Big Stick Diplomacy - Shaking it up with Vaal Earthquake
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"Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far."
Theodore Roosevelt Note/Warning: This build is not intended to be a league starter due to its heavy reliance on bloodstained fossil availability. Attempting this as a league starter is possible, but you would be better off with another build.  Build Concept: Vaal Earthquake (and Earthquake) scale extremely well by reducing their duration. By combining reduced duration with Vaal modifiers, we enable Vaal Earthquake to have 100% uptime, letting us run thru just about everything. While Vaal Earthquake can also be done by increasing the duration heavily, it loses out on the aftershock damage, which is an incredible 400% MORE modifier! By reducing the duration, we can cause overlapping aftershocks, destroying even some of the more stout enemies in the game by simply running by them. We Convert our damage into cold damage in order to freeze enemies as we first run by, giving us a bit more safety, and locking them into the aftershocks. Because we also scale Area of Effect to increase clear speed, we run Herald of Ice, which extends our reach a bit farther, and compliments our damage very well with frost explosions. Build Pros: -Unbelievably Fast, without relying on movement skills -High Damage, Fast AoE Clearing -Moderately priced for the clear speed -Uses lots of very cheap uniques, easy to get good rolls -Scales incredibly well with headhunter (what doesn't?) Build Cons: -Slightly low on life (6-7k full build) -Can't do ele reflect -Weak Single target when Vaal runs out, poor bossing. -Extremely susceptible to play error, using flask incorrect can stall -Tough to cap resists Tooltip/Defenses:
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While Tooltips are not a great indicator of dps, some people like to use them to compare builds of the same skill. My current build is still using a tabula (over 1800 fusings and no 6 link on the staff!) and a basic staff with only 300 dps and low crit.
Vaal Earthquake:
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Hideout, No Buffs
 Full Charges/Flasks  Defenses (with tabula):
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 Maintaining Vaal:
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Maintaining Vaal Earthquake is a high priority for this build. By using a crafted 2 handed weapon (generally staff) with 40% reduced soul cost of vaal skills, and pathfinders flask effect to increase the effect of the Soul Catcher unique flask, we reduce the soul cost of Vaal Earthquake to only 6 souls.
In addition, the flask gives reduced soul gain prevention, which combined with the less duration available to earthquake via helm enchants and the less duration support gem, we can reach 100% reduction of vaal soul gain prevention. This allows us to have 5 charges of Vaal Earthquake, and gain a charge after only 6 souls. Damaging unique enemies generates 3 Vaal souls per 2% life it loses, with a 1 second cooldown, as our Vaal Earthquake lasts a bit over 3 seconds, as long as we do 4% of the bosses health per cast, we can maintain Vaal Earthquake even on bosses! Bossing:
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For Bosses, we run a Vaal Double Strike setup in our gloves, which has 10 charges. This allows us to drop 20 clones on any target that we deem is especially dangerous, and sit back while they do the work for us! After using Vaal Double Strike, Vaal Earthquake will be unable to gain souls for upwards of 10 seconds, so it is generally only used as a "finisher" or when something is extremely dangerous and worth the loss of speed.
Passive Tree:
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For our passive tree, we focus on getting as much life as we can, while going directly towards the Witch starting area in order to pick up Alchemist. On the way there, we pick up cold conversion, some generic damage, and all the AoE increases we can get. Lastly, we fill out the tree with a bit of critical chance and multiplier. A link to the passive tree can be found in the links section.
We help Alira for the resists and Critical Multiplier. Ascendancy:
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We go the Pathfinder Ascendancy for the increased Flask Effect nodes. Nature's Boon and Master Alchemist are used to increase flask uptime and provide immunity to elemental ailments, while Nature's Adrenaline is used to give even more movement speed. Lastly, we pick up Veteran Bowyer for the elemental pen, and bonus damage.
Gear: All items linked are current gear where possible.
