Went a bit differently from OP's build but still freezing pulse inquisitor.
Chose not to travel to VP and using Atziri's acuity for insta leech with warlord's mark blasphemy and went to Pious path on ascendancy for extra mana regen + es regen.
Obivously only if u can afford acuitys and insta leech imo wasnt really required untill t15+ maps since everything just dies/freezes instantly.
There are 30 pages so I'm sorry if I missed something, but could you please upload a leveling tree? I'm not sure what to do while leveling since the end tree is CI. I understand if progressive leveling trees (20>40>60) are a pain, but could you give just 1 leveling tree right before the switch to CI? I'm still pretty bad with the tree and efficiency :(
I play HC so I just want to make sure I'm staying safe enough to not die.
I appreciate your time even if you can't put a leveling tree up! Thanks so much for an awesome guide.
I would like to see a passive tree for leveling too. Im actually following the level 90 one but in hc its so squishy.
Hey man, the only thing I could think of right now (until OP gives us anything) is to just get the HP node right above witch & "Annihilation" and also the HP node right under "retribution" next to Templar, and "Heart and Soul" if you need that for HP.
I think that'll be the same thing the OP says or anyone else who is efficient with the tree.
Went a bit differently from OP's build but still freezing pulse inquisitor.
Chose not to travel to VP and using Atziri's acuity for insta leech with warlord's mark blasphemy and went to Pious path on ascendancy for extra mana regen + es regen.
Obivously only if u can afford acuitys and insta leech imo wasnt really required untill t15+ maps since everything just dies/freezes instantly.
Thats an interesting approach, how much DPS you have? And ES from just 4 pieces of equip?
Playing actual at lvl 56 and have some problems with the Curse Setup.
Even as i have Herald of Ice active (linked with curse on hit and assassins mark) i see nearly NEVER any assassins mark curse on mobs ...
Any ideas? The linked warlords mark from cast when damage taken setup will work if i get hit.
@NK_Artega: Could you make an own passive build tree to see how you will use your passive skill points? I Mean you wrote you don't like the soul siphon points, but how will you reach vaal pact? etc.
You need to crit, and from a quick check on your char, you don't have any crit stat on dagger and shield, plus you still use a 4L chest. I suggest you read gear and mandatory gear sections again and focus on improving all your items accordingly.
Hmm my dagger still have 80% global critical strike chance, is that the wrong crit? Sry dont play PoE for long yet ;) And this is the highest breach char, so no money available for better equip (still just have about 6 chaos orbs for later). Sure the dagger has no additional crit on it or spell damage ... but better than nothing ;)
Hmm my dagger still have 80% global critical strike chance, is that the wrong crit? Sry dont play PoE for long yet ;) And this is the highest breach char, so no money available for better equip (still just have about 6 chaos orbs for later). Sure the dagger has no additional crit on it or spell damage ... but better than nothing ;)
Anyway thx for answering!
Its not a wrong crit, its just really alone there... ;) You can filter daggers for "crit chance for spells" > 140 + spell damage on poe.trade, there is enough under 5c you can use right now. But pretty much all your equip is really, i mean really bad, even for self found. You can buy big upgrade for 1c for pretty much any slot, except amulet.
Went a bit differently from OP's build but still freezing pulse inquisitor.
Chose not to travel to VP and using Atziri's acuity for insta leech with warlord's mark blasphemy and went to Pious path on ascendancy for extra mana regen + es regen.
Obivously only if u can afford acuitys and insta leech imo wasnt really required untill t15+ maps since everything just dies/freezes instantly.
Thats an interesting approach, how much DPS you have? And ES from just 4 pieces of equip?
ES is exactly 10k now and dps on concentrated ground with power charges 266k and goes up to 330k with flasks.
This guide is based on the Freezing Pulse Inquisitor build I played on Essence League totally updated for Breach League. Check the following highlights to see if you're interested in:
- Perma-freeze everything including T15 Core Malacai, T15 Colosseum Daresso, T15 Abyss Kaom.
- Up to 250K Freezing Pulse DPS for single target and 170K using LMP for great clear speed.
- Crit based build, your hits are almost always critical strikes.
- Thanks to Inevitable Judgement and because you always crit, enemies resistances are set to 0%.
- Incredibly safe build thanks to perma-freeze and CI with almost 10K Energy Shield life pool with instant replenish thanks to Vaal Pact & Warlord's Mark.
- Medium budget build (around 3-4 Exalted). You could start on low budget and improve your gear progressively while you earn currency.
- Easy deathless Normal Atziri
If you want to see this build in action, check out the following video:
If you have any questions or improvements for this build, please feel free to leave a comment, I will really appreciate it.
UPDATE! Incredible new unique for this build on 2.5 release!
What's new? (30/11/2016)
Spoiler
30/11/2016: Update after patch notes for 2.5 version.
