[3.21] ShakCentral's Cold DoT Elementalist For Everyone

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SpontaneousCombustion wrote:

I think what he may have meant to ask is: "Is there a tree for in between levelling and CI-80?".

I'm in the same boat, i don't have the gear to use CI and I finished filling out the levelling tree a while ago, so now I'm level 78ish and have 11 points unallocated (and being a noob, I have no good idea where to use them).

One option I considered was to change to the CI tree at 80, just don't take the actual CI node itself until I have enough ES.

At least that way I'll be able to see the effect of the tree's bonuses to ES and be able to see clearly when I am ready to put the final point in CI.

Ah, OK, different question :) I kinda answered that a couple of pages ago for another player. Here's what I wrote:

"Basically the change from hybrid to CI really involves respecing mostly life points and choosing ES ones instead, so if a player is not really ready to go all in on CI, just keep adding the skill points along the ES pathways to add extra defence.

It's also a good time to add some cluster or other jewels to the build."

What you don't want to do is switch up your tree to the CI version and not take the CI node. A lot of the nodes you would be respecing would be life nodes and removing them will significantly reduce your overall life/ES pool and also leave you very vulnerable to chaos damage one-shots which go straight through your ES and hit life only.

A lot of players also in this situation probably have a mix of gear too that is not always strong in ES and still has some life attributes on it. So you want to progress your gear as you move towards the CI swap over. For example, your current gloves with 50 ES and your boots with 20 ES will leave you very short for removing life nodes. You want to be planning for at least 100 ES for each of them. Similar for your body armour, you really want in excess of 400 ES there.

You can test out your current character by importing it into Path of Building and moving around some skill points. If you're not sure how to do this (and I only learned a couple of days ago), go to the Import/Export Build tab, enter your user name (not character name), hit Start, then select your character from the drop down list and click on the Passive Tree and Jewels button then the Items and Skills button then click Done. Easy :)


This will tell you where your ES will be if you did the shift which is very helpful for planning. Until you're ready to switch just allocate points along the future pathways that your change to CI will need anyway. When I did this for myself I realised I'd have about 4000 ES and nothing else. Now I'm a little over 7000 ES which needs work, but is OK for now. Got deleted by a Syndicate member last night in red maps with bad attributes. My own fault for getting cocky.

For yourself it's a case of upgrading gear, levelling up to get extra skill points and balancing between offence and defence. With a 6 link your damage should be reasonable so you could afford to drop a few offense points for defence instead.

You'll need to change the start path of your tree at some stage so if you use three points out to the right, you can reclaim 5 points from your current start path which is a net gain of 2 points.

I'm not too worried about increased area of effect, most monsters simply run at you so if you keep your Vortex between you and them they will run into the path and kill themselves anyway. So you could claim one point back to the left of Blast Radius, reclaim the two points from Elemental Focus and the two points back from the right of Lethal Assault and Resourcefulness.

So with those 7 points, take three on the wheel to Arcane Guarding, two to Arcane Focus, and the last two to Foresight. Once you've done that, respec the 4 points to Heart of Ice and use them for Arcane Swiftness instead. You'll have dropped some DPS but actually not a huge amount and you will have boosted your ES and very importantly, your block so your survivability should increase, which will help your levelling.

After that as you level up I'd try and fill in some of the upper pathway in preparation for your change to CI. Maybe work around the Unnatural Calm path for the extra ES.

You really shouldn't need a mana flask by now and would be far better served with an Amethyst flask to help reduce incoming chaos damage. Also, if you're not aware, Armourer's Scraps will increase the quality of your armour, which will increase your ES levels slightly so be sure to use those where you can. If you don't have too many then use them on the items your going to keep or at least go a while without replacing like your helmet but with Heist dropping currency like candy, you should do a couple of runs and quality everything you have.

Speaking of quality, also use Glassblower's Baubles on your flask as the quality increases their uptime.

Is "adds cold damage" ok to have on a weapon?

I know we can't have "added cold damage to SPELLS", but is simply added cold ok?

(does this add to spells or does that only add to attacks when written that way?)

edit: found out that no, it does not apply when on weapons which is great, as I just scored this beauty:


Interesting implicit too!

