[3.6] Indigon Winter Orb- Fast, Tanky, High Damage |Deathless U.Elder, T16 easy farm

*Updated for synthesis 3.6


Introduction

Hi, DK here. I have used this build for the majority of betrayal and synthesis and min max it along the way. This version of WO is extremely well balanced in terms of clear speed, single target damage and defense and can easily outperform in all regards on optimized gear. Gear cost is low for starter (<1ex) and have a lot of room to scale. I think pathfinder is much underrated for winter orb builds.

Concept
Concept is very simple, we use Indigon to scale up spell damage to boost winter orb. On paper, you can reach 1500-2000% increased spell damage with sufficient mana and mana regen on gear and tree. On tree we take only life and mana nodes to scale Indigon with some points into duration, AOE and cast speed nodes for winter orb. We make use of PF ascendancy fully on dying sun. Build is highly scalable, on higher end gear this build can reach effective shaper DPS of over 10 million, and around 1m on starting budget gear.

What Pathfinder gives you over other ascendencies is big QOL on permanent flasks with 50% more effect. You use this to scale up your damage tremendously with dying sun as it allows you to use LMP/ conc effect gems with bigger multiplier with no downside and also the ability to sustain righteous fire (not vaal) for 40% more damage. Taste of hate also gives you sufficient defenses against the tougher content in the game.

Gameplay
Channel winter orb to reach max stacks (10 or 12), bring up righteous fire, run as fast as you can and watch mobs shatter. Rinse and repeat. On all bosses (including U.Elder) run around spam winter orb, dodge stuff and delete them. This build can also take a hit or 2 including one shaper's slam/ ball if you screw up.

Notes on RF: RF gives you 39% more spell damage, and with vaal RF 78%. It is a straight up multiplier like pain attunement and definitely worth running it at least on harder bosses like U.Elder. Pathfinder allows you to sustain it with 45% less fire damage taken (wise oak + dying sun) at 4-5% life degen which you can deal with easily with life flask/ leech. Try to have fire resist still capped when dying sun runs out of charges so is less risky during phases. Loreweave, additional MOM and boot enchant helps a lot to sustain RF.

Leveling
For leveling Frost blade till 12, Toxic Rain 12-28 and switched to WO at level 28. WO- GMP- Infused channeling- Hypothermia 4L is more than enough to breeze through content till maps. Skip all mana nodes until you get Indigon. I grabbed the projectile nodes at ranger start for head start and you can respec out later.

Current gear in Synthesis league
*+2 Loreweave and onslaught boots not mandatory, is just for min-maxing.



Videos (Synthesis)

U. Elder- 1:52m
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sSaa4WeleQ&feature=youtu.be

Minotaur map run
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dospcxP3aY&feature=youtu.be

Phoenix map run
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFl-xeYStKQ&feature=youtu.be

Defenses
30% physical damage taken as cold (Taste of hate)
30-40% damage taken as mana against a high base + regen (MOM + watcher eye)
30% less fire damage taken (Dying sun)
30% less cold damage taken (Taste of hate)
15% less fire/cold/lightning damage taken (wise oak,depending on resist rolls)

Pros and Cons
+Very high single target damage with Tier 1 map clear speed
+Consistent deathless boss kills on shaper/ uber elder/ uber Atziri
+High EHP with MOM on high mana base/ regen
+50% Permanent flasks- Defense, AOE, speed and damage, QOL!
+Immunity to all elemental ailments
+40% more damage by sustaining RF with cool MTX

-No ele reflect maps (like any elemental builds)
-no inpulsa + beacon of ruin explosion ecstasy (if that's your thing)
-Flask management/ spam (if that's not your thing)

POB link/ Skill tree/ Other stuff (Updated for 3.6)


Required Gear



Rest of the Gear

Hi ! Mb u have some more Vids of the character ? :)

Btw. Gz on the build it's looking intresting :)

Wow, i really liked ur post and this looks awesome to play, can u gimme some tips about leveling?

Hi, interesting build !
How good would you say a mark of the shaper ring would be instead of the rare one ?

This right here takes Winter Orb to the next level! The most engaging winter orb build I've experienced. I've taken a different route for building this character, most notably using a crafted staff with level 20 Arcane Surge and "Socketed skills deal 20% more damage". This opens my body armour 6-link to utilize Armageddon brand as a combo ability of dumping lots of mana really quickly, and to leech back extra mana with Mana Leech Support. It also has a huge mana cost, dumping ~5k mana in about 5-6 casts (Running 3 Fevered Mind jewels).

