Uploaded April 2020 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
When Decay Support was first added to PoE in the 3.0 beta, it was incredibly overpowered and quickly got nerfed to nearly unplayable levels. Now, 10 leagues later, it's finally a viable option for endgame content! No ED/contagion for clearing or blight for single target, just straight up decay, baby. This build uses Arc/Vaal Arc + Decay for clearing, and Storm Burst + Decay for single target.
Noteworthy Interactions:
- Storm Burst's "75% of skill damage for each 0.4 seconds of remaining duration" on release scales decay's damage when linked with decay support. New cluster notables like Wicked Pall and Circling Oblivion allow for huge skill effect duration scaling, and are easy to stack, resulting in big Storm Burst damage scaling and decays with a duration of over a minute.
- Arc's "15% more damage per remaining chain" also scales decay damage. We utilize chain support to further scale Arc's clearing potential and decay damage while ignoring the "less damage with hits" downside, as decay is not a hit.
- Life-based Occultist is a perfect fit for the Divine Flesh keystone, as Withering Presence provides 60% chaos resistance and easily maintains wither stacks on enemies, which increase chaos damage taken.
- Hands of the High Templar gloves can have multiple corrupted implicits, including multiple on-hit curses. This makes it easy to apply 3 relevant curses without reserving mana for blasphemy.
- Aspect of the Spider hinders nearby enemies, allowing us to take advantage of the Touch of Cruelty cluster notable without actually hitting enemies with a chaos skill.
Here's the PoB for my current character:
pastebin.com/DLXpWdD4
Mapping showcase:
youtube.com/watch?v=VL2MFgX0-fU
Follow me on twitch:
twitch.tv/thatsrealneato
Join the Noteworthy Interactions Discord:
discord.gg/uZPvAuAFzz
When Decay Support was first added to PoE in the 3.0 beta, it was incredibly overpowered and quickly got nerfed to nearly unplayable levels. Now, 10 leagues later, it's finally a viable option for endgame content! No ED/contagion for clearing or blight for single target, just straight up decay, baby. This build uses Arc/Vaal Arc + Decay for clearing, and Storm Burst + Decay for single target.
Noteworthy Interactions:
- Storm Burst's "75% of skill damage for each 0.4 seconds of remaining duration" on release scales decay's damage when linked with decay support. New cluster notables like Wicked Pall and Circling Oblivion allow for huge skill effect duration scaling, and are easy to stack, resulting in big Storm Burst damage scaling and decays with a duration of over a minute.
- Arc's "15% more damage per remaining chain" also scales decay damage. We utilize chain support to further scale Arc's clearing potential and decay damage while ignoring the "less damage with hits" downside, as decay is not a hit.
- Life-based Occultist is a perfect fit for the Divine Flesh keystone, as Withering Presence provides 60% chaos resistance and easily maintains wither stacks on enemies, which increase chaos damage taken.
- Hands of the High Templar gloves can have multiple corrupted implicits, including multiple on-hit curses. This makes it easy to apply 3 relevant curses without reserving mana for blasphemy.
- Aspect of the Spider hinders nearby enemies, allowing us to take advantage of the Touch of Cruelty cluster notable without actually hitting enemies with a chaos skill.
Here's the PoB for my current character:
pastebin.com/DLXpWdD4
Mapping showcase:
youtube.com/watch?v=VL2MFgX0-fU
Follow me on twitch:
twitch.tv/thatsrealneato
Join the Noteworthy Interactions Discord:
discord.gg/uZPvAuAFzz
![[PoE 3.5] Deathless Shaper kill with Arc Decay Occultist](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Q-qdXRxVeJ0/mqdefault.jpg "[PoE 3.5] Deathless Shaper kill with Arc Decay Occultist
First deathless Shaper kill with my Arc Decay Occultist.
Shaper fight starts @ 3:40
My current gear and setup:
https://pastebin.com/wDU1LHD8
The build scales Decay support using Arcs 15% more damage for each remaining chain mod. My Arc has 11 chains (13 with Vaal Arc) which ends up being 165% more decay damage. Vaal Blight with 2x spreading rot jewels increases chaos damage taken by 70%, as well as enabling 120% increased damage of non-vaal skills (arc/decay in this case) during vaal soul prevention (~8 seconds) thanks to the new glove and boot crafts.
The new helmet Devouring Diadem with EB + MoM helps keep us alive by instantly healing ~4k HP and ES every 5 seconds, and enables us to run 2 blasphemy curses, discipline, dread banner, and level 1 clarity (for watchers eye). Our third blasphemy curse (despair) is free thanks to Impresence amulet.
With 13 vaal arc chains, this build is super fun for clearing maps since any enemy tapped by a single hit will die and have 25% chance to explode as well. Vaal Arc will clear multiple screens with the tap of a button. However, the single target is lacking as there just arent enough options for heavily scaling decays damage. It maxes out around 300-400k shaper DPS under the best of circumstances.
That said, the good news is that unlike most builds, decay deals full DPS for ~9 seconds from a single hit, so you dont deal any less damage while dodging boss attacks. The result is a lazy but fun build capable of slowly melting down most endgame bosses.
Working on Uber Elder next, though Im not sure the DPS will be enough.")
