[Top 5] Path of Exile Best Assassin Builds That Wreck Hard!

Updated:

04 Mar 2022

[Top 5] Path of Exile Best Assassin Builds That Wreck Hard!

Assassins are the master of being quick and dirty, and deleting bosses as quickly as possible with their high critical chance, power charge generation, and amplification, as well as speed with their high Elusive Effectiveness. You can cruise through the game with a properly well geared Assassin, but in general, they require a lot more investment than most other Ascendancies.

And here are five great builds in Patch 3.17!

5 – Poison Blade Vortex Assassin

Blade Vortex

One of my personal favorite builds of all time, Poison BV is back in the game after a sleuth of buffs to self-casting, which in turn amps up Poison Damage, and with the new Ashes of the Star Unique amulet, we can get insane levels of AoE, blade generation or extra damage with fewer blades through Alt-quality gems, up to 150% increased damage with 5 or fewer blades (perfect for mapping without care).

What the Poison BV Excels in:

Superb clearing, especially after getting Asenath’s Gentle Touch
League Start Viable and scales really well with investment
Can do most content with practice
Extremely simple playstyle

Poison Blade Vortex full details:

As BV is a physical spell with high base damage (which just got a 45% more damage buff in 3.17), it is extremely easy to scale poison damage, and when combined with Assassin’s kit for poisoning, you can deal massive amounts of damage and delete content while moving, without stopping to cast or attack.
To have the best clearing possible, you’ll want an Asenath’s Gentle Touch, which makes it so mobs explode when they die, and that gets proliferated due to the explosions themselves also poisoning the enemies it hits, in a chain reaction of delightfully satisfying pops.
For massive damage output, you’ll want to use two Cold-Iron Point Daggers, which scales our BV’s level by 6, and use a 21 Vaal BV, with a +2 chestpiece, +1 from the Ashes of the Star, which also gives us 20% Reservation Efficiency, and the wondrous 30% all gems quality, to achieve a whopping level 30 Blade Vortex, which nearly triples the base damage for a level 20 Gem.

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3168707

4 – Qosmoz’s Low Life CoC Ice Nova/Ice Spear

Celestial Ice Nove MTX

What a mouthful. But LL Cast on Crit is a staple to PoE, and with the buffs to both Ice Nova and Ice Spear, it’s difficult to say which would be the best and having played extensively both, I feel that Ice spear wins out in damage but Ice Nova wins out in the delightful clearing it has. Both, though, are so similar that you can mostly switch between one another at your leisure.

What Qosmoz’s Low Life CoC Ice Nova/Spear Excels in:

Surprisingly Tanky
Buttery smooth clearing
Scales supremely well with investment
Looks amazing with MTX
Freezes screens of monsters

Qosmoz’s Ice Nova/Spear LL CoC full details:

As a Low Life build, we use Shavrone’s Wrappings, and to further make use of our life pool, we use a Prism Guardian in order to reserve 3 50% auras (Hatred, Grace, and Zealotry), and then still have all of our mana to reserve other auras and utilities, like Skitterbots, herald of Ice, or banners.
If you go with the Ice Spear, I’d recommend getting a +2 Proj helm to enchant, as that is a massive boost to DPS, since Ice Spear can shotgun enemies. With the changes to how Ice Spear works in this league, I’d expect it to be much better now than previously since you don’t have to be at a certain distance to maximize your damage, and Ice Nova got a massive boost in flat damage against chilled enemies, which should offset the nerfs to Cast on Crit.
You can scale your Evasion as high as 25k, with Grace and make use of Ghost Shrouds to help with ES sustain and tanking hits. With the introduction of Forbidden jewels, you can also yoink extra damage by having a 5th Ascendancy node, and good options are Born in the Shadows, for more survivability, Explosive Experts for tons of damage, Harness the Void to gain Non-Chaos as Chaos damage, or even if you’re rich, Swift Killer, for free Frenzy generation and +1 Frenzy/Power Charge.

For more information, click here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2971773

3 – Kinetic Blast/Power Siphon Intelligence Stacker Wander

Celestial Kinetic Blast MTX

Another build that has stood the test of time, and remains as strong, stronger even, as ever. With the introduction of both Forbidden Jewels and Divine Blessing, this build essentially just got a boost of anything from 30 to 60% more damage, in patch 3.17!

