[3.0] The Azure Knight, Assassin version (Blade Flurry/Frost Blades/Life/Crit/Conversion)

this build is awesome and fum also i'm using it on the Xbox one and its doing great even without trading

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Bristoling wrote:

Good to hear that you had fun with the build. For 150-200c, this is quite good performace imo. Shame that 6 linking didn't work out for you, I'm trying to 6 link mine as well (using corrupted rare atm, spent 150c on fuses so far on Perfect Form).

PS: had a quick look at the PoB code, your cold resist isn't the highest one, so Wise Oak bonus doesn't actually work, but I understand you picked it for the resists anyway :)

I got 6L belly of the beast for my wanderer, so i tried Shaper again with belly. On 6L it is quite easy, damage increase with 6th link is insane, he is down. This build can be definetly played as assassin, you get perma power charge even during boss fights, but you have to handle Intelligence requirments for gems.

What tooltip DPS should I shoot for on BF?

So far I'm enjoying the build using Frost Blades. But I'm having significant problems with survivability.

I'm currently level 52 in Act 7, and I'm getting absolutely obliterated by absolutely everything. Bosses have been nearly one-shotting me throughout Acts 6 and 7, and it doesn't take much more for trash to kill me. I have to pop a life flask after almost every hit I take. I do have capped resists, and I'm keeping my evade over 50%. For reference my life is just under 1800.

I'm not sure what else I can do. I have to essentially res-rush every boss I fight, and that really ruins the fun of the game.

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What tooltip DPS should I shoot for on BF?

Depends on your claws, and I really mean it. With a fast attacking claw (say 1.84), that has 270 dps, your tooltip will be much lower then with a slow attacking (1.5) claw with similar dps.
Also, getting quality on your Doryani's/Singularity/offhand will also boost your tooltip, even if offhand weapon isn't used for attacking.

Anyway, with Abyssus on, Ice Golem active and auras on (no other buffs or flasks active) and 19/0 gems you should have over 4k with 250 dps Wasp Nest and decent gear, over 5k with 270 dps Touch of Anquish (real dps difference is only around 5% though), and with 20/20 gems this would be close to 5k and over 6k for Wasp/ToA respectively.
Those are numbers with AoE gem on, not Concentrated Effect. Real numbers might differ based on your gear, level and tree.

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I'm currently level 52 in Act 7, and I'm getting absolutely obliterated by absolutely everything. Bosses have been nearly one-shotting me throughout Acts 6 and 7, and it doesn't take much more for trash to kill me. I have to pop a life flask after almost every hit I take. I do have capped resists, and I'm keeping my evade over 50%. For reference my life is just under 1800.

I'm not sure what else I can do. I have to essentially res-rush every boss I fight, and that really ruins the fun of the game.

I had pretty much similar lifepool to yours when I was leveling, but uncapped resistances most of the time. In general, a lot of these new bosses can easily one shot your with some of their attacks and it is hard to react in time. Having leveled twice now it was quite easy for me, but first time I also had to death-rush Gruthkul or Greust for example, not knowing mechanics at all. Last thing, is that act 7 introduces a lot of chaos damage monsters, and they hit like a truck (for example ranged vaal constructs on the narrow paths of The Causeway). It would be easier for me to help if you made your character public.

I didn't even realize it was private lol. That explains some things. I unchecked the box that said to hide the character tab, I dunno if that's all I need to do.

The character in question is the single Shadow in Harbinger, called Borealis something.

Ok, few things:
- it's better to leave starting point through attack speed and physical damage nodes then elemental damage.
- coldhearted calculation is a weak node not really worth taking, if you need intelligence for gems then primal spirit flask node is better imo.
- you didn't take claw nodes and are using swords. claws will be your end game weapons so there is no reason not to use them, along with the great nodes they have.
- I'm on my mobile so can't really check the auras, but I hope you use hatred and blasphemy elemental weakness or frostbite.
- lastly, this might be a bit nitpicky since you are using whatever is available during leveling, but frost blades / multistrike / elemental damage with attacks / melee physical gems are going to be better then faster attacks and added cold.

