[2.6] The Curse Whisperer - Tri-Curse CI Whispering Ice EleRaider - Viable for Everything

Well, you cant really blame GGG for not keeping a build like WI in mind when designing new items for the game. Afaik no other build uses stat conversion jewels to buff its main skill's base damage. WI is a total niche build that is simply overlooked by most players. Which is good because this means the gear is cheaper than it should be, given the beastliness of this build. Just imagine a reset where 10% of the entire playerbase is trying to get their hands on a WI staff 3 hours into the league... ;)

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Kelvynn wrote:

A 'pre-update':

I switched my Scion to a non-Berserker version and reset one of my old Witches to Elementalist and played her with the Scion's gear, to compare.

1. Scion: Berserker will no longer be reliable post-nerf, it won't work against the bosses, i.e. where you need it the most. We need to bring back Life Leech (instead of Controlled Destruction). We have been using that gem before 2.2 and it works great. In fact, the build will only get tankier. Of course, it means lower DPS. But it will only be noticeable at the very top levels: Core Malachai will take longer to kill. I don't think Uber will be any different, but will need to try.

What to take instead of Berserker? Raider. It's fantastic for mapping. You will have permanent Onslaught and all benefits of 3 frenzy charges to clear maps real fast. No need to bring Silver flasks anymore, can make it even faster with Quicksilvers and Sulphurs.

Scion is very much alive, tankier than ever, clearing maps much faster. Just lost some DPS that's gonna be noticeable only at the very high end.

2. Witch: with the massive buffs to Elementalist, Witch is now a very good alternative to Scion. The stats (ES, DPS) are very similar. The main difference is that Witch will be 'a late bloomer' and achieve the build goals (3 curses and stun immunity) about 3-4 levels later than Scion. But after that the power is about the same. The Witch being 4 levels behind the Scion will have 1 less jewel (until lv 97-ish which most people won't go for), but should have about the same DPS at lv 93 as the Scion at lv 97, thanks to all the massive bonuses to ele damage.

I'm going to post a Witch version of the build in the next few days, before 2.3. Just haven't decided on the best way to level yet.

Here's what the main choice comes to:
- Scion will level faster, get more xp per hour, reach the full potential earlier
- Witch will be safer to play (what reflect?), have higher DPS, kill top bosses easier

Looking forward to seeing the witch version of the build. The raider option looks pretty decent too, I'm surprised the dps is so close to one another.

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Black_Gun wrote:

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Bruderhase wrote:

fire pen would be more reliable to keep up with orb of storms. also, i'm not sure how well you can keep shock up on targets that actually are hard to kill.

50% increased vs. 25% fire pen, not sure.. its probably very close in terms of damage

shock provides 50% MORE, not "increased". and since we will certainly be using the fire pen gem nonetheless and almost all monsters, bosses included, have less than 38% fire res, the 25% additional fire pen will in reality provide less than 25% "more" damage. (roughly 18% more damage against mobs with 0 fire res.)

the issue with conflux is that you need to constantly kill things. so its very unreliable against bosses and sometimes outright unavailable (for example daresso). for trash clears, you dont need that extra damage. so after having thought about it, I changed my mind and now agree with kelvynn: taking the halved ele reflect node would be more useful than the conflux node.

You're right, thanks for correcting me. Forgot that shock calculated afterwards multiplicatively. Not entirely sure about the fire pen though, correct me if I'm wrong, but there is now resistance minimum, eg., 25% fire pen will always be deducted from the mobs ress, resulting in 25% more fire damage. Either way, it doesn't really matter and this build is going to stay great!

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Bruderhase wrote:

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Black_Gun wrote:

"

Bruderhase wrote:

fire pen would be more reliable to keep up with orb of storms. also, i'm not sure how well you can keep shock up on targets that actually are hard to kill.

