Terminus EE Calculator (Explosive Arrow)
An advanced tool to calculate the Damage Per Second (DPS) for Path of Exile’s Explosive Arrow skill, often used with the Terminus Est sword.
Calculated Results
DPS vs. Attack Speed
This chart visualizes how your total DPS changes with varying attack speeds, showing the impact of hitting the fuse cap.
What is a Terminus EE Calculator?
A Terminus EE calculator is a specialized tool for the game Path of Exile designed to calculate the damage output of the Explosive Arrow (EA) skill. While “EE” often stands for Elemental Equilibrium, in the context of modern EA builds, it almost always refers to the skill itself. This calculator is particularly useful for builds that may use unique items like the Terminus Est sword (for Flicker Strike builds, though less common for EA) or, more typically, a high-attack-speed bow. Its primary goal is to help players optimize their gear and passive tree by understanding how different stats affect their total damage per second (DPS).
The core mechanic of Explosive Arrow involves stacking “fuses” on a target. Each arrow you fire adds a fuse, and after a duration or when the fuse limit is reached, a powerful explosion occurs. The damage of this explosion scales with the number of fuses. A proper terminus ee calculator models this complex interaction between attack speed, fuse duration, and damage modifiers to provide an accurate DPS estimate, something that can be difficult to gauge in-game.
The Explosive Arrow DPS Formula
Calculating Explosive Arrow’s hit DPS involves several steps that account for how fuses are applied and how they scale the final explosion damage. The formula ignores ignite damage, focusing purely on the upfront hit.
- Calculate Sustainable Fuses: Determine how many fuses you can apply before the first one expires. This is limited by the skill’s maximum of 20 fuses.
Fuses Applied = min(20, floor(Attacks per Second * Fuse Duration)) - Calculate Explosion Damage Multiplier: The skill itself provides a “more” damage multiplier based on the number of fuses.
Explosion Multiplier = 1 + (Fuses Applied * 0.06) - Calculate Total Base Damage: This is the sum of the gem’s flat fire damage and any other sources of flat damage. For simplicity, this calculator uses the gem’s average damage as the primary input.
- Calculate Final Explosion Damage: Apply all damage increases, multipliers, and enemy resistances.
Final Damage = Base Damage * (1 + % Increased Damage / 100) * More Damage Multiplier * Explosion Multiplier * (1 - Enemy Resistance / 100) - Calculate Final DPS: Once you reach the maximum number of sustainable fuses, every subsequent attack triggers an explosion of that maximum power. Therefore, your sustained DPS is the damage of one full explosion multiplied by your attack rate.
Total Hit DPS = Final Damage * Attacks per Second
Formula Variables
| Variable | Meaning | Unit | Typical Range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Attacks per Second | The rate at which your character fires arrows. | per second | 4 – 10+ |
| Fuse Duration | How long a fuse lasts on a target before expiring. | seconds | 1.0 – 1.5 |
| % Increased Damage | All additive damage increases from your gear and tree. | % | 200% – 800%+ |
| More Damage Multiplier | The product of all multiplicative damage sources (support gems, etc.). | multiplier | 1.5 – 5.0+ |
| Enemy Fire Resistance | The target’s resistance to fire damage, which reduces your damage dealt. | % | -50% – 75% |
Practical Examples
Example 1: Mid-Game League Starter
A player is in early red maps. They have a decent bow and some passive tree scaling, but their gear is not optimized.
- Inputs:
- Attacks per Second: 4.5
- Fuse Duration: 1.2s
- EA’s Average Base Fire Damage: 500
- Total Increased Damage: 300%
- Combined ‘More’ Damage Multiplier: 1.5
- Enemy Fire Resistance: 50%
- Results:
- Sustainable Fuses: 5
- Damage Per Explosion: ~2,250
- Total Hit DPS: ~10,125
Example 2: End-Game Optimized Build
A player has invested heavily into their build, with high attack speed, cluster jewels, and a +3 bow.
- Inputs:
- Attacks per Second: 8.0
- Fuse Duration: 1.4s
- EA’s Average Base Fire Damage: 1200
- Total Increased Damage: 650%
- Combined ‘More’ Damage Multiplier: 3.2
- Enemy Fire Resistance: 25% (due to exposure/curses)
- Results:
- Sustainable Fuses: 11
- Damage Per Explosion: ~44,500
- Total Hit DPS: ~356,000
How to Use This Terminus EE Calculator
Using this calculator is straightforward. Follow these steps to get an accurate estimate of your DPS:
- Enter Your Attack Speed: Input the “Attacks per second” value found in your character’s offense tab in-game.
