[3.25] Splitting Steel Gladiator - All Uniques, Cheap League Start, Explody Mapping

Hi Boss, Trying to build some defense into my build but failing.
Just got killed 2 times in delve at only depth 60-monster level 74 with no map mods which really pissed me off.
Am using a Stone Golem as a pseudo Vitality and, well, it dies a lot but is easily resurrected.
Haven't got to red maps as yet but i feel confident on nasty yellow maps so that is good.
So question time, Concentrated effect or Increased crit strikes? Thing crit is better?
As i am going for defense my DPS is suffering so is it in your opinion a good idea to try a better dps weapon but i think the defense of loosing Wings would be detrimental?
Check me out and let me know if i am doing anything stupid which is entirely possible.
Thanks corosou.
Good to see you didn't quit this league, thought you might have.
League mechanics are probably the worst i have seen and i have been playing for many years.
Cheers.

"

EDMOSES wrote:

Spoiler

Hi Boss, Trying to build some defense into my build but failing.
Just got killed 2 times in delve at only depth 60-monster level 74 with no map mods which really pissed me off.
Am using a Stone Golem as a pseudo Vitality and, well, it dies a lot but is easily resurrected.
Haven't got to red maps as yet but i feel confident on nasty yellow maps so that is good.
So question time, Concentrated effect or Increased crit strikes? Thing crit is better?
As i am going for defense my DPS is suffering so is it in your opinion a good idea to try a better dps weapon but i think the defense of loosing Wings would be detrimental?
Check me out and let me know if i am doing anything stupid which is entirely possible.
Thanks corosou.
Good to see you didn't quit this league, thought you might have.
League mechanics are probably the worst i have seen and i have been playing for many years.
Cheers.

Ello!

I keep asking to PLEASE take the time to read the League Start PoB notes IN FULL, but it doesn't seem like you did...

Some of this might sound mean, so don't take it personally, but you're messing up A LOT!

1) Why are you using Blood and Sand and its Mastery? Splitting Steel is not a Melee skill.

2) Why are you using Multiple Totem Support? It's a waste for Ancestral Protector and I never called for it.

3) Why are you using Stone Golem + Elemental Army? Waste of gem sockets and I never called for it.

4) Why are you using Determination? This should be Arctic Armour + Vitality at your stage of progress, but in Delve you really should be using Purity of Elements for Ailment Immunity.

5) Where are Warlord's Mark, Berserk, Blood Rage, Cast When Damage Taken + Molten Shell? Blood Rage you can also link to CWDT, so you don't have to cast yourself. You can also add Call to Arms + Enduring Cry.

6) Why did you grab Rampart in the skill tree? These should be the Freedom of Movement points, especially if doing Delve. Also, consider grabbing the "Enemies killed are destroyed" Mastery, as that helps with all the little explody bs mobs in Delve. And it should be a Chaos Res flask not a Phasing one.

7) Did you read what Precise Technique does? It doesn't let you crit, so you don't use Crit Supports while using that.

8) Where is your Instant Recovery Life Flask? I clearly stated "IT IS A MUST".

9) A helmet with Cost/Reservation Multiplier is only ~10c. That's where your Auras should go.

10) I use Replica Wings FOREVER, unless I can get a Mirror Tier weapon, so get a better one. I stated to look for one with good Attack Speed/Phys Dmg rolls and you have some pretty bad ones.

11) Why haven't you allocated the Lucky Spell Suppression Mastery?1

12) I remembered you mentioned arthritis, so consider using

If you're unsure of what you're doing, please don't deviate from the League Start PoB.

Also, if you look at my toon in PoE.Ninja, you can use the "Time Machine" feature (top right) to see my character from day 1 until today, so just copy what I am doing:

https://poe.ninja/builds/necropolis/character/corosou/Doronecro


GL

can someone answer why we keep chance to bleed?

Thanks.
Totally useless at POB and up till a few days ago i was following you religiously.

I was getting killed so thought more phys damage reduction was needed so in comes Determination, phys damage reduction goes from 60% to 90% that has to be a step in the right direction?

Had a lot of free slots so thought blood and sand would fit and it gave me a nice HO dps boost which i do know is a pointless stat but to my way of thinking more has to be better.

The helm had me a bit confused (not hard to do), thought Spell gems were not skill gems so my bad there.

Used Rampart solely for the increased armour and evasion while fortified - thought that was pretty good.

Precise technique, my bad LTR. Once again swapping in increased crit strikes gave my HO dps a big boost whilst concentrated effect does nothing for the dps figure.

Regarding ancestral protector 3 has to be better than 1 i thought.

So have tried to get back to what you recommend and a big thanks for putting up with me. When i can get my grandson around i will see if he can help me with POB, that would make life easier.

"

Myst3ryMan99 wrote:

Spoiler

can someone answer why we keep chance to bleed?

Because it's the first good DPS support we get. I usually swap it out when I get maps or whenever Maim starts calculating better.

"

EDMOSES wrote:

Spoiler

Thanks.
Totally useless at POB and up till a few days ago i was following you religiously.

I was getting killed so thought more phys damage reduction was needed so in comes Determination, phys damage reduction goes from 60% to 90% that has to be a step in the right direction?

Had a lot of free slots so thought blood and sand would fit and it gave me a nice HO dps boost which i do know is a pointless stat but to my way of thinking more has to be better.

The helm had me a bit confused (not hard to do), thought Spell gems were not skill gems so my bad there.

Used Rampart solely for the increased armour and evasion while fortified - thought that was pretty good.

Precise technique, my bad LTR. Once again swapping in increased crit strikes gave my HO dps a big boost whilst concentrated effect does nothing for the dps figure.

