My journey with 2nd Trial of Trial of Sekhemas (3 Acsendancy).

Thing giving a lot of stress for many people.

I was one of them until today. After many pains, I finished it. And I want share my experience and strategy. From perspective of average (working man) player, not some git guded swaggerer.

Playing armor/block/health/ blood mage with hex blast/essence drain, my own, very likely not optimal build.

Im not exactly good shooter, nor melee fighter, so something weird in between -- mid/melee range caster I guess. No minions.

In POE1 I was kinda casual player and never achieved anything big. So no legacy of success so to say. Only mediocrity : )

My steps:

1) After initial 2 failed runs and wave of agonizing anxiety (that i never be able to finish it), I forced myself to stop panic and approach it as long-term project.

2) Beefed up some char level on easy initial maps (up to level 80); not fancy (even boring), but also given me some resources for step 3), additional coins.

3) Sold all sorts of resources I gathered from start of game in currency exchange for exalts and improved my gear -- mostly adding HP/chaos resist/some damage; overall it was like 10 ex budget per slot, but some pieces were still just what I found myself.

> most important thing are +30% speed boots!

4) On easier Trials (1-2 level ones) I farmed honour resist/more honour/speed relics, overall it was like +40% resist, 20% more and +5% speed; also it good way to train 1-2 boss a bit and remember logic of room layouts.

> ended up with around 3200 honour (that was like 50% armored).

5) Experimented how good im in doing different rooms, making my priority of picks:

Ritual -- easiest
Gauntlet -- hate it, but if done right -- fast and little damage; so i forced myself to pick it, even it felt counter intuitive;
Escape -- generally little damage, but can punish for mistakes
Chalice/Hourglass -- bad, risky, especially in 3 part with endless flamethrower enemies -- reverse, while i loved this more combat focused modes, they proved to be mathematically not in my favor; so started to avoid them.

Generaly -- in any dodgy situation just roll like crazy (it seems helps a lot).

6) Another key of success for me was idea of farming water (as rewards) and hunting merchant to buy useful boons! While they not exactly compensate insane curses, can give at least some breathing room.

7) Bosses...

Tactic I guess will depend on build. I just was rolling around DS style, shooting essence drain and sometimes, when it was opening, knocking them to freeze with hex blast, for damage window.

My greatest pain was rather low overall dps, so I had to endure extra time dodging sweating until bosses hp over.

In win run my honour before/after bosses was like that:

1: 3100/2900

2: 3200/1800

2: 1200/400

Pretty close. Took some hits, but armor and resists kept me floating.

Overall attempts (of 3 step trial, done dozen of 1-2 step ones before):

1 - fail
2 - fail and mental agony
3 - fail, but some learning
4 - fail on 2 bosses, more learning
5 - fail on final boss, but change of perception, that its doable
6 - win

Anyway, I hope it helped a bit maybe to motivate someone struggling, I wish you all good luck and first of all -- some patience.

Haven't done it on my 74 witch so far, attempted like 5 times. The last time I managed to get to the final scorpion boss only to find out I don't have the DPS for it and just watch my honor slowly disappear.

It is the most annoying, unenjoyable thing I've ever had to go through in PoE.

I honestly miss the labyrinth.

I think I will somehow make it through with this character, but I sincerely hope that the full release will have the ascendancy trials altered, I never want to repeat this experience again.