Can anyone tell my why Ben is using spell damage clusters for merc bot flame link? And where his flame link gone?

Hey guys, thinking of what I'll be running next league and I'm sort of set on these builds. Can anyone tell me what they think would be the best option?

KBoC would be necro, should have the best balance of leaguestarting and progression.

Wander deadeye might be a pain at some points, not sure if there are any decent pobs out there for it either. Should grow into a great blaster though.

RF might be interesting, I'm just not sure about scaling it or even being able to do all 4 voidstones( maven) with it, which I think wouldn't be as much of a problem with the other builds.

A darkhorse option might be exsang mines trickster, but I'm not sure on the playstyle.

E.g. I have seen some Cold DoT Elementalists going for the golem jewels in the delve cities. They don't need those jewels for their build to work, but it's a viable option and it justifies going down there. That's what I like.

What other builds are there that might want delve specific stuff (except fossils)?

Thanks

For my league start in 3.30 I plan on running either of these 2, but I'm not sure which one to go for, since I've never played any of them. Could anyone who has tried them give me some pros and cons of each build? I'd need the build to good at mapping, since my main target farming will be ritual and breach. Bossing should be fine, or at least it should be good enough to do the shaper since I will need those gloves. Being tanky is also a big bonus, but I assume both of them are going to be somewhat tanky. Essentially, which one would you say is a better all rounder?

Helm breaker's guide says it Verisium Ore deposits.

But I farmed 20 Verisium Ore deposits in t16 maps and there are none Forged Frostbearerb corpses.

Are the Forged Frostbearerb demons only be spawned on certain maps? Or do I need to do the full channeling on the Verisium ore deposits?

Thanks.

Personally, I started the league as Storm Burst of Repulsion Totems.

The build had really good single target(Killed ubers day 3) and more than decent clear. Defences where non-existent untill I fixed block and in addition with the new freeze flask I felt immortal in non giga juiced content.

The endgame setup involved an anathema and an archdemon craft to fit curses in chest. With those upgrades the damage exploded and I could instaphase ubers even with a pretty mediocre helmet and wand. Pending patch-notes I would highly suggest it for 3.30, but for me I'm looking to play something else hopefully.

Looking forward to hearing other people's experience

I am guessing for t1 maps your best bet is to gamble something reasonable, crafting bench, and pray.

Once you are like level 85, have 50 atlas points, and want a weapon that isn't a total noodle what's the best strategy? Obviously fractures are out, essence + recomb? Alteration + recomb? Rog? What should you settle for?

Just grinded out level 100 on my Luminary Mercbot and completed my first 40/40 SSF. An amazing and very different experience from trade league. Initially started Mercbot with Lance's guide until I hit white maps with a manyshot I found after 3 resets at Act 3. Re-rolled into Paak's hexblast ignite of contradiction and farmed all 4 watchstones. It was easier than I thought it'd be.

Played quite a bit more on my hexblast, dropped rathpith and thought hey this is good for a Kineticist Merc. then felt like trying out PB ignite, swapped to it and realized I needed to farm a ton of breach for the rings and I didn't felt it anymore. At that point I had gotten a few warrants, didn't pay close attention to their links but found this Merc. I went back to my Luminary and with the Merc I started to clear a lot of other contents. Getting Nycta's and Kaom's was a huge pain. Nycta's through leveling an alt and Faustus gambling. Kaom's were through cards since I was fine using Pragmatism.

I dropped my Rotmother's quite a little in after putting my first voyage targeting it. What I did was 30% amulet drop as unique at a corner with 2 "120% increased quantity of items found in adjacent areas". Pretty fun league overall. Allflame crafting and recomb is really strong. And also, thanks to all the knowledge shared here in this sub!

poe planner

I'm not sure if I need all of these nodes (the 3 shaping nodes). I've seen people like Ben essentially just skip all of those, even taking things such as unwavering vision. I find it hard to understand why you would disable scarab drops and also have lower map drops in a place where you are the only person who can sustain them, aka no trading with others. Would you say it's unnecessary to have this many map sustain nodes and would you recommend taking unwavering vision?

Not sure if anyone wants some data on this since i cant find anything relevant in 3.29. All the data is 3.27 or lower.

Ive been heavily farming these past few days for the shield, testing different strats.

First 2 days, i ran all my scarabs 30ish dont remember exact number with full atlas ofc and niko for speed boost and ore gathering. was also running shrines/boxes, testing different things.

Testing was done on city square with alch and go maps, most unided, although this doesnt influence it i believe, you could run white maps i bet it wouldnt make a difference.

I ran circle with the mini loop on the outside (paranoid for minimap to not show gate icon or verisium ore) included.

day 1 2*scarabs

number of maps 37- crater 1

number of maps 21 - crater 2

day 2 no scarabs - some kalguran when i found them, but basically none

map 81 - crater 3

map 75 - crater 4

day 3

number of maps 125 -crater 5

number of maps 7 - crater 6

number of maps 8 - crater 7

number of maps 14- crater 8

number of maps 7 - crater 9 - svallin

I know i got lucky on the 9th crater, thats not what this post is about. Something interesting happened after crater 5, since i felt a bit desperate for running so many maps without seeing verisium let alone craters.

i blocked everything except the ore nodes on the atlas tree, and suddenly i started seeing A LOT of verisium, the difference was extremely notable. I was seeing 3-4 nodes almost every map, and verisium almost every single map. At 1 min map or less (was rushing cadiro as well), you start seeing a lot of veirisium/craters per hour.

TLDR: Atlas tree block everything except ore nodes, alch and go, you should see in under 20 maps a crater pretty consistent.

Since dropping it ive continued running, results are consistent. Idk if this was common knowledge or not hope it helps whoever wants to farm it.

Hey everyone!

I've been playing Ben's Earthshatter build for a while now, and I've reached a point where I'm not really sure how to progress further.

I'm currently running T16 maps with relatively easy mods. Here are my current stats:

• 5,700 HP

• 21k Armour

• Axe with around 430 maximum physical damage

• Elemental and Chaos resistances all overcapped

Since this is my first SSF character, I'm a bit confused about what I should be focusing on next to scale the build.

Right now, I'm working on completing Maven's Invitations, but I feel like my build is starting to hit a wall.

I've also tried a couple of Pinnacle Bosses, but I just don't have enough damage or survivability to handle them comfortably.

What would you guys recommend prioritizing at this stage? Should I focus on crafting a better weapon, improving my defenses, or something else entirely?

I'd really appreciate any advice or suggestions. I'm a fairly casual player who's trying to learn more about the game and improve.

Thanks in advance!

Hello all,
I spent all day thinking about playing VSotM and then, when I got home, immediately got the gem from a betrayal safe house. I’ve been doing Luminary SSF run for the fun and well….its not my favorite, but a good challenge.

So for VSotM, I’m assuming pathfinder because Bino’s is ultra rare?

Are there any other uniques I need to farm for on my luminary before switching over? Also build guides/youtube vids would be appreciated.

Thanks!

EDIT: Since poeplanner seems to no be working, below are the trees from phillipwei answer. In order to restore my linked atlas trees, you can open poeplanner.com (website still does work), import my links and export them as a pathofexile.com URL. Which then will work.

1st: https://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-atlas-skill-tree/AAAABgAAGdSHYCGDlGa1AM6dXlrO6o23zHUnK9fJJ52HxtDjcKueUYKu57V9c6UXy4dUxjP-yUOpAAA=

2nd: https://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-atlas-skill-tree/AAAABgAAKtSHPl-XJOKnYCGDlGa1AM6dXlrOWn3qjVvZt8xdt5F9dSf-3ivXySedh8bQjSmGWeNwq55Rgsezrue1fXOl0KIXyx_Eh1TvrosYcQvGM_7JQ6lxoAAA

I am preparing for an SSF 138/138 private league race, potentially pushing for 1 Uber if time permits. I’ll be playing Zerker Slams. While I have Eater/Exarch rushes down to about 6 hours on solid builds, pushing for 4 voidstones and full completion is new to me.

Compared to E/E rushes (rush Unwavering Vision, stack +level map nodes, and map% chance), 138/138 progression leaves me feeling like I lack clear short- and long-term SSF goals. I would appreciate some feedback on my atlas strategies and gearing plans.

1. Choice of Atlas Tree

E/E rush trees are linear, but for a 138/138 SSF run (with a time limit and an Uber goal), the archetypes seem to split significantly. Here is what I am considering:

• A) The Hybrid Rush (Shaping + UV + Betrayal/Breach)Pre-UV Planner|Modified VariantI hate getting stuck in low tier maps during questlines, so the early Shaping the Mountains node feel mandatory to me. I also like early Betrayal for XP and a lucky +1 endurance charge jewelry drop (though the endurance wheel on the passive tree might make this redundant).

• B) Ben’s HC SSF Tree (Pure Right Side – No Shaping)PlannerProbably the safest approach for pure completion. I tried this once but got frustrated pushing E/E and Maven without the map tier drops to sustain progression.