23/10/2016: Full changes on guide after being able to complete all maps from atlas up to Tier 15. Perma-freeze on all T15 bosses achieved.
30/08/2016: First version of this guide.
- This build is created exclusively based on Freezing Pulse skill gem: Critical Strike Chance and Freeze capabilities were the main concerns when deciding everything else around this build.
- With only 4 Power Charges we crit all the time. If PC are not available in any case (solo boss fights) a Diamond Flask will do the job.
- Your damage is 100% cold elemental damage and enemies resistances should be consider 0% thanks to "Inevitable Judgement" ascendancy point because you always crit.
- I choose dagger as main weapon instead of a wand for several reasons:
1. Great Crit Chance implicit and all required affixes are available.
2. Whirling Blades for mobility, best movement skill imo.
3. Most important, you can take full advantage of "Instruments of Virtue" ascendancy point thanks to Whirling Blades: 30% inc. Cast Speed for 4 seconds after each use.
- About defences, most important thing is that you perma-freeze everything.
- We rely on CI with a 9.5-10K Energy Shield pool. Plus Vaal Pact with Warlord's Mark for instant ES replenish.
- Elemental reflect mobs are not a problem thanks to high ES pool and a Sapphire Flask used when needed. No workaround mechanism are necessary.
- CWDT + Frost Wall gives the necessary time and space to avoid damage and synergies perfect with the build. FP allow us to attack from behind the wall and Whirling Blades can moves through them.
Why Ascendancy INQUISITOR is perfect for Freezing Pulse?
- Inevitable Judgment: all enemies resistances are set to 0% because you always crit.
- Instruments of Virtue: because we use daggers w/ Whirling Blades, a constant +30% inc. Spell Damage plus +30% inc. Cast Speed is applied.
- Righteous Providence: +100% inc. Crit Chance for first hit (no elemental status ailments) and +45% inc. Crit Multiplier after first hit (against frozen/chilled enemies).
- Augury of Penitence: nearby enemies deal 8% LESS elemental damage plus taking 16% inc. elemental damage. This means a final multiplier after hit and should be consider x1.16 damage from our DPS tooltip because mob resistances are set to 0%.
Mandatory Gear:
- Dagger: We use one high Crit implicit daggers with the following affixes:
[prefix] Adds # - # Cold Damage to Spells
[suffix] #% increased Critical Strike Chance for Spells
[prefix] #% increased Spell Damage
[suffix] #% increased Global Critical Strike Multiplier
First two are completely mandatory, next two are really important for getting a great DPS output.
- Gloves: I choose Maligaro's Virtuosity for the extra Crit Chance/Multi. Maybe this unique should not be consider mandatory, but helps me a lot reaching the desired DPS output. Just consider that Crit Chance plus damage dealt defines our Freezing capabilities.
- Ring: Valyrium Moonstone Ring is mandatory to deal with Stuns. Making Stun Threshold based on our high Energy Shield pool, allows us to be safe from stunning hits in most cases.
- Body Armour: a 6L with BBBBBG is needed. Ideally a high Energy Shield armour will be the best. Any 6L chest will be the most expensive item in our gear, and if you try to keep your budget low, I suggest you look for corrupted ones, with already 6L color combination BBBBBG, and then choose the best ES you can get with your budget.
Truly important considerations about Freezing Pulse mechanics:
Freezing Pulse mechanics have some special considerations that you will need to keep in mind making this build:
Spoiler
- CHANCE TO FREEZE: main objective for this build is that almost all hits deal critical strikes. This is mandatory because a critical strike has an inherent 100% chance to freeze. But, dealing a critical strike doesn't mean you will freeze the enemy. It will depends on this: "Base freeze duration is 60 milliseconds for every 1% of the target's maximum life (before party scaling) dealt by Cold damage, up to a maximum of 50%. If the duration would be below 0.3 seconds, the freeze effect is not applied". So, the amount of damage dealt is extremely important for achieving perma-freeze on enemies.
- FREEZE DURATION: any freeze duration modifier applies BEFORE Freeze Threshold is calculated. So, this is maybe the most important modifier after Crit Chance. You can't scale your damage after certain point, so this modifier allows you to multiply your damage for freeze threshold considerations easily without compromising anything else. The keystone here is using 5 jewels sockets with freeze duration increase in all jewels. A final freeze duration increase around +85% means a x1.85 damage increase for freeze threshold considerations.
- PROJECTILE SPEED: Freezing Pulse damage is reduced while the projectile travels away from the caster. So, projectile speed not only defines how fast the projectile travels, it also determinate how far it will travel and how much damage it will do as it travels. A Q20 Freezing Pulse gem is totally mandatory for getting the projectile speed needed for effective clear speed.
