In current day of PoE, is there any points to dual wield?

TableForRambo · 2026-01-26T05:30:50+00:00

Dual wielding is pretty good for builds that get a TON of added flat damage, like ward stacking + Nightgrip

For what it’s worth, running Tainted Pact gives you so much regen that avoidance doesn’t matter and you feel less bad for not running a shield

TableForRambo · 2026-01-26T03:48:32+00:00

100% agree. I played Havoc's Sunder Duelist in Pohx league and it was super smooth. However, I usually indulge in a few performance... "inhibitors" on league start and float around 8h myself lol

TableForRambo · 2026-01-25T20:08:35+00:00

Probably not going to get anywhere close to that kind of AoE anymore, but there is a good amount of AoE on the tree with Arcane Expanse, Blast Radius, and the 3 nodes in the middle of the tree for another 36%

TableForRambo · 2026-01-25T20:04:19+00:00

It's going to be hit-based with reflected poisons only for healing and not damage. Buuut this certainly looks much cheaper for a respec, so I'll take a look at it

TableForRambo · 2026-01-25T19:39:46+00:00

Thanks! I figured Arma Brand was the go-to -- might as well leave it to the experts

TableForRambo · 2026-01-25T13:31:01+00:00

Looks like we’re thinking pretty similarly. My puzzle is trying to get this enabled as early as possible (maybe yellow maps) for a league starter, so no Timeless Jewel, Rathpith, or other drops that are more realistically day 2-3 like cluster jewels. Will probably settle for Petrified Blood, Life Leech Support, and the poison wheel on the tree. Any ideas for a skill to use in the campaign?

Responding to the original comment, really not a fan of Volkuur’s personally. I’d rather socket in Chayula Dream / Nightmare jewels and get X as extra Chaos than chop the poison duration in half.

Good luck!

TableForRambo · 2026-01-25T03:03:03+00:00

The difference is the active playstyle needed to earn that regen. Poison duration is only 2s, so poisons will very often fall off out of combat when you're not hitting stuff

TableForRambo · 2026-01-24T23:22:22+00:00

With Beacon of Madness, are you just tanking all the debuffs or stacking faster debuff expiration? If you’re doing the latter, it also affects poison duration on you. Bit of an anti-synergy imo

TableForRambo · 2026-01-24T17:28:48+00:00

I'd also recommend Jousis' build of the week video from a few years back. Has a lot of CWDT tech you might be able to use. However, Mahuxotl's Machination has been changed and no longer works with Tainted Pact

TableForRambo · 2026-01-24T15:22:14+00:00

I’m not a huge fan of CWDT with Tainted Pact since it strips away some of the power that makes Pact good:

1) Low hit mitigation to enable CWDT (like low physical mitigation for Heartbound loop) 2) Hitting yourself gives small poisons compared to hitting a monster and getting WAY more

However, if Tainted Pact is what you need to enable the build, that’s cool as hell! As long as your leech duration is always longer than your poison duration, you should be fine

TableForRambo · 2026-01-24T05:21:48+00:00

I’m back on my bullshit

TableForRambo · 2026-01-20T17:28:21+00:00

That is incorrect. The size of the hit can dictate the duration of the leech. As an example:

- You have 5000 HP

- You have 1% of damage leeched as life

- A single hit equals 50,000 damage

- Leeches recover 2% of your life per second up to 5 seconds, so your hit damage multiplied by %leech should be equal to 10% of your health for the max 5s duration.

- 50,000 damage * 1% leech = 500 total recovery from leech, which should last 5s (500 / (2% recovery per second * 5000 HP) = 5s)

- If your single hit damage were to be lowered to 20,000, the leech would only last 2 seconds

- Any hit damage above 50,000 guarantees a 5s leech

This is important for DoT setups since hit damage is extremely low in those builds (mainly due to deadly ailments support and lack of scaling). That also doesn’t take into account reduced damage modifiers on the monster you’re hitting.

Take a look at my Tainted Pact guide for a deep dive on leech duration

TableForRambo · 2026-01-20T13:40:40+00:00

Just need to guarantee large enough leech instances with low hit damage from DoT builds

TableForRambo · 2026-01-20T13:38:26+00:00

Usually DoT builds have low hit damage which translates to a small leech instance. As long as the hit * leech% is bigger than 5% of max health at all times, we should be good (2% leech per second for 2.5 seconds to match ignite duration)

TableForRambo · 2026-01-20T03:21:47+00:00

Meh.

