[3.0 HC-Beta] Elementalist / Necromancer MOM 5-6 Golem Summoner [videos]

Golem Beta testing blog--supplemental entry re Primordial Might:

So, this entire time I've been running the build without an extra primordial might--just the anima stone and harmonies. Some nice person sold me a primordial might today for about 100c so I could complete the testing on this build. This is the stone that says "Your golems are aggressive." Here is what that actually means in play:

Without Primordial might, you focus the golems on a target by sending out a ball lightning and then not running away. If you move too far away from the target, the golems will follow you, so you cannot leave them to kill things offscreen. On the plus side, your golems will focus as you direct.

With primordial might, you can send your golems into the fight with the ball lightning, but they will then pick their own targets within reach, and can be called off only via convocation or leaving the area entirely. They become less focused, and can become distracted by adds. This is a relatively minor inconvenience. The most important thing, is that they will -NOT- follow you when you move away unless you completely leave the screen. This means that with primordial might, you can spend your full attention avoiding the attacks of harder bosses from a screen away and the golems will continue to work. This dramatically reduces the difficulty of upper tier content, and makes the jewel well worth its asking price, imo. As always, ymmv.

-O

Yep. At its current price, I'd still pay for it even it was only good for one fight :P

Golems+Primordial Might vs. Hall of Grandmasters, deathless:

(Due to technical issues, I was not able to record one of the halls, but the other three are linked below for your entertainment)

Golems in the Hall of Heroes: https://youtu.be/lthn67hqCR4
Golems in the Hall of the Twisted: https://youtu.be/owBrdefGQV0
Golems in the Hall of the Fallen: https://youtu.be/HpqyQkA-DTs

-O

Giving this build a go for the beta, can you post up the gem links you use, and what your 6th link would be?

My first time playing a golemancer. :)

Up to a 6 link now:

Flame Golem>GMP>Spell Echo>Minion Damage>Controlled Destruction>Fire pen is what I am currently using.

I think 6th link has other candidates worth experimenting with depending on color. If blue, would try elemental focus or faster casting. If green might try Slower projectiles.

Hope you have fun with it!

gonna edit this out as to not be misleading!

"

darthross wrote:

Despite popular belief, both Mastermind of Discord and Pendulum of Destruction (only 25% inc AoE part) affect your golems. I have seen a billion people on these forums and internet in general claim that only Liege of the Primordial affects your golems which is misinformation, so I'd like to squash this.

...

2) An added 25% fire penetration added to your golems for 10 sec after using any lightning spell from MoD.

Your post piqued my curiosity, so I went ahead and did some tests and got some rather confusing results. What I did was grab some test tools:

I then did 2 runs with Mastermind of Discord and 2 runs without. You would expect that either the MoD-enhanced runs would be quicker (proving you correct) or there would be no difference (indicating MoD has no effect on golem/minion damage). My results actually had the non-MoD runs being faster:


These results obviously make no sense, so I can only chalk them up to either small sample size or (admittedly) poor test controls for now. But at this point, I'm doubtful that MoD contributes anything to golem damage. I'd like to see harder evidence before believing that it does.

"

You can easily confirm what I'm saying by checking your golem's stats under the character tab. You will see:

1) The 25% inc. AoE from PoD cycling 4 sec on and 6 sec off.

2) An added 25% fire penetration added to your golems for 10 sec after using any lightning spell from MoD.

I think we have to be careful here, because spell stats in the character tab (and tooltip text) can be misleading at times. What you might be seeing is fire penetration being added to the act of casting a golem, not the golem's actual damage-dealing abilities. This of course, is completely useless, since casting a golem deals 0 damage. The same text display pops up when you check other non-damaging spells. Like Immortal Call for instance:



Another example of this is your golem's tooltip damage. If you mouseover your golem in your hotkey bar, it probably won't list any DPS. But if you stick in an added flat damage gem (lightning/cold/chaos), it will suddenly display a DPS number that goes up and down (due to Pendulum of Destruction). The number will also make no sense because it will probably be ludicrously low considering you likely have several other damage-boosting gems linked (you'll also notice the number doesn't change even when you add in or take out Minion Damage for example). This number is just an estimation of your DPS for casting the golem, which ends up being 0 for all practical purposes, because casting golems does no damage.

(agreed regarding Elemental Focus by the way)

Hi all,

I'm slowly fixating on golems for 3.0 leaguestarter, playing around in PoB.
Is it realistic to switch gems in & out for specific bossfights ? I'm thinking of GMP, which replaced with either LMP or even a damage gem can greatly boost DPS.

Re gem switching:

In general, it is both possible and often good play to switch gem setup for boss fights. Particularly with aoe skills, using inc aoe for general clear and conc effect for slow moving/stationary bosses is one common example.

Specifically with regard to the flame golems, however, I didn't find it beneficial, as their ranged attack with GMP seems to get the overlapping explosions effect that is all that is left of shotgunning (though I am not clear on this, and it may just be easier to hit/overlapping explosions from separate golems) When I tried subbing in slow proj for GMP, for example, my recollection is that the fight felt slower. Go ahead and test for yourself and see what you think.

-O

Hey, thinking of starting the new league with a life based + MoM golemancer, this is my first attempt to make a skilltree myself so feedback would be appreciated.

Here's the tree:


Also got a few questions about gems and the jewels, you've linked spell echo with flame golem, why so? Mainly for the golem?

Secondly, the build requires plenty of gem jewel slots, I understand I should get anima + might + eminence and the rest fill with harmony?