[3.3] Vaal Molten Shell CWDT Inquisitor

This Build uses Vaal Molten Shell as it's main skill, which causes an explosion everytime you mitigate physical damage - with no cooldown. _____________________________________________________________________________
The gem is often used with the unique item Scold's Bridle, which causes you to take damage everytime you spend mana.

This build, however, uses the combination of Eye of Innocence and The Rat Cage.

Everytime you ignite something, you will take fire and a little bit of physical damage, which will then trigger Vaal Molten Shell and Gems linked to level 1 Cast when Damage Taken, starting a chain reaction of ignites.
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To mitigate the damage dealt by Eye of Innocence - and even heal yourself from it - you can use a couple of items:
In general, one of these sources is enough to sustain your life, but having more will also cause you to heal more.
Watcher's Eye is by far the best item. Getting two life on hit mods is extremely expensive, although one is already enough.
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To sustain VMS we take duration passives on the skill tree and the unique flask Soul Catcher, along with flask effect passives.
The rest is done by killing enemies fast enough, but optional you can also use these jewels to help you out:

Pros:
+Memes
+Plenty of MTX options
+Pretty nice clearspeed
+Produces less lag than Poison Molten Strike
+Relatively tanky outside of lag and oneshots
+Damage grows with monster pack size, with no limit
+Core items are cheap

Cons:
-Not a league starter nor a beginner build
-Requires a good PC
-Doesn't work until you reach endgame
-Bad against bosses with a lot of phases, squishy vs single targets
-Gameplay can be hectic on bad map layouts
-Optimal gear requires high currency investment

You can't level with VMS at all until you reach maps, but you can play this like any other basic Inquisitor caster until then - the skill tree is pretty much the same on every build (including this one).

I personally leveled with RF, but would recommend either Volatile Dead (Poet's Pen), Arc or Blade Vortex because they're really strong right now.

You can check around the forum or use this guide by Lifting (still works as of 3.3) along with my skill tree.

Skill Tree:
17 Points
41 Points
70 Points
Level 75
Level 90

You can pick up Alacrity if you want to.
Mind over Matter can help you mitigate a bit of DoT damage (since the build doesn't use mana), but it's not a lot.


PoB:
https://pastebin.com/Dgremqdr

This is an import of my character, with only the level and gem level being adjusted

1. Instruments of Virtue
2. Augury of Penitence
3. Righteous Providence
4. Inevitable Judgement

You can also take Sanctify instead of Instruments of Virtue, the Consecrated Ground will proc when you are hit by Eye of Innocence, effectively giving you ~400 life regen.

I chose Inquisitor because he grants a ton of damage and mobility (I also had a Templar leveled at that point), but you can play this build on Elementalist, Chieftain, Ascendant or Juggernaut aswell.
What's especially notable is that you can use Shackles of the Wretched on Jugg to curse yourself with Temporal Chains, which will increase your VMS duration without slowing you.

Bandits
I killed all for the two passives points, but helping Alira for +20 crit multi and 15% resistances is not a bad choice either.

Pantheon
Major God: Stuns can interrupt your Vaal Molten Shell, so you should choose Soul of the Brine King to protect yourself against them.



Minor God: Soul of Ryslatha helps improve your life flask. This is important in case you ever get inflicted with a heavy DoT effect.

For a full setup check the example gear.

Main Skill - Helmet
Vaal Molten Shell - Immolate - Controlled Destruction - Combustion

You want this setup in your helmet, as getting 6 off-colours in The Rat Cage is a huge pain in the ass. If you want a more reliable VMS, you can replace Combustion with Increased Duration.
You can add support gems to this setup by using a Shaped helmet, which will essentially make it as good as a 6-link, while also saving two gem sockets and being cheaper.
An Essence of Horror crafted helmet also works here.


Mana Reservation - Non-Weapon
Herald of Ash - [X] - [X]

This build doesn't use any mana, so you should reserve as much as possible.
Herald of Ash should always be taken as it increases your damage.
If you have a Watcher's Eye, use Vitality/Discipline, otherwise Anger, Grace and Arctic Armour are all great auras to have.

You don't want to use these gems in your weapon/shield, as weapon-swapping causes you to deactivate them.


Mobility - Main Hand Weapon
Shield Charge - Faster Attacks - Fortify

Use this to move around and buff yourself with Fortify. Ideally you want this in a Vorici-crafted weapon with Blood Magic, to avoid running out of mana during the Soul Catcher flask.


Cast when Damage taken

The rest of your gems should pretty much all be level 1 CWDT spells that cause as many hits as possible.
Here is a list of my favorite skills/supports:

Immortal Call: physical damage immunity, must-have for defense
Enfeeble or Warlord's Mark: damage reduction or endurance charge generation, also great for defense
Firestorm / Ball Lightning: most hits-per-cast out of any spell, highly recommended
Bladefall / Arc / Volatile Dead / Cremation: good hits-per-cast ratio
Blade Vortex: consistent high-hitrate spell, very good when combined with support gems
Cold Snap: frenzy charge generation

Blind: 50% less damage taken from attacks
Power Charge on Critical: ~10% more damage through Power Charges, more ignites
Culling Strike: essentially 12.5% more damage if you land a perfect cull
Increased Duration: nice bonus on Firestorm, Blade Vortex and Immortal Call
Combustion: higher chance to ignite

Of course there's a lot more spells you can use, so feel free to experiment!


6L Staff - Weapon Swap

In case you run out of Vaal Souls, you can resort to a 6L Staff to back you up. You can also use it in single target encounters to trigger your VMS more often.
As a rule of thumb, the more spammy the spell is, the better. I recommend Incinerate CWC Firestorm or Cremation for single target, but you can really use anything.
Here is an example of my self-crafted LIDL staff, including hipster gem setup:

T16 Elder Haunted Mansion
T15 Shaped Siege
T11 Spider Forest