Old build: C3>Bokor3>Kabbalist>Exorcist2
Tried : C3>Bokor3>Kabbalist>Exorcist3 and C3>Bokor3>Kabbalist2>Exorcist2
Best option:
C3>Bokor3>Kabbalist2>Exorcist2
While Exorcist C3 surely had more damage to offer, the utility in dailies and endgame content wasn’t better than at Exorcist C2. The new attributes for C3 aren’t useful in any way outside of PVP, and the new damage skill Katadikadzo, while being very strong, didn’t prove to be reliable enough in solo play [i.e. without Surespell].
Also, the difference on normal monster kills simply isn’t there. While both Rubric and Aqua Benedicta deal about 17% more total damage when compared to C2, their damage modifiers are too small to make a real difference in Velcoffer Nest and Challenge Mode.
When going for dailies, as long as you have about 7k matk, the monsters die either way, be it with Rubric level 11 or level 16. The new maps also don’t have enough monsters to make a higher level feasible.
Sure, you have 2 overheats of Katadikadzo to use, but the skill itself isn’t strong enough against the majority of new monsters (non-devil/non-dark) to kill them in one cast, so I rarely even used the skill and rather used good old Effigy for ensured kills. You also need to mind your interruptible cast time, which is a huge bummer to the skill without Safety Zone/Mackangdal/Sterea Troph.
In contrast, I was far more flexible with Nahash and Merkabah since you can use them to kill flying monsters while also having decent amounts of extra damage [Divine Protection attribute] that’s useful for challenge mode and Velcoffer Nest.
And given that the Divine Protection attribute now boosts more reliably, it can be useful to have two of them in Velcoffer Nest (100% uptime by rotating).
It also offers me access to level 12 Ein Sof, which is really useful since it has only 4 seconds downtime and provides a huge HP boost for Velcoffer (not that it’s really needed, but it’s nice to have a HP bolster on the Exorcist to improve overall survivability).
Last but not least there is Double Chance, which was nerfed a little [i.e. you need more skilllevels to reach the same amount of damage boost, so you’ll be stuck at level 11 = 88% of the original damage at C2],
but still provides a decent boost every now and then for Effigy/Damballa or Rubric/Aqua Benedicta.
All in all I found the build with Kabbalist C2 to be more comfortable for every activity ingame so I decided to go for it instead of chasing after Circle 3 of Exorcist which was providing on average just a little more damage.