[0.4] Big Bluez | Empowered zombies + friends | SSF friendly | Oracle (skill tree WIP)

[0.4] Big Bluez | Empowered zombies + friends | SSF friendly

Update

Was able to get few hours in while keeping up with the family commitments.

Oracle has plenty of great nodes close by and the hidden nodes are great addition. I will work on finalizing the skill tree when POB or poeninja are updated to work with the ascendancy node that allows leaps in medium range of an allocated keynotes.

It was a shame that Raise Zombie was adjusted in a way that it now summons two standard ones per empowered cast. However, this works quite well during leveling as burning explosive zombies take care of bigger packs. This in mind, select good single target persistent minion for bosses. I used vines and lightning for additional dmg. There is hidden node for +2 temp minions. So, in total 14 zombies can be raised and 5 of those can be empowered versions.

Power charge generation with Devour is great. For late game I might still go with CI variant and use Quatelitzi'z Ablation and Pain Offering for main charge generation, while using Devour on needs basis. Oracle has access to additional charges, ~9% chance to get max charges, and 35% chance to get additional charges.

Unfortunately the keystone that allows simultaneous use of talisman and sceptre is bugged. When both are in weapon set I and skills are modified to only use that it disables all spells and persistent minions. Hope this is fixed soon. There is talisman that gives 50% inc minion dmg and two good abyss mods, +minion dmg when you have hit prefix and +spirit reservation efficiency suffix.


Build Introduction

Gameplay is quite straightforward. Generate power charges to keep up zombie army. While they do allow some clear, they are slow. Thus, spectres and skeletons are used to fill in gaps in the clearing, reduce downtime, and enable use of Muster support.


Videos

Archived 0.3 vids:


Skill Tree and Ascendancy

Skill Tree

Very rough iteration without keystone radius allocations


Oracle

1. The Unseen Path

2. Entwined Realities

3. The Lesser Harm

4. Converging Paths


Skills

I have not included new lineage support gems that have not yet dropped for me. Feel free to add Dialla's Desire to Frozen Mandibles or Skeletal Snipers.

Raise Zombie

1. Perpetual Charge
2. Muster
3. Rapid Attacks II
4. Minion Mastery
5. Feeding Frenzy II

Perpetual Charge helps to save power charges to maintain full stack of zombies. Other supports for damage.

Pain Offering

1. Danse Macarbe
2. Meat Shield II or Brutu's Brain
3. Quatelitzi'z Ablation
4. Prolonged Duration I
5. Efficiency II

Power charge generation and additional damage.

Additional charge generator

Spectres

Cultist Archer x1 or xMAX

1. Multishot II
2. Muster
3. Rapid Attacks II or Magnified Area I
4. Minion Mastery
5. Feeding Frenzy II

This spectre has very good AOE skill. Main drawback was its very long cooldown and the fact that cooldown reduction support gem was removed in 0.3. If the main skill cooldown is reduced enough, this would be ideal candidate to boost the clear speed of this build.

Alternate spectres


Additional friends


Itemization

Below list provides recommendations and will add another weaponset for Talisman+Sceptre combo. As exclusively SSF player some items have not been fully tested yet.

Mainhand: Sceptre
Any rare with +spirit and +minion skills will do well. Nice to haves are +presence AoE and +attack/cast speed or +minion damage.

Offhand: Shield/Focus
Prims Guardian was changed to provide buff skills reservation efficiency. As such there is no use for it, unless Sacrifice is utilized for chargw generation alongside with other buff skills.

For time being get good rare with triple resists. For life based builds get high block chance and for ES get use foci instead.


Amulet
Rare Solar Amulet with +spirit and +minion skills gives best damage output. Instilling Overflowing Power increased maximum power charge count to seven.

Helmet
Any high ES rare with +minion skills. Socket Talisman of Ralakesh rune for additional minions.

Body Armour
High ES rare with +spirit and +res.

Gloves
High ES rare with cast speed and +res.

Boots
Bones of Ullr provides much needed reservation efficiency to counter drawbacks from Gigantic Following notable. These can be substituted with +35% move speed rare if other items provide enough spirit to fill in all skill slots with minions for Muster support.

Belt
Now that most socketables are limited to one it is best to use good rare belt to fix all resists instead of utilizing Darkness Enthroned.

Rings
Priority on high life and triple resists. Mana regen and cast speed are nice to have, while rarity is luxury. Choose unset rings if unreserved spirit allows for additional skeletal minions. Else, choose prismatic or chaos res base.

Grip of Kumelak can have very nice mods like additional spirit, power charges and cast speed per spirit. As additional bonus these modifiers may have had buff on their ranges in 0.4. All of these are Kurgal modifiers. So, choose wisely and good luck.

Things to do

-Theorycraft Druid Oracle
-Update 0.4 skill tree
-Update power charge generation scheme

Hey, thats a nice Idea for a build! Will be trying to do something similar in trade with tactician. Also in the post above the dude gave me another briliant idea for this archetype: you can just strap sacrifice and unearth, kill one of your dudes with unearth. Then cast on minion death profane ritual and summon zombies. Rinse and repeat. Will be also adding sth like living lightning linked to orb of storms or some other trigger. Suffice to say: looks promising.

"

cyberzoneoff#1665 написал:

Hey, thats a nice Idea for a build! Will be trying to do something similar in trade with tactician. Also in the post above the dude gave me another briliant idea for this archetype: you can just strap sacrifice and unearth, kill one of your dudes with unearth. Then cast on minion death profane ritual and summon zombies. Rinse and repeat. Will be also adding sth like living lightning linked to orb of storms or some other trigger. Suffice to say: looks promising.

Thank you!

In the previous batch I did test Zombies and utilized very low costing Terracotta Soldiers for power charge generation via Sacrifice and Profane Ritual. However, this took quite an effort and the soldiers were bugged and did not follow without constantly pressing minion control hotkey. With new Gemlin Legionnaire ascendancy note power charge generation is much smoother experience.

p.s. uploaded new video. Have to farm more splinters for the higher tier bosses.

Updated T2 bosses as well as other minor things. Got Brutu's Brain drop and added it to skelly clerics.

Nice build!

Is this build fine to start with? I really like the concept.

"

Is this build fine to start with? I really like the concept.

Yes it is! I play exclusively SSF and did this build from the start. Be aware that act 1 final boss can be challenging as you wont be gaving any minion dmg nodes yet.

I used unearth and skeletal arsonist as main dmg during leveling before I spectre becoming available. After that I switched to cultist archers for aoe clear. Also, used last grip on minions until I reached to faster reinc nodes.

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BllackBlood#1510 написал:

Nice build!

Thanks!

Build buffed and will update once skill tree available.

Added new update comments and adjusted itemization. It is now clear that with new power charge generation schemes Oracle is much better choice than Gemling just because how close it is to minion nodes and hidden nodes are also great. Will update skill tree soon.