Feedback about skeletons

Hi guys! Sorry if you found misspeled words, I’m not a native english speaker.
I’ve been playing with my skelemancer cabalist since 2019. My build changed with the new items, devotions and balance patchs since I started to play the game, but I still love my little army of skeletons. This post is about them and how I think they should be improved.

In this guide: Guide: Recommended stats for end game Maya recommended this stats for the pets, and I agree:

150%+ HP
1000%+ Total dmg
90%+ attack speed
50%+ cast speed
100%+ Crit dmg
40%+ OA

The problem that I found it is that the skeletons die a lot with only 150-170% HP, my build stats are:

270% HP
874% Total Dmg
94% Attack Speed
84% Cast Speed
65% Crit Dmg
102% OA

Of course full resistances… But even with full resistances and 270% HP, Morgoneth can kill 10/13 of my skeletons with a single AoE (I can summon 4 each time) when supposedly the strenght of the skeletons comes from the numbers… And thats not all, Morgoneth may be an extreme case but since Forgotten Gods we have more creatures with powerful AoE skills that can kill this skeletons of 270% HP, and I still didn’t started to talk about Crucible or Shattered Realm! The problem in this game modes is worst! How am I supossed to enjoy playing with skeletons in Shattered Realm or Crucible with this issue? I mean, I can, but I have to spam the Raise Skeleton skill and keep running like a scared chicken!
Please, don’t answer me with something like “then play with a Warlord and stop crying” because I’ll ignore you.

So I think this can be “solved” with two things without upscaling the skeletons HP in the skill.

  1. Normal skeletons can’t be summoned while having the skills Raise Skeletons, Undead Legion and Will of the Crypt maxed. If the skeletons die too often, even normal creatures can kill them right now, then why do I have to stop for 3-10min to spam Raise Skeletons to make a group without 4 of this slow (yes, their attack speed is trash) and weak guys??? And stopping to build a “good group” of skeletons is not possible in Crucible, Shattered Realm or any boss fight.
  2. We already have Gate to Many Worlds (https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/13918) and Mythical Marrow Band (https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/14169), both items comes with a debuff which reduce the target damage by 12%, but this debuff can’t stack. So I found that the pet from the Mythical Black Grimoire of Og’Napesh (https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/9346) comes with a pretty nice defensive buff, but it last only 8sec and it has 32sec of cooldown! What about making it 12-24sec instead or something like that? Another point is the attack speed of this pet, is slower than the revenants from Raise Skeletons, I think it has the same attack speed of the “normal skeletons”, which is bad for an unique revenant. And about the fire ring, this skill is only 25%-35% more powerful than the revenants AoE but temporary and with high CD too…
    And about this pet looks, I’m sorry for the artist who worked in its model, but the model of this revenant is small, bored, old (before Ashes of Malmouth) and ugly compared to the necromancer’s revenants, this revenant is a unique pet so I think its looks should be improved to something more “unique”.
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In that case, your feedback is also going to fall on deaf ears if you choose to follow some people’s builds and guides like Maya’s but reject everyone else’s builds and experiences just because you don’t understand how to make a strong Skeleton summoner.


From my experience running them both in the past and recently, it’s not just health and resistances that pets need. You also need a way of healing them consistently.

On the last pet build I ran, I found to my dismay that just giving the Skeletons the 4% ADCtH node on Toad and Twin Fangs wasn’t nearly enough. Even bulkier permanent pets like Dirge of Arkovia’s Skeletal Golem got worn down during or inbetween fights and frequently needed resummoning. So I made some changes shifting my devotion setup over from Mogdrogen to Tree of Life (and Ishtak) and swapping my second mastery to Occultist to pick up Blood of Dreeg and that solved all of my problems.

Similarly, in the past, I’ve also posted a Skeleton Ritualist in the last couple of months that used Wendigo Totem to keep my pets alive as well. The heal and large amount of ADCtH on it is stronger than you’d think at first glance.

I just ran the above Ritualist through collecting all 3 Seals and the build’s first run of the Tomb:

Morgoneth Kill

Like you, I noticed about half of the Skeletons get nuked early on but after a re-summon, they pulled through without any more casualties just fine, straight facetank, took about 10 seconds.

Already shown in the posted thread but the same character can kill Lokarr whom I consider harder than Morgoneth. I have no problems on any Nemeses or other roguelike Bosses. Character can also farm Crucible or SR for Legendaries just fine.



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%E4%B8%A4%E7%A7%92%E4%B8%89%E4%B8%AA1 %E4%BA%94%E7%A7%92%E5%8D%81%E4%B8%AA1
They are indeed the most vulnerable pets, unless you give up output for survival and defense. If you don’t expect much from them, they can bring a lot of joy:)

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Hey, thanks for the answer!

Sorry, my bad, I was trying to say this: don’t answer me with something like “then play with a Warlord and stop crying”.
I’ll edit the post.

That’s the point, almost every viable “pet build” that I saw had “Tree of Life”, when we have Korvaak, the Eldritch Sun, Dying God and Mogdrogen to pick.
If you play with big pets you can avoid Tree of Life, you have the Behemoth, the Toad, gear or skills to heal your pets, you have options if you want any other big devotion, but with the skeletons it is not that optional. I play with a cabalist, my options are that tree or crows (Blood of Dreeg is a must)…

So I tried to avoid that and tried to find another option without crows and Tree of Life, which is working for now, that’s why I didn’t asked to put more HP in the skeletons, another way to recover their health or changes in a devotion, instead I asked to change a mechanic in Raise Skeletons (no more normal skeletons) and buff an item which gives a poor performance (if you want another option) when the idea behind it is good, I mean the buff is good, it’s not awesome but you can play with it, the problem is that it only last 8sec with a cooldown of 32sec, this is not good for runs in SR, Crucible or any long fight :sweat_smile:.

