Path of Exile 2: 10 Best Early Skill Gems For Witch Builds

Path of Exile 2 offers an extensive range of skill gems to enhance and customize your builds, and the Witch class is no exception. Known for its mastery of elemental damage, curses, and summoning, the Witch can dominate enemies with the right selection of skills. Whether you’re a fan of dealing massive AoE damage, summoning powerful minions, or controlling the battlefield with curses, choosing the best early skill gems can set you up for success as you progress through the campaign.

In this article, we’ll highlight the 10 best early skill gems for Witch builds in Path of Exile 2, focusing on those that provide versatility, power, and efficiency during the early stages of the game. Let’s dive in and find the perfect skills to complement your Witch playstyle!

#10: Raging Spirits

Raging Spirits is a reliable skill gem for any Witch player who enjoys summoning an army to fight on their behalf. This skill summons flaming skulls that aggressively charge at enemies, dealing fire damage over a short duration. While their lifespan is limited, the damage they inflict can clear groups of enemies quickly, making it an excellent choice for early leveling.

The low mana cost and rapid casting speed of Raging Spirits make it easy to maintain a steady flow of summoned minions during battles. Pairing this skill with support gems like Minion Damage or Burning Damage further amplifies its effectiveness. For Witches focused on summoner builds, Raging Spirits is an essential skill to kickstart your progression.

#9: Essence Drain

Essence Drain is a fantastic early-game skill gem for Witches looking to focus on damage-over-time effects. This spell fires a projectile that deals chaos damage to the target and applies a powerful debuff, dealing additional chaos damage over time. The best part? Any enemies killed while under the debuff heal you for a portion of your maximum life, making it both offensive and defensive.

Essence Drain shines in situations where you’re facing groups of enemies, as its damage-over-time effect can wear down multiple foes when paired with Contagion or Blight. To make it even stronger, you can use support gems like Controlled Destruction or Void Manipulation to increase its chaos damage output. For players building around chaos or DoT mechanics, Essence Drain is an excellent early-game skill that scales well into later content.

#8: Bone Cage

Bone Cage is a strong defensive skill gem for early Witch builds, offering protection in chaotic encounters. When activated, it creates a circular barrier of bones around your character, blocking incoming projectiles and slowing enemies that try to pass through it. This skill is perfect for crowd control, giving you breathing room during combat and a chance to recover or reposition.

What makes Bone Cage particularly useful early on is its synergy with summoner and caster builds. For summoners, it can shield you while your minions take down enemies. For casters, it provides a safe zone to channel powerful spells. Pair it with support gems like Increased Duration or Faster Casting to enhance its effectiveness. Bone Cage is an essential tool for surviving intense fights, especially for players who favor tactical playstyles or need extra time to execute their skills.

#7: Contagion

Contagion is a staple skill gem for Witch builds focused on area damage and debuffing. This skill releases a wave of dark energy, infecting enemies in its radius and dealing chaos damage over time. What sets Contagion apart is its ability to spread to nearby enemies when an affected target dies, creating a chain reaction that can wipe out large groups of enemies effortlessly.

For early Witch builds, Contagion shines as a crowd control tool, especially when paired with other chaos or damage-over-time skills like Essence Drain. The spreading mechanic ensures efficient mob clearing in dense areas, making it a valuable addition for leveling and farming.

Enhance Contagion’s effectiveness with support gems like Increased Area of Effect or Efficacy to boost its range and damage. Whether you’re leaning into a full chaos-damage setup or just need a reliable skill for early-game crowd control, Contagion is a powerful and versatile option.

#6: Pain Offering

Pain Offering is a standout early skill gem for Witch builds, especially for players leaning into minion-based strategies. This skill sacrifices a portion of your minions’ life to grant them significant bonuses to attack speed, cast speed, and overall damage output. While the trade-off might seem steep at first, the increased power makes your minions far more efficient in clearing mobs and taking down tough bosses.

Pain Offering pairs beautifully with skills like Raging Spirits or Skeleton Army, as the boosted stats turn these minions into relentless damage dealers. Its synergy with builds focused on summoning and sustaining minions makes it a staple in Necromancer archetypes, especially in the early game when extra damage can make a huge difference.

To maximize its potential, combine Pain Offering with support gems like Minion Life Support or Increased Duration to mitigate the health cost and extend the effect’s duration. Whether you’re tackling packs of enemies or single-target encounters, this skill ensures your minions hit harder and faster, giving you an edge as you progress through the campaign.

#5: Skeletal Sniper

Skeletal Sniper is a fantastic addition to Witch builds that focus on minions, offering a versatile ranged option for taking down enemies from afar. This skill summons skeletal archers that fire arrows at enemies, dealing consistent damage while keeping a safe distance. Its utility shines when paired with other minion skills, allowing you to create a diverse and well-rounded army.

What sets Skeletal Sniper apart is its ability to target enemies at range, complementing melee minions like Skeleton Warriors or defensive setups involving Bone Cage. Early in the game, this skill helps maintain steady damage output during encounters with bosses or large packs of mobs, especially when positioning is crucial.

To maximize Skeletal Sniper’s potential, pair it with support gems such as Added Fire Damage or Elemental Damage with Attacks for increased DPS. You can also use Multiple Projectiles to ensure your skeletal archers hit multiple targets, making them even more effective in clearing groups of enemies.

For players who enjoy hybrid minion setups, Skeletal Sniper provides a strong foundation for sustained ranged damage while other minions handle crowd control or close-quarters combat. It’s an excellent pick to strengthen your Witch’s early-game versatility.

#4: Flame Wall

Flame Wall is an excellent early-game skill gem for Witch builds, offering both crowd control and substantial area damage. This skill creates a wall of fire that deals burning damage to any enemies passing through it while also applying an Ignite effect. Flame Wall works well with other spells, as projectiles passing through it gain additional fire damage, making it a versatile choice for hybrid builds.

One of the key advantages of Flame Wall is its ability to control the battlefield. By positioning it strategically, you can funnel enemies into the burning zone, maximizing its damage output. This is particularly useful for keeping dangerous mobs at bay during tougher encounters or boss fights. Its consistent burning damage over time also pairs effectively with builds focusing on Ignite or Fire DoT (Damage Over Time) effects.

To amplify Flame Wall’s impact, consider linking it with support gems like Burning Damage or Elemental Focus for increased DoT or Arcane Surge for additional spell damage and mana recovery. If you’re running a minion-heavy build, casting Flame Wall in combination with skeletal or specter attacks can create a deadly synergy, enhancing your overall DPS.

Flame Wall’s low mana cost and reliable damage make it a must-have for early-game progression in Witch builds, offering a solid mix of utility and offensive power. Whether you’re clearing packs of enemies or dealing with tougher single targets, this skill gem will serve you well in your journey through Wraeclast.

#3: Skeletal Arsonist

Skeletal Arsonist is a powerful summon skill gem that combines the durability of minions with high fire-based damage output, making it an essential choice for early Witch builds. When cast, Skeletal Arsonist summons skeletons that explode in fiery blasts upon death or expiration, dealing significant area damage to surrounding enemies. This dual-purpose gem shines in clearing large packs of enemies and softening up tougher targets.

What sets Skeletal Arsonist apart is its ability to serve both as a minion skill and a damage-over-time tool. The summoned skeletons act as a frontline distraction, drawing enemy attention away from you and your other summons. Meanwhile, their fiery explosions provide excellent AoE damage, synergizing well with builds focused on elemental or fire damage.

To maximize the effectiveness of Skeletal Arsonist, consider linking it with support gems like Minion Damage to boost the explosion damage, Combustion for added Ignite potential, or Infernal Legion to give your skeletons a burning aura that deals continuous fire damage to nearby enemies. These links ensure that every summoned skeleton leaves a devastating impact on the battlefield.

Skeletal Arsonist pairs particularly well with other minion-based skills like Skeletal Sniper or Raging Spirits, as the combined forces create a relentless swarm of damage-dealing minions. For added utility, use Flame Wall alongside this skill to boost the fire damage of your summoned skeletons’ attacks and explosions.

