Advice on my Summons + Volcano druid?

[Animation]

All,

I'm playing a Druid now, he is actually a re-creation of a mish-mash one that I had before I found out which Druid skills are "fun" to me and which arent.

So, I'm level 48 now and in nightmare and doing fine. I'm probably going to play through nightmare and hell and then level up a lot in act 5, probably to level 80. I have Str 70, Dex Base (not going for the Bow route), and I will shoot for 200 vit and 100 energy and anything past that will go to energy or vit as needed (I'd like to be able to chain cast my summons and not loose too much mana, with the right gear I think I can). I'm not going to tank, or do melee in any way, and I'm not going to do archery.

I have maxed Volcano and I am working on maxing Grizzly and Dire Wolves. I already have 10 in spirit wolf to beef up summons' AR and DEF. I have a might merc and I'm pumping Heart of Wolverine. Obviously I will rarely use spirit wolf, I'll be using the Dire Wolves and the Grizzlies most of the time ... the spirit wolves are only for bumping passives and the occasional situation where lots of warm bodies would be better than anything else.

My question is: with this setup, at level 80, in Hell, would I be better off with 16 points in Heart of the Wolverine, and 10 in Spirit Wolf, or would I do better with 10 in HOW and 16 in SPirit WOlf, or 20 in Spirit WOlf and 6 in HOW?

In other words, how would you allocate these 26 points across HOW and Spirit Wolf (I have 10 in Spirit Wolf Already)? What will make my might + HOW + minions more effective? Damage? or AR + DEF?

Lewis

[ShadowHM]

I will leave the technical part of which skill point allocation improves the castable minions the most to others.

The other consideration is that HoW affects all party members, including your Might Mercenary, while the passive effect of Spirit Wolf points only affects the Dire Wolves/Grizzly.

[Animation]

Shadow,

That is a good point. It also occured to me that since I'm building my mana to where I can spam cast minions, it almost doesnt matter if they can tank slightly better since I can re-cast them effortlessly. As for the increased AR, the HOW does indeed help everyone. Nice logic, thanks for pointing out the HOW thing to me.

I wonder if the 1.10 patch will change the HOW to where there is a point to push it from 16 to 20 (no cap at 20 I hope after the patch)?

Lewis

[AtomicKitKat]

That and you can cast Volcano under your summons' targets, since they're not going anywhere(unless your summons are OHK by a boss...)

[Nebuul]

Grizzly will knock stuff off your volcano. You are better off with fissure.

[AtomicKitKat]

The other monsters will still chase the grizzly as he follows up on the knockbacked monster(or not), regardless, something will still wander onto the volcano...

[Nebuul]

Anything that moves in a fissure takes huge damage. Volcano does *CRAP* damage to anything that isn't planted directly on the spout.

[Animation]

Nebull,

How does Fissure do in terms of damage? I always loved Fissure in normal when I was tinkering with my early druid attempts, but can it hold up in Hell? I mean in nightmare, I dont need fire at all ... summons do the trick just fine. How can fissure at level 20 (or probably 26 by the time I gamble for some +skills gear) handle things in Hell? What about 4 player Hell? What about 8 player Hell? I dont mean cows, I just mean throughout the whole game (especially act 5)?

Lewis

[Nebuul]

Heh, I couldn't tell you how a level 26 fissure did, but a level 43 fissure cleared cows quite nicely in hell 8ppl . . .

[FenrisWulf]

I can agree that a high level Fissure is very effective against mobile crowds (ie, Cows). However, Volcano is more effective against the things that you have to worry about as a half-Summoner: stationary crowds, ranged attackers, Act Bosses. Remember, when you throw Summons into the mix, your Fissure gets all screwed up, because monsters bunch around your Summons and don't move around enough to really take a lot of damage from the vents. This is why I made my Artimentalist a pure Elementalist, exactly so I could use Fissure effectively. And I still had to max out Volcano!

For reference, I have a slvl 42 Fissure as well as a slvl 42 Volcano. I find that they both have effective uses, but I think that Volcano better caters towards the problems of a Summoner.

[BlackLightning]

Okay, generally, if your summons are doing ok, don't bother with Spirit Wolf, since it might just add a bit more to your overall situation.

On the other hand, HoW will easily help all your minions/party members, and they'll be thanking you deeply for it. Additionally, if you get a merc, he'll benefit as well (i think... :blink: )

Don't spend points into something which only gives you a passive bonus, also go with a crowd control spell with the points not spent.

Fissure, Hurricane, Armageddon, you know. You'll need it for cows or whatever, or to make a retreat if your summons die.

That's about all.

[Occhidiangela]

Fire Immunes?

[Animation]

Occ,

You use your summons. Phycical. :)

If you mean PIFI ... you run. :) Or get some poison potions.

Lewis