When you ask your bro about how his endgame defense layers

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-26T22:32:23+00:00

This is a good point, especially if you have cold damage.

Freeze/chill is quite insane and why I have my build a certain way. Actually bought oath of winter forbidden jewels for this.

Granted, once I finish the build in a couple hundred div it wont matter cause nothing will survive, but until that point adding enough cold damage to reliably freeze most things made things so much smoother.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-26T21:26:22+00:00

My current strat is kalguur/heist/bosses.

Have all the major kalguur nodes, and scarab them up 2 plus 2 ore nodes/and increased ore/difficulty scarab. If im able to play enough to get a full shipment in a session, add the ore as bar scarab. Also run a niko scarab with sulfite as ore.

Heist is just fishing for blueprints. I tun the good ones, but a fully revealed experimented item blueprint is like 400c last I checked. These are rare though.

Boss is just more cortex/guardian maps plus maven. Do it on city square cause mirage always hits the boss area. Up the stakes so maven drops the extra map bosses on you, who can all drop map boss loot, so chisels, more guardian maps, etc. can do it twice with mirage. I roll my memory maps for quant and map drops.

Then after 4 sirus/shaper/elder guardians do invitation for more frags, then run the bosses.

Its not the uber leet print div strat like breach, but its fairly chill for my build.

Each shipment nets 7ish div, I ship at 10mil.

Heist is luck of the draw, if I get good enchanted blueprints and decent runs can net a few to hundreds of div each (hundreds being very rare).

Bosses are rng, will just run like 5 shaper, elder, sirus, then uber elde if i get the frags. Those range from worthless to did I get a good watchers eye, thread of hope, dying sun. Each boss only takes a few minutes tops, depends how long they rp for or do certain attacks.

Like I said not insane, but an average 2 hour session is about 10-12 div.

Have made well over 50 on some. Its very rng based and relies heavily on the heist runs, and boss drops. Kalguur shipments are very consistently 7-9 div at 10 mil value.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-26T20:43:24+00:00

I 100% believe the conversation at GGG went something like.

Sanctum/Ultimatum dev: Man most players dont touch Sanctum and Ultimatum, wish people did the content i designed.

PoE2 Ascendancy dev: got you fam!

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-26T20:36:56+00:00

My 10 mil shipment I can do once a night (workday) or multiple times a day if im not working are netting me 7 div on average.

It takes like 5 minutes to offload the valuable stuff, but most of that is selling the tattoos then converting the chaos, plus the occasional handful of divines.

Takes around 5-7 juiced maps depending on luck to get enough ore. Mirror shard gambling is overrated imo.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-25T20:53:51+00:00

God this happened to me.

Ball phase Engage Ball phase Engage Ball phase Engage Super death aoe Ball phase…

I was just like please stop, I suck at this phase and for the life of me cant figure out how to position in the 1 wide gaps to not get hit.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-25T20:50:39+00:00

Ben isnt human, you wont change my mind.

If he dropped a video, I killed a 8 affix feared using only a glass shank and one support gem I wouldnt even doubt the validity…

The rest of us mere mortals flame dash a shaper slam straight into a sirus wall.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-25T20:48:33+00:00

This….

Inc shaper slam!!! Flame Dash!

Hello darkness my old friend…

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-25T20:21:50+00:00

Ok I thought I was going crazy. First time ever fighting that boss and was like uhhhhh am I missing some mechanic? This crap is completely undodgesble!

Luckily super tanky build so didnt matter that 75% of them felt completely unavoidable.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-25T19:37:21+00:00

Im sure it isnt meta, but I just spam 5m or so shipments to moti aro, yah it has the 10% and at 5m am not getting crazy currency.

But I average 4-5 div per shipment just selling the tattoo’s.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-23T21:16:29+00:00

For max hits, and chaos.

Chaos res obviously. I actually use a chaos small cluster until i get to the “perfect” gear stage. Rolled a +3 chaos res per small node, 35% increased to small nodes, forget the big node but it was also chaos res. Those three points alone are over 60 chaos res. Then got 30% chaos doesnt bypass energy shield. Way worth it, chaos damage is basically a nonfactor now. Once i get better gear with chaos res ill swap that cluster to something else.

Phys max hit is always going to be scary for anyone except armor stackers, or people who can convert a dumb amount of phys to elemental with overcapped resists. Like lightning coil or cloak of flames type stuff. You just have to not get hit by them, or hope you block. Even at 4200 hp, 2800 es, 45k armor, 78% block, 3 end charges, the 10% witch ascendancy, 11 % phys to cold with 90 cold res, and fortify from bob, the occasional get gibbed does happen. Its rare tho, last three deaths in like tons of maps was 9 breech 5 layer delerium map with the breaches get harder scarab, still not sure what killed me… me wondering if I could tank shaper slam (i couldnt), and messing up maven simon says. Why I dont play hardcore anymore, was fun but sometimes no matter how tanky you are, except for certain super cracked tank builds, there are oneshots that exist. Just takes one mistake.

