Witch - [3.16] The Zealous Zolemancer (Level 100 Proven / CI / Aegis / Zombie / Carrion Golem Build) - Forum

The Zealous Zolemancer: A Build Guide I AM NOT UPDATING THIS BUILD FOR 3.17 AND BEYOND! The core idea of the build still will work in 3.17 and would be a good option for pushing to 100 still in a safe way. Feel free to take the ideas here and run with them! I hit my goal of getting my first level 100 and will be moving on to new things! Thank you to everyone for giving the build a look. Want to hit 100? Maybe give this a try... Overview This is a tanky Zombies/Golems Summoner, with a focus on stacking ES/Armor and high survivability over high damage. The build was planned with the sole purpose of me hitting my first level 100 - without stuff like buying 5-ways or breachstone rotations. The concept is centered around becoming immune to whatever I can, layering on as much defensive layers as possible, and getting enough damage to feel comfortable. The core three uniques helping me survive are Aegis Aurora (of course), Incandescent Heart and Viridi's Veil. If you enjoy a near-walking simulator build that strolls through scourge and delirium in style, this build may be for you. If you want a giga-chad clear speed, button mashing, screen exploding, PoB Shaper DPS Warrior build, then build may not be for you. The build is not overly expensive to start, but will require some funding to get up and running. There are required uniques involved to play it as shown in this guide. Overall, I would say it is a medium cost build. Achievements Level 100! It has been done! 37/40 Challenges done. The Formed, The Twisted, The Forgotten, The Hidden all went smoothly. Maven/Feared I have not bothered with, as it was not my goal. Simulacrum Wave 25~ or so. I simply don't have enough DPS to deal with the bosses if I get unlucky in late waves. T16 maps run juiced at 60% delirious, beyond, 200+ scourge. Could push further, but want my EXP haha. Lots of T16 Blight maps - very fun on this character! Delve 300+ and feeling really comfortable. Various other bosses, such as Shaper, Uber Atziri, and Delve bosses, though it's not been my focus. A8 is annoying, but I can tank any hit (apart from maze). The character is very well rounded in that it does ok at most things, but is not "the best" at them, either. The Rundown Spoiler Defense I want to start by explaining defensive side of the build (the main focus). A list of what this build gets: 7k ES pool Unaffected by Curses No extra damage from Critical Strikes Enemies are Unlucky when hitting me Immune to Chaos Damage Immune to all Ailments Unaffected by Burning Ground Immune to Corrupting Bleed (Basically) Immune to Bleeding (Basically) Unaffected by Stun 76% Max Lightning / 80% Max Cold Resistance 75%/72% Block and Spell Block w/ Glancing Blows 40k Armor before Flasks, 60k after 800 ES on block before Flasks, 1200 after 25% of Elemental Damage taken as "Chaos" (aka gone) 8% of Physical Damage taken as "Chaos" (aka gone) 10% reduced Physical damage taken with my Minions alive 20% reduced Elemental damage taken with Flasks up 10% reduced damage from Damage over Time Enemies near a corpse deal 10% reduced Damage Fungal Ground causing enemies to deal 10% less Damage Enfeeble causing enemies to deal 9~48% less Damage Enemies are chilled with 12% value Bone Armor guard skill absorbing 2209 damage 5200 ES Recharge / Sec 500 ES Regen / Sec with Flask Divine Shield (3% of Physical Damage prevented recently as ES Regen) All those layers together keep me very comfortable in even crazy Scourge, Delirium and high wave Simulacrum fights. The goal was to be able to AFK something like an Infused T16 Beachhead map and not die - and I can say, that is a success. To break down how I get all those defensive layers, the most important part are these three unique items: Aegis is a staple item in many tanky builds, and for a good reason. The massive amount of ES I can get back on block is my main way to recover ES since minion builds have a hard time recovering without easy access to leech, on kill or hit effects. Virdi's Veil is a MASSIVE item that, paired with two magic rings, makes me immune to crits and curses - two huge, nasty killers out of the way - and enemies being unlucky is just icing. Incandescent Heart is a very simple, easy to get chest that cuts elemental damage I take by 25% since I am immune to chaos and it converts 25% of all elemental hits to chaos. All three