FAST with BIG Damage - Poison Blade Vortex League Start Build Guide - Path of Exile 3.15

---------------------------------------- WARNING WARNING WARNING ---------------------------------------- Path of Exile 3.15 Expedition League is potentially a turning point for the game. It is becoming MUCH more difficult. Understand, that I will do everything in my power to properly update this PoB with information as it becomes available. Regardless of what information we get, the true effects of the potential nerfs will only really come to light once we play the league. If you have any issues or need guidance on this build join my discord, linked in the description of every one of my videos. Understand that I myself am not capable of helping so many people but the community is extremely helpful. That being said they are not there specifically to help you. They play the game just like you do and if you want to be successful in Path of Exile you have to put the work in. Don't expect them to be Google for you. ----------------------- WHAT WE KNOW ----------------------- 3.15 will be massively nerfing quite a few things. SUPPORT GEMS There are a few new "rules" that have been given to us and this is a direct quote from GGG "https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3147157" Damage multipliers between Support Gems have been standardised following these rules: 1 - Gems that provide a useful benefit in addition to damage usually grant less than 25% more damage at gem level 20. 2 - Those that provide only a damage bonus or have only a very mild restriction or penalty grant around 30-35% more damage. 3 - Those with downsides or restrictions grant between 38% and 48% more damage, depending on how severe the cost of using the support is. Going off of these rules Poison Blade Vortex should be relatively fine, even though it has gotten some readjustment and Coralito's has been changed, the build should still function. Poison in general has gotten a 50% more multiplier overall to counteract the Assassin Nerfs. This allows for some other ascendancies to potentially use poison, but I feel in this specific case that Assassin is still the go to. FLASKS Flasks are going to be a point of interest going into this patch. We really and truly do not and will not know what is ideal until we explore this system. Currently expect that EVERYTHING you know about flasks to be up in the air. I have done my best to account for these changes but until PoB gets updated with all of the new information I am limited in what I can do. Do your best, I believe in you :) --------------------- INTRODUCTION --------------------- Please check the build guide on my YouTube channel at https://youtube.com/c/bigducks Liking my Videos and Subscribing to my YouTube channel help me to keep bringing you more content like this, if you just grab the PoB please consider giving me a like to help me out, I appreciate all of your support! Keep in mind there may be multiple videos per build, always look for the most recent video. Toxic Rain -> Poison Blade Vortex This build is a Poison Ailment build, we stack as many poisons on the target as possible which each do individual Chaos Damage Over Time debuffs. This build is quite fast and has excellent clear speed. Through the use of Plague Bearer we can achieve extremely fast and large AoE clear. Blade Vortex AoE has been nerfed over time but this is mostly irrelevant to us as Plague Bearer is our main form of clear. Bossing on this build is quite solid, but it requires some level of skill as you are required to stay near the boss to do damage. This can pose a problem early on so we typically will level as Caustic Arrow and Toxic Rain. ------------ RATINGS ------------ GOOD -> Clearing, Movement Speed, Elemental Damage Taken, Chaos Damage Taken, Playstyle, Trade League, Softcore, Cost, Damage Taken Over Time MEH -> Bossing, Survival, Physical Damage Taken, Solo Self Found BAD -> Hardcore DIFFICULTY OF PLAY - MEDIUM LOW This build is a good step up for a player who has some knowledge of the game. It does utilize a few interesting mechanics and requires you to be in melee range so it does require a bit of game knowledge to be successful. That being said the actual playstyle is very straightforward. You keep up your Blade Vortex and Plague Bearer and run through monsters. ----------------------- CONFIGURATION ----------------------- The current configuration is set to reflect the damage you would do while clearing maps and then finishing off a map boss. It does not do any "PoB warrioring" and should reflect typical boss damage you could do during a map. Make sure that you account for the "Unholy Might" checkbox in configuration. The main source of this we use is a Cluster Jewel and it is a LOT of damage. You can use a Sin's Rebirth if they end up being cheap but the Cluster is better. We do use Withered Stacks and are able to potentially keep up more than 6 at any given time. However the configuration is set to 6 as a precaution to not be over-selling. For accurate