- AMOUNT OF PROJECTILES: the projectile quantity determinate the radius of the FP skill. Thanks to Lesser Multiple Projectiles support gem, the angle of the skill will be enough for achieving a great clear speed. But LMP will decrease DPS output, so, when dealing with particularly high life bosses, is strongly recommended to hot swap with Slower Projectiles support gem.
When dealing with high life bosses, is recommended to hot swap LMP with Slower Projectile support gem for huge damage boost.
In case of dealing with "Cannot be frozen" bosses, you should exchange Increased Critical Damage with Elemental Focus for another huge damage boost (drawback from EF is not a problem then because you can't freeze them anyway).
Movement skill:
- WHIRLING BLADES, Faster Attacks.
Auras:
- CLARITY: level this gem according to your mana needs, Level 15 in my case.
- DISCIPLINE: for higher ES pool
- HERALD OF ICE + Curse on Hit + Assassin's Mark + Warlord's Mark: dual curse spread setup for getting our 4 Power Charges and constant ES instant replenish thanks to WM.
When dealing with high life bosses, is recommended to swap HoI setup for instant ES replenish with BLASPHEMY + Warlord's Mark.
Vaal setup is focused on boss fights: Vaal Discipline for huge ES boost, Vaal Clarity for no mana cost on skills when needed (if you use Blasphemy + Warlord's Mark then you will not need it) and most important, Vaal Lightning Trap to create shocking ground for an extra 50% increased damage taken on enemies. This is a huge improvement for damage and most important, perma-freeze capabilities.
- Diamond Flask is mandatory to sustain Crit Chance on boss fights (you can't rely on Power Charges).
- Sapphire Flask is mandatory to deal with elemental reflect mobs.
- Mandatory Affixes: Remove Bleeding, Remove Freeze & Remove Burning (burning ground map mod could be dangerous because prevent ES replenish).
- I don't consider the other choices as mandatory, so I just indicate why I choose them: Silver Flask (Cast Speed boost), Granite Flask of Iron Skin (great Physical Damage Reduction) and Stibnite Flask (Blind effect with 50% chance to hit reduction).
Last utility flask is not mandatory at all, and should be exchange with other utility flasks based on different situations: Ruby/Topaz/Sapphire, etc.
Important stats:
- All Mandatory gear explained at the beginning of this guide.
- Cap elemental resistances.
- +25/30% Movement speed from boots.
- Best ES you can get from each piece of gear: helmet and shield are the most important ones and inc. ES from amulet.
- +100% Crit Chance to spells from shield. Ideally, Spell Damage and/or Cast Speed, but not mandatory.
- Critical Strike Chance from ring and amulet.
- Some Mana Regeneration from gear, I pick new Blue Pearl Amulet for implicit +50% inc. Mana Regen.
Jewel stats:
- Freeze Duration from all jewels: huge multiplier boost for Freeze Threshold, totally mandatory to sustain perma-freeze capabilities on hardest bosses.
- Any damage boost like Cold Damage, Crit Multi and/or Spell Damage.
- Cast Speed could be useful too, but any of the previous one are preferred because affects directly Freeze Threshold.
Enchantments:
I strongly suggest to pick a normal iLvl +81 Hubris Circlet enchanted with 40% increased Freezing Pulse Damage and then craft best ES you could get. Any other enchant doesn't affects directly Freeze Threshold and should be consider poor choices.
This section describes general considerations and specific tips after dealing with all map bosses from all tiers T1-T15.
General Considerations while mapping:
Spoiler
* I didn't play any map on party, so all bosses fights were solo.
* When mapping and mostly on high tiers, a good flask management is completely mandatory. You can't just run any map without taking special considerations on which flasks to use and when.
* If you run -x% resistances or elemental weakness mod, you need Bismuth flask as one of your utility flask. Cap elemental resistances is always mandatory.
* If you run extra damage as fire/cold/lightning mod, you need the particular flask to deal with Ruby/Sapphire/Topaz.
* Some particular bosses require specific flasks, I assume some previous knowledge on bosses from 2.3 and explain here changes related with new bosses from 2.4 or changes from this expansion. If a boss have fire damage (like new Colonnade) carry a Ruby with you, and so on.
* If you can, try to record your first fight with new bosses and if things go wrong, try to figure it out what happened. This helps me a lot to learn how to deal with it on next fight. Try to learn which attacks should be avoided from particular bosses.
* Take into consideration that some map mods could reduce your freeze capabilities: enfeeble (because damage reduction), any modifier to boss life (because freeze threshold calculation), "cannot inflict elemental status alignment" and new one, "cannot be slowed below base speed" (because freeze is basically set speed to zero).
General Rules against bosses:
Spoiler
* Swap to Slower Projectiles will always increase your damage a lot, improving your Freeze capabilities too. When you're not sure you can freeze a boss with LMP, make the swap.
