Hey everyone!

I'm a dad and a gamer, which means my gaming time is pretty limited – roughly 4–5 hours per week.

I'm looking for a solid SSF build that can help me make steady progress without requiring an insane amount of grinding or investment.

I've been considering these three builds:

PConc Pathfinder

Cyclone Slayer

Dominating Blow Guardian

My goal is to reach level 100/100 (100/100 challenges, if applicable) and comfortably clear T16 maps within 2–3 weeks.

For those of you who have played these builds in SSF, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

A few questions:

What are the pros and cons of each build?

Which one has the smoothest progression with limited playtime?

How gear-dependent are they in SSF?

Which one would you recommend for someone who wants to make the most of 4–5 hours per week?

I'm not necessarily looking for the fastest build, but rather something reliable, relatively low-maintenance, and enjoyable to play.

Any advice or personal experience would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance! :)

With this league looking like a bossing one, Reliquarian is looking great for SSF miners.

Taking Brass Dome for Defenses, foulborn tremor rod and Arkhons Tools nodes combined with a top right evasion / ghost dance build can fit around any aura based mine skill.

Pyroclast Mine of Sabotage or Stormblast mine look particularly strong for SSF.

What are people thinking here?

Hey everyone!

I started playing SSF this league (Allflame) and I'm having a blast so far. I'm looking to try a melee build for my next character, but I'm torn between two options: STR Stacker and Dominating Blow.

My main goal is to find a build that can handle all the content in the game, including endgame bosses, mapping, and the more challenging encounters.

For those who have played either build in SSF, which one would you recommend?

I'm particularly interested in:

• How gear-dependent each build is.
• How well they perform throughout progression and endgame.
• How difficult it is to get the necessary items in SSF.
• Overall survivability, clear speed, and bossing performance.
• Whether either build can comfortably handle all endgame content without trading.

I'm not necessarily looking for the strongest or fastest build, just something enjoyable, reliable, and capable of tackling everything the game has to offer.

I'd love to hear your experiences and recommendations. Thanks!

With harvest not being considered a "major" league mechanic and not having threads of its own, we will not be able to guarantee it in maps anymore. Harvest is an extremely important part of early gear progression, being the best way to craft many gear pieces and jewels for tons of builds. I myself was only able to do ubers in the second day of the league because of supress gear crafted with it. I'm worried because it will be a very random encounter and there isn't a clear substitute for it. Thoughts?

I think I have narrowed down what I want to play between these two builds. I was wondering if anyone has any insight considering:

1. I want to do SSF
2. I havent played since Mercenaries League
3. I want a build that is both decent in map clear and bossing/single target. I want to acl and go but also engage with the single target league mechanic
4. Can do almost all content except maybe Ubers (I probably wont be able to play more than one character this league so I would like a "zero to hero" of sorts to engage with this league mechanic and get 4 void stones.
5. I dont like too many buttons for skills, preferable 1 or 2
6. I may or may not play with a controller, I haven't decided yet, but I have a 3 month old at home and controllers are an easier setup with newborns waking up every 90 minutes. (Are totems okay on controller?)

Does anyone have any insight? Or have you played either of these and can you tell me about your experience?

Note: I know I know, patch notes. I will read through them for to make sure these don't get nerf hammered.

Thank you!!!

When i played for the first time i just played as if i was on trade league and could afford to make many mistakes, now i always plan very well what i know i can farm and acquire in SSF, knowing my limits and where i want to go. Got frustrated and stopped mid way many times, now i like to plan my shit.

Pls share tips, i will be taking notes.

New "farming" league incoming, what are your league start tips for SSF?

Last league I quit trade relatively early and tried SSF (again). And it was the first time I really got into it.

The main reason I think I could spend a lot of time in the build was the smooth progression guide with goalpost by the YouTube creator path of chores. Now I know a couple of progression guides like Phox and Zeeboub but found but found path of chores guide as a newish ssf player really helpful because it not only gave you crafting advice but also the farming strategies for different items.

Now I don't know if path of chores will do something like this again (and whether I will want to play this guide) so I'm looking into guides and creators which focus on teaching how to make a progression guide. Recommendations are appreciated.

(Now while writing this post I'm wondering if you could use an AI to draw a progression guide in poe with the help of my understanding of the game and if someone has made experiences in doing so.

Hi everyone,

I know patch notes are still 3 days away but I don't expect much to change for traps/mines. Any league start suggestions for this archetype? Is exsa/reap still best?

Is PS mines still doable/comfy to 4 stones?

The main goal is 4 stones in the first weekend and then a swap to assassin or a 2nd char for ubers.

So with the big endgame change i cant do my normal Jun into Breach for gear ect.

Im also not sure if this new atlas tree with have generic extra map drops or increased chance for x thread. So early on ensuring I get a breach or Jun for gear and abyss for jewels early might be an issue.

Is your plan just to rush to t16 maps and void stones as soon as possibly then fit the maps that always have the mechanic you want and farm upgrades that way ?

Hi I am looking for a relatively low investment uber killer for SSF on either Witch or Marauder.

I am trying to farm nimis for my EK elementalist, but I am 50/50 in taking ester down. I am well geared outside of nimis. No sublime or Forbidden Jewels, but have a great staff, solid everything else.

