[3.7] Essence Drain/Contagion Trickster (the best one)

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markuskanada wrote:

Hey guys, I started an ED/Contagion this league and right now I am kind of lost.
I dont really know where to go, there are so many different setups.
I started with Ziz's build (wand+shield) and got kind of stuck because I ended up just farming monoliths in lower tiers like T4 (which was surprisingly rewarding).

Anyways, I feel like my defenses are way better than my offense.
I do like so little damage from T10+ ... is that normal?
I mean, i have crappy gear, but my gems are almost 20/20 at least, you would assume that you could farm into red maps or not?

When I just want to do monolith farming in lets say mid-high tiers, where would you go from here? Is a bow setup really so much better?

If i just want to do some monolith farming, will a carcass jack and bow setup enable me to do that? currently, damage wise, I cant do red maps, its really frustrating.

Thank you all for your help.

As far as damage goes (which is what you say you're lacking) bows CRUSH vs a wand setup. I switched yesterday and I'll tell you damage is definitely no longer an issue. Some red tier bosses are a bit tricky (due to me being a bit squishy) but if you want to farm monoliths at a higher tier (though I have seen many a post saying there is no discernible difference between low and high tier monoliths) than a bow is the way to go.
I'm completing the red tiers of maps for the extra sextant then going back to low level monolith farming.

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jbabel1012 wrote:

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markuskanada wrote:

Hey guys, I started an ED/Contagion this league and right now I am of lost.
I dont really know where to go, there are so many different setups.
I started with Ziz's build (wand+shield) and got of stuck because I ended up just farming monoliths in lower tiers like T4 (which was surprisingly rewarding).

Anyways, I feel like my defenses are way better than my offense.
I do like so little damage T10+ is that normal?
I mean, i have crappy gear, but my gems are almost 20/20 at least, you would assume that you could farm into red maps or not?

When I just want to do monolith farming in lets say mid-high tiers, where would you go here? Is a bow setup really so much better?

If i just want to do some monolith farming, will a carcass jack and bow setup enable me to do that? currently, damage wise, I cant do red maps, its really frustrating.

Thank you all for your help.

As far as damage goes (which is what you say you're lacking) bows CRUSH vs a wand setup. I switched yesterday and I'll tell you damage is definitely no longer an issue. Some red tier bosses are a bit tricky e to me being a bit squishy) but if you want to farm monoliths at a higher tier (though I have seen many a post saying there is no discernible difference between low and high tier monoliths) than a bow is the way to go.
I'm completing the red tiers of maps for the extra sextant then going back to low level monolith farming.

Hello Sir, thanks for answering, appreciate it.
OK, i get a bow + quiver later after work.
I guess it should be a +1 gem and +2 supporting gems short bow, correct?
and for zoom zoom, is a carcass better or a queen of the forest (in your personal opinion)? because carcass sounds so crazy with that AoE...


Thank you buddy, really appreciate your answer.

markus

Hey! Thanks for the build.
So I feel kinda lost, I started playing ED Contagion with Zizaran's build and then I ended up with crafting bow+quiver since I saw most of the people doing it at Poe.ninja

I do have crafted bow with + 6link restless ward.

I'm thinking to drop restless ward for another body armor but I couldn't decide which one should I choose, any suggestions? (My main goal is doing end game content like uber elder-shaper)

Plus should I get impresence amulet? Or should I use rare one and stick with the witchfire flask

As far as damage goes (which is what you say you're lacking) bows CRUSH vs a wand setup. I switched yesterday and I'll tell you damage is definitely no longer an issue. Some red tier bosses are a bit tricky e to me being a bit squishy) but if you want to farm monoliths at a higher tier (though I have seen many a post saying there is no discernible difference between low and high tier monoliths) than a bow is the way to go.
I'm completing the red tiers of maps for the extra sextant then going back to low level monolith farming.



Hello Sir, thanks for answering, appreciate it.
OK, i get a bow + quiver later after work.
I guess it should be a +1 gem and +2 supporting gems short bow, correct?
and for zoom zoom, is a carcass better or a queen of the forest (in your personal opinion)? because carcass sounds so crazy with that AoE...


Thank you buddy, really appreciate your answer.

markus






I am juggling chest options now as well. If all you really want is zoom zoom then QotF is probably what you want. I am planning on going with a perfect form for the massive evasion boost and 4 skill points it saves for phase acro.

As for how to craft the bow, on page 6 of this thread the OP gave me a walk through which I will cut and paste here:

1) Start with a 6-linked ilvl 50+ bow. Popular choices are Short Bow (due to Porcupine div card existence and the lower coloring costs with low dex) or Maraketh Bow for the movespeed implicit.
2) Alt spam until you hit +1 to level of socketed gems. This is a fairly common mod, so a few hundred alts should be more than enough. If you roll this prefix with no suffix, awesome. If you roll it as a 2-affix magic item, I'd consider continuing to alt-spam until you get it as a single mod. It will depend real-time on the price of alts vs. annuls which of these is the right choice.
3) Regal.
4) Say a prayer, then use Annulment Orbs until your item is a rare with only the +1 to socketed gems mod. If you had a 1-mod magic bow, you only need to get lucky once on a 50/50 annul. If you had a 2-mod magic bow, you'll need to get 2 lucky annuls.
5) Multimod (2ex).
6) Add non-ailment chaos damage over time multiplier, +2 to socketed support gems (1ex), increased cast speed & 10% chance to trigger arcane surge on killing an enemy, and 13-16% increased chaos damage suffix.
7) Destroy everything.

