Honestly double rare is not all that important. The MI’s stats alone make the build and I would choose a normal resistance affix over a rare pet affix.
Posted Deathknight Vitality Solo SR90 Very Easy
This is a good example of game mechanics. The main class is exactly that. The secondary is only there to augment the first. Trying to master both classes is futile.
Summon 3 Blight Fiends
OK, I tried it.
TL:DR It isn’t horrible. It took 29m52s to go from SR80 to 84, where it died because the potion was on cooldown and I dodged a meteor straight into a trap and died. Now I’m not the best SR speed runner out there, but here’s my notes on it.
No resistance shred means no damage. The only RR I could find was 18% on Nature’s Guardians. Kubacabra was a massive cockblock and I had to kite him around to avoid the bleed pools otherwise he would just sit there and take no damage. Moosilaukke was also getting to be painful, though he at least doesn’t regenerate while your minions are all frozen. Clear speed is only just slightly faster than my cold-converted Forcewave Battlemage and that’s more or less a meme build.
This is RSI the build. You have 3 buttons that you want to spam on cooldown, so I put them on 2, 3 and 4 and just spammed them constantly. Half an hour later, I’m glad it died, because my left hand doesn’t want to see it again.
It’s squishy. It has a decent HP pool, but it felt like I was using the potion on cooldown. Healing comes from Healing Rain, Menhir’s Will (which I saw trigger far too often for my liking) and the potion. That’s it. There were several times where I was standing by the portal, with no enemies near me, potion on cooldown just watching my last 2-3k hitpoints ticking away. The only reason I didn’t die there is that the DoTs ran out before the health bar did.
I’m not really sure (again) what the point of it is other than to say it’s a pet DK that can clear SR90 (which I believe it could, if you’re a better pilot than me and with some luck) incredibly slowly, but you could do it. You’re using an entire mastery choice for an aura again and you’ve got full defensive devotions to attempt to survive for long enough to bore enemies to death.
Will this work? Yes. It’s better than the Spellbinder and Sentinel for sure… but it’s still not great. I’m tempted to give it a D for the RSI complaint, but putting that aside, it’s still not even within sniffing distance of an actual pet build, and you can’t call it a hybrid because you don’t actually do any player damage.
C+
May I see your build. There is definitely something wrong.
I GDStashed it. It looked exactly like the one you linked in the OP.
EDIT: I do prefer to play aggressively, so builds in which your main job is to stand around and wait while the pets kill things are incredibly boring for me. I also prefer to go faster rather than slower, so I’m frequently in front of the pets when moving through an area. I’ll use the movement skills aggressively as well. Probably why I keep getting Conjurers killed and positioning is something I do screw up occasionally.
That’s probably what got this character killed at the end of the day, but that doesn’t change the fact that I do this with a Ghol’s Ritualist and everything is dead before it becomes an issue because I’m using 2 pet masteries worth of pets and I have a reasonable amount (read: all of it) of RR and buffs. My Ghol’s build also has more defensive layers, so it’s safer overall.
I think the only time you need to take Ishtak/Tree on a pet build is deep SR and until you get there you’re just wasting devotion points that could be helping you kill things faster. Dead monsters don’t do damage (usually) and so a good offense is usually the best defence (IMO).
i found that doesn’t work for me as well on many of Automator’s builds, so i don’t think that’s how the are “designed” or rather their design doesn’t lend entirely to that, atleast not without a couple tweaks.
If when playing “the boring way”, they relatively do what any/every pet build does, to varying degree of impact - perhaps that’s the highlight, they arent’ carried by the design, they are carried by pets innate abilities.
Which might also be why they don’t succeed in the sense we measure builds/succeeds the way Automator measures it (which might also explain why he doesn’t think top20 is good, he’s not used to playing them that way to get their performance out of them)
it basically reminds me of older pet builds that was very tanky and similarly tree ishtak LoE “always” routed, you know the old type where we would have spent 20mins killing Calla 
I made a video for you. Excuse my rambling…
YouTube Death Knight
just a thing, dont’ say “you’re not gonna do this with a non pet character”,
i get that you have your wee beliefs that any non pet char that’s defeated sr90+ without pets is cheating, but you’re objectively wrong, and there is plenty video and build evidence out there
“when you do this”, you’re putting yourself in Alex Jones territory, and does not help you past present future… and it’s disrespectful to your fellow GD players, (imo), and slightly arrogant putting yourself above “everyone” else in that fashion, intentionally or not
“You’re not gonna do this with a non pet character” can be construed a lot of different ways. Perhaps he was suggesting a hang back/push a couple of buttons don’t kite like crazy play style. You certainly cannot do that with a non pet build.
sure, totally a possibility, but judging by earlier comments in mind to me it definitely leads to it leaning the other way
obv it’s possible Automator changed minds and now meant what you say
Most of your builds use the Zantarin shoulders. If I am playing a necromancer what shoulders would you recommend since I will not be able to ally with Kymon’s chosen?
you can get zantarin shoulders in crucible or SR
*note you can also ally yourself with Kymon on necro chars, you just have to encounter them/make the faction choice before the actual Necro selection (easiest on alts with access to merits)
alternatively you use an alt char allied with Kymon to target farm the shoulders if SR rng is too high for you
What Gnomish said plus I like to use Sentinel and Witchblade to run MI’s for all characters. They summon quickly after restarting and move very fast through fodder.
Looking at the best builds, I am surprised to find pets Sentinel sitting on top.
