Path of Exile 2 Witch Lich Build Guide: Eternal Life Explained
Can't Heal with Your Health Flask? It's Probably This
So you rolled a Witch in Path of Exile 2, saw that “Lich” Ascendancy tree glowing like a neon “play me” sign, and thought, “hell yeah, I want to be the queen of darkness!”
Then you slam a few points into Eternal Life and suddenly…your health bar looks like it’s bugged out. Flasks don’t work, regen feels dead, and you’re spamming in chat “is this a bug or am I dumb?”
Spoiler: you’re kinda dumb, but it’s ok. Eternal Life is working exactly as intended, and it’s actually one of the nastiest defensive setups you can slap on a Witch right now.
You just need to flip your mindset on how to play it.
Witch Ascendancy: What the Lich Actually Does
At a high level, a Lich Witch isn’t some fragile glass cannon spamming chaos damage and hoping for the best. The Lich archetype is about embracing the void: tanking through Energy Shield, shrugging off dots, and punishing enemies with unrelenting damage-over-time.
Image: Witch Lich Ascendency | Eternal Life | Path of Exile 2 | Grinding Gear Games
Most players lean into a chaos DoT playstyle (Essence Drain + Contagion is the bread-and-butter), stacking ES gear and recharge speed so they can kite endlessly while everything melts around them.
With nodes like Soulless Form and unique items like Atziri’s Disdain, you’re not just throwing purple goo. You’re turning into a wall of damage mitigation that makes other casters look like a candy-filled piñata.
So when you pick Eternal Life, you’re doubling down on what makes the Lich truly unkillable…once you stop fighting against how it works, of course.
Your Life Not Healing is a Feature, Not a Bug
Here’s the raw deal:
Life cannot change while Energy Shield is active.
That means no healing, no damage, no leeching, no life costs. Basically, your red bar is frozen until your blue bar pops.To the untrained eye, this looks like a busted interaction. Your health flask does nothing. Your regen feels gone. It feels wrong.
Here's Why Eternal Life is Secretly Busted
Any damage that would’ve hit your life while ES holds? Ignored.
Immunity to bleed and poison while your Energy Shield is up.
Immunity to damage-over-time effects that normally bypass ES.
Now Stack That Damage Mitigation
Soulless Form Ascendancy node: 10% less damage taken.
Heavy Buffer passive node: toss on 5% more.
Atziri’s Disdain (unique helm): another 10% less.
Image: Atziri’s Disdain Gold Circlet Unique Helm | Path of Exile 2 | Grinding Gear Games
That’s around 25% mitigation right out the gate, before factoring in your already tanky ES scaling.
So no, it’s not bugged.
Eternal Life just rewrites the rules of survival for the Lich.
The Trade-Offs of Eternal Life (And How to Beat Them)
Of course, this isn’t free. Eternal Life comes with baggage:
You’re fully reliant on Energy Shield to live. If it breaks, you’re suddenly mortal again.
You can’t use life flasks until your shield is gone, which makes a lot of players panic when they see low life behind a full shield.
The Fix? Learn to Play By New Rules
Slot Convalescence to restart ES recharge instantly.
Pair it with Second Wind Support to give yourself an extra emergency charge.
Treat your life as a bonus buffer. Don’t worry about it sitting low, it’s just there to stop you from getting one-shot if your ES cracks mid-fight.
Image: Path of Exile 2 Convalescence Socket Options | Grinding Gear Games
Pro tip: If your health bar is stressing you out, take a few hits, let your shield drop, slam that flask, then back off while Convalescence gets your shield online again. Think of it like tag-teaming your survivability.
Shield handles the heavy lifting, life only steps in as a backup dancer.
Your Shield Is Your New Life
The biggest mindset shift for Eternal Life is simple: stop thinking of red bar = life.
Your ES is your health.
Your health is just “bonus health.”
When ES is up, you’re a ghost wrapped in void armor. You’re completely immune to all the nasty bleed, poison, and DoT crap that normally makes boss fights a nightmare. When ES cracks, that’s your signal to disengage, recharge, and get back to deleting mobs from off-screen.
Play it right, and you’ll live longer than just about any other caster build out there. Play it wrong, and yeah – you’ll die while spamming “bug???” in global chat.
The Third Edict: What It Means for Lich Builds in poe 2
Path of Exile 2’s Patch 0.3.0 (aka The Third Edict) just dropped, bringing with it asynchronous trading, new regions, and more endgame polish. But here’s the important part: nothing in this patch directly nerfed Eternal Life or the Lich toolkit.
So where does that leave us?
Eternal Life builds are untouched, still monsters in the meta.
No hidden tweaks to ES interactions or flask mechanics, despite the community’s wishful thinking.
If balance changes come, they’ll likely be in future updates once more data rolls in about ES-heavy Liches trivializing boss mechanics.
For now, this build is alive and well – ironically, more alive than most.
Eternal Logic Bombs
So let’s cut through the noise. Eternal Life isn’t bugged. It isn’t broken. It’s a deliberate design choice that rewards players who stop thinking “life first” and start embracing the void.
If you can shift your perspective and play smart with your shield uptime, this build turns you into a nightmare for anything dumb enough to stand in your purple chaos clouds.
Bottom line: If your health bar looks dead…good! That’s the point. Your enemies are the ones with something to worry about.
Let us know in the comments below what you want me to go over next and be sure to check out our other Path of Exile 2 Guides and grab Path of Exile 2 for yourself on Steam if you haven’t already!
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Save My Monk
September 4, 2025
so is this only a thing for Witch? I playinga monk and had this problem
Ayefkay
September 5, 2025
Hey Save My Monk, thanks for stopping by! Yeah, this is specifically in regards to Witch/Lich play so if you’re having trouble with health not regening I would check your build to make sure there’s not something going on and worst case scenario – you can always fill out a bug report on Path of Exile 2 forums.
DDD
September 5, 2025
I wonder “Sacrificial Offering” can be used with Eternal life.
Ayefkay
September 5, 2025
Hey DDD, thanks for stopping by! I’m not 100% sure, but I think you’re talking about Sacrificial Blood, maybe? If so, it don’t think that would work with Lich specifically since your Lich abilities all still use Mana and you would need to ascend to Blood Mage Witch to convert mana-based spells into life-based spells. That would be amazingly fun and seriously OP (in the best possible way) if you could though!
Anonymous Failure
September 6, 2025
I have lich but I didn’t realize what Eternal Lives did when I read it it but its really annoying. I’ll get my shield broken and lose health but then my shield will start coming back before I can pop my heal and I’ll be stuck at like 5 health just basically waiting for my shield to break again and for a gentle breeze to kill me.
Ayefkay
September 7, 2025
Hey Anonymous, yeah it can get you into rough situations but you just have to be ready to hit your flask if you know your shield is going to break. Honestly, sometimes I hit my flask even before it pops, just so there’s no down time between the shield breaking and health regening. Then when you’re topped off – you slam on Convalescence to keep your health fixed at full health and you’re good to go!