[3.21] 🌿Ultimate Claw Poison Pathfinder - Untouchable Viper - Molten Strike update by FEL

Hi and welcome to our Ultimate Poison Pathfinder - Untouchable Viper build guide!


First version of the build saw the light during 3.8 Blight league and so far it went thru multiple updates and iterations (peaked in 3.13 with Transcendence) up until 3.14. Then came the nerfs, a lot of them. Build was nerfed on so many levels it was finally broken.

Now it's coming back! Every step of the way of it's evolution there has been big feedback and support from players with their ideas on how to make it even better, that by now it's OUR build. Great appreciation goes to FEL who rebuilt it from scratch in 3.19.
Current version is made on the backbone of his 3.19 char.

If you want to go fast and clear even faster, delete bosses, be safe like the Juggernaut and be in the heart of the fight, this is a build for you. Poison the Atlas! xD


Guide will cover 2 melee strike poison skills Pestilent and Viper Strike.


*****Molten Strike update by FEL***** https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2639074/page/465#p24965674

I would also like to thank everyone who contributed to making this build better with their ideas, suggestions and support in development, especially to these exiles
Spoiler

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Yalpe wrote:
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blastinMot wrote:
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Vennto wrote:
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__FEL__ wrote:
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^^These guys are the ones often helping everyone with the builds on thread and setting the bar with best possible setups this build can have.

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Viktranka wrote:
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Archernick wrote:
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Corioliss wrote:
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and many others. (list is long xD)


Please read full guide before starting the build.


Wish you many fun hours of play in 3.21 Crucible league

TorsteinTheFallen and friends


Change log 27.4.
Spoiler

-added minimum ilvl for claw
-updated tree for 3.21
-added life Recoup wheel with mastery
-changed helmet enchant




Build Summary
Spoiler

Pros & Cons
+high dot Chaos damage (bypasses Energy Shield, reflect immune)
+great clear speed (poison proliferation + chaos explosions)
+all content viable (Ubers, Simulacrum wave 30, 90% quant invitations)
+flask regeneration (Pathfinder)
+very high level of defenses
+every possible map mod viable
+Jack of all Trades, superb mapper and potent bosser



-relatively expensive
-lots of buttons
-bad league starter! meaning, it's not for beginner players. Players who played this build before will do fine for league start. Start the build with dual wielding Wasps Nests.


This build requires all the pieces to function as said. It comes late to it's full potential.


Video showcase
Spoiler
Full Sanctum run by FEL
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBfUrhG308w

Legacy videos
Spoiler
Ultimate Transcending Melee Poison Pathfinder build variant - 100% Delirious farmer
https://youtu.be/0CT_nkL4IUY

T19 full run, fully juiced, 575% crit 2 add. proj. you can see all map mods and the end of video
https://youtu.be/l3yLHShFtag
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Non-Transcendence videos

Simulacrum last 5 waves - base setup
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-Y4XXecSJ4

Wasp Nest claws demo (cheap weapons)
https://youtu.be/coeOD0KTT_g
-mapping, conquerors, Sirus (*Viper Strike) all done on A8 lvl

*mind that rest of my gear is in the high tier with the exception of Wasp Nest claws. I wanted to show you that build is very much capable to complete everything even with 2 Chaos weapons if you sort out your other items.
Also i haven't played it in a while so i messed up some flask usage vs Sirus :P


Player's videos
Awakener 8 deathless kill by
"
supervi1 wrote:



Below videos are from 3.8 Blight league

----Pestilent Strike----

Aul, The Crystal King @461 depth
https://youtu.be/wOzKCTqajOI
100% increased area
28% increased damage
poison on hit

This was my first Aul ever, so needless to say i got rekt quite a few times before i figured out some mechanics, how to modify the char for the fight and tactics...

Uber Elder in 2 mins
https://youtu.be/HK7k2GhvlJs

Uber Atziri
https://youtu.be/RWt-BTF4j88

T13 Blighted Map
https://youtu.be/WlFCAvg6_i4

T16 Guardian of the Minotaur
https://youtu.be/TLQAL3s1M3U

T16 Guardian of the Phoenix
https://youtu.be/liwASqyAtw4



Path of Building for 3.21
Spoiler

Current: https://pastebin.com/q6A2p8hj

*if you can't buy Circle of Nostalgia with Onslaught mod it's fine.
Just instead of Sulphur flask use Silver flask.




