Essence Drain Lich Build Guide
The Essence Drain Lich spreads chaos across the battlefield! Essence Drain carried by Contagion offers a satisfying degen that proliferates across packs of monsters and is both subtle and effective.
Essence Drain deals damage with both a normal 'hit' component and a secondary Damage over Time debuff that lasts a set duration. That Damage over Time is propagated between monster packs when used in combination with Contagion to turn our primary damage into a clear skill, as well as leading to satisfying waves of chaos across screens.
Lich is an ideal pairing with Essence Drain due to generically strong defensive nodes in Soulless Form and Eternal Life. The Lich is also one of the only Ascendancies with a strong damage multiplier for Essence Drain using Eldritch Empowerment. To top it all off, the jack of all trades node Crystalline Phylactery matches any Jewel's power and then doubles it. The Essence Drain Lich is made to bring enemies down with chaos!
You do not need specific resistances on any item, just get the required total resistances amongst all gear combined. You need to cap your Resistances at 75% unless otherwise specified in the guide!
Path of Exile 2 is currently in early access, this means rapid development including frequent changes to builds as there are balance fixes and we learn more. Pin this page to be notified of any updates.
Skills
- Essence Drain is acquired at lvl 6 and has 2 damage dealing components. First, it 'hits' for a flat amount of Chaos Damage, which makes it worth repeat casting on bosses for extra single target. Second, it has a Damage over Time debuff that ends up being the primary damage dealer and can be spread between packs using Contagion.
- Contagion is a clear utility skill we get at lvl 2 that is used to spread the much higher Damage over Time of Essence Drain between packs.
- Despair is a Curse that lowers enemy Chaos Resistance. Acquired at level 31, it is primarily used on Bosses and tanky Rares to greatly increase single target damage when needed.
- Withering Presence & Blasphemy / Temporal Chains are used as primary, Weapon Set 1 Spirit reservations to inflict Wither on nearby enemies, as well as slow them down so they can be more easily evaded. Withering Presence is our first reservation, while the others get filled out in Act 3 Normal & Cruel.
- Convalescence & Blink are used on our secondary Weapon Set 2, as cooldown related skills still recover even when reserved in the offhand. Convalescence is used as a panic button to force Energy Shield to recharge when in danger, while Blink is used to get out of dangerous situations or just pure mobility.
- Sigil of Power & Dark Effigy are both used when needing a big boost of damage for Bosses.
- Lastly, Incinerate is a 'Channeling' skill, which when combined with Lifetap spends our life as a means to meet the 'low-life' condition. This promotes the Final Barrage and Quick Response Noteables in our skill tree.
Use the <Prev and Next> arrows to navigate.
Gem Engraving Priority
Skill Rotation
- Place Sigil of Power and Dark Effigy
- Cast Despair
- Add in Contagion to apply hinder & give an additional debuff on enemy thus allowing Dark Effigy to shoot an extra projectile
- Shoot Essence Drain
- Refresh each skill when expired but otherwise focus on casting Essence Drain
- Clearing requires a 2 skill rotation of Essence Drain to inflict our primary damage over time debuff quickly followed by Contagion, which then proliferates that damage over time across monster packs.
Skill Leveling Priority
Passives
Click the arrows to open the full tree in a new tab.
- The passive tree focuses on early Chaos Damage investment to get damage off the ground, then in mid-acts uses Mind Over Matter + Mana Regeneration to patch up defenses while working towards some Energy Shield gear pieces, and finally fills out defensively with Energy Shield nodes, making for a tank setup that can ignore most boss mechanics.
- Adjust attributes as needed for the minimum required of Strength & Dexterity while putting all excess into Intelligence.
- The green curse points are a way of snapshotting extra Curse Effect for Despair for higher damage gains. Ultimately, you can just spec all the Weapon Set passives normally and only do the extra work for setting up the weapon set swap passives when you want to min-max damage output. Check out our Weapon Swap Mechanics Guide to learn more.
Ascendancy
Learn how to complete the Trial of the Sekhemas and Trial of Chaos to earn your first 2 Ascensions with our Ascension Guide!
