06-07-2004, 11:52 AM
As someone who favored Skeleton Necromancers from day 1 (yes, that's D2 Classic from right when it came out ;-), I can only say: Wow. Patch 1.10 really made the summoner Necromancer what I had expected when I created my first one (and got bitterly disappointed that day many years ago).
Basically, what I do (your mileage may vary, but I've successfully and repeatedly gotten this kind of build to hell hellforge) is start out with raise skeleton up to level 3 (allowing for three skeletons), then putting a point into mastery, then amplify, then mastery up to 3-5 (toss in the clay golem when it becomes available).
After that, you have three skeletons and a golem, and your little troop should be fairly capable of dealing with any threat your level.
What I do next, is max raise skeleton. After spell level 3, you only get another new skeleton for every three skillpoints you invest. So you gain your fourth skellie only after reaching level 6 raise skeleton. BUT: pour them points in nonetheless. Each point in raise skel increases skeleton life, damage, attack rating and defense. Max raise skeleton first thing you do.
If you need power against act bosses, I suggest investing a few skill points in curses, to get to decrepify. This curse really cuts down on act boss danger.
Mages are a matter of taste. I, favoring the image of a necromancer with a larger skeleton army, do invest points, even though I don't right away. I first max raise skeleton, then skeleton mastery, and maybe put 1-3 points into skeleton mages somwehere in between to get those first three mages (more mages come at the cost of 3 skill points per mage, just like with raise skeleton).
You may also choose to spend a skillpoint into teeth and corpse explosion (maybe even as early as act 2, it works wonders at doorways, but eats your little starting mana like mad).
Revives are a topic of discussion among many people, but frankly, I don't put points into the prerequisites and revive before mid to late nightmare. Maxed skeletons with maxed mastery can easily take you all the way through to late nm.
As to how much energy points you need: if you don't have lots of +mana gear, try to keep enough mana on your hands to raise 3-4 skeletons. Drink mana potions when you need more. Mana potions are for sale now.
Strength would depend on your equipment, but most people stop at around 70-100.
A few final hints:
1. Try to go "Akara shopping" for a +3 raise skeleton, +3 skeleton mastery wand right away once you get enough gold for that (or something similar, pick whatever shows up). +skills HEAVILY bolster your army. At spell level 32 with level 32 mastery, skeletons do a wee bit under 400 damage a hit, and have around 800-900 life each.
2. Act 2 Mercenaries:
a. Prayer (combat, normal and hell difficulty): cool in all of normal. Greatly supports your and your skeletons' life regeneration. Next to worthless, though, from mid nightmare on. Either your skeleton can take the immediate threat and live, or prayer won't heal it fast enough to make a difference. Plus, it doesn't help your damage output at all. Which is bad. Never leave Frenzy Minotaurs standing in front of your troops longer than necessary. Especially when they're fanaticism enchanted.
b. Blessed Aim (offensive, normal and hell difficulty): not necessary in normal difficulty, but a real staple on hell difficulty, especially when you do like me and go to hell diff at level 65. Skeletons are created at your character level when you summon them, so my skels were lvl 65,and monsters tended to quickly reach the 80s, basically putting my skeletons at a severe disadvantage in regards of hit probability. Blessed Aim can go a long way towards setting off this "penalty", and keeps them marching more easily.
c. Defiance (defensive, normal and hell difficulty): bolsters the defense rating of your minions. However, as with prayer, this does not help your damage output at all, so I advise against it. There are monsters who completely ignore defense, too. Besides, skeletons have some defense, but nothing like what a barbarian or tanker paladin could achieve, so the benefit of defiance is somewhat less.
d. Thorns (combat, nightmare difficulty): This is a blessing against heavy hitter melee monsters. IF your skeletons are durable enough to take a couple of hits, the enemies simply kill themselves on your troops. Marvelous. Drawback: Thorns is useless against ranged attackers (as long as your minions haven't closed the distance) and magical attacks. Nice against melee-happy act bosses like duriel or andariel, too.
e. Might (offensive, nightmare difficulty): Another good candidate (the other two being blessed aim and thorns) to choose. Might can really skyrocket your minions' damage, more than tripling it. Consider a skeleton melee damage of 350 ok? Whaddaya say to over 1000 damage per hit? Might is good, and it supports all your melee minions no matter what they hit, be it melee monster, ranged, or magic. On hell difficulty, it means they will hit less often than with blessed aim on. I still don't know what would calculate better. I have used both, and liked both, even though secretly I am starting to like blessed aim better.
f. Holy Freeze (defensive, nightmare difficulty): The concept of slowing down the enemy, allowing your troops more time to deal out damage and to recover from damage done to them sounds good. It is. BUT: You might just as well increase YOUR damage over time instead of lowering that of the enemy. Going is slow enough on hell difficulty as it is, and with holy freeze, you don't kill monsters one bit faster.
