Level 92 Crit Cyclone Slayer^3.23

Notes

Disclaimer: The build relies on you being fairly knowledgeable about POE. That's probably the case for most melee starters. It's not extremely tanky and there's lots of options for gear and stats that might be confusing for newer players. If you don't know what you're doing, you WILL die a lot and it WILL feel horrible.
If you can get past that, the build mechanically feels amazing due to the nature of Cyclone being mobile and Shockwave support having huge aoe. It also scales pretty nicely into endgame if you want.

If you have any questions, feel free to pm me ingame: EchidnaPoe

----------------DPS mechanics-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cyclone's a solid skill for boss dps uptime since it allows you to move around while dealing damage. Shockwave helps with clear while still giving almost as much damage as another support.
Power charge generation from Assassin's Mark quality(hence why I recommend to get 20 quality on it asap)
Slayer's Brutal Fervour allows us to abuse "while leeching" modifiers like the ones from cluster jewels or Carnage Heart amulet
Totems are huge dps buffs, make sure they're always up. In my experience they don't really die that much so I place them on top of bosses for more dps. If you find they die often try placing them further away. Make sure you have multiple totems linked so you can have both Warchief and Protector. Add maim support for the extra damage taken that applies to Cyclone.
Crush(which doesn't really do much) from Awakened Brutality later
Intimidate(from Awakened Melee Physical Damage) later. Make sure the gem is level 5
Make sure chance to impale is as high as you can get it
Blood stance for bossing, Sand stance for mapping
+2 impale from Watcher's Eye is huge. They tend to be cheaper if you get it early since people want to liquidate.
A good Lethal Pride jewel goes a long way. Use the jewel finder function to get a good one.
Forbidden jewels are pretty big upgrades too - Get one of these: Inspirational, Master of Metal, Arena Challenger(this one is BIS)
Make sure you are accuracy capped. We can't afford using a very high level Precision so get accuracy on rings.

I enabled flasks for the endgame version since at that point you kill everything by the time they run out.

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-----------------TANKINESS mechanics-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To be frank, build is not that tanky. Especially against physical damage. Abyssus is too good not to use. We try to mitigate it by running Determination and armour bases.
Other defensive layers: Fortify from cluster jewel or tree, Slayer leech, endurance charge generation from Smashing Strikes notable, Purity of Elements ailment immunity if you wanna run Aul's amulet(I sure will).
All things considered, the build is fairly safe since you move nonstop. You can even drop a life flask for another utility flask once you get a corrupted blood jewel.
You can also consider using a Writhing Jar to have leech up all the time.

Consecrated Ground is on for the Bottled Faith in the endgame version. Turn it off if you only care about league start stuff.
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-----------------Gear---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I tried to make the leaguestart gear section fairly easy to get/buy/craft early. Hell, more than half of the gear, you can make by throwing essences at bases. If you can't get this amount of gear by like day 3, I wouldn't really recommend this build to you.
The endgame section is what I plan to get as I minmax the character. As you can see, with gear the build scales a lot.

I added good bases in the leaguestart POB but they're not THE best unless I missed something. You can find the best bases on the wiki.

AMULET
	Carnage Heart is really good early. Gives decent damage but also helps with attributes and res while being super cheap.
	Rare amulet with crit multi, life and flat phys. Also use it to get the attributes you want. Example in the item section. I'll prolly stick with Carnage Heart for a while.
	Aul's Uprising gives us a free aura which is huge. The Purity of Elements version gives crit AND intelligence. My go-to amulet for melee builds in endgame. Also easy to double corrupt if you're into that.

	How to get: buy

RINGS
	Generic life and res rings early. Try to get accuracy as well if you're not capped.
	Vulnerability curse ring once you get +1 curse from body armour
	Steel Ring and Amethyst are the best bases for later on.
	I've seen people use Circle of Guilt but that means you have to run Herald of Purity which means you'd have to drop another better aura.

	How to get: use reforge caster on warlord influenced ring or buy it. Usually it's cheaper to craft it yourself and you might get something nice.

BELT
	Use it to cap res early
	Belt of the Deceiver is the most budget friendly for damage
	The Magnate is really good once you have 400 strength
	BIS is Ryslatha's Coil if and ONLY if you have good rolls. Make sure you use an attack catalyst. It's good damage and nice life.
	Mageblood is the best at a huge budget but I wouldn't invest THAT much into this build unless you really like it.

	How to get: buy

HELMET
	Life and res till you can get a decent rolled Abyssus

	How to get: buy

BODY ARMOUR
	First of all, make sure you have a 6link. Use it to cap your res early. Make sure you DON'T HAVE a life modifier on it for the life mastery.
	You can also get a cheap +1 curse body armour(strength base) since the slot is kinda free. In that case, also get the Vulnerability ring.

	Ideally you want: Socketed Attacks have -20 to Total Mana Cost from Warlord, +1 curse from Hunter and flat crit chance to attacks from Hunter

	Best base is Astral Plate

	How to get: 
		Make sure the body armour has only 1 influence.
		Step 1. Reforge attack on Warlord base until you get the mana cost mod and another influenced mod. Make sure you only have 2 influenced mods so it's 50/50.
		Step 2. Use Orb of Dominance and pray. If you hit you can go to step 3 otherwise sell it and go back to step 1.
		Step 3. Reforge attack on hunter base until you get t1 attack crit and another influenced mod. Make sure you only have 2 influenced mods so it's 50/50.
		Step 4. Use Orb of Dominance and pray. If you hit you can go to step 5 otherwise sell it and go back to step 3.
		Step 5. Use Awakener's Orb on the bad base then click on the good base and pray. If prefixes are full and you don't have +1 curse sell it and do it again. Otherwise go to step 6.
		Step 6. If you have an empty prefix, cast Suffixes Cannot be Changed and reforge caster. Be careful that you don't have an empty suffix otherwise you might get crit chance to spells.
		Step 7. If you have an empty prefix, craft phys taken as ele to further mitigate phys damage. If you hit life mods, don't use the life mastery.

GLOVES

	Physical Attack Damage Leeched as Mana if you don't have the mana leech cluster notable.
	Life, res and attack speed.
	Influenced implicits to use: Rage and chance to impale(if you don't have it capped). Effect of Marks if you have capped chance to impale.
	Infuenced mods to consider: Elevated Hunter chance to impale and flat phys for each impale on enemy. Although I don't think they're that good since we need to cap our res somewhere and other slots are better for damage. Culling Strike is useless on a Slayer and Rage from Exarch implicit is very good for clearspeed.

BOOTS

	Movement speed as highest priority, life and res otherwise.
	Influenced implicits: Action Speed from Exarch, CDR of travel skills for Frostblink from Eater. 
	BIS boots later and how to craft: Lolcohol has a very nice guide for it. Although I'd also consider buying them since the craft can be fairly risky. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7KkfVGLGkE

WEAPONS
	Hegemony's Era is an option early if it's cheap
	Eventuality Rod is the best base
	Get a staff with as much pdps and crit chance as you can

	How to get:
		Get fractured phys%/hybrid phys% and spam Contempt essences till you get a decent one that you can craft phys% or as% on. Or just buy one.
		For a better one, check this Lolcohol guide. He's got really good guides for everything. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxZWhkL_80c

JEWELS

	BIS: Watcher's Eye with +2 Impale while using Pride. Other mods to consider: Precision crit damage/attack damage/attack speed, Pride phys damage/chance to impale/double damage, Determination phys damage reduction/reduced crit/flat armour, Purity of Elements chaos res/phys as ele
	Lethal Pride with double damage mods, use the jewel calculator
	Forbidden jewels with: Inspirational, Master of Metal or Arena Challenger
	Rare jewels with life + other mods. For damage try to get crit multi or attack speed. Can also use them to cap res if you need to or get mana reservation efficiency

FLASKS

	IMO, Quicksilver and Silver flask with flask effect are a must. It's just so much clearspeed.
	Diamond if you need more crit chance
	Lion's Roar is free damage AND defense for cheap
	Bottled Faith for damage once you can afford it
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--------------------------ASCENDANCY/TREE/PANTHEON-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There's trees for: leveling(with Sunder and two handed axe), league start tree without clusters and average jewels, 1 cluster tree for transitioning to cluster setup, final lvl 100 2 cluster goal setup

Ascendancy order: Bane of Legends->Brutal Fervour->Headsman->Impact
You don't really leech a lot until cruel lab and there aren't that many rares until around merc lab.
Major Pantheon:  Brine King for the stun immunity and freeze immunity till u get ailment immunity. Lunaris for zoom
Minor Pantheon: Shakari if u have issues with chaos damage. Garukhan is nice for the shock effect reduction until you get ailment immunity. Also maim and blind immunity. Gruthkul if you don't like the others.


