Necro curses

[Vash]

I haven't made my Zookeeper Necro yet (well I've technically made him...but I haven't played with him :P ). My current plan is to ditch regular skeletons all together. I'm going to try max fire golem, prayer merc, max skeletal mages, max skeleton mastery, and Lower Resist. I'm not going to even bother with Bone Spear or Bone Spirit because I've maxed Spirit in the past with other Necros and it sucks. Big time.

So now I'm thinking about where to put my extra points. Questions:

1) Attract vs. Confuse. I really don't know anything about the two. Any info for me?

2) Dim vision. I'm not quite sure how it works. If a monster is blinded but is hit with a projectile (from out of melee range), will the monster "see" who attacked it and seek revenge? What if the blinded monster was hit with a Fire Golem's holy fire? Anything else I should know about this curse?

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Vash,

Head to my homepage (link below) for a Curse Guide: Necromancers are the only time I advocate cursing on this forum ;) This'll answer your first question, and likely your second. Just to clarify though, you can hit them with projectiles/Holy Fire/whatever as much as you want, so long as you're not next to them they cannot retaliate :D

[Vash]

Attract:

1) A monster has been cursed with Attract and is being attacked by other monsters. Will the cursed monster retaliate?

2) A bunch of monsters are attacking a monster cursed with attract. The group of attacking monsters are in turn attacked by one of my minions. Will they cease attacking the cursed monster and retaliate?

Dim Vision:

1) Do monsters still move around when blinded? I faintly remember seeing blinded monsters pacing around its surrounding squares.

[Saga_Keeper]

Dim vision will help you keep them alive... but ere... be prepared to like go into an area, curse around like a maniac, and then go do the dishes, wash the dog, sheetrock the walls, and paint your house before you kill too many things later on, especially in higher difficulties.

And Elrics guide can answer pretty much anything you want to know on cursing... like ever... even things you didn't *want* to know.

-Saga_Keeper

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Vash,

Yes, if an Attracted critter is hit, they are likely to retaliate - unless they are in the middle of doing an existing AI operation (eg kill you :P ). This is one of my favourite apsects to the curse: I can set up one-on-one battles all round the place, then slowly bring them through a series of bouts until only the grand champion of them all remains...that's when I draw my ITD weapon and kill 'em in one hit ;)

It all depends with your second question. If they are in the middle of an AI script at the time, no; if they are free to change to something different, then yes, they shall retaliate. However, with Skeleton Magi, I would not imagine this would be a major issue - but then again, I'm not positive either...I never did much like them.

If a critter is still in a movement script when you curse them, they shall continue to after they are blinded. However, if you do something that makes them stop (eg tempting), then they usually don't move much, if at all. Some critters pace a little, due to their AI, but not enough for it to be significant.

[the Langolier]

For the zookeeper aspect of your Necro, you may want to move some skill points around. Although pretty much any distribution to summons is effective in early parts of the game, not being careful as to what points go where can produce un-effective minions (and a lot of wasted skill points) in the end game - especially in late nightmare and hell difficulties (I assume when talking about maxing all those skills you are interested in this).

Skeleton mages: You may want to consider revives, if that suits your style. Although lugging around 15 or more revives can be tiresome, even a couple of them can be of great assistance in many situations. As for skeletal mages go, I have found from experience that they are not too effective (again, in late nightmare and hell). Being a clvl 6 skill, they can be effective early on, but their damage bonuses with increasing points just don't cut it in the long run. Also, their hit points and defense rating are small wherein they will die within two or three hits in the late game. A few mages can, however, be an excelent compliment to your army. The cold mages are the most useful, if ever facing very difficult enemies, as they will be able to slow them down without having to use decrepify.

Skeleton Mastery: I would suggest not maxing skeleton mastery. Each additional point increases its effectiveness by litle (i.e. increases damage bonus from 14% to 16%). The difference between the levels of 15 and 20 are hardly noticeable, and one might argue that 10 points in this skill are plenty. This is especially true of you plan not to rely on normal skeletons. Revives also recieve a 200% life bonus from that skill itself, if you plan on using them. Keeping this skill lower than max will also free up skill points that can be of more value elsewhere.

Fire golem: This is direct from experience in act 5/ hell with my zookeeper. Golems just don't do enough damage. At skill level 20, a fire golem does 155-406 in hell difficulty. Ignoring enemy resistances even, this is very low damage - especially considering the golem's attack speed, which is pityful. They just can't put out the damage/time that will cut it. Again, this is just my opinion, but ideally I would suggest putting no more than 1 point into each golem, only adding a a point or two when you need it (or a few in fire golem to improve its fire absorbing abilities). I would save some of those points for golem mastery. A golem works much better as a tank with a great amount of life. A golem is usually best to just sit there and take hits, all the while keeping enemies off of your back.

Saving some skill points on key skills like these can allow some points into golem mastery, summon resists, and some key curses. Its also possible to dab into some poison/bone skills such as corpse explosion if you like.

A small note on attract: From what I have noticed, casting attract on a few enemies in a group will cause the group to polarize into two factions, the attracted and the normal enemies. It seems that the two groups will attack each other, but not their own "side", i.e. two cursed monsters would rather attack the normal monsters than each other. Furthermore, it sometimes appears that normal monsters will go out of their way even to to attacked the attracted ones. Even when your minions are all around the outside of the pack, the attracted monsters will attack normal enemies, and vice versa. Of course, this all depends on how many minions you have, how many you have cursed, and how many monsters remain, but for the most part this is what I have noticed. (For the same reasons a group of confused monsters tends to attack a group of normal monsters as a pack, but confusing every monster on the screen has litle effect).

Have fun with your Summoning necro no matter what path you choose with him.

[cheezz]

Since I have a few Zookeepers, I'll make a few comments here.

First off, Go ahead and max Skeleton mastery. Since revive life doesn't ramp up anymore, any life bonus is a good thing. I prefer that my revives last the whole three minutes thank you very much. I wouldn't bother to max fire golem. I have found, as others have, that he is little more than a meat shield. All you are doing by maxing him is making him more expensive to cast. You are the general, he is the soldier, or your tool, as it were. I tend to use him as a grenade, tossing him wherever I need him. Plug a hole here, or break some monster's AI there. The cheaper he is, the more you can throw him around. You can never have enough golem grenades. ;)

1. Confuse works, but the short time it lasts makes it a little difficult to use if you are using large numbers of minions. I like attract much better- curse a crowd, then single a few out with attract.

2. Dim vision- useful in the extreme for arty necs and zookeepers with few minions, waste of time for zookeepers with an army on the march. Whether they see anything is moot, since your minions are going to jump in their face anyway. Better to use curses that will hurt 'em, by that point in time.


edit- I can't spele

[Vash]

Thank you all but I want to try making a direct damage zookeeper Necro (i.e. without using thorns or IM). I will probably throw a point into Revive and let +skills take care of the rest.

My plan is to have Fire Golem and the Merc run engage the pack. Cast Lower Resist. Cast Dim Vision/Attract/Confuse (probably Dim Vision). I believe Skeletal Mages move away from enemies before attacking as part of their AI. Maybe I'll throw in CE if it truly takes too long to kill stuff at higher levels. You know...that just might work. My Fire Golem and my Merc will be doing doing extra damage to one (if they're attacking together) or two monsters. They will fall first. The rest of them are continually being weakened by my Mages. Maybe CE will fit very well into the build.

And the big final question...does Lower Resist stack with Dim Vision? What about Confuse or Attract?

[the Langolier]

>Since revive life doesn't ramp up anymore, any life bonus is a good thing.

"Revive - mana cost: 45 - number of monsters = slvl - HP (Original Creature +200%) - duration = 180 seconds" -from Arreat Summit.

That is also what I remember it being last time I played my necro. The revives get three times their HP not counting effects from skeleton mastery. I would say skeleton mastery is fine around level 10, adding an additional 70% life. Maxing this skill brings it to an added 140% life. But I just don't see a 25% increase in effectiveness worth 10 skill points (25% = (370%-270%)/270% = the percent increase in effectiveness from slvl 10 to slvl 20). If needed, level 15 is the limit one should need for skeleton mastery.

Of course, more life is more life, so if you feel it needs it then put points where you need them. I am sure though that it is possible to get by even without ANY points into skeleton mastery. Revives rarely die in actual combat, but rather to getting left behind or expiring. If you find that occasionaly they do die even at slvl 10 mastery, a single point into life tap (or three if you need the pre-requistes) with an occasional cast would be plenty.

If there is perhpas a bug I don't know about which causes normal revives without mastery to have no bonus hp, then my point it mute, but I am fairly certain this is not the case.

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Vash,

Again, my guide makes mention of the only stacking possible with Curses: for the most part, they do not stack. You cannot stack LR and DV, or Conf. and Attr.

