[3.16 updated] BRO, DO YOU EVEN SUMMON? Life/ES Dark Pact Skeleton Caster League Starter

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TomTheBloody wrote:

personally i don`t think this needs the zombies unless you do HC where an extra layer of defense is always great.

i took brants pastebin build and messed around a bit, lowering lvl and such... gear is still his, except removed -mana cost from rings... and only one curse.
switched to necro with desecrate and flesh offering... and threw in herald of ice ( perhaps will help with clear, though unsure of this )

with his items and slightly reduced level, and few other minor changes, it`s showing:
5,184,456 Total DPS

5353 Total life
3068 Energy shield
339 unreserved mana ( DP mana cost shows as 55 )

if anyone is interested, here`s the slightly changed version: https://pastebin.com/7fMUUC0n

p.s. still needs tweaks and such, but so far, on paper looks great.
p.p.s. damage can go slightly higher, since i only listed 5 consumed corpses recently and only 3 power charges.

You might as well disable shock bc its not going to be 50% shock which is how pob calculates it, you could use unnerved though to simulate shock with corpses.

I'm personally planning on going +2 minion gems and 20% more minion life with essence glutton and Queen's Hunger (ideally with +1 max curse) This way corpses consumption affects us and is automated as well allowing us to pump out the DP (less skills you need to worry about). I think this setup is much more approachable and stronger as a league start bc i've tried leveling with DP its hard when your minions aren't super beefy, and i doubt essences will be cheap in summoner meta cause thats the go to way to make a lot of increased minion life gear while leveling.

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TomTheBloody wrote:

with his items and slightly reduced level, and few other minor changes, it`s showing:
5,184,456 Total DPS

I dont want to be that guy, but PoB shock default to 50% you only have 20% and you have frenzies ticked ends up at 3.5m

any way since it doesnt look like we need unleash for skeletons does withering touch work well?

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Reibus wrote:

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TomTheBloody wrote:

with his items and slightly reduced level, and few other minor changes, it`s showing:
5,184,456 Total DPS

I dont want to be that guy, but PoB shock default to 50% you only have 20% and you have frenzies ticked ends up at 3.5m

any way since it doesnt look like we need unleash for skeletons does withering touch work well?

It could, I'm considering maybe using minion speed to counteract the loss of aoe from occultist (granted its small loss). In theory big pack dp goes off and then chains. As long as the first hit kills whatever is in radius of the skeleton then they will start to move towards whatever is alive and nearby, effectively increasing aoe and clear speed.

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pumpkin28 wrote:

Very nice work! Also want to play with DP necro. The question about your tree: why did you decide to pick up nodes with ele dmg left from templar's start, i mean, does DP benefit from ele increase or you allocate these points because of light of divinity and amplify? Would't it be better to pick death attunement instead of? Sweet hp points and +1 skel?

personally, at this point, i don`t see any need for another skeleton or for them to have more hp, i`d rather focus more on my own survivability or clear speed or mana sustain...
but if going up, additional curse node would be better i think instead of minion life and 1 extra skeleton.
light of divinity has everything we need, dmg, cast speed, crit chance.
holy dominion: 12 all resists, good for league starter since it`s harder to cap res on first character, plus, i`ve thrown in herald of ice, which grants me cold dmg and a chance to freeze enemies, and then they shatter, improving my clear speed. the 10% elemental dmg node is just for pathing, because i`d rather take that and 10 str instead of 20 int if i go up from mind over matter.
Amplify, it`s AOE and dmg, nuff said! ( but, it helps with clearing packs of monsters. simply put, if i run a high density map, id rather cast DP once without skellies on a large pack with increased AOE than cast skellies, then cast several smaller dark pacts to kill the pack before moving on... )

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You might as well disable shock bc its not going to be 50% shock which is how pob calculates it, you could use unnerved though to simulate shock with corpses.

