[3.0] Kurii's Fallacy - Tanky Crit Dark Pact Zerker [Deathless Shaper & Uber Atziri / Clear Speed]

with a non-corrupted Marylene’s Fallacy.

Weapon

The Rippling Thoughts is chosen because Storm Cascade can trigger Curse on Hit Support. This saves us from needing to use Blasphemy Support and allows for other auras spells. I recommend you use Vorici’s crafting option to add three blue sockets. This weapon also grants us a free level 21 Arcane Surge Support without needing to cast it because of Harbinger of the Arcane. This allows us to continue our DPS without break or taking an extra action.

Curse on Hit Support – Assassin’s Mark – Enfeeble

We are using two curses because our amulet has the +1 additional curse implicit. If you replace the amulet with someone that does not give an additional curse (like Bisco’s Collar), then only the bottom right curse will activate. So if you want Assassin’s Mark instead of Enfeeble while you are wearing a different amulet, then put Assassin’s Mark on the third gem slot.
If you do not have +1 additional curse on your amulet, then replace one of your rings with Doedre’s Damning.

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Shield

Lioneye’s Remorse is chosen for survivability. It is our biggest source of life and armor, and has 30% block chance. There is an adverse movement effect, but this can be overlooked by what it has to offer. Plus, using a shield instead of a second weapon lets us utilize Shield Charge which gives us Fortify and triggers Storm Cascade on cast without needing to hit an enemy first. This means you can Shield Charge in place to throw Storm Cascade at an enemy for damage and curse.

A rare shield with life, spell damage, and critical strike can be used here instead. This can greatly increase your DPS at the cost of your defense. Resistances can be obtained here too.



Shield Charge – Faster Attacks Support - Fortify Support

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Body Armour

Carcass Jack is chosen because it is easy to color and has nice stats for Dark Pact. Ultimately, Cherrubim’s Maleficence is better, but it will be difficult to color and twice the cost. Kaom’s Heart is not used because we need the sockets.

6-Link: Dark Pact – Void Manipulation Support – Spell Echo Support – Controlled Destruction Support – Concentrated Effect Support – Added Chaos Damage Support

5-Link: Dark Pact – Void Manipulation Support – Spell Echo Support – Controlled Destruction Support – Concentrated Effect Support

Faster Casting Support instead of Added Chaos Damage Support may give us more overall DPS on paper, however, casting too fast will cause mana issues (decreasing DPS) and life leech issues.

Please note that Controlled Destruction will reduce our critical strike chance, however, it will still give us a DPS increase even though we are critical strike based.

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Helmet, Gloves, Boots, and Belt

Rare helmet, gloves, boots, and belt is chosen because this will be your main source of resistances. Aim for at least 60 total resistances on all these. The resistance you should aim for is 75% (109%). The helmet should be armor and/or evasion based with over 80 life. The glove base should be Fingerless Silk Gloves with over 60 life. The boots should be armor and/or evasion based with over 60 life and has 30% movement speed. The belt base should be Leather Belt with over 110 total life (flask effect duration is a bonus).

Kaom’s Roots is not chosen because it does not give movement speed and it negates all of our evasion.

Enchantments: Do not enchant the gloves. For boots, aim for "Increased Attack and Cast Speed if you’ve Killed Recently". For helmet, aim for Dark Pact damage or cast speed, or Lightning Golem buff effect.

Wither – Spell Totem Support – Faster Casting Support – Increased Duration Support

This link will play a large role in your DPS. At full build, you should be able to apply 20 Wither stacks before the totem expires. Increasing your cast speed will also increase the cast speed of this totem. Increased Duration Support affects both the curse and the totem duration. Unfortunately, Faster Casting Support does not affect the totem placement speed; only the quality of the Spell Totem Support gem does.

