[2.4] CRIT STAFF DoT Earthquake Assassin: "MiasmaQuake" [Over 1m DPS / 0.38s Duration / VIDEOS UP!
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Introduction
Hey guys. My name is Rangeless and welcome to my first build guide. When I heard GGG was bringing back Build of the Week, I couldn’t help but showcase my MOST SUCCESSFUL character during the Prophecy League, my Level 92, Miasmaquake! Do you players like damage? How about adding layers of decent defense mechanics to tackle the Atlas? Say no more. Introducing the Bleed/Poison Earthquake Crit Staff Assassin… but wai-, why Assassin? Isn’t Assassin ill-equipped to be a bulky earthquake character? Keep reading and find out more!
Disclaimer
Even though Earthquake, Less Duration, Voidheart, and Chaos Damage mechanics have been nerfed in 2.4, this build is still viable but its DoT will not be as consistent as it was before. I am working on a project in Essence League using the nerfed voidheart and I still melt bosses. The damage scaling is just too overpowered at this current state of the game! In Prophecy at Level 92, this character had 6.2k hp with two curses auras and Herald of Ash. I am pretty safe to general map threats.) Let's talk about the build!
Theorycraft
This build scales physical damage through Earthquake and Ancestral Warchief to deal high amounts of burst damage. By equipping crit staves, this character can achieve 95% crit cap to make use of all the damage modifiers that Assassin has to offer. Assassin's Toxic Delivery and Noxious Strike scales additional chaos damage and MORE damage on DoT crits which is perfect for Earthquake and Voidheart.  In addition, it makes good use of jewel sockets and available area damage which double dips with damage over time. It is a very flexible build and can be opted for damage or tankiness. At the end of the day, it does not matter as long as the user makes quick work of bosses and melt them in less than 5 seconds each. I personally tackled through all of Prophecy content except for Core Malachai and Uber Atziri. (I simply suck at phase-related bosses).
Why we go staves?
The main reason to use crit staves is to take advantage of two notables that excel over traditional “hack’n slash” gameplay, Blunt Trauma and Smashing Strike. Blunt Trauma allows the character to knock back enemies when an attack crits. This node provides good defense against dangerous melee mobs but it also increases the bleed DoT (damage over time) from the Assassin Ascendancy/Voidheart. ![](http://i.imgur.com/yt5z4R6.png"]) Normally, bleeding enemies take 10% of the initial physical hit as bleed DoT. However, when a bleeding enemy moves, they take an additional 50% physical damage as DoT for 5 seconds from the initial hit. This means by scoring crits and knocking enemies back, this build can consistently make enemies bleed out without waiting for them to move. This mechanic can be shown in ZiggyD’s old Tornado Shot/Puncture Build Guide where he used Puncture skill and the “King of the Hill” knockback notable to maximize single target damage after every knockback crit.). Even though the Ancestral Protector is not required in the staff build, it is recommended to maintain the knockback effect and continuously deal maximum bleed damage. Smashing Strike gives the build a layer of defense through endurance charges. Every crit will have a 10% chance to grant an endurance charge to the user. Along with the immortal call-CWDT (cast when damage taken) and basalt-granite setup, this build can survive reflect mobs. This is especially useful for surviving the earthquake aftershock which deals substantially MORE damage than the initial hit.  Like any other life-based melee character, it uses frenzy charges through blood rage to sustain reasonable life leech and attack speed. Since I chose not to run vaal pact, this character can regenerate some life comfortably with blood rage on. Normally, scaling 95% crit is impossible without insane gear. Luckily, the Assassin can naturally generate power charges on non-crit and get bonus crit stats through each power charge. In general, this build utilizes all the charges in the game, crit, and damage over time. After reading this guide in full, I hope you guys will consider making this build. Like my writing, there are always improvements to be made to this build and I welcome all criticism and feedback.
Afterthought: Current Meta of Assassin and Melee
Most players in Prophecy league have used the Assassin notables, Noxious Strike and Toxic Delivery, to stack free bleed/poison damage on their physically based characters. Similarly, most melee characters have slapped on the Voidheart Iron Ring and thought, “Hey free damage is free damage?” However, I’d argue that GGG put Voidheart into the game to test the limits of DOT for melee characters to offset the popularity of bladefall trappers, miners, and rangers in the game. Skills like Ice Crash, Cyclone, and Molten Strike used to be meta but now, it can never compare to Earthquake because it deals more damage and can clear better. In the future, I hope GGG introduces new damage and area of effect mechanics which can improve melee's current state of the game. Players loved Earthquake because it can be activated without a target. In order to survive in the Atlas, POE players need more reactive skills like that with decent clear speed and purpose in today's meta.
