PoE 3.25 Flicker Strike Slayer Build

Flicker Strike has always been one of the meta builds in Path of Exile. When used, your character zips through packs of monsters and kills them with ease. Although it is not exactly a build that you’d want to start the league with, the Slayer ascendancy class allows you to take advantage of Flicker Strike in a way that doesn’t involve a ton of investment to begin with.

In this build guide, you will learn how to create the Flicker Strike Slayer. This guide teaches you what items you’ll need and the gems you’re going to work with. A Path of Building (POB) link will also be included so that you can try this build yourself.

So without further ado, this is our complete build guide for the Flicker Strike Slayer in Path of Exile 3.25 Settlers of Kalguur League!

Why Slayer?

In Path of Exile 3.25 Settlers of Kalguur, Grinding Gear Games (aka GGG) has completely removed Raider from the game. It has been replaced with an entirely new ascendancy class and it has vastly different notable passive skills compared to the one it replaced. For this reason, only the Slayer remains the best option for Flicker Strike or Flicker Strike of Power.

The Slayer is an ascendancy class in Path of Exile that’s all about destroying enemies before they even hit you. This class has some very interesting notable passive skills that truly complement Flicker Strike.

The first is Impact - an ascendancy node that increases your accuracy rating and melee strike range. Moreover, you deal up to 15% more melee damage to enemies based on proximity. This means that the closer the foe is to you, you deal increased damage to them. With Flicker Strike, you’re pretty much up close and personal with the enemy anyway, so you’ll always take advantage of everything Impact has to offer.>

After finishing the second labyrinth, you can take Bane of Legends. With this, you’ll have no problems taking on unique enemies because your Flicker Strike Slayer can deal 20% more damage. On top of that, this notable ascendancy passive skill provides you with 10% more damage if you’ve killed an enemy recently. Because of how Flicker Strike is used, you’ll be slaying enemies 90% of the time, therefore, this damage bonus is active almost always. As an added bonus, you cannot take reflected physical damage. This enables you to run maps with the reflected physical damage mod without worry.

For your third ascendancy notable, you have a couple of options depending on your current equipment. If you don’t have the endgame gear yet, you can take Brutal Fervour. This is essentially the life overleech that Path of Exile players are talking about. If you don’t know, you’re constantly leeching life and mana from your enemies because of your gear. Brutal Fervour just makes it so that the life leech effects are not removed even if your HP is already full. Besides that, this ascendancy node increases maximum recovery per life leech by 100%. You take 10% reduced damage while leeching as well.

If you have access to Replica Farrul’s Fur, then it’s recommended that you take Masterful Form over Brutal Fervour. The reason is that Masterful Form increases your maximum Frenzy Charges by one. But more importantly, your maximum Endurance Charges are always equal to the number of Frenzy Charges you have. For example, if you have seven Frenzy Charges, then the Endurance Charges you have are about seven as well.

The Endurance Charge has become even more potent in Patch 3.25 due to the fact that it now grants 4% additional elemental damage reduction rather than just 4% to all elemental resistances. For this reason, stacking Frenzy Charges with Replica Farrul’s Fur is the most optimal way of improving both the offensive and defensive aspects of this build.

In the endgame, the Flicker Strike Slayer will utilize a high critical strike chance to decimate your opponents. For this reason, the last ascendancy notable passive should be Overwhelm. This passive actually serves two purposes. For one, it reduces the critical strike multiplier of nearby enemies by 30%, thus improving your survivability.

Furthermore, your base critical strike chance for attacks with weapons is 8%. Voidforge is your endgame weapon for this build. This thing has a base critical strike chance of 5%. With Overwhelm allocated, that 5% chance is increased to 8%, which is quite huge in calculating your overall critical strike chance.

Once you have enough currency, you can take all of the five ascendancy notables mentioned above by purchasing a couple of Forbidden Jewels with a matching modifier. Purchase the most inexpensive set you can find.

The only major disadvantage of the Flicker Strike Slayer is that it doesn’t have an easy way to cap spell suppression. But, this is not to say that you cannot achieve 100% spell suppression; you just have to truly invest in it through your gear.

Basics

Flicker Strike is an attack skill in Path of Exile. When used, you teleport to nearby enemies to deal damage while looking so cool in the process! Now, the said skill has an innate cooldown, but this can be bypassed by spending a Frenzy Charge. Since you have so many ways to generate the charges, you’ll have no issue with Flicker Strike’s cooldown whatsoever!

In the 3.25 Settlers of Kalguur expansion, Flicker Strike receives a massive damage increase in that its effectiveness of base and added damage are now set to 177%-408% (compared to just 142%-210% previously).

On top of that, the skill now only costs 8 mana at gem level 20 rather than 10 at all gem levels prior to this update. This alleviates the need for mana reservation mods, particularly when struggling to activate all of the auras that this build needs.

Now, the most important unique item that elevates Flicker Strike to new heights is Replica Farrul’s Fur. Unlike its normal variant, this version grants you Endurance Charges rather than Power Charges for improved survivability and damage.

Replica Farrul’s Fur should be paired with a rare item (most commonly a crafted Unset Ring) that has the “Aspect of the Cat” skill. This will be discussed at length in the gear section of the build guide.

Next to that is Voidforge. This unique two-handed sword allows you to deal incredible amounts of pain. With this equipped, you gain 700% of the weapon’s physical damage as extra damage of a random element (fire, cold, and lightning).

Also in Patch 3.25, GGG made significant changes to how Rage (the resource) works in Path of Exile. It now provides you with even more damage, though this comes at the cost of not having any bonuses to attack speed and movement speed.

