This guy is basically part of every build’s load-out because Insight is so insanely useful, but nearly all of the build guides say to have him use either Might or Holy Freeze. Do you ever find uses for some of the other auras, either as a permanent option or switching out for specific areas?
Might is great for summoned armies but for P/B builds it really doesn’t add much utility. Even if running a Daggermancer it’s not much use, since any dagger’s physical melee-weapon damage is only fair at best (Blackbog’s does under 100 per hit). It only noticeably boosts the merc and golem, but even then there’s only two of them so it won’t really add enough DPS overall for it to matter much.
Stacked with Clay Golem and Decrep, Holy Freeze can help bring mobs and bosses to a near-standstill, which is hilarious and awesome. Unfortunately enemies affected by cold tend to shatter at death (leaving me less ammo for CE), so I tend to avoid the HF aura.
I seem to get the most mileage out of a Prayer merc for Insight synergy, especially on my P/B build. Running my summoner I almost always stick with Might, but occasionally will still swap the Might guy out for Prayer if I’m losing skellies too fast.
Defiance is nice in theory but doesn’t seem to be enough of a defensive boost to commit to it. I’m not sure I’ve ever found any use for Blessed Aim, and Thorns just doesn’t reflect enough damage to matter much in anything but low-level mobs, even if stacked with IM. A Thorns build just isn’t viable in D2 like it is in D3.
Has anyone gotten any use out of the less-popular auras, and if so what build/location were they useful for?
Might is a must for a summoner, I’ve been ‘researching’ the skelly warriors vs mages and the might merc is an important part of why skellys are better than mages. Quick thought on that: without might and amp damage mages do close to the same damage as skellys.
I’m using a Prayer merc on my Trapper, the prayer double synergizes with Insight to give double the healing. I keep thinking I need to swap him out for a holy freeze merc but he keeps delivering just fine.
Blessed Aim is good for some builds that lack AR. Bowazon’s use them early on sometimes even into hell. Blade Fury Assassins really benefit from the AR the BA merc delivers. If more players understood the importance of AR for melee builds this guy would get used more and you would see less people complaining that their Barb can’t kill anything in hell.
Defiance I have seen some melee players running, Thorns is useless just because how useless the skill is now. Monsters have too much health compared to damage done.
Last thing I’d say on this: Summoners don’t need Insight. A higher damage stick or one with good melee mods can be better. The only reason to get Insight on a summoner is to spam CE or telly if you have Enigma, both of those things are excessive on a high level summoner.
I’ve used the prayer one leveling but I was running a poison spec so very situational. I’m still a novamancer and I use might now that skellies are strong.
Yah I totally get the utility of other auras for other classes, I’m not surprised that Blessed Aim is useful for bowazons, as you mentioned. I was mainly getting at necro-specific usage, and it seems there are only three that I can find any use for, and one of those (HF) gimps one of my core skills so I avoid it.