damage on a boss such as Sirus account for turning flasks on/off if you are unable to maintain flask charges throughout the fight. Focussed is another damage modifier but it will only be up so often, if you want to see damage done during focus (due to enchant on our helmet) then tick that box. However uptime is questionable. --------------------------------------------- FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS --------------------------------------------- Q: Bandit? A: Kill All. You can Also do Alira early on as mana might be tough this time around and then respec later. --- Q: Pantheon? A: Solaris and Shakari --- Q: I can't find an item with those exact stats what do I do? A: You don't need the exact stats on every single item, Jewels are a big culprit for people getting confused. Get what stats you can and prioritize the stats in the defensive and offensive sections below. --- Q: The leveling skills are all level 1, do I keep them at that level? A: No, this is to signify that it is a leveling skill and you level it up as you go. --- Q: How do I stop dying? A: BOSS SLAMS WILL KILL YOU ON ALMOST ANY BUILD. YOU CANNOT TANK BOSS ATTACKS IN PATH OF EXILE WITHOUT A *VERY* SPECIFIC BUILD. This is a Dodge build and it is not properly suited for Hardcore as Dodge is a random chance mechanic. You WILL die occasionally but with proper gear and playstyle it should not happen often at all. That being said, Make sure you have the following: 75+ of ALL Elemental Resist (Resistances max at 75, having a bit over will help for ele weakness maps etc.) 50+ (Ideally 75+) Chaos Resist, Coralitos does damage to us now and you should be capped on Chaos Res. As much Dodge as you can manage (Acrobatics / Phase Acrobatics / Quartz Flask / Elusive / ETC) Don't ignore the power of Wind Dancer + Kintsugi. It combines extremely well with our Dodge to give us a HUGE Effective Healthpool. High tier Life roll on every piece that can have life Some pieces can have % Life on this build, such as Jewels, Belt, etc. Keep your Flasks up at all times while clearing. Make sure that you are making use of Enduring Cry to heal when needed on bosses. CwDT + Desecrate is also a solid recovery mechanic once you have The Diadem. --- Q: How do I do more damage? A: This Build scales Damage Over Time through Poisons and Crit.There are a TON of modifiers that affect this. The main modifiers we are looking for is anything that increases Poison / Ailment Duration, Damage Over Time Multiplier, + To Level of Spell Gems (Mainly Physical), Gain % of Physical as Chaos, and Crit Chance / Crit Multiplier. Due to the Perfect Agony Keystone we are able to scale Crit Multi for Poison allowing us some interesting options. Some other stats we are looking for in relative (but not exact) order. Poison Damage, Chaos Damage, Physical Damage, Generic Damage. --- Q: Should I use Flesh and Stone or Skitterbots? A: The default answer is Flesh and Stone, however if you are wanting to scale specifically damage, Skitterbots is a good alternative as it still provides slow. --- Q: I'm having trouble keeping my mana up, what should I do? A: In patch 3.15 GGG massively increased all mana costs and added mana cost to triggered spells. Because of this it is far more difficult to maintain mana on pretty much any build. Early on you should be using a mana flask and trying your best to not reserve too much mana. For example you will have to Drop Herald of Agony or one of your 35% auras early on. Once you obtain Devouring Diadem a lot of your mana problems will vanish. Devouring Diadem is VERY powerful and may be expensive on league start. --- Q: What about (insert other ascendancy here) A: Honestly they might be good! They did a generic overall buff to Poison to attempt and level the playing field between Assassin and other classes. I still feel that Assassin has the edge due to its poison interactions but they may be possible. Those options are not covered in this guide however, so use them at your own risk. We also will not be providing support for other ascendancies as it is too difficult to manage. --- Q: I don't have thread of hope, what should I do instead? A: Put points into the life points near Revenge of the Hunted --- Q: I'm scared of Cluster Jewels, can I play without them? A. You SHOULDN'T, but you can. Clusters are very powerful, specifically the "Overwhelming Malice" node that is available on them. If you are absolutely against clusters I would still suggest picking up a Crit Medium with Overwhelming Malice and slotting it in. All this being said if you refuse to use Clusters then slot in a Sin's Rebirth in your flasks instead of Atziri's Promise. --- Q: My question isn't in here, what do I do? A: Double check that you have looked through the video and this PoB. If you can't find it you can join my discord, linked in the description of all of my videos. Please remember that the people in the discord channels are very helpful but it is not their job to assist you. This is a knowledge based game and you have to