This skill gem is a fantastic choice for any Witch build focusing on minions or fire damage early on, providing both utility and offensive power. Its versatility makes it easy to incorporate into a wide variety of setups, helping you clear content efficiently while setting the stage for more advanced fire-based builds in Path of Exile 2.

#2: Skeletal Warrior

Skeletal Warrior is a staple skill gem for any Witch build that focuses on summoning. This gem allows you to summon a group of melee skeleton minions that excel at engaging enemies up close, providing reliable damage and acting as a protective frontline. These warriors are highly versatile, making them a go-to choice for many early Witch builds.

The strength of Skeletal Warrior lies in its simplicity and scalability. Right from the start, the summoned skeletons deal consistent melee damage, which can be further amplified with support gems like Minion Damage, Melee Physical Damage, or Multistrike, enabling them to hit harder and more frequently. Additionally, linking Feeding Frenzy can boost their aggression, ensuring that they actively hunt down enemies.

What makes Skeletal Warrior especially valuable is its synergy with other summoning skills. For example, pairing them with Skeletal Arsonist or Skeletal Sniper creates a diverse army of minions capable of dealing damage in both melee and ranged forms. This versatility allows you to tackle different enemy setups, ensuring you’re prepared for various challenges in the early game.

Another key advantage of Skeletal Warrior is its low mana cost, which ensures you can summon an army without constantly depleting your resources. It’s also highly effective when combined with auras like Hatred for bonus cold damage or Anger for added fire damage, significantly increasing their offensive capabilities.

Whether you’re new to minion builds or looking to establish a strong foundation for a late-game summoner Witch, Skeletal Warrior is a dependable and powerful choice. Its role as both a damage dealer and tank makes it indispensable in the early stages of Path of Exile 2, ensuring you’re well-equipped to take on hordes of enemies while keeping yourself safe.

#1: Unearth

Unearth is a versatile and powerful skill gem that excels as the cornerstone of many early Witch builds in Path of Exile 2. This spell creates volatile corpses at a targeted location, which can then be used for a variety of offensive and defensive strategies. It’s an incredibly flexible skill, making it one of the best choices for players aiming to maximize their effectiveness early in the game.

The true strength of Unearth lies in its synergy with corpse-based mechanics. For example, it pairs beautifully with skills like Detonate Dead or Volatile Dead, turning the corpses it summons into devastating explosions or homing projectiles. If you’re focusing on summoning or necromancy, Unearth is a great enabler for raising minions like skeletons or spectres, providing a steady supply of corpses to animate.

Another standout feature of Unearth is its ability to scale with multiple damage types, such as elemental or chaos damage, depending on your chosen build. By linking Unearth with support gems like Spell Cascade, you can cover a wider area with multiple projectiles, making it easier to hit large groups of enemies. Add Controlled Destruction or Elemental Focus, and Unearth becomes a significant damage dealer on its own.

Additionally, Unearth’s low mana cost makes it an excellent utility skill that won’t drain your resources while you focus on other abilities. It’s particularly effective when combined with corpse-centric buffs like Corpse Pact, which enhances your attack or casting speed whenever nearby corpses are consumed.

Whether you’re using Unearth as a primary offensive tool, a corpse generator for explosive damage, or a utility spell for summoning and buffs, it’s a must-have for Witch builds in the early game. Its adaptability and synergy with a wide range of skills ensure that Unearth remains an essential pick for those looking to dominate the early stages of Path of Exile 2 with strategic gameplay.

Conclusion

Choosing the right skill gems early in Path of Exile 2 is crucial for building a powerful Witch character and surviving the challenges of Wraeclast. Whether you’re focusing on summoning minions, dealing devastating AoE damage, or controlling the battlefield with curses and debuffs, the skill gems in this list offer versatility and strength for a variety of playstyles. From the explosive utility of Unearth to the reliable damage of Essence Drain, these gems are designed to help you progress smoothly through the early game and lay a strong foundation for your build. Experiment with different combinations to find what works best for your character, and enjoy the strategic depth that makes Witch builds so rewarding to play.