Mapping is moderately fast, I'm usually just winding up 12 stacks and running through maps with the occasional Phase Run bursts. Bosses die rather quickly, as is expected. I tried a T8 elder around level 84, and he got 1 ice spear attack off before I phased him.

I'm experimenting with Doedre's Malevolence gloves, for the +50 to mana cost base. It's a small boost to mana costs, simply reducing the Indigon ramp up time. They've been working decently for the build, but I'm toying with the idea of crafting cast speed gloves.

Overall I'm finding it to be a very fun and engaging build.

Edit: I wanna add how much fun the build is! Very durable due to the 40% damage taken as mana, which is regenerated very quickly.

Level 85 gear


Edit: Well I took this to the end and downed Uber Elder fairly easily. 49% MoM with insane mana regen makes this a very durable build. I think this has become my most favourite build of the league, right behind a Voidfletcher pathfinder.
Deathless Uber Elder kill
https://youtu.be/MtPBT1gHmS8

Level 92 Gear - Downed Uber Elder


Big thanks to desmondk07 for the guide!

"

iRa38 написал:

Hi, interesting build !
How good would you say a mark of the shaper ring would be instead of the rare one ?

Indigon already gives you more than 1000% spell damage. At optimal setup, a mark of the shaper gives you ard 8% more DPS but you lose a lot of mana and mana regen which is both DPS and survivability. It's a consideration but personally I don't think is worth it

"

Atimar549 написал:

This right here takes Winter Orb to the next level! The most engaging winter orb build I've experienced. I've taken a different route for building this character, most notably using a crafted staff with level 20 Arcane Surge and "Socketed skills deal 20% more damage". This opens my body armour 6-link to utilize Armageddon brand as a combo ability of dumping lots of mana really quickly, and to leech back extra mana with Mana Leech Support. It also has a huge mana cost, dumping ~5k mana in about 5-6 casts (Running 3 Fevered Mind jewels).

Mapping is moderately fast, I'm usually just winding up 12 stacks and running through maps with the occasional Phase Run bursts. Bosses die rather quickly, as is expected. I tried a T8 elder around level 84, and he got 1 ice spear attack off before I phased him.

I'm experimenting with Doedre's Malevolence gloves, for the +50 to mana cost base. It's a small boost to mana costs, simply reducing the Indigon ramp up time. They've been working decently for the build, but I'm toying with the idea of crafting cast speed gloves.

Overall I'm finding it to be a very fun and engaging build.

Скрытый текст

This is where I think this build shines in terms of flexibility. You can use any combination of weapons you like. I actually started by dual wielding apex rage and shade of solaris. After much testing, I still find that to have a sufficiently smooth gameplay and maintain both Indigon and WO stacks, you want to have at least 70 mana cost on WO and sufficient amount of cast speed (i have 43% on gear). I tried Doedre and while it frees up 2-3 fevered mind for more jewel slots, I find the 15% reduced cast speed a hindrance so not sure if worth it in the end especially when losing the additional AOE radius breakpoint

I'm playing a very similar build (just invested a little bit more on mana) and I want to say it's really phenomenal to face all the endgame content of PoE.

This is my gear so far (I'm still in the leveling phase - 92 atm - but I already killed Shaper, Elder / UElder and Guardians multiple times), I need to farm boots enchant which should allow an even better RF sustain but even without it the character has been a breeze to play, and has proven to be a great lab farmer too. Damage on bosses is nuts, especially when you can wisely precast Frost bomb + Vortex + Vaal RF. The tricky part was balancing Wise Oak defensively with flasks active to have Fire and Lightning resistances equal as the lowest ones.







I'm near to 10k EHP (5200 health and 4500 unreserved mana @ level 92), farming bosses deathless is a joke.


I'd definitely recommend this build idea, it's very enjoyable and I love the Indigon mechanics coupled with the Pathfinder ascendancy.

Now all this need is how to lvl the char :)

I don't really think this build is ideal for league starter or I wouldn't recommend it. It's not impossible but think it might be rather painful to level a pathfinder as a spell-caster without the core items. Having said that people were dumping Indigon rather cheaply even at the first week of this league. Perhaps a way is to transition from blade vortex/ ele bow till you get an Indigon but haven't really thought about it yet. Any suggestions would be great :)

Edit: Took this back. This is the best league starter than all those that I have used before eg. Hiero Arc Totem. Indigon + Doedre + Atziri all is needed to power from level 28 through maps to shaper.