[3.6] Chaos Cerberus - an ED LL Occultist | Viable for everything | Deathless UElder + Video

Added another Video. :)


Delve 485+ - 2 Player Carry

https://youtu.be/pQXQlC4fvbE

I did not play in Delve so my own mine is kinda low Level in standard till I play a bit more. I asked TheGagis, a friend of mine, to let me use his Mine - he did not do anything in this clip but stand around. He is a Molten Strike HoWaA and you would have noticed if he did. Molten Strike is really eye-catchy. Essentially making me 'carry' our party of two.

Looks great! Gonna have to give this one a try soon. Thanks for posting another build guide.

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YT_HB wrote:

Looks great! Gonna have to give this one a try soon. Thanks for posting another build guide.

Cheers!

This build is a nice mixup from all the 'gotta go faster' builds. Slower, tanky and very deliberate.

I enjoy it more then I thought I would. ^^

Hi Cyrix!
First of all, thanks for this in-depth guide, very usefull information.
Can I ask you to add some lvling tips - i know that's a noob question, but it's difficult to play ES right from the start (only 1.1k ES on lvl 47).

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Sojournerx wrote:

Hi Cyrix!
First of all, thanks for this in-depth guide, very usefull information.
Can I ask you to add some lvling tips - i know that's a noob question, but it's difficult to play ES right from the start (only 1.1k ES on lvl 47).

Well, leveling is kinda always the same for casters?

You start out with either FrostBlades and a high DPS weapon (for your respective level of course) or Freezing Pulse.

At Level 14 you can use Arc - which is a great leveling skill. Make sure to put the skills relevant for this build into your offhand weaponset to level those gems.

Try to use Gear that has Armor on it - physical mitigation is much more valueable then Evasion or ES in the early levels.

When you have at least 3links for contagion (+ arcane surge + increased Area) and 5-6links (with a tablua ^^ - noone expects you to use actual 6linked gear while leveling) Essence drain you can play this build from then on.

You might wanna stick with Arc though - Essence Drain is a bit of a late bloomer. It is a dot skill and as such cannot crit and doesnt really benefit much from cast speed. As such one needs modifiers and gear that are only available later in the game. (Pain attunment, Curses etc)

There are a couple of Health-Nodes in the Witch Start - I would path up to Occultist domain first - then go right and pick up those Health/Mana Nodes - they are fairly good. And then fill out the right side of the tree and forgoing the ES nodes for now.

Atropy is a good cluster to get once you use Essence Drain. Leave out all the Aura and curse specific nodes when you level - you wont use discipline or the purities for example nor will you really need them if you have rares with resists on them and no relevant ES gear.
In general this means the left side of the tree where Zealoth Oath is located should be the last bit of the tree to fill out.
Once you aquire ES gear you can specc out of the Life nodes you took and put them into ES nodes.

Tabula, Lifesprig, Wanderlust and Asenath Mask are all very good caster specific leveling items. As are Poet's Pens, but those are probs way out of your budget, especially this league. ^^'

I know this is a bit general - but honestly leveling is not such a big thing as people might think. And respeccing is not as expensive as one might think if you take a bit of care with your tree and dont deviate crazy from this tree. You get a couple of respec points even during leveling! 10 or so I think? Maybe a bit more. Can't remember.

Also, Low Life Chaos Damage builds are not really noob friendly. :/ I feel like they require the most understanding of the game out of the builds out there.

It is way easier to grab a weapon, socket a skill in it and bash monsters heads in then doing this. A lot of stuff like ES and its recharge rate, vs leech, vs gain on hit - and spells like contagion or blight that do not actually 'hit' but are just degeneration effects etc pp are all things specific to PoE and not really all that intuitive to understand.

Nevertheless, if you wanna try it you can! ED + Contagion is not a *bad* leveling skill when it comes down to it. It works well, but its not easy to grok. Arc might just feel better for you while leveling.

Blah. Wall of text. ^^'

Man, you're a god. Thank you very much for your reply, i'll try it <3

Thanks for the reply! I currently have a level 88 Cold Snap/Vortex occultist, but you can bet I'll level another occultist lol.

This is a bit off tangent, but how do you think the damage of 3.5 ED/Congtagion occultist compares vs Caustic Arrow occultist? The key appeal is that Soul Strike is much cheaper than Apep's (if you go the ES recharge route instead).

Appreciate the thought and effort you've put in, and go go go Occultist!

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shinjoker wrote:

Thanks for the reply! I currently have a level 88 Cold Snap/Vortex occultist, but you can bet I'll level another occultist lol.

This is a bit off tangent, but how do you think the damage of 3.5 ED/Congtagion occultist compares vs Caustic Arrow occultist? The key appeal is that Soul Strike is much cheaper than Apep's (if you go the ES recharge route instead).

Appreciate the thought and effort you've put in, and go go go Occultist!

First off: In non of my videos do I use Apep's; just to make that clear. ^^ I have it; but I thought the Shield/Cerberus combo is better.

As for the rest:

Bit difficult to answer - Caustic Arrow is an Attack Skill, not a Spell. As such it does not benefit from Pain Attunment or other 'More' Multipliers which are good for spells.

This also of course means you do not run a Shavs but most likely CI and a rare armor. (keep in mind that Shav's also has a faster start of ES recharge rate)

Caustic Arrow is an Bow Skill and as such an Attack Skill. Which in turn means most of its relevant Talenttree-options are down by the Shadow and Ranger. This per se is not an obstacle in principle - but I am fairly sure you would be better of playing a Ranger or an Shadow for it.

On to other things: Since you will be running CI for Caustic Arrow you will rely on expensive rare items for your BodyArmor and - more importantly - your bow. And the rare bow's to make Caustic Arrow really shine tend to be near Mirror Items. You can play without so much investment of course - but I think a fair warning is in order if you want to pursue a rare-dependant skill/build.

I just PoB'ed around fo' short and while you can get okay deeps with a unique bow it is kinda costly as well: https://pastebin.com/51JytvVk
The rare items I put in are kinda nuts - but you could compensate a bit with the jewels sockets I left empty.
With a crazy rare bow (one which gives +5 or more gem levels) you can deal a 'lot' more damage; but yeah. Mirrors and stuff.

Anyhow! Up to you how you wanna go about this. You might wanna check another thread in the Ranger or Shadow subforums if you are on the lookout for Caustic Arrow builds etc. :)

€dit: don't take me quickly made pob for the be-all end-all. ^^'

Damn, I didn't expect that in-depth of an answer lol! You're awesome for doing so :D This thought started after seeing the pob damage for a CA Occultist that has a +3 rare bow and 800k+ dot damage for CA.

I think I'm still going ED/Contagion, don't get me wrong. Last league, CA was great as an Occultist (obviously didn't have the Occultist ascendancy changes we have now), but a bit lacking on Single Target. A +3 bow is thankfully attainable with fossil crafting, but 6L is a bitch. I've also got a soft spot for bow builds, but I won't let that take away from my greater love for Occultist and chaos spells lol.

The draw for me to rare body armour over Shav's is that I won't have to fork over currency for Presence of Chayula. I'm sure I could afford it eventually, but the Occultist's Vile Bastion is perfectly fine. The counter to that is just using Eye of Chayula as a cheap alternative with Shav's, I suppose.

Thanks again for the thorough response :)

How big of a deal is it to not have the +2 duration in the chest? I switched it and the dps drops by 100k..I want to switch out from my build and have about 16ex but not sure if the dps is worth it.