items pack a lot of Armor and Energy Shield, so I made sure to grab ones with very high rolls and get 29~30% quality on them to boot. The corruption on Aegis for 8% of physical damage taken as chaos is also a huge boon, though not a cheap one to start off with and is not required. By skipping offensive auras, I can also fit Discipline, Determination AND Purity of Elements into this build, giving me massive chunks of my ES/AR and ridding me of pesky ailments. My flasks are a huge defensive layer not to be overlooked as well. All are rolled with "Gain 7 charges when you are hit by an enemy" paired with "Used when charges reach full" to keep near 100% uptime. A flat 20% reduced Elemental damage taken on the trio of Sapphire/Ruby/Topaz with a Basal for even more armor, and a Quicksilver (cause I'm pretty slow without it up...) is wonderful. Honestly, the suffix rolls on them are not as important. 3% life regen, extra armor, and stun and block recovery are the big three, with stun avoidance and movement speed on the other two. Another big bang of defenses is the reduced/less damage trio of my ascendancy causing enemies near corpses to deal reduced damage, enfeeble causing enemies to deal less damage, and Fungal Ground from the Sporguard body armor on my Animate Guardian causing enemies to deal less damage. Everything else on the list comes from various other things, such as a jewel with Immune to Corrupted Blood, but all comes together to finish off my defensive layers. Offense Even though I focus HEAVILY on defense for this build, it's not exactly "ZDPS", either. I am no expert in setting up a PoB - especially figuring out minion DPS - but I estimate that my build is doing around 4.5 milion Shaper DPS. This comes from the wonderful combo of: 12x Zombies 4x Carrion Golems 4x Specters 1x Animate Guardian 3x Grave Spirits (Commandment of the Grave) All my minions are supporting each other AND doing damage in this build, rather than one being the focus with others as pure support. It is also almost all pure Physical damage, meaning I don't need to worry about resistances, and with 35% "overwhelm" effect, armor on monsters is not a huge deal. My Zombies provide Feeding Frenzy and Intimidate, while also stunning enemies. My Carrion Golems provide a MASSIVE base physical damage buff. My Specters and Animate Guardian maim enemies for increased physical damage taken, as well as their own unique buffs and debuffs. My Grave Spirits....mostly look cool, and I think chill (sometimes). The Carrion Golem, in particular, gives my zombies around 25% of their damage JUST from their buff. It becomes this strong because they are level 32 with around 300% increased Buff Effect. That means their buff is around 216-328 base physical damage for all my other minions. From sources such as War Banner, Maim, Intimidate, Animate Guardian's Helmet, and a Demon Harpy Specter, I also debuff enemies to take a LARGE amount of increased physical damage. Both my Zombies and Carrion Golems are set to "Aggressive" and have large amounts of movement speed to zip around and clear things as I stroll by. Playstyle The build is very, very simple to play. With Bone Armor on my left click, and only two other buttons: one for Frostblink and one for Bane, I simply run through packs, blinking over any large groups of mobs or obstacles, and using Bane on anything scary (mostly just bosses, thick rares, and scourge) so they deal less and take more damage with the two curses linked to it. By just running around, my wand triggers Desecrate+Flesh Offering for me. The minions simply do their thing as they are aggressive. Without Convocation, blinking or running a bit off-screen will re-set them to me if I need them. Since flasks are also automated, and I don't need curses or flesh offering up, I can just AFK and alt-tab out to read Reddit while doing a delve node, blight map or something like Coward's Trial or Beachhead, and get all the EXP I want. :) Specters / Animate Guardian Spoiler Specters Carnage Chieftain (Act 2 "The Old Fields) Host Chieftain (Act 6 "The Riverways) Demon Harpy (Scourge AKA "Krangle-land") Pale Seraphim (Scourge AKA "Krangle-land") <- skip if only 3 specters Animate Guardian Helmet: Rare Elder Helmet w/ "Nearby Enemies take 9% increased physical damage" Chaos Resistance and Life are good extras. Body Armor: Sporeguard (Unique) This gives Fungal Ground where the AG is standing, for 10% less damage from enemies. Gloves: Southbound (Unique) Just for some life. I tried Gravebind for all kills to count from AG so Sporeguard makes more ground and pops, but it is bugged. Boots: Vicatrio's Flight (Unique) Enchant these with 2% Life Regen from Uber Lab if you want even more beef for your AG! Weapon: Dying Breath (Unique) The area on this is huge, buffing our minions damage and our two curses on enemies stronger. Kingmaker feels bad with small AoE and nerfed Fortify. Gear Spoiler Unique Slots Spoiler Helmet Virdi's Veil is my only choice here. It is simply too strong in this build in every way. This is not a bad item to divine, so aim for a good base AR/ES (the item base itself, not the % roll) and a good enchant, then divine to +2 gems with decent AR/ES % and all res. You have MANY enchant options for this item! I went with 150% Carrion Golem Buff Effect, but some other ideas are Flesh Offering Attack Speed, Zombie damage, or even Curse Effect with Bane. Shield Aegis is the only choice here as well. It is very core to the build. Try and get very high AR/ES base and rolls! All the AR/ES you can get will help. A corruption with "%physical damage taken as chaos damage" is VERY nice, but not required. You can get some nice Scourge mods on a shield, such as Energy Shield when you block, and downsides like -Chaos Res or Inc Crit Damage Taken don't hurt the build at all. Body Armor Incandescent Heart is STRONGLY suggested, but not required. A VERY good AR/ES chest with influenced mods can be very strong, too. The only roll that matters is the AR/ES roll. Like I've been saying, aim high on the base AND % roll! You could go for some crazy strong corruptions, like +1 all gems, 1% max res, etc. etc. but the scourge mods seem just "ok" (extra AR or ES rolls are nice). Amulet Eyes of the Greatwolf is not required, but a very simple item that I find works really well. A +2 zombie with high Global Defenses roll is the only type you will want to aim for here. It gives a large boost to ES and AR, while giving one more zombie than a rare amulet. A good rare amulet with +1 zombies, or a good talisman with +1 zombies implicit are both options. Boots Rainbowstride was simply an item I picked for how available it was with a +1 zombie scourge mod on it. It also has spell block and all ele res, something I had trouble finding enough of. A rare boot can provide more ES, or even go for a good AR/ES base, with more movespeed as well. Lots of good influence mods as well to look into. If you are looking into rare boots and not corrupted/scourged ones, any number of defensive boot enchants, such as movespeed or regen, are a nice boost. Other Slots Spoiler Rings Very simple: Two magic rings with a good Prefix + crafted Minion Speed For the Prefix, I suggest either +3 to Socketed Gems (especially for Determination) or a T1 flat ES roll / Temple ES roll. There is not much else I need off a ring that I am giving up by not using a Rare or Unique one, since my resists are capped from other sources. I have both rings enchanted for "Your Scout Towers have 25% Increased Range" for soloing blight maps. Weapon A Convoking Wand with +1 to spells / 1+ to minions, an open suffix to do the Trigger craft. Anything else is basically gravy. To "self craft" this: 4 socket resonator w/ Corroded, Shuddering, Jagged and Metallic fossils. Something like a 1 in 12 to hit the +1/+1, but usually without open suffix. The +1/+1 is just to get Zombies and Specters to the breakpoint of gem level 25 for +1 zombie and +1 specter. A rare scepter from the Temple with Minion Damage / Chance to deal double damage and crafted Minion Attack Speed will generally give you more damage per minion and is dirt cheap. Gloves Basic ES gloves. Very simple. I hit mine with a Warlord Exalt for Avoid Stuns, but it is not required. An open Suffix to craft Dex is very helpful, since the build is Dex starved. Belt Crystal Belt base with a high ES and AR roll and any decent amount of Strength. The % ES was a very nice bonus and helps a lot. Again, an open Suffix to craft Dex is very helpful here. Jewels / Cluster Spoiler Unique Jewels 2x Eminence and 1x Might to give +2 golems from Anima Stone. The corruptions on these are very, very helpful. Anti-corrupted blood is a near must at late levels! 