Summoner Help Pls (PvM)

[TheAlfheim]

Hi All,

I'm building my first necro in a long while. He's a summoner.

I'm going through the baal runs now, so I'm getting a lot of levels (hence skill points) quickly. I just have a few quick questions.....

What would be better, Skeles or revives?
(I see skeles as needing more and more points into SM to be sustainable, while revives are somewhat "self sufficient" - they scale their dmg based on the monsters in the area)
I'm really thinking revives, but Ive heard bad things about their AI. Is it really much of an issue?

Which golem would be good? Ive got a point in each (except fire). I hear clay golem is best (from the guides Ive read). Is this true?

My skill points are as follows:
Curses: 1 point in each
CE: 5 points

Summoning:
SM: 6
RS: 5
Then 1 in each, excelt fire golem (has 0)

I have 6 free skill points, and infernal torch (+1 skills)

Any advice would be much appreciated

Cheers,
TheAlfheim

[Necrochild313]

Let me seperate the uses of skeletons and revives.

Revives are basically tanks. Even with maxed Skeleton Master and numerous +skills they really can't kill anything on their own, unfortunately.

Skeletons, however, are your main offense. These guys can clear crowds in hell, and can take a great deal of damage due to a large amount of regeneration that they have.

What level are you? Generally for one who takes the summoner route 1-3 into skeleton mastery and the rest into raise skeleton seems to be the most efficient route for leveling purposes.

Oh, regarding revive AI, they are extremely stupid, and when they get offscreen often they "dissapear"

[TheAlfheim]

He's now lvl40 with 9 skill points free
(gotta love baal runs)

In looking at skelies vs revives, one thing I noticed is on the revive skill, it says:
+235% life
+70% dmg
So that means whatever I revive is going to be a fair bit more powerful than the packs I fight against (right?).

On the flipside, with the skills I have, Ive found my skelies get chewed up in the baal runs, let alone in NM when I get there.

I dont want to over-invest in something and ruin my necro (I dont normally play necros). Perhaps ruin is too strong. Underpower. I dont want to underpower my necro.

Any suggestions?

[Relive The Stupidty]

What would be better, Skeles or revives?
(I see skeles as needing more and more points into SM to be sustainable, while revives are somewhat "self sufficient" - they scale their dmg based on the monsters in the area)
I'm really thinking revives, but Ive heard bad things about their AI. Is it really much of an issue?


Skelie Mastery ( supprisingly) will make your revives stronger the last time i looked.

Skeletons, however, are your main offense. These guys can clear crowds in hell, and can take a great deal of damage due to a large amount of regeneration that they have.

I agree on this, so i say 2 points mastey 1 point skeles. thats the way i did it so at 35 skeles owned everything. Then i say put 10 points into Mages and max revies.

[TheAlfheim]

Skelie Mastery ( supprisingly) will make your revives stronger the last time i looked.

Yeah, SM improves both revive strength, and skellie strength.

The point I was getting at was that the power of the skellies (either through SM or RS - both improve their strength) has to be increased at a minimal rate in order to be progressively stong (eg: my skellies are very weak right now - probably because Ive under invested).

But with revives, they take their strength values from the pack you're fighting against (with an additional damage and health bonues from SM). This to me makes it seem like revives are a scalable solution.

In the long run, I plan to max SM, RS, and revives. I guess I'm at the crossroads of wondering which to go for first......
Very much in two minds......

[Alex Kerensky]

I say Skeletons. Why? Low maintenance and their strength. Skeletons kill very quickly and die seldomly, after you place many points into the skill. Revives, however, expire after three minutes. That means they can disappear at a critical junction; if you don't want that to happen, you have to spend lots of time in finding more bodies for your Revives to maintain a cycle of living Revives.

What you can do, however, is to max Skeleton Mastery, Raise Skeleton, Revive, and then Skeleton Mage. Why not do that?

But, at the moment, stick with the Skeletons.

[TheAlfheim]

Firstly, thanks heaps for your advice guys. Really helpful!

Ok, so it (overwhelmingly) seems like skellies are the way to go.

Which first? RS or SM?
With 9 free points, it looks like I'll almost triple their life and do a bucketload more damage (in RS)
But in SM, it looks somewhat similar.
(according to Arreat summit, going from level 6 to level 15 on either skill)

Preferences?

