Budget Endgame Archmage Gemling Legionnaire Build (2 Divine at max/Exalted Only Budget)

Here's the video for this build: https://youtu.be/f-GghDmSI0c

Hello everyone! So, this build is derived from the fattest mana stacker arc mage gemling created by one mana left( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVqDxAYon6c ). By far, this is one of the best and well-thought build that I have seen in path of exile 2. I was planning to replicate this build but the only problem though is that I don’t have enough divines to get the required items. Also, I know some of you will suggest that it’s better to do an arc mage build with storm weaver, as it has better damage scaling due to her ascendancy. However, I was really looking for something fresh, and gemling legionnaire was very interesting to me because of his interesting ascendancy passives.

The amount of mana you can stack with gemling legionnaire is insane, and it’s proven in the fattest mana stacker build. Also, this build has many potentials because of its versatile ascendancy, allowing you to craft more builds aside from this one because if its attribute stacking mechanics. There is a possibility for strength stacking, and I can also create a giant’s blood version of this gemling legionnaire. There’s also the possibility of doing thorns build for this since I can stack tons of strength values, and I can have high health with my class.

In addition, it’s also interesting to pair with the pillar of the cage god that has some crazy stacking depending on how much attribute you have in your build. Do take note that the gemling passive called enhanced effectiveness don’t increase your stat values, but it instead doubles the bonuses of each stat. For example, if you stack a lot of mana in your build, then you can double the inherent mana bonus with this class ascendancy. The worst would be stacking dexterity as it just gives accuracy, but I see a lot of potential for this class when it comes to strength and intelligence stacking.

I just use one mana left’s build as my baseline for my gemling, as it so happens that I was also looking for arc mage build which is one of the strongest build variants in path of exile 2 right now. So far, this build is pretty strong and I feel confident running this build at endgame levels compared to my warrior and minion summoner witch. Don’t get me wrong, witch and warrior are fun classes to play with, but playing an arc mage build is just easier when it comes to progression. This build has been a blast, and this is the first time I’ve ever enjoyed trials in path of exile 2.
I wasn’t expecting to even reach the endgame boss in the trial of sekhemas with this build, but I managed to do so and it was really exhilarating. Although I failed the trial, since this was my first time reaching the boss, but I was really amazed on the potential of this build. I think that I’ll get my fourth ascendancy within the trials of chaos, as the movement speed debuff in the boss fight is kind of harsh for this build. Right now, I only got 25 percent movement speed on my boots, and it’s not even enough for the time stop phase of the boss in this trial.

Probably, I’ll get more chances of getting my fourth ascendancy against the trial master because there’s seems to have no work-around for this fight than to get the boon that grants 40 percent movement speed, or increase your movement speed within the passive tree. In addition, I think it would be better now to stack up more damage as the trial master would have the same effective health from the trials of sekhemas. And I’ll be stacking more intelligence, mana and damage to my build before trying the trialmaster boss fight.

Currently, I don’t need the fourth ascendancy in my build though, as I’m currently undecided whether if I go with advanced thaumaturgy, or the implanted gems. The former grants 30 percent less skill cost which cuts down the mana consumption of my build. This will allow me to spam my spark more often, and even cut down some mana regeneration in my build. The latter grants plus 1 level to all skill gems which grants more damage obviously. I think, it would be much better if I’ll go with advanced thaumaturgy just like one mana left did with his build.

Now, let me share to you build progression, starting from campaign leveling until endgame mapping. After finishing the tutorial part, start your passive skill tree progression with intelligence nodes which helps you unlock the spark skill gem. Then, try to find gears which will boost your energy shield as it will help you in survivability throughout the campaign. The first few locations in act 1 will be a cake walk with the spark ability, but the damage scaling will be bad once you hit the point wherein you fight the king of the mist in frey thorn. Try to stack up as much lightning damage, spell damage, or projectile damage to boost your spark skill. For the support gems, get arcane surge first, then go with acceleration and arcane tempo later. The fourth support gem is for endgame mapping, and its mobility so you can have better movement while casting spark.

In your campaign journey, focus on increasing the level of spark and also getting fire wall which will grant spark extra bonus damage. After the king of the mist fight, you will be awarded with your first spirit gem, and I strongly recommend getting grim feast as this will help you with survivability throughout your campaign journey. At endgame levels however, we will be relying on remnants for survivability in mapping. It’s because we will be converting all the energy shield, we have from our equipment to mana with the eldritch battery passive. However, we will be saving the body armour, and try to get high evasive stats on this as much as possible.

This is because I also got spectral ward in the passive skill tree that grants decent energy shield bonus per evasive rating we have in our body armor. Now, this is good in progression too, when you still don’t have eldritch battery. Stacking evasion is great, especially if you can reach at least 60 percent during campaign. This pairs well with the energy shield you have from boots, gloves, focus and helmet, which will get doubled by grim feast for every energy shield remnant you pick after killing an enemy. Spark leaves you vulnerable to attacks, especially against rushing monsters, and both evasion and energy shield will help you survive during the campaign levels, up to the cruel difficulty of your journey.

In your passive skill tree, the first two notables that you should get are lightning rod and polymathy. This lightning passive allows your non-crit hits to be lucky, which means each spark will have better chances of hitting a critical hit. Remember that the ability shoots multiple projectiles, and it can have 20 projectiles if you upgrade the quality of the gem, and with the help of gemling’s passive notable called crystalline potential. Each of these projectiles will have a chance to dealing critical hit with the lightning rod notables which is really good in increasing the damage of this build.
In the case of polymathy, this will help us increase our attributes. We don’t just increase the intelligence for the mana, but also dexterity so we can equip better evasive body armor later. By the way, in terms of jewels, these are just things I picked up during my progression, and just put anything that will increase your spark skill’s damage, or have mana regeneration stats. Later, you can buy in the market good jewels which has mana regeneration, spell damage or even casting speed.

