FoxTactics "Lightning Ninja" Arc build 18k+ : No update for 1.2

Hello everyone!

Righteous Arcer variation "End game"
**********http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/896869********
Build in progress


My arc build in action

http://www.twitch.tv/foxtactics

Lvl76 crematorium
also previous broadcast of a random lvl76 crematorium *30% mob dmg + 2 bosses*
http://www.twitch.tv/foxtactics/c/4044060
Clear speed is the same on any map
think my record is fully cleared shrine lvl77 map on 4 min flat.





******* UPDATE ********

1.1 2014\04\12
+ What bandits i took
+ Moved a few points in the skill tree, removed some castspeed and the dmg nodes above the witch and put it on the aura nodes above shadow to get an additional 1% to my max res in purity of lightning for reflect, also took the remaining templar hp nodes, this put me at just above 18k dps and 4.2k hp and more unreserved mana to take larger hits, and also bumped my mana reg up above 400 "Still same clear speed :D"

1.2 2014\04\14
+ Gemlist
+ Q&A at the end
+ Early Progression
+ Changes in my skill tree "Moved 2 nodes in the north", changed the path so i could get the "Steady hands passive", i noticed i was getting stunlocked alot of vuln maps, this helped ALOT.
+ added cwdt + ic (Couldnt use this before due to my corrupted gear, but i managed to fit it in with a crowbar, this is crucial for those leaping goatmen on vuln maps.

1.3 2014\05\04
+ Map mods you wanna avoid
+ Reflect question added to Q&A
+ What to do when you can't afford the belt
+ Optimal Flask "Still undecided"

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I think it was about time i shared my build with you all after alot of consideration.
Arc has allways been on everyones lips due to the nature of its ability to autotarget and chain without support gems.

This is my first build i've ever written so please bare with me. I'll divide it into sections and explain why i picked the items i did.

I think i should also mention that the reason i came up with this build is through a discussion in anarchy league. People were saying arc was terrible, and then my challenge began

It took 2½ league to get it right. But i did it
Introducing "Lightning Ninja"

1, Stats
2, Passives/Early progression + Bandit rewards
3, Gemlist
4, Items/Flasks
5, Tactics
6, Q&A
7, Map Mods

NOTE: Don't forget the concept is a BUDGET build, "except the empower lvl4" you can use pretty cheap gear.

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1, STATS

Lvl: 93
Hp : 4200 + 1.3k mana unreserved MoM
TOOLTIP Dps : 18927 * Bit lower now, ill change this soon
TOOLTIP Totemdps : 5398 * Bit lower now, ill change this soon
Resistance : 77\77\83
Chaos: -18%
Mana : "without disc" 2450
Manaregen: +400 per sec
Auras : Disc *Barely running disc anymore*, clarity, purity of lightning "for reflect", I swap purity of lightning for purity of fire aswell if the occasion needs it since i got both equipped, i odnt really bother with cold, never had any trouble with it.

Core-survival : lvl24 arctic armour. This with inner force makes you basicly immune to small arms fire and allows you to get alot less stunned





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2, PASSIVES

http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgMAAuMEswVbB2MHpQj0DH0QfxGWE54UTRXnFm8W8xcvGYUabBzcHRQelB8CIxgkPCSqJjwmlSepLJwtHy1HL28vnTGINsU26USrRZ1GcUbXSVFJslBCVUtVrlXGVdZXK1ptXcZgbWTnbRlwu3NTc7N2EXkDeqp-WX6vf8aApIIQgh6DCYM4hW2LjIw2jRmPRo-mkyea4J2AogCio6SRpwinXKw_tAy1BLiTwFTBtMHzxp7PZdDQ1U_YJNkT2t3bC9xX3Yzd895337DgEuFz42rkIuTs6XPr7u0g8B_wa_Pd-tI=

My witch is lifebased with MoM, so i set out to grab every life node i could get my hands on,
I also noticed that Crit wasn't very viable with arc due to a number or reason, first an formost, The nature of lightning is very low minimum and very high maximum damage, so first of all you would need to have a good hit, then a crit on top of that, investing required alot of passives and crit gear, and more risk to die from reflect. Not to mention arc has a shitty base crit "4%"

2.5 Progression

AA = Arctic armour
EB = Eldrich Battery
IF = Inner Force

My memory is a bit hazy how i progressed, it was pretty much a mess. BUT if i was to do it all over again now, this is how i would do the passives.
During the early lvls you pretty much start off as any typical witch. Try and get all the nodes in the witches start area since they are very powerful so you get some survival and dps.
Next off i would head east and grab the eldrich battery passive since by this time i should have gotten my AA gem, this passive will help me with my increased mana demand. After that i would move down towards the shadow tree and grab the dps nodes and the life nodes just below that. Then i would move west of the witch area for the IF passive to increase the amount of physical reduction i would take with AA. After this i would head up and grab the life and aura nodes in the northwest of the templar tree.

