Overview
This Arc Totem Gemling turns the Mercenary’s Gemling Legionnaire into a hands-off caster: you drop six spell totems that cast Arc for you and keep moving while they clear the screen. The whole rotation is effectively one button, and because the totems out-range the camera you often hear loot drop before you even see the pack that died. It is a mapping-first build that has also been pushed into expeditions, 200% Delirium maps and pinnacle bosses, with the top-end version sitting around 1500 divines invested while the core is startable for far less.
The engine is mana. Mind over Matter routes incoming hits through the mana pool before life, and the build then leans into a low-life setup — Archmage is linked with Zerphi’s Communion so it reserves life instead of spirit, dropping you low enough to switch on Pain Attunement and other execute-tier bonuses. Eldritch Battery converts all item energy shield into maximum mana, so energy shield rolls still feed both the defensive pool and, through Archmage and per-100-mana passives, the damage.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- One-button, move-and-clear playstyle; totems shoot through walls and off-screen
- Mana doubles as damage (Archmage, spell-per-100-mana) and defence (Mind over Matter)
- Six-totem uptime via Ancestral Bond plus Gemling’s Advanced Totems quality effect
- Scales from a cheap core all the way to a 1500-divine ceiling
Cons
- Narrow, corridor-heavy layouts make placing all six totems awkward
- Low-life plus mana-as-health is fragile if the mana pool is drained in a pack
- Spirit budget is tight and easy to break when copying (totems reserve ~54 spirit each)
- Gear-dependent to reach the shown numbers; not a fresh-league starter
Key Skills
- Arc (Spell Totem) — the damage, cast by six totems; scales hard with quality via remaining chains
- Dominus’ Grasp — makes Arc chain 100% more, feeding the quality-per-chain damage
- Archmage + Zerphi’s Communion — adds mana-based lightning damage and reserves life to enable low life
- Ancestral Bond — doubles the totem limit to six and removes their cast/mana cost
- Blasphemy + Temporal Chains — defensive slow layered over the totem play
Gear & Anointments
Weapon is a scepter that grants the build’s largest chunk of spirit plus Purity of Ice. Amulet (~50 spirit) and body armour (~58 spirit, with reservation efficiency) are not optional — the whole six-totem setup lives or dies on hitting the total spirit number after reservation efficiency, not on any single item’s spirit roll. Helm and gloves are prioritised for reservation efficiency; energy shield everywhere feeds the mana pool through Eldritch Battery. Key passives: Ancestral Bond, Mind over Matter, Eldritch Battery, Pain Attunement, Archmage, plus Mana Remnants for a larger, self-refilling pool.
Endgame Notes
Used for high-end mapping, expeditions, 200% Delirium and pinnacle bosses. Open maps are where it shines; the only real content complaint is tight layouts.
Credits & Source
Build credited to ExFluent. See the source video for the full gameplay footage and voice commentary: Arc Totem Gemling Does All the Work | PoE 2 0.5 Build Guide.