[2.0] Mysterise's 'Demon King' Leech Tank | HC | Face-tanks insane maps + bosses

With a reworked leech system in 2.0 and having loved tanks in every game I play and character I make, I decided to make a tank that uses leech as its core survival mechanic. Before we get into the theory-craft, we should get to know the new revamped leech and how it works.

The new leech system is broken down into three areas:
the % amount of your damage which you leech,
the rate at which your leech is applied onto your health per second, and
the maximum rate at which your life leech can apply per second.
This is slightly confusing and doesn't say too much, so I'll break it down:







Starting off the theory-crafting, I searched around for any uniques that accomplishes and synergises with my goal of a leech-tank.



Jack, the Axe immediately caught my eye with its "2% of Physical Attack Damage Leeched as Life" which is the largest life leech mod in the whole of PoE (as of time of writing). Its damage is decent but not the best, however it is made up for the fact that it also has a "Causes Bleeding on Hit" mod that is very often looked-over and underappreciated with the new release of the Bloodlust support gem. It also has a very nicely-fitting demonic theme, which can be seen through the art and the voice-lines which you will experience when you use it in-game.



Bloodlust is an extremely good gem with this build, as we focus on stacking Physical Damage for our leech to be based off. It provides a more multiplier of our Physical Damage on bleeding enemies, however it disallows our main skill to cause bleeding. We can circumvent this through automatically applying bleed with the counter-attacks, Vengeance and Reckoning, as well as manually applying bleed through Leap Slam.



"But wait, Mysterise - what about the 50% reduced Life Leech Rate on Jack, The Axe?". I did think about that for awhile, and it did really put me off. However, 2% life leech and causing bleeding on hit are too good to pass up. The life leech rate was still a glaring issue however, and so I found Cherrubim's Maleficence.



Cherrubim's is an amazing chest with this build. Not only does it provide high life, armour and evasion, it provides a massive 100% Life Leech Rate. This effectively doubles our life leech per second, or paired with Jack, the Axe, cancels out the 50% reduced Life Leech Rate downside and still provides a large 50% increased Life Leech Rate. The only 'wasted' modifier is the %increased Chaos Damage, however it's not much of a waste and you could think of it as buffing your Chaos Golem, which will be discussed further along this section. Combine Cherrubim's with your passive tree and gear, you can achieve 90% increased Life Leech Rate after Jack, the Axe's 50% Life Leech Rate reduction.

Now, for the main skill. As we are using Jack, the Axe (and the fact that we're making a dedicated tank), we will have to choose a melee skill. Cyclone is the best option here, for multiple reasons (not including the fact that it's fotm):



It allows indefinite movement while you are attacking: This is huge as we are making a leech-based tank. For us to survive, we must leech, and if we do not always leech, especially in dangerous situations, then we are exposed and vulnerable. Melee skills that do not allow movement cannot leech when they are moving as they can't hit anything.

It provides stun immunity during usage: Not only does this save you several points from speccing into Unwavering Stance, but by not going US we can benefit off the evasion that Cherrubim's Maleficence provides, and the accuracy reduction from Enfeeble.

It has innate Area of Effect: This not only allows us to save a socket from not having to use Melee Splash, the AoE provided allows us to hit multiple enemies, meaning that we can stack instances of life leech extremely effectively.



Blood Rage is the perfect buff to supplement our build - it provides a massive 1.2% Physical Attack Damage life leech, as well as a decent attack speed buff and a chance to gain frenzy charges, boosting your damage further by providing attack speed and a more multiplier. Attack speed is amazing with this build, as it allows multiple instances of leech to stack faster and thus build up your life leeched per second much faster.

The Glaring Issue
Life leech is amazing against normal packs and bosses that do not one-shot you, but what about bosses that do one-shot you?


Enfeeble: Provides a 30% less damage modifier as well as reduced crit chance and damage, and reduced accuracy.


Fortify: Provides a 20% reduced damage taken buff. The Rampart cluster in the passive tree boost this to 23% reduced damage.


6 Endurance charges: Provides 24% reduced physical damage taken with 6 endurance charges, and possibly overcapping your elemental resists, fortifying your defences against resist-removing curses.


Chaos Golem: Provides 4% reduced physical damage taken. It is calculated alongside armour and endurance charge physical mitigation, meaning that 4% gets amplified to around 15% physical reduction, give or take depending on your armour.


Molten Shell provides a large amount of flat armour which will scale with your %armour nodes on the passive tree as well as endurance charges and Chaos Golem.

As with all builds, there are pros and cons to consider when choosing your build.

Pros
- Extremely tanky and consistent at being tanky - I'd put it alongside the tankiest builds in the game if I had the same quality gear like the other maxed out tanks. However, unlike most other tanks, this build is consistent for all damage types and skills. There are no weaknesses aside from one-shots, which almost all tank builds are prone to regardless.
- Doesn't require expensive gear - There are no expensive uniques (or specifically rolled rares) required for this build - as of time of writing Cherrubim's Maleficence happens to be the most expensive unique in my build and even then is only 10 chaos or less.
- Can do all map mods - Aside from the newly introduced map mod that prevents leeching, introduced on the day this guide was written (4/08/2015 - DD/MM/YYYY)
- Can do all map bosses - Well, I'd assume it can. So far at level 87 I haven't gotten to experience bosses higher-tier maps, however I have successfully attempted all bosses without failure (death). This includes Jungle Valley, Poorjoy's Asylum, Pit, Labyrinth, Torture Chamber, Crematorium etc, even with damage mods.
- Anxiety free - The risk of death or loss of exp is almost nonexistant unless you decide to do something extremely stupid such as not bother leeching with Cyclone. Even then, you have counter-attacks to leech for you and other forms of mitigation that you probably won't even die afking in 90% of scenarios.
- Themed to the point of satisfaction - The build is perfectly themed and everything works towards the appearance of a Demon King - there is even a Demon King set that i'd like to think was dedicated to the build (which it wasn't)

