Chaos Pets (Witching Hour Summoner)
Flat Damage:
Hellfire - 75 Chaos Damage @ 22/12 (30 Chaos Damage at 12/12)
Witching Hour - 49 AVG Chaos Damage
Bysmiel’s Domination - 28 AVG Chaos Damage
Voidwhisper Band Proc - 10 Chaos Damage
Campaign Viability: All Content easily cleared, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator complete
Build Showcase: Sneaky Parrot - Bane of Uroboruuk Cabalist
What’s good about Chaos Pets: 28 flat RR, +2 to all Cabalist Skills, 49 flat Chaos damage, 750% Chaos damage
Witching Hour is, bar none, the best pet item in the game now. It practically provides pet offense by itself, allowing players to better equip for pet defenses (see sneaky parrot’s Witching Hour build to see what I mean). In addition to that, you have items that grant great Chaos damage (Fiendmaster Raiment), a relic that provides huge pet OA, Crit, and a proc with 60% pet speed (Bysmiel’s Domination), and an item that grants 100% Physical to Chaos (Voidwhisper Band). Hellfire is very easy to get to 22/12, especially as Voidwhisper Band gives skill bonus to both Hellfire and Raise Skeletons.
Lightning Pets (Standard Summoner)
Flat Damage:
Spark of Ultos - 20 AVG Lightning Damage
Mantle of Modgrogen - 18 AVG Lightning Damage
Glyph of Kelphat’Zoth Proc - 13 AVG Lightning Damage
Raven (Constellation) - 6 Lightning Damage
Campaign Viability: All Content easily cleared, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator complete
Build Showcases: Sigatrev- Familiar Deceiver / Conjurer
DaShiv - Night King Cabalist
What’s good about Lightning Pets: Easy 50% conversion from Physical to Lightning thanks to Spark of Ultos and Glyph Rings. Stormbringer of Malmouth, Glyph Rings, Mantle of the Patron, Voidmancer’s Cord. Lightning pets are filled with large damage bonuses, making it the highest %Damage bonuses you can get from a pet build. Thanks to the generous bonuses from the tome and the rings, Crit damage can get very high, especially if you’re using Primal Bond as an exclusive skill. The 1.0.6.0 buffs granting innate pet Crit damage makes Lightning pets even more formidable, making it the easy candidate to run a train through Gladiator 170.
What’s not good about Lightning Pets: Conversion relies on Glyph ring procs, which adds to the large damage variances Lightning builds already have. Other than that, Lightning pets are the gold standard in designing for pet builds.
Lightning Pets (Hybrid Summoner)
Flat Damage:
Eye of the Storm - 38 AVG Lightning Damage, 106/s Electrocute Damage
Campaign Viability: All Content easily cleared, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator complete
Build Showcase: Snazzblaster - Death on Dark Wings Lightning Hybrid Conjurer
What’s good about Lightning Hybrid: 26/16 Raven attacks with 5 projectiles, and it appears from Snazzblaster’s build that 2 Ravens is far superior to one that pierces. Taking the upper right devotions helps tremendously with defenses, making the build tanky enough to make good use of Savagery.
What’s not good about Lightning hybrid: Getting the Raven to 26/16 (not an easy task when trying to grab all the pet Lightning items, mind you) grants it 5 projectiles, but the vast majority of the time, at least 3 of the 5 projectiles ends up hitting walls or useless obstacles, meaning the Raven is a very poor choice for a shotgun type pet. It’s a shame, too, as the 100% passing through enemies is the best pet-related Conduit in the game, in the sense that it’s a real build-defining skill as opposed to the other Conduits that give you a middle amount of damage to a single pet (Briarthorn, Hellhound, Blight Fiend). Even more of a shame in that you can’t combine it with the amulet that gives you 2 Ravens.
