[3.4] The Mistress of Agony - Lowlife BlightDrain Ascendant / Occultist - ALL content viable!

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djnat wrote:

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Haasts wrote:

Just to check - is the Cast While Channelling variant on Essence Drain only viable as Low Life, and if so, could you provide a quick explanation as to why? Been away from PoE for a while, so I'm a little rusty!

In my opinion it's a lot better as low life.

The reasons:

1. We need Discipline (free ES) + Haste (QoL + cast speed + clearspeed via faster whirling blades) + Clarity (infinite spam) + 2 blasphemy curses (amazing defense). This is only possible as low life.

2. Pain Attunement (30% MORE spell damage) partially compensates the loss of 2 support gems for ED. Plus, spell damage double dips with poison thanks to ED's unique modifier. We are replacing Pierce, Rapid Decay and Empower because we have pierce from boots (so we use Slower projectiles instead), while Empower and Rapid Decay are removed in favour of CWC and Wither. We are interested not to support Wither with Empower or Rapid Decay because the first is a level increase with a huge mana multiplier which gives no benefits, the second is a debuff for Wither itself (reduced duration = less stacks). So I think that is the best 6L setup.

3. This setup doesn't require the wither totem, so at boss fights we can spam more constantly for greater single target output. We can take full advantage from phases which allow us to go full out (e.g. Shaper beam). Gameplay feels so smooth with Haste, even for the Contagion + ED (via Wither) combo and the resulting increased clear speed.

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DaTraS wrote:

Hey mate,

Thank you very much for this amazing guide.
Because of it I'm going Scion first time - as overall second Char :D

I planned for starting in the SSF SC league today - do you think this will work out or should I go for trading?

Sorry if this question might seem a little bit stupid but I'm still very new to the game.

Went in Breach for BV Assassins and liked Contagion alot while leveling :)

Thanks!!

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Asatas wrote:

How about this for low life league starter?

Pick Life gear for the first 20 or so levels.
Go South, Sentinel, W->Consitution, Shaper, then Sentinel->Exceptional Performance,
Then go the regular build path to Harrier, make a detour S to Hired Killer.
Then continue on the regular build path.
This way you'll only have 12 points to spec out of later and a good life base for leveling.
When you feel your DPS is getting too low, start switching gear to ES (maybe 2 pieces per 4 points respecced), skill out of Shaper first to get to a regular node 4 points away, then the same for Hired Killer (4P), then for Constitution (4P), then switch out the last remaining life gears. Now you're a full blown low life build.
Obviously, wait with picking Pain Attunement until you're totally skilled out of the League starter nodes...

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Malk87 wrote:

Ever thought to go Blight instead of Wither (better casting animation and slow) and ahave a blight totem for the debuff? Also isnì't the 20$ ES from the Occultist keystone wasted since this is a Life based build? Thanks!

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djnat wrote:

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Malk87 wrote:

Ever thought to go Blight instead of Wither (better casting animation and slow) and ahave a blight totem for the debuff? Also isnì't the 20$ ES from the Occultist keystone wasted since this is a Life based build? Thanks!

The Occultist keystone is the strongest thing that Ascendant has for ED.

-15% chaos resistance on cursed targets is huge. It's a 15% MORE multiplier (in the worst case, a lot better in the best case, i.e. chaos resistant mobs) on your damage.

The build has 2 iterations: lifebased and lowlife. You can choose the one which you prefer. I'd suggest the lowlife one if you want to have an easier life in the endgame fights of the game (especially Shaper and Uber Atziri).

Blight is melee, Wither is ranged. We don't need the slow from blight because we already have temporal chains (with a 20% efficiency from tree plus blasphemy support), and Wither suits the ED / contagion playstyle (firing from a distance) better.