[Megathread] Path of Exile

[Fencers]

This is why I was sad to read that characters could just jump back to regular at any time. The game's drop rates are balanced around trade. Why make an entirely new league w/o trade if you aren't going to adjust the balance to match? As a SSF player, this league is pretty pointless, IMO.

The point of the leagues is organization. Many people play ssf for the bragging rights. Instead of using 3rd party tools like before, it's now embedded. Which is good game design.

For ssf players don't care about such, nothing changed. Continue as you had before.

[Coldkil]

The point of the leagues is organization. Many people play ssf for the bragging rights. Instead of using 3rd party tools like before, it's now embedded. Which is good game design.

For ssf players don't care about such, nothing changed. Continue as you had before.

I need a clarification: am i right about GGG stating that once SFF league is implemented you can bring one of your normal characters into it as one-time-only chance? Because that would fuck up the ladders big time imho.

I know that you can create a character as SFF and then move it to normal leagues.

[Fencers]

I need a clarification: am i right about GGG stating that once SFF league is implemented you can bring one of your normal characters into it as one-time-only chance? Because that would fuck up the ladders big time imho.

I know that you can create a character as SFF and then move it to normal leagues.

I have not read that claim. The official statement did not seem to indicate such a thing either. Which I don't think would work anyway- kind of a weird idea.

[Coldkil]

I have not read that claim. The official statement did not seem to indicate such a thing either. Which I don't think would work anyway- kind of a weird idea.

Yeah, that was exactly my thought - i probably have read something the wrong way; will re-read the news post just to be extra sure.

EDIT oh fuck, i'm constantly misspelling solo self founf as SFF lawl.

[Redblade]

You can still cheat, just not by trading/grouping.

People find exploits all the time

Not to mention the overlays that they don't even punish people for.

You know that I meant cheat with the SSF rule set...

- - - Updated - - -

Also since you're one of the veterans, would you mind giving me an answer or advice about my question above (dual-wielding daggers duelist)?

I rarely play Duelist so I'm really not the guy to ask tbh.

[Lysah]

http://poe-profile.info/profile/Redb...eRaider#Breach

While I traded to buy/roll some of the items most of that char is self found/rolled. Helm/Chest/Boots/Gloves are self rolled in less than 100 chaos, Paua ring is self found. Belt, Ammy and Opal I bought. While lucky it's far from impossible to get good gear without trading if you manage your currency right and use the recipes available.

By level 95 maybe, I was thinking more like when you're level 64 and starting to do merciless dried lake and still using a chest you found at level 16 and your stash has 3c in it.

@Coldkil
Do you have a specific plan in mind for duelist daggers? Not really the ideal class for it, as his ascendancies focus on blocking, two handers, or support, and few of the damage nodes around him help daggers much. Best idea I can come up with off the top of my head would be go gladiator with versatile combatant and gratuitous violence and use cyclone or blade flurry, but you'd probably have to immediately leave the duelist starting area and head straight for ranger/shadow for crit and damage, so you'd basically end up as a tankier assassin with way less damage.

[Coldkil]

By level 95 maybe, I was thinking more like when you're level 64 and starting to do merciless dried lake and still using a chest you found at level 16 and your stash has 3c in it.

@Coldkil
Do you have a specific plan in mind for duelist daggers? Not really the ideal class for it, as his ascendancies focus on blocking, two handers, or support, and few of the damage nodes around him help daggers much. Best idea I can come up with off the top of my head would be go gladiator with versatile combatant and gratuitous violence and use cyclone or blade flurry, but you'd probably have to immediately leave the duelist starting area and head straight for ranger/shadow for crit and damage, so you'd basically end up as a tankier assassin with way less damage.

Ok, that's what i wanted to hear. So if i want daggers it's just better starting off with Shadow, but i have a dualwielding claws one already Well i can just reroll, it's only a lvl 44 char. Any tips if i decide to run it that way?

[Lysah]

Ok, that's what i wanted to hear. So if i want daggers it's just better starting off with Shadow, but i have a dualwielding claws one already Well i can just reroll, it's only a lvl 44 char. Any tips if i decide to run it that way?

The most popular (because they're probably the best) classes for daggers are either going assassin and using poison with the obscene crit and 100% more poison damage they get, you can get 100% crit pretty easily since daggers already have great base crit chance and you can end up doing a ton of chaos damage, or going pathfinder ranger and using a diamond flask for the same effect. The best fringe builds that aren't shadow or ranger I could think of would be a necro using 2x Scourge and self offerings, probably also stacking poison damage, or a gladiator that dual wielded but not two daggers. The biggest problem with trying to go max block on dual wield is that there aren't really any one handed weapons designed around it. You could use something like advancing fortress or ungils but they do low damage and will lower your DPS a lot. The best way to get around this is to use a mainhand-only attack, or use an attack that can't be used with daggers, then you can dual wield a dagger and a mace, for example, and if you use ground slam it won't use the dagger offhand because it can't. But, if you are set on going 2x daggers that idea is off the table :P

If you want to play path of flasks, pathfinder with daggers is very good. If you just want to blow everything up in one hit assassin is the way to go. If you want to be a hipster there are other options, trickster is actually quite good with cyclone (zero mana cost + free base ES/frenzy charge on kill/other QOL stuff), raider is pretty good if you want to use reave, though vaal reave is even more of a pain than flask management imo, or you could go with a duel wield gladiator that uses a mace with a dagger. I could maybe see an argument for a slayer cycloner but I think going foils would just be better in every single way there. Templar and marauder are just too far away from the dagger nodes to be very viable imo, maybe berserker could work but you'd probably want to level as a generic 2h build the whole way.

