{3.10} Speaker for the Dead | The Mass Minion Summoner | League Starter, Leveling Guide 💀

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Hercanic wrote:

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The buff from a Chaos Golem is great, but their damage is extremely lackluster and split between a default melee attack, cascade spell, and a degen aura, making them very hard to support for damage. You might as well use a normal Unset ring and forget about them dealing any damage.

The Flame Golem is strong, but we're not a golemancer. We don't stack a dozen Primordial Harmonies to get their skill cooldowns down to a second. Magma Ball, the Flame Golem's best spell, has a 6 second base cooldown.

Plugging a 5L Flame Golem into my build in PoB, I get:

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Flame Golem (21/20)
+ Minion Damage (20/0)
+ Combustion (20/0)
+ Greater Multiple Projectiles (20/0)
+ Spell Echo (20/0)

Magma Ball (6sec cooldown)
12,278 average hit
5 projectiles
2 casts per 6 seconds
= 122,780 damage (assuming all projectile AOEs overlap)
= 20,463 DPS due to cooldown

Immolate (no cooldown)
7,832 average hit
1.6 cast rate
12,531 DPS

Flame Wave (2sec cooldown)
10,092 average hit

This doesn't even beat our 1L Holy Relic.


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You'd have better luck with an Ice Golem:

Ice Golem (21/20)
+ Minion Damage (20/0)
+ Multistrike (20/0)
+ Melee Physical Damage (20/0)
+ Bloodlust (20/0)

Default melee attack
22,264 average hit
4.88 attack rate
108,703 DPS

Cyclone (6sec cooldown)
17,780 average hit
4.88 attack rate
173,615 DPS (repeated 3 times due to Multistrike working with this version of Cyclone)

Ice Spear (2sec cooldown)
8,771 average hit


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And for good measure, the Holy Relic:

Holy Relic (21/20)
+ Minion Damage (20/0)
+ Vile Toxins (20/0)
+ Controlled Destruction (20/0)
+ Empower (20/0)

79,208 average hit
158,416 DPS


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Why not:

Raging Spirits (21/20)
+ Minion Damage (20/0)
+ Melee Physical Damage (20/0)
+ Spell Totem (20/0)
+ Multiple Totems (20/0)

2,504 average hit
5.26 attack rage
13,180 DPS each

1.62 cast rate x 5 second duration x 3 totems
= 24.3 possible spirits = 20 cap reached
= 263,580 total DPS (20 Spirits)

Substituting Multiple Totems for Bloodlust is only 211k, because you'll only get 8 spirits out. You'd have to invest in cast speed and duration somewhere to make Multiple Totems fall out of favor.


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In the end, we can't surpass the DPS of even 1 Skeleton with Hungry Loop, so if you really want to incorporate it, then it'd be better to think in terms of utility.

Wow, great writeup, I really appreciate it. That definitely makes me think twice about the hungry loop. I just am not getting much from the rare ring (as my resists will be covered) besides the + level and the added life gain from the shaper mod, so it leaves me wanting to experiment a bit. Though maybe I could swap most of the resists onto the ring instead to free up my other items for upgrades... hmmm, lots of options here! I never really could make the spectral wolves work which is super unfortunate, since that would be my go-to upgrade, trying to keep up 20, or at least 10+. I've thought maybe replacing one of the frost sentinels with another solar guard (for a higher chance at getting a burning kill) but I also really like how safe the frost guards make mapping so thats a sketchy trade-off for me.

@ ogogo:

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ogogo wrote:

im no more sure exactly all i can remember he casted some kind of aoe wich deals dmg with each stack and my minions melted in like 5 seconds ^^

Hmm. The most important thing to know right now is the level of the boss zone, otherwise we can't determine the exact damage. There's a huge difference between level 68 and level 82, after all:

Altered Synthete
GeometrySpell
SynthesisGuardian1FrontalBlast

Deals Cold Damage
3,678 - 5,518 @lvl68
vs.
9,432 - 14,148 @lvl82


I'm guessing the memory evaporated after failure?

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@ AmonRai:

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AmonRai wrote:

Wow, great writeup, I really appreciate it. That definitely makes me think twice about the hungry loop. I just am not getting much from the rare ring (as my resists will be covered) besides the + level and the added life gain from the shaper mod, so it leaves me wanting to experiment a bit. Though maybe I could swap most of the resists onto the ring instead to free up my other items for upgrades... hmmm, lots of options here!

Gain on Hit may not be scaled by damage effectiveness like I once thought. My basis was:

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Patch 0.10.3

"Life Gain on Hit is now scaled by the Damage Effectiveness of a skill."

https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Version_0.10.3

But a few people have claimed this was reverted, though undocumented. If that's the case, then the Shaper ring provides much more healing than I previously thought.

