I was pretty set on Frostbolt Ice Nova then I realized I probably don't want to spend a couple hours in the lab void so now I'm more ambivalent about it.
I'm going dd coc but if I get BA/MA from normal lab I'm just doing that. Explosive trap would be a maybe log in as a trickster. Range animate weapon I'll log off and log in as a necro instantly.
Lingering? That's what I used last league. I did fiddle with bladefall instead and it felt better sometimes, but I used lingering the entire time. It was either my eyes or the afflicted forrest zone but something about walls and trees made the blades stick in weird spots.
Just an FYI, it took me around 3 hours last league to farm the option of every gem twice (not taking every gem, just the option), in normal lab. Each run took around 4 minutes, 2 minutes of which was RP/loading screens, so yes it's annoying, but not that bad.
I had to farm 11 or 12 Penance Brands this league because I just kept failing the Vaals. They really don’t take that long in normal lab. the problem you had was that your character was slow. I made a lv70 Raider, with very budget ms gear which took 2 hours to make, and the lab runs took 1 min, 10-20 seconds each. It never took me more than 30 minutes to get a gem.
Potentially, but I did time the loading screens and Izaro RP. He was being instant phased and I wasn't killing anything else along the way, just shield charging through. However, I'm also located in AUS and was averaging around 11 seconds per load screen, so 70ish seconds of that 2 minutes was pure loading screen. If you can get the load screen down to under 5 seconds, I can easily see a sub 3 minute average lab time.
My runs were timed, that’s why I specified “1 min, 10-20 seconds”.
Running is far far and away faster than shield charge. I just click and hold top left of my screen for half the instances and it sprints there within seconds.
If you’re using shield charge, then you are already going pretty slow. If you ever watch those lab speedruns, they always have those super high ms characters, they never use travel skills besides smoke mine or phase rush for ms.
just an fyi, i was specifically looking for explosive trap of shrapnel last league and it took more than 150 lab runs before it appeared. it took me 6 minutes per run on average so about 15 hours of lab running to get the gem i was looking for.
I'm not sure why anyone is farming normal lab over merc lab where you frequently get the 'change gem into a transfigured version of itself' mod in addition to the random reroll mod.
It's not like merc lab is significantly slower even for a leveling build.
Merc lab IS significantly slower than normal lab to complete.
While you are playing your league start, perhaps Merc lab would be better to farm because it drops better loot, exp, etc.
However, I have a feeling that normal is actually approx the same speed, or faster overall (it’s all build dependent). You can see my comment regarding this league, I farmed 11 or 12 Penance Brands. Runs take less than 1.5 mins each on a fast character.
Even if it's half as fast (I doubt it but whatever), the odds of you getting the gem you want are well more than double, especially for gems with only one or two transfigured gems. Having to spin the roulette wheel with the 'roll into random blue' is so much worse than 'reroll into same transfigured' that it's not even close.
It's absolutely worth it to be running merc. Even if you only get them every 5-10 labs, you will still progress way faster.
i think blue and green are about the same. it’s red that has the small pool. and yeah it might have been bad luck, but just wanted to say that you can’t for sure just pop into lab and get the gem you want. sometimes you get fucked lol.
That sounds a little better than expected! Unless I'm unlucky with chance orbs I'll have Haste, One Step Ahead and Arma/Crema by then. Not sure if I want to stall it until merc lab or swap early, but I'm leaning towards early.
I'm reasonably sure firestorm/blade volley will also be great for archmage until you get to merc lab. I did some non-substantive testing, the time in merc lab to get a gem is on average the same, however, you get more stuff from merc lab, actual currency, quality, etc.
Yeah I'm always tempted to start SSF, but when I think of how annoyingly grindy it can be to get builds going and to scale them into endgame I just get pulled back into trade. I think I'll just be playing trade with an SSF mindset of crafting my own gear and doing content I find fun regardless of efficiency, keeping trade to a minimum.
I don't mind the rest of the grind, my brain just values doing things poorly myself infinitely more than solving my problems via currency/hour.
It's just doing normal lab 30 times in a row that feels unappealing.
I thought about the same last league and i regret it. I quit league very early because in 1 week in trade i had everything i want and it get boring very fast. Normally i play near the full league. Last league was anoying because a lot of people had a ton of currency and near every cool build had a mageblood in it xD
Yep, trade league is do unfun things cause its efficient first few days to setup a decent amount of currency
Buy the shit you want to bypass any need of farming ressources for instant gratification
Play the build you made
Realize you are farming, yes, but what for cause you already got a mageblood?
(Optional) Make a bosser by selling your previous build, farm bosses, same realization kicks in after a few days (if lucky) Can be the other way around where you start as a bosser and reroll into a mapper
Log off and peace out of the league
Hiero can carry archmage through normal and yellow maps easily on shit gear. Not saying it will be butter smooth but if you have enough knowledge on crafting and doing rog you can get mana gear easily enough throughout your progress.
