Minion Damage Ring Crafting Guide

Introduction

Minion Damage rings have become rather popular with builds like Mage Skeletons being a major part of the meta in PoE Archnemesis, as such we have brought you this simple step by step guide to teach you how to craft them yourself without having to spend excessive currency.

This guide exists in video format if you prefer that instead too.

The Finished Product

Since we have the option to go for either a Life based or ES based ring, we have 2 different types of rings we can end up with.

Life Based Ring

Our ideal Life based ring is extremely easy to craft, our primary focus will be on the Delve suffix minion damage, with attributes/ resistances as required, and Life.

ES Based Ring

The ES ring will have a lot more playing room and investment space to craft, making it more valuable, while also being harder to craft.

The base

Most ring bases can be okay for this, but seen as though Minion builds tend to be socket starved, we recommend doing this on Unset Ring to utilise the free socket. If you aren’t socket starved, resistances from rings can be extremely efficient to have

Acquiring a base

Getting your hands on a minion ring is quite simple, we may either farm minion Delve nodes to get a base ourselves, or use a trade search to get one without the hassle. The extent to which we take the trade search depends on your budget and what you’re looking to do.

We will use 3 different search functions to find ideal rings, we start off with an “and” function, this will make sure that any result found has the modifier of minion damage, at a minimum of 26%. Beyond this, we’ll use a “Not” function to make sure the item hasn’t got redeemer influence, though this isn’t necessary if we look for the minimum of 26%, since the highest tier of minion damage found with Redeemer influence is 25%. Keeping it in doesn’t hurt, and if you decide to look for lower minion damage rolls in hopes of getting better attributes, this may help.

After this, we will have a “count” function looking for specific modifiers we need. The modifiers we’re looking for here are solely dependent on how much currency we’re looking to invest, looking for a ring with a high amount of attributes that minion builds require can be extremely beneficial, as well as Life or Energy Shield depending on which ring we’re going for can be good. The count function works similarly to an and function, we specify the amount of modifiers we’re looking for, and then list each modifier. If we list 4 different modifiers at a count of 1, at least 1 of them will be present in the rings that appear, the more we increase the count, the more specific the ring becomes, and as such it will get more expensive.

The Crafting Method

The crafting method is relatively simple and the main point of contention is the amount of currency we’re willing to spend on min-maxing, we will first begin by talking about getting the Suffixes we need.

Part 1 – Suffixes

The suffixes we are looking for are quite self-explanatory regardless of variant, and the crafting of the rings will vary depending on how many suffixes we already have. Here we will list them in order of importance.

• Minions Deal #% Increased Damage – This Suffix is non-negotiable, otherwise it wouldn’t be a minion damage ring.

• Attributes – Dexterity is probably the most sought after attribute on the suffix, as minion builds require it the most. Intelligence and Strength come second, and they will depend on both stat requirements (though intelligence shouldn’t be a problem for a minion build), as well as whether you’re going to be crafting a Life or Energy Shield ring (since the two stats provide either flat life or an increase to your total energy shield, every little bit goes a long way in the long run).

• Resistances – we can also help ease the resistance requirements of other gear, but this purely depends on the rest of the gear we’re working with, making sure to meet the resistance cap and attribute requirements is important.

We will proceed with the assumption that Dexterity is a base requirement, and proceed with that in mind for the crafting method.

Step 1- Opening up a Suffix & prefix

In an ideal world, we would find 40-50+ dexterity on an Unset Ring with Minion damage, an open suffix and an open prefix, but this is a tall ask; as such, we may use Orb of Annulment in hopes of opening suffixes or prefixes, but this can be expensive on an Unset ring base to gamble. We may also do this through the use of a “Split” beast, the Fenumal Plagued Arachnid. This menagerie craft can isolate modifiers, in the case of having 3 suffixes, splitting the item will result in one copy having 1 suffix, and the other having 2, one of the suffixes we need will be guaranteed, but it is a 50/50 to get both suffixes as well as the open modifier. This won’t necessarily brick the item completely unlike Annulment orbs, which sacrifice the modifier to the RNG Gods.

Regardless of how we achieve it, the ring will look a little like this, making it ready for the next step. Do note that the prefixes we have don’t actually matter and are here just for the purposes of demonstration. :

Step 2 – High investment or Settling?

Once we reach this step, we have a few choices, we can settle for a crafted suffix that we need, like the ones mentioned above, this will depend on what you require.