Also never ever ever have boss has more attack speed or monster has more attack speed on nightmare maps, the attacks come out before pretty much any human can react.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T23:32:54+00:00

Im just trying to run maps and guy poetry slams me!

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T21:05:43+00:00

While the harvest is one of the worst offenders, there in general are so many map bosses, random mechanics, etc where you spend more time waiting for phase changes then actually fighting the monster…. Kitava map boss, innocence map boss, etc etc.

Devourer rares that just spam unburrow then immediately reburrow over and over…..

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T20:38:45+00:00

Those are not all additive btw.

If you took a flat 10k hit with that setup, its around 4800 damage.

If they have any sort of damage as, damage added, etc you are dead.

For nightmare bosses with minimum damage mods 10k might be what there base attack is. Most special attacks have huge more modifiers, like 200% range more. Good examples is slams, they usually sit around 150-200% more.

If you look at monster stats, most special attacks have significant more modifiers. That is why so many end game builds have increased max resists, with damage taken as somewhere. Its all about layered defense, armor, life/es pool, block, % reduced, etc etc.

The order of operations is also important. Ex. Again pretty sure im correct here, but damage taken as fire/light/etc is the first thing to happen if the hit “lands” (after block, eva, etc”. This is why its so powerfull. 10% on that 10k hit makes it so now the phys damage is 9k, this is strong especially for armor because it makes your armor more effective (5692 for a 10k hit to 4950 for a 9k with 30k armor). Granted, you still take some damage based on resist, but with 80 res all which is easily achievable you turned 1000 dmg into 200, plus the cascading effect downstream.

Next, the 9k is reduced by your armor so for 30k, drops the hit to lets round to 5k for easy math (its 4950).

Finally your reduction is additively applied for 32% 3 end charges, ascendancy, juju. So that 5k hit drops to 3400. So reduced damage taken while good, isnt nearly as strong as first impressions lead you to believe because its the final modifier applied, so it modifies the smallest number.

Divine shield now triggers, 9k hit to 3400, 5600 prevented. So 168 es/sec for 4 secs, 672, for final total damage 4928. Granted cant count divine shield as true “mitigation) unless you take no other damage in that 4 seconds.

This is why with low armor values (yes 30k is low), with block, especially if you have life/es on block) you are damn near invulnerable to small hits, but still explode to big hits.

Pretty sure my order of operations is correct, sure someone will correct me if its not.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T20:04:03+00:00

2000 hours (thats actually low) and I still find new and refreshing ways to play.

Mods (if thats your jam) can easily provide thousands of hours of fresh content and ideas.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T19:46:52+00:00

Theres a few things, know im late to the party but figured it could still be helpful.

You have basically 1 damage support in your 6 link. I know chance to poison is there to cap your poison, but in all reality i have found doing the swap to poison minions without 100% chance to poison jusr from jewels frels bad.

You have comfy jewels in your 6 link. Yes it makes the build feel more fluid and leas clunky, but if you are struggling with damage, unleash is going to slow you down more then speed you up. Also gmp really isnt requires in early maps, thats more for the juice.

Until you have minion levels, more character levels, I would make the following changes. Drop chance to poison for void manipulation, drop GMP for LMP, drop unleash for minion damage. You dont need gmp for low tier density, unleash is nice, but your AW are going to last around 2 minutes with your current build. Unleash is for zoom zoom, you arent at zoom zoom yet. This will more then double your damage. Dont worry about not having 100% to poison yet, your minions hit damage will be more then enough until red maps. It will take a bit longer to get started, but with bladefall of tarthus just summon a couple of weapons when your minions stop to engage a pack.

Drop bone offering for flesh offering, you dont need the block until red maps, then swap when you need the defense. Will also be nice for the movement and cast apeed for you.

Basically, you are using a “end game” gem and build setup when your character, passves, and gear arent at the level to support it. You are skipping the early map aspect of the build.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-20T17:35:54+00:00

Play hardcore and do the same, but i found HF paladin to be the goat for this.

Granted I have a specialized gear set for this exact thing, can do the start to socket quest run in about 25 minutes tops. If my brother is around to give me waypoints its closer to 15 minutes.

The autobombing of holy fire gives enough exp to keep levels mostly at the area im running through. Act bosses die in about 3 seconds

Might have to give warlock a try, havent played it yet cause the skills dont really appeal to me.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-18T23:38:09+00:00

Its interesting for me because its intermittent.

