Necro Summoner Advice

[shavenlunatic]

I've been reading a fair few guides on necros around. But i'm still a little unsure of how to progress mine.

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At the moment my skill/stat set is similar to this

Lvl 49

15 Skeleton mastery
20 Golem Mastery
10 Skeleton Mage
2 Revive
2 Iron Golem
1 Fire
1 Bone Armor
1 Corpse Explosion
(other than the pre-reqs i used)

(inc total of +3 skill items)

Str 100
Dex 30-40 (i cant remember exactly but its not really had any points)
Everything else in Vit and Energy.

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I obviously cant physically hit anything, and playing act2 on NM is so painfully slow it seems to take me hours to kill a couple of creatures (unless im using corpse explosion).

Have i screwed up the build? or are necros usually a bit tricky in the mid-range? Admittedly my equipment is a bit crappy, but i've never been one for doing meph runs for hours on end.


Just a bit of advice as to where to go from here would be appreciated, ive read a few guides but im a little unsre as to whats wise from my specific standpoint.

Cheers in adv.

[Chaerophon]

The build that you're listing is going to be a relatively slow killer. If you were looking for a bit more of a challenge than the standard Max skellies build, then you have it. Level ten mages will soon become negligible damage dealers and your iron golem will have a slow go of it reflecting back damage quickly enough to be a "serious" killer. What else do you plan to do with this build? Most of the "fast" necros are relying on skeletons, I'm not sure why you think that your build should be such a fast killer...

[shavenlunatic]

I genuinely don't think it should be "fast", my worry was that in act2 NM it was taking my Golem, 6 skeletons and 4 revives approximately 2 minutes to kill one bug in the sewers. I've never had a necro before but I just felt like it should be a little easier than that at such an early stage of NM. I'm looking for guidance on how to improve this character. Seems i should put the next few points into skeletons then i take it?

[Chaerophon]

First of all, let's get this straight: your not using Raise Skeleton, right? Second, I think that where you put your points should depend on what it is that you want from the character. If you want it to kill faster, then yes, maxing out RS will increase your kill rate dramatically.

A couple of question: are you on players 8? This would explain why your mages and golem may be having some difficulty. Secondly: why no curses? A little lower resist, amplify damage, or decrepify would help your cause... I tend to put at least one in all of the curses and let my plus skills build them up. With your mages only at level 10, you're not going to be putting out very much damage. With 10+ mages, you're starting to do some real damage, but they will never match the killing speed of your plain jane skellies.

Hope this helps. I can't really tell how well you know what you're doing, so it's a bit hard to offer you advice! :)

[shavenlunatic]

First of all, let's get this straight: your not using Raise Skeleton, right?  Second, I think that where you put your points should depend on what it is that you want from the character.  If you want it to kill faster, then yes, maxing out RS will increase your kill rate dramatically. 

A couple of question:  are you on players 8?  This would explain why your mages and golem may be having some difficulty.  Secondly: why no curses?  A little lower resist, amplify damage, or decrepify would help your cause...  I tend to put at least one in all of the curses and let my plus skills build them up.  With your mages only at level 10, you're not going to be putting out very much damage.  With 10+ mages, you're starting to do some real damage, but they will never match the killing speed of your plain jane skellies.

Hope this helps.  I can't really tell how well you know what you're doing, so it's a bit hard to offer you advice! :)

Aahh, normal skeletons are tough now? I didnt realise that. I was advised that normal skeletons were weak as p*ss, I shouldn't waste my time with them, and i should concentrate on Skellie Mages and a few revives.


Was i mis-informed? bah :angry:





Very good advice on the Curses though, much appreciated.. i think i'll try bung a few points in there to give me an edge :)

[Brista]

Normal Skeletons rock but only when maxxed

Let's see what you have there - a golem who is tough as nails and some moderately developed mages

How about maxxing mages and skeleton mastery?

The damage figures are here and are respectable:
http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/ne...ml#skeletalmage

Developing Raise Skeleton after that will give you a strong build in Hell

[shavenlunatic]

:D Cheers, thats handy to have (i saw one for the mages but for the whole shabang its handy as pie)

Yes, i think my aim is to max out Mages and mastery, they seem to do more damage than Skeleton Warriors and I expect they will last a little longer being thay they are not in hand-to-hand combat most of the time.


OK, couple more pieces of advice

Should i stick any more in golems? I clearly need to as I need to kill stuff to make stuff. Fire or Iron?

Also, if im gonna follow the earlier advice about the Curses, but im thinking of investing maybe 3-4 points, what is advisable to invest in at a low level?

[Archon_Wing]

Just wondering, would it be better to pump mastery first or skeletons?

[shavenlunatic]

Just wondering, would it be better to pump mastery first or skeletons?

