is an evolving conversation, with some hope for helpful advice if available.
After tixxar's suggestion below, I shifted my new champion character over to explosive arrow ballistas (https://pastebin.com/Aivkg9Lb). Some thoughts so far: TL/DR questions for explosive arrow ballista champions 1) everyone seems to use elemental overload, but is crit viable on these builds? So many arrows hit everything, and so many explosions trigger that it would seem crits would be decent to build around. 2) This is the first build I have had since before sirius was added that I have run that has made it to T16s. What are the preferred strategies for building out the atlas tree beyond the basics (e.g. I have selected harvest, ambush, expedition, and delirium as my preferred atlas interventions, and I use the notable that makes all extra content more common while not being able to use scarabs or other items in map generation? 3) This is the first build I have beat the eater of worlds and black star with (just 1st round so far). Eater of worlds is far more frustrating, with the teleport to islands in the middle of muck. The flow direction of the muck is not clear enough to chart a path through! I kind of liked the black star arena. It is beautiful and once I knew I had to hide behind pillars, it was pretty clear. Should I just continue this from here, or only focus on maven? 4) How do I ever find atlas conquerors or guardians? I know there are atlas passive notables that make them show up more often, but is that required? Notes on experience so far with this build: This build is able to run TT16s without much trouble: https://pastebin.com/DV3bYEdz This is pretty good for such a cheap build. The only thing limiting me now is time. Running 25% delirious maps is viable, and expedition and ambush are pretty good for raw currency drops. Xbox market is still limiting, however, as stuff does not sell quickly, especially for those that cannot stay online to wait for offers. Spoiler notes on champion explosive arrow ballista leveling experience:
Spoiler
I had to level a new explosive arrow gem from scratch before I could afford a fully leveled one, which took a bit, but I ran lower level content to do so. Doing it this way I realized/remembered that running very tanky builds that don't kill bosses within seconds is a great way to get the full boss experience the dev's intended. I saw some effects I had never seen before, but didn't die because the build was still very tanky during the slow transition to the explosive arrow ballista tree.
With a fully leveled explosive arrow gem now, but slowly evolving gear, the damage is high enough to run yellow maps, and run 25% delirium 6 mod yellow maps on the edge of your seat. The great thing about explosive arrow ballista is that it is cast and run, with a dot that also continues damage while running, so for broke players, it is a great way to kill challenging rares (like Kalandra Lake metamorphs) somewhat safely, albeit very slowly until you get better gear. With my basic gear so far, it has been a lot of fun running a build that safely, but slowly kills challenging bosses and rares, even with ~2.5k HP. Again, this is a different side of the game for me. I did not have enough orbs of regret or refund points to fully transition to the common champion ballista explosive arrow trees, so I adjusted my armor-heavy tree to fit. I feel like this added tankiness, although I don't yet have spell suppression. Also, there is a good dot reduction fortification mastery which stacks nicely with the pantheon dot reducers and other sources. Prior Post and Context:
Spoiler
After the experience below, I started a new champion character to try out armor stacking with two replica dreamfeathers (15 chaos each). No Doryani's, as I am not nearly that rich yet, so any suggestions for fun attack builds with replica dreamfeathers that are not LS? I was thinking a simple cyclone impale, but have not tried many other attack skills. Sweep seems fun in lower levels, and hits hard, but is very slow. I also forgot how hard mana management it on attack builds (eldritch battery is really easy for those on the other side of the tree). Without Doryani's, is it better to stick with pure phys damage attacks or are there other good elemental attack options worth trying? Bleed a viable option?
1st Post and Context: I have been leveling a lightning conduit build, trying out different, but affordable, variations, and am hitting a big red map wall. I only generally have time to play several hours Saturday and Sunday, so currency and grinding for gear is limited. I have used chaos recipes to earn about 50 chaos this league. No divines, and selling on xbox trade market is not easy, even if I do have some things worth selling -- its almost ssf. https://pastebin.com/fNdEpYZq I really enjoy the gameplay with lightning conduit -- it hits really hard after a satisfying lightning brand, arc, or orb shocks things. So far, brand is by far the most enjoyable with conduit for me (hence the tree nodes). For those wondering about Shaper of Flames, I was trying out Stormfire to see if I could make ignite work as an alternative to the call of the void and winterweave or very, very, very, very expensive Doryani's versions. Yes, I only have ~30 Chaos and zero divines (and zero exalts, for that matter). Playing with little amounts of time makes this a very different game. Ignite is not bad, but, from trying hard staring at the screen, I don't think lightning conduit can actually ignite (it says it can't shock, but I assumed ignite would still be possible). If anyone knows for sure, please share. The problem is that I am super squishy. Yellow maps are fine. Red maps are not. Lake at level 6 and 7 are not. Therefore my questions are two: 1) Any suggestions for a permanently broke player to continue with Lightning Conduit? 2) Anybody have a lot of fun with any (cheap) super tanky Marauder or Slayer builds? I love the ones I played several years ago, but it has been a while. Thanks all for any suggestions or feedback. Last edited by Liminal Bug#8442 on Oct 18, 2022, 2:55:39 AM Last bumped on Oct 18, 2022, 2:55:45 AM
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I dont want to discourage you at all but the deep DPS of armour stacking happens as you get into the many hundreds of thousands of AR values. Which is just very expensive.
Most replica Dreamfeather builds are dozens if not hundreds of divines. You can do other skills, maybe shield crush. But check out this gear, https://poe.ninja/challenge/builds/char/kraiz970/sixtyninepagesmanifesto?i=5&search=item%3DReplica-Dreamfeather%26allskill%3DDetermination%2CGrace%2CBrutality-Support Guy is at least 20 divines an doing sub 1M dps and only 360k armour. Without investment, many divines, dps is just not going to feel good. Replica Dreamfeather builds are true endgame scaling. So, at your budget, I would go into Explosive Arrow totems. I was crushing red maps in SSF HC (unless random AN mob in Tier 15 ended me) with a Champion Explosive Arrow build. But everything before then was falling like butter, and I am no endgame crafter so the gear was meh. I also did all content but ubers on SC trade league on a trash tier Elementalist EA ballista last league. EA did get nerfed but its still super strong. It also scales cheaper, faster and easier than conduit or replica dream. They might go higher end in some ways, replica is super defensive obviously and conduit 20 to 50 divine is better than EA. But EA catches up eventually at top tier. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUrmXTaNwxA 185 million dps uber maven kills. Just my 2c man, do whatever is fun, but super, sub-1 divine budget, I would definitely do EA totems. Last edited by trixxar#2360 on Sep 28, 2022, 1:10:18 AM
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wow, thanks trixxar, this is very helpful information. I was beginning to get the idea about the replica dreamfeathers, as 20k armor is only about 45%, and it seems the only real way to scale into 100ks is to stack aura boosting cluster jewels, which are pretty expensive.
Explosive Arrow totems/ballistas sounds fun. I have never played ballistas, and only played totems once, so this would be new too. Last edited by Liminal Bug#8442 on Oct 2, 2022, 3:15:00 PM
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