Stress-Free PoE w/ RIGHTEOUS INCINERATOR! Relax, SSF League Start-End w/ “Any” Items & 1-Button|3.16

I played this build for the endless heist event and I managed to start playing RF at around 36 so long as I used Enduring Cry on cooldown. It was a great time. I like this style of guide which takes a more laid back approach to playing the game. It doesn't even have a movement skill (which I think is perfectly fine). I'll be looking at more of your guides in the future my dude.

"

Dennis0454O wrote:

Spoiler

this build is so sweet, the more i play it the more i like it

this is first league i have past the lvl 94 (now at lvl 96 almost at 97)

and bosses i have killd are
Xoph, Esh, Tul and Uul-Netol up to Pure
Elder
Shaper
Sirius (first league i solo killd Him, only died 1 time due to stupid miss)
Atziri
The Council
UBerlab (with Dedication- Tribute- and Gift of the goddess)
4-way Timless Emblem (was very easy)

and today i even got an HeadHunter (Gwennen from Expedition gambling on leather belt).

HH makes this build insane.

That's awesome, Dennis0454O!

That's a nice resume you have there! Great job! I'm so glad you have found a build that really suits your style. You've made the build your own for sure! Playing around your chest piece is tricky stuff and you've done awesome. Nice work!

And amazing work finding the Head Hunter! That's got to be so fun!

Thanks for the post. I'm glad you're having so much fun :).

"

Univenon wrote:

Spoiler

I played this build for the endless heist event and I managed to start playing RF at around 36 so long as I used Enduring Cry on cooldown. It was a great time. I like this style of guide which takes a more laid back approach to playing the game. It doesn't even have a movement skill (which I think is perfectly fine). I'll be looking at more of your guides in the future my dude.

Oh cool, Univenon!

I haven't had a chance to touch Endless Heist yet! I'm glad the build treated you well. 36 is nice and early! Nice work!

I'm glad you've found a guide/build style that suits you so much (whether they are mine or not) and it's nice to have you around :). This game is so fun when it's played casually. I LOVE min/maxing RPGs with endless options...but it's really important to me to enjoy the process of min/maxing as well. I'm quite thankful this game doesn't ignore casual players or expect everyone to zoom zoom. Lots of choices they've made recently have accommodated my style of play. So I'm excited to make more guides (I'll keep my two current guides going each laegue for sure) once GGG calms down with all of the massive core changes that are happening each league (those are rough on content creators).

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to be so kind! I really appreciate it.

Perfect build for atlas invasion event and awesome guide, thx mate.

(Im using Righteous since level 27/28 without problems, rain of uniques help a lot).

"

DesDeCero wrote:

Spoiler

Perfect build for atlas invasion event and awesome guide, thx mate.

(Im using Righteous since level 27/28 without problems, rain of uniques help a lot).

Awesome, DesDeCero! I'm glad it's working so well. The late 20's?! Good work! That's awesome. it makes levelling so much more fun!

Thanks for the kind words and I'm glad you're having fun!

Thanks for the excellent guide. Got started very late in the league, and it has taken me to red maps so far with only a few ex invested, all of it farmed by the RF Chief.

I've borrowed from some other RF builds as well but yours is by far the most helpful and up to date. It's the best league start guide I've ever used since it gives so much freedom to customize the build, based around a very sturdy core.

I'm currently (temporarily) rocking a Kaom chest, I've also switched out a CWDT for arma brand+flamm+comb and managed to stick 4 auras on, Determination, Vit, Purity, and Malevolence.

I'm also in the middle of feeding the incinerate support gems to a Hungry Loop as I'm res capped with 6k+ life.

Most of my tinkering comes from an effort to reduce 1shots especially during red map scourges. A8 Veritania is the only one I'm really struggling with after 5 attempts or so.

Some questions since I'm not super savvy:

1. Malevolence vs Skitter? It seems Mal gives 'more' damage over time whereas skitter is a flat % increase of damage taken. I'm on PS4 and have no access to PoB so I can't test damage.

2. Is that Hungry Loop strategy worth it if I'm not hurting for resists/life? Basically swapping a ring for a 5link?

3. I get slowed a lot and I'm not always sure why. The majority of my 1shots come from unknown sources while I'm being slowed by ground. Are there mods on any boots to avoid that, like is it worth investing in desecrated ground boots or is that not going to help?

