Path of Exile: Rampage League: Ranger (43)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I guess i have to put off leveling Rainie Ying at level 73. It is kind of hard to level at this point. I’m not too sure how other people level characters past 73.

I ran 2 maps trying to look for Zana. I read that some people can run over 20 over maps and not find her. Which is kind of discouraging to read about. My first map was Dunes or something like that, that had Devourers.

These things killed me so many times… Took me my last life to kill the final boss, The Blacksmith. The second map i ran was Tropical Island or something like that. Met Vagan in the map. Atleast there aren’t any Devourers.

Anyway.. Coco Pox, my ranger, is now level 43. Skill tree is here. The skill gems are as follow:
Barrage – Cast on Critical Strike – Arctic Breath.
Ranged Attack Totem – Poison Arrow
Puncture, Fire Trap, Assassin’s Mark, Herald of Ash

I still can’t find another Herald of Ice and Arctic Breath, unlike Ethereal Knives, doesn’t benefit from Herald of Ash. I’m using Arctic Breath instead of Ethereal Knives because of the colors of the sockets on the equip. I couldn’t be bothered to switch with Chromatic Orbs.

But i’m taking a liking to Arctic Breath. So much that i think i’ll use Lesser Multiple Projectile as the 5th gem if i get to 5L. I think LMP would help with the Arctic Breath shotgun explosion.

Assassin’s Mark is really useful for Cast on Crit builds. Mainly because the character doesn’t do much at all if it doesn’t crit. Assassin’s Mark is just a way to activate the critical strikes. Bows and quivers have to be selected based on critical strike chance. And since Coco Pox is not yet in merciless difficulty, i could afford to use a lousy Diamond Ring just for more crits.

Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Heralds of Ash and Ice don’t really like to play together

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

The more i thought about the Heralds of Ash and Heralds of Ice, the more i felt that they weren’t really meant to be activated on a character at the same time.

The main difference between Herald of Ash and Herald of Ice is the elemental statuses. Herald of Ash’s second ability produces elemental status, burning, after killing a monster with an attack. Herald of Ice’s second ability requires elemental status, frozen, to shatter a monster with a kill to activate. The frozen status is required before the kill.

To take advantage of Herald of Ice, you’ll prolly want a critical strike build so that the monsters would shatter as often as possible. To take advantage of Herald of Ash, you could go scale physical damage or elemental damage to increase the chance of getting a bigger overkill. Though scaling physical damage doesn’t help Herald of Ice.

To further take advantage of Herald of Ash would be to support it with Elemental Proliferation. So that more monsters burn with every kill. Except that elemental status do not proliferate if the monster is shattered as it wold not leave any corpse behind.

Imo, the conclusion is that we should play only either Herald of Ash or Herald of Ice, and not both, Herald of Ash and Ice.

Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Rampage League: Scion (72)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I’ve finally managed to push Rainie Ying to level 72. I remember several leagues back that level 72 is enough to put you into the league’s ladder board. But now, with Rampage league, the lowest level, on page 750, rank number 15,000, is level 83. Woah.. at this rate, i’ll never make an appearance on the ladder board.

I also haven’t completed any challenges yet. Probably i should spend some time into completing the Full Clear challenge. I think that’s the only challenge i can complete *sigh*

I finally got around to reading Herald of Ice’s text, and realized that the damage is not scaled from physical damage the way Herald of Ash does. Which in turn meant that the Increased Physical Damage for bows in Rainie’s passive tree does not have any synergy with Herald of Ice.

Panicking and since i had lots of refund points, i refunded all physical damage nodes and moved toward increased elemental damage nodes. The end result is that i lost dps. I’m not sure if it’s because i have less % increment from the passive tree or if it’s because my Herald of Ice is rather low in level.

All in all, current objectives for this league is to complete the Full Clear challenge and level up enough to do some maps to find Zana to level Zana to level 2 to invite her to the hideout.

Geek Generation out.

Edit: I forgot to linke Rainie’s passive tree.

Path of Exile: Rampage League: Ranger (30)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I got Rainie Ying up to level 70. The repetitive grinding involved in these levels does become a little boring. Further more, the experience is drying up as over leveled experience penalty starts to kick in. Already, there’s experience penalty for farming Docks with Rainie.

I wanted to get a Herald of Ice for Rainie and decided to run a Ranger to get the gem for Rainie. I decided to try playing with Barrage, a skill that i’ve never played before. But after playing for quite abit, i ended up liking it and want to keep the character. Hence Coco Pox is born.

