[3.6] The Lazy Walker - Jugg - VMS walk and kill, 3M shaper, phys/ice/lightning immune, HC

9.03.2019:
This build will remain strong in 3.6, but I will review new build options when POB is updated with 3.6 content.

10.Jan.2019:
-Q&A section added
-Updated leveling section thanks to suggestion by "sikat"

23.Dec.2018:
-Replaced Unyielding with Unbreakable for further 5% reduced damage taken.
-After playing this build for several days, I realised the two Vaal Impurities eats up a lot of souls (when entering new map) and is not worth it in most cases. They are very good situational options if you know what boss you are fighting. I'm listing them as optional and give alternatives choices.

17.Dec.2018: V3.5 major update,
- Switching from stacking max resistance to stacking "reduced elemental damage taken"
- Removed MOM since Divination Distillate is reworked
- Martyr of Innocence to boost VMS damage
- Kongming's Stratagem to boost elemental damage reduction
- Review and update new flasks
- Build tested in T16 maps and delves to make sure smooth playstyle
- New POB and skill tree up to date now
- Fix bugged item display in this guide


8.Dec.2018: V3.5 online today. Relevant changes:
-Overall there is a small nerf to HOAG crawler, since we don't scale/rely on chaos damage this doesn't affect us much;
-Razor of Seventh Sun: additional 25% ignite chance is huge buff for this build;
-Fix a bug when MS is active casted VMS will get canceled out. This is very helpful for our build. Since MS is instant spell you can just spam that for mapping.
-Div Distillate completely nerfed. If you play standard can still use legacy flask with +max res. If you play in new league the MOM approach is not worth it anymore. Benefit is you don't need blood magic on your offhand weapon, and you can just pick up a saffel's frame to achieve similar max res. I'm eager to test the new flask "cinderswallow urn" when I get a hold to it.

In conclusion, if you already have this character built 3.5 won't impact us much, only minor tweaks are required. I loaded up my old character and had no problem clearing a T15 map without any modifications. If you are new to this build, it's going to remain strong in 3.5, very tanky, very relaxed play style and very capable to deal with most game content.

25.Oct.2018: Major update to include Herald of Agony.

Why Herald of Agony? Let's compare the pros and cons of this skill and our build:

Our build shines in:
-Procing many hits with no button pressed;
-Defensive layers;
-VMS can instant kill map bosses <5M HP;
-Fast run speed;
-Abyssal Cry can wipe out packs cleanly;
-CWDT and CD reduction boosts convocation.

Our build needs:
-Reliable damage source to kill phased boss;
-Consistently one shot white mob.

Traditional Herald of Agony build shines:
-Don't need investment in minion nodes to work;
-Crawler attack/spell already has GMP, and decent AOE.

However HOAG has some problems:
-Requires manual cast/attack (normally barrage/molten strike) to keep Virulence stacks;
-Crawler AI is crap, often get stuck behind corner/doors;
-Map clearing is not thorough.

------------------------------------------------------
If we combine HOAG with our Lazy walker build, we now have:
-Automatic 40 stacks of Virulence without effort;
-HOAG kill one mob, Abyssal Cry kills everything else;
-Auto cast Convocation brings crawler to you every 5 seconds;
-Can deal with all map mods;
-Crawler can kill phased bosses.

https://pastebin.com/pe6uP0cX

Current Videos
Red Elder https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4lbJuDbeaE
T16 Hydra https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyNo5uMuPX0
All red elder guardians https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWt1qPHbakg
T14 Palace (proof of concept) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONsR-C6Cg4g
Delve footage (courtesy to Twitch.tv/Wogidek) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/324377251 Delve start at 1:00:00.

Previous version videos

Self ignite interactions:
-Eye of Innocence deals 100 fire damage every time you ignite an enemy.
-Self inflicted damage triggers Firestorm, BV, Ball Lightning to inflict huge instances of ignites on enemies.
-The Rat Cage converts 10% of that to physical damage. Therefore every time you ignite an enemy, you hit yourself with physical damage.
-Self physical damage pops your VMS very frequently
-Ngamahu's Sign heals you every time you ignite.

