ELE LIGHTNING STRIKE - ALL T16s, Shaper, Uber Atziri, HOGM, Chayula, Elder

LIGHTNING STRIKE BUILD





Special thanks to everyone who played my old lightning strike build from 1.2 and 1.3! I have been playing my crit facebreakers build on my Ranger, but now I am back to lightning strike.

This is the new version of my lightning strike which I am trying to build in a different way - using an elemental dagger (dagger with flat lightning), rather than a phys dagger.

I did not make this build to go HAM on DPS - you can get much higher DPS on lightning strike with a good phys dagger and building for phys and the melee hit, or maybe building HaWA or whatever that claw thing is called.


Shoutout to noway55 for killing Uber Elder with this build less than 2 weeks into bestiary league.


VIDEOS


NEW! T16 Elder Guardians - Enslaver, Constrictor, Purifier, Eradicator:
https://youtu.be/k83TpJnE-_4 in 4K 60fps!


T16 Vaal Temple - Twinned, 6x Bosses: https://youtu.be/qBxJ99TpnEs?t=10s in 4K 60fps!
Double bosses, -10% max, 400% inc crit chance & +45% crit multi, turbo


The Elder, 1st Try, Red Map: https://youtu.be/e4EcvmVqrR0 in 4K 60fps!


Chayula, Who Dreamt, No VP: https://youtu.be/nwXcKt5p_wI in 4K 60fps!


T15 Core - Twinned - 2x Bosses, Temp Chains: https://youtu.be/v6Lgr40iAS8 in 4K 60fps!


Hall of Grandmasters: https://youtu.be/sTOqm3gZpdQ in 4K 60fps!


BUILD OVERVIEW, and Uber Atziri & Co.: https://youtu.be/-NEfMU1ni6Q


T17 Shaper's Realm: https://youtu.be/NSt8T7YIESk 4K 60fps
Epic boss fight but I lost concentration at the end xD


T16 Lair of the Hydra: https://youtu.be/x107VmfmBJ8 4K 60fps


T16 Maze of the Minotaur: https://youtu.be/CbAkEb-bSRU 4K 60fps
Toughest Guardian for this build IMO as it gets harder and harder to kite this boss as the fight goes on


T16 Vaal Temple: some high damage mods with 110% extra fire damage, 101% extra cold damage, 35% increased boss damage, 30% increased boss attack and cast speed
https://youtu.be/EqiA-Y8Rwf8 in 4K 60fps!


T16 Pit of the Chimera: https://youtu.be/kLB0JFlJJMw in 4K 60fps!


T16 Forge of the Phoenix: https://youtu.be/oivfRc-CP8g in 4K 60fps!



GOOD UNIQUES




WHY LIGHTNING STRIKE
Spoiler
RANGED ABILITY. In addition to an insane melee attack, LS has true range, not like Frostblades or Reave that are pseudo-range. If you need help on caged maps (e.g. Shrine) your Thunderfists gives a 5L with Added Lightning so you can use a skill like Spectral Throw socketed in Thunderfists to supplement your LS on tricky maps and to generate power charges. The damage of each projectile is HIGH and the LS projectiles can be used for both AOE as well as single-target vs. bosses, so I play ranged like 99% of the time. You don't have to facetank with this build, just kite and laugh.

SHOCK. This is a great bonus for lightning skills - especially with the new changes to Shock. A lightning hit for 10% enemy's max health will apply a 1.5x more damage modifier to subsequent hits for 2 seconds. If you hit only for 5% of enemy's max health - you apply 25% more damage modifier. A 1% hit will apply a 5% more damage modifier. You can see with good lightning damage on your first hit and good attack speed, the shocks will create escalating hits (up to a certain cap though depending on how hard your base hit is). Please use Light Pen instead of Ele Focus (which I use for T16 bosses who are difficult to shock) for lower maps for shocks. See below Shock Tables for some reference:


MASSIVE AOE. LS now has some of the best AOE in the game with 7-8 projectiles, with 100% pierce from Voidwalker and fast whirling blades, you can smash through maps quite quickly.


SHOCK TABLES
Spoiler
Basically you need to be hitting at about 7% of enemy health to have the shock buff escalate to 50%, if you are managing to hit for 1% of enemy health (i.e. Guardians) yes it will show shock effect but the 5% buff is so small you are not getting good returns - i.e. you will be hitting for 1.1%-2.2% but will be capped out. You would be better off with Ele Focus.

If you compare dropping Ele Focus for Light Pen (or a diff damage) gem and seeing your hit damage on PoB for Guardian/Shaper - the most I seem to be getting to is about 1-2% of the boss' HP (even when only looking at crit hit damage).

It is a different story for lower tier bosses (I estimate T14 and below) where you can hit for 7%+ and get the full 50% buff for shock - in these cases it makes sense to drop Ele Focus for Light Pen to get the full 50% more buff from shock and do higher damage.


See full sized image here: https://imgur.com/uBiMbVO (click on image to zoom)



I have assumed shock buffs are discrete so if you do not get equal to or more than 2% HP for example you will be allocated the buff for 1% (5% more).


CURRENT KIT
Spoiler


CRAFTING / BUYING GUIDE
Spoiler
Dagger: prioritize flat lightning damage, APS, crit chance, % elemental damage or flat fire. If you can get a Shaper dagger to add prefix Gain X% of Elemental Damage as Extra Chaos Damage that is great as well.

Jewels: prioritize % life (or flat life with Abyss jewels especially if you are using Belly), resistances, flat lightning / crit multiplier / APS. Blind can also be good. If you can afford one - get a Watcher's Eye with Wrath light pen, and then either Grace (+% chance to Dodge attacks, or +% chance to evade attacks) or Haste mods (% chance to Dodge Spells), since Watcher's Eye works with Vaal auras as well.

Rings: prioritize Opal base with % elemental damage implicit -> added lightning -> life -> resistances

Amulet: if cannot get Choir of Storm, get a rare (preferably Amber for strength) and prioritize % elemental damage -> added lightning -> life -> resistances

Gloves: Tombfists (with Murderous Eye Jewel to get Intimated = enemies take 10% increased damage from attacks, and if possible also add Searching Eye Jewel = 30% reduced movement speed on the affected target for 4 seconds which is GREAT for helping you kite from) ranger better). Prioritize > flat lightning > life > crit multiplier). OR Thunderfist Murder Mitts

Boots: Voidwalker for high pierce and faster clearing as well as good defense vs. projectiles, OR Wake of Destructions for more damage, OR Darkrays for extra frenzy charge. As recommended by kan33 - you can use Darkrays (or Wake) and put the LS pierce enchant on helm to get some pierce.

Helm: can use Rat's Nest / Starkonja, or get high EV helm (e.g. Lion's Pelt) with priority mods: life -> resistances. I recommend if you go Lycosidae for shield to get a rare EV helm so you can balance out the resistances easier

Shield: Lycosidae. OR rare EV with life and res

Chest: Loreweave is really good and easy to chrome. Also can use Belly of the Beast, or get rare high EV chest (e.g. Assassin's Garb / Zodiac) with priority mods: life -> resistances. Chroming pure EV chest is a pain though

Belt: rare (Heavy or Stygian Vise) with life, % ele damage, res and strength, or Darkness Enthroned with good jewels


CORE LINKS
Spoiler

Lightning Strike + Added Lightning + Elemental Damage with Attacks + Multistrike + two of ( Damage on Full Life / Light Pen / Ele Focus )

I am trying Light Pen + Ele Focus - when I switched to Loreweave, I had to change from Choir of the Storm to a rare amulet to balance my resistances - on this new setup Blood Rage + Light Pen only gave me about 10k less DPS than using Damage on Full Life. I use Ele Focus because the T16+ bosses cannot be shocked well (please see Shock Tables and notes above regarding when it is better to use shock i.e. for t14s and below).

Wrath + Herald of Thunder + Enlighten + Empower

CWDT + Arc + Projectile Weakness + Curse on Hit

Other gems to include: Whirling Blades + Faster Attacks, Ancestral Protector, Lightning Golem, Vaal Grace, Vaal Haste


TREE
Spoiler

1. Default tree (no Vaal Pact):

2. Alternative tree for those who want Vaal Pact:

Important Note on Path of Building: Multistrike is currently bugged in PoB so that it is not giving the attack speed bonus for the projectile DPS calc for LS.

Regular Tree: https://pastebin.com/iRwt7Ws1

Vaal Pact Tree: (VP, a little more life, extra frenzy charge, less crit, needed to update jewel to balance out res): https://pastebin.com/yhKP7F85

Conclusion on Vaal Pact
Spoiler
- With VP looks like we are capped at approx 2k life per sec for leech: health pool x default leech cap rate x Vaal Pact boost

- This is a good amount of leech, but the problem is it takes time to ramp up. This 2k life per sec leech will not happen instantly, rather we get to 2k life leech per sec over approx 1 second (with Multistrike) or approx 1.5-2s without Multistrike, because leech is done per instance of damage and we need to ramp and accumulate enough instances of leech to get to the max rate

- Increasing attack speed significantly will lower the time it takes to get to maximum life leech rate
- Increasing life pool will increase the maximum life leech rate, but I think this is difficult to get substantial gains
- Hitting more mobs will also get you instances faster, but of this is not reliable or relevant for 1v1 bosses
- Adding more % leech (e.g. Atziri flask, non-legacy VoV) will help increase teh duration of each instance allowing more leech instances to overlap, however this does NOT help us because with our attack damage already so high we hit the cap even with Blooddrinker 0.4%. So, unlike the old Vaal Pact where we needed to have VoV high % leech on for VP to really shine, this new Vaal Pact gives us good leech without needing flask uptime

- However, like flasks, life leech is removed when we get to full health (unless ofc you can get Slayer or Ascendant Slayer), so you will always have this issue of your life leech starting off slow and then getting faster and faster until you hit the cap - which I really don't like. When I take damage I want to recover fast and not have to keep attacking to get my leech to ramp up. Overall I think getting Vaal Pact doesn't hurt though on the new tree we lose about 70k DPS on the projectiles (mostly because I had to take out some crit chance nodes) in exchange for more life.

