[3.24] The Pestilent Viper 🐍 New video : The Viper (improved) & The Mamba (saved from nerfs !)

You're probably right about Melee phys dmg. As you were saying when we chat on Discord, Deadly Ailment will deal more poison dmg, filling Plague Bearer faster, since "When you inflict Poison while Incubating, adds 40% of the Expected Poison Damage to Plague Value".

For Cruelty, indeed it cannot be calculated in PoB. I should test with another support instead : Unbound Ailment maybe. But I'd need to recolor the Shadowstitch. Damn, I have touched Delve from the league, that's where these crafts can be found.

As for the single target, we'd probably need a better claw. But it's hard to find a rare claw that's significantly better than the Wasp Nest. It's even hard to find one that is as good as the Wasp Nest !
The elder mod "60% chance for poisons iflicted with this weapon to deal 100% more dmg" has been removed, but now, you can get up to "+59% Damage over Time Multiplier for Poison inflicted with this Weapon", so I guess it's close.

But frankly, for the moment, I don't have issues with regular t16 bosses. Endgame bosses like Shaper and Uber Atziri would probably take a while.

To refill Plague Bearer faster, we have "Low Tolerance" medium cluster jewel : "Poisons you inflict on non-Poisoned Enemies deal 300% increased Damage"
How could I forget this one !
It's not recognized in PoB, so I've simulated by writing in a flask : "300% increased poison damage", and it says 38% more dmg ! Maybe less, but still, that should be a massive improvement to refill Plague Bearer fast.

I am working on other improvements for the build, I'll let you know once my R&D department has completed the projects ;)

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You're probably right about Melee phys dmg. As you were saying when we chat on Discord, Deadly Ailment will deal more poison dmg, filling Plague Bearer faster, since "When you inflict Poison while Incubating, adds 40% of the Expected Poison Damage to Plague Value".

For Cruelty, indeed it cannot be calculated in PoB. I should test with another support instead : Unbound Ailment maybe. But I'd need to recolor the Shadowstitch. Damn, I have touched Delve from the league, that's where these crafts can be found.

For testing and other reasons like this, I've left my viper witch around level 80 while I progress my original exsanguinate character from this season.

Thank you again for all the testing and R&D. I play a lot of D2 Mods and always start the new seasons with the new or buffed skills/items and end up writing guides for them after I get to the endgame grind so I know how much time and effort goes into testing new builds and items! I'll be sure to check by every once in a while to see where the build can go and if it gets a more established "bis" or gem/gear priority. I'm currently too poor to afford the Shadowstitch and just blow up immediately when I get hit by several physical attacks, so I'll be saving up currency to make myself more beefy.

But thank you again for all the testing from a fellow new-skill/item tester from another game!

Hey,

thx for your words and good luck for your researches in D2 ;)

The Shadowstitch is not mandatory, as there other way to gain ES. Actually, only the Mahuxotl and the Wasp are BiS in this build.
It's true that I'm not sure for the helmet. I think the Glimpse of Chaos is BiS if you do a LL build with Bloodthirst support.

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From the R&D department, here is an experimental setup for the build, probably devised by some mad scientists from their laboratory in Heist ("You've seen TOO MUCH !") :

The idea is to automate the refill of Plague Bearer during Ultimatums, without the need of the main skill.

* We use the Hidden Blade dagger.

* When Phasing, it procs Unseen Strike, which we support with a proj gem to get multiple shurikens.
* We have almost perma-Phasing between Withering Steps, phasing chance on the tree and a quartz flask.
* The projectiles poison enemies and passively refill the Plague bag.

--> Poison autobomber !

I'm not the inventor of this setup (Pathfinder builds have already used it) but I'm probably the first to adapt it to the Occultist.

Here is a demo in an Unscribed Ultimatum :

#6 : Machine Gun



Gl & hf, Exiles :)

Ive pulled up some viper strike builds from other the pathfinder forums and it seems like they have higher poison dps per hit which in turns means smoother bossing

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AntiSkid wrote:

Ive pulled up some viper strike builds from other the pathfinder forums and it seems like they have higher poison dps per hit which in turns means smoother bossing

Yes, it's true. Pathfinder or Assassin Viper Strike definitely have more DPS.
On the other hand, this build can have easy max chaos res and Profane Bloom explosions.

Ok, I may have found a unique helmet that is BiS :



With a perfectly rolled helmet (+8 level / +50% quality) Plague Bearer is now level 28 : it can store 1.5M DPS (50% more than level 20).
With superior quality, it has 35% inc AoE. With Divergent qual, +35% poison DoT multi while infecting = 18% more DPS.

I bought a +5 level for 25c to test it, and with 3 divines, I got this almost perfect roll.

Good luck and have fun :)

*

If you're interested in this helmet, I have published a thread on PoE builds/Reddit, with a list a gems to socket into it.

Other good choice of gems include : Petrified Blood, Vaal Molten Shell, Flame Dash...

Here is a new video with the Hidden Blade setup :

T16 Burial Chambers with several encounters (Metamorph, Incursion, boss), then the Ultimatum where I go to the bare minimum as far as skills are concerned :



#7 : Creature of Havoc

(This was made before the Everlasting Sacrifice bug was corrected in patch 3.14.1c.)

Hope you like it, good luck and have fun :)

The Badger and The Viper

Hi Exiles,

I have submitted the Pestilent Viper to ThisIsBadger's first build competition.
This weekend, Badger reviewed all 40+ builds during an 11hrs stream. The naughty Viper didn't win the competition but was very well received and managed to amaze Badger several times : "Nice ! Nice !... NOICE !!"

You can watch the full stream here.

The Viper segment begins at 5h28.

So thanks a lot to Badger for his review, which cleverly highlighted the qualities and flaws of the build. Great work man, I really appreciate it.

Can't wait to participate again in 3.15 !

Good luck and have fun, Exiles ;)

Hi Rahsaan

Will this Avian Twins Talisman (Fire Damage taken as Cold Damage) work and reduce further?

Nope it can't. On the contrary, it will destroy your elem res. Because if you follow the setup, you have negative cold res. So not good at all.

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Here is the segment from ThisIsBadger stream from my YT Channel.

Thx again to Badger. Can't wait to try my luck again in 3.15 :)