0.3 -BotW Submission- Widowhail 100% Cold Infused Spark Elemental Equilibrium Infernalist

*Guide is a work in progress I am going to keep editing it as I have time*

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POE Ninja (POB import can be found here):

https://poe.ninja/poe2/builds/abyss/character/link1313-3590/ChillOutDude?i=1&search=name%3Dchillout

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Hi Exiles,

I have put together a very strong character I wanted to share with the community. It has farmed hundreds of divines and outside of legacy 0.1 temporalis and blink it is one of the fastest moving builds I have played, not only because of move speed but mainly because of insanely high projectile speed! (and Infernalist’s improved dodge animation).

I always create my own builds and have a lot of experience also doing this in PoE 1.

I’ve tried to layout a simple & straightforward guide below finishing off with raw gameplay footage to showcase that what is being written in this guide translates into reality.

Pros:

- With cold infusions up everything will be frozen so its relatively safe
(also cool unleash mechanics with BL/LW and also Bringer of Flame + Elemental Equilibrium + living bomb + overabundance II + cast on elemental ailment interaction never short on infusions)

- Screen wide clear with a cast and go next pack playstyle

- Good single target and can pre-fire the duration skills for when the boss spawns

- A very fun and interactive skill-packed playstyle with many cool mechanics (spark, ball lightning/lightning warp, mana tempest, flame wall, sigil of power, flameblast [for heal], demon form, living bomb, frost bomb)

- Can run all content

- Minimal downside due to Infernalist downside’s being overcome (for very strong ascendency bonuses)

- Can be budget friendly (outside of Charms and Jewels I feel 15-20 divine is the entry point)

Cons:

- If cold infusions are not up (rare) and/or you teleport into dangerous mobs without casting after you can get killed as EHP pool is not high

- Infusions only spawn under bosses, even with all the extra pickup radius we have if the boss unfreezes and you are under them picking up infusions you could die before they refreeze)

Ascendency:

Infernalist is just powerful, yet somehow under the radar powerful (as its not even top 5 played this league), lets lay out what you get:

1) All damage ignites/flammability (the best one for cast on elemental ailments which if you read the skill description gets triggered by this one the most)
2) 50% more crit damage
3) 30% more spell damage
4) 25% increased cast speed
5) 15% less physical damage taken (no armor and full chaos res)
6) Demon mode dodge (amazing)

All of this for two downsides:

1) Require Crystallized Immunities anointment on amulet (see Gem sockets – with red as the most support gem immune to Ignite)
2) Need a total of 185 life regen for Demon Form (level 20)
a. 1 Tecord’s gaze socket in body armor
b. Life regen on gear (an easy/inexpensive mod to get)
c. Vitality II in gem socket

The order of Ascendency nodes I went were:

1) Bringer of Flame
2) Demonic Possession
3) Altered Flesh/Grinning Immolation (this one is debatable if you have an end game amulet good to go and the currency i.e. 2x isolation 1x suffering to anoint crystalized immunities)

Build Mechanics:

Spark with the cold-infusion buff (which is obtained by picking up cold remnants off the ground is just brokenly strong. To summarize the benefits over regular spark at level 32 (ignoring the cast time):

- 58.33% more projectiles
- 22.22% more critical strike
- 200.00% more damage

Spark hits every 0.66 seconds so you want to increase skill effect duration enough (through passive tree, heart of the well, megalomaniac, prolonged duration support, etc.) to get the next ‘hit breakpoint’. In my case I have 4.83 / 0.66 = 7.31 (7) hits per spark. I remember in 0.1 when I pathed from Gemling Legionnaire up to Witch and grabbed all the 15% skill effect duration Jewels I could I got up to (10+) hits per spark it truly is underrated. Also we use a penetrating quiver because you want the spark projectiles to pierce instead of disappear after the hit (less projectiles would mean less chance to make the 0.66s hit frequency base, with the quiver its 100% pierce on the implicit * 4 so each spark projectile pierces 4 enemies). Finally projectile speed is also the last important factor for this and its easy to get 350%+ projectile speed (which the 350%+ also applies to % increased damage with projectile acceleration III support which is awesome).

Ball lightning is the same concept where, with unleash, it shoots out 3 ball lightnings and then with Lightning warp, with unleash, we quickly travel to and explode all 3! (ball lightning with fire infusion will also do fire damage and create ignited ground, lightning warp will create infusion remnants and will also create shocked ground if culling an enemy!). Lightning Warp creating 3+ remnants really helps to get infusions started pre-map start / pre-boss start and enables the build! Ball lightning with insane projectile speed is way quicker than dodging to a location!

Living Bomb is another Build Enabler with cast on elemental ailments and infernalist all damage applying to flammability/ignite and overabundance II it procs all the time like crazy creating remnants of all types through Elemental Equilibrium Keystone.