4. Whispers of Doom to apply 2 curses (ele weakness and flamm) may be a dps increase over my current growth and decay - does anyone have any info on this? I can't test it without blowing my budget.

5. My RF damage seems highly inconsistent even just hovering over the skill on the bottom right. Anywhere from 125-275k damage displayed. I have no idea what to use as a baseline to figure out what my improvements are doing without PoB.


All in all... this is the most fun realistic build I've played. Still have a long way to go but I just wanted to thank you and shoot some questions out. Apologies for the long post!

"

IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI wrote:

Spoiler

Thanks for the excellent guide. Got started very late in the league, and it has taken me to red maps so far with only a few ex invested, all of it farmed by the RF Chief.

I've borrowed from some other RF builds as well but yours is by far the most helpful and up to date. It's the best league start guide I've ever used since it gives so much freedom to customize the build, based around a very sturdy core.

I'm currently (temporarily) rocking a Kaom chest, I've also switched out a CWDT for arma brand+flamm+comb and managed to stick 4 auras on, Determination, Vit, Purity, and Malevolence.

I'm also in the middle of feeding the incinerate support gems to a Hungry Loop as I'm res capped with 6k+ life.

Most of my tinkering comes from an effort to reduce 1shots especially during red map scourges. A8 Veritania is the only one I'm really struggling with after 5 attempts or so.

Some questions since I'm not super savvy:

1. Malevolence vs Skitter? It seems Mal gives 'more' damage over time whereas skitter is a flat % increase of damage taken. I'm on PS4 and have no access to PoB so I can't test damage.

2. Is that Hungry Loop strategy worth it if I'm not hurting for resists/life? Basically swapping a ring for a 5link?

3. I get slowed a lot and I'm not always sure why. The majority of my 1shots come from unknown sources while I'm being slowed by ground. Are there mods on any boots to avoid that, like is it worth investing in desecrated ground boots or is that not going to help?

4. Whispers of Doom to apply 2 curses (ele weakness and flamm) may be a dps increase over my current growth and decay - does anyone have any info on this? I can't test it without blowing my budget.

5. My RF damage seems highly inconsistent even just hovering over the skill on the bottom right. Anywhere from 125-275k damage displayed. I have no idea what to use as a baseline to figure out what my improvements are doing without PoB.


All in all... this is the most fun realistic build I've played. Still have a long way to go but I just wanted to thank you and shoot some questions out. Apologies for the long post!

Nice, IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI! A console player! Love it!

Thanks for the kind praise! Not every guide suits every player (obviously) so I'm always happy to hear when a guide style totally suits someone's preference to how they like to play Path. I'm glad the guide suits you so much. Thanks for taking the time to be kind.

Nice work on your personal changes to the build! Kaom's is a tricky one to integrate. You've done awesome! The more natural the build, the better you'll do.

1) Malevolence does nothing for Incinerate but is best for RF. Skitter does less for RF but more for the build if you're keeping Incinerate. So, if you're doing both a Hit and DOT, I'd choose Skitter. Some people (myself included) take Skitter anyway because it reserves 15% less mana.

2) Hungry Loop is an awesome idea! Just make sure you're "sure" on the supports as you can't change it. Hungry Loop is awesome, it's just permanent. So as long as you're "sure" on the gems and the build you're using it on, it's a good call.

3) I HATE getting slowed as well. It's such a massive pain. There are so many ways to get slowed in the game. The new tree is a great source to prevent some of it. There are some mods that are easy to unlock as well. But not all can be covered. Some enemies leave tar on the ground when they die. There's getting maimed. There are spider webs, deep sand, Sirus specific slows, being chilled, being hindered, some bow icon that also has a stacking slow, temporal chains...arg. Too much.
- I always have a flask that gets rid of freeze/chill.
- The Masteries are a great way to get rid of Maim.
- The Pantheon is awesome for minimizing (not making yourself immune) some ailments and slows.
- There are some movement speed mods for boots that are easy to unlock with Jun that are a little lower than normal movement speed mods, but make you immune to chill (prefix)
- But it's that massive list of slows that makes the Jugg so tempting all the time. (Not being to be slowed below base value.)

