The sad tale of "It that Punched" or A Series of Unfortunate Revelations for the Acolyte of Chayula

"

Among the Dreamer's chosen few, one wanted to strike, swift and true.
He trained and ascended, yet his power faltered. Reality itself was false and altered.
Undeterred by malevolent unseen hands, this true Acolyte continues to stand.

- It That Punched

Introduction:
Last season I was indecisive, and made so many characters. This season (0.3) was going to be different. I would pick one class and play it solely, regardless of how good or bad it was. I would stay true to a single class and if it didn't work, I would figure out how to make it work.
I ran into so many bugs on this journey, it was hilarious. Here's my tale of continuous trials and bugs; enjoy!

Volatility
This is a tricky buff to manage. If you haven't gained any Volatility in 4 seconds, they detonate, and you get a buff for 10 seconds.
This buff is rarely active when you want it to be. By the time you stop gaining Volatility, everything around you is probably dead.
I tried to make the Volatility effect last longer, so I could carry it into boss arenas and have it last through the boss's invulnerable opening, so it could be turned into Volatile Power via Catharsis when I wanted it.
Discovery: Volatility is not a buff, it's a debuff. You cannot make it last longer via Skill Effect Duration or Buff Duration.
Bug: Even with Chayula's Inner Turmoil (which makes the Volatility explosion deal no damage), the Volatility explosion still knocks you out of casting your Portal to town.
Summary: Even without the bugs, Volatility is hard to manage, and has such a low damage boost (on average), that it's not useful.

Darkness and MoM
I tried using 2 Ming's Heart rings. Each of these rings provide extra chaos damage at the cost of Maximum Life and Defenses.
I thought I could use Chayula's Darkness, and my mana (via MoM) for my life instead, because Ming's Heart doesn't affect either of these things.
When you use Darkness and MoM at the same time, Darkness is only damaged AFTER all of your mana is gone. Why isn't Darkness hit before mana?
Bug?: When taking damage, Darkness is reduced after mana when using MoM.
Workaround: you can use "Mana taken before Life" affixes and NOT use MoM. This will take damage from Darkness before mana.
Edit: Looks like this might have been fixed in the latest patch. Now it seems like it's random whether the damage hits Darkness or Mana first with MoM.

Darkness and Burning Ground
This may be an issue with other types of Damage Over Time effects, but I noticed this with Burning Ground.
With about 1.3k Darkness. Stepping on Burning Ground would delete my entire Darkness bar in a little over a second. Without Darkness, it would take at least 10 seconds to remove that much health.
Bug: Some forms of DoT reserve your Darkness completely after a very short time. Darkness is not reserved little by little, the whole things just disappears at once.
Edit: Looks like this was fixed in the latest patch. Darkness now is reserved slowly from Burning Ground.

Charged Staff
Charged Staff does the following:
Consume all Power Charges to charge your Quarterstaff with electricity, adding Lightning damage and a Lightning shockwave to your Quarterstaff Attacks. Reusing this skill while the Buff is active adds to the Buff's duration and damage.
The important thing to note is that it does 2 things, and provides 1 buff.
It adds Lightning damage to your Quarterstaff Attacks
It adds a Lightning shockwave to your Quarterstaff Attacks
These things are given via a single buff.
However, when you're Unarmed, this single buff will only give you the shockwave, and NOT the additional damage. Even though both parts of the buff are worded exactly the same, one applies to you and one does not.
"This can be tested by checking the damage Quarterstaff skills using the 4 combinations that can be made from the following:
Weapon: Quarterstaff / Unarmed
Buff: Present / Not Present"
Bug: Unarmed attacks with Charged Staff receive the Lightning shockwave, but not the Lightning damage
Summary: Only use Charged Staff with Unarmed if you're ok with just getting the shockwave.
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3859218

Into the Breach gives weak Purple Flames of Chayula
I'm using Mantra of Destruction to give myself Purple Flames of Chayula for about a minute each (using increased Skill Effect Duration).
I choose the Waking Dream passive, which gives me Into the Breach. I thought that I could give myself short duration Flames of Chayula here and there to help with damage when I didn't have many flames from Mantra of Destruction.
Bug: If you pick up a Purple Flame of Chayula (which only lasts 5 seconds by default) when at max stacks of Purple Flames of Chayula from Mantra of Destruction (which lasts 20 seconds by default). The longer duration stack is overwritten by the shorter duration stack.
Summary: Purple Flames from Into the Breach make you weaker if you're using Mantra of Destruction.
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3661405/page/1#p26403078

Sap of Nightmares Bug
Sap of Nightmares says:
Leech recovers based on Chaos Damage as well as Physical Damage.
I thought that if I had 50% of damage taken from mana before life, and Sap of Nightmares, that I could use my life and mana pool at the same time for my defenses, and that I could use Chaos damage to leech both simultaneously, effectively doubling my leech rate.
Bug: Sap of Nightmares doesn't give you Life Leech from Chaos Damage, it only gives you Mana Leech from Chaos Damage.
Summary: Don't take Sap of Nightmares if you need to leech health.
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3850130

Combo and Weapon Sets
I thought I could use two weapon sets with my build. One weapon set would help to build Combo with fast attacks, and the other would be used to spend Combo on big finishers.
"This was because Combo says:
Combo can only be built while using the same weapon as the Combo Skill is bound to, and will be lost if you swap weapons."
So, if I use the same weapon (Unarmed) for weapon sets 1 and 2 I should be ok right? I'm not swapping weapons because I'm using the same weapon. The text says Weapon, not Weapon Set.
Bug: Swapping weapon sets while using the same weapon will delete your Combo count.
Summary: You can't use Combo skills and Weapon Swaps in a build, even if you use the same weapon for both Weapon Sets.
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3640790


I'll still continue to play this class, despite all of its failings, hoping that GGG will fix these issues before the end of the season, so that I can see what this class can really do.
- It That Punched