put in the work to be successful. ------------------ LEVELING UP ------------------ Prioritize The Gems you need immediately, Main Links > Movement > Auras > Utility. Check the "Skills" tab for which gems to grab. DON'T FORGET TO LEVEL UP BLADE VORTEX, PLAGUE BEARER, AND ANY OTHER SUPPORTS YOU NEED IN YOUR OFFHAND WEAPON SET Levels 1 - Maps || Caustic Arrow / Toxic Rain Self Cast + Ballista This playstyle uses very similar nodes on the tree and due to the change to the Poison gem it is difficult to get good damage and poison chance early on while leveling. You can still attempt to swap at 38 when you obtain Unleash but it is not suggested and will not be supported. Gearing - Focus on getting Movement Speed boots, Gear with the Links that you need, Life and Resists as well as Sapphire Rings for the Merveil fight. Act 1 has become significantly more difficult this patch so be aware that you might have a rough time. - Pick up Blue/Yellow items and sell them unidentified to the vendor for Transmutation Shards and Identified for Alteration Shards. - For Caustic Arrow / Toxic Rain the ONLY stat that matters on your bow early on is Attack Speed. If you can manage to find a Quill Rain then great! If not you can use a white Short Bow for the entire campaign, and it will be better than most other things. - Focus on topping off your resists early on and re-checking them after the Act 5 Boss and Act 10 Boss, grab as much life as you can. - Do not ignore links, if you feel your damage is lacking it is 100% because you are not setting up your links properly. Every ability is important, and you should be prioritizing links in softcore. You can run a few white pieces of gear with resists crafted on them from the bench in your hideout (talk to helena in act 2) with proper links until you can get your items together. - Don't ignore Essences, they can be very powerful for turning white pieces of gear that have proper links into resist / life gear. - Don't forget about your flasks, update your life and mana flasks consistently and make sure to stay on top of getting new flasks as they become available to you. There is a quicksilver flask available from both Mercy Mission (Act 1) as well as The Great White Beast (Act 2) A Silver flask is available from The Key to Freedom (Act 5) There is a Quartz flask available from The Silver Locket (Act 7) Tips - Explosive Trap is a useful ability for Single Target up until you obtain Toxic Rain - Make ample use of Smoke Mine if you want to move faster through the acts, you can make your life easier by putting Detonate Mine on left click. - Don't underestimate the new changes to mana, they will potentially make mana regen much more valuable, you should attempt to keep your mana flask updated at all times and consider siding with Alira in Act 2 before changing it back to Skill Points in the endgame. - The Toxic Rain Ballista Setup is powerful, place as many of them as you can on the ground while also keeping Caustic Arrow's debuff up and then Spam self cast Toxic Rain. Your damage should be quite good. - The New Focused Ballista Support is most likely good, however I have not tested it, you can attempt to add it into the Toxic Rain Ballista Setup. - The Gems Enduring Cry and Vicious Projectiles are both unavailable from the standard vendors for the Shadow. Use the other gems available in any links that contain them until you reach The Library quest in act 3. Go left from the waypoint until you reach the Library and do the quest for Siosa inside, he will sell the gems you need. --- Levels Maps - Endgame || Poison Blade Vortex Gearing Your goal for swapping into Poison Blade Vortex should be getting your Third Ascendancy done and obtaining the following items. - 2x Oblitaration Wand - 1x Ungil's Harmony Amulet - A 5-link or 6 Link Yellow Chestpiece with some Life and Resists (Corrupted is fine, just make sure the link colors are correct) - Appropriate Level Blade Votex / Plague Bearer / Support Gems (You did remember my warning above right? :) Tips - Withering Step on Left Click will allow you an easy way to consistently move quickly through maps and apply your wither stacks. However it will eat up most of your charges of Flame Dash. I suggest early on while you are still using Obliteration wands to NOT use Withering Step on left click. Later when you are using Whirling Blades as your main movement ability it will become much easier. - Don't underestimate Plague Bearer, it is your MAIN clearing skill. It does extremely good damage and you should focus on making use of it constantly. Just remember that damage supports do not work with it, only the gems listed in the Skills section do. - Once you are using Cold Iron Points your main movement skill should be Whirling Blades, we support this with Fortify support which gives us an additional defensive layer. Try to keep it up at all times. - Binos Kitchen Knife is bad, a lot of people like it but 2x Obliteration Wands are better for Clear and 2x Cold Iron Points are better than everything else once