[3.2] Occultist Doedre's Skin ~ 7-8 curses / 4 auras ~ Rank 1 Occultist Bestiary HC

3.3 ~ Not much has changed in the build itself as the guide kinda has multiple setups. Currently the best setup would be 5 curses blasphemy lowlife with shavronnes wrappings with one curse on hit with Curse on Hit - Freezing Pulse/Ball Lightning - Curse of your choice - GMP. The gear you would use are on this character(I would only use the gear as pointers of what direction to go and adjust it accordingly based on your own play style as i don't have all the required gear on permanent hardcore): Bobou_Curses_VOC

Flashback Incursion Hardcore Event ~ I played Ascendant ''Aurabot'' in this race and placed second overall and Rank 1 Ascendant. But the build remains the same. 12 possible curses or 7-8 curses + 4 auras depending on your setup.


Hello everyone. I decided i'd share this build to the community and everyone that is looking or interested in Occultist curser this league. (The league was Hardcore Bestiary)

This build is very budget and safe to play at early and late stages of mapping tiers, I reached rank 1 Occultist with team VOC and Team French. I will include everything you need to know and answer questions in the comments. I drafted this build right after hitting 100 so i was very tired but felt like doing it or atleast post one which i will edit as i add more information into the guide (pictures and corrects images and so on)

Small rundown of my stats at 100lvl

Energy shield: 12903 alone / around 19K with a Victarios aura Guardian / 28K with a Mana guardian in the party while using brightbeak
Mana unreserved: 104
Mana reserved: 1062
Skill duration modifier: +29%
All aura and curse nodes that increase effect aside from Whispers of Doom wheel.
Auras i ran was Discipline / Blasphemy temporal chains & Enfeeble and Aspect of the Crab.
Curse setup: Conductivity - Projectile Weakness - Assasin's mark - Elemental Weakness - Poachers mark - Enhance 4 or Faster Casting

How should i level this build alone?
I would recommend going the traditional Summon raging spirit witch into Necromancer so you get a nice and smooth leveling experience. Alternate option is going Essence drain life based version or just going Occultist with SRS and grabbing the Profane Bloom while having Blasphemy+Enfeeble during leveling to trigger the chaos explosions with SRS. I will explain later when you should respecc into CI and switch to Occultist.

What items you need to get the build working

What you need is a 6 socket Doedre's Skin and Sin treks.

How you apply the curses and how does Doedre's skin work

Basically Doedre's Skin is a very unique niche item. You don't need any links for the effigy to get full effect of the socketed gems and the effigy is supported by 20lvl blasphemy that has huge area of effect for your curses. The Effigy is not a totem so totem placement speed nodes or any totem nodes do not affect it at all. At the start you should use Faster Casting and 5 curses in the chest because it can feel very iffy at start to use and get used to play with.

What curses should i level and use at the beginning of mapping
You should focus on leveling gems in this priority order below

1. Enfeeble
2. Temporal chains
3. Assasins Mark
4. Elemental Weakness
5. Poacher's Mark

Curses you should level up in your weapon swap
Because curses share mostly between green and blue gem colors i recommend leveling your alternate setup curses in your weapon swap at start of mapping atleast, I'll list couple curses you should level up.

1. Projectile Weakness
2. Conductivity
3. Frostbite
Reason why you want these two curses leveled is that the most popular damage builds are currently Tornado shot or Kinetic blast/Barrage. Tornado shot characters usually deal mostly Lightning so conductivity would be your last curse to apply to your setup. I am not hundred percent sure but i feel like Kinetic blast/Barrage characters deal mostly cold or lightning damage.

Your final curse setup will look like this below

Chest piece: Projectile Weakness - Conductivity - Poacher's Mark - Elemental Weakness - Assasin's Mark - Faster Casting or ultimately Enhance 4.

Blasphemy: Enfeeble and Temporal chains linked together with Blasphemy and Enhance 3-4.

When should i go Occultist?

If you chose to go Occultist essence drain for leveling you wont have to refund any ascendancy points from going Necromancer for Summon Raging Spirit, I personally went Necromancer and even played spectres until level 91 before deciding to push for hundred with my teammates Jay and Scrumbles.

When should i go CI?
I recommend going CI around 70-75lvl range. You should have around 7.5-10K Energy shield depending on your rare items which are pretty cheap because CI builds are not very popular anymore. If you have insanity gloves(which are not required) you can use Ephemeral Edge for around 1400 additional energy shield, Which is very handy at early levels of the switch to CI. I used Edge for a quite long time because i had never personally farmed Poorjoys or any high tier maps with this ascendancy. I leveled to hundred with Trickster Doedre's Skin in Abyss Hardcore.

Playstyle
When playing alone with a carry you want to always stay with your carry and try to keep up to him with Brightbeak. If you have a aura support in your party you should either stay with your party and close to both your party members assuming it's a 3 man party. If you're feeling safe and confident in your abilities and knowledge of the build you want to be in the front around one screen ahead of the party and leave the effigy and move along and re-locate the effigy after the pack you previously left the effigy at is dead. This way everything is cursed before the party meets the pack and doesnt take the initial hit and the mobs just die harmessly.