Cyclone blade flurry and reave are the obvious choices for daggers I think. Maybe when they remove namelocking for melee skills frenzy and viper strike could be good again, heh. Ice crash/EQ/ground slam would be good if you wanted to do a dual wield build with only one dagger. Since you said you already have a claw character you're probably pretty familiar with the concept, they're basically the same exact weapon as daggers already but with more damage and less utility in the form of free leech.

If you can get your hands on a varunastra or two, people have made some pretty good builds with them and they can be used like daggers, though I have no experience with such builds myself and don't really know how they work other than stacking the nodes that give % damage to multiple weapons.

[Redblade]

By level 95 maybe, I was thinking more like when you're level 64 and starting to do merciless dried lake and still using a chest you found at level 16 and your stash has 3c in it.

Well that's when you farm Aqueducts instead to get a tabula and then you farm Dried Lake for chaos and some basic mapping gear. Basically you have to have a solid plan how to go about things for SSF and it's mostly fine tbh.

[Coldkil]

-snip-

Ok, sounds good - the nodes i was looking for were dot damage, poison and chaos damage ones. Also dual daggers is required not because it's optimal or such but simply because i like to make up a concept archetype of what i want to platy and see if it's doable and how far i can go with it.

Some skills i've looked at and seem good:
- blade flurry, cyclone and reave which you suggested
- trying to combine corpse explosion with contagion
- i used assassin's mark with the aura support gem and looked pretty good (for the life regen)

Also, i think i can come up with something based on cold damage after looking at Frost Blades.

[Lysah]

Well that's when you farm Aqueducts instead to get a tabula and then you farm Dried Lake for chaos and some basic mapping gear. Basically you have to have a solid plan how to go about things for SSF and it's mostly fine tbh.

Yeah that's the problem, farming ducts makes you want to stab your eyes out :P
Which is why I said I think most people will find they don't actually enjoy SSF, which is why GGG needed to put the option to give up and go back to regular league in the game.

Ok, sounds good - the nodes i was looking for were dot damage, poison and chaos damage ones. Also dual daggers is required not because it's optimal or such but simply because i like to make up a concept archetype of what i want to platy and see if it's doable and how far i can go with it.

Some skills i've looked at and seem good:
- blade flurry, cyclone and reave which you suggested
- trying to combine corpse explosion with contagion
- i used assassin's mark with the aura support gem and looked pretty good (for the life regen)

Also, i think i can come up with something based on cold damage after looking at Frost Blades.

Do you want to use an attack specifically? I think you could actually make plenty of great caster builds with two spell daggers and the dual wield casting speed cluster. You can pretty much do anything you want with that concept. Frost blades is pretty good for clearing but I think the single target damage is going to be low, unless you want to use a second skill setup for single target specifically (which is always possible but a lot of people don't enjoy using two skills it seems).

[Coldkil]

Do you want to use an attack specifically? I think you could actually make plenty of great caster builds with two spell daggers and the dual wield casting speed cluster. You can pretty much do anything you want with that concept. Frost blades is pretty good for clearing but I think the single target damage is going to be low, unless you want to use a second skill setup for single target specifically (which is always possible but a lot of people don't enjoy using two skills it seems).

Well, i think that focusing on one main attack + adding supports is the more viable choice. That sets a precise goal and makes mana management way easier. I usually go this rout + adding one or two secondary skills (usually passive procs or auras) that complement the previous setup, but casting a secondary spell every once in a while isn't a problem for me. Basically left click spam + occasional right click is my usual playstyle

I'm intrgued by your "spell daggers+frost damage caster thing". I'd prefer it to be a melee or short range character, but i'm open to everything tbh. PoE is so beautiful in promoting the actual exploration of the passive tree and skill system.
EDIT: i suppose Witch is a good starting point for this.

[Morae]

Gah... the moment when unique drops for you that would have been good for the previous character you played, but are not longer interested in playing and is to your current character useless.

Fuuuu

[Coldkil]

Another thing that can be done with duelist dagger is blade vortex build, there are some quite amazing ones with Champion ascendency.

(At least there were some months ago, might have changed with latest league)

Will check that. For the moment, i decided to try Witch - need to decide if i want to go with dagger+spirit shield or wand+spirit shield. This because i looked at Blight skill and looks something fun. For the moment i'm coupling it with Contagion and clearing speed looks good for leveling, so i'm ok with this for a while.

Chaos damage+dot damage should be the way to go. I need to decide if i want minions as cannon fodder or not.

EDIT: uh, i just saw cast on Channel support and Essence Drain.

[Lysah]

Another thing that can be done with duelist dagger is blade vortex build, there are some quite amazing ones with Champion ascendency.

