Installed D2 again. Considering necro builds

[Biff Loman]

Installed D2 again. Considering necro builds

I picked up D2 a long time ago, but never did much with it. I re-installed it, and am enjoying it pretty well.

I only play SP, (so far) on /players 8. Multi-player just doesn't suit me. I'm using ATMA to save my items.

Anyways, my necro Milwaukee is at level 27 in Act 3 normal. I've maxed raise skeleton and am putting points into curses. I'm not sure where to go from here.

Initially, my plan was to make a psn/summon hybrid, because that seemed cool and fun to play. I'm having a lot of fun, though, helping out my minions by stocking up on elemental damage charms and firing off a crossbow socketed with topazes. On switch I have a unique axe that freezes targets, which is also cool and really helped with Duriel.

My necro isn't doing that much damage, per se, but sniping Unravellers and Fetish shamans is just too, too fun while I cast amp damage and let my minions/merc do most of the killing. And the arcane sanctuary was a delight, what with me shooting the Hell clans from a distance, and the Summoner vaporizing my minions while I ran up to him and smacked him with my axe.

Maybe I should points into skeleton mastery, and stick with the commandomancer approach? I wouldn't be sure where to go from there, because I wouldn't have enough points to synergize any offensive spells. Mages? Everybody likes corpse explosion, but I tried spamming that with another necro and it got old.

I'd think it'd be fun to shoot things with bone spear from behind my army, but I think it'd be too weak to be useful.

Thoughts?

Edit: I also found a unique Bardiche, which made Milwaukee look totally badazz but didn't work as well as the axe. So far, I haven't used a shield, but I can run, run away like a little girl if necessary. And if the monster is extra fast/fanatic I can cast Gumby behind me and still flee.

 

[MasterMynd]

Two words: Dim Vision

 

[Rawness]

A standard psn/summon would mean 63 points into the Poison tree, 7 into curses (for lower resists) and 40 points into summoning.
The approach goes: 1pt gummy 1pt blood golem 1pt iron golem 1pt revives. 1pt either Raise skeleton or Raise mage. Rest into skelly mastery /rest into Mage or skellys. Possible points into Golem Mastery and Natural resists, dim vision and so on.
The approach of this in SP is way harder then on Bnet, commandomancer is also quiet hard (From what I can remember commandomancers requires a lot of rws...?). And if you meant just meant to suggest maxing summon mastery, do so.

The bow thingy will prob not last, you'll sooner or later start to use CE like mad. Bows may be usable for later lvls thou, never tried.

Bone/summons aren't completely unrepresented, but it isn't that cute due to the Marrow bug being fixed - but that could be fixed by installing a 1.09 vers. Or something like that.
I'd say 60/+ hard points into the bone section and 40/+ in the summoning - if you want to try that approach. You'd have a harder time with bosses, make sure you have Deceph for them + Gummy.
The RW 'White' would do the trick, and it wouldn't be that hard to set togheter either, the runeword would fit the hybride perfectly. There's a guide in the stikies also.

 

[BlargX]

They seem like they would be good to use against bosses or when all the corpses are gone.

 

[MalVeauX]

Heya,

It's all about what you like man. If you have skeletons, you can do whatever else you want and it will work. Low synergy bone skills? Go for it. Damage is damage and it's magical and not going to be resisted by hardly anything in the game. No harm going with spear there. Want some poison? Go for it. Dagger & Explosion get pretty high on just two synergies. Nova does well too. I just personally don't care for Nova because I like poison with a duration.... call me a 1.09 geek if you will. Skeletons last long enough for my durations to work their magic, so.... there ya go. Like I said, what ever you like is what you should do.

Personally, I go for a minimum of level 10 Dim Vision. It makes everything work like magic. In fact, my current joy is a golem lord necro with a rock hard clay golem, Pete, and an Act1 Rogue with a high damage bow (Eaglehorn) with a level 36 Dim Vision. I just blind the world and she kills them all, or my Golem goes and hangs out in a mob and they get covered in Iron Maiden. Sounds inefficient and noobish. But it works and its fun. My point? Play what you enjoy.

Cheers,