(WE'RE BACK!) Kitava's Thirst Corpseblaster - Patch 3.24 Necropolis League Start

IMPORANT NOTE - A lot of what was depicted in this PoB relied on Affliction benefits. Expect the top-end DPS to be lower in Necropolis League due to the loss of Wildwood Ascendancy notables + the nerf to Unearth quality. General updates have been made to the PoB, but I cannot stress enough that until we get into the game the number cannot be 'ultimately precise'. That said, the build will still be just as tanky as it was before, and it will absolutely get you through the first couple weeks of the league comfortably and ensure your start both smooth + fun! ================================================================================================================================================================================================== ================================================================================================================================================================================================== ================================================================================================================================================================================================== Preliminary Note - DPS in FINAL was 'conservative' for Affliction League with a much higher corpse life. it's expected that there's more than 5 'instances' running at a time. We DO reach maximum corpse consumed benefit from Corpse Pact, although mana is dubious after the loss of the Wildwood Ascendancy. DPS for Necropolis League should probably be revised to ~5 Million until we can experience the full fallout of the changes. There will likely be things from the mechanic that help make up for what we lost. !!!Detonate Dead Note!!! - We're scaling the Corpse Explosion Component. Spell Damage DOES NOT affect this. Fire Damage, Elemental Damage, Area Damage, Damage, and Minion Damage (Spiritual Aid) do. LEVELING 1-50 It helps to have Detonate Dead of Chain Reaction ready to go, as this is a very nice leveling skill even when it's self-cast. If league starting, Detonate Dead will do, and the improved version can be farmed from even the first labyrinth. Simply get Unearth at level 10, slap on Volley + Lesser Multiple Projectiles, and go to town. You can drop those supports for Greater Multiple Projectiles at Level 38, but otherwise most of what you do here is up to you, so long as your Skill Tree is ready at 50 for the switch. You *may* be able to switch earlier than level 50, but at level 50 it's extremely likely you'll be able to hit the 100 mana per cast breakpoint Unearth requires for the build to 'begin'. The links used for your initial setup are in the 'Skills' tab here on PoB. (Labeled Level 50 Unearth Links) We use Determination with Eternal Blessing, as we need our Mana Pool unencumbered. Vaal Molten Shell is amazing the moment Determination is running, and gives us the ability to wade confidently into a shitstorm when the time comes. Mana Regen - This build needs a lot of Mana Regen. If you can get Mana Regeneration Rate WITHOUT increasing our Maximum Mana, it's a valuable stat. Not ultra-necessary long-term, but some is required. LEVELING 50-68 From this point onward, you're crusing and probably having a blast. You will need a mana flask early on, and for quite a while beyond too for whenever you really 'commit' to blasting a tougher target. So long as you have Aetherwind Gloves (Aetherwind Gloves come from Ritual, so you'll have to trade for one or go without if you haven't acquired a pair.) and the 10% Refund Mana Cost Mastery, as well as Essence Glutton from your Ascendancy, it's going to feel really smooth despite mana because you just absolutely demolish the entire campaign with this setup. Keep an eye on your Mana Cost as it WILL continue to rise, and the goal is to keep it as close to 100 without going under. Switch the increased mana cost nodes to reduced when the times comes, and spec out of excess mana nodes that don't have reduced cost on them later. We get enough Mana otherwise to make Mind Over Matter do what it needs, and we don't benefit terribly overmuch once our mana consumption is manageable. The following Ascendancy nodes to pick up are Plaguebringer and Corpse Pact, which take your damage and give them the base scaling they need to really take off as time goes on. They also bring no small amount of bonus survivability to the table, so that's nice. MAPPING START (68+ / 72 Recommended) Mapping starts with some immediate changes to gear that may or may not be