[3.3] FIRETRAPPER (Leaguestarter, ssf-friendly)

DISCLAIMER:
this is a work in progress, Ill be updating the guide once Im confident I know what Im talking about.
check out weallgotissues' build guide which has the most discussions around firetrap!
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2150567/page/1
This is my take on a crit Firetrapper, I also plan to do a little "ssf-diary" if you want to follow my build along.



UPDATE #4 (lvl 89, carcass jack)


UPDATE #3 (lvl 80)

UPDATE #2 (finished tabula)

UPDATE #1



SKILLS
- Firetrap for AoE
- Flamethrower for ST


WHY SABO?
- I think saboteur is a very solid starting build, with high defensive options you should be able to fill your atlas nicely and be able to level the character safely to any level you choose.
- Also lots of quality of life for ssf, with chain reaction you need not worry about unique jewels.
- Ascendant looks very strong as well, especially for its versatility.


TREE

OFFENSIVE
- Lots of trap damage, some aoe and lots of good old CRIT
- Herald of Ash & Anger are a pretty sick combo but reserving 75% mana might be iffy as trapper.
- we are penetrating 65% fire resistance at max gem levels
- selfcast Flammability on bosses/rares
- bear trap is gonna be nice for bossing
- a scorching ray totem might be implented to lower boss resistances even more!
- also vaal righteous fire


DEFENSIVE
- lots of life (at least for a trapper) to work with
- depending on gear, if you feel you get hit too much, you can run grace instead of anger.
- acrobatics are always nice
- 20% life regen helps as well :D
- ideally we use dagger + shield for shieldcharge/fortify
- we have barely any evasion from tree. A good jade flask is gonna be mandatory



LINKS
you will probably want to switch out your firetrap in your 5l/6l to flamethrower in higher tier maps or generally depending on what content you run.

4-6l: Firetrap - Cluster traps - Fire penetration - combustion - trap damage - QoL gem (charged traps, crit strikes, increased area of effect for example)
4-6l: flamethrower - fire pen - conc effect - trap damage - immolate - advanced traps
4l: cwdt - immortal call - enfeeble/temp chains - increased duration
3l: flammability - faster casting - arcane surge
3l: shieldcharge - faster attacks - fortify
3l for high level bossing: scorching ray - spell totem - faster casting
useful onelinks: Your auras, golem, phase run (great for backtracking!), decoy totem, vaal righteous fire, vaal grace/haste, even enduring cry if you are into it.

There are lots of options, many depend on your personal preferences, I currently run another high lvl cwdt taken setup for my golem and my current weapon is too slow so I dont utilize shield charge for now.


PLAYSTYLE
- you know it, kite around and throw some traps.
- shouldnt get hit by any melee, so lots of movespeed and some phasing for good map clear


LEVELING

- check out ziggyDs guide https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRpIZJoxEz0&feature=youtu.be
- Also TarkeCats videos on general traps are very informative
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLh7WecqEKA
- Get a 3-linked fire trap (with multiple traps and fire pen/combustion) and 2l flamethrower going, go with sceptres for the good implicit and mainly look for added fire damage to spells.
- Only start incursions when you feel like you can clear fast enough.
- Mana isnt actually a big issue, I would suggest running clarity and anger at the start.



ASCENDACY POINTS
in order of personal softcore preference (possibly wont have access to uberlab for quite some time, depending on luck)

- pyromaniac (insta tankiness for leveling)
- perfect crime
- born in the shadows
- chain reaction/explosives expert

We get a lot of increased trigger area, just keep points in expeditious munitions as mentioned above. With 16 traps maximum and a big trigger area you probably wont have any issues.
CR und EE are very similar, EE gives pen, hence more damage, I imagine CR is gonna be better for utility.


USEFUL UNIQUES
Starkonjas Head (all the dex we need, high life, high evasion, some global crit)
Tabula Rasa (nice bridge unique until you get a proper chest)
Tinkerskin (IF you use Eldritch battery, otherwise there are plenty better chests)
The Perfect Form (best defensive chest for our build by a mile)
Carcass Jack (DPS)
Malachai's Awakening truly sick, mana problems are gone and the 200% effective damage from firetrap makes this ludacris. For tradeleague this is a cheap way to get your dps up.