* HoI setup is useless against bosses, so is strongly recommended you switch to Blasphemy + Warlord's Mark for instant ES replenish that will increase your survivability a lot.
* If you deal with bosses that "Cannot be frozen" exchange Increased Critical Damage with Elemental Focus for damage boost, drawback from EF is not a problem here because you can't freeze them anyway.
Particular considerations for specific maps:
TIER 1 TO 12:
Spoiler
Everything is really easy here, all bosses can be perma-freeze and damage output is really high for quick fights. Warlord's Mark will be great too for ES replenish when you feel you need it.
* Orchard: only boss that "Cannot be Frozen". Death Ray is activated when you're near, so you can go with Faster Projectiles instead of LMP for keeping the fight away from you. Elemental Focus swap is welcome for extra damage.
* Ivory Temple: at least some of the spawn cannot be frozen, and the arena is crowded with mobs, I suggest you go with LMP + Elemental Focus. And consider Blasphemy + Warlord's Mark mandatory.
TIER 13:
Spoiler
Same rules apply, two bosses are freeze immune, the rest are just straight-forward fights.
* Plaza: maybe the worst boss to deal with using this build. Cannot be Frozen and Death Ray when you try to reach her. There's no truly safe approach here, so I choose to swap Slower Projectiles + Elemental Focus and use Blasphemy + Warlord's Mark. Deathless cannot be assured using this strategy.
* Gorge: boss "Cannot be Slowed". This is practically the same as frozen, because freeze is just another way to say that speed on enemies are set to zero. Same rules apply: SP + EF and Blasphemy + WM.
TIER 14:
Spoiler
Really easy tier. No problem at all to perma-freeze all bosses. Don't see any particular consideration to take into account.
TIER 15:
Spoiler
Just can't believe it. I write the new version of this guide after dealing with all T15 bosses, but I can't imagine that will be viable to perma-freeze Kaom, Daresso and Malacai.
* Abyss: really easy one, perma-freeze and that's it.
* Colosseum: another strange case here. You can perma-freeze him, but then he reach certain life thresholds and becomes immune for quite some time until you can hit him again. Can't assure why. In any case, you perma-freeze, then move around for some seconds and repeat.
* Core: All guardians can be perma-freeze, they're plain easy to deal with. Then, you perma-freeze Malacai (again, can't believe it). When he reach his life thresholds, you have to allow him to loose freeze so he becomes immune and you perma-freeze Piety. Then again, you perma-freeze Malacai. Second stage is just the same as usual, easiest part is when you can hit him because you perma-freeze and you don't have to avoid attacks.
* Overgrown Ruin: spawn change here and I only run it once. In that case I manage to freeze and kill warband leader with no problem at all, but can't assure that some spawns could be immune to freeze or some combinations could be hard to deal with.
* Dark Forest: another easy one, perma-freeze and kill boss avoiding wolf stage.
Just a few tips, I will try to improve this section later on:
- Go all the way with Freezing Pulse, is truly great for levelling. Nice damage plus freeze capabilities.
- At level 10, use Axiom Perpetuum Bronze Sceptre.
- At level 32, switch to Bitterdream Shadow Sceptre for huge improvement thanks to all implicit support gems on sceptre.
- I found useful these three levelling uniques: Lochtonial Caress Iron Gauntlets, Asenath's Mark Iron Circlet and Mutewind Whispersteps Serpentscale Boots.
- First focus on life and rely on hybrid Life/ES pool. Later on move to CI and full ES. While going hybrid, you will need some workaround against elemental reflect mobs in addition to Sapphire Flask, I used: ICE TRAP + Concentrated Effect + Added Cold Damage + Trap and Mine Damage.
Bandits:
- Normal: Kill All.
- Cruel: Kill All.
- Merciless: Alira for +1 Max Power Charges (at the cost of just 1 skill point).
Freezing Pulse (w/ Slower Projectiles) DPS Tooltip with Charges and/or Diamond Flask and both Instruments of Virtue effects:
Freezing Pulse (w/ LMP) DPS Tooltip with Charges and flasks and both Instruments of Virtue effects:
Normal Atziri tips:
This build is great for deathless Normal Atziri:
- For all boss fights, switch to Slower Projectiles + Elemental Focus because none of them could be frozen and use Blasphemy + Warlord's Mark.
- For trio, go first for Q'ura, after that, A'alai and finally Y'ara'az. You have to avoid hitting Y'ara'az during his reflect fire-stage.
- Atziri is really straight-forward, I prefer to throw a Vaal Lightning Trap on each mirror stage for a fast clean kill.
Other builds:
My intention is to make a new build every league. In general, I wanted to make budget league starter builds that allows to play almost the entire content of the game and complete all the challenges in league. Here's the link to the other ones:
