[1.1.3/HC] Qhorrin's Blinding Dual-Totem, Dual-Curse CI EE Summoning Sporker

I've been trying a variant on this in Ambush and Invasion and it's going well. The main difference is that instead of spork totems with EE, I'm using Raging Spirit + Added Chaos Damage totems. I lose EE, but the Raging Spirits are supported by my minion passives and are in a Moonsorrow wand so they can blind. When both totems are up they can sustain 10 raging spirits, and since they're not blocked by the zombies and skeletons they make a good contribution (the tooltip DPS is 132, but that only counts the Added Chaos Damage).

After verifying that I can get through the Dominus fights successfully in Ambush, I'm now following (almost) the same build in Invasion. That character is currently at level 46 in Act 2 Cruel.

(The difference is that in Ambush I didn't take Minion Instability for the Normal Dominus fight. My skeletons already had Multistrike + Blind, so I didn't want them to die. In Invasion, I have fewer resources available!)

Normal Dominus skill tree

Cruel Dominus skill tree

I haven't yet gone CI in Ambush; I need a bit more gear but it should be soon.

Ambush passive tree at level 72



If you're interested in reading the journal of an Invasion summoner, this thread is a great read.

Ambush: I've swapped back from Raging Spirit totems to Spork totems (and respecced into Elemental Equilibrium). The blinding effect from the spork totems is just too good to give up, as is the extra damage from EE when using Flame Sentinels.

So currently I'm a dual-totem, single-curse EE summoning sporker ('sporking summoner' is probably more accurate now I think about it), and I'm preparing to take CI.

My Invasion character is level 50 in Act 3 Cruel and going well.

Hello Qhorrin, first of all, thanks for the guide :D Playing this summoner witch in ambush as my very first character. Followed the build and had no problem with most of the content. The quest rewards guide was really REALLY helpful too. And watching 10-20 minions kill stuff for you is really nice. I focused on reaching the +1 minion nodes since I really wanted the additional minions(was that ok?).

Currently lvl 42 in Act 2 Cruel. So far, my problems in Act 1 were Piety and Dominus which I think should be normal for everyone. They just wreck all my minions in a few seconds. What was your strategy when fighting them? I think my problem was getting minion instability early.

Oh and I managed to get a Bones of Ullr for the 2 extra minions too. Should I keep it and use jewelers + fusing + chromatic already or will there be a better version in Cruel/Merciless if I ever get one again?

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ishimarushun wrote:

Hello Qhorrin, first of all, thanks for the guide :D Playing this summoner witch in ambush as my very first character. Followed the build and had no problem with most of the content. The quest rewards guide was really REALLY helpful too. And watching 10-20 minions kill stuff for you is really nice. I focused on reaching the +1 minion nodes since I really wanted the additional minions(was that ok?).

Currently lvl 42 in Act 2 Cruel. So far, my problems in Act 1 were Piety and Dominus which I think should be normal for everyone. They just wreck all my minions in a few seconds. What was your strategy when fighting them? I think my problem was getting minion instability early.

For Piety, this is generally my approach:

1. Stop by the column on the left just before you reach her. This is far enough away that she won't activate.
2. Set up a totem (if you're using one) a little way away from her, but close enough that its effect (healing or damage) reaches her.
3. Surround her with skeletons.
4. Move forward and activate her. As soon as that happens (if you have your cursor on her, her name and health will display) put a curse on or attack her. This triggers your minions to attack.

Make sure you have maxed lightning resist, because it's that attack that will get you. If she transforms to the Ice Ranger, hide behind a column. If she transforms to the Fire Melee thing, move in and attack (surround her with skeletons and hit her with your spells). Once she un-transforms, there's a period of a few seconds where she stands there and does nothing - hit her as hard as you can during this phase.

In Normal, you'll probably lose your zombies and spectres and have to finish the fight with just you and your skeletons. Minion Instability will be a big help here.

Dominus is harder, especially if you haven't done the fight before. ZiggyD has a good guide on YouTube; the basic strategy is to try and pick off the initial 3 uniques one by one, get through the next set of uniques any way you can, then constantly hit first-form Dominus with ranged attacks so his energy-shield stays down. For a summoner, second-form Dominus is pretty simple. Surround him with totems and minions while he's transforming, and they should rip him apart pretty quickly. Make sure you have a Remove Bleeding flask or two though.

I usually like to be level 38-40 before doing Dominus Normal. You'll want to have somewhere around 1000 Life. The 'Normal Dominus' skill tree links I've posted earlier have worked for me in hardcore, and they have a balance of minions and life.

For both these fights, put up a portal well away from where the action is (for Piety I put this right next to the entrance, and for Dom at the top of the stairs). If the fight goes really bad, quaff a quicksilver and dive through the portal. You'll have at least 8 minutes to go into another area and re-summon some zombies and spectres to take back with you - even if they don't last long, they'll help while you re-engage.

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ishimarushun wrote:

Oh and I managed to get a Bones of Ullr for the 2 extra minions too. Should I keep it and use jewelers + fusing + chromatic already or will there be a better version in Cruel/Merciless if I ever get one again?

That was a great drop - I usually end up buying one of these (and Sidhebreath) before the Piety fight if I haven't found one by then, it's a big help. If the itemlevel is 28 or greater, you can get 4 sockets on it so it's worth 4-linking it and setting up the colours you want. (To find the itemlevel, left-click on it so it's on your cursor, then open the chat box and type "/itemlevel".) Alternatively, if you just keep applying Jeweller's Orbs you'll get a failure message if you reach the maximum number of sockets it can have.

Hope this helps!

I decided to see how high I could push into maps with this build, since I didn't go beyond about 68 in Domination.

