[3.3] HeiroFat: the Pen Is Mightier (HC, All Content, Perm IC, Boss Killer)

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Mawwk wrote:

We Build of the Week boys, gz SilverSequence, expecting a Poets Pen nerf for the next league cause we all know permanent IC its just too op.

You do realize Poet's has nothing to do with being able to have perm IC right?

Anyone one that wants to reliably generate 5 or more Endurance Charges within IC's cool down... exactly how hard is it press a keyboard key every time IC comes off cool down? And reality is, you don't even need to press the key every time IC comes off cool down. You only need to press the key when it comes off cool down if you are still be attacked by enemies that do physical damage.

All the Poet's do is make this a no-brainer.

I just wanted to go ahead and share my iteration of this build. It follows the same general idea of the OP, but I've made a few modifications as I wanted to fit in a bunch of abyss items that I'd picked up over the course of the league.

The main changes are a 6L Loreweave for Curse on Hit + Warlord's Mark (considering swapping to Enfeeble, think it makes a lot of sense but the life/mana leech on Warlord's mark is nice), two socket Lightpoacher, Tombfist, Bubonic Trails, an Anger + lv4 Enlighten setup, and a Carnage Heart instead of Atziri's Foible or Xoph's Blood. I'm using Murderous and Searching Eye Jewels in my Tombfists for Maim + Intimidate on Frenzy hits and have one of each type of jewel socketed for the additional 40% increased general damage from my boots. I also have pathed into Arsonist on the skill tree for some additional %Increased Fire Damage and Life Regen since my life pool is high enough to ignore taking some of the points near the Marauder start.

Warlord's Mark is used for extra Endurance Charge generation and leech in general mapping and bossing since I'm using Concentrated Effect and Elemental Focus to support VD. I'll be doing some testing with Fire Penetration Support to see if that improves boss dps as well as an enfeeble curse setup to gain extra survivability, but I feel like this CE-EF and Warlord's Mark is better for mapping.

The build is not quite as tanky since it isn't perma-IC (could be with self-cast IC), but the additional damage potential from an extra link on VD is significant. Tons of Abyss Jewel slots means you can take advantage of the lack of need for skill gem slots and gear for a ridiculously huge life/mana pool and balance your resistances more easily. Also, without one of our ring slots taken up by an Essence Worm, you allow yourself another equipment slot to scale your life, mana, dps, and help with your resistance balancing. I should honestly have more mana on my abyss jewels (current MoM would support up to 2550 ish, so ~400 more flat EHP), but HC economy and having created the character later in the league made it a bit challenging to find T1/T1, T2/T1 or T1/T2 life/mana jewels. This will be easy to optimize further when everything gets rolled to Standard.

Resistances are perfectly balanced for optimal Wise Oak effect and being able to use Atziri's Promise because of no Avatar of Fire from Xoph's is nice for the extra damage, leech, and chaos resistance. No elemental ailments from Arcane Surge is hugely beneficial and once I do an Oasis map to get the pantheon bonus to be immune to poison, I'll feel really comfortable only needing to worry about curses and bleeds (will have to change the life flask at that point). Side note, the extra corpse explosions from the Bubonic Trails are very satisfying. I'm not sure if it's really adding any more damage, but the pop-pop-pop from the corpses exploding all over the place is immense for the audio A E S T H E T I C S.

My gear:



Path of Building link: https://pastebin.com/AQkmV9ae

EHP: 9048 (6360 Life / 544 ES / 2144 Mana --> Can support up to 2544 full MoM so my mana is definitely low for the build).

In PoB, my average damage/hit is 25,200, putting my average DPS (non-boss) at approximately (25,200)*(4)*(3.70) = 372,900 dps. I believe with the proper jewels and jewelry, this could be scaled up much, much higher. Upgrades I am currently looking for that will really help the damage:

- Elder Opal Ring with %Increased Fire damage and Fire Damage to Spells and Attacks
OR
- Shaped Opal Ring with %Increased Fire Damage, %Increased Spell Damage, and MGOH/LGOH for Spells

- Elder Onyx Amulet with %Increased Fire Damage, %Increased Spell Damage, Gain % of Non-Chaos as Extra Chaos, Strength, All Res, Life or Mana
OR
- Shaped Onyx Amulet with %Increased Fire Damage, %Increased Spell Damage, %Elemental Penetration, Strength, All Res, Life or Mana

***NOTE --> Not sure if worth trying to self craft with Deafening Essence of Anger for the maximum possible %Increased Fire Damage. Something to consider.***

- Anger based Watcher's Eye (Ele Penetration and Fire Damage Leech would be nice, triple Anger with %Increased fire damage in addition to the two previously mentioned mods would be the dream)

- Hysteria Crafted CDR Shaped belt (currently what I have is pretty good but a nice hysteria shaped leather belt would be better). Optimally, Life, #%Increased Maximum Life, You Take #% Reduced Extra Damage from Critical Strikes, #%Increased Cooldown Recovery Speed (CDR), #%Increased Spell Damage During Any Flask Effect, and Damage Penetrates #% Elemental Resistances While Using a Flask. An Elder belt with #%Increased Life Recovery Rate and #%Increased Effect of Flasks on You could be a possible substitute, but I am absolutely sure that CDR will scale the damage better and more reliably, so Hysteria Shaped Leather Belt is the optimal choice even for an Abyss Jewel stacking build. The issue then becomes my attack speed, so building more frenzy charges (+1 Frenzy amulet and +1 Frenzy Bubonic Trails) or more attack speed will be necessary.

