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Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2)

PoE 2 0.4 Sorceress Build - Cold Chronomancer

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This is a Cold Chronomancer Sorceress build for Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2)'s The Last of the Druids Update. Check out the Cold Chronomancer Sorceress build, including its gear, socketables, skills, and playstyle!

PoE 2 Icon Attention! This endgame build starts from 92+ levels. If you want to see a build for leveling, check out our Leveling Builds!

Cold Chronomancer Build Summary

PaintMasterPoE's Cold Chronomancer Build

This Cold Chronomancer endgame build is crafted by PaintMasterPoE, updated for the latest 0.4.0 patch. Check out all of their detailed guides on Path of Exile 2 and other games over at PaintMasterPoE's Youtube and Discord!

Updated for the 0.4 Patch, this video explains the changes made for the latest iteration of the build as well as a short explanation

Cold Chronomancer Build

Build Setup
Chronomancer iconCold Chronomancer
Sigil of Power Icon Temporal Rift Icon Arctic Armour Icon Frost Bomb Icon Frostbolt Icon Frost Wall Icon Cast on Critical Icon Elemental Weakness Icon
Path of Exile 2 Build ProGreat AoE and Single Target Capabilities

Path of Exile 2 Build ProEasy Execution

Path of Exile 2 Build ProExcellent Survivability

Path of Exile 2 Build ProDoesn’t Run Into Resource Issues

Path of Exile 2 Build ConExtremely Expensive

This Cold Chronomancer build is optimized for the endgame and uses Life Recoup to replenish resources. Since we recoup more life and mana than we lose when casting spells, we can cast them continuously without running out of resources, while simutaenously providing additional survivability.

Date Changes Made
01/05/26 ・ Cold Chronomancer Build Revised for The Last of the Druids Patch.
・Adjusted Skills and Support Gems
・Adjusted Passive Tree
・Updated Skill Rotations
・Updated Equipment Section
09/17/25 ・Added Endgame Build and Budget Setup
・Updated Equipment Section
・Adjusted Skills and Support Gems
・Adjusted Passive Tree
・Updated Skill Rotations
09/08/25 ・Removed Arctic Armor
・Removed Orb of Storms
・Added Cast on Elemental Ailment
・Added Comet
・Added Elemental Weakness
・Added Temporal Rift
・Updated Passive Tree
・Updated Skill Rotations
・Updated Equipment Section
09/04/25 ・ Cold Chronomancer Build Revised for The Third Edict Patch.
・Adjusted Skills and Support Gems
・Adjusted Passive Tree
・Updated Skill Rotations
・Updated Equipment Section
04/28/25 ・ Cold Chronomancer Build Revised for Dawn of the Hunt Patch.

Build FAQs

Calculating Mana Recoup

Due to differences in armor values, mana costs, and modifier rolls, it's difficult to determine the amount of mana recoup each character requires, which can range from 110% to 120%.

To that end, PaintmasterPoE has created a calculator that you can use to input your item values and determine how much mana recoup you need.

The calculator can serve as a good indicator of whether you have enough combined mana recovery and regeneration to cast spells repeatedly. If your mana recoup and regeneration are too low, you may need more sources of mana recoup or a better helmet.

External Link to Mana Recoup Calculator

Utilizing Elemental Infusions

A Elemental Infusions mechanic was introduced in patch 0.3. Using certain skills creates a remnant on the ground that can be picked up and grant additional bonuses to applicable skills. This changes how skills interact with each other, allowing them to be used together for unique interactions.

Cold Chronomancer Equipment

※ The affixes shown below are arranged based on descending priority.

