[Archived] Moosseolini's Holy Relics Guardian

Hello everyone! I wanted to share with you an interesting build which revolves around scaling Summon Holy Relic for our main damage source, and triggering the relic nova spell using either Static Strike or Cyclone. Let's quickly run over the main selling points of this build.

Some of the main reasons to play this build include:
- Huge life pool of 8,000+.
- Over 3M DPS without flasks.
- Many defensive layers.
- The ability to move freely while dealing damage.

The build features many defence layers, alongside great utility, and high and consistent damage. We do not require flasks or combat buffs to deal our damage, making everything that much more predictable.

Bossing is made simple as we can just keep moving and dodging while our relics do the heavy lifting. If we do get hit, all of our defensive layers will mitigate the damage for us and also replenish our health.

Mapping feels very smooth as we always keep moving, killing each pack with one large nova blast. Since our flask options are very flexible, we can run whatever immunities we want on them.

The build is optimised to tackle all content, and therefore is invested in both bossing and mapping capabilities.

Gameplay footage can be found at the bottom of the Gameplay section.

Pros
+ Wrist friendly playstyle
+ Cheap league starter (get to red maps using <1ex)
+ All content viable
+ Very tanky (8K+ life pool with many defence layers)
+ Good damage (3M+ DPS without flasks)
+ Useful in party play

Cons
- Does not sprint around or off-screen enemies.
- Relics occasionally die by standing in AoE and need resummoning.
- Can only get life back through flasks or regen.
- Vulnerable to Phys Reflect/No Regen

Path of Building
Path of Building (PoB) is an offline build planner for PoE. Many builds are created and shared using this tool, which you can get here. Be aware that some players may ask you to open their builds in a different fork of PoB. The link provided will lead you to LocalIdentity's implementation.

Loot Filter
A loot filter is going to make your Path of Exile experience much smoother, as it will help you understand what items are valuable and which are not so valuable. There are many loot filters available. I will be providing you with NeverSink's loot filter, which can be found here.

Path of Exile Trade
If you are not playing solo self found, it can be greatly beneficial to trade with other players. The official trade site can be found here.

Using this trade site (or any other third party trade sites available), you will be able to search for items which players have put into their public stash tabs. Most items will have been assigned a price. You can filter your results by many different filters, including filters for stats, type, sockets, requirements, and others. Remember to set the league in which you want to trade first!

When trading, it is common etiquette to whisper a player for the item you want to purchase. Copy the whisper message by clicking the 'Whisper' button, then paste it into chat with CTRL + V. The player will invite you to their party if they want to trade with you. Once you are in their party, join their hideout, and wait for them to trade you. Once you perform the trade, thank each other before proceeding on your merry ways.

Here is the link for one of the mandatory unique items for this build, Geofri's Crest.

Path of Exile Wiki
Path of Exile is a complicated game with many variables. To make it more approachable and easier to grasp, I recommend using the PoE Wiki, which can be found here.

A quick search on the wiki is likely going to help clear up any confusion you may have about various topics. If you are still confused, you can ask questions either here on the forums, or on the Path of Exile Subreddit.

The gear section is split by item type. Within each subsection, you will be able to find information about the progression for that gear slot.

Progression is split into three main sections: Levelling, Mapping, and Endgame.

1) Levelling - describes the recommended gear while progressing through the main story.
2) Mapping - describes the item progression going into the Atlas of Worlds.
3) Endgame - describes the best-in-slot gear for this build.

If gear does not have these sections, it is assumed to be endgame. If gear is missing one of these sections, try to progress directly to the next section.

Endgame gear priority:
1) Get Geofri's Crest first, as this item gives so much damage for its price. You should be able to fight Shaper/Elder and their guardians once you get this.
2) Get one of the staves from the Weapons>Mapping section. This will allow us to upgrade our chest next while ensuring we don't lose out on damage.
3) Get Kaom's Heart for insane life. If you need the sockets, instead craft a 6-link body armour with the essence of Greed.
4) Get lvl 21 Summon Holy Relic and a lvl 3 or 4 Empower gem. This will not only make the relics deal more damage, but it will also make them tankier.
5) From this point onwards, prioritise the most cost-effective upgrades. Endgame content like A8 Sirus and Uber Elder is now potentially doable.