Defensive layers:
-Juggernaut’s endurance charge gain on hit has you instantly at maximum endurance charges in combat.
-Generated endurance charge fuels permanent immortal call -- meaning you are always immune to physical hits.
-CWDT Ball Lightning in shaped glove blinds all enemy. It also provides instant 40 Virulence stacks.
-All enemy (easily blinded, including Elder/Shaper/Guardians) have 30% reduced spell damage
-Other effects such as Fortify and Vaal Impurity auras can further stack reduced elemental damage taken. See table below for full details
-Combining Jugg's Ascendancy, and flasks, you are immune to the following mechanism: Slow, chill, freeze, all curses, bleeding and corrupted blood.
-CWDT phase run guarantees safe and speed.
-Bladefall (with Curse On Hit) applies mass temporal chain during mapping
-Herald of Agony can deal with Ele reflect maps
-Autocast Flesh offering not only buffs your HOAG crawler, but also eliminates ground corpses, make you safe against detonate dead strongboxes.

-The only thing that can kill you now are:
1. The molten fire core chase you after monster dies;
2. Ground effect explosion
3. Stand long time in Lab traps
4. Disconnection



Offensive automations:
-VMS can be active 60% through out the game (90% if use Soul Ripper);
-At 40 stacks of Virulence, Herald of Agony crawler deals at least 300k damage with pierce, enough to one-shot any white/blue/rare mob on any map;
-Stacking cooldown reduction in belt and boot allows 20% faster cooldown on everything, such as cwdt, immortal call, Phase Run etc. That's not only 20% more damage, but also more ignite, and smoother mapping.

-Vaal Molten Shell (VMS) and Vaal Rightous Fire (VRF) are abused for boss fights. Every time you ignites and enemy your VMS will pop, dealing some 40-70k dmg per hit. With all the duration nodes VMS lasts 9.5 seconds. In theory you are igniting 50-100 times per second, but in reality Shaper DPS (tested with Guardian) is more like 2-3M. The lost damage is possibly due to internet tick delay or server side restriction.

1. Options -> UI -> Networking Mode, use "Predictive"
2. Enable Dynamic resolution
3. If you still experience disconnection, it might be due to internet quality or your local POE server. Replacing ball lightning will significantly reduce server-side load (however also reduce the number of ignites). Alternative spells should have decent number of hits per cast, for example Armageddon Brand, glacial cascade and arc.

Bandits: Kill All

Pantheon: Arakaali (reduce shock) and Yugul (Cold dmg taken reduction)

Lvl 100 Skill tree:

Ascendancy:
Take Unflinching first;
Then take Unstoppable, Unbreakable and Unrelenting (order doesn't matter)

Leveling progression:

This build doesn't have much crit/spell/attack nodes taken. I recommend level in a Party.
If solo, when you are low level, can use Abberath Hooves to level:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAx4oDAM4io
At Lv.30ish Abberath damage falls off, can switch to poet pen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXD3b8236Yc

Leveling methods by sikat and (highly recommended)

And a similar method by TomTheBloody

Eye of Innocence + Ratcage is an ancient technology allowing self damage and proc CWDT, and also enables VMS. In order to mitigate the self damage, we use two of Ngamahu's Sign.
Razor of Seventh Sun has recently been buffed (+25% ignite), it also provides lots of HP gain/ignite instance.
Kongming's Strategem is essential for our damage mitigation, and provides decent damage boost too.

My Current Gear

Helmet

Gloves

Boot and Belt, and "Cooldown Recovery Speed"

Swap Weapons

Flasks

Jewels

Luxury upgrades:

Kongming's Strategem (All-purpose weapon set)
Incinerate - Cast while Channeling - Firestorm
This is your CWC firestorm setup during bossing, provides reliable ignite, and some 100k Shaper DPS without VMS.