- I think complementing Vaal Pact with a life flask with Bubbling or Catalyzed is probably the best. And if you have access to a Belly of the Beast you will get even faster life recovery from flasks (and ofc higher HP too)

- Regarding Blood Rage - I tried dropping Damage on Full Life for Blood Rage, but I felt Blood Rage's degen detracted too much from your life leech that it wasn't worth it if you are tryign to get good leech going

- Overall for me I think I prefer the old tree and keep the same setup and just use life flasks (I'll probably change from Cautious Eternal life flask to a Catalyzed Eternal life flask), the old setup relied on VoV which was only good for 1 sip to get the instant leech which really only worked well on Atziri maps with lots of mobs to reload VoV, so I feel comfortable just skipping VP. If you REALLY want Vaal Pact for peace of mind and not to rely on flasks then please use the alternative tree I've posted under the "Tree" section. And you may also want to consider building as Slayer or Ascendant-Slayer with Ranger start.


Bandits: Kill All


Ascendancy: Raider Slaughter + Chase is default. If you use VoV you need ele immunity so go Veil instead of Chase.

Way of the Poacher, Avatar of Slaughter, Rapid Assault, Avatar of the Chase:





PANTHEON
Spoiler
I've written below a few suggestions. Overall I encourage people to take what they like, and also, it doesn't hurt to be constantly swapping your powerups on the Pantheon depending on type of map/boss you want to do.

This is a good online tool to view the Pantheon:

http://www.burnguild.org/pantheonplanner/




SUGGESTED MAJOR GODS

1. Lunaris

Base:
- 1% additional Physical Damage Reduction for each nearby Enemy, up to 8%
- 1% increased Movement Speed for each nearby Enemy, up to 8%

Additional Souls:
- Arachnoxia (Map T3 – Sewer): 10% chance to avoid Projectile Damage
- Master of the Blade (Map T6 – Strand): 5% chance to Dodge Attacks and Spells if you’ve been Hit Recently
- Lycius, Midnight’s Howl (Map T13 – Lair): Avoid Projectiles that have Chained

Overall: really good defensive option. In particular for projectiles (both spell and attack projectiles): Arachnoxia 10% chance to avoid projectile damage would combine well with Voidwalkers 20% chance to avoid projectiles. What I like about this is it gives extra defense vs. spells since most spells that are hitting you since we play at range are projectiles.


2. Solaris

Base:
- 6% Physical Damage Reduction if there is only one nearby Enemy
- 20% chance to take 50% less Area Damage from Hits

Additional Souls:
- Penitentiary Incarcerator (Map T4 – Dungeon): 8% reduced Elemental Damage taken if you haven’t been Hit Recently
- Lady Stormflay (Map T6 – Vaal City): Take no Extra Damage from Critical Strikes if you have taken a Critical Strike Recently
- Suncaller Asha (Map T13 – High Gardens): 50% chance to avoid Ailments from Critical Strikes

Overall: really good defensive option for 1v1 vs bosses with phys damage since this build has little phys damage reduction. For the higher tier bosses their autoattacks can be painful so this is a good option to help mitigate some of the damage. Penitentiary Incarcerator is also good to reduce some ele damage. The critical strike defensive options are not really necessary with high EV and also with ele status immunity from Veil.


SUGGESTED MINOR GODS

1. Garukhan

Base: +5% chance to Evade Attacks if you’ve taken a Savage Hit recently
Additional Soul: 6% increased Movement Speed if you Haven’t been Hit Recently

Overall: gives decent buff to attack avoidance which combines well with Avatar of Chase EV bonuses for your EV and helps further lower chance of getting hit consecutive times in a row.


2. Gruthkul

Base: 1% additional Physical Damage Reduction for each Hit
you’ve taken Recently up to a maximum of 5%
Additional Soul: Enemies that have Hit you with an Attack Recently have 8% reduced Attack Speed

Overall: recommended mostly for the Additional Soul bonus - reducing the APS of enemies that have hit you will work well with movement speed slow from Maim on hit (from Tombfist).


3. Ryslatha

Base: Life Flasks gain 3 Charges every 3 seconds if you haven’t used a Life Flask Recently
Additional Soul: 60% increased Life Recovery from Flasks used when on Low Life

Overall: the Additional Soul bonus of 60% inc. life recovery when on low life is really good when you are in a pinch; especially if you have Belly of the Beast (additional inc. life recovery from flask) and are using Cautious or Catalyzed life flasks.


LEVELING
Spoiler
I don't like putting leveling guides as people like to level in many different ways and it also depends on what gear you can get!

If you want to level as ele dagger, the hard part is that you are probably going to need an intermediate ele dagger (rare) for like levels 40-60 because Ungil's Gauche is the only elemental dagger you can use earliesh starting from level 20 but then ofc it is going to fall off in DPS as you get closer to mid-game.

Without complicating it too much, if you wanted to level as ele dagger LS, this is what I would recommend:

Early Game (Levels 1 to 30):
- Basically here you want to rush to get 4 things if you can: Ungil's Gauche, Wake of Destruction, Lycosidae/Crest of Perandus, and Herald of Thunder. HoT because Wrath will reserve too much and you will not be able to sustain mana
- Use whatever melee or ranged skill you want until level 12 when you can put in LS
- If you have a Tabula Rasa - great, otherwise I love Briskwrap chest which gives nice EV for quite a while. You should be on a 4L as soon as you can
Tree: I would go like so with about 37 points I have gotten good life, started to get my ele nodes, and already have my Acro and Phase Acro up:

- Playstyle: mostly melee
- LS Links: LS + Faster Attacks + Ele Damage with Attacks + Added Lightning
- Flasks: 2x quicksilvers, mix of life and mana flasks


Mid Game (Levels 31 to 69)
- This is the intermediate phase which can be a pain because it is before you get the juicy end-game items that require level 65-70+ and before your other end-game rares, so you need some new goodies to carry you. This is also when you need to start managing your mana (once we put in Multistrike) and resistances properly
- Start setting up your 5l / 6l - use Ancestral Call for faster clearing, for bosses put swap out Ancestral Call for Ele Damage with Attacks
- Feel free to dual wield for more DPS if you don't have Lycosidae / Perandus
- On weapon swap: start putting in these gems so you can level them to get them ready to swap in for mid or late game: Wrath, Projectile Weakness, Curse on Hit, Vaal Grace, Vaal Haste, and any other gems for the 6L LS which you are not using
- Grab Tombfist (level 36) as soon as you can and socket a Murderous jewel with some decent stats to get the Intimidate, if you can get one with 2 sockets so you can put a jewel to get Maim as well that would be ideal
- If you can't get Tombfist wait until you can put on Thunderfist
- Once you feel the DPS form Ungil's Gauche slowing down I would first swap out HoT for Wrath. If the DPS is still low you need to start finding rare dagger with higher lightning rolls and/or rings / amulet with lightning damage and WED. You will need to upgrade chest as well if you don't have Tabula Rasa (just something decent with life and res). The difficulty will start ramping so you need to get some decent life and res on as many gear pieces as you can (rings, helmet, belt, boots).
- NO need to go HAM here on buying stuff, remember you just want something decent to carry you to level 65-70 which is when you will put on your final items
- Grab mana leech at this point on the tree. Turn on both Wrath and HoT if you can sustain them otherwise wait for later levels when you have better mana
- At this point I would also get 2-4 points from labs for my Raider Ascendancy and put into Avatar of Slaughter so I can at least start using frenzy charges
- Once I hit say mid 50s I would assess if I am having too much trouble with survivability - if that is the case I would start speccing more defensive on the tree - focusing on life nodes and jewel sockets to put jewels with life and res in them, as I go through Shadow. But assuming I am feeling OK, I would just spec a mix of life and DPS (frenzy nodes, crit, and ele nodes)
- Get some strength on tree, setup the CWDT curse combo, and start leveling your golem and ancestral protector

- Playstyle: mix of melee and range
- LS Links: LS + Multistrike (if you are having a lot of trouble sustaining mana, try Damage on Full Life now, or just keep Faster Attacks) + Ele Damage with Attacks / Ancestral Call + Added Lightning + Lightning Pen
- Flasks: wise oak / silver, diamond, silver / quartz flask, 2 life flasks / 1 life flask + karui's blood


Late to End Game (Levels 70+)
- Finally, we can start getting the juicy end game items and this is when we get a big power spike
- You should be putting your character in PoB and checking each item you are considering buying in PoB to see how it affects your DPS, life and res before spending currency. This is important especially for Wise Oak needing to make sure your light res remains the highest uncapped
- No need to rush and buy everything at once - you can do some upgrades in the early 70s, then the rest in early 80s
- Get your end-game dagger with priority mods as listed in the guide (lightning, APS, crit chance, WED)
- Get your final rares: I recommend you spend most of your budget on getting good jewels and good rings as that will have the highest impact on defense adn DPS
- Get your final shield - Lycosidae if you don't have one yet, or a rare EV shield with life and res
- Get an EV helm with the LS enchant, life and res, or if you decide to use a rare shield go with Rat's Nest
- Put on Choir of the Storm
- Put on Voidwalker boots
- Once I have good pierce I am now fully playing from range, and at this point I will put on Damage on Full Life
- Get your final belt - either Abyss belt with jewels, or a stygian vise or a heavy belt with some str, life, res and ele damage
- Get final strength upgrade from Written in Blood and stop leveling your Ancestral Protector at your strength threshold
- Finish lab and spec Avatar of Chase
- On the tree I am now finishing up crit and dagger nodes, grabbing my final life nodes and have now gotten all the jewel sockets
- Playstyle: nearly 100% range after pierce
- LS Links: LS + Multistrike + Ele Damage with Attacks + Added Lightning + Lightning Pen / Ele Focus + Damage on Full Life
- Flasks: wise oak, diamond, quartz (or silver), take out 1 life flask for Atziri's Promise, then 1 life flask / karui blood


Important:
What I recommend people to do as they play my build is to customize, there is no need to follow what I do 100%. If you want to level as phys then switch to ele - that's totally fine. You may end up liking phys more and decide to build that way. If you want more defense - spec Avatar of Veil instead of Avatar of Slaughter, drop the frenzy nodes, grab more life, put on a Belly of the Beast, etc. If you want to clear even faster - put on Ancestral Call. If you just want to farm certain maps like HoGM or Alluring Abyss - make the customizations I recommend in the front. If you like claws or you find a great ele claw for end-game - spec claw nodes instead of dagger.


