Cryo-Shock Telestomp Stormweaver (T16+ Maps)

This Stormweaver build focuses on optimising the Cold Damage and Freeze Capability across the build whilst using curses to aid against more difficult targets.

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NOTE:

A new Endgame Update video is available at:

https://youtu.be/kua_s1EYj9Y

NOTE: 28/12/2024

A new T16+ Update video is available at:

https://youtu.be/Dv_2HrR8jlQ

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Using Frostbolt as the primary way to Freeze enemies, Cold Snap can be manually used to consume the freeze until Cast on Freeze becomes available which is used to automatically invoke Cold Snap for big damage in the early game or Ball Lightning for huge Shock Utility & Mobility during combat in the endgame. Comet is still taken but now as a manual cast when required.

Hypothermia is used to reduce enemies Cold Resistance whilst Frost Wall is used as an Offensive / Defensive tool depending on the situation. 

Frost Bomb is taken as a big damage tool when a target isn't moving or is locked in place. This I found to be quite strong in the early game.

Lightning Warp is taken to add the ability to Cull enemies, add Shock into the build and give the ability to maneuvre around the battlefield a bit easier.

Grim Feast is taken in the early game as it gives a quick way of generating Energy Shield from killing enemies. Arctic Armour can be used if you feel it fits your build better but Grim Feast is just the superior option right now before we move away from Energy Shield entirely.

Blasphemy in conjunction with Enfeeble are added later down the line when you can get to 120+ Spirit on the build and have taken the Whispers of Doom Key Passive. It can also be expanded to included Hypothermia in the super late game when you get 177+ Spirit.

NOTE: Blasphemy needs to be at 20% quality to reduce the Spirit requirements to 177.

At level 52 Eye of Winter becomes available which opens up further possibilities for Damage, Cold Exposure and Ailment Application.

Sigil of Power is added to Weapon Set 2 to boost our boss damage in the late game boosting with Increased Skill Duration and Area of Effect.

I'l be live streaming most evenings (GMT) so this is a good time to come ask me questions directly!

Cast Frost Wall as required to block enemies from swarming you or underneath larger targets feet as this causes the wall segements to explode instantly for big damage.

Cast Frostbolt towards the enemies for near Perma-Freeze activating Cast on Freeze for big damage from the triggered Cold Snap or high utility output with Ball Lightning which can be used to teleport onto for big damage with Lightning Warp as well as placing Shocked Ground this occurs.

if in a safe spot, cast Comet at will for big Focused Area Damage. It's recommended to block enemies off with Frost Wall before trying to go ahead and spam cast Comet to rain down frosty meteors of goodness on the enemies heads.

Cast Frost Bomb under large groups of enemies or larger targets for huge demolition style AOE damage. This is excellent for clearance and for big damage on bosses when they are stationary or crowd controlled.

Cast Hypothermia on Cold Resistant enemies whilst you work on building up enough Cold Penetration to bypass these resistances alltogether.

Cast Lightning Warp on enemies highlighted to be Culled or on Ball Lightning projectiles. This creates Shocked Ground at the Telestomp location causing all enemies within to be Shocked. This can be used as a method to engage or to disengage

Once you hit level 52 and unlock Eye of Winter I find a good rotation is as follows:

• Cast Frostbolt to build up some Chilled Ground.
• Place down Frost Wall to block enemies or underneath larger enemies feet to quickly build up Freeze.
• Once enemies are frozen, place down Hypothermia + Frost Bomb and cast Comet in a safe place.
• Use Ball Lightning projectiles to engage or disengage as needed.
• Eye of Winter is more useful against bosses where it excels are applying huge damage very quickly to large targets.

Once you have Blasphemy running both Enfeeble and Hypothermia as well as manual Ball Lightning equipped, the play style can change to be a much more defensive/aggressive style. I would recommend engaging by blocking off enemies with Frost Wall to scan the battlefield for what you're about to engage whilst manually casting Ball Lightning projectiles through the Frost Wall in preparation to engage with Lightning Warp . If you deem there not to be any One Shot Mechanics in play from Rare Enemies+ then you should be safe to jump in. This allows you to be a bit more in control.

If you find yourself feeling a bit worried in a fight or you're feeling like you're about to get overrun. I would suggest blocking off as many angles as possible with Frost Wall and then manually casting Ball Lightningaway from you so you can Lightning Warp out of the current area.

I personally tend to fight Harder Single Target Enemies with Eye of Winter which I'm attempting to make my main single target DPS. If it feels safe to use, you can also choose to cast Comet down on the area if you are able to block them off with Frost Wall first.

NOTE: I would highly recommend not perma-teleporting with Lightning Warp in higher risk maps as there are currently some very overtuned one-shot elemental attacks that rare enemies can get in conjunction with bad map modifiers that just means you'l get killed very easily.

Sigil of Power is added to Weapon Slot 2 in order to give us that extra damage we need for Harder Single Target Enemies. At Level 18 it gives 14% More Spell Damage Per Stage equating to 56% More Spell Damage at Stage 4. The sigil is charged up by spending mana inside the sigil so casting lots of high mana skills constantly will help a lot here (I recommend Eye of Winter).

Aim to place Sigil of Power somewhere central to where you want to run around so you can start charging it up and give yourself plenty of area to move around whilst benefitting from the extra damage it provides if you have to avoid incoming damage. Reset the placement if it ends before the fight is over, in most cases this won't be the case.

NOTE: Make sure to assign all damage skills to Weapon Set 1 only so that when you cast an offensive skill you will automatically swap back to your main weapon and focus. Sigil of Power is automatically allocated to weapon set 2 as it's a skill that is attached to the staff we equip. You can leave Blasphemy and Cast on Freeze on both Weapon Set 1 and Weapon Set 2 so these stay active regardless of what set we have equipped at any given time.

Starter Skills

On a fresh character you'l want to start with the basic skill gems available such as Firebolt / Spark / Freezing Shards / Flame Wall until you can get your hands on Frostbolt which pairs very nicely with Cold Snap and Ice Nova is also a very nice addition to the build so be sure to get hold of this when you can as well.

Skill Gems

Frostbolt is useful when you pair it with Scattershot and Unleash giving a decent amount of early game damage. Later on Unleash will be removed in favour of other gems. Wildshards along with Cold Penetration should be equipped when available adding omni-directional damage and Cold Resistance Penetration to the build. Arcane Tempo is useful for raising your cast speed until this can be solved elsewhere. After you have enough Cast Speed you can swap this for Glaciation to raise the Freeze capability of the build. Deceleration can be used to reduce the projectiles speed, creating a moving wall of projectiles that you can stay behind. This can be furter slowed in the passive tree through the notable Turn the Clock Back.

Frost Bomb was very strong early on for killing groups of enemies and bosses. Spell Cascade and Second Wind can be added to further the damage output which I found to be super helpful.

Frost Wall is extremely useful because it can be used to block swarms of enemies, or you can plant it under the enemies feets for extra damage. It's especially useful against large hit box enemies where it instantly explodes under their feet for pretty significant damage and Freeze Build Up. Combined with Fortress to give the ability to block enemies within it and the utility of Font of Mana for Mana Sustainance, this is a must have in the build. You can take Icicle to reduce the crystals life if you want to use it as a more offensive option. Later on You can replace Fortress for Ingenuity for faster cooldowns.

Hypothermia Is the bread and butter curse in the early game to help deal with Cold Resistance mobs. The one thing to note here is that this can reduce enemies resistances below 0% allowing you to do extra damage. Cold penetration does NOT reduce below 0% in POE2 like it does in POE1 so this curse is useful even if you can penetrate all of an enemies resistances. Most of the support gems here are focused around increasing the area effect of the curse. The main ones are Magnified Effect and Persistence to achieve both a larger area and a longer duration. Later down the line you can get hold of Cursed Ground which turns the curse into a persistant ground effect with no activation delay and Ritualistic Curse for further area increase at no detriment if you have Cursed Ground already slotted. Heightened Curse can be useful in increasing the strength of the curse but I would avoid this if you're having Mana Sustain issues.

Cast on Freeze adds a layer of automation to the build focused mainly on group clearance. Everytime you freeze an enemy you will gain energy towards activating the skills slotted inside it, and later on you can achieve activating them very frequently with the right setup. I would recommend Cold Snap here to start with as you won't have access to Ball Lightning at this stage. Unleash and Inspiration are taken early to double up the offensive activation whilst mitigating the mana pressure this can put on the build. Later down the line there are support gems that can be used to improve the activation rate such as Impetus and Energy Retention. Once Ball Lightning becomes available you will want to replace Cold Snap as it's jsut extremely useful later on and Cold Snap seems to flatline damage wise in the end game. Ball Lightning allows us to be able to teleport to the projectiles with Lightning Warp as well as giving us the ability to apply Shocked Ground through this interaction much more easily. It also allows us to integrate Ailments into the build such as Electrocute which would be very useful in the higher endgame content.

