[3.19] Donkster5' LS Champ - Still great! Leaguestart to endgame SC and HC. Updated 8/18

This was my league-starter, and it's really been a great ride. When people say, "You want a character that's an über tank? Zoomy map blaster? Boss killer? Pick two," it obviously doesn't apply here. Even more gratifying is being able to play it from Act 1 to level 100, scaling into the ultra-endgame with upgrades feeling meaningful and impactful.


A few reflections:

1. If you go the Perseverance armour and evasion route, the suffix pressure on the rest of your gear can feel very stifling. You have to somehow fit in all resistances, 160 str/dex, 130 int, accuracy, hopefully ailment avoidance and spell suppression.

This is while Aspect of the Cat and Assassin's Mark have to occupy two suffixes (and Tailwind when you get the currency), Mark of the Elder and Farrul's contribute nothing to those, and your glove slot isn't the most flexible because you have to keep additional strike locked in.

But when you can fit everything in, all the auras and defense and damage, it feels unbelievable. Purity of Elements was the real game-changer there, as it gave 57% all res from the aura effect, full ailment immunity including alternative ailments, and 46% chaos res from a Watcher's Eye.

Another helpful change in 3.16 was the weapon craft of crit chance/quality now being crit chance/strength and int.

2. I couldn't figure out how Wave of Conviction could give us lightning exposure because of Anger. While fire exposure isn't negligible either, especially if your claw has added fire and you use Mantra of Flames, I still switched to Hydrosphere being triggered instead.

Hydrosphere's -10% to cold and lightning res is nice, even better if you can fit in the elemental mastery making exposure -18% to both cold and lightning.

Another marginal benefit is that it is persistent with a long duration, longer than Static Strike, keeping power charges topped up with PCoC. From what I can tell, Hydrosphere won't eat your additional strike target, but it does probably eat a pierce if you fire through it. One other downside is that its having collision means that sometimes it might block a doorway.

3. Watching that Uber Elder fight reminded me that a champion's relative weakness is damage over time compared to hits. I haven't played around with it yet, but traveling to Claws of the Falcon also puts you within two points of picking up Lethe Shade.

The downside of Lethe Shade isn't that big of a deal if you already have full elemental ailment avoidance. As for poison and bleeding, one of the benefits of playing a build that uses a unique ring is that corruption implicits are targetable. Looking at the trade site, a Mark of the Elder with "Bleeding cannot be inflicted on you" or "Cannot be poisoned" is very affordable at this point.

A flask can handle the ailment not otherwise solved, or you can min-max all the way with jewel implicits.

Lvl 80 now. Cant seem to drop an imperial claw to craft. How do i go about upgrading my gear. Seems very gear dependant. Damage is falling off on bosses in white maps. But i managed to face tank and kill the lightning scourge boss.

Should i keep farming till i drop an imperial claw or are there other ways of improving my dps? Build feels great so far ngl

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erdamus escreveu:

When people say, "You want a character that's an über tank? Zoomy map blaster? Boss killer? Pick two," it obviously doesn't apply here. Even more gratifying is being able to play it from Act 1 to level 100, scaling into the ultra-endgame with upgrades feeling meaningful and impactful.

That is a uber huge complement, thank you. And, more importantly, thank you for your thoughts. I really like learning from other skilled practitioners.

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buttcaake escreveu:

Lvl 80 now. Cant seem to drop an imperial claw to craft. How do i go about upgrading my gear. Seems very gear dependant. Damage is falling off on bosses in white maps. But i managed to face tank and kill the lightning scourge boss.

Should i keep farming till i drop an imperial claw or are there other ways of improving my dps? Build feels great so far ngl

Looking at your gear… I’m amazed you have reached level 80. That’s not a dig, just a bit of amazement at the versatility of the build and your perseverance. You’re rocking a 4 link chest and your claws have no attack speed and little to zero added flat elemental damage. Take your noble claw and hit it with a screaming or better essence
of zeal or wrath. Craft on either flat lightning damage or attack speed… whatever you’re missing based on the essence used. Then, drop the gemini claw and go claw/shield. It’ll feel like an immediate upgrade. Next, buy a six link for 10
chaos with 2 red, 2 green, and two blue slots. If you’re playing SSF, farm harvest and choose all the “socket link” crafts. 5-link harvest crafts drop really regularly.

Other than that, maybe check your loot filter, as imperial claws drop all the time. Most of them are white, so you need to refine your filter to call them tier 1 and show up as normal items. item lvl 82 is the sweet spot, but youre still too early for that. I think lvl 73 is T2 lightning damage, which works. Also, Noble claws are essentially just as good. Show normal claws and slap an essence on them or harvest craft reforge speed or lightning.

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Donkster5 escreveu:

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buttcaake escreveu:

Lvl 80 now. Cant seem to drop an imperial claw to craft. How do i go about upgrading my gear. Seems very gear dependant. Damage is falling off on bosses in white maps. But i managed to face tank and kill the lightning scourge boss.

