#Showcase mapping - https://clips.twitch.tv/TalentedSlipperyShrimpFunRun-1t7zZj0CIjzpbYvt
pobb.in - https://pobb.in/sQm0V6MJTmv4

#Offense This is a variation of what used to be a popular two button build a few leagues ago - Locohol Build Guide. How it works:

1. One button shocks enemies (with your choice of spell). In our case this is Orb of Storms which repeatedly launches out chaining arcs to shock with
2. Other button casts Lightning Conduit to consume any shocks in the area for a huge hit.

As long as you can consistently apply large shocks you will do huge damage in a massive area for very very low investment. Removing ALL gear but Annihilating Light we still do over 1.5m Guardian DPS. Lightning Conduit carries hard! As for AoE, with just the Heart of Destruction ascendency you will have an AoE radius of ~80 which will easily cover your screen.

The most common options for shock are Storm Brand and Orb of Storms because they constantly reapply the shock for you to consume. Arc and Shock Nova can also be used but these require you to alternate between them and Conduit every cast and I hated that. I supposed you could tie them to spell totem or something to automate. If you're using orb of storms or storm brand I would also recommend chain so you can get a more spread out application of shock.

To make your shocks easier to scale you will also want to juice your shock/ailment effect so the damage threshold you need breach to apply a big shock gets severely reduced. Overcharge Support and Unbound Ailments are great for this, so are points in the tree and Shaper of Storms. If you DON'T do this you'll have to hit for millions of damage against bosses and tankier enemies to get a good shock and at that point you might as well just use whatever can do that as your primary skill instead.

EDIT: There's also this great explanation on approach to shock effect and even how to max shock WITHOUT scaling damage here - https://youtu.be/y6HZMjxlBDo?t=151. Thanks to /u/quantum_hacker

#Defense Honestly I kind of hate playing Elementalist because the location in the tree is terrible for cheap defense

• Spell leech
• Decent damage to kill things from distance before they threaten you
• High evasion from Grace + Gear + Aura effect
• Reflected Damage immunity (elementalist)
• Elemental Ailment immunity (purity of elements)
• ~40% spell and attack block from staff nodes + divine shield impossible escape
• Primal Aegis from ascendency

#Gear All gear except uniques picked up off ground or crafted. You CAN run this build with just rares very easily and there are definitely different ways you can take it. These are just the uniques I chose to build around:

• Berek's Respite (5c) - I can't escape this ring. You can absolutely play without it but it's so nice to spread shocks on kill at a radius of 20. The uneven application and larger radius than the shock mastery (range 10) mean that your shocks spread out much further. Huge QoL.
• 60% Annihilating Light (40c) - absurd damage boost over the next best uniques or any rare staff I could feasibly craft. This WILL stretch you super thin as you try and make up ele resist. With a perfect roll staff you're looking to effectively get ~200% fire/cold/lightning res. If you can't be bothered to work your way to this yet just start with an Agnerod. They're basically free (1c) and are totally reasonable damage-wise if you're just mapping.
• 90% Darkness Enthroned (30c) - not mandatory at all but cheap and super super flexible. Having a decent roll means you can use abyss jewels to fit any missing niche including stun/bleed/poison avoidance. Any rare belt with life and resists will also work just fine.
• Impossible Escape (20c) - we are desperate for defensive stats and Divine Shield has a bunch of good staff block nodes around it along with crit+crit multi so its perfect for us. It's also dirt cheap which helps
• Lethal Pride OPTIONAL DEFENSE (60c) - A decent boost to defenses after we make some currency. I bought one that gave 15% phys taken as fire.
• Watchers Eye OPTIONAL DEFENSE (200c) - the most expensive thing in the build by far. Again I prefer defense so I bought one with onslaught and phys taken as conversion.
• Three Dragons INTERESTING DEFENSE (5-10c) - Not using this right now but the uncorrupted version basically costs an alc which means you can get extremely strong corruptions like reservation multiplier/gem levels/power charge max for next to nothing. The real trick here is that because Shaper of Storms gives you guaranteed shock you don't need your lightning damage to shock. This means you can get freeze for free and your average hits are so thicc you freeze very consistently for a very strong defensive layer. The 30% allres is good for mitigating staff downside too.
• Inpulsa's INTERESTING CLEAR? (10c) - I'm not personally using yet this but there's a really weird trick here with Three Dragons. You already have shocked enemies and killing them blows them up to deal fat lightning damage that can FREEZE so with herald of ice you could end up getting %life shatters that chain off each other. This is not my trick, here's SOMAYD explaining it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jOydD_lM5Y&ab_channel=SOMAYD

#Problems With my approach specifically a big problem was gearing up. 200% res of each element is a lot to get with handcrafting. This becomes worse depending on your tree as you will also need a lot of dex and strength for your auras. As a result of this you will simply not have enough suffixes left for reasonable chaos resist without huge investment elsewhere. Luckily this is just a mapping build and chaos damage is very rare (aside from poison and caustic ground which can be mitigated)

Movement speed could also be better. There's basically no movement speed near Witch and moving slowly is both unhealthy and unfun hence the haste, onslaught and withering step. Being a lightning build with decent cast speed I should say Lightning Warp is a good alternative to sprinting but I'm pretty sure only psychopaths actually like that skill.

Also worth mentioning this is not a bossing build! Getting awakened gems, +1 curse, gem quality, wrath + divine blessing can easily jump your Guardian dps over 10m but you still have only ~4500 life and very very weak phys resistance.

Maxing shock on something like Uber Sirus is also a little sus.