Lightning Warp is a very useful utility skill that may seem out of place but what it allows is for us to integrate Culling into our build, including against bosses. It also gives us the ability to add Shock into our build once an enemy is culled which increases our damage against enemies whilst affected. In conjunction with Considered Casting for Huge Increased Damage, Soul Drain for extra Mana Sustain and Overcharge to increase the Potency of the Shock, this ability has incredibly utility value here. With the addition of Ball Lightning we are now able to activate Lightning Warp on demands towards the projeciles, using it as an offensive and a utility option for moving around the battlefield and apply Shocked Ground much more frequently. This ontop of the Culling tech means you can teleport around the map during combat to get in and out of combat situations as you see fit.

Eye of Winter becomes available at level 52 and is very strong. Cold Exposure is useful for near permanent cold exposure application on Critical Hits, Elemental Focus is taken more raw damage whilst costing some the ability to apply ailments (we can solve this elsewhere) and Fork is taken to allow the projectiles to split off to other enemies at the cost of 50% Damage after Forking. One thing to note here is we have both Chilled Ground and Shocked Ground in the build, so it can inherit these effects and apply them to all surrounding enemies with ease if you take off Elemental Focus and replace that with something else.

Grim Feast is an extremely powerful tool you can pick up as soon as you gain access to Uncut Spirit Gems. This allows you to get Energy Shield pickups from enemies corpses based on chance. This gives us a much needed extra layer of sustain whilst dealing with groups of enemies and with the addition of Clarity it gives us access to 30% Mana Regeneration which is very useful early on. Bludgeon can also be taken to help prevent Perma-stuns by Knocking Back enemies when it activates.

Arctic Armour is another useful Defensive tool you can opt to use instead of Grim Feast if you prefer but right now this is the inferior option so this is completely up to you but not recommended. The same Support Gems can be used here.

Which ever you choose to use, they are later replaced due to removing Energy Shield from the build and the addition of Blasphemy will take precedence once you can get to a minimum of 120+ maximum spirit, but preferably 130+ maximum spirit.

Blasphemy combined with Enfeeble is a very powerful combination that allows us to entirely bypass Curse activation restrictions in favour of a Reduced Strength Curse that acts as an aura around us reducing enemies damage against us. This can later be used to have permanent activation tools such as Clarity for Mana Regeneration. This can be used without Clarity so that you only require 120+ Maximum Spirit to use this in conjunction with Cast on Freeze but the extra Mana Regeneration is highly recommended.

For Blasphemy to be able to be taken in the build alongside Hypothermia the Key Passive Whispers of Doom is required as this allows us to have 2 Active Curses at once at the cost of Double Activation Delays. The great thing here is that Hypothermia later on will use the support gem Cursed Ground to turn it into a persistant ground effect and Blasphemy will be turned into a constant Aura so both of them bypass Activation Delays entirely, meaning is just a benefit to us with no downside.

Much later down the line we will be able to socket both our cursesEnfeeble and Hypothermia into Blasphemy so they both auto bypass the Double Activation Delay from Whispers of Doom. This requires 177+ Spirit with Clarity also added to Blasphemy and allows for a much smoother gameplay. This increases your general damage quite a bit because you probably won't be manually casting Hypothermia all the time, only on larger targets. Once enough Area Effect and Area Effect of Curses has been stacked on the build, it can be applied to enemies pretty much screen wide and Increased Effectiveness Of Curses allows us to push our Curses back to full potential or even higher in some cases. This allows for a straight up Damage Reduction Mechanic to any Affected Enemies of which there are very few in the game right now. This also frees up a skill slot for us to add a manual Ball Lightning into the build which makes the build feel a lot less clunky to play.

Comet is used now as a Manual Casting Ability rather than an On-Cast Ability. This in Conjunction with Spell Echo, Unleash and Arcane Tempo make it a deadly engagement tool once Frost Wall has been placed down to control enemies advancing upon you as well as being a good burst damage tool when larger enemies are Frozen. Later on Inevitable Critical & Supercritical can be equipped to supercharge the critical power of the comet skill if you choose to stack some Critical Chance and Critical Damage on your character.

Skill Info

The bread and butter of this build is to Freeze enemies using Frostbolt / Frost Wall / Arctic Armour / Eye of Winter as quick as possible to activate Cast on Freeze that will then activate either Cold Snap or Comet to clear waves of enemies.

Mobbing should be pretty straight forward and is definitely where this build excels more than bossing in the early part of the game. Frostbolt has such a high ability to Freeze with it's Chilled Ground effect that Cast on Freeze will activate fairly often. Both Cold Snap and Ball Lightning work here but since patch 0.1.0d it's now slower to activate skills so Energy Generation will be important to allowing consistent gameplay. Ball Lightning allows us to integrate Electrocute into the build as well as giving us Mobility options since you can teleport onto the projectiles using Lightning Warp, leaving behind extremely potent Shocked Grounds boosting our damage across the build in favour of doing big hits from Comet which now doesn't activate as consistently.