Oathkeeper has nothing to do with pets and provides very little, compared to Shaman class. Also, unlike your Death Knight (which is boosted by a very strong item and has natural support) you don’t have any pet exclusive skills. Shaman/Necro+non-pet class means you still can get Primal Bond or Master of Death, instead of 1pt in Possession. Taking Shaman and Bond here can still provide extra damage absorb on top of pet stats.
Damage focus: Since Bysmiel set supports birds, it’s not bad idea to focus on their strong damage - lightning and boost it with -RR devotion, in this case Widow with Arcane bomb. I have seen in some of your other builds the tendency to neglect RR devotions, they’re crucial for damage dealing, regardless of your build type.
Sustain: even though pets tend to be tanky, you still need some sustain for you and your minions. The Sentinel has a nice damage absorb, but you have almost no way to regain your lost health. Absorb with no healing is the equivalent of having a PC case with abundance of fans, but the case is like a coffin, with no way to suck in fresh air. Shaman can give you a healing totem and devotions, getting Behemoth for proc and extra health regen can be really good for survival. One can combine that with Tree of Life for an extra bit of defence. If you want more sustain for your pet master, you can take Dryad, which also fits the route for Ishtak.
So, I’ve decided to make a Conjurer build, using the key items from the Sentinel - Bysmiel set, Visage and Mindweaver, focusing on birds. Also, more lightning focus to better support Familiar’s familiar damage type, and that’s that. Not being a pet ‘‘expert’’, but it’s safe to say, it’s a significant improvement, despite obviously not being a top tier pet build.
GT - Conjurer, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator (grimtools.com)
Save file:
_Connie.zip (1.4 MB)
*one can tweak it with more points in Wendigo or taking Healing Rain devotion, if they feel needing more defence.
Since the stated metic is SR 90, here are 2x videos from the shattered realm. Piloting wise, one can do a much better job, staying out of ground pools.
Grim Dawn Lightning Bysmiel Conjurer vs SR 90 (different run) (youtube.com)
Of course, build can do Ravager of Flesh with no issues and Crucible in decent time.
Video looked great. Unfortunately the editor majorly messed up the save file so I was unable to test in a SR.
worked fine for me, you sure you did it right?/if you’re using cloud saves (ingame setting) then you can’t copy paste saves into the save folder
In order of when uploaded only.
As I said the editor version is bugged so I built very close to your build from scratch to test.
Great Job!!! It scored a 7.5 with low devotions. I would guess it’s as good as my best 8.5 with max devotions. Some of you editor gear was nuts, but I did get very close.
I will definitely look into using your Bull and Dryad devotions. You convinced me that Conjurer isn’t as bad as online players made me think. Very nice SR90 Very Easy build!!!
EDIT: I was so excited to see a good Conjurer I rushed a bit. My low devotions were defensive only so score will likely remain 7.5 or 8 with my best gear. Aether resistance is easy to fix.
I am having a hard time understanding Bull, Behemoth, and Dryad devotions. I know it could be 8.5 with some minor devotion changes.
I stand by “Very nice build”. Rare for me to be so impressed 
EDIT2: Well there goes another full day playing grim dawn lol
Further testing averaged your build around 7-7.5. I must have had a good roll the first run.
I worked over an hour fixing your build, but after changing almost everything I decided to start over. Also removed the belt. With no editor it took a years worth of materials to craft it and I don’t realistically expect anyone to do that.
My new version is “so far” scoring an 8 which is up there with my top builds. It has no real bonus damage via other players, but I don’t include that extra DPS in my ratings.
By tonight I should have enough test runs to post it.
Thanks again for the inspiration!
Does looking at the timer left make any sense?
Nery’s has 2 SR 90 runs that have nearly the same duration (a bit less than 4m) yet differ by over 2 minutes in timer left before it’s over. Can you run SR 90 that fast?
Btw save worked for me too. You can also GDStash devotion to max so there’s no excuse for not testing the build properly. Testing a build without maxed devotions is absurd and a tremendous detriment to it.
Why did the devs not save much programing by simply using elapsed time?
It may be only if you have the editor installed. The few editor saves I have tested and players online with editor builds have all acted funny. Don’t know why. I’ll just build legit if something looks interesting like Nery’s Conjurer.
To punish you for dying obviously (and other things like that) which is not relevant here.
I’ve never had GDStash or any editor installed on laptop I tested this character on.
Devotions: It’s important not to miss the effect of an extra flat RR, in this case is Bysmiel proc, which is a pet with flat RR and some OA shred, it works nicely here. You can alternatively use Elemental Storm and bind it to a constant pet. Having high RR value and proc with DoT damage ain’t a bad way to supplement your damage. Counting only on Ishtak for flat RR (low value and not full uptime) ain’t recommended.
Bull isn’t a crucial piece from this build. Took it, cause it fits my route to take Ishtak. Main appeal is the damage proc. Trauma damage is converted, so it will function as additional support damage, when attach to a pet.
Dryad devotion is one of the top tier defensive ones in the game. It serves as an extra healing source for your pet master. Player builds have life steal through weapon damage attacks. Pet masters needs alternative methods to regain their lost health. Dryad having a physical resistance node is also a nice perk.
Behemoth is a health regen monstrosity. It has a nice heal and passively improves health and health regen values. One can even combine it with Tree of Life for even more tankiness. Behemoth is also an earlier tier, so it fits in majority of maps, it’s one of the premier devotions, if you’re playing pets. It’s also synergetic with Shaman class, given the high health regen values provided by Mogdrogen’s pact.