4) Whispers of doom does allow two curses to be applied on any enemy (unless they are Hexproof). But that is a big trip away from the default tree. It also costs 3 gold which is nuts. But if you find something that gives it to you, you would have the ability to add a second curse to the build. A few uniques do the same thing as well.

5) The in-game tooltip is garbage. I can't wait for PoE 2's tooltip they have advertised. Your set up will have very different damage stats than the guide's because of Kaom's chest. With the guide, RF, though the build revolves around it, is our clear skill. Incinerate is for bosses. Your damage fluctuation is likely based on Valako (ascendancy node). Gaining and losing Endurance Charges with that node, mixed with Immortal Call really mixes up the numbers when watching live. Enemies being covered in Ash shouldn't show in that stat. So that's my guess. So, IF that's the case, you can either number as your baseline since those numbers will always be fluctuating.

Thanks again for the kind words. I really appreciate the time you took to be so encouraging. I'm glad you're liking the build so much.

If I didn't answer a question, or you have any others, feel free to ask as much as you like. (And the posts can be as long as they need to be ;).)

"

Wrecker_of_Days wrote:

Spoiler

Nice, IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI! A console player! Love it!

Thanks for the kind praise! Not every guide suits every player (obviously) so I'm always happy to hear when a guide style totally suits someone's preference to how they like to play Path. I'm glad the guide suits you so much. Thanks for taking the time to be kind.

Nice work on your personal changes to the build! Kaom's is a tricky one to integrate. You've done awesome! The more natural the build, the better you'll do.

1) Malevolence does nothing for Incinerate but is best for RF. Skitter does less for RF but more for the build if you're keeping Incinerate. So, if you're doing both a Hit and DOT, I'd choose Skitter. Some people (myself included) take Skitter anyway because it reserves 15% less mana.

2) Hungry Loop is an awesome idea! Just make sure you're "sure" on the supports as you can't change it. Hungry Loop is awesome, it's just permanent. So as long as you're "sure" on the gems and the build you're using it on, it's a good call.

3) I HATE getting slowed as well. It's such a massive pain. There are so many ways to get slowed in the game. The new tree is a great source to prevent some of it. There are some mods that are easy to unlock as well. But not all can be covered. Some enemies leave tar on the ground when they die. There's getting maimed. There are spider webs, deep sand, Sirus specific slows, being chilled, being hindered, some bow icon that also has a stacking slow, temporal chains...arg. Too much.
- I always have a flask that gets rid of freeze/chill.
- The Masteries are a great way to get rid of Maim.
- The Pantheon is awesome for minimizing (not making yourself immune) some ailments and slows.
- There are some movement speed mods for boots that are easy to unlock with Jun that are a little lower than normal movement speed mods, but make you immune to chill (prefix)
- But it's that massive list of slows that makes the Jugg so tempting all the time. (Not being to be slowed below base value.)

4) Whispers of doom does allow two curses to be applied on any enemy (unless they are Hexproof). But that is a big trip away from the default tree. It also costs 3 gold which is nuts. But if you find something that gives it to you, you would have the ability to add a second curse to the build. A few uniques do the same thing as well.

5) The in-game tooltip is garbage. I can't wait for PoE 2's tooltip they have advertised. Your set up will have very different damage stats than the guide's because of Kaom's chest. With the guide, RF, though the build revolves around it, is our clear skill. Incinerate is for bosses. Your damage fluctuation is likely based on Valako (ascendancy node). Gaining and losing Endurance Charges with that node, mixed with Immortal Call really mixes up the numbers when watching live. Enemies being covered in Ash shouldn't show in that stat. So that's my guess. So, IF that's the case, you can either number as your baseline since those numbers will always be fluctuating.

Thanks again for the kind words. I really appreciate the time you took to be so encouraging. I'm glad you're liking the build so much.

If I didn't answer a question, or you have any others, feel free to ask as much as you like. (And the posts can be as long as they need to be ;).)

I stacked up some more defense, found a 5% life gain on kill 5L chest, and am back to Incinerate. The leech just works better than the extra health/damage from Kaom. And makes the build much tankier against bosses, and obviously the massive life on kill really helps being in the thick of a big cluster of dangerous stuff. So I'm staying true to your concept, all the Mirror Tier builds on Poe.Ninja just don't have the same feel.

However...

