Didn’t people figure out that overall the new version of pally thorns was actually weaker than the other version at high skill levels? Or am I miss remembering.
Only only game I ever found reflect damage good on was Grim Dawn.
I dont really like fire because it sucks at baalruns and in act 4.
Personally I just never liked the hit boxes on any of the fire spells. Like you can always find a place to farm… but man those hitboxes.
Damn… makes me wonder though… how a wind druid would be with act 1 merc with brand. Never actually tried that… hmmmmm
it was changed/buffed. the pally aura thorns. does more damage now. not like crazy high but its better
In normal i faced no issue. That’s why i said is super ez ans strong early on. But after a point, need to respec to wind, or summoner or SS 
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Found it today on Mephisto nightmare
Swift - I’m working on doing this SSF playthrough now! I’m level ~50 in act 4 nightmare doing 200-1000 dmg with an rare axe I found (and 3 points bear, 3 points dire wolves) and its getting kinda sluggist.
What/how did you get a decent weapon to get through hell? Is there a certain base/runeword that I could “easily” farm and utilize?
I’m doing a SSF playthrough of a fury/summoning hybrid and in act 4 nm with a rare axe doing about 300-1k dmg.
Did you find any good weapons at this point to push you over the edge? Any key runewords? How did you distribute your summoning skills after fury/werewolf maxed?
i did get lucky with weapons honestly, in norm act 5 i found a steeldriver, which i upped
then in hell act 1 i found a windhammer
i had to respec for the windhammer, and in hell i also had to put a single point in each summon
and then i had a 49% tarnhelm and sig shield and spirit sword on swap for summon prebuff
the entirely of hell i relied on my summons to tank.
i also got an act 3 fire merc with enchant to deal with the physical immunes.
my resist were ranked from -30 on poison to positive 8 ish on lightning and fire
for armor i used a hawkmail i found for cbf.
other than the spirit swap i used no runewords ( although pre-hell my act 2 AR merc had insight, i should have gotten fire merc earlier though.
merc also has an insight sword
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if u can find a lem i highly recommend treachery as your armor though, i never found one or any other piece of cbf for use ater i took hawmail off ( ironically i found 2 hawkmails… so my merc had the other >.>)
I found that, before the update, Summon Druid was actually viable, even in Hell, though that summon druid was different in the way in that it used Werebear+Shockwave combo as support, allowing you to practically control the entire battlefield, while having a Reaper’s Toll act 2 merc with Might for damage. You could even kill ubers with it. The problem, obviously, was that it was incredibly slow, due to the fact you obviously either used Dire Wolves or Bear, and couldn’t have both, thus clear times were the slowest.
Now though? It’s a massive boost, and summon druids can clear parts far easier, especially if they went with the classic Werebear+Shockwave build. Spirit Wolves need adjustment, obviously, as cold damage is pointless, but other than that, it’s literally a 100% improvement on a build, possibly even moreso. Now, if you really wanted to, you could go pure summondruid and not struggle as often, as you can simply use a wand with Amplify charges to compensate the lack of stuns.
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I agree with you for the most part, my HC SSF pure summoner is half way through Hell Act 2. I have never been that far with a pure summoner before without mod, and he is not even struggling.
But, are there wands with amplify damage charges?
unfortunately, after taking a look, there is none, I mistook Attract for Amplify, HOWEVER! There is some odd weapons that do in fact have Amplify or Decrepify!
One of them being the unique Gavel of Pain, with a CtC of 5% of Amplify Damage, as well as 3 charges for a level 8 amplify, so obviously that’s for bosses, but the other interesting one was
Spellsteel, a unique bearded axe that has 30 charges of level 3 Decrepify, which I feel is far more useful in higher difficulties, what with physical immunes running amok.
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There is no wands with amplify damage charges.Thats the big problem!
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I implemented runeword Brand into my druid build, its amazing.
Also lacerator can cast amplify on attack.
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that’s awesome! It’s stuff like this that opens up an entire new way of playing, people just need to widen their horizon and grab these off-lane runewords/weapons and give them a whirl.
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That’s the spirit! This is what metaslaves can’t comprehend.
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how viable is Spirit of Barbs now that it returns flat damage?
Someone has numbers how does it scales beyond 20?
Its viability when whole zoo is summoned?
unfortunately, Spirit of Barbs, while stepping in the right direction for reflect damage, is still not enough, honestly. To put into example, if you had enough +Skill to pump it up to 45, which is possible, you would get 1,382 damage reflection, so while it’s great in normal, and alright in Nightmare, it’s underpowered in Hell, what with late game monsters having 17k or more health, as well as having 50% or more physical resistance. Even with Amp damage, it’s still under performing at best.
For a whole zoo, it can be decent, what with applying damage across the board against mobs as to help with pumping out damage, I think HoW spirit is still the go to for raw damage output when it comes to dealing with mobs, as well as bosses.
So Barbs does physical damage? I mean, the return damage is physical right?
1400 physical damage on hell sounds like absolutely ignore-able number. 
well, thats kind of sad.
Would be interesting in the damage returned would be physical/poison or something.
Also another question, does the return aura from barbs stacks with Bramble?
Technically you could have 40-45 levels in summ tree + 15-21 levels from bramble.
If it does stack, you would have like 55-66 lvl return aura.