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Required Items
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This build requires a staff with the bloodstained fossil mod "40% Reduced Soul Cost of Vaal Skills". By fossil crafting, you can make a usually decent weapon capable of going thru most T16 content in the game. If you want to go a step further, you can create a multimodded staff with a small handful of exalted orbs and a bit of luck.
In addition, this build requires a helm enchant with "30% Reduced Earthquake Duration" to play smoothly. I recommend a Starkonja's, as it has life, crit, and is relatively easy to acquire with the proper enchant because most people enchant them regularly for other builds. Next, we pick up the Hrimburn gloves. These are used to convert 50% of our damage to cold, which combines well with the 40% from the passive tree. This also lets our cold damage ignite. Because our Vaal Earthquake hits slow, but hard, the ignite damage is not terrible, but we don't especially scale it. Lastly, we require the unique flask, Soul Catcher. This flask is available extremely early in a league, and is quite cheap, but a good roll on soul reduction is required for the build to function correctly. Core Items:
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Next, we pick up a "Hyrri's Truth" amulet, which gives us the precision aura, fixing our accuracy issues. It also gives us cold damage, critical strike chance, physical damage, our primary source of leech, and even critical multiplier.
We also grab a "The Tactician" belt, which helps us cap our resistances, and gives more damage than most other options available. The flask charges gained is extremely useful as well. We use the Conqueror's Potency Jewel for additional flask effect. (ADD LINK) Lastly, we pick up "Kaom's Heart". This gives us a huge amount of life, and fits quite well. Alternative options include a Belly of the Beast, Shroud of the Lightless, Loreweave, or a high life/resist rare. Extension Items:
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Our Rings and boots are used primarily for resistances. Boots should have movement speed and onslaught on kill crafted on them (or pure movement speed), and one of your rings should have curse with assassin's mark on hit. Diamond, Steel, and Opal ring implicits are all fairly close in DPS, and two-stone bases can always be used on a budget or to cap resistances.
Luxury Items:
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If you find yourself with spare currency that you want to use, pick up a headhunter, Elemental weakness on hit corruption on gloves, extra curse amulet corruption, max resistance kaom's heart corruption, permanent onslaught synthesis boots, Soul Ripper, and a nice hearty multimod staff.
Capping Resists:
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This build struggles heavily with resistances. It is important to get as many resistances as possible on your boots, and both rings. Generally, each of these items will need to have upwards of 100% total resistances each, making them a bit tough to find.
If your resistances lack, you can grab extra resistances with jewels or by investing in Survivalist on the passive tree, although that is generally not recommended. Flasks:
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Flasks are an integral part of the build. Because we have so much flask effect, we can make many flasks extremely powerful.
We use an Alchemists Quicksilver of Adrenaline, which gives us upwards of 150% movement speed on use, Lion's Roar, A Diamond flask with bleed removal, Soul Catcher, and a Life flask with poison immunity. If you pick up a soul ripper, you can substitute out the lion's roar, diamond flask, or life flask, depending on your needs. Gem Links:
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In our staff, we run Vaal Earthquake, linked with Less Duration, Elemental Damage with attacks, Increased AoE, Melee Physical Damage, and Added Cold. Increased AoE can be substituted for Concentrated Effect for bosses. Our gloves are used to run Vaal Double Strike, linked with Increased Duration, Melee Physical Damage, and Elemental Damage with Attacks. Boots are used for a Cast When Damage Taken setup, consisting of Cast When Damage Taken, Immortal Call, Phase Run, and Increased Duration. Make sure that Phase Run is placed Later in the cast chain so it is not cancelled by Immortal Call. Lastly, our helmet runs our Auras; Hatred, Herald of Ice, Blood Rage, and Enlighten (or leap slam to cross gaps). If you do not have an Assassin's Mark ring, link your Herald of Ice with Curse on Hit and Assassin's Mark, and Level 2+ Enlighten, and move Hatred and Blood rage to your boots, removing increased duration and Phase run from them to make space. Links:
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Passive Tree (110 points spent): http://poeurl.com/clQ4 Path of Building (Endgame): https://pastebin.com/upeQYJYK Path of Building (Godmode/Mirror): https://pastebin.com/FWga6PMK
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 Items in PoB are given as reference only as a true "full build" item that you would likely use for a very long time. Godmode PoB staff is likely unobtainable, and is given purely for "deeps". Videos and boss tactics:
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T16 Elder Underground Sea, 5x Density Sextant
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1trKcAdq0w&feature=youtu.be - This build is not especially strong at bossing, and the boss in the map was especially dangerous, so I chose to skip it. This build Can do T16 bosses, albeit not safely.