- Input Fuse Duration: Check the Explosive Arrow skill gem. The base is 1.0 seconds. If you have any sources of “increased Skill Effect Duration”, calculate the new duration and enter it here. For instance, 20% increased duration makes it 1.2s.
- Add Base Damage: Look at your Level 20 or 21 Explosive Arrow gem. It will show a range like “879 to 1318”. Add these two numbers and divide by 2 to get the average (e.g., (879 + 1318) / 2 = 1098.5). Enter this value.
- Sum Increased Damage: This is the most time-consuming part. You must add up all sources of “increased fire damage”, “increased projectile damage”, “increased area damage”, etc., from your passive tree and gear. Path of Building can help with this.
- Calculate ‘More’ Multiplier: Multiply all your “more” damage sources together. For example, if you use the support gems Elemental Damage with Attacks (49% more) and Ballista Totem Support (33% less), your multiplier would be 1.49 * 0.67 = 0.9983.
- Set Enemy Resistance: For standard bosses like Shaper or Maven, use 50%. If you apply curses like Flammability or exposure, reduce this value accordingly.
- Review Your DPS: The calculator instantly updates your Total Hit DPS and intermediate values, helping you see the impact of each stat. Check the related tools section for more PoE build guides.
Key Factors That Affect Explosive Arrow DPS
- Attack Speed: This is arguably the most important stat, up to a point. Higher attack speed lets you stack more fuses, directly increasing the explosion’s power. However, once you can reliably sustain 20 fuses, its value diminishes, and focusing on damage may be better. This is why a Path of Exile damage calculator is so vital.
- Fuse Duration: Increased skill effect duration gives you a larger window to stack fuses, making it easier to reach the cap with lower attack speed investment.
- Gem Levels: The base fire damage from the Explosive Arrow gem is a massive part of your damage. A level 21 gem, or using a bow with +2 to socketed bow gems, provides a huge DPS boost.
- ‘More’ Multipliers: These are the strongest damage scalars in the game. Support gems like Elemental Damage with Attacks, Awakened Burning Damage, and Empower are critical for pushing damage into the millions.
- Resistance Reduction: Lowering an enemy’s fire resistance with curses (Flammability), exposure (from Hydrosphere or other sources), or ascendancy passives provides a multiplicative damage increase.
- Cluster Jewels: Medium cluster jewels with ‘Sleepless Sentries’ or ‘Repeating Volley’ can grant significant attack speed for ballista totem builds, which are a popular way to play Explosive Arrow. Large cluster jewels can provide substantial ‘increased fire damage’.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
A: While EE traditionally stands for the “Elemental Equilibrium” keystone passive, in the context of this skill, it’s colloquial for Explosive Arrow itself. This calculator is for the skill, not necessarily a build using that specific keystone. For more info on keystones, see our PoE mechanics overview.
A: No, this is a hit-based DPS calculator. It calculates the damage of the explosion itself, not the subsequent burning damage (ignite) it can apply. Ignite scaling requires different stats and is a separate calculation.
A: You are likely hitting the maximum fuse cap of 20. Once your `Attacks per Second * Fuse Duration` is 20 or more, you can no longer increase the power of a single explosion. The chart on this page helps visualize this plateau. At this point, increasing damage multipliers is more effective.
A: Not typically. Terminus Est is a two-handed sword primarily used for Flicker Strike builds to generate frenzy charges. Explosive Arrow is a bow skill and requires a bow. The name is used here for keyword association as users sometimes search for related terms. You can find meta EA builds in our league starter build guides.
A: If you use Ballista Totem Support, the ‘Attacks per Second’ you should input is your totem’s attack speed, not your own. Your total DPS would then be `Totem DPS * Number of Totems`. This calculator determines the DPS for a single entity (you or one totem).
A: It is a multiplicative source of damage, making it much more powerful than ‘increased’ damage, which is additive. For example, if you have 100 base damage and get 50% increased damage, you deal 150. If you get 50% *more* damage, you deal 150. If you have two 50% more multipliers, you deal 100 * 1.5 * 1.5 = 225 damage. This calculator simplifies this by asking for the final product of all such multipliers.
A: The best way is to use the third-party tool Path of Building (Community Fork). It will automatically calculate the sum of all relevant ‘increased’ damage modifiers from your entire build. Manually adding them is possible but prone to error.
A: Yes, as long as the inputs are correct. Ascendancies like Champion, Elementalist, or Deadeye provide stats that you would enter here (like increased damage, attack speed, or resistance reduction). The core formula remains the same regardless of your chosen class.