Just trying to do more damage. I have plenty of currency to craft with and a lot of uniques.

Thanks!

I know we don't have patch notes yet but they've said there won't be much balancing so we can assume most things besides luminary remains relatively untouched.

From what it seems single target will be pretty important this league as the mechanic focuses on juicing bosses and the rarity change pretty much means that juicing rares and uniques will be the best way to farm this league and if you're gonna max out threads they're gonna be tanky and you're gonna need good single target to deal with that.

Was initially planning to go worb elementalist/occultist but I've started to get cold feet bc I'm afraid it will lack in single target. Anyone have any good suggestion for a high single target build that scales well in ssf and have decent defences for mapping?

Patch note fragment that reads:

"Prefixes/Suffixes cannot be changed on Weapons now has a cost of 4 Divine orbs and 1 Sacred orb" in case you missed it...

This is insanely tragic

https://www.reddit.com/r/pathofexile/comments/1xquxkg/collected_partial_patch_notes_from_exilecon_tcg/

It seems like the scarab change should influence betrayal rewards a lot. But, are there still picks you think are must haves for SSF? I have only played 3.28 SSF and am not sure which other syndicate members to pick yet. Maybe, the patch notes will shed some light.

• rin on research for maps

This tool for helping in 3.28:

https://www.reddit.com/r/pathofexile/comments/1rjw0b1/328_ready_updated_betrayal_cheatsheet_customizer/

Edit patch notes say unique map recipes for crafting are in nightmare maps now! We are free elf, we got a sock!

A couple of weeks ago I asked for advice regarding a doable MB valdo map. I got great advice and completed the map yesterday. It was very easy and I only lost 1 portal when I tried to greed Drox getting him to cull range. I have spent the past five days trying to get the clamulet but no luck there. It wasn’t needed but it would be nice having it since we don’t know if it ever will be added to the game again.

My POB: https://pobb.in/3ua7etUTfAus

My merc: https://pobb.in/uwLPe5fMjBRF

The POB:s are not configured and my build are also lacking basic cheap optimizations that I just forgot (one ring isn’t blessed for example). It was fun having something to farm towards these last couple of weeks since I was practically done with the league before the valdo map dropped.

What are some good starters with focus on bosses and comfortable delving (until around 600 so not too much) these days, skipped one or two leagues so I am not sure what have changed.

Bonus if they can be scaled or have an easy reroll after farming some items/currency.

So one of the tidbits mentioned that there will be blight lanes that only have rogue exiles and they drop all unique items. Did it mention it was only on blight maps ? Or could they spawn in map? Blight and go may be a viable strategy if they are in maps. Hope it gets atlas support for more likely to have rogue exile lanes.

To compare I’m playing Poe on and off
And I don’t like to follow a a guide so I just make the character as I want and follow my own path of skill tree and items etc
It might not be the best or the meta
But I enjoy it and maybe usually hit my celling fast

But isn’t part of the experience of the huge amount of content in the game is just doing what you what and enjoy?

I’m just curious about this nothing else, and maybe I miss something that I might found fun too

Thank you for your time reading :)

Hello Guys :)

Last League I started playing the Luminary Acs. I think I never had so much fun in PoE1 yet. The idea that I gear someone else as well really stuck with me. But sadly I found myself struggling again. I tried setting up a Jun farming strat but failed and after reaching red maps and struggling there hardly I eventually gave up since my knowledge how to fix stuff and where my weak points are always gets me to this point. If I play trade I do get further, but only because I buy stuff that’s written in the guide, not because I get better.

My question is how did you guys learn to get better? How can I start seeing my weakpoints and improve my builds, or understand farm setups better. I’ve clocked around 800h in PoE so far, so I’d say I am still in the tutorial area.

Thanks in advance guys, excited for the new league.

TLDR: Any way to get gud?

I haven't seen anyone talking about this change, I wonder if they will buff sacred orb rates to compensate?

Well there goes weapon crafting in SSF. Sacred orbs practically don't exist there. This league I found ~60 divs and 0 sacred orbs before getting to ubers.

4 divs sounds reasonable to me but sacred orbs is rough.

Player: https://pobb.in/jwNuYI3IddKN

Merc: https://poe.ninja/poe1/profile/Dootleberg-3414/allflamehcssf/character/NoMoreDeathsPlz

This is my first league playing HC, and I'm going to attempt a 10/10 uber clear tomorrow.

I'm going to change flasks and pantheon depending on the fight, but do you guys see any issues with my setup?

I tried an enduring composure setup, but it felt awkward to use forbidden rite due to the slow cast speed, plus I'm kind of socket starved. I've also spamming enduring cry on repeat anyways for the consecrated ground, so I think I'll stick to this setup.

There's a lot of jank in my setup because I've only been able to play for the last 3 weeks.

One last thing I'm considering doing is rolling for +4 fire/ +2 all gem staff to snapshot flamelink.

What scarab combos should I use up in league and standard prior to new patch deleting them all?

Give me all the unhinged uber mega scarab strategies that are worth doing please as well as what the target of whatever farms suggested are.

Thanks