St. ELMO's Fire (Dual Totem, Dual Curse, EE, Fire Trap Templar) NERFED :( RIP build

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St. Elmo's Fire - The Dual Totem, Elemental Equilibrium, Minion Explode, Dual curse, Fire Trap Templar
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Why did I create this build?
I wanted a very powerful unique character in patch 10.0 that no one else uses, can solo the game, and has high survivability. I am now coming out with this build because i have played with a few public parties and want to claim this build as my own before someone else does.

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VIDEOS
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Norm A1 in 15 Mins!

Norm A2 in 15 Mins!

Merciless FellShrine @ lvl 67

Merciless Lunaris Temple Lvl 3 @ lvl 68

Tropical Map Solo @ lvl 76


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ACRONYMS
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EE - Elemental Equilibrium
FT - Fire Trap
AoE - Area of Effect
Dmg - Damage

LC - Left Click
CC - Center Click
RC - Right Click

So how did I theorycraft this....
I placed an order of importance on things that I wanted in a character.
1.) Resistances, High Hp, Safety, Kill Speed, Uniqueness

Why Elemental Equilibrium?
1.) Simply, no one uses it
2.) I wanted to be different
3.) It got a bit of a buff in patch 10.0 to -50%
4.) EE is a trade off. I kill white monsters slightly slower at a cost of being able to kill rare monsters and bosses at twice the speed.

Why Dual Totems?
1.) They create a diversion
2.) They raise your DPS
3.) 2 totems is like having a 2nd player by your side.

Why did I choose Arc for totems?
1.) 10% chance to shock!!
2.) The ability to hit multiple monsters with 1 shot.
3.) It can shoot from far.
3.) It always hits unlike spark.
4.) It doesn't need a bunch of costly support gems to be effective.
5.) It sets off EE for more trap dmg!!

Why Zombies and Minion Explode?
1.) More dmg!! Utilize the EE of the totems!
2.) They tank for you.
3.) AT lvl 68, my zombies have 3.4k hp. so they do 1.3k base dmg per explode.
4.) AT lvl 74 Zombies have 7.4k hp doing 2.5k dmg per explode.

Why Dual Curses and What Curses?
1.) Only have to curse monsters once and its there permanently
2.) Elemental Weakness -30% all resists nuff said
3.) Critical Weakness - doubles your chance of critting.
4.) Highly effective on bosses / rares.
*I will note that it may be effectice to use the conductivity curse and utilize shocking.
*This turned out to be true. Use conductivity unless you use increased critical chance support gems, or until your critical chance exceeds 25%.
*Flammibility works great as well, but when using conductivity many times, totems kill the monsters before I even need to throw a fire trap. SO I chose conductivity over fire trap. Fire trap is probably better pvp.


Why Fire Trap as my main attack?
1.) Aside from Molten Shell, it is the single most damaging spell in the game.
2.) Requires little if any support gems.
3.) Traps can be thrown very rapidly.
4.) Can utilize them with dual totems.
5.) Very easy to get this gem.
6.) Takes advantage of EE.
7.) Its AoE and can hit multiple enemies.

What Auras and why?
Clarity - traps use hella mana
Grace - I like not not getting hit and requires little mana
Discipline - Additional Energy Shield

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Passive Tree 106 Pts
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*Obviously your tree will vary a bit depending on wether u want to go for burning, more block, more life, or more armor.

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Gems & Supports (Ideal) Arranged in order of importance
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1.) Arc + Spell Totem + Faster Cast + Elemental Proliferation + Lightning Penetration + Iron Will + Increased Critical Chance + Chain + Reduced Mana
I am not using chain as of yet. I feel it will increase white and blue mob kill speed but decrease rare mob kill speed. It is a matter of preference really.

2.) Fire Trap + Fire Penetration + Iron Will + Increased Critical Chance + Increased Area of Effect + Concentrated Effect + Reduced Mana

3.) Raise Zombie + Minion Life + Minion Speed + Reduced Mana + Minion Damage
Zombies are a key meat shield once you get to merciless. The minion life is the best support to increase the minion instability damage. Minion damage is pretty useless in this build. I chose minion speed becasue there is a greater chance minions will be right next to enemy when they explode