Enlighten Support – Haste – Arctic Armor – Herald of Ice

Until you get level 3 or higher on Enlighten Support (which reduces the mana reserve cost), only use Haste and Arctic Armor. Herald of Ice is more for just supplementary damage with the remaining unreserved mana. If you are having mana problems still, just remove Herald of Ice until you get more mana.

Cast When Damage Taken Support – Blade Vortex – Power Charge on Critical Support – Summon Lightning Golem

This link will keep our Power Charges at max during longer fights, and we also don’t have to worry about manually casting our golem. DPS can be inconsistent because of this, but spending time to re-summon your golem every time it dies will reduce our overall DPS. A level 20 Cast when Damage Taken (CwDT) Support is used to summon a stronger golem for higher DPS against tougher bosses. A lower level CwDT gem is better for mapping because it would activate more often, but we shouldn't need a golem for general mapping. Because our life pool is so high, we can afford to user a high level CwDT gem. A level 1 CwDT gem should only be used when using Immortal Call in the link. Furthermore, Blade Vortex will actively heal us for its duration to full due to the life leech from Cloaked in Savagery.

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Rings

Both rings should be Diamond Rings with increased chaos damage (from Essence of Envy), life, and extra critical strike crafted on it (or resistance if you need it). Please note that Elreon's crafting option for "Added Chaos Damage to your Attacks" for 13 Chaos Orbs do not work with Dark Pact - it only works with Shield Charge.

A Two-Stone Ring, Prismatic Ring, or Coral Ring may be used if you want less offense and more defense.

An Unset Ring may be used if you want to have Flame Dash.

If you do not have +1 additional curse on your amulet, then replace one of your rings with Doedre’s Damning.

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Amulet

Amulet should be Marylene’s Fallacy corrupted to have +1 additional curse. This amulet is what sets us apart from other Dark Pact builds. We rely on the large critical strike multiplier from this amulet to allow us to life leech without Cloaked in Savagery, and increase our DPS significantly. We take a large hit on critical strike chance because the penalty is multiplicative, but we will still see a DPS increase regardless. On top of this, we now do not need to use the Culling Strike Support skill gem.

As mentioned above, if you do not have +1 additional curse, then replace one of your rings with Doedre’s Damning. Attempting to craft your own +1 curse Marylene's Fallacy will statistically take 152 tries based on this datamine source.


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Jewels

The jewels to aim for must contain Increased Maximum Life and some form of damage increase. Since we are using a shield, I recommend getting a suffix with Increased Spell Damage or Cast Speed when using a Shield. Focus mainly on increased damage or Critical Strikes, but grab one or two cast speed jewels. Attack speed, Resistances, and Stats is a bonus.

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Flasks

https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Flask

I prefer to use two offensive flasks, and three defensive flasks.
For offense, Diamond Flask and Silver Flask are a must. They will help kill bosses extremely quick.

Diamond Flask does a lot more for you than Silver Flask, but I choose not to run two Diamond Flasks because they don’t stack. I run anti-curse and anti-freeze on these two flasks because when I am attacking, I want to be unhindered.

For defense, I use an instant life flask for emergencies, a flask that recovers a lot of life over time so I can be at full life with just one use, and a mitigation flask.

For the two life flasks, I choose to put anti-bleed on the instant flask because I would be taking damage quickly and I want to replenish my life, and I choose to put anti-shock on the other one but it can be anything because the anti-shock effect ends when you reach full life. Also note that you do not get bleed immunity with the instant flask; it only removes the current bleed status.

For the mitigation flask, I chose Rumi’s Concoction because it adds a decent amount of armor and block (including Spell Block). A Basalt Flask of Iron Skin would add more Physical Damage Reduction, but only be a few percentage. To me, it’s not worth the loss of the block bonus. Alternatively, you can use a Stibnite Flask; you are limited to the area of the smoke cloud, but the blind debuff to the enemy is strong.

These alternative setups are to be used at your own discretion, and are currently not fully supported by this guide.

