[1.0.2] Freezing Pulse/Life Based Witch (Noob friendly/HC viable)
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[1.0.2] Freezing Pulse/Life Based Witch
1. Introduction/Pros and cons 2. Talent Tree/Bandits 3. Gems, Mechanics and Playstyle 4. Itemization 5. Leveling 6. Credits/Change Log ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Introduction First of all, and I want to make it clear, a lot of content here was ripped from other resources, mainly @Bada_bing Cold Witch Guide for Beginners. Freezing Pulses skill trees don't differ too much, they normally are CI based, few guys go for Power Charges, but they are all basically the same thing. I decided to make another guide to bring some points I felt important, Freezing Pulse Life Based Witch is a good build to start playing POE (this guide is noob friendly), it's viable in Hardcore leagues if you already have experience, it's viable end game and not heavy gear dependent. You can use this build not only as a Witch, but as either a Templar or a Shadow. I avoid power charges at all, in my point of view power charges make the build Unique Item dependent and costly, you will need Void Battery, and probably 5/6L Voll's Protector. I'm not favorable at linking Power Charges on Critical on any skill, since the setup time is a loss of DPS, fun, survivability, that don't make the game play appeling at all. I also favor mana regeneration in despite of mana leech, since with it I can afford to spam any spell, even against few targets, and get a gem slot. As consequence, it can viabilize Arctic Armor, but also make me avoid "cast speed" nodes at lower levels, and make me Flask dependent at low/no regen maps, having to switch to mana leech gem. Pros * By avoiding CI, you are also avoiding overpriced ES gear. * By going Life you are grabbing gear no one want, low ES gear with Life, which is also cheaper. * Not an Unique Item centred build. * Since status ailments are based on your health poll, they won't be a problem, you won't need Dream Fragments, Eye of Chayula, or any crap like that. * Good survivability and party play, since you are freezing and chilling the entire screen. Cons * By being a life based character you will take chaos damage, and need chaos resistence from your gear. ES = Energy Shield CI = Chaos Innoculation Bandits = Deal with the Bandits Quest dps = damage per second L = linked ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. Talent Tree/Bandits
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86 Points Passive Skill Tree
You are in the late 60 levels with 86 points, with is a reasonable goal. It will work at any level, so even if you don't aim a high level you are cool with it. You are essenciatily grabbing spell/elemental/cold damage nodes, life nodes, critical chance nodes, mana regeneration nodes, in the most effective way. You can progress more at it, in the leveling section I will cover a more complete tree. Bandits normal - help Kraityn for 8 Resists or Oak for 40 base Life cruel - kill all merciless - kill all ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Gems, Mechanics and Playstyle
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3.1 Main Attack Spell - Freezing Pulse
4-6 Links: Freezing Pulse + Lesser Multiple Projectiles + Life Leech + Faster Projectiles + Cold Penetration + Faster Casting + Increased Critical Damage
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Yeah, 7 linked gems, they are on priority order. I highly suggest that you afford a high quality Freezing Pulse if you can. It's important to note that Lesser Multiple Projectiles allow Freezing Pulse to deal MORE damage, actually 3x the tooltip DPS at short range, since the 3 projectiles can and will overlap. Note also that Freezing Pulse projectiles pierce through targets. Which gems get linked to Freezing Pulse is a controverse point, that's not the most common setup. The mechanics in Frezzing Pulse make projectile speed and important thing to consider, quoting Path of Exile wiki about how it works: "Projectile Speed: The Faster Projectiles support and x% increased Projectile Speed mods will affect Freezing Pulse, causing it to travel farther before it dissipates, effectively increasing its range. Freezing Pulse modified by projectile speed will cause more damage and have a better chance to freeze at every point along its trajectory than a slower Freezing Pulse projectile would, because it has had less time to dissipate." This means that by raising the projectile speed you will also raise the range of the skill, but most importantly, the damage it deals at higher ranges. That is not taken into account in by skill tooltip, that will show only a small damage gain from Faster Projectiles, which is a lie. There 3 ways to get Projectile Speed, with Projectile Speed gem, from Freezing Pulse quality, and from Wand modifiers. I highly advocate that you should not drop Faster Projectiles gem, even if you get a high quality Freezing Pulse gem. Also about mechanics, Cold Penetration gives you MORE damage, in a MULTIPLICATIVE away (not aditive, as any "increase damage" effect), that also is neglected by skill tooltip. You can lower monsters resistences above 0%, and do MORE damage. It's really important against "cold resistence" and "elemental resistences" mods, especially if the monster is also curse immune or you can't afford to curse it in a party, making you even deal more damage with Freezing Pulse then with your single target spell against resistence monsters. I'm actually with a 5L chest, by going with this setup the tooltip shows me 2,2k dps, swaping Faster Projectiles+Cold Penetration for Faster Casting+Increased Critical Damage I have 4k dps, but lower range Freezing Pulse, and struggling a lot against monsters with resistence. For last, it's important that you level up a Mana Leech gem, so you can run no regeneration maps. 3.2 Single Target Spell - Ice Spear 4 Links: Ice Lance+Increased Critical Strikes+Increased Critical Damage+Faster Casting
