[2.6] Hybrid Life/ES Non-Crit Chaos Ethereal Knives Nova Occultist
|
Hey everyone, Tibasu here with a build guide for the character I used as a league starter for Legacy League, my Hybrid Life/ES Non-Crit Chaos Ethereal Knives Nova Occultist.
TL:DR? Here's a video explaining the basics Budget?
Spoiler
The gear at the start of the league cost me 1-4 chaos each piece, and required uniques were only 1 chaos each. The character will scale with the amount of currency you put into it though, so there's a lot of room to grow.
Build information
Spoiler
I love Ethereal Knives. I Love Chaos. I put the 2 together and BOOM. My favourite build is created. This build focuses on using 2 cheap uniques, The Covenant and Ring of Blades Jewel. Gearing is easy since the only 2 uniques we use are common ones, one of which has a free link and we're also Non-Crit so we don't have to be concerned with having a decent crit rate or thinking about when to pick up crit nodes.
The Covenant has 2 main features that make it appealing. lv15 Added Chaos to socketed gems, and socketed gems has blood magic. The added chaos makes stacking both physical and chaos a lot easier (or mainly chaos which I'll go over later) and means you can use a 4 link until you have a bit more currency to spend. Having blood magic on only your main skill also means you can skimp out on investing on mana and instead invest in more important things like more damage, life or even chaos resist. Ring of Blades simply makes Ethereal Knives better in my honest opinion. Ethereal Knives normally shoots 10 projectiles out in a small cone in front of you, but enemies can only be hit by 1 projectile at a time meaning most of the time, there are wasted projectiles. Ring of Blades adds another 10 projectiles while spreading them in a nova (360 degree area around your character) This means when clearing, instead of having to aim at groups constantly, you can just click once and have everything be hit at once. This build can also be respeced into other Ethereal Knives builds or be played with different ascendancies depending on your playstyle, but my version is an Occultist Pros and Cons
Spoiler
Pros:
-Very Cheap to get started -Nice 360 area of effect without having to scale area of effect -Easily cap Chaos resists -Respecing into other Ethereal Knives builds is easy (Crit, elemental, physical, CI etc.) -Not ascendancy locked. Multiple ascendancies just offer different benefits and downsides -Beginner Friendly Cons: -Ethereal Knives doesn't have insane damage without crit -Rolling 4 Green sockets on an Energy Shield base is annoying (You can settle for 3 though) -Can't use Whirling Blades or Shield Charge unless you settle for Innsbury Edge as a weapon -Movement speed flask is almost required unless you're fine with Lightning Warp -Min-maxing your gear can be frustrating at the very high end depending on your luck and bandit choices Mapping
Spoiler
Guardian/Shaper/Uber viable?
Probably not unless you have really good gear and are a good player. This build is more for fun rather than a "do all content" type of build. Map Mods to Avoid: No Regen, Physical Reflect and Hexproof were the only mods that ever gave me issues. Depending on the map and your ES, Minus Max Elemental Resists will probably give you troubles too, so just be careful it that pops up when in less than GG gear. Uniques
Spoiler
Leveling:
See the Leveling section Required: The Covenant Ring of Blades Viridian Jewel Optional Uniques: Doedre's Damning if you want easy double/triple cursing Apep's Rage very cheap wand for chaos stacking Rathpith Globe is overall a great hybrid shield for spell casters Innsbury edge covert 25% of physical to chaos, gain chaos leech, and can corrupt for culling strike. More niche/hipster type of weapon but still worth mentioning Ming's Heart for more chaos damage at the cost of some survivability, also tons of chaos resist Atziri's Promise obviously 25% of physical gained as chaos, chaos leech, and chaos resist are very nice and recommended, but not required Witchfire Brew gives you crazy single target once you have poison Rumi's Concoction if you have Rathpith Globe, you gain quite of bit of block and spell block Bated Breath has global damage, a lot of energy shield, and recharge rate Voidwalkers is a very easy way to get 100% pierce allowing you more freedom with links, curses or skill points depending on where you get your pierce from. You will miss out on 19% MORE damage from the gem though so keep that in mind. You can then replace pierce with faster projectiles for better clearing or slower projectiles for bosses. Leveling
Spoiler
Leveling Uniques?
