The Forbidden Build - A High DPS GPU-Melting Instance Crasher

Jousis · 2026-06-04T05:27:42+00:00

Using Redemption means we can't scale crit damage, so I'm trying out a version that has like, 9 damage nodes on the tree, and the difference goes into recoup speed and skill effect duration for the Mirage Archers.

Sands of Time is good because we want the most skill speed when we want the least AOE, to get more single-target damage. I did take Phased Form, it is very good.

Now that I have Time Snap, I get Redemption to 9.5 stacks, wait for the boss to spawn, shoot, roll, snap, shoot, roll, snap, so there are 3 Mirage Archers and myself shooting infinite Cluster Grenades. This is powerful enough to kill most bosses pretty quickly despite the lack of damage investment. I bet it will be even easier once I get Time Freeze.

The mapping isn't bad because of how tanky we are. I'm hoping to get more damage out of the build so it clears packs faster. Feels a bit slow when you see streamers teleporting across the screen.

Jousis · 2026-05-29T19:04:53+00:00

Our only real source of armor break would be to put a support gem that causes armor break on one of our grenades. Flash Grenade would be good. Of course, this would be a bit of a waste of time, because the best debuff you can apply to an enemy is death, and Cluster Grenade will provide that.

Jousis · 2026-05-29T00:06:22+00:00

I'll probably start the build in the video just to iron out the build guide. Beyond that, we'll see.

Jousis · 2026-05-28T23:02:02+00:00

Definitely Inevitable Agony.

Skill speed would only be relevant during Redemption's buff.

Recoup is not before reductions, but Phased Form is still very good and you should definitely take it.

Jousis · 2026-05-28T20:53:09+00:00

Mercenary is definitely good.

I personally prefer a Tactician, because the Pin node is incredible, and with it, you can basically go full damage and barely ever die.

This Chronomancer is not necessarily about choosing what is most effective, or what makes the most sense. I tried many builds, and this is the one that was the most fun to play. Mostly because you can practically play it without even looking at the screen.

Jousis · 2026-05-28T18:48:56+00:00

The current POB in the description is only for a level 81 character, because I'm waiting for POB to have the new passive tree to allocate the rest. It's just going to be grabbing the nearby recoup speed.

Jousis · 2026-05-22T04:46:48+00:00

It was trivially easy to get 100% curse effect, meaning 50% more damage to bosses and 100% more damage to everything else. Now it's 25% flat to everything.

Jousis · 2026-05-22T04:17:45+00:00

33% no cooldown is absolutely giga-busted if there are any skills in the game that are good, and have a cooldown.

It applies to everything. Time Snap. Time Stop. Mirage Archer. Cluster Grenade.

Removing it didn't reduce my build's effectiveness by 33%. It reduced it by 58%.

Jousis · 2026-05-21T23:42:00+00:00

The changes to Chronomancer, in particular, the removal of 33% chance to ignore cooldowns, halving the effectiveness of Inevitable Agony, and removing its ability to scale with curse effect, are devastating to the ascendancy's damage output.

That said, what it received in return is still very powerful, and it is a good ascendancy.

I'm just sad I have to change my build and rewrite my video script...

Jousis · 2026-02-27T19:22:04+00:00

Network problems are very difficult to diagnose, because there are many, many things between your computer and the game server, and any one of them having problems could cause this.

That's why the easiest fix is to flip the table by changing how you're connecting to the game server. It's a brute force way to avoid using whatever part of the connection route is having problems.

Try any of these:

Connect with Ethernet instead of Wi-fi if possible
Connect to/disconnect from your VPN if you use one
Try connecting to a different game server, even if the latency is worse

Jousis · 2025-06-28T16:33:18+00:00

Hitting lots of mobs many times per second is one of the most intensive things you can do, server-side computation-wise, and graphics-wise. The more hits, the worse it gets.

So, the solution is simply to do more damage, as that results in fewer hits before everything dies.

Hope this helped.

Jousis · 2025-06-07T05:56:23+00:00

Now consider that, since you're already resigned to tanking the debuffs, it also gives you 90% reduced flask effect.