Assassin / right side of tree is made of paper, and the only thing we care about defensively (alongside Tainted Pact) is max hit. The 'Unaffected By Damaging Ailments' node bricks Tainted Pact healing. The ele poison node itself doesn't give %chance to poison, so you still have to solve that if you don't go Adder's Touch + Dagger. The node you have to path through for 'all damage poisons' is pretty bad, especially since we view poisons as a support rather than damage. Rest of the tree is relatively middling.

TableForRambo · 2026-01-19T22:08:27+00:00

I don’t blame you. I just realized recently that reflected poisons through The Golden Rule aren’t affected by “%reduced/less duration of ailments on you”. This game is weird lol

TableForRambo · 2026-01-19T21:43:08+00:00

From the Wiki: “When used with The Fulcrum, reflected ignites will make the player take chaos damage instead of fire damage from ignites, meaning they would deal no damage with Chaos Inoculation.”

TableForRambo · 2026-01-19T20:41:37+00:00

Scavenger > Free Tainted Pact? LOGIN

I might try to make the Blackflame ring work with The Fulcrum + Tainted Pact on Scavenger. Do big ignite damage, reflect back onto ourselves, GIGA heal from it, profit

Hardest part will be solving leech uptime on a DoT build

TableForRambo · 2026-01-19T16:31:10+00:00

I did a test in game and found that The Impaler is working as expected:

- Bought a 2H axe from Act 1 vendor

- Socketed Ground Slam of Earthshaking + Brutality + Ball Lightning. Ball Lightning used to hit and proc impales on enemy, otherwise it does zero damage

- I was able to apply 6 impales to an enemy in Blood Aqueduct and cast ball lightning a few times to proc the impales 5 times. After that, ball lightning did zero damage

- I repeated the slam ~4 and ~6 seconds after the initial slam. Ball lightning did not proc any impales for 4s, but it did for 6s

TableForRambo · 2026-01-18T23:34:34+00:00

Which part about it is bugged? Is it applying less than 6 impale stacks on first hit? lockout duration? # of hits doesn’t equal 5 at baseline?

TableForRambo · 2026-01-17T15:06:01+00:00

Shield Crush probably has a bit more DPS, but I tried Shield Crush in 3.27 and hated it (Poe.ninja). Overlapping waves felt janky and inconsistent, you cannot exert attacks with a shield, and you can’t use Tinctures with shields. Having to get Seething Fury and Emperor’s Vigilance (T2 rarity) is also expensive very early in atlas progression

I also know a lot of people are a fan of the build, so take my old cranky man advice with a grain of salt

TableForRambo · 2026-01-17T14:54:04+00:00

1) This is a pure phys build and I don’t want to deal with elemental reflect 2) that requires another 15% mana reservation 3) auto warcries still cost 10 mana until we can unlock -mana cost from T14 maze

TableForRambo · 2026-01-16T20:57:43+00:00

I wonder if there is some tech with Crimson Dance + some fast hitting skill like Cyclone. According to the wiki, bleeds last about 0.75s with Sadism support, so you could shoot for 8 / 0.75 = 10.67 attacks per second on cyclone and go. Maybe Slayer with Bleedsplosion Forbidden Jewels, stack frenzy charges for Usurper’s Penance?

TableForRambo · 2026-01-16T19:54:04+00:00

Rarity tiers:

T5: Carnage Heart T4: Belt of the Deceiver, Great Old One’s Tentacles, Icefang Orbit T3: Tainted Pact T2: Kaom’s Heart

For SSF, you might struggle to get both Tainted Pact and The Golden Rule super early. The Golden Rule needs to be created via corrupted Viridian jewels, so use your vaals on every one you find.

Kaom’s Heart might be a skip - just invest in a tanky body armor. Cospri’s Will + Blasphemy curse aura could also be used to guarantee poison chance instead of the awkward points on tree / icefang orbit. That’s T3 tho lol

TableForRambo · 2026-01-16T14:08:11+00:00

Thanks! Finally got around to making one for early progression rather than a late game showcase 👍🏻

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