Siphon Elements is final Build Enabler creating remnants through freezing and igniting targets.
Flameblast + Second Wind III creates a very long cooldown, but 2 uses, and just pressing it (i.e. not channeling it) will heal about 1250hp on a 2500hp character (what you should aim for around level 90-95)

Mana Tempest you cast and move off of it (with quality it lingers) so you get the effects while not burning through your mana

Lightning infused flame wall adds damage to spark

Frost bomb provides more remnants and exposure on the enemy.

Passive Tree:

The passive tree is relatively simple. For the stat nodes there a mix of Intelligence and Strength. The tree stays around the top side of the witch area pathing over to Elemental Equilibrium on the left, and Heavy Frost/Thin Ice and the Crit nodes on the right. There are four Jewel slots (1 for Heart of the Well, 1 for Megalomaniac, 1 for a Rare Jewel with Bonuses to Equipped Quiver/Large Radius, 1 flex Jewel slot). I also added Lucidity cluster for damage taken from mana before life for very juiced map survivability (can also get mental perseverance on a megalomaniac to hit 26% total)

The thing I will say about the passive tree is, and I think it’s a development miss-decision by GGG, is any conditional nodes (with relatively easy conditions to meet) are just WAY too powerful so we take all of them:

i.e. example:
Are you going to take Potent Interaction cluster (60% spell damage/5% reduced cast speed) = 15% spell damage / -1.25% cast speed per point or spend 1 more point for Echoing Frost/Flames cluster (60% elemental damage if ignited/chilled recently + 30% elemental damage) = 19% damage per point
Another important note is that one point in a passive ‘1% mana gained on kill’ is required if you don’t have the modifier on a Heart of the Well jewel or another Socketable.

The tree is overall incredibly strong I would not suggest too many deviations but let me know if you see room for improvement. See ‘POE Ninja’ section for the passive tree itself.

Equipment:

Two Unique’s in the build:

1) Widowhail was only a few divines for 279% (remaining 21% from the rare bonuses to equipped quiver jewel) instead of paying 55+ divine for a 300% widowhail 2 socket. The bow combined with quiver gives +8 to projectile levels, ~175% projectile speed at bare minimum then I have other bonuses on quiver (crit damage corrupt, life on kill, dexterity, mana on kill is also good). 2 socket is mandatory-ish (if you can get +30 spirit elsewhere then great)

2) Call of the brotherhood is 100% lightning to cold, +intelligence, freeze buildup, mana regen, resist basically everything outside of the mandatory conversion is great for the build and it’s a dirt-cheap item
The rares are quite simple:

Life/Mana/Resistance is always the core easy to get stats. Outside of that there is the regular movement speed on boots, ideally +3 skills on amulet, enough Intelligence to use gems, and enough Life Regeneration for demon form. (see Ascendency section for details on why)

40 spirit on body armor minimum (assuming 30 spirit is on bow) for Vitality II and Siphon Elements, I have 50 spirit on body armor (so I can use Clarity I) but 60 would be ideal required (60 for Clarity II)

Make sure you have a Sigil of Power Staff for Weapon swap.

Charms and Jewels is where the build can get expensive but are not required. A ‘Rite of Passage’ with the ‘Spirit of the Primate’ is absolutely digusting, actually all versions of this gem are crazy and some (i.e. Cat) are worth a mirror for a reason.

Gem Sockets:

[note all gems except Spirit reservation ones and Sigil of Power should be set to WEAPON 1 ONLY]

Spark + Projectile Acceleration III + Prolonged Duration II + Efficiency II + Zenith II + Rising Tempest or Considered Casting

Ball Lightning + Projectile Acceleration III + Unleash + Efficiency II + Rapid Casting III
Lightning Warp + Harmonic Remnants II + Remnant Potency I (I am not sure if this actually does anything but it’s Red colour) + Rapid Casting III

Flameblast + Second Wind III (this combination is AMAZING for healing) + 2 red sockets (I use Ignite II and Steadfast I)

Mana Tempest + Efficiency II + Lightning Mastery + Rapid Casting III
Flame Wall + Prolonged Duration II + Efficiency II + Fire Exposure + Rapid Casting III

Frost Bomb + Harmonic Remnants II + Cooldown Recovery II + Short Fuse II + Potent Exposure

Cast on Elemental Ailement + Living Bomb (LEVEL ONE!!!) + Overabundance II + Harmonic Remnants II + Boundless Energy II + Energy Retention

Siphon Elements + Harmonic Remnants II + Remnant Potency I + Vitality II + (no Clarity / Clarity I / Clarity II depending on Spirit)

Sigil of Power + Prolonged Duration II + Cooldown Recovery II + Efficiency II

Use Bow Shot and Demon Form to put enough Red gems in for Crystallized Immunities node (it does not matter which)

Campaign Rewards :

*WIP*

Important Notes:

*WIP*

Video:

*WIP*

POE Ninja (POB import can be found here):

https://poe.ninja/poe2/builds/abyss/character/link1313-3590/ChillOutDude?i=1&search=name%3Dchillout


Thanks for reading, again I will try to finish this guide today but wanted to get it posted as I know GGG starts work in Eastern Standard Time’s Sunday afternoon 😊

Kindest Regards.