At 20 hits per second x 15 life = 300 life per second per target.

A single ball hits a single radius 4 target seven times, which would give us 105 life. That's what we get per second from a Stone Golem, for a single ball.

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AmonRai wrote:

I never really could make the spectral wolves work which is super unfortunate, since that would be my go-to upgrade, trying to keep up 20, or at least 10+. I've thought maybe replacing one of the frost sentinels with another solar guard (for a higher chance at getting a burning kill) but I also really like how safe the frost guards make mapping so thats a sketchy trade-off for me.

Spectral Wolves are, unfortunately, only level 65 and are thus very weak. As an amulet craft we can't even support them with melee splash as a bare minimum. At most, they can act as bodies to block monsters.

Finding their database entry is proving to be a challenge. GGG doesn't always name things the same internally, so nothing turns up for Spectral Wolf. The Spectral Spider from Arakaali's Fang's Raise Spiders, for example, is called a Spider Minion. Summon Bestial Snake from Yriel's Fostering actually creates a Summoned Cobra.

Spectral Wolf, Wolf Minion, Summoned Wolf, Summoned Spectral Wolf, Rigwald's Wolf, Rigwald's Pack, RigwaldsPack, RigwaldsWolf, nothing comes up.

Near as I can tell, their entry might just be Wolf, based on the mod details from The Scourge:

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local_display_summon_wolf_on_kill_%

Which is weird, because Rigwald's Crest has a slightly different mod:

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local_display_trigger_level_18_summon_spectral_wolf_on_kill_10%_chance

There's a Dire Wolf, but I don't think the Spectral Wolves puncture.

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Hercanic wrote:

"

Patch 0.10.3

"Life Gain on Hit is now scaled by the Damage Effectiveness of a skill."

https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Version_0.10.3

But a few people have claimed this was reverted, though undocumented. If that's the case, then the Shaper ring provides much more healing than I previously thought.

At 20 hits per second x 15 life = 300 life per second per target.

A single ball hits a single radius 4 target seven times, which would give us 105 life. That's what we get per second from a Stone Golem, for a single ball.

Yeah I'm currently in the process of trying to alt spam me a ring with +level to gems and the life gain on hit and it's a pain. Figured it was cheaper doing it this way than fossil spamming it since the fossils I would use (aetheric, pristine, and probably metallic) are too expensive to justify because they can't narrow down the mod pool enough. All the rings for sale like this are not very good either. This ring and a belly would help my survivability big time.

Should I replace
with a mace INCREASED 95% minion damage ?

Hi,

I just wanted to say that I absolutely love your guide. Obviously it's very well-written and informative, but more importantly I love the poetry and "role-play" it features. I was not planning to make a necromancer this league, but seeing you romanticize the class actually convinced me to play it.

Thank you for the guide! :)

on my claw i have adds 15 to 36 fire damage to attacks does it mean i cant use
elemental equilibrium thanks

Hercanic,

I have to reiterate that this build is both powerful and a blast to play.

Two questions:

1. Based on a few of your posts, I know you had been toying with the build to incorporate Animate Guardian/physical reduction. I have made an attempt as well and wanted to know where you have ended up with the alterations and your thoughts on that approach.

2. I just earned a Circle of Nostalgia from a Synthesis boss and wanted to know the viability in the build (considering the multiple iterations of such a ring). My guess is that it would potentially replace the Mark of Submission as the Shaper ring is so useful to survival.

Thanks again for the build!

Oh Hercanic,

Synthesis is my first league and I can'T believe how much fun I'm having thanks to your build, guide and all the hard work you've put into both.

Today I've downed the shaper (unfortunately died to the Unshaped because I was surprised by it, but no more deaths otherwise) and my new goal is to meta-craft the best-possible claw you've described in the crafting section.

My current solution is as follows:
use alteration until i hit both +1 lvl gems and 20maim, although the chances seem abysmally low. Then imprint it with beast crafting so I can use regal + annulment on it to further meta-craft it.

I just read what TheUberElite wrote about crafting a +3 maim mace, sounds possible, but oh so expensive...

Thank you very much!

@ nhoxbuzz123:

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nhoxbuzz123 wrote:

Should I replace

with a mace INCREASED 95% minion damage ?

Since our minions have 300-400% increased minion damage in this build, you can divide any new minion damage by 5 to roughly figure out how much More damage it's worth. 95 / 5 = 18% more damage. Our claw can be crafted with up to 28/28% increased damage/life, which is 5.6% more damage. So it becomes a difference of 13.4% more damage.

Now the question becomes, how much does +1 and Maim (Faster Attacks, in your case) contribute to total DPS, and does it outweigh 13.4% more damage? Keep in mind +1 and 28% minion life improve Zombie survival, which means maintaining the Physical Damage Reduction they provide to you and all minions.

