[3.25] Holy Flicker Strike Necro [League start > All content] All content is done. PoB updated

"

moumout wrote:

if i read it right, in the patchnote they announced they have deleted Fated items and the Geofri's Helmet haven't received "+1 to maximum summoned holy relic"
So now, only 1 relic ? they just destroyed the build ...

"

TheEighthPanda wrote:

"

moumout wrote:

if i read it right, in the patchnote they announced they have deleted Fated items and the Geofri's Helmet haven't received "+1 to maximum summoned holy relic"
So now, only 1 relic ? they just destroyed the build ...

You have read it wrong. What it said was:

> The Geofri's Crest Unique Helmet no longer has +1 to Level of Socketed Gems, or Summoned Holy Relics have 20-25% reduced Cooldown Recovery Rate. It now has 120-150% increased Armour and Energy Shield (previously 60-80%). The Fire, Cold and Lightning Resistance modifiers now have values of +20-30% (previously all +15-20%).

"

moumout wrote:

(...)
So they have deleted the non fated one ?
(on the wiki they have updated it, but there is still the +1 to socketed gems tho)

"

TheEighthPanda wrote:

That was some time ago, they merged the two.
The change now is both nerf and a buff.
no longer +1 to socketed gems - nerf
no longer increases Relic cast delay - buff

"

Fire_Archer wrote:

So depression period is passed lets move on to acceptance.

But first I wanna give you a brief history of the build development and also rant a bit while at it.

Spoiler

I started the build with full elemental conversion, using Triad Grip with bunch of added flat damage to Relic.
That was back in the days where exposure didn’t exists and you could stack a lot of negative ele res on enemies.

GGG changed that, killing the idea of having elemental scaling entirely, making pure physical build the better choice.

So I moved on to the pure physical version. That was back in Ultimatum and the build felt great. Back in the days I was using non-crit version because it was more consistent and the damage was enough to do all the content I wanted.
More importantly – the entire build was 2 minions. 2 relics, and that’s what I liked the most. I never liked to have a literal army running around on my screen and much more prefer to have 1-2 strong minions I could invest into.

You know what happened next – a cross board nerf to all damage. Expedition league. No longer build was able to deal with end game. And so I had to add some support.
Animate Guardian and Specters were included to compensate for damage nerf, using both of those support minions purely as damage boosters and nothing else. And it worked just fine.

Then Scourge came out. Brining a lot of power creep to enemies. Raising a need in defenses to stand against the rising scourge stacks of increased damage taken. The adjustments been made, trading some damage to protective specters like They of Tul and Ruins Hellion. AG gear were also adjusted a bit. But the damage was still barely. BARELY enough to deal with the end game.

And then Siege of the Atlas came out. Bringing out new bosses with rollable mods. And very fat enemies in form of Archnemesis rares. The build started to feel very weak, taking minutes to kill the enemies in maps. And so the idea to scale damage with critical strikes appeared. With the help of Brittle ground and power charges you could reach close to 100% crit. With a proper gear that would provide you with + levels of skills, Ashes of the Stars and massive boost to crits the damage was all time high.

But it was still not high enough to trivialize rolled bosses even with tanky stats of the build. It was not killing bosses fast enough, it was not even killing rares fast enough. You still would have to stop and run around those for a while.


Moving on to 3.19
Now we lost about 70% crit chance with a faint promise we can get it from gear.

We lost +2 to level of minion gems with no compensation what so ever. As a pure physical build we have no way to use Unholy Might.

-2 to minion gems in turn leads to massive defense reduction. We lost additional extra specter from Raise Specter gem that we no longer can get the gem to level 25.

We lost +1 of socketed gems from a helm, again, with no compensation what so ever. At this point I feel personally attacked, but it wouldn’t even matter because even with it – you can’t get to level 25 Specter gem.

Both Specters and Animate Guardian life were nerfed. And even further reduced because of –2levels. And its not like those were able to stay alive to begin with. The hard content and endgame boss fights were killing them even prior to the nerfs.

Passive tree now gives less area of effect and less crit nodes to relics. Removal of mana reserve with no way to compensate for it means -1 defensive aura.

So the tl;dr – the changes are – you won’t do damage, but also your minions will die, but also you will die too because we reduced your defenses. We also give you no way to make up for it with gear because we nerfed gear too. There is also nothing on the passive tree you can take to make up for it.

Now when rant is over, I’ll try to summarize what I will do with the build.

Spoiler

First of all – crit seem to be still a way to go, because its like the only way to add any damage to the build.

Here is some idea of what you should expect in moderate gear https://pastebin.com/yDbSt0PH

Might wanna drop Bone Offering (and die every map) for Spirit Offering. The later gives about 30% more damage. You can check it out – I put it on a flask.

Losing bone offering, however, puts you from 230k ehp to 90k. Also makes your minions beyond squishy. So its most likely not even worth.

With that you should expect to be doing around 1-1.3 mill dps yellow-red maps. This is NOT enough by any means. But maybe you can get some ‘good rewarding items’ going.

Ascendancy is an interesting choice. You could potentially go Scion over Necromancer. Its slightly worse in terms of damage but has a bit more utility in it. You’d wanna pick Necromancer (for block) and Champion (for damage) with potential to add Pathfinder/Raider/Deadeye with forbidden jewels. Scion also has access to more jewel sockets and close by mana reserve.

I still don’t recommend doing it – because Necromancer adds more damage and gives massive life boost to minions via Bone Barrier (50% MORE life) and resist aura. If you ever wanna keep AG/Specters alive, even with new rings – Scion is most likely not the way to go.

I can’t recommend Guardian either as it barely adds any damage compared to Necro or Scion in terms of pure ascendancy.

In terms of the build guide – I can totally recommend the Guardian one. Might be better than what I have here, plus its never bad to educate yourself on what other people do.

In conclusion

Spoiler

I’m very much not happy with GGG making build same but worse league after league.

I will still try to make the build work.

I will league start with it. It SHOULD hold to at LEAST yellow maps. With Bone Barrier boost to SRS life + minion instability – for sure.

I can’t recommend starting it UNLESS you REALY REALLY like the skill (and also like the CBT of having zdps at all times). There are far better starters in terms of damage/survivability, although the word is – everyone have it rough. But still prolly not THIS rough.

You can start Scion or Necro. Mind that this is important because you could, potentially reroll into other build if this one would feel really bad. So you won't have to level a new character.

You CAN change ascendancy even after you picked one. You can go from Necro to Occultist or Elementalist. Scion is just flexible overall.

My plan is to go Witch – then swap to cold dot or whispering ice if things go south. Or to other game.

Anoint Death Attunement to make up for extra specter loss.

Use skitter bots lvl 1, Pride, Tempest Shield to make up for mana resrve loss. Hope for Enlighten I guess then swap to Zealotry from Skitterbots. Link Tempest Shield with Life Leech support.

Use SRS for leveling as Absolution got a bit nerfed, SRS buffed AND because you be taking extra life meaning explosions will deal a lot of extra damage.

That’s all folks. I have nothing more to give.

"

eyeyue wrote:

That was an amazing history write up.

Looking forward to the builds' next evolution

"

Fire_Archer wrote:

(...)

Also starting day one as per usual (if nothing bad happens to me) so you can scout and track my progress.