Revealing the Secrets - LA

hello guys im FanonFlower


Quick idea about what the build is about. lvl 95 gotta level to 97 asap.

i'll talk about my Lightning Arrow build to you. I was about to buy +1 gems shavs and make a firestorm build, libritannia made me change my mind and i heard from lapiz that LA hits really hard when there is a wall. i started the build with having no idea in my mind, i used split arrow + puncture mine for long time. While playing vs willi in sarn arena i realized that LA is superior next to other bow skills in pvp. Dethklok recommended me to use Lioneye's armor, and from tests we did, i experienced that pierce is direct multiplier of our dps. i maximized my pierce to 99% after that. This is the story of my build development.

How Does LA work?

LA does not shotgun. LA has 2 damage types, and sometimes both deal damage. according to our tests with dethklok, 1 arrow does 'shotgun' too. after that we both realized LA, just hits twice when there is a wall and you can pierce that wall. LA has a secondary damage as explosion, as aoe damage.(jewels with aoe damage benefit LA secondary damage, yes) both can be dodgeable, evadable.


When/how does the secondary damage apply?

secondary damage is aoe. when LA projectiles hits/pierces a target, Lightning arrow projectiles chains to nearest 2 more targets. Nearest Chain radius will be decided ith your total aoe% modifiers. When there is a wall, and you have 0% pierce, LA's secondary damage cant pierce the wall and cant reach the other side of the wall. when the target is VERY close to wall, even with 0% pierce that secondary aoe damage applies to the target at the next side of the wall.
Also when LA projectiles travel range is over, your projectiles explode, deal aoe damage and naturally chains to nearest targets.
LA works like EA too. when the proejctiles hit the wall, they explode there and chains to nearest targets.

Is it a shotgun? more projectiles, beter damage?

No! Projectiles does not shotgun with FW. They just pierce and deal aoe damage. and i tested my damage with LMP from close range and far range. nothing changes. and my FW + LA damage is always better with ppad than LMP. (tested with ahfack)

Why LA?

Ill make it simple, 75% pierce is a must in pvp, and all other bow skills cant benefit from pierce, its just a waste of gem slot for other builds. However, LA gets better and work even better with pierce. Also Lightning arrow has the highest arrow speed / projectile travel range in the game.

What are core items?



there are 2 variants of this build. one with Lioneye's vision other is with Kaoms Heart. Leg or non leg doesnt matter.

Lioneye's vision provides us 1 free gem slot. so we can use phys proj damage, or faster attacks there instead. Lioneye's vision offers basically 30-50% more damage. However, Kaom's Heart provides +2000 life compared to Lioneye's vision. to those who have really good gear, i recommend Kaoms Heart. People who cant afford all mirrored gear, better use lioneye's vision. Cause this builds main strength is 2-3 shotting people. This build is about punishing all the initiation attempts of your opponent... hard... very hard. the harder, the better.

2.2 UPDATE[



In 2.2 i decided to use Lioneye's vision. That was a hard decision i made. Let me tell you why:

2x6l + more damage vs more durability

"

The story behind this particular build (and frankly all of my builds) is that I just wanted to find a skill that would deal actual damage in a 4link so I could use kaoms. This is because the current poe pvp pretty much requires you to have 9k+ life or have tempestshield&12k+ ES to survive.

As long as your mines doesnt one shot or your arrows 2 shot everyone out there. This is true.

And True, Ascendancy classes provided so much power to builds that even 8k life is not enough anymore. This build lose its viability if we are not be able to outdps everyone in the game. Ranger has almost no defences, no block, only acro which is all about RNG and everything almost hits more than 3k+ damage per hit.

So what stupid idea is dropping the leg kaoms and using Lioneye's vision?

Your life pool is not important anymore as used to, just dont get one shotted. You have to one shot as a crit char or you are going to be one shotted. Things has to be killed before they reach you, or when they reach you they has to be killed very quick.

8K life means nothing vs a good BV build.
8K life means nothing vs 13-14K ES, heavily invested tempest shield damage Spark build.
8K life means nothing vs tabula inquisitor sparkers with 150+ proj speed.

So i switched to x2 6l and 50% more damage which i get from Lioneye's Vision.
Mines are direct counter for BV builds, Mines let your sparker friend stay far from you or have him killed if he tries to close up with tempest shield. 50% more damage totally nails tabula inquisitor if you dont even crit.

