[3.4 Dancer of Death | Dancing Duo Necromancer/Pathfinder

Hello,

I've played summoner builds for a long time, and Dancing Duo is my favorite 'Summon' to play with.

Most builds that utilize this however use it as a secondary source of damage, utilizing other minions as their main source of damage. This build is thus made to use the Dancing Duo as your Damage dealing minion, and others just serving the role of increasing it's DPS.

3.4 Edit : Changed PoB skill tree for 3.4. I will have to look up the new Uniques to decide if they are good.


Pros and Cons

Pros :
  • Tanky with around 7.5k eHP and about 50/50 dodge/spell dodge
  • Really Fast gameplay
  • Really Cheap to start out cause this is never going to be meta
  • Map Mod proof for those who hate wasting time reading mods


Cons :
  • Not the fastest map clear
  • You're the walking buff bot, you can't kill stuff(other than puny worms)
  • Super High Scaling for gear, with specific vaal outcomes resulting in huge damage boosts
  • Not idiot proof, nor newbie proof for the matter



How to Play

At the start of the map, you spam writhing jars, and then arc them all. Due to recent changes, irrespective of your damage they are going to die in 1 hit.
Make sure you have at least 1 charge left over in case you can't find enemies before rampage expires.
After that it's smooth sailing, following your swords as they perform unspeakable acts of horror on the peaceful citizens of whatever map you have opened, and pick up the spoils of war. Make sure that you keep up all other flasks.
Use The writhing jar whenever you take a hit to get back to full health and mana or whenever rampage is about to end.


Defense

  • 6k HP and 1.5k Mana with MoM
  • over 50/50 dodge/spell dodge
  • All enemies are taunted towards your sword
  • Over 150-200 MS, if you are good, you can dodge most deadly attacks
  • You need only a 5L never a 6L


Offence

  • 2 scary swords destroying every living(and totem) thing in sight


Gems

Main Setup :
On the sword, you do not need any 'main gem', and can socket 6 support gems. These do not need to be linked.
  • Damage on Full Life
  • Minion Damage
  • Additional Accuracy
  • Concentrated Effect
  • Multistrike
  • Ruthless

As Dancing Duo cannot be damaged, Damage on Full life is really good on this.


Auras :
  • Anger
  • Clarity(Lv. 1)
  • Generosity
  • Enlighten(As high as you can afford)

These take up half your mana, the other half is for MoM.


Immortal Call :
  • Immortal Call(Lv. 3)
  • Cast When Damage Taken(Lv. 1)
  • Increased Duration
  • Flesh Offering

Here, level up flesh Offering as higher than CWDT's needed level. You are gonna cast it manually. It is linked here though to benefit from flesh offering.


Minions :
  • Animated Gaurdian
  • Raise Spectre
  • Minion Life
  • Minion and Totem Elemenatal Resistance
  • Stone Golem

We use animate guardian to work as another aura bot.
If you manage to 6s your gear, throw in Flame Dash.


Curses :
  • Vaal Arc
  • Curse on Hit
  • Poacher's Mark
  • Flamabillity

This is what you will use when you manage to get a +1 curse on your amulet. Just use Poacher's Mark till then.


Single Socket
  • Convocation

This is socketed into a ring. This is not strictly needed, but gives you some control over your blades.


Alternate Weapon :
  • Desecrate
  • Portal

This is used to summon your Spectres



Gear

There are just 2 uniques that are NEEDED to play this build :

and
* 3.
Try to get as close to 20% reduced flask charges as possible. This is more important than the reduced amount recovered.

There are other uniques that are useful such as :
. This deals with Bleed so that you don't have to deal with anti-bleed flasks. The 100% increased life recovery from flasks is also super useful considering we spam The writhing jar. It is also super cheap so you can easily pick up the +1 to curses as the implicit isn't too good.

Grip of The Council : This adds to the DPS of your minions, and the reduced speed is countered by rampage easily. Note that in 3.4 we replace this by the new gloves Command of the Pit for a LOT of minion DPS.

Helmet :
A rare Bone Helmet. It does not need any specific mod/enchant, as 40% minion damage is BiS.

Boots :
I use one of the incursion boots with 30% MS and 12% chance to avoid spell hits as this is so much more protection against incursion spitters. In future leagues where these are not availible, get the best rare with life and resistances you can.

Body Armour :
There are three choices you can use :
1> Loreweave : The ultimate Defensive Choice
2> Vis Mortis : The ultimate Offensive Choice
3> A rare chest piece : The ultimate budget choice

Belt :
A lot of DPS can be gained from Abyss Jewels, so any rare Stygian Vice is pretty good. It MUST have the mod 'reduced flask charges used'.

