Erannorth Chronicles: The BEST Chaos Witch Build

The core concept of this build is to control enemies through multiple chaotic effects, and deal massive chaotic damage by inflicting tons of vulnerable stacks. I checked the card pool and figured out [Infernal Magic], [Witchcraft] and [Arcana] skill sets have those cards available. The initial setup of the character is shown below. Some skill sets are disabled to narrow down the card pool. Note that [Arcana] is available if your background is fortune teller.

Important perks are listed below.
(If the game is not in the Chosen difficulty, please choose [Secret of Pain] instead of [Memories of Love}.)
[Memories of Love] can reduce the natural resistance of vulnerable to 0%, which is extremely powerful when facing living creatures, especially for those who have high nature vulnerable resistance. (Their resistance will still go up as vulnerable stacks increase.) I prefer choosing this perk during the early game, even though many enemies, including the final boss, are undead.

Background perk [Fortune Teller] and [Gnosis] can boost your defend whenever you draw a card or play an [Arcana] card. The defend points triggered by ripple effects can be improved by other perks (i.e., [All Action] Defend +4, available after killing 240 enemies from progression reward), which makes it far more powerful than it looks like initially. It is interesting to note that ripple effects can also be triggered by discard effects, which do not consume concentration. With these effects, one can have 300+ defend in a single turn without focusing on defend.

Most powerful cards in the pool IGNORE SYNERGIES, and hence their cost can be decreased substantially by decreasing [Strain] using certain perks, such as [Superior Intellect] [Simplicity in Form], and equipment. Since the [Strain] effect can be interrupted by cards that do not ignore synergies, the entire deck is chosen to be synergy-less to get full benefit from strain (Note that discard effects do not break [Strain]). This is mandatory because most powerful cards are not affordable otherwise.With a proper setup, the AP cost of all cards can be reduced to zero.

Gears are shown below. The most important gear is [Orb of The Moon], which can decrease the strain by 3 (without any perks) at the start of the turn because it is an automatic effect. Other gears can provide heal effect to compensate the cost from certain [Draw] effect, and provide [Amplify] stacks to boost astral and dark damage. [Staff of The Moon], available in the late game, is chosen because its discard effect can remove all fatigues, which enables the character to play 4-6 additional cards every turn.

The full deck is shown below. All cards come from 4 card pools: Witchcraft, Arcana, Infernal Magic and Esotericism. Please Check the symbol at the upper right corner of each card for the category. Note that high level cards are acquirable only when your corresponding skill has a similar level.

Cards related to [Draw] actions are listed below.
For a deck to operate properly, the character needs to draw enough cards. [Lucid Dream] is one of the strongest cards in the early game in my opinion. It can not only replenish your hand quickly, but also enable many high cost cards by recovering your AP. [King of Swords] is also very strong after you can decrease its strain below zero from certain perks considering it is [Effortless]. The ability to replicate itself by 71% makes it extremely easy to replenish you hand to full with only one card. [Temperance] is chosen because of its discard effect, draw 4 without costing your precious concentrations.

[The Hermit], [Divination] and [Moondance] are also chosen because of their discard effects. Even if their discard effects basically do nothing, these effects can induce defend-related ripple effects acquired from certain perks and hence increase your defend substantially. [Infernal Aura] is chosen to compensate HP loss from cards mentioned above.

Cards related to debuff actions are shown below.
Debuff actions serve for two main purpose: disable enemies’ turn by applying stun/entangle/bewitch and increase your damage output by applying vulnerable. Single type of debuff, stun for example, can be resisted by random enemies easily and hence it is not a stable approach to control enemies constantly. On the other hand, multiple debuffs can increases the robustness of controlling enemies greatly. Even if one type of debuffs is resisted by a certain type of enemies, the other type may still work. [Phase] can provide 53% concealment and therefore is considered to be a strong defensive card. Note that the crafted card [Phase(Escape)] is discarded usually for not breaking the [strain].

Since damage output highly relies on vulnerable stacks, enemies with high vulnerable resistance must be taken care of properly. [Rite of Binding] can apply 50 fracture stacks, which means enemies’ resistance to all types of dubuffs is decreased by 50%. With two [Rite of Binding}, any enemies can be debuffed easily.

In the late game, [Rite of Binding] can be replaced by [Snister Ritual], which can apply massive fracture stacks and is synergy-less. [Snister Ritual] is available after unlocking [Ritual] skill set.

Cards related to damage actions are shown below.
[The Hidden Ven] is the main damage source of the deck, and it should be played after you apply enough vulnerable stacks to enemies (i.e., when you have a few fatigue stacks). [Hellfire Eruption] and [Madness] are also strong but not comparable to [The hidden Ven]. I feel like maybe I should add more damage cards and less debuff cards in the deck.

Please check the video below as a demonstration of the deck where the character encounters two level-20+ boss and several level-60+ enemies.

The play style is described below:
1. Draw enough cards and use [Phase] for defensive purpose.
2. Trigger as many discard effects as possible to boost defend.
3. Apply as many vulnerable stacks as possible to increase damage output.
4. Use [The Hidden Ven] as the main damage source.
5. Discard weapon [Exquisite Staff of The Moon] when you have 5-6 faigue stacks. This allows you to play 5-6 more cards.
6. Apply stun at the end of turn for defensive purpose.

Thank you for reading this guide, and let me know your opinions on the build!