Lycan Monk Herald of Ice and Thunder Endgame Build

Introduction

This Werewolf Monk build revolves around using Herald of Ice and Herald of Thunder, creating chain reactions that clear entire packs. The playstyle is heavily inspired by the Herald interactions from 0.1, but uses the new Concussive Runes support to make the interaction work.

The build combines the massive Cold damage and Freeze buildup of the Werewolf skills with heavy investment in Lightning damage. This is important because Cold damage cannot contribute to Stun buildup, while the Lightning damage allows our Heralds to reliably stun enemies and trigger Concussive Runes.
The result is a hybrid Cold + Lightning Werewolf setup that combines strong Freeze and Stun mechanics with Herald chain explosions.

We use Chaos Inoculation to gain immunity to Chaos and Poison damage, and Crystallized Immunities set up to grant Ignite immunity. With 40% damage reduction, a 71% Evasion rating (capped while mapping), and a 55% Deflect chance, this setup makes the character extremely tanky, with multiple layers of defense and strong ailment immunity.

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Strengths and Weaknesses

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Build Mechanics

After the changes made in Patch 0.2, Herald skills can no longer directly trigger each other.
Both Herald of Ice and Herald of Thunder require a non-Herald Attack Hit to trigger their effects. This is what Concussive Runes will be used for.

Concussive Runes creates a Runic Shockwave when you Heavy Stun an enemy. This Shockwave acts as our non-Herald Attack Hit, allowing us to trigger the Herald effects and keep the chain reaction going.

Because Concussive Runes require a Heavy Stun to activate, Stun Buildup is a major part of the build.
Therefore, we will need to use the Stun III support gem in both Heralds. We also invest heavily in Lightning damage because Cold damage cannot Stun.

This works really well with the Werewolf skills, especially Lunar Assault, as they provide massive amounts of Cold damage and Freeze buildup, while our Lightning damage and Stun investment provide the Heavy Stuns needed to activate Concussive Runes. Once the Runic Shockwave is triggered, it provides the non-Herald hit needed to start the Herald chain again, and to make this even smoother and help chain Herald of Ice explosions, we will use the Polcirkeln ring, which will shatter all chilled enemies as though Frozen.

Please check the Low Budget requirements section below.

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Ascendancy

1. I am the Thunder – As Lightning damage is one of the most important stats for the build, this is vital as we Gain 10% of Damage as Extra Lightning Damage + Gain 10% of Damage as Extra Lightning Damage.
2. Lead me through Grace – This will allow us to gain spirit from our Body Armour, and we can easily get close to 150 spirit even on a lower budget.
3. I am the Blizzard – Cold damage is required to proc Herald of Ice efficiently, and this gives us Gain 10% of Damage as Extra Cold Damage, and also On Freezing Enemies create Chilled Ground which will slow enemies.
4. Sunder my Enemies – Really good, especially early game, when Rakiata’s Flow is hard to get, as it enables Critical Hits to ignore non-negative Enemy Monster Elemental Resistances.

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Skill Tree

This interactive skill tree gives you an overview of the build’s final state. When assigning travel Attribute Nodes, you will want to account for the requirements of your Skill Gems and Gear, and may have to respec some nodes as you find upgrades and progress.

For Jewels, we have Emerald jewels with Critical Hit Chance, Critical Damage Bonus, % Increased Effect of Suffixes, % increased Attack Damage, and % increased Attack Speed. On a lower budget just focus on Critical Hit Chance and Critical Damage Bonus or % increased Attack Damage.

• Voices with two sockets is more than enough.
• Heart of the Well with double Gain % Damage as Extra Lightning and also Cold Damage and Critical Hit Chance and Increased Critical Damage Bonus.
• Against the Darkness with Notable Passive Skills in Radius also grant Gain 4% of Damage as Extra Cold Damage, and also Notable Passive Skills in Radius also grant Gain 4% of Damage as Extra Lightning Damage (adding this in close to the nodes Dizzying Hits and Stupefy).
• Controlled Metamorphosis jewel (adding this in close to the Node Killer Instinct), which allows you to allocate passive points without being connected to your tree. The passive points we allocate are the following.
  • Wild Storm
  • Concussive Attack
  • Disciplined Training
  • Deadly Force
  • Shatter Palm
  • Shadow Dancing

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Gem Info

In the Planner below, you will find a full list of Skill Gems and their Support Gems listed in order from highest to lowest priority, top to bottom, left to right. When choosing where you should use currency such as Perfect Jeweller’s Orbs, or when shopping for high-value Lineage Support Gems, you can use this table as a guide. Make sure you remember to Quality your Skill Gems as well, as many of the Skills in this build benefit significantly from Quality.

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Video Guide and Showcase

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Build Files

If you would like to have an in-game guide to see the recommended Passive Tree and Skill Gems, you can download this file. It will need to be placed in the folder found at this file-path:

C:\Users[Your Username]\Documents\My Games\Path of Exile 2\BuildPlanner

Please keep in mind that a .build file does not replace a written guide, as there is a lot of information that just cannot be reasonably added to that file in a digestible way. For the best experience, and to make sure you have the most up-to-date information, make sure you refer to both the in-game file and the written guide here!

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Skill Rotation

• Boss/Single target:
  Pounce -> Lunar Assault -> Shred ->Cross Slash

Pounce to apply Freezing Mark, Lunar Assault until target is Frozen, Shred to trigger Icy Fragments, Cross Slash to execute and explode Icy Fragments.

