[3.2]Blink & Mirror Arrow Necromancer * Shaper down * Build of the Week * Deadeye version added*

Build guide has been updated from 2.1 to 2.4. We are now Necromancers!

This skilltree gets me almost 7k life and 3k ES with MoM.

This tree will end up with only ~9k eHP, but can cap block at 75/75 with a Rearguard + Lioneye's Fall jewel + 2x Reckless Defence jewels.

Pierce has been buffed since 2.1, so I replaced Chain. +1 on quiver is not so essential now, I figure.

I've replaced zombies with a CWDT setup. I've also picked up more %reduced flask charges used, and Bloodgrip amulet, to make my life flasks last almost forever. A normal divine life flask gives 7200 life and has 5 uses.

The damage is still very respectable. Thanks to Necromancer tree, we don't actually need to get any %minion damage on our normal skilltree. (Each 15% node gives me about 3-4% more dps - if you really want that, that's up to you). Thus I've specced heavily into defenses for 2.4.

Gear:

weapon swap


Unfortunately I dont have time (or patience) to start all over on Essence League, but I am still playing in Standard with non-legacy gear. I have done all map bosses up to t15, deathless and without portals. When I get some more currency I will attempt and record the Shaper fight.

Hi, glad you update this! I tested a very similar build in 2.3, i was like 50/75 block thanks to Stone of Lazhwar, it was performing well even with poor gear.
Also, since i played prophecy i have a legacy reach of the council, do you think it is worth to swap GMP and use both elemental focus and added lightning? this should be at least a 35%-40% more damage

Without a hard number for our minions' accuracy, I honestly have no idea. Mathematically, Reach and Lioneye's should come out almost equal, perhaps Reach is a tiny bit stronger but less reliable. I've always gone with Lioneye's for cost efficiency, but let me know if Reach feels like it clears faster.

I'm also testing a bow crafted with Essence of Delirium within the next few days.

So I got my hands on an Essence of Delirium in Standard. (Can you believe it cost me 3 ex??)


I did some testing and my conclusion is.. it's generally worse than Lioneye's Glare.
There were 2 routes I explored:
1) Create a build dedicated only to scaling the Decay / damage over time.
2) Put the Delirium bow directly into my current lioneye's elemental build.

For option 1) I tried 2 different setups.
Mirror Arrow - GMP - Pierce - Minion Damage - Void manipulation - Rapid Decay.
Theoretically, with about +300% increased minion/projectile damage from skilltree/gems/gear, the damage would be:

"

1000 (base damage) * (1 + 3.00 increased damage) * (1.75 Mirror Arrow bonus) * (0.74 GMP) * (1.2 Pierce) * (1.49 Minion Damage) * (1.39 Void Manipulation) * (1.39 Rapid Decay) = 17,894 DPS

This is pretty comparable to my current Lioneye's elemental setup... except for the fact that I can summon 4 clones that each do 20,000 dps in that setup. With the Decay bow, instances of Decay do not stack, so I'm stuck doing only 17,894 dps instead of 80,000+.

So how about Mirror Arrow - GMP - Pierce - Minion Damage - Added Chaos Damage - Poison?
Turns out this setup was even worse. With this setup, Decay does a measly 9,261 DPS. The clones are able to stack poison on enemies, but they only get about 10k DPS each (since my Delirium bow has basically no Phys damage to begin with). Furthermore, the clones miss their targets about 20-30% of the time...

2) How about using the Delirium bow with elemental auras, replacing my Lioneye's Glare?
Mathematically it doesn't look good. Like above, Decay should only deal ~9,261 DPS. Add that to the 20,000 x 4 = 80,000 elemental DPS that the clones already have, and you get about 90k total DPS. However, the clones miss their targets about 20-30% of the time, so again, the Delirium bow is worse than Lioneye's Glare.

My conclusion: Elemental Lioneye's is still the best. Damage over time variants are slower at clearing maps and since Decay can't stack, it is not well suited for a build that capitalizes on summoning multiple minions.

Well, i think the occultist variant is better for the poison route even if got nerfed now (both poison and curses on bosses), instead the elemental variant has never been so strong, the perfect gear should be a 40% increased minion damage bone helmet crafted with essence of Delirium for the +2 level of aura...a man can dream

I'd be willing to donate currency on standard to see the shaper fight, very curious how that will turn out./

"

dariidar wrote:

I did some testing and my conclusion is.. it's generally worse than Lioneye's Glare.
There were 2 routes I explored:
1) Create a build dedicated only to scaling the Decay / damage over time.
2) Put the Delirium bow directly into my current lioneye's elemental build.

I don't have currency to test it, but If I am not wrong, you could master craft the bow with high physical damage and the essence. Decay is the suffix, so if you use "Prefixes cannot be changed" before crafting you 'll keep your high physical mods. It gives us good poison damage with Posion Support Gem, since it also scales with Void Manipulation and Rapid Decay. 6L Setup will be BA / MA - Minion Damage - GMP - Void Manipulation - Rapid Decay - Poison.

My current bow is:


so i just focus on Decay's damage now.