"

Aldora_the_Summoner wrote:

Spoiler

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SpontaneousCombustion wrote:

I think what he may have meant to ask is: "Is there a tree for in between levelling and CI-80?".

I'm in the same boat, i don't have the gear to use CI and I finished filling out the levelling tree a while ago, so now I'm level 78ish and have 11 points unallocated (and being a noob, I have no good idea where to use them).

One option I considered was to change to the CI tree at 80, just don't take the actual CI node itself until I have enough ES.

At least that way I'll be able to see the effect of the tree's bonuses to ES and be able to see clearly when I am ready to put the final point in CI.

Ah, OK, different question :) I kinda answered that a couple of pages ago for another player. Here's what I wrote:

"Basically the change from hybrid to CI really involves respecing mostly life points and choosing ES ones instead, so if a player is not really ready to go all in on CI, just keep adding the skill points along the ES pathways to add extra defence.

It's also a good time to add some cluster or other jewels to the build."

What you don't want to do is switch up your tree to the CI version and not take the CI node. A lot of the nodes you would be respecing would be life nodes and removing them will significantly reduce your overall life/ES pool and also leave you very vulnerable to chaos damage one-shots which go straight through your ES and hit life only.

A lot of players also in this situation probably have a mix of gear too that is not always strong in ES and still has some life attributes on it. So you want to progress your gear as you move towards the CI swap over. For example, your current gloves with 50 ES and your boots with 20 ES will leave you very short for removing life nodes. You want to be planning for at least 100 ES for each of them. Similar for your body armour, you really want in excess of 400 ES there.

You can test out your current character by importing it into Path of Building and moving around some skill points. If you're not sure how to do this (and I only learned a couple of days ago), go to the Import/Export Build tab, enter your user name (not character name), hit Start, then select your character from the drop down list and click on the Passive Tree and Jewels button then the Items and Skills button then click Done. Easy :)


This will tell you where your ES will be if you did the shift which is very helpful for planning. Until you're ready to switch just allocate points along the future pathways that your change to CI will need anyway. When I did this for myself I realised I'd have about 4000 ES and nothing else. Now I'm a little over 7000 ES which needs work, but is OK for now. Got deleted by a Syndicate member last night in red maps with bad attributes. My own fault for getting cocky.

For yourself it's a case of upgrading gear, levelling up to get extra skill points and balancing between offence and defence. With a 6 link your damage should be reasonable so you could afford to drop a few offense points for defence instead.

You'll need to change the start path of your tree at some stage so if you use three points out to the right, you can reclaim 5 points from your current start path which is a net gain of 2 points.

I'm not too worried about increased area of effect, most monsters simply run at you so if you keep your Vortex between you and them they will run into the path and kill themselves anyway. So you could claim one point back to the left of Blast Radius, reclaim the two points from Elemental Focus and the two points back from the right of Lethal Assault and Resourcefulness.

So with those 7 points, take three on the wheel to Arcane Guarding, two to Arcane Focus, and the last two to Foresight. Once you've done that, respec the 4 points to Heart of Ice and use them for Arcane Swiftness instead. You'll have dropped some DPS but actually not a huge amount and you will have boosted your ES and very importantly, your block so your survivability should increase, which will help your levelling.

After that as you level up I'd try and fill in some of the upper pathway in preparation for your change to CI. Maybe work around the Unnatural Calm path for the extra ES.

You really shouldn't need a mana flask by now and would be far better served with an Amethyst flask to help reduce incoming chaos damage. Also, if you're not aware, Armourer's Scraps will increase the quality of your armour, which will increase your ES levels slightly so be sure to use those where you can. If you don't have too many then use them on the items your going to keep or at least go a while without replacing like your helmet but with Heist dropping currency like candy, you should do a couple of runs and quality everything you have.

Speaking of quality, also use Glassblower's Baubles on your flask as the quality increases their uptime.

Thanks again, understood.

Just on the flask thing - I've never been big on flask usage. I play other games so I find it best to keep my keyboard / mouse button mappings and actions the same as far as possible.

Even while levelling I usually forget or can't be bothered with the speed flask.

It also feels like hard work instead of fun to be pressing flask buttons all the time, so in this build I really only use the life flask - as you say, I never need mana now.

