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

Hi there!

Love your build! This is exactly what I was looking for. Been playing the new league in HC, and have reached level 85 and going. Cleared Poorjoy's, merciless lab, all with ease.

Although I don't use any uniques (perandus signet going 3ex in HC), I search for intel 40+ on each piece, and that get's the job done aswel. I have 1,438 intelligence and 8,578 ES and 5,848 damage on tooltip unbuffed.

Those are my items:

Alright, I went through the leveling process from the start to lv 63. Before doing that, I prepared:
- WI (5S): without WI it makes no sense anyhow, and 5S is very easy to get;
- Astramentis: since you need to get the 1st mandatory unique before starting, may as well get the 2nd one too and don't deal with the stat requirements;
- Fertile Mind: it's dirt cheap and it gives a nice bonus early;
- a jewel with Int and 1 damage mod: dirt cheap, useful early.

Up to lv 33 it's a cakewalk with just about any gear you can find. I didn't even have a Lifesprig or any other standard twinking gear.

At lv 33 (before Normal Dominus) I went to poe.trade and bought Int/ES gear 1 alc per piece or cheaper.

At lv 52 (before Cruel Daresso/Malachai) I went to poe.trade again and upgraded to chest/helm/boots/gloves with more ES/Int and this time with resists. Again, 1 alc per piece. And then I spent 1c to buy a jewel with Int and 2 damage mods.

That was enough to level to 63, finish all rewarding quests (up to A4M Deshret), and do the Lab on Normal and Cruel. Total easymode all that.

I did try Merciless Lab with that gear (3494 ES, 2013 Icestorm dmg) but couldn't facetank Izaro, and it's not worth the pain just to get Pendulum.

Now I'm going to head to the Lake, get lv 70 quickly, wear the real endgame gear, then do Merc and Endgame Lab, and head into the maps.

The Leveling section has been heavily reworked.

I also changed my mind on when to get the 3rd curse. Since I can't do Merc Izaro in lv 52 gear and have to level to 70 to wear endgame stuff first, may as well head down to get Unwavering Stance before the 3rd curse. Each node down that path is a DPS/ES upgrade, and it'll be fine with just 2 curses until the high end stuff (lv 88).

"

Quazifuji wrote:

"

Kelvynn wrote:

Taking Avatar of Fire and switching to fire damage is a HUGE boost to your DPS (and leech). The moment you take it, you instantly gain 33% increase damage from Snowforged and ~15% MORE damage from Cold To Fire. And if you already have Izaro's - the bonus from them too. Only expensive jewels are comparable to Izaro's, and including Fire makes it easier to find good non-Izaros too.

The thing with the cold to fire more multiplier is that you're swapping out Controlled Destruction for it. So the 15% more damage from Cold to Fire is actually less than you would get without it. Factor in Frost Bomb, and you're sacrificing the equivalent of about 7% more damage and 20% pen (against enemies strong enough to be worth frost bombing) for the conversion.

At that point you have very few Increased damage modifiers, and getting the ones that the conversion to fire brings outweighs the difference in MORE multiplier between CtF and CD. When I switched after taking AoF, my damage went up significantly. I didn't even have Izaro's on this char yet, just a cheap Int/dmg jewel. You can test it yourself.

Frost Bomb is not worth using with this build IMO. Everything dies too fast to pop it. And then you get EO/Orb of Storms.

"

broseidon07 wrote:

Now that 2.3 has been out for a while, is scion or witch looking better for this build?

2.3 has only been out for a week. It's too early to say still. Need to play the Witch a little to see what she can do. Scion has pretty awesome clear speed now as a Raider, I'm loving it. But I haven't tried anything really hard with the Witch yet.

"

rikutata wrote:

Is'nt "melding" worth picking? It gave you crapload of es with energy from within jewel

You can get more ES from the 4 nodes right at the Witch start than from Melding. But you don't need it. Our ES comes almost entirely from Int. I am not even sure we need Arcane Focus.

Sacrificing a jewel and 4 skill points just to get a little more ES is absolutely not worth it. This is not a ranged attacker build with huge ES. We tank and leech, and then you only need as much ES as you can possibly lose in 1 hit. More DPS = more leech.

"

Inferius90 wrote:

Will it work to use just 3-link CWDT+Enfeeble+Temporal Chains?

It will work poorly. If you use lv 1 CWDT, you will get crappy low level curses. If you use lv 20 CWDT and curses, then they will fire too rarely and not at the same time. Also, 20/20 CoH adds 10% curse effect.

"

Majin111 wrote:

I don't Like the unwavering stance the tree looks just meh because of it -.-

Int is everything to this build. Most of our tree consists of just Int nodes. It doesn't matter where you take them, Int is Int. Unwavering Stance costs you only 3 extra nodes that are not converted to Int. And on the way there you pick up a +30 Int node (Ancestral Knowledge), as well as connect the much needed resist nodes (Diamond Skin).

Stun immunity is awesome.

"

Majin111 wrote:

Well i will try myself a wiz kind of this char out after my gems hit 20 WIthout it.
Right now i play kind of a raider variant of this

https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAABAIBAAPuDPINfA5IEFgRDxEtES8RUBGWFdcXJhmKGmwc3B0UHb4i6iL0KPoqOCsKLJwspiy_L28zhzW5Nj03gzsNPL49X0cGSVFRdFJTVYVWSFZjV8lca13yX2pfcGJabAttGW1scLt6hHyDf8aCx4NthEiExYauh2WO6Y8aj0aP-pDWkyeXBpf0m6GbtZ2uoS-io6XLppmm66cIpyusmK-Nr5uv67QMtMW4k7vjvorBxcM6w23EosrT0NDVptgk2NXZE9vn35jkIud05-ro1uq66xTrY-vu7Bjv6_DV99f5M_66?accountName=Majin111&characterName=Euphemia_Li_Britannia

With all the phasing u definatly don't need the stun imunity ..

Raider, as in Ranger?! Wow. I really don't see that working. You are sacrificing your entire Ascendancy for what the Witch can get at the price of 4 skill points. Looks like a big waste to me.

P.S. I also don't think stun is an elemental status ailment. Raider won't save you from stun. Not 100% sure though.

"

Quazifuji wrote:

Why do you recommend going Liege of the Primordial first and Mastermind of Dischord last? Liege of the Primordial gives around 100% increased damage if you use fire and ice golems, or around 60% and some attack and cast speed if you use a lightning golem instead of ice. That's strong, but is it as strong as the 25% pen you get from Mastermind of Dischord?

Or is it more about not needing to trigger Dischord with Orb of Storms or Dischord having Pendulum as a prerequisite?

It's about the order of getting them. You can do Normal and Cruel Lab with 1 alc gear while leveling (I did them at lv 63 and they were completely trivial; could have done them much earlier). So that's 4 Asc points. You can spend them all on Pendulum-Mastermind, or you can get Liege and Paragon. And getting the next 4 points requires leveling and obtaining endgame gear. Liege+Paragon are much more useful than Pendulum+Mastermind.

And the result I've been hoping for:

Reflect? What reflect?

So here's your reason to play the Witch. It takes longer to level and doesn't have the amazing clear speed of the Scion version, but it can do THIS.

Really like this build! Just waiting you to post your gear because I find really difficult to reached the es, high int and resistance with only body armour, boots, and gloves. So I am using Doryani's Invitation insteed on Auxium and use flasks to solve the chill and freeze problems. Sadly this turn out only 7k es and 7k dps without buffs.

Hey Kelvynn, can you unprivate your profile so I and others can see the gear progression you're going through :P?

"

Kelvynn wrote:

And the result I've been hoping for:

Reflect? What reflect?

So here's your reason to play the Witch. It takes longer to level and doesn't have the amazing clear speed of the Scion version, but it can do THIS.

Possible to see your char items/tree ? :D
Getting tired of Firestorm and tempted to swap to this build, lvl 87 in prophecy softcore atm.

"

SuperBillyDog wrote:

Really like this build! Just waiting you to post your gear because I find really difficult to reached the es, high int and resistance with only body armour, boots, and gloves. So I am using Doryani's Invitation insteed on Auxium and use flasks to solve the chill and freeze problems. Sadly this turn out only 7k es and 7k dps without buffs.

My Witch in Standard is lv 93, respecced into this build. She is using my Scion's gear (see the Scion thread) plus the shiny new +1 curse Astramentis (but that just adds ES and DPS, not resists). I plan on updating the gear for this guide based on my progress in Prophecy, just stopped at lv 63 yesterday there, but I will continue updating it. All progress up to lv 63 is in the Leveling section, including the gear I used.

Replacing Auxium leaves you very vulnerable to chill and freeze. Cold damage, chilling ground, Beyond, the undying mobs - all that becomes problematic. A random Haast encounter = big trouble. Core Malachai = guaranteed RIP. Auxium is really mandatory if you plan on doing maps.

You can use a rare ring with high Int instead of Perandus Signet to solve the resist issues. I am going to do just that in Prophecy until I can find good gear like in Standard.

"

villur wrote:

Hey Kelvynn, can you unprivate your profile so I and others can see the gear progression you're going through :P?

Profile is open now.

Standard: Kelvynnia is the respecced lv 93 Witch with the Scion gear. Right now it's exactly what was used to cheese Atziri, but the items may jump back and forth between the Witch and Scion, whichever I play last. I use 6L in the body armor for Scion now to link the curses with Enhance, but that's a luxury thing, not needed to win. That gear is a total overkill for Atziri, you don't need that much ES or DPS. I'll try Uber some time soon, should be fun.

Prophecy: Ice_Prophecy is my league Witch. This is the char I'll be using to update this guide. Currently lv 63.

How fast is your leap slam? I tried setting up Leap Slam/FA/Fortify and it was incredibly slow and clunky to use.

"

Kelvynn wrote:

Frost Bomb is not worth using with this build IMO. Everything dies too fast to pop it. And then you get EO/Orb of Storms.

Frost Bomb lowers enemy resists with the pulses that happen before it pops, which are almost immediately. The pop just does damage. I've been using it, it's very easy to lower enemy resists with it. Granted, it is true that most things die too fast for it to be worth it, but against bosses it can be a good damage boost. Not sure if it's worth putting off the fire conversion for it, though.

"

Kelvynn wrote:

"

Quazifuji wrote:

Why do you recommend going Liege of the Primordial first and Mastermind of Dischord last? Liege of the Primordial gives around 100% increased damage if you use fire and ice golems, or around 60% and some attack and cast speed if you use a lightning golem instead of ice. That's strong, but is it as strong as the 25% pen you get from Mastermind of Dischord?

Or is it more about not needing to trigger Dischord with Orb of Storms or Dischord having Pendulum as a prerequisite?

It's about the order of getting them. You can do Normal and Cruel Lab with 1 alc gear while leveling (I did them at lv 63 and they were completely trivial; could have done them much earlier). So that's 4 Asc points. You can spend them all on Pendulum-Mastermind, or you can get Liege and Paragon. And getting the next 4 points requires leveling and obtaining endgame gear. Liege+Paragon are much more useful than Pendulum+Mastermind.

That makes sense. If I've already done merc lab, would you recommend getting Mastermind before Liege, then?

Right now, I haven't bothered with the AoF conversion yet, and it's working pretty well. I was considering just going for Mastermind right away (triggering it with Flame Dash), and then holding off on Snowforged and AoF until I do end-game Lab and can get Liege.