What is "poison" how it works
Spoiler
Way of dealing damage with this build is with poison ailment. Poison deals Chaos damage over time and it stacks, so the more poisons you inflict to an enemy the more damage you will deal. Poison also has duration time it's affecting the enemy. By inflicting as many poisons before the first one expires increases your DPS.
Chaos damage is the best damage type in the game because it bypasses the Energy Shield and there is no mod that reflects it back to you.



⚔️ Offense mechanics
Spoiler
For those that are familiar with poison builds there's not much new and you can skip this part.
For those that are unfamiliar here are the explanations.

Pestilent Strike

is a true melee namelocking skill that has secondary debuff similar to the Infernal Blow which explodes enemies and deals secondary chaos damage to the surrounding enemies based on the amount of poison damage that primary had on itself. This and Pathfinder's poison proliferation will result in a chain reaction that can wipe out whole lanes of monsters and bosses caught in it (like Blight).
Overall for me this is best balanced skill in terms of single target damage and clear speed. Imho it's the best melee strike skill in the game atm.


Viper Strike

Is a well known poison skill. It can achieve insane poison stacks due to almost double poison duration compared to other skills and attack with both weapons at the same time (like viper fangs). It's on the top end of single target dps.
To have good clear speed with Viper Strike you will have to anoint Melee Splash and lose Corruption anointment.

Main difference between these two skills are the clear speed and single target damage.

-Pestilent Strike has natively much better clear speed than Viper Strike and same DPS (not total damage) in ~5 second window.

-Viper Strike on the other hand will outpace the PS on single target because of the twice as long base duration of the poison and ability to inflict 2 poisons per strike when dual wielding but this version of the build is with shield. Nevertheless, even with one claw 1/1 Viper Strike's single poison will deal twice amount of total damage for it's duration compared to Pestilent.
That would be very useful in any scenario that you will have to hit targets for more than 5s or with the targets that constantly blink and move around. Because of that we will be using Pestilent Strike for the most part of our play and doing the gem swap pretty much only on Pinnacle bosses (early endgame game for Guardians and Izaro).

Withering Step

This is a spell that when you activate it debuffs enemies in a circle around you. It applies Wither debuff on monsters(6% increased Chaos damage taken). Great thing about this spell is that it applies multiple stacks of Wither.
With Anomalous quality WS gem and linked level 4 Enhance it will apply 10 stacks instantly (60% increased damage taken) and greatly improve your damage which is especially important on bosses.
It can be used from level 10.


Plague Bearer

Spell with toggle ability. It has two states, Incubating (accumulating damage) and Infecting (dealing damage) You need to activate it first when you slot in gem.
Plague Bearer gains it's power from poisoning monsters. When enough poisons are applied it's capacity will be full and you can start infecting monsters in a circle around you like small aura.
This skill is very powerful while leveling (don't forget to use it) and is also potent even while mapping and bossing in the late game. It will improve your clear speed greatly.
It can be used from level 24.

Also worth mentioning are Ancestral Protector totem which will buff your attack speed and Focus mod. Focus mod on this build will increased your attack speed and duration of poisons.



🛡️ Build defenses and concept of Untouchable Viper
Spoiler
Defense concept is completely changed from before. To revive the feel of safety build had in it's peak Transcendence version, it is heavily invested into layered defenses, primarily on avoiding damage. All used defensive layers will make you very hard to be hit and killed.

-4K Life + 2K Energy Shield
- 95% Evasion chance

Difference between 90% and 95% Evasion is massive. 95% guarantees avoiding 20 consecutive attacks while 90% "only" 10. In combination with 24% block chance it's 20+ consecutive attacks.

-24% Attack Block (Shield)
- 75% Spell Dodge chance via Acrobatics keystone


150% Spell Suppression chance is converted to 75% Spell Dodge via Acrobatics keystone. It comes at a hefty price but it's worth it.

-75% Spell Block chance (conditional)
- Ghost Dance keystone (3 Ghost Shrouds with each recovering 1K Energy Shield)
- Temporal Chains aura

slows action speed of enemies and therefore lowers the number their attempts on your life, effectively slowing decay of Evasion.

- Elemental Ailment immunity (Purity of Elements)
- separate 8-15% chance to avoid physical damage from hits
- Phasing (Quartz Flask)
- Steel Skin


Life Recoup - effectively 30% of damage taken is recouped as life!