[Relive The Stupidty]

do 5 SM 4 Rs

[Alex Kerensky]

I say max RS first, as you have enough SM for now. Maxing RS will give you more skeletons faster and make them stronger at the same time.

[Myrakh-2]

Another suggestion: I usually find that 1 point in Revive is more than enough, as I'm looking for +summoning skills anyway... and additional points in Revive just increase their number.

If you intend to go after the diablo clone, a point in Revive is more or less a MUST, unless you have insane +skills on your skellies. I find that my skellies (37 SM, 35 RS, 34 RSM, 13 SR) die rather quickly when dealing with DC, and they only chop off a few pixels from his lifebar. So I fetch myself some revives with crushing blow... 4-6, usually, and they take off the majority of his hitpoints rather quickly, so a fresh set of skellies can then do the rest.

This is, however, just one monster where I find that Revives are really needed. I don't generally use them a lot elsewhere. DC really IS a special monster, as my skellies fail nowhere else...

[JoJeck]

For a summoner intending to max both RS and SM it is always best in terms of dealing damage to max RS before SM although do put 1 point in SM as soon as you can. Investing in RS makes each skellie do more damage than investing in SM would and gives an extra skellie every 3 points, and that is an overwhelming advantage.

Revives can do more damage than skeletons do in Late Hell. But that is because the monsters you revive then are big and tough and hit hard. In Normal and Nightmare the monsters are weaker and hence your Revives will be weaker than skellies. That is why some people will give you misleading advice about the strength of Revives versus Skellies, but they are just not playing the game at its hardest. So essentially you don't need to use Revives until Hell, although I admit it is fun to do so. ;)

The strength of your skellies is determined only by the skill points in RS and SM and a damage boost from the level of your Might mercs aura. That strength will be the same in all parts of the game (although skellies get a hit point boost in Nightmare and another in Hell).

The strength of Revives is determined by skill points in SM and your Might Merc and the basic strength of the monster you revive. Incidently, this is only true for revives that do physical damage, those doing only elemental damage get no boost at all. So if you choose what to revive carefully, like a Death Lord minion of an extra strong boss that was cold enchanted you'll have a revive that is much stronger than any skellie ...

[TheAlfheim]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks HEAPS for all the advice. :clap:

Myrakh-2:
I doubt I'll be hunting D-Clone. But then again, you never know. This isnt a task I'm really building/preparing for. If the character's viable in Hell, I'll be happy.

JoJeck:
I agree with you that revives will eventually do more damage than skellies. I wasnt sure when in the game it would happen. I havent started NM yet, and with the crossover being in Hell, Ive got a bit of a way to go.
Reviving monsters in baal runs, in particular, Moon Lords and Venom things (big guys with wings, a sword, and inferno skill), it made it seem like revive was very powerful. Maybe its just monsters in there.

My necro's now also using a set shield with +1 to all skills (forget which one, it was late last night.... :drink: ). So that's 3 points into revive for the value of 1. Should be enough to keep me entertained for a while.

So, I'm going to boost my RS, and keep pushing them up. I'll let you know how it goes......
:thumbsup:

One final question though:
The resists penalties in NM/Hell, do they apply to my minions? (and hence need more into summon resist to counter?)

Cheers,
TheAlfheim

[Alex Kerensky]

Nope, resist penalties do not apply to your summons.

Also, you probably don't want to put too many points into Revive. You should get enough bonuses simply by having items that give you + skills. I say this because you'll rarely need 20+ Revived creatures running around. Less than 10 usually suffices.

Unless, of course, you are trying to lag everyone. :)

[TheAlfheim]

Hi All.

I dumped 9 points into RS, and now he's running around quite efficiently!

Thanks for all your help!

Cheers,
TheAlfheim

[Starkey]

maxing revives is pointless, my necro is setup like this
max skellies
max mastery
1 in mages
1 in every curse
1 in bone armor more if your not using bugged marrows
1 in clay mastery max is optional
1 in clay,iron,blood golems fire is a waste of points
i maxed ce and summon resist for my revives and skelles
1 in revives + skills will make it higher
im maxing well im trying to max bone spirit as a back up killer

currently lvl 94 HCWest necro 5th on necro ladder CalKiwiCal

i can solo every area in the game and have soloed dclone with ease
also he is a great mf'er currently running 265% mf with max resists 174% mf on merc