Showcase

vs Simualcrum +4 https://youtu.be/L2lHu7_FCQU

vs Xesht +4 https://youtu.be/PTTwDBqxFMw

Why Play Minion Gemling

• Minion gameplay is beginner friendly. You can focus on evading while your Minions deal all the damage.
• Very simple and easy to understand.
• You like the Mercenary's voice lines.
• Flexible and linear gearing progression means you'll have an easier time in SSF or you can easily bag cheaper deals from trade.
• Chaos Inoculation allows you to not worry about Chaos Resistance.
• Minion Level 37 is easy to achieve which allows you to clear Endgame content sooner.

Minion Gemling Cons

• You don't like playing with minions.
• Limited to Skeletal Snipers as of 0.1.1c due to other summons' gem quality not really providing anything
• The build uses Ghostwrithe, Chaos Innoculation, and Grim Feast as crutches. It won't teach you much about defensively gearing other builds.
• Not as flexible as Infernalist in terms of Minions that it can use for now.
• Needs a lot of specific stats you can only get from Corruption.

Skill Tree - https://poe2.ninja/pob/696

• If you're having trouble with attributes, you can opt to have less Jewel Sockets and path towards Polymathy for the meantime.
• Implanted Gems (+1 Skill Gem Level) provides really value for the power it provides. Prism of Belief Skeletal Sniper +1->+2 is around 50 Divines and +2->+3 is around 100 Divines difference.
• Has access to other weapons' higher level skill gems due to Adaptive Capability.

Budget Gear

• Make sure you only trade for socketed corrupted gear. Quality isn't as important earlier into the game.
• Your main goal is to have as much minion levels as possible.
• Any Minion +3 on your Amulet with no Spirit before saving up your first Divine or two to purchase a Corrupted Fireflower with the correct Anoint is perfectly fine.
• Any +4 Minion Sceptre is practically free in Trade League.
• Don't worry too much about Spirit on your first +5 Minion Sceptre as it will provide you 120 Spirit with 20% Quality. Each 20 increase in total Spirit your Sceptre provides only one minion (not factoring in Bones of Ullr) and increases the price exponentially.
• Skill Levels +3 From Weapon, +5 from Sceptre, +3 from Helmet, +5 from Amulet, and +1 from Ascendancy already nets you a level 36 Skeletal Sniper at only Level 19 Skill Gem.

Gear	Name	Stats	Corruption
Weapon	TRENCHTIMBRE	+3 Minion Skill	Any
Offhand	ANY SCEPTRE	+5 Minion Skill	Any
Helmet	ANY HELMET	+2 Minion Skill	+1 Minion Skill
Armour	GHOSTWRITHE	Any	3 Sockets
Gloves	ANY GLOVE	Resistances	Any
Boots	ANY BOOTS	Movement Speed and Resistances	Any
Belt	ANY BELT	Resistances	Any
Amulet	FIREFLOWER	+4 Fire Skills with Dark Entries Anoint	Any Corrupt is cheap off Trade
Rings	ANY RING	Resistances	Any
Life Flask	ANY LIFE FLASK
Mana Flask	ANY MANA FLASK
Charms	THAWING CHARM

Endgame Gear

• When you reach this point, each Minion Level cost increases drastically. The cheapest ones you can get are the 5-Link Level 21 Skeletal Sniper Gem and +1 Level to Skeletal Sniper. After getting those two, the cost increases to around roughly 50 Divine and the final two from Fireflower is valued at around 500 Divines (100 Corrupts).
• You can transition to Evasion once you get Alpha's Howl and Heroic Tragedy Timeless Jewel Olroth.
• Use Bones of Ullr for content that doesn't need you to move around too much like Simulacrum. It should net you around 30% more Skeletal Snipers.
• Fireflower +6 should be final upgrade since most Fireflower +6s on the market doesn't have the correct anoint, you will be making one yourself.

Gear	Name	Stats	Corruption
Weapon	TRENCHTIMBRE	+3 Minion Skill, Soul Core of Azcapa	+1 Minion Skill (+4 Total)
Offhand	RATTLING SCEPTRE	+5 Minion Skill, % Increased Spirit, Allies In Your Presence Deal % Increased Damage	% Spirit
Helmet	ALPHA'S HOWL	95%+ Evasion, 65%+ Cold Resistance, 1 Socket and +20% Quality.	+1 Minion Skill
Armour	GHOSTWRITHE	2 Sockets	61% Life life Energy Shield
Gloves	EVASION GLOVE	Magic Find, Double Resistance, Max Life and Evasion	2 Sockets
Boots	EVASION BOOTS	Movement Speed, Magic Find, Double Resistances, Max Life and Evasion	2 Sockets
Boots 2	BONES OF ULLR	40 Maximum Life	2 Sockets
Belt	INGENUITY	At least 50% Increased Bonuses From Equipped Rings	Any Elemental Resistance
Amulet	FIREFLOWER	+4 Fire Skills with Dark Entries Anoint, 20% Fire Quality Modifier	+1 Fire Skills (+6 total with Quality)
Rings	VENTOR'S GAMBLE	18-20 Spirit, High Magic Find and Max Life. Resistances depend on your other gears.	Too Scared to Corrupt
Life Flask	ANY LIFE FLASK
Mana Flask	ANY MANA FLASK
Charms	THAWING CHARM