Melee Savagery looks like the way to go, so if you like to play a kiting caster with Storm Totem like I did, you’ll face the following issues. Gearing is extremely hard to get properly (you need over 1000 Physique to equip the Light’s Defender set and 724 Spirit to equip the Stormbringer Tome); the new Valguur’s set would have been perfect for the Storm Totem bonuses + Conjurer skills on the helmet, but the Lightning conversion to Vitality tosses that idea right out. Not only that, but obtaining all the necessary skill points requires extreme luck on the greens (the right prefix and suffix are vital), and even if you get that far, the build suffers from poor OA and DA. This is not a build I’d recommend.
Vitality Pets
Blood Pact - 90 Vitality Damage @ 22/12 (40 Vitality Damage @ 12/12)
Soul Harvest - 64 Vitality Damage @ 22/12 (28 Vitality Damage @ 12/12)
Diviner’s Set - 35 Vitality Damage
Undying Oath - 20 Vitality Damage (Blood of Dreeg)
Dread Armor of Azragor - 18 AVG Vitality Damage
Corruptor’s Set - 15 Vitality Damage
Campaign Viability: All Content cleared, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator complete
Build Showcase: Superfluff - Guardian of Death’s Gates Ritualist
What’s good about Vitality Pets: Skeletons are the best pet DPS source you can get, and Skeletons are chock full of Vitality damage. Overcapping Will of the Crypt and Soul Harvest provides a great amount of flat Vitality. Benefits greatly from Dying God, especially with the huge Crit damage bonuses. Vitality provides the most RR out of any pet build, as not only multiple mastery skills provide RR, but equipment does as well if you want to experiment a bit further with the concept. That doesn’t even get into additional sources, that being Wendigo Totem’s Blood Pact and Guardian of Death’s Gates. The former provides constant healing and huge flat damage bonuses, while the latter adds additional conversion, so that over 50% of Physical damage is converted without Skeletons, while Skeletons get around 70% conversion when Will of the Crypt is factored.
What’s not good about Vitality Pets: Like with Bleeding Pets, Wendigo Totem needs buffs in terms of a range modifier in order for Skeleton Builds to get any use from it. Dirge of Arkovia pet was also added to do Physical / Vitality damage, but it’s very slow and runs into the same pet AI problems as Raven and Hysteria Crab.
Physical Pets
Flat Damage:
Steel Resolve - 80 Physical Damage @ 22/12 (32 Physical Damage at 12/12)
Temper - 60 AVG Physical Damage @ 22/12 (26 AVG Physical Damage at 12/12)
Mogdrogen’s Pact - 60 AVG Physical Damage @ 22/12 (26 AVG Physical Damage at 12/12)
Nature’s Guardians - 33 Physical Damage
Call of the Beast (Skill) - 28 Physical Damage
Fleshwarped Bulwark - 25 Physical Damage
Guile - 23 AVG Physical Damage
Blessed Cleaver of Mogdrogen - 16 Physical Damage (Obsolete by Beastcaller’s Set)
Campaign Viability: All Content cleared, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator complete
Build Showcase: Sigatrev - Nature’s Guardians Conjurer
thepowerofmediocrity - Conjurer Pet Retaliation Build
thepowerofmediocrity - Pummeling Pets Vindicator (150 Gladiator viable)
What’s good about Physical Pets: Enemies not having a lot of Physical Resistance makes having good Physical RR that much more vital, and using an Occultist or Necromancer gives a lot of good help in attaining that RR. Beastcaller’s Set + Fleshwarped Bulwark leads to far better defenses, three classes having flat Physical damage can lead to quite a few different builds (Demolitionist, Inquisitor, Shaman). Beastcaller’s Cowl is one of the best pet items in the whole game. Some items are really good auxiliary defensive items like Mythical Golemborn Greaves, Mythical Hammerfall Girdle.
What’s not good about Physical Pets: Not much pet %Physical bounses (only Beastcaller’s Medal provides that for equipment, Temper and Steel Resolve for additional %Physical bonus), so if you don’t have ~2,000% to all damage, your pet build is rather weak, so you’ll struggle to get past the higher waves of Crucible that something like Lightning Pets will have no problems getting past. Nature’s Guardians has very poor uptime (20 second cooldown for 6 second activation), so while damage absorption and flat Physical damage is nice, it’s not something you can rely on.