- Better Abyss Jewels. The perfect jewel would look something like this: +50 Life / +50 Mana / +10% All Res / Adds # to # Fire Damage to Spells or Damage Penetrates #% Elemental Resistances if You Haven't Killed Recently. Other potential suffix choices include #% Chance to Hinder Enemies on Hit With Spells, #%Increased Global Crit Chance, #%Increased Damage if You've Killed Recently, #% Increased Attack Speed if You've Dealt a Critical Strike Recently (Not too much!), or any of the various defensive oriented options. You can also look for the prefix add # to # Fire Damage to Spells While Dual Wielding if you feel like your EHP is high enough.

Other than that, I think this version is one of the better options for this particular build if you are willing to sacrifice your Perma-IC uptime. I find the build to be tanky enough currently without Perma-IC if you build your EHP high enough through abyss jewel stacking, so this version sacrifices a bit of safety and peace of mind for immense damage potential without using Indigon + Zerphi's.

Mind you, since we are using all the two-socket Abyss items available in league, it is definitely not a budget-friendly version of the build.

- VD Enchant Two-Socket Lightpoacher - 7-9ex
- Two-Socket Tombfist - 3ex
- Two-Socket Bubonic Trail - 6ex
- 6L Loreweave - 2-4ex for decent rolls + 1-1500 fuse or more (took me about 200 for mine)
- 2xPoet Pens (4 if you swap) - 2-4ex
- Various Abyss Jewels - 25c to 3ex or more (currently using 9 jewels, will eventually use 10-12)
- Well rolled Stygian Vise or Hysteria Shaped/Elder Leather Belt (A LOT, 2-10ex MINIMUM)
- Double Anger Watcher's Eye - 10-25ex

Total estimated cost: ~80ex or more to really maximize this version of the PPVD build.

Also I just want to say, thank you for making this build. It is truly an easy to learn, infinitely scalable, fun, fun, fun build. I absolutely love the combination of survivability and damage, and teleporting around exploding everything is a sheer pleasure.

Small question. I'm in HC and it seems like the main problem I have is when I get attack speed slowed, is there any solution for that? mainly talking about the little spike shooters that use suppressive fire and I guess chills as well. My attack speed without frenzy charges is .37. Is that bad? if it is, what should I aim for?

Edit: nevermind on the .37, I just qualitied my culling and frenzy and that brought me down to .32, but my question on slows still stands.

What about when you are beginning a map and dont have end charges running yet, do you play it safe until you have it going?

Edit again: also porcupines fuck me up

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Galtrovan wrote:

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Mawwk wrote:

We Build of the Week boys, gz SilverSequence, expecting a Poets Pen nerf for the next league cause we all know permanent IC its just too op.

You do realize Poet's has nothing to do with being able to have perm IC right?

Anyone one that wants to reliably generate 5 or more Endurance Charges within IC's cool down... exactly how hard is it press a keyboard key every time IC comes off cool down? And reality is, you don't even need to press the key every time IC comes off cool down. You only need to press the key when it comes off cool down if you are still be attacked by enemies that do physical damage.

All the Poet's do is make this a no-brainer.

I'm not saying IC is broken here. The nerf ive talked about is going to be on Poets Pen.

Just look what they did with old Coc, Mjolner builds, its obvious that PP is going to be nerfed.

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Mawwk wrote:

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Galtrovan wrote:

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Mawwk wrote:

We Build of the Week boys, gz SilverSequence, expecting a Poets Pen nerf for the next league cause we all know permanent IC its just too op.

You do realize Poet's has nothing to do with being able to have perm IC right?

Anyone one that wants to reliably generate 5 or more Endurance Charges within IC's cool down... exactly how hard is it press a keyboard key every time IC comes off cool down? And reality is, you don't even need to press the key every time IC comes off cool down. You only need to press the key when it comes off cool down if you are still be attacked by enemies that do physical damage.

All the Poet's do is make this a no-brainer.

I'm not saying IC is broken here. The nerf ive talked about is going to be on Poets Pen.

Just look what they did with old Coc, Mjolner builds, its obvious that PP is going to be nerfed.

Is that something that generally tends to happen? I have been playing for about a year but I never really paid attention to the relation between the Build of the Week and potential item nerfs for that build.

It just seems odd to showcase a build only to nerf one of the primary items that makes it all work, but that said, I've seen GGG do stranger things in my short time playing so I suppose it's not that crazy.

