[2.5 SC/HC] King of the Forest Marauder (Berserker)

Intro & build description

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Passive tree(s) and Path of Building

Pasive Tree
Crit version

Skill gem setup

Helm

Vaal Haste

Immortal Call

Increased Duration Support

Cast when Damage Taken Support

Body Armor

Barrage

Pierce Support

Added Chaos Damage Support

Slower Projectiles Support

Void Manipulation Support

Faster Attacks Support

Gloves

Blood Rage

Blink Arrow

Frenzy

Faster Attacks Support

Boots

Decoy Totem

Summon Ice Golem

Grace

Arctic Armour

2h Weapon

Lightning Arrow

Added Chaos Damage Support

Pierce Support

Slower Projectiles Support

Void Manipulation Support

Faster Attacks Support

1h Weapon

None

Offhand weapon / shield

None

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Build uniques / Example rare gear

Tip: Click on the item to view it on PoE Wiki or to view similar rare items in poe.trade

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If you can’t afford Reach of the Council, you can start with a Lioneye’s Glare Bow, it costs 1 Chaos and will carry you all the way to T11 maps.

(If you cannot afford a Reach, you can buy a Death’s Opus ! It is almost as good as Reach if not better in some cases, and is alot cheaper.)

This gear is very close to being perfect. I am trying to push the limits with this build. You do by far means not need this level of gear to be strong. However every extra upgrade is worth it and scales the damage very well.

Gameplay

The goal of this build was to abuse “double dipping” Poison to the maximum:

When applied by a Projectile, “Projectile Damage” applies to the initial hit as well as to the Poison DoT damage, effectively “double dipping” in the total damage.

Using a bow skill with added chaos – slowerproj-pierce-void manipulation combined with Drillnecks Projectile damage, Projectile damage from the tree, Frenzy Charges, and Assassin’s “100% More Poison Damage with crits” now combine together to a huge doubledipping fest.

We get a free poison effect on all attacks at max. frenzy charges using snakebite. We only use 4 charges in total so that they are easy to get (use frenzy for bosses, bloodrage enough for maps) and to sustain. Getting more would be detrimental, because of snakebite’s 10%reduced duration per charge.

I chose Lightning arrow as a skill because of its supreme AoE coverage. You should definetely try and compare it for example with Tornado shot. Personally I feel LA is much better. Despite what other people claim, I still think it is one tier above Splitarrow/Tornado shot or whatever. Its too good and needs a nerf.
You might think its a bad idea to use it, since 50% of physical damage gets converted to lightning, right? Yes, but since we use added chaos damage and void manipulation, we dont really care about that. The physical damage is a great bonus, but chaos is the real deal. And with Crits, the Lightning part can also apply shock. While split arrow / Tornado do more damage against a single enemy, the AoE Lightning effect also applies poison, allowing several stacks through one attack if you hit a pack, which makes it so good.

Reach of the Council is the most OP unique Item GGG has released since Skyforth. It is GG BIS for this build. Why ? Because we dont need a GMP gem. The 26% LESS Damage modifier on it double dips as well, i.e. it reduces the inital hit damage by 26% AND the Poison damage by 26%. That was the reason why your DOT suffered so much from being applied by an AoE skill. With reach, you can use your single target skill now for pack clearing ! Balanced!!!!!11111 Even after the recent nerf, it is still insanely powerful !

As this build does mostly chaos/poison damage, we dont need any offensive auras. Yet Grace is very good, providing defense and Movespeed if you chose to use Queen of the forest. For the second aura you can use whatever you want. Blasphemy setup, Arctic armour, a Purity or a herald for styling bonus.

Once you reach the point of damage where you oneshot everything and your single target damage is great, all that limits your clearspeed is movementspeed as a bow character. This build also has a very high movespeed: 90% without any flasks or buffs possible ! Devotos devotion, 30% Movespeed on boots, and some from the tree, plus the bonus from queen of the forest all add up to alot. You can scale it to absurd amounts with a quicksilver, silver, Jade and Stibnite Flask, pumping your Evasion and therefore your Movespeed into insane levels.

On top of having insane damage, one of the highest movespeeds of any archers, this build now also gets a huge life pool on top. I am almost at 6500k life at lvl 93, and there is some life left ready to get in the tree. Using a rare helmet with life instead of devotos pushes me to over 7000 life. You can get even higher with a belly of the beast/Kaoms heart if you really want.

All these features combined make up for a very versatile, reliable and fun archer to play, so definetely not your average ratsnestmaligarocritbow4klife build!

Feel free to share your thoughts/experiences/tips about the build in comments section below.