[Veteran/Hardcore] What's the best second class for a Occultist no Familiar?

[Rialm]

Hardcore veteran. is it manageable to survive as an Occultist with no familiar? Could it be easy to reach the end of the game?

Any good idea what could be the best second class for an Occulist with no Familiar, playing Vitaliy or poison.

I was thinking Necromancy. Is it good?

Thanks!

[Safarel]

Some vitality caster with orientation to sigil from occultist and earth from necromancer sounds good

[Ultimatum]

Originally posted by Rialm:

Hardcore veteran. is it manageable to survive as an Occultist with no familiar? Could it be easy to reach the end of the game?

Any good idea what could be the best second class for an Occulist with no Familiar, playing Vitaliy or poison.

I was thinking Necromancy. Is it good?

Thanks!

Cabalist, Necromancer and Occultist, is incredibly powerful. With a certain set that I will not spoil here, I have cleared all content on Hardcore , INCLUDING 2 Superbosses , Ravager of Souls and Callagadra, and Lokkar (On Ultimate difficulty, of course). My character is literally unkillable, the only thing I see that kills me is if I get dispelled by an Arcane champion, which on Hardcore you pay attention to without excuse. I did not use any guide, I make my characters myself, therefore I cannot provide a link to any forum discussion.

P.S. No pets, using only direct attacking skills like Sigil of Consumption, Ravenous Earth, Sihpon Souls, Bloody Pox, Mark of Torment, Call of the Grave, Blood of Dreeg and Possession along with Spectral Binding aura

[Cynodontia]

My occultist Soldier Combination works pretty good....

[Neit]

Aside from Cabalist (which will definirely work well), you can also pick Shaman. You'll end up with Conjurer to get another vitality caster (which will also work well). You can have a lot of vitality dots, great regen, and easy way to stack resist reduction. The build might be a little bit piano with a lot of spells, so that's something worth considering.

[Matthew]

Surviving HC is more about over-capping resists. Not to say some classes won't have an easier time than others, just that I wouldn't stress over the perfect skill selection. You don't need familiar.

As said, shaman/occy as a vitality caster was a popular choice. It is both very safe in that it has a ton of healing and also the nature of the build (totems) allows for easy kiting to manually avoid a lot of damage.

I haven't played one in quite a while and can't speak to how it holds up these days, but if you are just looking to get achievements or whatever it should be more than enough.

[ModerNertum]

Soldier is kind of tanky as a 2nd mastery (meaning good for HC). But depends on your play style and what you are most used to play. The good thing about GD is right now it has 36 possible mastery combos so lots of playstyles to try (from tankier ones to CC ones). Really is up to you, the important thing is you having fun slaying monsters :)

[Morton Salt]

Shaman, you have pretty nice vitality RR there and can be build in many ways and also being tanky, i have bloody pox vitality/bleed Conjurer that i have beat 3 super bosses and reached 91 sr with him on hardcore. Not the best times at bosses thu, but he still alive!

[+|A.O|+]

it's weird that nobody mentioned demolitionist when it almost lends itself to vitality/chaos builds towards occultist. Provides good passive regen, resist increase, damage absorption, debuffs (lower OA/DA, lower total speed, fumble/impaired aim). The kit is useful, but 'tis not easy to make full use of it without certain items.

[Rialm]

Okay, so Necromancer, Shaman or Demolitionist, I'm taking notes and I will check this builds. I'm planning after beating Hardcore Veteran as a Warder (hopefully I don't die).

[Ultimatum]

Originally posted by Rialm:

Okay, so Necromancer, Shaman or Demolitionist, I'm taking notes and I will check this builds. I'm planning after beating Hardcore Veteran as a Warder (hopefully I don't die).

Warder will be the most safest option if your play your cards right. As long as you focus on a little bit of defense Normal (Veteran) won't be a problem. But you might want to farm for some better drops if you have a new (Clean) save. Good luck.

[ModerNertum]

Warder is one of the craziest build you can make (Soldier+Shaman). Lots of potencial with different weaponry.

[nuffi]

You can make an backup of your save and just toy around a bit.

[ModerNertum]

I am not sure if you can create a vanilla custom game for HC using the vanilla map files as opposed to modded ones. I have never tried this. Not sure if that character would then be unable to take part in the Crucible, for example. What I do know is you get the vanilla map in the list of custom game options when creating a character in that mode (along with the mods you have installed).

[Wintermute]

Originally posted by +|A.O|+:

it's weird that nobody mentioned demolitionist when it almost lends itself to vitality/chaos builds towards occultist. Provides good passive regen, resist increase, damage absorption, debuffs (lower OA/DA, lower total speed, fumble/impaired aim). The kit is useful, but 'tis not easy to make full use of it without certain items.

Because pyromancers are notoriously fragile in any edngame setups I saw for them. It's not a tanky class, despite all the absorb. Speaking from personal experience with Darkblaze build, it's the dead last class I would recommend for hardcore.

[ModerNertum]

Originally posted by nuffi:

You can make an backup of your save and just toy around a bit.

Yes, even in my main save directory I keep a .backup folder. This is if I want to experiment with some file editing, Just keep a fresh backup folder for fast retrieval (so main saves are stored in main and my backups on main.backup folder). Then I back up the whole save folder to my external HDD, to be extra safe.