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Mawwk wrote:

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Galtrovan wrote:

"

Mawwk wrote:

We Build of the Week boys, gz SilverSequence, expecting a Poets Pen nerf for the next league cause we all know permanent IC its just too op.

You do realize Poet's has nothing to do with being able to have perm IC right?

Anyone one that wants to reliably generate 5 or more Endurance Charges within IC's cool down... exactly how hard is it press a keyboard key every time IC comes off cool down? And reality is, you don't even need to press the key every time IC comes off cool down. You only need to press the key when it comes off cool down if you are still be attacked by enemies that do physical damage.

All the Poet's do is make this a no-brainer.

I'm not saying IC is broken here. The nerf ive talked about is going to be on Poets Pen.

Just look what they did with old Coc, Mjolner builds, its obvious that PP is going to be nerfed.

To be fair, one of the main reasons they were nerfed was, at least from what GGG stated, was the issue of server performance, where with that many things going on at once, it was a strain on servers, since multiple spells procced at once and with no limit on how often.
If there is a nerf, it would have to be carefully done because if too much, it moves into the realm of "why bother using it".

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LovieNeverDies wrote:

Is that something that generally tends to happen? I have been playing for about a year but I never really paid attention to the relation between the Build of the Week and potential item nerfs for that build.

It just seems odd to showcase a build only to nerf one of the primary items that makes it all work, but that said, I've seen GGG do stranger things in my short time playing so I suppose it's not that crazy.

Botw have no relation on upcoming nerfs or so.
Old COC, Mjolner and Trigger stuff was nerfed most cause to server problems. With the old COC you were able to spam a shitton of skills in a second (I dont even like to remember what was using Fireball+Artic Breath togheter). Party play was a nightmare and even tose who had a decent pc struggled playing these builds.

Now for the Op stuff:

Grand Spectrum nerf, now they added all those jewel stacks in a single item called Indigon. Ofc this is going to get nerfed soon.

Ignite/Aoe/Prolif nerfs, example the build i had 4 years ago:


Voltaxic and Consuming Dark nerfs, you can add Poison (we have Assassin now), Shotgun, Snapshotting.

There are op stuff these days, and most are going to be nerfed soon. Everyone who played PP atleast once knows how Op it is. I think it will be nerfed soon.

I am sorry if this has been mentioned before but is Kaom's better than Loreweave? Also, I looked at other Pen builds and I don't see clear mind anywhere. Most of the others are stacking jewels that are % max life/mana + all res/res of any element and not fire damage. Just wondering what is more important since I play HC? I just started leveling this char and main reason is because I hit Volt Dead enchant in lab with a Burgonet Helmet that has double life (100+ life) and 3 tier 1 res.

Thanks for any help in advance!

PS - I can also afford Xoph's Blood and wondering if that might be better than rare?

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dsata wrote:

I am sorry if this has been mentioned before but is Kaom's better than Loreweave? Also, I looked at other Pen builds and I don't see clear mind anywhere. Most of the others are stacking jewels that are % max life/mana + all res/res of any element and not fire damage. Just wondering what is more important since I play HC? I just started leveling this char and main reason is because I hit Volt Dead enchant in lab with a Burgonet Helmet that has double life (100+ life) and 3 tier 1 res.

Thanks for any help in advance!

PS - I can also afford Xoph's Blood and wondering if that might be better than rare?

Xophs Blood will give u a nice damage, but you cant use Atziris Promise for the extra leech.
You can decide between using a rare ring instead essence worm, thats up to you. Clear mind gives us a nice dmg with mana regen.
I think Lorewave its better overall due to 80% all Res and the 5% reduced ele dmg from Hiero.

Using a unique belt without life and a meh gear i have 5500hp and 2900 mana that can be pushed to ~6200hp and 3500 mana with a good gear.
I did everything on endgame with the gear i had sitting on stash, did not killed Uber Elder.

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dsata wrote:

I am sorry if this has been mentioned before but is Kaom's better than Loreweave? Also, I looked at other Pen builds and I don't see clear mind anywhere. Most of the others are stacking jewels that are % max life/mana + all res/res of any element and not fire damage. Just wondering what is more important since I play HC? I just started leveling this char and main reason is because I hit Volt Dead enchant in lab with a Burgonet Helmet that has double life (100+ life) and 3 tier 1 res.

Thanks for any help in advance!

PS - I can also afford Xoph's Blood and wondering if that might be better than rare?

Clear mind is just a solid dmg jewel. probably equiv to about a 3 mod dmg jewel, but cheaper and easy to get (generally), esp since mana reservation isn't something we want.

A rare amulet is more flexible, but doesn't give as much dmg unless its super good (and even then, hard to be a 20% more multiplier (?)) That being said, it's still a conditional multiplier so its not going to always be up (probably only really useful on bosses). - Since you're hc, the rare amulet is probably better if you have a good life roll, but it's dependent on your tree and other gear (there are points where % > flat and flat > %)

I also second Loreweave, same reasons.