[3.5] Scold Snap™ - a low-life league starter Cold Snap Occultist

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s130133269 wrote:

any idea for new ascendancy points?
seems need to take out 4points from profane bloom and malediction or keep profane bloom then take out vile bastion??

Yep, I'm probably going to drop the curse nodes. Vile Bastion is crazy strong for an ES build, and the primary incentive for being an Occultist in the first place.

My take would be that the ascendancy change is necessary.
Am I right in thinking Profane Bloom doesn't help this build due to the DoT from the ground doing the killing?

Then the following changes give a massive boost in DPS:

Drop Spiritual Aid cluster, Heart of Ice arm, Nullification.
Take Growth and Decay, Breath of Rime, and Fingers of Frost (route from Written in Blood).

Results in 32% improved DoT DPS (a smidge shy of 1mill), the loss of 300 ES, a little evasion and the 8% resists. Also uses 1 more point so will need a bit more thought.

So

Void Beacon + Frigid Wake, Wicked Ward + Vile Bastion ?

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oregoncrete wrote:

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April_Spades wrote:

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Cold Snap
Now deals 19.6 base cold damage at gem level 1, up to 1196.3 base cold damage at gem level 20 (up from 997).

So not only are there new cold DoT passives, but Cold Snap got buffed on top of that.

-Cold Snap damage up 20% (unclear on DoT damage).
-Items can now roll +Cold Dot mods
-Occultist Nodes
-Witch area nodes
-Zero nerfs
-Scolds more available due to Torment

Thoughts on Aegis Aurora buff, or using Voidbringer for glove slot?

Hmmmmm

Aegis Aurora: now has 300-400% (up from 80-100%) increased Armour and Energy Shield.
That's good. I'm not sure what the final ar/ES totals will be, but it looks promising, especially against Shaper and Elder. I don't think this build would use Aegis without Cerberus Limb.

using Voidbringer for glove slot:
why tho?

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kennoba wrote:

Are you updating the build as soon as 3.5 comes out?

A new tree with all the passives, etc?

I'm a newbie at poe, so the update would be crucial for trying out this for the first time hehe.
thanks

I'm busy with school right now. Final exams next week, with the last test on Friday.

The passive tree won't change much. Most of the new "cold damage over time multiplier" nodes are in really inconvenient places. The only clusters worth chasing that contain them are near the Shadow start (Growth and Decay) and the far-north Witch cluster (Breath of Rime and Heart of Ice).

Follow the tree shown in the guide and try not to eat all your regret orbs. Occultist has more appealing early ascendancy nodes, which is great for someone starting out with life + Mind Over Matter.

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QuackSage wrote:

My take would be that the ascendancy change is necessary.
Am I right in thinking Profane Bloom doesn't help this build due to the DoT from the ground doing the killing?

Then the following changes give a massive boost in DPS:

Drop Spiritual Aid cluster, Heart of Ice arm, Nullification.
Take Growth and Decay, Breath of Rime, and Fingers of Frost (route from Written in Blood).

Results in 32% improved DoT DPS (a smidge shy of 1mill), the loss of 300 ES, a little evasion and the 8% resists. Also uses 1 more point so will need a bit more thought.

Profane Bloom:
I like it because it means curses will always be applied, and the corpse destruction is helpful vs a variety of monsters with on-death mechanics. It also helps the clear speed (a little). If you decide to do a life-based Occultist, this node will be a keeper for sure. But for the low-life version... not so much.

There's nothing bad or un-helpful about Profane Bloom, but we got damage to deal (Frigid Wake) and I rather enjoy stun immunity and that whole "not dying" thing (Vile Bastion).

passive tree stuff:
If I'm taking Breath of Rime, you can bet your ass I'm going to want to take Heart of Ice. Obviously points are the limiting factor here - Heart of Ice will likely be one of the first nodes to trim. I'm also not 100% sold on Fingers of Frost being worth it, but could easily be wrong.

I'm busy with school right now so I don't have time to rigorously analyze the tree. For the next few days, I think your analysis will be better than mine.

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JaxRC wrote:

So

Void Beacon + Frigid Wake, Wicked Ward + Vile Bastion ?

For a low-life Occultist, yes.

The new values for Aegis Aurora should be 1118 Armour and 218 ES, which is not bad with Cerberus Limb.