immediately available (such as in a league start scenario). Get a weapon with the 'Trigger a Socketed Spell when you use a Skill, with an 8 Second Cooldown' fast, as you'll need it to make your Uber Lab Ascendancy (Mistress of Sacrifice) function. This lets you approach block cap, and acquiring enough sources of Offering Effect (Minion Offense Mastery, Eldritch Implicits on Chest/Boots) will bring you to the ultimate 75/75 Attack + Spell Block cap. Socket Bone Offering into your weapon, and you will have 100% uptime. I also socket Flammability and Wave of Conviction in for a bit more automation on Curses / Exposure. Speaking of Automation, the Automation Support MIGHT open up options to different weapons. We'll have to see! During this time, you are still using the 4-link gloves setup, but should be conscious of the eventual 6-link setup to come. This 4-link setup is generally just fine for mapping all the way up to T16 maps, and will kill story Eater/Exarch, but will lack the punch of a build that can juice maps and fly through them effortlessly. The 6-link setup comes when you can afford a Level 3 Empower AND Level 3 Enhance, which both run for significantly less than a single Divine Orb total if you buy them corrupted (A week into the league usually, at least). You then pair these with the usual Greater Multiple Projectiles and Archmage, as well as Inspiration. When it comes to Inspiration, use the level of the gem that gets you closes to 100 mana cost without going under. Keeping the mana cost at 100 while raising your mana pool makes the build more consistent, so keep up on that for a smooth experience, and so that you have mana for Mind Over Matter to actually contribute! Due to Archmage changes, it's very possible Inspiration will be unnecessary. League Mechanic (Necropolis) - Unknown! Obviously, we don't have the league yet. The build is survivable, so exploring the mechanic once it gets going should be relatively safe. Being so connected to Undeath and Corpses as it is, there's hope that flavor will influence some corpse-based mechanics, but there's no way to know for sure. ENDGAME (90+) Detonate Dead in Kitvava's Thirst does a great job maintaining damage all on their own. Getting Detonate Dead of Chaining to 20% Quality is a HUGE AoE Boost, so run Lab to get that done early if you haven't already. Likewise, Unearth to 20% Quality is massive for our damage via Corpse Life. This was nerfed from 1.5% per quality to 1% per quality. It's the 'big nerf' the build suffered, but this is mostly for Pinnacle Boss situations. In mapping, you'll still have strong mobs completely unrelated to Unearth dying and making massive explosions to keep clear feeling good. Watcher's Eye offers many, MANY good mods for our build, but the two I'm most concerned with are 'Reduced Damage Taken from Critical Strikes while Affected by Determination' (Blue Wisps from League Mechanic) and then also '#% Chance to Recover 10% of Mana when you Use a Skill while affected by Clarity'. The Clarity mod takes our mana uptime and makes it INCREDIBLY STABLE. These two mods together weren't particularly expensive for me, and aren't in general, so you will likely have decent luck acquiring a jewel with both (unless this build gets more popular, sorry). Getting the Determination mod lets you change your Annoint from Sanctum of Thought to a damage-oriented mod like Divine Judgement. If you are wondering 'How are you running Clarity while also using Eternal Blessing?', the answer is, Eternal Blessing only stops you from reserving something else with MANA. That's a neat little bit of tech to keep in mind for the future ;) If you plan to run Breach, you no longer need the '25% Chance to Open a Chest when you Cast a Spell' mastery! Yay! It's still good though, so if you have a floating point it might score you a divine or something. Recoup - We take these nodes because, with Mind Over Matter + Energy Shield, they're insane. It gives Life Recovery for ALL damage taken, even if it doesn't take from Life. This means we top off very quickly after taking huge amounts of incoming damage. I still run 2 Life Flasks because of Bleed Immunity and Poison Immunity. Poison Immunity is very useful for Expedition, as the Poison Mod there gets very nasty, and degen effects, while well-mitigated, do put us in trouble. !!!GEARING CONCERNS!!! We want Life + Resistances Capped, but some things are a bit special for specific gear slots... We need Strength (155/158) and Dexterity (100/111), alongside the usual Resistances. We get a fair amount of