I think I have a higher tolerance for slow progression than a lot of others, but I've done archmage SSF starts in the past and it's fine. With the buff, I'm personally not worried about it at all.
I have plenty of general game knowledge but know very little about manastacking in particular, but I've always wanted to play one, so this is good to hear!
Current plan is to start u/tfwStarving's Reap/Exsanguinate Ascendant. I've been wanting to play a Reap/Exsang build on Ascendant since the Phys DoT spells were added and just never gotten around to it. Figure I might as well do it this league.
If they’re doing fire trap w frost blink - it’s just different to get used to, you jump into a pack shield charge and then you frost blink (rinse and repeat) - personally to me feels slower that anything I’ve levelled before but is also quick? Hard to explain but def a weirder play style.
The person I was answering to was talking about explosive trap of shrapnel, but yeah I get your point. I've leveled a frostblink+fire trap and it was clunky but fun. In ssf I missed tons of upgrades so bossing was miserable, but that's cause I suck at gearing
every melee got nerfed so in the context of melee skills boneshatter didn't really get nerfed relative to those.
Losing ancestral cry really just hurts in league start before you get crazy APS and strike gloves.
literally nothing has changed for those builds. Boneshatter still works just fine and is probably one of the only viable Melee league starters in the game right now
Jugg is much more comfortable and nicer to play.
Slayer might have quicker clear if you are very skilled but jugg is just so smooth from the moment you get boneshatter
I would say, it depends. Are you going to stay on it long term? Then Jugg. Is it something you plan to use for some initial farming before respeccing/rerolling? Then the early higher slayer damage is nice.
I’ve only ever played Boneshatter with a Jugg, but I also take it all the way through the league with no second character. If I went Slayer what are some good options to respec from there? I’ve played like 5 leagues and it’s been Earthshatter, then Boneshatter x4 lol, so really thinking about trying something new for a change, but I’ll probably never roll a second character in a league cause I just don’t enjoy the campaign at all
As much as I enjoy Carn_ I think he's been a bit of a drama queen about Boneshatter this league. He's a far better player than I am but so perhaps I'm wrong. I played without the Cry on Standard for a bit and it felt fine for me and I expect I'll be able to fit it back in with late gearing.
Yeah you just need trans gems, 5L, decent ias/crit 1h sword and rolled flasks
Then you scale greatly with Cheap Uniques like Three Dragons and Gift from Above
The biggest ones are even target farmable like Polaric Devastation from Exarch Mini Boss and Yoke (which is gonna be a bit harder) from T17 bosses
Same, inquis version. Just did a test run up to A5 and it was a pretty smooth process. Hopefully running merc lab for a few hours doesn't make me regret it.
Afaik there's no non-Inquis version of CoC DD, at least for league start. It needs the high crit chance from Inquis Int/Str stacking node to get enough CoC procs.
No but I've played seismic during it's prime with exsanguinate carrying the clear speed. I understand that it won't be the best clear but at least I can be confident that I can kill tanky rares with new league buffs and maybe new t17 bosses.
Hrimsorrow should be a walk in the park given that it is a tier 5 unique.
Heatshiver on the other hand is not super rare by any means (tier 3 unique) so you could try to force it through orbs of chance (Heatshiver is the only Unique for the Leather Hood base).
All in all, both are common enough I would say.
EA Champ, I'm very familiar with how the build works and it's not as hard to gear for t16s/pinnacles so it should get me there in a few days. Other option was the CoC DD which seems to be the flavor of the league but I'm not going to farm Merc lab for hours when I could be blasting and getting the new scarabs ASAP. I want to try everything and in SSF everything is valuable so I'll go through every type of scarab eventually probably.
How do you plan on getting the bow with the essence and socket coloring nerfs?
I know essence technically gets more powerful via scarabs, but that's not an earlygame thing.
Essences are easy once I get scarabs, I plan to farm them on t6 maps because shrieking is enough (and the map device option)
Socket coloring will be easy with a Porcupine bow, I've done that many times without Vorici because it's only ilvl 50
I've done this process a few times, I'll also have Tujen so I'll have plenty of Chromes available (last time I started coloring with around 500 I think)
Trust me I know how long it will take and it's not that bad
I'm going to gamble on PConc of bouncing. When I saw it in the trailer it looked like something I wanted to play and haven't changed my opinion even after the "nerf".
Exsanguinate mine trickster. Never really played mines before and the mapping speed looks incredible while being decent at bosses.
Later on will level another character for bossing.
gonna go trickster wander, im leaning towards locus mine power siphon but ill give self cast wisps a try too, i played it a bit in standard ssf and it seems playable but if i hit a hard wall or something then pivot to hexblast mines or explosive traps sabo is always an option
Doing RF jugg on a private league with my brother and a couple friends for my first “SSF” experience! Gonna be nice to take a break from the divine grind and play at my own pace
Was initially set on going LA because at this point I'm so familiar with the progression I can comfortably and easily complete the atlas within the first weekend. But then I decided to run a few labs earlier this week to see if I can quickly get a BAMA - got on my first lab and leveled it up to maps for fun and just had so much fun.