FLASKS
Spoiler
Diamond: with approx 25% reduced charges used,, or + maximum charges

Quartz or Silver: depending on Ascendancy choice (i.e. if you are specc'd Avatar of Chase you don't need Silver obviously)

Wise Oak: lightning penetration. Please check to balance your lightning res so that it is the highest to use Wise Oak

Atziri's Promise or Vessel of Vinktar : for extra damage, leech, and light/chaos res. I prefer usign Atziri's Promise because it gives 2 uses per flask vs. 1 for new Vinktar. Also given changes to leech, adding more % leech is not necessary for this build. So I encourage to use Atizri's Promise vs. Vinktar's. If you decide to use Vinktar's get the light pen one or the added light to attacks version, and make sure you have ele status immunity or unaffected by shock (e.g. Inpulsa).

Life Flask: use Catalyzed or Cautious Eternal life flask, and/or a instant recovery Divine flask. OR a Blood of the Karui.


Detailed Flask Guide:
Spoiler
Core

Diamond:
- This is the highest damage flask you can use on this build. Significantly raises our effective crit chance


Wise Oak:
-Very high damage flask with lightning penetration


Life Flasks:
- 1 or 2 Life Flasks:
- Please use Divine flask with instant recovery prefix (Seething) and Eternal life flask for life recovery over time (particularly Catalyzed or Cautious prefix). Reason I recommend this is because the base differences:
Divine: 2,400 life over 7s = 343 life/s
Eternal: 2,080 life over 4s = 520 life/s
So you roll Divines with instant life recovery since it has bigger lfie amount (2,400 vs. 2,080), but for regaining life over time Eternal gives you faster life per sec
- Blood of Karui is absolutely awesome life flask with very fast regen and then instant recovery at end of flask effect, but downsides are that is only has 2 uses per fill and you cannot roll mods i.e. Staunching on it ofc, so you will have to put the mod on another flask.


Other Options - Damage Flasks

Silver
Onslaught is a good damage boost, so if you are Avatar of Veil (instead of Chase), this could be a good option to use. If you are Avatar of Chase you don't need Silver ofc.


Vinktar's
- Added lightning to attacks
- Light pen version
- Very good damage flask, but remember i) it has only 1 use now per fill, ii) you need shock immunity (i.e. from Raider Avatar of Veil) or unaffected by shock (i.e. from Inpulsa) to use Vinktar's otherwise you will be shocking yourself for 50% more damage taken
- Overall, given the changes to VP now and because Vinktar only has 1 use per fill I prefer not to use this flask


Atziri's Promise
- Very high damage flask with nice bonus of chaos res
- Cheap unique
- 2 uses per fill which I like vs. VoV


Sulphur
- Nice damage flask with 40% inc. damage
- 20 out of 60 charges is very nice as well

For your particular setups / preferences - I recommend playing around in PoB with different flask and Onslaught options so you can see which setup you like.


Other Options - Defense Flasks:

Quartz
- Really good flask to get some spell defense since defense vs. spells is the weakest part of this build. This is what I used for HOGM, but ofc is also a good defensive option for PVE


Basalt
- Great flask if you are struggling against phys damage
- Is good to combine wiht Fortify in your setup, or if you are using Arctic Armor (if you are having trouble kiting and want to lower damage when you are stationary), or Kintsugi


Jade
- High EV flask. Use if you are having a lot of trouble vs. attacks (particularly ranged attacks)


Stibnite
- Blind is also very powerful vs attacks, but this flask only gives blind in an AOE around you, so it is not completely necessary since we try and stay at range vs. attacks. Use this if there is a boss you want to fight in melee range


Topaz, Aquamarine, Ruby
- Very good if you need to raise ele res vs. certain bosses during Act progression or in maps


General Rolls:

- Reduced charges used or +max charges
- And then defensive options like immunity to Bleed, Hexproof, EV %, freeze/shock immunity (if you are not specc'd Avatar of Veil), movement speed are all good.


NUMBERS
Spoiler
- 4.8k - 5.3K life depending on your gear (jewels and chest). I have 5K with my gear above
- 16k EV (approx. 50% chance to evade)
- 20% chance to avoid attack and spell projectiles
- 40% dodge, 30% spell dodge
- 810k DPS per projectile on Shaper/Guardians, with no shock, no Vaal Haste, no Ancestral Protector, no Lightning Golem
- 1.1 million DPS per projectile on Shaper/Guardians, with no shock (fully buffed)
- 8 projectiles
- 100% pierce for regular clearing


SOME FIGHT CUSTOMIZATIONS
Spoiler

Chayula's Domain
Spoiler
Please do not try this map with -60% chaos res as you will struggle with Chayula as she can do a lot of chaos damage. I managed to find 2 breach rings with some chaos res and life for about 10 chaos each which I used on this map. Atziri's flask ofc adds a lot of chaos res too. I am also using a Catalyzed Eternal Life flask rather than Cautious

This map is a bit of a pain because the angles of the pathways are not that great for LS. Probably can go even faster by swapping in Frost Blades for the AOE clearing and then put in LS when you get to Chayula so you can kite her from range easily.

HOGM
Spoiler
95% of the exiles are not a problem but there are a few exiles where a lot relies on how well you can position and react, and not all of these exiles spawn all the time.

- CWDT/aegis block guys - you can quickly kill yourself if you are not careful. Good thing is most have low/zero damage and so using scorching ray or another degen skill will easily kill them. The problem is recognizing very fast that you are hitting these guys and to immediately stop and switch to your degen skill. Zami, gubben brothers, kezzBlox etc.

- There is a caustic arrow girl using purple tentacle caustic arrow - you need to get out of her degen pools very fast as not even my life flask made a dent vs. her degen

- Danziggg girl - LA archer. Not much you can do against her except kill her first

- Dyness - this is the guy with firestorm in my vid - very tanky and does a lot of damage, I believe he has insane regen as well so you would need to use Frost Bomb if you'd like to kill him faster

Danzigg and the caustic arrow girl are not a problem if you position your angle with LS to cover the whole wall before triggering the wall as they will die very fast- Gubben brothers (Aegis/tempest shield)

Aegis tempest shield guys are the worst because you can kill yourself before you realize it. A lot of them do no actual damage though (e.g. Zami). After reading some tips I decided to carry alt weapon with a 3L Scorching Ray for these guys - the worst being the Gubben brothers.

Other changes I made was to swap to Avatar of Veil for ele status immunity and then put bleed and curse prevention on my flasks, and to add in a Quartz flask. So an example flask setup could be:
- Wise Oak
- Diamond with Hexproof
- Quartz with Staunching
- 2 Life flasks. Or 1 Life flask adn another damage flask

Uber Atziri
Spoiler
- Hardest part of this map I would say are the 2 Vaal bosses at the start, you need to be careful so you DPS them evenly so that the last one standing who becomes enraged can be killed quite quickly.
- Do not get close to the regular mobs - they can hit extremely hard - just stay at range adn DPS them down
- Trio: easy fight just kite in a circle and kill A'alai first, then focus on the fire guy, then kill the cycloner
- Atziri: here I like to spec Arrow Dancing because all her spells I can dodge easily manually so the only thing left to worry about is her spears. With Arrow Dancing and my EV and Raider buffs - that will take the spears out of the equation, making the whole fight quite easy. So I don't mind spending 2 regrets (spec then unspec) to have a very easy Uber Atziri fight. The clone split phase should be straightforward if you have enough DPS to kill them right at the start - pop a Vaal Haste, place ancestral totem, and hold shift and direct projectiles away from the other clones.



PHYSICAL LIGHTNING STRIKE
Spoiler
- The regular build is scaling flat elemental damage and projectile damage of LS
- This version scales physical damage and the melee hit of LS, this is the highest way to get DPS on LS because the melee hit of LS has base damage of 176% vs. the projectiles of LS (150% base damage each), and there are more ways to get crazy damage multipliers on melee and physical damage now

Note! I have not factored in Shaped/Elder items or Abyss jewels.

Note! You need to use Bleed to get the MOST out of this build, you need 1 stab with Puncture when fighting against bosses, so if you do not like this, please do not try this version.

- Now there are some other OP skills like Blade Flurry, so if you really want just a crazy high DPS build then it would be better to use those other skills, but for people who want to use LS AND get very high damage then I think this is the way to go.


NOTE:
- PoB link below but there are a few things to note:
- Rings: I am just using my rings I have for my crit facebreaker build which just have some phys damage: ideally you want to have GG rings with phys damage, crit, and % ele damage
- Amulet: I have put in Choir of the Storm, but you can get better DPS from a GG phys amulet
- Weapon: this is with Bino's dagger, xD
- Bleed: this build relies on inflicting bleed with Puncture

DAMAGE:
1. Melee phys scaling
- Abyssus
- Lion's Roar
- Bloodlust support gem
- MPD support gem

2. Elemental scaling/conversion
- Phys to Lightning support gem
- Elemental Damage with Attacks support gem
- Hatred
- Herald of Ash
- Elemental Weakness curse

3. General damage scaling:
- Damage on Full Life support gem
- Silver flask for onslaught - high damage boost since we take Raider Onslaught path
- High crit multiplier (from Abyssus) and dagger nodes
- Accuracy and crit chance: Lycosidae, Diamond flask, dagger crit nodes

4. Flask buffs
- Phys build is very reliant on the flasks: this why I go all the way to Witch for Alchemist nodes - this gives me more increased flask effect than even a Pathfinder

5. Other damage multipliers:
- Intimidate from Belt of Deceiver
- Shock - I have turned this OFF in PoB but you will ofc be getting shocks for some damage boost

HOW TO PLAY:
- Just use projectiles for AOE for regular clearing - should have enough DPS for that
- For bosses: go to melee, 1 stab with Puncture to put bleed and Ele Weakness on the boss (will last about 13 seconds which is quite a long time), and then go town with your melee LS hits

NUMBERS:
- Bino's Dagger: about 1.9 million DPS
- Mirrored dagger: DPS nearly double
- If you upgrade my rings and amulet you can get easily above 4 million DPS

LINK:
Paste into PoB >
https://pastebin.com/cN3ikmYg

Thank you, if you spot any things to improve let me know!


