[0.4] Freeze & Self-Chill IceNova Stormweaver (Perfect League Starter and Endgame Racer)

Foreword Note: If there is more intereset, I will add image- and video-material of my gameplay to show you how insanely fast and strong this build is


INTRODUCTION
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Hello fellow Exiles!
This is my build guide about my favorite archetype in this game:
--- the ice sorceress ---

The core skills are Ice Nova paired with Frost Wall and Snap. Our ascendencie class will be the Stormweaver. The gameplay is to freeze and shatter everything in our presence!

This guide is addressed to any new player as well as any PoE Veteran. I'll dive deep into the philosophy and any mechanics of this build. If you still have any questions, you can write a comment and I will try my best to answer you.


OVERVIEW
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PROS:

+ Great League Starter (good early damage and survivability without any big gear dependencies)
+ Strong endgame DPS without any expensive gear (Killing Tier16 MapBoss < 5 sec)
+ One of the fastest endgame mapper because of self-chill mechanic
+ Really smooth gameplay (casting & killing while walking and meaningfull combos for bosses)
+ Shattering monsters is so damn satisfying ^_^

CONS:

- Can be squishy (with big gear investment only 6k ES / no other defensive layers)
- Screen clutter in boss fights (makes it hard to dodge boss mechanics)
- Getting regularly Ignited and Shocked because of self-chill mechanic



BUILD PHILOSOPHY & MECHANICS
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The core philosophy of this build is: If the enemy cannot hit me, I cannot die
High enough cold damage can chill or freeze the enemy, resulting in drastically slowing or "stunning" the monster, so you can walk away (or even right through) the dangerous monster packs. And if the damage is high enough, they die instantly, so nothing to worry about!

So this build prioritizes high damage per hit with increases to freeze buildup, so every white or blue monster gets frozen or shatters in first contact. Not frozen but chilled enemies get additionally slowed by temporal chain curse, so they are mostly too slow to hit us (especially against our high movementspeed from self-chill). Pairing these mechanics with a big energy shield pool plus the keystone Chaos Inoculation and we can only die by getting stunned/frozen or by a high-damaging boss ability.






SELF-CHILL
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Self-chill is one of the strongest endgame mechanics in this game!
But why, you may ask:

Through the unique body armour Sierran Inheritance chill effect on yourself is reversed! This means instead of 50% LESS action speed, we get 50% MORE action speed! This results in:
• 50% MORE Movement Speed
• 50% MORE cast speed
• 50% MORE attack speed
Self-chill plus an Acceleration Shrine and you are zooming through any map!


But how do you consistently chill yourself?
For that you need 3 things:
1. a method of constantly applying damage to yourself
2. ensuring the damage always chills you
3. having some kind of sustain to counteract the constant damage

The build achieves this through following interactions:
1. The unique helmet Scold's Bridle always damage you for using skills. The damage amount is relative to the paid mana cost. So lowering your mana costs and getting a low roll of the self-damaging mod can reduce the incoming damage.
2. the Sierran Inheritance body armour makes that every damage type can chill you (like your physical damage from "Scold's Bridle"). But for a chill to apply your Ailment threshold has to be low enough. The ailment threshold is per default your max health. With the Chaos Inoculation keystone passive your max health becomes 1, as well as your ailment threshold. If you don't acquire any "gain additional ailment threshhold equal to % energy shield", every hit will always chill you!
3. getting damage on your energy shield prevents it from recharging and leaves you very vulnerable, if you don't want to stop fighting every couple of seconds. To recover your energy shield we use the unique belt Shavronne's Satchel. With this belt an "instant-recovery" Ultimate life flask can recover around 550 energy shield per flask use instantly. With max 10 uses you can get back to full energy shield after an unexpected big hit and have good sustain during mapping. (Important: Because we count as "full life" with Chaos Inoculation, none-instant life flask recovery effects are stopped immediately = only "instant recovery"-mods will give us any recovery)


Important Note: Chaos Inoculation turns your ailment threshold and stun threshold to 1. Therefore, every damage stun and every cold damage freezes you instantly. To counteract this, you need to get "gain maximum energy shield as Stun threshold" from jewels or passive nodes. And you have to grab the smaller nodes before the "Unbothering Cold" Noteable or anoint the "Icebreaker" Noteable - each giving "Gain maximum Energy Shield as Freeze Threshhold"!



