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Season 6 zET Archon Strategy, Guide & Builds

sVr90 recently wrote a detailed thread on Reddit with the top tier group meta in S6. It uses the standard Archon as the main damage source, but changing Halo of Arlyse for the Zodiac ring. It was used by Quantum Warriors to clear GR 120 and get rank #1 on the EU leaderboards.

While there's some room for theorycrafting and testing, as he explains in the post, this is considered to be one of the highest level group strategies at the moment. chewingnom also made a similar thread on our forums giving some gameplay tips for the group who wants to run this. Check it out!

Introduction

Most recently a “fairly” new ET-Archon variant started to climb the leaderboards, dropping its Halo of Arlyse for Zodiac – hence zET. The original idea came from Horrax, was played by Thargor (Dfans) and got refined by a numerous amount of people (check credits section if you are interested in names). The current iteration is quite close to the very well-known meta ET-Tal wizard, focusing on Area Damage and Elemental Damage and playing Pain Enhancer. The huge changeup compared to the ET-Archon build, where you are forced into max CDR, is the fact that Pain Enhancer + Zodiac frees up several primary affixes on your gear (dropping CDR) giving you the possibility to add the DPS affixes the ET-Tal wizard thrives with. As a tradeoff the RG fight becomes harder, dropping any real ability to deal damage while there is no elites to fuel your ET casts – In total: you have to burst the RG down preferably in a single rotation (failure example: 90% -> 0%).

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Build

The Swami build is considered to be stronger, due to the additional ApoC. In the Swami variant (8 total ApoC) you can consider playing MW:Deflection, which gives you a ridiculous amount of eHP with those high ET breakpoints you’ll be able to hit (5 casts per second). If you can survive without MW:Deflection, you should play MW:Conduit – you’ll feel the difference on the RG pylon click. In the Fazula Build you have to play MW:Conduit, since Tal-Headpiece is not a Wizard Hat.

• 3/4-Man Swami Build [D3Planner] [Dfans]
• 3/4-Man Fazula Build [D3Planner] [Dfans]

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Gameplay as zET

Start of the GR: You have to accept as the last Player on your CoE-Light. Join, get 4 Talstacks, click Archon, find position in next 20 seconds. In your last 2 seconds of Archon: Teleport onto stacking spot, force-attack into the corner.

Mid of GR: Stack twisters at a corner from CoE-Fire to CoE-Light. Usually you’ll have a decent amount of archon stacks and PE stacks (both giving you IAS) giving you a ridiculous high ET breakpoint (25-30 twisters is where things get crazy). Pop Archon on CoE-Arcane, jump into occulus circle. Do burst-damage for 4-6 seconds, then you are free to do whatever you want for 16 seconds (be a pseudo-barb scouting, pulling, or stay in position if it is dangerous or you have no proc). In your last 2 seconds of Archon: Teleport onto stacking spot, force-attack into the corner. The second you drop from archon you are squishy until you have the 4 Talstacks back; the Monk has to blind and the WD to confuse in that exact second (this is your call to make). You click archon on every second CoE-Arcane after opening the rift – always!

RG Fight: Place 2-3 Twisters, cast SD on RG (get some AP due to ET/SD with 8-ApoC and MW:Conduit), place another ET and so on. You still pop archon on every second CoE-Arcane. In Archon just smash the ground and explode if RG is in meele, else laser him. You have to time the pylon such that the elites are dragged in the second you come out of archon and from there on you ONLY cast ET (ofc still EB and FN but those have no casting animation and won’t interfere with your ET casts). On next CoE-Arcane you have to oneshot the RG. The hardest thing on the RG for you is to keep sync of your archon and CoE rotations. Once you’re a desynced and failed to reset properly you lost the fight.

Dying is a ridiculous timeloss in this build, especially in archon (at this point you can probably remake unless you are far ahead of time).

Gameplay/Build as supWD

No changes for you mate if you are paired with a Barb. If there is a supDH in group, you drop your Iceblink and Nemesis. Change from Frozen Piranhas to Wave of Mutilation, equip Strongarms and Gogok/Mutilation Guard.

Gameplay/Build as Monk

Tsunami, if zET is on APDs. Temple of Protection, if you are paired with a supDH. Possibly mantra considerations to be done, since often the zET can cap out on APS without your transgression already (in great density maps). If your zET has survivability issues (Fazula-zET with MW:Conduit), go with Time of Need and make it spammable (Chant of Resonance or Band of the Rue Chambers) or Agility for dodge. You have to time your blind with your zET dropping from archon.

