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

Ever since Raiders got their Onslaught node reworked, they’ve risen to popularity and Wraeclast by storm, with their unparallel speed and build diversity and flexibility. Even after several nerfs, they’re still the go-to class for speed, in exchange for power. Here are some of the better builds that make use of Raider’s speed to wipe out the entire continent!

5 – Caustic Arrow

Tentacle Caustic Arrow MTX

While Toxic Rain continues to rain supreme as the go-to Chaos DoT Bow build, its older, simpler brother, Caustic Arrow, is much cheaper and easier to make, and you have a much smoother clearing with CA than TR, at the cost of some single target damage. Both skills are mostly interchangeable since they scale similarly. The biggest difference is that TR wants Attack Speed, while CA doesn’t care about it at all. Thus, much easier to get a strong +3 bow for CA than it is for TR.

What the Caustic Arrow Excels in:

• Fantastic and seasoned League Starter
• Can do all content with proper investment
• Simple playstyle and clear screens with just one button press
• Very tanky, with over 6k life

Caustic Arrow full details:

• CA relies on scaling gem levels, just like a spell, which is perfect for early game league, since you don’t need special gear to deal damage, just killing mobs and leveling up is enough. Eventually, you’ll need upgrades like a +3 bow, +2 amulets, an Empower Level 4, everything you can to push CA to level 28 or more, which will cost a lot late game.
• We’re very tank with the changes to Spell Suppression and high evade chance, and the best defense in the game: not getting hit. With how quickly we move, we can manually dodge most projectiles and telegraphed attacks and spells in the game. If you want even more tankiness, you can get a Xibaqua Legion Jewel and convert 50% of elemental damage into chaos damage, making it even stronger against big hits. All this on over 6,000 life pool.
• The stat you’ll want the most is Chaos DoT Multiplier, and you can get it on gloves, quivers, bows (that’s why they’re so expensive because you want a +3 and the DOT multi), jewels, and in the passive tree. If you’re rich, you can also go for a Malevolence Watcher’s Eye, but with how good the new defensive auras are, it’s harder to justify.

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2077932

4 – Lancing Steel

Lancing Steel skill demonstration

While Steel skills aren’t everyone’s cup, with the way the Call of Steel works, no one can argue how strong they are and how quickly they can obliterate bosses when properly geared. With this build, you’ll cover your screen in projectiles and clear as far as the eye can see, sweeping monsters into dust along the way!

What the Lancing Steel Excels in:

• Somewhat cheap to start with, even in League Starts.
• Can do all content
• Over 15 million DPS without much effort
• The Saviour is a DPS and Clearing multiplier

Lancing Steel full details:

• Call of Steel works by pulling out stacks of Impale off of monsters and exploding them in an area, at the cost of losing the stacks, but since we attack over 12 times a second, that really doesn’t matter, and the more steel shards we have (that we get when we pull the impales stacks) the more damage we can do.
• It’s a 2-button gameplay and thus people aren’t extremely fond of it. The fact that it isn’t a flashy attack, and that makes use of some obscure mechanics, also hasn’t endeared most people to it. But that’s a good thing! It means that gearing for it is cheaper than what otherwise could be!
• We achieve some form of survivability by stacking Life Gain on Hit through gear and jewels, and with literally dozens of projectiles hitting per second, we’re near immortal as long as we can attack (not counting one-shots).

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3077253

3 – Hopeshredder Frenzy Stacking

Frenzy 

It couldn’t be a Ranger build-list without some bow builds, and Hopeshredder embodies all that Raider wants to be and is great at while giving us the damage that Raiders tend to lack. All for the cheap price of a constant degen that we have to deal with in some way.

What the Hopeshredder Frenzy Stacking Excels in:

• Can achieve over 50 million (FIFTY million!) DPS
• Clear screens instantly
• Insanely fast
• Melts bosses in the blink of an eye

Hopeshredder Frenzy Stacking full details:

• Hopeshredder is a bow that scales its damage based on the number of frenzy charges, as well as several other bonuses, like movement speed, elemental ailment avoidance, and life leech; all at the cost of losing 200 life per second per frenzy charge. And since we achieve 9 to 10 Frenzy Charges, that’s a lot of life we have to regenerate.
• We do that by getting as much maximum cold resistance as possible, getting some regen nodes on the passive tree, a corrupted Darkray Vector with 100 life regen while moving, and leech.
• Aim for +2 or +3 arrows so you can use Lightning Arrow as the clearing skill, otherwise, go with Scourge Arrow or Rain of Arrows for your clearing, and your single target is Barrage to completely demolish your enemies in an instant!

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2912054

2 – Oro’s Cyclone

Fire themed character

Oro’s Sacrifice has been a standard unique to use at league start and still be relevant throughout the playthrough, and Raider takes the relatively slow attacking sword with huge flat damage, and maximizes it with their insane attack speed, by stacking Frenzy Charges as much as they can.

What Oro’s Cyclone Excels in:

• Extremely Tanky
• Simple and effective League starter
• Fast clearer
• Elemental Ailment immune

Oro’s Cyclone full details:

• Our tankiness comes from stacking as much Strength as we can to increase our life totals, combined with a lot of high armor gear to scale our armor and Molten shell, giving us a fairly constant capped Molten Shell.
• Our damage has a soft ceiling with Oro by nature, but we can still farm T16s and get better gear. Scaling critical multiplier and jewels can also buff up our damage to the heavens.
• If you want even more tankiness, you can get a Brass Dome (at the cost of a lot of life) to get Crit immunity, 5% maximum resistance, and over 4k armor chest piece.

For more information, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3052143

1 – Devon’s Blooming Flicker

Devon's Blooming Flicker Illustration

What else embodies the Raider than the skill that fits the archetype perfectly? With Flicker, you become as quick as lightning, dashing through packs of enemies without care, demolishing everything along the way.

What Devon’s Blooming Flicker Excels in:

• Can be a good League Starter if you know what you’re doing
• Fastest attacking build in the game
• Can clear most content
• Surprisingly Tanky

Devon’s Blooming Flicker full details:

• Flicker Strike is a skill that consumes a Frenzy Charge to teleport to the enemy and hit them with a powerful strike. With Multistrike, we can do 3 hits with just one charge. And if the enemy dies during this, you get teleported to the nearest enemy. In an ideal scenario, you’ll chain from pack to pack seamlessly and leave nothing but corpses and loot behind.
• To circumvent the issue of consuming Frenzy Charges to attack, we need a reliable way to generate such charges. We do that through Flicker Strike’s inherent frenzy on hit (15%) + 20% from Raider’s own node + 10% from an Influenced body Armour, which gives us a 45% chance to gain a charge on hit. This means that with Multistrike, there’s only a 16.6% chance of NOT getting a charge per use of Flicker, and even then, you’ll have a lot of built-up frenzy charges, and most bosses melt instantly anyway. While clearing, this is a non-issue since you always get frenzy charges on kill.
• Our tankiness comes from Spell Suppression, a lot of Evasion that gets converted to Armour with Iron Reflexes (and Determination to further boost the armor values) and by virtue of killing everything before they can kill us!

For a thorough breakdown, check here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2874747

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