- Soulless Form trades the base Mana Regeneration amount of 4% of maximum Mana for 6% of maximum Life. This gives generally much higher base mana regen and still scales with Mana Regeneration Rate. Just remember that flat Life is important on gear to up your base mana regen. Early game, this bolsters Mind Over Matter, while late game it helps sustain the harsh mana costs of high level skills. Additionally, this node also provides "10% of Damage taken Bypasses Energy Shield," which later on translates to raw damage reduction after grabbing Eternal Life.
- Eternal Life is a very unique node which gives our character raw damage reduction, as all damage that bypasses Energy Shield, as from Atziri's Disdain, Heavy Buffer, and Soulless Form is negated. Additionally, Eternal Life is used to lock Life in place to enable "Low Life" mechanics for extra benefits.
- Eldritch Empowerment is a straight forward damage multiplier, BUT it does require the build to be fully swapped into an Energy Shield setup. If this node is allocated too early, it locks the user out of casting when Energy Shield is depleted.
- Crystalline Phylactery is straightforward power. The better the Jewel, the more powerful the node. It's recommended to use the best rare Jewel in this slot to maximize benefit.
Stat Priority
Offensive Scaling
- + Gem Levels (roughly 11-14% more damage per Level, sources include: Wand(+5), Focus(+2), Amulet(+3), Gem corruption(+1) and Prism of Belief for up to +3 in uber late game)
- % increase to Chaos/Spell Damage
- % increased Cast Speed(QoL priority)
- % increased Wither Effect
- % increased Skill Effect Duration (allows for better uptime of damaging skills)
Defensive Scaling
- Sufficient +#% to Fire, Cold, Lightning and Chaos Resistance to cap your Resistances
- +# to Maximum Energy Shield (Every gear piece's Energy shield # affects the Total Energy shield of the character)
- +# to Maximum life (this affects mana regeneration rate and, if it's too low, then abilities can't be cast to defend one's self)
- % increased Mana Regeneration Rate (mana sustain is necessary to cast abilities)
- If you are still struggling, check out our Survival Guide for additional useful information!
If you're struggling to survive, or want to learn more about damage and defenses in Path of Exile 2 check out these additional resources:
Gearing
- When starting out, the primary gearing objective is damage via +Levels on Wand, Amulet and Focus. These items are also great locations for %increases to Chaos & Spell Damage.
- As you enter the Atlas of Worlds and begin mapping, the next objective is capping Resistance and getting some decent Energy Shield pieces to shore up defenses.
- Our third objective is to acquire good Cast Speed & Mana Regeneration Rate on Rings and Amulet to improve overall QoL of the build.
- Then, as gear pieces are rounded out, consider targeting each slot individually filling in min-max rares as they can be afforded.
- Aside from min-maxing rares stats, the unique Atziri's Disdain can have its roll ranges increased by as much as 22% using a Vaal Orb. Keep in mind this is a rare outcome and should only be attempted as late game purchase or time investment, as it requires corrupting many Helmets on average to succeed.
Use the buttons to navigate between gear sets.
Learn about the endgame activities available to you in Path of Exile 2 with our guide!
FAQ
- %Gain Damage as Extra does NOT apply to Essence Drain's damage over time debuff, which is the primary source of our damage. The tooltip on Essence Drain is showing the hit portion of the skill, and to find the Damage Over Time tooltip you need to investigate the skill options by selecting the damage over time tab.
- That being said, if it's preferred to maximize Dark Effigy single target than this would benefit, as Dark Effigy's damage is hit based.
- General sources of gain damage include:
- Wand modifiers
- Necromantic Conduit
- Archmage
- Passive Tree Notables
- Path of building is a community tool designed for creating and sharing build ideas. It's great for theory crafting and is highly recommended for ideal build improvement.
- Endgame PoB for this Build: https://maxroll.gg/poe2/pob/u571o0lq
- Download PoB 2 here: PoB Github Page
- Filters by Neversink on Filterblade are recommended.
- There are lots of customizations that can be easily done on Filterblade but often the preset package of Regular through Very Strict filters is all that is needed.
We get 2 passive benefits:
Final Barrage gives 20% Cast Speed when on Low Life
Quick Response gives 30% Faster Start of Recharge when not on Full Life
- Firstly, unequip all energy shield pieces OR swap on Visage of Ayah, which procs Eldritch Battery to remove all Energy Shield. This allows life to be modified and it's time to cast a Channeling Skill like Incinerate with Lifetap to spend life down to below 35% of total value. Then, swap back on Energy Shield gear or your normal Helmet. Once Energy shield gear is swapped back on, Eternal Life locks the Low Life value in place.
