How To Make A Summon Raging Spirits Guardian Build In POE 3.23 Affliction League?
The SRS Guardian emerged as a popular choice for a league starter in the current league, prompting me to opt for it as my initial build in Path of Exile 3.23 Affliction League. Here’s a comprehensive guide for anyone interested in constructing this build. If you plan to embark on creating this build, make sure you have an ample supply of Path of Exile Currency.
Why Play SRS Guardian?
The biggest improvement to minion builds recently has been reworked to the Guardian Ascendancy, which gives players access to the Sentinel of Radiance. Additionally, a Triple Aura effect is sustained by Elemental Relics.
On top of that, the Affliction League saw the addition of some powerful specters which cast various auras and provide utility effects that greatly buff the damage output of any minion build.
Summon Raging Spirits
For Summon Raging Spirits, the main skill setup links SRS to Minion Damage, Elemental Damage with Attacks, Unleash, Elemental Focus, and Ruthless Support.
Alternative support gems for this setup include Multistrike for faster attacks or Melee Splash for better multi-target damage. This will be socketed in the body armor of the build.
Trigger Wand
In the weapon slot, this build sockets Desecrate, Flesh Offering, and Punishment in a Trigger Wand. This is done to sustain Flesh Offering when summoning Raging Spirits.
Punishment will also be triggered onto enemy mobs, increasing their damage taken when on low life.
Auras
The auras that this build reserves in its Mana pool are Tempest Shield, Determination and Skitterbots linked to Unbound Ailments.
These can be socketed in the gloves with a +2 to socketed AOE gem to improve the effectiveness of these auras.
Tempest Shield and Determination greatly improve the build’s survivability by providing armor, spell block, and shock immunity.
Skitterbots, linked to Unbound Ailments, increases the shock effect of the aura.
Mobility + Divine Blessing
For mobility, this build sockets a Shield Charge in an unset ring and Frost Blink in one of the sockets of the shield.
Shield Charge is the primary travel skill, while Frost Blink allows the character to traverse across small gaps and obstacles.
In the remaining sockets of the shield, the build uses a Haste aura linked to a Divine Blessing Support, sustained through Eldritch Battery.
Buffs + CWDT
In the helmet, the build has a Summon Carrion Golem linked to Feeding Frenzy and a level 14 Molten Shell linked to level 9 Cast When Damage Taken support.
The Carrion Golem provides flat physical damage to the Raging Spirits and sustains the Feeding Frenzy buff, providing more damage, increased movement speed, and increased attack speed.
Spectre Setup
Finally, in the boots, there will be a Raise Spectre and Animate Guardian linked to an Elemental Army support.
An Elemental Weakness curse gem will also be socketed in the remaining socket for the double curse setup.
Elemental Army support increases the survivability of these support minions and allows them to apply elemental exposure to enemies.
Note that to obtain a maximum of 4 specters in the build, the gem level of Raise Spectre will need to reach level 25, and Death Attunement must be allocated.
The first spectre needed is a Perfect Hulking Miscreation, providing 100% increased damage and 30% attack speed to the Raging Spirits, along with an additional 20% physical damage gained as lightning damage.
The second spectre is a Perfect Spirit of Fortune, providing the equivalent of a level 47 Wrath aura effect as well as the ability for lightning damage dealt by allies to be rolled twice.
The third spectre is a Perfect Judgemental Spirit, granting the equivalent of a level 3 Envy, level 29 Discipline, and level 32 Anger.
Finally, for the fourth Spectre, a Perfect Blasphemer is used, providing a level 40 Smite buff and creating moving curse ground that applies inable Temporal Chains and Vulnerability to enemies, ignoring the player’s maximum curse limit.
Animate Guardian Setup
For the Animate Guardian, Leer Cast grants 50% increased damage to nearby allies. Dying Breath grants another 18% increased damage to nearby allies and 18% increased curse effect on nearby enemies.
Legacy of Fury applies Scorch to nearby enemies, lowering their elemental resistances. Southbound and Belly of the Beast are defensive POE Items that significantly increase the life pool of the Animate Guardian and are used to prevent it from dying.
Weapon + Gloves + Boots
For the gear on the character, this build uses a +1 Trigger Wand with fractured Minion Attack Speed and some Minion Damage.
