How to make a build - quick start guide (2.0 updated)

Thank you, this is helpful.

I agree, this is extremely helpful to a noob like me.

I'm working on a build of my own as we speak, and I believe that its coming along quite nicely thanks to this guide.

Surely as a first time player you aren't going to have base your first character around the equipment you find not the other way round

If you meant basing your character around the items you find - there's such a thing as trade.

And on that note, I've edited the gear section to be more comprehensive. This obviously does not cover self-found, but I didn't write it for self-found.

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Kirielis wrote:

This obviously does not cover self-found, but I didn't write it for self-found.

Perhaps not for the first character of a self found player, but still more than usable and helpful for us once we've built up a little bit of a stash.

I appreciate this break down, thank you. I've played ARPG games for a couple of decades and always sucked out loud at trying to make my own builds. I resigned myself long ago to looking up builds to use. After reading this I may take another stab at it.

mweh

Only two things I would suggest is it could be a little more newbie friendly.

For one, someone new to the game is not going to have any idea what the acronyms mean (CI, EB, ES, HP, FP, etc might as well be French).

Second, it could use something that would point them towards help with planning ahead. Again, someone new to the game is not going to have any idea what specs or uniques they plan to build for. I'm fairly new so I'm only somewhat familiar with what is being mentioned here but I would imagine someone who already knows all these things and gets all the references probably doesn't need help with builds by that point?

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MaurDL wrote:

I would imagine someone who already knows all these things and gets all the references probably doesn't need help with builds by that point?

Not necessarily true. See my reply a couple posts above yours.

Thanks for the encouragement, glad to see people finding this helpful!

@MaurDL

Re: newbie friendliness, I went back over it to see exactly what abbreviations I used. Let me put it to you that anyone who doesn't know the meanings of nearly* all the terms/abbreviations used is not yet in a position to use them to create a build.

More than that, it is my studied opinion that anyone without the presence of mind to look up terms they don't know, and their mechanics, will never succeed in making an endgame viable build except by pure chance. I am the last person to be elitist about making your own build, but let's be realistic here, okay?

*In context, FP is very clearly seen to be a projectile skill; the exact skill name is unimportant for the purpose of illustrating the point. You will notice that I did NOT use the more technical term "shotgunning". Okay?

Your second point is moot. Every new player has access to a wide range of active skills starting from level 1-2, and there is no substitute for experience when it comes to learning how a skill "feels" and what they like to play. As for uniques, see above re: looking up things.

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I would imagine someone who already knows all these things and gets all the references probably doesn't need help with builds by that point?

I'm just going to raise this thread as a counter-example. He even says it right there in the first paragraph, and there's a shout-out to his buddies at the end too. And now let me point you to the Standard ladder, do you perhaps recognise a name on there? (To the author of said thread: if you would prefer not to be cited, I will remove this reference, just let me know.) I was not involved in crafting that build in any way, just using it as an example.

Here's that contest thread:
http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/467218

Maybe someone can find a cool build to try out from the submissions there.