Alternatively, we can choose to bench craft “Suffixes Cannot Be Changed” (costing 2x Exalted Orb) followed by using a Veiled Chaos Orb on the ring. Doing this adds a Veiled modifier, to the item, with it being 50/50 on whether the resulting modifier is a suffix or prefix.

Our two suffixes will remain unchanged, but another one may end up being added, as beyond adding a Veiled Modifier, a Veiled Chaos Orb works exactly like a Chaos Orb. This would effectively put us back into step 1. This issue can be compounded by having 3 prefixes too, as then we would also need to gamble away a prefix as well as a suffix to return it to the state seen in Step 1.

If this goes successfully, your ring will have some prefix modifiers, Minion Damage on the suffix, Dexterity, and the last suffix will be veiled. We then take it to Jun to unveil it, hoping for a mixed Attribute unveil, the only one that can appear will be “ X to Strength and Intelligence”, if we successfully hit it, then our Suffixes are officially complete. For life builds, a Chaos resistance + elemental resistance can also be acceptable, though it isn’t as amazing as the attributes.

Part 2 – The Prefixes

Once we’re happy with our suffixes, we can now begin focusing on the Prefixes. We have a few different ways of approaching this and it will also change depending on the state of the item from the previous steps.

In the case of an item having no open prefixes, we will want to Harvest Craft with “Reforge a rare item, keeping all suffix modifiers” to re-roll the prefixes while leaving the Suffixes unchanged. We can do this until we hit a set that has a prefix open.

Life based

For a life based ring, we will now proceed with (yet again) crafting Suffixes cannot be changed, and using Harvest to reroll the ring with a life modifier, we would do this until we have a life modifier we’re happy with, as well as, again, a remaining open prefix. The other prefix doesn’t necessarily matter.

Hitting 3 prefixes with a life modifier we’re unhappy with will take us back to the beginning of part 2, forcing us to use the “Reforge a rare item, keeping all suffix modifiers” Harvest craft.

Once we are happy with the life roll we have and have an open prefix, we would simply craft “non-channeling skills have -# to total mana cost”, and our ring will be done.

The finished product will look a little like this:

ES Based

ES Based rings are a bit more complex, as there are 2 prefix modifiers that we can actually look for (outside of the craft mana cost craft) which will be beneficial to us, The first is the flat ES roll that naturally appears on rings, while the other is an increased energy shield modifier found on Crusader influence, we can settle on just having the one, or push the investment extremely to create the perfect ring.

Similarly to life based rings, we can craft “Suffixes Cannot Be Changed”, followed by a Harvest “Reforge an item with defence modifiers” in hopes of hitting a good ES roll and open prefix, hitting full prefixes here would lead us back to the beginning of Part 2.

Once we have an energy shield roll we’re happy with we can finish the craft just like we would with a life based ring, through the addition of “non-channeling skills have -# to total mana cost”, and our ring will be complete.

Alternative ES Based variant (Super high investment)

Once we have isolated the suffixes and have an open prefix we will remove all prefixes through crafting Suffixes Cannot Be Changed and using an Orb of Scouring after this, we will use a Crusader's Exalted Orb to add Crusader influence to our item.

After this, we will once more craft Suffixes Cannot Be Changed, followed by a Harvest craft of “Reforge a rare item with a Defence modifier, defence modifiers are more likely”, we will repeat this process until we hit a good flat Energy Shield roll, a % Increased Energy shield roll, and an open prefix. If we have no open prefixes, we can keep the ring as is, or we can return all the way back to part 2, except this time we will not need to use a Crusader orb to give it influence, after hitting an open prefix we would simply repeat the Suffixes Cannot Be Changed -> Reforge Defence craft. Do this until you’re happy with the result.

Our ring will now look a little like this.

TL;DR

• Acquire a base with minion damage & a second suffix.

• Force the Suffixes you need through a combination of Meta crafting & Veiled orbs.

• Open up a prefix through the use of “Reforge prefixes keeping all suffixes”

*Follow the steps for the Life based variant or ES based variant, depending on which you need.

FINAL NOTES

As much as I love making guides, it is very crucial in a game like Path of Exile that you play the game the way you enjoy playing it. This guide merely describes the most effective approach to craft the best items.
I hope you found the guide useful, and I wish you all many Tier 4 Seeds & Successful Divination Card gambles!

I hope you found the build guide useful and I wish you all many Divine Orb drops!