Amethyst might be interesting though (if it can be taken while poison damage is draining life) - then it's more like a life flask for a damage type where I'm -60%. I'll give it a try. Cheers!

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Shaddolf wrote:

Is "adds cold damage" ok to have on a weapon?

I know we can't have "added cold damage to SPELLS", but is simply added cold ok?

(does this add to spells or does that only add to attacks when written that way?)

edit: found out that no, it does not apply when on weapons which is great, as I just scored this beauty:

Interesting implicit too!

I think it messes up Elemental Equilibrium, there was an earlier discussion where Aldora pointed out the same problem with the wand I used to have.

Gives enemies cold resistance because you're always hitting them with cold first.

Someone more knowledgeable about the game will presumably confirm/deny.

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SpontaneousCombustion wrote:

I think it messes up Elemental Equilibrium, there was an earlier discussion where Aldora pointed out the same problem with the wand I used to have.

Gives enemies cold resistance because you're always hitting them with cold first.

Someone more knowledgeable about the game will presumably confirm/deny.

Nah I can confirm in my case it is fine - added cold damage as it is written on the wand only applies to actual attacks made with the wand itself. Checking the tool tip for my lightning attacks, they have no added cold.

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kingkano wrote:

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Mentosman42 wrote:

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llMrSinisterll wrote:

Hi all first thanks for the build its awesome!
Sorry for asking again it seems that my question got lost and didn't answered,
I have mana reserve problem.
Im using lvl 3 Enlighten linked to malevolence and frostbite aura.
I also have Insightfulness in the tree.
But i dont have enough mana to reserve Discipline + malevolence + frostbite.
What i am missing?

Thanks!

I asked this very early in the league and never really got an answer other than "dont use the discipline aura". Basically you NEED the mana reservation reduction nodes(even with enlighten 4) the LL tree has to be able to run everything. It is possible to modify the CI tree to grab those nodes as well but I dont know if that is optimal. Technically with enlighten 3 or 4 you could probably only take a couple of the reduction nodes but it probably makes the most sense to take all of them and forget enlighten like the LL build does(which can run discipline + malevolence + frostbite on mana reserve)

I could be reading it wrong, but doesn't the LL version actually use malevolence with blood magic, meaning it reserves life not mana? This is how the LL version runs all of them I think?

The Discipline thing threw me at first too, as I really wanted to run it for the ES boost, and I don't honestly find Vaal Discipline that useful? But maybe I don't understand well enough how to use it. (admission: I'm a casual player)

Also, thanks for the build OP, have really enjoyed playing it so far.

You are 100% correct, that was me failing. Either way, you can run malevolence + frostbite + discipline with mana reserve nodes and enlighten unless they changed something from 3.11 as I was able to do that on my CI build in harvest. Malevolence - Blasphemy - Frostbite - Enlighten(2/3) + Vaal Discipline on a different item unlinked was ~99% mana reserve(with reduction nodes) unless Im being the big dumb again.

The top Occultist, for delve depth, on poe.ninja still uses glancing blows. He also has a large CJ in and uses a different thread of hope setup. His Hope covers more good notables than the one used here, any thoughts on that?

Shak, i would have asked on stream but you never stream Sadge.

For all the people asking about CI and discipline I have found a way to fit it in.

I’ve ran too many LL builds in the past so I didn’t want to make yet another one so I decided to min max the CI build (looks a bit stupid when they say PoE has lots of customisation yet half your characters are all wearing shavs, chayula, prism guardian, alpha howl).
I basically run a Auls uprising with no mana reserved on malevolence which is expensive but it is a ultra late game CI build. With it I have all these auras running - discipline, frostbite, malevolence and aspect of the spider. I could fit in skitterbots too but you’ll need 2 enlightens and I prefer those gem slots for phase run, cwdt+ic+longer duration, just quality of life stuff over the dps gain (barely).

Lands on 10-12k es and 1.2-1.4m dot sirus dps. If I can get the insane wand in the OP’s pob, I land on 1.6 dot dps - for the non LL version!

Check out my character for more details.

nvm i was stupid

Is Efficacy bugged? It doesn't show Vortex tooltip dmg increase and doesn't even highlight gem when moused over. Support letter doesn't show on skill icon too.