How do the mechanics of CS work with ORotZ? Is it once per initial hit? Or 7x per initial hit (ie: each of the 7 skeletons initial hits creating a separate proc)? or something else?
I’m asking because the Maxroll Pestilence T16/Nephalem Rifts guide (https://maxroll.gg/d3/guides/pestilence-corpse-lance-necromancer-guide) uses Command Skeletons to proc LotD cooldowns via ORotZ. And here’s another guide similar to the Maxroll one using CS with ORotZ but without Jesseth: Power up command skeletons - #3 by Isend-2850
Given that CS costs 2.5x the resource of Bone Spear and Death Nova, it doesn’t seem to make sense to use it unless you get at least 2.5x ORotZ procs per invocation. I know that CS is used for GR speeds and pushing with Pestilence because those builds use the Jesseth set. However, for Nephalem Rifts, the Jesseth set is not used and hence there is no damage bonus from CS.
only initial manual hit. 1 time every time you activate it to attack anything. can spam it and it will work, but mana costly.
that guide suggests you numlock autofire it and it will work anytime you mouseover something. i dont suggest that myself, it’s probably clunky as f. but some do it that way since you’re just teleporting around.
you’re supposed to be almost perma LotD sucking the juices of everything you kill and Orotz helps keep you there but if you have maximum cooldown reduction it doesnt take much. if LotD ends then just spam Command until it’s back and ready.
if you run Messerschmitd’s or In-geom you’ll almost always be perma lotd if you can still kill things.
Well, Jesseth’s gives more damage and it made sense back then to run it for pushing, but the set is one of the weakest sets in the game now so nobody uses it for anything but speed farming T16s and the other guide with In-geom Messer’s removes the need for Orotz and makes the build run smoother and farming much more enjoyable.
Thanks Bravata. So the 2 Neph Rift guides I linked to seem suboptimal then because they are using CS without Jesseth and thus use 2.5x as much resource than necessary without any increased damage benefits.
No, no guides on maxroll are suboptimal you just dont read:
VARIANTS: Nephalem rifts AND GR Solo Speeds: Gameplay
The gameplay is easiest in T16 because our Land of the Dead should always be up. Spam Devour and Blood Rush as you fly forward and everything should die easily! To help with cooldown management, Numlock or otherwise spam Command Skeletons permanently and hover over enemies as much as possible while rushing through the rift to proc Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac. On elites and the boss, you can also cast Corpse Lance manually to help with DPS.
For a slightly weaker but more laid back approach, you can play the same build without Jesseth Arms and the need to spam Command Skeletons all the time by equipping Reilena’s Shadowhook, dropping Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac for Haunted Visions and replacing the Skeletons with Simulacrum Reservoir.
To go even faster at the cost of a lot of damage, you can drop Jesseth Arms for In-geom and Lost Time. This guarantees essentially no downtime whatsoever and give you even more mobility.
I assumed the Speed GR descriptions were specific to the Speed GR setup and not the Neph Rifts one. But even if those descriptions were also included in the Neph Rifts section, I don’t understand how that justifies the Neph Rift variant because:
I’m not sure how this is relevant? The Neph Rift variant only drops Jesseth but does NOT drop ORotZ.
My guess is that in the Speed GR version, they can drop ORotZ because of Captain Crimson, but the Neph Rift variant doesn’t have Captain Crimson, hence the need for ORotZ and a resource spender for it, and I don’t know why they still use CS in that non-Jesseth case because BS or DN are more efficient.
This only explains why Jesseth is replaced with In-geom but not why you would use CS with ORotZ instead of BS or DN with ORotZ for the non-Jesseth case. Unless perhaps the the Neph Rift variant is incorrect?