This section will outline the progression of the build as you progress through the acts of the main story.

Note: The levelling described in this section is not optimized for speed; instead we are trying to reach maps as comfortably as possible while also levelling our main Holy Relic setup. If you are a more experienced player, you may prefer to level with one of the well-known levelling minion builds and swap later.

Passives: Check the 'Passives' section of this guide for assistance. In PoB, you should follow the passive trees for Levelling, then Early Mapping, and then Endgame, as you fill out your passive tree.

Skill Gems: Check the 'Skill Gems > Levelling Gems' section of this guide for assistance. In PoB, levelling gems have also been added.

Gear: Check the 'Gear' section of this guide for assistance. Each item slot has its own suggestion for Levelling. PoB also has an Early Mapping item set which you can look at to compare your items.

Check the tips below for some good advice.

Expectations:
1) You should be able to clear the main story with anything you pick up from the ground, levelling gear will only make it faster.
2) You should be able to clear to red maps with just the mapping gear. Your expected stats for mapping with this gear will be 0.5M+ DPS and 5K+ life.
3) Challenging content in high tier red maps (T14-T16) may prove difficult until end game gear is acquired. Most content should be doable.
4) Transitioning from mapping to endgame gear will take a long time and will be expensive. Have a bit of patience as you farm up the necessary currency.

Playstyle
Our strategy to clear maps is very simple:
1) Hit enemies with the activation setup (channel with Cyclone, or hit once with Static Strike).
2) Chug utility flasks for defences and activate your Guard/Warcry skill.
3) Move from pack to pack, and watch as the relics destroy each pack with one fell swoop.

Likewise, our strategy for bosses is also very simple:
1) Hit the boss with the activation setup (channel with Cyclone, or hit once with Static Strike).
2) Dance around the boss while the relics do the heavy lifting.
3) Occasionally drink a flask when required; for life recovery or buffs.

Here are some other tips:
- Using 'Flame Dash' to move between distant packs will help you clear faster, and it can also be used to dodge dangerous boss attacks.
- Use 'Signal Prey' from Predator on any enemies that don't immediately die to kill them faster. Re-apply every 8 seconds.
- Use 'Vaal Molten Shell' before engaging dangerous enemies to keep your life protected.
- If your relics die, simply toggle one of your auras, and then re-summon them.

Negative Map Mods
1) 'Monsters reflect % of Physical Damage' - your relics will immediately kill themselves from the reflected damage after they hit an enemy with the nova, therefore your damage and clear-speed will be very low.
2) 'Players cannot Regenerate Life, Mana, or Energy Shield' - the only other way we have to recover life and mana is through flasks, so this map mod will be especially dangerous to run.

We are still able to run all map mods, but if we can, we would really prefer to avoid those in particular.

Videos (3.9)
Awakening 8 Sirus Deathless
T16 Underground River
Awakening 8 Hunter citadel
Shaper Deathless
Elder Deathless
Uber Elder
Mastermind lvl 83
T15 Estuary (No Regen + Phys Reflect)

Fork: https://pastebin.com/20HW17Cn

Get the fork here.

Note: To calculate the maximum potential damage manually, take the shown Average Damage, divide by Skill Cooldown, and multiply by Active Minion Limit.

Q1: How fast should my activation skill hit?
A1: This answer is pretty complicated.

If you use Summon Holy Relic with an attack skill in PoB, it will calculate the trigger rate of the relic nova pretty well for you. Below are the steps just in case you wanted to calculate it manually though.

First, we need to calculate the cooldown recovery for the relics. As the nova skill of the holy relics can only trigger if it is not on cooldown. PoB does this very well. It performs the calculation and then rounds it to the nearest server tick. We are therefore able to just take the number PoB gives us (Skill Cooldown for Summon Holy Relic). We will refer to this number as C.

Now that we have the skill cooldown, we need to make sure that our activation skill matches this number (or is a little bit lower than this number).
1) For static strike, this means we want the Hit Rate in PoB to be equal to 1/C or less.
2) For cyclone, this means we want the Attack Rate to be 1/C or less. This can be hard to achieve, so we can also aim for the Attack Rate of cyclone to be a multiple: i.e. 2/C, or 3/C, or 4/C, and so on.