Moreover, Rage is much easier to build and sustain now, particularly when you equip Kaom’s Spirit, and invest in some life regeneration mods to maximize the effect of these gloves.

You can replace Kaom’s Spirit with self-crafted double-influenced Spiked Gloves. These gloves do not give you Rage generation. However, they do provide you with one additional maximum Frenzy Charge and the mod “Non-Vaal Strike Skills Target 1 Additional Nearby Enemy,” which is pretty insane for map clearing. You can refer to our ultimate crafting guide for information about how to craft these gloves yourself.

With the Transfigured Gem, Flicker Strike of Power, you have a way to generate Power Charges as well. This gem is very powerful, especially early on when your critical strike chance is not capped at 100% yet.

In addition, the Flicker Strike of Power has been buffed with the same values as that of its base counterpart. This is primarily useful if you are still in the process of gearing your character since Power Charges increase your critical strike chance (for more damage).

Because of the gear you’re going to equip for this build, you can stack the following mods to improve your damage:

• Added Physical Damage
• Critical Strike Chance
• Critical Strike Multiplier
• Increased Elemental Damage
• Added Elemental Damage (preferably cold)
• Increased Attack Speed

Playstyle

This build is pretty fun to play! When you arrive in a new map or area, you activate Blood Rage for a sizable boost to your attack speed, as well as the ability to gain Frenzy Charges on kill. Then, you simply hold the right mouse button (where the Flicker Strike skill should be) and move around the map searching for packs of monsters. Then, watch your character slice through them without a problem! If no foe is around, use Leap Slam until you find one.

The Flicker Strike Slayer now has a much smoother gameplay because of the removal of the melee totems, Ancestral Protector and Ancestral Warchief, in Patch 3.25. Although you have lost a bit of power, you have gained more utility as a result. As to what this increased utility is, it will be discussed later in the build guide.

Gear

The Flicker Strike Slayer is a build that’s mostly composed of unique items, with only two or three rare pieces of gear. Here are the things that you need to equip in order to enjoy this build to the fullest:

Weapon

Voidforge is arguably the best weapon for the Flicker Strike Slayer; only bested by a Paradoxica and rare shield that requires a ton of investment to obtain. This weapon has all of the goods that perfectly suit the build, such as:

• 5-8% Increased Attack Speed
• 90-100 to Maximum Life
• Your Elemental Damage Can Shock
• Gain 700% of Weapon Physical Damage as Extra Damage of a Random Element
• 20% Increased Area of Effect for Attacks
• Deal No Non-Elemental Damage

The main highlight of this weapon is the “700% of physical damage as extra damage of a random element” mod. By scaling flat physical damage, Voidforge has the power to eliminate enemies that dare stand in your way.>

What’s more, your damage can shock enemies, making them take even more damage. The 20% increased area of effect also helps with map clear since it enables you to hit more monsters at once.

Voidforge can be obtained by defeating the Uber Elder. Alternatively, they can be purchased with Divine Orbs from the PoE trade website.

Body Armor

This build without a doubt cannot function as comfortably as it can be without Replica Farrul’s Fur. This unique Triumphant Lamellar grants the following:

• 100-150% Increased Armor and Evasion
• 80-100 to Maximum Life
• +2 Seconds to Cat’s Agility Duration
• Gain Up to Your Maximum Number of Frenzy and Endurance Charges while you gain Cat’s Agility
• You Have Onslaught while you have Cat’s Agility

Replica Farrul’s Fur requires you to have the “Aspect of the Cat” skill. This is a mod that can be added to a rare item through Beastcrafting. To open up your gear slots for better items, you should place Aspect of the Cat on a rare Unset Ring. Crafting this ring will be discussed further in the appropriate section of the guide.

If you’re still starting out, you can actually use the normal version of Farrul’s Fur. It is significantly cheaper than the replica and the only major difference is that you gain Power Charges instead of Endurance Charges.

Helmet

Because Voidforge allows you to deal more damage by scaling physical damage, the Abyssus is a good complementary piece for the build. This unique Ezomyte Burgonet not only grants flat physical damage to attacks, but also boosts your melee critical strike multiplier by a considerable degree. Here are its stats:

• 20-25 to All Attributes
• Adds 40 to 60 Physical Damage to Attacks
• 100-125% to Melee Critical Strike Multiplier
• 100-120% Increased Armor
• 40-50% Increased Physical Damage Taken

The additional attributes provided by the Abyssus certainly help you equip gems that have a high INT requirement.

The only disadvantage to wearing this unique helmet is that it increases the physical damage you take by 40-50%. For this reason, you’d want to acquire one that has below 45% increased physical damage taken so as to not make enemy attacks too dangerous.

Because of the Transfigured Gem, you no longer have to worry about any helmet enchants. As a result of this change, however, you do not have access to the “9% Increased Flicker Strike Damage per Frenzy Charge” enchantment anymore. Fortunately, the other support gems you use for the main attack skill have been buffed in some capacity, so the loss of the helmet enchant is not too big of a deal.

Gloves

Despite the nerf to Kaom’s Spirit, this pair of unique gloves is going to become popular in Path of Exile: Settlers of Kalguur mainly because it can give you a reliable way of sustaining Rage.

In case you do not know, Rage has been reworked in Patch 3.25 in that each point of Rage now provides you with “more” damage as opposed to “increased” damage. This means that the damage bonus granted by Rage is calculated multiplicatively rather than additively.

A good alternative to Kaom’s Spirit is a self-crafted pair of double-influenced Spiked Gloves, specifically one with the combined Hunter and Warlord mods. If you want to craft it, you must first obtain two pairs of Spiked Gloves – one with a Warlord influence and the other with a Hunter influence. The crafting process is a bit lengthy, so we will divide the crafting process into three to make it easier for you to follow.