SSF
- you can use rare gear in every slot, use the nicest chest you find and can 5l.
- any combination of wands/daggers/shields basically works
- capping resists is very easy, so lots of room for wonky gear.
- with saboteur you do not need to use any unique jewels, so thats always nice!


MOVEMENT
- shield charge for the fortify or
- good old lightning warp or
- phase run

General gameplan thoughts:
Pretty much rushing blood aqueducts and try to farm some gear and a tabula (gonna use a inc crit strikes gem until I have enough crit filled out on tree).

Skilltreewise Im gonna go with my alternate tree since it offers more damage.
Once I hit like 93+, with a good gem setup and decent gear I might just respec into acro and the scion wheel for the tankiness to reach a high level easier.

Until that point I will most likely use a tabula until I respec or get a decent other 6l using charged traps as 6th link until then.

Heyyy, are u gonna give a PoB tomorrow when the new gems are out on PoB?

With gear and stuff...

Thank you.

Im gonna see if I have time.
Though I don't see the point of adding fictive gear since its generally very interchangable.
Same with gemlinks, I will have to test a lot of stuff first.

I would probably rather just wait and update my character as I prgoress on PoB.
So it might take a while until I get realistic endgame dps numbers, but since Im not very familiar with this tool and have limited time until league start I will probably only put in the basics for now.

The point of the build (at least for now and me) is to explore the new mechanics and what works and how to build a very generic and easy to gear crit trapper that ends up fairly tanky with minimal gear requirements.

Have you considered MoM instead of Acrobatics and Phase Acro, or are you too worried about mana?
If I can figure out mana, id be more comfortable with more defenses and MoM. I could see Acro being better to start.

I will try it out for sure!
It will depend greatly if we can still play comfortably w/o running too low on mana when getting hit.

But all in all I have my doubts, if we go MoM we should invest into a few good mana nodes but thats not really points I have lieing around.
With fire traps having its cost reduced significantly Im pretty confident that we can achieve 75% mana reservation and having enough mana and regen remaining w/o MoM.
If we went MoM I would definately not feel too great reserving that amount of the mana pool.
Having MoM also adds another layer to your gear since max mana and % regen becomes more of a priority on gear.
What would be sweet though is we could get anger or any 50% aura on an essence worm, leave the mana 100% free so we can utilize the "mind over matter" jewel.
But thats not really too easy for ssf, but a nice option for tradeleague!
Also, MoM + Eldritch Battery might synergyse well, maybe then even tinkerskin might be good enough again.

And as I pointed out, I will not go for acrobatics until much later, so sadly I wont be able to test that out until then.

Im also thinking a perfect form unique chestpiece should be insanely good for survivability.
We get a free AA, and all the acrobatics node are mainly worth it for phase acro, making this chest synergise greatly. Also a nice amount of flat evasion!
https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/The_Perfect_Form

e: with the perfect form you can even do a supertanky hybrid endgame skill tree.
This is definately doable longterm in ssf if you dont get unlucky with tul blessings drop.

Hey, thx for the build.
What weapon should we use?

Unfortunately I dont have enough time to do anything today, real life got in the way :E

But I will play all day tomorrow, gonna progress until at least blood aqueducts.

T0miii, if you are playing trade league doryianis catalyst should be nice until you get a gg endgame weapon.
Other than that just go for a rare dagger/sceptre/wand, depending what movement skill you want to use.
Look for Crit chance, crit multi, trap damage, area damage, spell damage, elemental damage, added x-x to spells cast speed helps a bit with Flamethrower.

A whole lot of useful stats this build can utilise, finding good gems shouldnt be too hard either, but I will write a list with all useful mods eventualy!

small update:

Its a lot hotter here than anticipated, only really playing at night :D
I expect to get to aqueducts today.
I updated the leveling section, so far leveling is a breeze once you get your 3l going ^^

Alright, finally got to Blood Aqueducts, updated the build again.
I already found 2 humilitys in a lvl 3 armor area in the incursion temple.
So it shouldnt take too long to get geared for maps!