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Langolier,

I believe Cheezz was referring to how in 1.00, the more points you put into Revive, the more life they got. I forget the real figures, but for argument's sake, let's say it was this:

slvl1 - 200%
slvl2 - 225%
slvl3 - 250%
slvl4 - 275%
...

Now they do not `ramp up', so you need Skeleton Mastery to boost their life further.

[Archon_Wing]

On skeleton mastery:

I do not think that you need more life for revives, because they die anyway in three minutes. However, the damage boost, however small, is useful, since you want them to deal as much damage as possible.

[the Langolier]

However, the damage boost, however small, is useful, since you want them to deal as much damage as possible.

Good point. Usually, however, I find that single point into amplify damage has even a greater effect than several points into skeleton mastery (for damage boost). If you have the skill points to go around though, a bonus is a bonus.

Elric: thanks for the clarification.

[cheezz]

If you have the skill points to go around though, a bonus is a bonus.

Bingo. Given the choice between a point in amp damage or skeleton mastery, I choose both.

I have revives get killed all the time, usually when my army is still small, or when I'm fighting a nasty boss. Sometimes act bosses can make mincemeat out of even a large army. Many is the time when the boss has died with only a few minions left between me and certain doom.

Due to the minion's roaming radius, and the fire golem's aura, I often find myself getting swarmed before I've built my army up. It's a matter of numbers. If my minions can't dish out as much damage as they receive, they die and I have to retreat. Early on, I do not use direct damage curses since my minions aren't doing enough damage to begin with. At that point in time, every little bit of life helps.

I have found that minions need to be deployed carefully at first, until the they start to hold their own, damage wise. When they reach this 'critical mass', then I switch to direct damage curses. At that point in time, yes, a few extra points in life don't make much of a difference.

In the end, I suppose it comes down to playing style. I play my zookeepers very aggressively. I like to pick as big a fight as I can. I want a huge army, and the only way I can acheive that is by having huge battles. I prefer to let my minions survive from their own skills and my ability to manipulate the enemy until such a time as I can bring overwhelming force to bear.

[Animation]

Vash,

You have said you want a direct damage Zookeeper without Thorns. No problem. However, I don't personally think that Prayer is the way to go, and I think points in Fire Golem are wasted ... he does nothing whatsoever as far as offense past normal difficulty. Skeletal Mages ... they are slow, very slow. Be prepared to protect them with revives. :)

I think if you want a Direct Damage necromancer, you want a Might Merc (act 2 nightmare offensive), and you want to max Skeleton Mastery. The extra points in Skeleton Mastery will more than make up for prayer anway, and in Hell, I dont think Prayer will significantly help you. For direct damage, you want a Might Merc and the max Skeleton Mastery.

I would personally build mine like so, assuming at least +4 or more to skills in the end:
Skeleton Mastery 20
Golem Mastery 10
Fire Golem 1
Summon Resist 1
Revive 10
Skeletal Mages 10
Dim Vision 10
Attract 10
Amplift Damage 5
Lower Resist 1
Corpse Explosion 1
Bone Armor 1
Pre-Reqs 11

It is true that you could get by with 5 points or even 1 point in your revives and your skeletal mages, and just 1 in Amplify Damage, if you have a LOT of +skills, but my personal preference for a minion build is to actually sink some points into them. I also only recommended 1 in Corpse Explosion because you are going to be pounding enemies to dust. If they are immune to physical, you are out of luck anyway, especially since you dont plan to invest in Bone Spirit (I hate Bone Spirit too). The mages are slow but if you have to kill a Phys Immunes, they can work with Lower Resist ... slowly.

You might want to put some elemental damage on your merc. I've always wanted to take an elite 6-socket spear and drop 2 amns in it and 4 jewels of thunder in it, along with a 3-socket helm with jewels of thunder, and a good resists armor (like maybe a goldskin, or that druid set armor with 30% lightning resist) socketed with a jewel of thunder also. Of course that is a lot of jewels of thunder. I'm just dreaming. :)

OH! And regarding Dim Vision ... someone earlier said it isnt useful for Zookeepers because your minions engage them and so the blindness is pointless. That is essentially true. I just put 10 there because I love it. It is my favorite Necro curse ... heck, it is my favorite Necro Skill, other than maybe Bone Prison. :) Anyway, I still find it useful in a Zookeeper build when you have a lot of casters. Even if the casters get engaged by your troops they are still prevented from casting spells at range and such. Nice. It is also useful when low on minions and you want to more safely get a few more bodies. Shutting down the whole screen to let your merc safely tank one or two .. thats useful. Dim Vision is tricky at first to use but in the end, it rocks when used well.