For the Hunter-influenced Spiked Gloves:

1. Use an Orb of Scouring and an Orb of Transmutation to transform the gloves into a magic (blue) item
2. Then, spam it with Orb of Alteration until you get the mod “Non-Vaal Strike Skills Target 1 Additional Nearby Enemy.” This may take about 1,000 Orbs of Alteration, so be patient
3. Once you have the mod, use a Regal Orb to turn it into a rare (yellow) item. Then, set it aside for now
4. Alternatively, if you have a ton of Wild Crytallised Lifeforce (Purple), you can utilize Harvest Reforge Attack to get the same mod as well

For the Warlord-influenced Spiked Gloves:

1. Follow the same step as above to achieve a magic (blue) item
2. Spam the gloves with Orb of Alteration until you get the mod, “+1 to Maximum Frenzy Charges”
3. Use Regal Orb to turn into a rare (yellow) item

Now that you have the influenced modifiers that you need, the next step is to use an Awakener’s Orb to combine the two. Doing this not only merges both of the mods together but it will give you a bunch of random affixes as well. If you still have open slots, you can use your Crafting Bench or Exalted Orbs to fill them up.

After following the above steps, you should have something like this:

Since both of the desired influenced modifiers are prefixes, you can put “Prefixes Cannot Be Changed” from the Crafting Bench if you have an open suffix, then use an Orb of Scouring.

After that, lock the prefixes again and use a Veiled Orb. Bench-craft “% Increased Attack Speed While Focused” and then head to Jun to unveil. You are looking for the mod, “30% Increased Elemental Damage if You’ve Dealt a Critical Strike Recently, 22% Increased Global Critical Strike Chance.”

Once you get the said veiled modifier, bench-craft “12% Increased Attack Speed” and call it a day. To finish the gloves, use an Exalted Orb to fill the last remaining suffix.

Of course, if you do not want to go through the hassle, you can just spam Exalted Orbs after combining the two influenced gloves and be done with it.

The self-crafted Spiked Gloves are an incredible replacement for Kaom’s Spirit. Sure, you lose the ability to gain Rage, but what you get in return is something that scales really well with Flicker Strike, Replica Farrul’s Fur, and the “Aspect of the Cat” ring.

It is important to note that if you have the Hunter-influenced modifier, you cannot use Vaal Flicker Strike. Otherwise, the said prefix will not do anything.

If you’re pretty tight on budget and you’re unable to craft the Spiked Gloves yet, you can swap Kaom’s Spirit with Tanu Ahi. This thing gives you the ability to gain Adrenaline and Onslaught for more attack speed.

Boots

The Flicker Strike Slayer utilizes Frenzy Charges for offense and defense, so it’s a good idea to stack as many of them as possible. That being said, the Darkray Vectors is a unique pair of boots that increases your maximum Frenzy Charges by one, making it ideal for the build. You gain other benefits too, such as:

• 40-70% Increased Armor and Evasion
• 10% Increased Evasion Rating per Frenzy Charge
• 20-40% Lightning Resistance
• 5% Increased Movement Speed per Frenzy Charge

In addition, you have the option of corrupting the Darkray Vectors with Vaal Orbs. Here are the corrupted implicit mods worth getting:

• +1 to Level of Socketed Gems
• +2 to Level of Socketed Duration Gems
• +2 to Level of Socketed AoE Gems
• #% Increased Maximum Life
• +2 to Level of Socketed Aura Gems
• Regenerate 100 Life per Second while Moving
• +#% Chance to Suppress Spell Damage
• #% Increased Movement Speed

Ralakesh’s Impatience is a viable alternative to the Darkray Vectors. Although you lose one additional Frenzy Charge, what you do have in return is that you’ll always count as having the maximum number of all charges, these being Endurance, Frenzy, and Power Charges. This effect synergizes with other unique items.

While Ralakesh’s Impatience got a sizable nerf in the previous league with the removal of the movement speed modifier, it still remains one of the best boots to use on the Flicker Strike Slayer.

When you have Ralakesh’s Impatience equipped, you could use the Wyrmsign gloves to gain permanent Rampage. Besides that, you have the option of using Arn’s Anguish to get the effects of Brutal Charges, unlocking the ability to deal triple damage!

Rings

As previously mentioned, to unlock the full potential of Replica Farrul’s Fur, you need to craft a rare Unset Ring that contains the Aspect of the Cat Skill. To do that, get an Unset Ring with an item level of 85. Ideally, run some Alva Temples to acquire an Unset Ring that has the “+74-78 maximum mana/0-8 to Total Mana Cost of Skills” prefix so that you’ll have space for another mod.

Before you can add the Aspect of the Cat skill, you must capture Farrul, First of the Plains to unlock the recipe. Alternatively, you can purchase the itemized monster from the trade website if you don’t want to be bothered to hunt this ferocious beast yourself.

When you have the necessary stuff, you can find the crafting steps below:

If You Have Alva Temple Unset Ring:

1. Make sure that you have an open suffix to craft the Aspect of the Cat Skill>
2. If you don’t have an open suffix, use an Orb of Annulment and hope that the mana mod mentioned above is not removed
3. Once you have an Unset Ring with a suffix slot open, head to the arena located in the Menagerie
4. Interact with the huge circle at the center of the arena then place your Unset Ring
5. In the search bar, type “Farrul” and then select the said beast
6. After that, you’ll have to beat Farrul and its minions to have the Aspect of the Cat Skill added to your ring

If You Don’t Have the Alva Temple Unset Ring:

1. Get a rare ilvl 85+ Unset Ring
2. You can use essences to craft the ring. You have a few essences to choose from: Deafening Essence of Greed for life regen, Deafening Essence of Loathing for increased critical strike chance, or Deafening Essence of Spite for some INT.
3. Spam the Unset Ring with the essence of your choosing until you’re happy with the mods. Just make sure that you have an open suffix to craft Aspect of the Cat
4. After that, just repeat steps 3 to 4 above to get the desired skill.