you obtain them. Binos will only ever reliably proliferate 1 poison to nearby enemies. It may occasionally get a few in dense packs but there is never really a time where swapping to Binos would be better. ------------------------------ GENERAL PLAYSTYLE ------------------------------ The video guide will be MUCH better at showing how to do this but I will give you some basics. - Keep up 10 Stacks of Blade Vortex, remember that with Unleash we do not need to spam it constantly. Only cast every few seconds. - Utilize Plague Bearer CONSTANTLY. It is your main form of clear and should stack up quite quickly in maps. It is important to note that the damage done by this skill is based off of what the Max Poison is when you first initially activate the ability. It is better to leave it activated and let it run out than turn it off and on constantly. - Keep up your Fortify buff with Whirling Blades. - This build requires us to be in melee range to deal damage to bosses, you will want to learn to weave around boss abilities and learn the art of running in circles. - Use Flame Dash for crossing Gaps or for dodging boss abilities and such. - Early on you will Self Cast your Despair curse on bosses or hard enemies until you can afford either a Curse on Hit Ring, Asenath's Gentle Touch, or Both and the Curse Chest. ------------------------ CLUSTER JEWELS ------------------------ There is info on Crafting these in the Crafting Section. Clusters are important for this build! They are not required but the "Overwhelming Malice" node is a HUGE dps boost. Make sure you get it! - Large Cluster Chaos Cluster - We are mainly looking to get as many solid nodes as we can. Anything that gives you Chaos Damage or any of the other stats listed in the DPS FAQ up above are solid. The node you are mainly looking for is Grim Oath and then Wicked Pall. You CAN get Overwhelming Malice here but it is very difficult and rare. - Medium Clusters Chaos DoT Multi - You are looking for specifically Circling Oblivion and Haemorrhage. These two are substantially better than most other things here. Crit Chance - Overwhelming Malice is required here if you did not get it in the Large Cluster. This is the easiest spot for it. Other good nodes are Basics of Pain or Haemorrhage. ------------------- ASCENDANCY ------------------- Assassin - Our ascendancy provides us many extremely helpful stats, and is the obvious choice for a Crit Based Poison Build. Mistwalker - This is one of our main sources of maintaining the Elusive buff. It will give us significant movement speed early on in leveling and also provides us solid defensive layers from taking Critical Strikes. Opportunistic - Previously this node would be taken last but is chosen second now due to leveling as Toxic Rain throughout the campaign. This node provides us immunity to Reflect once we are crit capped (possible in the expensive version, thanks uncle ungil). It also provides us a significant damage bonus when we are fighting a boss. Noxious Strikes - One of our two main Poison nodes. This provides us a majority of our chance to poison as well as our Poison Duration scaling. This node also provides us one of our main sources of recovery while clearing. Toxic Delivery - This node allows us to scale poison with crit and begins to enable the other half of our damage. It provides us significantly more damage with poisons when we crit as we are applying them as well as a significant increase to chance to crit. -------------------------------------------------- CRAFTING AND OBTAINING THE GEAR -------------------------------------------------- REMEMBER that you can always just buy all of the final pieces from the trade website. Crafting most of the time is cheaper. Typically leveling items or items in the "Budget" section that are just Life / Resists and that are not hard to obtain will not be included in this section. There will be items that simply aren't in need of detailed crafting notes, I will mention that in those cases. Weapons / Offhands - Budget Option - 2x Obliteration Wands, these are VERY cheap almost always and drop very commonly. There are easy to find divination cards as well that drop this wand, check the wiki for a list of those. - Mid Tier Option - 2x Cold Iron Points, these are the premier weapon of this build, they are a world drop and mid-low tier rarity but can be very pricey early on in the league depending on how popular builds that use them are. - Expensive Option - Corrupted Cold Iron Points, typically you are looking for % Increased Damage over time however for those who are interested in potentially getting some cheaper options take a look at the other mods available on these that people might "fail" corrupting. Power Charge on Crit is an interesting option. Helmet - Budget Option - Simple helmet with Life and Resist and any other stats you need. - Mid / Expensive Option - Devouring Diadem COULD be expensive or cheap but it depends on what the farming meta is. If people are killing Catarina consistently it should be cheap, if