Guide help

[Tyrr]

I was flipping through the guides, and I couldn't find a "PvM only mf hardcore summoner" type guide. I was wondering if anyone had/knows of one? Or if anyone could offer any advise.

So far I got max'd RS and SM.
I have one point in all the curses I need, don't think I need more than one. +skills should take care of that.
Max'd bone armor.

So now I have about 40 skill points left, and I don't really know where to put them. I've heard a lot of people say "max ce" but shouldn't +skills boost that high enough? Or maybe I should just put 10 and not 20. I'll be mfing in the pits so I don't really need huge explosions.
But where do I go from there? Don't think I need max summon resist, skellies never die in ellemental fights anyways. I was thinking about either maxing revive or fire golem. I know iron golem is better in a lot of people's eyes but I think it's ugly as hell and it's a pain to keep 50 IK mauls on stand by. I also heard that I only really need one point in revive and the +skills will handle the rest. Maybe fire golem/golem mastery?
I have no damage spells besides CE because I figure'd they'd be a waste without synergies.

Help :( sad panda

[logger120]

that basically the first guide. the one by nightfish is designed for HC has intensive MF section and he plays only hardcore. try reading it.

[Tyrr]

that basically the first guide. the one by nightfish is designed for HC has intensive MF section and he plays only hardcore. try reading it.

I did, it was great but I was wondering if there was anything specific to solve my skill point problems.

[Mad Mantis]

I did, it was great but I was wondering if there was anything specific to solve my skill point problems.

There are a lot of threads on this subject. Maxing Mages is a popular choice.
Maxing DV certainly can do no harm for a HC char and most people find it very helpful.
You can pump GM and a Golem, but that is mostly for experimental purposes or because you really need a very sturdy IG for something.
You can choose to further increase your BA by maxing BW or BP. That would actually have been better than trying to max BA in the first place. The synergies give more bonus to your BA than points in BA do.

[Nightfish]

So now I have about 40 skill points left, and I don't really know where to put them. I've heard a lot of people say "max ce" but shouldn't +skills boost that high enough? Or maybe I should just put 10 and not 20. I'll be mfing in the pits so I don't really need huge explosions

Of course you need huge explosions. When MFing, faster killspeed = faster MFing = more items per time. A larger CE radius means you hit more stuff in the same cast, and each point in CE does more than the last. Consider the area that's affected.

At first glance it might seem that CE doesn't really do a lot more at higher levels (damage is always 60-100%), at second glance it seems that there is a linear increase (radius always goes up by the same amount). But in reality the increase is better than linear. Think of the ring shape of explosions, each ring you add has a larger area than the last.

This certainly increases your killspeed a whole lot more than adding 20 points to mages. They do little more than block the actually useful revives or skeletons and your iron golem.


So, here's a short list of what I'd do with points, though I think it is all in the guide:

- Max Golem Mastery & Fire Golem. This is what I consider the best choice after about a year of intensive D2 playing. The idea behind this is that you cast an *Iron* Golem out of a badass weapon. Windhammer, IK Maul, or something similar. You max fire and the mastery to increase damage and life respectively. If you just MF the pit the golem never dies (well, okay, not "never" but I always found a new IK maul before the old one died) and he does almost as much damage as your merc. Gets the first corpses a lot faster and fast corpses mean fast CE, fast CE means fast items.

- Get a few more points in revive. Around 10-15 is enough with +skills so you prolly don't need that. In the pits, revive archers. They do physical damage and due to the fact that they are ranged (duh) they will not get blocked too much. Pretty helpful. Revives are more useful in the WS K, though, where there's more than one type of good monsters.

- Put on a blindfold and randomly click until you're out of points. This works pretty well if you want a necromancer no one else has. ^_^

[Tyrr]

Of course you need huge explosions. When MFing, faster killspeed = faster MFing = more items per time. A larger CE radius means you hit more stuff in the same cast, and each point in CE does more than the last. Consider the area that's affected.