Gear Affixes
Attuned Wand IconAttuned Wand
(Weapon Set 1)
Chiming Staff IconChiming Staff
(Weapon Set 2)
・+ Level of all Cold Skills
・Gain % of Damage as Extra Cold Damage
・% Increased Cold Damage
・+ Level to all Spells
・Increased Critical Hit Chance for Spells
・ + Maximum Mana
・ +Level to All Spells
Arrayed Focus IconArrayed Focus
(Offhand Set 1)
・+ Level of All Spell Skills
・% Increased Cold Damage
・Increased Critical Chance for Spells
・Maximum Energy Shield
・% Increased Energy Shield
・Increased Critical Hit Chance for Spells
ScoldScold's Bridle Jade Tiara
・% Damage Taken Recouped as Life
・Increased Energy Shield
・Increased Spell Damage
・Take % of Mana Costs you Pay for Skills as Physical Damage
Sacrosanctum Corvus Mantle IconSacrosanctum Corvus Mantle
・% of Damage Taken Recouped as LIfe
・*Increased Armor and Energy Shield
・Chaos Resistance
・Strength
・%of Damage taken Recouped as Life
・Damage taken Recouped as Life is also Recouped as Energy Shield
・Spirit
MaligaroMaligaro's Virtuosity Fine Bracers
・% increased Evasion Rating
・% increased Critical Hit Chance
・5% increased Attack Speed
・+Dexterity
・Your Critical Damage Bonus is 250%
Sekhema Sandals IconSekhema Sandals
・Increased Movement Speed
・Maximum Energy Shield
・Maximum Mana
・Elemental Resistance
・Increased Energy Shield
Stellar Amulet IconStellar Amulet
・% of Damage Taken Recouped as Mana
・+ Level to All Spell Skills
・+ Spirit
・Elemental Resistance
・Increased Energy Shield
Annointment: Infused Flesh
・+20 to maximum Life
・8% of Damage taken Recouped as Life
Snakepit Pearl Ring IconSnakepit Pearl Ring
・% increased Spell Damage
・% Increased Cast Speed
・Left ring slot: Projectiles from Spells cannot Chain
・Left ring slot: Projectiles from Spells Fork
Prismatic Ring IconPrismatic Ring
・Elemental Resistance
・+ All Elemental Resistances
Blood of the Warrior Gargantuan Life Flask IconBlood of the Warrior Gargantuan Life Flask
・90% Less Life Recovered
・Effect is not Removed when Unreserved Life is Filled
・15-30% of Damage Taken during effect Recouped as Life
・Gain 3-5 Rage when Hit by an Enemy during effect
・No Inherent loss of Rage during effect
LaviangaLavianga's Spirits Gargantuan Mana Flask
・Recovers Mana Every 2 Seconds

Weapons

Your choice of main weapon, a Wand can be quite flexible since you are mainly looking for Level of all Spell Skills for stronger spells, Cast Speed to make sure your spells hit before enemies get close to you, Maximum Mana to sustain spellcasting, Critical Hit Chance, and Cold Damage to further boost your spells.

For your second weapon set, use a Chiming Staff as your second weapon specifically for Sigil of Power, which increases your damage significantly and used primarily for boss encounters.

List of Weapons

Armor and Accessories

This build relies on three unique items: Scold's Bridle Jade Tiara, and the Sacrosanctum Corvus Mantle provide mana recoup and sustainability, while the Maligaro's Virtuosity Fine Bracers provide critical hits.

Ideally, you would want two sockets on your Scold's Bridle and Sacrosanctum, which can be added via corruption using Vaal Orbs.

We will be using Maligaro's Virtuosity Fine Bracers for our gloves slot to set our critical damage bonus to 250%. This will eliminate the need to get additional critical damage bonuses on our gear and passives, allowing us to get more sources of damage.

Lastly, the unique ring Snakepit is utilized in the left ring slot in order to enable Frostbolt projectiles to fork. This allows Frostbolt to fork upon hitting the first target it comes into contact with, and explode on the second, dealing massive amounts of damage on the explosion.

List of Accessories List of Armors

Runes and Soul Cores

Equipment Sockets
Weapon
Armor

Our current setup provides more than enough damage, so we will socket our weapon with a Greater Body Rune to increase life recoup.

Socket Estazunti's Soul Core of Convalescence in your helmet and the Soul Core of Tacati in your body armor for additional life recovery and chaos resistance. You can use any elemental resistance runes on your boots and gloves to cap out your resistances.

List of Runes List of Soul Cores

Belts and Charms

Belt Modifiers
Midnight Braid Rawhide Belt IconMidnight Braid Rawhide Belt ・+To maximum Mana
・% To all Elemental Resistances
・% of Damage taken Recouped as Mana
Charm Options
Nascent Hope Thawing CharmNascent Hope Forsaken BangleForsaken Bangle Sanguis HeroumSanguis Heroum

The Midnight Braid Rawhide Belt provides additional mana recoup and elemental resistance for increased survivability. The mana recoup modifier can be as high as 61%, so aim for a value around that. If you have the budget for repeated attempts, you can further increase the value of the modifiers by corrupting them a second time using the Architect's Orb.