Final Note: A well-built summoner necromancer (with gentle use of amplify damage, dim vision, and decrepify) can pretty easily handle most everything the game routinely tosses at you. This includes hell Baal and the hell Ancients. Of course, 1.10 still spawns a few really ugly boss packs (especially, when two or three bosses have a meet-and-greet in close quarters) - but apart from that, the worst things you will be facing are narrow passages and doorways. ;-)
Basically, what I do (your mileage may vary, but I've successfully and repeatedly gotten this kind of build to hell hellforge) is start out with raise skeleton up to level 3 (allowing for three skeletons), then putting a point into mastery, then amplify, then mastery up to 3-5 (toss in the clay golem when it becomes available).
After that, you have three skeletons and a golem, and your little troop should be fairly capable of dealing with any threat your level.
What I do next, is max raise skeleton. After spell level 3, you only get another new skeleton for every three skillpoints you invest. So you gain your fourth skellie only after reaching level 6 raise skeleton. BUT: pour them points in nonetheless. Each point in raise skel increases skeleton life, damage, attack rating and defense. Max raise skeleton first thing you do.
If you need power against act bosses, I suggest investing a few skill points in curses, to get to decrepify. This curse really cuts down on act boss danger.
Mages are a matter of taste. I, favoring the image of a necromancer with a larger skeleton army, do invest points, even though I don't right away. I first max raise skeleton, then skeleton mastery, and maybe put 1-3 points into skeleton mages somwehere in between to get those first three mages (more mages come at the cost of 3 skill points per mage, just like with raise skeleton).
You may also choose to spend a skillpoint into teeth and corpse explosion (maybe even as early as act 2, it works wonders at doorways, but eats your little starting mana like mad).
Revives are a topic of discussion among many people, but frankly, I don't put points into the prerequisites and revive before mid to late nightmare. Maxed skeletons with maxed mastery can easily take you all the way through to late nm.
As to how much energy points you need: if you don't have lots of +mana gear, try to keep enough mana on your hands to raise 3-4 skeletons. Drink mana potions when you need more. Mana potions are for sale now.
Strength would depend on your equipment, but most people stop at around 70-100.
A few final hints:
1. Try to go "Akara shopping" for a +3 raise skeleton, +3 skeleton mastery wand right away once you get enough gold for that (or something similar, pick whatever shows up). +skills HEAVILY bolster your army. At spell level 32 with level 32 mastery, skeletons do a wee bit under 400 damage a hit, and have around 800-900 life each.
2. Act 2 Mercenaries:
a. Prayer (combat, normal and hell difficulty): cool in all of normal. Greatly supports your and your skeletons' life regeneration. Next to worthless, though, from mid nightmare on. Either your skeleton can take the immediate threat and live, or prayer won't heal it fast enough to make a difference. Plus, it doesn't help your damage output at all. Which is bad. Never leave Frenzy Minotaurs standing in front of your troops longer than necessary. Especially when they're fanaticism enchanted.
b. Blessed Aim (offensive, normal and hell difficulty): not necessary in normal difficulty, but a real staple on hell difficulty, especially when you do like me and go to hell diff at level 65. Skeletons are created at your character level when you summon them, so my skels were lvl 65,and monsters tended to quickly reach the 80s, basically putting my skeletons at a severe disadvantage in regards of hit probability. Blessed Aim can go a long way towards setting off this "penalty", and keeps them marching more easily.
c. Defiance (defensive, normal and hell difficulty): bolsters the defense rating of your minions. However, as with prayer, this does not help your damage output at all, so I advise against it. There are monsters who completely ignore defense, too. Besides, skeletons have some defense, but nothing like what a barbarian or tanker paladin could achieve, so the benefit of defiance is somewhat less.
d. Thorns (combat, nightmare difficulty): This is a blessing against heavy hitter melee monsters. IF your skeletons are durable enough to take a couple of hits, the enemies simply kill themselves on your troops. Marvelous. Drawback: Thorns is useless against ranged attackers (as long as your minions haven't closed the distance) and magical attacks. Nice against melee-happy act bosses like duriel or andariel, too.
e. Might (offensive, nightmare difficulty): Another good candidate (the other two being blessed aim and thorns) to choose. Might can really skyrocket your minions' damage, more than tripling it. Consider a skeleton melee damage of 350 ok? Whaddaya say to over 1000 damage per hit? Might is good, and it supports all your melee minions no matter what they hit, be it melee monster, ranged, or magic. On hell difficulty, it means they will hit less often than with blessed aim on. I still don't know what would calculate better. I have used both, and liked both, even though secretly I am starting to like blessed aim better.
f. Holy Freeze (defensive, nightmare difficulty): The concept of slowing down the enemy, allowing your troops more time to deal out damage and to recover from damage done to them sounds good. It is. BUT: You might just as well increase YOUR damage over time instead of lowering that of the enemy. Going is slow enough on hell difficulty as it is, and with holy freeze, you don't kill monsters one bit faster.
Final Note: A well-built summoner necromancer (with gentle use of amplify damage, dim vision, and decrepify) can pretty easily handle most everything the game routinely tosses at you. This includes hell Baal and the hell Ancients. Of course, 1.10 still spawns a few really ugly boss packs (especially, when two or three bosses have a meet-and-greet in close quarters) - but apart from that, the worst things you will be facing are narrow passages and doorways. ;-)