You mentioned in one of your posts here that you sometimes use petrified blood for a laugh. So during my tinkering, I gave it a try. It took some changes to the tree, like grabbing Infused Flesh.
I'm not totally done optimizing this, but with determination + vitality, a good life flask, the leech from incinerate, and the 30% life recoup over 4s from Infused Life(same time as PB), plus all the insane natural regen the build has, there is something there that supercharges this build.

It seems so counterintuitive to reduce your health, since a Low Life RF build is just ridiculous. RF keeps my health at a paltry 2600, and it doesn't regenerate above that without a life flask. But, it just works. It's even more stress-free PoE.

There are likely to be severe PB drawbacks I just haven't run into yet although I did facetank all A8 conqs and the Elder using my current setup. I wasn't able to before. I'm testing the build in T16 scourged 20% deli maps atm which is a new frontier for me. On tougher maps there are several times (especially on T16 alch+vaal maps the 4th or 5th time you go into scourge, even with rough mods) where I so fully expected to die, 0 life left and totally surrounded and taking big hits, for several full seconds, only to end up watching the regen+flask fight back and get me out of it. Without PB in those situations my health would reach 0 and I'd die in less than 2 frames (PS4) with zero chance of avoiding the death.

I can't say I'm not dying sometimes, and I'm not the most knowledgeable player, and my gear is average, but there is something here that almost feels meta-level strong and is definitely worth exploring a bit further by folks like yourself who know the ins and outs of RF. Everything I googled just dismissed RF + PB combos.

https://www.pathofexile.com/account/sony/view-profile/IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI/characters <-- Stinkhorse, hopefully that works in case someone is curious about gear or passives. I'll admit I don't fully know what I'm doing, so assume I'm super inefficient.

PSA to anyone who tries this, though: Pop a life flask before you hit Vaal RF or otherwise it's a suicide button.

"

IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI wrote:

Spoiler

I stacked up some more defense, found a 5% life gain on kill 5L chest, and am back to Incinerate. The leech just works better than the extra health/damage from Kaom. And makes the build much tankier against bosses, and obviously the massive life on kill really helps being in the thick of a big cluster of dangerous stuff. So I'm staying true to your concept, all the Mirror Tier builds on Poe.Ninja just don't have the same feel.

However...

You mentioned in one of your posts here that you sometimes use petrified blood for a laugh. So during my tinkering, I gave it a try. It took some changes to the tree, like grabbing Infused Flesh.
I'm not totally done optimizing this, but with determination + vitality, a good life flask, the leech from incinerate, and the 30% life recoup over 4s from Infused Life(same time as PB), plus all the insane natural regen the build has, there is something there that supercharges this build.

It seems so counterintuitive to reduce your health, since a Low Life RF build is just ridiculous. RF keeps my health at a paltry 2600, and it doesn't regenerate above that without a life flask. But, it just works. It's even more stress-free PoE.

There are likely to be severe PB drawbacks I just haven't run into yet although I did facetank all A8 conqs and the Elder using my current setup. I wasn't able to before. I'm testing the build in T16 scourged 20% deli maps atm which is a new frontier for me. On tougher maps there are several times (especially on T16 alch+vaal maps the 4th or 5th time you go into scourge, even with rough mods) where I so fully expected to die, 0 life left and totally surrounded and taking big hits, for several full seconds, only to end up watching the regen+flask fight back and get me out of it. Without PB in those situations my health would reach 0 and I'd die in less than 2 frames (PS4) with zero chance of avoiding the death.

I can't say I'm not dying sometimes, and I'm not the most knowledgeable player, and my gear is average, but there is something here that almost feels meta-level strong and is definitely worth exploring a bit further by folks like yourself who know the ins and outs of RF. Everything I googled just dismissed RF + PB combos.

https://www.pathofexile.com/account/sony/view-profile/IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI/characters <-- Stinkhorse, hopefully that works in case someone is curious about gear or passives. I'll admit I don't fully know what I'm doing, so assume I'm super inefficient.

PSA to anyone who tries this, though: Pop a life flask before you hit Vaal RF or otherwise it's a suicide button.

You know, IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI, I spent a good portion of this league trying to find ways to replace Incinerate (which I wish was WAY stronger) while maintaining it's survivability. I tried so many different combos...and at the end of the day, Incinerate worked best. Funny how that works. The instant leech aimed exactly where you want is just too good to pass up.