This gear is for clearing easier maps quickly and not meant for tough bosses. These items will increase your cleer speed at the cost of damage and survivability. You will lose out on a lot of life and resistances, so be wary. Replace Concentrated Effect Support and Added Chaos Damage Support for the two skill gems.

All these items will help you with traps. Since traps do percentage damage based on your maximum life, having high life will make it hard for your flasks to keep up with the damage.

Summon the Harbinger of the Arcane and activate Haste, Arctic Armor, and Herald of Ice.

Traverse with Shield Charge. This will trigger The Rippling Thoughts’ Storm Cascade which will do decent damage and trigger Curse on Hit Support to apply Enfeeble and Assassin’s Mark. Hitting an enemy with Shield Charge will give you Fortify. You can Shield Charge in place against monsters with higher life to reapply your curses and Fortify.

Use Rumi’s Concoction when in large packs such as Harbinger packs or when mitigating damage from slow and large hits such as from The Shaper or Minotaur.

Summon the Wither Totem during longer fights for more damage. Can be used against all bosses or in Beachhead to clear packs faster.

Chaos damage cannot be reflected, but be careful in these maps because they can kill you if you Shield Charge into a mob due to Physical Reflect. Furthermore, when you Shield Charge, you active Storm Cascade from The Rippling Thoughts which does Elemental Damage. Try to Shield Charge at the edge of a pack for Fortify, or not use it at all.

https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/The_Lord%27s_Labyrinth

Traps will be your biggest threat. They do percentage physical damage based on your maximum life. Armor, Granite Flasks, Basalt Flasks, and lowering your maximum life can help here. It also helps to bring an extra instant life flask or two.

Do not rush through traps unless you have enough healing flasks to get to the end. Using an Unset Ring with Flame Dash is recommended to bypass traps. If you find a safe spot, wait there to refill Flame Dash charges and your flasks with the Soul of the Ryslatha Pantheon. A low level Cast when Damage Taken Support with Immortal Call can also help a lot with traps.

It’s okay to take a few seconds to learn the trap patterns. You don’t win by getting to the end quickly. You win by not dying.

When fighting Izaro, place a Wither Totem near his spawn point before fighting him. Shield Charge into him to curse him and gain Fortify. He should go down pretty fast. The only Izaro weapon to look out for is his Two-Handed Mace because Ground Slam does a lot of damage. You should Shield Charge to dodge this and use Rumi’s Concoction just to be safe.


Resources: http://www.poelab.com/

This site has a lot of good information about how to obtain the maximum number of Treasure Keys. Argus will give you an additional Treasure Key. Satisfying Izaro’s mechanics in his first two phases will reward an additional Treasure Key per phase. Puzzles and Gauntlets drops up to two Treasure Keys. Dark Shrines may give you one additional Treasure Key. A random treasure box in the treasure room can give you two Treasure Keys. If you are lucky, you can open nine of the ten treasure boxes at the end!

Reference Video: https://youtu.be/LpjgfdJYvxg

Hydra - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Guardian_of_the_Hydra
Health: 9,537,659
25% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Your cold resistance should be capped.

Open up with a Wither Totem to the side, then Shield Charge and hold Dark Pact. She does a lot of little damage to you so it won’t trigger Cloaked in Savagery. Optionally, you can run into Frostbolt on purpose to trigger Cloaked in Savagery. You should be able to out-leech her Barrage attack. She does a charged Fork Arrow attack that does a lot of physical and cold Damage. It can be tanked, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge behind her when she is charging up. She will disappear briefly and summon minions. During this time, just clear minions and wait for her return. Take a hit from an Frostbolt at this time if you need to trigger Cloaked in Savagery.

Wither Totem placement should be in the gap of the Frostbolt attack lines.