4.) Auras + Reduced Mana

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What gear to look for?
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Since we're stacking resists, we don't need any resist gear! 2 ez!
0.) +skills! +minion gems on helm and +2 fire on weapon!
1.) Life - TONS of life this mod better be on every item you own
2.) Armor - so things like Vaal falling rocks won't 1 hit u!
3.) Run speed on boots. Run speed is very nice. Allows you to run when u need to.
3.) Did I mention HP!?!?!
4.) Chaos resist as 3rd most important mod on gear!
5.) Energy shield! Get it and lots of it.
6.) Cast speed. Faster totems cast the more they can shock!
7.) Spell dmg. Boost ur trap dmg a bit.
8.) +Strength - More dmg w/ Iron will and more hp! 2 for 1!
9.) +dex - if u get +dex you can stack some evasion and refuns 1 or 2 dex passives you took
10.) Mana - Get enough mana and maybe run 1 more auras

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Pros
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1.) Massive dmg w/o sacrificing into many dmg nodes
2.) EZ
3.) No worries vs ANY reflect
4.) Dual curse GREAT for parties
5.) Tank w/ zombie meat shield


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Cons
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1.) No leech :(
2.) Can't break pots on ground
3.) Sore back from carrying groups of noobs.
4.) Sometimes hard to get enemies to trigger traps but not usually
5.) Takes a high lvl to spec into it.

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The Hotkeys - these hotkeys I use you can do whatever you want
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LC - Elemental Weakness
CC - Clarity / Tempest Shield / Grace / DIscipline / Raise Zombie
RC - Arc Totem
Q - Fire Trap 1
W - Fire Trap 2
E - Fire Trap 3
A - Fire Trap 4
S - Critical Weakness / conductivity / flammibility

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How to play
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1.) Item farming in an easy zone such as fellshrine (White Mob)
Run ahead and look for a mob w/ at least 4 enemies
Upon spotting the enemy take a few steps back to avoid ranged attacks.
Hold RC until 2 totems are cast.
Quickly drink 1 mana pot
LC center of mob to curse them all w/ Elemental Weakness
Quickly throw 1-2 traps depending on strength of mobs
Don't forget to detonate if your using remote mine.
Mob should be dead.

2.) You run across Rare Mob in fellshrine
*This is where this build really shines.
Acquire target group
Summon 2 totems directly in front of your char between you and mob
LC to curse whole mob
Quickly press A then S
This will throw a trap and curse them before the trap lands.
Now begin to spam throwing traps.
Detonate if your using remote mine gem.
*mob should die really fast

3.) When Moving in a hard area.
What I do is summon totems in front of me as a lure to see if enemies will come rushing out.
When the enemies come I summon another totem next to previous one and throw a few traps and curse the area. Mobs still die extremely fast.


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Choosing your Quest Rewards
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Use this spreadsheet to help determine the skills you will choose.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0Anunpnd0-mAudHIxazRvZGpqLXdlQ3JfT0hkWVRjV2c&toomany=true

QUESTIONS?

What do you think about flame totem and maybe Searing Longstaff. Therefore leaving out EE
I believe fame totem is a bad idea. It does alot of damage, but its short range will get it killed by the hard hitting ranged mobs IN A3 merciless. I thought about searing touch myself. The EE buff is what gives the traps the HUGE dmg boost. Along w/ the shocked status from ARC. Your talking HUGE multiplicative bonuses in there and this is what this build is based off of. I do think maybe I will test without EE once I can strengthen the arc totems accordingly. 20% quality faster cast + chain + elemental proliferation.

how do you manage to hit things with mines-firetrap?
i tried to do so myself a while back and the delay between seting the mine->delay for trap to set was too much for fast mobs. or do you constatly lure mobs to preset mines?
I have not yet used the mines :( so I am not sure about the delay there. :( I will definately test this and eliminate from build. I was thinking of spamming detonate button while throwing the mines. BEST question so far!

why dont you use elemental equilibrioum on arc totem? with base chance +shock passives that is 30% that each targett will apply the shock debuff to all around him meaning i usually have 3 stacks on all mobs constantly
I do plan on using Elemental Proliferation. I do not have the sockets on my gear at the moment. I believe faster casting is better than elemental proliferation because 1.) You cast the initial totem faster. 2.) Totem casts faster.

how come you don't use the burn passive cluster? the +60% damage on burn synergizes well with searing touch for +130% burn aoe in the ground (and with +ignite if you put that into firetrap). also firetrap has a quality bonus of +burn damage that applies both to ground aoe and burn damage from the trap itself I think burn takes too long to be effective. Throw 1 more trap in the time it takes to burn the enemy to death. Even if the enemy is burning from multiple traps, he only takes damage from 1 trap but it calculated the highest dmg. Just throw another trap, its faster.