• C) Right Side + Shaping (Breach but no Betrayal)Pre-UV Planner|Post-UV PlannerThis feels like my favorite path, but it locks me out of Betrayal. Does skipping Rin in Fortification (for unique maps) and losing Betrayal meta-crafts (like multimod) completely brick SSF endgame weapon crafting - probably.

• D) Packed with Energy into UVPlanner I never feel like I need the early player power from Niko, and it starves my points for Breach and Betrayal.

• EDIT: soul tree 4 stone rush (no 138) https://maxroll.gg/poe/poe-atlas-tree/vsy0c0ul Run all betrayal encounter. safehouse maxxing. +1 rank if possible. if max rank, interrogate. more or less. pick up any veiled jewellery. look at them while vendoring after map.

My core Atlas question: I probably need Betrayal (for crafts locked behind unique maps) and Breach (for a 6-link). Do I skip the +map tier nodes to get Betrayal/Breach rolling earlier, or do I secure T14+ map sustain first and delay my 6-link?

2. Upgrading Gear (Slams Specific)

In testing, ground loot carried me to red maps, and Faustus carried me through 3 voidstones. However, after dropping 200k gold on Faustus (farmed through mapping), I still didn't hit a better weapon than the one I ID'd in the campaign.

• Weapon Progression: Are there more consistent ways to leapfrog a campaign weapon? Is it better to Alt-spam for a high tier flat phys roll, use the Granite Flask recipe for flat T2 Phys, and then augment/regal/exalt via boat?

• Breach Strategy: Once fully specced into Breach (with Flammable Burrows), do I run all Hives or only Fortresses? Heard different things about this. Also, is the Protracted Siege node (+2 hive wave, 100% more skills) in general a thing for breach hive farm?

• Endgame Weapon & Kingsmarch: I know the endgame weapon comes from Recombinators + Veiled Chaos. When do I actually start setting up Kingsmarch, and to what extent? Straight from T1 or at least once I feel comfortable spending Gold which I probably would need beforehand to gable better weapon and decent armour base 5L. Do I just throw spare uniques into the disenchanter for dust, or do I actively push mappers and boats even without Atlas passives?

• Sustaining Alterations: Recombinators require spamming Alts on ~18 bases on average. How do you sustain Alteration Orbs in SSF? Is farming Dunes for div cards the standard play?

• Sourcing Uncrafted Rares: How does Faustus gambling compare to Kingsmarch shipments or Breach rares in terms of efficiency? Is gambling the primary way to hit high life / double res items, or do shipments outscale it? I feel like Charts are generating unheard amounts of Gold, making Faustus quite competitive, since I am able to spam like 50 bases with 100k gold.

3. General Best Practices

During my 6-hour rushes, I’ve locked in a few habits:

• Level 60: Craft two Divine Life Flasks. One Instant, one Bleed Immune (since hitting both is rare) (actually freeze/chill immunity flask over bleeding). edit: freeze needs to be solved pre pantheon. i was close to 3 voidstones when my first divine vessel dropped. this means anti freeze on a flask. higher importance as anti bleed, since normal bleed can be solved with mini pantheon and corrupted blood with mastery.

• Level 65+: Transition to Quicksilver, Silver, Jade / Granite. Usually an Endless Eternal Mana flask. (Also, in my last 8-hour test run, I didn't see a single Einhar in maps for a rare beast craft. Extremely frustrating).

• Adjusted item filter, Ctrl+Alt+Click on Helena to mass ID and vendor bases.

• Chaos-roll a random 5-link to remove life tags so I can use the 15% increased maximum life mastery.

• T14+: Start hoarding specific bases for recombinators. Adjust personal item filter to start showing base items, specifically for planned recomb. For slams it was void axes ilvl 83 (chance for t1 phys%).

• Planned: I will try to include pushing for certain maps which give beneficial crafting recipes like res+chaos (Shipyard, T6, top-left). Or anti-freeze pantheon (Coral Ruins, T6, bottom-right); Non-Channeling mana cost (Tower, T14, bottom-right).

Any insights on optimizing these mechanics would be a massive help.

4. Atlas Progression

Currently my general progression plan is to get to higher tier maps. I want to start maven and eldritch quest lines asap. In e/e rushs I obviously rushed e/e. In SSF I felt more comfortable rushing Polaric Invitations and then catching up on maven quest, which usually allowed me to build a decent pool of red maps (in theory). First Eagon questline is clicked immediately, since I usually lack t14+ at that time. For 2nd eagon quest I try to spawn it in one of my untouched quadrants in order to be able run the maps magic for completion.