Pros and Cons
Pros - Flexible end-game skill tree (can be opted for offense or defense) - Can start cheaply on a budget with an optimized skill tree and ascendency setup - Insanely high offense (can reach 150k~ and 250k DPS on 6l Earthquake and 5l Ancestral Warchief) - Promotes hit-and-run strategy with high DoT - Generates power charges and endurance charges on HIT rather than on KILL - Can survive reflect rares Cons - Awkward skill tree start - True end-game potential is gated through the Hegemony’s Era, Voidheart, and double curse setups - True damage won't show until Merciless (when all 6/8 Ascendancy points are taken: Noxious Strike, Toxic Delivery, and Unstable Infusion) - Cannot do reflect maps unless specc’d into Vaal Pact (The only reason I decided against Vaal Pact was because it hurt my survivability while navigating in the end-game labyrinth) - Very hard to melee kill T16 guardian bosses due to their immunity to either bleed or poison
Skill Tree, Ascendancy, and Bandits
2.4 Essence Skill Tree (More suited for new endgame scaling)
2.3 Prophecy Skill Tree (Outdated due to Atlas content becoming harder)
Ascendancy (in order of priority): 1. Noxious Strike (Bleed/poison/maim procs on physical damage scaling) 2. Toxic Delivery (Start doing bonus chaos damage) 3. Deadly Infusion (Score a few crits here n there but it won't matter till you get a decent staff) 4. Unstable Infusion (Watch your power charges add onto base crit and watch the enemies' hp bars melt to zero!) Bandits: Normal: Oak (for 40 base hp) Cruel (preference): Oak, (16% physical damage), Kraityn (8% Attack Speed), or Eramir (skill point for “double dipping” area damage or pure damage jewel) Merciless: Alira (+1 power charge)
Leveling Tips
1. Level as a spellcaster/melee character and head straight to Resolute Technique by the Marauder part of the skill tree. 2. When you reach Resolute Technique, start using a two-handed mace or axe and level up Earthquake and Ancestral Protector. (Note that these gems are not available to the Shadow and will require players to purchase from other players/characters.) 3. Take all life and other non-specific nodes (that are anything that’s not staves or crit). Make sure that strength and intelligence are high enough to level up the necessary gems for late-game. 4. Before heading to map endgame, buy a cheap crit staff and an armour or armor/evasion base 5l chest. Make sure you are elemental resistance capped and have accuracy in either the gloves, jewelry, or helmet. (The main detriment to most staff builds is that very few invest in accuracy which results in only 75-80% chance to hit. Remember if you can’t hit, you can’t crit.)Ideally, by Level 90, you should have a 85-90% "chance to hit" to avoid any substantial dropoff in damage. 5. Spec out of Resolute Technique and start picking up staff and crit nodes. Don’t forget to do endgame trials to acquire the last 2 ascendancy points! 6. Have fun.
Character Stats
Offense
Character Profile (Find “Miasmaquake” in Standard) Disclaimer: These damage figures do NOT take into account DoT or Earthquake aftershock damage. This build actually does substantially MORE because damage over time because area damage nodes and vulnerability curse double/triple dips on initial and DoT. The tooltip also does not consider the .38 second cooldown on earthquake's aftershock and increased duration through Noxious Strike.
DPS with Herald of Ash
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Above DPS WITH Blood Rage, 3 Frenzy, and 6 Power Charges
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Above DPS WITH Lion’s Roar and Atziri’s Promise
  Note: I opted more life and less jewels in 2.4 but still manage to get 111k on earthquake and 185k on ancestral protector.  
Earthquake DPS with Concentrated Effect (Strictly for bosses=217k tooltip)
Defense
Regular Defenses
Defenses with Lion’s Roar and Atziri’s Promise
[does not include 3 end charges]
 Last edited by Rangeless#6404 on Sep 16, 2016, 5:00:41 AM Last bumped on Oct 20, 2016, 6:16:45 AM
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Skill Gem and Link Setup
These support gems are linked in order of importance and sockets available. This build is highly flexible. Feel free to refer to other crit melee guides for inspiration. Earthquake - Less Duration - Melee Physical Damage - Increased Area of Effect (map clear) or Concentrated Effect (for strictly bosses) - Rapid Decay (less duration means higher aftershock uptime between hits) - Increased Critical Damage Ancestral Protector - Concentrated Effect (double dips with DoT) - Melee Physical Damage - Faster Attacks - Less Duration/Increased Critical Damage Leap Slam - Faster Attacks - Fortify - Blood Magic (I chose not to use blood magic because I have movement speed boots to travel and I generally leech enough mana between packs to leap indefinitely.)
