[3.6] Zombiemancer - High Survivability - End Game Viable

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zuouxarm wrote:

wouldn't puppet master be more beneficial in the long run since bar the minion duration thing, every other effects from the node are beneficial as opposed to MoS which only have the offering & skill duration effect applied for benefit while the other two effects from the node pretty much did nothing?

20% movement speed isn't that useful for our zombies. If we need MS for mapping, we just gem for it, that should be enough. dmg after using minion skill is mostly useless since we basically never summon any minion except at the start of the game.

And finally, the attack speed after killing might be useful, but it might also completely mess up your Attack speed vs slam cooldown balance and actually decrease your dps (for example with my build, if I took it, the 12% more attack speed would actually be a dps loss for me while my zombies are under frenzy charges, and not a small dps loss, but something like a 40% dps loss).

Seems like a half-useful ascendancy on maps at best (depending on your current attack speed and gems, because at worst it's straight up bad) and useless on boss, not a very good one imo. Mistress of sacrifice gives us a lot of defense through spirit offering which is really useful on red maps and bosses.

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Aesahethr wrote:

20% movement speed isn't that useful for our zombies. If we need MS for mapping, we just gem for it, that should be enough. dmg after using minion skill is mostly useless since we basically never summon any minion except at the start of the game.

And finally, the attack speed after killing might be useful, but it might also completely mess up your Attack speed vs slam cooldown balance and actually decrease your dps (for example with my build, if I took it, the 12% more attack speed would actually be a dps loss for me while my zombies are under frenzy charges, and not a small dps loss, but something like a 40% dps loss).

Seems like a half-useful ascendancy on maps at best (depending on your current attack speed and gems, because at worst it's straight up bad) and useless on boss, not a very good one imo. Mistress of sacrifice gives us a lot of defense through spirit offering which is really useful on red maps and bosses.

I'm using storm burst+CWC+desecrate+spirit offering combo. Since offering is tagged as minion skill and the combo triggers the whole setup often, the 'after using minion skills' bonus should be up pretty constantly.

Hmm.. I never knew about the whole added speed messing up the slam. Currently I'm using 1 violent dead+slam ascendancy passive and visually, i still see the slam trigger quite often even with puppet master specced. Or does the dps loss did occur? My passive is pretty much the very same as the guide and i have no added minion atk speed bonus outside of the passives and minion speed gem.

the main thing is, at some point any minor/mediocre increases to your zombies damage (or decreases for that matter) basically make no difference anymore, since everything dies so quick anyway. even stuff like uber phases so quickly at some point.

to answer your original question: i dont actually think either of the 2 ascendancys are "necessary". Theres just no better option and Mistress of Sacrifice at least gives you a very decent defensive bonus.
Just got to figure out what you need more, for reference, MoS basically provides me with an extra ~1,5k ES in tougher content

point taken. guess i'll stay with puppet master for now and see how things goes. MoS undeniably gives a huge ES boost, though i don't really find it highly useful so far.

@OP. If I don't like to bother with specters and animated guardian is this build still can be used efficiently? If so, what gems would you reccomend instead those two?

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Agarwaen88 wrote:

@OP. If I don't like to bother with specters and animated guardian is this build still can be used efficiently? If so, what gems would you reccomend instead those two?

You should bother with it. It doesnt take long to set them up and you usually dont have to ever do it again, cause they rarely die.
Frenzy charges are a huge damage increase and this only costs your one gem slot.

If you really want to use something else, use some utility skills like Flame Dash i guess. Or put the Stone Golem in there for the +2 from the Baron.

I was wondering if you could possibly look at this build:

https://pastebin.com/esGUBNzr

Not into hard min-maxing, but i got pretty much ok gear. One ring is to be changed if I would want more life and es, but pretty much hard to find.

Empower lv. 4 still to be bought or crafted. The rest is pretty much ok I think, best rolled armour in the server i think, the dream would be +1 to socketed XD

On T.16 had only trouble with Phoenix, as I didn't recall zombies when he slammed, will swap speed for life next time, I didn't kill shaper, but I think this would not be a problem, heading straight to Uber elder, I just need to get one more lv to take ES and Minion Life node, to improve my chances.

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Snorku wrote:

I was wondering if you could possibly look at this build:

https://pastebin.com/esGUBNzr

Not into hard min-maxing, but i got pretty much ok gear. One ring is to be changed if I would want more life and es, but pretty much hard to find.

Empower lv. 4 still to be bought or crafted. The rest is pretty much ok I think, best rolled armour in the server i think, the dream would be +1 to socketed XD

On T.16 had only trouble with Phoenix, as I didn't recall zombies when he slammed, will swap speed for life next time, I didn't kill shaper, but I think this would not be a problem, heading straight to Uber elder, I just need to get one more lv to take ES and Minion Life node, to improve my chances.

Looks good, really the only thing you are missing is a useful helmet enchant.

It is my first time playing a passive build with minions in PoE... I like the potential, but am wondering how you navigate the zombies later on?

Now during leveling with SRS I noticed that the zombies always move where I set the spirit offering, or click for it, and also on which mob I cast the SRS...

Now I switched fully to zombies, no SRS, and wonder if there is still a way to kinda direct the zombies? Or is it just shield charging through packs and they just clear whatever comes up? Can I single out enemies somehow so they prioritize attacking... ?

Hello everyone long time lurker here... but I have an interesting observation that I have made during the testing of this build... first of all it is a great build that CAN clear most game content... uber elders is a big issue...

Anywho here's my observation... ZOMBIES... they do not give you life leech from the BARON unless.... the ZOMBIES are socketed within the helm itself... this is my observation after trying understand the play mechanics of this build and trying different nodes here and there...

So... this means that the 6 link setup that has been used all this time is actually a wash because zombies will never leech life for you no matter what you do. And if you do decide to use the Baron with zombies in it that means you'll have a socket setup like ZOMBIES>Minion Damage>MELEE PHYSICAL DAMAGE>(MULTISTRIKE/MAIM/RUTHLESS)..

Tell me if I am wrong about this... because I tried both instances where if they're socketed to your chest armor sometimes damage penetrated my shield and noticed I wasn't healing most of the time and when I did it was either because i took a flask or my ghastly eye jewel regenerated 1% of life while moving... and then when they were socketed to the helm... I seldom saw my health going down that's because they were leeching enough damage to keep it full continuously...

Also... is it because Geofri's Sanctuary could this be affecting the leech...? I'm just not sure anymore...