Later down the line, you must replace the Alva Temple Unset Ring with a synthesized version that has “+1 to Maximum Frenzy Charges” as an implicit modifier. Take note that this particular piece of jewelry is not cheap, so you should be ready to spend a boatload of Divine Orbs to acquire one.

For your other ring slot, equip the Circle of Guilt. This unique synthesized iron ring can only drop from Synthesis Bosses, including the Altered Synthete, Augmented Synthete, Rewritten Synthete, and Twisted Synthete.

<p >Having said that, the ring can roll two random modifiers that affect Herald of Purity. You only need to be concerned with these ones:

• Herald of Purity has 40-60% Increased Buff Effect
• Herald of Purity has 30-40% Increased Mana Reservation Efficiency

You could replace the increased buff effect mod with “4% Additional Physical Damage Reduction while Affected by Herald of Purity” if you want more survivability.

Since Circle of Guilt is a unique synthesized iron ring, you have access to some pretty cool implicit modifiers that will enhance the damage of Flicker Strike. Obtain one with the following implicits:

• +1 to Maximum Frenzy Charges (Best)
• +# to Intelligence
• #% Increased Fire/Cold/Lightning Damage
• #% Increased Global Physical Damage
• #% Increased Elemental Damage
• #% Increased Global Critical Strike Chance
• #% to Global Critical Strike Multiplier
• #% Increased Global Accuracy Rating
• #% Increased Maximum Life
• +# to All Attributes
• #% Increased Damage with Vaal Skills
• Regenerate # Life per Second
• Regenerate #% of Life Per Second per Endurance Charge
• Gain # Life per Enemy Killed
• #% Increased Evasion Rating per Frenzy Charge
• #% Reduced Mana Cost of Skills
• #% Increased Evasion Rating

Amulet

For the amulet, the absolute best-in-slot is the Stranglegasp. It is a unique onyx amulet that allows you to insert three additional anointments for a total of four. You should anoint it with the following:

• Whispers of Doom
  • You can apply an Additional Curse
  • Requires 3x Golden Oils
• Frenetic
  • +1 to Maximum Frenzy Charges
  • Requires Azure Oil, 2x Silver Oils
• Forces of Nature
  • Attack Damage Penetrates 10% of Enemy Elemental Resistances
  • Requires Verdant Oil, Azure Oil, Silver Oil
• Disemboweling
  • 50% Increased Melee Critical Strike Chance
  • +25% to Melee Critical Strike Multiplier
  • Requires Verdant Oil, Violet Oil, Golden Oil
  • Note: Replace Panopticon with this one if you have low critical strike chance

The reason why Stranglegasp is the best for the Flicker Strike Slayer is that you can actually try to “brick” it with a Vaal Orb, thus turning it into a rare amulet. Once you do this successfully, you can then use a Tainted Mythic Orb to transform it into a random unique amulet. The resulting amulet will still have all of the four anointments present in the original!>

Now, the three unique amulets that you need to go for using the above method are Carnage Heart, Yoke of Suffering, or Replica Dragonfang’s Flight. Get any of these and you have the perfect one for the build!

If the budget is tight, you can use Yoke of Suffering for now and anoint it with Frenetic (Azure Oil, Silver Oil, Silver Oil). In fact, Yoke of Suffering has gotten a lot better with the buffs GGG has implemented in the previous league!

Belt

The Flicker Strike Slayer build can gain huge benefits from two unique belts: Mageblood and Arn’s Anguish.

Mageblood is the preferred option for a more balanced build since four of your magic utility flasks will have permanent uptime. But, Arn’s Anguish is actually not bad at all!

Equipping Arn’s Anguish gives you the ability to gain Brutal Charges instead of Endurance Charges. Each Brutal Charge grants a 3% chance to deal Triple Damage. If you have seven Brutal Charges, that translates to a 21% chance to deal huge amounts of damage to your enemies!

Keep in mind that because Arn’s Anguish converts all of your Endurance Charges, your survivability suffers as a result. But, if you just want to get as much damage as you can, then this is a great alternative to the Mageblood for sure! You just have to sort out your defenses elsewhere if you’re going this route.

If you want to keep the effects of Endurance Charges intact, you can wear Arn’s Anguish along with the Ralakesh’s Impatience unique boots.

For the budget version, you have several options to choose from. Ryslatha’s Coil increases your physical damage range so that your overall damage is more consistent.

Perseverance increases your attack damage based on your armor or evasion rating, whichever is the lowest on your Flicker Strike Slayer. Not only that but you gain Fortify for improved defense, and Onslaught for more attack speed.

The Magnate allows you to deal double damage or even triple damage if you have at least 400 strength. If you’re going to use this, you might have to put more STR mods on your gear wherever possible to take full advantage of the belt’s unique effect.

Lastly, the Belt of the Deceiver grants you the ability to intimidate nearby enemies, making them take more damage as a result. It also provides some elemental resistances, life, and global physical damage. And oh, you also take 30% reduced extra damage from critical strikes!