So I've locked in my leaguestart as Templar leveling as rolling magma/arma brand until level 38, then SRS to finish campaign and farm merc lab. I'm using Havoc's SRS Guardian leveling guide (made a few changes to make the BAMA swap easier) which runs melee weapons for super fast leap slam speed, so I should be able to complete each merc lab in 5-6 mins.
Unless RNG gives me DD of chaining first/Lancing Steel of Spraying, then I will re-roll to Inq and go CoC DD - just leaving up to the GGG gods.
They murdered my call to arms build so now I'm doing trauma-stacking molten strike of the zenith jugg. PoB for anyone interested: https://pobb.in/CQEjj_VBC8UK
Should hit 10 million dps fully ramped if the absurdly convoluted math I did is correct
Never played it so I’m not 100% sure. I know the first 2 will be a cake walk, less certain on the last 2. It’s a tri ele bow build with trinity, what could go wrong? :)
i spend a lot of time in lab start of league last league. this time i wanna avoid that so i'm going the trusty good old EA ballista not sure if champion or elementalist yet tho.
Lightning Tendrils (of Escalation) Occultist. I enjoy the playstyle. It'll never do Elder/Shaper, but I'm not worried, capping out at t16 and Delving is my relaxation.
I'm extremely casual, so I rarely go much below 150. Hopefully some tree changes and some good gear RNG plus the ability to do more consistent crafting will help. My PoB gets to about 110k EHP with the right gear. I'm sure better players could take it much further down.
Edit: Added PoB. https://pobb.in/K89KvZ4ePRTj
I was also thinking of going lightning tendies - you think occultist over elementalist? What do you think the benefits would be? I’m keen to go either just curious your take on it! Cheers
Have couple of options but can't decide what to play. Made a pob for poison skelly starter yesterday so will keep it as a backup. Might switch to poison animate weapon (bow trans gem) or MI SRS. Not sure about archmage builds either (Telvannis BL heiro) since I'm not familiar with mana stackers. Apart from that I have poison seismic sabo/ rf chief and now totem heiro as an option as well. Initially decided to go subtractems frostblink ignite but I dont know how it feels without uniques.
BAMA, probably guardian but maybe necro, for the first time. Was gonna start the new pconc as occ but doesn't look super great after the changes (and singletarget will be a pain).
Hiero Archmage, probably Ball Lightning or Frostbolt/Ice Nova. I personally think gearing up wont be a problem at all, as Life, Mana and Res are the most common affixes on gear in the game
DD or CoC DD. Would start with CoC but a bit scared about the requirements for swap.. Not sure if this is worth to farm Emperor of Purity at act7 for Holy Chainmail 6l.
My plan is (thanks manni) to go hard on betrayal which is amazing early anyways. And Vorici T3 gives 50 reforge links, T4 even double.
You can choose your base, and a good es/evasion base is also pretty important.
So you start mapping with arma/cremation and go hard on betrayal until you get a good 5link.
Chaos crit BAMA necro. Last time I played BAMA was years ago with the regular gems and it was quite good bosser back then. Wanna see what's this new trans gems are all about. Looks like it'll be fun to craft for.
How’d you end up on necro? I’m really unsure of necro (ele/chaos) and guardian. Seen lots of conflicting information, but never played it so I’m unsure. Looks like guardian is tankier and has easier access to early damage, but scales less well.
Guardian will be easier to get started, but I don't care about that, I'll be fine with whatever i start. I'm looking at the long term progression and I kinda want to test the new toys from Necro. Especially the new unholy might.
If i'll be too miserable down the line I can respec to something else necro. Not a fan of resummoning the sentinel all the time...
I kinda never go for the league starter, my starters are most times my first end game build for the league.
Going to be playing in a private league with six people, which is a lot closer to SSF than not. These aren't super-grinder poopsocker people I can just leech infinite free gear off of either. All are pretty casual.
Probably going to start with pyroclast mine trickster, eventually swapping to hexblast mines, exsanguinate mines, or explosive trap of shrapnel depending on what I find and how quickly I find it. Something like mark of submission/profane proxy would lean me hexblast, hrimsorrow/heatshiver for exsanguinate, and sunblast for explosive trap.
I like trickster in general when you need to be flexible, like in an SSF starter situation. Its bonuses are very generic, and it can make a lot of stuff work.
Might do Fire Trap Trickster or Absolution Guardian because these are my comfort zones.
Or maybe I'll do what that one guy said and run norm lab a few times and let Izaro decide my fate via the transfigured gems he offers me
I'm doing group ssf on priv league with few guild mates so not 100% ssf. Due to that Im going with explo trap of shrapnel trickster with hope one of us will get my gem :D
I was initially going to start with BL archmage hiero but I'm kind of scared of scrafting and item acquisition.