Rings :
This is going to be hard. You need to essence craft movement speed for minions using essences. Not many players use those, so you may need to craft these yourself. Whats more, is that rings with a socket is BiS due to the huge number of gems we use.

Jewels :
You need ghastly abyss jewels with minions deal Fire/Cold/Phys/Chaos damage. Avoid minions deal lightning damage as it is halved due to Elemental Equilibrium.
Get atleast 1 jewel with Minions have % chance to taunt enemies on hit. Just one of these is enough to perma taunt most unique mobs/bosses.
Get at least 1 jewel with Minions have % chance to apply blind on hit. This further blinds monsters, and reduces their chance to hit you.

Animated Guardian :
Helmet : Leer Cast
Body Armour : Bloodbond.
Weapon : Dying Breath.
Boots : Victario's Flight.
Gloves : Southbound.

For the rich guys

There are a couple of super expensive upgrades you can make :
- Get Resolute Technique as a corrupt on your weapon. This superbly boosts your DPS as it is a 100% chance to hit. You can now replace Added Accuracy with Faster Attacks as it provides no DPS boost.
- Get a +1 to all gems on your body armor. This increases the survivibility of your AG and specters.
- Get a 'immune to corrupting blood' on a gem. This is the only dangerous bleed when it stacks on you.



Bandits and Pantheon

Bandits : Kill them All
Pantheon : Lunaris as chained projectiles are scary.
Shakari as Chaos damage is scary.


PoB

https://pastebin.com/DmC111W8


Flasks

We use the following flasks :
  • The Writhing Jar
  • The Writhing Jar
  • Quicksilver flask of Adrenaline
  • Quartz Flask of Heat
  • Basalt Flask of Warding

You can replace the basalt with Taste of Hate for some phys mitigation. In this case, use 'of Warding' on your Quicksilver flask.


Leveling

I will mention ONE way to level this build. There are many others, that may even be better than mine.
1 - 24 : Get a +1 to fire gems wand ASAP(BRB). Socket Raging Spirit + Minion Damage + Melee Splash. Use zombies as meat shields.

Level 24 : Bin the wand, socket the following : Summon Skeletons + Pierce + LMP(Lesser Multiple Projectile) in reverberation Rod(BGG). Socket two jewels Dead Reckoning. This is enough to carry you to level 70.

Level 35 : Use Armour Bloodbond, and get a 4L for your specters. Socket Raise Specter + Minion Life + Minion and Ele Resistance + Ele Focus.

Level 38 : Switch LMP with GMP(Greater Multiple Projectile). Use slower projectiles instead of GMP for boss melting.

Level 45 : Get Tukohama's Vangaurds in A6, replacing these every few levels. These are you boss killers while leveling. Keep a desecrate handy in case they die.

Notes :
Now, unless you can get a 5L weapon, this is your main weapon. If you manage to get a 5L/Tabula, socket the following : Summon Skeleton + Spell Echo + Pierce + GMP + Minion Damage + Added Cold.
If you manage to get a cheap Sire of Shards 4L, socket Skeleton + Pierce + Spell Echo + Minion Damage. This is not necessarily efficient, but bucket loads of fun.

I plan to use this as a leaguestarter in Delve, and I shall update this when I have a proper leveling strategy in place.

We use this method of levelling for one main reason : We are not a necromancer, and so do not get the 'skeleton attacks can't be evaded'. I do not like to use SRS as they feel clunky. Spectres gain traction late game. Using non-minion gems like Arc Trapper is possible, but Im a cheap-skate and don't want to spend any regrets.

Getting the sword

Do NOT buy a Dancing Duo unless you are freaky rich.
Get a Dancing Dervish with stats as high as you can get. This should be around 2-3c(Don't need to be perfect, just good). Don't buy a random one for 1 alch cause while cheap, it reduces your DPS a LOT.
20% qual it, which is good DPS. Then, if you have enough jeweller orbs, you can try to 6s it. Try to get atleast 5 sockets.
Buy 2 things : Dance of Steel prophecy(about 1c) and Arsenal Map(4-5c). Then have a friend/random person kill the boss for you.
This allows the sword to keep the sockets/properties and is much cheaper than buying a dancing duo.



Videos

I have just one video, as my character RIP'ed at 85 wearing super sub-optimal gear.I did not even have money to buy my AG gear in standard as I usually bin my chars when they reach standard.
T14 Colosseum Map
Note that this is really bad gear, and my DPS can easily be tripled if not more.