• Mapping:
  Lunar Assault and Pounce from pack to pack.
  

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Gearing

Gear Affixes

In the table below, you will see a breakdown of the most important affixes for each gear slot, as well as what unique items the build uses. These are listed in order of priority, so consider your gearing options carefully.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Make sure that you are capped at 75% Elemental Resistances and meet all Attribute Requirements when you are changing gear pieces.

Slot	Base	Prefix	Suffix
Main Hand	Spiny Talisman	Adds 30 to 50 Physical Damage Adds 8 to 277 Lightning Damage 75% increased Physical Damage (fractured) +185 to Accuracy Rating	+3.97% to Critical Hit Chance +3 to Level of all Attack Skills 27% increased Attack Speed
Helm	Runeforged Sorcerous Tiara	Allocates Crystallised Immunities 40% increased Energy Shield +72 to maximum Energy Shield 95% increased Energy Shield +34 to maximum Mana	+40% to Fire Resistance +44% to Cold Resistance +40% to Lightning Resistance
Body	Morior Invictus	5 Socket Base	Increased Armour, Evasion and Energy Shield Attributes per Socket filled Increased Global Armour, Evasion and Energy Shield per Socket filled To all Elemental Resistances per Socket filled
Gloves	War Wraps	Adds 24 to 32 Cold damage to Attacks Adds 3 to 71 Lightning damage to Attacks Adds 16 to 29 Physical Damage to Attack	33% increased Critical Damage Bonus 15% increased Attack Speed +2 to Level of all Melee Skills
Boots	Runeforged Daggerfoot Shoes	99% increased Evasion and Energy Shield 35% increased Movement Speed 41% increased Evasion and Energy Shield +121 to Stun Threshold	+43% to Fire Resistance Gain Deflection Rating equal to 23% of Evasion Rating +33% to Lightning Resistance
Belt	Mageblood	Legacy of Diamond Legacy of Jade Legacy of Silver Legacy of Jade	45+% increased effect per duplicate.
Ring 1	Polcirkeln	% increased Damage(Enchant) % to Cold Resistance	% increased Cold Damage To maximum Mana To Strength Enemies Chilled by your Hits can be Shattered as though Frozen
Ring 2	Unset Ring	Adds 39 to 62 Fire damage to Attacks Adds 30 to 52 Cold damage to Attacks Adds 1 to 101 Lightning damage to Attacks	% increased Attack Speed Leech % of Physical Attack Damage as Mana Increased Rarity of Items found
Amulet	Absent Amulet (Grants Skill: Eternal Rage)	Allocates Zarokh’s Gift(enchant) -1 Prefix Modifier allowed (implicit) -1 Suffix Modifier allowed (implicit) Grants Skill: Level 18 Eternal Rage (implicit) 50% increased maximum Energy Shield 29% increased Global Armour, Evasion and Energy Shield	39% increased Critical Damage Bonus +4 to Level of all Melee Skills

Instilling Your Amulet

To gain access to the ability to instill your Amulet, you will need to progress the Delirium Questline in the Endgame mapping system.

Unique Items

The Polcirkeln ring is the only mandatory Unique for this build, as it enables Herald of Ice to proc chain explosions efficiently. Normally, Herald of Ice requires you to shatter a Frozen enemy with a non-Herald attack. But with Polcirkeln, an enemy only needs to be Chilled by your Hit to be treated as Frozen for the purpose of Shattering. That makes Herald of Ice much easier to trigger because you no longer need to actually Freeze the enemy first.

Low Budget Requirements

This will 100% work on a Lower budget, for T15 Waystones, just avoid juiced waystones/maps where Monsters have #% increased Ailment Threshold.

You can use a rare Belt with Resistances instead of Mageblood, use only Rare Emerald jewels with Critical Hit Chance and Critical Damage Bonus or % increased Attack Damage. The Polcirkeln you can get very cheap at any point of the league; as for other items, look for similar items just with lower stats to help you reach the below numbers.

At least 300 Ward is a must as the Concussive Runes (Runic Shockwave) costs 45 Ward to trigger. We use Remnants of Kalguur to regenerate Ward efficiently.

On the Skill Gems menu (press the G key in game), check both Herald of Ice and Herald of Thunder stats by clicking the arrow next to the DMG field.

• Herald of Thunder
  • Main Hand Cold Damage at least 1000+
  • Main Hand Lightning damage at least 3000+
  • Main Hand Lightning Stun Buildup Modifier 900%+
• Herald of Ice
  • Main Hand Cold Damage at least 4000+
  • Main Hand Lightning damage at least 6000+
  • Main Hand Lightning Stun Buildup Modifier 900%+

Augments

This table will show you what Augments are used for each gear slot.

Slot	Socketable
Main Hand	Perfect Stone Rune, Soul Core of Citaqualotl, Farrul’s Rune of the Hunt
Helm	Bear Idol, Raven-Touched Shard
Body Armour	Rune of Foundations, 4x Perfect Iron Runes
Gloves	Cadigan’s Epiphany, Jewel socket
Boots	Uhtred’s Sidereus, Legacy of Wanderlust

Flasks and Charms

The recommended setup for your flasks and charms is:

• Mana Flask – Lavianga’s Spirits
• Charms – Nascent Hope, For Utopia, Rite of Passage(Cat)

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Changelog

• September 5th, 2026: Guide created for 0.5.5