I'm personally planning on going +2 minion gems and 20% more minion life with essence glutton and Queen's Hunger (ideally with +1 max curse) This way corpses consumption affects us and is automated as well allowing us to pump out the DP (less skills you need to worry about). I think this setup is much more approachable and stronger as a league start bc i've tried leveling with DP its hard when your minions aren't super beefy, and i doubt essences will be cheap in summoner meta cause thats the go to way to make a lot of increased minion life gear while leveling.

unnerved is only 10% increase.
yeah, i`m considering second curse for frenzy charges or using blood rage...
i doubt leveling with DP would be good if you`re trying to dash towards maps. personally i`ll use the tree and level with bane linked with despair and swift affliction... making my way to +1 curse to link another curse to bane in a 4-link. depending on my items i might pick up 30 dex and str nodes also for early stat boost... then do shadow area before moving to templar side. respeccing out of extra curse when i switch to DP if i use blood rage or leave it and use as a frenzy generator.

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Reibus wrote:

I dont want to be that guy, but PoB shock default to 50% you only have 20% and you have frenzies ticked ends up at 3.5m

any way since it doesnt look like we need unleash for skeletons does withering touch work well?

yeah, explained about frenzies above... since i`m still messing around with POB, forgot to add a generator, but i do plan to get them somehow.
p.s. cold snap in second set has a chance to give frenzy charges...
personally right now considering if immortal call is really that needed, since it was kinda nerfed and remade...
i think wither+spell totem is a better way to stack withered effect.

curious, why don`t we need unleash?

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TomTheBloody wrote:

curious, why don`t we need unleash?

Because level 21 summon skeletons will summon 4 at once with no cooldown so ill summon 8 skeletons in half a sec without unleash, also there is the new wither step which gives 6 wither so that will get me to 12 - 15 right?

Also I might have a neat idea of what to do with the extra gem sockets.

I've messed a bit in PoB and here is what I have:

Power Charge rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Occultist (current one):

https://pastebin.com/eixhkQJk

18.6m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Power Charge Void Battery Hybrid Life + ES Occultist:

https://pastebin.com/N1SvXiuG

22m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Offering rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Necromancer:

https://pastebin.com/7PvExBQx

20m dps
21-40 DP radius
62% attack / 45% spell block (with perfect Rumi's)
42 mana cost of DP

All gear is based on my existing one (I've only changed Discipline Gloomfang for +1 Curse Gloomfang in Necro version).

All 3 pastebins are lvl 98 because I don't want to overcomplicate things before testing in game. I will make lvl 90 tree for each version later during a league.

I want to test if it's worth to keep Unleash linked to Summon Skeleton - if not then in Necro version we could put Desecrate there freeing up 1 wand socket and there we could link Vaal Blight and Offering with Increased Duration. Another idea is to put Bodyswap in place of Unleash but I need to test it in game first if it's worth to supplement this build with it.

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brant09081992 wrote:

I've messed a bit in PoB and here is what I have:

Power Charge rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Occultist (current one):

https://pastebin.com/eixhkQJk

18.6m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Power Charge Void Battery Hybrid Life + ES Occultist:

https://pastebin.com/N1SvXiuG

22m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Offering rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Necromancer:

https://pastebin.com/7PvExBQx

20m dps
21-40 DP radius
62% attack / 45% spell block (with perfect Rumi's)
42 mana cost of DP

All gear is based on my existing one (I've only changed Discipline Gloomfang for +1 Curse Gloomfang in Necro version).

All 3 pastebins are lvl 98 because I don't want to overcomplicate things before testing in game. I will make lvl 90 tree for each version later during a league.

I want to test if it's worth to keep Unleash linked to Summon Skeleton - if not then in Necro version we could put Desecrate there freeing up 1 wand socket and there we could link Vaal Blight and Offering with Increased Duration. Another idea is to put Bodyswap in place of Unleash but I need to test it in game first if it's worth to supplement this build with it.

https://pastebin.com/JgxxDkMg my pastebin for occultist 5m shaper dps and less jewels same life. Basically less gear requirement but less aoe and skeletons will be tankier early on by rushing left hand side of tree for minion life/damage applies to you. I don't think 40 radius DP is really needed personally and I'm going staves early cause 5l staff div card is super easy to get as jungle valley is t1 which allows me to just pepega to maps then farm a super quick 5l div card as well as aoe from those nodes will let me judge if it is absolutely needed.