(At least there were some months ago, might have changed with latest league)

I figured he wouldn't want to go BV because he wanted to be melee XD

With Witch basically any spell caster is possible...Occultist is great for chaos builds and Elementalist for not-chaos builds. Daggers are very popular because you can use whirling blades with them (which can also get you fortify) for speed. Wands are generally cheaper and easier to get damage on but daggers are still great, and you can use two of them for more damage or a shield for more ES. These days, most people go CI with a high ES shield.

Blight seems to be okay, general consensus I've seen from people is that they don't feel it does enough damage, though ED does pretty good damage with contagion and is a popular build because it doesn't require a lot of investment to get started.

[Coldkil]

I figured he wouldn't want to go BV because he wanted to be melee XD

With Witch basically any spell caster is possible...Occultist is great for chaos builds and Elementalist for not-chaos builds. Daggers are very popular because you can use whirling blades with them (which can also get you fortify) for speed. Wands are generally cheaper and easier to get damage on but daggers are still great, and you can use two of them for more damage or a shield for more ES. These days, most people go CI with a high ES shield.

Blight seems to be okay, general consensus I've seen from people is that they don't feel it does enough damage, though ED does pretty good damage with contagion and is a popular build because it doesn't require a lot of investment to get started.

Eh, with Witch i cannot dual wield daggers apparently until there's something missing. So i'm running with dagger + shield atm and going for an Occultist build.

Strange enough, channeling spells work really strange in PoE. Most support gems simply don't work if it's not the cast on channel and standard damage increases; stuff like multihit simply don't work.

However something is really interesting. With channeling spells everything is snapshotted at the initial cast - this means that if you crist the first cast, every subsequent hit is a guaranteed crit. I don't know if i can reach a 90-100% crit chance on spells, but i think it's the way to go. I need to decide what to cast on channel to increase blight damage - there's the other channel skill that debuff enemies but i don't know how it will work.

[Redblade]

Eh, with Witch i cannot dual wield daggers apparently until there's something missing. So i'm running with dagger + shield atm and going for an Occultist build.

Should be able to, you can't DW dagger and wand though for example.

Strange enough, channeling spells work really strange in PoE. Most support gems simply don't work if it's not the cast on channel and standard damage increases; stuff like multihit simply don't work.

Just look at the gem descriptions, if it says "spell" it only works with spells and if it says "melee" it only works with skills that have the "melee" tag. There are some complexities to it but for the most part it's very literal. A spell like Scorching Ray for example that doesn't hit anything but instead applies a debuff that deals damage won't work with anything that is "on hit".

[Coldkil]

Should be able to, you can't DW dagger and wand though for example.

I tried last night but i can equip one in MH, but not one in OH - when i try the item slot is red. Don't really know why as i've seen some builds on forums that dual wield daggers.

Just look at the gem descriptions, if it says "spell" it only works with spells and if it says "melee" it only works with skills that have the "melee" tag. There are some complexities to it but for the most part it's very literal. A spell like Scorching Ray for example that doesn't hit anything but instead applies a debuff that deals damage won't work with anything that is "on hit".

Yeah, it's not that kind of issue. it's how the channel mechanic works apparently.
Here's Blight: http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Blight
Here's the explanation on channeling: http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Channelled_skill

Basically one says that loh works, the other doesn't. I assume that's just because the damage is done by the stacking debuff and not by the spell itself. Need to explore the various uses of Cast while channel support gem to see which spell is best used on it - i suppose some heavy hitter or dot should be the ideal (essence drain come to my mind).

[Redblade]

I tried last night but i can equip one in MH, but not one in OH - when i try the item slot is red. Don't really know why as i've seen some builds on forums that dual wield daggers.

No idea what the problem is then but you can DW daggers on any char as long as you have the stats for it.

Basically one says that loh works, the other doesn't. I assume that's just because the damage is done by the stacking debuff and not by the spell itself.

Assuming you're talking about life gain on hit which is tagged as 'attack' so it doesn't work with any gems that isn't tagged with 'attack'.

Need to explore the various uses of Cast while channel support gem to see which spell is best used on it - i suppose some heavy hitter or dot should be the ideal (essence drain come to my mind).

ED doesn't work with trigger/cast on supports as far as I know. Most people use Firestorm/Bladefall/EK and some other skills for cast on setups.

[Coldkil]

No idea what the problem is then but you can DW daggers on any char as long as you have the stats for it.

Assuming you're talking about life gain on hit which is tagged as 'attack' so it doesn't work with any gems that isn't tagged with 'attack'.

ED doesn't work with trigger/cast on supports as far as I know. Most people use Firestorm/Bladefall/EK and some other skills for cast on setups.

Ok, i'll double check tonight and see if it's just me being an idiot and seeing i have not the right stats. I'll need to bank some DEX to use daggers, any tip on how to do it without wasting skillpoints?

About ED - from 2.1.1 it can be supported by "cast on" gems (always citing the wiki); now, if i want for example ED to be cast while channeling Blight, do i need a 3link item to put all gems in or i can use Blight on an item and ED+cast on channel in another?