Key points in char progression
Spoiler
This is probably the most important part of the guide to understand what to expect from the build in it's different stages of progress as it is not liner or easy without currency as with some other builds (spells for example). It takes off late and with currency so be patient, it will become that good.

There are some transitional key points to address:

1. To play Strike Melee build you need at least "strikes hit +1 additional targets". Before having the implicit on the gloves you will use Ancestral Call support gem in your main skill gem link setup. Without it it's just horrible to play as targeting will be bad.

2. Whitchfire Brew flask along with Wasp Nest claw is early cheap stepping stone in damage. You can get it as early as level 48.


3. With Wasp Nest unique claw you will hit dps wall when entering red map tier.


Your ticket to red maps is The Covenant body armour.

The sooner you get it the better. Despite attack based archetype characteristic where weapon (Claw, although important)is your main source of damage, in this build it's the body armour. It will more than double your damage output.

As you can see the armour is INT base and we need lots of off colors.
There are 3 efficient ways of getting desired ones:
- Vorici in Research can give white sockets, idea is to get 3 white while remaining ones are either 2R-1G or 2G-1R or 2G-1B or 3G
- corrupted chest with all white sockets
- corrupted chest and getting desired colors using Tainted Chromatic orbs

4. Defenses when do they become good?
Build will feel like sh*t without no currency to invest, mainly not having The Covenant chest for damage. But damage is only part of the equation here.
Build defenses have exponential progression, meaning they will feel like nothing special until you have all defensive pieces in place, where all of a sudden it will be amazing.

-Difference between 85% and 95% chance Evasion is massive! At 95% you will be hit 3x less often of then than on 85% chance.
To cap your Evasion chance at 95% you will need both Watcher's Eye with Grace mod and Forbidden Jewels.
*Don't spec into Acrobatics early as without enough spell suppression to convert into high spell dodge it will be worse.

5. Claw crafting by Yalpe

1 - Buy a fractured Gemini claw with damage over time multiplier (25-26%), claw must be minimum item level 83!
2 - Spam essences of Zeal (adapt tier to your budget starting at Screaming, preferably Deafening) until you hit a tier of Increased Damage with Poison that you are comfortable with
3 - Notice that you now have 3 suffixes. If you don't have an open prefix, you are on the annul train. At this step you need full suffixes and one empty prefix or the rest won't work.
4 - Buy Wild Bristle Matron beast. It will add "Suffixes cannot be changed" 100% because it is the only possible prefix meta mod.
5 - Reforge chaos with harvest for flat chaos and hope for empty prefix
6 - Bench craft hits cannot be evaded


6. Rare gear piece crafting
You will use ideally Dex/Int bases for crafting, but Dex is a must. Try to find bases with fractured mods as they will make things easier to craft better items.
You will use Eldritch crafting method.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5wfuOounq4&t=491s&ab_channel=PathofMatth


You can use either Veiled Chaos orb or buy on trade gloves with Focus attack speed mod and resistances. Fix prefixes via Eldritch crafting.


Fractured spell suppression base, fossil crafted for Movement Speed, Life and Resistances. Craft rest of the resistances on bench.


For Helmet suffix you will use
.
Bench craft increased ailment duration when Focused. Prefix craft with Eldritch method. Eldritch Exalts and Annuls are probably most cost effective.

*Helmet enchant "Grace has 30% increased Mana Reservation Efficiency" is now mandatory!
To be able to reserve all auras you will need:
- Enlightened support lvl 3 gem
- Helmet with both implicit "7% increased mana reservation efficiency of skills" and suffix "9-10 increased mana reservation efficiency of skills"
- Small cluster jewel for reservation efficiency

Luxury item:
Onslaught implicit. It's really a luxury and not a must have item. If you don't have Onslaught implicit just use Silver flask instead of Sulphur.

These are some key points to guide you into progressing with char. I also want to remind you to try to replicate Path Of Building gear as much as possible. Don't forget about correct flasks too, they play big part of character functioning the right way.
If I skipped anything or you need help feel free to ask on forum thread.



Ascendancy
Spoiler



Ranger - Pathfinder
Pathfinder has great synergy with poison skills, flasks and defenses. She enables you high flask up time, pushes further clear speed thru proliferation of the poison, scales well poison itself.