If you've chosen to go with Swift Killer with your ascendancy points, then adding "5-6% increased damage per frenzy charge" is likely going to be better than the 13-16% chaos damage suffix almost always.


^this process took me 3 annuls to get it ready for crafting. I only regaled when I got the +1 craft by itself, I alt'd past when I got it with another affix (didn't want to wast the annuls, plus my RNG is bad). So in ~200 alts I got the +1 by itself 3 times and annulled it away the 1st 2 tries. I got the +1 with another suffix at least 2 times during this process as well.

Good luck. If you need a crafting service the person I used is in this thread:
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2530928
he doesn't charge a fee (though I tipped 30c) and the craft costs 4ex, 8c and 3alc
plus the bow cost (i bought porcupine cards for ~10c each so 60c for the bow for me).

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rlauren2 wrote:

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kevinbrightblade wrote:

And the plan was to buy a quiver and switch to the bow. But the thought of doing two three-gem setups in my armor makes me die inside. What would be a six link that's worth it? Going from a 5link to 6link on blight hardly seems worth the effort (20k to 50k dps according to PoB). And a 6link contagion is a waste according to PoB since it doesn't do enough dps to matter.

The only thing I can come up with at the moment is to do the 6link blight in the chest, drop CWDT + Steelskin along with Allelopathy and run rare gloves with Contagion + Increased AoE + Intensify + Arctic Armour. There has to be a better way though. The dps gain from a 6l blight isn't awesome, and losing CWDT + Steelskin hurts.

You're correct that there isn't a super natural choice for a second 6-link. I specifically don't suggest it because it's a great way to save costs on the build. Given that you already have one though, we can try.

The blight damage gain is significant. I believe PoB shows Blight damage "per stack". Blight is a channel skill that can stack on top of itself up to 20 times. If your tooltip is showing 50k, you can actually do 1 mil damage from Blight if you stand and cast with enough cast speed.

After that though, you're down to only 12 sockets left for your auras, curses, contagion, cwdt, VRF, and movement skills. Things get squeezed.

It's Blight or nothing. I know it feels bad, but I think you just have to use the chest as utility.

Thank you for the response, and that's helpful about PoB and Blight. If anyone's interested, here's what I landed on for final gem setup:

6L Bow: ED, Empower, Void/Swift/Efficacy/CD
6L Chest: Vaal Blight, Infused Channeling, Void/Swift/Efficacy/CD
4L Helm: Malevolence, Blasphemy, Despair, Enfeeble
4L 2: Phase Run, Arctic Armour, Vaal Righteous Fire, Increased Duration
4L 3: Contagion, Increased AoE, Intensify, Frostblink

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qaizr wrote:

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Shangles wrote:

Is it worth trying to put in Wither totems at all?

the spreading rot jewel adds wither to blight and some builds use totems to cast blight

So since I am using Vaal blight anyway that would make that sort of setup completely useless then?

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Shangles wrote:

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qaizr wrote:

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Shangles wrote:

Is it worth trying to put in Wither totems at all?

the spreading rot jewel adds wither to blight and some builds use totems to cast blight

So since I am using Vaal blight anyway that would make that sort of setup completely useless then?

yep, since blight applies wither it would be pointless to add wither totems

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Shangles wrote:

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qaizr wrote:

"

Shangles wrote:

Is it worth trying to put in Wither totems at all?

the spreading rot jewel adds wither to blight and some builds use totems to cast blight

So since I am using Vaal blight anyway that would make that sort of setup completely useless then?

The important part is to get the "Withered" debuff. Wither skill does this by itself, but it does no damage. If you use the Spreading Rot unique jewel, it will cause Blight to inflict the debuff as well. So you need either Wither totems OR Blight plus Spreading Rot. You don't need both.

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Daisenpu wrote:

Hey! Thanks for the build.
So I feel kinda lost, I started playing ED Contagion with Zizaran's build and then I ended up with crafting bow+quiver since I saw most of the people doing it at Poe.ninja

I do have crafted bow with + 6link restless ward.

I'm thinking to drop restless ward for another body armor but I couldn't decide which one should I choose, any suggestions? (My main goal is doing end game content like uber elder-shaper)

Plus should I get impresence amulet? Or should I use rare one and stick with the witchfire flask

For the big boss fights, Perfect Form is the way to go. You also drop everything on the way to Acro/Phase Acro (so everything to the right of Revenge of the Hunted). Use those 8 skill points to pad life and ES. You also don't need to take Amplify since the AoE is more for mapping/monolith farming. Impresence amulet is all around awesome, but super expensive. If you can afford it, go for it and you're set for everything. A cheaper option for bossing is to use despair linked to CWDT. Witchfire sucks for bossing since you will immediately run out of charges and won't have the curse up most of the fight.