Flasks

Your main flasks for this build are:

• Diamond Flask
• Amethyst Flask
• Jade Flask
• Granite Flask (for bossing)
• Quicksilver Flask (for mapping)

In terms of flask mods, aim to get the following:

• 60% Increased Evasion Rating (of the Impala)
• 55% Chance to Avoid Being Shocked during Effect (for Stormshroud)
• 34% chance to Freeze, Shock, and Ignite during Effect
• 14% Increased Movement Speed during Flask Effect

If you have a Mageblood, make sure to use Enkindling Orbs until you obtain a 70% increased effect of flasks. Also, roll each of your magic utility flasks using Orb of Alteration for the “25% Increased Effect” mod.

The last flask depends entirely on your needs. If you’re new to Flicker Strike, it’s highly recommended to take a Life Flask, preferably with the “Seething” mod on it to heal your HP instantly when used.

Once you get comfortable with the playstyle, you can replace the Life Flask with a Bottled Faith. This unique Sulphur Flask creates a Consecrated Ground when activated. Monsters that step on the affected area take increased damage. Moreover, you have an increased critical strike chance against enemies that are on the Consecrated Ground.

Jewels

The Watcher’s Eye is a staple in many builds in Path of Exile. That is also the case for the Flicker Strike Slayer. Since you will be using Precision, Grace and Determination as your main auras, you should get a Watcher’s Eye containing mods that get activated whenever you have these buffs active. Here are some suggestions:

• +% to Critical Strike Multiplier While Affected by Precision
• +% to Increased Attack Damage While Affected by Precision
• Gain a Flask Charge When You Deal a Critical Strike While Affected by Precision
• % Increased Attack Speed While Affected by Precision
• % Chance to Block Attack Damage While Affected by Determination
• + to Armour While Affected by Determination
• % Additional Physical Damage Reduction While Affected by Determination
• You Take % Reduced Extra Damage from Critical Strikes While Affected by Determination
• +% Chance to Suppress Spell Damage While Affected by Grace
• +% Chance to Evade Attack Hits While Affected by Grace
• % Increased Movement Speed While Affected by Grace

Large Cluster Jewels allow you to get some incredible passive skills that are not found on the passive tree. That said, you should get a Large Cluster Jewel with the “Axe/Sword Attacks Deal 12% Increased Damage with Hits and Ailments” as a base. Then, obtain any of these mods to improve the Flicker Strike Slayer build:

• Martial Prowess
  • 20% Increased Attack Damage
  • 6% Increased Attack Speed
  • 15% Increased Global Accuracy Rating
  • 20% Increased Damage with Ailments from Attack Skills
• Feed the Fury
  • 0.4% of Attack Damage Leeched as Life
  • 30% Increased Damage While Leeching
  • 15% Increased Attack Speed While Leeching
• Fuel the Fight
  • 8% Increased Attack Speed
  • 0.4% of Attack Damage Leeched as Mana
  • 20% Increased Damage While Leeching
• Calamitous
  • 30% Increased Elemental Damage with Attack Skills
  • 10% Chance to Freeze, Shock, and Ignite
  • 15% Increased Effect of Non-damaging Ailments
• Bloodscent
  • Attack with Axes or Swords Grant 1 Rage on Hit, No More Than Once Every Second

The good thing is that the passive skills above all have the “Attack” tag on them, which means that you can roll the Large Cluster Jewel on your Harvest Bench with the “Reforge Attack” option until you get any three of the passives on the list.

To help you get a high base critical strike chance (before Power Charges), we recommend that you use Medium Cluster Jewels as well. Get one with “15% Increased Critical Strike Chance” as a base. Because the mods you are looking for have the “Critical” tags on them, you can use your Harvest Bench’s “Reforge Critical” option until you get Pressure Points and Basics of Pain. Other viable alternatives include Quick Getaway, Magnifier, and Skullbreaker.

The Flicker Strike Slayer, admittedly, does not have a high HP pool. Therefore, it is crucial that you reach ailment immunity as soon as you can. One of the ways to achieve this is by using the Stormshroud unique Viridian Jewel. When you have this inserted into a gem slot, any modifiers that increase “Chance to Avoid Being Shocked” translate to “Chance to Avoid Elemental Ailments” as well. For this reason, you want to add as many “Chance to Avoid Being Shocked” mods via flasks or base jewels until you achieve 100% ailment immunity.

Base jewels are a great way to address any deficiencies you may have with the build. That being said, here are some of the modifiers to look for when purchasing these jewels:

• +% to Critical Strike Multiplier with Two-handed Weapons
• +% to Melee Critical Strike Multiplier
• +% to Global Critical Strike Multiplier
• % Increased Maximum Life
• % Reduced Effect of Curses on You

The Lethal Pride is a timeless jewel that can provide you with a lot of amazing mods for the Flicker Strike Slayer, such as:

• 30% Increased Melee Critical Strike Chance
• +15% to Melee Critical Strike Multiplier
• 5% Chance to Deal Double Damage/li>
• You take 10% Reduced Extra Damage from Critical Strikes
• 5% Increased Strength
• 0.4% of Attack Damage Leeched as Life

As a start, purchase a Lethal Pride jewel with at least two crit chance nodes and one crit multiplier node. The double damage node, while very appealing, is only worth it if you acquire a Lethal Pride with at least three double damage nodes. Otherwise, you’re better off focusing on the crit mods instead.

When you reach the endgame, you can get your hands on the Forbidden Jewels set. Refer to the ascendancy portion of this build guide for more information.

Gems

With the items you have equipped, it is quite easy to get the right socket colors. Most of the gems used in this build require red sockets, but there are several that need blue or green sockets as well.

There are plenty of changes that affect the Flicker Strike Slayer in Patch 3.25. If you have read our guide in the past, you will find that this section, at least most of it, has changed dramatically to accommodate the adjustments GGG has made.

