[3.16 updated] BRO, DO YOU EVEN SUMMON? Life/ES Dark Pact Skeleton Caster League Starter

I also can't wait to try it against Syndicate ;)

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any tips in early levels?

1.Start off with a right side of the passive tree in order to get enough dexterity to use Phase Run as soon as possible
2.Get Abyssal Cry at lvl 34 to help yourself with clearing monsters
3.For levelling link your Wither Totem with both Faster Casting and Increased Duration
4.Keep 6 additional Dark Pact gems at your secondary weapon slot so you could try to vaal them for lvl 21 later.

Hey, this has probably been asked already, but what is your reason for running bloodbond over cherrubim's maleficence? I haven't played this build so I don't know if I am missing something, but is the minion life more damage than the (up to) 80% chaos damage?

Just some background, I made a self-cast dark pact slayer last league that I killed shaper with. Your build seems a lot safer and able to clear maps with self cast so it sounds fun.

Thanks in advance!

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what is your reason for running bloodbond over cherrubim's maleficence?

Bloodbond provides better life bonus and it's easier to color (with Cherrubim's we have to get 5 off-colors). Also 30% minion life bonus is almost identical to 80% increased chaos damage.

Can't wait till I play this build!

Thanks for your answer! Another question I had is why you use gloomfang instead of something like a well rolled rare amulet. If you use the essence of delerium you can get the chaos leech and still corrupt it for the +1 curse. With a couple dmg mods I think it would give more dmg than the chain. I don't know how to put the chain into POB lol.

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why you use gloomfang instead of something like a well rolled rare amulet. If you use the essence of delerium you can get the chaos leech and still corrupt it for the +1 curse. With a couple dmg mods I think it would give more dmg than the chain. I don't know how to put the chain into POB lol.

It's literally impossible to craft better dps amulet than Gloomfang. I've just made a totally unreal amulet in PoB (essence crafted 33% inc chaos damage, 26% spell damage, 13% cast speed and 38% crit multi) and the dps is 12.2mil while with Gloomfang it's 13.9mil. And yet you still would have to corrupt it. ;)

PoB doesn't take chain into calculations so you have to do it manually by yourself.

I just wanted to come and say that this is really nice build. Decided to go play PoE for one day to test this build as a starter build and it went nicely. Early leveling was not that good but it was manageable and around act 6 i started to feel really powerfull with the damage DP can do with okish leveling daggers. Decided to buy some early league cheap items and tried with 5 link and it rocked all the content i faced. Only downside is that life is hard to get for the start but hey, thats why SC is created for :) Got to maps and oh boy... Apeps are really great option for early wands but i decided 1 apep is enough and i replaced 1 wand with obliteration wand. Helped to compensate lack of AOE and still kept damage really good. Going to start next league with this but gonan do some changes after i get 5link and replace Assassins mark to enfeeble until i get comfy with my HP. Really nice guide, i am waiting to get high tier maps with good gear. This looks promicing.

But few questions i would like to ask:
1. How high priority you see Empower and +x minion helmet in leveling or in early maps?
2. How about minion life essences? is it better to start crafting with those later on or do i just spam all fears while leveling?
3. What is best upgrade after aquiring cheaper placehold uniques? ( apep, bloodbond )

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1. How high priority you see Empower and +x minion helmet in leveling or in early maps?

You may buy some +2 minion helmet with good life roll for early mapping and lvl 3 or even lvl 2 Empower. Just to give you an idea, my current DP char has 13.9m dps with lvl 4 Empower and 13m with lvl 3 one so it's not that huge dps upgrade regarding the price.

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2. How about minion life essences? is it better to start crafting with those later on or do i just spam all fears while leveling?

Don't bother with it while levelling. I always start mapping with some rare gloves with good life bonus. Once I feel I need more dps for higher tier bosses I'm buying Shrieking Essences of Fear (2c each) and usually after spending about 15 of them I end up with 70+ life gloves with some res.

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3. What is best upgrade after aquiring cheaper placehold uniques? ( apep, bloodbond )

DPS - Void Batteries followed by 6L Bloodbond. Functionality - curse on hit ring since it allows you to reserve mana for one more curse (I recommend Temporal Chains). Note that it's a double expense since you also have to buy +1 curse Gloomfang (I also recommend some +1 curse rare amulet) to apply all that curses on monsters.

Really big but cheap upgrades are regular Gloomfang and Vaal RF (doesn't have to be lvl 20).

With the 3.5 changes to energy shield recharge: "Energy Shield Recharge is no longer interrupted by non-damage changes to your Life or Energy Shield, such as when you spend your Energy Shield on skills via Eldritch Battery."

Does that mean i can go hybrid and still be able to reharge energy shield while losing life from gloomfang, right?

I don't know, I'm waiting for 3.5 to test it.