Get ascendancy points in this order:

1. Nature's Reprisal
2. Master Toxicist
3. Nature's Adrenaline
4. Nature's Boon



Bandits & Pantheons
Spoiler
Kill all bandits

UPGRADED BOTH PANTHEONS

major: Solaris/Lunaris

minor: Yugul
Last edited by TorsteinTheFallen#1295 on Aug 18, 2023, 12:09:34 PM
Last bumped on Nov 4, 2024, 1:44:47 PM


This part of this build is aimed to give you an outline how to level this character in a SSF- or league-start scenario. From the first iteration of this build until now a variety of gems have been introduced to the game that can improve the leveling-experiences by a lot. While it is certainly possible to level with Pestilent Strike/Viper Strike from the very first act until endgame, there are other gems that help us establish a gear and progression basis that make our final gems feel a lot better.

For this reason we use Poison Concoction. It has barely any gear requirements, doesn´t need a claw, can use a shield for added defenses and is one of the most effective leveling-gems in the game. All the while we need only minimal changes to the tree while it is also a chaos/poison-build, that means we are resource-efficient when it comes to the respec. As far as information goes, I will deliver the desired links and an itemless PoB that shows you the pathing through the campaign. Gear-wise you are looking for life, resistances and attributes to wear your gems and, if possible, accuracy - thats it for the campaign, there is nothing else you need. I will go into more detail for A1 and A2 as in those acts a lot of shenanigans are happening, the later acts are basically incremental gear improvements and adding of gems and links, but nothing that inherently changes the basic concept. Allright, lets start.

Act 1:
- Starting as a Ranger you can use Caustic Arrow as a Quest Reward after Hillock: G-G (Caustic Arrow - Pierce)
- Progress The Mud Flats and Tidal Island, add Mirage Archer if you have a 3G already, if not it´s down to personal preference. Also, add Dash: G-G-G (Caustic Arrow - Pierce - Mirage Archer; Dash)
- Progress until you hit the Prison, at Level 8 you can get Void Manipulation as a quest reward. Swap out one of the functional supports, preference is all yours: G-G-G (Caustic Arrow - Pierce - Void Manipulation)
- You can also use Puncture in one green Link to help with Brutus, the bleed-dmg when he moves is higher than your 3G.
- After Brutus you can add Smoke Mine for further mobility if you want (optional).
- After entering Merveil's Caverns and at hitting level 12 you can finally equip Poison Concoction. Additionally, you can buy Withering Step.
- Your final setup should look like this: G-G-G (Poison Concoction, Lesser Multiple Projectiles, Volley); G.G.G (Dash, Withering Step, Smoke Mine); Optional QoL-Upgrades: Vitality (R), Clarity (Mana Regen), Precision (Accuracy).

Act 1 alternative start:
- While the above variant felt for me a tiny bit stronger, there is one more variant you can pick if you prefer it. You would start muleing (that means creating a char to kill Hillock and then transfer crucial gems/items for your Main-Character) a Shadow. Kill Hillock, take cobra lash and the 2 Daggers you naturally have (1 from Twilight Strand, one from Hillock Drop)
- First setup is then Cobra Lash-Chance to poison, followed by Cobra Lash-Chance to poison-onslaught.
- This setup also carries you to Poison Concoction, has the advantage of Onslaught-Procs but is more dependent on at least one decent weapon-upgrade (which can be Daggers or Claws). The rest stays the same as above.

Act 2:
- Once you finished Fidelitas Questline you can add Herald of Agony. Depending on how many auras you have added in A1 you need to pick and match based on what feels allright. From my testing, Precision is not needed early on and I rather have clarity over vitality since life flasks do but it´s basically down to your own preferences.

Act 3:
- By end of A2 into A3 you start seeing 4-link drops. For Poison Concoction there are 2 options you can go for: G-G-G-G for Poison Concoction-Lesser Multiple Projectiles-Volley-Void Manipulation or G-G-G-B with PC-Lesser Multiple Projectiles-Volley-Unbound Ailments.
- you´ll also want to add Despair for manually dps-increases on hard rares or bosses. If you prefer speed you can also go for PC-LMP-Volley-Onslaught
- In Act 3 you are able to add Grace for defensive layer, Despair for higher Single Target Damage as well as Plague Bearer after Gravicious. For those you´ll want G, G and B.