We'll ignore Added Fire, since that tends to be difficult to get for most players:

Zombie vs. Zombie w/o +1 Maim
32,824 vs. 19,069 = 72% more damage

Agony Crawler vs. Crawler w/o +1 Maim
640,258 vs. 371,926 = 72% more damage

Now, we're going to do this quick and dirty, so we'll figure out the contribution percentage of the two minions from the total with the numbers in DPS Breakdown (slightly out of date, but it'll give us an idea):

338,312 Zombies / 4,726,230 = 7.1% of total DPS.
789,681 Zombies / 4,726,230 = 16.7% of total DPS.

So these two minions account for 23.8%, or almost a quarter of our DPS. 72% more can then be scaled down to a quarter for comparison to the 13.4% of the mace. 72 * 0.238 = 17.14% more damage.


RESULTS
Mace = 13.4% more damage
vs.
Claw = 17.14% more damage

This doesn't include the loss of Maim's 14% increased Physical Damage Taken debuff on Skeleton or Phantasm damage, either.

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@ Vatinas:

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Vatinas wrote:

Hi,

I just wanted to say that I absolutely love your guide. Obviously it's very well-written and informative, but more importantly I love the poetry and "role-play" it features. I was not planning to make a necromancer this league, but seeing you romanticize the class actually convinced me to play it.

Thank you for the guide! :)

Exactly as planned...

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@ maxy44:

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maxy44 wrote:

on my claw i have adds 15 to 36 fire damage to attacks does it mean i cant use
elemental equilibrium thanks

You can use EE, it's just not optimal. Every individual hit overwrites EE, so Ball Lightning, which hits extremely rapidly, will replace any EE set by Charged Dash within 150 milliseconds or less.

When Charged Dash hits, monsters will get +25% Fire and Lightning Resistance and -50% Cold.

When Ball Lightning hits the EE will be overwritten, and monsters will get +25% Lightning Resistance and -50% Cold and Fire.

Your minions deal Cold Damage because of Hatred, and Frost Sentinels naturally deal Cold Damage. The only Fire Damage you have would come from either a Solar Guard or Added Fire Damage Support. If you don't have either, then the Fire Resistance of monsters doesn't matter to you. If you do, then there's just a micro-small chance of some Fire Damage hitting before Ball Lightning hits after Charged Dash hits.

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@ Tvazpolarvyn:

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Tvazpolarvyn wrote:

Hercanic,

I have to reiterate that this build is both powerful and a blast to play.

Two questions:

1. Based on a few of your posts, I know you had been toying with the build to incorporate Animate Guardian/physical reduction. I have made an attempt as well and wanted to know where you have ended up with the alterations and your thoughts on that approach.

I haven't implemented it, but I'm pretty optimistic. The main issue would probably be its survival against Uber Elder.

"

Tvazpolarvyn wrote:

2. I just earned a Circle of Nostalgia from a Synthesis boss and wanted to know the viability in the build (considering the multiple iterations of such a ring). My guess is that it would potentially replace the Mark of Submission as the Shaper ring is so useful to survival.

Thanks again for the build!

1. Herald of Agony has (40-30)% reduced Mana Reservation = Would allow for more support affixes on your claw, or a Banner if you make space.

2. (40-60)% increased Chaos Damage while affected by Herald of Agony = Useless.

3. Herald of Agony has (70-100)% increased Buff Effect = If this only applies to the personal buff on you (anything that starts with "Grants..."), 20% poison chance and more poison damage, then it'd get you to 100% poison chance. Nice, but not necessary. If this applied to all values on the gem, then it'd pretty much double the power of the Agony Crawler. I doubt it's the latter, though.

4. Agony Crawler deals (70-100)% increased Damage = Our level 26-28 Crawler gains 22-23% increased Physical Damage per Virulence, which comes to 880-920%. Plus the 300% + crafted minion damage we get, the Crawler already has ~1200% increased damage. Another 100% increase only adds 7.6% more damage. Nice, but not great.

5. +(31-43)% to Chaos Resistance while affected by Herald of Agony = The ring itself gives up to 36% Chaos Resistance, so you could gain up to 79% with this mod. Our build gets 33%, so you'd have 112% Chaos Resistance. Your resistance value would be at a net positive of 52%. Taking the other two life/chaos resistance nodes in the "Purity of Flesh" cluster would put you at 60%, just 15% away from cap.

MINOR GUIDE UPDATE
Speaker for the Dead is among the top 10 most popular builds on poebuilds.cc right now. Nice!



Looks like the ranking is based on view count since league start. Considering we're neither meta nor an established multi-year-old build, I'd say that's pretty impressive!

Thanks everyone!