The build is simple, grab all the Increased Projectile nodes in the tree, then use Barrage – Chain – Cast on Critical Strike – Ethereal Knives. And since Barrage and Ethereal Knives both deals physical damage, i’m thinking of scaling the damage with double Heralds of Ash and Ice.

And since Coco Pox, as a ranger, can get both Heralds from quests, the gems are hardly an issue. I also manage to get both Chain and Cast on Critical Strikes from a Gemcutter box earlier this week. I was literally dancing when that happened.

But that means i’m still missing a Herald of Ice for Rainie Ying : (

Anyway.. the problem with the build is when deciding what gem to use for the 5th link, if i get it the 5th link that is. I wanted to add one more spell for Cast on Critical Strikes, but there isn’t any more physical damage spell that’s also a projectile. There’s Arctic Breath which is a projectile, but doesn’t have physical damage. And there’s Glacial Cascade which has physical damage but isn’t a projectile.

I think i’ll go with Glacial Cascade first and change to Arctic Breath when i have it. Choosing Arctic Breath over Glacial Cascade because it can chain.

Ok, so much for now, Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Rampage League (Level 67)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I played quite abit of Path of Exile this week and managed to push Rainie Ying to level 67. Just 3 more levels and the experience penalty for playing in Docks is going to start kicking in. Probably, it’s going to be kinda hard to level uo Rainie. after level 72. So that’s like only 5 skill points left for me to make sure Rainie is strong enough to farm the Library.

Unfortunately, i need all 5 of those points for 8% more mana reservation and +30 more Dex. So there’s not going to be more life or more damage from the passive tree *sigh*

You can see the skill tree here. I refunded the odd +10 Dex that puts me within range of Mind Over Matter should i decide to refund Iron Reflexes. I placed the point into +30 Dex node instead.

Rainie’s skills list:
Arctic Armour
Conversion Trap
Reduced Mana – Clarity – Discipline
Cast on Damage Taken (level 7) – Decoy Totem – Enduring Cry – Molten Shell
Herald of Ash
Rain of Arrows – Added Fire Damage – Life Gain on Hit – Increased Critical Strikes
Burning Arrow – Vaal Burning Arrow – Added Fire Damage – Life Leech

I stopped using Ambu’s Charge and am using a 5 link full Evasion armor. I’m rather tired of casting Flammability before attacking, and really prefer a one skill fighting style. So i’m hoping to link Rain of Arrows – Added Fire Damage – Life Gain on Hit – Curse on Hit – Flammability. But i’ve burned through a couple stacks of Chromatic Orbs and couldn’t get the colors i want. Plus, i do not have Curse on Hit gem.

I have a Murauder that’s in the beginning of Act 3 in Rampage league. Maybe i’ll use that to get Curse on Hit gem from the library quest for Rainie. And run another character, Rogue maybe, for Herald of Ice. Hmm..

I’m thinking of putting one more Reduced Mana to Herald of Ash. And hopefully link Herald of Ice and Elemental Proliferation in. But that seems to be pretty mana intensive. I’ll have to do some calculations later.

Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Herald of Ash for Rainie Ying

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I wanted to get a couple more passive points for Rainie Ying before i made a post, but since i have less time to play now, and i completed a couple quests that gave passive points, so i’m posting an update regarding Rainie Ying. You can see Rainie’s passive tree at level 63 here.

Basically, i took the reduced mana reservation nodes near Scion, went up a little higher into Ranger’s projectile cluster, and took all the +30 Str nodes, which are really good since they give Rainie more health and damage via Iron Grip.

There is enough mana to run 3 buffs now, Reduced Mana Clarity, Reduced Mana Discipline, Herald of Ash. Still can’t find gloves to 4 link my buff gems.

For me Herald of Ash is a little confusing. It works like an aura, reserving mana and giving me a buff icon on the top left of the ui, but it doesn’t have the keyword Aura. When i took the “6% increased effect of Auras you cast” node, it didn’t do anything for Herald of Ash. Not even the Overkill ignite damage. Then when i took the “4% reduced Mana Reserved” node, it managed to reduce Herald of Ash’s mana reservation cost. So i was thinking, is Herald of Ash an Aura or not? And whether it’s affected by these clusters of nodes or if it were some tooltip inaccuracies instead.

Fortunately for me, ZiggyD did a youtube video explaining Herald of Ash. Only after watching the video did i realize that the reduced mana reservation nodes did not specifically state Auras. I was wrong to assume that the entire cluster of nodes applied solely to Auras. Skills that reserve mana are affected by the reduced mana reservation nodes even if they’re not Auras.