You should'nt forget about Vulnerability. It is another 1,33 modifier (or even more with curse effectiveness).

300% is very low increased minion damage. For Necromancer we can get close to 500% or even more increased minion damage (Passives + Ascendancy points + Bone Helmet + Jewels + Animate Guardian + Enchants + Quality of Support Gems etc).

Additional 114% increased minion damage from Blink / Mirror arrow.

For bosses I also use Wither - Spell Totem - Faster Casting (140% increased chaos damage taken after stacking 20 times).

Vulnerability and Wither are additive, so maths with 500% increased minion damage:

"

1000 (base damage) * (1+(5+1,14) increased damage) * (1.75 Mirror Arrow bonus) * (1.49 Minion Damage) * (1.39 Void Manipulation) * (1.39 Rapid Decay) * (0.74 GMP) * (1+0,33+1,4) (Vulnerability and Wither) =72669 Chaos Damage per second

If you can craft the bow with high physical damage / Decay and use Poison Support Gem, then DPS should be really good.

"

Decay is the suffix, so if you use "Prefixes cannot be changed" before crafting you 'll keep your high physical mods.

Unfortunately, this will not work. From this manifesto:

"

Essences are primordial and more powerful than crafting mods applied by Forsaken Masters.

I agree that my tree could pick up a fair bit more minion damage, but it would probably cost you >10 skillpoints (which could add up to 800-1000 EHP lost). I guess that tradeoff is a personal decision, in my case I prefer being able to keep ~10k ehp and still do decent damage even without minion damage% nodes.

Regarding your gem links, the Poison support gem is almost useless in that bow / linkage. Your poisons will be scaling off of just 70 base physical damage, which is almost nothing. BDY has a good build with a Lioneye's Glare poison mirror arrow summoner - He uses Lioneye's Glare (~190 base damage) + added chaos damage (141 base damage) and it seems his DPS is on par with the elemental build.

So back to your bow - if you threw in an Added Chaos Damage link in there (replacing Void Manipulation?), you'd be poisoning with 70 physical + 190 chaos base damage. Not too bad, but then multiply that amount by 60-70% because our clones have the accuracy of a level 70 monster. You'd technically be down to ~180 base damage, which is still quite puny. Even with Decay, I don't think you'd be able to catch up to the Lioneye's - especially in a situation where you summon more than 2 clones (since Decay doesn't stack). The caveat is that if you can craft a good bow with a few hundred physical DPS, then the Decay bow might beat lioneye's.

Or instead of using poison support, you could try using another DOT multiplier, but as I explained in my previous post the overall dps still feels quite weak compared to lioneye's, especially since Decay instances cannot stack.

Perhaps against bosses, the Decay bow might fare better, I am unsure of the math but perhaps Wither could be a huge boost.

In any case, would you be able to record a video of gameplay? I'd like to see your approach.

____________________________________

"

crazyjake wrote:

Also, since i played prophecy i have a legacy reach of the council, do you think it is worth to swap GMP and use both elemental focus and added lightning? this should be at least a 35%-40% more damage

I apologize for my answer before - I took another look at the spreadsheet and it turns out Reach of the Council actually is stronger than Lioneye's (both the legacy and 2.4 versions) for AoE dps. (Single target, Lioneye's is still better if you switch GMP for Slower Proj). Since I originally made the build with Lioneye's, and Lioneye's is slightly better for single target, I'll be sticking to my trusty Lioneye's for my upcoming Shaper fight. but if you have a Reach, take advantage of it!

I've been farming Shaper pieces and have finally been able to do all the guardians deathless. (been putting off Shaper fight till I level up) Hardest one was minotaur, but once you learn the fight (use clones to lure him through the shocking pillars) then it's cake.

I'll try to configure OBS today so that I can actually record my gameplay at a reasonable FPS, and possibly have a Shaper video up later this week.

"

dariidar wrote:

Regarding your gem links, the Poison support gem is almost useless in that bow / linkage. Your poisons will be scaling off of just 70 base physical damage, which is almost nothing.

Sorry for my bad English, if you didn't understand me. Of course I don't use Poison Support Gem with my current bow, because it doesn't have any physical / chaos damage. I was hoping to use Poison Support Gem with the master crafted bow. But now, after reading this Manifesto, I know that I can't craft it, so my dream is dead. Thank for the link to Manifesto, by the way.

6L setup with my bow is BA / MA - Minion Damage - GMP - Void Manipulation - Rapid Decay - Slower Projectile.

I play BA/MA summoner each league since these skills were added into the game and I have read almost all good guides about these builds. I just like to try different things each time. For example, I played Voltaxic + Wrath one league, before lighting -> chaos conversion got nerfed. So yea, Decay may be not the best variation of this build, but I have a big fun with it :)

Quick update..

Uploaded some guardian videos.

Hydra
Chimera
Aaaand.. here is my first failed Shaper attempt.

I definitely could have dodged better and my ball placement was horrible in the 2nd phase. Once I get the mechanics down this build should be able to kill him. Not much time to farm guardian fragments lately, but I will try to do it soon.