My first necro....

[jackthelad]

Hey! :thumbsup:
This is my first necro (see title lol!) read a few guides n thought a skellimancer wud be cool, so am currently at lvl37, & am wondering where to go from here...
have maxed RS & will have maxed SM in 3 more levels, this has got me thru normal with no problems, pretty easily actually! my other skills are 1 in AD, 1 in teeth & 1 in CE. Also have +3 to all skills due to items, courtesy of my mf meteorb sorc! :) incidentally, will have full trang set by the time I am at the appropriate lvls to wear em (again, thx sorc! :) ) So woz after some advice as to where to go from here (before I start nmare) Do I need to be doin more magical/poison dmg to take on nmare/hell? Or make my skellies as hard as possible? A golem? Or are curses the way to go? Any advice/hints wud be appreciated! I realise everyone has their own favorites/strategies so most of the advice will prob be conflicting, but throw it all in anyway & at least then I can make an informed choice! Thx all!

[RealmOftheWolf]

Well ive made many skelemancers. Decrep and amp are the best curses but you could have one in all because all of them have there uses.
Mages add more damage to the build and help against those rare physical immune after amp monsters and also add the chill effect in the form of a cold mage and prevent monster heal from poison.
Revives i love these things some people max them some people put one point. one problem with revives is 3 minute timer which i hope will be took away in new patch or something.
Golems dont bother with them there not worth investing in there just tanks even maxed they do as much damage as my lvl 6 barb not worth it.

If you can aquire a 3 summoning teleport charges ammy. i found a 3 cold skillz 20 charges ish ammy of teleport. minion stacking justo ownz bosses totally negated need for decrep because with 12 skeles i stun lock hell baal.

At least one in golem mastery and summon resist but dont put more in they have crappy returns . let + skillz boost it.


its so fun duelin with a army of 40 cows 15 skeles and 15 skele mages OOOOOOO the lag lol

since ure useing trangs ure loseing out on the red pants

Good luck with your necro :thumbsup:

[jag]

You may also want to put a point or 2 in bone armor -- its a great 1st hit warning to get out of harms way. You wont have enuf points to max this out or synergize it with a skelly build, but it has saved my butt MANY times

Summon resistance -- definitely need some investment in that -- check out Arreats on that skill since benefit per point drops off dramitically -- maybe 5 hard points + bonus from skillers will be enough. My skell army can take elemental attacks far better than i can myself LOL

Couple points in CE to get a decent radius.

Agree with Realm of the wolfs suggestions too

[RealmOftheWolf]

well he said trangs so just let +skillz boost it. and i forgot about armor lol

[jackthelad]

I found wormskull whilst questin on arreat plateau, so now have +4 to all skills! :) Have maxed SM n put a point in bone armour (so its at lvl5, 60% absorb, shud be enough?) Also looks like 2-3 points in lower resist (to get it to +50% resist all) shud be enough, so I'll go with that. But still not sure where else to go?
Its only one curse per monster, isnt it? I mean they dont stack, so I couldnt have a monster wiv amp and decrepify at once? So not sure if I see the point of having a point in any/all curses except amp. Apart from attract, iron maiden n decrepify none of the other curses seem to be of any use!
As for the poison/bone side, cant see the dmg there being significant unless some synergies are maxed too, n aint got enough skill points left to do that (i don think) so should I just go with max mages n a coupla points in revive? I think I am leaning that way atm....
Thx for the advice so far btw! :)

[RealmOftheWolf]

I found wormskull whilst questin on arreat plateau, so now have +4 to all skills! :) Have maxed SM n put a point in bone armour (so its at lvl5, 60% absorb, shud be enough?) Also looks like 2-3 points in lower resist (to get it to +50% resist all) shud be enough, so I'll go with that. But still not sure where else to go?
Its only one curse per monster, isnt it? I mean they dont stack, so I couldnt have a monster wiv amp and decrepify at once? So not sure if I see the point of having a point in any/all curses except amp. Apart from attract, iron maiden n decrepify none of the other curses seem to be of any use!
As for the poison/bone side, cant see the dmg there being significant unless some synergies are maxed too, n aint got enough skill points left to do that (i don think) so should I just go with max mages n a coupla points in revive? I think I am leaning that way atm....
Thx for the advice so far btw! :)

One curse per monster yes but many of the curses are used at different times. dim vision good against souls and lifetap is good when ure merc is low.

lower resist dont more than one point trangs gives you enough and for hybrids nah not enough points unless u go poison i prefer pure summon anywayz lol.

oh about bone armor it aint percent absorb its just extra life against physical and with trangs ull ave it at 140ish . so thats 140 more life on ure necro plus it makes u look cool .

id go max mages and rest in corpse explode but to me nothin is more fun that telein with 40 cows on me lol

[AnimeCraze]

http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=391291&page=2

See my rant about how to use curses and that there are more than just amp and decr in the game.

