Frostbolt Cast On Crit Comet Stormweaver Endgame Build Guide
A Frostbolt Cast On Crit Comet Stormweaver for the Sorceress class unleashes a volley of Frostbolts exploding across the battlefield and freezing everything in sight.
Normally Frostbolt pierces through all enemies dealing damage only once but thanks to the Snakepit equipped in your left ring slot it no longer pierces but forks instead splitting into 2 projectiles on hitting the enemy. This way Frostbolts detonate after forking dealing damage in the area. Explosions from multiple projectiles can overlap damaging enemies many times which results in an amazing clear while mapping.
Using your Frostbolts to destroy the Ice Crystals created by the Frost Wall results in a chain reaction of many Frostbolts and Ice Crystal explosions. This is a perfect scenario for Cast on Critical supported by the Comet spell shine. Many hits with a high critical strike chance generate a ton of energy for the Cast on Critical resulting in amazing single target damage.
Early on you play a life/energy shield hybrid build. This combination is much easier to gear rather than going pure life or energy shield and creates a solid defense. Later on you switch over to Chaos Inoculation to access a larger effective health pool and makes you immune to chaos damage and bleeding. This mean you no longer need any chaos resistance on gear which makes gearing much easier.
Snakepit is the core item of this build. Without it play a Cast on Freeze variant of this build where you detonate Frostbolts with Cold Snap. Maligaro's Virtuosity is not required for the build but provides massive amount of damage because of the limited access to critical strike damage on this build.
You do not need specific resistances on any item, just get the required total resistances amongst all gear combined. You need to cap your Resistances at 75% unless otherwise specified in the guide!
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This Endgame Frostbolt Cast On Crit Comet Stormweaver build guide assumes you are at least level 68 and have completed the campaign. Learn how to get through the Campaign and level this build using our Cold Snap Frostbolt Stormweaver Leveling Guide
Skills
- Before you can afford Snakepit play a non-crit version of this build focused more on freezing enemies and triggering Comet with two Cast on Freeze setups.
- Frost Wall kills most of the enemies while mapping, especially when fighting rares. Ice Crystals created by Frost Wall detonate instantly when spawned on top of enemies.
- Cold Snap detonates Frostbolts on top of enemies and Ice Crystals created by the Frost Wall.
- Use two sets of Cast on Freeze supported with Comet. Each set requires 60 Spirit so make sure to get additional 20 on the amulet or body armour.
- Hypothermia and Frost Bomb reduce enemies resistances so make sure to keep these debuffs up 100% of the time when fighting bosses.
- Once you acquire Snakepit swap to the Cast on Critical version of the build. it is recommended for your Frostbolt to have at least 60% critical strike chance after the swap. This can be done by allocating crit nodes on the passive tree and supporting Frostbolt with the Pinpoint Critical support. Without this ring you don't hit enemies often enough to generate sufficient energy to outperform Cast on Freeze.
- Thanks to the Snakepit Frostbolt becomes an amazing clearing ability. It provides fork and makes Frostbolts detonate on impact with the enemies. Make sure to instill Split Shot on your amulet for more forking projectile. Make sure that Snakepit is equipped in the left ring slot!
- In this setup you no longer need to detonate Frostbolts with the Cold Snap so use it only to finish off frozen enemies.
- Comet triggered by the Cast on Critical provides amazing single target damage.
- It is recommended to swap from Life/Energy Shield hybrid to full energy shield build with Chaos Inoculation at this point. To recover Energy Shield use Convalescence in the 2nd weapon set to avoid extra Spirit cost. Additionally Energy Barrier forces Energy Shield Recharge to start when you get stunned while casting Frostbolt which happens very often.
- Hypothermia and Frost Bomb reduce enemies resistances so make sure to keep these debuffs up 100% of the time when fighting bosses.
- Use Shield Charge in the 2nd weapon set with wand and a shield equipped. Use this to move around faster.
- Use Cast on Freeze or Cast on Critical only in the 1st weapon set.
- Use Convalescence in the 2nd weapon set. This way you only need 120 Spirit for double Cast on Freeze or 100 for a single Cast on Critical.
- Use Hypothermia and Frost Bomb in the 2nd weapon set to benefit from additional curse and exposure effect from the passive tree.
- Put all remaining abilities ONLY in the 1st weapon set.
- For pinnacle bosses equip a Chiming Staff in the 2nd weapon set which provides Sigil of Power skill which improves your single target damage.
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Skill Rotation
- Cast Frost Wall on top of the monsters.
- Detonate Ice Crystals created by the Frost Wall with Frostbolt and Cold Snap.
- When Frost Wall is on cooldown or enemies are in inconvenient position cast Frostbolts and detonate them with Cold Snap on top of the enemies.
- Freezing enemies generates energy for the Cast on Critical which triggers Comet.
- Sigil of Power right before the boss becomes active.
- Hypothermia and Frost Bomb to reduce enemy Cold resistance.