SKILL INTERACTION & SETUP
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Skill Overview:
• Ice Nova <Weaponset I>
• Snap <Weaponset I>
• Frost Wall <Weaponset I>
• Frost Bomb <Weaponset II>
• Elemental Weakness <Weaponset II>
• Blasphemy + Temporal Chains <Weaponset I & II>
• Mana Remnants <Weaponset I & II>
• Siphon Elements <Weaponset I & II>
• Sigil of Power [from Chimingstaff] <Weaponset II>
• Firestorm (for endgame min-max) <Weaponset I> OR <Weaponset II>
• Spellslinger + Comet [from Dueling Wand] (for endgame min-max) <Weaponset I>

Weaponset I is our damage setup and Weaponset II is our support setup. In the passive tree we will allocate for Weaponset II every achievable increases to curse magnitude, exposure effect and skill/ curse duration for bigger elemental resistance reduction of the enemy and longer duration, so we have more time before casting our support skills again.

Firestorm can also be in Weaponset II, if we don't go for a Chimingstaff (and therefore not for Sigil of Power) but for the Unique Focus Effigy of Cruelty for Weaponset II. The purpose is to stack the debuff "Critical Weakness" on the boss with the rapid-hitting Fire Storm, so in a couple of seconds it's max stack resulting in +10% base critical hit chance.

For normal clearing we just use Ice Nova and then Snap for every survived frozen monster. Snap provides infusions to empower our next Ice Nova spells. This is enough to clear every normal monster pack. For magic monsters you sometimes need to cast Frost Wall into the pack, to get some extra damage through shattering the spawned Icicle of the Frostwall!
Important Note: In the first 0.5 seconds duration of Frost Wall, the icicle deal 80% LESS Damage, so always explode them with a 0.5 - 1 second delay!

For rare or unique monster like bosses, we use our whole arsenal! The optimal skill rotation is:
-> Sigil of Power
-> Elemental Weakness
-> Frost Bomb
-> Frost Wall
-> Ice Nova
-> Frost Wall
-> either Ice Nova or Snap (if frozen)
-> repeat the last 2 steps or restart rotation if the effects of the first spells wear off

For Endgame bosses, you wanna make sure that you have at least 1 infusion of every type and at best 3 cold infusions before fighting the boss. With casting Frost Bomb before entering the map boss arena and with the Stormweaver ascendancy node "Refracted Infusion" you can stack every infusion type beforehand.
In the fight you cast a fully-infused Firestorm either at the beginning or if the boss is frozen, so it doesn't move out of the storm. And you swap one Ice Nova with your activation of Spellslinger Comet for a devastating blow (does most of the time 2/3 of the boss health as damage!!!) (Note: check, that you have enough mana for 3 comets before activating spellslinger or otherwise only 1 comet will be casted but all spellslinger charges are gone)





PASSIVE SKILL TREE
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Act 1 - Act 2 (prioritize damage and area for fast clear)
https://maxroll.gg/poe2/passive-tree/7dod90u0

Act 3 - Act 4 (going for crit / unlocking stormweaver ascendency)
https://maxroll.gg/poe2/passive-tree/u7odu0ui

Interlude - Early Mapping (shifting to more ES / shock magnitude / using weaponswape passives)
https://maxroll.gg/poe2/passive-tree/niodp0uc

Endgame (Switching to Chaos Inoculation / Enabling Self-Chill)
https://maxroll.gg/poe2/passive-tree/jwpb800t


GEAR
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For gearing we try to get as much "+level to spell skills" as possible, because this is the best damage increase you can get.
Especially for starting the campaign try to acquire a +(1 - 2) level of all (cold) spell skills on wands / staffs / focus / amulet as fast as possible to have a smooth sailing! Try to visit the vendor after every level-up (then the vendor inventory is reset) and pick up every wand / staff / focus / amulet, you can find and identify it or craft it with Transmutation or Augmentation Orbs. Also try to get 10% Cast Speed or more on Rings, too, at the beginning.

This build needs only 115 Spirit, therefore 15 Spirit extra on gear (20 Spirit, if you dont have 20% Quality on your Blasphemy Gem). A perfect solar amulet base can give you that amount right away!

If we go for self-chill, we cannot equip Sandstorm Visage for "Critical Weakness" debuff stacking. To fix this I would recommend switching the Chmingstaff in Weaponset II to a the Effigy of Cruelty setup. We will stack "Critical Weakness" now with every Firestorm critical hit. This is overall a better and more flexible damage increase, because Sigil of Power forces you to stand in the Circle, which is not always feasible because of boss abilities. And +10% base critical hit chance results in always critical hitting with every spell in our arsenal.