On the gloves, the build has a +2 to socketed AOE gems to improve the effectiveness of the socketed auras. Otherwise, it just has some life, resistances, a bit of suppression, and Minion Damage.
For the boots, a total of 35% movement speed and 23% life regeneration rate can be achieved by stacking both Explicit and Implicit Eldritch Modifiers.
The rest of the modifiers cover more life and resistances.
Body Armor
The body armor used in the build is the Doppelgänger Guise, which mitigates a significant amount of physical and chaos damage taken.
It also allows the player to regenerate a large amount of health when hit because minions do not benefit from the character going insane. In this case, the build can remain sane 100% of the time to take advantage of these defensive modifiers.
Doppelgänger Guise + Divine Flesh Combo
To further improve the build’s survivability, a Glorious Vanity jewel (Sacrificed in the Name of Xibaqua) will be socketed next to Pain Attunement to allocate Divine Flesh. This increases the maximum chaos resistance to 80% and converts 50% of elemental damage taken into chaos damage instead.
By equipping the Doppelgänger Guise while running Divine Flesh, this build can effectively apply the less chaos damage taken modifier to 50% of the elemental damage taken as well.
Shield
In the shield, the build has a fractured 2% to all maximum resistances to further increase the elemental and chaos max hits. This will also be another source of global minion gem level, helping the build achieve the level 25 Raise Spectre skill gem.
Helmet
The helmet for this build is a fractured Energy Shield item base that also grants another +1to all minion skills. It provides a bit of physical damage taken as lightning, minion life, and resistances.
More importantly, this helmet provides a significant amount of flat Energy Shield that can be used to scale both evasion rating and flat minion damage.
Charms
Using these 2 charms, the build can get an additional 2,192 flat evasion rating and 41 flat physical damage for minions. This is the equivalent of a level 16 Grace without the gem or Mana reservation and a level 20 Carrion Golem buff.
With the third charm, this build can gain permanent Onslaught for all minions as well as another 14% elemental resistance.
Rings & Amulet
For the rings and amulet, it is important to fulfill the high Dexterity and Intelligence requirements within these item slots.
If the dexterity requirements are too high, a lower-level Haste skill gem could be used. If the Intelligence requirements are too high, the Convoking Wand can be downgraded to a Convening Wand instead.
On the amulet, this build will also need a +1 to all skill gems to reach the level 25 Raise Spectre and Death Attunement, anointed for access to the fourth Spectre.
Jewels & Clusters
Aside from 1 singular medium jewel, this build has 4 Ghastly Eye Jewels, each with life and Minion Attack Speed.
Some alternative modifiers this build could benefit greatly from are increased minion damage if the character has used a minion skill recently, minion blind on hit, minion accuracy, or elemental resistances.
For the cluster jewel, this build uses Renewal and Bless Rebirth to increase damage output and prevent Raging Spirits from dying too quickly when tanking enemy attacks.
Finally, a Quickening Covenant is socketed in the cluster jewel, which grants a significant boost to Minion Attack Speed without any of the downsides, as the unique jewel is socketed within a cluster jewel.
Ascendancy Passives
For the Ascendancy passives, this build first runs Radiant Crusade, allowing the player to summon the Sentinel of Radiance.
The Sentinel of Radiance has high based attack damage, fairly strong damage over time aura, and the ability to redirect 20% of damage taken from the player.
The second passive that this build runs is Unwavering Crusade, allowing the build to summon and sustain 3 different Elemental Relics that each cast an Anger, Wrath, or Hatred aura. Even with only a 25% chance to summon these relics when hitting a boss or killing enemies, Summon Raging Spirits can usually sustain these relics pretty well due to the frequency of their attacks.
The third passive players will usually want to grab for this build will be Time of Need. This will help with sustainability during Uber lab, as well as throughout the campaign.
Players can also choose to allocate Radiant Faith as their third passive instead if they desire a higher health pool from the flat energy shield and armor provided early on.
Finally, the fourth passive will be Bastion of Hope, which gives a consistent 25% chance to block both attack and spell damage as long as the player has either casted a spell or attacked recently.
Passive Skill Tree
The passive skill tree for SRS Guardians follows a pretty typical outline for most minion builds, aside from the pathing it takes towards Whispers of Doom and Eldritch Battery.