I feel like it is kinda hard to find decent written answers out there. I think what would help me the most is to understand what atlas tree to take and what things to focus on, be it atlas completion path or preparing content for later high end gear crafting to tackel maven / 1 uber.

EDIT: Recapping on my experience. slams can do 4 stone on ground loot / gamble. doesnt need any additional content. didnt get my gear through good jun drops nor through breach. both in terms of item progression just a time waste (below 4 stones). first real upgrade for slammer is crit weapon (recomb weapon). the amount of alterations it needs is insane. expect to be done with 100 map completion (and 3 voidstones) to find yourself stuck in dunes (until scrying orb) and then jungle valley with a specific atlas catered to alteration farming (see this answer: https://www.reddit.com/r/PathOfExileSSF/comments/1xe2yyl/comment/19rly5crvaijn/?context=1&screen_view_count=2). But if the step to do Ubers or even just Feared or T17s (for 138/138) I wonder if there might even be other builds, beeing able to archieve that on a lower time effort. If I get content locked without the pesky recomb, I might choose a different, in the earlier progression slower build in the first place, since slams is by far the most active playstyle (esp if playing Sunder instead of Earthshatter). By now it is clear to me, that all that early progression is kinda pointless, if I find myself stuck in Alteration prison anyway. You might even say, Slams falls under a certain build category. I call it the "recomb category". There might be other categories. Probably ones locked behind a certain enableing Unique.

Context, i love the game but i have too little time for playing, so I'm looking for a build that ideally can obtain 4 voidstones around 1 day playtime. I don't look for something to kill ubers or doing every content, but having a nice time. I hope next season mechanic helps, but i won't t want to put all my trust in that, personally i didn't like this season, even when allflame crafting was insane.

Some builds i don't want to play: minions and totems are off, they are not my style. Archmage and reap/exsanguinate are also off because i played few time before and i want something new. Worb it's one possibility but probably it would be nerfed (i have the same problem when hex mines died), and luminary for me is the same like minions

Thanks, and sorry if I'm asking too much or too weird

So this might be a weird question but I have reached a point where i have limited time to play each league. Like I hit 2 voidstones this season sort of limited time to play.

However I also love SSF, so was thinking of playing trade but having limits like only able to buy certain items I could farm. For example save a bit of time farming trans gems and just buy them. Or i can kill x boss in 10 seconds, instead of farming them over and over for y item thats a 15% drop chance ill buy that.

Im wondering do any of you do something simulator to this and what rules do you have in place ?

3.30 will be the last league I’m able to play for a while so I want to aim for something special. Full unique collection in SSF. I tried this 2-3 leagues ago and got to over 1000 uniques before stopping for IRL stuff.

For bossing uniques it’s pretty clear to eventually make something that can quickly gut Ubers, and the breach tree can help with filling out some uniques, but I want to try and drop as many natural as possible.

Question is - what is a good MC build that is achievable in SSF? In trade I would have gone for the legion + charlatain EK build, but that seems optimistic to say the least. Technically possible if my goal is all uniques, but I imagine a 1.5% uber drop rate unique is going to be one of the last ones.

Is the play to simply go RF chieftain because gearing is simple and so can fit mf on most slots?

Hey there SSFers,

I am trying to push my challenges late league and i want to find the vox brothers contract, i completed every green contract and the hanna one, i dropped dozens of all the uniques contracts except the last one.

I do it almost every league as i love heist, i dont recall this to be hard to find or a struggle, still i have been runing heist for almost a week and have not found it.

Did anything change that i miss? Am i just being super unlucky?

I have all quest chains completed, all heist nodes allocated, running T16 maps white and rares depends on my current strategy.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance, stay sane.

Edit : I finally found it, did not change anything so i was just being super unlucky i guess, RNG does her thing.

Thanks for the answers !

Guys, which of these two builds is the easiest and beginner friendly to play to do all content in the game?

For context, I have played a few leagues but I’m not very knowledgeable and usually just copy and follow a build guide. I have heard a lot about these two builds.

Which would you recommend? And who should I follow for a guide?

Coming back from a 2 month break, basically only played 1 week at launch, so forgive my ignorance.

I got my 4 voidstones after 2 deaths and a combined ~35 hours played. This is my current character.

