pob: https://pobb.in/aqBM1rAYthLY budget: ~100 ex (maybe ~70 ex if self craft)

#Introduction

Hey all, I took a break last league but have now returned. And I've got another aura stacker setup!

I actually really like where aura stackers are in the meta rn; they feel like a fair and balanced build (and hopefully GGG is done nerfing them). You can start from ~10 ex and gradually work your way up (my snapshot from then: https://pobb.in/e0nfoceYSfhX). Due to melding of the flesh, their most powerful and unique trait, being 90 res capped, is far more accessible to other builds. Regardless, the build still has it's own strengths.

##Pros

• high damage/coverage with spark
• no enlightens
• tons of upgrade paths
• tons of build diversity, can tweak build to fit your preferences
• great flexibility - play what skill you want (though spark is just best)
• good simulacrum farmer

##Cons

• low health pool, weak to pen (e.g. shaper balls)
• relatively slow start
• build really shines when you tweak it yourself to fit your preferences (not greatest plug & play build) unless you have infinite currency

#Mechanics

The core of this build is running a ton of auras. The itemization/tree of this build is pretty much solely to facilitate running all those auras.

The most important breakpoint for aura stackers is 3.0 aura effect. This gets you to 90 max res and juices up guardian/necro ascendancy. You can get this by running multiple introspections/purposeful harbingers.

##Ailment Avoidance

For some reason, I can't find a single aura stacker on leaderboards who picked up ailment avoidance. It is incredible easy this league with the new eldritch implicit and ashes of the stars + anomalous grace. Boots + grace alone can get you up to 75%, and the last 25% can be acquired with 3 passive points (which also give other decent stats).

##Traitor/Coruscating

This has been a thing for a while, and I used it a couple leagues back. Due to the strength of the new eldritch implicits and players like captainlance9, it has become much more popular - I think back in 3.15 I was the only person on leaderboards running the combo, but now there is a pretty wide array of characters (not just aura stackers) utilizing the combo.

Try to get aura effect on one of the nearby nodes from your brutal restraint.

I made a scuffed calculator if you want to check your coruscating uptime - pob's calculations seem to be off: https://www.desmos.com/calculator/rljvnmnmha

##Melding of the Flesh

A new addition this league which lets us cut 2 of our purities while still getting 90 max res. This makes getting res on gear/clusters requisite, but it is well worth it for tons of reservation saved and 2 gem slots.

#Ascendancy

I've been a big advocate for guardian for 'budget' (<100 ex) aura stackers, but now I think scion is just better at all budgets. Champion is entirely necessary, as using path of the duelist to go by champion of the cause is way better than grabbing the 3rd cluster by ranger or templar. The champion of the cause cluster has both a % aura effect node and a generic reservation efficiency node, which makes it well worth the couple extra travel nodes.

Guardian is pretty requisite for pdr. I wouldn't feel comfortable skipping it unless I had 500k+ armor (which obviously we aren't hitting). The third slot is flexible; at an entry level, elementalist is cheap, but ultimately necromancer is the best damage option.

#Gear

##Helmet I love running a pseudo-6l in my helmet. It makes the build way cheaper to start (no 6l), reduces mana cost significantly, and frees up 2 gem slots.

I personally opted to go for a helmet with 15% aura effect implicit.

You can go for an endgame influenced pseudo 8l with hypo/+2/+3% crit/essence, which is actually cheaper than you'd think (only costs ~20 ex to make). However, I think it is better to just go for alternate ailments. Theres also these mirror gloves which are worth considering: https://www.pathofexile.com/trade/search/Archnemesis/Jy2aBoWFl

But you'd need to get multi somewhere (which is difficult without using transcendent flesh + lethal pride) and obviously they are expensive as hell.

##Chest For the chest slot, you probably should just stick with an eldritch aura effect chest. If you have an item editor, you could make a better elevated influenced chest, but in practice you probably would end up with <400 ES. Base crit is also not that important since brittle is so OP.

##Boots For boots, I am currently using eldritch boots for ailment avoidance. Ultimately, you probably want to switch over to triple elevated elusive/tailwind/onslaught boots. Those boots on their own are 40+ ex though, and it would make ailment avoidance much more costly. You'd need 2 of: belt implicit, chest prefix craft, boot suffix craft.

##Belt For belt, I just try to get a bunch of es + res. The base is dirt cheap, and the essences aren't too expensive either. The chaos res during flask effect will have 100% uptime for this build, so it is very strong.

Other than that, there is the standard suite of ashes/nebulis/prism guardian/2x cotb (48%)/maligaros aura stacker suite. I could go on and on about how good ashes is, but I think everyone knows by now.

#Skill Choices

Especially after the buffs, spark is head and shoulders over other skills. It is also a perfect skill for simulacrums.

If you don't like spark, any lightning skill works. Hell even non-lightning skills are playable, but you'll have to keep up smite 100% (I usually leave smite/rf off during mapping unless I'm struggling).

Other than that, there are a couple of flexible spots.

For guard skill, you can run molten shell if you have determination. Otherwise steelskin is better for mapping/bossing and immortal call is better for simulacrums (the flat shield does nothing against the amount of damage you take per second in simulacrums).

For dash skill, I like frostblink quite a bit. It is definitely better in simulacrums, but for mapping you can switch to flame dash.

##Alternate qualities

Ashes of the stars makes so many alternate qualities shine even brighter.

• Anomalous Spark: Gives us more than enough pierce, which saves us a support gem

• Phantasmal smite: well known and huge damage boost, but relatively expensive.

• Anomalous Dread banner: way underrated - unless you can get anomalous defiance banner and are running divergent determination + grace, I would say dread banner is better. My dread banner is giving nearby enemies ~18% less damage, which is incredibly strong.

• Divergent Haste: Very strong if you are going spark or ek. Definitely go for a vaal version, it is well worth it and isn't crazily expensive.

• Anomalous Grace: Incredibly good for hitting ailment avoidance cap

• Divergent Steelskin: a great option when starting out. Cleanses bleeds and gives you a shit ton of generic resistance, which means it also gives chaos res. Will help out a lot to reduce poisons damage during the effect.

• Divergent Righteous Fire/PoI: Decently cheap generic damage boosts

• Anomalous HoP: I honestly can't feel the taunt (probably because I also taunt everything due to champion), but theoretically it should be nice

• Wrath/Zealotry: not even remotely worth the price