- Cast Frost Wall on top of the boss.
- Detonate Ice Crystals created by the Frost Wall with Frostbolt.
- Many Frostbolt and Ice Crystals critical hits generate energy for the Cast on Critical which triggers Comet.
- Spam Frostbolt.
- Use Frost Wall on top of rare enemies.
- Detonate any leftover frozen enemies with Cold Snap.
Skill Leveling Priority
Key Mechanics
Critical Strike Chance And Damage
Critical strikes are core part of this build. All Cold spells have high base % Critical Strike Chance which makes it much easier to scale. Careful Assassin, Controlling Magic, Critical Exploit and 70%+ Increased Critical Strike Chance on your wand and focus should make all of your spells have 70-80% Critical Hit Chance.
High Critical Hit Chance is especially important for the Frostbolt because that's the Skill that generates the most amount of energy for the Cast on Critical. Supporting Frostbolt with the Pinpoint Critical allows you to reach 100% Critical Hit Chance without overinvesting into it.
There is a very limited amount of Critical Damage Bonus available for this build. Maligaro's Virtuosity sets your Critical Damage Bonus to 300% meaning it cannot be decreased or increased further. This means that Pinpoint Critical and Careful Assassin have no effect on it.
Snakepit And Frostbolt
Snakepit is a core part of this build. When equip in the left ring slot it makes Frostbolt no longer pierce which at first look might sound like a bad thing but it's actually a positive. Frostbolt deals damage in 2 ways; from the projectile and from the explosion which deals more damage. Normally explosion only occurs at the end of it's travel or when it hits the wall. When Frostbolt cannot pierce it is always going to explode when it hits an enemy.
Additionally Snakepit provides fork for the Frostbolt which means its' projectiles split into 2 on hitting the enemy (3 with instilled Split Shot onto the amulet). All of those projectiles if they overlap can hit the same enemy meaning that investment into Increased Area Of Effect is a good idea.
Shock Scaling
Shocked enemies take 20% increased damage from all sources. Thanks to the Shaper of Storms ascendancy node you can apply shock to enemies with the Cold damage. Strike Twice allows you to apply 2 shock to the enemy instead of one, but with lower effectiveness. Once these nodes are allocated you can start scaling increased Magnitude of Shocks and increased Magnitude of Non-Damaging Ailments you inflict.
Mana Sustain
Mana is the biggest issue of this build. While clearing mana recovery is easily fixed by equipping 2 jewels with Recover 2% Of Maximum Mana On Kill modifier.
While fighting bosses unfortunately this is not so easy. High mana cost of the Comet and high energy generation of the Cast on Critical makes mana the most limiting factor of this build single target damage. Reducing Skill level of the Comet is one way to reduce the mana cost however this is not worth it as it reduces the damage significantly.
The best way to help your mana sustain while fighting bosses is to invest into +to Maximum Mana and % Increased Mana Regeneration Rate on gear and passive tree. Arcane Surge provided by the Constant Gale node increases Mana Regeneration Rate even further. Conservative Casting passive node is especially useful. Make sure to use Saturated Ultimate Mana Flask of the Chemist with high % Increased Amount Recovered and Belt with high % Increased Flask Mana Recovery Rate modifier.
Ascendancy
Learn how to Ascend with our guides:
- Pick Scouring Winds for your first ascendancy node. It increases the effectiveness of Exposure applied by Frost Bomb which scales even further with the passive tree and Strip Away.
- Constant Gale for 10% more cast speed and 20% more mana regeneration rate. This build often struggles with mana so any additional mana regeneration is always welcome.
- Once you unlock the third ascendancy node remove the Constant Gale node and allocate Strike Twice and Shaper of Storms. Strike Twice let's you apply two shock stacks to your enemies and in combination with Shaper of Storms your cold damage can apply shock. This unlocks a new way of scaling your damage by shocking and freezing enemies at the same time.
- For the fourth Ascendancy node allocate back Constant Gale.
Passives
Click the arrows to open the full tree in a new tab.
- For the attribute nodes take enough Intelligence and Dexterity to meet gear, skill gem and support gem requirements, then use the rest on Strength for more life.
- You can use your Gold at the Hooded one or Doryani to respec and change your Attributes if a new skill or gear upgrade leaves you unable to use your skills/items.
- Cast On Freeze - Use this tree before you can afford Snakepit.
- Get as much Increased Freeze Buildup as possible to proc Cast on Freeze more often.
- All nodes colored green are used only when 2nd weapon set is equipped. Overexposure and Glaciation increases the effect of Cold Exposure applied by the Frost Bomb.
- All nodes colored red are used only when 1st weapon set is equipped. Take any damage nodes here to utilize extra weapon set passive points.
- Once you allocate Shaper of Storms start scaling Magnitude of Shocks you inflict with passive nodes like Alternating Current.
- Once you equip Snakepit swap to the Cast On Crit tree.