For offensive masteries, it is important to allocate these passives to improve the build's damage output. For defensive masteries, this is the list of passives that you'll want to allocate.
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Sometimes, games are more than just entertainment, especially large games with complex mechanics. It's the examination of player skill and the impact on life that gives rise to the concept of the meta-game.
More simply, the meta-game refers to using patterns and strategies not explicitly stated in the game, but summarized by the player community, to take proactive actions and improve the gaming experience.
While not all gaming communities agree on this, the meta-game is quite important for Path of Exile 2 players, as the game has a relatively high barrier to entry, and it's difficult to play without understanding this extra information.
This article will analyze the current state of the meta-game in terms of classes and Ascendancies based on the newly released PoE 2 Patch 0.4.0, and predict the future development of PoE 2.
Why Should You Understand Meta-Game Changes?
You might think you just want to relax and play the game, so why bother with such in-depth meta-game information? But in fact, if you intend to look up information such as class or build recommendations, you're already involved in the meta-game.
Of course, you can still play the game without understanding this information, but you'll miss out on a lot of hidden information, potentially leading you down the wrong path or causing you to miss out on exciting details.
Patch 0.4.0 Meta-Game Overview
For PoE 2, the meta-game encompasses a wide range of content, such as endgame resets, currently dominant classes in the league, and new available builds, all of which can be considered part of the meta-game.
Originally, Patch 0.4.0 planned to rework the endgame to upgrade the gaming experience. Although this didn't ultimately happen, it brought about significant balance adjustments in other areas, most notably with the addition of the new Druid class.
With the addition of Druid, the power and intelligence areas of the passive skill tree were completely revamped, and nerfs and buffs were implemented based on build balance considerations, ultimately significantly impacting the entire PoE 2 meta-game.
Changes In Dominant Classes And Ascendancies
Since the release of Patch 0.2.0, Path of Exile 2 updates have been relatively stable. Based on this, both 0.2.0 and 0.3.0 had a dominant Ascendancy class that completely defined the meta-game.
In Patch 0.2.0, this Ascendancy belonged to the newly introduced base class, Huntress, specifically Amazon. Statistics show that a week after the release of Dawn of the Hunt, this class had an astonishing 48% usage rate.
While this extreme imbalance in 0.2.0 might have been due to the novelty factor, in Patch 0.3.0, the most used Ascendancy class, Deadeye, was not a newly added class.
Based on this, we can see that, at least before Patch 0.4.0, Path of Exile 2's balance was far from ideal, and any class dominating was far from accidental. Their excessive power ultimately led to a lack of challenge and innovation in endgame content.
0.4.0 Brings Revolutionary Changes
However, after the release of The Last of Druids, the usage rates of various Ascendancy classes became more balanced, and the class that gained the most advantage was not the newly added Druid, but Pathfinder.
At least currently, Pathfinder's usage rate is approximately 18%, a significant improvement compared to previous patches, but not so exaggerated as to completely dominate.
This is mainly due to the developers considering balance issues and reworking the class in many aspects, such as adding multiple Ascendancy passive skill options and other improvements to damage and defensive capabilities.
However, it's important to remember that regardless of your current class, don't overlook the importance of gear and its affixes. If you find your current affixes not good enough, now is the best time to buy PoE 2 currency at POECurrency to re-roll them!
From December 23rd to 31st, use code XMAS to enjoy a 10% discount at POECurrency! Don't miss this opportunity!
How Is Druid Ascendancies Performing?
Druid's two Ascendancies, Shaman and Oracle, currently have usage rates of approximately 17% and 14% respectively. Overall, they are not far behind the top-ranked Pathfinder, creating a relatively stable balance and leaving enough room for other Ascendancies to develop.
More importantly, as a new class introduced in Patch 0.2.0, the two Ascendancy classes of Huntress had extremely unbalanced usage rates, differing by more than 40%. Druid has perfectly avoided this "curse."
What If There Were No Druid?
Although the balance of Ascendancy class usage rates improved significantly in The Last of Druids, without Shaman and Oracle, would the situation with Pathfinder have repeated the dominance of Deadeye in Patch 0.3.0?