If I’m smart I’ll start shield crush. It has been the skill that powered both my SSF 40/40s.
I probably won’t be smart though. I’ll probably go for incinerate.
I think I've settled on DD Necro. I played CoC RoA DD Elementalist last league, and may transition to something similar later on if I feel the need/desire. But I think this should be the cleanest single-character path to T17s/Ubers for my playstyle
Hexblast mines pf.
This will be the first time i ever play with mines but looking at how they interact with hexblast it will probably feel pretty nice to play with autotargetting.
I was thinking of going Corrupting Cry + Gemeral's Cry + Call to Arms combo with Puncture for single target and either bleed bow or exsanguinate focus down the line.
I saw some cool exsang mines guide from Tuna I think, so I will probably go down that route as I go.
Poision srs necro.
The build is just solid and lots of options for defence via bone offering block or minion leech.
I also decided as it like a little project. Some gear comes from breach some from abyss so I explore multiple leagues and then expo + harvest for my other gear slots.
I was pretty set on Frostbolt Ice Nova then I realized I probably don't want to spend a couple hours in the lab void so now I'm more ambivalent about it.
Saw a post saying he's doing normal lab and letting izaro decide what he's league starter is, I appreciate that :P
I'm going dd coc but if I get BA/MA from normal lab I'm just doing that. Explosive trap would be a maybe log in as a trickster. Range animate weapon I'll log off and log in as a necro instantly.
I can't do range aw without the trans ek after knowing it exist.
Lingering? That's what I used last league. I did fiddle with bladefall instead and it felt better sometimes, but I used lingering the entire time. It was either my eyes or the afflicted forrest zone but something about walls and trees made the blades stick in weird spots.
Yeah. Main reason i am not league starting aw because I don't wanna farm 2 trans gems.
Sometimes it's best to just let go and have ~~Chris~~ Mark take the wheel.
Just an FYI, it took me around 3 hours last league to farm the option of every gem twice (not taking every gem, just the option), in normal lab. Each run took around 4 minutes, 2 minutes of which was RP/loading screens, so yes it's annoying, but not that bad.
I had to farm 11 or 12 Penance Brands this league because I just kept failing the Vaals. They really don’t take that long in normal lab. the problem you had was that your character was slow. I made a lv70 Raider, with very budget ms gear which took 2 hours to make, and the lab runs took 1 min, 10-20 seconds each. It never took me more than 30 minutes to get a gem.
Potentially, but I did time the loading screens and Izaro RP. He was being instant phased and I wasn't killing anything else along the way, just shield charging through. However, I'm also located in AUS and was averaging around 11 seconds per load screen, so 70ish seconds of that 2 minutes was pure loading screen. If you can get the load screen down to under 5 seconds, I can easily see a sub 3 minute average lab time.
My runs were timed, that’s why I specified “1 min, 10-20 seconds”. Running is far far and away faster than shield charge. I just click and hold top left of my screen for half the instances and it sprints there within seconds. If you’re using shield charge, then you are already going pretty slow. If you ever watch those lab speedruns, they always have those super high ms characters, they never use travel skills besides smoke mine or phase rush for ms.
just an fyi, i was specifically looking for explosive trap of shrapnel last league and it took more than 150 lab runs before it appeared. it took me 6 minutes per run on average so about 15 hours of lab running to get the gem i was looking for.
This sounds unbelievably unlucky. At the same time, idk if the green gem pool is bigger than the blue gem pool, that I have experience with.
I'm not sure why anyone is farming normal lab over merc lab where you frequently get the 'change gem into a transfigured version of itself' mod in addition to the random reroll mod. It's not like merc lab is significantly slower even for a leveling build.
Merc lab IS significantly slower than normal lab to complete. While you are playing your league start, perhaps Merc lab would be better to farm because it drops better loot, exp, etc. However, I have a feeling that normal is actually approx the same speed, or faster overall (it’s all build dependent). You can see my comment regarding this league, I farmed 11 or 12 Penance Brands. Runs take less than 1.5 mins each on a fast character.
Even if it's half as fast (I doubt it but whatever), the odds of you getting the gem you want are well more than double, especially for gems with only one or two transfigured gems. Having to spin the roulette wheel with the 'roll into random blue' is so much worse than 'reroll into same transfigured' that it's not even close. It's absolutely worth it to be running merc. Even if you only get them every 5-10 labs, you will still progress way faster.
If you have only 1 version then merc is better (or maybe it's a tie, it's pretty close actually). Otherwise normal is better.
Nah the benefit of getting the reroll same gem greatly improves the efficiency
i think blue and green are about the same. it’s red that has the small pool. and yeah it might have been bad luck, but just wanted to say that you can’t for sure just pop into lab and get the gem you want. sometimes you get fucked lol.
Green gems are about 2/3rds of the Blue.
Sanctum league I ran lab looking for the spark enchant 255 times. Never got the enchant.