Auras (Multiple options available)
This build’s damage does NOT scale physical -> elemental so it is not a requirement to use Hatred and Herald of Ash. I personally chose 2 curses under Blasphemy and Herald of Ash because I do have a Level 3 Enlighten. Choose whichever aura setups are available but make sure you at least 10-20% mana left for skill use. Due to the 2.4 nerf to Earthquake, its base mana cost increased from 6 to 10. Plan your mana carefully and if you have a level 2-4 Enlighten, Conqueror's Efficiency, or Reserved Mana nodes on the skill tree, reserve your mana smartly and USE IT! Blasphemy (Choose 1-2 curses below. Use Doedre’s Damning or Windscream boots if you do not have a corrupt +1 curse amulet). - Vulnerability (triple dips with physical and chaos damage scaling) - Temporal Chains (slows enemies and prolongs DoT effects which increases damage) - Enfeeble (good defensive option to avoid one shots vs hard map bosses) - Enlighten (at super late game if you can afford) Other Options - Arctic Armour - Herald of Ash - Hatred - Grace - Haste - Purity of Elements and other (map and party specific) [spoiler="CWDT (Dependent on gear sockets available)"] All linked skills must be below Level 42 requirement because I use Level 2 CWDT (too lazy to buy Level 1). Play around to see which damage threshold you would like to activate your skills. Remember that these skills are activated depending on the positioning of the socket order from top left to bottom left. Core Setup - Immortal Call - Increased Duration Other Additions (preference) - Summon Ice Golem (Best in slot golem) - Vortex (Provides pseudo chilled ground and slows down enemies. Very useful if you are not running Temporal Chains or Arctic Armour.) - Arctic Breath and Greater Multiple Projectiles (The good ole Hegemony setup: It provides chilled ground like Vortex but has a greater coverage as it reaches across the edge of the screen.) - Phase Run (Underrated skill. It grants invisibility and phasing while active and gives MORE melee damage for a very small duration.) - Molten Shell (For more base armour) [/spoiler]
How to Gear?
Things to look out for in order of priority
Weapon (Staff)
- High physical DPS (start from 300 and make your way up) - High base critical strike chance (anything above base is good but don’t threat if it’s not) - Attack speed (not as important since Earthquake won’t benefit from it until we acquire the Earthquake 30% Reduced Duration Enchantment) Play with the weapon until you got an exalt or two to buy the best-in-slot weapon, Hegemony’s Era. Starting from ONLY 1.2ex in Essence League, this staff can reach achieve 470-500 pDPS with 7.9-8.4% base crit. It gives +1 power charge which complements with Crit and Assassin Ascendancy, Deadly Infusion, which boosts our crit by 0.5% per power charge. The user is also able to gain a power charge 10% of the time if it knocks an enemy back, thus boosting power charge up-time considerably. Did I mention that it comes with 18% block chance? Let’s see you get a better bargain with Wings of Entropy?
Helmet
- Life (60+ is ideal) - Accuracy (Your character MUST have some form of flat accuracy in either helmet, ring, or glove slot. Otherwise, damage will drop off considerably.) - Elemental resistances (30% per resistance is ideal) - Chaos resistances Stick with this helmet until you can buy a similar helmet, Rat’s Nest, Abyssus with a “20-30% Reduced Earthquake Duration” enchantment. The theoretical DPS goes up tremendously because it means more aftershocks. Depending on your end-game attack speed with blood rage, you can coordinate your damage nodes to time your aftershocks perfectly to maximize actual DPS.
Body Armour
- Life (60+ is ideal) - Elemental resistances - Armour and/or Evasion (This character’s skill tree pathing can favor both defenses. Take your pick but DO NOT pick an Evasion chest because rolling multiple red sockets may outweigh the price of the chest).) - Chaos resistances There are several uniques that are considered best-in-slot for late-game. Personally, I went with the Belly of the Beast because I needed the extra life (5.8k). Other options include Kaom’s Heart and the new Brass Dome Gladiator Plate. That monster of a unique gives 4k armour and damage mitigation from critical strikes.
Gloves
- Life (60+ is ideal) - Accuracy (Your character MUST have some form of flat accuracy in either helmet, ring, or glove slot. Otherwise, damage will drop off considerably.) - Elemental resistances - Added physical damage to attacks (5-10) - Attack speed (10-16%) - Open stat for life/mana leech I decided to stick with my rare gloves because I needed the accuracy. If my amulet or ring had better accuracy, I would definitely put Facebreakers because it would give a good boost to critical hit damage and overall DPS.
