Skelemancer?

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Reply,

Thanks for the advice so far. I guess it isn't entirely clear which is better. I did play a Skelemancer, untwinked, through the end of nightmare in 1.10s (well I started in 1.10 beta 1, and then continued through 1.10s, so I had to play a while with few items since 1.10s nuked all non-mundane items). I used a prayer merc in normal and a might merc in nightmare and he rocked. So, I'm pretty sure Might with Skeletons is "viable". I mainly wonder if Thorns is viable in Hell or if the monsters just have too much life and regeneration in players 1 Hell for reflected damage to work.

Then again, I will *probably* be doing my gold running in nightmare, just because the gold drops are still nice, and it is "safer". So, maybe I'll plunk on out to level 85-ish in 1.09 and then just leave him.

Also at this point, my build is already committed. I already have LR 1, CE 1, SR, 1, Revive 10, SKMast 20, Skeleton 20, Mage 13. The reason I went ahead and actually pumped Revive is that since I will have almost no +skills gear when I'm actually gold running, I wanted to have plenty of revives in full. I guess revives being dumb work well with thorns anyway. Since I've already spend the point for Lower Resist, I may consider this a Skeleton Mage guy and pump all points now into Raise Skeleton (7 more points to max it), Corpse Explosion (4 more), Lower Resist (4 more, for mages) and Amplify Damage (4 more for thorns). That way even with no +skills I could have good coverage on my curses without any +skills gear (i.e. when I'm gold finding). I do have +3 to skills now while I'm adventuring, but later I wont. I find CE 4 (with skills) is sufficient, so 5 natural points should do fine, and I can retire at 85.

When 1.10 comes out, I'm planning to make an untwinked Skelemancer from the ground up anyway; this guy is a utility / fun / experiment character for me. But my 1.10 untwinked Skelemancer will go with the Might merc like I did while briefly playing the beta, and then I can compare them in Hell. My 1.10 untwinked Skelemancer will probably go Bone Prison and either Spear or Spirit, instead of Mages, just to be different. Plus, for an "active" character I like being more aggressive, so those will help.

OK thanks for all the advice; it helped me come to a decision (thorns for my gold finder, might for my untwinked skelemancer to me made after 1.10 comes out).

THANKS!

Lewis