Cheap CoC dual wand barrage guide

This build uses Barrage with dual wands to activate spells linked to Cast on Critical. Why barrage? It hits four times and its critical chance is calculated once for all four hits. That means that when you crit, it will activate a succession of spells for a machine-gun effect. Also, the mana cost is very low since Barrage has low mana requirements and you don't need to level it at all.

Why wands? Wands are the weapon with the highest critical chance. It is very easy and cheap to find two wands with 10% critical chance. This means your +increased crit chance bonus will be highly effective.

Why dual wield? You can get the Twin Terrors node which gives a total of +125% crit chance. Dual wielding provides a passive buff to attack speed. Also, wands give +spell damage and it's fairly easy to get wands with 10% crit chance and the additional spell damage mod, which is a big DPS boost.

Pros
- spectacular AOE damage, excellent single-target damage (most CoC builds I've seen have issues with single targets)
- mechanisms to deal with reflect
- cheap
- doesn't rely on weapon damage. That means you just have to level up and level your gems and your damage will be pretty much guaranteed.
- fun to play, it feels awesome when your character "clicks" and you start melting everything in seconds

Cons
- low hitpoints at some stages of the game, requires situational thinking and some experience to deal with chaos damage and tough bosses
- expect a tough time in Merciless until you gear and level up
- one of its strengths, not relying on weapon damage, is also a weakness - in endgame, a physical DPS build with a really good weapon will hit harder
- might make you spoiled and lazy after you reach lvl 70+

Level 68 - fully functional tree

Endgame plan - tree @level 90

note: Vaal Pact is 2 points away, I'm not such a big fan, but people really like it for endgame, so you might pick it

Stats at lvl 90:

1. Weapons
Uou need two wands with 10% base critical chance, some +spell damage mods on them are highly recommended and will increase your DPS a lot. The wand dps does NOT matter. Wand attack speed is important, you also have to consider that you won't have enough intelligence for the highest-level wands. An Engraved Wand would be perfect since it has 1.50 attack speed and you will have enough intelligence to equip it without any bonus intel from gear. My wands (bought each of them for ~4 chaos):

Disregard the gems in the sage wand, I was messing around. Also, it's not ideal since it has only 1.10 attack speed, but I couldn't find a better affordable wand at the time and it has the two most important mods: crit chance and spell damage.

Axn crafted a stupidly good wand specifically for this build. Here's what the perfect wand would look like (it is damn expensive, I'm posting it just as a point of reference if you're wondering what mods to look for):


(this is from his shop)


2. Chest
The build will be functional with a random 4-link armor, but only barely. I again strongly recommend getting any 5-link armor or a 4-linked Voll's Protector (warning: rolling three green slots on a 4-link Voll's is VERY difficult!). While I leveled up, I bought a white 5-link armor for 3 chaos, crafted it with alterations, regaled just for kicks and - voila! that's the chest that carried me to ~lvl75:

In the meantime, buy or craft a 6-slotted Voll's and try to 5-link it with your spare fusings. I recommend using armorer's scraps to add 5% quality for each fuse attempt. I think I managed to 5-link mine in ~100 fuses total. If you have the currency, you might opt to just buy one instead. Tabula Rasa is a cheaper, but not so good, equivalent of a 5-link Voll's.

If you have the currency, you can play in endgame with any 6-link armor of your choice. There are great rare and unique chest pieces that have much better stats than Voll's, but they aren't cheap. The main reason for my 5-link Voll's recommendation is that it saves you one slot for power charges and thus equals a 6-link piece - as well as letting you use Cold Snap.

Other uniques to think about:
Maligaro's Virtuosity, even post-nerf, give 50% crit chance and some crit multiplier, but they cost 1 exalt pre-nerf and you sacrifice survivability. I used these gloves and I liked them a lot, but it's a matter of preference.

Rat's Nest: a lot of CoC / Crit builds are using it. Again, it's great for damage, but not so cheap and it gives no defensive stats. I recommend using, at most, either Maligaro or Rat's Nest, if you use both, your survivability will suffer. This can be compensated if you have top-notch rares in the other slots.

Stats on gear to look for: basic stuff, life and resists. I strongly recommend a solid accuracy bonus on at least two items because your chance to hit is calculated TWICE for criticals (1. accuracy check if you will hit; 2. chance to crit is checked; 3. if it's a crit, your accuracy ir checked again and if it's a miss, you score a normal hit instead of a critical). The best rings are diamond rings. With 2 of them your crit chance with power charges at higher levels should be around 90. If you also have maligaro's or rat's nest, you might actually overcap it (it can'be more than 95%).

Flasks:

This is what I use. I generally run with the 2 life flasks, the amethyst flask since it the anti-curse mod and the granite and quicksilver flask for physical mitigation. A jade flask instead of the quicksilver would be ideal.