I switched from Leg mali + TC on hit to Facebreakers, since they provide better damage for mines,
I switched all my jewels to light crit multi + attack speed + life + %damage jewels:

Jewels:



What i learned from other LA variants, my copies:

People who have interpreted this crit build as their own, are pve players. So from them i've seen that they are focusing on getting the best attack speed as pve behaviour. That sounds really awful idea as a pvp'er. but i realized high attack speed + LA aoe damage + King of the hill knockback totally locks your opponent to an area and they cant get out! I use LMP and i get 5 arrows and with that i can lock my opponent to with LA + AOE so they cant get out and i narrow my distance slowly until i manage to kill. This builds aim is 2 shotting your target as soon as possible.

The other aim is:
the most important thing is, you shouldnt aim one shotting your targets. you should be able to switch your positioning very fast so you can deal those who spam a skill behind a wall. you should aim on speed, quickness and mobility in your build. hitting for 9k but hitting slow is really bad compared to hitting for 5k but attacking very fast. positioning is very important.


Tree:



My tree in EA matchups:



This tree provides 6.5k health. at lvl 95.

Auras:

Im using arctic armor + clarity lvl 11.
Herald of Ash vs Chaos Cloud Summoners for herald of ash prolif damage. they melt in seconds.
Herald of Ash when im about to use Burning arrow mines.
Herald of Ash vs miners, cause ash prolif kills the mines which are close to where you aim/target too.

assuming we are using lvl 11-12 clarity(in order to not overspend our passive points to get more intelligence from tree i stick with lvl 11-12 clarity which has same requirements of lvl 21 lightning penetration)
Lioneye's vision provides 7L, but therefore we are having very high mana cost, 53 if im remembering correct. to sustain such mana cost, you need 130-140% mana regen total.

Leg kaoms + LA arrow requires less mana cost, 100-110~ mana regen is enough to sustain mana cost of LA.

arctic armor provides more defense versus phys / fire attacks and makes us harder to catch. so i love it. vs ele weak on hit gloves users, vs people who are using -resist curses or mjölner users who play with EE, i use purity of elements aura, sometimes i even use + purity of the certain elemental damage type.

Links:

Gloves:

Enhance + Frost wall + blink arrow + spell echo

Boots:


Enhance lvl 4, Blood Rage, Clarity + arctic armor

I use Blood rage when i want to lock someone and give no entrance to come close. Its also good to kill targets who are very tanky in 2 shots very quickly.



Frost wall + increased duration(or herald of ash) + cwdt + flame dash(sometimes i take this out)

Weapon:
Burning Arrow Mines(101k dps)

Chest:



Light pen + ele focus + phys to light + ppad(or faster attacks or BCR or LMP depends on matchup), LA + wed

Faster attacks is good in targets who are having 10K minus life and using whirling blades, so you wouldnt have to worry when you miss your chance to hit them, cause short after another hit is coming.
Faster attacks is good vs Belly + curse EA players. since they are 'squishy' and very fast, you can give them no room to move and rush on you.
Faster attacks is good for mirror matchups. Since knockback locks and stunlocks your target, faster attack speed is always better than having the highest damage
LMP is good to lock your target at the start of the round to a point and outmicro/outplaying your opponent.
PPad is good vs 11k+ life targets without block(like EA)
BCR is self explaining it self i suppose.
LMP is very good versus coc cycloners who are faset and very lethal. LMP is very good vs glacial cascade miners who are very fast and lethal like ________M. LMP is very good vs one shotter flmaeblasters like jorge



NOT THE BEST COLORS FOR SURE. SO dont take this as an example.


Counters for each popular build in the meta.



a must use vs quick blind flask user / quick blinder targets.

Leg aegis - low dps builds.

barrage is best. pierce + phys to light + light pen + barrage + bcr + wed. deplete their defensive flasks. use point blank + barrage.

vs conversion talismans:

Brotherhood Ring x2

play mind games with your opponent switch to x2 brotherhood rings use hatred and add cold pen to your 6l gem setup.

you can use half light + half phys damage with crit chance + crit multi gem too. depends on your preferance.

here is a long mathematical explanation of how much damage reduction offers conversion talismans in ascendancy:


vs blind + ball lightning

get accuracy on helmet, both rings and amulet. if thats not enough. use accuracy 20/20 if its getting really a big problem. 4k+ accuracy is a must for this build.

vs spark

outrange them. dont get close. with lioneyes vision, put mines, and force them to go to that point. you eally need high dps vs these guys, when your damage is very punishing they cant dare to get close, and you can slowly break their nerves and gameplay with high damage, long range shots. force them to get near walls, force them to get near to frost walls that you manually cast.

