Share your Merc tips & tricks

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Imp0815#7644 wrote:

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Thank you! I didn't know about that arrow in the skill window. Super useful!

Yea, conc doesn't seem to do anything for crossbow shot, based on the detailed view.

Based on the detailed view, another of my support gems also isn't doing anything...(Glaciation support on Permafrost Bolts)

I feel somewhat confident about conc not doing anything for crossbow shot, but I think Glaciation might be working even though the detailed view doesn't indicate it. Felt like it froze more after I socketed. Could just be confirmation bias though.

Yeah, crossbows are 2 handed ranged weapons; that bunch of nodes near the beginning of the mercenary tree works (just press ALT on the Crossbow info, and you'll read: Two Handed ranged weapon)

If your DPS is low, always upgrade, if you can, your crossbow to a better DPS one... Makes a ton of difference...

Use, if you want to, a extra bullet crossbow for shots, and an extra grenade one for grenades; tie your specific skills to the desired crossbow (you can do that in the G menu), and get the talent to switch weapons faster...

You can also do one build for grenades, and another one for shots...

If you're playing with the WitchHunter ascendancy, try the 4 concentration points path... AMAZING!

My overall build, so far, for WitchHunter...

https://maxroll.gg/poe2/passive-tree/zq6310hw

I would like to add that Splinter support will likely never work with High Velocity Rounds, because if you hover over the "Payoff" descriptior of the HVR, it says that payoff skills can never inflict the debuff that they consume, so most likely those two are intented not to work. Same as Fragmentation Rounds not being able to inflict freeze.

Splinter support works with Gas Grenade, but only with the initial hit, not with the dot.

Cant think of other things I tried atm D:

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MarcusIgnis#6067 wrote:

I would like to add that Splinter support will likely never work with High Velocity Rounds, because if you hover over the "Payoff" descriptior of the HVR, it says that payoff skills can never inflict the debuff that they consume, so most likely those two are intented not to work. Same as Fragmentation Rounds not being able to inflict freeze.

Splinter support works with Gas Grenade, but only with the initial hit, not with the dot.

Cant think of other things I tried atm D:

Thank you for clarifying. That means HVR is literally useless compared to other combos.

The armor break combo on auto-attacks for Warrior seems to be busted, especially when stacking Splinter with all the armor-breaking supports. But god forbid we socket something to make HVR playable as a main skill.

I tried to use HVR while breaking armor with fragmentation rounds, but the damage on bosses is so low compared to Freeze + Frag Rounds that I think I’ll just trash it and live without cool-looking pierce projectiles. Shame!

New tips for Mercs:
You can rebind your secondary skill bar to different keys (without the awkward CTRL + key combos).
For example, my skill slot 9 is now bound to Shift so I can use an additional cast while WASDing.

Hailstorm Rounds do reload while not being active, so you can use them as a one-off attack.

You can have multiple copies of 'Emergency Reload' available that each share different cooldowns.

When activating a skill gem, if you do not have a skill equipped at that time, you can create multiple copies. There you can have as many Emergency Reloads as you like, and use them independently of another. I use 2 different ones currently and will chain them one after another with Shockburst Rounds for single target DPS (Though Lightning ailments usually don't last long enough to get more than a single magazine off)


Another thing as well is if you want to be a bit more nimble, there's a rhythm you can do with tapping the mouse button to not lose movement speed with some skills that don't require holding (Any Machinegun oriented skills), tap firing does not lose you any of the attack speed compared to holding the button down if you can get the rhythm down. This is actually true of other skills in general as well (Such as Lightning Bolt from Staffs)

is it just me, or is basic attack kinda OP?
I take huge dps & mobility loss for using any other skill on single targets.

Merc with witch hunter asc here.

I'm level 46 and do this:

1. Galvanic shards with Herald of Ashes, Zealous Inquisition and Pitiless Killer for normal monsters, which effectively makes it one-button mapping machine.

2. Galvanic shards until You shock an enemy, then Shockburst rounds for bosses. This deals at least 1/5th of health boss every time.


Probably not endgame viable tho