Resistance from the tree to help with this. Shield - GET REDUCED DAMAGE TAKEN FROM CRITICAL STRIKES! Affliction League really highlighted good this stat is. Get this mod and annoint Sanctum of Thought early, and you'll find things much, MUCH more manageable. Additionally, you want as much additional Block and Spell Block on the shield as you can get to achieve Block Cap. The shield used in the build was bought early and never changed (I should probably upgrade it...). Weapon/Amulet - Physical Gem Levels, NOT Fire Gem Levels We are scaling the 'corpse' explosion of Detonate Dead, not the base fire explosion. To this effect, we want Unearth to go up in levels. We want Unearth to have additional Quality%. In the Final setup, we have level 86 Bone Archer corpses with +54% corpse life. This isn't as important while mapping, as you'll get strong corpses from the enemies to blow up, but it makes a huge difference against stronger enemies + bosses. For our weapon, because we have Spiritual Aid, you can use Essences of Fear to craft %Minion Damage and guarantee a functional damage mod for Detonate Dead. Nexus Gloves - No Eldritch Implicits, Craft Yourself with Armour Essences! Nexus Gloves are used for their implicits. If you try to add one with the Eater/Exarch currency, you'll remove the baseline one. Additionally, these gloves need an Armour roll, either from an Essence while making them, or crafted on afterward. This is because we use the Armour and Energy Shield Mastery that reads '100% Increased Armour and Energy Shield from Equipped Body Armour if Equipped Helmet, Gloves, and Boots all have Armour and Energy Shield'. That wil be talked about next... Body Armour - As much Armour/ES as you can get on the base as possible! We have decent Energy Shield uptime, we run Determination. We take the Life Mastery that gives us '15% Increased Maximum Life if there are no Life Modifiers on Equipped Body Armour'. Suffixes can be whatever you want, but Life Regeneration is a Life Mod, so be aware that that bricks the Body Armour for our purposes. Eldritch Implicits should avoid Life Modifiers as well (Yes, these count! You can reroll them, though). Determination Effect and Offering Effect are both very, very good. Strength, Dexterity, Resistances (Chaos + Elemental), and Phys Damage Reduction are all very good. Boots - Free Square Get whatever you can here alongside Movement Speed. Eldritch Implicits are likewise there to fill gaps. Jewellery - Resistances and Life | Cast Speed on Rings are a bonus, Armour on Belts is great. Strength + Dexterity need to reach their aforementioned values for all of our skills to operate at maximum efficiency. This is much like Boots, where you're just looking to fill in the gaps. Amulet has a bet more in the way of specifics to it, but we already went over that. Kitava's Thirst - Corruptions There are lots of decent Corruptions for this helmet. +2 Fire Levels is best, with +2 AoE close behind. We don't get a massive benefit from this, but it's there, and the base is cheap. Gem Levels on Detonate Dead both gives a little extra base Corpse % Scaling, as well base AoE Radius. !!!GOING FORWARD!!! Getting a +2 Phys Spell Skills Weapon, and a +2 Phys Amulet are all on the block, with varying degrees of really fucking expensive. All the same, the corpse life scaling is only just starting to really get moving 'fast' for the build, and will see huge benefits from this (all the way up to Gem Level 30, where things start to taper off). Necropolis will have to be explored to see what exactly will be the result of its addition to the game. Any decent source of corpse life pumps things back up to where it was, and possibly even pushes it beyond that. If I had got all the upgrades I wanted for Affliction League into the build during Necropolis, it would at least break even (maybe even be better, they were substantial upgrades). No matter what, the build will still do really well as a starter for anyone looking for something fun on the way to a high-investment build. That said, I plan to stream/play/update throughout the league any improvements to the build I find, hopefully pushing it beyond its happy nigh-immortal Affliction League run. (I mean, it NEVER died, but it probably could have...) Found a way to improve the build? Shout me out on Youtube on the Build Guide video and I'll give you a mention for next league when I remake this guide (assuming it doesn't get nerfed into oblivious, of course...) Alternatively, if you make your own guide with your owns twists, I'd love to hear about it.