VIPER STRIKE - ETERNAL CHAMPION OF POISON (~1m Shaper DPS on a budget)

I wanted to see if it was possible to get a decent build out of viper strike (VS) without going Pathfinder. Here’s what I’ve got: 6K life, ~1m Shaper DPS. Clear speed is not bad while mapping, boss kills are also ok. My own testing is ongoing, so if you have any questions or suggestions, let me know.

Delve IGN: ThickThickViper

Pros

- ~1m shaper DPS
- Cheap to gear, options for growth
- Active playstyle
- Slap things really fast
- Added tankiness from (perma-)fortify
- Viper strike but not pathfinder (curl that mustache, it’s time to get hip)

Cons

- Can be quite squishy depending on tree paths and gear
- Mana problems while leveling
- Melee means if you don’t dodge around well you will die
- Gaining max life requires damage trade-offs

POB: https://pastebin.com/V9HJdNBS

Thanks to Say_Ten for their excellent guide, https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1623329, from which I have stolen the formatting of this guide.

Bandits: kill all

Class: duelist

Ascendancy: champ, unstoppable hero, conqueror, worthy foe, fortitude

Main skill links: VS – multistrike – added chaos damage – unbound ailments – deadly ailments – melee splash

Uniques: wasp nest x2, maligaro’s cruelty, growing agony

https://poeplanner.com/AA4AAO0ADgQAAHObLV85ivDEgrCrvqdlTb02R36E2WBBY3AR1VeXQzHawXTtBS1670CgIWB08Y9gwYuBQTXvOu0B3HfjqW7AGngNtfI1kti9bqpKyD8nKk19W6xHUUzKSl-wm7XDOiLqMgGyGc966NbndG1stUiTkJoXkoAFtQZwLiN6f3aCyAy00Ra_JpVh4lVLjDbi1e1Bwuy0xWKsbIydqoTFbzsY2zklM9npdv6PTeNfmFltzzIV_WSvRfSKONYHplc64fJF_gqNv9QjeWjBBF8_FCDvDlBHLlPTb4qvkBF7w4Lk4J_rFPZIjM89_AAAAAAA

All leveling is described in terms of passive points available to you, not character level.

20 points


40 points


60 points


85 points


95 points


115 points

Current gear



Weapons
Wasp Nest is your best bet here. Dual wield for a budget option that still does damn good damage, add a Breath of the Council or another similar stat stick for more DPS. When you get more money, work on the rolls of the Wasp Nest first (ignoring accuracy), then on the chaos roll of the Breath of the Council.


Helm
A good rare helm with life and resists is good for our purposes, as without it it becomes difficult to cap out resists, and we are already not overcapped enough for elemental weakness maps.
Unique option is Starkonja's for additional DPS at the cost of the maximum life from a good rare helm.


If you have the cash, grab a Crown of the Tyrant and vaal it for a white socket. Alternatively, grab a Crown of the Tyrant and brick it.

Body Armour
Starting out, go for a corrupted 6L with a decent life roll and res if you can get it, with the required colors. 2G 2R 2B is ideal, but 1G 3R 2B works as well, you just swap in melee physical damage and swap out Vile Toxins or Unbound Ailments or whatever the green that isn't Viper Strike.

Alternatively, you can use Cospri's Will for double curse if you want to put less reservation into Herald of Agony (see Skills section below for more discussion).


For those late in the game or with a bunch of currency, a Cherrubim's Maleficence gives a nice DPS bump, evasion, and OK life.


Gloves
Again, rare with life, res, even flat phys or attack speed. Unique option is Embalmer for DPS.


Boots
Rare with life, movement speed, and res.

Amulet
Budget choice is Maligaro's Cruelty for power charge and frenzy charge generation, as well as a bit of life and attributes. Expensive option is Impresence with Chaos.


Rings
Rares with life and res. This is also where I tend to fix my problems with Intelligence. Wasp Nests require 113, which can be a stopping point. Search for rings with an open crafting slot for INT or with INT already on them when you regear at mapping.

Flasks
Instant life flask for panic recovery. Good prefixes are Bubbling, Seething, Panicked.


Coralito's Signature for damage. It lowers your tooltip but to be honest you should be ignoring tooltip at all times with this build. This saves us a passive point not taking Perfect Agony.


Atziri's Promise for more damage and some nice chaos res.


Jade Flask bumps our evasion up significantly, letting us actually survive.


Silver Flask gives movement speed and attack speed.


Always important with flasks to make sure to have of Heat, of Warding, and of Staunching available in some combination on your three non-unique flasks. Cheapest way to get those kind of flasks is to take 10c or less, trade it for a bunch of alterations and just roll what you find. That's my opinion and method, because buying anything with Warding on it can get steep quick.

Jewels
Preferred affixes
- Increased maximum life
- Increased poison duration/chance to poison

Plus one of the below:
- Increased attack speed while dual wielding
- Increased attack speed with claws
- Increased attack speed with one handed melee weapons

This poe.trade link should give you the goods: http://poe.trade/search/tanausitatahok

Skills are listed in order of importance, with most important on the left, down to least important on the right.

Viper Strike
Viper Strike - Multistrike - Added chaos damage - Melee splash - Unbound ailments - Deadly ailments

For bosses without strong mobs, swap in melee physical damage support for melee splash to get better single target. Melee splash is basically mandatory for clearing maps or levels with any speed.

