[3.17] Wallach's Hierophant Freezing Pulse Totems (No Further Updates)

Howdy folks!

I'm trying to follow the build guide, and ran out of currency (oh no!). It's only my second league, and I've never had much currency, so I figured I'd roll this and try to farm some bosses this league. I only have time to play maybe two builds in a league, so my starter was Ziz's ED trickster (which is fine) but I was really looking forward to this.

My damage is low, struggling with red map bosses, probably for the following reasons (*I'm broke, with 50c to my name):

- I don't have any cluster jewels*
- I don't have the Pandemonius*
- I only have a 5L Soul Tether*
- I don't have the fancy boots / gloves / helmet rolls and enchants because I have to prioritize resist cap before enchants*
- My main source of income has been Ultimatums, which were really easy on ED/Trick but this build seems kind of bad at (could just be me) - I had to drop the off-hand for a shield, and I picked up a Rumi's, Glancing Blows, and a Jade flask to try to do them, but still die about half the time
- In that same vein, I feel like I have very low life, with few gear slots to get good life rolls needing Viridi's veil - dumping more skill points into life nodes further reduces damage
- Small point here, but for some reason I'm really low on dex and have to use 2 skill points on dex nodes to support the green gems

I do have all the requisite unique jewels (2x first snow, self-flag, clear mind) but Thread of Hope* and Watchers Eye* are a little out of reach atm

I feel like I'm stuck in a place where I can't farm currency for the upgrades (again, can't do ultimatums, and Valdo's rest easy-mode has been destroyed) and I'll have to go back to ED just to try to progress the build, which feels really bad.

The maps that I can do go rather quickly - any yellow map can be done in 2-4 minutes depending, so I'm planning to go get Friend of the Family and farming Perandus to sell some Shavronne's or something to try to build the coin to get further in the build.

Any and all help would be appreciated!

Thanks in advance
Last edited by opticaliqlusion on May 5, 2021, 12:07:41 PM
Your character is set to private. The solution to ultimatums is phasing and DPS. I needed about:

~180k any mod, any tier
~105k in T16
~70k in T14
~40k in T11

DPS in hideout with auras on, nothing else. This used phasing - at least one of phase run & divergent dash - and vaal grace and/or vaal haste.

All the ways to make money pre-ultimatums still work - pick up all the rare rings, ID them, then sell them for alts for example. Jewellers/fuses are very valuable, so running a pile of low level maps is profitable per hour. Selling maps and excess currency is still profitable, etc.
Last edited by NoImagination on May 5, 2021, 12:21:34 PM
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NoImagination wrote:
Your character is set to private. The solution to ultimatums is phasing and DPS. I needed about:

~180k any mod, any tier
~105k in T16
~70k in T14
~40k in T11

DPS in hideout with auras on, nothing else. This used phasing - phase run & divergent dash - and vaal grace and/or vaal haste.

All the ways to make money pre-ultimatums still work - pick up all the rare rings, ID them, then sell them for alts for example. Jewellers/fuses are very valuable, so running a pile of low level maps is profitable per hour. Selling maps and excess currency is still profitable, etc.


Wow thanks for the quick reply! I do a lot of lurking on the forums - I've set my chars to public now (my apologies).

I'll double check my DPS tonight when I have time to get on - thanks again for tips! I've definitely got phasing (can't do without it after ED, though I miss elusive...) but have a lot of empty gem slots that I don't know what to do with. I messed up a Cast on Damage Taken setup (Steelskin / etc?)

Also, perhaps a diamond flask and +totem shield? More testing required, as they say.
Last edited by opticaliqlusion on May 5, 2021, 12:34:43 PM
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Wow thanks for the quick reply! I do a lot of lurking on the forums - I've set my chars to public (my apologies).

I'll double check my DPS tonight when I have time to get on - thanks again for tips! I've definitely got phasing (can't do without it after ED, though I miss elusive...) but have a lot of empty gem slots that I don't know what to do with. I messed up a Cast on Damage Taken setup (Steelskin / etc?)

