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Hey Kay,
I need your advice.

Ive been playing spectres forever now and always HC and my build is quite different because of that but I ran into a problem.
While i was able to literally kill any boss in this game, I struggle A LOT with the awakener, esspecially with the last phase.

I ve been only using slave drivers for the last leagues and I feel like they are just not good for this fight (or minions in general are not good).
I have about 2million sirus DPS, but I feel like with the way SD move, even with deathmark on the boss, their DPS uptime is terrible and they react poorly to the boss moving, esspecially in the last phase their DPS uptime is just so bad.
Also they actually die to the beam, many times in this fight I randomly lose spectres and I cannot resummon them inside the area because they are not in the desecrate table...

So can you recommend a spectre for the awakener fight?
I dont even care about the most "sheet DPS", Im really looking for a spectre who have the most DPS uptime and them not dying would also help a lot.
Should I try melee spectres maybe? (this would mean changing alot since my build is based on ele damage, and my AG has -lightning resist helm and stuff, but maybe worth a try?)
I ve watched your videos about different spectres, but I cant really decide or tell which one is best :(
(nice videos btw tho :D)

I would even be okay to farm a second set of gear just for this fight to switch spectres, but I would need to know its worth it and what actually works best.
This fight is really the only thing in the game I struggle with A LOT :(

Would be cool if you could give me some advice ♥

"

KalHirol wrote:

Hey Kay,
I need your advice.

Ive been playing spectres forever now and always HC and my build is quite different because of that but I ran into a problem.
While i was able to literally kill any boss in this game, I struggle A LOT with the awakener, esspecially with the last phase.

I ve been only using slave drivers for the last leagues and I feel like they are just not good for this fight (or minions in general are not good).
I have about 2million sirus DPS, but I feel like with the way SD move, even with deathmark on the boss, their DPS uptime is terrible and they react poorly to the boss moving, esspecially in the last phase their DPS uptime is just so bad.
Also they actually die to the beam, many times in this fight I randomly lose spectres and I cannot resummon them inside the area because they are not in the desecrate table...

So can you recommend a spectre for the awakener fight?
I dont even care about the most "sheet DPS", Im really looking for a spectre who have the most DPS uptime and them not dying would also help a lot.
Should I try melee spectres maybe? (this would mean changing alot since my build is based on ele damage, and my AG has -lightning resist helm and stuff, but maybe worth a try?)
I ve watched your videos about different spectres, but I cant really decide or tell which one is best :(
(nice videos btw tho :D)

I would even be okay to farm a second set of gear just for this fight to switch spectres, but I would need to know its worth it and what actually works best.
This fight is really the only thing in the game I struggle with A LOT :(

Would be cool if you could give me some advice ♥

THIS ^^

This is exactly the reason that I switched to Redemption Sentries. Since the nerf to spectre levels this league, Slave Drivers are horrible for the fights against Uber Elder and Sirus - they just die way too easily.

So personally I switched to Redemption Sentries and I've never looked back. The ONLY downside is switching gems for the major bosses (not map bosses, those die easily), but that literally just takes 3 secs and isn't much of a problem. RS do a little bit less DPS than Slave Drivers, but not that much. But their HP is 4.5x as much as slave drivers, so they never die!

The gear stays exactly the same, only the gems change. Change Wrath to Hatred, and drop Zealotry if you were using that. If you were using conductivity, switch to Elemental Weakness (it's better than frostbite IMO).
You can see what gems are needed in the "Recommended Spectres" section of the guide.

Hope this helps! Seriously, what you described was EXACTLY my problem with Slave Drivers, so now Redemption Sentries are my new favorite spectre. :)

"

wasabexx wrote:

"

KalHirol wrote:

Hey Kay,
I need your advice.

Ive been playing spectres forever now and always HC and my build is quite different because of that but I ran into a problem.
While i was able to literally kill any boss in this game, I struggle A LOT with the awakener, esspecially with the last phase.

I ve been only using slave drivers

Spoiler

for the last leagues and I feel like they are just not good for this fight (or minions in general are not good).
I have about 2million sirus DPS, but I feel like with the way SD move, even with deathmark on the boss, their DPS uptime is terrible and they react poorly to the boss moving, esspecially in the last phase their DPS uptime is just so bad.
Also they actually die to the beam, many times in this fight I randomly lose spectres and I cannot resummon them inside the area because they are not in the desecrate table...