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Chimera - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Guardian_of_the_Chimera
Health: 9,537,659
25% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Open up with a Wither Totem to the side, then walk up to him and he will Flicker Strike onto you. When he does, Shield Charge in place and hold Dark Pact. He will do an AoE combo attack indicated by a red circle. This can be tanked, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge out until after he finishes the attack. During this time, refresh your Wither Totem. Shield Charge back into him when he is finished.

Minion Phase: At each 25% life interval (75%, 50%, 25%), he will disappear and summon strong minions that do a lot of damage from three corners of the map. It is recommended that you stop casting Dark Pact as soon as you see him do the animation to disappear because you don’t want to sacrifice your life for nothing and these minions are very strong. The dogs will cause bleed so be sure to have your anti-bleed flask ready. The snake do a decent amount of chaos damage so chaos resistance can help here. Place a Wither Totem in the middle to draw their attention. After several waves, he will summon a rare minion on the east gate. A Wither Totem can be place near the east gate in preparation of this rare minion. After this wave is cleared, Chimera will re-appear. At this point, he will most likely go into the Smoke Phase, but he may attack you a few times before doing so.

Smoke Phase: Much like the Minion Phase, it is recommended to stop casting Dark Pact as soon as you see him do the animation to disappear because his upcoming attacks do a lot of damage, and you do not have a target to leech life until you find him. During this phase, Shield Charge into the smoke clouds around the map until you find him in one. Use your life flasks and Rumi’s Concoction to help survive this phase. Your life should be healed to full when you find him because he would have triggered Cast When Damage Taken Support, Blade Vortex, and Cloaked in Savagery. At this point, continue as normal until the next Minion Phase or until he dies.

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Phoenix - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Guardian_of_the_Phoenix
Health: 12,472,323
25% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Your fire resistance should be capped. If you feel like you need more, then bring in a Ruby Flask and/or Rise of the Phoenix.

Open up with a Wither Totem to the side, then Shield Charge and hold Dark Pact. You should out-leech his Whirling Charge spin attack. After he spins, he will do his Phoenix Firebomb which is an AoE around him after 4 second charge-up. This attack does between a lot of fire damage that penetrates 50% Fire Resistance. It can be tanked, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge away while he is charging up his explosion. During this time, try to kill some minions. Shield Charge back into Phoenix after he explodes. He will repeat with the Whirling Charge and Phoenix Firebomb.

Wither Totem placement should be in a place where it is closest to Phoenix and not his minions, and out of his line of attack for when he spins towards you.

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Minotaur - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Guardian_of_the_Minotaur
Health: 12,472,323
25% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Walk up to him and he will Burrow attack you at the spot you currently stand which does a lot of physical damage. Simply Shield Charge away from him, and wait for him to resurface. When he resurfaces, this does an AoE attack. Place a Wither Totem behind him after the attack, then Shield Charge and hold Dark Pact. If your Wither Totem drops, you can resummons it behind him in-between his slow attacks. Do not summon your Wither Totem away from him because he will burrow attack it, and beware of your Lightning Golem because he can Burrow attack that too if it is too far away. Shield Charge in place to reapply curses and Fortify. He will eventually do a Slam attack which does a lot of Physical Damage. It can be tanked, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge away and wait for him to burrow attack onto you again, because after he Slam attacks, he creates a cave-in area from which falling rocks do a lot of physical damage. If a rock falls on you at the same time he attacks you, you might die. It is safest to relocate the fight if possible.

At every 20% life interval (80%, 60%, 40%, 20%), a lightning fence is created between the inner circle and the outer circle and stays there until Minotaur dies. You can see the lightning posts on the map so be sure you aren’t fighting near one or it will kill you. Towards the end of the fight, you won’t have any room to relocate so use Rumi’s Concoction and your damage flasks to kill him quickly before the falling rocks kill you.

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The Shaper - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/The_Shaper
Health: 20,190,261
25% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Your fire and cold resistances should be capped.


Video 1: Dodging attacks


Video 2: Controlling Ice Balls

Phase 1: Set a Wither Totem away from him while he is still talking. When he is finished talking, Shield Charge and hold Dark Pact. At this point, he will do one of several things...

