3.19 Lillianwinters' EA ballista elementalist (40M+ Sirus dps) easy to play, strong boss/mapping

Uber Elder - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLXnj6ldDzk&t=10s
Sirus - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rS9-Nb83qKQ
Maven - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MA_2_oGmRwQ&t=3s
70% quantity feared - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHzNsUuKs8A
Searing exarch (Avoiding balls) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNgKRs5AjVU
Eater of worlds - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmR180ytjZg

*High DPS
*Amazing for bossing (200+ maven's dead and counting)
*Good survivability, spell suppression, max res and high armour/evasion
*Easy to play
*Good with low gear, can be minmaxed for a lot of potential


*Things don't die instantly due to fuse stacking needed.
*Good loot filter needed as have to backtrack for drops sometimes

Okay here we have a list of the various items that I believe are important, as well as the priorities that you need.

I must stress to avoid "adds # to # fire damage" on ANY item at all costs. It will drastically reduce the damage you deal due to elemental equilibrium

Bow:

+2 to socketed bow gems
+1 to socketed gems
T1 attack speed
Fire damage over time/Fire as extra chaos (Both can be achieved easier with multi-craft

You may start off with a quill rain or storm cloud.Realistically you want to prioritise a short bow for this after with a 6L and eventually as your funds are higher swap over to a thicket bow.

Short bow would be crafted via shrieking essence to get the +2/+1 however this means it is a lot harder to get the attack speed mod. For the thicket bow you would use defeaning essence of zeal to guarantee the 18% attack speed, however the thicket bow will need a Ilvl 83+



Quiver:

There is an option for a unique beforehand, however for the most part you want a rare version with some/all of the mods below. Mine definitely has room for improvement.

Fire damage over time with attacks/damage over time with attacks(At least one of these)
Attack speed
Life
Acurracy (for 100% hit chance)
+damage with attacks
Elemental damage with attacks




Helmet:

If you cannot afford the blizzard crown, then something with Spell suppression life/resistances is good enough!

Blizzard crown
Life
9%+ fire damage
Ignites you inflict deal damage faster





Armour:

Here initially I went for a Hyrri's due to the massive increase to DPS, but as the game went on I swapped to a rare armour with better stats, spell suppression and lots of added life.

Spell suppression
Maximum life
% to maximum life
Resistances
100% global defences (For end game If you have 300+ ex to spend)



Gloves

For this, although I have written to prioritise damage over time, I avoided this as my DPS is currently around 40M, so I wanted to prioritise accuracy/attack speed above all else.

Damage over time
Accuracy(for 100% hit chance)
Attack speed
Spell suppression
Life
Resistance




To begin with something like atziri's step can be really good and cheap, it has your life requirement, 30% movement speed as well as some spell suppression. Its extremely viable until you have a few exalts to spend on a rare pair.


Boots

Movement speed
Spell suppression
Life
Resistances (Chaos res is really good to try and apply here)



Belt

The clear and obvious choice here is dyadian dawn. With attack modifier catalysts to add more damage. You'd only change this for the following:

headhunter - Cheapest of the two, better for mapping
Mageblood - A lot more expensive, really good for mapping and bosses

Though keep in mind. I lost 6M dps swapping from dyadian to mageblood.



Rings

This league has given us an amazing ring that is really good, it gives the ability to cover enemies in ash, which increases the damage taken by enemies in relation to fire damage as well as high resistances, however you need to make sure it is in the LEFT slot

As for the other ring, you want something with 20/32% flammability and the other stats should be whatever you lack.


Life accuracy
Curse on hit with flammability
Resistances
Elemental damage with attacks (or # to # damage)



Amulet

I apologise in advance, I don't have a +2 amulet to link with DOT, however I have found it hard to upgrade considering how strong ashes of the star has been. The increased quality boosts all my auras and 20% reservation allows me an extra aura too.

a +2 amulet with 26% DoT would put me from 38.5M dps up to 46M dps

We also want to allocate watchtowers (Silver/Silver/Indigo)


+1 to all skill gems/fire skill gems (At least 1, both is high cost but very good)
Damage over time mulitplier
Life
Accuracy
Resistance

6L bow with ignite profileration:

Lifetap support (I use this for everything, no mana needed)
Explosive arrow
Divergent ballista totem support (Longer range attacks for bosses than normal variant)
Ignite proliferation (Needed for the ignite spread if don't have it elsewhere
Burning damage Support (+1 to fire skills, upgrade to awakened later)
Swift affliction (More damage than deadly ailments, upgrade to awakened later)


6L bow when you have ignite spread on cluster/gloves:

Lifetap support (I use this for everything, no mana needed)
Explosive arrow
Divergent ballista totem support (Longer range attacks for bosses than normal variant)
Elemental damage with attacks (Upgrade to awakened later, I could swap this to empower lvl 4 for even more damage, upgrade to awakened later)
Burning damage Support (+1 to fire skills, upgrade to awakened later)
Swift affliction (More damage than deadly ailments, upgrade to awakened later)

Now on to the 4L items, there is a lot of variations, some enjoy using culling strike with arcanist brand, or flammability with frenzy etc, so these are personal preference to me.