Jewels

• Level 96+ Skill Tree has 12 Jewel Sockets.
• Get Sapphire 1s for simplicity's sake when starting out. Even getting only 15% Minion Damage helps a lot.
• Once you get to Sapphire 2-4s, you can start removing Minion Elem res from the skill tree which allows you to allocate other nodes.
• Heroic Tragedy Timeless Jewel Olroth converts a keystone in range into every 2 INT provides 1% Evasion instead.
• If you don't know what you want yet, I would advise just getting another Sapphire. Megalomaniac depends on your budget or what's currently on the market. A few obvious ones would be Evasion nodes from the Ranger side. Anything that saves precious skill points are good too!

Jewel	Stat 1	Stat 2	Stat 3	Stat 4	Corruption
Sapphire 1	Minions Deal 14-15% Increased Damage	10%-20% Increased Energy Shield			Any Attribute Increase
Sapphire 2	Minions Deal 14-15% Increased Damage	10%-20% Increased Energy Shield	Minions Have +9-10% To All Elemental Resistance		Any Attribute Increase
Sapphire 3	Minions Deal 14-15% Increased Damage	10%-20% Increased Energy Shield	Minions Have +11-13% To Chaos Resistance		Any Attribute Increase
Sapphire 4	Minions Deal 14-15% Increased Damage	10%-20% Increased Energy Shield	Minions Have +9-10% To All Elemental Resistance	Minions Have +11-13% To Chaos Resistance	Any Attribute Increase
Grand Spectrum Emerald	2% Increased Spirit Per Socketed Grand Spectrum				Any Attribute Increase
Against the Darkness Time Lost Diamond	Notable Passive Skills in Radius Also Grant +12 to Spirit	Notable Passive Skills in Radius Also Grant 4% Increased Strength
Prism of Belief Diamond	+1-3 To All Levels of Skeletal Sniper Skills
Megalomaniac Diamond	Any Nodes that grant Attributes, Energy Shield, or Evasion
Heroic Tragedy Timeless Jewel	Remembrancing 2448 songworthy deeds by the line of Olroth	Passives in radius are Conquered by the Kalguur

Against the Darkness Layout

https://preview.redd.it/gly5em2dqnie1.png?width=440&format=png&auto=webp&s=4b8a08a7941f87a1f7a33d89b3a28f247dd1f451

Skill Gems

• A Level 36 Skeletal Sniper with 34% Gem Quality costs only 19 Spirit Per Summon.
• You can corrupt a 4 Link Level 19 and below Skeletal Sniper Gem to try to get +1 Link or +1 Skill level then upgrade it to Level 20. This boosts your power by quite a bit before getting your 5 Link Level 21 Gem.
• If you're at Skeletal Sniper Level 38, use Chaos Skill +1 or Fire Skill +1 for Link 4 and 5 on your Snipers. You'll have less clear speed and DPS but your minions will be much tankier which is important in content like Simulacrum.
• Martial Tempo isn't really needed because Pain Offering gives your minion a lot of Attack Speed. I recommend using it only when your Skeletal Sniper is at level 40.
• Scattershot is not that good because the two extra arrows doesn't really always hit and reduces total DPS by a lot. Fork is by far a better choice and can hit targets off-screen.
• If you have at least 25% Minion Revive Speed from your nodes, you can opt to not use Persistence Link from Pain Offering. Inspiration Link is for lowering mana costs for when you have Heroic Tragedy Timeless Jewel Equipped.
• Ancestral Warrior Totem with Armour Breaker well, uh, breaks Armour and provides 2% HP Regen for our Minions via Font of Blood. Any level 5 Link can be bought cheap from Trade since there are players gambling for +1 Gem Level Corrupt.
• Grim Feast is broken as it effectively doubles your Energy Shield and removes the need for ES% Regen. I think it's going to be nerfed in the future.
• Use Wind Dancer only when you switch to Evasion.
• Blink is nice for Trial of the Sekhemas. Steal Ingenuity Link from Skeletal Cleric.

Skill Gem	Link 1	Link 2	Link 3	Link 4	Link 5	Corruption
Skeletal Warrior	Maim	Blind	Culling Strike
Skeletal Sniper	Heft	Brutality	Feeding Frenzy	Martial Tempo	Fork	Level +1
Pain Offering	Ablation	Danse Macabre	Font of Rage	Persistence	Inspiration	Link +1
Skeletal Cleric	Minion Mastery	Last Gasp	Meat Shield	Ingenuity
Ancestral Warrior Totem	Armour Breaker (Skill Gem)	Demolisher	Ancestral Urgency	Overabundance	Font of Blood	Any
Grim Feast
Wind Dancer
Blink	Ingenuity

FAQs

• Why no Raging Spirits? Because we are using Fireflower amulet. Fire Wall needs Brutality in order to not Ignite and we already have our Armour Break Source from Ancestral Warrior Totem.
• WIP

Links

https://www.youtube.com/@Formana
https://www.twitch.tv/formana