Melee: Neglectable. Just hold Dark Pact.

Kamehameha Wave: Fire and cold Damage per second. You can tank this without Cloaked in Savagery if you are lucky with critical strikes, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge behind him while he is doing this for 3 seconds. Place a new Wither Totem if you need to during this time.

Golden Orbs: A lot of cold damage that penetrates 25% Cold Resistance. Can be dangerous if you are stunned and two of them hit you during your stun duration. It can be tanked with enough cast speed, but the safest thing to do is Shield Charge to his side and not into the orbs. He usually does this when you are away from him.

Teleport Slam: A large amount of physical damage. This can be tanked (https://media.giphy.com/media/l1J9r5dyIUNf1AaiI/giphy.gif) unless it is a critical strike, but the safest thing to do is to stop casting Dark Pact when he leaves the realm, and Shield Charge away when he enters back in and wait for him to come on and slam (and welcome to the jam).

Portal: Use this time to leech your life back to full and to refill your flasks. You can lure an ice ball (described below) to the edge during this attack. Just keep Zana alive so she can protect you during the Bullet Hell attack.

In addition, throughout the fight, ice balls will appear around the map and follow you. They will pop and stain the floor when they hit you and do damage if you stand in it. The stain will disappear between phases or until Shaper dies. It is best to pop the ball at the edge of the battle field or on top of a stain from a previous ball.

At 50% life, The Shaper will teleport you away and start regenerating life until you get back. Go to Phase 2.

Phase 2:
Just Shield Charge to the end of the map towards the northeast and kill the boss. He does a very slow charged attack that can hurt. You can tank it, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge behind him. Kill him and enter the portal when you are ready.

The Shaper will have the same moves as Phase 1 with one additional move...

Bullet Hell: He teleports around the map and throws projectiles everywhere. As long as Zana is alive, she will create a protective force field in which you can stand in to block all incoming bullets. Unless you want to play Touhou, I recommend standing in it. During this phase, it is possible that an ice ball will chase you. You can run in circles along the inner radius of the force field to prevent the ice ball from popping. At the end of this phase, the Shaper will follow up with an attack while there are still bullets airborne. Take heed to not run into these.


Video 3: Dodging the ice ball during Bullet Hell

At 25% life, The Shaper will teleport you away and start regenerating life until you get back. Go to Phase 3.

Phase 3:
Just Shield Charge to the end of the map towards the northeast and kill the boss. He does a very slow charged attack that can hurt. You can tank it, but the safest thing to do is to Shield Charge behind him. Kill him and enter the portal when you are ready.

The Shaper will have the same moves as Phases 1 and 2, and can create an invulnerable clone that has his skill set from Phase 1. If you are comfortable enough with killing the Shaper at this point, you can swap on Item Rarity gear and skill gem while he is still talking.

Reference Video: https://youtu.be/AIobql2cD-I

Vessels of the Vaal (Level 80) - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Vessel_of_the_Vaal
Health: 2,125,919
60% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

These guys will appear at different times if you walk along the outer perimeter of the room. This will allow you to handle them one at a time. But be warned, when one is down, the other enrages and gains increased cast speed.

Start with a Wither Totem before one spawns. Shield Charge into the first one and hold Dark Pact.

The vessels have several moves, but there are three to look out for...

Slam: A large amount of physical and fire Damage. You want to avoid this at all costs.

Laser: Decent lightning damage. He shoots dark lasers at you three times. You can tank the first hit, but it will inflict Shock, thus making the second and third hit potentially fatal. These lasers come fast, but can be side-stepped. A flask with anti-Shock can be of help if needed.

Icestorm: Cold damage every 0.06 seconds. Shield Charge out of this as soon as possible or you will die.