Also, perhaps a diamond flask and +totem shield? More testing required, as they say.

Welcome. It's definitely good to follow the guide for your gem links. Or copy from my character (though you'll want to manually cast curses, and note that I use vaal grace/haste, but not the non-vaal auras).

I think your main problem is that your wand is rubbish. If you get 2x 5c wands, you'll do way more damage. You should also get a 20/20 freezing pulse, it's 3-4c and will be a big boost.
Last edited by NoImagination on May 5, 2021, 12:43:46 PM
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Any and all help would be appreciated!


I don't have any specific advice for currency but NoImagination had some in the post above. Now that your profile is set to public I'll give some critiques.

Spoiler
I think you need to go back to double weapon. Shield, while more defense, is going to destroy your damage and this build is built around killing mobs before you get hit (enough to die).

Your weapon that you have only has 3 good mods on it, the cold damage and the 2 spell damage mods. You ideally want something that has crit multi, cast speed, then spell damage/cold skills/spell crit chance, etc. If you even search something like this https://www.pathofexile.com/trade/search/Ultimatum/R6VOY6Zh7
you can find weapons for 5-10c that will be much better than your current.

Again, toward the end of increasing you damage, try to get your flasks back in order with a Wise Oak (remember to swap your resists around so your cold is highest), diamond and silver with grounding and heat. You don't have grounding currently so if you're getting shocked that's gonna kill you, probably.

Your next upgrade should be a 20/20 Freezing Pulse which is 3c. (obviously 21/20 is best but that's a lot more expensive.) Get Flash Freeze anoint on your amulet, it's about 5c for the oils. 20% quality on your multiple totems will help with placement speed, especially in ultimatums. And again only 5c for a 20% lvl 1. The faster you can place, the faster they start casting which means less opportunity for you to get smacked.

After that you should get a 6L soul mantle, then a Coward's Legacy and take the Pain Attunement node for that 30% more spell damage, and switch your bubbling life to a panicked prefix.

For Gem setup, your body is fine. You want a CWDT/Steelskin setup either both lvl 20 or a 7 CWDT 13 Steelskin setup. Stick a stone golem in with your CWDT for life regen but make sure if you're doing the 7/13 setup that your stone golem is only lvl 8 unless you want to level it up higher and self cast it.

For QoL you can set your Viridi up to a curse setup with Hextouch/Hydrospehere/Frostbite/Arcane surge. Then you can just get rid of your Frostbomb setup altogether.

Get a Vaal Grace and Phase Run gem to use during ultimatums. Drop your 6 totems and your Hydrosphere, cast phase run, dodge stuff, repeat. Pop Vaal Grace if you're getting hit. Then for your last 4 link do a CWDT/Cold Snap setup like in the guide. You can look at my skill setup for a template, just realize my helm is a double curse setup now and so I stuck arcane surge on Flame dash. You can leave surge in your helmet while only doing 1 curse.
Last edited by etherel90 on May 5, 2021, 1:12:11 PM
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etherel90 wrote:
"
Any and all help would be appreciated!


I don't have any specific advice for currency but NoImagination had some in the post above. Now that your profile is set to public I'll give some critiques.

Spoiler
I think you need to go back to double weapon. Shield, while more defense, is going to destroy your damage and this build is built around killing mobs before you get hit (enough to die).

Your weapon that you have only has 3 good mods on it, the cold damage and the 2 spell damage mods. You ideally want something that has crit multi, cast speed, then spell damage/cold skills/spell crit chance, etc. If you even search something like this https://www.pathofexile.com/trade/search/Ultimatum/R6VOY6Zh7
you can find weapons for 5-10c that will be much better than your current.

Again, toward the end of increasing you damage, try to get your flasks back in order with a Wise Oak (remember to swap your resists around so your cold is highest), diamond and silver with grounding and heat. You don't have grounding currently so if you're getting shocked that's gonna kill you, probably.

