[3.0] Death Aura Build - Guardians done

Death Aura Build
Witch - Occultist


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IF YOUR DEATH AURA TOOLTIP DPS IS LOWER THAN 10K, READ THIS PLEASE!
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This is a Death Aura build. It works like Righteous Fire without Energy Shield degeneration since you are immune to chaos damage. Please note that this is not one of those Blight, Essence Drain builds that choose to wear Death’s Oath to add some flavor. Because this build can clear T16 maps by only using Death Aura damage. However, single target damage is still quite limited for red map bosses due to reduce effect of curses. You will still need Blight and Wither to boost your single target DPS to make it more efficient. Currently, the build has completed 4 guardians and is on the way to the Shaper.


Video
My videos are not entertaining at all. Just to show this is guardian/Beachhead map viable.

Gorge with Breach https://youtu.be/w_E43-sxZfQ
T15 Beachhead Boss (without using Blight and Allelopathy) https://youtu.be/cDfFZZmp8pg
Blight gem is there to trigger Void Gaze but turns out that Shield Charge is okay for the job.

Guardians:
Hydra https://youtu.be/2WzviVvORxM

Vault map (Recorded by Borehed) https://youtu.be/6PYqttiI58g


How to do it right?
Most people do not know how it works: You need to add an ARCANE SURGE Support to your Death’s Oath in order to get a “Duration tag” for your Death Aura. By doing this, support gems such as Swift Affliction, Efficacy and Less Duration will boost your Death Aura damage! So the optimal 6 sockets will be:
Concentrated Effect – Void Manipulation – Arcane Surge – Swift Affliction – Efficacy – Less Duration
These sockets do not need to be linked at all but 5 off colors can be hard to get.


Ascendency:
There are only two choices for you: Occultist or Ascendant with Occultist. These are only two ascendancies that give you -% Chaos Resistance to enemies. This is very important since there is no other ways to penetrate monster’s chaos resistance except Void Gaze triggered by Eber’s Unification Unique helmet (which is also included in the build).

Occultist - Void Beacon, Profane Bloom, Wicked Ward and Vile Bastion
Our clear speed with Death Aura is very good while the only problem are bosses in red maps. One additional curse does not help very much since the reduction effect of curses on unique monsters is huge. So the regeneration obtained from Vile Bastion is much more valuable than one additional curse.


Skill tree:
Things you need:
Chaos Inoculation, Zealot’s Oath
Aura effect, Damage over Time, Chaos damage, Energy Shield, regeneration
Current tree: (lv90)
https://goo.gl/mtDF7g


Bandits:
Oak or all
Personally, I choose Oak for 1% regeneration and physical mitigation.
2 Passive points can work well too.


Gem links:
Chest: Concentrated Effect – Void Manipulation – Arcane Surge – Swift Affliction – Efficacy – Less Duration
Helmet and Boots:
Enlighten (lv3) – Blasphemy – Vulnerability – Enfeeble
Enlighten (lv3) – Grace – Discipline – Lightning Warp (lv 1)

Gloves: (given lv22 Blight)
Swift Affliction – Efficacy – Void Manipulation – Controlled Destruction

Weapon and Shield:
Shield Charge – Faster Attacks – Fortify
Spell Totem – Wither – Faster Casting


Current Gear:
Death’s Oath of course
Eber’s Unification helmet for Void Gaze (-10% chaos resistance)
Allelopathy for free 6 link (it’s equal to lv3 Empower + lv20 Blight with 4 open sockets)
Breath of the Council (for Chaos damage, chaos effect and AoE)
Marble Amulet for additional regen
Ring and Crystal belt for Int, Str, ES and resistances

We do not use Spreading Rot gem to increase damage since it only works on the initial hit to hinder your target. This makes it very hard to maintain in a boss fight so I’d rather use those two gem slots for something else.