If you don’t have enough DPS to quickly kill them, it may be a good idea to keep moving, and only attack during opportune moments. Every so often, they will use Hide to disappear for a few seconds and come back. Use this time to refresh your Wither Totem, damage the other vessel, or clear minions.

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Trio (K’aj Q’ura, Y’ara’az, A’alai)

https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Vaal_Temple_Map#Mechanics

Q’ura (Two-handed Weapon) - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/K%27aj_Q%27ura
Health: 1,467,332
15% Chaos Resistance
60% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

Y’ara’az (Dual Striker) - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/K%27aj_Y%27ara%27az
Health: 1,467,332
15% Chaos Resistance
60% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

A’alai (Ranged) - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/K%27aj_A%27alai
Health: 1,467,332
15% Chaos Resistance
60% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

As noted by the wiki, the trio will trigger a specific event when the first one dies and when the second one dies. When a member dies, this also leaves behind a physical degeneration cloud. The last member will regain full health and become enraged.

The recommended kill order is to first kill then ranged boss, then dual striker boss, then then tank the two-handed weapon boss with your anti-bleed flask. So start by placing a Wither Totem close to the ranged boss in the middle, Shield Charge at her, and hold Dark Pact.

The ranged boss is to be killed first because she does the most damage out of the three and is the biggest threat. You want the two-handed weapon boss to be the final boss because he will just attack slightly faster (but still fairly slow) and apply more Bleed stacks which can be negated with an anti-bleed flask. He won’t do enough damage to you to truly be a threat unless you run out of anti-bleed flask charges. It is often difficult to split apart the dual striker and two-handed weapon bosses so you might kill the wrong one first. This is okay too, but not ideal.

Don’t be afraid to split them up if you need to. Keep Fortify active throughout the entire fight. Use damage flasks to try to kill the ranged boss as quickly as possible because she can hit you from pretty far away. Save your anti-bleed flask until you see noticeable health loss from Bleed. To be safe, Shield Charge out of the degeneration cloud upon killing a boss.


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Atziri, Queen of the Vaal (Level 80) - https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Atziri,_Queen_of_the_Vaal
Health: 5,024,900
15% Chaos Resistance
80% Reduced Curse Effectiveness

This fight will revolve around your ability to quickly dodge her spells, and attacking every time you see an opening. Please refer to the wiki for the general strategy. Having higher DPS to go through the phases quickly is recommended, but save your damage flasks for the Clone Phase as it is her most dangerous phase.

Open the fight with a Wither Totem placed in front of her. She won't attack until you come close. Shield Charge into her and hold Dark Pact. Atziri will reflect your curses back onto you, but that is okay. Do not use your anti-curse flask here; save it for the clones.

Atziri will perform a Clone Phase at every 25% life interval (75%, 50%, 25%). During her Clone Phase when she splits into four copies of herself, try to spot the one holding the mirror in the air. Note her location and do not Shield Charge into her or she will kill you with reflect. You only need to kill one of the clones before going to the next phase, so before they become active, position yourself away from your target and wait for the Fireblast to show up under your feet before Shield Charging to your target. If you use a Wither Totem, there is a chance that Fireblast will target your Wither Totem instead of you, so be careful of the placement – you don’t want to place a Wither Totem on your target, then Shield Charge into the Fireblast.

Once you are at your target and there isn’t a Storm Call under your feet, use your damage flasks to push to the next phase before the next Fireblast activates. Note that if you see a Fireblast forming and you get to the next phase by killing a clone before Fireblast does damage, the rest of the Fireblast animation is cancelled and no damage is done.

If you miss the opportunity to attack the target because of Storm Call, be prepared to dodge the next Fireblast. While all this is going on, spears that cause Bleed will be thrown at you constantly.

If you die during the Clone Phase, enter back in the room and take advantage of the invulnerability grace period from entering the room and not moving to ensure that you won’t be walking into a spell.

Find someone to carry you or swap to a different skill gem against Chaos Inoculation