- Reduce the amount of Freeze Buildup in favor of Increased Critical Hit Chance from nodes like Careful Assassin and Controlling Magic.
- Psychic Fragmentation makes your Frostbolt occasionally shoot additional 2 projectiles.
- With enough energy shield gear you can allocate energy shield passive nodes. This uses Chaos Inoculation to ignore the need for Chaos Resistance and make it easy to scale your effective health pool by stacking more energy shield. Patient Barrier, Enhanced Barrier and Dampening Shield provide a sizable health pool.
- The High Budget Tree optimizes your pathing on the tree by equipping unique jewels Controlled Metamorphosis and From Nothing with modifier Passives In Radius Of Mind Over Matter Can Be Allocated.
Stat Priorities
Offensive Scaling
- The main way you scale your damage is by getting All Spells and Cold Spells levels.
- High Increased Critical Hit Chance For Spells on the wand and the Focus is extremely important for this build.
- Gain % of Damage As Extra Cold/Lightning/Fire Damage.
- % damage, like Spell Damage and Cold Damage.
- % Increased Magnitude of Shock you inflict.
- % Increased Mana Regeneration.
- + to Maximum Mana.
- #% increased Cast speed.
Defensive Scaling
- Sufficient +#% to Fire, Cold and Lightning Resistance to cap your Resistances.
- Maximum Energy Shield.
- % Faster Start Of Energy Shield Recharge.
- % Increased Energy Shield Recharge Rate.
- % increased Freeze Buildup.
If you're struggling to survive, or want to learn more about damage and defenses in Path of Exile 2 check out these additional resources:
Gearing
- As you enter the Atlas of Worlds and begin mapping, your first goal is to cap your resistances and meet Attribute requirements. You want body armour and helmet with as much Life and Energy Shield as possible such as Havoc Raiment.
- Prioritize Attuned Wand and Sacred Focus with high + to Level of all Cold Spell Skills.
- Once you acquire Snakepit and Maligaro's Virtuosity focus on getting high % Increased Critical Hit Chance For Spells.
- After that, focus on increasing your Energy Shield to increase your defense.
- Once you have sufficient Energy Shield pool increase your Mana Regeneration Rate and Maximum Mana.
Use the buttons to navigate between gear sets.
FAQ
Yes, you can use this skill for leveling. Learn how to get through the Campaign and level this build using our Cold Snap Frostbolt Stormweaver Leveling Guide
Thanks to the Shaper of Storms ascendancy node you can apply shock to enemies with the Cold damage.
While clearing mana recovery is easily fixed by equipping 2 jewels with Recover 2% Of Maximum Mana On Kill modifier.
While fighting bosses Mana is always going to be an issue but you can make it better by investing into % Mana Regeneration Rate, + to Maximum Mana, % Increased Flask Mana Recovery Rate on gear and % reduced Mana Cost of Skills on passive tree.
You only need extra +20 Spirit on Amulet or Body Armour after the Campaign to use 2 sets of Cast on Freeze. After you swap to Cast on Critical you don't need any extra spirit above 100. Make sure you use Cast on Critical only in the 1st weapon set and Convalescence only in 2nd weapon set.
The build can be pretty heavy on the attributes if you level everything. Ingenuity provides +25 Intelligence. Get extra attributes on gear. Amulets especially can provide good amount of attributes as an Implicit and on Suffixes.
NOTE: These bonuses are minor, if you picked something different for the Venom Draught, don't worry too much!
Focus on the main Atlas tree until you are able to afford the cost of expensive boss keys to take on Xesht, the King in the Mists, Olroth, Simulacrum, and the Arbiter to fill out your league mechanic points.
- This build excels at Breach due to high amount of projectiles.
- Delirium and Ritual are a bit more difficult until you go Chaos Inoculation.
- Expedition is easy so long as you avoid Cold Immunity Remnants.
- Remember to swap to Chiming Staff in your 2nd weapon set for bosses. Sigil of Power provides massive amounts of single target damage.
Summary
- Snakepit is the main component of the build. Before you can afford it follow the Cast on Freeze variant of the build.
- Cast Frostbolt to clear most of the enemy packs.
- Cast Frost Wall to deal with tougher enemies.
- Detonate Ice Crystals created by the Frost Wall with Frostbolts to trigger many Comets thanks to the Cast on Critical meta Skill.
- Scale Cold Spell levels and Critical Hit Chance on the wand and the focus to drastically increase your damage.
- Get Maligaro's Virtuosity to ignore scaling Critical Damage Bonus.
- Scale Energy Shield and pick up Chaos Inoculation to get a huge "life" pool.
- Get Recover 2% Of Maximum Mana On Kill on Jewels, % Increase Mana Regeneration Rate and + To Maximum Mana on gear to help your mana sustain.
Credits
Written by: Zen_M
Content Reviewed by: Crouching_Tuna
Language Reviewed by: Tenkiei