Now, don't sell yourself short! The things you're trying are really smart. And the people in the community that know better than you, have the same questions that you do. They've just already gone through the troubleshooting steps to figure out how things work together (or they've found a video or post of someone that's already done the work). You understand the game really well and as long as you're willing to try some combos yourself, you'll be rolling in knowledge (in this game that only comes from experience) in no time. You're already there. So good for you!

A lot of the time, the community is "cookie-cutter". They see/hear someone that can crush the game say something, and everyone obeys. Lots of the time, these typical opinions are correct, but most people forget how in-depth the game is. There are always grey areas for wicked combos and synergies. It's never a black-and-white situation. For example, in RF's case, you've found a nice gem. People have been told to avoid Petrified Blood with RF. Rightly so...it slows down your life regen and lowers your life pool. But that really only applies to pure DOT builds. We use Incinerate/leech. I have no clue what the numbers actually are...but I'd bet very few people use leech with RF outside of us with this guide. But Leech with Petrified Blood is amazing, as you've noticed.

I just finished (last week) finalizing my ultimate min/maxed set up for this guide...if 3.17's changes didn't change anything for this build. BUT, I forgot about PB. Back to the drawing board! ;-)

Great post and keep on asking.

"

Wrecker_of_Days wrote:

Spoiler

You know, IlIIlIlIIlIlIIlI, I spent a good portion of this league trying to find ways to replace Incinerate (which I wish was WAY stronger) while maintaining it's survivability. I tried so many different combos...and at the end of the day, Incinerate worked best. Funny how that works. The instant leech aimed exactly where you want is just too good to pass up.

Now, don't sell yourself short! The things you're trying are really smart. And the people in the community that know better than you, have the same questions that you do. They've just already gone through the troubleshooting steps to figure out how things work together (or they've found a video or post of someone that's already done the work). You understand the game really well and as long as you're willing to try some combos yourself, you'll be rolling in knowledge (in this game that only comes from experience) in no time. You're already there. So good for you!

A lot of the time, the community is "cookie-cutter". They see/hear someone that can crush the game say something, and everyone obeys. Lots of the time, these typical opinions are correct, but most people forget how in-depth the game is. There are always grey areas for wicked combos and synergies. It's never a black-and-white situation. For example, in RF's case, you've found a nice gem. People have been told to avoid Petrified Blood with RF. Rightly so...it slows down your life regen and lowers your life pool. But that really only applies to pure DOT builds. We use Incinerate/leech. I have no clue what the numbers actually are...but I'd bet very few people use leech with RF outside of us with this guide. But Leech with Petrified Blood is amazing, as you've noticed.

I just finished (last week) finalizing my ultimate min/maxed set up for this guide...if 3.17's changes didn't change anything for this build. BUT, I forgot about PB. Back to the drawing board! ;-)

Great post and keep on asking.

Thanks for the words of encouragement!

A big issue with PB is one shots. I think the damage threshold for a one hit kill is much lower with PB on, but as a tradeoff it drastically increases the build's tankiness when completely surrounded, like on tough scourges or delirium maps.

I understand why it's been discounted by the community, especially after getting insta-zapped a few times in Heist. I think ultimately it'll come down to situational use for clearing in dense encounters, but toggling it off when facing chaos degen or big one-hitters. But anything that can't reliably one-shot me is doomed in a facetank at this point.

I added some more mana reservation and a defiance banner, phys damage reduction is reliably kept at 90%, plus unlucky hits from Lori, 81+ capped res except chaos, about 13-20k armor, etc etc. Switched skitterbots out for PB so I can still run Purity of Fire, Vit, Def banner and Determination. I toggle PB off and Skitter on when I switch to bosses. It ends up looking more like a HC build devoted to not dying. It's all tradeoffs at this point.

I doubt PB will make the cut for a true minmaxed RF build, especially one focused on clear speed and high damage. I think I just hate dying more than I like speeding through a map. And I'm convinced there are more opportunities to maybe increase my survival against one shots even with PB on.

I definitely share your opinion on cookie cutters. They're strong for a reason but they give no margin for creativity and no sense of progression other than the eternal chase for the next 2% of additional power through pricy gear.