Poison Pets
Flat Damage:
Blood of Dreeg - 88 Acid Damage @ 26/16 (44 Acid Damage @ 16/16)
Viperfang Grips - 108/s Poison Damage (Blood of Dreeg)
Venomancer’s Raiment - 18 Acid Damage
Campaign Viability: Vanilla Content cleared with little difficulty, likely capable of beating AoM Nemeses and secret content
Crucible Viability: 170 Gladiator Complete
Build Showcase: Valinov - Knights of Nurgle Cabalist
thepowerofmediocrity - Wretched Army Cabalist (Uses Venom Launcher + Putrid Necklace Conversion, not Gladiator viable)
What’s good about Poison Pets: Blood of Dreeg is an amazing ability for pets, providing flat OA, flat Poison damage, more than enough Poison & Acid Resistance, and Physical Resistance to boot. Viperfang gloves provides flat Poison to pets, while the Venom Launcher gun + Putrid Necklace converts 90% of Elemental to Acid, giving a lot more flexibility for skill points + Devotion points. The Rotmender rings give great Poison & Acid bonuses while providing an alright heal, and pet build’s innate large Crit bonuses (with Hungering Void) can lead to some very potent DoTs.
Blight Fiend’s abilities are the best of all Mastery pets, with Rotting Fumes providing huge DA reduction and good fumble chance and Blight Burst providing good AoE capabilities. With the transmuter, the build is theoretically capable of having 3 Blight Fiends up at a time.
What’s not good about Poison Pets: The Elemental to Acid conversion and flat Poison from Viperfang requires using Blood of Dreeg, and yet the Great Serpent helmet gives all bonuses to Shaman. As it is, there’s no way for Shaman Poison pets to have any flat Poison at all since the Great Serpent helmet removed its proc. Primal Spirit’s own Poison is not nearly enough to make up for losing Blood of Dreeg + Skeletons having flat damage + Storm Spirit’s converted flat Acid damage, even if you include the Blightshard pets amulet that you wouldn’t normally get using the Cabalist. There are several nice weapons that a regular Poison pet summoner can use (Plagubearer of Dreeg, Blightshard Invoker), but there’s no off-hand that makes the trade-off worth it (Mythical Fiend’s Resolve gives nothing to pets, Mythical Contagion gives no bonus to All Necromancer skills (Why Nightblade?), Wretched Tome of Nar’Adin is Occultist based, the Black Grimoire pet uses Fire Damage which doesn’t get converted, only two off-hands give +Skills to Shaman and they’re both unrelated to Poison or Pets, etc.)
Fire Pets
Flat Damage:
Flame Touched - 57 Fire Damage @ 22/12 (23 Fire Damage at 12/12)
Campaign Viability: All Content cleared with moderate difficulty, including AoM Nemeses and Secret Content
Crucible Viability: 150 Gladiator might be doable (haven’t seen a Dracarris build since the new Crucible update), lol at 170 Gladiator
What’s good about Fire Pets: The equipment surrounding Fire Pets makes it very easy for both Summoner and pets to do large amounts of damage together, maximizing the benefits of Dracarris’ “On Enemy Death” proc. Equipment that grants 22/12 Flame Touched are some of the best items you can get (Ulzuin’s Headguard for the Fire RR, Mark of Divinity for the circuit breaker). Easy to get good Fire RR shred- Thermite Mines may be wonky, but its huge RR shred is formidable.
What’s not good about Fire Pets: Despite their great damage output, builds that focus solely on Swarmlings are going to have a very hard time fighting Nemeses like Grava’ Thul and Kuba. Even regular bosses that pile on death pools like Fleshweaver Harraxis, Naxen Shade, and the Slith boss at the Ancient Grove will give Swarmling builds fits of frustration. It is also the only Elemental damage type that has no “Physical damage converted to,” so Hellhound, Swarmlings, and maybe that Naga’Pesh Skeleton (though you have to give up Wyrmclaw for it) are really your only options if you want to use a Fire pet build.