vs EA

EA cant focus on you with stacking fuses on ground or frost wall because of cwdt+ flame dash. when the first damage applies on you, you get rid of aoe shotgun explosions with auto flame dash and attack from a safe point. this repeats with each damage focus attempt of EA opponent. if you know what you are doing, EA cant focus damage on you. i use point blank + LA vs EA.

vs bleed ST


whatever they do, our range is longer. keep your range close or very far. attack to walls instead of the target. keep your range, in order to shotgun with frost wall + LA tricks. or stay very far from your opponent to kill with secondary damage aoe explosion + chain. from mid range they can really hurt you hard, but we have tools to get very close or very far.

15K+ES tank builds.

put a wall next to you, manual cast it. keep putting walls and right click. its not hard.

ill continue writing later.

BUDGET SECTION

400 pdps bow - 45ex
+1 arrow drillneck - 12ex (or kaoms heart which is 3ex)
lioneyes vision - 14-15ex
30% chaos resistance 90+ life 32+ wed belt - 10-15ex
x2
boots with 30% chaos resistance 5-10ex
New +90 facebreakers 1ex
an amulet with crit multi, life, add phys, accuracy - 10-15ex

Budget Tips:

if you wanna go budget, you should use Call of the brotherhood x2 + hatrdd aura. therefore you can get same dps that i have with x2 mirrored rings. you can prefer having kaoms heart instead of lioneyes vision, lioneyes vision grants 50% more damage though, also consider that while building your build.

then your 6l would be,

cold pen + phys to light + pierce + LA + wed + phys proj damage. with leg kaoms
with lioneyes vision change pierce to elemental focus gem, thats all.

70-80ex total. you'd have same dps that i have probably with lioneyes vision.

My gear:



swaps:



Dont forget that, this is the only build which can deal with libritanniaES in this meta. LApiz did good tries too, but he won 1 match out of 20.

me vs libritannia 3 matches, after i started using cwdt+flame dash. 3-0, 4-2, 4-2. 4 mathces total. i lost one match to her after i won first game, but i had pve setup there. all good, i played bad there, it wouldnt change anything to have full pvp setup.


vs any kind of EA, crit LA is the best cure out there. so i decided to share all the fundamentals my build has. ill keep writing.

The guide looks good Rupenus! Its great to see someone take a few ideas and work on min/maxing everything they way you have here. Hopefully this gets people to try out some new things :D

you forgot the TL/DR

i developed this build just to be able to beat every EA in the game. so im aware that im not fighting fair.

To be fair, I grew bored of your standing behind frost wall camping.

Nice write up rupenus,

this summary pretty much confirmed what i was thinking, LA is the most damaging skill in PvP right now without any doubt.

Your gear check ( bow, jewelerys, quiver and 1k kaoms ) plays a huge role in it as well, a build with budget gear wouldn't do as good.

I hope this helps GGG into balancing the mechanics around LA/iceshot wall interactions, it shouldnt be damaging twice in a single shot.

Basicly you are shooting once and it deals an X amount of damage, the secondary shotgun considered as AOE will then do damage depending on how many arrows you shoot which explains why it deals too much damage.

Obviously your gear is a good part of why you deal so much damage but nonetheless something needs to be done to lower the output of LA, god knows how much damage you would do with conc effect instead of pierce with lioneyes since the secondary is AOE, have you tested that out ?

You shouldnt be able to deal 8k health in 1 button.

I really appreciate your incentive on sharing this with us, goodjob !


* PS Maybe you should learn us how to make money, i seriously dont know how you managed to be able to mirror 4 items, 1k kaoms, gg quiver all that since 2014, i played for longer and i only have 1 mirrored item, a leg shav that i got for 65 ex back in the days... if i value your items theres atleast 1.5k exalts in your gear. what's your secret bro =o ?

Can't you both share the same love for (frost) walls or in this cruel world that is Wraeclast, only EA have this right. Let's all be WallBros (or BroWalls ? BroWo ?).

"

IceDeal wrote:

Can't you both share the same love for (frost) walls or in this cruel world that is Wraeclast, only EA have this right. Let's all be WallBros (or BroWalls ? BroWo ?).

WallHoes. It's got a nice ring to it.

You guys have no right to blame walls, both of your builds abuse of them !

Nice write-up Rup. Hahahaha, yes Wallhoes is very apt.