Diablo 2 Hireling question

[Varen_Tai]

OK, folks, time to dust off a classic game. :smallsmile:

I am currently playing with a lvl 60 Necro in NM difficulty and am considering switching out my current hireling for a new one. I am currently in Act 5 of NM, getting ready to launch against Baal and start up Hell difficulty.

Best one for me is the Act 2 guys since their auras affect all my minions (and boy, do I have minions - I have maxed out Skeletal Mastery and Summon Skeleton, close to maxing out Skeletal Mage and a bunch of points across all the other Summoner skills). I do *so* love being The General.

So far (and it has served me well), I have used the prayer aura since healing all minions all the time keeps them alive longer, but I'm getting up in levels and since they auto-heal themselves now, the aura is of less use.

New possibilities:

Defiance - raises everyone's defense up. Great way to keep them alive is to have them not get hit. Some critters ignore defense, though.

Thorns - physical attacks do damage against attacker. I've got a couple of points into curses that can really up this, and with the number of minions floating around, this could do some damage, but it is limited to critters that do physical damage.

Might - All minions do way more damage. No limitations on this, and perhaps the best defense is a great offense.

So... Thoughts? Opinions? Which of those three will serve me best as I approach Hell difficulty?

[tyckspoon]

Might or Blessed Aim would probably be best. Thorns doesn't scale well against the HP pools of Hell monsters, and most of your minion losses will be against things the defensive auras don't really help against. The Holy Freeze merc is also popular for crowd control, although he may be redundant for you depending on what curses you like.

[Varen_Tai]

Might or Blessed Aim would probably be best. Thorns doesn't scale well against the HP pools of Hell monsters, and most of your minion losses will be against things the defensive auras don't really help against. The Holy Freeze merc is also popular for crowd control, although he may be redundant for you depending on what curses you like.

Nah, Cold attacks are the worst for corpse loving classes like me. I'm leaning towards Might as well, so your info about Thorns is really helpful. Danke! Hell level, here I come!

EDIT: Holy schneikies! I grabbed me a Might aura hireling and practically died as soon as I wandered out into the Frigid Highlands! Got hit with some minor poison and I almost didn't get back to town in time to be healed. And I got drained down to really low life, and even with all my regen gear, I still healed up so incredibly slow as to be almost useless. I hadn't realized how life saving the Prayer aura was until it was gone... Time to get it back. :smallbiggrin:

[Winthur]

I am currently playing with a lvl 60 Necro in NM difficulty and am considering switching out my current hireling for a new one. I am currently in Act 5 of NM, getting ready to launch against Baal and start up Hell difficulty.

Seems kinda low level for that stage of the game.

That said, Defiance and Thorns aren't worthwhile auras at this point of the game - raising Defense doesn't help one iota unless you blow it into really, really high values. Thorns is useless especially against anything that doesn't hit you with physical damage in melee and even if you wanted it, you'd use Iron Maiden.

Go Might. Skellies have no problem hitting stuff - Blessed Aim is not worth it. No need for Prayer, either - just respawn the Skeleton when it dies, and keep spamming Clay Golem in enemy's face. Might makes right.

Also, I'd say maxing out Skeleton Mage isn't that useful - the mages deal low damage, spawn with crap skills like Poison and they don't benefit from your best curse, Amplify Damage. I propose you max out Corpse Explosion, perhaps even respec into it. Best PvM necro builds all revolve around Corpse Explosion, no matter if they're bone or minion based - all that your non-CE skills do is generate your first corpse to set off a Corpse Explosion chain reaction (and in case of minions, give you a buffer) And Corpse Explosion, due to being 50% physical damage, benefits from Amplify Damage. I'd use a respec to put your Skeleton Mage points into Corpse Explosion unless you really want to play a pure minion necro, but that's not as optimal.

Before you ask - CE's damage doesn't scale with level, but its radius does, and it really does make a difference.

You shouldn't be getting yourself killed with a summoner necro - skeletons and golem make for the best tanks in the game, short of a Werebear with Shockwave or a War Cry Barb.

[KillianHawkeye]

Oh, man, this brings me back....

I played a TON of D2 Necromancer, although I didn't go onto Hell difficulty with him. You can do SO much with the summoning tree that you don't even need curses or bone/poison spells!

I played all the way through Normal and most of Nightmare with the defense-boosting aura. I considered getting the healing one, but individual skeletons and your other critters are so expendable that I don't feel like it's really worth it.

Then again, I had so many +Skills going on that my skeletons were truly uber. And blood golem should be all you need for healing. No reason to go for the higher golems as a minionmancer IMO.

[factotum]

I completed all three difficulties as a summoner Necro back in the day. Curses are usually one-point wonders that you use to, for example, break a nasty monster's physical immunity to give your summons a chance against it, and a Blood Golem is a liability in Hell because it will die very quickly and take your own life with it. Clay Golem is far better--the slowing effect of its hit is particularly useful against bosses, because you want to reduce their damage output as much as possible. As for dying yourself, you really shouldn't be getting hit at all as a summoner, although part of the skill of playing that way is to get your skeletons between yourself and the bad guys so the two groups fight each other.

Also, don't underestimate the utility of Revives--they may only last three minutes, but they're generally incredible tanks due to the massive disparity between the monsters' life and the damage they deal in Hell. Just try to pick ones that will actually fight, because a Revive will use whatever AI it had before death with the friend and enemies swapped around, so something that stays at a distance and lobs ranged attacks is largely useless to you.

[vhfforever]

I don't think I've ever played in that deep without immediately going to a Holy Freeze Merc, regardless of what class I was playing, and equipping him with the runeword polearm that gives Prayer. Like, I used to spend hours and hours slogging through Hell, and always had the trusty old Act II Merc by my side, stabbing away at things.