ANCESTRAL CALL EXAMPLE - by Castablanca
Spoiler
"
Castablanca wrote:
Lightning Stike shotgun mechanic on single target.
Conditions: if enemy is beyond your melee range, your lightning strike's projectiles can hit the enemy, and your ancestral call will spawn a melee attack on top of the enemy = 2 hit shotgun.
Projectile hit (132%) + Melee hit (176%) = 308% damage




Here's my PvP variation of OP's build.
I maintain both physical damage and elemental damage. Also CI version is great in PvP as blight builds and death's oath opponents feed me charges and leech. The physical component to lightning strike is quite threatening. Tooltip dps will hurt as it's harder to scale up the phys when there are so many generous sources of elemental damage buffs. But, your opponents will feel it as soon as their cwdt immortal call and shroud of the lightless buff is gone. Try leaving out Phys to Light gem and Winter Spirit, in order to maintain this physical component. Against all but the toughest tanks (e.g. markusz with 200k+ armour), anything and everything is sliced and diced.


Gear:


Mirror Service Link (feat Lightning Strike Helm and block pen claws)
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1713980


SCION EXAMPLE - by bvgftr
Spoiler
"
bvgftr wrote:

https://pastebin.com/qSn8XQfP

Using Lightpoacher + Shroud of the Lightless + Tombfist

( Total 11 Abyss Jewels + 1 Crimson Jewel )

My Lightning Strike vs Shaper Video: https://youtu.be/HZgk9ixDvHQ

My Tree: www.poeurl.com/bJSG ( Origin Spectral Throw Tree )
Just Swap Gems (Lightning Strike - Ele Focus - Multistrike - Ele Dmg Attacks - Inc Crit Stirkes)

Weapon: Foil { APS:2.0 / Crit Chance: 7.0+ / Lightning Dmg +@(Crit Multiplier) }
You can use a dagger instead of a sword.
Shield: lycosidae
Helmet: Lightpoacher(2S)
Body: Shroud (1S)
Gloves: Tombfist (2S)
Boots: Kaom's Roots
Belt: Rare Abyss Belt (1S) Res + Life + @(Ele Dmg)
Ring & Amulet: Rare {Res + Ele dmg + Crit Multiplier + @(Life & Crit Chance)}

The most important thing is Abyss Jewels. { Lightning Dmg to Attacks + Sword Attacks + @(Life) }

Other Gems [ (cwdt-immortal-enfeeble) / (Whirling-BM-Fortify) / Bloodrage / Ancestral Protector/ Wrath /Herald Thunder ]


RESOURCES

PoE Roadmap for Planning Leveling:
http://poe-roadmap.com/index.php

Poe.Trade live searching and alerts:
- On poe.trade click on the blue bar "Click here to perform this search in Live mode and be instantly notified when new items matching your criteria are posted." > then adjust your options
- Alternatively, PoE Sniper: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2027114/page/1

Copying from Poe.trade into Path of Building:
- Add this Chrome extension: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/poe-trade-copy-to-path-of/dfieikfjcjekajhabkpjoffobdlillli
- I believe there is one for Firefox as well
- It will put a small "POB" link next to each item on poe.trade - click it to copy, then go to Path of Buildling > Items > Create Custom > and paste!

Price Trends and Statistics:
- http://poe-rates.com/
- This tool has very nice visuals. Use this to search prices easily to see trend, avg, min, max etc
- Example I searched for Voltaxic on Abyss to see price over past 6 hours, by # of links: http://poe-rates.com/index.php?league=Abyss&item=Voltaxic%20Rift&interval=6h

Vorici Chromatic Calculator:
- http://siveran.github.io/calc.html
- Use this to determine the cheapest way to chrome factoring probabilities plus cost per attempt
- For example if you are thinking about buying a 183 dex Assassin's Garb chest and want to put 3R + 2B + 1G > this will show you that the cheapest way is to roll Vorici 2R1B attempts, with an expected (average) total cost of about 3.7k chromes

Aura Calculator:
- https://poe.mikelat.com/
- I like to use this when I'm theorycrafting and trying to figure out if I can squeeze in an aura / herald and how many nodes / what uniques I may have to use

List of Vendor Recipes:
- https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Vendor_recipe_system

Crafting:
- For lists of affixes and DPS calcs: https://poecraft.com/

PoE Database:
- http://poedb.tw/us/
- This I like to use when I need to find some data on bosses e.g. how much HP does Armala Widow on T15 Sunken City have? (http://poedb.tw/us/area.php?n=Sunken+City). What are her resistances, what moves does she have, which are attack vs. spells, how much damage do her moves do:(http://poedb.tw/us/mon.php?n=Armala%2C+the+Widow)

Daily Lab Layouts:
- Notes for each lab of the day showing the layouts and direction to go to find exit to next lab area: https://www.poelab.com/
Last edited by Ceryneian on Sep 10, 2018, 9:53:22 AM
Last bumped on Jun 16, 2019, 11:22:15 AM

My first build for Tiurakh - Double Strike Axe (old):
Spoiler




INTRO:
Hey! This is my first guide, but people keep asking me about my build and I wanted to share this and show how an evasion-based melee character is highly scalable and definitely viable for end-game.

PLEASE NOTE: This is an in-depth, advanced guide for those looking to push the envelope on creating an elusive melee character. Please see the "Index" in the 2nd post for easy reference and summary of discussions/comments throughout the thread.

The key behind the build is Blind and damage avoidance defenses that scale: high evasion, max block chance, high SPELL block, endurance charges, and elemental resistances. Blind is an incredible skill and is highly underrated.

Dodge is optional and can be incorporated into the build for further damage avoidance. This build also uses other methods to mitigate damage that seep through Evade / Block.

Main skill is Double Strike. Key gear pieces are Bringer of Rain and Stone of Lazhwar.

I know there are many guides out there with evasion based melee characters, but I feel this guide brings a unique build: it creates a character that scales very well throughout the game, and combines exciting gameplay, high DPS, and unique forms of defense against not only regular attacks but also spells, reflect, thorns, desync etc..

TLDR is just below after Videos section.
If you cannot use Bringer of Rain - please see FAQ for workable alternatives.
Hardcore players please see the "Hardcore" section after the passive tree below for potential adjustments to this build.



VIDEOS:
(solo gameplay). Please enjoy:


Level 72 Torture Chamber Map - 2x Unique Bosses - Shock & Horror (with -Max, Shocking Ground, +30% Boss Damage and +25% Boss Attack Speed). Test for Dominating Blow


Level 76 Academy Map - 2x Unique Bosses - Arbiter of Knowledge. Test for Cyclone


Poorjoy's Asylum. Test for Frenzy


Summary Highlight Video


Level 78 Palace Map - Dominus, God's Chosen (with 92% Extra Damage as Fire and +30% Physical Resistance)


Level 78 Courtyard Map - 6x Unique Bosses - 2x Oriath's Vengeance + 2x Vigil + 2x Virtue


Level 78 Courtyard Map - 3x Unique Bosses - Oriath's Vengeance + Vigil + Virtue (with Vulnerability and 92% Extra Damage as Lightning)


Level 77 Shrine Map - 2x Unique Boss - Piety the Empyrean


Level 77 Shipyard Map - 2x Unique Boss - Warmonger


Level 76 Precinct Map - 2x Unique Boss - Lady Stormflay: (with Vulnerability)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7u40Xa-k5I


Level 76 Crematorium Map - 2x Unique Boss - Magaera:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yXWELdo9Jo


Level 72 Jungle Valley Map - 2x Weaver: (with 86% Extra Damage as Fire)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAvGakIcbF4



SUMMARY (TLDR):
- Goal: Build a melee evasion-based character that is effective throughout the game, with exciting gameplay, great defenses and strong DPS. This build is focused on Blind, avoiding damage, and removing threats quickly
- Scales well. (scaling skills: blind, extreme attack speed & block, endurance charges, culling strike)
- Survivability: high base evasion (~50% evade chance), 12% chance to Blind, 2x increased evasion vs. projectiles, 40% chance to Dodge attacks (optional), 75% chance to Block attacks (max), 30% chance to Dodge spell damage (optional), 56% - 75% (max) chance to Block spells, 12%+ mitigation to all physical damage with 3x Endurance Charges (easy to raise to 5 charges for 20% mitigation), 4+ seconds immortality with Immortal Call, 75% all resistances, instant life gain with Life Gain on Hit, high life leech with Blood Rage
- Main Skill: Double Strike in Bringer of Rain linked with Multi-Strike, Melee Splash, and Life Gain on Hit
- High AOE DPS: ~13K unbuffed, ~18K with buffs - extremely high DPS and enough for single target. Handles reflect and thorns very well. Single target variant can be made by swapping one gem to significantly boost DPS.
- Other Skills Used: Flicker Strike/Leap Slam with Cull, Enduring Cry and Immortal Call, Frenzy - to gain frenzy charges
- Passive Tree: is focused on nodes giving evasion, +life, block, and attack speed & damage



PROS:
Spoiler
- Exciting and fun gameplay: true melee up front, close and personal
- Engaging: constantly trying to maximizing AOE damage and remove key threats. Use of various fun skills including Culling Strike and Leap Slam / Flicker Strike
- Flexible build: passive tree is highly flexible and can be used with axes, swords or daggers. Very easy to grab close nodes for: more survivability, or more DPS, or more resistance nodes that are close along the path as you see fit
- Very strong DPS to quickly remove threats (18K+ AOE DPS, if needed - single target variant up to 25K+ by swapping one gem)
- High survivability: unique defenses focused on avoiding damage rather than tanking damage. This becomes particularly important vs. high-end bosses that can deal fatal damage to you regardless of your defense type (i.e. armor)
- Has moderate damage mitigation + moderate health pool to soak any damage that manages to get through
- Handles reflect and lightning thorns extremely well: minimizes crits, maximizes instant life gain through high attack speed and Life Gain on Hit gem, high evasion gives good chance to evade your own reflected damage


ISSUES TO CONSIDER:
Spoiler
- Mana intensive - very high mana costs due to fast attack speed. Countered through mana leech on gear, passive points, and use of Clarity aura
- Need specific gear, so can be a bit expensive. However, use of 4-link in Bringer of Rain (which gives a total of 7-links) is cost efficient - easy to roll colors on a 4-link, and also means you do not have to buy an expensive 6-link chest-piece and try and roll its colors. If you cannot use Bringer of Rain - please see FAQ for workable alternatives (includes standalone Smoke Mine and Flame Totem with a Blind support).