To make a reliable assumption based on this, we must consider Disciple of Varashta. Ascendancy class, which wasn't included in the livestream, was only announced a few days before Patch 0.4.0 went live, yet it still achieved a 4% usage rate.
Furthermore, while the once dominant Deadeye class saw a significant drop in usage after adjustments and nerfs, this is actually a sign of improved balance.
Therefore, it's expected that by the later stages of 0.4.0, Path of Exile 2's meta-game performance in terms of class balance should be even better.
Other Adjustments
In addition to class adjustments, Patch 0.4.0 also optimized the game's skill balance, and the unique item buff mechanics performed better than in previous leagues.
Predictions For Patch 0.5.0
Based on the game's regular update cycle, Patch 0.5.0 should be released around April 2026. It's unlikely that this patch will add new classes, so the adjustments to the meta-game will probably focus on the endgame.
After initially addressing class balance issues, 0.5.0 should introduce truly challenging content through an endgame reset, avoiding the current simplistic design where having enough damage is all that's needed to instantly kill bosses.
The above is our analysis and summary of Path of Exile 2's current meta-game performance in terms of class mechanics balance. We hope this helps you gain a deeper understanding of the game!
Besides the new Druid class, Path of Exile 2 0.4.0 update also added a new ascendancy for Sorceress: Disciple of Varashta. This ascendancy quickly exploded in popularity in the early league by bypassing traditional critical strike damage bonuses and minion limitations.
Here, we'll showcase Djinn Disciple of Varashta build, which, based on the high burst damage of Djinn and flexible resource and cooldown management, has almost changed the current endgame meta.
Build Overview
The core idea of this build revolves around Navira's Fracturing and Ruzhan's Reckoning, ultimately using Cold Djinn to explode the entire screen.
Navira's Fracturing
The highlight of Navira's Fracturing is that it causes all Chilled Ground with enemies standing on it to deal high spell damage and have a strong Freeze effect.
However, to fully utilize Navira's Fracturing, we need to create a large amount of Chilled Ground. There are many different ways to do this, but we decided to primarily use a Cold-Infused playstyle with Ice Nova.
Because when it's Cold-Infused, it creates a patch of Chilled Ground. This Chilled Ground has the same radius as the explosion, meaning we can significantly expand the area of effect by continuously using Cold Djinn explosions, even covering the entire screen.
I need to remind you that Chilled Ground effect does not stack, meaning that even if you trigger many different Chilled Ground effects, it will only count as one instance of damage. So, don't continuously cast it.
Furthermore, the way Chilled Ground works is that it needs an enemy on it, so if there are no enemies on it, it won't explode. But if someone is standing on the edge of Chilled Ground, even if the effect extends beyond the screen, it will still explode. So you can use this to your advantage to maximize your attack range.
To obtain these infusion effects, you must use Frost Bomb, and increase the maximum number of uses through Overabundance. Then, use Spell Cascade in your skill links, which will create two additional bombs. Finally, using Short Fuse II, you can increase the detonation speed by 80%, making it explode almost instantly, but at the cost of reduced damage.
If you don't want to take any risks, you can also equip Harmonic Remnants II gem, which allows you to pick up remnants from 35% further away, allowing you to collect all the loot while staying away from the battlefield!
Ruzhan's Reckoning
For Ruzhan's Reckoning, it is mainly used to compensate for single-target damage, because although Navira's Fracturing deals decent damage, its cooldown is not short enough to deal sufficient single-target damage.
Casting Ruzhan's Reckoning skill also adds a large amount of fire damage, and then you gain a 100% Ignite Magnitudes bonus, which is essentially a 100% Ignite damage bonus. Since this is our single-target skill, we simply press the button, and it will jump up to attack the enemy and unleash a powerful shockwave.
Cold Djinn
Finally, Cold Djinn is crucial for Disciple of Varashta build because it perfectly complements the core mechanic of this ascendancy - summoning powerful and invincible Djinn minions.
Especially when used in conjunction with Cold Djinn, through interaction with support gems such as Frost Nexus and Encroaching Ground, and burst damage commands, it can generate powerful screen-clearing capabilities and massive damage to bosses, creating a satisfying and safe monster-clearing engine, and benefiting greatly from cooldown recovery and area of effect.
How To Crit?