Although Inner Force would improve Herald of Ash, i’m not going into those nodes as they would make Arctic Armour cost more mana (i assume they still work this way).

So Rainie Ying’s build is more or less complete. Not very strong and i’m not sure if that’s because of build or because of inferior equipment. The subsequent levels would all focus on getting more health, more damage, more reduced mana reservation so i could eventually swap out Iron Reflexes for Mind over Matter. More resists if i can get them, more accuracy after more resists.. if i can get them.

Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Rampage League (Level 60)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

While leveling Rainie Ying to level 60, i stumbled upon a unique armor, the Ambu’s Charge.

While Ambu’s Charge’s Endurance Charges abilities does nothing for me, I decided to use the armor anyway because it gave me a higher Armour and ES rating; i was using crappy pick up equips that were several levels old.

After using Ambu’s Charge for awhile, i looked at my character and realized that Evasion armor wasn’t very useful for Rainie. The reason is that most of the sockets required by Rainie was red as she was mostly using fire gems. So it made more sense to use Armour/ES armors rather than Evasion/ES armors, just for ease of rolling red sockets.

Another thing with Rainie was that once i’ve gotten Heart of Oak (life node near Ranger), which gave her “1% of Life Regenerated per Second”, Rainie had an easier time fighting mobs. The life regen helped quite abit, which makes me rethink about going for Vaal Pact in the later levels.

For most of the last 5 levels, i’ve concentrated on getting mana and mana regen. While i still can’t switch on Arctic Armour on the move permanently, i could still leave it on for most of the time. The regen and amount of non-reserved mana was enough to sustain one screen’s worth of movement.

The damage is really pathetic at the moment, i’m still trying to find a 4 link equip to link Herald of Ash to the Reduced Mana support gem. Speaking of Herald of Ash, for a long while, i thought that it was a spell gem. It was only very recently when i decided that i wanted to see what Herald of Ash looked like that i realized it was an aura gem. And only for 25% reservation. 

Passive tree at level 60.

I’ve swapped Life Leech for Life Gain on Hit. Gems are as follows:
[Arctic Armour]
[Conversion Trap]
[Reduced Mana – Discipline – Clarity]
[Burning Arrow – Vaal Burning Arrow – Added Fire Damage – Life Leech]
[Rain of Arrows – Added Fire Damage – Life Gain on Hit] (Alot lesser support until i can get sockets and links into Ambu’s Charge)
[Cast on Damage Taken – Enduring Cry – Decoy Totem – Molten Shell]

Speaking of Cast on Damage Taken, with the addition of Molten Shell, which gave alot more animation and sound, i realized that my Cast on Damage Taken was activating almost back to back. Since Cast on Damage Taken has a quarter second cooldown, i thought i might be able to level up Cast on Damage Taken gem a little without compromising too much. That would allow me to level up the supported gems a little.

I’m thinking of leveling Cast on Damage Taken to level 7, that would double the amount of damage required to activate.

So much for now, Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Rampage League (Level 55)

Hello everyone, Geek Generation here.

When i finally got Rainie Ying into Merciless difficulty, i thought i would farm the Ledge for awhile to level up the character. But then i discovered that Rainie was way too squishy. Just about any thing coming at her can get her killed. It was practically unplayable.

I decided to swap out my pieces of Evasion/ES armor for full Evasion armor. That got my armor from 1000+ to 1600+. Together with the life nodes near Pain Attunement and life granting equips, i managed to push Rainie’s life from 1300+ to 1700+ which made Rainie playable again in Merciless Act 1.

While this means i have less mana, it’s still not too bad as at the moment i’m only running Clarity. I haven’t found Anger plus even with Discipline, the mana regen is still not enough to support Arctic Armour mobility.

Rainie needs more life, more mana for Arctic Armour and also heading down to Mind over Matter when i have more mana, reduced mana reservation for more auras, more armour nodes for swapping back to Evasion/ES armor, more crit for more fire.. to sum it up, Rainie needs more of everything ><

I’m wondering whether the “need more of everything” issue is due to me heading straight for several keystones. Maybe if i took my time getting there and took all the nodes along the way instead i won’t have this problem. Maybe, i’m not sure.

In any case, here’s the skill tree at level 55.

Gems currently are as follows.
[Arctic Armour]
[Conversion Trap]
[Reduced Mana – Clarity]

[Burning Arrow – Vaal Burning Arrow – Added Fire Damage]
I have the link to a red socket, but still haven’t found any Fire Penetration.