Pantheon
Soul of the Brine King for stun immunity and recovery
Soul of Tukohama for casting blight when face tank bosses


Conclusions
Overall, in T10 or lower maps, it works just like Righteous Fire build but the Death Aura provides much larger Area of Effect since it’s an aura (even with concentrated effect, it’s still much larger than RF). The clear speed is very satisfactory since DPS is high enough by using correct gem links.
For boss fight in red maps, Blight and Wither Totem can provide significant damage boost but you still need to stand in place to cast Blight.
I didn’t expect to go this far for this build but I’m quite happy now and would like to share the information with you. Please tell your friends who are playing with Death’s Oath, do yourself a favor and PUT AN ARCANE SURGE GEM IN IT!!!

Hello.

Great idea with Arcane Surge, sir.

I was trying to build something similar, but missed AS gem = no success.

Any video?

Thank you for your interests!
I will upload a gameplay video soon.

I am just a casual player and this is my first gameplay video.
I don't even upload anything on Youtube before. So this may take a while, lol.

Nice build mate, i'm also building death oath char - occultist. Interesting idea with arcane surge i must say but ill stick to mine idea. Note that efficacy is currently bugged and will be fixed in next patch so it will affect death aura anyway ! In my experience getting 5 off colors is harder than getting 6l :) I will go with setup inc aoe+conc eff+ void manip+efficacy+abyssal cry+less duration on 6l. Also i'm not sure if i should go for shield charge+decay+fortify or just stick to faster attacks what is your opinion ? Will use same gem setup on gloves. And for aura i picked blasphemy+vulner , arctic armor, discipline and vitality for more regen. I'm also trying to build it with malachai's vision so i need all items corrupted to get that sweet 100 es regen per sec , will see how hard is that :). Overall i'm liking your build and i'm happy more ppl are interested in this awesome armor. Forgot to ask how big is your es pool ?

Hi, I totally agree with you about the off-color.
5 off-color is really painful to get for a 180 strength armor!
For my build, the mana is very tight (only 31 mana left).
So I only tested several low cost skills to boost single target dps.
I have tested a variation using BV + Decay (just like RaizQT's decay build).
It turns out not dealing very significant damage. (feels a bit lower than Blight for single target, but you gain mobility fighting harder bosses)
So probably shield charge + faster attacks is a better choice than Decay.

Malachai's Vision can be a very good idea, but I have no ball to vaal my 5-off color Death's Oath, lol.

And for the Beachhead video I just uploaded, by wearing Shaper's Touch gloves, I have 13886 EV without any flask so it is very tanky. (No unique boss here so single target DPS is not needed)
And the ES becomes 8443 (from 8813 EV and 8165 ES using Allelopathy gloves)

I am also very happy that many players like Death's Oath's new change and make builds around it!
Have fun.

yea u got really lucky with those 5 off colors :D. I know about mana issues because i'm also using all aura nodes like you and that's why i choose arctic armor over 2nd curse ( 95 mana is needed for abyssal lvl 1 on 6l ) + it's really great for any channeling build as we stand a lot. Dunno, i think i will use that sweet decay anyway, fuck a little more speed :D, this is pure chaos/dot build so i will use any chaos dps in it, even using chaos chaos golem because it wouldn't be ethical to use fire golem on pure chaos build :). Good thanks for answer , i aim also around 7-8k es but with like 10k+ armor+fortify+basalt and chaos golem, it should be fine. Wish you good luck with your build, if you come out with something share with us, i will also do the same. Cheers !

Hey guys.

To get 5 off-colour, just use Vorici's trick.

Much cheaper than chromes.

Enjoy Your builds :)

yeah, maybe I'm just not so lucky >.<
I craft mine using Vorici's "jeweller method".
5th socket is 70 jeweller each roll plus 10 to reset it to 4s.
I end up rolling like 30 times to get my last blue socket + 350 jeweller for the 6th.

I will try 1g1b with vorici and will see if i can hit 5 off , if not i will just stick to my 6l 2g2b2r plan :)

Crafted mine in just 8exa worth of jeweller's and i assume i was lucky.