At first glance it might seem that CE doesn't really do a lot more at higher levels (damage is always 60-100%), at second glance it seems that there is a linear increase (radius always goes up by the same amount). But in reality the increase is better than linear. Think of the ring shape of explosions, each ring you add has a larger area than the last.

This certainly increases your killspeed a whole lot more than adding 20 points to mages. They do little more than block the actually useful revives or skeletons and your iron golem.


So, here's a short list of what I'd do with points, though I think it is all in the guide:

- Max Golem Mastery & Fire Golem. This is what I consider the best choice after about a year of intensive D2 playing. The idea behind this is that you cast an *Iron* Golem out of a badass weapon. Windhammer, IK Maul, or something similar. You max fire and the mastery to increase damage and life respectively. If you just MF the pit the golem never dies (well, okay, not "never" but I always found a new IK maul before the old one died) and he does almost as much damage as your merc. Gets the first corpses a lot faster and fast corpses mean fast CE, fast CE means fast items.

- Get a few more points in revive. Around 10-15 is enough with +skills so you prolly don't need that. In the pits, revive archers. They do physical damage and due to the fact that they are ranged (duh) they will not get blocked too much. Pretty helpful. Revives are more useful in the WS K, though, where there's more than one type of good monsters.

- Put on a blindfold and randomly click until you're out of points. This works pretty well if you want a necromancer no one else has. ^_^


Thanks a ton, that's just what I needed to hear :)

One thing though; I was sort of confused by your golem coment. Do you think I should max GM and IG? Or GM and FG?

[Nightfish]

Np ;)

One thing though; I was sort of confused by your golem coment. Do you think I should max GM and IG? Or GM and FG?

Not sure what confuses you so I'll lay it all out once more:

The idea is to have an iron golem that 1) doesn't die and 2) throws a badass punch. Maxing GM takes care of 1) and maxing *Fire* Golem takes care of 2).

Maxing iron golem does basically nothing at all. It just increases the base damage of the golem by a tiny amount and the thorns damage which nobody cares about anyway. I tried to think of any build that would actually benefit from more points in IG but it doesn't exist. Even my iron golemmancer (who killed solely with CE and iron golem and had no skellie or revive support at all) only had 1 point there. There's just no use in bumping it up.

Then there's the "synergy" between %ED and -% physical resistance: With maxed fire golem your Iron Golem does 2.2 times damage, which becomes 4.4 times damage with the amp curse on. His damage output is more than doubled by the 20 points in FG, that amount is doubled again because the monster has -100% resistance. (assuming a monster that started out at 0% resis).

to summarzie: We damage and life:

- Fire Golem is maxed solely for synergy purposes (I cannot even cast my fire golem on my HC skellimancer who has little mana). Buffing IG does (more or less) nothing for damage.

- Golem Mastery buffs golems life much better than the synergy in blood golem (if you were considering that).

[Tyrr]

Np ;)



Not sure what confuses you so I'll lay it all out once more:

The idea is to have an iron golem that 1) doesn't die and 2) throws a badass punch. Maxing GM takes care of 1) and maxing *Fire* Golem takes care of 2).

Maxing iron golem does basically nothing at all. It just increases the base damage of the golem by a tiny amount and the thorns damage which nobody cares about anyway. I tried to think of any build that would actually benefit from more points in IG but it doesn't exist. Even my iron golemmancer (who killed solely with CE and iron golem and had no skellie or revive support at all) only had 1 point there. There's just no use in bumping it up.

Then there's the "synergy" between %ED and -% physical resistance: With maxed fire golem your Iron Golem does 2.2 times damage, which becomes 4.4 times damage with the amp curse on. His damage output is more than doubled by the 20 points in FG, that amount is doubled again because the monster has -100% resistance. (assuming a monster that started out at 0% resis).

to summarzie: We damage and life:

- Fire Golem is maxed solely for synergy purposes (I cannot even cast my fire golem on my HC skellimancer who has little mana). Buffing IG does (more or less) nothing for damage.

- Golem Mastery buffs golems life much better than the synergy in blood golem (if you were considering that).

Thanks a ton buddy