All that remains is to figure out how we can tweak the attack rate/hit rate.
1) For Static Strike, this can be changed by gem level (or quality if Phantasmal).
2) For Cyclone, this can be changed by attack speed.

If you didn't understand any of the above, just play Static Strike and leave it at level 18.

Q2: Static strike feels slow and clunky. What do?
A2: Static strike on its own feels bad for multiple reasons.
1) First, we need Increased Duration to make sure it lasts long enough for us to actually be able to take advantage of it.
2) We need Ancestral Call to increase its range, so that we don't need to be inside enemies to hit them.
3) We need a bunch of attack speed to make the animation faster. The more the better. For me, I try to aim for at least 2 attacks per second while using static strike. Consider using Elder gloves with 'Socketed Gems are supported by Level # Faster Attacks' and putting static strike in the gloves.
4) If you still dislike static strike, consider using cyclone instead.

Q3: My relics are dying! Help!
A3: If you relics are dying, that means their gem level is low. First, try to increase the gem level of your relics as much as you can. If they're still dying, grab some minion life or minion leech on the tree.

A single leech point will be enough to reach the maximum leech per second cap.

Also remember that it's not the end of the world if a relic dies. Simply put down your war banner and resummon it when safe.

Q4: Which one is better, Guardian or Necromancer?
A4: They both have their upsides and downsides.

Guardian has a lot of quality of life on his ascendancy, especially for league start. All elemental resistances, onslaught while levelling, huge life regen every 4 seconds, lots of curse effect reduction, block chance, and immunity to stun. Guardian's damage is generally lower than Necromancer, but tankiness is generally higher.

Necromancer has better raw damage on her ascendancy. +2 to all minion gems is a good damage and a good life increase for Holy Relics. We often use Bone Offering to give ourselves block, but it also gives the relics a lot of block, making them tankier. We often therefore also reach higher block numbers as Necromancer in general.

Ultimately, the choice is mostly preference. Look at the upsides and downsides above and consider which ascendancy suits you better.

This section explains how to maximize the damage on Summon Holy Relic.

The below PoB highlights what was probably the top-end of holy relic damage for '3.16 - Scourge'. Check the Notes section of the PoB for things we'd like to do but don't have room for in the build.

Crit Necromancer PoB: https://pastebin.com/VSWXGAah

Ways to scale relic damage include:
- Minion damage from various sources.
- Gem level increases from various sources.
- Frenzy/Power charges and other buffs from spectres.
- Kingmaker on an Animate Guardian.
- As many damage auras as we can fit into Victario's Influence.
- Minion crit from Cluster Jewels.
- Curses on enemies (primarily Assassin's Mark, but with investment other curses could be used too, such as Vulnerability)
- Divergent Summon Holy Relic gem quality via Enhance.

Crafting steps for the min-maxed staff:
1) To start, you should get your hands on a Judgement staff with '+1 to Level of Socketed Gems' fractured on to it.
2) You can do the fracturing yourself by chaos orbing any Judgement staff for the +1 mod and then using the fracture harvest craft on it. Bear in mind the craft is pretty rare.
3) Once you have your fractured staff, use 3-socket resonators with Faceted, Corroded, and Aetheric fossils on it. Do this until you hit +1 to Dexterity Gems and +1 to Intelligence/Strength gems. The Intelligence gem mod is better but the Strength gem mod is good enough too and it will lower costs.
4) Now we need to remove all mods on the staff except the two gem level suffixes we rolled for. You'll want to annul off any additional suffix that rolled, as well as one of the two additional prefixes that rolled. You can remove a single prefix by crafting 'Suffixes cannot be changed' and then scouring.
5) Once we have just our fractured mod and the two gem level mods, we can craft 'Can have up to 3 crafted modifiers' followed by 'Minions deal % increased damage' and '+2 to Level of Socketed Support Gems'.
6) Expected costs are in the tens to hundreds of exalts, depends on how lucky you get and how cheaply you got the crafting base.
7) This is just the best method I could think of at the moment, there may be better ways of getting this staff but I'm not aware of them.