The Nascent Hope is a significant upgrade to the standard Thawing Charm, offering increased survivability in addition to freeze immunity. The Forsaken Bangle is used for increased chaos resistance. The third unique slot is flexible, but the consecrated ground effect of the Sanguis Heroum is a great bonus, providing additional survivability during spellcasting while stationary.

List of Belts List of Charms

Cold Chronomancer Skills

※ The Support Gems' priority are arranged in a descending order. The first one being the most important and the last being the least crucial.

Skill Support Gems
Sigil of Power IconSigil of Power
Temporal Rift IconTemporal Rift
Frostbolt IconFrostbolt
Frost Wall IconFrost Wall
Frost Bomb IconFrost Bomb
Elemental Weakness IconElemental Weakness
Cast on Critical IconCast on Critical
Arctic Armour IconArctic Armour

Endgame Build Skills

This build revolves around dealing massive amounts of cold damage, so Frostbolt will be the main damaging skill. Socketed with Sione's Temper to increase projectiles, Frostbolt gains significant bossing capabilities when used with Frost Wall to manually trigger explosions. These will be our main skills for most encounters, while the rest will be used mainly against bosses.

The rework of Frost Bomb means that it is no longer used primarily for damage, but rather for its elemental exposure debuff.

For bosses, replace theSpell Cascade support gem with the Living Bomb support gem for Cast on Critical. This will significantly increase your DPS thanks to the fire-infused comets from Elemental Infusion.

List of Skills

Cold Chronomancer Passive Tree

Passive Tree Progression

Ascendency Passive Nodes
The Rapid River, Quicksand Hourglass ,Apex of the Moment and Now and Again
Passive Nodes
1. Pure Energy and Elemental Force 2. Lingering Horror and Critical Exploit
3. Echoing Frost and Dynamism 4. Curse Effect and Pliable Flesh
5. Patient Barrier and Invocated Efficiency 6. Master of Hexes and Stormbreaker
7. Exploit the Elements and Chronomancy 8. Sacrificial Blood and All Natural
9. Adverse Growth and Stormcharged 10. Necromantic Talisman.pngAdverse Growth and Glazed Flesh
(Accessed via From Nothing Diamond)
Screenshots taken from Path of Building.

※ Legend: Red = Weapon Set I | Green = Weapon Set II

We will take mainly nodes related to Cold Damage, Critical Hit Chance, Critical Hit Damage, and Freeze Buildup to drastically boost damage done by your spells. For survivability, you will go for nodes related to your Energy Shield

To increase damage and survivability and balance our mana with life as a partial resource, we will take Sacrificial Blood and get more nodes on Life Recoup, such as Taut Flesh and Heart Tissue.

Passive Skill Tree Guide and List of Passives

Jewels

Note: The modifiers listed are arranged according to priority.

From Nothing From Nothing Allocates: Necromantic Talisman
・Passives in Radius of Necromantic Talisman can be allocated without being connected to your tree
Controlled Metamorphosis Controlled Metamorphosis ・Passives in Radius can be Allocated without being connected to your tree
・- to all Elemental Resistances
Heart of the Well Heart of the Well ・Gain % of damage as Extra Fire Damage
・+ Gain Additional Ailment Threshold equip to 5% of Maximum Energy Shield
・% of Damage Taken Recouped As Life
・% Increased Speed of Recouped Effects

We will use the From Nothing diamond to allocate passives near the Necromantic Talisman Keystone. This will allow us to allocate additional Life and Mana recoup nodes without connecting them to our skill tree.

The Heart of the Well was introduced in the Rise of the Abyssal League and can be rolled with unique Abyssal modifiers. If you manage to get a good roll on it, it can increase your damage output tremendously, so keep an eye out for this jewel.

List of Jewels

Cold Chronomancer Playstyle

Endgame Mobbing Rotation

For most encounters, we only need to cast Frostbolt continuously since we can cast it without running out of resources thanks to our life and mana recoup. The rotation is as follows:

  1. Cast Frostbolt Continuously Until the Target Dies.
  2. Rinse and repeat.

Endgame Bossing Rotation

We will use all of our skills to quickly take down bosses. Make sure to replace the Spell Cascade support gem with the Living Bomb support gem beforehand to trigger fire-infused comets. The rotation is as follows:

  1. Start with Sigil of Power for the buff.
  2. Cast Elemental Weakness to lower enemy resistances.
  3. Cast Frost Bomb to induce the elemental exposure debuff.
  4. Cast Frost Wall to set up the boss for repeated Frostbolt casts.
  5. Cast Frostbolt on the boss, making sure the first point of contact is the boss and the second is your Frost Wall.

Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2) Related Guides

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List of All Builds

0.4 Best Endgame Builds

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A tier Icon
B tier icon
c tier icon
Cold Chronomancer BuildCold Chronomancer UP

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All Build Guides

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Path of Exile 2 - Witch Builds Witch Path of Exile 2 - Sorceress Builds Sorceress Path of Exile 2 - Warrior Builds Warrior
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Other Build Guides
0.3 Leveling Builds How to Make a Good Build

Sorceress Leveling Builds

Spark SorceressSpark Sorceress
Arctic Armour Icon Spark Icon Flame Wall Icon Orb of Storms Icon Conductivity Icon Mana Tempest Icon Lightning Warp Icon Mana Remnants Icon

Focus: Mobbing, AoE, Lightning, Fast Clear
Fireball SorceressFireball Sorceress
Flame Wall Icon Snap Icon Fireball Icon Raging Spirits Icon Living Bomb Icon

Focus: AoE, Mobbing
Cold Infusion SorceressCold Infusion Sorceress
NEW
Frost Bomb Icon Flame Wall Icon Ice Nova Icon Orb of Storms Icon Snap Icon Frost Darts Icon

Focus: Elements, Cold, AoE, Infusions

Sorceress Endgame Builds

Fire SorceressFire Sorceress
Flame Wall Icon Solar Orb Icon Flammability Icon Fireball Icon

Focus: DoT, Mobbing
Cold Warp StormweaverCold Warp Stormweaver
Frost Bomb Icon Frostbolt Icon Hypothermia Icon Frost Wall Icon Lightning Warp Icon Comet Icon Cast on Freeze Icon Blink Icon

Focus: Burst Damage, Crowd Control
Spark StormweaverSpark Stormweaver
Spark Icon Flame Wall Icon Orb of Storms Icon Conductivity Icon Lightning Warp Icon Mana Remnants Icon Archmage Icon

Focus: Mobbing, AoE, Lightning, Fast Clear
Cold ChronomancerCold Chronomancer
Frost Bomb Icon Flame Wall Icon Ice Nova Icon Snap Icon Comet Icon Cast on Elemental Ailment Icon Siphon Elements Icon Frost Darts Icon Elemental Weakness Icon Temporal Rift Icon

Focus: Crowd Control, Burst Damage, Cold
Arc Stormweaver BuildArc Stormweaver Build
Arc Icon Frost Bomb Icon Orb of Storms Icon Blink Icon Archmage Icon Cast on Elemental Ailment Icon Siphon Elements Icon Elemental Weakness Icon

Focus: Lightning, Cast on Elemental Ailment, Mobbing
Elementalist StormweaverElementalist Stormweaver
Frost Bomb Icon Ember Fusillade Icon Orb of Storms Icon Ball Lightning Icon Trinity Icon Siphon Elements Icon Frost Darts Icon Elemental Weakness Icon Living Bomb Icon Elemental Storm Icon

Focus: Elements, Shock, Chill, Ignite
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Focus: Minion, Cold, Burst, Slow Magnitude, Crowd Control, Djinns

Sorceress Class and Ascendancy Guides

Base Class
Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2) - Sorceress Portrait Sorceress
Ascendancies
Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2) StormweaverStormweaver Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2) ChronomancerChronomancer Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2) Disciple of VarashtaDisciple of Varashta

Comment

1 Anonymous Anonymous 12 months

Your activate skills for Mid Game are fire spells instead of Frost spells.

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