Deluxe items
There's not many items that are very expensive for this build but are still very useful.

Astramentis ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Astramentis

The reason why this item is very useful at early stages is that we will not get much dexterity from our passive tree and Poacher's mark requires a high value of 159 DEX at 20lvl.
It gives a nice amount of energy shield and attributes.

Star of Wraeclast ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Star_of_Wraeclast

This is the amulet you should be using until level hundred. It gives +60% curse area of effect for your curses and your Effigy. It also grants a skill called Illusory Warp which is like flame dash but faster casting speed and longer distance with 3 seconds cooldown. Which is very nice to have when you're supposed to be in the front and cursing the enemies before the carry meets them.
You also can't be silenced when using this amulet and it gives nice resistances.

Ascent from Flesh ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Ascent_From_Flesh

The main reason we use this belt is that it gives Phasing for you if your energy shield recharge has started recently. It makes so you never get stuck in between monsters and can run right through them even if your quartz flask is empty(which is the best flask hands down).

The Pariah ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/The_Pariah

Now this ring again is very odd to use with a curser. It gives +100 flat energy shield and two levels to socketed gems. You always want to have your Discipline in this ring so you get 22lvl Discipline and potentially 23lvl Discipline if you have one.

Energy from Within 3x ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Energy_From_Within

What this unique jewel does is transform life passive nodes to energy shield nodes for their corresponding value of life that they give. You should have 2 at least at swap to CI. You can work with one but i would recommend having two.

Intuitive Leap ~ https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Intuitive_Leap

The reason and spot where you want to have this jewel is the jewel socket between Potency of Will and Skittering Runes so you can allocate points into the earlier mentioned nodes without having them connected to your passive tree.

Aura setups you can use
In hardcore Abyss league i solo supported 3 carrys to level one hundred with this aura and curse setup below.

Option #1
6 curses depending on your carrys build which i had 3 different types of that league and 4 auras.

Curses: Assasin's mark - Poacher's Mark - Enfeeble - Temporal Chains - Elemental Weakness - Projectile weakness
Auras: Purity of Fire / Lightning / Ice and Discipline

The setup above was used for a KB Wander carry

Option #2

Curses: Vulnerability - Elemental Weakness - Warlord's Mark - Poacher's Mark - Enfeeble - Temporal Chains
Auras: Purity of Fire / Lightning / Ice and Discipline

The setup above was used for a Sunder Gladiator that i helped get to 100

Option #3

Curses: Assasin's Mark - Poacher's Mark - Enfeeble - Temporal Chains - Elemental Weakness - Conductivity
Auras: Purity of Fire / Lightning / Ice and Discipline

The curse setup above was the one i used the most and the carry was a Tornado Shot Slayer

Option #4 which is the best so far

Chest: Assasin's mark - Elemental Weakness - Poacher's mark - Enfeeble - Temporal Chains - Faster Casting
Auras: Purity of Fire / Lightning / Ice and Discipline

The reason why this setup is good you get Elemental Equilibrium with a curse on hit - ball lightning - Projectile Weakness - Conductivity with Avatar of Fire. Enabling a more interactive playstyle. I would recommend this setup LATER when you're used to the build as your final setup.
Flask setup

I will list my flasks here in order i have them in my belt.

1. Stibnite Flask
2. Quartz Flask
3. Granite or Rumi's Concoction
4. Quicksilver flask
5. Basalt flask

The main removals you want to focus is Bleed removal on Stibnite, Freeze removal on Quartz or Basalt, Granite or Jade Flask with bleed removal or alternally a Rumi's Concoction for additional block and spell block. Adrenaline Quicksilver flask for additional movement speed, If you went with freeze removal on quartz you want your Curse removal on your Basalt flask.

The most optimal roll on your basalt is 40% increased duration and curse removal in my opinion.

Gem links

Helmet: Ball Lightning - Greater Multiple Projectiles - Curse on Hit - Conductivity
Gloves: Shield charge - Faster Attacks - Fortify - Spirit Offering
Boots: Blasphemy - Enhance 4 - Temporal Chains - Enfeeble
Chest: Faster Casting - Poacher's Mark - Assasin's Mark - Elemental Weakness - Projectile Weakness - Any curse you like
Weapon: Increased Duration - Vaal Haste(or Grace) - Vaal Discipline
Shield: Cast when damage taken - Immortal Call - Tempest Shield

Leveling tree

Levels 1-70

Pastebin for PoB: https://pastebin.com/uWPQFhJ9





Skill tree when you go Curser and beyond


What you should focus getting first is Curse nodes like Hex Master and Skittering Runes for additional curse effectiveness.
Energy shield nodes to boost your energy shield pool to the maximum.