Bleeding pets
Flat Damage:
Primal Bond - 64/s Bleeding Damage @ 22/12 (28/s Bleeding Damage @ 12/12)
Howl of the Wolf Proc - 28/s Bleeding Damage
Mogdrogen / Huntress Nodes - 14/s Bleeding Damage
What’s good about Bleeding Pets: The 1.0.6.0 update granted flat Bleeding damage to both Primal Bond and Mogdrogen the Wolf’s proc, making it a suitable pet damage type. All credit goes to Safrael for posting his build. Conjure Primal Spirit is- far none- the best pet ability in the game, and Ritualist provides essentially permanent Primal Spirit through the Necrolord’s Gaze and Bound Wraith (Wraithbound Bound Spirit of Binding is the silliest equipment name I’ve seen in a long time).
What’s not good about Bleeding Pets: Pet Bleeding Damage is one of the most undersupported damage types there is, with only one equipment slot (Beastcaller’s Talisman) granting bonus Bleeding damage and only one skill (Blood Pact) doing the same. Especially if you’re playing a Skeletons build, prepare to be disappointed at Wendigo Totem’s short range. Conjure Primal Spirit may have huge Crit Potential, but its base Bleeding damage is fairly low, especially compared to player-scaled abilities like Blade Spirit. As it’s a Mogdrogen- based build, it won’t be able to take advantage of Dying God’s huge Crit bonuses, and the extra speed provided by the proc will only serve to re-apply the Bleeding DoT.
Sections not covered:
Elemental Pets
Flat Damage:
Iskandra’s Elemental Exchange - 94 Elemental Damage @ 22/12 (+20 from Manifestation), 37 Elemental Damage @ 12/12
Overload - 130/sec AVG all Elemental DoTs @ 22/12 (57/sec all Elemental DoTs @ 12/12)
Storm Spirit - 88 Elemental Damage @ 22/12 (30 Elemental Damage @ 12/12)
Arcane Empowerment (for all pets in Seal) - 88 Elemental Damage @ 22/12 (30 Elemental Damage @ 12/12)
Mythical Spellgaze - 20 Elemental Damage (Word of Renewal)
Ancestor - 22 AVG Elemental Damage
Build Showcase: Superfluff - Beastcaller’s Druid (Grimtools only)
Sneaky Parrot - Elemental Pets Warlock (Update your thread, Parrot!)
Piercing Pets
Aura of Conviction - 74 Piercing Damage @ 22/12 (30 Piercing Damage @ 12/12)
Arcane Empowerment (for all pets in Seal) - 66 Piercing Damage @ 22/12 (24 Piercing Damage @ 12/12)
[spoiler]Failed Concepts
Chaos Pets (Black Scourge Hybrid Summoner)
Campaign Viability: Vanilla Content cleared with difficulty, not likely to beat AoM Nemeses
Crucible Viability: lol
What might be good about hybrid Chaos pets: If you’re not using Witching Hour, you still have a plethora of options to choose from. Black Scourge provides now-decent pets on kill, Will of Bysmiel (the regular amulet, not the mythical one) provides temporary Voidfiend pets for more Chaos damage, and Salazar’s blade provides a very good pet with all damage RR and great damage. Dying God provides wonderful damage to the player as well as the pets, and Riftstone is a wonderful damage source that can get the “On Enemy Death” procs easily.
What’s not good about Chaos pets (non-Witching Hour): Considering that Witching Hour has finally made pet builds Crucible worthy, it’s a huge indicator as to how much other pet build equipment lacks compared to Witching Hour in every sense of the word. Lost Souls set is completely obsolete, which is ironic that a full set of 4 items can’t hold a candle to a single item. As much as I’ve wanted to make a build around the Black Scourge pets, the combination of pets that only arrive on kill & pets on poor uptime (Salazar’s Blade + Voidfiends), you can’t really combine these pets to make a solid pet build. Getting enough kills to make the Black Scourge pets useful is a daunting task, and my testing for my build specifically designed for this led to it being too squishy and not nearly enough damage (and you’re not going to get any tankier than a Witchblade, that is for sure).