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jbabel1012 wrote:

dumb question about impresence. it has the despair has 100% reduced mana reservation. despair doesn't have mana reservation or am I totally missing the point of this (I know I am help a blind man see). Is it for blasphemy setups? If so then why do we care since we use bane for despair?

Another question: now that I have the arcane surge on kill mod on bow do I take the skill gem out of contagion? Or leave it so that it procs on first cast of contagion before any kills (to basically have additional arcane surge procs?)
if i do remove replace with what? faster casting?

For Arcane Surge, it depends on what you will be doing most. For bosses, you will want to keep the gem in so you can keep Arcane Surge up permanently, since bosses won't afford you as many random minions to kill to keep the buff up. If you map/delve mostly, then you can drop the gem and replace with faster casting.

As for Impresence, you are correct that the mana reservation serves to make it free when linked to Blasphemy. If you do this, you get to drop Bane completely from your setup. It's a huge boost to quality of life, since you never have to manually cast your curse, and it's just permanently up.

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markuskanada wrote:

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jbabel1012 wrote:

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markuskanada wrote:

Hey guys, I started an ED/Contagion this league and right now I am of lost.
I dont really know where to go, there are so many different setups.
I started with Ziz's build (wand+shield) and got of stuck because I ended up just farming monoliths in lower tiers like T4 (which was surprisingly rewarding).

Anyways, I feel like my defenses are way better than my offense.
I do like so little damage T10+ is that normal?
I mean, i have crappy gear, but my gems are almost 20/20 at least, you would assume that you could farm into red maps or not?

When I just want to do monolith farming in lets say mid-high tiers, where would you go here? Is a bow setup really so much better?

If i just want to do some monolith farming, will a carcass jack and bow setup enable me to do that? currently, damage wise, I cant do red maps, its really frustrating.

Thank you all for your help.

As far as damage goes (which is what you say you're lacking) bows CRUSH vs a wand setup. I switched yesterday and I'll tell you damage is definitely no longer an issue. Some red tier bosses are a bit tricky e to me being a bit squishy) but if you want to farm monoliths at a higher tier (though I have seen many a post saying there is no discernible difference between low and high tier monoliths) than a bow is the way to go.
I'm completing the red tiers of maps for the extra sextant then going back to low level monolith farming.

Hello Sir, thanks for answering, appreciate it.
OK, i get a bow + quiver later after work.
I guess it should be a +1 gem and +2 supporting gems short bow, correct?
and for zoom zoom, is a carcass better or a queen of the forest (in your personal opinion)? because carcass sounds so crazy with that AoE...

Thank you buddy, really appreciate your answer.

markus

With your current setup, you should be able to get pretty far. I'd estimate your tooltip in game to be ~100k dot DPS with current gear. You can clear all the way up to t15 with that since you're also using Allelopathy gloves. Your ED/Contagion should clear trash mobs, but you just have to be more liberal with Blight usage on bosses/rares. Blight, when channeled, can do more than ED plus it inflicts withered which at max stacks doubles your damage. So ED + Blight channel is almost 4 times as much damage as ED alone.

Eventually you absolutely want the bow. Those two mods you mention are correct, along with non-ailment chaos dot multi and increased cast speed/arcane surge on kill.

Carcass Jack is better for monoliths. Queen of the Forest is probably better for Delve or other enclosed spaces that don't benefit from the AoE as much. I tailored the build to AoE with the purpose of mostly open area mapping and Legion content farming, so that's where I took it.

Hey, thanks for this guide! Interesting variation and nice specifics on Legion!

I'm running a mix of Ziz/Ghazzy guides on Hardcore Legion (ggdowntown). Not having too many issues (damage could be a little better as rares have so much health now - hopefully improves when i 6-link) but haven't hit red maps yet. I'm a bit torn on a couple of thing:

1. I want to ditch Acro nodes for more life on the Templar side similar to Steelmage did in SSFHC but I'm not sure it will be the better defensive option as i lose the big evasion on my chest which works well with my ascendancy. Interested in Perfect form, do you think it would be a good replacement to Hyri?

2. Is Bow + Quiver really that minor of a difference to defence? I think it would be great to boost damage that much.Intended on getting Magna Eclipsis with Cerberus but now i'm second guessing it.

3. Should i ditch spell totem and just channel blight? Concerned i cant place and run if i channel though.

Any other hardcore survivabilty/damage tips?

I'm enjoying mapping but i wouldn't mind pushing bosses. Although if this build isnt quite good for it i might roll another character - any good HC boss killer suggestions if so?

How do you get enough Dexterity to use Perfect form? Any chance you can take a look at my setup and see what I need to try and improve next?