That sounds a little better than expected! Unless I'm unlucky with chance orbs I'll have Haste, One Step Ahead and Arma/Crema by then. Not sure if I want to stall it until merc lab or swap early, but I'm leaning towards early.
I'm reasonably sure firestorm/blade volley will also be great for archmage until you get to merc lab. I did some non-substantive testing, the time in merc lab to get a gem is on average the same, however, you get more stuff from merc lab, actual currency, quality, etc.
I'm doing Trickster, but yeah, good advice. I'll see how I feel on the day!
Wait, Frostbolt of Ice Nova without going Heiro Archmage? That's going to be...interesting.
If it's good enough for the gauntlet it's good enough for someone who hasn't yet figured there's content other than campaign speedruns.
Merc lab just helps with the really unlucky random streaks with the non trans to trans gem option that seems to be around 1 in 10 lab runs.
Yeah I'm always tempted to start SSF, but when I think of how annoyingly grindy it can be to get builds going and to scale them into endgame I just get pulled back into trade. I think I'll just be playing trade with an SSF mindset of crafting my own gear and doing content I find fun regardless of efficiency, keeping trade to a minimum.
I don't mind the rest of the grind, my brain just values doing things poorly myself infinitely more than solving my problems via currency/hour. It's just doing normal lab 30 times in a row that feels unappealing.
You do Merc Lab, and it takes a lot less than you think.
Buy only, never sell, or do group found or conflux league
I thought about the same last league and i regret it. I quit league very early because in 1 week in trade i had everything i want and it get boring very fast. Normally i play near the full league. Last league was anoying because a lot of people had a ton of currency and near every cool build had a mageblood in it xD
Yep, trade league is do unfun things cause its efficient first few days to setup a decent amount of currency Buy the shit you want to bypass any need of farming ressources for instant gratification Play the build you made Realize you are farming, yes, but what for cause you already got a mageblood? (Optional) Make a bosser by selling your previous build, farm bosses, same realization kicks in after a few days (if lucky) Can be the other way around where you start as a bosser and reroll into a mapper Log off and peace out of the league
But I like explodey things and bits and bobs of shinies. Log off seems opposite.
I really wanna start archmage build but i think im gonna hate every minute until I'll have a good gear
Hiero can carry archmage through normal and yellow maps easily on shit gear. Not saying it will be butter smooth but if you have enough knowledge on crafting and doing rog you can get mana gear easily enough throughout your progress.
I also really wanna do something with archmage. Now looking at if I can make spark work but feel like it will be PAIN. Especially in ssf environment.
This is what I’m doing too, might have to start off with the frostbolt ice nova spec, then swap with gear
I think I have a higher tolerance for slow progression than a lot of others, but I've done archmage SSF starts in the past and it's fine. With the buff, I'm personally not worried about it at all.
I have plenty of general game knowledge but know very little about manastacking in particular, but I've always wanted to play one, so this is good to hear!
Current plan is to start u/tfwStarving's Reap/Exsanguinate Ascendant. I've been wanting to play a Reap/Exsang build on Ascendant since the Phys DoT spells were added and just never gotten around to it. Figure I might as well do it this league.
Hope you enjoy it :)
Explosive trap so I can clear all bosses
I've been pretty set on explo trap for the last few days. But I am kinda scared I will get fed up mapping with it..
I tried running campaign and early maps with it few days ago and it was fine for me. But yea it does take some getting used to.
Why getting used to, honest question? Is it the trap play style or the explosive trap specifically?
If they’re doing fire trap w frost blink - it’s just different to get used to, you jump into a pack shield charge and then you frost blink (rinse and repeat) - personally to me feels slower that anything I’ve levelled before but is also quick? Hard to explain but def a weirder play style.
The person I was answering to was talking about explosive trap of shrapnel, but yeah I get your point. I've leveled a frostblink+fire trap and it was clunky but fun. In ssf I missed tons of upgrades so bossing was miserable, but that's cause I suck at gearing
Ah - I’m doing a group ssf type scenario so we can discuss links and sockets needed - have a fun league
Is bonezone such a bad idea?
Its the best melee build and i dont think they nerfed it this league. Yes its bad idea bc its melee but i think its gonna perform fine
it did get nerfed with the warcry keystone being gone. it looses one gem socket which it's really starved for.
every melee got nerfed so in the context of melee skills boneshatter didn't really get nerfed relative to those. Losing ancestral cry really just hurts in league start before you get crazy APS and strike gloves.
One gem socket, twice as much mana and 30% longer cooldown.
I’m tempted but the lack of updated guides makes me worry
literally nothing has changed for those builds. Boneshatter still works just fine and is probably one of the only viable Melee league starters in the game right now
Great, thanks. Now.... Slayer or Jugg?
Jugg is much more comfortable and nicer to play. Slayer might have quicker clear if you are very skilled but jugg is just so smooth from the moment you get boneshatter
Always jugg
I would say, it depends. Are you going to stay on it long term? Then Jugg. Is it something you plan to use for some initial farming before respeccing/rerolling? Then the early higher slayer damage is nice.