Razor of Seventh Sun (All-purpose weapon set)
Vaal Impurity of Lightning - Vaal Impurity of Ice - Vigilant Strike
The Vaal Impurities eats up a lot of souls when entering new map, and are not necessary for easy maps. I recommend you equip the right impurity gem for the right boss (if necessary), and for general mapping just go Conc Path(R)-Faster Attack(G)-Fortify(R).

Boot 4L
CWDT(1) - Immortal Call(3) - Blade Vortex(8) - - Phase Run(3).

Glove 4L
Firestorm(8) - Ball lightning(4) - CWDT(1) - Poison(20) - Slower projectile [Glove affix] - Blind [Glove affix]
This is your mass ignite link, also blinds and poisons on hit.

Helm 4L
Vaal Molten Shell(20) - Fire Penetration(20) - Controlled Destruction(20) - Combustion(20)
This is your VMS 4L, combined with helm socketed gem supported by Immolate and Conc Effect, this is essentially a 6L for boss fight.

Chest 5-6L
Herald of Agony(21) - Empower(4) - Damage on Full Life(20) - Minion Damage(20) - Pierce(20) - Vicious Projectile(20)

This is your HOAG 6L. HOAG scales extremely well with gem level, hence if you want to level one gem up while mapping, make sure you start with something like Lv17.

Martyr of Innocence 6S 5L for mapping
CWDT(1)- Bladefall(4) - Curse On Hit(20) - Temporal Chain(20) - Flesh Offering(8), VRF(20)

Mass spammed Bladefall applies temp chain during mapping; VRF can be used in combination with VMS when entering boss fight. Temp chain can be changed for flammability for more damage buff.

1. Pop all flasks run towards mobs
2. Your BV will normally trigger the first ignite, and every other CWDT spell will burst like an avalanche.
3. If you use RF, manually pop Dousing flask to stop RF self damage when monsters killed
4. During boss fight, swap to sword/shield weapon set, and use VMS (and VRF) to kill boss. If the boss didn't die your crawler can reliably finish him off.

If you are dying a lot from this build
Obviously something is wrong. You need to figure out WHAT exactly killed you. Most commonly, I've seen:
-Fire resistance is not capped at 75%, and your self damage (fire) will overwhelm your self healing;
-Put a low level VRF in a level 1 cwdt link, and RF will always trigger and you die in panic screaming "HOW DO I TURN THIS SHIT OFF!"
-Don't yet have seamless phys immunity due to not having 5/6 endurance charge or no CDR in gear. Facetanking mobs in high tier map will eventually get you.
-Leveled all CWDT too high (>1) and can't trigger anything quickly
-Die by bleed: carry utility flask
-Insufficient self heal: you might be running 90% chance to avoid ailment red maps, be careful in those
-Reflect maps: remember never ever touch MS or VMS!
-Die/disconnect by DeSync: I really can't help much here besides from suggestions in the "How to Fix Lag" section.

If you are not dealing much damage
-Don't have "+phys/chaos damage to spell" in your jewels, ball lightning won't apply poison, no virulence and crawler don't deal much damage. This is like the most common question I've seen
-GregoryPOE pointed out: "When I was using "3-7 phys damage to spells" jewel it was not enough to reliable get poisons because phys damage range on ball lighting was just 0-1 and it seems it doesn't proc poison when it roll 0." This is very important, POE always ROUND DOWN when dealing with non-integers. Always check your tooltip damage of ball lightning, a safe bottom line might be minimum 10 phys/chaos damage.

Other
-Take resistance nodes when you don't have capped res. "Holy Dominion" is the best
-Remember to apply fortify (with Vigilant Strike) in high level maps
-You don't need both Vaal Impurity auras at the same time, they will eat up too much souls when you enter a new map. Rather, tailor your gems based on the boss you plan to fight. In easy maps, don't use them at all
-Is self-ignite worth it? Amulet brings +70% damage when ignited: No. This 70% translates to just 10% MORE final damage, which is not worth to replace a ring or boot (only Mokou and Sunspite can self ignite).
-I don't like Kongming shield: best replacement is Victario's Charity. The additional frenzy and power charges on crawler is stronger than a 7th link!