Your next upgrade should be a 20/20 Freezing Pulse which is 3c. (obviously 21/20 is best but that's a lot more expensive.) Get Flash Freeze anoint on your amulet, it's about 5c for the oils. 20% quality on your multiple totems will help with placement speed, especially in ultimatums. And again only 5c for a 20% lvl 1. The faster you can place, the faster they start casting which means less opportunity for you to get smacked.

After that you should get a 6L soul mantle, then a Coward's Legacy and take the Pain Attunement node for that 30% more spell damage, and switch your bubbling life to a panicked prefix.

For Gem setup, your body is fine. You want a CWDT/Steelskin setup either both lvl 20 or a 7 CWDT 13 Steelskin setup. Stick a stone golem in with your CWDT for life regen but make sure if you're doing the 7/13 setup that your stone golem is only lvl 8 unless you want to level it up higher and self cast it.

For QoL you can set your Viridi up to a curse setup with Hextouch/Hydrospehere/Frostbite/Arcane surge. Then you can just get rid of your Frostbomb setup altogether.

Get a Vaal Grace and Phase Run gem to use during ultimatums. Drop your 6 totems and your Hydrosphere, cast phase run, dodge stuff, repeat. Pop Vaal Grace if you're getting hit. Then for your last 4 link do a CWDT/Cold Snap setup like in the guide. You can look at my skill setup for a template, just realize my helm is a double curse setup now and so I stuck arcane surge on Flame dash. You can leave surge in your helmet while only doing 1 curse.


Thanks a ton! I see the value in dropping the Jade for Phase Run to free up for damage flasks and a Wise Oak.

Hextouch sounds like - maintaining frostbombs in ultimatums was rather difficult.

I do have one question though, on the weapons - why not focus on +1 level for cold gems? Is it too expensive? For my ED build, the guide really pushed scaling the gem level, and I got it up to 25 or 26 with Empower, but that doesn't seem to be important with Freezing Pulse -- why not?

Thanks again!
+1 gems is nice, and it's the best weapon/amulet affix, but not at the expense of everything else. It's overall DPS that matters. You'll notice that we don't use empower in the six link either (it has worse shaper DPS).
Hi Team,

Thanks so much for the continued help. I've been struggling with survivability, so I sacrificed many of the DPS notables and standard tree pieces to fit in the four recommended clusters (except my large is a 2 passive 8, any of the one's I POB'd with three notables under 14 ex still had blanketed in the 12 position).

Was this the correct play? I am just hoping to get higher level and farm up some more currency to get a proper 3 notable, but I just want to make sure I've sacrificed the correct pieces. Looking at POB, I think they were, but maybe something's not captured properly.

Side note, for phasing I picked up a hatred/haste watchers eye that gives phasing during vaal haste. Is there another advised way I should seek survivability and/or are any of my gear pieces glaringly awful? I appreciate it!!
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sh420it wrote:
Is there another advised way I should seek survivability and/or are any of my gear pieces glaringly awful? I appreciate it!!


I can't answer your question about the cluster jewels as I haven't gotten there yet, myself. If it were me I would sim it how it was before and now in PoB and see what gets you more dps while also considering your life and what not.

Nice watcher's eye! While it's super nice to get phasing during your vaal haste, I think you still need a phase run due to the longer cooldown and soul collection of using a vaal skill. You could also pick up a Divergent Dash to use in place of your Flame Dash to get additional phasing. Your gear looks good, the only thing that stands out to me is your 6L has no quality on anything except FP and you're running a 20/20 FP. Getting a 21/20 FP and 20% on everything else or, ideally, 21/20's will up your dps a lot. Or even awakened Added cold/cold pen/cont dest.

Also, putting 20% quality on your multiple totems will add an additional 20% totem placement speed for very cheap which helps get your totems casting faster during ultimatums.

For QoL purposes, since you have dual curse w/ whispers of doom, you could set up your Viridi's w/ Hextouch, Frostbite, Elemental Weakness and Hydrosphere, instead of self cast frostbite and sniper's mark. Then just move your arcane surge to proc off your Flame Dash.
Last edited by etherel90 on May 5, 2021, 2:36:57 PM
Also re: survivability - you need about 7k eHP too.

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