Complete Walkthrough of Path of Exile's Endgame - Veteran Player breaks down his 25-hour playthrough

USE THE LOADOUTS DROP DOWN MENU IN THE TOP RIGHT! ---------------------------------------- LEVELING ---------------------------------------- Go through the ENTIRE campaign with Sunder. It is, by far, the best melee leveling skill in the game and it will be easy to swap to Earthshatter once you hit maps. Here is a DEDICATED PoB to this leveling process! https://pobb.in/4tG-QFiCLvNB // ACT 1 // Start with Ground Slam until you get Sunder (lv12 - enter Merveil's Caverns and immediately return to town) Your gems by the end of Act 1 should be: Sunder (w/ Added Fire, Ruthless) Leap Slam Frostblink (keep level 1) Blood and Sand War Banner Intimidating Cry Enduring Cry 2x Lifetap (unlinked, for now) // ACT 2 // Complete both The Weaver's Chambers and The Chamber of Sins areas, first - these quests give you skill gem rewards. Your gems by the end of Act 2 should be: Sunder (w/ Melee Phys, Faster Attacks, *Ruthless) [*if 4L] Leap Slam (w/ Faster Attacks, *Lifetap) [*if spare 3L] Frostblink (w/ Lifteap) Blood Rage Blood and Sand Herald of Purity Herald of Ash War Banner Intimidating Cry Enduring Cry Seismic Cry // ACT 3 // You should SWAP Herald of Ash (and Purity, if you were running it) with Pride. Also, remember to BUY Earthshatter here and socket it but do NOT use it (it will gain XP and level up!) Also, be sure to complete A Fixture of Fate quest (The Library zone), grab Urgent Orders as the reward and BUY Pulverize FROM SIOSA! Your gems by the end of Act 3 should be: Sunder (w/ Melee Phys, Ruthless, Pulverize) Leap Slam (w/ Faster Attacks, Lifetap) Frostblink (w/ *Lifetap) [MOVE this Lifetap over to your Urgent Orders links, once you get a second 4L] Blood Rage Blood and Sand Herald of Purity Pride War Banner Intimidating Cry & Enduring Cry (w/ Urgent Orders, *Lifetap) [*if you have a spare 4L] Infernal Cry (no need to use this warcry - just keep it socketed for XP. and yes, this DOES work with Brutality) Autoexertion (UNLINKED - just for XP) Earthshatter (socketed for XP) // ACT 4 // Swap in Brutality (remove Ruthless) and Fist of War (remove Pulverize but KEEP IT IN YOUR SOCKETS) once you complete Kaom's & Daresso's areas. Also, remember to BUY Overexertion & either Brutality or Fist of War (whichever you did not choose as your quest reward) from Petarus & Vanja at this time. Your gems by the end of Act 4 should be: Sunder (w/ Melee Phys, Brutality, Fist of War) Leap Slam & Frostblink (w/ Faster Attacks, Lifetap) Blood Rage Blood and Sand Herald of Purity Pride War Banner Intimidating Cry & Enduring Cry (w/ Urgent Orders, Lifetap) Infernal Cry (socketed for XP - you do not have to use it) Autoexertion (UNLINKED) Earthshatter (socketed for XP) Overexertion (socketed for XP) Pulverize (socketed for XP) // ACTS 5-10 // You should be good-to-go with your gems, now. Remember that, in Act 6, you can buy EVERY gem from Lilly Roth after you clear the Twilight Strand. ---------------------------------------- SWAP TO EARTHSHATTER ---------------------------------------- I recommend that you swap to Earthshatter once you are COMFORTABLY in maps. You do NOT HAVE TO swap to it IMMEDIATELY after hitting maps but you definitely CAN! Sunder is perfectly fine for clearing white maps and gathering your initial Atlas Passives. Plus, keeping Sunder for early mapping will allow you to focus more on upgrading your gear (including your weapon!) The only requirements for swapping to Earthshatter are: - Allocate ALL necessary Warcry passives on the tree AND anoint "Admonisher" - Have one source of "Warcries Cannot Exert Travel Skills" (either on a jewelry / belt or take the mastery) The swap can happen as early as level 70 (if you know what you're doing) but will probably be closer to 80. Remember to unspec out of the leveling passives! However, I also STRONGLY recommend that you grab 1 or 2 pieces of jewelry with Elreon's "Non-Channelling Skills have -x to Mana Cost"! This makes your Warcries cost 0 mana and will GREATLY improve the QoL of the build. You can either spec into Betrayal (what I do) or simply buy a ring / amulet with an "Elreon's" veiled prefix (it MUST be a prefix!) (note that you are NOT guaranteed to unveil "-x mana cost" on the first try!) ---------------------------------------- WHAT TO WORK TOWARDS ---------------------------------------- After you have successfully made the swap, you can choose to work towards one of the two endgame setups I've provided. Use the dropdown menu in the top right, next to the Ascendancy Class. "T17 Farm" = tankier (also my actual character) "Giga Damage" = damagier :) Both setups are Uber Pinnacle viable. With either setup, the absolute FIRST upgrade I'd buy would be ANY 6L ARMOR-BASE BODY. You do NOT care what the stats are - just that is a PURE armor base (not hybrid evasion / energy shield) Then, simply chaos spam it a few times until it rolls decently-well (life, armor, resistances) This will net you the "most bang for your buck", as you can buy a "bad" 6L for very cheap and get decent stats on it in under 20 chaos, for sure. Remember to craft a missing stat, such as life or a resistance. Then, I'd get 20% quality on Autoexertion and STAGGER your quality across the warcries it's linked to. For example: Autoexertion (20%) Intimidating Cry (20%) Seismic Cry (14%) Infernal Cry (10%) Battlemage's Cry (6%) The reason you do NOT want all of your auto-warcries at 20% is because Earthshatter spikes detonate whenever a warcry goes off, so you want them to go off at different times, to give you more-frequent spike pops. Different quality % = different cooldown # Also, due to this reason, some people autoexert General's Cry for its FAR lower base cooldown of 3s (instead of 8) However, if you choose this, know that General's Cry DOES NOT COUNT TOWARDS YOUR Overexertion DAMAGE! You are PURELY using it for its lower CD spike-pops. Then, I'd do a big-boy upgrade for your weapon. Look for a 700-800 pDPS axe with AS HIGH OF TOP-END DAMAGE POSSIBLE! You are NOT looking for a fast axe (aka NOT Despot)! Ideally, you want a ~1.3+ attacks-per-second Vaal Axe / Karui Chopper. You can also stop at 5L, if your body is a 6L. Know that there are MANY ways to upgrade the build (such as Cluster Jewels and Spell Suppression), so, again - choose whether or not you want more damage or more defense and start working towards the things I've listed! And, if the answer to "what is your budget?" is: "yes", then you can definitely shoot for the best of BOTH worlds (+1 endurance charge ring w/ Kalandra's Touch, Echoes of Creation & capped spell suppress are all possible in the same build!) Have fun! Questions? twitch.tv/wooliegaming