[1.3] Wanderfully Balanced Kinetic Blaster

First I want to thank the author for this well written and detailed guide.

Since I don't have a 6L VP I went with my 6L Belly instead. This saved me a few life nodes which I invested in "Path of the Hunter" (projectile damage, accuracy, dexterity and 6% monement speed as well) and the "missing" damage nodes in "Piercing Shots" and "Elder Power" (more wand and projectile damage).

A tip for levelling: I used Redbeak at first and Quecholli from lvl 22. This guide is using a lot of projectile damage nodes right from the start so it was smooth sailing with Spectral Throw through Normal difficulty. At lvl 35 I changed to some self-crafted Spiraled Wand which got me to lvl 59 (required for an Imbued Wand) with ease. And if you don't have a 6L Voll's, Carcass or Belly, I'm pretty sure this build is nearly as viable with a shabby Tabula as none of these chests do much in terms of resistance, armour or evasion. You won't have the benefits of power charge gain, increased AoE or HP bonus but other than that a Tabula (or any other 6L armour you may have) should go a long way, much better than any 5L armour.

I still don't have a mega power wand but 190 pDPS (self-found) is good enough really.

And as promised, this build is heaps of fun, enjoy. ;)

Has anyone tried to respec this build to 2.0.0 or tried something similar?

I have my doubts, because life leech is kinda wonky right now, so can it sustain the "mana cost"?

Thankfully PoeBuilder hasn't been updated, I was able to make similar skill tree by copying the author's skill tree.
I haven't repected my character. Waiting for someone wiser's input :)

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RaivokasMagma wrote:

Has anyone tried to respec this build to 2.0.0 or tried something similar?

I have my doubts, because life leech is kinda wonky right now, so can it sustain the "mana cost"?

Well, I rebuilt my Scion at lvl 88 after the release of The Awakening and this build still works pretty much as advertised though you will have to make some adjustments to the skill tree.

Life Leech is still OK since VP doesn't carry the effectiveness penalty anymore but it is now effectively about 1% less as compared to 1.3. I have also tried LGoH instead of Life Leech, it does work pretty well but not quite as good. Of course, for the sake of survivability, you may use both together but then you will loose a lot of damage without WED (almost 13k or 30% in my case).

Unless you're super rich (i.e. unless you have some lvl 4 Enlighten gems) you can forget about running all three Herals and an aura. I guess, it is still possible with Charisma (just below VP) and Alpha's Howl (125 - 20% = 100) but then you'll have to invest four passives and loose all the goodies from Rat's Nest. For now I have ditched HoA and I'm using Wrath rather than Hatred but this may be subject to change, still experimenting.

Another issue is the nerfed CWDT combo, but this can be remedied with manually cast EC or Daresso's Defiance.

On the plus side, you'll have some spare sockets to toy around with. I have trained me a little Ice Golem, the wee fella gives me a nice DPS boost (almost 3k) and he can take some serious abuse. I also have 5 decent jewels in the tree, you can get lotsa damage and HP there. Can't beat the Scion for jewel sockets in the skill tree. ;)

The mandatory Increased Duration nodes GGG have placed before the Power Charges are another nice change in the tree, the extended uptime is certainly a bonus.

Here is my skill tree now at lvl 90:



... and my gear:





It's still a work in progress but I am thoroughly enjoying this build, the clear speed is exceptionally good. Right now I have 3.5k HP and 46k tooltip DPS (with the Golem, buffs and charges up) using LMP, the mana costs with GMP are a bit scary though still sustainable (126 life per shot).



Because GGG have moved Vaal Pact, a Shadow or even a Ranger may now be the better choice for such a build but the Scion can make up for this with the two "free" jewel sockets right at the start.

Some final thoughts... When I replace WED and crit multi with IIQ and IIR, my tooltip DPS drops to 28k which is still plenty for mid-tier maps. I have done some Precinct and Shipyard maps with this setup without breaking a sweat. So with a few changes in your gear and a bunch of IIR jewels you can turn this toon into a pretty decent MF toon.

I'm also considering to regret out of Written in Blood in favour of Path of the Warrior, the loss of % to max life I can compensate with the next level and the 10 additional STR will allow me to max Blood Magic, I'm also saving some GCPs to push the Quality on the BM gem for further reduction of the mana costs... every little helps. Or maybe I get lucky and roll a super nice jewel with +10 STR as bonus. One can but dream. ;)

Now I hope this has shed some light on your concerns. ;)

5L volls sounds better than tabula, because you will get more charges instead of grab pcoc for 6l.

I was thinking about use the new eldritch battery to sustain the attacks with jewel es on hit and the same idea of reserve all mana and drop blood magic for added fire.. too much cancer? ;|

I think its good with Eva/ES gear so u get at least 500ES or better 1k+, hm Singletargetting might be a rpoblem, so u want prolly 2k+ ES

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FightorFall wrote:

5L volls sounds better than tabula, because you will get more charges instead of grab pcoc for 6l.

5L Voll's is indeed better than Tabula but only marginally so, maintaining charges uptime with PCoC works just fine. And Tabby is still cheaper than 5L Voll's. ;)

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FightorFall wrote:

I was thinking about use the new eldritch battery to sustain the attacks with jewel es on hit and the same idea of reserve all mana and drop blood magic for added fire.. too much cancer? ;|

I'm not so sure if it works out with the new Eldritch, you will need quite a lot of ES to sustain your skills and it will have to come from boots and shield (and maybe some from belt and jewelry) because Rat's Nest and Maligaro are set in stone and VP doesn't give much. The tree also doesn't do much for ES either, except Written in Blood, if you decide to take it. And you will have to rely on ES recharge only because Ghostreaver is not an option.

Leech on the other hand works still fine with Vaal Pact although it is a bit less than it was in 1.3

My Scion is now lvl 91, 3.5k HP and 43k tooltip DPS with GMP (49k w LMP), good enough to one-shot even magic mobs in high level maps. Great fun to play this build for sure, even more so now with Flame Dash rather than Lightning Warp.

I'm waiting for my Enlighten gems to hit lvl 3 and then hope for a lvl 4. Charisma is only 4 passives away and if my calculation is correct it should be possible to bring back Herald of Ash.