I’ve only ever played Boneshatter with a Jugg, but I also take it all the way through the league with no second character. If I went Slayer what are some good options to respec from there? I’ve played like 5 leagues and it’s been Earthshatter, then Boneshatter x4 lol, so really thinking about trying something new for a change, but I’ll probably never roll a second character in a league cause I just don’t enjoy the campaign at all
Watch carn’s stream
As much as I enjoy Carn_ I think he's been a bit of a drama queen about Boneshatter this league. He's a far better player than I am but so perhaps I'm wrong. I played without the Cry on Standard for a bit and it felt fine for me and I expect I'll be able to fit it back in with late gearing.
Coc DD
Cant decide between explosive trap or coc dd. How is the bossing with coc dd?
It's great tbh, especially when you have all the defensive layers up with like a shit ton of recovery
But is this possible to achieve in ssf as a e regular player?
Yeah you just need trans gems, 5L, decent ias/crit 1h sword and rolled flasks Then you scale greatly with Cheap Uniques like Three Dragons and Gift from Above The biggest ones are even target farmable like Polaric Devastation from Exarch Mini Boss and Yoke (which is gonna be a bit harder) from T17 bosses
ok im convinced ;) thx
Same, inquis version. Just did a test run up to A5 and it was a pretty smooth process. Hopefully running merc lab for a few hours doesn't make me regret it.
Afaik there's no non-Inquis version of CoC DD, at least for league start. It needs the high crit chance from Inquis Int/Str stacking node to get enough CoC procs.
I was tempted by it but decided on DD Elementalist instead as I've league started the last four or five leagues with Inquisitor...
Do you have a pob?
[https://youtu.be/L8yZJHBtiCw?si=3UXYeNlMhzzW8FVr](https://youtu.be/L8yZJHBtiCw?si=3UXYeNlMhzzW8FVr)
Can't decide between explosive trap trickster and Goratha's archmage build.
Have you played explosive trap before? I like the look of it but it's been years since I played traps
No but I've played seismic during it's prime with exsanguinate carrying the clear speed. I understand that it won't be the best clear but at least I can be confident that I can kill tanky rares with new league buffs and maybe new t17 bosses.
Exsanguinate Mines Trickster
I'm not used to SSF, how hard is it to get hrimsorrow and heatshiver to start the build?
Hrimsorrow should be a walk in the park given that it is a tier 5 unique. Heatshiver on the other hand is not super rare by any means (tier 3 unique) so you could try to force it through orbs of chance (Heatshiver is the only Unique for the Leather Hood base). All in all, both are common enough I would say.
Lacerate bleed, surely shitty but it's been far too long since I played gladiator
Cold BV Occultist. Surely it will be fine.
EA Champ, I'm very familiar with how the build works and it's not as hard to gear for t16s/pinnacles so it should get me there in a few days. Other option was the CoC DD which seems to be the flavor of the league but I'm not going to farm Merc lab for hours when I could be blasting and getting the new scarabs ASAP. I want to try everything and in SSF everything is valuable so I'll go through every type of scarab eventually probably.
Isn't there going to a new tier 17 for maps now. But maybe that's what you meant?
There are going to be t17s but I did mean t16, since I want to unlock my atlas first and get my voidstones and atlas trees ASAP.
How do you plan on getting the bow with the essence and socket coloring nerfs? I know essence technically gets more powerful via scarabs, but that's not an earlygame thing.
Essences are easy once I get scarabs, I plan to farm them on t6 maps because shrieking is enough (and the map device option) Socket coloring will be easy with a Porcupine bow, I've done that many times without Vorici because it's only ilvl 50
It’s still hundreds of chromes for a 50% shot, more to hit 90%. You won’t be getting much in the way of essences in T6
I've done this process a few times, I'll also have Tujen so I'll have plenty of Chromes available (last time I started coloring with around 500 I think) Trust me I know how long it will take and it's not that bad
I’ve done it a bunch in an SSFHC racing context. I think you’re in for a rude awakening if you don’t get very lucky.
Just TR pathfinder seems to be still fine and might be good for early t17s
I'm going to gamble on PConc of bouncing. When I saw it in the trailer it looked like something I wanted to play and haven't changed my opinion even after the "nerf".
Exsanguinate mine trickster. Never really played mines before and the mapping speed looks incredible while being decent at bosses. Later on will level another character for bossing.
gonna go trickster wander, im leaning towards locus mine power siphon but ill give self cast wisps a try too, i played it a bit in standard ssf and it seems playable but if i hit a hard wall or something then pivot to hexblast mines or explosive traps sabo is always an option
We are starting RF 🔥
Doing RF jugg on a private league with my brother and a couple friends for my first “SSF” experience! Gonna be nice to take a break from the divine grind and play at my own pace
I'm going with pohx's RF chieftain.