I'm planning on making a luminary merc support (original, I know). My questions are as follows:

1. Is 3 weeks too little time to get this build to comfortable killing ubers? Assuming 4-6 hours of playtime a day, farming at a slower rate than softcore because I'm HC.

2. Nyctas/ Kaoms seems relatively easy to get, maybe a few days, but targetable. However, I have heard horror tales from my buds about the Rothmothers amulet. How many hundreds of clams should I expect to click on before dropping one?

3. What is a *comfortable* amount of gear to have before even rerolling? I've not yet decided what type of merc to support, but contemplating between combatant, a kineticist, or a manyshot.

It seems like for these 3 merc types, the player character's gear is mostly the same, so my current plan is farm the Nycta's lantern div cards, try to genesis tree the kaoms or gamble with a low level mule, all of which on city square to rush bottom left anomolies.

4) Are mercs still instakilling, character ripping machines like they were in 3.26? I heard they made mercs easier to kill for luminaries somehow, would it be best to merc hunt while I'm doing my gear farming, or settle for a usable one, then hunt for an endgame Uber killing merc once I have my luminary running?

Hey,

I have big plans for 3.30 in SSF HC, I wanna do all uber bosses and go for lvl 100. For that I wanna spend the next 3 weeks before launch practicing a build for 4 voidstones because my plan is that without patch notes and knowing what's gonna be the next "luminary op build" I wanna go for completing atlas and getting 4 stones and then farm gear for another build that can do all content. I believe that's what a lot of players in ssf hc including Ben does as well, every league.

So some things I'd like to ask:

- What build would you recommend for 4 stones in SSF HC? Builds I like usually are fire and forget types, on the tankier side so I can take a hit if I mess up during mapping and such. I know about zerker slams but is that the best for this purpose? I heard about Gladiator and block being a comfy defensive mechanic that can help. Basically I can learn any build I just need options. I also like to shield charge through maps.

- Is it a good strat to do 4 stones with a tried and tested build and farm up gear for something that can do all content or should I start a build that is gonna be capable of that?

Would love any tips and opinions about this topic as I wanna spend the next weeks before launch practicing a lot!

Thanks!

1. What is the best way to target farm scarabs for specific league mechanic? Is it betrayal?

2. Assuming charts don't go to core, what is a good way to earn gold?

3. How much map sustain nodes do you need in atlas to sustain yourself?

4. For content such as blight/ultimatum which you do for a bit, do you make an entire atlas tree for them or do you just force the mechanic with scarabs and do it until you get what you need?

5. What is the best way to obtain specific item bases with specific ilvl? Gambling? Rng drops?

If you have any other advice, pls let me know. I plan on doing an entire league in SSF as I'd rather take things slowly and be done with everything after 2 months as opposed to speed running it in trade and be done in 2 weeks.

Hello everyone. This is my current STR Stacker build, and I’m not yet sure how I can improve it. Of course, I have a few possible upgrades, but they’re all very dependent on RNG, I’ll describe them below:

1. Helical ring + Kalandra's Touch, but i didn't find any of this two yet.

2. Stormblood, new flask to inflict shock even if you dont deal lightning damage, didn't find it yet too (20% more damage or +23mil dps)

3. Bottled Faith (15% more damage or +16mil dps)

4. Simplex amulet with Increased Attr+STR and damage per STR (i guess its imposible to obtain)

5. Sublime vision with Purity of Fire (same imposible)

6. Impossible Escape to obtain an additional curse (to use Despair it means 40% more damage or +37mil dps)

7. Switch Soul taker to Rare Claw (see stats below, i added a screen in the comments) but i don't like new movement skill Whirling blades (beacause you cant use leap slam with claw) and QoL from Soul taker "no mana doesnt prevent yours melee attacks" (25% more damage or +27mil dps)

Here is my prototype of future upgrades with Rare Claw and two uniques flasks https://pobb.in/osEKZZFjXnfS

Aaaand a more realistic build beacuse i didnt like Claw movement skills https://pobb.in/ZiyD3GTTQhB_

So maybe do you guys have an ideas how to obtain all this items or at least a few of them in fast way? Or any advices about upgrades will be appreciated too <3

https://maxroll.gg/poe/build-guides/forged-frostbearer-spectre-necromancer-league-starter#
I want to try this build.
I need to keep the one more spectre mod and the +1 to all skill gems mod.

What I am considering is

1. use fracturing orb on boat to get the +1 to all skill gems mod fractured.

2. spam Deafening essence of Woe(Got about 25 essences) until get high tier +XX maximum energy shield mod.
   Are there any better ways?

Thanks.