50% increased vs. 25% fire pen, not sure.. its probably very close in terms of damage

shock provides 50% MORE, not "increased". and since we will certainly be using the fire pen gem nonetheless and almost all monsters, bosses included, have less than 38% fire res, the 25% additional fire pen will in reality provide less than 25% "more" damage. (roughly 18% more damage against mobs with 0 fire res.)

the issue with conflux is that you need to constantly kill things. so its very unreliable against bosses and sometimes outright unavailable (for example daresso). for trash clears, you dont need that extra damage. so after having thought about it, I changed my mind and now agree with kelvynn: taking the halved ele reflect node would be more useful than the conflux node.

You're right, thanks for correcting me. Forgot that shock calculated afterwards multiplicatively. Not entirely sure about the fire pen though, correct me if I'm wrong, but there is now resistance minimum, eg., 25% fire pen will always be deducted from the mobs ress, resulting in 25% more fire damage. Either way, it doesn't really matter and this build is going to stay great!

we are hitting a mob with 0 fire res with a spell that does 100 fire damage. thanks to fire pen, it takes 137 damage. now add 25% additional fire penetration. we now deal 162 fire damage to it. 162/137 = 1.1824, i.e. it corresponds roughly to an 18% "more" multiplier. since almost no notable monster has a higher fire res than 35, it is a good approximation to say that the 25% additional fire pen from the ascendancy node, which we get on top of the regular fire pen gem, will, under normal circumstances, be equivalent to a damage multiplier that ranges between 18 and 25%, depending on the concrete mob. if a map, however, is rolled with the "+80% fire res" mod, those additional 25% become huge. the only downside is that we have to use orb of storms every 10s to keep that effect active, while orb of storms has a much longer cooldown (afaik 16 seconds with passives). so keeping that buff up forces us to use orb of storms more frequently than otherwise needed (somewhere between every 16 and 24 seconds).

Thank you for this nice guide. I now decided to play in 2.3 Curse Whisperer.

Today I had for breakfest a Vaal Orb and I decided to make some sience (Vaal Orbs do not taste well, I feel a little bit corrupted) :)

I tried to make a skill tree also for lvl 94 but based on the Witch skill tree. Please see my result:



After this, I compared this skill tree with the skill tree from the guide. Please see the results:



Jewel Socket:


Stats:


Cast Speed:


Damage:


Energy Shield


Resists:


Curses:


These are the hard facts. Now I start to calculate and - to be honest - I have no idea if these calculations are correct. Please feel free to correct if I made bullshit. I added all percentage values together to compare them. :)

Scion:
+ 26 Intelligence. This should be something around 26% damage (based on a post ealier)
22% more spell Damage
23% fire Damage (form Izaro's Turmoil)
23% cold Damage (from Izaro's Turmoil)

Sum: 94% more Damage

Witch:
40% more Elemental Damage
40% more cold Damage from Golem
10% more fire Damage from Golem
20% more damage boost form Fire Golem

Sum: 120% more Damage

Back to the speical Bonuses: The Scion can get 5% permanet Elemental Resistance Penetration. The Witch needs to cast a lightning Skill to get 25% Fire Penetration. As already mentioned above, I hope this can be covered by a Orb of Strom or Ball Lightning. The Pendulum gives in addition a 100% every 10 secondes for 4 seconds. Theorectially you can count this as 40% Elemental Damage increase seen over time.

Therfore the damage should be a little bit higher for the Witch than for the Scion. If we now remove one gem from the staff and replace it with Life Leech, do we still have more damage? 2% Life Leech from the gem is much more (I think something about double) form the Scion Ascendant.

My summery:
Using this build for a Witch costs us some amount of Energy Shild but we will get 5% less physical damage and 1% less elemental damage. I do not know how much Energy Shild we loose. Perhaps the amount is comperable to the 5% pysikal damage reduction?

The damage output using a Witch will be high than using a Scion but we loose 1% Life Leech. If we cover the Life Leech los with a gem, the damage will be a little bit lower? But we will have the double Live Leech.

I expect with 2% Life Leech the Witch will be more tankier against curse immune bosses than the Scion even that we loose a amount of Energy Shild and perhaps also some Damage.

Please feel free to comment and blame me for my calculations if I made bullshit :)

dear man..

scion berser is down.. in 2.3 patch


1.5 life leech -> 1% life leech kill recently.


I think life leech is likely very important in this build.

Do berserk there any other alternative? Or should we continue with the berserker?

:(

++++

oh, so sorry.

Now checking the your previous answer.

raider's a good choice. I think so.

And eh just a new curiosity.
I want to see your new witch build. Thanks a good guide.

I think I will try this build.

Thought about trying it in Prophecy. But I am not sure if it wouldn't be better to try something different for Prophecy and use the Passive Skill reset to Change my Level 64 Elementalist in Std to this build. With 2EX 20C I have in std i can also buy unique items for this build.

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Der_Ich wrote:

I tried to make a skill tree also for lvl 94 but based on the Witch skill tree. Please see my result:

Spoiler

https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAABAMCAN-wksGOvhEtfIOD9yyc6-4fAhBYpwgc3DLRBAevm4dlj0a4k48aRUfr5EyzHRSboSj6tQTAZl8q0B8tH6-NGGqCx-QiPAXv65UgHU94Lx2--egpT9Wm73zB8zW5fOUzh0GH7DiePKKjEVCnK1gHA-63PoKbhXuMdlF0f8ZtGYPMZlSO6ZMnwcWX9Dwtppm-iuwYUlODX8auoS-P-iy_PV_E9tDQFdfEFSftRwZfaoauGS7b51Zj2WFsCFcN8YrSIfObz91qHp7NaGUbyBznajunMDY98i-fy21s53To1iLq6xTDOpu1KjiExZD6321Mi-9LF6QTNdQH3I0=

You're missing Elemental Overload in the tree :)

Also, if you're saying

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Der_Ich wrote:

The Witch build gives at a sum 6% more elemental resist.

you're missing the Lightning Walker point.

Those two together would mean level 99, which I would not plan my build for. If you would change the pathing to Unwavering Stance to the left route (starting left from Elementalist) you save 3 points at the cost of 36-44 intelligence and 40% mana regeneration.

Really going to try this build!

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tuffff wrote:

You're missing Elemental Overload in the tree :)

Yes, you are right... This costs me two skill points but gives 20 Intelligence more... (dropping a + 10 Strengh node and use two +10 Intelligence nodes)

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tuffff wrote:

The Witch build gives at a sum 6% more elemental resist.

you're missing the Lightning Walker point.

The Lightning Walker was not used for this build because additional lightning damage bings no benefit.

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tuffff wrote:

If you would change the pathing to Unwavering Stance to the left route (starting left from Elementalist) you save 3 points at the cost of 36-44 intelligence and 40% mana regeneration.

My target was to grap the 45 % incrased duration. I do not know how important duration is for this build. I wanted to be as comparable as possible. Taking the way left from Elementalist would result in the same Intelligence (because of Jewel conversation). The left way gives +10 (unconvertable) Strenght more but 40% Mana regneration less. I think the 40% Mana regeneraton is more worth or even no difference.

Finally I end up with Level 96 for the final tree.

Here you can find it again:


For leveling I would drop some Jewel slots. But this build will be much harder to level because you reach Vaal Pack and Unwavering Stance very late.

I am also thinking about the Skill Gems because of the two golems. I would like to use them with Incrased Minion Life and Increased Minion Resistance. Do we need this?

If yes, I do not see a possibility to use Cast on Hit with Immortal Call. I think this will strongly affect the defence.

If no, (maybe I misinterpret the Skill "Your Golems are immune to Elemental Damage") it should be no difference from this point of view.

P.S.: If anybody wants to make an official Witch build and uses some of my input, feel free. I will not cry for copyrights :-D