Then, continue progressing until you reach the spectral ward passive that grants energy shield per evasion rating in your body armor. By the time you are here, you already have the four ascendancy points for your gemling legionnaire, and I strongly recommend getting enhanced effectiveness first. This will greatly boost our attribute’s inherent bonuses, and then continue in your passive skill tree until your reach the eldritch battery passive notables.

But before getting this passive notable, try to get first arcane intensity which boost your spell damage per 100 mana, pure power which grants lightning damage boost per intelligence, and as well as power conduction. When you reach act 3 in cruel difficulty, you will gain access to the arc mage spirit skill gem which will greatly improve the D.P.S of your spark ability.
Take note that this will reserve 100 spirits, so you will need to have 40 more spirts before you can activate this gem. You will be granted 60 spirits during the campaign, and you can get more from your amulet and possibly body armor. This is also the time wherein you need to focus on your gears, and you need the necessary stats to make this build work.

For the offensive stats, I strongly recommend focusing on lightning damage, spell damage, increase maximum mana, and as well as plus levels to lightning gems if possible. For the defensive stats, you will need a body armor with the highest possible evasion rating so it can also give you energy shield. Not to mention that the evasion will also help as a secondary form of defense for your build.

Once you get the body armor with the highest evasion rating, it’s time to get the eldritch battery passive notables and convert all those energy shield to mana. While doing so, make sure that you also have access already to mind over matter which is our primary source of survivability. This passive notable is broken when you can regenerate your mana pretty well.

This is a great survivability setup for any class that can get this passive and stack mana regeneration easily. But be warned though, don’t over spam spark when you have this passive skill node. With my current build, my mana depletes fast when I over spam my spark ability due to arc mage will also increase the mana consumption of this build. However, it greatly increases the damage of the build, and thanks to the passive called branching bolts, and as well as the other lightning passives I have on this build, my sparks can deal massive damage even to tier 14 and 15 rare maps at endgame levels.

Right now, I am only using sparks as my main damage dealing skill. Then, I have arc mage with lightning mastery and clarity as support gems. Finally, I added remnants for the mana drops which allows us to restore our mana especially when dealing with breaches and other endgame activities that swarms the player with lots of monsters. This is really a great breach slaying class, and so far, the best when it comes to farming endgame maps.

By the way, when it comes to gears, I only invested 1 divine and 90 exalted orbs to make this character endgame viable. Probably, I needed more damage as you might have seen during the trial’s boss fight, but that is easier to achieve now because I can solo most tier 15 rare maps easily. And this is by far the best farming class I have used, and I am enjoying not dying at tier 14 and 15 rare maps, and getting all those juicy loots.

The most expensive I have spent on this build is probably the body armour that cost 1 divine in the market. The wand was 40 exalted orbs, then the focus was about 10 exalted orbs. The rest cost around 5 to 3 exalted orbs each to get, and then I invested 1 greater jeweller orbs in my spark kill gem to get it 4-linked. My mana pool will get higher once I have invested on expensive gears, and most of these cost 1 to 2 divines each.

The first one that I will upgrade is probably the boots with 30 movement speed, plus mana, intelligence, energy shield, and some elemental resistance stats. But last time I checked, one will cost around 4 divines in the market. It won’t be a problem farming currency right now with my build, but it would take some time to get all the stat that I want, especially those gears with high stats that I need that also provides decent number of resistances.
For now, I am surviving with 44 fire resisitance, 25 percent cold resistance, 21 percent lightning resistance, and 0 chaos resistance, thanks to the mind over matter passive notable, paired with mana regeneration and some evasion from my body armor. Resistances are great defensive stats in the game for survivability, and I strongly recommend you getting these as high as possible. For now, my resistances are enough to help me survive, but I don’t think it will be good enough for pinnacle bosses, which I have yet to experience in this game. I just broke the barrier, and entered the realm wherein I can finally fight trial bosses thanks to this build. And I’m definitely pursuing this build until I reach the same crazy numbers as what I initially saw from one mana left’s fat mana stacker gemling build.

Cool post.
I decided to go pillar of caged god with ice.
I am lvl88 currently, having a real hard time reaching 90, which is the final form of build, where i can get frenzy charges converted to powercharges to gain massive damage.
Other than that, even if i'm getting the most possible armour and life, i only have 6k HP. Life is just in a really bad place right now.
I'm wondering if it's possible somehow to turn it into an ES build; only issue is, even as it is, you really do need all your skillpoints up to lvl90, i can't see myself pathing any place to get ES-related nodes.

Hello!

How do u fight with mana-leech rares? They actually shot's me :(

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alexleis#0209 wrote:

Hello!

How do u fight with mana-leech rares? They actually shot's me :(

you mean the mana siphoners with the blue ring around them?

Its not a full circle but a ring. So you can either run away from them or simply run inside and stand next to them

Exactly what I was looking for. Thank you sir.

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Shadownova99#4203 wrote:

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alexleis#0209 wrote:

Hello!

How do u fight with mana-leech rares? They actually shot's me :(

you mean the mana siphoners with the blue ring around them?

Its not a full circle but a ring. So you can either run away from them or simply run inside and stand next to them

OMG if it works, u r the best)))!

One just cougth me on altar :((( 5.5 mana in 2-3 secs gone away