Noobie Idea: The Bonermancer

[Pherdnut]

Noobie Idea: The Bonermancer

I really think this will work so please inform if my noobish ways are overlooking something. My plan is to spend very few points until level 12 and not a spot on summoning for my entire Necro's career. The gist of the idea is to get Bone spear up to ridiculously epic proportions. I plan on plunking my way through the first 12 levels of normal with a bow and judicious use of potions while running away when necessary. The only skills I will take before 12 are one level in Bone Armor, One in Bone Teeth and then one in Amplify Damage and maybe one in Dim Vision (is that right?) if the ranged attackers become insurmountable.

After 12 I plan on putting a couple points into Bone Wall and one more in Iron Maiden, using that combo to make it to level 18. Then the goal will be dump 14 points into Bone Spear ASAP or immediately if I have that many to spare. After getting those 11 in, I will max out Bone Wall, Bone Prison, and Bone Spirit when it becomes available. The goal being to have the nastiest Bone Spear possible. Not sure I have the math right on this, but since the synergies give you 7% more to damage, it seems pointless to put any more skills into Bone Spear (after 14, you're getting less than 7% by taking more picks in BS and are effectively only upping the mana cost when you could be strengthening other skills) until you've exhausted the other synergy skills. Assuming no magic items or a lot more skill point quest awards than I was aware, I don't think it would be possible to max the synergies and have enough to max BSp. I also like what cranking wall and prison will do for that slvl 1 Bone Armor.

The only trick will be to get those elemental resistances up via items and I should have a pretty well balanced PKer/Regular game character capable of blocking stupid AI monsters with wall and hosing them down with a really nasty BS or locking a PC or a boss up in a very tough bone cage and once again, hosing them down with BS or even Bone Spirit assuming they won't be able to bust out in time (I haven't even seen it yet, just know that it's a little slow, doesn't pierce through, and is easily avoided by fast PCs). Flaws in the plan? Suggestions? I'm running under the assumption that Bone Spear isn't blocked by anything since it isn't an element or do some critters resist all magic? This of course, is what Lower Resistance is for if necessary.

Thanks for any help/constructive flaming!

 

[Mad Mantis]

Welcome Newcomer to The Darkness. Grab a brew :drink: and feel free to raise some corpses.

What you list is the standard Bonemancer. Take a look at the excellent guide made by Soulesschild.

Using the DV is a good thing for later on in PvM. Do not use the IM thing. IM is nearly useless with the change in monster hitpoints versus monster damage.

Going for a Bowmancer in the first 12 levels or so is very viable.

 

[darnocpdx]

At level 18 realistically if you saved the + skill quests the most you could dumpi into Spear would be 3, one for the leveling up one for den and one for Rad if you did those two at level 18 (ok mabey 2 more if you can get rushed through izzy.) After that one point per level again....

So why not spend all of them on but level 16-18 on wall and teeth that way you can still do those quests at 18 drop your 3 (or 5) and have 15 synergy points. You for example put one in BA, one in CE (forget the curses, even amp, just make sure you got tps on belt). Pet the rest in teeth and save 6 points for when you get to 12, then whien you hit 18 you'll have (after doing plus quests)

BS 3 (or 5 with rush)
BA 1
CE 1
Bone wall-6
Teeth-10

You'll have big syeneries a strong wall and you have teeth as an attack which can get you by ok for 18 levels with a merc.

You can't at 18 dump a 14 points at once like you suggest, I've tried. You can look for wands and heads with +3 to the skill though which at 18 would be at the least a level 9 BS.

 

[Pherdnut]

Ah, but I've been banking my points. I'm at level 15 at the moment and have like seven or eight, but yeah, it's getting really tough (I died a few times in the barracks) and I'm not sure I'll be able to nail Andariel without using some of those points. I noticed Iron Maiden seemed kinda weak. I lucked out gambling for a unique composite bow with Gheed though and that's carried me pretty far.

I just wish it was possible to find low level Necromancer summoning skill items that didn't interfere with bow use. If I can get past Andariel and suddenly throw ten points into Bone Spear, I think things are going to suddenly get a whole lot easier since I plan on using BSp as my primary weapon from that point on and will be able to equip Necro skill items in my hands. I've already picked up some decent heads.

Well, thanks for the advice guys. I'll let you know how it works out. Sorry, I didn't find reference to this build before. Lotta stuff to search through.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Ah, but I've been banking my points. I'm at level 15 at the moment and have like seven or eight

darnocpdx is right, you can't put all the points in Spear. Not even if you have enough saved. The game won't let you. Just spend the points now in the synergies for Spear.

 

[Olio]

You can only spend up to one point per level in a skill. This means that at level 18 the maximum bone spear you can have is 1, the maximum corpse explosion would be 7. The best results would have been to spend all the extra points in the useful synergies like teeth and bone wall. One point in clay golem and summon mastery is also nice.

The curses can be skipped entirely since they don't have any effect on the bone damage and aren't super useful until you get sufficient skill items. Alternatively you could get various curses to use in a mojomancer style.

The build doesn't really take off until about 30ish when you can finally wear enough gear to get to 75%fcr and boost your mana. Get a suicide branch and vipermagi skin as soon as you can.

Olio