- Despair is not bugged. When the green Weapon Set 2 passives are allocated for faster Curse Activation, then the Despair animation no longer plays as the "delay" has been removed. The Despair curse and -40% or so Chaos Resistance should be visible on enemies.
- Spirit Guide
- Act 1 King of the Mist (30)
- Act 3 Bone Witch (30)
- Act 3(cruel) Bone Witch (40)
- Weapon Set 1 & 2 have separate reservations for our total 100 spirit.
- Weapon Set 1 = Withering Presence(30) + Clarity(10) + Blasphemy Temporal Chains(60) = 100 total
- Weapon Set 2 = Convalescence(30) + Blink(60) = 90 total
- Since Weapon Set 2 uses cooldown gated reservations, these cooldowns still tick when using weapon set 1 which means we can use them whenever we need without paying the reservation cost and still yield the benefit.
It is an implicit on the Chiming Staff base in your Weapon Set 2. You need to set all primary skills to Weapon Set 1, then Sigil of Power & Despair to Weapon Set 2. The game then auto swaps to cast skills. Use Sigil and your Curse on bosses.
Mana cost scaling with gem levels gets a bit out of control. To combat this, it's recommended to keep Contagion & Despair at lower levels. Additionally, for sustaining Essence Drain casting itself (which needs to remain at a high level to deal damage), it's recommended to get Mana Regeneration Rate and Maximum Life rolls on both rings. These both contribute to total Mana Regeneration.
- Stun/Ailment threshold is entirely tied to your Energy shield, Maximum Life and the amount of %Ailment/Stun threshold gained from Energy Shield. You can get more of this stat from Jewels and certain Notables on the passive tree.
- Including a charm for freeze removal is recommended, but an additional charm for stuns goes a long way.
- They are "Weapon Set" passives, which basically allow the tree to change depending on which Weapon Set you currently have on.
- Wand and Focus is Weapon Set 1 with your primary damage skills and normal tree, which you can just allocate normally (red passives become the tree and ignore green passives in this case) if you don't want to optimize for this.
- Weapon Set 2 is your Staff, which has a bunch of Curse nodes and thus snapshots a potent Despair when you cast it as you have Despair tied to Weapon Set 2.
Assign Weapon Set 2 to have Blink reserved and force a weapon swap by starting a Despair cast. Since Blink is tied to your dodge roll keybind, you must be using Weapon Set 2 to enable it and casting Despair allows for its use. This is great for crossing gaps or speeding up clear.
Cast Speed(makes casting curse/sigil faster) / All spell Skills(applies to sigil/+lightning does not). +All Spell Skills allows you to hit a breakpoint for sigil lvl at 21 for 1% more damage per stage.
- Respec Travel Nodes to meet minimum requirement for Gear/Gems
- Put the rest of attributes all into Intelligence
- IF this is not enough with just changing travel nodes
- THEN it is necessary to add an attribute roll or two onto gear.
- Budget: Essence Infusion
- Non-Budget: Spiral into Insanity
- Relic: % increased Charm charges gained
- Venom Drought: 30% increased Elemental Ailment Threshold
- Cruel Relic: %increased Charm charges gained
- Cruel Venom Drought: +10% to Chaos Resistance
NOTE: These bonuses are minor, if you picked something different for the Venom Draught, don't worry too much!
Video
Summary
- The Essence Drain Lich leads a simple existence of draining her enemies life force one Essence Drain at a time.
- Lich provides potent generic defensive & offensive power while utilizing some Low Life benefits.
- It's quite simple, Chaos Damage and Energy Shield nodes are very closely tied on the tree. The Lich has an ideal starting location with perfectly paired ascendancy nodes to scale Essence Drain and the Energy Shield defenses. Don't overthink it because it just works.
- The simple beginning of Contagion and Essence Drain at level 6 in Act 1 can take you to defeating the hardest difficulty Arbiter. Good luck, Exile!
Credits
Written by: Captain Lance
Content Reviewed by: IBoilerUp
Language Reviewed by: IBoilerUp