When lvling id suggest you grab and spell you feel comfortable with untill you can get your hands on arc as a quest reward. I using mine directly when i got it due to how i love the way it works, you can use. I think during my lvling i barely used any shield at all when the dps of the weapon outgrew the shield "early shields are as good as wands".

You also wanna buy another arc to lvl for your totem, even more for offlvling if you wanna corrupt them later on.

This is pretty much how i would have done it now. But you will also need to feel for yourself since its also gear dependent, need hp? get life nodes, got life but need dps? yeh you get the picture =).

The bandits i chose were:

Oak on normal : life
Alira on Cruel : Castspeed
None on merciless : passive point
Note: Taking the endurance charge is equally good, if not better.

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3, GEMLIST

A full list of the gems i currently have equipped and their lvl in their items
*Note: My gloves and my boots are corrupted, so the location of my gems is a bit off because i cant recolor them to optimize the links. I Really wanna put my elemental weakness with my enhance gem and another empower. But i might need new gear for that. Will see.

Lvl first, then quality

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Helm: Main Spell
Arc 21\20Q + Fastercast 21\20Q + Lightning penetration 20\20Q + Empower lvl4

Armour: Totem
Spelltotem 20\20Q + Arc 20\23Q + Fastercast 20\20Q +
Lightning penetration 20\20Q + Elemental proliferation 20\23Q

Gloves: Utility
Lightning warp 21\20Q + Reduced Duration 20\20Q +
**Cast when damage 1\0Q taken + Enduring Cry 5\0Q

**Note: This is just a lvl1 cwdt and lvl 5 enduring cry so it wont support the lightning warp, its just for procing enduring cry, so dont think this is going to activate lightning warp in anyway, you still use that to your own will, a 5\20 enduring cry would be optimal.

Boots: Utility
Reduced Mana 21\0Q + Clarity 20\0Q + Purity of lightning 20\0Q + Purity of fire 20\0Q

*Note: I've dropped my dicipline now, but thats because i can support AA without that needed mana reg. And it gives me a bigger unreserved mana pool. I usually only have pur of light running for reflect, and purity of fire when i know there are exiles on the map AND or if the boss is fire based. Fire exiles seems to be the most dangerous. Explosive arrow, flameblast.. yeh you felt it.

Scepters: Utility

First scepter:
Arctic Armour 20\20 + Empower lvl 3 + *Elemental Weakness
Elemental Weakness is better than conduct in this build imo, Check Q&A if you wanna know why.

Second Scepter:
Cwdt 18-20\0 + Immortal Call + Increased Duration

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4, ITEMS

This is where it gets very interesting

When i broke down arc it had sh*t castspeed and a high manacost?
How did i fix this? The answer was introduced when empower landed in PoE

*** Helm ***





A lvl93 char using a 5 chaos helmet? yup.. that's right.
Geofri's crest single handedly blew any 6L chest away when i combined with Empower
Arc + Fastercast + LightningPen + Empower
Lvl25 arc "Soon lvl 26 with corrupted empower" <<<< THIS IS DONE :D
Were talking a couple of extra thousand more dps while still maintaining a low mana cost over any 5l-6l.

Atm im pulling 18000 dps, every lvl of arc increases the dps more than any single support gem, take added lightning dmg for example, it just doesn't measure up when looking at the scale of arc at high lvls

*** Weapons ***

To get the huge dps from arc i decided to dual wield wands and drop my shield, "I would still manage to get survivabilty from MoM and AA later on"
* Wands turned out to be expensive, people forgot about scepters so i bought 2 of those
atleast 100% totaldmg and 17+% castspeed each was my requirement


Gems: AA, Empower, Elemental Weakness
Pure dps scepter, free ex slot, havent decided what's next, mana reg probably for AA and MoM


This was part craft, added cold dmg and +2 cold skills, the cold skill turned out to be a blessing in disguise, AA is cold right? well, throw an extra empower in there and you get a lvl24 AA, *25* if corrupted.



Gems: Lighnting penetration, "lvling", Reduced mana, Purity of lightning *** I had to put this in now with the recent patch, my dps got increased by 6000-7000 dps so i kept hitting reflect alot, purity of light solved that.

before finding your right items just buy 2 moonsorrow wands and dual wield those, used em untill lvl85. they perfect

*** Armour ***

Gems: Arc, Lightning penetration, Castspeed, Spell Totem, elemental proliferation



MoM, is so underrated imo. It takes 40% of any dmg and puts it on mana instead, get a huge mana pool and sick reg and just watch those spells wash over you, combine this with a high lvl AA and you pretty much get immune to small arms fire, and take very little dmg from spells.

