Summoner end game and Maps

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Avicularia wrote:

I used to be full summoner, and tried every way known to man to solo maps, and couldn't even manage to solo a blue 66 map with good modifiers.

I'll just post this as counter proof for low lvl maps (with the most horrible modifiers) .. and no i didnt die ...



/Edit

Also as it wasnt mentioned before and sentinels/titties get all the love, my current favourite setup with 3 spectres is 1 burned miscreation + 2 voidbearers .. shit is melting

Grimlocke_
Could you post a video of a map run?

I just hit 59 and have been following the "Lord of the Dead" guide, but have started feeling a bit unsure with how it progresses with passives after this point.

I read your build and feel that might be best for me, however I don't want to make any errors.

Am in Act II in Merciless and even though I have crappy gear, I do okay. I'm still going back to Cruel Act III to get flame sentinels which I feel are the strongest specters.

I loved the necromancer in D2 so would like to succeed as a pure summoner.

Thanks -- Salty

The danger when running pure summoner is being overhelmed, either by chaos damage, flickering mobs or mass AOE damage.

1°) for chaos you can grab +32% resist for 3 points if you are a summoner, I didn't took it myself yet, but I will do it once I feel the need for it
2°) flicker mobs are a real pain cauz' they bypass your minions. To counter this, use temporal chains/ other curse to escape
3°) mass AOE will destroy all your minions whatever you do, so it's better to have a second plan.


In short: user conversion trap, it solve 2 and 3. It is the best spell ever for a summoner, it allow you to temporize while your minions are getting beaten hard. It allow you to kite by sending them in a room and wait for the mobs to kill each other, it allow you to snipe the rare mobs and gain the benefits of their aura for as long as 15-20 seconds with increase duration support.

I think this spell is almost too good:
-the converted mob attacks his pair and thus, each hit it makes OR takes is a benefit for you, cause it reduce the overhaul life of the pack
-you can convert rare/ elite monsters
-even without the duration increase support gem, the duration (roughly 7 sec at level 16) is really enough to finish the pack, then deal with the remaining monsters
-you can open a door, put a skele totem inside/ cast skele manually, and protect them with 3 traps. And just wait.
-The harder the monster, the more powerful the converted are. It may look a small thing, but it isn't. It is the best scaling spell in the game

The only drawback is that you will have to deal with the converted monster once (if he is not dead yet) the spell wears off, so it slow you down a bit, but it adds tons of survivability.

I am level 69 with 1K3 hp and 700 ES, no armor/evasion and I can do low level maps (66/ 67) with crap gear without fear (even some with bad rolls)

You also have to use several curses depending on the situation (temporal chain/ enfeeble on hard maps, vulnerability/ elemental weakness on easy one)

"

downstroy wrote:

The danger when running pure summoner is being overhelmed, either by chaos damage, flickering mobs or mass AOE damage.

1°) for chaos you can grab +32% resist for 3 points if you are a summoner, I didn't took it myself yet, but I will do it once I feel the need for it
2°) flicker mobs are a real pain cauz' they bypass your minions. To counter this, use temporal chains/ other curse to escape
3°) mass AOE will destroy all your minions whatever you do, so it's better to have a second plan.


In short: user conversion trap, it solve 2 and 3. It is the best spell ever for a summoner, it allow you to temporize while your minions are getting beaten hard. It allow you to kite by sending them in a room and wait for the mobs to kill each other, it allow you to snipe the rare mobs and gain the benefits of their aura for as long as 15-20 seconds with increase duration support.

I think this spell is almost too good:
-the converted mob attacks his pair and thus, each hit it makes OR takes is a benefit for you, cause it reduce the overhaul life of the pack
-you can convert rare/ elite monsters
-even without the duration increase support gem, the duration (roughly 7 sec at level 16) is really enough to finish the pack, then deal with the remaining monsters
-you can open a door, put a skele totem inside/ cast skele manually, and protect them with 3 traps. And just wait.
-The harder the monster, the more powerful the converted are. It may look a small thing, but it isn't. It is the best scaling spell in the game

The only drawback is that you will have to deal with the converted monster once (if he is not dead yet) the spell wears off, so it slow you down a bit, but it adds tons of survivability.

I am level 69 with 1K3 hp and 700 ES, no armor/evasion and I can do low level maps (66/ 67) with crap gear without fear (even some with bad rolls)

You also have to use several curses depending on the situation (temporal chain/ enfeeble on hard maps, vulnerability/ elemental weakness on easy one)

Thanks this is very helpful information. You went the two curse route?

Rsalty,

I leveled up to a1 merciless with frozen pulse spam, anything before its just too annoying to play as a summoner, your zombies die waaay too fast, spectres follow em, gg. On 52, got me a nice +2 minion helm, zombies went from squishfest to invincible, steamrolled trough first two acts and then a only a minor problems with snakes/cinder golems in a3, but otherwise ez mode.

As for gear, I used eldrich battery in merciless, because at that time I couldn't afford to craft me some nice +mana gear.

Everything I wrote in this thread was directed STRICTLY at maps, since everything else can be done with a few pieces of decent gear, almost no important passives and just fp spam.

As for passives..