I had to make that choice earlier. What I did (and im sure its FAR from right) was to add to my summons mainly up until I hit level 30 then started sticking stuff in mastery. My reasoning behind this was because i thought "make up the numbers first, then work on the quality". More meatshields.

Again, it was probably a bad idea...heheh :D

[TriggerHappy]

This thread maybe of interest to you.

http://www.lurkerlounge.com/forums/index.p...t=ST&f=7&t=2439

[shavenlunatic]

This thread maybe of interest to you.

http://www.lurkerlounge.com/forums/index.p...t=ST&f=7&t=2439

Aye, I had read that one yesterday. Kinda wish that I had read it before i started my necro and I could have followed a more... lets say organized path. Cheers for pointing it out though, it is a handy thread to have at hand. (i might possibly start again with the necro in the future, once I'm a little more handy with them)


OK, so we agree that i should run by this.

Max out Mastery and Mage (not far to go now)
Put a single point in a couple of curses to give me an edge (then try to boost with items)


Do we reckon that any additional points (should i have any left) go into Raise Skeleton, A Golem or something else? (bearing in mind that my golem mastery is maxed already)

[lilnecro]

Just wondering, would it be better to pump mastery first or skeletons?

Always and i mean always, max raise skeleton before you max skeleton mastery.

[dkass]

Remember that we're discussing skeletal mages here, not standard skeletons. Somewhere (probably either here or at the AB) I saw a chart listing the damage boost from points in skeletal mage and mastery. From my recollection of that chart, boosting the mastery gave significantly more damage enhancement (at least after a few points in both). My guess is that for a skeletal mage build one puts points into mage until one has a few (4 to 6?) and then pours everything into mastery until its at 20 before going back to finish off the points in skeleton mage. I also seem to recall that +5 (? might even have been +4) to skeleton mastery did much more for the damage than +3 to each.

[Animation]

Shaven,

Are you startng over or salvaging what you've got? 20 in Golem Mastery is a big point sink that you probably don't need. Anyway I maxed Skeletons, Mastery, and Mages in that order basically. I got my summon resist to 5 base, I have 2 base in revives (will shoot for 5) and 1 in CE and 1 in each curse.

I somewhat regret maxing mages. They work fine but they constantly get in my way by getting in the way of my skeletons. They seem to limit my skeletons' ability to swarm targets, and they definitely block them in doorways, creating tactical bottlenecks I have a hard time getting out of. Also, I regret not pumping CE more. It would be very useful to have 10 points in that skill, but I have 1. My next 9 points, if I continue playing this guy, will go toward CE. I'm level 75 in act 1 Hell right now.

In retrospect, I'd skip mages entirely and put those 20 points into something else. More than likely I'd pump CE to 10, and either Dim Vision or Attract to 10, so that my next 10 levels from 75 to 85 would just be shoring up things I like to make them better (Revive 5, more CE, or more of whichever curse I pump).

Anyway best of luck, sorry for chiming in late on the advice.

Mages do look cool though. :D

Lewis

[AtomicKitKat]

Not sure if this will help, seeing as my Necro is still in Act 5 Normal, but since he was the only one who didn't die versus P7 Diablo... :P

I did it this way:

(L1) +1 Raise Skeleton(item)
(L2) +1 Mastery/+1 RS(still from item)
(L3) +1 Mastery/+2 RS(1 from item)
(L4) +1 Mastery/+3 RS(3 skellies now, respectable amount)
(L7) +1 Mastery/+1 Clay/+6 RS(4 skellies, a little wasteful to pump more so early in the game, plus I was aiming for a no-energy build)(1 bonus skill came from DoE quest)

(L10) +4(1) Mastery/+1 Clay/+6 RS/+3(0) Amp/+3(0) Weaken Army beginning to build up speed. I got lucky and got a +3 Weak/Amp/SM wand with no stats from Akara.

(L12-17) Get +6 Mage(4 mages), so that I have 1 per element(ideally) and enough to match my skeletons. Any more than this would crowd me and each other.

Subsequently, improve your golems/skeletons as needed. Regarding the "AI Branch" of the Curse tree(Dim Vision/Confuse/Attract), they're useful as far as keeping monsters distracted, but useless in boss fights. I found myself using a Blood Golem/IM mix against Duriel/Mephisto/Diablo. Cheesy, but I couldn't afford to keep buying new Iron Golems/raising skeletons. A higher mana build with Bone Armour/Prison/Wall and IM could probably do the same thing with less cheese(but more mana)

Summon Resist is pretty important. Try to get it to about +50% Resist All(with items, if you are maxing all other summon skills) I have yet to get an Iron Golem with any immunities other than poison, but if you can get one, it should last you against all except maybe Duriel/Diablo(depends on how big you want your items) I would not recommend using an expensive item IG except during "end game", when you're mostly just playing to get Diabro(the clone) or topping the ladder at 99.

Hope my rambling post helped in some way.