[3.6] Lyxara's Winter Orb Elementalist non-crit Guide

Intro
Hey guys!

Welcome to my write-up for the 3.6 Synthesis Winter Orb. A lot of people are posting in older threads (Site 70-80) that are not being updated so I thought why not give it a quick write up to help everybody to get their questions answered and find the information they need.

Changes in 3.6

Winter Orb got a slight nerf in the recent patch:
Spoiler
Now deals 25 to 31 Cold damage at gem level 1 (from 23 to 28) and 232 to 289 Cold damage at gem level 20 (from 258 to 322).
Now has an added damage effectiveness of 50% (from 60%).


Since we are a non-crit build, there is also another change that affects the Gem Setup we will use for Winter Orb, Controlled Destruction can still be used tho:
Spoiler
Removed the minimum and maximum Critical Strike Chance caps. Previously, characters had a 5% chance to deal a critical strike with attacks and spells, even when the spell specified a lower chance, and could reach a maximum of 95% chance to critically strike. In practice, that cap was ignored by effects which applied to enemies, such as Assassin's Mark. We have changed several of these 'external' critical strike sources, and have removed the cap as a result.

TLDR: we need a bit more crit to have a reliable uptime for Elemental Overload


My Gem Links

So we all want to know how the new setup looks like:

Spoiler
Main Skill Winter Orb:
Winter Orb - Infused Channeling Support - Concentrated Effect Support - Greater Multiple Projectiles - Cold Penetration - Hypothermia

Heralds (+ Aspect of the Spider on an item):

Herald of Thunder - Herald of Ice - Empower - Enhance

Movement & Utility
Phase Run - Increased Duration - Vaal Grace - Frostbomb

Flame Dash - Faster Casting - Arcane Surge

Cast When Damage Taken Setup:

CWDT (1) - Immortal Call (3) - Increased Duration - Vaal Righteous Fire

Because it is asked a lot: we have Vaal RF because we make use of the increased spelldmg it gives us, it is linkted to Increased duration to have a longer burst phase, and it won't get triggered from CWDT because our CWDT Gem is level 1 and only triggers spells/abilities up to level 38.

CWDT (1) - Bone Chill - Cold Snap (7)

Reminder: This is a suggestion, play how it fits you the best :)


My Passive Tree and PoB Link:

Spoiler
https://pastebin.com/EYunrm1J


Bandits, Ascendancy & Pantheon:

Spoiler


Leveling tips & Tree progression:

Low level tips until level 28, then Winter orb is usable

Spoiler
My plan is to level with explosive trap from level 2 on (after Hillock, you can buy it from Nessa) until level 12.

From level 12 on I'll go with Storm Brand and Blade Vortex, for bosses. At 16 in Act 2 you get Brand Recall after you went into Chamber of Sins + 1 Herald of your choice, choose herald of ice.

Support Gems will be whatever you prefer to start out with, mostly added cold/lightning support, controlled destruction for BV.

That combo brings me to lvl 28 without any issues, and 28 on I switch to Winter orb right away.

Links: Winter orb, LMP = lesser multiple proj, + infused channeling support,
Mana Cost Worb is low, so it's possible to run 2 heralds already

31 is hypothermia and cold pen, lvl 38 switch out LMP to GMP

since storm barrier support is changed into infused channeling support, it should be available at level 4, atleast I can't find any other info on this.

I'll include the pathing I will be taking when leveling up, some decisions depend on if I need more life or not, have 1-2 Jewels I can already put in or not

Tree 1

Tree 2

Tree 3

Tree 4

And after that fill out the rest of the tree, beginning with "Exceptional Performance", our second Duration Cluster and then Jewel Slots.


