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PoE 2 Build

Trinity Thorns Tactician - Leveling & End Game Guide

0.3 TTE

Tactician

Mercenary

Verified

By KallTorak

Updated on Nov 20, 2025

Nov 20, 2025

Build Overview

Hey guys, KallTorak here! I'm an Off-Meta creator with an affinity for silly goose time builds! This is my Thorns Tactician build for leveling through the campaign & end game.

Watch This Before League Starting Thorns!!!!

For years now monsters in ARPGs have gotten too used to the idea of hitting us with no repercussion. Thorns is a really fun playstyle where you take damage to deal damage! However that isn't the only way we deal damage. Thorns is a very diverse playstyle that can be used to enhance many different skills in the game. Crown of the Pale King makes it to where all hits we take deal thorns damage and proc us Barbs and Quill Burst. This helmet is required to play thorns, so if you are SSF do not play this build until you have it. Thorns builds play no different than your standard melee skill builds, we just take advantage of the fact that melee characters are always getting pummeled with lots of blows!

Videos
An Introduction To Thorns
Trinity Thorns Guide
POE NINJA

Streams

Leveling Stream #1
End Game Stream #1
End Game Stream #2

Strengths and Weaknesses

Thorns is cool. Take damage to deal damage!
Fun and Fast Leveling
Tacticians A Solid Plan combined with Matsya is 75% reduced spirit reservation! This allows us to stack spirit gems with many Thornskin II for maximum thorns damage!

Not SSF / League Start Friendly. Crown of the Pale King is REQUIRED for thorns.
Gotta take damage to deal damage. Always risky in a game with so many one shots. This requires us to invest heavily into defenses.
Not the cheapest thorns leveling build. Requires lots of Greater Rune of Tithing ,. spirit gems, and uniques. Good for 2nd characters.

Build Variants

Leveling

End Game

Do not start your thorns leveling journey without Quill Burst and Barbs I / Barbs II. Leveling without these support gems makes thorns horribly slow. They are unfortunately gated behind Uncut Level 3 Support Gems right now. If you are league starting you can trade for these.

Do not start your Trinity thorns leveling journey without Uncut Spirit Gems. The moment you get your first ascendancy point A Solid Plan with Matsya you have 75% reduced spirit reservation. You will be able to use so many spirit gems. These can be expensive. Level 4 through level 7 spirit gems can be traded for through Ange with the currency exchange.

Equipment

Leveling

End Game

Set 1

Set 2

Equipment Priority

Helmet

Crown of the Pale King

Body

Enfolding Dawn

Boots

Briarpatch

Gloves

Painter's Servant

Main Hand

Matsya

Amulet

Beacon of Azis

Required Leveling Gear

Crown of the Pale King. You can't play thorns without it. Try and get one with 3 sockets.
Matsya allows us to stack many spirit gems for Thornskin II. You will use this forever. Get one with 3 sockets.
Briarpatch 25% FLAT critical hit chance is insane. You will use this forever once you put it on so invest into this early. Try and get one with 3 sockets.
Painter's Servant since we are leveling elemental thorns these are required. We use these forever because of Trinity. Try and get one with 3 sockets.
Greater Rune of Tithing are required for leveling with this style. You will want as many sockets as possible with as many runes of tithing as possible. The only slot you dont put these in are weapon and helmet.
Enfolding Dawn gives us a lot of spirit from the start of the game. Lets us stack spirit gems for Thornskin II. This is the only item you will eventually replace when we get to end game. Try and get one with 4 sockets.
Beacon of Azis gives us spirit and makes our elemental damage crits ignore resistances. Almost all our damage is elemental damage.

Important Stats For Leveling

Cap Elemental Resistances
Maximum Life
Armour
Chaos Resistance
Grants 1 Additional Skill Slot - Unset Ring
Thorns Damage %

Jewels

Heart of the Well - Look for % increased thorns damage based off armour on body armour and % increased armour. Can also get % increased thorns crit chance. Lots of good stats to get here but these are the best ones to look for.
Sapphire % damage taken from mana before life (try and get 8% on jewels), % increased elemental damage, % increased critical damage bonus.
Ruby % increased thorns damage, % increased armour

Skill Gems

Leveling

End Game

Support Gem Requirements:

Str 65

Dex 15

Int 10

Expand all

Tempest Flurry

Killing Palm

Scavenged Plating

Mana Remnants

Time of Need

Iron Ward

Herald of Ash

Herald of Ice

Arctic Armour

For leveling don't worry about increasing the gem level of most of your spirit gems. Get them at level 4 and just put Thornskin II in them. They are just auras for more thorns damage. Just get as many spirit gems as possible during leveling!

Passive Tree

Leveling

End Game

main:

123

set 1:

set 2:

Trials For Ascendancy

There is a lot of misconception on Trials of Sehkimas and thorns. It is a lot easier than you would expect once you understand block and active block via raise shield. I have an entire video about it HERE!.

Blocking a hit in Path of Exile will fully negate its damage. However, you will still retaliate your thorns damage. This is key to clearing Sehkimas as thorns. Doesnt matter if its with passive block or active block from raise/resonating shield. Add on relics with % to honour resistance and % increased maximum honour. Honour resistance caps out at 75%. With a high enough block % you can walk through trials with ease, especially with honour resistance capped.