Cons
- Mediocre damage - As we are mainly focused on survivability (and as a result, using 1h + shield), our DPS is sub-par compared to other builds. In my eyes however, this is OK and negligible as you can survive almost all content easily, so all it takes is a little bit more time.
- The newly introduced cannot leech map mod somewhat counters the build - It's still just one map mod though. Even then, you may be able to replace Bloodlust with LGoH and still have decent survivability.
- Requires you to attack for maximum survivability - Unlike some other tank builds, you cannot AFK in very dangerous situations as your main source of survivability - leech - comes from attacking. However, in moderately dangerous situations you may be able to AFK as you have counter-attacks to leech for you and other forms of mitigation, as well as natural regeneration.

52 points
69 points

level 87
level 100

Weapon Switch



The only necessary items required for this build is Jack, the Axe and Cherrubim's. A great shield may be able to replace Lioneye's Remorse, however I prefer the additional flat damage reduction to projectiles so I chose to use it.

I highly suggest obtaining a Saffell's Frame and another Jack, the Axe to put in your offhand slots. This allows you to quickly adapt to situations when needed.

For gear, I highly recommend going out of your way for Chaos Resistance as Chaos damage can get quite scary in high-level maps if you have negative resists.

For flasks, I find running one Seething Divine of Staunching to be enough as a panic button - you do not need normal life flasks as your leech will heal for more than enough for life flasks to be noticeable. The other 4 flask slots I would recommend a Ruby of Warding, Topaz of Grounding, Sapphire of Heat and Granite of Iron Skin. If you can afford one, you may choose to replace both the Sapphire and Granite flasks with a Taste of Hate - be careful that Taste of Hate does not grant freeze/chill immunity unlike the Sapphire of Heat though. You may then run an Atziri's Promise for more damage and leech when required.

Chest - Main skill (Cyclone) - 5l/6l
Cyclone - Fortify - Melee Physical - Bloodlust - Conc Effect - Faster Attacks

"Wait, Mysterise, why aren't you using Added Fire Damage instead of X?"
I often asked myself this, and the reason is that while Added Fire does provide a nice damage boost without any conditions attached like Conc Effect, it provides fire damage, not physical. We cannot leech off fire damage, and also the damage is much worse against mobs with fire resistance or in maps with Elemental Equilibrium.

Any 4-link gear - CWDT
Cast When Damage Taken - Enfeeble - Molten Shell - Summon Chaos Golem

Any 4-link gear - Counter-attacks
Vengeance - Reckoning - Melee Phys - Life Leech

Any 4-link gear - Buffs
Blood Rage - Vaal Haste - Increased Duration - Faster Casting

Weapon - Leap Slam
Leap Slam - Faster Attacks - Fortify

Shield - Enduring Cry
Enduring Cry - Increased AoE - Increased Duration

Normal: Oak - 40 flat life is nothing to scoff at. With the endgame tree, you'll be getting 247% increased maximum life. That 40 flat HP gives us a total of 138.8 hp (40 + 40*2.47), which can be the difference between getting one shot or surviving with enough hp to quickly pot up and leech back.

Cruel: Oak - 18% increased Physical Damage not only scales our damage, but buffs our leech. Other modifiers such as Bloodlust and Melee Physical further scales off this bonus.

Merciless: Oak - 1 additional maxmimum endurance charge nets us 4% additional Physical mitigation, 0.2% extra life regen (from the passive tree), and 4% additional elemental resistance over-cap. These are all very beneficial stats that greatly improve our survivability.

52 points
69 points

Very brief levelling guide for now, sorry! The tree is very flexible, there aren't any nodes that you must take first, except for Resolute Technique and Blood Magic which I recommend rushing. Also, note the +30 dex and int nodes i've taken on the tree. Take them when you need the stats, and if you need more then just try to get some on your gear.

Start with groundslam/sweep until you can use cyclone, follow the 52 points tree.

Use the generic levelling uniques such as Goldrim and 2h levelling uniques i.e. Hrimnor's Hymn or Geofri's Baptism until you reach level 45. You should have finished or be close to finishing the 52 point tree.

Now, obtain a Blood Reaper. This will be your main weapon all the way until you can use a Jack. Follow the 69 point tree. You should be around level 60 or so when you have finished that tree.

Then, start building towards the 87 point tree (located in passive trees section)

DD/MM/YY
6/08/15 - Added video of a Poorjoy's Asylum run.
6/08/15 - Used the spoiler element to 'hide' the Poorjoy's image as it was quite large.
6/08/15 - Added flasks to the gear section.
10/08/15 - Died while doing a Poorjoy's run! This was due to my own mistake - jumped into a pack, got distracted and forgot to Cyclone (thus not leeching) as I was fairly comfortable farming Poorjoy's for profit. I don't think this should discredit the build - it still is extremely strong and it is still very HC viable (even for Poorjoy's running) provided that you make sure that you remember to attack in dangerous situations. I had an amazing run with the build and I still would highly recommend it for players who love tanks and can trade some DPS for massive survivability.
24/10/15 - Added rough levelling section and 52/69 point versions of the skill tree.