Gearing & Stat Prio

Spoiler
Defensive Stats:
Cap resistances at 75%
Life

Offensive Stats:
Spell Damage
Cold Damage
Cold Damage as extra Chaos
Elemental Damage as extra Chaos Damage
Chance to deal double damage
Aspect of the Spider
increased Damage with hits against Chilled Enemies (Gloves, drop in the Incursion Temple)

Jewels:
Flat Life
Cold Damage
Spell Damage / Spell Damage while Dual Wielding / Spell Damage while holding a shield
Area Damage

Unique Recommendation:
Inpulsa Broken Heart
Mark of the Shaper paired with an Elder Ring in the other slot with "Curse Enemies with level X Warlord's Mark
Pandemonius Amulet

Flasks:
Seething/Bubbling Life Flask of Staunching (anti bleeding)
Experimenter's Quicksilver Flask of Adrenaline (increased movement speed + duration)
utility Flask of Heat (anti freeze)
Atziri's promise Flask
Wise Oak Flask


Change Log

Spoiler
8.3 Included leveling trees & Gearing section
8.3 Included Ascendancy order & Pantheons
9.3 updated PoB pastebin
9.3 switched Efficacy with Conc Effect for 6L


Ending & Thanks

If you have further questions please post them here, it will be hard for me to keep up ingame - especially at the league start :)

Also a big thank you to the community, to work together to improve builds and share their work across the board!

Thanks to the original guide for 3.5 from Suck, his guide can be found here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2285097
IGN: FluffyMetamorph
Last edited by Lyxara on Mar 15, 2019, 8:49:41 AM
Last bumped on Jun 14, 2019, 1:12:03 AM
The new ES leech is insane at 39% more damage while leeching. Do you think we can fit in Blood Rage into build and replace ES Leech with Efficacy probably? Or Cold penetration.
to repost from other thread :

we still can use controlled destruction I think
WO
GMP
Hypothermia
CD
Infused Channelling
Cold Pen/Added Cold (may have fallen alot)/ Empower 4

To overcome the crit loss to proc Ele Overload
Path to Trickery (20% crit chance near shadow) and Light of Divinity (20% crit chance near templar) and pair that with Ice Golem which will give your WO around 4.2% crit chance which I think is enough to proc Ele Overload consistently
https://twitter.com/pathofexile/status/1103800786729951232

So looks like we got some more changes with some nodes down before Acrobatics, this bad or whatever?

edit: like only 1 more node and very small benefits of it. not really worth but ye its the only way?
Last edited by stonerocky on Mar 7, 2019, 11:05:18 PM
double post somehow. please delete.
Last edited by stonerocky on Mar 7, 2019, 10:36:47 PM
Thx for putting in so much time and effort to recreate this build and bring it back to life.
"
NexiieQT wrote:
The new ES leech is insane at 39% more damage while leeching. Do you think we can fit in Blood Rage into build and replace ES Leech with Efficacy probably? Or Cold penetration.


It is possible, but we won't have that much ES to begin with, yes we would constantly leech, but maybe the other benefits would fall off, since there's not much ES to begin with :D In my opinion it would fit better into a LL/CI version of Winter Orb.

"
to repost from other thread :

we still can use controlled destruction I think
WO
GMP
Hypothermia
CD
Infused Channelling
Cold Pen/Added Cold (may have fallen alot)/ Empower 4

To overcome the crit loss to proc Ele Overload
Path to Trickery (20% crit chance near shadow) and Light of Divinity (20% crit chance near templar) and pair that with Ice Golem which will give your WO around 4.2% crit chance which I think is enough to proc Ele Overload consistently


Yes, it is possible - my Winter Orb links should be a guideline, not what anyone has to do :) if you feel more comfy with this pathing and linking why not play it that way, the game gives us more opinions than one

"
stonerocky wrote:
https://twitter.com/pathofexile/status/1103800786729951232

So looks like we got some more changes with some nodes down before Acrobatics, this bad or whatever?

edit: like only 1 more node and very small benefits of it. not really worth but ye its the only way?


Yeah, I saw that when I went to bed...I don't know why they change it like this, looks weird. But if I'm not mistaken, it's the same amount of points for us, we lose Fangs of the Viper tho.
IGN: FluffyMetamorph
Last edited by Lyxara on Mar 8, 2019, 1:11:14 AM
Thanks for the work !
awesome guide! maybe add some low lvl trees in the levelling section for newer players who don't know what nodes to prioritise? :)
"
WyattPOE wrote:
awesome guide! maybe add some low lvl trees in the levelling section for newer players who don't know what nodes to prioritise? :)


Just did :)

IGN: FluffyMetamorph

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