Ascendancy nodes
From the labyrinth you want to grab ascendancy points in this order:

1. Profane Bloom
Why we grab this node is because it helps us while leveling aslong we grab a Enfeeble and link it together with blasphemy sacrificing a small portion of our MoM mana to get a curse to get the chaos chain explosions going whenever you or your minions kill enemies making leveling as an Occultist smoother. Another big thing is the ''Your curses affect hexproof enemies'' Which used to be the biggest weakness of this build but with the new Occultist ascendancy points you can bypass and negate the biggest weakness of this build and that's why the ascendancy node is a must.

2. Wicked Ward
Flat energy shield and making your energy shield regen almost like vaal discipline if you haven't taken damage for a while and recharge starts. Your energy shield will continue recharging even if you take damage making this node really strong. You rarely need Vaal discipline for yourself due to this.

3. Vile Bastion
Because transitioning into CI at early levels like 70 is not always optimal this node gives an astounding amount of 150 flat energy shield and you cannot be STUNNED while you have energy shield which is our life pool in this build making us unable to get stunned while running through packs with quartz flask which can be very annoying if you don't take it or have it yet.

4. Malediction
This node is probably one of the strongest curse nodes in the game. You get +15% increased curse effect which is huge due to passive tree not having many curse effect nodes and an additional CURSE for FREE which is very important. Also cursed enemies take and deal 10% less damage which is nice.

Pantheon setup

Soul of Lunaris

This pantheon is useful due to the upgraded effect by killing Lair(T11) boss. It negates chain mod completely and you want to use this for sure in chain maps.

Soul of Solaris

Why you want this pantheon is the ''Take no extra damage from critical strikes if you have taken a critical hit recently''. What this means you can't be chain critically striked multiple times in row.
We use this pantheon unless it's a chain map.

Minor

Soul of Tukohoma

This one is kinda whatever because none of the minor god points don't help us that much. While as we dont really have alot of physical mitigation and we will stand around mobs in place sometimes it adds 2% physical mitigation per second while being stationary.

Less good options

Soul of Garukhan

The extra 6% movement speed you get from the upgraded effect is pretty nice but not necessary. Still we can utilize this node because we'll rarely get hit and the additional 6% will be up for most of the time. I wouldn't say you need this pantheon but it's an option if you don't stay around waiting for mobs to die in front before moving forward with the party.

Soul of Shakari

Do not take this because it does absolutely nothing for us. As we're CI we are immune to poison damage which is chaos damage.

Honorable mentions
I'd like to give special thanks to VOC (Our trader and Coach), Zinqk_TinfoilVOC, ScrumblesBlessedbyVOC from team VOC.

Yolonou, DylanPitou and Toaster from the French Team.
Who all helped and made this push possible and made this race very enjoyable to play.

GKrafty and Boomy for helping the team immensely to get this far and do maps/ trades for us while we were time starved.

Also Curser(also known as DOEDRENINECURSES) for giving me the build idea from last Abyss League which was Trickster Ascendancy but literally the same build.

I will answer any private messages about this build or questions in the topic so feel free to ask here or in game under name Bobou_Curses_VOC.

I will not accept friend requests sadly as my friend list is currently full of people i know and like playing with but that doesn't mean that i don't love you guys.

My profile is private for the flashback race and next league.

Reserved for future use.

14th of March

Rundown of my stats after hitting 100

Added additional leveling option

Ascendancy Tree

Pantheon

Different aura and curse setups i used in the past and early phases of atlas mapping with different carrys in past leagues

17th of March

I am currently working on my second occultist which is currently level 96 with same build using option #4 out of the setups. Main goal is adding Aspect of the Spider into the build with a enlighten 4 and using maybe the Spider aspect boots for testing.

This build was an incredible curse support.

Very strong, Very Defensive.

Bumped due to guide being updated with multiple headers and pointers for different options and points.

Hey NewGen, build is very solid. I'm running with a Guardian so he has the Purities up so I am using a Legacy Heretic's and running 8 curses.

My question: Why are you running "Spirit Offering" now? Is it to give your Effigy 20% resists? Does it do that? Is there any other purpose?

Thanks mate. Great support to run with a Guardian.

"

Bonebaddy wrote:

Hey NewGen, build is very solid. I'm running with a Guardian so he has the Purities up so I am using a Legacy Heretic's and running 8 curses.

My question: Why are you running "Spirit Offering" now? Is it to give your Effigy 20% resists? Does it do that? Is there any other purpose?

Thanks mate. Great support to run with a Guardian.

Glad you're enjoying the build.

The Spirit offering is used for detonating corpses in avoid ailments maps and bosses so nobody gets corpse detonated. As i play Hardcore for the most part it is certainly nice.

It can be any offering you like the most visually. Flesh or Bone offering work aswell.

19th of March

Additional information for more setups coming soon once i wake up!

What are your thougts on Heretic's Veil?

"

What are your thougts on Heretic's Veil?

It is a good item for curser due to the blasphemy for free but not necessary when playing Doedre curser :). I used it for a while last league on a Trickster 9 curse guy. It has its uses for sure.

interesting build, can u add some spoilers tho? thats alot of reading