Gameplay/Build as Barb

No Changes in your build. As long as the zET archon is not doing damage (~85% of the time) the elites are allowed to be anywhere and you can position them as you wish. As soon as he gives the 3sec countdown to the burst you have to rageflip them right into the center of the stack. Always remember: CC immune mobs cannot be frogged/flipped into the stack anymore, meaning: If you bring an elite too close to the monk and he starts repetitively to apply cyclone strike on it with implosion, that elite will not be frogged/flipped into center anymore and will only take minor damage from the burst. Keep elites at a distance to the monk and wait for the frogs to grab them or flip them in yourself when the countdown comes. Having them in the stack when there is no damage yet is worthless. This is a changeup to the current meta gameplaywise for you, as in ET having the pack close and not in the center to the stack is not optimal but commonly accepted, since trash will die off constantly and the elites will move in.

Gameplay/Build as supDH

Standard wudijo - eeeeehm standard supDH. Seriously. Ask /u/wudijo in this thread. I have no clue.

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Clears and Fails

• S 2 Man – GR 110 R1
• NS 2 Man - GR 113 R1
• S 3 Man – GR 115 R1 – no VoD
• S 3 Man – GR 116 R1
• S 4 Man FAIL – GR 118 (15:34)
• NS 4 Man - GR 122 R1

There were other 4 Man GR 118 close calls (4:45m Power Rime). I did not bother listing all of them.

Credits and Shoutouts:

• Horrax (/u/Horrax) for the CDR ET-Archon build.
• [EoD]Thargor (/u/Lyrala) and [EoD]Galarix (/u/Galarix) for pushing with the CDR variant and sticking to the build, when no one else did in S6. Huge credit to those guys!
• [EoD]RinusTalarin for theorycrafting and trying the zodiac variant in different setups. I loved the Endless Walk fails with (2) Vyr, since we did want to include our gg-travelers at any costs :-/
• [EoD]Thargor (again!) for the amount of theorycrafting and the willingness to reroll his gear as wished – wasting time and ressources on testing!
• [LoH]Crema (/u/Cremasahne) for trying out a funny 4-Man setup with double wiz. Did not work out Some servers rest in peace since that day.
• [EoD]Hashashin (/u/Hashashime) for bringing up the idea of dropping Barb for SupDH regarding the RG fight in 4-Man.
• [ZE]wudijo (/u/wudijo) for jumping in as a SupDH and later as a Barb during 4-Man testing without prior knowledge about the build and just “blindly” trusting us.
• Hoxango (twitch.tv/hoxango) for jumping in as a monk with his experience on high-tier pushing and giving us confidence in the build.
• WQW for bringing zET action to NS with R1 clears.

Closing Statement

Try it out! It’s fun to blow things up. Compared to ET-Meta you are way more mobile (not staying in one spot for 3 minutes). Once you die though, the GR is gone probably, whereas in ET-Meta you’d just switch positions. The optimal group setup on a perfect rift (following elite monstertypes) would be zET/WD/Monk/supDH – however zET/WD/Monk/Barb is more consistent. If you don’t have an issue with hardcore fishing and waiting for the Silverspire-Unburried combination: Go with supDH. Most people asked multiple times: “Does this build more DPS than the current meta build?”. The answer is “probably” - test it yourself. Ask your questions. Most of the people involved will check in hear and may participate in the discussions

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TL;DR

MW either Conduit or Deflection, depending on APoC and survivability.

• 3/4-Man Swami Build [D3Planner] [Dfans]
• 3/4-Man Fazula Build [D3Planner] [Dfans]

1. Start GR on CoE-Light
2. Click archon on every second CoE-Arcane
3. Jump into Occulus
4. Blow up everything
5. Kill RG

Is it stronger than meta? Probably yes. Test it, play it, discuss it.

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Disclaimers

This guide showcases one iteration of the build. Generally speaking there is still a lot of space for theorycrafting left. Gearwise APDs and weapon cube slot are still exchangeable. Furthermore, given how Archon works with elemental damage, changing your elemental composition to 19%arcane and 20%cold/fire let's you play around a lot with your Talstacks and runes! You can freeup a skill slot like that (FN or EB) and take Blackhole/FA (whatever you think is best). What is better? Full arcane or split elemental? That is something only experience and a shitton of minmaxing can answer. So far we believe that the full arcane iteration will be better on the RG, which is why we decided to present that specific variation. If I forgot someone in the credits, whisper me at sVr#21743 or pm me here.

4-man S6 GR 120 Clear