Why are you using lvl 10 mine in your calculation, though? There's no point not leveling it.
That was the only solid number I had of remote mine damage. I do not know the higher levels of damage it does. Thanks for damage corrections too.

1. what skill/stat can affect the casting speed for laying traps? Is it casting speed or attack speed or what?Trap speed nodes, but they are too far away and traps cast fast enough in my opinion.

2. does the AOE passive skills effect the AOE splash fire dmg of the fire traps?Yes. That is why I chose them.

3. what dmg modifiers are there for fire traps? Does spell dmg on wands work? Spell dmg from passives, fire dmg from passives?Traps cast a spell so yes spell dmg does work, as does the +elemental dmg and +fire dmg nodes. Note I did not choose those nodes because I chose survivability over mass dmg. Those spell dmg nodes are additive of your gear nodes. You want to go for multiplicative bonuses such as reducing enemies resists -80%, Shocking to inflict more multiplicative dmg, and trying to crit on top of that will take the dmg into the 5,000+ mark. I will do better caulculations once I get better gear but haven't been playing much so...

How to exp at early lvls? I mean 15-31 due Spell totem.
DO not spec into spell totem until level 40-50

Btw.Add some passive at lvl gaps 20-27 28-34 and so.
I TY for feedback will be done.

didnt have spell totem until lvl 38+ or so
I did not get dual totems until late lvl 40's or so. I had 2 bear traps and 3 fire traps early on. But then I learned the fire traps were more effective then the bear traps after EE so I specced into all fire traps.

I been out for a bit. Wow lotta questions I hope I get to all of them! I only got a tiny bit of time b4 the wife gets home and its V-day!

hmm I suppose you're right. what you think about ice spear? it got nice range and slow/freeze monster down also.
Ice spear is nice but shocking is nicer! Plus arc auto hits 3 enemies every shot so it triggers the EE for the traps to do more damage. Add in shock and dmg output is insane.

Any know a good setup for flasks yet?
I'll post my new flask setup on main page.

is it alright to use different totem such as spark totem?
I recommend arc because spark can only hit a single enemy max of 1 time per second. ARc also has greater chance to shock and it will hit every time from far away.

much appreciated. by frost nova does he mean ice nova? cuz i cant find a frost nova gemprolly

What skills did you rely on early and such?
Early on I used frost nova / molten shell + 2 fire traps and 2 bear traps.
I wanted to keep the bear traps, but fire traps do just as much damage and overall kiling speed is faster with 4x fire traps

any way to make bear traps stronger than fire traps + ee ? Or is fire traps the better option generally.
Bear traps are good but later on teh high dex requirement and only single target dmg turns me off of them. Zombies keep the enemy occupied while u throw fire traps so locking them in place doesn't matter.

Current gear as of lvl 75


Gear as it was @lvl 67


Passive Tree as it was at lvl 67

Not sure why no one is responding, this certainly seems quite interesting.

I will be posting a vid of farming merciless fellshrine. I already made the vid but connection is slow so when daughter wakes up, I will post the vid. I am solo farming Lunaris Temple for maps right now very easy. The way I have the build setup right now if for Hardcore because living is everything.

Resists are:
Cold 80%
Fire 80%
Lightning 77%
Chaos -52%

Completed Merciless Piety at lvl 67 in a group of 3. You still have to watch out becasue her ice arrow put me down to 50% life in 1 hit.

It's looking good, nothing wrong about it.

I personally dislike Arc, though. But I assume it would work with Spork as well (despite the nerf).

Also, using Mines on Traps makes them hit hard, but I'd prefer the ability to throw them nevertheless.

And I don't like EE.

Sounds more negatively than it is, these are all somewhat minor adjustments.

€: Oh and I think I would prefer Life regen. Might even sacrifice some of the resistances nodes you grabbed at the Marauder area.

what your counter spell for EE
cuz once you use ARC first mobs get +25% resist to lighting and -50 to else

so u just spam fire traps? or you got also some sort of skill you spam also like

nova or smth?

also do you think using totem decoy+alot hp in it to decoy bosses so u never get hit by them
is good idea?

In fair education, you most definitely were not the first to have this build idea lol. Me and a friend have wanted to try something similar sense searing touch has been around in closed beta.

Its a nice build though, I never thought about the minion explodes, I might incorporate that into my specific build.

