(Updated!) [1.2] EE Ball Lightning/Ice Spear Build with AA/MoM (Cloak of Defiance)

Would you recommend starting the new league with this build?

This build looks really fun, I might give something similar a spin and see how it turns out :)

"

darkmatch wrote:

Would you recommend starting the new league with this build?

I'm planning on it. :)

Btw, any thoughts on using power charges? The extra crit -> more shocking with orb lightning -> more damage from ice spear too, no?

Hi ... hum it miss me a trad what is EE? ^^'

Its Elemental Equilibrium, which is a passive on the tree.

Enemies you hit with Elemental Damage temporarily get +25% Resistances to those Elements and -50% Resistances to other Elements.

So we hit with lightning and follow up with fire when the mob goes -50% resist.

"

patricklightsmith wrote:

So I had wanted to do this Build as well and tested LMP ball lightning to shock and provide curses. The biggest problem I encountered was that the ball lightnings were slower than the ice spears meaning I was trying to apply damage to un-shocked and un-cursed mobs. I also looked a Cold Snap or glacial cascade as a single target but am not sure of thier effectiveness.

This was an issue I was worried about too – if you put increased AoE on Ball Lightning, would that help it to reach targets more quickly? As in, it won't travel faster, but with the larger AoE it will reach the edge of the screen sooner. I'll try to test some different options later, I hope it's not going to make the build unviable.

"

Theaisa wrote:

Btw, any thoughts on using power charges? The extra crit -> more shocking with orb lightning -> more damage from ice spear too, no?

Yes, personally I think power charges is a good idea for this build. You can get Ice Spear above 90% crit chance (not including Critical Weakness) if you invest in the strong crit passives in Templar, Witch and Shadow, and Ball Lightning around 35% chance. The shock would provide a 50% damage boost and result in much longer freezes.

Here's a level 75-ish tree I've planned. You could drop some crit nodes as the chance with Ice Spear is still massive, but unfortunately most of the crit multiplier is mixed in with chance nodes. For higher levels I'd probably pick up block + spell block nodes if you can invest in spell block uniques. If you go that option, you could probably drop a bit of life as you'll be tanky. (Depending on your priorities of course.)

hey Vultigh, I would like to use skill tree, what support gems would you use for ice spear?

ice spear + LMP + PCoC + Ice pen + Faster Casting?

thanks

In the past, I really liked Added chaos damage with Ice Spear. It provided a lot more damage than Cold Penetration. I've also played around with Added Lightning / Cold damage, but chaos just worked way better.

"

crucialp wrote:

hey Vultigh, I would like to use skill tree, what support gems would you use for ice spear?

ice spear + LMP + PCoC + Ice pen + Faster Casting?

thanks

That setup should work well!

"

_Elminister_ wrote:

In the past, I really liked Added chaos damage with Ice Spear. It provided a lot more damage than Cold Penetration. I've also played around with Added Lightning / Cold damage, but chaos just worked way better.

Interesting, that's worth a try. I guess it would result in less freeze duration on bosses, but conversely you'd take less reflect damage. I'd give that a try for sure.