So far I've done maps up to level 72 with a depleted complement of minions:

- 8 zombies and 2 spectres instead of 9+3, using Goldwyrm instead of Bones of Ullr (for extra loot);
- Item Rarity instead of Minion Life on my zombies (also for the loot).

At some stage (when higher level maps drop?) I expect I'll need to go back to a full-force setup, but for now this is a good balance between survivability and loot.

Passive tree at level 76.

Sadly, my Invasion summoner was set upon by a pack of magic devourers and RIPd at level 60 in Act 2 Merciless :(

However, I've started another (Kereitha) in the 2 Week Charity Race, and made it past Normal Dominus without using Sidhebreath or Bones of Ullr (actually without any trading at all).

Normal Dominus passive tree

Thanks for the tips! They were really helpful.

I wanted to try what you taught up until merciless before reporting what happened. Somehow, I managed to not die on both cruel and merciless Piety. All my zombies and spectres died in cruel though, but I managed to beat merc Piety with only 2 specters dying <3

So far, I've reached level 68 and wrecked everything in Merciless up until Piety... except for those random rares/uniques/rouge exiles with elemental aoe attacks. Surprisingly, the undying aristocrats and chimeras in merciless scepter of god are also destroying my zombie horde fast.

Now for more questions...

- When is it safe to get CI? I got 5 extra points waiting to be used on the CI + ES nodes. Currently @ 1.7k ES

- Is the sovereignty cluster + reduced mana gem enough for 3 auras? If its not, I might sacrifice the dual curse for the two aura nodes on the right side of the tree. Gonna try discipline + clarity + purity of elements if possible. Might switch out discipline for haste once I dont get hit as often.

Again, thanks for the build. I had fun playing PoE up till this late in the game. Tried a couple other builds but this one helped me to die less XD

Also, for anyone trying this build I got a spare Bones of Ullr and Perandus Blazon I'm willing to give away for free :D Ambush league only though

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ishimarushun wrote:

Surprisingly, the undying aristocrats and chimeras in merciless scepter of god are also destroying my zombie horde fast.

They can be nasty - my approach is to summon 2-4 skeletons right in the face of monsters like these. Usually that works, but if there's a big pack then sometimes you just need to retreat, regroup and go back in.

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ishimarushun wrote:

When is it safe to get CI? I got 5 extra points waiting to be used on the CI + ES nodes. Currently @ 1.7k ES

I think this depends on what you want to do. For farming Merciless Dominus, staying with life is probably safer. With a levelled up rejuvenation totem plus the ability to use flasks, you have great survivability even with only 2k-ish life. I haven't tried farming Dominus with CI but I suspect it will be more difficult than using life - the only way your ES will recharge is if you don't get hit, and that can be tricky in such a small area.

If you want to go into maps, that's when CI will pay off. You're immune to chaos damage, and open maps (Dunes, Dried Lake, Tropical Island) have enough space that you can run away to let your ES recharge. Because you no longer need the rejuvenation totem you can make use of other totems (obviously I like a pair of spork totems with Elemental Equilibrium and fire/cold spectres, but use whatever works for you).

FWIW, I levelled up to about 75 with Dominus runs before taking CI and then moved into maps.

It also depends on your gear. I try and collect good ES gear while I'm still on life: a chest piece with 500+ ES, gloves with 100+ ES, helm with 200+ ES and a shield with 100+ ES (the boots are either Bones of Ullr or Goldwyrm). Ideally these bits of gear will have good resists and no life, since it's a wasted bonus.

If you have 1.7k ES while still on life, you should have sufficient ES when you take CI. The ES bonus nodes beyond CI are a big help, as are Unnatural Calm and Arcane Focus (unless you have them already).

I tend to do this with my build:

Before CI

After CI

Notice that I swap the 4 Int connecting nodes at the top for 3 ES connecting nodes through the middle. The exact nodes depend on gear; my 2 week charity league char has really bad resists, so with her I've taken two +6% resist all nodes to help out with that. I'll refund them once my gear improves.

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ishimarushun wrote:

Is the sovereignty cluster + reduced mana gem enough for 3 auras? If its not, I might sacrifice the dual curse for the two aura nodes on the right side of the tree. Gonna try discipline + clarity + purity of elements if possible. Might switch out discipline for haste once I dont get hit as often.

I guess it depends on which 3 auras. You'll probably have enough for Clarity, Purity of Elements (or another 40% aura) and a 60% aura. I'm tending away from dual curses at the moment, since I find that I don't have enough sockets for a second curse gem anyway. So I'd say it's worthwhile getting the Influence cluster instead of the second curse, and also the reduced mana and increased effect nodes near Leadership.

Although my original char was dual curse, I think I might revise the build guide to de-emphasise that. It's probably better in a party support role (Enfeeble + Temporal Chains) with someone else helping to deal damage, but for solo play I'm doing fine with just Enfeeble.

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ishimarushun wrote:

Also, for anyone trying this build I got a spare Bones of Ullr and Perandus Blazon I'm willing to give away for free :D Ambush league only though

:)

My 2-week charity league summoner has reached level 66 in Act 3 Merciless. Still haven't found Bones of Ullr or Sidhebreath, but it's good to prove that the build is viable in hardcore without those uniques.

The invasion bosses continue to be the biggest threat. Several times I've had to reset a zone and try again because the boss was just too dangerous, even when overlevelled.

Hopefully Kereitha will survive to move into Invasion when the league ends :)

Sadly, Kereitha has RIPd at level 71, position 1215 on the ladder. Still hadn't found any useful summoner uniques or a Reduced Mana gem (running Discipline would have been helpful).

Never mind, it was a pretty good run while it lasted.