So can you recommend a spectre for the awakener fight?
I dont even care about the most "sheet DPS", Im really looking for a spectre who have the most DPS uptime and them not dying would also help a lot.
Should I try melee spectres maybe? (this would mean changing alot since my build is based on ele damage, and my AG has -lightning resist helm and stuff, but maybe worth a try?)
I ve watched your videos about different spectres, but I cant really decide or tell which one is best :(
(nice videos btw tho :D)

I would even be okay to farm a second set of gear just for this fight to switch spectres, but I would need to know its worth it and what actually works best.
This fight is really the only thing in the game I struggle with A LOT :(

Would be cool if you could give me some advice ♥

THIS ^^

This is exactly the reason that I switched to Redemption Sentries.

Spoiler

Since the nerf to spectre levels this league, Slave Drivers are horrible for the fights against Uber Elder and Sirus - they just die way too easily.

So personally I switched to Redemption Sentries and I've never looked back. The ONLY downside is switching gems for the major bosses (not map bosses, those die easily), but that literally just takes 3 secs and isn't much of a problem. RS do a little bit less DPS than Slave Drivers, but not that much. But their HP is 4.5x as much as slave drivers, so they never die!

The gear stays exactly the same, only the gems change. Change Wrath to Hatred, and drop Zealotry if you were using that. If you were using conductivity, switch to Elemental Weakness (it's better than frostbite IMO).
You can see what gems are needed in the "Recommended Spectres" section of the guide.

Hope this helps! Seriously, what you described was EXACTLY my problem with Slave Drivers, so now Redemption Sentries are my new favorite spectre. :)

Redemption Sentries are a must, not only for HP but also for freezing lot of monsters, which is another layer of defense, very appreciable for HC.

"

wasabexx wrote:

If you were using conductivity, switch to Elemental Weakness (it's better than frostbite IMO).

Why ?
They have the same Base Duration and radius, but at level 20 "Elemental Weakness" provide -39% res where "Frostbite" provide -44% cold res, and "Frostbite" add 14% chance to freeze enemies.

"Elemental Weakness" is only valuable if you change from one element to another (ex : leveling with Slave Driver and changing to Redemption Sentries when affordable).

"

wasabexx wrote:

If you were using conductivity, switch to Elemental Weakness (it's better than frostbite IMO).

"

Why ?
They have the same Base Duration and radius, but at level 20 "Elemental Weakness" provide -39% res where "Frostbite" provide -44% cold res, and "Frostbite" add 14% chance to freeze enemies.

"Elemental Weakness" is only valuable if you change from one element to another (ex : leveling with Slave Driver and changing to Redemption Sentries when affordable).

Actually, a 20/20 Elemental Weakness also provides -44% res (because of the gem quality bonus), so that part is the same. I will admit that the extra chance to freeze could be very valuable while mapping, but how often do you curse enemies while mapping? I guess it depends on your playstyle and spectre power, but I just run through maps and my spectres kill everything so fast, there is no need/time to curse mobs. The only time I use curse is on bosses, but the have high enough HP to avoid being frozen anyways. And on end-game bosses I also switch to Elemental Focus gem for the extra DPS, so again, no freezing there.

So for me, I found that Elemental Weakness is better to use because it works with all spectres throughout the leveling process and never needs to be changed, while still providing the exact same damage increase.

Hi Kay,

I wanted to suggest a different setup for the 1-Cluster build. For Slave Drivers it gives the same DPS, but you gain 2 passives. For Redemption Sentries/Knights it gives better DPS and you gain 2 passives. Those passives can be used for either better DPS or more life or whatever. Also, the cluster jewels are MUCH cheaper, only a few chaos each.

This is only good for the 1-cluster build, it loses DPS against the 2-Cluster build. The cluster setups rely on 2 things to boost DPS - increased Aura Effect from Vengeful Commander, and increase Critical strike/multiplier. But with only 1 cluster, you just don't get enough Critical Strike / Multiplier to make a big difference. Especially with RS as their base Crit is only 5% (Slave Drivers base crit is 6% so they are slightly better). If you go with 2 cluster setup, then the critical stacks enough to make a huge difference and that is definitely the route to go. However, if you are only using 1 cluster, there is a better setup.