[factotum]

I don't think I've ever played in that deep without immediately going to a Holy Freeze Merc

They're not great when you're playing a class that needs a lot of corpses--frozen enemies shatter when they die and don't leave a corpse behind.

[Winthur]

Then again, I had so many +Skills going on that my skeletons were truly uber. And blood golem should be all you need for healing. No reason to go for the higher golems as a minionmancer IMO.

Blood Golem is an utter liability that can get you killed and doesn't provide any actual utility. Stick to Clay Golem, you want the slow (Clay Golem + Decrep = enemy boss is neutered) and a disposable mobile wall.



Also, don't underestimate the utility of Revives--they may only last three minutes, but they're generally incredible tanks due to the massive disparity between the monsters' life and the damage they deal in Hell. Just try to pick ones that will actually fight, because a Revive will use whatever AI it had before death with the friend and enemies swapped around, so something that stays at a distance and lobs ranged attacks is largely useless to you.

Also of note is the fact that the creeps' special abilities stay on Revived monsters. This is cool in certain places - you can Revive Urdars to gain their Crushing Blow and turn it against a beefy boss like Baal or Izual, for instance.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Personally, I go for the Prayer merc, then equip him with an Insight polearm. Remember, Meditation gains synergy from Prayer, and the merc's prayer stacks. So you basically get 2x healing + mana regen. Who cares if he never does anything, he's a life and mana battery!

[tyckspoon]

Personally, I go for the Prayer merc, then equip him with an Insight polearm. Remember, Meditation gains synergy from Prayer, and the merc's prayer stacks. So you basically get 2x healing + mana regen. Who cares if he never does anything, he's a life and mana battery!

This is what I preferred to do with my mercs too. Not the most effective setup (although that Insight is wonderful if you're a mana-heavy class) but the stupid-high healing from it meant I could play a lot more fast and loose; as long as I didn't get instagibbed I'd heal up in a few seconds of dodging. Just get the merc an Insight and the tankiest stuff you could find for him.

If you're running minion-heavy, tho (so Summoner Druid or Necromancer) Might is generally the way to go.

[Winthur]

Remember, Meditation gains synergy from Prayer

Wait, what? How?
I thought the aura was only intrinsic to the item you're carrying and that the Prayer aura from the Merc isn't exactly like the Paladin one.
I'm aware of stuff like the Marrowwalk bug where an item with charges can give you a synergy, but I never thought it'd work on mercs.

Still, even with that in mind, I'd pick Might or Blessed Aim (on really AR-starved melee champions) merc most of the time. Mostly because I play softcore tend to be good enough with hyper-tanky Shockwave/Fire Claws werebears that never die footwork, positioning and such to not get too damaged. Especially on Necro summoner. Skeletons either get bursted down immediately or live for long enough for you to raise more of them. Actually, it's the case with my characters too, it takes a FE/LE bug to kill me, healing won't catch up in time anyway.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Wait, what? How?
I thought the aura was only intrinsic to the item you're carrying and that the Prayer aura from the Merc isn't exactly like the Paladin one.
I'm aware of stuff like the Marrowwalk bug where an item with charges can give you a synergy, but I never thought it'd work on mercs.

Still, even with that in mind, I'd pick Might or Blessed Aim (on really AR-starved melee champions) merc most of the time. Mostly because I play softcore tend to be good enough with hyper-tanky Shockwave/Fire Claws werebears that never die footwork, positioning and such to not get too damaged. Especially on Necro summoner. Skeletons either get bursted down immediately or live for long enough for you to raise more of them. Actually, it's the case with my characters too, it takes a FE/LE bug to kill me, healing won't catch up in time anyway.

I did a LOT of testing over a few years and discovered that the Meditation aura from Insight actually DOES get the synergy bonus from Prayer from the merc. Don't ask me why, but it does. It also gets synergy bonus from Prayer if a Paladin equips it. Check it out for yourself.

Makes it darn handy for a Sorceress build. I generally found minions didn't do enough damage for Might to really be worth it, but I suppose it couldn't hurt. Cold Aura is good for being tanky, but not too useful for a Necro who needs corpses to replenish their supply of disposable minions.

[factotum]

I generally found minions didn't do enough damage for Might to really be worth it

It is 100% possible to solo the whole game as a summoner Necro while never dealing a single point of damage yourself (apart from the very beginning before you get a Golem and thus need to hit stuff yourself to create your first skellies). I did it--didn't put a single point into Corpse Explosion or bone spells, every point went into buffing my minions. (I can't remember which patch release that was on--maybe 1.12?).

Darn it, all this conversation is making me want to buy Diablo 2 (for the third time!) and play a Necro again...

[Winthur]

Darn it, all this conversation is making me want to buy Diablo 2 (for the third time!) and play a Necro again...

If you want a bonus tank (I love to play werebears) I'm tempted to be of assistance.

[KillianHawkeye]

It is 100% possible to solo the whole game as a summoner Necro while never dealing a single point of damage yourself (apart from the very beginning before you get a Golem and thus need to hit stuff yourself to create your first skellies). I did it--didn't put a single point into Corpse Explosion or bone spells, every point went into buffing my minions. (I can't remember which patch release that was on--maybe 1.12?).

Darn it, all this conversation is making me want to buy Diablo 2 (for the third time!) and play a Necro again...

Yeah, when they revamped the skeletons and made them way tougher (sometime around 1.09 or 1.10 I think), soloing with a minionmancer became much easier! It more than made up for the fact that you got less skeletons overall. My undead army went from 50+ semi-worthless disposable skeletons to 30+ stone cold badass skeletons overnight. It was a weird adjustment, going from having your skeleton skill ready for spamming reinforcements to make more as soon as they died to leaving Revive on tap because their timers would run out more often than my skeletons got killed.