Body Armor

• Flicker Strike/Flicker Strike of Power
• Close Combat
• Awakened Multistrike Support
• Trinity
• Awakened Melee Physical Damage Support
• Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks/Rage Support

This is your main attack setup. Flicker Strike enables you to teleport to nearby monsters, allowing you to dispose of them in an efficient manner. The base version is already so good, so you can use it well into the endgame.

However, Flicker Strike of Power is not bad at all, especially if you still do not have access to good gear yet. In Patch 3.25, both Flicker Strike and Flicker Strike of Power have gained even more damage thanks to the buffs implemented by GGG in the Settlers of Kalguur expansion. If you’d like recommendations, we recommend Flicker Strike of Power if you still do not have access to good gear yet. Swap to the base version when you have Replica Farrul’s Fur and the other items mentioned above.

Now, it is important to note that Flicker Strike of Power now uses Power Charges instead of Frenzy Charges to bypass the skill’s cooldown. That is why you still need to have a relatively high base crit chance, with at least 65% as the bare minimum, to ensure that you gain enough Power Charges to keep your Flicker Strike up at all times.

Close Combat is a support gem that grants you more damage against enemies based on how close they are to you. This gem is a perfect complement to the build because Flicker Strike teleports you to melee range to hit your foes. Despite the removal of the “Divergent” alt-quality version of this gem, Combat Support is still quite good for this build.

Awakened Multistrike Support is vital to the build. What it does is it repeats Flicker Strike hits three times, dealing more damage with subsequent attacks. It’s highly recommended to get the Awakened version as it allows you to execute an additional, more damaging strike. Now, if you don’t have the currency yet, you can go with the non-awakened version, though keep in mind that it only repeats Flicker Strike twice.

Since Voidforge essentially converts all physical damage to a random element, you can take advantage of Trinity Support. This gem not only increases the elemental damage of Flicker Strike, but it also empowers the said skill gem to penetrate up to 16% elemental resistances. The last part is quite helpful, particularly when fighting against enemies that have a naturally high resistance to elemental damage, including Guardians and pinnacle bosses. You don’t even have to stress about Trinity’s mechanics while playing this build at all. So long as you hit something, you’ll always have all of your resonance up.

Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks is pretty self-explanatory. It increases the elemental damage done by your Flicker Strike by up to 39% at Level 5. However, the reason why you’d want the awakened version of this gem is so that you cannot take reflected elemental damage. This, coupled with the Slayer’s Bane of Legends ascendancy passive, makes you immune to all types of reflected damage!

Awakened Melee Physical Damage Support, as the name implies, provides a “more” damage multiplier to Flicker Strike, meaning the damage is calculated multiplicatively instead of additively. At max level, the awakened version of the gem grants you a 10% chance to intimidate enemies for several seconds on hit. Intimidate, in Path of Exile, is a debuff that causes the affected target to take 10% increased attack damage.

With Kaom’s Spirit being an appealing option for the Flicker Strike Slayer in this league, you do have the option of swapping Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks for Rage Support. This is to maximize every point of Rage you accumulate with your attacks.

If you are struggling to sustain mana, you can replace Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks for Inspiration Support. In Patch 3.25, skills supported by Inspiration now have less mana cost rather than reduced mana cost. In short, this support gem now addresses the mana cost issues you may have had with Flicker Strike. This particular support gem also gives you an added benefit by improving your critical strike chance per Inspiration Charge (max 5).

Weapon

• Leap Slam
• Faster Attacks Support
• Blood Rage
• Guardian’s Blessing
• Raise Spectre
• Grace

With the removal of Ancestral Protector and Ancestral Warchief, the gems that you are going to put on the weapon are now slightly different. You still have Leap Slam and Faster Attacks Support to make this skill your primary mode of traversal.

Blood Rage is still present to provide you with attack speed. This mitigates the loss in attack speed boost previously granted by Ancestral Protector.

The remaining three gems are quite different from the previous iterations of this build. If you are wondering why they are here, GGG has brought back the itemized corpses introduced a couple of leagues ago. This means that you now have access to the Dark Marionette again – a minion that can bring itself back to life whenever it dies from an enemy attack.

The auto-revival mechanic of the Dark Marionette is useful, especially because you are using Guardian's Blessing linked to Grace. The said support gem allows you to activate Grace without reserving mana. And, since the Dark Marionette has no problems coming back to life, you can rest easy knowing that Grace will be up indefinitely!

According to GGG, you can get the itemized corpses as possible rewards from the Ritual Altars. You can either invest in Ritual nodes on the Atlas Skill Tree or you can purchase the Dark Marionette directly from other players via the trade website. If you are going for the latter, expect to pay heaps of PoE Currency considering the utility that this minion provides.

After getting your hands on the itemized corpse of the Dark Marionette, simply use Raise Spectre on it.

Helmet

• Berserk
• Precision
• Herald of Purity
• Determination

Determination has always been a staple for the Flicker Strike Slayer. However, there is something that you need to know about it. In Patch 3.25, Determination now only provides 90-1,026 armor compared to 179-2,051 prior to this update.

According to Mark Roberts, game director on Path of Exile, Determination has been nerfed due to the change to the item quality bonus in the Settlers of Kalguur expansion. More specifically, item quality on armor now grants multiplicative bonuses instead of additive ones. To put it simply, you now gain “more” defense rather than “increased” defense.

Herald of Purity is here to give you a bit more physical damage, which factors into the damage calculation of Flicker Strike as well.

Precision is a means to help you cap your accuracy and provide you with a sizable increase in critical strike chance.

