[3.15 Ready] ED/Bane/Blight Occultist | Max Block | low to high budget | 15M+ DPS
Changelog
3.15 The build lost around 30% DPS across all gear levels. Mana costs significantly increased. A few small changes to support gems, no changes to tree or gear.
Video
PoB
https://pastebin.com/SF5qBxUc - ultralow budge/leaguestart https://pastebin.com/6KpasTFu - basic build, can do all endgame bosses except the Feared https://pastebin.com/PdWFiWGi - My character in Standard, around 400-500 ex investment https://pastebin.com/YGJ3b3M2 - 22.5M Full DPS theorycraft with realistic gear (no legacy items, no mirror-tier items)
Pro/Con
PRO: - Good survivability - Good clear speed - Cheaper to gear due to being off-meta - bosskiller due to survivability - All map mods (no regen requires mana flask) - cheap to start, no expensive uniques required CON: - lots of buttons - Need to aim ED - Need to remember to keep ED up all times - Rare items can be expensive to minmax - Hard bosses won't let you always channel Blight for max DPS
Core Mechanics
Capped blocks together with Glancing Blows allows us to survive big hits, and huge regen from ED puts us back at full ES in 1-2 seconds. ES on block mod from Shaper or Crusader shield helps survive in mapping. We use Bane instead of ED + Contag to clear maps, because it's much faster and allows us to squeeze more single-target DPS against bosses. Evil Eye and Brush with Death medium cluster notables provide Blind and ES recovery on kill for smooth mapping. After putting ED and Bane on a boss, we channel Blight whenever we can to get more of the much-needed DPS.
Ascendancy order and Pantheon
Pantheon: Brine King and Ralakesh Ascendancy order: Void Beacon -> Withering Presence -> Profane Bloom -> Malediction Use Whispers of Doom until you get Malediction.
Tips
We apply 2 curses with Bane, one is always Despair, the other can be Enfeeble or Temp Chains. Enfeeble is a straightforward survivability increase, Temporal chains makes our DoTs last longer, so you have to apply ED less often and most importantly, you can reach 20 stacks of Blight after channeling for ~4 seconds Shield Charge + Fortify is a great movement skill for mapping, but for bossing you will mostly use Flame Dash because it's instant and lets you pass through dangerous zones. If your Bane is not killing mobs quickly enough (low gear or you're doing juiced Delirium or other hard content) just switch to 6-link Bane
calculating Blight breakpoints
Look at your Blight cast rate and skill duration in PoB. This equation should hold true: 20/Cast Rate > skill duration This will allow you to reach maximum 20 stacks
Leveling and leaguestart
In Act 1 and Act 2 use the typical Witch skill setups like Stormblast mine, Frostbomb, Orb of storms. In A3 you can switch to all the skills of this build - Bane with Despair and Temp chains, ED, Blight, Malevolence, Discipline. For tree, you start with picking spellpower to Arcanist's Dominion, whil you will later respec away. Then continue to Atrophy, after that Growth and Decay, Entropy, Lethal assault. then you move to Corruption and finish the build tree. Get a large cluster asap, you will need it for the must-have notables. There are 3 core items that you need to get when you're entering white maps - Brush with Death cluster jewel, Evil Eye cluster jewel and a shield with ES on block. Without these items you will not have a good time in maps. After 3.15 nerfs Shav's is the most important item to get early because of the huge damage it provides.