PLAYING STYLE:
Spoiler
- Initiate with Flicker Strike / Leaping Slam -> cast Enduring Cry if need be -> Double Strike attack
- If necessary: i) use Frenzy to gain some frenzy charges for enhanced attack speed, ii) use Enfeeble / Temporal Chains on boss to reduce their DPS and lower their chance to hit, iii) cast Immortal Call for physical immortality
- Extremely high HP boss? -> reduce to <10% health and then Cull !
- Desyncing? -> cast Flicker Strike again to help force correction and move you to a targeted mob


DEFENSE MECHANICS:

Defense strategy: 1. avoid damage (priority), 2. mitigate damage as best we can, 3. quickly regenerate.

Please see Math section in 2nd post for some calculations on damage avoidance %s.

Physical Attack Avoidance: ~50% base chance to Evade (will be significantly enhanced by Blind) & 75% chance to block (max)
Spoiler

For incoming physical attacks, the first stage is A) chance to EVADE, and then chance to DODGE (OPTIONAL in this build), and then B) chance to BLOCK.

A. Evasion:
- High evasion from tree and gear can give ~50% chance to evade (before Blind)

The chance for an attacker to hit you is calculated as follows:

Chance to Hit = Attacker's Accuracy / ( Attacker's Accuracy + (Defender's Evasion / 4) ^ 0.8 )

We can drastically reduce this Chance of Hit by i) increasing our evasion rating (gear and passives), and ii) reducing the Attacker's Accuracy (can use Enfeeble).
- Our tree and gear will focus on a lot of evasion
- The Enfeeble gem provides a 20% reduction to monster accuracy at level 1, and up to 39% at level 20. Each % of quality on this gem adds 1.5% reduced accuracy: thus a level 20, 20% Enfeeble inflicts 69% total reduced accuracy (i.e. Attacker's Accuracy in the above formula is now only 30% of what it was before). I hardly ever need to use Enfeeble and only reserve it for high-end, hard-hitting bosses.

With our high evasion (and if necessary use of Enfeeble) - we become extremely evasive to attacks.

Now if Blind is applied: the total Chance to Hit is reduced by 75%!! Thus the new chance for the enemy to hit is:

Chance to Hit while Blinded = 0.25 x Chance to Hit while not Blinded.

Even if you had almost no evasion and an enemy had a 95% Chance to Hit you - applying Blind to them would reduce that Chance to Hit to only 24%!

This is why Blind is an amazing skill, and makes a high evasion build incredibly powerful.

Entropy: evasion is entropy based - this is great for high-evasion builds because it guarantees that you will not get hit for consecutive attacks according to your evade chance. The initial entropy value is random however, and so there is a chance you make take a hit at the start of a fight, however the consecutive attacks after that are guaranteed to miss in accordance with your chance to evade. You can read more about the mechanics of evasion here: (http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Evasion and here http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/11707/page/1). Eventually, however, a hit may get through - in this case you still have your chance to block it (75%), as well as ways to mitigate the damage (see Damage Mitigation below).

Furthermore Ondar's Guile is a powerful keystone that adds to our defenses against projectiles. It DOUBLES your chance to evade against projectiles (especially helpful against archers, chaos projectiles, and ice spears). With a good chunk of evasion and Ondar's Guile, the chances that projectiles hit you become incredibly slim.

Another benefit of evasion is that it gives you even greater chance to avoid critical hits. Critical hits themselves are rolled separately against your evasion. If a regular hit has a critical strike attached to it: first the regular hit must pass your evasion, if it does then the critical strike part of the hit is also rolled against your evasion to see if the critical hit passes your evasion. If the critical strike is evaded - you will only get hit for the regular damage, and will not take crit damage.

Aim for ~50% chance to evade throughout your leveling. You can run Grace to give a huge boost to your evasion if necessary. At the high level 60s you will need ~7000 evasion to have a 50% chance to evade, in the 80s level you will need about 10,000 evasion to have 50% chance to evade. Keep in mind that this "chance to evade" displayed on the tooltip is an estimate based on accuracy of monsters at your level, and so it will go down slightly each time you level higher. You can also use a Jade flask to temporarily increase your evasion.

B. Block: 75%. This is the maximum amount of block (unless you use the Anvil which adds 3% to maximum Block). Gear gives ~43% (+~30% from shield, +15% from Bringer of Rain) + 28% from tree + 4% from Tempest Shield = ~75% block chance. Your block %

Block scales well throughout the game because it is a fixed % against all monsters at all levels.

Spells: can reach up to ~75% chance to avoid Spell Damage with max Spell Block
Spoiler

- 56% total chance to Block spells can be obtained by using the Stone of Lazhwar amulet + Rainbowstride boots that can apply 50% and 25% of our regular Block chance to spells respectively. This gives a total of 50%+25% = 75% of our regular Block chance being applied to block spells. With a max regular Block chance of 75% - this results in 75% x 75% = 56% Block chance against Spells. This implies 44% chance of taking spell damage.

- With Spell Dodge incorporated (optional Phase Acrobatics keystone) - spell avoidance chance will reach 65% - i.e. 31% chance of taking spell damage - based on 30% spell dodge chance.

- Maximum spell block of 75% can be obtained by getting max regular block and then combining Stone of Lazhwar + Rathpith Globe.

Elemental resistances are extremely important and should be number 1 priority for your spell defense (before block) as they provide the spell damage reduction. Aim for as close to 75% of each (Fire, Lightning, Cold), unbuffed. Running a Purity aura will add up to 27% to each as well as +2% to your resistance maximum - capping your resistances at 77%. You can also use elemental flasks (Topaz, Ruby, Sapphire) if you need to improve your resistances.

With high Spell Block and high Elemental Resistances - the amount of spell damage we take is drastically reduced.

**Please see the Rathpith Globe section under Items and Gearing for how to attain MAX spell block + MAX regular block**.

Physical Damage Mitigation: Enfeeble, Endurance Charges, Immortal Call, Granite Flasks, Health Pool
Spoiler
In the rare case that damage gets through our defenses, or when facing an extremely hard hitting boss:

- Use Enfeeble curse - this drastically reduces enemy chance to hit and also reduces their total damage significantly. Can be linked to a low level Cast on Damage Take if you prefer this to be automatically cast
- Use Temporal Chains for heavy spell bosses - this reduces their rate of spell casting and gives you more time to recover. Can also be linked to a low level Cast on Damage Taken

- Keep Endurance Charges. The damage mitigation from Endurance Charges scales excellently throughout the game. Cast Enduring Cry to generate these charges. Each Endurance Charge reduces all incoming physical damage by 4%, regardless of the size of the damage, and also gives +4% to all elemental resistances.
3 Endurance Charges = 12% physical damage reduction and +12% to all your resistances. There is a + Endurance Charge node right near the path of this tree at the Duelist start that can increase max Endurance Charges to 4, you can also help Oak in Merciless to get another + Endurance Charge giving a possible total of 5 Endurance Charges = 20% damage mitigation to all physical damage throughout the game.

- Bringer of Rain also provides a 10% chance to gain an Endurance Charge from a block.

- Cast Immortal Call - consume your Endurance Charges to grant invulnerability to all physical damage. With just 3 Endurance Charges, and with Immortal Call linked to Increased Duration - you can get 4 seconds of immortality.

- Granite Flasks - these provide +3000 to your armor.

- Health pool - you will want your life pool to be as high as possible. I have found health of ~3k+ life for end game sufficient to soak up the rare high damage hits that get through my defenses.

Life Regen
Spoiler
I've tested both Life Gain on Hit and Life Leech gems in this build - and found Life Gain on Hit to give much better survivability.
- Life Gain on Hit scales very well with our high attack speed and also provides INSTANT life regen that helps counter reflect mobs as well as chaos damage/puncture which are fast life degeneration-over-time (DOT) effects that can be hard to counter with life leech.
- Life leech has a downside in that the life leech rate is capped at 20% of maximum life per second which is ~600 health max over each second (based on a 3000 life pool). This can be dangerous when fighting reflect/chaos/puncture as you may not be able to recover to your full life quick enough with just your life leech. There is no cap on life gain from Life Gain on Hit.
- Try both Life Leech or Life Gain on Hit and see which you prefer.

Handling Reflect
Spoiler
This build mitigates damage from physical reflect such that reflect mob packs/maps are a non-issue.

a) This build is not focused on crits - having a high crit chance and high crit damage is very dangerous against reflect, and will kill you. I have also found crits unnecessary as this build already provides very high DPS. With minimal crits in this build your DPS will be very smooth (not spikey) and thus reflect will be easy to handle.

b) Life Gain on Hit helps against reflect and thorns by providing instant life regen to counteract those effects.

c) Additionally - the high evasion in this build is a key advantage: reflected damage can be evaded (against your own accuracy rating).

