Explosive Trap Trickster is my Path of Exile 3.22 league starter build. I used it to complete my Atlas, collected all Voidstones, and defeated most non-uber bosses and Invitations. Includes Maven’s Invitation and other more difficult invitations. So let’s recap the full guide for this build and see what we got in terms of damage.

Skill Itself

First, our skill of choice is Explosive Trap. All explosions hit the same enemy, which is where our DPS and trap counts come from.

But you can set the number of explosions and POE Currency to hit the target. I set it to an average explosion since most enemies have a small hit range.

How We Scale?

Since we have the unique Moonstone Ring, Anathema, the build now works with 4 curses. Since we have 4 maximum Power Charges, we have a curse limit of 4.

Flammability will reduce the fire resistance of enemies. Elemental Weakness will further reduce fire resistance. Defensive curses weaken the damage the enemy can do to us. We apply this curse through Arcanist Brand and unique POE Orbs. We can also use Assassin’s Mark to increase our critical strike chance and critical strike damage against enemies.

If you want more damage, you can use penalties instead of nerfs to get more damage. We can easily spawn Power Charges and Frenzy Charges if our enemies trigger the trap. You can also give Trickster an extra 2 max Frenzy Charges so we can have 5 Frenzy Charges. We paired it with Charged Traps Support to make our trap throws as fast as possible.

Meanwhile, you need to exchange gems for stronger bosses. Because we are using Cluster Traps Support and increasing Area of Effect to clear.

I also want to fix a big problem in the build. Traps cost too much mana by default. But in Trial of The Ancestors, we can use tattoos. Builds now use 5 tattoos to provide Mana Regeneration. With these, we can spam traps all day long. But if you still have mana issues, you can always place more Mana Regeneration Tattoos on your tree.

Defense

In terms of defense, since we chose Trickster, we have access to a very interesting node, One Step Ahead, which will slow down the enemy’s movement speed. If we pair it with Summon Skitterbots, the enemies will move like snails, giving us plenty of time to react.

It’s also worth mentioning that you don’t have to worry about Freeze and Chill Immunity, as it also increases your base movement speed.

Plus, because of Trickster, we get a circular defense layer. Every 5 seconds the hit damage we take decreases accordingly. I have no problem with this. Because I designed the build in such a way that if you don’t take increased damage, you can also tank pretty much anything.

Next, we use Grace Aura to increase the dodge level so that we hardly ever die from monsters’ basic attacks or projectiles. Since we use Grace Aura, we also have access to Ghost Dance Keystone. When we take a hit, we restore 3% of our evasion rating as an energy shield.

We’ll use Immortal Call as our guard skill and cast it when we take damage. In addition, we can also buy POE Currency to invest in the body armor craft, which can help us withstand 12% physical damage.

The elemental damage wasn’t too much, but it was enough to keep us alive. Because we’re just dodging attacks, but if we’re attacked, other layers of defense come in handy so we can recover easily.

Right now, we’re pretty much untouchable by physical attacks. The only problem is the spell damage. But we can use the spell suppression on the tree. We have 61% suppression from the trees alone, so the remaining percentages are easy to reach.

Items

Next we want to talk about some important POE Currencies needed in this build. Since we use Ghost Dance, we need to use dodge and energy shield bases to get more benefit from this Keystone.

Also, trap throwing speed craft is very important to increase your damage. You’ll feel better when playing at high throwing speeds.

Our anointments are Ash, Frost and Storm. These are very cheap but powerful anointments. And Anathema, with this Moonstone Ring, we can use 4 curses. It also gives us intelligence and a little energy shield.

Eldritch Implicit Modifiers

You can also increase Eldritch Implicit Modifiers on your gear with Eldritch Ember. On your helmet, for example, to increase the mana retention efficiency of your skills, you need to have at least 8% done. Otherwise, you cannot use your aura. Another mod is to add Flammability effect, you can prioritize POE Currency usage accordingly.

You need Explosive Trap to cause two additional smaller Explosions Enchantments. On your body armor, Zealotry will increase the effect of the aura and increase the effect of the non-curse aura.

The thing to note here is that you can use the buff Endurance Charge mode every 15 seconds. It will increase your Physical Mitigation and Immortal Call duration.

Passive Tree

We use eight passive Cluster Jewels with Iron Breaker, Battle-Hardened and Force Multiplier. Medium Cluster Jewel features Careful Handling or Surprise Sabotage. There is also a Medium Cluster Jewel that includes Careful Handling and Guerilla Tactics.

We also get a gem here that reduces shock effects, Pandemonium Glimmer Large Cluster Jewel. It reduces the impact effect by 95%. And Tattoos we use are Mana Regeneration Tattoos I mentioned earlier. We fixed my resistance issues with some all-elemental resistances.

Ending

Now you know what this Explosive Trap Trickster build is. There are a lot of POE items here for you to know about, and there are different ways to level up to research. You can create a game plan for which gear to use so you’re ready to take your Explosive Trap Trickster build into the expansive world of Path Of Exile.