[2.4] The Master of Agony - CI / ZO + Tri-Curse Essence Drain / Contagion Trickster

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7thDayTheory wrote:

Hello.

I'm trying this as Occultist. What changes to the tree would you make for that?

Probably very few changes. You would start from Occultist's ES nodes and remove some ES nodes in the Shadow area (or Path of the Savant) to compensate.

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broseidon07 wrote:

What's the main differences between this version and ghazzy's trickster non-tri curse one? Besides the different ascension and less curses, which clears faster? which is safer? which is better on a 0 budget new-league character?

Thanks to both of you

The difference is that my build is CI, his one is life based.

His one is low budget, my one is not. Gear progression when going for the CI route is very smooth btw, and when you have the full gear, the survivability and clearspeed are fantastic.

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djnat wrote:

His one is low budget, my one is not. Gear progression when going for the CI route is very smooth btw, and when you have the full gear, the survivability and clearspeed are fantastic.

Gotcha, thanks. I will probably have to go with his then as this is for new essence league and i will start off with nothing, unless you think this build will also work great from nothing.

Hey i got a few questions someone can hopefully answer :

1. ED + Consuming Dark Dot Stack at single target : Do i have to spam ED and can stack the poison dot or is it enough if i just cast it once every few secs?
If i can stack how many stacks can it get?

2. Vulnerabilty vs Discipline

If you want to go for higher lvls ( 90+) and clear endgame content, wouldnt it be better if you switch out Vulnerability+ Doedres Ring and go for Discipline + another rare ( or even unique!?) ring to boost survivabilty by alot?
i always feel like ED is already doing enough dmg

3. Regarding the playstyle, im never sure if its enough to just cast ED+contagion once on a big group or cast ED once and spam contagion a few times in different locations
But i guess its just enough to spam it once because both ED+Contagion dots spread or?


4. How high do you value the piercing shot talent?

Im aware of that its a QoL improvement , but couldnt you rather save the ( 7-8!?) points you need and go for even more dmg/ surv

Thanks for the answers already, really appreciate your guide :)

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Arcev wrote:

Hey i got a few questions someone can hopefully answer :

1. ED + Consuming Dark Dot Stack at single target : Do i have to spam ED and can stack the poison dot or is it enough if i just cast it once every few secs?
If i can stack how many stacks can it get?

2. Vulnerabilty vs Discipline

If you want to go for higher lvls ( 90+) and clear endgame content, wouldnt it be better if you switch out Vulnerability+ Doedres Ring and go for Discipline + another rare ( or even unique!?) ring to boost survivabilty by alot?
i always feel like ED is already doing enough dmg

3. Regarding the playstyle, im never sure if its enough to just cast ED+contagion once on a big group or cast ED once and spam contagion a few times in different locations
But i guess its just enough to spam it once because both ED+Contagion dots spread or?


4. How high do you value the piercing shot talent?

Im aware of that its a QoL improvement , but couldnt you rather save the ( 7-8!?) points you need and go for even more dmg/ surv

Thanks for the answers already, really appreciate your guide :)

1. Yes, you have to spam ED, the poison stacks from ED's initial damage, not from its DoT. The max number of stacks you can get depends on some factors:

- Total Increased Skill Duration % passive nodes (like Exceptional performance or Potency of Will)
- Total Increased Chaos Skill Duration % from gear (i.e. items like BotC)
- Curse Effectiveness on Temporal Chains (from passives like the ones in the whispers of doom cluster)
- Total Increased Poison Duration (like the one from poison support quality bonus, or from Pathfinder's Master Herbalist)
- ED casts per second (affected by your total cast speed from passives and gear)

2. If you feel you are doing fine damage, you can switch Vulnerability for Discipline. Since I already consider a potential 14k+ ES pool, coupled with the insane defenses from trickster, golem tankiness, fortify and flasks a sort of overkill, I think it's not necessary to sacrifice a strong damage multiplier like vulnerability for extra ES. But it's really up to you. :)

3. The playstyle is simple: cast Contagion before ED, then watch things die while you whirl away and navigate the map. The clearspeed from the ED+Contagion combo is better if the map density is good, because you can clear entire screens of mobs with a single combo. More mobs = more spread.

4. The only case in which I don't take the piercing shot cluster is when I play Scion ED with the Deadeye sub-ascendancy. The QoL improvement is huge and after you reach the higher levels you won't regret about having spent some more passive points to get full pierce.

How much ES should I have to get CI and Zealots Oath

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renfro12 wrote:

How much ES should I have to get CI and Zealots Oath

If you can get to 5-6k (softcore) or 8k+ (hardcore) after the switch to CI I consider it a good moment to do it.

I may be fairly dense here, but is there any way someone can post a few "mid-way" passive trees? Especially when talking about respeccing and whatnot, I always get confused about which way to really start off without being able to see it (still fairly new overall as well so I'm sure that doesn't help)

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fiyawerx wrote:

I may be fairly dense here, but is there any way someone can post a few "mid-way" passive trees? Especially when talking about respeccing and whatnot, I always get confused about which way to really start off without being able to see it (still fairly new overall as well so I'm sure that doesn't help)

I'm running this build in Essence i'm not an expert and didn't save my exact leveling trees but ill see what i can remember. I didn't include ascendancy in all the trees below, i just followed the listed order in the guide making sure i had the first 4 points in place before CI.

NOTE: not Djnat approved :)

This is how i started out rushing Pierce, i leveled with EK, fire trap at the start. I switched to ED contagion as soon as i got them, and used blade vortex for single target.


This was my tree a while later not sure exact level but i took the base from above and started moving into witch.


I suppose this is what you would call my completed life tree, after this point i started preparing for CI.


Here is my tree as close as i can remember it before CI. You can see ive setup to spec out of life nodes, and approached CI and Ghost reaver.



Here is my tree right after CI. I didn't have to use any regrets, just the respec points from quests. I made sure i had the first 4 Ascendancy points so i could get that 250 base ES, and also made sure i had some decent starting ES in all my slots, 200ish in helm, boots, gloves. 300-400 on shield and chest. Went es\ev chest to make coloring easier for now.



Finally my tree as of right now (level 82). I've ignored the 3rd curse thus far, saving that for last didnt feel the need to do it without Heretic Veil etc.



I generally only plan my builds for level 90 anything i get beyond that is icing on the cake. This is what i'm shooting for atm. although i do keep going back and forth on the witch aoe. You'll also notice i only have 2 jewels i cut back on them on purpose, i hate shopping for Jewels early in a league, but you could go for a few more if you happen to get some good ones.


Hope this helps.
Hob

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Hobben wrote:

I'm running this build in Essence i'm not an expert and didn't save my exact leveling trees but ill see what i can remember. I didn't include ascendancy in all the trees below, i just followed the listed order in the guide making sure i had the first 4 points in place before CI.

NOTE: not Djnat approved :)

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Hope this helps.
Hob

Very much so, thanks a ton. I think I need to focus on some more life now and go for those piercing shots. (Only 25 at the moment).

Thanks again!

Hobben, your leveling strategy was very good. I'd still level in a very similar way.

And you are right, too, when it comes to the curses matter: if you can't use three curses, you can skip the WoD node. You can take it later when you get HV.