So what would i use my 5l for?.. An extra arc totem that procs shock with elemental proliferation,

Why isn't it 6L? Well, its part of my future plans, I could have bought a 6L, but i've been buying all the 5L cloak of defiance, vaaling them and attempting to get the +1 Level affix,
Then i would move my Main arc from helm to armour and add "Added lightning dmg" for a huuuuuge dps increase. I would move my totem to a 4L, havent decided what yet.

*** Belt ***



Doriyani's, was the only belt that would fit my dps build, and the light leech just is a cherry on top.

For alot of players who doesnt have the currency to buy this belt, "The belt is pretty cheap now btw. like 2-3 Exalts due to the increase of droprate in vaal areas.

What to do when you can afford the belt yet?
I'd suggest you try and get Lightning Leech on a corrupted Amulet, Or life regeneration node in passive tree "There is one to the left of scion, 1%life 40% mana.
If your using doryani's scepter the belt can also be dropped for LIFE\res belt.

*** Rings and amulet ***



For rings i had to have Castspeed, Life, and res.
For amulet i had to have Castspeed, life, sick mana reg for AA \ MoM, and spelldmg.

* Ofc better gear to be found, just haven't been looking to hard yet

*** Boots ***



Gems:
Dicipline, Reduced mana, Clarity, purity of fire
I use diciplien and clarity constant, purity of fire when needed.

For boots i picked ES Based, Tri-res + Life + Hp

Es for MoM and AA, tri-res to make up for the lack of res on my other gear, hp "Duh",
I don't need movespeed because of they way i move , the ninja part ;) Lightning warp + Reduced duration

*** Gloves ***


Gems: Cwdt + Enduring cry, Lightning warp, reduced duration

My gloves were just recently changed from aurseize +1 level, was using it with AA before i got my scepter +2 cold.

These add HP, some need coldres, Castspeed, and the MUCH needed dex problem i had for running AA.

* These are gonna get swapped in the future.

*** Offhand ***

just 2 random weapons for lvling my extra empowers :D



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4b, FLASKS

Undecided still whats optimal. But i like the Panic flasks alot =)
So i used 3x Instant low life, and remove curse\bleed

And 2 mana flasks also instant on low life, with remove curse\bleed

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5, TACTICS

Arc is a auto target spell, so it doesnt matter if you're aiming at your grandmother.

Use lightnig warp to get around with lightning speed and keep shooting arc while placing you're totem, and cast that elemental weakness when needed

Simple huh?

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6, Q&A "Questions And Answers", Still working on this lol, so tired right now.

Q: Why elemental Weakness instead of Conductivy?
A: Well this build allready shocks like crazy and there is no need for more shock, not even the static blow passive. The difference between ele weakness and conduct is in the amount of resistance it reduces. Ele weakness get 0.5% -% max res for every quality point, meaning at lvl20\20 it has -59% Max res to enemies compared to Conductivities -49% 20\20,
Elemental Weakness is a beast when combined with Enhance gem "Quality to linked gems", Enhance lvl3 will give another 16% quality, meaning another -8% max res to mobs, putting it at -67%. This is really alot better than conductivity for solo play since you wanna be all around even for bosses.

Q:Is this viable for Invasion league?
A:I get this question alooooooooot on my stream, and the answer is yes and no. The concept of the build is viable. But ofc invasion needs more hp and survival, so you would prob need to use a shield and pick up more hp nodes instead of dps, in theory the dps will be more than enough.
If you look through the pages posted, people have posted their takes on an alteration of the build for invasion.

Q:How do you deal with reflect?
A:How i deal with reflect is a combination of things, and you can improve it even further.
Firstly, Purity of lightning is a must, and this will be running at atleast 5% more max due to buff nodes in the tree. Secondly, Cloak of defiance soaks up alot of the reflect dmg.
Thirdly Ofc you can still die to reflect if your playing like a maniac "yeh i do", but since this build doesnt utilise crit, you can adapt your firing speed when dealing with reflect packs without taking substantial damage, and ofc last, still feeling uncomfortable, Bring topaz. And its pretty much no reflect dmg.

Q:
A:

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7, Map Mods

Some map mods you wanna avoid with this build are!
* No life mana regeneration
* Blood magic
* Lower resistance "Duable but will make reflect hurt more, so bring another topaz and swap empower out for life leech if you must do this*
* Reflect maps, Same as above.
* 50% lower mana regeneration and life, This map is also duable, But i dont like anything that tampers with my mana and arctic armour.

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ALOT OF EDITING GONNA BE NEEDED

:D, Comments?

