[3.7] SC/HC - ED/Blight Trickster - Up to 10k eHP, Layered Defense, 3m DPS

Thank you OP for the build. It was a slow start but now is really fun :)
Bosses (T15) melt away with this :)

Now the usual question... this is my gear as Occultist:



I'm sitting at HO with auras at 10k ES and ED (20/22q) 13.9k dps (36.9k chaos dmg/s).

I want to upgrade my helmet for more ES but.. well.. this ain't cheap :P
If something catchs your attention pls let me know! ^^

As soon as I upgrade i'm gonna go for higher content

You are pretty much ready for anything with your current setup. I am just going to assume you have a decay weapon for those pesky guardians.

One thing does catch my attention though: Vaal or no balls! Those support gems can all give you 1% more damage with a good vaal orb (or get a bit shittier for a few days). Then there is the obvious level 21 ED that will benefit you a lot.

Another thing that will really help against guardians and Shaper is to get a 4L on the wither totem. Maintaining 20 stacks more easily will increase your damage quite a bit, but you will have to sacrifice something. Personally, I might drop abyssal cry to fit it.

Other than that your gear is obviously just fine. You just have to consider how much you want to spend to get those extra 50-100 ES extra on gloves/helmet in addition to an ED related enchant (maybe Brinerot Whalers?). Glad you liked the progress of the build. It is one of the reasons I always start out with an ED character in new leagues. As you progress through the game your build constantly evolves, even in higher map tiers, making it enjoyable all the way from Dried Lake to Shaper.

Hey there, I'm kinda new, I've only played HC and finally get to T10+ maps. I know the trickster is geared more towards clearing but starting to feel a little sluggish and maybe at the crossroad of where the build needs to go. I'd like to do more high level content but feel the damage is starting to fall off. Would like to know what you think based on my setup.


I'm at 10k ES and the tooltip in hideout is 6944.

ED as CI on a 5L will always start to feel a bit slow around t10-12s with level 19 gems. You can brute force your way through tougher packs by using abyssal cry more actively, but you are at the point where you need to decide if you want to go for LL or stick with CI. Hopefully you are leveling several EDs, so you can vaal a bunch when they hit 20 and hope for a 21. Other than investing more time in gem levels you need to figure out where you can squeeze out more DPS. Brinerot Whalers, 6L regalia, ED enchant on a helmet and a bit more upgrades should get you up to nearly 40k DoT DPS even as CI.

In your current setup you could swap your contagion to your boots and keep abyssal cry there. It will save you one gem slot for fun things like vaal discipline or a golem.

So I didn't think this was going to be possible like a week ago but I have solo killed Hydra guardian and Phoenix twice with this build. It has a kind of hidden power once you have sufficient gear and get really good at micromanaging skills / kiting around (there's just a lot of casting involved so an Eye of Chayula is necessary most of the time)

It took me a while to get used to but I love it and it's really helped me progress through the harder maps and bosses in this game <3

Glad to hear it. It takes some time to nail the flamedashes past the lightning on minotaur, and I always felt chimera was pretty easy. Keep up the good work.

Hey OP i wanna play another ED build but this time ED build who reaches like 18-20k ES and i cant find one like that but i see all the streamers with their ED builds with 20k ES i thought i found this one cool ED build but he doesnt use Vile Bastion ascendy and uses poison gem so i dont get it at all...

My build is a 13-15k ES build tho. If you want something else than that you will have to go consult someone else. Alternatively you can search for "energy shield" in the passive tree, grab some more of that, then drop something else.

You take vile bastion if you want it or think you need it. Just read the description, flex those brain muscles and make a decision.

Hi there - playing PoE for the first time in a while in the SSF Legacy league. Many thanks for having a guide/build with a "how I levelled" section, and life/hybrid options ... not sure if I'm going to find an Eye of Chayula, eh (I'd be happy with an Essence of Delerium).

I'm at L86 and starting on red maps; my gems are around a third/halfway through L19/0Q. What's the priority on gem quality out of the core skill/support gems? I've around 30 GCPs saved up, and wondering if I should just bite the bullet and sink them into my Essence Drain gem rather than levelling a 1L/20Q one from scratch in a weapon swap once I can use the vendor recipe.

Also, for anyone else playing SSF, are there are any divination cards worth farming for ED?

I have an occultist in SSF HC that is just above level 80, so I am currently considering the same issues.

For gems, I usually vendor everything with a GCP for 20 quality. supports quickly get back to level 15-17 at least, so the DPS loss is not that bad in the long run. An hour or two of Dried Lake gets you close to where you were (maybe 10% lower DPS at those gem levels). After that you could use the remaining GCPs on your ED gem if you can get it all the way to 20% for a vaal. Never vendor your main skill unless you have one leveled in offslot swap it out with.

Other interesting things for this build for SSF is:
Chance Fiend Daggers for Consuming Dark, then chance Occultist's Vestments
Prophecies for "The Watcher's Watcher" which guarantees an Eye of Chayula
Essence Leaguestones to increase the chance to get remnants of corruption to corrupt essences to Essence of Delirium

When it comes to divination cards, there is nothing that gives us a specific item that we really need other than farming Scriptorium for the Shav's cards.