The +armor mod on one of the life flasks isn't optimal at all but I gave up trying to roll something better + surgeon's.

The surgeon's mod is mandatory since with it you can spam the flasks almost non-stop. For lategame, it'll also be good to have a "removes freezing" mod on one of the life flasks. The curse immunity mod is better on a non-life or mana flask since it will end if you heal up - that's why it's on the amethyst one.

Main attack:

4-linked random armor:
a)Barrage - CoC - EK - PCoC (simpler to play, easier to die)
b) 1. main attack: Barrage - CoC - EK - LL
2. supporting attack: Barrage - CoC - PCoC - Summon Skeletons

4-linked Voll's (rolling 3 green slots out of 4 is difficult!): Barrage - CoC - EK - LL

5-linked random armor: Barrage - CoC - EK - LL - PCoC

5-linked Voll's:
a) Barrage - CoC - EK - LL - Cold Snap (more offense)
b) Barrage - CoC - EK - LL - Summon Skeletons (more defense)

6-linked random armor: same setup as 5-link armor, things you can add according to preference: chain for extremely fast map clear speeds (you can replace it for the rare solo boss encounters), summon skeletons if you want a permanent meatshield; if you want higher single target dps - increased attack speed / fireball / added accuracy

6-linked Voll's: I'd go with the 5-link Voll's Cold Snap setup; as a 6th gem, you can try the same options as the ones I listed for a 6-linked random armor.

For phys reflect maps (I assume you have at least a random 5-link armor by that time!): Barrage - CoC - LL - LMP/GMP - Fireball

About cold snap: it works only with Voll's cause it generates the necessary power charges and it is amazing. You will perma-freeze anything but bosses, which means a huge survivability boost, and the damage is also not bad at all.

Mana management

If you have a 6-link and you put chain, your mana cost will increase dramatically. You might want to pick Mana Geyser or Primal Spirit, or even both to compensate to some degree:
tree with Mana Geyser and Primal Spirit

DO NOT level Barrage past level 10! It only increases mana cost and benefits you in no way, shape or form. Even a level 1 barrage will be fine.

Supporting attack if you aren't using skeletons in your main attack:

Barrage - CoC - Summon Skeletons - Curse of choice (enfeeble / temporal chains for survivability, critical vulnerability for dps)



This needs some explanation. First, skeletons with CoC barrage are absolutely amazing. Each barrage fires 4 times and, if it crits, all 4 hits are considered a critical. That means that at higher levels of your CoC and Summon Skeletons gems, you will summon 6 skeletons with each barrage attack right on top of your target. Skeletons summoned with CwdT die instantly, spawn next to you, are no more than 4 and you have no control when to spawn them. Skeletons summoned with a spell totem require a ton of mana or a dedicated 4-link with blood magic, the totem tends to die and they still have to reach your target. Skeletons with CoC can be max-leveled and appear right on top of your target. This allowed me to kill Kole safely on my way to Lunaris 3 with a lvl 68 "glass cannon" character, which is a complete joke, when you think of it. Against hard-hitting bosses, the CoC skellies will become your best friends. I actually leveled to 70 using the 5-link leather armor with Barrage - CoC - EK - Life Leech - Summon Skeletons. They were so good for survivability that I sacrificed +250% crit chance from the power charges for them.

Why is the curse linked here too? At high levels, crit chance is ~90 with power charges, this means you have to hit, at the most, two times to spawn skeletons and apply the curse and the curse can be max level (unlike in a CwdT setup).

I ran for a long time with Barrage + CoC + Skellies + EK to avoid the DPS loss when summoning skellies and that IS a good option, but you have to be very careful to not suicide on reflect packs. The no EK option is safer at the cost of lost DPS.

If you have skeletons in your main attack, this is a free slot. You can use a curse with blood magic, or another CwdT setup, or whatever you like.

Alternative - skeleton totem:
Spell Totem - Faster Casting - Summon Skeletons - Blood Magic

Some people complain that bosses in the highest-level maps kill the skeletons too quickly. If they are part of your main attack, you'll still resummon them fast enough, but it might be problematic otherwise. The spell totem is a good alternative.

Auras:

Clarity on life allows you to sustain barrage even with Voll's protector which cuts your mana in half. Even with 3 auras on mana, if you have enough unreserved mana left to cast Barrage, you can sustain it. Adjust its level to reflect your mana spending (it will increase a bit as you increase your attack speed). Yeah, losing that life hurts but it's necessary. The plus side is, you don't have to worry about mana at all. At -50% regen maps, the worst case scenario is deactivating Hatred to unreserve some mana and using a surgeon's mana flask from time to time.

Hatred is important because it adds a solid wallop to EK. Grace is important because you'be absolute squish without it and Iron Reflexes. Purity is to max your resists, which is quite difficult to do without super-expensive items since the passive tree gives only +10 resists. If you can actually max them without Purity, I recommend using Purity of Lightning or Purity of Fire for the +max resists.