If you feel that you are taking damage for some reason, drink a Granite flask for armor or keep Endurance Charges.

Lightning Thorns
Spoiler
Lightning Thorns is also a non-issue. Thorns on a target will reflect a fixed amount of lightning damage to you per your melee attack on that target. However the thorn damage is spell damage and so can be blocked with our spell block. Further - the instant life gain per every hit we deal from Life Gain on Hit also helps counteract thorns.

Frozen
Spoiler
Freeze is easy to handle and rarely happens with this build. Usually freeze results from a cold projectile or spell - which is countered well with the high evasion (especially vs. projectiles with Ondar's Guile), max attack block and strong spell block.

You can also carry a flask that has the "Dispels Frozen" mod. It is still wise to have high cold resistance when facing freeze potential.

Also note - you can still evade and block while frozen.

Desync
Spoiler
I have found Flicker Strike to help a lot against desync as it forces your character to lock onto a targeted monster.


OFFENSE MECHANICS: (also see Gems section below)
Spoiler
1. Extreme attack speed and high damage. Smooth DPS (does not spike). Gained from tree and gear.

2. The mana cost is very high. In Bringer of Rain - our Double Strike also uses the mana cost multipliers of the inherent Melee Physical Damage and Faster Attacks supports. With 8+ attacks per second, mana gets burned very quickly. This can be countered by investing in Mind Drinker node (2% mana leech) in the Shadow area near the top of our tree, using a Mana Flask with a +% Mana Leech mod, getting mana leech on gear, or running a low level Clarity gem for mana regen.

Note: Mana leech is based off your physical damage - if you are having a lot of mana trouble try getting a slower attack speed weapon, or higher physical damage weapon, and try getting more of the physical damage nodes on the tree first before you get attack speed nodes. With enough physical damage - 2% mana leech will be sufficient.

3. Frenzy charges - each Frenzy charge gives a nice +5% attack speed. Use Frenzy attack to gain a Frenzy charge. With up to 6 Frenzy charges in this build you gain +30% attack speed (as well as 24% increased total evasion, from tree).

4. Crowd control - having added cold damage (Hatred aura, Soul Taker chill effect) on your attacks allows chilling and sometimes freezing and shattering of mobs.

5. Culling - linking Flicker Strike / Leap Slam to the Cull support gem helps to quickly execute a high HP boss with <10% of health left. This works well on unique bosses too (i.e. Vaal, Piety, Oak) with very high HP, and scales throughout the game. You can also run some nice IIR/IIQ linked to it.
Note: Leap Slam has flexibility to help you get in and out of fights quickly, as well as leap obstacles for shortcuts.


PASSIVE TREE:

Tree is flexible and can work with different melee weapons (axes, daggers & swords). I prefer a low crit. weapon such as an axe for reasons mentioned above regarding reflect.

It emphasizes high defenses from evasion, shield blocking, +Life, high attack speed, and very high attack damage.

Current Tree 1.3:


Level progression:
Spoiler
Start at the Ranger and begin improving your life, damage and shield as you head towards the right edge. From here, grab Ondar's Guile. Keep heading up to the Shadow to improve your evasion and shield defenses, and to get some close intelligence nodes and the mana leech from Mind Drinker if necessary. Finally expand across the Duelist to get more shield defenses, physical damage and life. If you upgrade to Soul Taker you can unspec from Mind Drinker as you no longer need mana leech; there are also several axe clusters you can spec into (Duelist area) at this stage that are right along the path of this tree.

About Acrobatics (Dodge): Dodge is not required for this build as the build is focused on attaining maximum block. As such the damage avoidance from Dodge becomes unnecessary given the high evasion, blind, and max block of the build. If you decide to NOT go for max regular block and max spell block in late game (i.e. you prefer to use a life+evasion shield, or get more damage, etc..) then Dodge would be useful. Please see this post for discussion on how the contribution for damage avoidance from Dodge drops off in effectiveness vs. max Block: http://goo.gl/VUYJbC


Notable passive nodes are:


Ondar's Guile

Doubles chance to evade projectile attacks. Great against chaos projectile attacks and Piety's ice arrows.



Revenge of the Hunted

4% increased physical damage, 16% increased evasion rating, 10% increased maximum life. Very strong node giving damage, increased evasion, and large increase to life all in one.



Aspect of the Panther

16% increased 1H physical damage, 6% increased 1H attack speed, +10 to maximum life, 4% increased movement speed. Very strong DPS node giving some survivability as well.



Heart of Oak

4% increased maximum life, 30% chance to avoid being stunned, 1% life regenerated per second. Another amazing node right at the Ranger start giving life, life regen, and chance to avoid stun. Please note - if you decide to use Eye of Chayula instead of Lazhwar's Stone you do not need this node.



Testudo

20% increased defenses from shield and 6% additional shield block chance. No other single node on the tree gives such a high +% to block chance.



Optional: Acrobatics (up to 40% physical attack dodge) and Phase Acrobatics (30% spell dodge). Please note that Acrobatics halves your armor and ES.



Tree Alternatives:
Spoiler
Invest less points in Shadow and more points in the Duelist to get more +Life, +Endurance Charge, and more elemental resistance (Diamond Flesh) nodes - these are all very close to the original tree. Or invest more points in the Shadow side to get more Int., damage, and mana leech (Mind Drinker node).


ATTENTION HARDCORE PLAYERS:

Spoiler
Please note that this guide is not a TANK build. It is focused on avoiding damage (priority), mitigating any damage as best as possible, and rapidly regenerating life.
The evasion/max block combo is extremely strong and gives you very high survivability. As long as you play smart with this build you will be fine.

However, here are some additional pointers that could be helpful to boost survivability:
- Remove some DPS nodes and get i) the extra endurance node by Duelist, ii) health nodes
- Get the extra endurance charge from Oak in Merciless
- Use Enduring Cry in battle and keep your Endurance charges up - with 5 endurance charges you have 20% physical damage mitigation against all enemies (i.e. Vaal)
- Case Enfeeble / Temporal Chains - even on regular mobs if you want to play super safe
- Blind is the key to a strong evasion build - prioritize linking Blind to your attack early on, or use a Flame totem with Blind / using Smoke Mine
- Be careful of Vulnerability maps and make liberal use of Enfeeble on such maps/use Eye of Chayula
- Look for a high evasion shield that gives you +life. Hardly anyone uses these types of shields - so you can find one for very cheap

Alternative tree with Duelist / Ranger start (credits: mvm199 for the original version): http://goo.gl/Wt3CdE. This tree sacrifices damage, but has a lot of life. You may wish to spec into more/less damage as you see fit.




BANDIT REWARDS:
Spoiler
Normal: Get 8% all resistances from Kraityn or +40 Life from Oak. I prefer the 8% all resistances as it is generally hard to get a good balance of resistances from gear.
Cruel: Get 8% attack speed from Kraityn or the +18% physical damage from Oak (recommended if you are having mana issues) . The 8% attack speed is preferred as it scales well by benefiting everything that adds to our attack (i.e. elemental damage from auras etc, life gain on hit, etc).
Merciless: Kill all for 1 passive point; if you like using Enduring Cry and Immortal Call - get the +1 Endurance Charge from Oak.


ITEMS AND GEARING:
Spoiler
A. 1H Weapon: damage nodes in this build are all general melee damage nodes and so you can begin using any weapon that can use Double Strike.

I recommend starting with 2 types of daggers for your leveling: Ungil's Gauche and Mightflay Flaying knife - these daggers are very cost effective: easy to buy, and give great DPS throughout your leveling up until level 60. Then you can switch to a high-end axe such as Soul Taker for end game. Early weapons to use:
- Level 20 - 35: Ungil's Gauche.
Very common dagger with nice DPS, easy to find (cost: ~1 chaos)
- Level 35 - 60: Mightflay.
Another common dagger, strong DPS all the way to high levels. Easy to find (cost: ~2 - 3 chaos)
- Level 60+: Try and find a axe/dagger/sword with ~250+ dps, preferably 300+ (this is calculated by taking the average of the low and high damage of the weapon and multiplying by the weapon attack speed). Weapon's with fast attack speed of 1.5+ and low crits are more desirable for this build. Axes are preferred for the lower crit chance. Price can range from a few GCPs and up. Try and find a weapon that gives resistances as well. An example is this dagger which I bought for 2GCP:

Soul Taker axe:
This is a superb axe with very high attack speed. Note: it is not required for this build, but it allows you to continuously maintain your DPS even if you have no mana - directly benefiting our survivability as continuously attacking keeps Blind applied and gives instant life gains from Life Gain on Hit. Very expensive axe. The main roll you want is the Increased Physical Damage to be as high as possible (180%+). You can further refine your damage by getting the very close axe DPS nodes along the way to the Duelist area on the tree. Please note however that there are quite a few rare axes that give higher DPS than even legacy Soul Taker. If your physical damage is high enough and with a decent mana pool size - mana leech should not be a problem.


B. Helm/Chest: look for high evasion, +life, and +resistances on your helm/chest.

- One cheap and very useful helm you can use early on is Fairgrave's Tricorne (cost ~1chaos) which gives shock immunity, evasion, and high lightning resistance.


- Another great unique that can be used for leveling up is this chest piece:
Briskwarp is a great chest giving a ton of evasion that can be used starting at level 9! It will continue to give high evasion into the early 30 levels. It also has other nice stats: movement speed, attack speed, cold res, mana recovery from flasks. Cost ~2 chaos.


- Around level 67 - switch to Bringer of Rain (costs ~7ex depending on rolls) to amplify your DPS and to add Blind to your attacks. Bringer of Rain also gives a nice 15% Block chance.

Note: when you switch to Bringer of Rain you will no longer be able to wear a chest piece.
Please see FAQ for alternatives for getting Blind if you cannot use Bringer of Rain.