One thing I tell everyone.. DO NOT FRIGGIN FOLLOW SOMEONES BUILD like a blind mofo. Almost all builds on this forum were tailored according to certain players preference, and in most cases will not suit you or your gameplay. Remember their endgame build and tailor your own to eventually get there, but while leveling, make your own choices on that path, maybe take resistance nodes first? more es? or more mana regen then respec out of those nods later? maybe more spell dmg for faster leveling? You get the point.

As for frapsing/streaming, not really my thing. People I ran trough maps can tell you how quickly I finish them while dragging one or more flower-pickers behind me, in full mf gear.

Not everything is so 'wonderful' though. During springs rare map run (mobs were hasted, 4 projectiles, reflect elemental damage, we had some curse on us, temp chains I think) we encountered uberfast piercing snakes with 8 projectiles each, hasted monkeys throwing 5 rocks at a time and undying incinerators shooting 5 explosive bolts. Their packs were supporting each other, so my whole friggin army evaporated in measly 2-3 seconds each time we ran into any of them. Worst-map-ever for any summoner, aside from uber-tight tunnel maps.

Summoners can clear any map with ease, except when RNG gods decide to take a dump on you. In that case, arm yourself with patience and try to avoid smashing something :)

"

One thing I tell everyone.. DO NOT FRIGGIN FOLLOW SOMEONES BUILD like a blind mofo. Almost all builds on this forum were tailored according to certain players preference, and in most cases will not suit you or your gameplay. Remember their endgame build and tailor your own to eventually get there, but while leveling, make your own choices on that path, maybe take resistance nodes first? more es? or more mana regen then respec out of those nods later? maybe more spell dmg for faster leveling? You get the point.

Very true. Don't blindly follow a guide to the letter. You have to make your own choices that suits what you need.

Ran a lot of maps today from what i noticed you can't rely on your spectre to survive through all of them. You need to be more flexible which means packing extra support gems to switch out when necessary. This also means you should carry a variety of curse gems too. I have the top inventory row devoted to gems/scrolls.

Thanks. Since I'm so new to this game - been playing just over a week now - it's hard not to "blindly follow" someone else's build.

My biggest problem now at level 59.5 is gear. Mine is utter crap. But it shows that a summoner can get to Merciless without having great gear. I did have to have people come help on a couple bosses, but, for the most part I have done it all alone.

I'm just not sure what I should be doing at this point? Should I work on finishing Merciless? Right now the zones where my quests lead are the same level I am or higher, but I haven't had trouble killing anything yet in ACT II.

Should I farm the ledge until I'm blue in the face? I farmed it the other night for about 2 hours and got exactly nothing except a few quality gems (5%-10%) but no armor or weapon upgrades.

At this point what would be anyones suggestion?

EDIT:

I farmed the Ledge for about 2 hours tonight and got a few drops, nothing spectacular - upgraded my robe. Also got three levels and am midway through 62 now.

I had a 12% conversion trap gem drop tonight and I used it for a bit - I didn't choose to level it - should I level it up? I know a lot of people swear by this trap especially in maps?

When leveling your first char, the best thing you can do is outlevel questing content, if you ever have any troubles with it. Once you are 2-3 levels higher, I noticed mobs doing significantly less dmg to you/your pets.

True, summoners don't really need great gear to survive, if you play smart. I oneshotted Vaal and Piety merci without ever going out to replenish my army, its that easy. Just gotta play smart, when you spot a treat to your army, quicksilver back until whole army pops on you, then go step by step.

Conversion trap can be handy in some situations, but there's a catch. Lets say you convert one of those magic/rare undying alchemists, they are prolly highest chaos dmg dealing mobs in the game. Our pets aren't the brightest lot (meaning it takes them a sec to spot enemies, even when they are right on top of you), so when the trap wears off, usually that mob will be standing close by, often turning around and hitting you straight in the face, possibly even ending your misery.

Up to you.. I like never having anything near me. And converting one big-ass monkey to provide frenzy charges for your spectres won't really increase your killing speed, or save your army in case of uberfast piercing snakes and similar.

To all you players who say summoners can't handle end-game content, I really don't understand it.

I am not a hardcore player, so all my opinions are 100% based on softcore play, but I can safely say that a pure summoner, is definitely viable and a really good solo class.

I am at level 79 at the moment having no problems solo-ing maps. I cast no spells, besides curses, let my spectres do all the damage.

This is my current skill tree:


Part 1: Auras


Part 2: Curses


Part 3: Gear


Part 3: Minion Skill Gems and Combinations


Spectre and Curse Combination:
1. Flame Sentinel - Flammability + Elemental Weakness
2. Burned Miscreations - Elemental Weakness + Vulnerability (due to 40% increased DoT)
3. Titty Machineguns (fire damage) - Elemental Weakness + Flammability/Projectile Weakness
4. Voidbearers - Elemental Weakness + Flammability
5. Arc Mages - Elemental Weakness + Projectile Weakness


I hope my wall of text helped in some way.

"

You went the two curse route?

Actually no. I didn't even take permanent curse. Until now I have used almost exclusively temporal chains for the extra survivability (and because I have crap gear).


^ you have a pretty strong setup, love the blind on spell totem, it is really clever,will try it too. Your items are amaizing (500ES chest 5L dual rez, I mean who can afford that ^^) + 3 20% gems!

So just to show that it doesn't requires such gear, here is mine (can solo everything up to 67 hard map, didn't try the 69 I have just dropped yesterday)



The +minion helm/ boots are "mandatory", the rest is just not as you can see.