Here are our Top 10 League Starter builds for PoE 3.22 Trial of the Ancestors League. The Maxroll team decided on the following builds and guides for players looking to League Start in a Softcore Trade setting, so we've focused on builds with great early game scaling. With Skill Tattoos, Support Gems and new Uniques there could be some surprises waiting to be discovered after launch! Check out our top 10 builds (in no particular order) below!
If you prefer to only live once, check out our Top 5 Hardcore Ancestor League Starter Builds.
Righteous Fire Inquisitor
This build uses Righteous Fire to clear and Fire Trap for single target. Inquisitor is an excellent Ascendancy which applies Life Regeneration to your Energy Shield and gives significant Elemental Damage bonuses. An Inquisitor consecrates the ground beneath his feet, so a reliable source of Life Regeneration is never far, simply stop moving for a moment and you'll feel the soothing affects of holy healing.
The world must be cleansed of impurity, and you're just the exile to do it! In comparison to Juggernaut, a Righteous Fire Inquisitor needs to pay closer attention to their defenses in the early game, especially when it comes to Physical and Chaos damage. But you have a much easier time scaling your damage and a smoother pre-map experience.
Pohx goes over everything you need to know about how to level and gear your Righteous Fire Inquisitor on his Wiki. All you need to do is begin burning your way through the atlas!
Why Inquisitor instead of Juggernaut? Inquisitor has a stronger leveling experience, and as a result it's a bit more new player friendly. Juggernaut is still a great choice if you'd prefer to play that!
Boneshatter Juggernaut
The Boneshatter Skill deals damage to enemies based on your Trauma stacks. However in exchange, you take damage per Trauma stack on you. Therefore playing a Juggernaut is ideal, you are an immovable object to Trauma's unstoppable force. The faster you Attack the more damage you both take and deal, which means this build has insane potential provided you're able to survive the damage you deal to yourself.
The Boneshatter Juggernaut League Starter is an Unstoppable force of skull crushing Rage combined with an immovable chunk of steel, tanking and obliterating everything in reach. Just keep an eye out for Stun Immune monsters as those really put a damper on your AoE.
If you like doing damage as much as you enjoy taking it, head over to our Boneshatter Juggernaut League Starter guide immediately. Because pain is the game, and you're going to be a winner!
Your boss damage starts a bit low, but ramps up with gear. Watch out for degeneration effects like Bleed and Ignite.
Corrupting Fever Champion
Hit enemies while under the effects of Corrupting Fever to inflict Corrupted Blood. This Physical debuff stacks up to 10 times dealing damage in an extremely efficient manner, because Corrupting Fever costs a large chunk of your Life you can use it to proc Adrenaline from the Champion Ascendancy. This build is all about being a tanky speedster, and can even be converted into a Magic Find build later but doesn't have as much single target damage as many other options on this list.
Corrupting Fever Champion is a top League starter mapping build focused on speed, explosions and survivability. Attack with Spectral Throw hurling your Weapon outwards and scything through enemies applying Corrupting Fever stacks causing them to Bleed. Slain enemies to explode with Haemophilia for an explosive finish! This guide holds your hand to take you from the Twilight Strand all the way to blasting through maps at a break neck speed.
To get blasting read all about Corrupting Fever Champion with our complete League Start Guide.
Remember to use a skill that costs life to keep your Corrupting Fever active. Many players enjoy this build, but some may feel uncomfortable with the sense of being on a timer, and needing to attack to keep your Corrupting Fever active.
Cold DoT Elementalist
This build combines Vortex, Creeping Frost, and Cold Snap to deal with everything from regular enemies to the toughest bosses Wraeclast has to offer. Elementalist offers AoE and lowers enemy Cold Resistance making it easier to do damage. Furthermore, Chilled enemies move slowly, making their attacks easier to avoid. Because you combine the damage from multiple skills, this build requires very little gear to get going.
The Cold DoT Elementalist is a league start all-rounder that is capable of handling everything PoE has to offer. You're a Spell casting Damage over Time specialist with a focus on Chilling enemies and spreading your Chilling Ground through every arena.
If you're excited to play Cold DoT Elementalist as your League Start build check out our full guide to learn about key mechanics, leveling, skills, and progression of this exceptionally well rounded build.
This is a great starter, but has quite a few buttons. However, you don't need to press them often and your main damage can be put on left click.
Toxic Rain Pathfinder
Toxic RainBallista Pathfinder is good at 3 things; being tanky, doing damage, and preventing you from seeing anything on your screen. Playing a Pathfinder feels like wearing a Mageblood, and now you even get the option to have a permanent Life Flask! You're able to focus on moving around and dodging boss mechanics while your Ballistae kill things, just remember to drop them from time to time to keep your damage output at maximum.
The Toxic Rain Ballista Pathfinder abuses clever game mechanics coupled with absurdly strong Unique Flasks to form the ultimate League Start All-rounder. If you want a build that fires countless arrows that cover the whole screen in Chaos pods using their mechanical contraptions, look no further.
To find out more about the mechanics of league starting Toxic Rain Ballista Pathfinder be sure to carefully read our guide.