In fact, we have Baryanic Leylines and all the minion critical strike bonuses on the skill tree. Don't underestimate them; the minion critical strike bonuses are quite substantial, allowing our critical strike chance to reach approximately 45%. Combined with the high base critical strike chance of Navira's Fracturing skill itself, using Malice aura will bring our critical strike chance very close to the limit.
In addition, we also use Soul Joy, which not only provides a large amount of energy shield but also provides critical strike damage multiplier for summoned creatures, giving us critical strike bonuses that are usually unavailable.
Defense
Now let's talk about defense.
First, Djinn Disciple of Varashta is a hybrid energy shield and life build. If you're willing to invest more PoE 2 currency into your character, you could eventually even transition to a chaos immunity build. However, this is just an early-game league starter character, so we've opted for a hybrid build for now.
We utilize The Fourth Teaching, which increases your energy shield recharge rate by 40%. So now we can recover nearly 2000 energy shield per second, fully recharging in just 2 seconds. This means if we get hit, we only need to move away from enemies and wait 4 seconds to almost instantly recover full health.
Additionally, we need some chaos resistance and ailment immunity. You can use Amanamu's Gaze on your helmet, which removes a damaging ailment when you use a command skill. This way, every time you use Navira's Fracturing and Ruzhan's Reckoning, you can remove harmful ailments, providing us with decent defensive capabilities.
Equipment
Finally, let's talk about some key equipment for this build.
Throughout the game, we need to prioritize increasing our life and resistances, and look for Wands, Scepters, and Staffs with high Cold Spell skill level bonuses or all spell skill level bonuses to maximize the effectiveness of Cold Djinn.
For other equipment, prioritize boots with movement speed bonuses, and try to get some cast speed bonuses on rings and amulets. Focus on increasing maximum life on your equipment, but also try to get some energy shield if possible.
The equipment we chose is as follows:
- Scepter: Cataclysm Star
- Helmet: Fate Guardian
- Focus: Dread Spell Tasalian Focus
- Rings: Soul Knuckle & Demon Hold
- Amulet: Entropy Clasp
- Armor: Vis Mortis
- Gloves: Carrion Touch
- Belt: Mind Thread
- Boots: Bramble Sole
Essentially, Djinn Disciple of Varashta is not just a powerful summoner build; it transforms Disciple of Varashta into a powerful minion-centric destroyer through high interaction and a series of carefully crafted mechanics. Djinn can create constantly spreading ground effects, triggering powerful chain reactions across the screen for efficient and safe clearing of enemies.
If a new class or skill appears in a new Path of Exile 2 patch, then builds centered around them will be popular for at least half of the league's duration. For example, the recent Druid builds with three forms have been very popular.
However, this doesn't mean that other styles or builds exclusive to older classes are not viable. On the contrary, you can delve into other updates brought by the new patch to strengthen your familiar builds from different angles.
Based on this, we will introduce the applicability of minion builds in Patch 0.4.0 and recommend two minion builds in particular.
What Are Minion Builds?
In PoE 2, minion builds are a type of build based on spirit resources, allowing you to summon different types of minions to assist in combat depending on your class and skills.
Spirit resources can be obtained from specific bosses in Acts 1 and 3, up to a maximum of 100 points. Additionally, scepters, amulets, and chest armor can provide extra spirit resources.
It's important to note that summoned creatures do not inherit your character's general damage; instead, you need to stack "+ Level of Minion Skills" or other affixes that specifically mention summoned creatures or allies on your available gear to make them effective.
Before Patch 0.4.0, popular minion builds in PoE 2 included Witch Army Infernalist, Lich Arsonist Detonators, and more. Now, Minion Druid Shaman has become a new favorite. However, compared to other Druid builds, it's not yet very popular.
Kripp's Infernal Titan Build
As the first minion build we'll introduce, Kripp's Infernal Titan is a durable armor-stacking build that utilizes Infernal Legion support gem, allowing summoned creatures to deal life-based burning damage in their surrounding area.
This build focuses on survival and positioning, primarily relying on the aura damage of summoned creatures for damage output. It also uses Mind Over Matter and high mana to increase its own survivability against high damage.
Originally, this build might not have stood out in Patch 0.4.0, but the game's enhancement of Xoph's Blood changed everything.