Spoiler
Lifesprig: Ethereal Knives > Controlled Destruction > Added Fire
Geofri's Crest: Ethereal Knives > Controlled Destruction > Added Fire > Spell Echo Amplification Rod: Ethereal Knives > Added Fire > Empower/Faster Casting Leveling Skill Trees:
Spoiler
16 Points: Rush to Mind over Matter and Inspiration to keep you from dying and solve pretty much all mana issues while leveling. http://poeurl.com/basD
31 Points: Head over to Sniper and Nullification in the shadow tree. Projectile speed adds range to your Ethereal Knives. http://poeurl.com/basG 47 Points: Go down to Heart of Oak. Projectile speed/damage from Ballistic Mastery and the rest of the stun resist for the build from Heart of Oak. http://poeurl.com/basK At this point, you can pick up the jewel socket right beside Charisma if you can get a Ring of Blades jewel early 60 Points: Move into the left side of the tree for some life, a little damage and 20 chaos resists from the Purity of Flesh wheel. http://poeurl.com/basP This is where things will start to deviate depending on what you manage to get in terms of gear, what your end game set up will be, and also if you're playing on hardcore or not. If you want to switch over to The Covenant now, drop Mind of Matter and Quick Recovery (We don't really need mana or mana regen after the switch), then pick up either the shadow's physical/chaos starting nodes or pick up both Melding and Written in Blood. Now that you have your mana free to reserve (Keep a little unreserved for side skills like Flame Dash, Lightning Warp, Abyssal Cry, Wither Totem etc.) you'll want to start using Warlord's Mark on Blasphemy, then pick up Ghost Reaver. This will help keep your Energy Shield up so it's not just stuck at 0. If you rushed to Vile Bastion in the Occultist Ascendancy, you can skip Ghost Reaver, but keep in mind you can't regen your Energy Shield during boss fights or other tanky rares then. Depending on your weapon of choice, you'll do a few things: Apep's Rage: Get all the chaos nodes Spell Damage Wand or Innsbury Edge: Get Force Shaper. You get nice physical damage, plus extra chaos based on your phys making the shadow's starter nodes "Double dip" in a way. The damage is very similar unless you decide you want Void Beacon in the Occultist Ascendancy, but focusing on the chaos nodes means poison will double dip if you get a 5/6 link early. Fill in the rest of the life nodes like Revenge of the Hunted and Blood Drinker when you feel you need it and pick up the jewel sockets under Melding and Quick Recovery when you get good jewels. Life, Projectile Damage, Spell Damage, Chaos Damage, Energy Shield or Resists are all useful stats. Optional Nodes:
Spoiler
Piercing Shots lets you get 100% pierce chance making clearing very easy (Especially breaches)
Void Barrier/Arcane Focus are both great if you get yourself high energy shield items since they let you recharge faster as well as giving you more energy shield to hide behind. Bandits?
Spoiler
Normal Choices:
Alira: Useless Kraityn: Good for capping chaos resist Oak: Decent but we rely on energy shield more than life Kill: What I did. I still managed to cap my chaos resist but I lost energy shield on some pieces of gear Cruel Choices: Alira: Decent, but we get tons of cast speed already Kraityn: Useless unless you use a dagger because you love whirling blades/shield charge that much Oak: Pretty good since more physical means more chaos with Force Shaper Kill: You can pick up more energy shield this way Cruel Choices: Alira: Only if you decent to go crit Kraityn: Only if you are a Trickster or use Poacher's Mark Oak: With Warlord's Mark you can be at max Endurance Charges all the time Kill: You can get more energy shield this way My lv90 Tree Currently
Spoiler
http://poeurl.com/ba2p
I should be finished with this character for now until I can get my hands on some GG gear. For me, I found that specing more into energy shield and less into life actually feels a lot better, especially once you cap your chaos resist. Gear
Spoiler
Things to look for:
Spoiler
High Energy Shield / Life / Elemental Resists / Chaos Resists if Possible
Focus more on Energy Shield over Life since that's the health source that's up most of the time. Ideally, I would aim for 4.5k Life and 4k Energy Shield. Remember, you can get energy shield on your jewellery and belt which help a lot more than you think Pure Energy Shield is recommended, but you may need to get 1 Armour/Energy Shield Hybrid piece to run a Cast When Damage Taken set up. Use Essence of Envy to craft jewellery with chaos damage. If you get an open prefix, you can craft % Energy Shield which will scale all your gear at once. Do this when you can afford to change all/most gear pieces Trying to fit in chaos damage jewellery can mess your resists and energy shield badly since you probably won't get an amazing piece right away. You could also just buy these pieces then build the rest of your gear around them but this is still just min-maxing damage and isn't required. Shield:
Spoiler
For your shield, Life, Energy Shield and Spell Damage are Prefixes. You have to decide which of the 3 stats are most important to you. If you have life, flat ES and spell damage, you won't be able to get % ES to scale it higher.
Rathpith is a pretty good shield if you don't need a lot of resists in that slot, but a rare shield can get more energy shield (If you sacrifice spell damage) more life, and a lot of resists. Weapon:
Spoiler
It turns out Apep's Rage is the best choice once you get all the chaos/projectile nodes nodes. The 40% Increased Mana Cost may be too much to handle though if you don't get Growth and Decay however.