[Rain of Arrows – Added Fire Damage – Life Leech – Increased Critical Damage – Faster Projectiles]
I would’ve prefer Increased Critical Strikes to Increased Critical Damage at this point of time because my critical chance is rather low. But i don’t have the gem. Faster Projectiles is ok, but i’d prefer Weapon Elemental Damage, but it’s hard to get that many red sockets in Evasion armor.

[Cast When Damage Taken – Enduring Cry – Decoy Totem]
Cast When Damage Taken is fixed at level 1 so that it procs more often. Enduring Cry at level 5 and Decoy Totem at level 8 so that they can proc of a level 1 Cast When Damage Taken.

So much for now, Geek Generation out.

Regarding Support Tickets

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

A couple days ago, i was playing Path of Exile and was in a party to help clear Merveil. After killing the boss, i went back into town thinking of leaving the party. So i brought up the “Social” window and click the Leave button. What i didn’t realize was that i was on the wrong tab of the Social window.

Instead of leaving my party, i ended up leaving my own Guild (one man guild). At that time, i didn’t realize that my friend was also in the guild and as such i thought i had permanently lost my guild and with it, the guild stash which i had bought with real life money.

It reminded me of an incident in Guild Wars 2. A friend had bought, using in game currency, two ascended trinkets of the same name not realizing that they had a stat called “unique” which prevented them from being used on the same character. He submitted a ticket explaining the situation.

What surprised me was that Anet, Guild Wars 2’s company, refunded the extra trinket for my friend. So i decided to take a lesson from my friend’s incident; asking nicely might get what we want, even if the developers don’t really have to help.

After a couple of email exchanges with GGG, Path of Exile’s company, i was offered a guild stash for my new guild. By then, through the email exchanges, i realized that my friend was still in the old guild and that the guild stash was still existent in the game and recoverable by getting my friend to reinvite me into the guild.

So i declined the guild stash for the new guild, coz if i didn’t, that would be me cheating, in a way. 

As of now, i still remain in my new guild without a guild stash, because my friends have stopped playing so there was no real need for a guild stash; i had originally bought it so it was easier for us to transfer items to each other. 

All in all, i’m pretty satisfied with how GGG handled the issue, i think they did a pretty fine job. Props to GGG and Anet (for helping my friend back then).

Geek Generation out.

Path of Exile: Rampage League (Level 50)

Hello everybody, Geek Generation here.

I’ve managed to get Rainie Ying to level 50. I mentioned previously that i wanted the mana nodes north of Scion. But instead, i decided to go toward the mana nodes at Ranger’s start point. That would put me nearer to the mana reservation nodes, which offers a whopping 12% reduction.

The character, as it is, is pretty weak. Big burst damage kills Rainie rather quickly. I’m guessing it’s because of the armor she’s wearing, since it’s Eva/ES armor; the effective armor is around half that of a normal armor character. So i’m thinking of grabbing the increase armor nodes near Iron Grip.

Rainie’s dps is also rather weak and has problems two problems with killing stuff. Mobs with life regen that deals chaos damage  or has huge bursts are a problem. The other problem is Rainie simply cannot win against Vagan’s timed missions. Or Vorici’s timed missions. These missions are a serious check on dps and tankiness to dish out dps. 

So i’m down to the last 15 levels to fix Rainie Ying, i hope i don’t screw it up. See Rainie’s level 50 passive tree here.

Anyway, i thought i show a screenshot of the currency in my stash.

I do have quite abit of Chromatic Orbs for the amount of time i spent playing Path of Exile. The reason for this is that i’ve been checking every NPC vendor for triple color linked equips to resell (you get a chromatic orb for selling an equip that has all 3 color sockets linked together) after leveling every time.

This checking of every NPC vendor is most certainly immersion breaking as i waypoint through the towns of every act, but you get to start hoarding Chromatic Orbs early. That also means i need to stock up on Transmutation Orbs (selling blue equips without identifying) as NPC vendors sometimes sell their wares for Transmutation Orbs.

I’ve also been stashing quality equips to sell them for Blacksmith’s Whetstone and Armorer’s Scrap. What can i say.. i’m a pack rat.

Alchemy Orbs are rather low because i’ve been using them to buy quality gems from the masters. Even if you don’t use the gems, you should buy them anyway to resell them for Gemcutter’s Prism once you’ve hit 40% quality. It’s a form of trading up for your currency.

Geek Generation out.