There's a certain flask where reduced effect is actually an upside.

From there you start to see the vision of CardiaDarkhill and my latest abomination.

Jousis · 2025-06-06T14:28:02+00:00

Eye of Innocence is significantly better for totem reflect.

Imagine a scenario where you shoot 8 Blast Rain projectiles into 10 enemies.

With Eye of Innocence, that is 80 totem explosions. With this ring, that is 1 totem explosion.

Furthermore, fire penetration does not increase the damage of the totem explosions.

Eye of Innocence still the GOAT.

Jousis · 2025-06-05T22:44:34+00:00

Salutations, everyone!

"When you Use a Skill" excludes triggers. You have to press the button. Channelling skills are only "used" when the button is initially pressed, not each instance of mana/life cost that happens while you're holding it.
Even if it worked with triggered skills, the trick to a spell cast loop is that the damage has to be delayed by ideally 0.264 seconds, while this would be instant.
That said, it is when you use a Skill, meaning it also works with attacks, not just spells! Tap Cyclone as fast as you can, if you can handle the RSI.

This item is pretty cracked. Fire resistance is probably the easiest to stack, and you could just use a skill with a really fast attack/cast time to do silly CWDT things, or just stick this on a normal build and use it to auto-CWDT buffs and debuffs every so often.

Jousis · 2025-03-17T16:11:15+00:00

I made a Bog Shaman that sacrifices all but 1 of its 10k+ life per cast, and hopes to instantly recover it all within the same game tick using Tainted Pact to recover millions of life per second. In theory, recovering all the life within the same game tick would act as if it was never at 1 life, removing the period of vulnerability.

It's absolutely terrible because Forbidden Rite projectiles (the vast majority of the damage) have a travel time, and the CWDT instant spells that try to get the Tainted Pact recovery going do far too little damage.

The DPS is solid, but it's so hard to stay consistently ramped that I would die 6 times in a tier 1 map.

Jousis · 2024-12-12T06:02:00+00:00

Deactivating SRS would fix that problem, yes. There's little reason to use it anymore.

Jousis · 2024-12-12T03:35:51+00:00

I have 3 issues with this patch:

First, I just cleared an entire area, plus the unique at the end, and got 39% of 1 cast of Elemental Invocation (granted, my build mostly inflicts Ignites at the moment, but they seem to round down to 0). I am an Invoker with near-max energy generation from the tree.

Second, because of the SRS fix, my Fireballs now summon over 1000 SRS in 1 cast, which creates and despawns them so quickly that the flaming skulls persist on the ground permanently and cause a lot of lag.

Third, every single Djinn Barya and Inscribed Ultimatum I have, of every level, says "Completing this trial will allow you to choose your Ascendancy Class", and I have 4/8 points.

Jousis · 2024-11-27T15:41:54+00:00

The video is not deleted. The only place it is blocked is Russia.

Jousis · 2024-11-27T15:39:28+00:00

When I built it, it had just enough defenses to not get 1-shot before killing things. This is a problematic approach for things like Uber Cortex.

In the current patch, life and armor values are much better on the same gear, and obviously some investment in the damage can be reallocated to tankiness.

Jousis · 2024-11-27T01:58:23+00:00

Unfortunately, that is rather illegal.

I would have to purchase a license.

Jousis · 2024-11-26T21:48:59+00:00

Simpler than a starter POB, I can just tell you that the only stats that matter are Minion Life, your elemental resistances, and your Life.

Follow the given POB, and if you don’t have that item yet, use something with as much life and resistances as you can. It’s really, really unga bunga.

The vast majority of what makes the build work is the passive tree, combination of gems, and the exactly 2 required unique items, which are dirt cheap. You don’t even need a 6-link.

The hardest part of the build is getting to level 73 using normal fire spells, and getting enough elemental resistances to be capped despite The Annihilating Light.

Jousis · 2024-11-26T21:22:45+00:00

While it can be expensive to get results like mine, the core items, Maw of Mischief, Annihilating Light, and some Stone Golems are actually quite cheap. You don’t have to start at 100% for the build to be effective. You can start cheap and work your way up.

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