If you don't like the pure physical/chaos set up, you can use a rare wand with high spell damage and flat elemental damage. Having elemental damage will give you a better tooltip, but won't do anything to your poison damage, other than getting slightly more chaos damage from Atziri's Promise Flasks:
Spoiler
Freeze Immune, Curse Immune, and Bleed Removal. Get whichever base feels best for you, but I recommend a Granite for face tanking phys mobs
Atziri's Promise is highly recommended since you get more chaos damage and leech. Witchfire Brew is recommended for pushing T14+ map bosses but you'll have to spec into more curses through Malediction, or an amulet with +1 curse. Current Gear (Check the Links section for information about my gems)
Spoiler
Links
Spoiler
Main Skill:
Spoiler
Ethereal Knives > Controlled Destruction > Spell Echo > Pierce > Poison > Void Manipulation/Faster Caster
Using Void Manipulation means you will need 4 off colors on The Covenant which can be annoying, but Faster casting works almost as good, and in some cases better. Do you want harder hits and stronger poisons or quick hits and many poison stacks at the cost of draining your life rapidly. Your Choice Auras/Blasphemy Curses:
Spoiler
Warlord's Mark > Your Choice
If You Double/Triple Curse:
Spoiler
Warlord's Mark gives you leech, keeping your Energy Shield up with Ghost Reaver. Works great for tanky rares/bosses when Vile Bastion isn't active.
Temporal Chains lets your poison stacks last longer and slower enemies is obviously very helpful for survival Enfeeble pretty much makes you more tanky. Good for very scary maps or before you get good gear Poacher's Mark lets you gain frenzy charges, meaning more damage and you will always have full flasks when clearing Projectile Weakness is a curse that most forget about but here it works very well and is what I use. General damage from projectiles means enemies take extra damage from both the physical and chaos portion of your attacks. The 50% pierce means we can save 6 skill points and skip out on Piercing Shot on the skill tree If You Want an Aura:
Spoiler
Hatred is decent but remember you don't have any penetration and if you stay non-crit, you won't freeze or shatter anything. You will get a higher tooltip and get abit of extra chaos damage from Malediction and Atziri's Promise though
Discipline is great once you get more energy shield scaling for obvious reasons. You can probably hit 6k energy shield with really good gear Support Links:
Spoiler
Each have their own purpose. Use whichever suits your play style
Wither > Spell Totem > Faster Casting > Increased Duration Abyssal Cry > Void Manipulation > Increased Area > Poison CWDT > Immortal Call > Increased Duration > Golem/Vortex Ascendancy:
Spoiler
Occultist is my favourite choice because of a few reasons. Option for easy double curse, easy energy shield regeneration when clearing, and the option for chaos penetration if you just want more DPS.
I personally went with Vile Bastion first to make sure my ES was always full, then Malediction because I wanted to use 2 curses. You can drop one for Void Beacon if you want to kill things a lot quicker however. Other Options: Pathfinder for free poison and powerful flasks Assassin for crazy crit chance and poison DPS Trickster for frenzy charges, massive energy shield bonus, slight poison bonus Ascendant (Berserker, Occultist, Assassin) Berserker would give you leech and more damage, occultist gives energy shield regen and chaos penetration, and finally assassin gives you easy crits with powerful poison crits on full life enemies Don't be afraid to change anything you dislike about the build. If you want to play the character but feel a change somewhere might be better then go ahead with the change and share your feedback. If I forgot to add anything to the guide, please let me know. Thanks for reading through my guide and hope you enjoy this odd but fun build. Zuletzt bearbeitet von Tibasu um 22.03.2017, 14:59:47 Zuletzt angestoßen am 12.04.2017, 17:06:22
|
|
|
With apeps increased mana cost and the costly links you would take a ton of bloodmagic life. I would go innsbury for conversion and to fortify.
|
|
|
Am I blind or i just do not see what asc points should i take?
|
|
|
Do you think this well be HC viable?
|
|
" I was able to face tank pretty much everything with my flasks up as long as it wasn't very high elemental damage with only 4.5k ES. If you spend more currency (Getting a 300+ ES helm and 400+ ES shield) or work in Discipline (Vaal discipline too) you should be fine in HC. You just need to learn when you should face tank and when should you keep your distance |
|
" Pretty much everything occultist works so it's based on your choice if you want more DPS, ES regen or double curse. I added more to that section to make it more clear |
|
|
What about mapping? What to avoid etc? And ye playing this in hc and doing nicely with it. Wondering how to get vaal discipline in.... what to replace and maybe what golem to use? What about Conc effect gem switching for bosses??
Zuletzt bearbeitet von hovikeiju um 20.03.2017, 09:09:31
|
|
" I'll add a small section on map mods to avoid. No regen, phys reflect and hexproof are the only ones i came across so far in terms of what to avoid. Currently, I have an Abyssal Cry set up that I don't use anymore so those links can be switched out for Vaal Discipline. I never include a golem in my guide since it's pretty much player choice if they even want to use one in the first place. Plus, even on a CWDT setup, I was never able to keep my golem alive for it to matter anyways. Conc effect on EK? EK isn't affected by area scaling/damage |
|
" Okay thanks, what you is testing / using instead of Abyssal Cry? Like really need to know if there is now 3 free slots if one should be vaal discipline..? |
|
" I would probably use Vaal Discipline > Increased Duration, then try and get Charisma which should let you fit discipline into the build according to the poe mana reserve calculator. You may need Enlighten though to cast Wither totem depending on your max mana however |
|