Boots
- Life (50+ is ideal) - Elemental resistances (100+ total) - Movement speed (is not essential but VERY helpful in labyrinths) Finding ideal boots is hard but at the start of the league, I usually buy un-crafted boots with 2 of the 3 stats shown and just add the 3rd mod. In Essence, I was able to acquire really good set of Two-toned boots for only 5 chaos and added life to it. I sacrifice movement but I guess I can just put blood magic on leap slam and hop away.
Rings and Amulet
- Life (50+ is ideal) - Elemental resistances - Accuracy (Your character MUST have some form of flat accuracy in either helmet, ring, or glove slot. Otherwise, damage will drop off considerably.) - Increased global critical strike multiplier - Increased global critical strike (This won’t matter as much in the late-game when you have completed the skill tree. You just need enough crit to reach 95% when all 6 power charges are up.) - Added physical damage - Attack speed, added chaos damage, and other miscellaneous stats In the new Essence League, crafting has become easier because we can guarantee a certain stat when we craft our jewelry. Pick the ideal setup that fits with the rest of the gear. In the end, sub out a ring with Voidheart for maximum DoT damage. Try to get the best roll possible and if you are playing in Standard, try your hands on a legacy version! If you want to run a double curse setup, you either must use a +1 curse amulet or Doedre’s Damning or Windscream boots (as a budget option). I was lucky enough to acquire this bad boy for 1.5 ex near the end of Prophecy.
Belt
- Life (remember half of the strength value is considered added flat life) - Elemental resistances - % Physical damage (use blessing orb to reroll to 20-24%) - Flask-related stats - Armour
Jewel
- Life (choose 7% life at it is the max roll) - Area Damage (double dips with DoT) - Critical Strike Multiplier - Critical Strike Chance (if you are still uncapped) - Accuracy - Any Physical Damage - Attack Speed
Ideal Flask Setup (preference)
In 2.4, a good end-game character must have a good understanding of their flask setup and when to use each one. With the right strategy and piano-like reflexes, you can survive most end-game content with no problems. I opted to use a “remove bleeding” and “remove freezing” life flask to avoid corrupting blood and freezing strongboxes. The Basalt Flask of Warding grants 20% melee mitigation and curse immunity so I don’t die to reflect when I get caught in vulnerability. The last two flasks are for damage and leeching purposes. Note that the chaos damage acquired from Assassin and Lion's Roar does stack with Atziri’s promise. It is not a requirement to use Lion’s Roar but when you first enter a boss fight, you are not guaranteed to have full power charges to crit/knockback. Lion’s Roar provides a reliable alternative to knockback.
Other Options
- Taste of Hate - Vessel of Vinktar (ideally x% of physical damage added as lightning damage) - Panicked flasks (Instant recovery when on low life) - Jade/Stibnite flasks (Keep hitting and pray you won’t get hit)
My Gear
What about enchantments?
Helmet: Earthquake duration Gloves: Anything that scales our damage typing or provides any notable layers of defense. (My current set of gloves has a fire enchantment that does not fit with my build at all. Looks cool through!) Boots: "Reduced mana cost when hit" to manage Earthquake's high mana cost
Video (Red Mapping and Dried Lake UP!)
Q&A: Message me in-game for feedback and help
I will add on as I keep in contact with you guys:
1. This character is too squishy for end-game content. Are you sure this build works? It was my 2nd character in Prophecy and I managed to breeze through content pretty easily. However, i admit that with the new Atlas, this character has to opt more life to survive. If you look at the updated skill tree, i have at least 180% life and not including jewels. 2. Does this character do THAT much damage? Yeah. Under the right conditions, you can melt and push enemies with max crit knockbacks with a combination of your main skill, totem, and flask utility. Look in the video tab for my map testing. I admit that I suck at dodging attacks but I will learn, especially in the new Essence league. I'm still trying to make a Shaper viable build. Soon tm. 3. This staffbuild doesn't seem all that worth it for an Assassin. Why bother? Compared to most melee characters, I found this build to be most enjoyable because it scales dot as close to viper strike ever did. Yes. I would agree Staff characters should probably be classed under Marauder and Duelist Ascendancies but I wanted to try something new. It worked, didn't it?