Rime Gaze could result in a DPS increment over Scold's Bridle because of the +22% to Cold Damage over Time Multiplier. It also provides Conc Effect for Vortex, making it 5L instead of 4L. The Vortex gem has also been buffed.

The only downside would be losing the utility aspect of Scold's Bridle, but I'd take Malachai's Artifice into consideration instead of EE, which no longer has the reduced EE effect.

We are losing curses against Hexproof enemies, so it's something to think about.
New Shaper/Elder items with DoT multiplier will be interesting.

There is also a new aliment for Cold damage (Brittle), but we still don't know what's that about. It's probably exclusive to a new Unique item.

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Davos_Seaworth wrote:

The new values for Aegis Aurora should be 1118 Armour and 218 ES, which is not bad with Cerberus Limb.

Rime Gaze could result in a DPS increment over Scold's Bridle because of the +22% to Cold Damage over Time Multiplier. It also provides Conc Effect for Vortex, making it 5L instead of 4L. The Vortex gem has also been buffed.

The only downside would be losing the utility aspect of Scold's Bridle, but I'd take Malachai's Artifice into consideration instead of EE, which no longer has the reduced EE effect.

We are losing curses against Hexproof enemies, so it's something to think about.
New Shaper/Elder items with DoT multiplier will be interesting.

There is also a new aliment for Cold damage (Brittle), but we still don't know what's that about. It's probably exclusive to a new Unique item.

I like all of these things and would like to try them all at some point. Not a fan of Malachai's Artifice, but I'd be a fool if I claimed the new ring will be bad for a cold snapper without testing first.

Aegis indeed looks like a pretty sexy choice for pairing with Cerberus Limb.

One caveat of all this theorycrafting is to remember the rules of scaling: piling "more damage" modifiers on top of each other is only great when you also have a healthy amount of "increased damage" mods as well.
Malachai's Artifice looks interesting, but at the cost of a ring slot (I can get well over 45% inc damage on a rare opal ring).

Aegis looks interesting for its ES and max cold resist, but at the cost of damage (my current rare shield has 48% spell dmg).

When it comes to damage, Rime Gaze is one of the few items that don't seem to have much of a drawback when compared to Scold's Bridle. But if we start thinking about what makes ES-based Occultists fare well in boss fights (ES recharge)... Will 50% reduced ES recharge rate be too much to handle? (I vote yes)

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cha_siu_bao wrote:

Spoiler

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Davos_Seaworth wrote:

The new values for Aegis Aurora should be 1118 Armour and 218 ES, which is not bad with Cerberus Limb.

Rime Gaze could result in a DPS increment over Scold's Bridle because of the +22% to Cold Damage over Time Multiplier. It also provides Conc Effect for Vortex, making it 5L instead of 4L. The Vortex gem has also been buffed.

The only downside would be losing the utility aspect of Scold's Bridle, but I'd take Malachai's Artifice into consideration instead of EE, which no longer has the reduced EE effect.

We are losing curses against Hexproof enemies, so it's something to think about.
New Shaper/Elder items with DoT multiplier will be interesting.

There is also a new aliment for Cold damage (Brittle), but we still don't know what's that about. It's probably exclusive to a new Unique item.

I like all of these things and would like to try them all at some point. Not a fan of Malachai's Artifice, but I'd be a fool if I claimed the new ring will be bad for a cold snapper without testing first.

Aegis indeed looks like a pretty sexy choice for pairing with Cerberus Limb.

One caveat of all this theorycrafting is to remember the rules of scaling: piling "more damage" modifiers on top of each other is only great when you also have a healthy amount of "increased damage" mods as well.
Malachai's Artifice looks interesting, but at the cost of a ring slot (I can get well over 45% inc damage on a rare opal ring).

Aegis looks interesting for its ES and max cold resist, but at the cost of damage (my current rare shield has 48% spell dmg).

When it comes to damage, Rime Gaze is one of the few items that don't seem to have much of a drawback when compared to Scold's Bridle. But if we start thinking about what makes ES-based Occultists fare well in boss fights (ES recharge)... Will 50% reduced ES recharge rate be too much to handle? (I vote yes)

I think if Aegis is cheap, it'll be an easy option to slot in unless you get a better rare. As for Rime Gaze, you'd also lose the QOL from Scolds autocast. I think Rime is solid for Life-Mom before going LL.