C. Amulet: the best choice here is Stone of Lazhwar
(cost ~1alc - 1chaos). This is a very nice amulet and a critical part to the build that you can start using at level 5. It applies 50% of your Block chance to spells. This is great for avoiding spell damage. Since the regular Block chance of this build gets very high - we want to use as much of that as we can to apply to Spell blocking. It also gives you a lot of intelligence, mana, and cast speed (great for speeding up casting of curses/enduring cry/immortal call)

Another option for amulet is Eye of Chayula (10+ chaos)
- which prevents stuns and allows you to maintain your DPS and life gain on hit without being interrupted by stuns. However given the high evasion and block of this build, stuns are not frequent at all. Please note the amulet will also reduce your life by a bit. You can use Chayula in your leveling if you are having some trouble with stuns. I usually use it only when in a very difficult Vulnerability map.


D. Shield: early on use the Crest of Perandus shield (cost ~1 chaos) which can be used from level 8 until early 50s.
This shield is great as it gives a lot of block chance, a lot of life, life leech, and a lot of lightning resistance.

After that look for any shield that can give you a lot of evasion (1000+ evasion) and life/intelligence and resistances. An example would be:


One option is Atziri's Mirror - this is a very underrated and underused shield that you can buy very cheap (~2-3 chaos).
It is a great shield in combination with Bringer of Rain - since you cannot use a chest piece and therefore you will need to try and get as much evasion, life and resistances from your other gear as you can - as such you may fall short on Intelligence requirements. This gives a good amount of evasion, 20%-30% to all res, as well as a large amount of intelligence which helps improve your mana pool and enables the use of high levels of int. gems such as Enfeeble and Tempest Shield.


If you are seeking maximum spell block: Rathpith's Globe (cost: ~3GCP) is a good choice:

This applies 40-60% of your Block chance to spells (which if added on top of the 50% from Stone of Lazhwar easily gets you to maximum spell block). So key mod you want on Rathpith is high spell block, and you do not really need the spell damage or ES mods which can make the shield expensive.
Please note that the Lazhwar Stone + Rainbowstrides combo already gives you very high spell block of 56% with Tempest Shield. I have found 56% to be very high, giving great survivability in the majority of maps. However if you are running against a very hard spell boss: Piety or Mageara, having max spell block will help significantly.

Using Rathpith Globe + Stone of Lazhwar (no Rainbowstrides) - will easily get you to maximum spell block while keeping maximum regular block. However you will need to solve for the following constraints:
- Intelligence required to use Rathpith (very high) - I use Sin Trek boots and a ring that give some int
- Resistances - without Atziri's Mirror and Rainbowstrides - you will need to balance your resistances carefully from your other items (belt, gloves, rings)
- Missing evasion - Rathpith gives no evasion, as such you may need to run Grace to maintain high evasion

The above constraints may be tricky to solve, and so I recommend staying with the Atziri Mirror + Rainbowstride for the shield + boots combination. You can swap to Saffell's Frame for heavy spell bosses - however be careful with Saffell as you cannot block regular attacks at all when using that shield.


E. Shoes: use high evasion and high movement speed boots (high movement speed increases your survivability by getting in and out of fights quickly, as well as improving your clearing speed of levels). Priority mods on boots should be +life and +resistances.

Early on, you can use Wanderlust boots (very cheap ~1alc). They prevent you from getting frozen so they are great to use for Hailrake and Merveil boss fights early on:


The Blood Dance
boots (cost 2-3GCP) are not really necessary, but are a good pair to use from level 44 until you can get to your Rainbowstrides. They give a good amount of life regen per frenzy charge you have. However they are lacking in life and resistances.
Use these if you already have high resistances from your other gear and need some life regen. You can use Blood Rage to generate the frenzy charges to get up to 6% life regen with 6 frenzy charges.

At level 53 - you can switch to Rainbowstride boots (cost <2ex). These are the core boots for this build as they will increase your Spell Block chance significantly, give +Mana, a nice +20% to all resistances, and good movement speed.


Another pair of end game boots that are very cheap and effective are Sin Trek boots (cost ~1 chaos). These shoes give a lot of intelligence, evasion, and energy shield (which is great if you combine this with Rathpith Globe for maximum spell block). Additionally, enemies cannot leech from you when you wear these shoes.



F. Belt: ideal belt to use is Meginord's Girdle (cost: ~15+ chaos depending on rolls).
This is an amazing belt which can be used from level 8 all the way into end game, and can be used on many physical builds. Gives nice benefits: +Strength, +Physical Damage, +Life, +Cold Resistance.

One cheap belt, that is very effective for leveling is Wurm's Molt (cost ~1alc). This belt gives great benefits: life, strength, int, cold resistance, as well as life leech and mana leech.



G. Gloves:
For gloves look for the following benefits: high evasion, life, resistances. An example would be these gloves:


Cost-effective gloves you can use while leveling that will help significantly with mana upkeep (credits: phenonymous) are the Slitherpinch Gloves (cost ~1chaos), which gives strong life leech and mana leech:


H. Rings:
Priority mods on rings should be: resistances, life, physical damage. If you are having a lot of trouble with mana leech, Thief's Torment (oost ~10 chaos) is a solution, however you cannot use other rings when you use Torment (credits: oligartoon, Zyglrox43). It gives +15 mana to you for each hit which is quite a lot of mana with Double Strike + Multistrike.


I. Alternatives: if you are having a lot of trouble with heavy spell bosses (Piety, map Kuduku etc.) - try using Saffell's Frame (cost: 3+ GCP).
This shield converts 100-120% of your Block Chance to Spell block, and increases your resistances and max resistances. However you will no longer be able to block attacks.


GEMS:
Spoiler
Key skill is Double Strike linked to Blind. Core supports in order of priority of linking: Melee Splash -> Multistrike -> Life Gain on Hit. Then link these in a Bringer of Rain to make it a 7-Link supported by Bringer of Rain's Blind, Melee Physical Damage, and Faster Attacks. If you cannot get Bringer of Rain - at least use the above 4 Link and add in Blind (5-Link), and Melee Physical Damage (6-Link). You can also use Blind separately and do not have to link to your attack (see FAQ).


- The above gives a lot of DPS in AOE which is more than enough even as a single target attack against bosses.
- Single Target: if for some reason you need more single-target DPS - simply swap out Melee Splash for Added Fire Damage to boost DPS (this gem will add 20%+ of your physical damage as fire damage). However I have never needed to do this as the AOE DPS in this build is already so strong and enough for single target.

- Blind is crucial and significantly improves our chance to avoid hits.
It synergizes very well with our high attack speed. With a high level Blind gem there is a 12% chance to apply Blind per hit. This build reaches ~8-10 attacks per sec., and so the Blind is usually applied within 1 second of starting a fight. With Melee splash, entire mob packs will be blinded very quickly.


Flicker Strike / Leap Slam:
used for initiating, jumping to the next enemy quickly, and also for Culling a really high HP boss when they are on less than 10% of health. It is sufficient to have Flicker Strike / Leap Slam in a 3-link with just Culling Strike and Faster Attacks (for Leap Slam)/IIR/IIQ supports.


Tempest Shield: run this at the start of levels to add a nice 4% to your shield block chance.
This would also indirectly add to your spell block chance due to the bonuses from Stone of Lazhwar and Rainbowstride.

Cast on Damage Taken: have this linked to a curse such as Enfeeble or Temporal Chains, as well as either Increased Duration and/or even Increased AOE.

Note: Cast on Damage Taken requires no mana to activate the curse and it is automatic once a certain damage threshold is reached - you can keep your Cast on Damage gem at a low level so that it remains sensitive and readily casts on the slightest damage!


Enduring Cry and Frenzy: no links necessary.
Use these to generate Endurance charges and Frenzy charges as need be.


Auras: You can run 1 or 2 of the following auras (I usually just run Grace and Hatred):
Hatred (improves DPS by adding a lot of cold damage and giving some chill/chance to freeze to your attacks - the freeze helps with crowd control and the shatter helps against Necromancers raising the dead).

Grace (improves survivability by giving a large bonus to evasion).

Purity (provides large bonus to spell resistances).


Curses: - ideal curses to use are Enfeeble or Temporal Chains.

Enfeeble is great because it lowers enemy chance to hit and drastically reduces their total damage - which is perfect for an evasion based build.
Temporal Chains reduces attack, cast, and movement speed of enemies - thus you will get hit less frequently / be able to safely recover between hits, and also safely block/stun recover.

Quality on Gems - the key gems for quality are:
Melee Splash - quality increases AOE range. This vastly improves clear speed and survivability as our DPS, Life Gain on Hit and Blind are all spreading across a broader area of enemies.
Enfeeble (this is not critical and a no/low quality gem is fine - Enfeeble is rarely used in gameplay except for high-end bosses). Quality adds to the amount of % reduction to enemy accuracy - drastically lowering their chance to hit and improving your survivability.


AURA STACKS:

Spoiler

- Use the Reduced Mana gem to help reduce the mana reserve of these auras (the Reduced Mana gem gives a 75%+ reduction in mana cost at level 16+): Purity for elemental resistances (can be reduced from 40% reserve cost -> ~30% reserve), Hatred for DPS increase (60% reserve -> ~45% reserve), Tempest Shield for block (25% reserve -> ~19%).


FLASKS:
Spoiler
Good mods to have on flasks include: instant life recovery, mana leech, % increased evasion, and removal of ailments such as freeze, burn, and bleeding. It is also ideal to have a flask that removes curses and gives you curse immunity (i.e. for PVP or vs. Academy boss). For Jade flasks you want to have a mod to increase % evasion so that it further boosts your evasion on top of the +3000 evasion rating it gives. At the moment Jade flask is in Domination/Nemesis leagues only - a quick way to get this flask is to make a Nemesis character, get the flask super cheap and then die to go to Standard. You can also just buy it straight in Standard of course.

Some examples of the flasks I use are below. You can make various combinations. One combo I used was a Ruby flask with knockback vs. Mageara - the knockback helps move you out of the burning areas.