AND OFC PROOF OF ARC!

http://www.twitch.tv/foxtactics

Level 98/rank 2 Ambush here.


Played a bunch with this guy, this build has INSANE DPS. I highly recommend anyone rolling a witch now to try this out.

looks like the best party build out there.

Equilibrium DD / Flameblast can easily do more damage but the shocks are awesome once you play with >3 players.

Your hp still seem quite low with 3.6 k though, e.g. skipped purity of flesh. i guess you won't like evangelists / devourers too much.

"

iAmTegra wrote:

Level 98/rank 2 Ambush here.


Played a bunch with this guy, this build has INSANE DPS. I highly recommend anyone rolling a witch now to try this out.

Well obviously he was doing alot of damage. He's a glass cannon. Forgoing alot of survivability nodes for more damage. I hopped into the stream earlier and you were doing blue 78 maps. How does he fair against difficult map mods?

Arc WAS bad up until now. You had to get the perfect gear and your running around with 3k life just to get decent dps. The good builds run around the tree getting defense nodes and maybe 10 offense nodes. This build literally ran around the tree and picked up all the lightning damage and cast speed nodes. I wonder how high you can get a bow build dps if you ran around the tree picking up all the attack speed/projectile/bow damage nodes. Also very inefficient pick ups of the few health nodes he does have.

However I'm interested in Arc in general right now. I want to test dual totem arc in Invasion. Knowing that + levels in arc benefits the skill more than support gems, what do you think about 2h staffs with +1 gem +2 lightning? It could entail a 6L with Arc, Empower, Lightning Pen, Added Lightning, Faster Casting, Spell Totem or Elemental Prolif.

Damn i wanna make this build too now. I will have to change it to fit an hardcore character tho.

Nice one btw

+1

Played with him previously as he was still sorting out the build(before the latest patch), and even then the build was amazing. Glad to see it finally coming together.

"

alkara wrote:

"

iAmTegra wrote:

Level 98/rank 2 Ambush here.


Played a bunch with this guy, this build has INSANE DPS. I highly recommend anyone rolling a witch now to try this out.

Well obviously he was doing alot of damage. He's a glass cannon. Forgoing alot of survivability nodes for more damage. I hopped into the stream earlier and you were doing blue 78 maps. How does he fair against difficult map mods?

Arc WAS bad up until now. You had to get the perfect gear and your running around with 3k life just to get decent dps. The good builds run around the tree getting defense nodes and maybe 10 offense nodes. This build literally ran around the tree and picked up all the lightning damage and cast speed nodes. I wonder how high you can get a bow build dps if you ran around the tree picking up all the attack speed/projectile/bow damage nodes. Also very inefficient pick ups of the few health nodes he does have.

However I'm interested in Arc in general right now. I want to test dual totem arc in Invasion. Knowing that + levels in arc benefits the skill more than support gems, what do you think about 2h staffs with +1 gem +2 lightning? It could entail a 6L with Arc, Empower, Lightning Pen, Added Lightning, Faster Casting, Spell Totem or Elemental Prolif.

Thanks for the feedback, actually its more than 3k life if you count the MoM in, before i didnt have to use purity of lightning, but after patch i have to because reflect can kill me now, so i've lost around 1000 hp. earlier i was running 3.6k hp and over 2k mana, thats alot of hp.

And arc wasn't bad untill now, nobody has used it like this before, just scaling the lvl on it. Before patch i was still doing 12k "You can see my previous recorded streams" and playing with rank2 on the ladder. All map mods are pretty easy EXCEPT, Halfreg - bloddmagic and no reg. That's more you can say for an RF user.

Thirdly, if i wanted to push further lvling now i can just drop a few nodes and grab life nodes, i got more to the north, and in the templar tree. would prob just loose 1 or 2k dps, and that im gonna get back once i get my new empower, and or new weapons.

PS, don't put empower in something that doesnt have +1 level. It's to good to leave that out

Tried the +1, +2 staff on anarchy or dom league, with a lvl3 empower, didnt work to well. lost to much castspeed.
Besides, gl finding a weapon like that, its easier getting you're hands on a 500dps 1h

Think i did the math when using this


Regards \ Fox

Had a hard time pasting the passives since it was such a long link. I made a tinyurl link which is much easier to paste.

http://tinyurl.com/lgcq8kl

this as dual totem low life tree?



can anyone tell me if i can make this better?

I think you should use this tree instead :



Just some nitpicks, but for the same 105 points, you get 24% additional increased life, +15% aura effect but -3% cast speed. However, if you use the haste aura, the 15% to aura effect is almost the same as 3% cast speed.

So, overall, its almost like a free 24% life, which would put you at 166%. Still low, but much more comfortable than 142% increased life.