[3.13] MOM & POP Skeletons - Strong at Bosses & Heists

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Okay, someone mind checking my character and telling me what I'm doing wrong? DPS is quite here, I'm not "melting" bosses but damage is fine, I just need a bit more survivability...

Not gonna lie, Ultimatums are pretty rough for this build. They require you to constantly aoe AND stay on the move. This build is more suited to boss encounters and less pressure.

Still, you can map and clear endgame bosses and heists just as well as previous leagues. If you're leaguestarting with MOM & POP you'll want to consider Ultis dangerous and focus elsewhere. It'll still get you to t16s and take down all the important objectives, allowing you to fund a second character that might be more tuned for Ultimatums.

So my opinion after playing few days is simple: Build is good for dirt cheap league starter, but investing more into it is quite poitless. Defensive mechanics like MoM without any strong damage mitigation isnt good for later game. I just keep getting oneshotted with 8kehp plus bone barrier active by t12plus bosses. Also DPS isn't that high as guaranteed.

In the end if You go for like 5l chest, cheap helmet with plus two and one gem, maybe some cheaper jewels - build is fine. Just fine. For low budget it is very strong and I recomend it, but if You wanna push some endgame later on... You can't really in my opinion. Maybewith like 100ex investment for some godlike gg items, but getting oneshotted is still the build issue.

Oh, and no stun immunity even with reduced stun treshold flask is annoying.

The new league mechanic IS pretty challenging for this build, but after leaguestarting with it the last two leagues (this time I went Skele Mages, more on that in a minute) I can assure anyone it will take you all the way to Uber Elder/A8 Sirus, even Maven if you get pretty good, on a fair budget. I would not recommend pumping more than 20 or so Exalts into it, save up some money for a second character!

One thing that hurt is the nerf to Harvest, raising helmet prices. HOWEVER, if you settle for +2 or "7-link", here's a shopping list for such with at least half Int base:

https://www.pathofexile.com/trade/search/Ultimatum/O3Lr7kaIE

Checking this a few times a day you can find a very respectable Helmet for about 2 ex, something anyone can farm in even white maps. Our chase mods are not the same as meta builds', so good damage is certainly within reach.

I have discovered another strong defense that may make Ultimatums a lot more practical: Disciple of Kitava from the Kitava's Teachings unique Cluster. This will replace one of your small clusters, but well worth it I expect. Basically, you can drop Blood Offering from your bar and automatically eat corpses around you to regen huge amounts of life and mana. The regen would be so strong that anything but one-shots would be unlikely to kill you. Triggers Plaguebringer, too, as long as you remember to Desecrate during boss fights without corpses.

The jewel's also about 2ex, affordable with some farming by anyone.

As for a build with stronger defensives AND damage scaling, this league's been tough on a lot of builds. I really like Skeleton Mages with MOM, but getting it to uber levels does get expensive. You can transition to it from Popcorn, even, if you want. An uber-Ultimatum viable end-of-league build would need capped avoidance, very high eHP, very high sustain, AND millions of SDPS. A lot of exalts no matter what direction you go.

I picked up Kitava's Teaching and can say it feels better.

I think it's worth a mention in the build guide on the front page.

If not using Blood Offering, would we still use Bloodbond?

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Syngedragon wrote:

If not using Blood Offering, would we still use Bloodbond?

Yeah it's still some of the best stats you can get on a chest. Rotting Legion is a strong defensive alternative, or even an expensive well-rolled rare chest like one that gives Endurance Charges.

Delve can drop chests with Minion Life (mod can only drop, not be crafted) and Fear Essences can craft Minion Life for you, but it would get expensive very quickly to make something better than Bloodbond. You ~could~ spam Deafening Fears on a Warlord chest lv80+ and try for Endurance charges, hopefully with some life on it, and an open prefix to craft % life & mana.

Why is all the gear ES gear? I've never used The Agnostic before, is there a reason we don't just use armor or evasion gear?

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Scarborough wrote:

Why is all the gear ES gear? I've never used The Agnostic before, is there a reason we don't just use armor or evasion gear?

If your build isn't stacking a lot of armour or evasion, these small bits really make no difference. It does affect how hard it is to color your sockets and that can be a drag on your income while you're getting built.

Great guide,

I managed to get a +320% minion life elegant hubris and the damage went bunker.

vaal summon skelis nearly one shot all 4 conquerors.

I recommend to use From Dust for several reasons:

1) It summons 8 skeli per cast, which is important when u have to cast + run in boss fights
2) The 1 sec cool down isn't a bad thing, my skeli dies just right within 1 sec, I can have a better control of cast timing (basically every 1 sec :D)

Overall really solid build!

The only downside I think is it's not a very cheap build for end game

3.15's looking alright for this build. Besides the flasks which affect everyone, there's one particular upside and downside:

Downside: Minion Damage Support now lowers Minion Life, making it awful. I think Fire Penetration rotates in here. Helmet's gonna have to be Conc Effect/Min Life.

Upside: Ultimatum, which MOM & POP was quite bad at, won't be in 3.15 and they're planning to thin it out. Fewer mobs, more big targets, presumably. The problem with Ultimatum was the constant rush from all sides.

The Expedition mechanic seems fine so I think MOM & POP will be viable again!