Frost Bomb is also useful for clearance and bossing if you can keep the enemies in place long enough to benefit from it. This is particularly strong in the early game before you can unlock many of the other skills or support gems so make good use of it. In the late game, we mostly use Frost Bomb for it's exceptional application of Cold Exposure which helps drastically improve our damage against harder targets.

Comet is still used in the build for its extremely devastating clearance ability as well as decent single target damage. Paired with Spell Echo, Unleash, Concentrated Effect and Inevitable Critical it grants it devastating Focused Target Area Damage.

Eye of Winter can also be used to apply freeze if fired over the Chilled Ground effect that is left behind by Frostbolt as well as being able to apply shock if fired over the Shocked Ground effect that Lightning Warp creates, so bare this in mind for easy ailment application. Paired with Arcane Tempo, Supercritical and Cold Mastery this skill can become a pretty decent Single Target DPS skill. I am exploring boosting this further.

Note: This will only work if Elemental Focus is not used on it, so be weary of this.

Note: Eye of Winter currently does NOT apply Shock from Shocked Ground which is likely a bug.

Hypothermia is best used when the enemies are not moving much or locked in place to maximise its potential. When you Freeze an enemy is a good example of when to use this. This won't be an issue later on when it's socketed into Blasphemy as it is Auto Cast as an Aura.

Enfeeble is Auto Cast as an Aura through the use of Blasphemy allowing us to reduce incoming damage quite drastically once enough Area of Effect, Area of Effect of Curses and Effectiveness of Curses has been stacked. It's pretty weak to start with as the Area of Effect of Enfeeble is just too small to make a real difference and it's Effectiveness is reduced drastically for becoming a Permanent Aura. It becomes very strong later on though once these problems have been solved.

Sigil of Power is made available through equipping a Chimed Staff in our Weapon Set 2 equipment slot so it doesn't require a free Skill Slot. It boosts our damage drastically which is very useful against Harder Single Target Enemies especially Boss Fights. The size is increased through Increased Area of Effect passives, Jewels and increasing the quality of the Chimed Staff to 20%, giving a +0.8m size increase. The duration is increasd through the use of Increased Skill Duration passives allowing for durations upwards of 30 seconds+ in conjunction with Persistence support gem.

In the End Game the aim is to get the Sigil of Power to last as long as possible with a size that is useful in combat situations where you have to avoid big attacks, giving options on where you can position yourself and still benefit from this huge damage boost. Clever use of Weapon Set passives allow us to unspec non-essential damage passives from Weapon Set 2 so we can allocate these points into Increased Area Effect and Increased Skill Duration clusters while allocating the damage nodes back to Weapon Set 1 to avoid any damage loss on our damage skills.

Mana Stacking

This starter build doesn't play entirely into the mana stacking tech as mentioned above as we don't take Mind Over Matter & Eldritch Battery by default.

It does however have Arcane Surge on by default from the ascendancies as well as Arcane Intensity in the passive tree. What these allow are the ability to scale your cast speed, mana regeneration and damage through stacking mana so it's important to try prioritise this where you can.

The Endgame Variants choose to take both of the above key passives are taken which also scales the defensive capabilities of the build as well. This requires a minimum of 800 - 1000 Maximum Mana for the Early Endgame Variant and recommended 2500+ Maximum Mana for the Mid/Late Endgame Variants.

8th December / v0.1

11th December / v0.2

12th December / v0.3

13th December / v0.4

14th December / v0.5

18th December / v0.6

19th Dec. 2024 / v0.7

20th Dec. 2024 / v0.8

22nd Dec. 2024 / v0.9

23rd Dec. 2024 / v0.9.1

24th Dec. 2024 / v1.0

25th Dec. 2024 / v1.1

28th Dec 2024 / v1.2

• Added Amulet Annointments.

6th Jan. 2025 / v1.3

• Updated Starter Uniques.
• Updated Starter Levelling Path.
• Added Attribute Priority.
• Optimised Passive Trees for Starter & Early Endgame.
• Updated Campaign Rewards.
• Added Blasphemy to Skill Info.
• Updated T16+ Passive Tree & Equipment.

7th Jan. 2025 / v1.4

• Added Gem Quality Priority to all Variants.

12th Jan. 2025 / v1.5

• Added Pinnacle Variant (Work In Progress).
• AddedSigil of Power to Weapon Set 2.
• Updated T16+ Passive Tree & Equipment.

15th Jan. 2025 / v1.6

• Added Gem Socket Priority to all Variants.

16th Jan. 2025 / v1.7

• Added Sigil of Power to all Variants.
• Updated all Variants Passive Trees.