Path of Exile 2 – Warrior Thorns Build: The Reflect King

Guide to Thorns Build

By Kalltorak.

Big thorns fan and would love to make it work in Path of Exile 2. Been doing a lot of research into thorns the last 2 days and recently started a warrior alt to test it out. With PoE2 we’ve gotten:

13 Passive Points

A few awesome specifically these two.

• Retaliation – 75% Increased Thorns Damage if you’ve blocked recently.
• Spiked Armor – Gain Physical thorns Damage Equal to 2% armor from equipped Body Armor.

Spiked Armor is not scaling like I hoped it would. There is a passive called Sturdy Metal that increases the armor from equipped body armor by 80%. This does not further scale the damage gained for thorns.

6 Uniques

The important thing from uniques is the new helmet:

• Crown of the Pale King – What’s important is the following “Thorns Damage Is Triggered By All Hits”.

Before only melee hits triggered thorns. With this helmet all ranged and spell hits will not trigger thorns, making this style way more viable.

2 Skill Gems

• Scavenged Plating – When you break armor of an enemy you get a buff that lasts 8 seconds. One of the effects of this buff gives you thorns damage. At level 15 of this passive skill gem its giving 25-37 thorns per stack, stacking up to 10 times. Thats pretty awesome
• Resonating Shield – This is just an aoe way to break armor and build stacks of scavenged plating. You combine the two to help farm thorns.

Ascendancy

I’m pretty torn between Titan and Warbringer. Sturdy Metal didnt impact Spiked Armor, I doubt Stone Skin will. Either way hulking form and Mysterious Lineage would be nice. Otherwise i think the armor stuff from Warbringer will be best.

Right now I’ve hit a pretty hard wall around level 26 with leveling thorns. Might have to level with a different build until the 60s then try thorns again. Curious what your guys thoughts are and if you have tested any of these cool interactions.

Video below goes over everything: