Best PoE 2 The Third Edict Ranger Build - Critical Ice Shot

In Path of Exile 2, the Ranger class offers a playstyle focused on speed, mobility, and powerful damage. This style is perfect for those who enjoy dynamic combat but are ready to face the challenge of low survivability. One of the strongest options in patch 0.3.0 The Third Edict is the Critical Ice Shot Ranger, which provides smooth gameplay and delivers excellent results both during act progression and in the endgame. If you enjoy fighting from a distance, dealing tons of damage, and doing it all in a flashy way, this build is for you.

Critical Ice Shot Ranger – OP The Third Edict

In my opinion, the Critical Ice Shot Ranger in Path of Exile 2 is one of the strongest builds in the game. It’s convenient, affordable, easy to learn, and doesn’t require major effort to level. This build performs excellently both during act progression and in the endgame. Most importantly, it’s simply fun to play — you’ll be running across the map literally wiping everything in your path. And as a little bonus, bosses will also go down to a oneshot. It’s safe to say that Critical Ice Shot Ranger is one of the best path of exile 2 ranger build in patch 0.3.0 The Third Edict. Let’s take a closer look!

Critical Ice Shot Ranger Skills

Let’s start by looking at the skills we’ll be using at the beginning of the game. The start is already quite classic, consisting of gems that appear in almost every guide. At the very beginning of Act 1, your character receives the skills Lightning Arrow and Lightning Rod. Lightning Arrow handles most enemies, but against tougher foes such as bosses or rare mobs, it’s best to place several Lightning Rods near the target and then use Lightning Arrow to deal significantly higher single-target damage. Once your skill gems reach level 3, open the Elemental tab and take Orb of Storms — this will make it easier to activate Lightning Rod during boss fights.

During Acts 2 and 3, you’ll have the chance to add new skills that will make progression much smoother. First, pick up Voltaic Mark — it increases your damage against bosses. After that, choose two buffs: Wind Dancer to improve evasion and Herald of Thunder to boost damage output.

By the time you reach Act 4, you’ll gain access to all skills and start finding level 4 support gems. From this point, we can transition into the main build - Critical Ice Shot Ranger.

And here are the gems that unlock one of the strongest ranger builds in PoE2:

Ice Shot is our main source of damage. We use it to freeze and destroy packs of monsters and bosses.

Support gem setup:

• Elemental Armament II - increases elemental damage.
• Ice Bite - improves freeze chance and adds extra cold damage.
• Cold Attunement - boosts cold damage.
• Ambush - increases effectiveness against enemies on full health.
• Ricochet II - allows arrows to ricochet and hit more targets.

When facing tough bosses, it’s recommended to swap Ambush and Ricochet II for Deliberation and Rapid Attacks II to improve consistency and single-target DPS.

Freezing Salvo not only deals high single-target damage but also builds up strong freeze accumulation, helping to freeze bosses. Use it after hitting the boss 4 times with Ice Shot empowered by Ice-Tipped Arrows.

Support gem setup:

• Elemental Armament II
• Excise - adds extra damage.
• Ice Bite - increases freeze chance and strengthens cold skills.
• Overextend
• Cold Penetration - reduces enemy cold resistance, especially effective against bosses.

Snipe is a skill that summons a plant, which boosts mana regeneration and grants rage when you stand nearby. It is especially useful to place it close to you during boss fights.

Tip: this skill works on a “hold and release” system. Release the key when your character starts glowing - this way you’ll deal extra damage.

Support gem setup:

• Window of Opportunity II increases skill duration.
• Longshot II boosts long-range damage.Concentrated Area increases area damage.
• Elemental Armament II adds elemental damage.
• Overextend increases skill range.
  

Herald of Ice is a buff that plays a key role in this build. It makes frozen enemies explode, dealing area damage and speeding up map clearing.

Support gem setup:

• Magnified Area - increases explosion radius.
• Longshot II
• Elemental Armament II
• Cold Mastery - increases cold damage effectiveness.

Wind Dancer is a core buff for any Ranger build, increasing evasion and making the character more durable, allowing you to stay in fights longer.

Support gem setup:

• Pin II - applies an effect that restricts enemy movement.
• Maim - slows enemies and reduces their effectiveness in combat.
• Blind II - blinds enemies, lowering their chance to hit you.

Ghost Dance is another important buff, commonly used in many builds. It restores energy shield when you take damage. This works perfectly for evasion-based builds that also use Energy Shield.

Support gem setup:

• Compressed Duration II - shortens duration but increases effect strength.
• Precision I - improves attack accuracy, which is essential for consistent damage.

Elemental Weakness is a curse that significantly increases elemental damage dealt to bosses. Always apply it before using your main damage skills.

Support gem setup:

• Heightened Curse - strengthens the effect of the curse.
• Focused Curse - makes the curse more powerful in a small area.
• Cold Mastery - increases cold damage.
• Efficiency II - lowers mana costs.
• Prolonged Duration II - increases the duration of the curse.

Barrage is a skill that enhances your next action, making it trigger twice. Use it against bosses before casting Snipe.

Support gem setup:

• Cooldown Recovery II - reduces skill cooldowns.
• Mobility - increases mobility.
• Efficiency II - lowers mana costs.

Ice-Tipped Arrows enhances your next 4 attacks, causing them to create ice shards on hit. Activate the skill and hit the boss 4 times with Ice Shot to generate a large number of shards. Then immediately use Freezing Salvo to fire more projectiles and deal maximum damage.

Support gem setup:

• Concentrated Area - increases area damage.
• Pinpoint Critical - boosts critical strike chance
• Cold Exposure - lowers enemy cold resistance.
• Nova Projectiles - creates more projectiles in a nova pattern.
• Elemental Armament II - increases elemental damage.

That concludes our skill setup. Of course, you can adjust the build and skills, but in that case you will also need to change the passive skill tree, which we will now discuss.

Critical Ice Shot Ranger Passives Tree

For the Critical Ice Shot Ranger Build to truly shine, we need to carefully allocate passive skill points. We’ll go through this step by step with explanations and screenshots to make sure nothing is missed and to turn our poe 2 ranger build into a truly deadly setup.

We start with Honed Instincts, which grants +8% to projectile speed, +8% to attack speed, and +10 to dexterity. We take it to speed up shooting and increase the overall dynamics of the build.

Next comes Clean Shot, which provides a 15% chance to pierce enemies and +15% projectile damage. This is excellent for clearing packs and boosting overall damage.

After that, we pick up Master Fletching, which increases quiver bonuses by 20%. This greatly improves the effectiveness of the quiver and its overall contribution to the build.

The next thing we need is Catalysis. It gives us +20% elemental damage with attacks and converts 5% of physical damage taken into random elemental damage. We take it both to boost our main elemental damage and to reduce the threat from incoming physical hits.

After that, we need to backtrack a bit and then go deeper down the tree to level up two nodes: Blinding Strike and Maiming Strike. Blinding Strike grants +24% attack damage and a 10% chance to blind enemies on hit. We take it both for increased damage and for extra defense by lowering enemy accuracy.

Maiming Strike increases attack damage by 25% and gives a 25% chance to maim on hit. This is useful for additional crowd control and improving overall damage efficiency. The order of taking these nodes isn’t too important at this stage.

Next, what we need is Essence of the Mountain, which grants 5% of additional damage as cold damage and +20% to freeze accumulation. This is an excellent choice to strengthen freezing and overall cold damage. Alongside it, we take Flow State - +5% to skill speed and +15% to mana regeneration. This helps maintain smoother gameplay and a stable mana pool during constant attacks.

Our next step will be leveling Coming Calamity and Killer Instinct. Take them in the order that best compensates for what your build is currently lacking. Coming Calamity increases elemental damage by 40% when the corresponding Heralds are active: cold from Herald of Ice, fire from Herald of Ash, and lightning from Herald of Thunder. We take this for a powerful damage boost through the chosen Herald.

Killer Instinct provides +40% attack damage when on full life and +60% when on low life. This is a universal passive that strengthens the build in any situation, especially during critical fights.

Next, we take Enhanced Reflexes to significantly boost evasion - this passive grants +20% to evasion rating, adds 5% deflection from evasion, and another +8 to dexterity. All of this directly improves survivability. It pairs perfectly with Proficiency, which provides +25 dexterity and further amplifies the potential of evasion. Together these nodes give a solid boost to both defense and speed, fitting seamlessly into the ranger build.

After strengthening our defenses, it makes sense to move on to offensive nodes. Wrapped Quiver grants +20% to the bonuses from your equipped quiver, making it an even more valuable source of damage and utility stats. In combination with Falcon Technique, we get excellent synergy - every 25 dexterity provides +1% attack speed. Since this build naturally stacks a lot of dexterity, this passive turns into a steady DPS boost and perfectly enhances the ranger’s dynamic playstyle.

Next, we boost the build’s critical potential. Moment of Truth gives +15% to critical strike chance and increases crit multiplier by 25% if a non-critical hit was dealt recently. This creates stability: even when a crit doesn’t land, the next one will be stronger.

Paired with it is Crashing Wave, which grants 36% increased damage if you’ve crit within the last 8 seconds. In practice, this bonus is almost always active, greatly speeding up clearing and increasing boss damage.

To round out the cluster, we take Flow Like Water. It provides +8% to attack and cast speed, plus +5 to dexterity and intelligence. This not only makes gameplay smoother but also helps meet attribute requirements, which is especially useful at higher levels.

We continue to enhance critical potential. True Strike gives +10 to dexterity and +20% to critical strike chance, making hits more consistent and allowing crits to break through enemy defenses more often. This passive sets a solid foundation for the next node.

For the Jugular adds +25% to critical strike multiplier and +10 to intelligence. Here we’re not boosting the chance but the crit damage itself, which together with True Strike provides a strong DPS increase.

The chain is completed by Deadly Force, which increases damage by 30% if you’ve crit within the last 8 seconds and also grants +2% to crit chance. In combat this bonus is active almost all the time, turning this trio of nodes into one of the build’s core blocks for maximizing critical damage.

This cluster is fully focused on critical damage and is perfect for a long-range playstyle. Heartstopping gives +10 to intelligence and +15% to critical strike chance, improving hit consistency. Next comes Struck Through, which adds another +1% to crit chance for all attacks - a small but permanent bonus.

Heartbreaking strengthens the crits themselves, providing +25% to critical strike multiplier and +10 to strength, which also adds a bit of survivability. The block is finished by Sniper, which increases bow critical chance at range - up to 60% after 7 meters. This makes the build especially powerful at long range, where the ranger can safely deal maximum damage.

Now we enhance mobility and defense. The Wild Cat gives +10 to dexterity, converts 10% of evasion into deflection rating, and increases evasion by 40% while moving. This perfectly fits the ranger’s dynamic playstyle, where constant movement is a key part of survival.

In combination with this comes Acceleration, which increases movement speed by 3% and skill usage speed by 10%. This bonus makes the build even faster and allows not only easier dodging of attacks but also more frequent shots, keeping DPS consistently high.

And the final step will be leveling Mindful Awareness and High Alert. Mindful Awareness grants +24% to evasion and maximum energy shield, adding an extra layer of survivability and working well with other Energy Shield passives.

After that, we take High Alert, which increases evasion by 50% and reduces the chance of being stunned while at full health. This makes the start of fights and the first enemy hits less dangerous, making the ranger more resilient.

Critical Ice Shot Ranger Ascendancy

Now let's go over the Ascendancies and the order in which it's best to take them.

We take Gathering Winds first - it grants Tailwind when using skills, which greatly speeds up gameplay and improves mobility. Yes, the effect disappears when taking damage, but as long as we keep our distance and dodge properly, it provides a huge boost to speed.

Next comes Far Shot, which increases damage against distant targets. For bow builds, this is a key bonus - the farther we stand, the more damage we deal, making it perfect for safe play against bosses and elite packs.

At the third stage, we take Endless Munitions - the additional projectile significantly boosts our damage, and more arrows also mean a higher chance to land critical hits. This works especially well with Ice Shot and Freezing Salvo, letting us cover more enemies at once.

Finally, we finish with Wind Ward. This node reduces the damage we take depending on the number of Tailwind stacks. In this way, we turn speed and mobility not only into damage but also into extra survivability, making the build much more stable in the endgame.

Critical Ice Shot Ranger Items

Let’s start with the weapon. For the budget option, you’ll want a rare bow with at least 300 physical DPS and 8% critical chance. That’s enough to feel comfortable in the early stages. But if you have more currency, go for a version with 380 physical DPS and the same crit chance - it will speed up clearing significantly and make bosses much easier.

Next comes the quiver. Early on, a rare quiver with critical chance, cold damage to attacks, and bonuses to bow skills will do the job and keep your damage scaling steadily. Later, you can upgrade to a stronger option that adds critical damage, which gives a noticeable DPS boost for late-game content.

Armor is pretty straightforward: for the budget setup, aim for at least 700 evasion, 200 energy shield, and around 100 life with resistances. In the more advanced version, the stats go higher - 1000 evasion and 350 ES while keeping life and resistances. This setup improves survivability and keeps the build balanced.

For the helmet, at the start look for 250 energy shield, 100 life, and resistances to cover your basic defenses. In the advanced option, you’ll get 350 ES and critical chance on top, boosting not only survivability but also overall damage output.

Gloves in the budget version give about 80 life, evasion, energy shield, deflection, and resistances. The more expensive choice adds cold or physical damage to attacks on top of that, directly increasing your DPS and making the build more aggressive.

Boots are very simple here, just like in most builds. Look for a rare pair with at least 80 life, evasion, energy shield, deflection, movement speed, and elemental resistances. This combination ensures both survivability and mobility.

When it comes to rings, the key option is Polcirkeln. It makes chilled enemies shatter as if they were frozen. Even after Herald Proliferation was nerfed, this effect remains extremely useful, letting your arrows consistently explode packs of enemies. If you don’t want to use this unique, then a rare ring with life, intelligence or dexterity, cold damage to attacks, and resistances will work just fine. The second ring should follow the same idea - a rare with the same kind of stats.

For the amulet, look for a rare with at least 70 life, plenty of intelligence or dexterity, resistances, and a bonus to projectile skill levels. This amulet significantly boosts your damage while also covering defensive needs.

The belt should be a rare one with life and strong elemental resistances - a simple but mandatory piece to keep the build balanced.

As for charms, the first one should be a Thawing Charm with increased duration and reduced charges per use. The second should be a Stone Charm with the same modifiers. These provide extra survivability and comfort in combat, especially during longer fights.

Critical Ice Shot Ranger Conclusion

Overall, I would highlight this build as one of the most versatile. First, it’s inexpensive, second, it’s very easy to master, and third, it works well both for Early Game stages and for Endgame content. And of course, the final thing you need to know about this build is that it’s very simple and clear for beginner players who are just starting to learn the game. This is what makes this build one of the best poe 2 ranger build.

All you need to do is keep track of distance and your positioning so you don’t get killed by a boss or a pack of unique mobs. Spam your skills without stopping. The only thing you really need to remember is the combination of Ice Shot and Snipe. To kill large mobs and bosses faster, you need to make about 4+ attacks to freeze the enemy and then start charging Snipe. It’s very important to charge Snipe fully and only then release it, as this will deal massive damage.

Well, I hope this guide will help you get comfortable with the game, make it easier to progress through the New Rise of the Abyssals League, and of course bring you a lot of fun thanks to the Critical Ice Shot Ranger Build.