Other spells: I run with CwdT + Enduring Cry + Molten Shell + Decoy Totem, but that's a matter of personal preference. You could use a curse here, but I prefer to cast Enfeeble manually with the CoC+Barrage+Skeletons+Curse setup since it's not really necessary in most situations and that way you can level it up and have more control over it.

Another option would be manual curse + blood magic but you'll have to sacrifice the movement skill for that.

For movement: Lightning Warp + Blood Magic + Reduced Duration

You could also replace the lightning warp setup with another CwdT + Enfeeble + random spell if you're feeling lazy.

As far as curses are concerned, I strongly recommend Enfeeble since damage is spectacular anyway and getting survivability is a priority for lategame.

When you reach level 70+, your damage will be superb and you'll be worried mostly about surviving. If you hit 90, you will have a lot of extra life nodes, but until then you'll need to use your flasks and kiting skills well. You'll need these flasks (the quicksilver one would ideally be a jade flask):


As I said, with the Surgeon's affix, you can have 100% uptime during whole boss fights.

Hard-hitting bosses:
- cheese with Coc + Summon Skeletons + Enfeeble. As I said, I was farming Kole at lvl 68 with that
- use granite flask + evasion flask simultaneously

Tough spellcasters:
- use a topaz / ruby / sapphire flask, their +max resistance bonus is crucial, you can even go as far as to swap some auras and get Purity of Fire / Lightning / Ice for more max resistance.

While you are undergeared and low-leveled and for difficult maps, I recommend cheesing everything with CoC Skeletons.

- if you have Voll's, Cold Snap wil perma-freeze anything but the fattest bosses. It provides a ridiculous survivability boost.

Dealing with reflect:
As I said, for phys reflect maps swap EK and Cold Snap with Fireball and LMP.

Elemental reflect is not a problem unless you roll an ele reflect / ele weakness / max resist map, in which case you'll have to remove Cold Snap and possibly even deactivate Hatred.

Single phys reflect packs are not a problem because you have Iron Reflexes + Grace. Combine that with the granite and evasion flask and you'll have enough armor to mow down the pack with little life loss. Actually, you can do even phys reflect maps like that, but you'll occasionally run out of flask charges and a double reflect pack will be painful.

If you are still experiencing difficulties with reflect pacts, you can always use a CwdT + Enduring Cry + Immortal Call + Increased Duration setup.

You can also try Vaal Pact. I didn't use it, but some people like it a lot.

I leveled as a dual striker, if you prefer something else, that's entirely up to you. Lots of people seem to like leveling with 2H Spectral Throw (alsmost the same tree, just save the dual wield nodes for later). Good, cheap leveling items: Ungil's Gauche, Mightflay, Slitherpinch.

Level 36 (near the end of Normal with all quest bonus points)

Level 56 (end of Cruel - beginning of Merciless with quest bonus points)

Level 68 - transition to CoC with some respec points

(you might want to keep the two +6% resist nodes if your gear + Purity isn't enough for maxed or nearly-maxed resists)

Around Act 3 Cruel you'll start feeling squishy and in Merciless you'll have a tough time until you transition to CoC and get some life and crit chance. The first used aura should be Grace for survivability, then Purity, add Hatred when you can use all 3 auras with a reduced mana gem.

It would be a good idea to grind some experience in Merciless Act 1: Ledge, Act 2: Fellshrine and Act 3: City of Sarn, Docks and Catacombs.

From Cruel and onwards, it is generally more effective to buy the gear you need with fusings/alchs/chaos orbs than to try and craft the desired links. For normal, you don't need much gear anyway, don't burn your orbs for stupid items you'll discard 5 or 10 levels later unless one of your resists is absolutely horrible. You could be a bit more liberal with the chromatic orbs since you'll accumulate a ton of them with the chromatic recipe. Also, per each new level up check all vendors for chromatic items, buy them and sell them to get more chromes. From cruel onwards, also check for 5-link items - if you check all vendors at each level up, you have a pretty decent chance of lucking a 5-link armor.

It would be great if you get some chaos resist on gear, but that's a bit expensive and I managed to do without it with some skeleton/amethyst flask usage.

Also, plan ahead what gems you're going to use and level them in your free slots and in the swap weapon slots even if you're not using them at the moment.

Most important gems to level: EK, CoC, Fireball, LMP (you'll need the last two in lategame for phys reflect maps!). Leveling the Summon Skeletons is also good since they become tougher and increase in number at higher levels. Also try to level the auras.

Help Oak for +40 life in Normal, kill all for +1 skill point in Cruel, help Alira for + 1 power charge in Merciless.

You can get the attack speed or physical damage (it works for EK) in Cruel, if you prefer so. I like the additional skill point more.