Doing Necro-Summoner correctly

Necromancer
1

I see a lot of posts about “S” tiered gear, and dying in HC, and how “weak” skels are or that a Summoner needs love …

I am here to tell you, you are doing it wrong!

First, you don’t need “S” tiered gear, you don’t need a Torch or an Anni [they are just nice to haves] …

Stop using single tree builds.

Gear:

Trangs Helm, socketed with an Um rune [adds +15 res all]
Trangs Armor, upped, socketed with Um Rune [mine has 1230 def][adds +15 res all]
Trangs Shield, upped, socketed with Um rune [adds +22 res all]
Trangs Belt
Trangs Gloves, upped

[using the just the Um’s and the Anya quests, that’s +82 res all before you even count your gear and charms … it’s not rocket science][Trangs full set adds ungodly amounts of res all] My def is over 2.3k, easily, with the upped gear. That’s w/o Bo/CTA.

Arm of King Leoric
Marrowwalks +2
+3 summon ammy
Res rings

Summon GC’s [I only use 7]

Stats:

Max

Skel Mastery
Summon Skels
Summon Res [Res is just as important to your summons as it is to you for survivability]

Summon Clay Golem-10
Golem Mastery-5

Rest in tree-1

Curses

1 in each on the right so have Amp, Decrepify, and Lower Res

[Amp will be your go-to skill - Decrepify combined with Clay Golem for single overpowered enemies, especially for bosses like D & Baal - Lower Res mostly for group play allowing casters to do more efficient damage]

Bone skills

Teeth-1
CE-1 [this will help in clearing certain areas a little more efficiently]
Bone Armor-1
Bone Wall-1 [this can save you in an emergency - can use it for emergency separation between you & melee enemies - does not help vs. casters]

… any more points can go where you feel like it …

Act 2 Might merc with Obedience … You do NOT need Insight. I have base mana plus what gear adds. I NEVER have mana issues, ever.

Really inexpensive, easy to find and/or trade for

Just enough points in str for gear [118]

Rest in Vitality.

My res’, in Hell, are 100+ [AFTER difficulty penalties]

Build your character to survive, not to look/sound good on paper.

If you cannot survive with this build, you don’t deserve to play

This build can solo every corner of Hell. Albeit, some areas a little slower than others. But, nonetheless, it has no issues like Hammerdins with Immune to Magic.

Utilize your skills available to you. Utilize your army. Remember, you are an army commander, not a head-to-head melee char.

:edit:

And, NO. I do not use teleport. I am not trying to kill D or something else 123 x an hour. I actually enjoy playing the game. I actually enjoy killing a lot of monsters and getting their drops. You’d be surprised the gear that has dropped for me that botters never get to see … because I play the game.

At the end of the day, my army:

15-16 skels
9 mages
19-20 revives
merc
me

** I use this build in HC. Obviously, as I am still alive, I haven’t died using it.

2

Just started thinking about building a Necro, and have never, in the history of D2, much less R played one… not even started one and gave up.

Always told myself I would make one at some point, so, along the way I collected the Trang’s set, have a couple King L’s and Marrow’s and some usable 10fcr/res rings… no +3 Ammy but do have a +2 all skills Necro Ammy with level 3 tele charges (and a few Mara’s).

Also have a Death’s Web and a Mang Songs… would that cause you to make any changes?

Thanks for taking the time to post this… I want to finish getting my Zoo Druid to lvl98 then taking a break from him for a while, this could be fun.

3

You can alter build to whatever suits your play style. I am just saying that you can use the the full trang ouls set and still be strong in the game without having to resort to “having to have” overpowered gear, like enigma and such. They re not needed.

Bear in mind, there is NO one single do-all to end-all perfect build. There are many strong builds either using “S” tiered gear or basic gear. Mine is an example of using an intended set build. Perfect, absolutely not. Strong, hell yes! Try it, make it your own, adjust to fit YOUR needs. You will be pleasantly surprised.

Keep in mind, replacing parts of the trangs set will cause you to lose some of the full set’s bonuses.

Go to arreat summit to see the entire full set bonuses you get. Now ad in the benefits of upping the parts than can be, and the benefits of adding Um runes to helm/armor/shield.

Is quite strong.

:EDIT:

Also in the interim …

Bone Armor runeword for Necro …

Is a great runeword to use until get full trangs …

15% Chance To Cast level 10 Bone Armor When Struck
15% Chance To Cast level 10 Bone Spear On Striking
+2 To Necromancer Skill Levels
+100-150 To Mana (varies)
All Resistances +30
Damage Reduced By 7

It gives skills, mana, and Res All to hold you over.

The key is staying alive until can equip Trangs.

Vitality & Resistances are the number 1 priority to staying alive.

Concentrate on getting Skels maxed out, then work on the other skills as you go. Maybe get skels maxed then 1 in each other in the skills mentioned above until got them covered, then add to them as you see fit.

In early stages, skels will die, no getting around that. Just keep a few mana pots handy to raise more. Once wearing trangs, mana becomes a non-issue. After getting all of the gear, you’ll see just how strong your skels are …

You can swap any gear you want in any slot that makes you happy. Just keep in mind, as you take away parts of the Trangs set, the overall benefits that the full set provides diminish. It can be a trade-off … do so carefully and test out in lower difficulty to see the differences.

As far as Mangs and web … I never had a use for them, but that choice is yours … I like the bene’s of King Leoric’s despite the chance of being bone-walled in if hit. I rarely get hit, but it does happen. It’s like the side effect of using Occy. Take the good with the bad.

Can socket Leorics and add an all res jewel or some such. [an all res with life jewel would be the bomb][+15 res all/+20 life jewel would be awesome!][Magic Scintillating Jewel of Hope]

What I offered is a means that I have tested and used over many years. It can always be changed and fine-tuned to make it better and better. With what I have listed, I have been happy, maybe a little complacent, but it’s because it works. And, it works well for me. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.

Caveat: Once you learn to build this properly and play it strongly in HC, you’ll learn that when you you play SC, you almost never die, lol. While all those around you keep dying very regularly. As you see this, you’ll find it very amusing. Learning to survive in HC only enhances your SC experience.

I firmly believe Blizz got it backwards. Originally, you had to finish SC in Hell to unlock HC mode. Personally, I think you need to survive, learn to build properly, and finish HC to unlock Easycore. People would learn how to build strong builds and not cookie-cutter builds that they complain about dying a lot, lol.

1 Like
4

You intentionally leave out Dim Vision? It’s quite literally one of the most powerful curses. It is so underrated and underutilized. it’s saved my hide so many times.

And yes, you DO need a source of teleport, if only to position your fleet.

5

I mean I’ve played without teleport on necro and it’s fun, still, but telestomping with 50 minions is unparalleled. Telestomp one guy and then explode the whole screen with CE. Not a lot of danger there for SC or HC. Can tele back out if needed and can still play the whole game like that. Tele is a necro weapon, not a content skipper.

6

If it was intended to be a necro weapon/skill, then it would’ve been included in their skill tree.

If you “need” this, then you you do not know the basics of being able to play a true necro-summoner.

7

If it wasn’t, it wouldn’t be available on a generic piece of gear for anyone to use. Much of what make this game great is the cross-use of skills. My point was teleport has a purpose for necros that doesn’t involve skipping content. But you knew that when you got snarky.

8

I’ve played necromancer most of my adult life. The class can function without it yes, but you basically have one hand tied behind your back because of the horrible AI pathfinding. Maggot Lair. Nuff said. The AI is terrible, so to compensate, you need a mechanism to reset your minions position. Be it teleport, staff, enigma, amulet or even a town port.