I had the same experience, and about this is the other point I talked about: the mechanics in Raise Skeletons.

If you play with big pets you buff yourself, then you summon the pets and you’re ready to kill monsters, if one pet dies then you summon it again and your DPS will be the same as before. Oh and you have few pets, so less time summoning them.

This is not what happens with the skeletons. In addition to having to play in a more strategic way to relocate them (when possible), few build options to make them survive the fights (and losing damage because of that), you have to pray to RNGsus to avoid a waste time summoning them until you have few “normal skeletons” in the group, and if they die you have to pray again to not lose more DPS thanks to this “normal skeletons” in the mix.
I don’t know if the “normal skeleton” is weaker than a Revenant, Arcanist or Archer (I noticed they die more often than the others, but it may be my imagination), but I do know its attack speed is slower, and because of that I lose DPS for each one in the group :unamused:.

Do you see my point? They are harder to build, playing with them is harder and their DPS depends on the numbers (when they are way weaker than any other pet) and the type of the skeleton.
I have Raise Skeletons at 26, Undead Legion and Will of the Crypt at 22, and sometimes I found 7/13 “normal skeletons” in the group… My problem is not their health or having to summon them again, my problem are these “normal skeletons”, in any game it is a pointless waste of time having to stop to summon a good group when any other class doesn’t has the same problem :roll_eyes:.

Hi Fat-square!

This is exactly the main problem with the skeletons :sweat_smile: But I found a way to have almost every resistance in 80, +270% HP and more than +900% Damage :rofl:

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Yes, that’s also the most common choice for summoners.On the contrary, it’s rare to reach the limit of 90% or 85%. So am I. Even if all resistance reaches 90%, we can’t avoid the loss of skeletons.What a sad ending.
Therefore, if you want to play them well, you can only refer to the build of summon masters
%E9%AA%B7%E9%AB%85%E6%AD%BB%E5%AE%8C

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I feel like I should point out that one of the reasons my Skeleton build works the way it does, besides all the AoE healing is having 2 Hellhounds with 20/12 Infernal Breath to tank for you (and for your Skeletons) while reducing enemy damage by 23% :stuck_out_tongue:

I tried getting Life leech on them, but that was rather lackluster. I rather prefer straight up Heals for Skeletons (and pets in general)

And I personally find Twin Fangs to be terrible on Pets. Recently tried them on a Variation of my Fluffy Squishy and the 4% from Toad proved much better all around while Fangs did not do anything to warranty the points. Build in question for the curious: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/r2B8zkKZ
The conclusions I arrived at were that

  • Twin Fangs require you to actually proc it and can only be used by one pet at a time, making toad more attractive choice.
  • Twin Fangs’s Weapon Damage part is apparently useless for pets as it does not take Pet’s Flat dmg into account and hence the healing received is only from the Vitality and piercing damage on the skill itself, which is rather negligible in the grand scheme of things.

Regarding Skeletons, I am personally ok with their current state. They seem much more comfortable to play compared to previous patches. Can they be improved? certainly, but that applies to pretty much everything.

But how to actually improve them? That is a good question. I do like the suggestions in the OP as Og’Napesh is still one of the rather poor off-hand choices and would definitely like to see it get some love.

Most builds also stop Undead Legion at 20/12 since the returns for the last 2 points are negligible. So if normal Skeletons were made to have 0 spawn chance for builds with the entire Skeleton line fully maxed out, that would provide incentive to get those last 2 points as well.

So, definitely good ideas atleast in my opinion.

Personally, one idea I kind of had (but never suggested) was to make Skeletons proc an Aoe Buff upon death that temporarily (like for a second or two) made your surviving Skeletons stronger defensively including maybe a split second of invulnerability. That way, unless all of them died at once, you will have better chances of not losing them all to a single AoE. Lore wise, could be something like using the life essence (unlife essence? :thinking:) of the recently destroyed Skeleton, the rest get bolstered by the necromancer, or something like that.


Regarding Twin fangs and weapon damage on pets:

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I’ve thought about using Stone form of the Obelisks to enhance their defense, but it doesn’t seem to work very well.

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Hi Maya!

I noticed how this can help them survive thanks to the Marrow Band rings, having 4 dogs with high threat that can reduce damage helps a lot.

That is a good idea, this short buff can help them survive long enough to let you heal the pets before resummon them.

One less option for our skeletons :sweat_smile:

I think that we can’t ask more than this 3 ideas for our little guys, I hope this feedback will be taked into account by Crate :smiley:.

PS: I have another idea… We need one more augment for ring/amulet with bonus for pets with Pierce Resistance or another epic/legendary medal for cabalists with Pierce Resistance and some other like Bleeding or Chaos Resistance as bonus for pets (there isn’t one with these resistances and a good combination of skill points for a cabalist build with skeletons). Remember please, this type of builds with skeletons already has to lose a lot of damage giving them survivability, so please don’t make an item with only resistances :sweat_smile:

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https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/8989

I found this amulet, heaps of extra damage and good protection for pets for big fights!
https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/8989

Seems to work well. Run in, press this button and sit back while your minions run riot over the bad guys.

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