It may be a factor of trying to find the delicate balance between player damage and pet damage, but as long as the Chaos Voidfiends from the Will of Bysmiel amulet continue to have a bad uptime, I consider this a very unviable build.
Cold Pets [Trickster / Druid]
Flat Damage:
Bane of the Winter King - 32 AVG Cold Damage
Frostdread Cuirass - 21 Cold Damage
Campaign Viability: Vanilla Content cleared with difficulty, not likely to beat AoM Nemeses
Crucible Viability: lol
What may be good about Cold Pets: A good amount of flat damage bonuses from both Winter King Sword and Frostdread Cuirass. Winter King Sword also provides over 300% Pet Cold damage, Chillmane is a great pet that focuses on Cold Damage, and 50% Physical conversion allows you to either keep the Cold / Physical balance (Trickster) or use other Elemental Conversion to get 100% Conversion (Druid)
To the surprise of precisely nobody, Druid pets are far, far better than Trickster. I know the Winter King sword is meant to use Nightblade and Shaman classes, but why feel stuck with the struggle to get acceptable levels of OA/DA when you can just bring in a Druid, cash in that sweet, sweet 22/12 IEE (which is fairly simple to get thanks to faction shoulders, Magi boots, and that craftable belt) and go to town on everyone.
What’s not good about Cold Pets: As said above, Trickster needs to rely on Savagery to get enough OA/DA just to take on the content, meaning you can’t use the Winter King granted skill as effectively. Damage is okay, but it’s a Swarmling build that’s even worse than Dracarris as you’re not able to put any of its base Fire damage to good use, so take the problems of Fire Pets and multiply that by 2 or so and you get Cold pets.
Note: I didn’t see this until I started doing the numbers, but Cold Pets almost has as much flat damage as Fire Pets (55 with the items against 57 for 22/12 Flame Touched). Now if only you can stack up the % bonuses as well as you can Fire and have more pets that do 200 base Cold damage, and you can have a build that’s as viable as a Fire based pet build.
Cold/Vitality Hybrid Ritualist
Flat Damage:
See separate entries for Vitality and Cold, also
Deathchill - 25 AVG Vitality Damage
Deathchill - 25 AVG Cold Damage
Campaign Viability: Vanilla Content cleared with great difficulty, definitely will not be able to beat AoM Nemeses
Crucible Viability: lol
What may be good about Cold / Vitality Pets: Both Reap Spirit and the Bound Spirits from Bonescavenger use Cold + Vitality damage. In addition, you can combine the Winter King Sword and Master of Death to convert 75% of Physical Damage into 50% Cold + 25% Vitality. Thanks to the Corruptor Set’s bonuses to Bone Harvest, you can obtain an overcapped Bone Harvest that’s easy to kill the enemies necessary to get the Bound Spirits.
What’s not good about Cold / Vitality Pets:
1)[spoiler]
- It’s not worth it to use Raise Skeletons in this build, as not only do you need a lot of assistance (+5 BoM) to get Raise Skeletons to 26/16, but even if you did, their damage output is piddling, going for around 25K crits when you can easily get 60K+ crits on other pet casters.
As for Reap Spirit, here are the numbers on that:
23/16 (the minimum to get 3 Reap Spirits) cast costs 366 Energy. With the 6 second cooldown, that comes to 61 Energy per second, which is extremely difficult to get if you’re not using a caster off-hand (and that’s using nothing else other than spamming Reap Spirit). Secondly, the 10 second Reap Spirit life is far too short to get 3 Reap Spirits going, in fact you’d be lucky to get even 2 Spirits fighting with you. Using the Diviner’s Set to lower the Reap Spirit cooldown also kills the Corruptor’s Set, and you’d rather go for the whole set anyway with the off-hand than trying to use it with the 2H Winter King Sword. Considering how much you have to invest just to get to 23/16 Reap Spirit, I’d much rather see the regular life of the Reap Spirit pet to be 20 seconds and have the full Diviner’s Set give it something a little more oomph, like adding a particular debuff to the Reap Spirit cast.
[/spoiler]