[Painman]

I'm doing my 1st necro too, standard Fishy summoner, it's a great place to start... almost lvl 75 now. I decided to go with maxed Mages after I got CE done. I find them more reliable than Revives, but with skill bonuses I can still raise a dozen Revives if I want them. 16 when my guy is finished. Use NM as your testing ground to see what you like and what you don't, then put more hard points into what you like. :)

[jackthelad]

Right, so 1 point in all curses then... thats 9 points, am at lvl41 atm. Shud I put those 9 in now or go sumwhere else first n come back to them?
Also, while mf-ing last night found an undead crown, +3 to SM & 101 def (seem to find a lot of good necro gear while mf-ing, one of the reasons why I chose to build a necro) so shud I stick with wormskull, 33 def & +1 all skills, or go with the crown?
Also did one of the stupidest things ive ever, EVER done last night: while running hell andy, died a coupla times, so to get sum money for merc resurection, dropped all my charms to pick up & sell everything she dropped. Then left the game. WITHOUT my charms! Arrggggghhhhhh :eek: :mad: :( Wouldnt have minded too much, except that included my 40% Gheeds! Found myself too! Jeez, did I feel sick! :(

[magicalkitty]

Right, so 1 point in all curses then... thats 9 points, am at lvl41 atm. Shud I put those 9 in now or go sumwhere else first n come back to them?
Also, while mf-ing last night found an undead crown, +3 to SM & 101 def (seem to find a lot of good necro gear while mf-ing, one of the reasons why I chose to build a necro) so shud I stick with wormskull, 33 def & +1 all skills, or go with the crown?
Also did one of the stupidest things ive ever, EVER done last night: while running hell andy, died a coupla times, so to get sum money for merc resurection, dropped all my charms to pick up & sell everything she dropped. Then left the game. WITHOUT my charms! Arrggggghhhhhh :eek: :mad: :( Wouldnt have minded too much, except that included my 40% Gheeds! Found myself too! Jeez, did I feel sick! :(

that does suck i bet u wont do that again

[GotFriana]

Sorry about your loss.
About curses I d suggest after you have Decrepify, invest enough points into Corpse Explosion to have a decent radius with +skills, then start with the curses. Or you could alternate both.
All curses have their uses in different situations, you can get away with just Decrep and Amp but having more options is allways good, at least that s what I like.
Amp is the default curse usually, for bosses Decrep is the best, for dangerous ranged attackers like Souls Dim Vision is good to prevent them from shooting, for tight packs of archers or hard to kill melees Attract is very good too combined with Amp, Attract affects only 1 enemy at a time (except uniques) so you Attract one and Amp all the rest, this releases the preassure from your skelletons since most enemies will be attacking their old mate, even archers will turn on their feet and shoot the Attracted one. You can allways use Life Tap to replenish your merc and skellies if you dont feel like stopping for a while to let them heal themselves. Confuse works similar to Attract but on groups, I mean its similar because it ll cause some to attack each other but personally I prefer Attract because it cannot be overriden and lets me control better who gets Attracted and who gets Amped. Terror can be used to unblock narrow passages, when the enemies are clustered at a door or passage and only one or two skellies can reach them you can herd them to a wider area with Terror. Lower Resist is not really needed for a Summoner but it can be a party friendly curse for spellcasters. Although Iron Maiden is so lethal when used by OKs the same is not true for Necromancers :-/ at least in PvM the damage is cut in nm and hell iirc so its not effective, also most monsters dont do enough damage to actually kill themselves quickly. Weaken is just prerequisite for Decrep.

This is all IMO of course what I find usefull or not :) You could also consider investing 1 point into Clay Golem and Golem Mastery if you havent done yet. This guy is great to fight bosses among your army for his slow effect and also can help your merc get the first bodies in new games.

[jackthelad]

In case any1 is wondering, am now at lvl55 n have a few points in skellie mages, goin good so far! Nmare is easy for the most part, even act 5, so its all good! Still need trang helm n belt (expensive!) But have marrowalks :) but need to lvl a bit to wear em!
Need a question answerin tho: traded for a sup. tomb wand with +2 iron golem, fire golem n lower resist. If i give it to larzuk, will n put 2 sockets in it?
N if he does, can I make white runeword wiv it? I tried makin 'insight' in a sup. polearm for my merc, but it didnt work! Dont want to waste the runes, so need to know before I do it! Thx for all the help 2! :thumbsup:

[RealmOftheWolf]

lazuk will give u 2 sockets in that.
Insight is ladder only so wont work nl in hc or sc or you have put them into the item in the wrong order.

White works in all modes so just make sure you do put them in right order