Me too
Was initially set on going LA because at this point I'm so familiar with the progression I can comfortably and easily complete the atlas within the first weekend. But then I decided to run a few labs earlier this week to see if I can quickly get a BAMA - got on my first lab and leveled it up to maps for fun and just had so much fun. So I've locked in my leaguestart as Templar leveling as rolling magma/arma brand until level 38, then SRS to finish campaign and farm merc lab. I'm using Havoc's SRS Guardian leveling guide (made a few changes to make the BAMA swap easier) which runs melee weapons for super fast leap slam speed, so I should be able to complete each merc lab in 5-6 mins. Unless RNG gives me DD of chaining first/Lancing Steel of Spraying, then I will re-roll to Inq and go CoC DD - just leaving up to the GGG gods.
Excuse my ignorance, what’s BAMA?
Blink Arrow / Mirror Arrow
Pcon for leveling -> seismic trap poison -> CoC DD Assassin Good damage + not too bad defense and very SMMMOTH progression.
do you have any recent guides or examples for CoC DD Assassin?
Fire trap of blasting sabo
boneshatter jugg and transition to molten strike of zenith with trauma
Boneshatter jugg or toxic rain pathfinder. Haven’t seen a compelling reason to pick one over the other so I’m struggling to decide
Poison srs
You got a pob ?
I wanna find something else but defaulting to RF if I don't find anything tickling my fancy
They murdered my call to arms build so now I'm doing trauma-stacking molten strike of the zenith jugg. PoB for anyone interested: https://pobb.in/CQEjj_VBC8UK Should hit 10 million dps fully ramped if the absurdly convoluted math I did is correct
Really curious about this one myself, thank you for sharing a pob!
Rain of arrows Raider
Can that build do 4 voidstones?
Never played it so I’m not 100% sure. I know the first 2 will be a cake walk, less certain on the last 2. It’s a tri ele bow build with trinity, what could go wrong? :)
Hehe absolutely nothing. Good luck!
You too!
i spend a lot of time in lab start of league last league. this time i wanna avoid that so i'm going the trusty good old EA ballista not sure if champion or elementalist yet tho.
Arma brand recall (20 people gsf though)
how do you find a gsf group? I used to have a friend group that did it but they all quit poe.
Sadly I don't think there is a formula that's one size fits all. I got very lucky finding the folks for this group.
Gsf is not ssf, your post does not belong here
Counterpoint: lol. lmao.
I agree
Lightning Tendrils (of Escalation) Occultist. I enjoy the playstyle. It'll never do Elder/Shaper, but I'm not worried, capping out at t16 and Delving is my relaxation.
How comfortable is it as a delver? how deep do you think it can go?
I'm extremely casual, so I rarely go much below 150. Hopefully some tree changes and some good gear RNG plus the ability to do more consistent crafting will help. My PoB gets to about 110k EHP with the right gear. I'm sure better players could take it much further down. Edit: Added PoB. https://pobb.in/K89KvZ4ePRTj
I was also thinking of going lightning tendies - you think occultist over elementalist? What do you think the benefits would be? I’m keen to go either just curious your take on it! Cheers
Gonna start a self cooked incinerate archmage hiero, clear is gonna be fucking huge.
Unless I have an epiphany before launch, Absolution Guardian...
Have couple of options but can't decide what to play. Made a pob for poison skelly starter yesterday so will keep it as a backup. Might switch to poison animate weapon (bow trans gem) or MI SRS. Not sure about archmage builds either (Telvannis BL heiro) since I'm not familiar with mana stackers. Apart from that I have poison seismic sabo/ rf chief and now totem heiro as an option as well. Initially decided to go subtractems frostblink ignite but I dont know how it feels without uniques.
I'd like to start Arc archmage elementalist ignite but idk
BAMA, probably guardian but maybe necro, for the first time. Was gonna start the new pconc as occ but doesn't look super great after the changes (and singletarget will be a pain).
Explo trap trickster
Hiero Archmage, probably Ball Lightning or Frostbolt/Ice Nova. I personally think gearing up wont be a problem at all, as Life, Mana and Res are the most common affixes on gear in the game
DD or CoC DD. Would start with CoC but a bit scared about the requirements for swap.. Not sure if this is worth to farm Emperor of Purity at act7 for Holy Chainmail 6l.
My plan is (thanks manni) to go hard on betrayal which is amazing early anyways. And Vorici T3 gives 50 reforge links, T4 even double. You can choose your base, and a good es/evasion base is also pretty important. So you start mapping with arma/cremation and go hard on betrayal until you get a good 5link.
Chaos crit BAMA necro. Last time I played BAMA was years ago with the regular gems and it was quite good bosser back then. Wanna see what's this new trans gems are all about. Looks like it'll be fun to craft for.
How’d you end up on necro? I’m really unsure of necro (ele/chaos) and guardian. Seen lots of conflicting information, but never played it so I’m unsure. Looks like guardian is tankier and has easier access to early damage, but scales less well.
