S-TIER | BUILD SORCIÈRE PLANTS ABYSSAL LICH (@DEADRABB1T) | SAISON 5

Build Video

Build Overview

DEADRABB1T’s Plants Abyssal Lich is a Witch build that combines summoned plants (Entangle, Thrashing Vines) with a devastating single-target spell, Bonestorm, all powered by the new Abyssal Lich ascendancy from Path of Exile 2 0.5 « Return of the Ancients ». Designed as a true league starter, it is playable from level 1 and scales smoothly all the way to the most demanding endgame content.

The entire mechanic revolves around a permanent low life state. Thanks to the Abyssal Lich’s Eternal Life passive, once you have an Energy Shield your life can no longer change: you lock yourself below 35% life to permanently stay « low life », which unlocks a cascade of damage bonuses, cast speed, and movement speed. On top of that, the Rupture the Flesh passive causes cursed enemies to explode like a free Detonate Dead.

The result is a build that is both ultra-fast at clearing, formidable against bosses (Bonestorm shows over 1.5 million tooltip DPS) and very tanky, with 30% damage reduction. DEADRABB1T presents this as his final endgame version, but the build remains accessible: more budget-friendly variants (full life and budget low life) are available alongside the min-maxed version on Mobalytics.

Strengths / Weaknesses

Skill Gem Setup by Step

This build offers 8 progression steps from leveling to the final build. Select a step to see the corresponding gem setup.

Act 1 Act 2 Act 3 Act 4 Interludes Early Endgame Low Life Uber Endgame (Live Build)

Act 1

6 skills • 13 gemmes

ExhumationUnearth

EnchevêtrementEntangle

VolcanVolcano

Bombe de givreFrost Bomb

Essaim voraceRavenous Swarm

Tempête d'ossementsBonestorm

Act 2

4 skills • 12 gemmes

EnchevêtrementEntangle

Tempête d'ossementsBonestorm

OrageThunderstorm

Essaim voraceRavenous Swarm

Act 3

5 skills • 18 gemmes

EnchevêtrementEntangle

Tempête d'ossementsBonestorm

Lianes cinglantesThrashing Vines

OrageThunderstorm

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Act 4

5 skills • 21 gemmes

EnchevêtrementEntangle

Tempête d'ossementsBonestorm

Lianes cinglantesThrashing Vines

OrageThunderstorm

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Interludes

7 skills • 32 gemmes

EnchevêtrementEntangle

Lianes cinglantesThrashing Vines

OrageThunderstorm

Sceau de pouvoirSigil of Power

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Convalescence

Tempête d'ossementsBonestorm

Early Endgame

6 skills • 31 gemmes

EnchevêtrementSet 1Entangle

Lianes cinglantesSet 1Thrashing Vines

Tempête d'ossementsSet 1Bonestorm

OrageSet 2Thunderstorm

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Convalescence

Low Life

7 skills • 39 gemmes

EnchevêtrementSet 1Entangle

Lianes cinglantesSet 1Thrashing Vines

Tempête d'ossementsSet 1Bonestorm

OrageSet 2Thunderstorm

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Convalescence

Sceau de pouvoirSet 2Sigil of Power

Uber Endgame (Live Build)

7 skills • 41 gemmes

EnchevêtrementSet 1Entangle

Lianes cinglantesSet 1Thrashing Vines

Tempête d'ossementsSet 1Bonestorm

OrageSet 2Thunderstorm

BlasphèmeBlasphemy

Convalescence

Sceau de pouvoirSet 2Sigil of Power

Recommended Equipment

Equipment is never set in stone: DEADRABB1T emphasizes that his gear is only an example and that you will always need to work with what you find. Here are the stat priorities slot by slot.

• Staff (Weapon Set 1): the main damage piece. Prioritize +levels to all physical spell skills, then spell damage and physical spell damage (prefixes), critical hit chance for spells and cast speed while low life (suffixes). If you land a « gain damage as extra elemental damage » mod, do not use Brutality I.
• Lightning Staff (Weapon Set 2): a second staff entirely dedicated to shock, with as much spell damage as possible, +levels to lightning spell skills, gain damage as extra lightning, and increased chance to Shock. This is what makes single target explosive.
• Helmet – Atziris Disdain: the core item of every Lich Eternal Life build. It converts a portion of your maximum life into energy shield, provides 10% damage reduction (bypass) and some rarity. Very affordable — aim for a 2-socket version.
• Amulet: target +4 to all spell skills, complemented by critical hit chance, cast speed, spell damage, and energy shield. Recommended anoint: Barbaric Strength for pure damage (or a critical anoint like Critical Exploit on a budget).
• Body Armour: the main source of energy shield. Maximize energy shield then fill in resistances.
• Rings: thanks to the Genesis tree, you can obtain caster modifiers on rings. Look for critical hit chance for spells, critical damage bonus, and cast speed, plus spell damage and life/mana as prefixes.
• Boots: high energy shield, 2 sockets to slot Tegrod’s Gaze (10% movement speed while low life) and a movement speed rune, then resistances.
• Gloves – Nightscale: critical hit chance, cold resistance, and above all a large mana regeneration after a recent critical, which solves most of the build’s mana issues.
• Belt – Mageblood (expensive endgame version): Quicksilver, Bismuth, and Amethyst flasks permanently active. Completely optional — budget versions do without it.
• Charms: Rite of Passage (the wolf charm, which provides armour break and allows you to unallocate Cut to the Bone), The Fall of the Axe, and Nascent Hope.

Final stats for the endgame version: approximately 8,500 energy shield, 1,500 life, all resistances capped, high movement speed, and 30% damage reduction.

Gameplay Tips

The build is intentionally straightforward to play, with a nearly identical rotation for both clear and boss encounters.

• Clear : cast your Entangle, then place Thunderstorm on top to trigger overgrow. This blinds enemies and activates the Blindside bonus. Drop a few Thrashing Vines on the ground against rares, and let Rupture the Flesh chain the explosions.
• Boss : first blind the boss with Entangle on the ground, apply Thunderstorm to shock it, keep Thrashing Vines active, then strike with a fully charged Bonestorm (20 stacks) for massive damage.
• Shock : always stay on Weapon Set 1, and only switch to the lightning staff of Weapon Set 2 via Thunderstorm to apply shock. A shocked boss can take over 50% increased damage taken.
• Survival : notable Convalescence is your panic button to instantly regenerate your energy shield without interruption. With Temporal Chains as an aura, almost nothing can reach you.
• Brutality pitfall (Brutality I) : if your staff has elemental damage gain, remove Brutality I, which would negate that elemental damage. Always check the tooltip before and after.

Why Abyssal Lich Is the Best Ascendancy

DEADRABB1T is categorical: for a plant build, Abyssal Lich outclasses every alternative, for four cumulative reasons.

First, the Eternal Life passive: once you have an energy shield, your life can no longer go up or down. This lets you lock it below 35% and permanently benefit from low life bonuses. And those bonuses are massive: Execute I grants up to 60% more damage (30% while you are at low life, an additional 30% when the target is as well), Pain Attunement adds 30% more critical damage, and Final Barrage grants 20% cast speed. Those sources alone launch Entangle damage into the tens of thousands.

Next comes Rupture the Flesh, the signature passive of Abyssal Lich. Unlike the classic Lich that scales chaos, here it converts to physical damage: every cursed enemy you kill has a 33% chance to explode for a quarter of its maximum life. Since everything is cursed at all times via Blasphemy + Temporal Chains, and since the build scales physical damage, you get a chain reaction of explosions — the equivalent of a free Detonate Dead. That is why Cast on Critical is entirely superfluous here.

Finally, Abyssal Lich stacks defensive layers. Locked life combined with a high energy shield bypass rate (10% + 5% from the passive, up to 25% with Solar Form and 30% via Heavy Buffer) translates into pure damage reduction: on every hit, before your resistances even apply, you take 30% less damage. More than enough to survive comfortably through the Abyss and overloaded Breach of 0.5.

How to Lock Yourself at Low Life

Since life cannot change as long as you have an energy shield, you need a trick to reach low life once, then freeze it in place. DEADRABB1T’s method takes five steps.

• Equip a Soul Tether belt: you lose your entire energy shield, making your life modifiable again.
• Insert the support gem Lifetap into any spell.
• Cast that spell until you drop below 35% of your maximum life (for example, below 526 out of 1,505 life).
• Remove Lifetap and put the original support gem back.
• Re-equip your regular belt: the energy shield comes back, your life freezes, and you are now permanently locked at low life.

The Weapon Set 2 Shock Setup

The most frequent question about this build: « Why isn’t my Thunderstorm shocking? » The answer lies in the second Weapon Set. Thunderstorm is the only skill played on Weapon Set 2, which is equipped with a staff entirely oriented around lightning: maximum spell damage, +levels to lightning spell skills, increased lightning damage gained, and higher shock chance. Shock chance depends directly on your lightning damage, which is naturally low on a physical damage build.

To compensate, the passive tree activates nodes specific to Weapon Set 2, packed with shock chance and especially shock magnitude. Without investment, a shock increases damage taken by 20%; with this magnitude, you push past 50 to 60%. A shocked boss therefore becomes far more vulnerable, which literally explodes your single target damage. Pay special attention to that second staff: it is what unlocks the full potential of Bonestorm.

Passive Tree, Jewels and Mana Management

The passive tree depends on the version you are playing (full life, low life budget or endgame); always refer to Mobalytics for the exact pathing. That said, jewel priorities remain consistent: maximum energy shield, then everything related to crit (critical hit chance for spells, critical hit chance, critical damage bonus for spells), and finally either spell damage or a faster start to energy shield recharge (which drops to 2.4 seconds — very comfortable). For a full-damage Heart of the Well, aim for a double damage roll combined with critical hit chance for spells.

On the mana side, the build becomes hungry as your gem levels increase. The Nightscale gloves solve much of the problem through their massive mana regeneration after a crit. If that is not enough, the tree offers Conservative Casting, Efficient Casting, Aspiring Genius and Touched Arcane (for Arcane Surge), enough to keep your mana above 90% and maintain the Zenith bonus.

FAQ: SSF, Nature’s Archon and Lineage Gems

The build excels in SSF and HCSSF: Abyssal Lich is, in the author’s opinion, the best hardcore ascendancy, and the build remains largely gear-independent for clearing T15 maps. Regarding Nature’s Archon, DEADRABB1T is not convinced: either the buff only lasts 10 seconds every 20, or you have to accept 50% less effectiveness to keep it permanently. He prefers keeping constant cast speed and crit on his staff.

If you go above 100 spirit (best avoided — better stats are preferable), spend the surplus on gems such as Mysticism I, Clarity I, a second curse on Blasphemy or Heightened Curse. For lineage gems, Nettle’s Embrace (40% of physical damage added as chaos) is excellent but expensive; Uther and Dialla’s gems remain very solid options. Finally, if your plants are red, it is simply the Bestial Entangle cosmetic from the shop — not a build effect.

Skill Tree