Final Conclusions and Build Rating
This odd build can shred general map content with ease but will suffer against boss fights requiring quick feet. I tried doing all 4 T16 guardians but couldn't kill them given their immunity towards bleed or poison. However, given the starting budget of just a Hegemony's Era and a Voidheart, this build can reach DPS equivalent of multi-exalt worthy gear. This is still one glass cannon build that I was glad to play during the Prophecy league. I will rate it 4/5! Had a lot of fun playing this build and making this guide. I hope you guys will have fun trying your own versions of this zany staff build. Cheers! See you in the next build guide!
Change Log: Updated POE 2.4: Sep 15, 2016
- Sep 14, 2016: Written build guide - Sep 16, 2016: Updated skill tree, Q&A, and demonstration video!
Upcoming Essence project teaser
Last edited by Rangeless#6404 on Sep 16, 2016, 5:08:00 AM
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reserved
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Looks tight. Will try out.
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" once i get obs working, ill showcase it melting some T15-16 bosses |
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Build seems solid although I have a CI/lowlife fetish. Also I have one concern is this build atziri viable?(kappa)
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Looks interesting. Extremely interesting. Assassin Shadow with a staff is thematically questionable, but hey, you go with what works in PoE.
Very well written guide. Lots of information. Almost too much variety, flexibility and player choice, but that's probably good thing. Not one of these "this is your 20ex endgame setup, deal with it or go home" guides, but still one that I wouldn't call beginner friendly. Well, the best builds rarely are. I appreciate the leveling section and budget options. That leveling tree is pretty rough, though not the worst I've seen. I do have a few concerns, though. You're already going to address one - actual endgame maps and boss fights. Lake farm is pretty... yeah. Looking forward to those videos! The second concern is pretty big too. As the big thing this patch, how is this against the guardians, shaper, and old goodies like uber Atziri? Would be nice to know. Then, regarding your tankiness. You have enfeeble aura, minimum end charges, immortal call and leap fortify as your defenses, with pretty average armor, eva and hp. Are the knockbacks that good? I wouldn't know, I have no experience with that. Maybe I'm just inexperienced, but I worry a little about how tanky you really are. I hope I'm worrying over nothing. Lastly, your "teaser". It looks like you're running a bit different setup in the current league. You are, of course, free to play the game as you wish. I'm just personally sick of guides that have been updated to 2.4 after 15 minutes of standard play with the guide's author playing something else entirely in Essence. Well, I'm just whining now. Do you think the listed staff build has potential against the toughest content available, at least? Regardless, cool guide, one I actually got very interested to play. I might just wait for those videos though. |
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148% tree life as a melee character though. No armor. No focus on endurance charges. How do you not get absolutely destroyed by things like bird spines and whatnot?
I am sitting on a Hege staff and i'd like to try this, but it just seems way too squishy... |
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" Honestly, in Prophecy, I was able to steamroll regular Atziri, all map content but Core Malachai, Uber Izaro/Argus, and the Pale Council (i did not know how to beat them. I just smacked random things and eventually they died.). As for the new guardians, i'm actually planning on buying some t16 maps and running them. Hopefully the OBS quality is good. As for clearing the new Atlas content, you guys are right. Jewel sockets aren't enough to sustain life. It needs to hit at least 180-200% life for sure. I'd opt to take the entire Scion life wheel next time, leave out duelist and take staff nodes for damage. As for the lost accuracy from duelist, i can always take more accuracy by Templar and maybe shadow too. Everything is still up in the air to be honest. That's why I like feedback. I'll update you once I finish the t16 guardians! " 100% agree. At the moment, it's 148% with four 7% life jewels so it's at 176% life. -- UPDATE: So I specc'd out of Duelist and took some efficient life/staff/accuracy nodes between Marauder and Duelist. I am currently at 6.2k life and at 200%~ life with jewels included. Atm, this build definitely cannot beat the guardians because half the bosses are immune to bleed and other half are immune to poison. I managed to try all of them. I was very close to killing Hydra but the field had burning ground and I was vaal pact... not pretty. I will try again once I research how to properly conduct myself in those fights. As for the rest of the red map content, I was able to dps t15s pretty easily except the really rippy Daresso one with damage amd additional lightning damage mod. I died there once. I haven't played this character in a while so I realized I need blood rage active to sustain my leech. If it wears off during a boss fight, I am pretty much screwed unless i stay still to activate it. Regardless, with proper flask and totem placement, I was still able to cheese through Daresso and Vaal Oversoul (both with extra life). I will upload those clips before I go to bed tonight. I thank the people thus far for helping me with this build idea. It's already turned out better. I know this build is not the most top of the line but I believe there is always room in POE for creativity. Last edited by Rangeless#6404 on Sep 16, 2016, 1:18:56 AM
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waiting for Ti16 videos
really hope this build can kill them |
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