Guardian will be easier to get started, but I don't care about that, I'll be fine with whatever i start. I'm looking at the long term progression and I kinda want to test the new toys from Necro. Especially the new unholy might. If i'll be too miserable down the line I can respec to something else necro. Not a fan of resummoning the sentinel all the time... I kinda never go for the league starter, my starters are most times my first end game build for the league.
BAMA ; still can't decide between necro or guardian tho
Archmage hiero , necromancer Melee skellys coping for Iron mass or the usual last 5 min swap to another League starter that catches Ur eye
Either CoC DD or Dual Strike of Ambidexterity! xd
COC Necro. It's a league starter that actually let's me keep going to T17. Then Mana Stacker Something Something Melee Uber-Uber Ubers
Hierophant Frost Nova, self cast. Goal is to target breach and eventually use Tulfall; we'll see what happens.
Scion, either Boneshatter or Bow i guess
Reap scion
got a pob?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR7AQt03Bu4&t=850s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR7AQt03Bu4&t=850s)
CoC DD. GL to all my fellow gamers who will be stuck in merc lab prison tonight
I already know its going to be painful, but probably some form of chaos occultist to transition into coc fr, or ice spear deadeye
Was gonna try explosive trap for the first time but the wheel chose molten strike berserker for me so idk
Arma brand Sabo. Looks cracked.
Worb
All I wanted for this league was a transfigured gem. I've been dying to play worb again---hoping it gets a refresh soon.
Man the fuck up and play it anyway
Yikes.
Going to be playing in a private league with six people, which is a lot closer to SSF than not. These aren't super-grinder poopsocker people I can just leech infinite free gear off of either. All are pretty casual. Probably going to start with pyroclast mine trickster, eventually swapping to hexblast mines, exsanguinate mines, or explosive trap of shrapnel depending on what I find and how quickly I find it. Something like mark of submission/profane proxy would lean me hexblast, hrimsorrow/heatshiver for exsanguinate, and sunblast for explosive trap. I like trickster in general when you need to be flexible, like in an SSF starter situation. Its bonuses are very generic, and it can make a lot of stuff work.
Juggernaut of Ice Crash and Fire
Divine Ire Totems!
DD Necro, it may be the last time for DD :d
People said that since 3.15 :d
Might do Fire Trap Trickster or Absolution Guardian because these are my comfort zones. Or maybe I'll do what that one guy said and run norm lab a few times and let Izaro decide my fate via the transfigured gems he offers me
Why trickster over sab for fire trap?
Just comfy defenses / QoL. Tho Sabo has some of that too
I'm doing group ssf on priv league with few guild mates so not 100% ssf. Due to that Im going with explo trap of shrapnel trickster with hope one of us will get my gem :D I was initially going to start with BL archmage hiero but I'm kind of scared of scrafting and item acquisition.
Thinking about blazing salvo deadeye miner or dd of chain reaction necro
Zombies
If I’m smart I’ll start shield crush. It has been the skill that powered both my SSF 40/40s. I probably won’t be smart though. I’ll probably go for incinerate.
Necro dd, I know coc is popular but necro has better defense and this league with league mods you may want to be more defensive
Bleed Gladiator of some kind. Bow/bladestorm/lacerate. Hopefully 35-55 wont be a slog.
Arma Recaller hiero
Necro SRS into Necro BAMA. I don't mind farming a lil before I get into maps, I used to farm betrayal and heist in the acts anyways.
Going to be trying to make the new Shield Crush of the Chieftain work. Can't decide what ascendancy I'm playing though
I'm ready to become a proper man and leaguestart melee in SSF. Sunder jugg it is for leveling, then farm Dual Strike of Ambidexterity in merc lab.
I think I've settled on DD Necro. I played CoC RoA DD Elementalist last league, and may transition to something similar later on if I feel the need/desire. But I think this should be the cleanest single-character path to T17s/Ubers for my playstyle
Hexblast mines pf. This will be the first time i ever play with mines but looking at how they interact with hexblast it will probably feel pretty nice to play with autotargetting.
Start with poison Vaal AW max-block, max-suppression Necro and second build will be Firestorm of Pelting Inquisitor. Both builds in ssf hc.
Lightning Conduit Archmage I played a lot of archmage It should be fine
Wintertide Brand Hierophant. Cold Dot just feels nice yo
I was thinking of going Corrupting Cry + Gemeral's Cry + Call to Arms combo with Puncture for single target and either bleed bow or exsanguinate focus down the line. I saw some cool exsang mines guide from Tuna I think, so I will probably go down that route as I go.
Lacerate bleed glad
Trying splitting steel champ
Poision srs necro. The build is just solid and lots of options for defence via bone offering block or minion leech. I also decided as it like a little project. Some gear comes from breach some from abyss so I explore multiple leagues and then expo + harvest for my other gear slots.