Crafting endgame gear
Cost ~30ex
Helmet
1. Buy lvl 86+ Hubris Circlet with Despair enchant. It can be Hunter influenced or uninfluenced. 2. Spam dense fossils till you hit 310+ ES. 3. If you have no influence, scour suffixes and slam for 20% chance to hit -9% chaos res aura. 4. If your item had Hunter influence or you failed at steap 3, craft prefixes cannot be changed and use harvest craft "reforge with Chaos modifier". You will have 1 in 7 chance to hit -9% chaos res. Repeat this steap until succeed. 5. Craft Ailment avoidance on bench or resists or Dex if you still need some. Cost ~12+ ex
Shield
Buy a 82+ Titanium Spirit Shield with already existing T2-T1 Spell damage and T2-T1 ES or increased ES, an open prefix and open suffix. Bonus points if you have both ES mods, but it won't be cheap then. 1. Scour suffixes. 2. Craft multimod, any prefix, prefixes cannot be chamged. Craft Harvest "reforge with a defense modifier". This guarantees ES on block suffix. 3. If you have 2 open suffixes, craft multimod, the other ES prefix and block chance. If you have only 1 open suffix, you might want to repeat steps 1 and 2 or leave as it is and craft only ES prefix. 4. Add quality with Hillock in Fortification if you have only 20% quality Cost ~30-50ex Cost ~30ex
Gloves
1. Buy 84+ Hunter's Fingerless Silk gloves. 2. Use Essence of Delirium until you get 1 open prefix, 1 open suffix and one desirable suffix (a high-tier resist). 3. Craft "suffixes cannot be changed", use Harvest "reforge with chaos modifier" to hit CDoT multi. If you get resist, try to annul it, if it fails return to step 2. Repeat this step until you get CDoT multi. 4. Craft "suffixes cannot be changed" and use Veiled Chaos Orb. Unveil and look for +2 AoE gems. Repeat this step until you get AoE gems. If you get +2 Projectiles, you could try to sell these gloves, if there are builds that put ED in gloves (Bane or Blight main skill). 4.1 Double corrupt them, because getting another +2 or even +4 lvls to our Blight is a huge DPS boost against bosses.
Why this build and not ED/Contag
Occultist gets much more DPS from Ascendancy than Trickster, and you don't need ED/Contag to clear trash mobs, 4-link Bane is enough, and it has much faster casting speed. By using 3 damaging skills at the same time you can reach much higher DPS than a typical ED/Contag build and kill endgame bosses much faster. Last edited by desu on Aug 1, 2021, 3:07:18 AM Last bumped on Feb 11, 2022, 5:51:45 AM
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can you post an ascendancies order?
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" Void Beacon -> Withering Presence Then Profane Bloom and Malediction is a matter of preference, Bloom would help with mapping at league start, Malediction will enable second curse for more utility, and it itself is a small offense/defense bonus. | |
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looks good man! definitely gonna try this out if my Max block forbidden rite is a failure haha, hopefully no crazy things in the balance manifesto / patch notes.
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My overview of the Balance Manifesto for this build.
Arcane Surge nerf - slightly annoying for bossing, missing a few ED in a row and have not enough mana to try again would feel bad. Fortify Effect nerf - I was rarely using Shield Charge against bosses anyway, it's a bit risky. Damage over Time Multiplier change - this is a small buff, allows crafting stronger endgame wands. Veiled Mods nerf - this hurts our endgame crafts a bit, but nothing too serious. Flame dash nerf - no big deal, maybe will make the Feared a bit dangerous. Now we wait for patchnotes, hopefully GGG didn't think that Chaos support gems are OP and need nerfs. | |
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Patch notes are out. No active skill or aura nerfs (Bane received a tiny irrelevant nerf).
All support gems nerfed. Mana costs will be greatly increased. Efficacy took a huge hit. I inserted lower level gems in my PoB and my Standard character lost around 33% DPS. | |
" So you fall from like 18mln to 12mln dps? That suck :/. You think it's still viable to play as league starter? And worth overall to play, as you put 400ex to get, now, 12mln dps? I wanted really to play it but didn't expect that it's going to hit dmg so hard, without really touching damage and only mana multi. Last edited by Deskowicz on Jul 21, 2021, 8:02:27 AM
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" Literally all builds in the game got their DPS nerfed by similar amounts, and some probably got hit much harder, like Archmage or crit builds. I think this build got off relatively easy. You're not paying 400 ex for just DPS, you're paying for the ability to facetank Maven & Shaper, do the Feared deathless and generally not die to mistakes. I still have an ace up my sleeve - using Righteous Fire for bosskilling while ED is up. That's a huge DPS boost, I didn't use it previously because I didn't felt like I need it and it's a bit clunky, because you have to cancel it with flask during phase transitions. Now it might be worth doing it. Still, I'm waiting for PoB patch to tell exactly how much the changes will affect this build. | |
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Do you have any leveling trees? Which would be the best notables to target?
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PoB has been updated. The build lost ~30% DPS. Mana costs significantly increased, which might result in clunky gameplay. First thing I'm gonna do at launch is to login to my Standard character and see how the build performs against bosses.
" I haven't tried leveling as this build, but my plan is to take SP nodes to Arcanist's Dominion first, then continue as the build tree - move to Atrophy first, Fangs of Viper & Growth and Decay second, Corruption third. Then finish the tree, at some point respec Arcanist's Dominion branch, Last edited by desu on Jul 23, 2021, 5:14:24 PM
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