While summon necro’s are far better than they ever were in classic diablo 2, I still feel that they are far weaker than the other build like the bone poison builds I have seen. I think that if blizzard were to link skeleton and skeleton mages together this would vastely improve how strong both of them are.
Right now the only bonuses skeletons and skeleton mages get are from skeleton mastery and summon resist. But, if skeleton mages and skeletons were to get bonuses from each other as well they would greatly improve one another. Also, I think Revive should not have a time limit before they go poof.
The problem with mages is the damage is low once you figure all the bonuses in. Warriors benefit from Amp and Might, lowering the resists of the target while the warriors get their damage increased. Mages do not have a function of increasing their damage, we only have the ability to lower the resists of the target. Thus we are missing 50% of the damage increase for mages vs what we get from warriors.
So to ‘fix’ the summoner we would need mage damage to increase. Some would be happy moving mages to skelly archers so they benefit from might. I would prefer they get a version of mastery that ups their damage as they get higher in level.
That would still leave the complaint that they get in the way but any decent summoner has figured that issue out.
Creating a synergy between skellys and mages won’t fix them by default. It would probably only make people drop 20 pts into mages to up the warrior damage, but I don’t think they would start using mages.
I do agree the summoner is a bit lacking on the high end vs poison or bone necy’s though. I still love running them though.
Removing the time limit from Revives makes them too strong. Udars are the ultimate revive and the whole reason we can do Ubers. Making them permeate would mean I don’t need skellies, I can get 20-30 Udars and forgo skellies. A longer time limit may be in order but allowing me to go around and pick up the strongest monsters in the game is too ‘nice.’
Necro summoner’s virtue is being a build work at 60 points + 1 point skills.
The last 20 points can be allocated
Revive only lasts for 3 minutes, making the time unlimited wouldn’t be absurd as eventually the areas the necromancer wants to farm will run out and he will need to open a new game.
Golem Master: Loading an extra runeword into the golem is possible when playing points into golem mastery, but the risk of character death makes this an adventure in putting anything more expensive than an insight.
Skeleton mages are weak as stated and blizzard doesn’t seem willing to change them again. Infinity on a necro sum mercenary is a very misallocated resource.
Missing runewords/unique items that do more for the summoner.
Fanaticism coming from Beast is simply the best for necro sum, but it is made for druid. There is no fanaticism for Wand.
For the mercenary’s weapon the best weapon, the Pride that gives aura of concentration comes with the Cham rune which I repeat, it’s just not worse than slain monster rest in peace.
The fact that the build works makes the dev comfortable, since we don’t have a mosaic to call our own.
Changing Skeleton Mages to Skeleton (elemental) Archers would do a LOT since then they would benefit from auras and Amp just like the Warriors and most Revives do.
2 Likes
Changing them to archers and making their element damage a conversion of physical is the best way to fix them. It allows buffs like might, concentration, and fanaticism, to work on them. It also makes skeleton mastery give physical damage to them which in turn increases their damage. This is a very low ball change that would help summonmancer viable in p8 terror.
The mages work fine. Put 20 points in skeleton mastery, 20 in skeletons , 20 in mages, 1 in summon resist. Then get an act 2 thorns merc , cast amp damage on the enemies let them deal physical damage