Aside from Determination, Berserk has changed dramatically in Patch 3.25. Previously, this skill grants a temporary boost to attack damage, attack speed, and movement speed. But now, you only get up to 59% increased Rage effect at gem level 20.

The new Berserk still translates to a huge damage increase. However, the loss of attack speed can be felt, most notably when you also consider the removal of the Ancestral Protector totem enhanced by Panopticon.

Gloves

• Molten Shell/Immortal Call
• Automation
• More Duration Support
• Frostblink

Molten Shell is your guard skill for the Flicker Strike Slayer. Despite the nerf to Determination, if every piece of gear you have equipped has maximum quality, you enjoy the multiplicative defense bonuses provided by each one. Why is this relevant to Molten Shell? Because the amount of damage this guard skill absorbs depends on your total armor value. That’s why!

Automation Support is here primarily to activate Molten Shell whenever it becomes available for use. You could experiment with Cast When Damage Taken Support to see which support gem works better for you. But in our build guide, we will stick to Automation Support because it gives Molten Shell a more consistent uptime.

Increased Duration Support has now been renamed to More Duration Support in Patch 3.25. The reason for this is that this support gem now grants 39% “more” skill effect duration. In this case, Molten Shell now lasts longer than before unless a recent attack by the enemy depletes all of it.

If you are not able to maximize Molten Shell, you can replace that with Immortal Call. This reduces the physical and elemental damage you take, so you’re not relying on your total armor for damage mitigation.

Do not worry about the Endurance Charges that Immortal Call consumes because that can easily be replenished by Replica Farrul’s Fur and the Aspect of the Cat Skill.

Frostblink is more than just a movement skill for the Flicker Strike Slayer. It now has 250% effectiveness of added damage at gem level 20. This is helpful in granting Flicker Strike more oomph, especially when you execute the attack after casting Frostblink.

Boots

• Assassin’s Mark/Poacher’s Mark
• Mark on Hit Support
• Lifetap Support
• Defiance Banner

As a Flicker Strike Slayer, you want to capitalize on critical hits to ensure that you slay enemies without a hitch. That said, Assassin’s Mark increases your critical strike chance and critical strike multiplier against cursed enemies. Mark on Hit Support is a mandatory piece of the puzzle as it automatically casts Assassin’s Mark for you whenever you hit a rare or unique monster.

If you are struggling to sustain mana, you can replace Assassin’s Mark with Poacher’s Mark. Poacher’s Mark is amazing for the Flicker Strike Slayer because killing cursed enemies grants you a Frenzy Charge guaranteed! Besides that, every time you hit the affected monsters, you regain some life and mana in the process.

Because you are pretty tight on mana, adding Lifetap Support just makes sense. Instead of using mana to cast Assassin’s Mark/Poacher’s Mark, you spend a bit of your HP to cast your preferred Mark Skill. Don’t worry, you won’t feel the pain because of your insane overleech.

The last gem slot can be used for any gem of your choosing. You can experiment with the newly tweaked Banner Skills in Path of Exile: Settlers of Kalguur. Try Defiance Banner as it gives you a small boost in spell suppression and movement speed.

Ring

• Less Duration Support

For the Flicker Strike Slayer build to work comfortably with Replica Farrul’s Fur equipped, you should use Less Duration Support wherever you’ve placed the Aspect of the Cat Skill. Since you’ve put it on your Unset Ring, you should slot it in there. To understand why you need to use Less Duration Support, you must first learn the mechanics of Aspect of the Cat.

Activating Aspect of the Cat grants you two alternating buffs: Cat’s Stealth and Cat’s Agility. For this build, you only need to concern yourself with the latter since you’re using Replica Farrul’s Fur. Basically, whenever you have Cat’s Agility on, you gain maximum Frenzy and Endurance Charges.

That said, Cat’s Stealth lasts for four seconds and Cat’s Agility has a six-second duration. You want to reduce their duration so that it won’t take long to cycle between them. That’s where Less Duration Support comes in. With this support gem slotted in your ring, Cat’s Stealth only lasts for two seconds before Cat’s Agility gets activated with a four-second duration.

If you’ve used Immortal Call recently, you don’t have to worry about your Endurance Charges since the unique effects of Aspect of the Cat/Replica Farrul’s Fur replenishes those charges in just several seconds.

Passive Tree

Build Variations

The Flicker Strike Slayer is actually a versatile build. It has a few notable variations that you can try for yourself. Here are the most recommended:

Oro’s Sacrifice

Among the variations of the Flicker Strike Slayer, this is the most inexpensive. It utilizes Oro’s Sacrifice as the main weapon. This unique two-handed sword deals no physical damage. Instead, all of your damage is converted to fire, which means that this thing gives you the ability to burn enemies with each hit.

Aside from that, you gain a Frenzy Charge every time one of your hits ignites an enemy. When used along with Blood Rage, you have an easy way to gain charges without all of the expensive items!

Unlike the original build mentioned above, there are some key differences in this version. First of all, the support gems for your Flicker Strike are different, swapping Trinity and Awakened Melee Physical Damage Support for Awakened Fire Penetration and Immolate Support.

In addition, Hatred and Herald of Purity are replaced with Anger and Herald of Ash for some flat fire damage and increased fire damage, respectively.

Because Oro’s Sacrifice is pretty cheap, you can corrupt the two-handed sword for some amazing implicit modifiers, such as:

• Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 10 Momentum
• Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 10 Fortify
• Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 10 Additional Accuracy
• #% Increased Attack Speed
• #% Increased Area of Effect
• #% Increased Elemental Damage with Attack Skills
• #% Increased Global Accuracy Rating

Rakiata’s Dance

The Rakiata’s Dance is a two-handed sword that provides huge flat cold and lightning damage. But, the main draw of this weapon is that it treats enemy monster elemental resistance values as inverted. For example, if the enemy has 50% fire resistance, that is changed to -50%. Take note that this unique effect only applies to hits with this weapon.