2x Reservation Efficiency lets me use War Banner and still trigger skills off mana. Fortress Covenant is put into the Cluster jewel so the negative effect does not happen. Cluster Jewel Any Large Minion Damage Cluster, 8+ small passives. The main thing I looked for was rolling 35% increased effect of small passives + 3% minion attack speed per small passive, for a total of 13% minion damage / 4% minion attack speed PER small passive! I avoided rolling any notables, since they were not very good for me. This was a late game pick-up and is not required. I would only switch to this in the late 90s, personally. 10+ small passives would be best, since I could unassign some 16% minion damage passives for points in the cluster. Flasks Spoiler Gain Charges When Hit / Used When Charges Reach Full is the winning combo here. Aim for 5+ Charges When Hit, you do not need 6 or 7. The suffixes here are less important, but getting %armor during flask effect and a high stun/block recovery roll will help out a lot. Looking for "miss-matched" suffix rolls can help the cost. Movespeed on a Basalt and Armor on a Quicksilver, for example, will be often cheaper than the opposite. Gem Links Spoiler 6L (Body Armor) Raise Zombie + (Anomalous) Feeding Frenzy + (Awakened) Multistrike + (Awakened) Melee Physical Damage + (Awakened) Brutality + Ruthless 4L (Helmet) Summon Carrion Golem + Empower + (Awakened) Minion Damage + (Awakened) Banality 4L Animate Guardian + Raise Specter + Minion Life + Maim 4L Bane + Enhance + (Anomalous) Vulnerability + Enfeeble 3L (Weapon) Desecrate + (Divergent) Flesh Offering + Inspiration 3L Purity of Elements + War Banner + Frostblink 1L (Ring) Discipline 1L (Ring) Determination Bandit/Pantheon/Ascendancy Spoiler Bandit: Kill All Pantheon: Major: Arakaali Murgeth Bogsong + Arachnoxia Upgrades Minor: Abberath Mephod, The Earth Scorcher Upgrade Ascendancy: Normal -> Mindless Aggression Cruel -> Unnatural Strength Merciless -> Bone Barrier Uber -> Plaugebringer PoB Spoiler I am no PoB expert, so this will just be a basic rundown of my current tree and gear https://pastebin.com/aNhL0hMg Videos Spoiler I apologize in advance for how shit I am at recording video... Crusader Kill https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15k9zO2_lNI Maze of Minotaur Map https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vu2-EGyZRwE The Formed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8SOG7ItvLQ T16 Delirium/Beyond Map (Bad Demo) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSRfxYErJcA AFK T16 Infused Beachhead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUUNij5gDm8 Extras Notes on keeping minions alive Unfortunately, with all the layering of my own defenses, my minions - especially my zombies - can tend to sometimes...die. I also don't have the mana to re-summon them unless I take off War Banner first. This is not an issue for me, I am fine to take off my banner and click a couple buttons to re-summon a zombie or two, but I know for some people it is frustrating. If you want your zombies to stay alive, you should be prepared to make your OWN changes to the build to get them tankier. It will probably require taking away a bit of defense or damage, but that's totally fine with the levels this build has. Some suggestions: Swap from Flesh Offering to Bone Offering full time. Switch your weapon to Mon'tregul's Grasp and run 10 (down to 5) Zombies instead. Swap your Zombies into the Helmet and Golems into your body armor. This will give you high gem level zombies with more HP, but less damage, and golems with more damage, but less buff effect. It should be an overall DPS loss, but minion sustain will be improved. Drop points on the tree (maybe some ES nodes or just minion damage nodes) and pick up the Grave Intentions cluster. If you follow the build as I have outlined, you should only be losing the odd zombie (if any) in regular content, up to things such as T16 well-rolled maps, and with a Bone Offering swap only losing a few to the harder content in the game. Your other minions should not die to much at all. If you find they are dying, make sure you check the following: Are you using Anomalous Feeding Frenzy? Is your Raise Zombie gem 21/20? Do you have Sacrifice anointed on your amulet? Did you pick up the Minions Leech 1% mastery? Is your Purity of Elements aura 20% quality? (AoE matters here) Are you swapping to Bone Offering in hard content? With 2% life regen, 1% life gained on hit, 1% life leech, all the minion life I pick up on the tree, my ascendancy points, and my auras on them, the zombies are doing a decent job staying alive. Don't forget to swap around