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Main single target nuke, note that at short range or against monsters with resistence (in case you got Cold Penetration) you are better with Freezing Pulse, even against single targets. On the mechanic side is important to notice that Ice Spear second form (solid) has 600% increased chance to crit, and also that first form it pierce through monsters. 3.3 Auras 3 Links: Reduced Mana + Clarity + Purity/Haste
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We rely heavily on Clarity since we are not using Mana Leech in any skill, and we can run it at higher levels with no problem at all. The second aura is purity, since capping resist is our main form of defense (despite Freezing everything). If you can cap your resistences with your gear, go for Haste, for more mobility and DPS. 3.4 Curses Frostbite
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It's the way to go, hands down, no other curse is better, lowering resistences and giving you chance to freeze even without criticals. For party play you should have a Elemental Weakness to switch. 3.5 Totem - Summon Skeletons 3-4 Links: Summon Skeletons + Spell Totem + Faster Casting + Blind/Culling Strike
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Awesome defense, this is your meat all, faster casting really improves YOUR survivability, cause you will urge to cast it in bad moments, you can add Blind or even Culling Strike if you got a 4th link to spare. 3.6 Control - Coldsnap 2-4 Links: Coldsnap + Elemental Proliferation + Cast on Damage Taken + Increased Critical Strikes
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Coldsnap + Elemental Proliferation is an amazing combo, you cast it and the screen freezes, add Cast on Damage Taken and the entire screen will freeze on critical moments, add Increased Critical Strikes for more reliability. Note that you should keep leveling Cast on Damage taken and all other gems involved in the setup. 3.7 Movement Lightining Warp
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Great to use when trapped in a corner, or even to take shortcuts. 3.8 My setup 5L BGGGR Chest - Freezing Pulse/Faster Projectiles/Lesser Multiple Projectiles/Life Leech/Cold Penetration 3L BRG Wand - Reduced Mana/Haste/Clarity 3L BBB Wand - Frostbite/Faster Casting/Lightining Warp 4L BBBB Helmet - Ice Spear/Increased Critical Strikes/Increased Critical Damage/Faster Casting 4L RBBB Gloves - Cast on Damage Taken/Cold Snap/Elemental Proliferation/Increased Critical Strikes 4L RBBG Boots - Spell Totem/Summon Skeletons/Faster Casting/Culling Strike ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Itemization
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You need life, that and resistences, they are the main goal on your gear. Any life you grab from gear will scale with the insane amount of increased life nodes from passive tree. Also note that you will be needing Blue sockets, so you are better with ES/Armor hybrids, but again, your main focus should be LIFE. As you will be needing 3 green sockets for Freezing Pulse you will probably need a evasion/armor or evasion/ES chest.
As I'm actually at softcore I've been running with double Wands, but would change to Wand+Shield or Dagger+Shield for more survivability at Hardcore. Double Daggers are also ok. When you came to the min-max game, the important stats you should be aiming (despite LIFE and resistances) are Spell Damage, Cold Damage, Critical Strike Chance, Critical Strike Multiplier, Cast Speed, Mana Regeneration, also some Dexterity. My Gear
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----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5. Leveling
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15 points
First health nodes, some mana regeneration, Lord of the Dead preparing for the upcoming spell totem and Frost Walker, that will also help you with Merveil. 31 points More health, Dex node will be necessary for Dex gems. 45 points Health who? 63 points A bit more of health, also going for the Templar nodes. 76 points Critical and Damage nodes over Shadow area, also a bit more of health. 86 points Droping Lord of the Dead (you can do this sonner), and grabing some Crit Chance nodes 93 points Note that you could go to Clear Mind and the Elemental Resistece node near it. If you ever face mana regeneration problems, you can try to reach the 40% no in the start of Templar tree, 4 points far only, grabbing elemental damage nodes in the way. You could also grab Eldritch Battery sonner, depending on your gear, and to keep Clarity at a higher level. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6. Credits/Change Log
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Credits goes to,
- Bada_Bing for the ripped content, Cold Witch Guide for Beginners. - Path of Exile Wiki Change Log. 1* 29/11/2013 posting the guide IGN - Peonsius my characters/739743 - standard shop/511367 Last edited by peonso on Nov 30, 2013, 12:46:31 AM
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Thank you for the thoughtful tips and well-written advice. Look forward to applying your suggestions in-game.