This unique Amber Amulet now reduces the fire resistance of surrounding enemies by 25%, and with perfect affixes and a life catalyst, you can increase its life value from 20% to 24%.
Based on this, Infernal Legion can consume this life value to gain a damage value, which is then amplified by various multipliers through gems, the passive skill tree, and so on.
If your amulet consistently fails to obtain the relevant affixes, or the affix improvements are not significant, you can buy PoE 2 currency to re-roll them. Different currencies have different functions, so be sure to distinguish them clearly when using them.
Titan is very suitable for this playstyle because you can unlock many small passive points that increase minion damage and minion life. Since life can be used as base damage, they actually stack multiplicatively.
For example, if you have 100% minion damage and 100% life, you can double your minions' life and double the damage dealt, resulting in four times the original damage output.
Therefore, when you can significantly increase these attributes, the overall damage output of Kripp's Infernal Titan Build will be enormous. Although the initial Titan Ascendancy passive skills are not that powerful, they truly shine in the endgame.
Minion Army Infernalist Build
As a premier Witch build in PoE 2, Minion Army Infernalist is known for its high survivability and efficient boss fight capabilities, with Infernalist's Ascendancy passive skills playing a crucial role.
In general, this build utilizes the characteristics of the support gem Muster to increase minion damage based on the duration and type of summoned minions, such as summoned skeleton warriors, brutes, or storm mages.
In Patch 0.4.0, the new highlight of this build is the adjustment to passive skills, which effectively provides an overall minion buff.
Previously, you could stack life and use the unique Intricate Crest Shield Prism Guardian to gain energy shield based on your life. However, the developers have changed this function, and you can no longer obtain shields using this method.
Fortunately, on the other hand, the new patch adds more passive skills for summoned creatures, mostly focused on Witch class. This means you can directly allocate points to the energy shield nodes, making the entire build an energy shield-based build.
Now, for this build, you only need to efficiently allocate skill points, such as energy shield minor nodes and minion damage minor nodes, to quickly improve the build's damage output and survivability.
On this basis, if you can obtain Abyss-only modifier +2 minions, you can use Focus as your weapon, but this is quite difficult, so we recommend Rattling Sceptre instead. This weapon grants you Skeletal Warrior skill, giving you more minions.
Regarding the composition of the minions, two warriors and two priests are usually a reasonable combination. If conditions permit, you might also consider bringing three priests.
Among all the minions, Frost Mage's slowing effect is wonderful, but if you want to improve the effect of the support gem Muster to allow minions to provide extra damage, it's better to directly equip Skeletal Reaver skill.
In addition, you can add Skeletal Storm Mage to apply the shock effect, or fully utilize cooldowns with Skeletal Sniper.
That's all for this guide. Whether to use these two minion builds ultimately depends on your actual needs and skill level, but they are indeed good options in Patch 0.4.0 besides Druid-centric builds.
Path of Exile 3.27 has been out for over a month, and major content updates have ceased. Most players have likely switched to PoE 2, and those still playing PoE 1 are likely casual players.
Therefore, Cold DoT Elementalist build recommended today is perfect for casual players. It requires minimal investment, involves few actions, and is incredibly versatile.
Cold DoT Elementalist Advantages And Disadvantages
Cold DoT Elementalist is a very versatile build, with no weaknesses in farming or boss battles. This build primarily relies on DoT damage, so even if the weapon's damage is low, the impact is minimal.
This build can apply slowing and other negative effects to monsters, and although its health is relatively low, you can compensate by stacking energy shields, making it actually quite tanky. Additionally, this build can generate pulses periodically, enabling automatic farming.
However, as a DoT build, DoT damage has a cap, so even if you invest heavily in PoE Currency to acquire top-tier gear, your burst damage won't surpass that of burst builds. When facing bosses, you need to cast spells to stack DoTs, and fights against bosses with high Cold resistance can be lengthy.
Core Gameplay
This build's damage doesn't come from any single skill, but rather from multiple layers of Cold Damage over Time and large-area Chill crowd control. You simply need to keep moving, and mobs will die around you.
Therefore, your damage primarily comes from these skills:
- Creeping Frost
- Vortex
- Vaal Cold Snap
Once the ice field is established, players hardly need to cast spells frequently; simply keep moving, and monsters will be slowed, frozen, and naturally fall under the CTD damage. The key to achieving this is Vaal Cold Snap, which inflicts Cold DoTs and Chills on enemies within a certain area.