not it will be expensive. The best enchant is by far the Duration of Ailments While Focussed one. Chestpiece - Budget Option - 6 Link Rare with Life and Resists, Corrupted is fine but double check colors. - Mid Tier Option - Kintsugi, this can be expensive depending on quite a few things. It is the most powerful defensive option for this build by far. it is obtained through a prophecy and is rather rare. - Expensive Option - This is a super interesting Chestpiece. We use a Sacrificial Garb base off of Atziri to obtain +1 to Level of Vaal Skill Gems. Ultimately you want to try and get a Level 21 Vaal Blade Vortex as it is super helpful and will enable this to work for us. - Obtain an ilvl 84 Sacrificial Garb with the Warlord Influence. If one is not available you will need to either use Harvest or a Warlord's Exalt to create this. - Use a 3 combination resonator of Dense + Metallic + Pristine to obtain +1 to Level of Active Skill Gems and no other Warlord Modifiers. - Obtain an additional Chestpiece to sacrifice with the Hunter Influence that is ilvl 82+ Base is irrelevant as it will be destroyed. - Use a 3 combination resonator of Dense + Metallic + Pristine to obtain "You can apply an additional Curse" with no other Hunter Modifiers. Alternatively Caster Harvest or Single Aetheric Fossils work as well. - Use an Awakener's Orb on the Sacrificial Hunter Base with Additional Curse and then use the SECOND use of the Awakener's Orb on the Sacrificial Garb Warlords Base with +1 Active Skill Gems. - Hopefully you landed a good 3rd prefix or no prefix and an open suffix. You can attempt to land a prefix of your choosing first if you like by using Beastcrafting or other methods. - Craft Prefixes cannot be changed and use a Harvest Reroll Caster. You have a 50/50 chance to hit T1 or T2 Spell Crit. If you get T2 you can always repeat this process as long as you have an open Suffix. - Craft any final mods you would like such as resists or life. Boots Nothing Special in this slot, simply go for as much resist, movespeed and life as you can get. You can craft Cannot Be Frozen on an expensive pair since they made dealing with Freeze harder now. Amulet - Budget Option - Get carried by a 1c Amulet. Ungil's Harmony OP - Expensive Option - Obtain a perfect or near perfect Ungil's and use Crit Catalysts before Corrupting for Malevolence Effect or other good mods. Rings - Budget Options - Simply go for Life, Resists and any other solid stats you can find, nothing special here. - Mid Tier Options - You can use a Circle of Nostalgia if you can find one cheap. - For the other slot consider trying to get a Despair on Hit ring. These can be crafted quite easily on an ilvl 80 Hunter base with Aetheric Fossils or Caster Harvest Rerolls. Go for Life / Resists on top of that and you can use a Vermillion or Chaos Res base as well. Belt - Budget Options - Grab any Belt with Life / Strength / Resists that you need. Nothing special for this slot. - Expensive Options - Upgrade to a Stygian Jewels - Thread of Hope - This is a drop off of Sirus, you want Large Ring, with as good of a resist roll as you can get - Corrupting Blood Immunity Jewel - This is a random corruption of any Jewel, it is rare and best that you buy a life / generic damage one with the mod once and use it the entire league. - PBV Jewels - You do not need this specific Jewel, get jewels with Life%, Some damage modifiers and any resists that your build needs. Cluster Jewels - Large Cluster When crafting Large Chaos Clusters the main thing we are looking for here is Grim Oath. It provides a huge damage bonus. My suggestion is to use Aberrant Fossils or Chaos Harvest Rerolls or Reroll+ Best way to obtain this Cluster is to purchase it. - Medium Clusters Chaos DoT Multi These are best rolled with the Alt + Augment + Regal method. The main two mods we are looking for are Circling Oblivion and Wasting Affliction. Neither of these have any tags so rolling them with Fossils or Harvest can be rough. I suggest if you get either of these mods and another keepable mod (most of them) then stop and use that. Crit Chance These are best rolled with the Alt + Augment + Regal method. The main mod we are looking for here is Overwhelming Malice, it is mandatory on the jewel if you don't have it on the Large. Take ANYTHING else that is worthwhile along with this mod. Basics of Pain, Haemorrhage are best. ------------------------ FINAL THOUGHTS ------------------------ A build that has held tried and true for quite some time. It lost some power while leveling so we have swapped to Caustic Arrow + Toxic Rain to make it smoother. If you have suggestions or just want to hangout with the community make sure to join my discord linked here -> https://discord.gg/aDtqeDC Thanks for taking the time to read through all of this! If you enjoy the build make sure to let your friends know about my YouTube Channel / Twitch Stream and have them join the discord server! Thanks, have fun and stay safe out there in Wraeclast, and I'll see you all next time!! ---