[1.0.1] Dagger Spell Mage 380k pack DPS, 42k solo DPS. (Cast on Crit fun)

Pros-
Low gear requirements. (one 5l and a decent dagger or bow)
Staggeringly high dps against packs of enemies. (50+ casts of a spell in a single second)
High durability is possible, though that may not be till higher levels if you opt for lower-level CoC functionality.
Does not explode itself to reflect.
Has functional to high single target DPS if you pick up a second CoC gem.

Cons-
Very bad if you have a slow computer.
Improvements to gear are very costly/rare once the base setup is complete.
If you rush ahead there is potential to die instantly from the unfortunate one-shot penalty that effects all evasion based builds.
Depends on alot of different values, such as spell damage, spell crit, attack crit, crit multi, attack accuracy, and all three stats. Not heavy requirements but alot of universal ones, making gear management a priority.
Lightning Thorns is leathal as all hell.

Cast on crit is another of the new trigger gems, that has the effect of casting linked spells % chance of the time per hit with a critical strike. (This means it can trigger more than once per enemy with something that hits more than a single time such as ST or a chaining arrow) When combined with a large volume of piercing attacks, a good attack rate, and a high crit rate (possible with daggers or the new harbinger bows) it can be possible to cast a linked spell endlessly in short order on a poor pack of unsuspecting mobs.

From alot of use I have been learning some great things about the build, some not so great things about how critical strikes work, and some great things about freezing! In general this means time to revamp the math! Please keep in mind these are all averages, and the real combat will be much more smooth, you wont have MASS burst followed by TINY burst followed by NOTHING. I am just doing this by example so you can read the math. The ending dps however is accurate. This dps is also based on my current gear. This means alot of room to improve still as I could bulk up around 100% more multi and around 120% increased spell damage.

Given:
95% crit rate (easy with a 10% dagger)
68% chance to cast on crit (level 20 CoC gem)
Four attacks per second.
90% Accuracy
52.3% crit rate with Freezing Pulse
10 mobs you are striking with the build.
5.5 seconds worth of combat (for easy math).
The fact that every hit results in a chance to cast the linked spell (even if its the same target)


The following will happen on a pack of 10 mobs over 5 seconds. My skill of choice for this is Spectral throw linked with GMP, some supports, and Freezing Pulse as both have 100% pierce and benefit from GMP. The formula for chance of one cast because more than one check (because of ST returning) is 1 - (1 - P)^N. The formula for more than one cast because of more than one check is P*P. (For this example, we are going to say that we are not striking the "sweet spot" of ST and thus only hitting each monster twice.

89.76% (rounded to 90% for easy math) chance to cast FP once per monster struck twice.
68% (rounded to 66% for easy math) of those that cast on the first hit will cast a second time.
90% of the attacks that hit trigger a crit due to the double check on acc/crit.

Attack 1: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 2: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 3: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 4: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 5: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 6: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times
Attack 7: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 8: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 9: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times
Attack 10: ST misses.
Attack 11: ST scores a critical hit. ST does not confirm a critical hit.
Attack 12: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 13 ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 14: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 15: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 16: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 17: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times
Attack 18: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 9 times.
Attack 19: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times.
Attack 20: ST scores a critical hit. ST confirms being a critical hit. ST Casts FP 18 times
Attack 21: ST misses.
Attack 22: ST scores a critical hit. ST does not confirm a critical hit.

Here in 5.5 seconds (22 attacks) provided all monsters stay alive, we can see that FP would be cast 270 times. That is 50 times per second! With the current damage of my pulse being 287-430 (average of 358.5), with a 52.3% crit rate for 723% damage. That means of those 50 pulses per second, 26 of them will be a critical. This gives us a DPS of 75,994 and remember that FP can "shotgun" effectively causing a point target such as a boss to suffer as high as 379,974 dps. Keep in mind, most monsters wont live this long. Also you wont always shotgun perfectly. Also random does happen so this is just an expected average since we dont have a training situation to set up that tells us a dps.

There is a downside to this crazy dps though, that being a one on one fight. Take the same instance as before, however the casts drop alot. In 22 attacks (5.5 seconds) you are likely to instead see it be cast only 30 times. That means 16 crits, 14 normal hits, only for a total of 42,263 dps.

Of course, end game maps with +pack mods can give piles of 20-30 enemies, causing you to potentially spike 1m dps so... everything with a grain of salt, right?

Also, this does not include things such as frenzy charges (more ias) and the all powerful critical weakness curse (boosts crit rate on FP up to 62% and critical multi up to a HUGE 1294%)

The gear has improved alot. Resists are looking good now, spell damage and life went way up. Dagger still needs an overhall though. Now I just need to replace the boots and helm with a evade+es version for good gear before i get into the perfect gear.

Master Gear

While my flasks are not "perfect" yet, these are pretty much exactly what you want. Surgeons on everything with 5 different flasks. A healing flask that can remove bleed/shock/frozen/curse/increased healing. An elemental flask for whatever spell you are crit casting to deal with reflect that can remove bleed/shock/frozen/curse. An MP flask that can remove bleed/shock/frozen/curse. A Granite Flask for boosting your armor. And finally, as a personal preference, a QS flask for movement speed. With the number of crits you get, you have endless charges.

Main:


Single Target:


Utility:


Support:


Defense:

This build focuses on crit, evasion, and some attack speed plus spell damage. The overall goal is to hit a 95% crit rate with a dagger, around a 50% crit rate with your triggered spell, and then have enough mana and life to stay alive and spamming. As far as bandit rewards go, that is mostly up to you, though I opted for the passive point from the second difficulty, while I went with oak's life in the first and the +power charge in the third.

Level 20:
To start the build off, I established the line out of Shadow towards where I wanted to head, focusing on durability first, not bothering to even pick up the crit notables if they were not a direct link.


Level 40:
By 40, I picked up more life, more crit, and more accuracy/ias from dagger nodes. At this point I also preped to go straight into acro.


Level 60:
By level 60, we have acro, even more life, more acc and more crit, and are in the perfect spot to pick up more for the last leg of the trip.


Level 80:
By now you know the drill, more life, more crit, more multi, more acc.


Level 100:
Time to finish the trip... gl getting to 100! Life jumps up to +254%, attack speed gains a good +30%, Crit multi goes up another 70%. All in all the final leg makes you ready to deal with anything.

With the new Harbinger bows, it is possible to design this around a bow rather than a dagger. While you would take different passives, the overall design would be the same, using split shot and pierce or split shot and chain as potential triggers.

Likewise, the options for other spells inplace of FP is vast. I have tested firestorm (crashes EVERYONE) fireball (high damage) Arc (shocks everything) Ice Spear (freezes everything) and Sparks (its the new sporker) just to name a few. Trial and error is in order if you are looking to find out what suits you best.

http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgABBX0F0whnDkgQexEvEZYVIBXXF9gY2xmiHNwhYCi1KaUqOCpNKwosnCymLL8s6S0fLUctqDQKN2Y7KECgRKtFlkZxRwZMMkyzTipQMFBCVa5WY1bqW69d8l76XypfamNDbRlwUnBWcLtw1XLDdPF9W3_GgwmGrohCiGuMNo-mkBuQ1pMnmZqaE52jnrmio6sLsZC0DLTFtve31r46wFHBAMHFwfPC7MNtzAbQOdeG2xrbWdte29TdDeKA44TkCOss62Pr5OwY707yHfLh8-r1S_yr