To complement the flat cold damage from Rakiata’s Dance, the helmet you should equip for this variation is Heatshiver. This unique leather hood not only gives you a boost to fire and cold resistance, but you also gain 30% of cold damage as extra fire damage against frozen enemies, which is pretty huge! Since this build has a high critical strike chance, you’ll be freezing monsters without a hitch! Although this helmet was nerfed in the previous league, it is still a viable option if you’re using Rakiata’s Dance.

Now, there are two distinct support gems that are linked to your Flicker Strike gem in this version. The first is Ice Bite - a support gem that enhances your Flicker Strike to gain a 15% chance to freeze enemies on hit. The second support gem is the Endurance Charge on Melee Stun. This grants you more damage per Endurance Charge.

This particular build is actually quite tanky thanks to Petrified Blood and Immortal Call. For your main auras, you have Hatred and Herald of Ice to boost your cold damage. Precision is also present, though it is linked to Arrogance Support so that you can fit it into the build.

While this variant of the Flicker Strike Slayer is good, you have to be willing to spend some currency because it uses some expensive items, namely Impossible Escape, Unnatural Instinct, Elegant Hubris, and the Mageblood belt.

Additionally, you can fit two large cluster jewels that have the notable passives Martial Prowess, Feed the Fury, and Fuel the Fight for improved damage, life/mana leech, attack speed, and accuracy.

Forbidden Shako

If PoE currency is not an issue and you want the best possible version of the Flicker Strike Slayer, then wear the Forbidden Shako - a unique Great Crown that can be acquired from Oshabi, Avatar of the Grove. What makes this helmet great is that it can get the following mods:

• Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 10 Added Cold Damage
• Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 35 Ice Bite

Because the Forbidden Shako contains a plethora of mods in its pool, getting the desired ones is actually pretty hard to do. That’s why a Forbidden Shako with these mods costs a ton of currency!

The reason why those specific mods are highly coveted is that having both of them on the helmet allows you to use a one-handed sword and shield instead of a two-handed weapon. Speaking of which, your main weapon is Paradoxica with “Attacks with this weapon Penetrate % Elemental Resistances” and “Attacks with this Weapon deal Double Damage” as explicit modifiers.

Your shield is a synthesized one with “+1 to Maximum Frenzy Charges” as an implicit. You can use a Titanium Spirit Shield as a crafting base so that you can roll flat cold damage. You can craft the shield using any essence of your choosing. Utilize the shield as a way to cap your resistances or improve damage, whichever you need for your character.

This version of the build uses a lot of expensive jewels, including:

• Stormshroud
• Impossible Escape
• 3-mod Watcher’s Eye (Hatred/Precision)
• Elegant Hubris
• Forbidden Jewel Set
• Thread of Hope (Large)
• Intuitive Leap
• Inspired Learning
• Two Rare Large Cluster Jewels (Martial Prowess, Fuel the Fight, and Feed the Fury)

Since fitting the Immortal Call and Cast When Damage Taken Support combo is not possible on this build, your survivability is improved by using Progenesis. This sort of acts like Petrified Blood, albeit for a short duration only. Basically, when this flask is active, 25% of the HP you’ve lost from damage taken is spread over four seconds rather than being dealt in an instant.

Tattoos

The Wildwood Ascendancies have still not returned in Patch 3.25. However, the massive melee balancing changes GGG has implemented in the Settlers of Kalguur make the Flicker Strike Slayer work wonders even without them.

Still, you can populate some of the nodes on your passive tree with Tattoos. That’s right! Tattoos from a few leagues ago have returned, albeit with some adjustments.

Anyway, here are the Tattoos that we recommend for the Flicker Strike Slayer:

• Tattoo of the Kitava Warrior
  • 5% Increased Physical Damage
• Tattoo of the Tukohama Warmonger
  • 5% Increased Melee Damage
• Tattoo of the Tasalio Scout
  • 4% Increased Effect of Your Marks
• Tattoo of the Ramako Shaman
  • +2% Chance to Suppress Spell Damage
• Tattoo of the Ramako Fleetfoot
  • 2% Increased Movement Speed

POB

Flicker Strike Slayer (Main)

Oro’s Sacrifice Version

Rakiata’s Dance Version

Forbidden Shako Version

Final Thoughts

There you have it! The Flicker Strike Slayer is an inexpensive way to experience one of the fastest builds in the game. It has multiple variations that you can try depending on your current budget, which makes it quite appealing!

Flicker Strike allows you to zoom around the map, jumping from one pack of monsters to the next. With all of the gear mentioned in this guide, the damage potential of this build is immense! We’re talking about 30+ million damage, with the possibility of reaching 300 million with Paradoxica/Rare Shield and the Forbidden Shako!

With the Raider being completely removed from the game in Patch 3.25, the Slayer has become the premier ascendancy class if you want to use Flicker Strike as your primary skill.

So, if you’re looking for a build that you can use for fast mapping and bossing, then the Flicker Strike Slayer is definitely one of the best in the game!

With all of that said, good luck on your adventures in Wraeclast, Exile!

PROS

+Insane damage potential

+Culling Strike due to Slayer ascendancy passive

+Good Sustainability due to Slayer’s overleech

+Able to clear maps within three minutes

+Viable league starter

+Massive damage increased in Patch 3.25

CONS

-Some items are expensive

-Hard to cap spell suppression

-Uses a lot of unique items, which makes capping resistances a bit challenging