Instead of going critical, we instead boost the aura effect even higher. For this, we can use a 8-passive Large Cluster Jewel with 2 jewel sockets, Overshock, Vengeful commander, and ANY other 3rd notable. The last notable will be a suffix so it will be positioned at the end of the cluster and we won't allocate it. So this is how we gain 2 extra passive skills. In other words, on an 8-passive large jewel, we only allocate 5 passives instead of 7.

For the medium cluster jewels, we use a 4-5 passive Medium Cluster Jewell with 1 jewel socket, Vengeful commander, and First Among Equals.

This setup will boost DPS, give 2 extra passives, and costs a LOT less.

One thing to note is that the notable "Overshock" DOES boost the shock effect from your skitterbots (it shows 54% boost to shock effect in tooltip). So the shock effect is effectively 23.85% (15% x 1.54). This will have to be manually changed in PoB.

If you want to see an example of this, you can look at my character here:

https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/wasabexx/characters (WasabeMinion)

https://pastebin.com/G1XKcfsd

Hope this gives another idea if anyone prefers the 1-cluster setup.

"

wasabexx wrote:

Hi Kay,

I wanted to suggest a different setup for the 1-Cluster build. For Slave Drivers it gives the same DPS, but you gain 2 passives. For Redemption Sentries/Knights it gives better DPS and you gain 2 passives. Those passives can be used for either better DPS or more life or whatever. Also, the cluster jewels are MUCH cheaper, only a few chaos each.

Spoiler

This is only good for the 1-cluster build, it loses DPS against the 2-Cluster build. The cluster setups rely on 2 things to boost DPS - increased Aura Effect from Vengeful Commander, and increase Critical strike/multiplier. But with only 1 cluster, you just don't get enough Critical Strike / Multiplier to make a big difference. Especially with RS as their base Crit is only 5% (Slave Drivers base crit is 6% so they are slightly better). If you go with 2 cluster setup, then the critical stacks enough to make a huge difference and that is definitely the route to go. However, if you are only using 1 cluster, there is a better setup.

Instead of going critical, we instead boost the aura effect even higher. For this, we can use a 8-passive Large Cluster Jewel with 2 jewel sockets, Overshock, Vengeful commander, and ANY other 3rd notable. The last notable will be a suffix so it will be positioned at the end of the cluster and we won't allocate it. So this is how we gain 2 extra passive skills. In other words, on an 8-passive large jewel, we only allocate 5 passives instead of 7.

For the medium cluster jewels, we use a 4-5 passive Medium Cluster Jewell with 1 jewel socket, Vengeful commander, and First Among Equals.

This setup will boost DPS, give 2 extra passives, and costs a LOT less.

One thing to note is that the notable "Overshock" DOES boost the shock effect from your skitterbots (it shows 54% boost to shock effect in tooltip). So the shock effect is effectively 23.85% (15% x 1.54). This will have to be manually changed in PoB.

If you want to see an example of this, you can look at my character here:

https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/wasabexx/characters (WasabeMinion)

https://pastebin.com/G1XKcfsd

Hope this gives another idea if anyone prefers the 1-cluster setup.

Interesting idea! I think those cluster jewels will be a lot cheaper than my version.

I made a slight different version of yours. It has a bit more DPS, more life, less ES (no mom) https://pastebin.com/xWMvtk7X

The plan for 3.11 is no MOM because taking big hit = 0 es = can't flame dash/dash out of trouble!


By the way, the single cluster plan (not cheap build):
RS has 2.75M DPS (no vaal haste), 98k life, 11k leech, 2k regen
Player has 7.6k life & 711es (no MOM). VMS. endurance changes from enduring composure, 49/10 block (with rumi's, no bone offering).

I'm waiting for patch notes before I share builds. Might be a big change.

"

PatGniak wrote:

Why ?
They have the same Base Duration and radius, but at level 20 "Elemental Weakness" provide -39% res where "Frostbite" provide -44% cold res, and "Frostbite" add 14% chance to freeze enemies.

"Elemental Weakness" is only valuable if you change from one element to another (ex : leveling with Slave Driver and changing to Redemption Sentries when affordable).

20/20 Ele Weakness = -44%
20/20 Frostbite/Flammability/Conductivity = -44%

You are right. The specialised curses are better for their element because of extra things like freeze chance or shock chance. But you can't use Ele focus.

So, you might have to use Hypothermia (39% more) instead of Ele Focus (49% more). But maybe it's OK. Just need a hit of about 1M to minimum freeze a boss.

