[2.1 Video Guide] Hybrid ES/Life Tanky Zombie/Specter Summoner - The Puppet Master [HC/SC viable]

When should you do the switch from flame totem to full summoner?

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JuztBe wrote:

When should you do the switch from flame totem to full summoner?

In his video, LiftingNerd recommends getting a Matua Tupuna Tarnished Spirit Shield at level 23, and then start leveling as a summoner.

From my own experience, I had a Rejuvenation Totem (life regen aura) and a Vaal Summon Skeletons (boss killing squad) to start with, so I leveled up as a summoner from the very beggining, and I may say, it was so damn easy that I was having trouble keeping my level at most 3 levels higher than the monster levels in act 1 (and I wasn't even clearing all the zones, I was just going through them searching for the next zones), until I rushed through act 2 with a party and fixed that. Now, I'll go get that Matua Tupuna Shield for the +2 to minion gems and aura effectiveness.

Great guide, this has been a very fun character. Maxing your chaos res is a must. I was dying until I got positive chaos res on Merciless. Got lucky with an exalt drop and could afford the Prism Guardian.
Here is my current gear, only "expensive" item is the Prism Guardian.



Once again Thank you LiftingNErd for such great guide.

Yesterday, I found that:



Today, I found this:



Wow, many items for my witch to play with. XD

Guys is it some kind of bug or what, but i can summon only 2 spectres of the same type, when i try to summon 3rd one it randomly chose other corpse and summon it o.0

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CrazyDawid wrote:

Guys is it some kind of bug or what, but i can summon only 2 spectres of the same type, when i try to summon 3rd one it randomly chose other corpse and summon it o.0

You need to remove the Spell Echo gem before casting the Rise Spectre skill. Once you have your three spectres up, you can equip again the Spell Echo gem.

My comparison of two builds. I'm addicted to Lifting's video guides, they're excellent quality. I'm currently using this summoner build and the cyclone marauder build of his and I couldn't help but notice that while both claim to be cheap builds(and they are) my Witch is getting one shot by things that I can't really avoid (missile totems summoned underneath me, boss aoe, rare or champion mob aoe) while my marauder is easily face rolling the same content.

Both have near Max resist (using purity of elements on the Witch), both have similar ehp, both are using one piece of gear bought from PoE trade for 1 chaos (a 4l Kaoms primacy and Bones of Ullr), but the marauder is not only far more survivable in merciless, he seems to do just as much if not more DPS.

I love my summoner, its incredibly fun to play and I've always wanted to play one since I first started playing arpgs. Its just a huge disappointment having your minions bypassed by some attack and getting one shot (eg a tiny bit of Brutus groundslam one hit ko'd me).

I guess I just need better gear that gives me more life and ES? Seems to me that even with those, without the armour and defensive skills that the marauder build has access too, that's just going to be a huge pile of squishy HP.

I am having some fun with skeletons, vaal skeletons and raging spirits (spell totem):


I had 2 near-death moments in those sewers. The first was when some rare mobs (specially, that one which throws poison bombs) ganged up on me and my vaal skeletons was down. The second was in a corrupted zone in those sewers, that thunder-whip mob was the boss, he had increased movement speed and some kind of lightning rain aura (man, that was terrifying, at least I had vaal skeletons to block the way while I backed up to recover, or else I'd be dead).

I'm sure the tankiness of this build will continue saving my life in moments like that.

Hi! I'm curious about the reasoning behind Prism Guardian. I understand that it allows you to run two more auras than you otherwise would be able to, and the +2 to level of aura gems is amazing especially for the Vaal auras (that don't cost anything to cast). But Discipline and Arctic Armour still reserve 31% of your life if my calculations are correct, even when taking every single reduced mana node in the passive tree. This is quite a large sacrifice, considering that Chaos damage passes right through the Energy Shield granted by Discipline (hence the need for such high Chaos resistance).

Wouldn't it be more effective to use an Alpha's Howl for the auras? Obviously you couldn't run quite as many auras, but the +2 bonus could now also be applied to Wrath or Haste (may or may not balance out the use or generosity, I don't know). If my calculations are correct, you would only have to sacrifice Discipline, since you can run PoE + Wrath + Haste + AA for 94% reserved Mana on an Alpha's Howl. Might be tricky to still be able to cast skills though, and I don't think speccing Eldritch Battery + Mind over Matter would be worth it in this case.

Of course with Alpha's Howl you'd also lose out on a +2 minion level helmet, but I think that could be balanced out with Matua Tupuna at the loss of one socket. Alpha's and Prism Guardian are comparable in price range at the moment so it wouldn't change the budget much.

This is all theory crafting on my part (I don't own enough currency to buy either of those items, let alone both so I could compare), but I was wondering if you'd have some input on the matter. Obviously the loss of Discipline hurts, but on the other hand I'm not sure the increase to ES and 1 additional support gem for Zombies is worth a third of our life pool. Could Vaal Discipline alone be enough to keep the minions safe?

Hi, my build is almost the same but, i have 1/life and all in ES. The problem is that i can be killed in 4 hits lol. I was looking for a bit more "tanky" wich, being summoner ofc. My minions have 10k+ life, fast clear and really tanky(i can summon 9 zombies atm and 3 spectres). But if the mobs reach me im done hahah. I have 75% in every resistance, 2k ES, 1.4k+ def. What can i do to increase my survivability? Im lvl 75 atm.

Thanks!