[3.25] Lightning ranged Animate Weapon build | Uber Boss Killer | great clear 200m+ DPS

Intro:

Hi everyone,

I want to show you my Lightning ranged Animate Weapon Necromancer which I first played at the end of 3.23 but couldn't make a build guide for due to the removal of the affliction exclusive spectres. In 3.25 those same spectres were reintroduced albeit in a lesser state but they still enable the lightning version to outpace all other versions of rAW in terms of dmg and defences.

Basics:

Animate Weapon of ranged Arms animates Lingering Blades (which we create with Bladefall) to summon temporary minions with a long duration (~85s). They are minions with a basic ranged attack and can be scaled significantly via minion modifiers like flat added damage, attack speed and crit as well as +levels.

The lightning version also inflicts shocks and can scale minion dmg via Volatility Support in combination with lucky hits (dmg is rolled twice and the higher value is chosen) from one of the spectres.

Class/Ascendancy:

You want to play AW on the Necromancer so you can grab Commander of Darkness, Mindless Aggression, Mistress of Sacrifice and Bone Barrier for increased damage, elemental resistances, minion&player survivability, skill effect duration, Offerings applying to the player as well as Minions leeching life to the player.

Bandits & Pantheon:

Kill all bandits for the passive points.

Use Soul of the Brine King for freeze immunity and reduced chill effect as well as Soul of Ryslatha for flask charges and increased life flask recovery on low life.

Leveling:

The melee version of the skill gem can be accessed after the quest 'Breaking some eggs' in act 1 but is only used after acquiring unleash support at the end of act 4. Until then I recommend leveling with Absolution or SRS for ease of play. The ranged version is a transfigured gem which you can get from the lab or via trade.













Miscellaneous:

Crafting guides for most of the items and additional Lightning ranged AW Necromancer content can be found in the description of the video guide. A skill guide for the campaign and atlas passive tree progression can be found in the Low Budget PoB.

Enjoy!

Hi thank you, great build, very well explained!
The video & campaign guide help a lot as well!
Just what I needed to tackle the Uber boss challenge (Ultimate Usurpers) which was too far out of reach of my Righteous Fire toon!

The build goes into several advanced minion mechanics (eg animate guardian / capping minion block) which I think could provide tips to anyone who has played with minions before.

Already by lvl 80 on low budget pob, I was destroying Catarina much faster than my lvl 100 RF! 🙃

Although advertised as boss killer, this build runs through maps just fine - though of course with a few more keys to press.
What I did was put Convocation & Bone Offering next to each other, and whenever I jump into a pack, I'd press both keys.

Level 95 was extremely easy on low budget, level 97 just a bit more grind, and by then I could stomp most bosses.

However to take down Uber bosses, I felt I had to push the build further - I would say ~100 divine investment, sticking to the high budget pob.

Cheers!

This build is damn good.

Thanks for the information.

Well done!

Please keep this going in the future.

Hey,

thanks for the build, I am testing it league-start style right now. Just got out of campaign, bought AW of ranged arms and triad grips just to simulate leaguestart. What I found was that Haste is more QoL, but getting an early Wrath + Generosity tends to feel better in regards to early damage. I think this is the route to go before you get the spectres online. Question on those: in your experience, how fast do they come online in a new league and how expensive are they? I checked trade and perfect Fortune thingy is 1 div right now, which I would consider pretty hefty on league-start, especially since you cant guarantee they survive early on.

Still, build seems very solid even without that, just with the swap to wrath you basically keep the dmg with -1 spectre, which is insane. And its fun too :)

"

Vennto wrote:

Hey,

thanks for the build, I am testing it league-start style right now. Just got out of campaign, bought AW of ranged arms and triad grips just to simulate leaguestart. What I found was that Haste is more QoL, but getting an early Wrath + Generosity tends to feel better in regards to early damage. I think this is the route to go before you get the spectres online. Question on those: in your experience, how fast do they come online in a new league and how expensive are they? I checked trade and perfect Fortune thingy is 1 div right now, which I would consider pretty hefty on league-start, especially since you cant guarantee they survive early on.

Still, build seems very solid even without that, just with the swap to wrath you basically keep the dmg with -1 spectre, which is insane. And its fun too :)

With the prices for the spectres being very high right now it might actually be more sensible to start with chaos rAW and transition to the lightning version later.

Got a build guide for that too and you can find it here:

https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3477712

"

With the prices for the spectres being very high right now it might actually be more sensible to start with chaos rAW and transition to the lightning version later.

Got a build guide for that too and you can find it here:

https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3477712

^

Thanks for the hint, marked that guide as well. Not really sure if this is the better option though - With the recent changes in the last 2-3 leagues it has gotten harder to get a decent Skin of the lords as well as getting 4 white sockets on the gloves, so I honestly feel it is easier to get the lightning-version online if you just stick to one or two of the spectres and taking wrath earlier. One option to make them saver is to add meatshield on top of minion life and elemental army, this should result in pretty save spectres and then only get the cheap one.

I will keep testing the build progressing through the atlas and the maps and give an update about how it goes and where pitfalls are. So far, early maps are absolutely easy with just carnage/host chieftains.

"

Vennto wrote:

Thanks for the hint, marked that guide as well. Not really sure if this is the better option though - With the recent changes in the last 2-3 leagues it has gotten harder to get a decent Skin of the lords as well as getting 4 white sockets on the gloves, so I honestly feel it is easier to get the lightning-version online if you just stick to one or two of the spectres and taking wrath earlier. One option to make them saver is to add meatshield on top of minion life and elemental army, this should result in pretty save spectres and then only get the cheap one.

I will keep testing the build progressing through the atlas and the maps and give an update about how it goes and where pitfalls are. So far, early maps are absolutely easy with just carnage/host chieftains.

I recommend going with the life based version which uses The Fourth Vow. Getting one with +2 Duration gems shouldn't be too hard. It does require Glorious Vanity but a basic one should be available even if the event is short-lived.