Lower resist builds, nova/mages. Does it work?

[Catflap]

Hi y'all, I'm coming back to D2 after a long break and I want to try something a little different from the norm melee builds.

Would something like this work?

20 Mage
20 Skel Mastery
20 Poison Nova
20 Poison Synergy
5 Lower Res
1 point all other skills

Thanks

[Mad Mantis]

Welcome Newcomer to The Darkness. Grab a brew (http://www.holland-at-home.nl/images/bier.jpg) and feel free to raise some corpses.

A Lord of Mages build can work. It won't be as fast a standard Summoner, but it can be viable. With that set-up you need to think on how you are going to keep your Mages alive. You could focus a bit on protection curses such as the AI curses.

[Jaquiezz]

As Mantis said, you will need protection. Mages are incredibly fragile, and once the mob gets in your face, they will quickly fall.

Remember you have 11 skill points from quests, so the build you listed only takes you to level 78 or so. Level 85 is very attainable, but above that it takes time you might not be willing to spend.

Count on having a very durable act 2 merc. If you can afford one, an Infinity will make your mages massive, added with LR.

My second suggestion for survival is a decent Clay Golem, because it has the most life. With enough +skill gear, 1pt Mastery/Golem will work wonders, and can easily exceed 3k life.

3rd, I recommend Summon resist. Once you have a clay and mastery, this is only one more point, so no biggie. This will really help mages out from ranged attackers and make gumby more durable.

Skills:
20 Skele Mastery
20 Mage
1pt each Golem/Mastery/Summon Res
1-5pt Lower Res (Depends on +skill gear)
20 Poison Nova
20 Poison Explosion (you can actually use this skill, compared to dagger which is useless)
8 Prereqs
Rest in Dagger

[Senshiki]

I don't want to say the build doesn't work or try to dampen your enthusiasm, but during a single player testing, I set both Raise Skeletal Mages AND Skeletal Mastery to level 99, and mages still fell like plies during a Baal run, and it was on standard players 1.

However, if you do want to run them, I definitely recommend an Infinity on your merc, and a Holy Freeze merc would probably be the best. That way, not only do you get great crowd control, but your merc will deal extra elemental damage.

What you could try is a Mage Cannon necro. They are pretty fun. Rather than a typical walk around with your minions necro, max out everything that pumps mages, max lower resist, invest in a sturdy fire golem and put on en enigma. The idea is to simple teleport, then stop for half a second, or just long enoughto let every mage fire once, then teleport again.

Can be effective if you do it right, but it only works well against bosses or single targets.

[Jaquiezz]

Of course they fell like 'plies', the only thing that increases their life is mastery, unlike warriors which get it from mastery and the skill itself. Chances are, most things didn't get very close to them to touch them, as they would probably one shot pretty much everything.

That build is a summon necro with a nigma, so just a high end summoner. Most people who make summoners are on the extremes of the spectrum- dirt poor or quite wealthy.