Overview
This is a late-league refinement pass on DeathKing’s Ice Shot Deadeye — a bow archetype the creator describes as having reached its “final, most balanced version” for patch 0.5.4. Rather than a fresh build from scratch, the video documents a round of targeted upgrades aimed at one specific problem: making a high-attack-speed projectile build survive and sustain through hard Grand Expedition, which the creator considers the toughest content in the game right now.
The core identity is volume of projectiles. A Warmonger’s-style bow replaces an earlier weapon that carried a 50% reduced projectile range drawback, restoring the ability to kite and hold distance properly. On top of that sits the Legacy of Quill Rain rune (roughly 126 divines at time of recording), trading 20% less attack damage for 50% increased attack speed — a trade the build barely feels on the damage side but converts into a near-continuous stream of arrows. Gloves supplying a ~57% chance to fire an additional projectile push the typical shot count to four, which is where the pack-clearing comes from.
The rest of the update is spirit and mana engineering. Ice Shot at level 31 costs 88 mana per shot, and mana is the real constraint in long Grand Expedition fights where enemies die slowly and on-kill recovery dries up. Nearly every change in this pass exists to feed that: freeing spirit for Mana Remnants, layering Harmonic Remnants with Cattle Rejuvenation for cooldown recovery, and stacking mana cost efficiency from multiple sources.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Extremely high attack speed — the creator describes it as “basically a machine gun” with around 700k tooltip DPS in the hideout
- Four projectiles most of the time makes pack clear comfortable without a dedicated clear skill
- Very high deflection rating (79% at full Wind stacks, climbing past 80% while mapping) on top of 70%+ evasion
- Layered mana sustain means the build holds up in long, slow fights rather than only in fast farming
- Full-range kiting restored by dropping the reduced-projectile-range weapon — the build plays safe rather than committing
Cons
- Gear-gated hard: the Legacy of Quill Rain rune alone is over 100 divines, plus a Megalomaniac diamond and a bespoke amulet
- Mana sustain is fragile without the full package — expect problems in Grand Expedition until every piece is assembled
- Life pool is deliberately low (around 1,179 after the Communion life reservation), leaning on evasion and energy shield instead
- Many interlocking systems to keep straight: spirit reservation, runes, remnants, and mana cost efficiency all feed each other
- The creator repeatedly flags severe client performance issues (freezes, disconnects, input delay) during recording — a gameplay-experience caveat, not a build flaw
Key Skills
- Ice Shot — the entire damage engine, run at level 31 via leveled projectile skills on the amulet
- Elemental Conflux — rotates the damage element, at a modest 6 spirit cost
- Wind Dancer — evasion and deflection layer, made free on spirit via an Azirus-style Communion that converts the reservation to life instead
- Ghost Dance — around 33 spirit (reduced by quality), paired with Clarity for extra mana regeneration
- Mana Remnants / Harmonic Remnants — the sustain package that makes the whole thing work, with Cattle Rejuvenation adding cooldown recovery per stack
Gear & Anointments
The weapon is the pivot: a Warmonger’s bow without the reduced projectile range drawback, socketed with the Legacy of Quill Rain rune for its 50% increased attack speed. Gloves are chosen specifically for the ~57% chance to fire an additional projectile. The amulet is an Absent-style piece rolled for spirit and level of projectile skills.
- Megalomaniac diamond — Shattering stays allocated; the creator swapped Serrated Edges for Mind Eraser to raise mana cost efficiency
- Emerald jewel — added in a newly-taken jewel socket to recover the lost 30% increased damage against rare and unique enemies, landing at 20% plus 8% attack speed and 6% bow damage
- Passive tree — four evasion/deflection nodes were dropped in favour of six nodes weighted toward energy shield and evasion, since deflection was already sitting near cap
- Conservative Casting — pairs with Mind Eraser for roughly 30% total increased mana cost efficiency
Berserk was tested alongside Eternal Rage and rejected: it added around 100k damage but drained life too quickly for a build already running a reduced life pool.
Endgame Notes
The showcase footage is Grand Expedition, chosen deliberately as the hardest available content. That environment is what drives the entire upgrade list — slow-dying enemies punish mana-hungry attack builds, so the sustain layers matter more here than raw tooltip DPS. Deflection rating scales higher during mapping thanks to Wind stack accumulation, so the build feels tankier in maps than it does standing still in a single hard fight.
Credits & Source
Build credited to DeathKing. See the source video for the full build’s gameplay footage + voice commentary: Path of Exile 2 - NEW OP Ice Shot Deadeye GAMEPLAY UPDATE | ROTA 0.5.4 Uber Endgame build SHOWCASE.