Random Things I want to cover that have no specific place

  • Im Softcore and I don't care about health. I want MORE DEEEPS :
    Remove MoM, Get Hungry Loop to socket your Curse setup, add Wrath to your generosity, remove arc and use Freeze Pulse to curse instead so you can still proc EE. Get more DPS on your Jewels.
  • Im Hardcore and I don't care if Im a turtle. I want more EHP :
    Remove Anger and EE. Throw all that into mana/health. Use the free sockets to get Kaom's Roots.
  • You said you won't use any other minions and you use spctres, YOU LIAR:
    The spctres aren't there do deal damage. You get Tukohama's Vangaurd to apply the scorching ray debuff on mobs. This reduces their fire damage so your duo deals more damage. If you want to, bin the poor golem(he's almost useless anyway), and socket blood magic. Then get the endurance charge and frenzy charge apes as your specters and replace Poacher's Mark for Vulnerability for more damage. This comes with the drawback that these die more often as they spam their skill with their own life and u'll need to replace them every few maps.
  • Only two writhing jars? All other builds have atleast 3. :
    There is a node on the skill tree that gives 15% reduced flask charges used. Combine this with the 20% on the flask, and 20% on a belt, we get 55% reduced flask charges used. You can then use each flask FOUR times, and thus gain rampage of 2 flasks only. As you are PF, every flask you can use at all time is a huge buff for you. You have a 5% leeway in your gear, so 17% reduced flask charges on the flask, and 18% reduced on the belt is ok. Any more though, and you are better of using 3 flasks temporarily instead.




  • [spoiler="TODO"]
    Wait for 3.4 passive tree changes and incorporate those. Minions getting lots of love this patch. I think I can ditch Additional Accuracy thanks to the caster tombfist(accuracy over a certain threshold isn't a good idea). I'll lose two sockets and that's going to hurt.

    [/spoiler]
  • Last edited by lyciel on Aug 30, 2018, 10:23:27 PM
    Last bumped on Sep 16, 2018, 2:07:54 PM
    Looks good...
    What have you been able to kill with this? Guardians? Shaper? Red Tier Elder? Uber Atziri? Uber Elder?
    Is it ok if we first start with The Dancing Dervish (with only one 'minion' activated at a rampage, till we get enough currency for The Dancing Duo, cuz im kinda poor and need some chaos for The Dancing Duo?
    "
    Ulrira wrote:
    Looks good...
    What have you been able to kill with this? Guardians? Shaper? Red Tier Elder? Uber Atziri? Uber Elder?


    Nothing atm, I've died in Flashback HC and haven't played the build in standard. I've killed yellow elder.

    I plan to league start with this in Delve though, and hope to do most content.




    "
    JubZyy wrote:
    Is it ok if we first start with The Dancing Dervish (with only one 'minion' activated at a rampage, till we get enough currency for The Dancing Duo, cuz im kinda poor and need some chaos for The Dancing Duo?


    While Dancing dervish is good enough for white/yellow maps, Dancing Duo is a flat 50% MORE damage boost. I'd suggest buying the prophecy and map for around 5c and having a friend or someone on global kill the boss for you. They get the loot from the map, you get an upgraded sword.
    So on the Dancing Duo I cant manage to get the right color of sockets but I got 2 blue 2 red and 2 green. Is there a green gem to put instead of one of the reds. And if there is which red gem should it replace
    "
    JubZyy wrote:
    So on the Dancing Duo I cant manage to get the right color of sockets but I got 2 blue 2 red and 2 green. Is there a green gem to put instead of one of the reds. And if there is which red gem should it replace


    Use faster attacks got now. Try to get 3R though, it's a big DPS boost.
    Replace Ruthless as it has huge DPS just once every 3 hits.
    How does this build compare with straight up skeles?
    Any changes to Dervish Duo itself ?
    "
    bladelaw wrote:
    How does this build compare with straight up skeles?


    I think skeles are better than this build. I believe this build is more survivable though, due to constant spamming of flasks. The whole purpose of this guide was to play duo cause it's so much fun :)

    Also, not many changes to the build in 3.4. I'm working on a new tree atm, will have to make a fair bit of changes. All of these should increase the DPS though.
    "
    lyciel wrote:
    "
    bladelaw wrote:
    How does this build compare with straight up skeles?


    I think skeles are better than this build. I believe this build is more survivable though, due to constant spamming of flasks. The whole purpose of this guide was to play duo cause it's so much fun :)

    Also, not many changes to the build in 3.4. I'm working on a new tree atm, will have to make a fair bit of changes. All of these should increase the DPS though.



    I'm gonna try a hybrid Duo + self cast Skelly variation on your build for Delve. Thanks for sharing.

    I'm thinking having a bunch of taunting skellies running around will increase survivability here quite a bit. I'll lose the 6th gem link, but the other 5 can apply to skeletons and the dancing deverish equally. Good synergy.

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