Just got this item on one of my barb’s trav runs. It looks BiS for summons. The skill adds are nuts. But this youtuber is saying the bone prison proc can trap you and is dangerous. Is this a big issue in practice? I was using a Blackhand Key, but this new wand is so much better. I’d rather use it.
Arm is like an Occy, yes it’s BIS for a summoner, yes it’s dangerous and can get your killed.
Lets compare it to Blackhand though.
Arm + 2 Summons, +2 P&B 10% FCR +3 Skelly +3 Mastery +2 mages good chunk of mana
Blackhand: +2 all Necy +1 Curses, 30% FCR, 50 Life, Fire resists.
Blackhand is a good solid wand, it brings in the 30% FCR to help hit some breakpoints. The drawback is it’s only slightly better than Spirit as the FCR is comparable, Blackhand has +1 to curses and the life bonus is about the same. All in All it’s only a small step up from Spirit.
Arm give +5 to Skelly/Mastery, This is just impressive. No bonus to curses but most players don’t really use the curses aside from amp/decrep so for most players this isn’t an issue.
Arm will give you stronger Skellys, I commonly say it’s the best weapon to summon up your boys with, then switch to something else (usually Beast or HoTo). For the summoner that doesn’t use well rounded curses it’s BiS but you also need to be good enough not to get hit. It also helps if you already have Enigma and can just telly out if you get bone prisoned.
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Thanks for the detailed analysis. It’s why I post questions like this to the board. I hadn’t thought about using the Arm to summon, then doing a swap. I think you just inadvertantly answered a question I justed asked in another thread, which is do I use Faith on an A1 merc or Pride on an A2. I can use Arm to summon, swap to beast for fana, and use pride on the merc. So the entire army has all three auras.
It can get you killed in tight areas but realistically who cares, the benefits outweigh the bone prison negatives. It’s only a real concern in hard-core. The places it will kill you are places you won’t be going to anyways like maggot lair.
I will always get this wand on a summoner because it is bis.
Arm of King Leoric is a great wand. You can use it to summon skellys even in max end game GG gear and it will give you the strongest skeletons that you can get. You can switch it to something else as Rondel stated, so you don’t have to equip it 24/7. I currently use it on ladder.
My alternative suggestion would be Carin Shard. A very underrated wand for summon necro imho.
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Someone was nice enough to give me one of these the other day when I was in a public Baal run. I sarcastically said I needed more summons as I had 10 Skellys and 20 revives out when they then said “hey I got something for you”.
I’ve almost died because of the bone prison thing but as said above, I’m not playing Hardcore so meh, and it doesn’t happen that often.