I personally feel the difference between 40 and 42 radius and now with Necro it may be even more noticeable without Profane Bloom.

Your version of a passive tree looks great for mana sustain issues, I would like to include it in my guide if you don't mind.

Btw, PoB doesn't take into account 20% minion dmg if used minion skill recently from Enduring Bond so your dps is slightly higher than it shows. ;)

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brant09081992 wrote:

I personally feel the difference between 40 and 42 radius and now with Necro it may be even more noticeable without Profane Bloom.

Your version of a passive tree looks great for mana sustain issues, I would like to include it in my guide if you don't mind.

Btw, PoB doesn't take into account 20% minion dmg if used minion skill recently from Enduring Bond so your dps is slightly higher than it shows. ;)

Aligned spirits is INSANE! Even just anointing that node on an amulet is pretty good and should solve a lot of mana problems 15% reduced cost of dark pact is nice. The 2 points of mana/damage leading up to it is efficient though. The other node with the 40% increased damage is nice but 1 of the nodes is dead to our build leading up to it. You can also pick up the mana regen/es node at start of witch for 1 point its 25% regen extremely efficient.

Any pastebins or concepts here feel free to use, this is your thread.

https://pastebin.com/yPEc7q6R

My lv 70 tree non crit setup this is what i plan on doing for my a10 kitava kill in 4 hours ssf gear. Idea is to rush minion damage scaling which gives some minion life on the way and using the orb of storms meta before that point. After that yeet into sacrifice providing a total of 2% regen for skeletons. If you run zealotry while leveling you can poop out consecrated ground so skeletons get 6% regen combined. The regen is very noticeable to me when I tried leveling the other day with this build, with summoning multiple skeletons should make leveling smoother. The problems I have had leveling is not cast speed related because oos/conviction pepega is basically a similar playstyle infact this is safer because you can stand even further away. The problem I experienced was minion life and tankiness. Which I am very certain this should solve. To spec into crit drop dark arts/sacrifice for arcane potency and doom cast (exact same points as long as you have respect from leveling) and start picking up power charges. If you are going staffs for early game like I am getting the staff cluster and aoe is extremely efficient for boosting crit before power charges too. I'm going void beacon before propane bloom as its just even more damage. Plan on killing atziri ASAP for promise because hybrid chaos res is valuable and provides leech too. Despair early game manual casting is strong too.

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brant09081992 wrote:

I've messed a bit in PoB and here is what I have:

Power Charge rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Occultist (current one):

https://pastebin.com/eixhkQJk

18.6m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Power Charge Void Battery Hybrid Life + ES Occultist:

https://pastebin.com/N1SvXiuG

22m dps
23-42 DP radius
15% attack block (no Rumi's)
38 mana cost of DP
Profane Bloom
+1 Curse and can apply them to Hexproof monsters

Offering rare wand Hybrid Life + ES Necromancer:

https://pastebin.com/7PvExBQx

20m dps
21-40 DP radius
62% attack / 45% spell block (with perfect Rumi's)
42 mana cost of DP

All gear is based on my existing one (I've only changed Discipline Gloomfang for +1 Curse Gloomfang in Necro version).

All 3 pastebins are lvl 98 because I don't want to overcomplicate things before testing in game. I will make lvl 90 tree for each version later during a league.

I want to test if it's worth to keep Unleash linked to Summon Skeleton - if not then in Necro version we could put Desecrate there freeing up 1 wand socket and there we could link Vaal Blight and Offering with Increased Duration. Another idea is to put Bodyswap in place of Unleash but I need to test it in game first if it's worth to supplement this build with it.

Hey, I'm trying to follow your necro build. If you got any update after release please let me know.