Some players may not enjoy the playstyle of Ballista DoT, but having great flask uptime makes this Pathfinder build still feels great.
Explosive Arrow Elementalist
Big booms are the name of Explosive Arrow Elementalist's game. Ballista Totem Support stack Fuses on your enemies, when the Fuses reach 20 stacks they explosively combust, Igniting the target. Avoid any source of Piercing, as this causes your arrows to pass through a target without leaving a Fuse. The build has no required items, and scales well off of incredibly common Uniques such as Quill Rain.
The Explosive Arrow Ballista Elementalist is a well-rounded Leaguestarter. It kills bosses with huge Ignites and clears whole screens of monsters with the Ignite Proliferation Support.
This is a powerful build, balanced by a few intricate mechanics. So pay close attention when following our Explosive Arrow Ignite Ballista Elementalist League Starter Guide and you'll have a great time!
Some players may not enjoy the playstyle of Ballista DoT, but the clear is still quite smooth thanks to ignite proliferation.
Impending Doom Pathfinder
Curse enemies, then overwrite your Curses to trigger Impending Doom Support unleashing a blast of damage! Pathfinder is perfectly suited for Chaos Damage over Time builds, and specializes in Flask uptime so it feels like wearing a Mageblood from day 1. This build has great coverage, solid damage, and impressive defenses. As a Pathfinder you're well positioned to swap to powerful endgame builds like Poison Spark after you farm some currency.
The Impending Doom Pathfinder Curses enemies, Poisoning them and causing a chain reaction of Chaos proliferation to melt the entire screen in a very satisfying manner. It is great at mapping with enough damage to take down all of the end game bosses in the game. If you are looking for a build that causes the entire screen to melt, look no further!
This build is a little more difficult to play, and careful cursor positioning is required to maximize your overlaps, and therefore your damage. To find out more head over to our Poison Impending Doom Pathfinder League Start guide!
Remember to correctly position your Impending Doom to maximize overlaps and therefore damage.
Lightning Arrow Deadeye
The Lightning Arrow Deadeye fills your screen with projectiles. With the recent inclusion of Projectiles on the skill tree, Bows are in a great place. This build doesn't have many defenses in comparison to many of the other builds on this list, but also doesn't need them as you can safely attack from a distance. After you've finished with the League Starter version you can use the currency you farmed to transition into our midgame guide.
If you're looking for a great ranged bow build, the Lightning Arrow Deadeye League Starter stacks flat Elemental Damage to achieve high DPS while speeding through the campaign and maps. The Lightning Arrow Deadeye League Starter is a mapping beast capable of farming at high efficiency with a mid-range budget. If you want a fast build that fires countless projectiles which Chain through every enemy this is the build for you!
To find out more check out our full Lightning Arrow Deadeye League Starter Build Guide!
Lightning Arrow Deadeye is a great bow build that excels at clearing quickly. However it has less defenses than many other builds on this list.
Detonate Dead Elementalist
Detonate Dead Ignite is one of the best ways to kill Bosses on a budget. The build scales its damage by increasing the Life of corpses generated by Desecrate, leaving a lot of room to gear for defenses.
The build leverages a multitude of defensive layers including Spell Suppression, Armor, Evasion, and even the Elemental Aegis from Bastion of Elements. This build won't be the fastest option on the list, but if your goal is to avoid death, slow and steady wins the race.
Zizaran's guide details the best way to use Detonate Dead Ignite Elementalist to take down bosses by guiding you through the gearing and providing comprehensive notes on how to level.
This build offers supreme defenses, but it's a 2-button playstyle and clears a bit more slowly than many other builds on this list, so it's ideal for Exiles looking to fight bosses.
Hexblast Mine Saboteur
If you want to kill bosses, you can't go wrong with HexblastMine Saboteur. The build leverages Hexblast's unique interaction with Curses to lay waste to a wide area. By leveraging damage shifting, the build is able to maintain solid defenses to compliment the damage. The return of Sanctum's Sandstorm Visage offers great endgame damage scaling, however we don't know how available or expensive the item may be.
The Hexblast Mines Saboteur is a League start All-rounder that excels at having high damage across the board, at every level of gear. It maps well, while having more than enough damage to take down all end game bosses. If you want a build that fills the whole screen with purple explosions, look no further!
The build has rather complex mechanical interactions, so before you play be sure to thoroughly read through our Hexblast Mines Saboteur League Start Build Guide.
Mines are certainly an acquired taste that's not for everyone, but for those who can stomach it, Hexblast mines reward players with extremely high levels of damage.
Featured Content Creators
If you want more content from any of the above creators, here's where you can find them:
Hungry for More?
New Support Gems
3.22 New Guides
New Atlas Keystones
Those are our top 10 Ancestor League Starter builds, but which build will you pick? There's a lot to look forward to in Trial of the Ancestors, and you haven't already done so, check out our ExileCon Wrapup for some Path of Exile 2 news. Then head over to our Discord and select the Path of Exile role in #roles to stay up to date with our content development. Stay sane, Exile!
Written by: Tenkiei
Contributions by: The entire Maxroll Path of Exile Team
Reviewed by: Xtra37