Curses and Auras
Blasphemy - Temporal chains (- Despair)

Herald of Agony - minion damage support - faster attacks (- withering touch support)

Auras and curses are bundled together here because there is a choice to be made. Basic setup is Blasphemy - Temporal Chains plus Herald of Agony in a three-link set up, with each omitting the support gems in parentheses. This should leave you with enough mana to still attack quickly and leech off mana to sustain. If mana is still a problem, remove another link from Herald of Agony and group it with Blood Rage for efficiency.

Alternative setup is to put Herald of Agony in a 4L or greater setup and cut out a curse altogether. I am still in testing here. With a 4L setup on Herald of Agony, you reserve over half your mana, meaning that even with Conqueror's Efficiency or other minor decreases in mana reserved, you will only barely be able to use one curse, and will not have enough mana to take advantage of your attack speed.

Lastly, you can use Herald of Purity
to get extra physical damage. Just be careful how much you reserve. Take extra mana leech nodes near Vaal Pact if you are having trouble sustaining.

Cast When Damage Taken

Cast when Damage Taken (low level, 5-7) - Immortal Call (also low level) - Increased Duration

Pretty straightforward. Level CWDT and Immortal Call for the level of hits that you feel like you can take. I keep mine low because I enjoy flashing lights in my face once every five seconds.

Whirling Blades

Whirling Blades - Faster Attacks - Fortify - Blood Magic - Culling strike (with quality)

Fortify is very important, and using whirling blades liberally will keep you alive and let you kill things quickly. If you take fortitude for permanent fortify, remove it from your setup and add in culling strike with quality to give greater attack speed. Using a culling strike without quality is unnecessary because anything low enough to cull is going to die to our poison soon anyway. Maybe for Uber lab farming if you want to speed up your Izaro kills. Blood magic lets us zip around with minimal concern for our mana problems and reservation.

Ancestral protector

Ancestral protector - Added chaos damage - Vile Toxins - Deadly Ailments (- Unbound Ailments, if in Embalmer gloves)

Adds some nice DPS and occasionally draws some aggro. If you keep this setup in the Embalmer gloves you get a free Vile Toxins link, so change your fourth support to Unbound Ailments accordingly.

Blood rage

Once you have Worthy Foe, taunting things outregens the degen from blood rage. The attack speed is nice, and the frenzy charge generation is mandatory if you are not using Maligaro's Cruelty.

Kill em all. Alternatively, take Alira to make gearing easier with the resists. DPS bump from Alira isn't really that great though.

CHAMPION
Unstoppable Hero -> Conqueror -> Worthy Foe -> Fortitude/Inspirational

I take fortitude last because I can survive putting up fortify through whirling blades, but it is definitely safer to take it second. If you are really good at managing fortify uptime, fortitude is unnecessary and you can take Inspirational for extra movement speed and DPS.

Conqueror and Worthy Foe let us get out of taking Immortal Technique or stacking accuracy. Worthy Foe is a massive DPS increase, so don't wait around to do labs.

Major: Lunaris/Solaris situationally
Minor: Situational. Consider Yugul, Ralakesh, or Ryslatha.

Heralds and curses
It's really up to you. I have no real sense of the DPS of the Agony Crawler from Herald of Agony, but it is probably a bunch. Whenever there are mobs, you will be at 40 or close to 40 virulence stacks. If you are afraid that the Agony Crawler is out-DPSing or out-bursting you and that makes you feel bad, reduce its links and use them elsewhere for more curses, more totem links, or ice golem on CWDT.

Vaal Pact
It could be good. Taking more leech would definitely make it easier to just go face. Possibly using Atziri's Acuity instead of Embalmer gloves would be a workaround.

Cospri's double curse with Impresence
Further testing needed. Let me come back with more currency.

Voidforge
Maybe I'll try it out later, but for now I'm a poorboi.

Help, I'm dying.

First, max out elemental resists as best you can. Second, take more life nodes, put off damage for life in most instances. Easiest way is to unspec damage nodes or travel and put them into Scion life wheel. Third, regear for more life. 90 on chest, 60-70 on rings, 70-80 on boots and gloves, 100+ on belt. Fourth, if you still can't get enough life, use fewer uniques and replace with rares with nice res and life rolls.

How do I increase my DPS?

Low level: get a better unique claw or sword or dagger.
Mid level but still in Acts: get a better unique claw and take more claw nodes. Get more links.
Mapping: Swap to wasp nests. Swap to breath of the council. Get a wasp nest with better rolls.
Uber Elder/Guardians/Shaper: the game is basically Monster Hunter for you now. Dodge skills and spend as much time going face as possible without getting your face ripped off and fed to you, poison stacks rack up.

Acrobatics or no acrobatics?

Up to you. I didn't use it while theorycrafting, then took it while leveling. Seems OK.

How do I deal with mana problems?

Situationally take more mana leech nodes near Vaal Pact or get a better mana flask if it's early on.

What's the cheapest way to gear this?

Bringer of Rain and a big pair of brass balls to keep you alive with uncapped elemental res. I do not recommend this, you should see a doctor and enjoy better survivability and DPS with a cheap 5L.

Will you help me?

Is it help if I don't know what I'm talking about? Message me in the forum or in-game for "help" from this "expert" on "Patch of Eggs, IL."