Anyway, I think if you want to put the smack-down on some skulls, you need max Skeleton Mastery and a Might Merc, with liberal use of Amplify Damage (and/or Decrepify).

Lewis

[Kevin]

I think that was changed in 1.07 actually, but CE will hurt physical immunes that are not fire immune.

[Logic_X]

Ok....Here's a build for ya that I think you might find a bit more successful....since you seem to be wanting a LoM (Lord of Mages) Judging from your skill choices. -- I'm gonna describe it from scratch, ignoring the other posts (I skimmed over them though) for simplicity's sake --

Givens:
Level 99
110 skill points
505 stat points

Stat Distribution:
Enough strength for your equipment (60-80)
No points in Dexterity
Vitality - 200+
Energy - about 150-200

Skill Distribution:
67 points in Summons
29 points in Curses
that leaves 14, I recommend getting 1 in CE in the P&B tree....and Bone prison is nice for protecting those magi.

Summon Tree:
20 Skeleton Mastery
1 Summon Skeleton
1 Clay Golem
20 Golem Mastery
1 Blood Golem
1 Summon Resist
1 Iron Golem
1 Fire Golem
1 Revive

Curse Tree:
1 Amplify Damage
1 Blind
1 Weaken
1 Iron Maiden
1 Terror
1 Confuse
1 Life Tap
1 Attract
1 Decrepify
20 Lower Resist

Poison and Bone:
1 Teeth
1 Bone Armor
1 Corpse Explosion
1 Bone Wall
1 Bone Prison

This leaves 11 points to do as you will with.

My personal favorite equipment setup for this build:
Helm: Harlequin Crest Shako
Amulet: +2 necro or +3 Summon amulet
Weapon: Arm of Leoric is my favorite for this build (it's a great summoner wand)
Armor: Skin of the Vipermagi - Resists protect you from the only real threat to you - Ranged magic.
Shield: I use a Homunculous - although a +3 Summon skill/+2 all skills necro head w/ +3 Skele Mastery, +3 Skeleton Magi, +3 Summon Resist/Revive is best (good second mod is nice)
Gloves: Trang's Gloves
Rings: 2x SoJs
Belt: Trang's Belt (cannot be frozen) - the unique mesh belt is nice too if you're short on mana
Boots: These are personal preference usually....I've used everything from infernostride to the unique mesh boots to Nat's boots....it's really all personal preference, none are really best.

Charms (I usually go w/ a 6x4 charm space in my inventory..because I like to carry the cube, 1 tome id, 1 tome tp, and have a 2x4 spare space for picking up items in a hurry - so 6 gc, 6 sc):
General Idea:
6-10 Summon charms (if you can't get that many - fill in empty slots w/ curse charms) - +life is great second mod.
6-10 small charms of one of the following types:
+single res (11%), +16-20 life
+All res (3-5%), +16-20 life
+13-17mana, +16-20 life

Magi Mixup - aka Which mage distribution type should I try for?
(per 10 setup):
1:2:7 - Poison : Ice : Fire + Lightning

Poison - Highest Damage but can only have 1 effecting at a time.
Ice - Lowest Damage, chill effect.
Fire - Highest Average instant Damage
Lightning - Highest Max instant damage

This is tweakable to personal taste - just keep poison present, but minimal.

Top Revives:
Act 1 (non-cow level):
Melee Revives:
Fallen and their relatives - Weaker than Rat Men....but More readily available
Wraiths - PI in hell...and fly through walls making them vanish less (My personal favorite for melee revives)
Rat Men - Fast, and moderate power
Skeletons - Basically strong versions of your summon skeleton
Corrupt Rogues - Meaty Skeletons - faster
Yeti - Good for locking enemies
Spiders - Mediocre, when they run from low life they can get annoying though.