I recommend Ele Weakness because it's easy to swap spectres if you want and you can keep the same curse.

"

KalHirol wrote:

Hey Kay,
I need your advice.

Spoiler

Ive been playing spectres forever now and always HC and my build is quite different because of that but I ran into a problem.
While i was able to literally kill any boss in this game, I struggle A LOT with the awakener, esspecially with the last phase.

I ve been only using slave drivers for the last leagues and I feel like they are just not good for this fight (or minions in general are not good).
I have about 2million sirus DPS, but I feel like with the way SD move, even with deathmark on the boss, their DPS uptime is terrible and they react poorly to the boss moving, esspecially in the last phase their DPS uptime is just so bad.
Also they actually die to the beam, many times in this fight I randomly lose spectres and I cannot resummon them inside the area because they are not in the desecrate table...

So can you recommend a spectre for the awakener fight?
I dont even care about the most "sheet DPS", Im really looking for a spectre who have the most DPS uptime and them not dying would also help a lot.
Should I try melee spectres maybe? (this would mean changing alot since my build is based on ele damage, and my AG has -lightning resist helm and stuff, but maybe worth a try?)
I ve watched your videos about different spectres, but I cant really decide or tell which one is best :(
(nice videos btw tho :D)

I would even be okay to farm a second set of gear just for this fight to switch spectres, but I would need to know its worth it and what actually works best.
This fight is really the only thing in the game I struggle with A LOT :(

Would be cool if you could give me some advice ♥

DPS uptime is really complicated. I don't explain this usually. Also GGG changed the fight so much and Sirus moves around too much now.

5 things affect DPS uptime:
attack/cast rate
attack/cast range
hit time (projectile speed / melee / aoe)
movement speed
ability switch

Also important in HC is visibility. Some spectres use really big effects that block vision.

About the popular spectres:

Slave Driver has OK cast rate (1.2 with spell echo), short cast range, instant hit (aoe), good movement speed, 2 abilities (spell and melee), medium visibility. Short cast time and instant hit is the best, but they want to cast in melee range, so if boss move they need to chase after. They also seem to stop casting sometimes, I think they hit with default melee attack then. And they also die easily in storms >_<


Redemption Knight has good attack rate (1.23 with multistrike), short attack range, instant hit (melee), good movement speed, 2 abilities (but same DPS), high visibility. Similar problem as SD, they attack in melee range, so they must chase boss if boss moves. It's not too bad because they move quickly! You need to use convocation to move them if Sirus teleports a long way.


Redemption Sentry has slow attack rate (0.67), long range, delay hit (projectile), good movement speed, 4 abilities (big drop in DPS), high visibility. The long range helps because they don't need to move. But the projectile will miss if the boss moves. Also the attack time is so slow so they take time to shoot again. RS has really bad DPS uptime actually. The spectres seems good in 3.10 because of crit/hatred stacking so they hit really hard.


Maybe old school spectre is better for your build (no cluster) and HC!

Solar Guard has fast cast rate (2.0 with spell echo), long range, delay hit (projectile), good movement, 2 abilities. The damage is actually pretty good and the fast cast time helps a lot with DPS uptime. The fireball moves quickly and has a small size, so visibility is good.

3.9 fight was easier, but you can see the DPS uptime. Fireball shoots so so quickly it's like a laser beam. https://youtu.be/VmsatHljnzg



*I check attack/cast rate with POB. Just add raise spectre and no passive points to see basic stats.

If anyone want to practice levelling. I have updated the levelling guide for Act 1 - 4.

Walkthrough should be smoother/faster. Also changed spectre to Cannibal Fire-Eater for more DPS.

Notable progression works better with DPS focus.
1. Enduring Bond
2. Lord of the Dead
3. Heart and Soul
4. Death Attunement
5. Sacrifice
6. Spiritual Command
7. Quick Recovery
8. Indomitable Army

Levelling tree in https://pastebin.com/dCDzzsXw

I am doing a test run in SSF (character: kaytttttnttntnt). Deathless so far and no time I felt in danger. No spectre died. one zombie die against piety when she did the spinny beam.

Holy Flame Totem is the most important thing in the build! It gives 6% regen and adds good DPS. It will also pull agro.

If you try this update. Please let me know how it is.

I love your guide. I have one question

Which spectre would be best for mapping and bossing without gem swapping?

I'm considering Necro or some melee guy for next league