your offering based on the content you do! Notes on leveling Generally, just level as a basic summoner, or any other flavor of leveling. I just slapped zombies into a Tabula with skeletons in a Lifesprig and it felt fine. Minions are strong enough to carry you until you can start equipping your key uniques. The switch to CI I made at around 50 after buying a few pieces of decent starter ES gear. I died a few times around the swap while leveling, but it wasn't a huge deal. Notes on keeping it budget The build works really well WITHOUT all the mix-maxing I have done. I had no corruptions, scourge modifiers, GG flasks, Awakened gems, etc. until the mid 90s and it felt just as good with the core uniques and 5k ES. A +2 to gems wand with trigger crafted on it is a huge QOL improvement and the bonus specter and zombie is really nice, so make that your first big purchase if you can. Using anything with some minion damage, or even a Mon'tregul's Grasp, is totally fine until then. 9 zombies, 3 golems, and just ok armor and ES is enough to help you farm for the rest. I started the build with around 2 exalts or so after giving up on a level 93 Cyclone Raider and it was fine. The damage might not be amazing at that point, but your defense should still be very strong for the budget. Last edited by Yordle#4292 on Jan 27, 2022, 8:27:40 PM Last bumped on May 8, 2022, 10:00:53 AM	Posted by Yordle#4292 on Nov 27, 2021, 7:14:41 PM Quote this Post
Any chance you could post some videos on the bossing and clearing of the build?	Posted by ericchongws#1140 on Nov 27, 2021, 8:56:21 PM Quote this Post
" ericchongws wrote: Any chance you could post some videos on the bossing and clearing of the build? I can definitely try and get some short clips together. My PC isn't great and it's been a while since I tried recording anything, but I should be able to get something. Honestly, it's not that exciting to watch as it just looks like any other zombie build, haha, but I know it helps to see. EDIT: some videos are up now! Last edited by Yordle#4292 on Nov 27, 2021, 11:27:24 PM	Posted by Yordle#4292 on Nov 27, 2021, 9:19:49 PM Quote this Post
how much cost?	Posted by lordfratos#1059 on Nov 28, 2021, 11:30:39 AM Quote this Post
" lordfratos wrote: how much cost? My current gear is probably around 40~50 exalts of just very slowly upgrading and min-maxing as I go, but I did craft some stuff and buy other stuff when it was cheaper, so hard to say an exact #. However - I started the build with just the three core uniques, no corruptions or scourge mods, no Awakened or alt quality gems, and just some basic rares. That was maybe like 2 exalts of funding to start.	Posted by Yordle#4292 on Nov 28, 2021, 12:39:35 PM Quote this Post
thank	Posted by Gros888#7393 on Nov 28, 2021, 1:57:37 PM Quote this Post
One of the best character ive ever played!!!!! Ty so much for bringing carrion golem to life!!!! So hard to find a reliable and tanky minion build those day's... Cost me about 50 ex to fund the build with high end gear so definitely a good starter build with 1-2 ex investment.	Posted by dominic0168#0920 on Nov 29, 2021, 6:25:56 AM Quote this Post
this is the best necro build i ever played, just run around into everything and my es is not moving at all and everything dies, there is no better necro build for this amount of currency hands down. Tnx for this guide	Posted by rara986#4756 on Dec 1, 2021, 9:45:16 AM Quote this Post
Currently playing the build on a 3EX budget. Great defences for sure, DPS is lacking but what can you expect at 3EX for a build this tanky! Will continue to push on and try even the DPS out, thanks for posting!	Posted by Snafu92#0381 on Dec 1, 2021, 3:02:09 PM Quote this Post
Well, I did it! Hit 100. Not as quickly as I had hoped with a very busy couple of weeks, but because I only ended up dying once early on (double fireblast Uber Atziri when trying to finish a challenge, heh) it still felt good to keep making progress every time I logged on. I'm basically done for the league now that I've got my challenges done and hit 100, but I will still hang around this thread on occasion if anyone has questions or comments. Not sure if I will update it at 3.17, will have to see what that league brings us. This was purely made to hit 100, and that will NOT be my goal again, hah - doing that mostly solo was way too much of a grind. Glad I did it, though!	Posted by Yordle#4292 on Dec 5, 2021, 4:21:59 PM Quote this Post