Should i keep farming till i drop an imperial claw or are there other ways of improving my dps? Build feels great so far ngl

Looking at your gear… I’m amazed you have reached level 80. That’s not a dig, just a bit of amazement at the versatility of the build and your perseverance. You’re rocking a 4 link chest and your claws have no attack speed and little to zero added flat elemental damage. Take your noble claw and hit it with a screaming or better essence
of zeal or wrath. Craft on either flat lightning damage or attack speed… whatever you’re missing based on the essence used. Then, drop the gemini claw and go claw/shield. It’ll feel like an immediate upgrade. Next, buy a six link for 10
chaos with 2 red, 2 green, and two blue slots. If you’re playing SSF, farm harvest and choose all the “socket link” crafts. 5-link harvest crafts drop really regularly.

Other than that, maybe check your loot filter, as imperial claws drop all the time. Most of them are white, so you need to refine your filter to call them tier 1 and show up as normal items. item lvl 82 is the sweet spot, but youre still too early for that. I think lvl 73 is T2 lightning damage, which works. Also, Noble claws are essentially just as good. Show normal claws and slap an essence on them or harvest craft reforge speed or lightning.

Thank you for the reply : D I am playing ssf. I do have imperial claw mega highlighted in my filter haha. I'll try to make these changes with nobile claws/shield.

Why do we go shield btw? More defence? Does it provide a big bonus for the build in a special way?

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buttcaake escreveu:

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Donkster5 escreveu:

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buttcaake escreveu:

Lvl 80 now. Cant seem to drop an imperial claw to craft. How do i go about upgrading my gear. Seems very gear dependant. Damage is falling off on bosses in white maps. But i managed to face tank and kill the lightning scourge boss.

Should i keep farming till i drop an imperial claw or are there other ways of improving my dps? Build feels great so far ngl

Looking at your gear… I’m amazed you have reached level 80. That’s not a dig, just a bit of amazement at the versatility of the build and your perseverance. You’re rocking a 4 link chest and your claws have no attack speed and little to zero added flat elemental damage. Take your noble claw and hit it with a screaming or better essence
of zeal or wrath. Craft on either flat lightning damage or attack speed… whatever you’re missing based on the essence used. Then, drop the gemini claw and go claw/shield. It’ll feel like an immediate upgrade. Next, buy a six link for 10
chaos with 2 red, 2 green, and two blue slots. If you’re playing SSF, farm harvest and choose all the “socket link” crafts. 5-link harvest crafts drop really regularly.

Other than that, maybe check your loot filter, as imperial claws drop all the time. Most of them are white, so you need to refine your filter to call them tier 1 and show up as normal items. item lvl 82 is the sweet spot, but youre still too early for that. I think lvl 73 is T2 lightning damage, which works. Also, Noble claws are essentially just as good. Show normal claws and slap an essence on them or harvest craft reforge speed or lightning.

Thank you for the reply : D I am playing ssf. I do have imperial claw mega highlighted in my filter haha. I'll try to make these changes with nobile claws/shield.

Why do we go shield btw? More defence? Does it provide a big bonus for the build in a special way?

SSF… makes more sense. The offensive buff for going dual wield is not big enough to offset the defensive mod gains you get from a shield. Shields can roll spell suppression, elemental avoidance, and all the other resistances, stats, life you need. The key is having a high attack speed claw, which then mitigates most of the offensive downsides to not dual wielding.

I'm also really digging the build. Had to be a little versatile since I'm stubborn about sticking to SSF this time around (had been a couple years since I played, was spending way too much time theory crafting/pricing out items/trading/trying to min max every ounce I could from every upgrade, etc).

Haven't been able to get Grace to work yet (along with anger/HOI/precision), just not enough mana to be comfortable with being able to always attack. I think it's prob that I'm still using Ancestral Call which makes casting LS go from 18 to 23 mana (swapping out AC for Inspiration drops mana cost to 15!). I'll get the gear I need to keep progressing (eventually), but being able to fit in Grace would be a game changer I think.

Mainly just wanted to post and say thank you Donkster5, this has been a great build guide and a very enjoyable SSF league so far for me. Thank you!

link to poe ninja build: https://poe.ninja/challengessf/builds/char/Huseby/Husebeard

link to pob: https://pastebin.com/7nBgEgfJ

Can someone please explain why his POB shows Secrets of Suffering jewel? I notice it pretty much renders herald of ice useless, wondering how important the brittle, etc. ailments are. Thanks in advance :)

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Ragercore escreveu:

Can someone please explain why his POB shows Secrets of Suffering jewel? I notice it pretty much renders herald of ice useless, wondering how important the brittle, etc. ailments are. Thanks in advance :)

Drop HoI when you get the interrogation jewel. You can then turn on arctic armor or grace for a boost to survivability. Brittle and scorched are pretty huge. With the additional effect of non-damaging ailment nodes we can can get ~10 stacks of brittle and 25 stacks of scorched on endgame bosses, which means our crit chance is at or near 100% with minimal investment (none on weapon or crit chance passives) and their ele resistances are lowered by ~25%. Way better than shock/etc.

PoB has add lightning dmg and elemental dmg w/ attacks at lvl 5. Is that correct and if so, why? Sorry if this has already been asked I read through a few recent threads and didn't see anything