6L armour:

Precision (Later upgrade to divergent later which adds increased damage)
Defiance banner (Later upgrade to anomalous quality, very expensive but adds more armour/evasion) so start with normal defiance
Grace
Purity of elements (Later upgrade to anomalous quality for increased effect of the aura)
Determination (Upgrade to divergent later for added evasion rating)
lvl 4 enlighten

If you cannot afford the lvl 4 enlighten, leave precision at lvl 1 and perhaps not use purity of elements if you cannot get the reservation through jewels/clusters or such.

4L helmet

Lifetap support (I use this for everything, no mana needed)
Frenzy (Adds attack speed which results in damage)
Greater multiple projectiles (Hits multiple targets at once, can hit bosses easier off screen)
Divergent culling strike (2% life recovery on kill and 10% or less hp, a boss dies)

3L gloves + 1

Lifetap support (I use this for everything, no mana needed)
Anomalous summon stone golem (increased buff effect, nice during a boss fight for hp regen and avoiding using health potion charges)
Divergent culling strike (Same as before, maybe a waste as the golem rarely hits anything)

Vaal haste (Put this skill on its own, helps to kill bosses quicker if you have the charges to use it.

2+2L boots

Cast when damage taken support (Allows molten shell to occasionally be autocast)
Vaal molten shell (Basically an "oh shit" button to save you from dying)

Large cluster jewel:

Prismatic heart - Means less resistances needed on gear and adds elemental damage

Smoking remains - Mostly again for the added fire damage, I could change this to another with "elemental damage" however I do enjoy the smoke cloud on kill for more survivability

Disorientating display - Highest damage output of all the leftover skills

Medium cluser jewel 1:

Sleepless sentries - Solely for the onslaught if you've summoned a totem, I am constantly summoning them so this gives my totems the buff almost constantly

OR

Ancestral reach - Its another 1.2M DPS boost, however you lose onslaught and mainly the 20% movement speed for mapping

Include this with 1 from above:

Snaring spirits - Slows the enemies and a huge DPS boost

Medium cluser jewel 2:

This cluster is mainly to allow you to remove ignite proliferation from your bow, or the "ignite spreads" from your gloves. This is a LOW priority choice and should only be taken if you do reach level 98+

Fan the flames - Allows your ignite to spread to nearby enemies, makes mapping a LOT easier

Wasting affliction - High dps output

Primatic jewel:

The chaos resistance one is the most important, my second point was only for the movement speed and quicker content clear

Chaos resistance whilst affected by purity of elements

Since you need a lot of suffixes for accuracy/spell suppression, this will help you achieve the 75% chaos resistance a lot easier.

15% movement speed whilst affected by grace

This was just for faster movement/clear it is not important you have this as it adds to the cost.

Leveling:

Bandits - Kill all

Pantheon:

This is entirely preference over anything but..

-Soul of Lunaris (movement speed, damage reduction)
-Soul of abberath (I hate burning ground)

Ascendancy order:

-Shaper of flames (This allows for 100% ignite chance)
-Mastermind of discord (Higher exposure damage towards enemies)
-Heart of destruction (Convergeance which is a higher DPS output and AoE)
-Shaper of storms (Increases damage taken by enemies)

Path of building:

Below is a POB completed and another with how I leveled. Keep in mind there are faster alternatives using skills such as arc that can easily be found on Youtube. However I tend to stick to my skills as soon as I unlock them, even if they do tend to be a little slower

End build:

This is my current build and equipment, certainly room for improvement but with dyadian dawn equipped it hits a lovely value of 38.5M dps.

If I were to equip mageblood instead for quicker movement speed

https://pastebin.com/G4idLPjL

Why did you take this skill?

Hired killer: Mostly due to me being a little lazy on the health potion usage, with these points you have attack/movement speed nodes up to it and on top of that each enemy you kill regens your life considerably to keep you alive longer

Watchtowers: Increased totem damage, you get an extra totem and since you are always placing the totems, the 6% movement speed helps you clear content even quicker

Elemental equilibrium: This is why I stressed to not take any # to # fire damage, instead you want lightning/cold as it applies a buff to the enmies to those elements and then applies -25% fire res to them (Aka more damage with your fuses)

Leveling build

https://pastebin.com/C346Ydyk

Keep in mind this is a rough guide that I made, so as you can see I got rid of a lot of the skills between "high level and end game" build.

Examples such as intuition/quickstep/heart of the oak as I had enough exalts to get all the spell suppression on my gear without needing skill points to help.