I'm going full Drunken Master. Get the gem to make Unarmed damage count for dual wield, go gladiator and get Versatile Combatant, get the neck that gives punches crit, then get as high ApS, Frenzy Charges and DW Block as I can. PUNCH ALL THE THINGS! Maybe finish off with that belt that gives Chaos Damage on attack if you've got a flash effect up, and perma-chug pots for the thematics.
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The new gem that gives +5 dex per "how far away you slot it from starting point" sounds cool for this build, maybe can gamble for some maraketh jewels for extra dex as well? Also fractal thoughts / garukhan's flight / shaper's touch for extra benefits from stat stacking.
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So here's another newbie Q from someone who has never made it past act 2. How important is following a build? I keep reading that if you don't, you'll be screwed at the end, but is it really that bad? Can you not even get to max level and goof around unless you are following a guide? Following a build/guide just doesn't sound fun to me, especially my first time through.
I've played a ton of diablo, and without following a guide you can easily make it to Torment 10.. You just can't push greater rifts. Is PoE similar? Can you still get some stuff done at max level and just have fun without following a guide, as long as you don't try to really push the difficulty up?
unless you're doing something absolutely ridiculous like only choosing life nodes, or choosing nodes that do nothing for the skill that you're using you'll be fine until end game. In this game everything works, it's just that some things work better
just reading what your shit does, like skill gems, gear and stuff goes a long way
Think I might go ed contagion this time around after league starting off meta builds the last few leagues
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Just choose some strong damage nodes on the tree, path to them and pick up life as you go. Most builds are functional if you do that. I think gearing can be more complicated than the passive tree to be honest.
I feel that respeccing your passive tree is the most difficult thing to salvage; comparatively, poor skill choices are easily remediable, as is poor gear. So as long as your passive tree isn't too awful, your character should be playable.
And if you ask me, the most important part to making a decent passive tree is making sure you have sufficient effective HP. In a life-based build, I believe you should shoot for at least +150% life in the late game, if not more, and get some other mitigation (and sustain) on top of that. This does mean a lot of passive points spent on life/defenses and getting to areas with those; as attractive as DPS nodes might be, you really shouldn't try to go for them all.
Just note that Path of Exile does like to throw stupid amounts of burst damage at you, so even with a properly built character, some things might kill you in no time. But that's still a huge improvement over everything killing you in no time, and surviving even a split second longer might give you time to react and recover.
So yeah. As long as your character doesn't get killed by a stiff breeze the moment they step out of town, you should have freedom to experiment.
Ok, so to state it from my point of view...
Following a guide:
Effort 2/10
Results 5-9/10 depending how good is the guide and build
Going in blindly:
Effort 0/10
Results 1/10 usually
Doing general research about POE to understand what makes a build work or not:
Effort 8/10
Results 7-9/10 as you will avoid crappy builds and at best will end around the same area as good / meta builds
So I would recommend NOT going in blindly, and if you don't want to follow a guide, you should read a lot of generic guides how poe works, wiki, do google searches about mechanics you are not sure about etc.
Typical noob mistakes of people going in blindly:
- Having no support gems to their skills
- Having no damage support gems to your skills (yes I did see a bow build with main attack supported by greater multiple projectiles, life on hit, onslaught and blind, you'll still do 0 damage)
- Going in circles on talent tree around your starting area, not knowing which stats are strong for your build and picking everything
- Not having any life on gear and / or talent tree and being 1-shot a lot
- Having too many different skills instead of making 1 a centerpiece of the build
- Not knowing there are utility flasks or what they're for (only having life and mana flasks)
- Not understanding how stats work (especially which stats apply to "attacks" and which apply to "spells" and whether the skill you're using is attack or a spell, it says so on the skill gem btw), but for example people playing minion builds and using talents from passive tree that only apply to the player character not its minions, people using crit stat on abilities that can't crit, people using weapons that give melee crit for spell builds (GGG unfortunately didn't state it very clearly on items)
- Not knowing that if you play a weapon based build (melee, bow or wand) you have to constantly upgrade your weapon or your dps will fall behind, this is not the case for builds that don't scale off weapon damage (mostly spell and minion builds)
- Not knowing about ascension (basically every class can choose from 3 sub classes, except scion that has 1) i.e. how to do it, when, and what to pick
My first character didn't follow a guide but I had a more experienced friend that was there to give me pointers and help me with any questions. In case you don't have any friend like that you could join some community / discord / guild (many streamers / youtubers have one) that is known for helping newbies.
And still now that I look back I see that character could have been so much better haven't I been so stubborn and insisting to do it "my own way". I mean... it was fine for map clear but killing any bosses was atrocious and that was even before bosses got buffed in 3.9, because I started like a year ago.
Well that's a matter of preference, some people LIKE to create builds, some others think it's a waste of time theorycrafting and would rather spend that time playing and not fiddling with POB.
Both playstyles are viable, it's about what gives you more fun. Efficiency vs the feeling you made your own build work.
In diablo3 it's easier to come up with a build without following a guide because literally it tells you on each set which skills are you meant to play with it.
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I never follow guides and generally don't like trading too much... but then again that could explain why I've been playing on and off for years and never got to T16 maps, let alone Shaper/UE, until I made a Necromancer in Blight league.. =p
And even then I put my own spin on a Necro which was far less effective than a normal Necro, but I finally did get an Uber Elder kill before the Atlas changed in 3.9!..
im just now getting into this, playing arc witch. My literal first character, the game is okay so far, im following a guide. Just got to act 6. The community is, well, a lot less helpful then in diablo. In diablo you can ask chat for help, and someone basically always has an answer or tip, they might even pop in and help, in POE, ive asked chat like 5 things and never gotten an answer. Never gotten someone to trade using poe.trade, pretty much never had contact with another player even though im trying. Kinda souring me on the game.
That's actually normal at this point in the league (1 week away from the end of Metamorph), most people arent playing anymore, the ones playing are sitting on a ton of currencies so getting out of their map to just trade something worth 1alc/1c they dont bother and the general chat after the mid-point of the league is just a meme fest.
If you give it a shot at the start of the league you'll see a completly different community.
yeah i probably will. Im just trying to get through act 10 for now. Im having a hard time figuring out what gear i have is bad and needs replaced, vs what is usable for a while. So since its hard for me to tell good vs bad still, and not being able to trade for anything, the story is getting harder and im dying faster (losing resists at katava, not a fun feeling lmfao). Im also getting to the point in the build where i need a 5 link wep or chest for the arc build.