Thanks for the guide, leveling a new char now to try it out. I am curious though as to which permanent buffs would you recommend picking up in the campaign. Looking forward to a build showcase if you decide to do one.

Cool, that I could inspire you to try this build out :)

For Act 1 & 2 I would suggest picking up "Arctic Armour" as a permanent buff and adding "Freeze"-Support to it, so every monster gets instantly frozen or die, if it hits you.
After reaching 60 Spirit (normally in Act 3), you have 2 Options: Either you already get "Siphon Elements" for better Infusion generation. Or you can swap for "Elemental Invocation" and socket "Comet" into it, as a replacement for "Spell Slinger", which you can only get from a "Dueling Wand" needing Character Level 65.

BUT: As soon as you reach a good amount of Critical hit chance (around 25% without Support Gems), I would recommend getting "Mana Remnants" as soon as possible to fix your Mana issues, rising at the end of Act 3 normally

Oh I've just been following your skill gem setup you have in the guide, but your suggestions for spirit buffs in the campaign will be helpful. I was actually asking about the permanent buffs like the vials and tattoos, not sure which ones will benefit the build more at endgame. Also the boss damage right now is a bit low, using elemental weakness, frost bomb, ice nova and frostwall/cold snap.. Anything i can add to do a little more single target? Enjoying the build so far with semi twink gear. One more thing, I just finished the 2nd ascendancy and picked up shaper of storms, I'm noticing mobs aren't being shocked, am I doing something wrong?

Ah, now I understand what you mean.

For the quest reward buffs, I would suggest like this:
Act 2 - Valley of Titan Relique: Mana flask recovery (switch to charm charge gain at endgame)
Act 3 - The Venom Crypts Poison: 25% increased Stun Threshold (Mana reg is also fine)
Act 4 - Hall of Dead Tattoos: Always Resistance
Act 4 - Abandoned Prison Statue: Flask Life Recovery
Interlude - Quima's Pillar: Cooldown Recovery (Global Defense OR Movementspeed is also good)


Regarding lacking Single Target Damage:
I guess, you are currently between Act 3 - Act 4. This is the weak phase of the build, because your crit chance and damage from the tree is rather low and if you do not have the max "+level of spell skills" mods for this character level and no crit chance on gear, the boss damage can be a bit lackluster. Sadly, you have to push through. Mid - End Act 4 it will be way better.

Regarding Shock:
As soon as you get "Shaper of Storms" you should Shock with high damaging or rapid hits. In the campagne you mostly get shocks from the multiple hits of Frostwall. Ice Nova will shock nearly always if you reach the 31.5% Crit threshold (-> 100% Crit on first hit). If you still do not get Shocks, you probably have the Support Gem "Elemental Focus" socketed in you skills. Also, if you cast Snap on an enemy, it consumes the Shock from it, too, so this could be another explanation for your observation

Oh, and I also forgot to mention something important regarding Frost Wall: In the first 0.5 seconds of its duration it deals 80% Less damage. You need to wait this short delay before exploding it, to get the correct damage output. I added this information in the guide above!

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Bomchickawowow#1243 написал:

Oh, and I also forgot to mention something important regarding Frost Wall: In the first 0.5 seconds of its duration it deals 80% Less damage. You need to wait this short delay before exploding it, to get the correct damage output. I added this information in the guide above!

wow I didn't know that. weird

Thanks for the response, the damage is better now that i set the skills to weapon set 1, the game defaulted to set 2 after i put down the sigil of power xD. Regarding frost wall it does specify doing less damage if the wall is destroyed by something other than you so I assume you can still detonate it asap for full damage.

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toanerz#7163 написал:

Regarding frost wall it does specify doing less damage if the wall is destroyed by something other than you so I assume you can still detonate it asap for full damage.

It's the same wording as Shield Wall, and it doesn't deal reduced damage when you detonate it with your own skills (Warcry for example) under 0.5s. So if Frost Wall really do reduced damage when you do it, it's a bug and should be reported.

As far as I know, they added this only because before Frost Wall was used under the mob to do instant burst of damage (in CoX setup), now you cannot really abuse this mechanics.

Hey, what a really well written and structured guide! Really appreciate people putting in so much work.

On a side node, what do you think about the tech with the shackles of the wretched? Captainlance9 made video about it 3 days ago. Would you say there is a benefit and using them compared to your build?

I will definitely follow your guide and maybe try lances one too.

Thanks and good luck!