PoE's LD-50 = < 60 DMG DoT. i.e. MMO Click-em-up +2 mad millinery FTW when PVP by CAT-5.
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Hey, thanks for taking the time to write the guide. I have a couple of questions.
1) I have a high Q FP & LMP, what would be the next 3 gems to make high Q? 2) If I link reduced duration to lightning warp will that make me warp faster? Thanks again. Last edited by johnbeans on Nov 30, 2013, 6:22:11 AM
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" 1) DPSwise Faster Projectiles would give you more damage to your main nuke (increased cast speed, same quality bonus as LMP). For Ice Spear, Quality to Faster Casting would be the better (after that Increased Critical Damage). Quality to Frostibite and them to Cold Snap and Elemental Proliferation would give you more freeze duration, which is amazing. 2) I got Faster Casting linked to it, reducing the cast animation, which is a slightly improvement. The wiki states that reduced duration would work with it, reducing the traveling time. I don't see any as a big improvement, and you are probably better saving the gem slot to something better. I will give Arctic Armor a try as soon as I get enough mana regen. IGN - Peonsius
my characters/739743 - standard shop/511367 | |
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Why has this build not gotten more hits? Bada_Bing's Cold Witch Guide for Beginners is great, but it is lacking when it comes to life-based information.
First of all, I can't think of a thing I would change in your base tree, so nice work there. Second, I love the idea of using Cast when Damage Taken with Cold Snap and Elemental Proliferation; it works so well! Third, I was very skeptical about using the skeleton totem without taking any minion boosts, but it's an amazing distraction that's saved my ass so many times. I've been running this build with a Tabula Rasa (FP + LMP + Life Leech + Faster Projectiles + Added Cold Damage + Cold Penetration), and it works very well, but I have a heck of a time when it comes to resistances because I insist on running Haste instead of Purity of Elements. I was hoping to use two wands, but an Angelic or Archon Kite Shield with explicit resistances seems like the way to go if I want to retain the 6L (plus I really don't have the currency for a worthwhile 5L, and I'm finding that good wands are hard to find). Resistances are my biggest challenge with this build, and, since this is my first caster character, I didn't realize at first that I'd have to reserve a spot for the Life Leech gem, which is extremely annoying. Is it just me, or do physical-based characters have it way easier? Do you think casters need some type of buff? I even feel kinda weak in comparison to my physical characters, despite the 6L. One thing you might add to the build is the fact that you can pair Lightning Warp with Reduced Duration to further shorten the teleport time. Of course, you probably don't have room for this luxury if you have to use Frostbite with Lightning Warp in a 3L. Nice work! Dreamfeather Elemental Cleave Ranger: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1087616
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i blitzed through the guide so if it was already mentioned i apologize :)
Why no power charges? they are 2-3 nodes away (all three of them) and the damage output and survivability would go much higher IMO. to get them i saw CoDT + Icespear + GMP + Power charge on crit. Or we can tweak your CoDT and swap increased critz for chagre on critical Then again I have never played witch om more serious level so I may be overlooking some basic stuff | |
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I have been following this guide for my first character and I am now L77 and finding L67 maps pretty easy with most of gear cost around 1-2 chaos for each piece.
I think it is an excellent guide. |
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I am probably going to be running this as my first toon in the new leagues.
I have one question that arose while doing a test run on standard league.... kind of defense to stack? I assume it would be a mix of all 3 to more easily get the desired socket colors needed. Like getting 4 greens on a chest would be hard on a non EVA chest, etc. What would be the best base armor choices do you think; and what base defenses should I stack? | |
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Wondering the same thing as Savorrow
Will probably try this build in the new league tomorrow, it's been a while i wanted to play frost-based hero. Also, Heart of Ice is not picked till 86 points. Isn't the fairly large +cold damage and life and es worth the 3 points earlier? Or should it be picked after this point, since the bonus is not that high? Last edited by Lyesainer on Mar 4, 2014, 8:37:36 AM
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Bump for Skill Tree update, keen to play a life based Witch Freeze Pulser
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