Onwards: From this point onward you don´t need to change your setup to progress through the campaign. Every additional upgrade means some Quality of Life at best, nothing else is needed.

And here is the PoB for the Leveling: https://pastebin.com/a70qtsFU

"
Vennto wrote:
Best Regards, Vennto


Last edited by TorsteinTheFallen#1295 on Dec 10, 2022, 9:27:59 AM
why bother building armor if you take acrobatics anyway and halve it lul
"
DaddyGangplank wrote:
why bother building armor if you take acrobatics anyway and halve it lul


...
Last edited by TorsteinTheFallen#1295 on Oct 15, 2019, 6:46:57 AM
FINISHED GUIDE, VIDEOS WILL BE ADDED
"
DaddyGangplank wrote:
why bother building armor if you take acrobatics anyway and halve it lul
Just skip acro, buy perfect form (1 week into the league and it's already down to 15c lol), spend 2 points on iron reflexes (meanwhile you saved 5 by not speccing acro / phase acro) and you get all the bonuses of "increased evasion" transformed into armor, fat molten shell, and spell dodge.

I don't think it makes gearing restrictive, on the contrary, you can use either evasion or armor bases, and hybrid armor + evasion are even better because the sum of the 2 usually exceeds the amount you get from a pure item.

I used that trick last season because I was tired of evasion based gameplay which is 9 out of 10 times nothing happens but when something in the end manages to hit you, you're insta dead. And basalt flask costs too many charges per use even for a pf. Deshret's jewel (brutal restraint) is also harder to get now that legion is 10% chance to meet. So most of the anti 1-shot means have downsides.
"
Viktranka wrote:
"
DaddyGangplank wrote:
why bother building armor if you take acrobatics anyway and halve it lul
Just skip acro, buy perfect form (1 week into the league and it's already down to 15c lol), spend 2 points on iron reflexes (meanwhile you saved 5 by not speccing acro / phase acro) and you get all the bonuses of "increased evasion" transformed into armor, fat molten shell, and spell dodge.

I don't think it makes gearing restrictive, on the contrary, you can use either evasion or armor bases, and hybrid armor + evasion are even better because the sum of the 2 usually exceeds the amount you get from a pure item.

I used that trick last season because I was tired of evasion based gameplay which is 9 out of 10 times nothing happens but when something in the end manages to hit you, you're insta dead. And basalt flask costs too many charges per use even for a pf. Deshret's jewel (brutal restraint) is also harder to get now that legion is 10% chance to meet. So most of the anti 1-shot means have downsides.


That Acro from Perfect Form in PoB shows that you are right. Are you sure this works? If it does it's a fantastic idea!
Char will lose some life but wow, I can push it to 40k armour this way!

I meant that Zodiac Leather is kinda expensive now, for whatever reason...

Interesting, looking forward to the videos and some more feedback from players who tried it.

Also, the hero image for the build says "Posion" instead of "Poison" :)

Cheers!
"
shabanotti wrote:
Interesting, looking forward to the videos and some more feedback from players who tried it.

Also, the hero image for the build says "Posion" instead of "Poison" :)

Cheers!


Ah fuck... :( tnx for noticing that xD lmao

Feel free to start leveling. I made "this" build 3.7 for Viper Strike after I saw what Mathil did and how he scaled it. I managed to pull out ~35% more damage than him.
In the end i decided not to post the build because it required mandatory 2 gem swaps to map (it was impossible to play otherwise), and when you switch to full single target gem setup you would miss half the strikes if you are not positioned perfectly.
Venom Gyre has 0 of those problems and compared and makes flatout double dps compared to the last league Viper Strike, which was very potent btw. I can show you all pastebins if you want to compare them.
Skill itself feels amazing!

Last edited by TorsteinTheFallen#1295 on Dec 12, 2019, 7:48:26 PM
"
Viktranka wrote:
Just skip acro, buy perfect form (1 week into the league and it's already down to 15c lol), spend 2 points on iron reflexes (meanwhile you saved 5 by not speccing acro / phase acro) and you get all the bonuses of "increased evasion" transformed into armor, fat molten shell, and spell dodge.


I am just concerned about 1 thing though. Without Acrobatics anything that is going your way will hit you and without stun immunity you would be very prone to eating stuns although very tanky. Idea is fantastic I will just have to test it when i get currency.

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