normalcatpictures' Piety's Mercy Permafrost Bolts Tactician
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This is a low budget league starter that can scale all the way to ubers with modest investment. It's using some cool tech, so read below for details.
build guide here: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/profile/6b47434c-462a-412e-964e-3b13bfe67cbc/builds/58419581-35ae-4e17-849e-6ff22152e1c3 Build Showcase / Preview Uber King  Uber Xesht  Mapping Example  Max Difficulty Map Boss (overkill tbh, could have just consumed freeze immediately to headshot)  Full video showcase: (a bit out-of-date -- single target and clear have both been drastically improved. T3 Xesht takes seconds using a 2d crossbow.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0sANhDE6R4 ==== Tech ====
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I'm using Piety's Mercy to prevent Permafrost Bolts from killing, but not freezing, enemies.  A Permafrost Bolts specific weapon set in combination with the Tactician ascendancy notable Suppressing Fire (40% more immobilization buildup) allows us to hit 5k+ freeze buildup modifier on Permafrost Bolts  We use Permafrost Bolts with the Chain II support and the Attacks Chain an Additional Time modifier on our crossbow, freezing everything in one shot. We're then able to consistently proc the Vs Frozen conditional of Fragmentation Rounds, consuming the freeze to delete enemies.  The overkill damage (there's a lot...) is propagated by Herald of Ash for better clear. Damage Scaling We get even more damage out of the Vs Frozen state by using Heavy Frost. Heavy Frost makes it so our hits against frozen enemies ignore non-negative elemental resistances. Effectively setting them to zero.  Damage Scaling Continued... Since we consistently apply maximum chill to enemies, we use Heatshiver to give us extra damage as fire and the ability to ignite, opening up more damage scaling through stacking elemental ailments.  The notables Harness the Elements, and Stormbreaker provide a respectable amount of increased damage.   Even more significant is the "Enemies take increased damage for each elemental ailment type" provided by Yoke of Suffering. We equip this after acquiring a source of shock.  Finally, to assist with Ubers, and bossing in general, we include Mirage Archer with Glacial Bolt. Glacial Bolt is supported by Crystalline Shards and Embitter, allowing us to inflict very large impales which we then consume for much stronger Vs Frozen hits. Most of the same ways we scale our Vs Frozen damage also scales our impale damage which scales Vs Frozen... This is a relatively low budget build, scales well and easily into endgame, and is 100% suitable for league starting. The guide posted above links to a leveling guide for Mercenary if you have no prior experience with the class and would like to try the build. If you run into issues or have any questions, I'd be happy to assist. Thanks for reading! Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Oct 5, 2025, 9:44:32 PM Last bumped on Oct 8, 2025, 9:01:53 PM
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Why not Mist Whisper?
... ... ... todo tl;dw: S-tier for mapping, awful for map bosses, pinnacles, and ubers. Having to switch out makes it not worth the effort. "All Damage from Hits with this Weapon Contributes to Freeze Buildup" would go a long way to making this less of a leveling unique. Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Sep 27, 2025, 11:08:31 PM
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Chain II vs. Nova Projectiles for Permafrost Bolts
WIP Chain II performs far better for high-density content. 4 Chains + Cone Shattering = OP. Nova Projectiles is better for low to moderate density content -- not having to aim is such a huge QoL boost. Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Sep 27, 2025, 7:30:57 PM
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Reserved
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Updated with a crossbow crafting guide. Roughly 200ex to make a crossbow that'll let you clear all content.
Working on an updated build showcase currently. Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Oct 2, 2025, 4:14:45 AM
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Freeze Buildup vs T1 Xesht
Methodology: attack until frozen, record freeze buildup per attack. die, repeat. Formatting: Attack 1 Freeze Buildup % / Attack 2 Freeze Buildup % / Attack 3 Freeze Buildup % THE NUMBERS, MASON...
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Without Ailment Chance: 54/100 42/100 49/90/100 59/100 65/100 31/98/100 40/100 37/100 67/100 67/100 44/100 With Ailment Chance: 53/100 45/100 67/100 33/100 49/100 47/100 Magnitude: 67/100 60/100 35/86/100 - awkward position 27/92/100 27/94/100 63/100 35/100 51/100 55/100 33/96/100 37/84/100 67/100 60/85(awkward)/100 40/100 Overwhelming Presence (lvl 18/ 20% quality) + Magnitude 90/100 40/100 67/100 76/100 82/100 91/100 91/100 87/100 51/100 91/100 91/100 79/100 Overwhelming Presence (18/20%) 67/100 75/100 72/100 87/100 91/100 91/100 91/100 69/100 84/100 87/100 57/100 (awkward) 81/100 Overwhelming Presence (18/20%) + Freezing Mark (Level 17 / 20% Quality) 91/100 91/100 91/100 76/100 69/100 91/100 91/100 91/100 Freezing Mark (Level 17 / 20% Quality) 67/100 67/100 67/100 67/100 67/100 67/100 64/100 55/100 67/100 54/100 67/100 Freezing Mark (Level 27 / 25% Quality) 67/100 67/100 67/100 67/100 Overwhelming Presence (Level 23 / 25% Quality) + Freezing Mark (Level 27 / 25% Quality) 98/100 98/100 98/100 Observation 1: Chance and Magnitude of Ailments do nothing for freeze buildup directly. However, since this build does incorporate sources of shock, magnitude and chance do benefit us indirectly because freeze build-up is calculated post-mitigation. That's to say, the bigger the final cold damage hit, the more build-up. Since this test was mostly looking at freeze buildup of the first shot, the shock interaction is not reflected in the data. Oberservation 2: Reducing ailment threshold of enemies is very, very strong. If you can't easily scale the hit of the skill that is freezing, you can try reducing the ailment threshold of enemies instead. The max hit of Permafrost Bolts in conjunction with Freezing Mark seems to only be able to generate at most 67% freeze buildup on T1 Xesht. Supplementing, or outright replacing, it with Overwhelming Presence pushes that into the 90%s~. Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Oct 2, 2025, 5:28:49 PM
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without leo 983 1m 796 1.1m 567 2m 1m 1m 582 1.1 1m 1m with leo 1.1m 1.3m 1.4m 1.5m 887 without leo + with pand 548 1.2 (shock applied) 855 1m (shock applied at end) 852 1m 966 1.1 976 leo + pand + heavy frost 924k 1.4m 1.4m 1.7m 924k 1.6m 1.5m 1.1m 1.5m 1.5m 1.1m 1.5m 952k 1.2m leo, pand, no heavy frost 1.9m 1.3m 1m 965m 1.2m 1.3m instakill 1.2m 1.6m 1.2m 1.3m 1.5m 1.8m 1.7m 1.3m leo, pand, heavy frost 1.5m 1.5m placeholder for testing! will add context later. Last edited by heckbacon#7226 on Oct 2, 2025, 6:32:56 PM
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Reserved
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Added a T3 Crux gif to the build preview
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Reserving another spot for testing The Molten One's Gift and Armour Break investment. Stay tuned!
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