[3.8] 0piate's Lacerate Bleed Gladiator

This build makes use of all the new bleed skills and mechanics which prove to be very effective. Lacerate combined with a Blood or Sand stance while using the Gladiator Challenger charges makes a very powerful character. Can clear most content with just a click of the mouse, and high tier bosses usually die within a few seconds. It also works as a league starter because there are cheap ways around this build.

The build puts more emphasis into survivability and leveling up fast and efficient, but not a whole lot is put into damage. If you are looking for a gazillion DPS character, this build is probably not for you. But if you want to level up fast and still get enough damage to take out the end game bosses, then this is the right build. And there is always potential to add more DPS later, just depends on how much you want to spend.

It is a good league starter because you don't have to put much into it to clear maps. This was done in Blight League, starting with nothing, and no legacy items.

The damage fully buffed is 51k DPS hit damage and about 34k bleed damage. When you add in Crimson Dance with Ruthless Blows that brings the bleed damage up significantly but it's hard to tell exactly how much. Judging by how fast the bosses were dying I'm guessing the overall damage is well beyond 300k DPS.

Bandits: Oak
Anointments: Hatchet Master

https://bit.ly/2Mpy8VH

The idea is to make the most effective use of bleed. To do that you want to combine Lacerate, Flesh and Stone, the Gladiators Arena Challenger, and Gratuitious Violence.

Bleed mods in your tree should come last, you only really need it for the more difficult late game bosses. Try to invest in life and hit points until you reach around a level 80. Late game you are looking for anything that scales with bleed as it is about 80% of your damage. Look for the keywords, bleed, ailments, damage over time, and attack speed. Most of the damage skill points around the Duelist have both increase damage with ailments and attack speed in them. There's a few that have neither which you want to avoid, e.g: Forceful Skewering, Swift Skewering, Dismembering. Basically, critical strike and impale mods do nothing for bleed damage in this build. Defense relies on blocking and/or armour. I like to build blocking early and armour late game. To build up armour I combine Determination, Soul of Steel and some miscellaneous armour nodes in the skill tree, Enduring Cry along with the Outmatch and Outlast skill in the Gladiator. Pop a Granite flask and Basalt flask at the same time and your physical damage reduction should get to 80 to 90 percent.

The weapons used are more of a budget item. If you want higher DPS you can always put more currency and time into the weapons, but I'd rather invest in items that give more hit points for the sake of dying less and leveling up faster. I like to buy my weapons when my character reaches a level 73 or 74. Probably 30 to 40 chaos axes will be enough. But if you want more damage, look for the mod "60% chance for bleeding inflicted with this weapon to deal 100% more damage" on your axe, along with an overall 250 DPS on it. Probably a three or four exalt investment to get two of them.

If you are starting the league and have no currency, I suggest you get this thing as soon as you can.



This is a great budget item, cost 1 chaos, covers your helmet and body armour, and is strong enough to let you basically clear out any map. You can't wear body armour with it so your hit points will suffer a little bit as opposed to wearing a helmet and armour. Plus you are relying on blocking so you will likely get one shot a few times when you get into the tier 11+ maps. But it's a good item for getting you there until you can farm up more currency.

If you decide to use it, get Blade Barrier and Pain Forged in your tree and carry this flask.

You want to get your blocking up to around 60% for it to be effective.

The majority of the damage is bleed so Swift Affliction and Deadly Ailments scales really well with it. However, this is only true after you have Crimson Dance and most your bleed mods in place from your skill tree. I don't like to get all my bleed mods until late in the game, sometime after my character is a level 80. When you are leveling, don't use Swift Affliction and Deadly Ailments, you can use Concentrated Area, Impale Support, Faster Attacks, or Pulverize are all good choices for early game.

As soon as you can afford a six link Belly of the Beast, use that instead of the Nightmare Bascinet. Then you'll want to switch things around, get rid of blocking and scale up armour instead. Armour is good for the high tier maps because it lets you tank a lot of the monsters that would otherwise one shot you. Now you can get rid of Blade Barrior and Pain Forged, replace with Arena Challenger and Soul of Steel.

Lacerate in a six link goes like this:

Lacerate > Ruthless > Swift Affliction > Deadly Ailments > Multistrike > Melee Physical.

If you need currency, as soon as you get to a level 92, stop and switch out your gear to item quantity and item rarity items. This is what I use.


Download the Neversink filter https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1246208 I like to keep it on a level 3 for currency farming.

As you find maps, save all the ones with a percent quality on them, save your chisels too. When you're ready to grind maps for currency, chisel the maps you have with a percent quality already on them when they are white. Get them to 20% quality first, then alch them, then just start running maps. Don't chisel anything that is magic or rare because you will waste your chisels. A chisel adds 5% on a white map, 1% or 2% on a magic or rare.

Lacerate kills Shaper pretty quick! I like to make a few adjustments to get ready for him. Bring two Sapphire flasks and activate a Purity of Ice to help tank his cold damage. Stay in Blood Stance to do more damage. Put away the Lion's Roar Flask as it gives no boost to your bleed damage and you can't knock him back. Your Sulpher flask will help your bleed damage, that's the only offensive flask you will need for him. I also replace Enduring Cry with a War Banner, Enduring Cry won't be real effective on Shaper, but War Banner is. I like damage over time builds because even when you stop attacking he will still take lots of damage.

General mapping, tier 15

https://youtu.be/U7vCXRqgc7I