T17 Abyssal Depths + Lich (partial lich)
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Coming Soon (editing) - I disabled recording after the first phase break as the input lag from recording was a bit scary.
Atziri/Uber Atziri
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Coming Soon (editing) - Atziri is a bit scary, if only because of the split phase's mirror form and the massive AoE caused by this build. Putting in concentrated effect is HIGHLY recommended. The trio can be a bit dangerous on uber, but if you focus more on running PAST them, recast, run back, as though you are "jousting", it is quite a bit more safe.
Incomplete: Forge of the Phoenix - Should be doable with most mods. Maze of the Minotaur - Likely the hardest of the guardians. Pit of the Chimera - Slightly difficult due to phasing, very important to manage your flask/vaal cooldowns. Lair of the Hydra - Similar to Phoenix, should be easy. Elder Guardians
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Coming Soon (recorded, to be edited)
Red Tier Elder - Likely doable, though add phase might prove to be difficult,
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 Doable, T9, so not red, but can definitely be done. 2 deaths, and not a clean fight. Better gear can easily push red+ elder. Add phase was surprisingly very easy, as each portal generated souls per 1 second, letting me pretty easily keep vaal. Getting to the add phase was especially annoying, as I accidentally let him get a free 70% ES, which blocked soul gain for a looooong time.depending on soul generation. Uber Elder - Likely doable with better gear and top play, though this build will definitely struggle to do it. Last edited by wadafruck on Apr 3, 2019, 12:33:15 AM Last bumped on Apr 5, 2019, 10:03:21 PM
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Reserved for later
To Do: Fossilcrafting staff guide Boss Strategies and videos Chieftain Variant with fire conversion? | |
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Look very fun, and at least a fast melee mapper.
If I may, you should put URL around your link in the link section, updating the tree for 3.6. Also, having your skill tree not in the passive tree section is counter intuitive. It seems my beast was useful if it's your current staff linked. Last edited by BaKouneT on Apr 3, 2019, 12:53:27 PM
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Playing this build myself. The damage is really nice. I changed the tree ever so slightly for my build, and used an axe instead.
IGN: Starlight_Seraphim
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I had the same idea, and have been playing it as my Synthesis league starter. It was terrible against bosses until I got the bloodstained fossil mod. Some uniques I've enjoyed are Carcass Jack for AOE, Shadows & Dust for Rampage, and Bubonic Trail for the flavor of exploding corpses while stomping around.
I'm currently over 1.5 million shaper DPS (character name TaterStumps), and can still improve my gear a lot. Though keep in mind that number is with an Abyssus... In fact, a massive downside of my version is that my defenses are terrible, relying entirely on Soul Tether overleech and Acrobatics. Definitely not hardcore viable the way I did it!
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" I ended up spending about 10-12ex crafting the multimod one, partially because of a mistake in crafting that cost me 2ex (twice). For anyone looking to craft their own, the best bet is to start out with a bloodstained fossil (and some other decent ones in case you hit a good roll by RNG), then split the staff into 2 multiple times, using a regal if it ends up with only the vaal mod. From there, you should have 1 prefix, 1 suffix, on a rare. Craft multimod, craft suffixes cannot be changed, scour, and you are left with a staff with multimod, vaal skills, and 0 prefixes and 1 more open suffix. |