Regarding ancestral protector 3 has to be better than 1 i thought.

So have tried to get back to what you recommend and a big thanks for putting up with me. When i can get my grandson around i will see if he can help me with POB, that would make life easier.

No worries! this game is tough, but if you stick with it you'll learn it in no time!

PoB is its own game, pretty much... you can find YouTube videos on how to use it.

Determination is definitely good, problem is it's expensive mana wise and without good Evasion you'll still get one-shot. I've found that early on Vitality + Arctic Armour is enough, then when you get to Red maps or when Ailments become more of a pain, then Purity of Elements + Arctic Armour.

Later later on, once you've gotten Mana Reservation reduction from Helmet Corruption + Skill Tree + Cluster Jewels + Anointment, you can do Purity of Elements + Determination + Grace, which feels very nice!

For DPS auras, early on Herald of Ash + Herald of Purity, or Pride instead of those two. Fitting these in with Purity of Elem/Determ/Grace is possible, but will require 2 Enlighten lvl 4, so very expensive.

If you look at my toon right now, and the cluster jewels, you can see I am now doing Purity + Determ + Grace + Herald of Purity, cuz I can't afford 2 x Enlightens lvl 4 right now. If I did, I'd probably run Pride.

An important detail is that when running Herald of Purity or Pride, you should use Brutality as a support, but NEVER with Herald of Ash, because it disables Elemental dmg.

You can't rely on in-game DPS calculation, the numbers are pretty useless and a lot of effects won't get calculated; it's pretty much the reason PoB exists.

All we care about is the buff Ancestral Protector gives, the dmg it's doing to mobs is not noticeable, so 1 is all you need. The Dawnstrider boots help a lot with the bonus we get from it and helping it last for 4 seconds after you're out of range of the totem.

Just checked your toon and it's looking much better now! Good job :)

You do have 2 skill tree points wasted: one in "Accuracy" past "Versatility", just reclaim that. And the small "life/mana leech" we grab early can also be dropped; that was replaced by the Mana Leech from Lioneye's and the Life Leech from Lust For Carnage.

GL

Is the Wings of Entropy axe better for when you swap to crit or is it balanced for both builds because of the attack speed.

I actually died a few times today and was like wtf. I was in the incursion map and it had absolutely insane mods on it. I haven't played in forever and didn't even think about it and then after my 4th death, I was like, AH!

"

Freakynorm wrote:

Spoiler

Is the Wings of Entropy axe better for when you swap to crit or is it balanced for both builds because of the attack speed.

I actually died a few times today and was like wtf. I was in the incursion map and it had absolutely insane mods on it. I haven't played in forever and didn't even think about it and then after my 4th death, I was like, AH!

Yes, it works for both non-crit and crit, though of course taking advantage of the Crit is very worth!

Also, being able to grab Dual-wielding nodes in the Skill Tree is very handy!

I died a bunch too today, leeching XP from /global 820, but got 99 and feels good!

I'm about to post an update and first T16 video for 3.24, stay tuned...

GL

3.24 Video Update: T16 Hydra (Baseline for Comparison)

Hi Fellas,

Just a quick one so you can judge your own setups against:

YouTube: 3.24 T16 Hydra (Enfeebled, Boss Possessed, Maven Witnessed)

This is the PoB Export for this kill: https://pobb.in/1GgD_tnlywXT

The config page shows everything that can be active, not everything that was. Though most everything has a pretty good uptime, except for Adrenaline.

As you can see, the build is doing fine and I haven't even gotten a Nimis yet, so TONS of room to grow!

And the starting Atlas I had for this kill:



GL

EDIT: Forgot to mention, as you can see in the Skill Tree, I dropped all Spell Suppression nodes, and I really can't tell the diff without them, but that's once I was able to fit in both Determination and Grace, so that's probably why. I'm sure T17s may encourage me to grab some again ;)

corosou! Firstly, thank you for an incredible build guide!

I'm far from new to this game, but I still like to follow build guides coz I mean, there are so many things I don't know about this game despite having over 18k hours :'( so having a strict guide is great.

I am curious as to when to change to crit (as seen in your recent Hydra kill PoB thingy). Is it a full conversion once you have the right gear/awakened? or is there a possibility of progression?

My first assumption is that its a full conversion once all of the gear is sorted so its a smooth transition, but I started the league following the levelling PoB (my character is very under-equipped thanks to my laziness, I can certainly fix it within days but it's been a busy week for me.

You're awesome, reply when you can. Take care of yourself, and again, thank you for the incredible build guide!

"

Slayer_Tip wrote:

Spoiler

corosou! Firstly, thank you for an incredible build guide!

I'm far from new to this game, but I still like to follow build guides coz I mean, there are so many things I don't know about this game despite having over 18k hours :'( so having a strict guide is great.

I am curious as to when to change to crit (as seen in your recent Hydra kill PoB thingy). Is it a full conversion once you have the right gear/awakened? or is there a possibility of progression?

My first assumption is that its a full conversion once all of the gear is sorted so its a smooth transition, but I started the league following the levelling PoB (my character is very under-equipped thanks to my laziness, I can certainly fix it within days but it's been a busy week for me.

You're awesome, reply when you can. Take care of yourself, and again, thank you for the incredible build guide!

Thx for the kind words :)

I know what you mean, I learn something new everyday in this game!

U can change to crit right after getting a Replica Wings as it has a sizeable Crit bonus and lets you grab DW crit nodes in Skill Tree, but a good point is when you can get the large/medium cluster setup. Good thing about these is you can craft yourself, so they aren't hard/expensive to get. The small rare clusters I am for the first time using this league, previously I used Megalomaniacs with the Reservation mods.

Thx again, you take it easy too, and YW!

GL