Once your dps is higher, you kill faster so you are hit a lot less in return.
Claws also have an implicit "life gain on hit" which is really strong during leveling and together with some leech thanks to the claw nodes will keep you alive a lot better then other weapons like swords.
You should be able to buy 2x ornament of the east claws, they should be for like an alch each at this point, and will last you for a good while.
Hope this helps :)

Yeah, thanks so much for taking the time to have a look at my guy and give me some pointers. I'm always happy to get advice from a pro, and I really appreciate it.

I should note that I sort of went rogue with the build. From the start, my intention was to construct a build using a pair of Cospri's with all the fun cold gems to just create icy chaos all over the screen. I like Frost Blades as a base, and your build seemed solid; I figured I could just replace the claw/pure phys nodes with elemental damage nodes and have something workable. I fully understand it isn't going to be capable of true end-game content, but I wanted something fun.

As far as defenses and crit and all that, I've otherwise been following your guide. But that's the reason for the alternative start and skipping the claw stuff.

Also, originally I started going north in the tree, before I found your thread, and luckily had enough refund points to mostly undo the damage and go your way. Coldhearted Calculation is just a remnant of that, and I fully intend to ditch it very soon. I'm on my way to Primeval Spirit.

I have indeed been using Hatred, but to try to aid my survivability I combined Blasphemy with Warlord's Mark for some life leech. It's been helping, but only barely. I guess it's time to ditch that as well.

My biggest problem is just getting the right colors of gems. Getting up to a 4L is no problem since Vorici is my bro, but I've dumped more than 200 chromes into a single item without seeing the right combination--including with Vorici's guaranteed mods sometimes. RNGesus just has it out for me these days when it comes to spending currency.

To that same effect I've just been using the highest-DPS weapons I can find. Sometimes I get to use claws, and that extra LOH is great.

Thus far, my damage seems on point. A little subpar, but better than I expected for basically skipping all the good damage nodes in your build. I would love to get the FB/Multi/ED/Phys combo going, but G/R/R/R has just never appeared for me, even after dumping ungodly numbers of chromes into my crappy gear. So for now I'm rocking about 3.5k with the current setup.


If you have any insight into building for Cospri's, other than the usual Discharge, I'd be very happy to hear it. My inspiration was the so called Freezerator from 2.4 (no longer viable as written), and it just seems like no one is doing anything like that in 3.0.

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I have indeed been using Hatred, but to try to aid my survivability I combined Blasphemy with Warlord's Mark for some life leech. It's been helping, but only barely. I guess it's time to ditch that as well.

If you don't have or plan to use claws just yet, I would still run Warlord's Mark with swords, otherwise you won't have a lot of leech.

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but I've dumped more than 200 chromes into a single item without seeing the right combination--including with Vorici's guaranteed mods sometimes.

That hurts!
Best thing would be to simply find a mixed armour/evasion piece, even boots will be fine since you only need a 4 link for leveling. Otherwise it will be always hard to get off-colors.

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If you have any insight into building for Cospri's, other than the usual Discharge, I'd be very happy to hear it. My inspiration was the so called Freezerator from 2.4 (no longer viable as written), and it just seems like no one is doing anything like that in 3.0.

Oh, I wouldn't know anything about CoC builds as I've never had one before and probably never will (my laptop is barerly struggling as it is lol).



Anyway, I have made some small adjustments to the passive tree, in order to include Acrobatics in the setup. If you are following this build, it is recommended to switch to the new passive tree - it costs the same amount of points, we gain Acrobatics but lose around 2-3% dps, which can be regained with higher levels. However, if you are on a budget, don't worry about it since difference isn't massive and Regret orbs are expensive, so leave it till much later.

I've still got some Books of Skill in my future so I think it'll be no problem to ensure I get over to acrobatics.

And I may as well try to run armour/evasion on most of my gear, since we end up with a bunch of strength and I have a little extra in order to keep running these massive DPS swords that keep dropping.

I did have a stroke of luck last night, though, and got a nice pair of boots that I managed to 4L with good colors. Three reds would have been nice but now I've got FB/multi/ED/Efficacy going, and my dps after a few charges build up is close to 8k.