MAPS:
Spoiler
- This build is very strong in maps and can easily solo. Your Blind is also great when grouping as everyone benefits from this being applied. Blind is a status ailment and does not interfere with other status ailments or curses.

Map Mods to Consider:
Physical reflect map - and double physical reflect mobs: easy to handle due to the low crits of this build, multiple small hits with Double Strike, instant life gains on hit, and high evasion (can evade your own reflected damage). If for some reason you are taking too much damage from reflect use a Granite Flask or keep some Endurance Charges up.

Vulnerability (increases your chance of getting stunned and the amount of physical damage taken): with your high evasion & block - this will not be a big issue, but still requires caution. If you want to play super safe - use Enfeeble on mobs to reduce their accuracy or swap in Eye of Chayula (prevents stuns) for your Lazhwar stone.

-Max Resistances / Elemental Weakness / Increased Elemental Damage - requires caution and maxed resistances as you will be taking more damage from elements.

Map Bosses: (Please also see section "Further Map Boss Strategies" in the 2nd post on this page)
High physical damage, high HP bosses - map Oak, Brutus, Vaal, etc. are handled well. You will rarely get hit by these bosses. Use Enfeeble (and Granite Flasks and Enduring Cry if necessary), and Cull them at <10% HP. Be careful with Vaal's smash and play smart by moving out of the way. Do not try and tank Vaal's smash - there is a chance it will miss, but if it gets through it will kill you.

High spell damage bosses (Pietys, Kudukus, Magaera etc) - our high Spell Block works very well against these bosses. Make sure your resistances are high (run Purity if necessary). If you are really having trouble - swap in Rathpith / Saffell's to maximize your spell block. Use Temporal Chains to slow down their casting.

Chaos and Puncture damage over time (i.e. Canyon Sniper boss) - his puncture and chaos damage are easily countered with the rapid instant life gains from your attacks. It is extremely rare to get hit by his arrows due to your high evasion and Ondar's Guile. Use Flicker Strike to lock onto him, and DPS him down - his puncture will have little effect as we gain instant life rapidly and are in melee range and hardly moving. Use an Amethyst flask if you feel you are taking chaos damage.


CURRENT STATS AND GEAR:


Base Stats in Town (no Auras):
Spoiler


Hatred + Grace + Jade Flask (without Jade, Evasion = 50%):
Spoiler


Hatred + Haste + Jade Flask (without Jade Flask, Evasion = 36%; with Jade Flask, Evasion = 61%):
Spoiler


Gear:
Spoiler




Credits: Inspiration for this build came from LeMing's Witch Dominatrix guide, and Aimlessgun's Ranger Dagger guide.
Last edited by Ceryneian on Jun 28, 2015, 10:11:01 AM
Wow, Alot of work went into writing this. The Build looks really good. May use it sometime. Good Luck!
"Just because you can't see the path through the forest doesn't mean using a bulldozer is the most efficient way through." -Rhys
"
zakktb wrote:
Wow, Alot of work went into writing this. The Build looks really good. May use it sometime. Good Luck!


Thanks! I have added a quick play on a reflect map. More high level map play coming.
It is nice to see evasion based builds and it's nice that people started realising how strong the block builds are...however, one thing concerns me here - low life (for a life based melee). Your tree doesn't sport much life% and you rely on damage avoidance and life on hit, which is ok, but eventually avoidance will fail and you will get hit. And when you get hit you will have crappy armor and low life pool to soak it. Not good.

One of those things cannot be adressed (armor) since you go pure evasion, but you don't have much life either, and you pretty much need it because it is your only buffer when you get hit. I know I may sound like a life pool fanatic but consider that armor based block builds can afford to have less life than normal because those few hits that come through will get reduced by armor...you don't have that luxury. I would drop some of those damage nodes (Bringer of Rain adds a lot of damage too, not just defensive stats like blind and block) and try to get as many life nodes as possible. Also need as much life as you can get on non-unique peaces of gear...I really think you should aim for 3-3.5k life, atleast.

One more thing, with high damage it may be benefitial to swap Life On Hit for Life Leech, atleast for single targets/bosses. In general, reliance on LoH for survival is kinda risky by itself, you need to go in and hit so you can get life, but at the same time you return to situations that put you in danger in the first place. Plus, you need to hit as many mobs as you can so you can benefit from it which increases the chance for hits to get through your block/evasion, and then we come to that thing above about no armor and lowish life...

Don't get me wrong, I am more, like, thinking out loud here, not criticizing your build... :) I like it because it's evasion/block melee Ranger, so it's refreshing, and you seem to do well with it...I just think it needs more life, atleast to be HC/ONS viable. Nothing wrong with it for Standard/Anarchy.
Last edited by IANVS on Aug 21, 2013, 1:00:45 PM
Thanks for the feedback! Appreciate the comments as it helps in thinking about my build. You raise several good points.

"
IANVS wrote:

One of those things cannot be adressed (armor) since you go pure evasion, but you don't have much life either, and you pretty much need it because it is your only buffer when you get hit. I know I may sound like a life pool fanatic but consider that armor based block builds can afford to have less life than normal because those few hits that come through will get reduced by armor...you don't have that luxury.


There are ways to mitigate the damage that gets through our evade & dodge & block - I outline this in the Damage Mitigation section under Defenses. I use Endurance Charges and Granite Flasks. Endurance Charges are an exceptional form of defense against physical attacks as they scale very well against high damage hits. I only run with 3 endurance charges up, but it is very easy to get up to 5 endurance charges on my build (1 right along path of tree, and 1 from Oak Merciless). This will provide up to 20% reduction in all physical damage that gets through your evasion/dodging/blocking. This damage reduction is a fixed % and does not change regardless of how big the incoming damage gets.

The problem with armor is that it does not scale well (I outline more detail in the FAQ). You will need an incredible amount of armor to have reasonable % mitigation against big incoming damage.

I agree with you on the health issue - as it is the last line of defense, and so having a large amount of health is ideal. I have been playing throughout the endgame with 2.5K - 3K health and have found this to be a sufficient level of health. More would be better, but I think once you get your health in the 2.5K - 3K range - there is little that adding an extra 300-500 health can do to help you survive a devastating hit that passes through your avoidance and mitigation.

"
IANVS wrote:
One more thing, with high damage it may be benefitial to swap Life On Hit for Life Leech, atleast for single targets/bosses. In general, reliance on LoH for survival is kinda risky by itself, you need to go in and hit so you can get life, but at the same time you return to situations that put you in danger in the first place.


So I have tried both Life Leech and Life Gain on Hit. I prefer Life Gain on Hit - the instant life regen from your attacks is what helps against reflect and lightning thorns.

If I need some life leech (and attack speed) with my Life Gain on Hit - then I use Blood Rage. I urge people to try both and see what they prefer.

For Hardcore, I recommend in the FAQ that users dial down the DPS and focus more on life nodes and life from gear. I strongly believe this can be made into a very strong HC build with both high survivability and high DPS. High DPS is a form of survivability too, as it allows you to gain life faster, and quickly remove mobs before they do too much damage to you.

Added quick Piety video, and level 72 Torture Chamber map with reflect and added monster cold damage. More videos coming soon.
Last edited by Ceryneian on Aug 23, 2013, 7:36:00 AM
Love the idéa!

Shame on the low HP pool though, I mena sure. One chould easily buff the HP here, plenty of nodes around to pic, but again; The DPS would suffer quite badly then.


Havent seen a working "Guide" as for HC yet, guess i wil just have to start with something like this and make my own ;D
zzZzzzZzzZz
"
Tzaina wrote:
Love the idéa!

Shame on the low HP pool though, I mena sure. One chould easily buff the HP here, plenty of nodes around to pic, but again; The DPS would suffer quite badly then.


Havent seen a working "Guide" as for HC yet, guess i wil just have to start with something like this and make my own ;D


Hey, thanks for the comment. Regarding reducing DPS and buffing health: DPS would not suffer that much - the DPS is already quite high. 18K+ DPS is more than enough even for single target. I don't have the regrets to test, but if you spec out of some of the +% physical damage nodes and get some HP nodes around the path of the tree - your DPS unbuffed would probably fall to ~9-10K (which buffed would be about 15K I think) - which is still a lot of DPS. Your health would probably jump to 3.2k+ depending on how much life you have on your gear.

I am currently running with 2.6K HP - there isn't much difference between 2.6K health and 3.2K health when it comes to surviving an incredibly large hit like Vaal's smash. But as long as you play smart - use Endurance Charges/Immortal Call/position yourself well - you'll be fine. I've been in maps for quite a while now and have found 2.5K+ health to be sufficient.

I think I might upload a video of a hard rolled map I did to show the survivability of this build: this was with the Carnage (Brutus) boss - the map had a lot of chaos damage, spell damage, arc mages, & flicker mobs; it also had both physical reflect and vulnerability curse on the map rolls. I ran this on 2.5k health and without Eye of Chayula (would not recommend this on Vulnerability maps) - and still did fine.

My point is just to show that this build can be made to be very strong in terms of survivability.

For hardcore, I would recommend the following:
- remove some DPS nodes and get i) the extra endurance node by Duelist, ii) health nodes
- get the extra endurance charge from Oak in Merciless
- Use Enduring Cry in battle and keep your Endurance charges up - with 5 endurance charges you have 20% physical damage mitigation against all enemies (i.e. Vaal)
- Remember to cast Immortal Call if you are in a pinch
- get the Heart of Oak node and the % chance to avoid stun nodes right in the Ranger area if you will be running without the Eye of Chayula
- be careful of Vulnerability curse and do not do any maps with Vulnerability curse unless you are prepared to use Eye of Chayula
- Instead of Atziri's Mirror - look for a high evasion shield that gives you +life instead of intelligence. Hardly anyone uses these types of shields - so you can find one for very cheap.

The downside is that without the large boost to intelligence from Atziri's Mirror - you may not be able to use high levels of the Enfeeble and Tempest Shield int. gems.
Last edited by Ceryneian on Aug 24, 2013, 2:53:28 PM
Great build and guide! :D

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