Building upon this, since enemies are almost constantly chilled or severely slowed, and DoT skills can be applied from a distance, you rarely need to engage in close-range combat. This means that even if your armor and elemental resistances aren't at their maximum, you can achieve high safety through control, distance, and timing.
However, when facing elite monsters or bosses, relying solely on Vaal Cold Snap is insufficient. You need to actively apply curses like Frostbite and sequentially apply Vortex, Creeping Frost, and Cold Snap to keep the target constantly in multiple frost zones. You need to amplify existing damage over time, not change your damage output.
Cold DoT Elementalist Gear
This build is playable regardless of your currency investment, and approximately 20 POE Divine Orbs are needed to make it run smoothly.
This build doesn't rely on specific gear, so you need to understand which affixes you need. Once you understand your damage and defense sources, you can then apply affixes to your gear yourself.
Weapons
- Recommended: Tulborn (Foulborn Version with +4 Cold Spell Skills)
For weapons, focus on the affixes Cold Damage over Time Multiplier and +Cold Skill Gems. The weapon type itself is irrelevant; as long as it contains these affixes, it's usable for a long time until you find something better.
Armor
- Recommended: Daresso's Courage, Rime Gaze
You don't need to deliberately stack resistances. What you need is health or energy shields to provide stable support for sustained combat and map movement. If your support gems require you to maintain low health, then stack more energy shields.
Resistances, status ailment immunity, and movement speed take priority over armor or evasion stats. Since enemies are often in a chilled state, you rarely suffer concentrated melee attacks, so gear should prioritize increasing survivability rather than tanking enemy damage.
Jewelry
- Recommended: Ashes of the Stars, The Hungry Loop, Triumvirate Authority.
For necklaces, rings, and belts, their primary function is to supplement resistances, provide attribute requirements, and further enhance Cold DoTs. If they can further increase DoT damage or skill level, it will significantly enhance overall output, but these are not necessary conditions for building a full set.
Cold DoT Elementalist Skills
- Chest Armor: Creeping Frost, Cruelty, Hypothermia, Swift Affliction, Elemental Focus, Controlled Destruction
- Helmet: Vortex, Cruelty, Controlled Destruction, Bonechill
- Gloves: Arctic Armour, Tempest Shield, Summon Stone Golem of Hordes, Malevolence
- Boots: Summon Lightning Golem, Summon Flame Golem, Summon Stone Golem, Summon Chaos Golem
- Ring 1: Animate Guardian, Elemental Weakness
- Ring 2: Vaal Cold Snap
- Main Hand Weapon: Shield Charge, Vaal Righteous Fire, Frostbite
- Off-Hand Weapon: Vitality, Arrogance, Flesh and Stone
Your DoT output primarily consists of Creeping Frost, Cold Snap, and Vortex. Creeping Frost creates a frozen path, while Cold Snap rapidly generates a Cold DoT area around you. Vortex unleashes a burst of energy, primarily used when enemies approach.
These three skills are sufficient for clearing maps and farming bosses. Other skills are mainly for triggering passive skill buffs, further enhancing your DoT.
Skills like Golem and Animate Guardian aren't direct sources of damage; they provide damage reduction, auras, or additional debuffs, making Frost DoTs last longer and have more consistent coverage. Especially in long boss fights, the indirect benefits of this type of gear are often more significant than simply stacking damage.
Passive Skill Tree Keystones
- Pain Attunement: Increases spell damage at low life.
- Hex Master: Reduces Curses damage, but grants unlimited damage over time.
- Eternal Youth: Reduces life regeneration efficiency and leech, allowing life to regenerate like an Eternal Youth.
- Zealot's Oath: Life regeneration effect can be applied to ES.
Masteries
- Cold Mastery (2)
- Elemental Mastery (1)
- Energy Shield Mastery (1)
- Damage Over Time Mastery (1)
- Reservation Mastery (1)
- Minion Offence Mastery (1)
Cold DoT Elementalist is very easy to play and can satisfy almost all endgame content. The process of clearing out mobs is also very smooth. You can try to optimize this build yourself.