What the KB/PS Int Stacker Excels in:

Marvelous Clear, able to do even 100% Delirious Maps with ease
Can reach over 15k ES easily
Can do all content in the game
Doesn’t rely on temporary buffs to deal its maximum output of damage

KB/PS Intelligence Stacker full details:

When we say Int stacker, what we mean by that is that there’s a special mod on Shaper or Hunter wands that gives 1-6 Lightning damage to attacks with that weapon per 10 intelligences, and as such, the more Int we have, the more damage we get, while also getting absurdly high amounts of Energy Shield, as it scales synergistically with Int.
This is not a cheap build, and the entry-level is at the very least 60 exalts, but contrary to most other builds, this build has nearly no ceiling, is able to scale with as much investment as you want, and can deal more damage than it’s possible to survive, instantly deleting the tankiest of bosses with the harshest of mods.
In 3.17, Divine Blessing gave us a new way to spend the mana for a temporary (around 18 to 25 seconds) extra aura, which in turn would scale our damage or defense even further. And with the Forbidden Jewels, you ‘steal’ an ascendancy node, and in this case, Swift Killer would be BiS, for free Frenzy generation, as well as giving massive amounts of damage since we also stack Power Charges.

For a full breakdown of the build, click here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2854585

2 – The Nightblade

Blade Flurry

Going back to the most archetypal type of Assassins, the Nightblade is a silent and deadly build that will stab and mince enemies with his daggers, by using some extremely broken synergies to his favor, able to reach millions of single target DPS with nary an issue.

What the Nightblade Excels in:

Can League Start
Upwards of 6 million DPS when properly invested
Can do all content
Respectable clearing

The Nightblade full details:

Nightblade is a Support gem that grants you Elusive when you hit a critical strike. It also gives a base +1 crit chance, and up to 140% critical strike multiplier while you have Elusive. The catch here, though, is that Nightblade’s Crit Multi scales with Elusive Effect, and Assassin’s get tons of it, from Mistwalker, and you can further scale that on the passive tree and with Masteries. Without any other Crit Multi on gear or Ascendancy, you can instantly get over 600% Crit Multi, which is by far and away more than any build usually can get, and this can scale up to over 800% with investment!
We are forced to use daggers in order to make the most use of Elusive Effect, as that’s the passive that has the buff. While we are mostly physical, getting an amulet with Gain % of Phys as extra Cold/Light/Chaos is a great idea to further boost our damage, especially because we are also using Secrets of Suffering, making our Cold Damage grant us Brittle, which will in turn guarantee we are always critting!
For defenses, we have over 40% chance to avoid all forms of hit damage (we still take DoTs), we take 0 extra damage from Crits, we have some Evasion, Life gained on Hit, on Kill, and on Stun, from Rhyslatha’s Coil, as well as thoroughly decimating your enemies before they can do anything about it!

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2284176

1 – KissMeQuick’s Assassin Reap

Reap against The Shaper

A surprisingly tanky Assassin who also packs a massive punch, reaching over 100 million DPS when properly positioned and invested, due to how Reap works with Awakened Spell Cascade and Unleash. If you want a build that will clear everything in the game, in seconds, without keeling over the smallest of hits, this build is for you!

What KissMeQuick’s Assassin Reap Excels in:

League Start Viable, though scales supremely well with investment
Can reach over 120 million DPS with fairly attainable gear (a bit over 50ex)
Can do all content in the game
Surprisingly tanky
Enjoyable playstyle, of hitting one button and everything dying

KissMeQuick’s Assassin Reap full details:

The way Reap works with Awakened Spell Cascade (which are criminally cheap this league, not even 30c) is that it overlaps the AoE and can shotgun larger mobs, and with enough AoE, even smaller monsters will get hit by all 5 blades. With Unleash, you stack seals that are, as the name suggests, unleashed all at once when you cast, creating a massive burst of damage, as each Reap can usually deal from 3 million per blade hit, then that’s multiplied by 5 blades from Woke Cascade, which then is multiplied by 5 to 6 Seals (depends on the gear investment) to reach over 100 million DPS!
Our tankyness comes in several layers. First and foremost, the most classical one: kill before being killed. Then, we have over 6k HP, which gets supported by a respectable amount of Armor to mitigate incoming damage. We’re also crit immune and take no extra damage, while also avoiding some damage from hits, from Mistwalker. And finally, we are 54/77 Attack/Spell Block, which is essentially a massive layer of pure defense that enables us to go up close and personal without fearing being blown over in an instant!
This build also makes use of the new Forbidden jewels, using my favorite one for Assassin’s, Born in the Shadows, for another substantial layer of defense in the form of 15% Reduced Damage taken (of all kinds, including DoTs) from Blinded Enemies, and everything is blinded around you and who you hit (which is essentially everyone).

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3079012