Path of Exile 2: Witch Leveling Guide
In Path of Exile 2, the Witch is a versatile spellcaster that can deal massive amounts of damage and offer unique utility in a variety of builds. Whether you are new to the game or a seasoned player, leveling a Witch character can be an exciting yet challenging experience due to the vast array of possible skill and passive tree choices. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the most effective strategies for leveling your Witch, from choosing your skills to building your character for the early, mid, and late game.
Choosing Your Witch’s Build: A Quick Overview
Before diving into the leveling steps, it’s important to choose the kind of Witch you want to build. The Witch can specialize in several different playstyles, but the most popular approaches are:
- Elementalist: A powerful choice for summoners and elemental damage builds. Great for beginners due to its strong defensive layers.
- Occultist: Focuses on chaos damage and poison builds, often with curses and debuffs. A more advanced but rewarding choice.
- Necromancer: If you want to summon minions to do your bidding, the Necromancer is the way to go. Ideal for players who prefer letting their army do the dirty work.
Leveling the Witch: Act 1 to Act 3
Starting Out (Act 1)
In the early stages of the game, your Witch will be weak but versatile, making it important to pick a build that suits your playstyle.
- Skills to Use: The Witch starts with Fireball, which is an excellent skill to level with, dealing high damage to groups of enemies. As you progress through Act 1, you’ll want to pick up Frost Bomb or Essence Drain as additional abilities for crowd control and single-target damage. These skills provide good synergy and will allow you to take down enemies efficiently.
- Passive Skill Tree: Focus on Intelligence nodes and Spell Damage nodes early on to maximize your damage output. Prioritize Energy Shield nodes to increase your survivability.
- Gear: At this stage, focus on increased Energy Shield and Elemental Resistances. Items that boost Spell Damage and Critical Strike Chance are also valuable early on.
Act 2 to Act 3 (Early and Mid-Level Progression)
As you reach Act 2, you’ll have access to more powerful spells and can start to specialize your character. This is where the real fun begins, as you can focus on building your damage and defenses further.
- Skills to Use: In Act 2, you should have access to Flameblast or Arc, both of which offer massive AoE damage. Flameblast is great for clearing packs of enemies, while Arc is perfect for dealing with bosses and large groups. If you prefer a more controlled approach, Storm Brand is an excellent choice, dealing steady damage over time.
- Passive Skill Tree: Continue progressing towards the Spell Damage, Mana, and Energy Shield nodes. If you’ve chosen the Elementalist ascendancy, consider picking up Elemental Overload for an extra damage boost. Alternatively, the Occultist ascendancy will provide a big boost to your chaos damage and debuffs.
- Gear: Focus on boosting Spell Damage, Energy Shield, and Critical Strike Chance. At this point, you’ll want to start picking up Flasks that help with Mana Regeneration or Life.
Leveling from Act 4 to Act 6 (Mid to Late-Level Progression)
This phase of the game can get tricky, as you’ll encounter stronger enemies, but it’s also the point where your Witch starts to hit her stride. Whether you’ve specialized in Elemental or Chaos damage, it’s time to fine-tune your character and make sure you’re scaling your damage properly.
- Skills to Use: By now, you should consider using Arcane Surge with Flameblast or Firestorm for powerful burst damage, or Essence Drain with Contagion for effective chaos damage over time. Bladefall and Blade Vortex are also great options for high DPS and dealing with multiple enemies in close quarters.
- Ascendancy Points: Make sure you’ve chosen the correct ascendancy for your build, as it significantly impacts your damage output and survivability. For example, the Occultist’s Forbidden Power and Forbidden Flesh nodes allow you to amplify chaos damage and further increase your ability to stack debuffs, while Elementalist’s Shaper of Desolation provides increased elemental damage with high survivability.
- Passive Skill Tree: At this point, you should be focused on enhancing Mana Regeneration, Elemental Damage, and Critical Strike Chance/Multiplies. Picking up the Improved Energy Shield nodes will allow your Witch to tank damage while dishing out huge amounts of spell damage.
- Gear: Aim for high Energy Shield items, while also looking for Resistance, Life, and Mana Regeneration boosts. Prioritize Elemental Damage, Critical Strike Chance, or Chaos Damage if you’re running a chaos-based build.
Late Game (Act 7 and Beyond)
Once you reach the late game (Acts 7 and 8), your Witch should be much more powerful and ready to face harder challenges. This is when you can really start testing your build with endgame content.
- Skills to Use: By now, you should be using your best AoE and boss-killing skills. Firestorm, Flameblast, Essence Drain, Storm Brand, or Blade Vortex will serve you well. Consider leveling up Vaal skills, such as Vaal Fireball or Vaal Arc, for increased burst damage when fighting bosses or clearing endgame content.
- Ascendancy Points: For Elementalist, focus on Beacon of Ruin and Shaper of Desolation. For Necromancer, you’ll want to go for Invoker and Commander of Darkness for minion-based synergy. The Occultist ascendancy will make use of Forbidden Power and Forbidden Flesh for chaos damage and debuffing.
- Passive Skill Tree: At this stage, prioritize nodes that enhance your chosen skills and increase your damage output, whether that’s through Spell Damage, Chaos Damage, or Critical Multiplier. Additional points for Energy Shield or Life will give you increased tankiness for tougher fights.
- Gear: Focus on obtaining high-tier unique cheap path of exile 2 currency for your build, such as Death’s Door, The Vertex, or Cherrubim’s Maleficence. These items provide useful boosts to your damage, survivability, or defense stats.
Key Witch Leveling Tips
- Focus on Survivability: Early on, Witches can struggle with survivability. Boosting Energy Shield, Mana Regeneration, and Resistances early on is key.
- Optimize Your Gems: Always use the best gems for your build, and remember that support gems can increase your damage output exponentially.
- Use Flasks Wisely: Having the right flasks can make or break your Witch’s survivability. Mana Flasks, Instant Life Flasks, and Quicksilver Flasks are all essential for mobility and healing during tough fights.
- Test and Adjust: Don’t be afraid to change your skills, gear, and passive skill tree as you progress. Experimenting with different combinations will help you refine your build and increase your efficiency.
Conclusion
Leveling a Witch in Path of Exile 2 offers poe 2 orb to plenty of flexibility and fun. Whether you choose to specialize in elemental damage, chaos damage, or summoning, the Witch’s versatility will keep you entertained through all stages of the game. By focusing on survivability, scaling your damage output, and optimizing your gear and gems, you can quickly build a powerful character capable of taking on the toughest challenges the game has to offer.
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If you want to know more, you can read this article:Best Endgame Monk Build Guide In Poe 2