Level 91 Lightning Strike Champion^3.24

Notes

****** IMPORTANT INFO ON THE VARIOUS RESPECS IN THE CAMPAIGN ****** PLEASE READ *******
You will level with two handers until around level 40 and you have a one handed sword and axe with damage mods. You can then do the Lightning Strike Switch as per the POB. 
1. First Respec (8 Points) When you switch in Act 4 you will need to have all the respec points thus far in the campaign, so will need to do fetid pool in act 1 and through sacred ground in act 2. You will have 8 respec points which is enough to stick to the trees provided.
2. Second Respec when you pick up the 2 points in act 5 - Remove Master of the Arena and the small 5% life node connected to it
3. Act 7 you need to respec 5 points so will need to use 1 orb of regret or wait until act 8. You will be removing the +1 strike mastery and all the nodes leading to it (Gladiators Perseverance). You will then take the attack speed & Multishot along with the +1 strike mastery
4. In act 9 once you pick up the leech nodes on the right hand side of the tree respec the small leech node near your starting area

Respecs in Maps:
1. When you have ichimonjis drop the ignite nodes and mastery and take the sword wheel near point blank and take the mastery for chance to gain frenzy charges on bosses
2. When you have enough resists to drop the accuracy and resistance nodes (Weathered Hunter) remove these and add Acuity and the mastery for -2 accuracy per level/+500 Accuracy


Overall Guidance:
Levelling to level 38 is a bit clunky as you really have to use Spectral Helix which is not the nicest feeling skill. As soon as you get Anger, flat damage on gear/weapons, multistrike and first lab you can switch to Lightning Strike and the one handed setup when you have an axe and a sword with flat ele damage.
Either buy or use vall orbs on LS gems. The sooner we get a Vaal LS gem the better as this is a huge boost to both clear and ST
Add in blood rage for frenzy charges whenever you feel comfortable since it does use a lot of life early on

When you get the ignite 100% more damage mastery you need some fire damage on the build. Anger covers this. When you get the dual wield mastery you need to run one axe and one sword!
Keep ensuring your accuracy is higher than your life. The accuracy mastery should ensure you do not need to worry about this until maps

Act 1:

Throughout acts 1-4 pick up all rares and sell unidentified to vendors. You will need a lot of transmutes

Buy two-handed sword  from vendor if available. Take splitting steel  as reward so you links are Splitting Steel - Chance to Bleed
At level 4 take ancestral protector and dash as rewards and buy defiance banner
Drop defiance banner on bosses as gives you adrenaline for a few seconds

Get 2 x iron rings and rustic sash as soon as possible

At level 8 pick up Maim as your reward and add to links if you have G-R-R

At level 12 you can swap splitting steel for Spectral Helix if you like

Look for long sword or Bastard Sword as an upgrade these are included in the filter

Act 2:
Add Level 1 precision if you need accuracy help when you take precise technique. This should not be necessary though
Take Herald of Ash as your reward from Chamber of Sins. You will need an intelligence amulet to run this
Do not take a reward for killing weaver we will come back and get ele dmg with attacks later

Act 3
Replace Herald of Ash with Anger at level 24
Pick up all flat elemental damage crafts and start looking for one handed weapons (1 sword & 1 axe) both with elemental damage on them
When you switch to ele weapons go to act 3 skill setup. If you end up with 3 x r 1 x g socket add volatility instead of trinity

After 1st Lab:
Drop War Banner 
Pick up Corrupting fever from act 2 and lifetap from act 1 and link together
Corrupting Fever needs to take 50%+ life. You can then use this to perma proc adrenaline
Once you get multistrike at level 38 and the +1 strike mastery you can switch to a melee skill of your choice (Smite, FB or VLS)

Act 6:
Pickup wrath, added lightning & Smite from Nessa after clearing twilight strand and level in off hands. You will not have the INT/STR to level them too high but we want to start  levelling them. Also level up volatility (act 2) and Determination & Grace (Act 3 vendor)
Attributes and resistances are both a struggle on this build so do not worry if you fall slightly below resistances. Aim for 55%+ resists and you should be fine, but obviously capping is better. Use the +30 STR/INT nodes if needed
Be on the lookout for Agate amulets at vendors as these can be good for boosting up STR + INT same for Heavy Belts

Act 7: Take Jade Flask as reward and then go back to Act 5 and take granite flask as avarius reward and use both. You should no longer need a mana flask
From here on in try and craft/ID a bleeding life flask as both bleed and corrupted blood becomes more prevenlent 

When you get ichimoniji's drop the mastery increased damage if wielding 2 different weapon types
When you take the reservation wheel run level 1 precision, Anger + Wrath (If you feel squishy or have a super low level wrath run grace or determination)

Getting Ichimonjis
When you get to level 50 start going to the rogue harbour every level and buy every demolition and lockpicking contact that comes in Wakanos inventory for chance orbs (ignore the ones for alchemies)
When you get to level 58 run all these contracts. You should then have 10c+ which will be easily enough to buy 2 x Ichimonjis. This should also give you vaal orbs to make a vaal lightning strike gem. I recommend making your own as 
if you buy one from trade it will likely be level 1 and this will seriously hurt your DPS

Act 9
You may start to feel squishy in Act 9 and beginning of Act 10 as we will not yet have much life or spell suppression or fortify. When you get the suppression nodes and fortify it will feel a LOT tankier. We will be adding in doube defensive auras,
but you will do this at level 78 when you get perseverance