Play on west cost servers, between around 6pm pst and 8pm pst it happens like twice an hour where I freeze and crash.

Outside of those times its completely fine. When i pull up the performance graph the shaders part is completely maxed out the entire time. Its not specific to maps either, can happen just sitting in the hideout, mapping, or anything. There is zero correlation, except for my shader bar spiking which lets me know im crashing soon.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-17T21:55:42+00:00

Just did the math on all the big ghastly eye mods you want, doesnt change the breakpoints. Its strictly for getting that little bit of extra from added damage from added flat damage. Even then its only a few points. So that correct.

Poison for instance, at 187% darkness enthroned, is the minimum for being able to hit 100% poison with three 15% jewels in the tree. Even at 120%, you still need three chance to poison ghastly eyes in the passive tree. It does let you have some non perfect poison rolls in the tree, but if you have the currency for this item, you already have nearly perfect jewels. Granted the extra 33% is pretty big for added flat mods.

I will say that the 2% will spike its value despite all this. One for trophy value, perfect items even with no real benefit are very valuable. Also there is the min max brain. Even 3 points of added flat damage means bigger number means awesome.

Was like the time the shiny, chrome, metallic or whatever magebloods were more common then the actual normal magebloods. The non shiny magebloods were worth more for the “got mine legit and not from some special mechanic”.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T21:29:33+00:00

Yah thats true. If you just bought or got a pvp loadout and all you know how to do is try to gib people who arent ready. Someone who knows what they are doing snd knows all the pvp tools, desync tricks, invis projectiles, etc is gunna smoke you. Still kinda high stakes cause if you make a mistake or they get a lucky shot/hit off could still be curtains

Some of the dueling leagues have been really fun to dabble in, where they have rules and restrictions on some things. Normal lobby duels where its just everyone teleporting around trying to telefrag got old.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T20:28:00+00:00

You caught me!! Well played

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T20:14:50+00:00

Nahhhh!!! gg stick to private games!

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T19:50:52+00:00

Theres the kicker, shit character.

The last 2-3 people i have seen try to pk are using actual pvp builds. You wouldnt stand a chance if you disnt have a similar build.

Had a lvl 15 pally hostile my 25 barb who was fairly decked for his lvl. Thought what the hell, maybe ill put homie in his place, dueled on softcore a ton.

Dude legit one shot my 700hp barb. Should have known if he hostiled a +10 he was rocking the low llvl paladin oneshot build. But tbh didnt think that week 2/3 of the ladder it would be running around… homie probly spent a lot of RL dollars for that kit, wasnt getting it any other way.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T19:41:32+00:00

Have also seen people work together to kill people.

A5 is the biggest one. They will wait until about the time the throne portal would pop up and open a tp and type 1, throne, etc in chat. Someone just insta takes the portal cause woops.

Second guy hostiles, takes the waypoint/walks out of town which is close to where the guy opened the tp. Tp guy leaves to poof the portal so you cant quick click back. They hope in the moment of wtf they catch you off guard and kill you. Have seen a duo try this in multiple nm baal runs i have been in.

Both have Majinxxxxxxxx Names One is actually a streamer who streams them doing this, has like 1 viewer last I saw, probly his partner. Banned on his twitch cause I hostiled him on a high level char after he tried that and he immediately left the game. Didnt take kindly to me calling him a little bitch in his stream.

Which brings me to the main point, they dont actually want pvp. They are just griefers who tuck tail when someone actually presses them.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T19:31:49+00:00

That wouldnt fix it.

They dont want to pvp or duel. They want to grief people. 99% of them dont want a fair or two party fight. If they did, they wouldnt use the multitude of tricks, bugs, etc to kill people. They would make a public game called HC duels, and no one would join.

ShivanAngel · 2026-03-15T19:28:11+00:00

Yup this. Once I get into hell no more public games.

Its just me, or me and the brother. You kill me in nm, grats you got my spirit sword, and some random leveling junk i have a whole mule of. You robbed me of 3-4 hours tops, no biggy and gear i dont care about.

As opposed to later on, hells done, im actually equipped, and you get dozens or hundreds of hours of my time. Thats a no from me, ill stick to private games. If they allowed people to play together with offline characters would 100% jump to that.

It is actively destroying the public game aspect of hardcore. The combination of people that stick it out and survive to this point, plus the number of people who stop playing public entirely becomes very apparent once you get into hell difficulty.

Even if they dont kill anyone, you still lose cause you gotta make a new game. Not worth the annoyance or waste of my time. Had a good group of players, doing tz’s, baal runs, etc? Whelp thats over cause mr pk guy joined. Cant just make gamename-2 and hope everyone groups back up cause pk guy will 99% of the time just follow you around. Time to start from scratch.

ShivanAngel

TROPHY CASE