This is from a notepad on my desktop, I've been updating it constantly when I see a new good idea. I honestly wished no one would make a thread about this build, because now everyone will try it and some one will inevitably find a way to make it OP and it might get nerfed. but here.







figure I might as well share my ideas as well ^^, lt me know how things go with your char.

my name is SoNice, i'm on HC ofc.

I look forward to seeing the video


P.S. on the second build, I don't know if life gain on hit attached to a zombie gives u life when they explode or hit an enemy.... I figured it was worth looking into because of the possibility of making u an extremely serious tank on top of damage dealing... unless ofcourse there nothing around to make zombies out of... in which case.... RUN rofl

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what your counter spell for EE
cuz once you use ARC first mobs get +25% resist to lighting and -50 to else

Firetraps.

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also do you think using totem decoy+alot hp in it to decoy bosses so u never get hit by them
is good idea?

Not for a dual totem build.
I have found in group play it is beneficial to spam skeletons around the boss and htat will keep the boss busy hititng the skeletons. Usually totem last long enough to tank though with zombie meat shield. When zombies die U can sacrfice a fire trap for a raise zombie gem.

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P.S. on the second build, I don't know if life gain on hit attached to a zombie gives u life when they explode or hit an enemy....

Life gian on hit gives life to zombies as they are thier own identity. That is the drawback to this build as you cannot leech with it.

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items
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searing touch

I thought about using searing touch myself, but I just don't think its worth it. You sacrifice the much needed block and resists, and later on daggers with +2 skills and crit chance with spell dmg will far outweigh the searing touch +2 to fire skills. Searing touch is for a fireball build

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auras
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anger
discipline
clarity
grace
determination

I am not sure why you want all those auras? Fire trap will soon be costing me 100 mana per cast. Can't run all those auras w/ It. I am running a low level clarity aura and thats it. The Auras I wish I could use are:
Discipline, and Tempest Shield.

ANger does not do any more dmg.
Grace is for evasion which is useless for str/intel build
Determination maybe but again a diamond flask is better.

*note:
I did start running maps now. I tried out a few more curses. Enfeeble and Temp Chains. Both seems not very effective and I don't really feel safer using either of those. SO I went back to critical weakness. I will prolly try conductivity for additional chance to shock tonight and see if I like that better than critical weakness. I will post a vid showing solo of lunaris temple prolly tomorrow night as thats the area I have been running to gather maps. Once I get about 10 maps I will begin to solo run maps.

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YeahPete wrote:

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what your counter spell for EE
cuz once you use ARC first mobs get +25% resist to lighting and -50 to else

Firetraps.

"

also do you think using totem decoy+alot hp in it to decoy bosses so u never get hit by them
is good idea?

Not for a dual totem build.
I have found in group play it is beneficial to spam skeletons around the boss and htat will keep the boss busy hititng the skeletons. Usually totem last long enough to tank though with zombie meat shield. When zombies die U can sacrfice a fire trap for a raise zombie gem.

"

P.S. on the second build, I don't know if life gain on hit attached to a zombie gives u life when they explode or hit an enemy....

Life gian on hit gives life to zombies as they are thier own identity. That is the drawback to this build as you cannot leech with it.

"

items
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searing touch

I thought about using searing touch myself, but I just don't think its worth it. You sacrifice the much needed block and resists, and later on daggers with +2 skills and crit chance with spell dmg will far outweigh the searing touch +2 to fire skills. Searing touch is for a fireball build

"

auras
----------------
anger
discipline
clarity
grace
determination

I am not sure why you want all those auras? Fire trap will soon be costing me 100 mana per cast. Can't run all those auras w/ It. I am running a low level clarity aura and thats it. The Auras I wish I could use are:
Discipline, and Tempest Shield.

ANger does not do any more dmg.
Grace is for evasion which is useless for str/intel build
Determination maybe but again a diamond flask is better.

*note:
I did start running maps now. I tried out a few more curses. Enfeeble and Temp Chains. Both seems not very effective and I don't really feel safer using either of those. SO I went back to critical weakness. I will prolly try conductivity for additional chance to shock tonight and see if I like that better than critical weakness. I will post a vid showing solo of lunaris temple prolly tomorrow night as thats the area I have been running to gather maps. Once I get about 10 maps I will begin to solo run maps.

lvl 60 + with the nodes I have for my build u gain like 50+ mana per second and you will have about 2k+ mana. all of those aura's will take roughly 1k-1.5k and the mana regen will keep ur mana pool up and u will always have enough to spam skills. believe it :), and if u play correctly staff is possible.