Act 10
At this point you ideally want to be res capped with good suppression and 2k+ life. Do not worry about the lifepool we will be adding to this soon!This should see you through the next 2 labs. You can always juke Izaro and wait for your vaal charges before
committing to attacking

*** TIPs***
I recommend doing some low level heists (Demolition and lockpicking to pick up a few chaos  to buy Ichimonjis at level 58. Also use this to get gear to get res capped and get some  attritbutes if needed. It is better to spend an hour here than
struggle when you hit maps. 
You do not need to rush to do second lab as it does not give us anything until we unlock the third so feel free to do it just before killing Kitava. You can also use the labs to try and get some gems to sell for currency. If you feel too squishy you
wait until early maps but if you can I would recommend doing them in the campaign and if needed use heist or desecrated  chambers to level or gear up
SMITE TECH - As we are adding quite a lot of aura effect a smite linked to increased duration gives us around 20% more damage. Use ths one bosses and tough rares to give you a huge DPS Boost. This is important as makes a 5 link feel like
a 6 Link

MAPS
2k life+, Capped resistances, 3 x labs completed. Skillls as per POB. 
From here we are in no rush as we ideally want to be high 80s before we start pushing red maps
Do Atlas completion but do not rush!
Use loot filter "Smite Early Mapping" and look for armour & evasion bases & Jewellery. Use Essences on  these as and when you find them as the first order is to get life and resistances along with attributes sorted and on good bases.
We cannot really push past early yellow maps until we get a 5 link and persverance belt
We also want the following clusters:
- 8 passive large lightning cluster (We can alt craft this we just want Scintilating idea for more mana and  lightning penetration + any other mod) 1 mod jewel the notable will be at the back. I would try and buy this or Alt + Regal into 2 mods as it can cost
quite a few chaos to make. If you are strapped for cash any 2 passive lightning cluster will work
- 3 Passive Mana reservation jewel (This can probably be 2 passive). Again alt + regal this looking for introspection or you can take reservation for one of your auras to make mana more managable 

Flasks: 
Get flasks crafted so you have evasion, armour and attack speed suffixes

How to craft gear:
You do not really need damage as this comes from auras and swords. We need to get life, resistances and Attributes and I would recommend doing the following:
- By 2 x two stone ring with fractured Resistance of T3+ (Different resistance each ring). Craft one with Shrieking essences of Spite and one with Shrieking essences of Rage.
This will give you a good chunk of STR + INT
- Get an Agate Amulet with all attributes +24 and preferably life and resists
- Buy fractured helmet, gloves with 1 x high resistance and roll with screaming essences of Greed until you get something decent. Attack speed or suppression are great but resists and Strength is also good
- Boots but a pair with fractured movement speed and roll with greed essences or fractured life and roll with zeal essences. Again looking for resists and STR
- Helmet buy with fractured resist and use spite essences for INT. Craft Life
- Buy 5 link chest and roll with resistance or life essences

Cheap Unique to help with Strength
Eventually you will be running a Lethal Pride jewel to help with strength but these may be expensive early on. Inertia jewel works very well slotted here to help with strength in the meantime if you need the boost

Uber Lab & Perseverance Swap
You can put perseverance on as soon as you hit level 78 if your Strength and resists are still good. Use inertia jewel if you need to make up strength
Wait until you have your cluster jewels and can run Grace, Determination and Wrath before running Uber Lab it will make it a breeze. If you cannot get clusters you may be able to get away with just taking mana nodes and 12% mastery but mana will be very tight

Syndicate Crafts:
Unlocking mana cost of attacks on jewellery is important. This is easy enough to do you just need to unveil jewellery from Elreon. He starts in leadership position in research so if you come across him interrogate him to get him out of that position
so he turns up more often. When you have this on 1 ring you can drop the life as mana mastery. When you get a 6 link you will need it on on 2 rings or mana cost of attacks implicit on helmet (Searing Exarch Mod)
You need to get mana cost as low as you can as the final version of the budget starter has very little available mana

Physical damage taken as fire and lightning is also important. This is unveiled from Graviscous body armours. He does not start on the board so kick non important people out to try and force him in

Physical damage taken as fire on helmet is unveiled from Korrell helmets

Further DPS
The best way to get more damage is recraft your jewellery with essences of Torment for more flat lightning damage. This will add cost as you will still need to balance resists and attributes however it will add 4-5% more DPS per item
Annointing amulet will also give DPS. Divine judegement for a cheap annoint Arcing blows is the best and not mega expensive
Voice of the Storms is insane damage so if this is affordable I 100% recommend it
- Boots: increased action speed
- Body Armour: Grace/Determ aura effect (whichever needs boosting) + non curse aura effect
- Gloves: Strike skills target 1 additional enemy + lightning exposure on hit
- Helmet: Mana Cost of Attacks + Phys taken as
- Corrupted Ichimonji with attack speed if cheap but watch out for accuracy!

BIG UPGRADE OPTIONS:
There are some items that will actually push the build to Uber Elder/Maven DPS, but could be too expensive to make it worthwhile:
Voice of the Storms Amulet gives insane damage to non crit lightning builds but is an upgraded breach item so may be expensive
Wrath Pen Watchers Eye but again could be way too much! Increased Lightning Damage Watcher's would be a very cheap alternative
3 Mod Cluster Jewel to free up points on the tree.
I would recommend just switching  to crit claw for these fights as the build scales better. Please see the separate POB in the video description

80-87 Level in yellow or lower  tier red maps. You need level 20 auras and quality on support gems to push the highest maps. This should happen naturally anyway as you will unlikely to be hitting T14 maps before level 87-88