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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Annoints---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cheap: Kinetic Impacts
Best for DPS: Panopticon
Aura shit: Charisma
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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Random ideas depending on how the build feels-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drop Blunt Trauma get another medium maybe
Get 1 large cluster and 2 mediums instead and get more life and shit(doesn't seem worth)

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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gem stuff----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Get Assassin's Mark to 20 qual ASAP
Assassin's Mark allows for charge generation on bosses(yes it's enough to sustain, cyclone hits a lot)
Since we're using Herald of Purity instead of Pride for a while, you can level up your Precision more.

Keep Cyclone gems in your offhand. We'll want to swap them in lab eventually for the new transfigurated gem version that we'll use for bossing. It is a lot more damage but sucks for clear.

Cyclone supports: Since we'll be leveling with Sunder until maps you'll most likely have a 5link right away so leave Melee Physical Damage for last. Order: Shockwave->Infused Channeling->Pulverise->Brutality->Melee Physical Damage

Travel skills: Leap Slam(use Faster Attacks if you have a free gem slot) and Frostblink(allows us to teleport while Cycloning without stopping since it's instant, and gives a bit of chill)

Guard skill: We don't have THAT much armour and we have endurance charge generation so I opted for Immortal Call. It's especially nice that it's good at low levels too so you can keep a low level CWDT

Mandatory Auras: Determination(our phys mitigation), Blood and Sand(makes mapping and bossing a bit better for virtually no cost), Dread Banner(impale chance and impale effect), Precision(crit chance and accuracy). Link to Enlighten if you have to.

Aura options: I wouldn't recommend going Grace since we don't really run evasion bases. Get Herald of Purity early and replace with Pride once you have enough mana reservation. I like getting Purity of Elements for ailment immunity and easy res if you use Aul's Uprising

Buffs: Blood Rage(frenzy charges during mapping and AS), Ancestral Warchief and Ancestral Protector(no brainer for any melee build) linked with Multiple Totems so you can use both and Maim support so we can apply the increased damage taken debuff

Curses: Assassin's Mark with Mark on hit as priority. Vulnerability from ring once you get +1 curse body armour.


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------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Leveling-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We level using Sunder and two handed axe. I made some leveling trees for that.
Can take out Precision once you get RT.
For what gems and shit to use, just check out these videos from better players than me like Havoc and Kobe: 
	Kobe guide: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9ds8DjCtbg
	Havoc A10 run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irZOARI6Jl8
TLDW: https://imgur.com/a/cgvYcA0

I plan to swap to Cyclone Shockwave around when I get to maps, maybe like Act 9/10. More of a feeling thing tbh. Make sure you can actually respec.

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-----------------FAQ/My build feels bad------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: How do I sustain mana?
A: Use mana flask until you can get mana leech from gloves. Later you can get mana leech from Fuel the Fight from cluster jewels instead. Also consider taking the life cost life mastery.

Q:Why is my damage bad?
A: Make sure you are accuracy capped. Get accuracy from rings. Precision isn't enough. Make sure you actually have lots of crit chance. Until you get clusters and/or a good staff you don't have a whole lot. We're an impale build, make sure you have enough chance to impale.

Q:Why is my mana pool is super small after turning on my auras/Why can't I use all auras?
A:Make sure you take mana reservation nodes or don't level your precision too much. Use Herald of Purity early and replace it with Pride once you get Enlighten.

Q:Why do I die a lot?
A:While the build isn't that tanky, make sure you're not face tanking too much. Cyclone is used for how mobile it is after all. Get armour, determination and endurance charge generation(from tree). Get life on your gear, cap your res, get a granite flask. Hit stuff, you're a Slayer.

Q:Why does my Shockwave not proc more often even though I got lots more attack speed?
A:It has a cooldown, attack speed doesn't work for it.

Q:Why is *thing* not in the guide?
A:Most likely, I forgot

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