Ranged Revives:
Skeleton Magi - Chances are lower damage than your magi, but sturdier
Skeleton Archers - Ranged Physical, decent, are good if you're strapped for decent summons
Corrupt Rogue Archers - Meaty Skeleton Archers - Faster
Shaman - Good for their fireballs, can't revive fallen, but have an alternate melee attack that's decent.
Banished (the mages in catacombs) - You hate em as enemies - you love em as revives, best ele dmg from revive in act 1. (My Favorite for ranged revives)

Act 2:
Melee Revives:
Scarab Demons - Decent Melee - but do their lightning death to enemies when they die for you too (One of my 3 favorites in act 2 melee)
Vultures (in perticular the undead ones) - Leech life from enemies keeping themselves alive longer....hit decently.
Swarm - Fast, PI in hell, all around good revive. (Another one of my 3 favorites in act 2 melee)
Sabre Cat - Fast....good revive on average.
Vipers - great revives, mediocre damage, but cold hit is nice sometimes - and their charge is nice.
Blunderbores - good locking summon
Spectres - same reason as Wraiths...these actually do good damage. (Absolute Favorite in act 2....among all revives).
Raiders - Fast attack....and move decently fast

Ranged Revives:
Not much to choose from:
Skeleton Archers
Skeleton Magi
Maggot Mother - Poison damage is nice
Greater Mummies - Variety in attack - decent speed for undead (my favorite ranged in act 2)
Vampires (Banished are in this category so you know what they are)

Act 3:
Melee Revives:
Fetish (all) - Fast, chattery - annoy me so they're not my favorite....but they are really good revives as much as I hate to admit it.
Thorned Hulks - Big, stun, frenzy, fun - (My favorite act 3 melee revive)
Zealot - decent, but they have the habit of running away which detracts from them.
Council - Great revives....if i had to pick a second favorite these would be it.

Ranged Revives:
Vampire (again)
Zakarum Priests - Lightning, Blizzard, teleport....nice enhancements for a necro to have - #1 revive in a3 for me.
Willowisp - Lightning hit....and turn invisible....also change colors heh.....fun to play with....moderate use.

Act 4:
(general rundown....getting tired of seperating them):
Knights, Knights, and more Knights - All but Oblivion Knights are revivable - even w/o their best version being able to be revived gotta love them....
Finger Mages - Those lovely lightning immune, color changing, mana burn, tracking attack guys.....they fly so they're good at keeping up.
"Mega Demons" - Balrogs...just call them Balrogs....good revives .... if for no other reason than they look great in black :)
Urdars - Same reason as Blunderbores in a2...
Good readily available summon is the the little spit up spawn....their mothers are crappy - it's the nasty crawling children that are fun (if you haven't figured out what I'm talking about - think about what spawns from the wanderer when he vanishes in a3)

Act 5:
Pretty much all of act 5 is good revives....only not-so-good revives are those who can't be revived....
My favorites though are: Succubi, Death Maulers, Frenzytaurs, Imps.
For Baal you pretty much use what he summons to restock your summons as you fight. (too bad you can't revive MoD's that'd be evil :P)

As for your questions on curses:
Dim Vision: They move until they finish the pre-dim AI script, then they stop and perform available actions....and since they have a 0 light radius they can't see anything but melee - so they won't do anything but idle until: a) curse wears off, or B) something enters their tiny sight range.

Terror, Confuse, Attract (AI curses) :
Their AI script will continue for the duration, even if overridden by another curse. (IE they'll flee the full distance even if Terror is overridden)
Hence it's nice to Attact + IM and such or Attract + LR. (Attract will NOT override confuse)

[Edit: Forgot Merc Section - Thorns and Might are your best bet....holy freeze can be nice too if find you're able to get enough corpses with it - really depends on personal luck. Since you don't want thorns...and since you'll be mostly mages w/ light revive support w/ this build - I recommend Holy Freeze - just be sure to give him good equip to stay alive. - HF doesn't shatter as much as people think.....it's about a 33% shatter rate or something if i remember correctly....but I could be thinking about something else...all I know it is possible to have enough corpses w/ proper conservations....Might is better if you're heavier on revives than mages basically. Prayer is nice, but it's not worth much w/ mages - it's more of an IG build type of merc....Prayer doesn't heal frequently enough to save mages who get caught. Defiance and Blessed aim are easily seen as useless because minions have either - Horribly low def/AR or an always hits attack (mages)]

[Logic_X]

CE trick: Anti-PI CE, while still dealing maximum damage to non-PI.

Cast Lower Res before Amp and then CE away - Amplify damage doesn't stick to PI's allowing maximum damage all around.

Casting Bone Prison on your own minions (this used to work....haven't checked it in ages):

Put your left click as unsummon, your right click as Bone Prison - Right click on the highlighted minion to summon a bone prison on them.
(Unsummon is also nice for viewing your summon's immunities - as it will list immunities under their name - Skeletons = Poison immune :D)

[Elric of Grans]

Hail Gnollguy,

I believe it was 1.03 actually: VERY old change!