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In Path of Exile 2, the Witch looks like a dark mage Archetype with some summons on top.
So In this guide I wanted to break down the Witch class together with the most promising Witch skills and both Ascendancies we have for it: Bloodmage and Infernalist.
If you are still not sure which class to play - check out the dedicated guide - Which Class/Ascendancy to Play
First off let’s start with the skills, and let's focus on the ones that could be considered promising and combos that should work especially early on.
This is the most obvious combination that came from POE1 and will be a basic choice for Chaos Damage over time builds. Both of those skills deal Chaos Damage over time and if monsters die while affected by Contagion, ALL Chaos DOT debuffs, including Essence Drain, will spread to nearby enemies and renew the duration.
This combo will excel at clearing large packs, where Essence Drain will be a main damage source and should be pretty nice for early game.
These are basic minions that you might want to use as a Witch, Most of the minions in Path of Exile 2 will reserve your spirit and will be resummoned automatically if they die. Generally you would expect to combine minions, using some as a frontline and some others to deal damage from the distance.
Some particular minions such as Clerics can also heal and revive your other Skeletons which looks very promising.
Skeletal Frost Mages and Skeletal Storm Mages are both range caster minions with great AoE, comparing them to each other Storm Mages look like a better option since they cost less spirit and Lightning Damage can Shock enemies providing more damage overall.
Looks like a perfect choice for a Melee oriented minion army since they can enrage, making their hits significantly stronger. Those minions are losing health so will not be consistent but can provide a very big damage burst due to rage stacking.
It is too early to say which minion combo will work the best, however it will certainly include different minion types.
Hexblast right now is one of the most promising Chaos skills, it can do a lot of damage and could be easily combined with Blasphemy Aura to make sure nearby enemies ALWAYS Cursed and you can use Hexblast on them in the same fashion as in POE1.
The biggest issue with current Hexblast is Cast Time - which is 1 second and can feel too high.
These are skills that interact with corpses - so you will need to choose between them, because they are removing corpses when used. Detonate Dead looks very promising since it has been one of the strongest low budget skills in POE1 for a VERY long time.
Currently one of the corpse related skills should be complimentary even if Detonate Dead still has potential to be a primary skill.
These are all curses that are here to improve our Chaos or Physical damage based on the build OR boost your survivability lowering damage of monsters (for enfeeble).
Most of the time you would need to choose one of those or two if you are going for Whispers of Doom Keystone. (Let's you apply one additional Curse)
You can also combine curses with Blasphemy to make your Curses an aura for 40 spirit reservation per curse. It could be a great idea if you have enough free spirit.
This skill can give us the Totem that will attack enemies affected by Damage Over time effects, so it can be a nice support damage source for Contagion and Essence Drain combination.
These are mostly supportive skills for minions. Pain Offering looks like the most promising out of those for a DPS improvement for minions. Using at least 1 of those will be mandatory for Summon-based builds.
Let’s start with Bloodmage because I’m more excited by the Life stacking possibilities in Early access!
This is a mandatory passive because it leads to all other Ascendancy nodes.
It will give us the chance to drop Life Remnants when killing monsters and those remnants are going to recover Life when picked up.
With that passive All Witch skills will gain a Base Life Cost equal to Base Mana Cost which is a downside because now we will need to sustain BOTH mana and life together but the main idea here is that the cost will be mitigated by other passives down the path.
The Keystone Blood Magic can help with it - removing your mana cost altogether, so skills will only cost life.
Will be another passive in the left path which gives 1% increased Critical Damage Bonus per 20 Life and it is a very strong option. Just with 2000 life you will already have 100% increased Critical Damage bonus and 2000 is a pretty small number even if we don't have a lot of Life in the Passive tree anymore.
Gore Spike looks amazingly strong from any perspective and probably the main reason why you would like to play as a Life Stacking Bloodmage.
Gives 10% of all spell damage leeched as life for only 2 points. This passive looks like a very good choice for all spell related Bloodmages because without it it will be very hard if not impossible to get Spell Life Leech.
It can also work pretty well combined with such nodes as Voracious, which makes 20% of Leech instant or Vaal Pact Keystone which makes ALL Your Life Leech instant.
The only downside there - that it is not leading anywhere else.
Keep in mind that even if you take it and fix your life cost mitigation, you still need to mitigate the mana cost of your skills if you are not taking Blood Magic.
Adds energy shield from Body Armour as an extra Maximum Life.
This one is very simple but feels very strong, and combines pretty well with Gore Spike.
However to reach this passive you will need to spend 4 points and take 1 unrevealed passive which could be not that good in comparison.
Overall, the Bloodmage looks like a great option for any Crit based Caster build and should have improved survivability in comparison. The biggest issue there is to solve your Life sustain, especially for skills with high mana and therefore high life cost.
Now let’s talk about Infernalist Ascendancy and look at the passives that GGG already revealed.
Grants Witch a Demon Form, increasing your damage and cast speed, you will also receive damage over time while you are in this form and will transform back if your life reaches 1.
This looks like a High Risk / High reward skill that would benefit heavily from sustain such as leech or huge regeneration to mitigate the DoT you take.
The next skill in line summons a minion which is going to burn enemies and take 20% of the damage that your character would receive. Hellhound looks like a Guardian Minion from Path of Exile 1 and to say how strong this choice is going to be we would need to see damage numbers, because Guardian Minion did a lot of damage in the campaign.
Will Hellhound be as effective? We will see, but even the 20% tankiness that skill adds is already enough to consider it.
Pretty unique passive that removes your mana completely replacing it with Infernal Flame instead. When using skills you are going to gain Infernal Flame. When you reach the maximum, your character will receive your Maximum Life + Energy shield as Fire Damage and Infernal Flame drops to 0.
Keep in mind that this damage is going to be mitigated by your Fire Resistance.
You are also going to lose 10% of Infernal Flame per second if you are not gaining it in the last 2 seconds.
With such an approach, the node looks pretty good because it solves mana issues completely with only a little downside.
While you are not on low Infernal Flame (low is expected to be around 35%), all damage from you and minions contributes to Ignite Chance and Magnitude.
That node just makes Pyromantic Pact a stronger option, it looks like an absolute must have for all Ignite related builds.
Bloodmage looks like a better choice for Crit related builds and will probably be one of the tankiest casters possible. It may be a main alternative to the Archmage approach it should shine with most spells except maybe damage over time chaos skills, which can’t properly benefit from Crits.
Infernalist on the other hand is more damage over time oriented and has cool bonuses for minions too making it more versatile. Demonic Form will be an absolute win or an absolute miss based on the numbers and will work for you if you like to play risky - just remember that you are losing a map if you die in POE 2.
Both Witch Builds can be used with minions and most of the spells out there, both of them also do not work well with Archmage, but the potential to get damage from stacking life or relying on DoT is there.
