Second class feature is Riftstalker!
The above two screenshots sum up Riftstalker’s potential for craziness: when you have a 25% to have your next crit have 150% extra Crit damage, you throw as many bodies at the enemy as possible and have the Crit damage add up. The buff that grants that Crit damage is great on its own, as it grants the player (and pets) flat OA, DA, and Total Speed. In fact, the buff is only one of three abilities that grant Total Speed: Riftward totems + Warp autoattack (if you’re playing a Melee build) also grant Total Speed.
Riftstalker’s damage capabilities are in three damage types: Pierce, Aether, & Chaos. Chaos immediately conjures up images of Witching Hour destruction + Voidwhisper Band, and essentially replaces Occultist as the Chaos pet support of choice (assuming you’re not making use of double Ravens, that is). Aether grants a new world of possibiitiy to pet builds, as there were no ways to give pets Aether damage in the vanilla game; Grimarillion, however, does have a few classes where pets specialize in Aether damage, and I’ll show a brief sample of one in the example builds at the bottom of this post. Pierce damage is essentially limited to player-scaled builds, where the potential for conversion - and with it, the number of pets available to you - is much greater.
Riftward Totems are a treasure of boosts to both player and pets, as for a mere 24 Skill points, you and your pets get the gift of a massive amount of flat damage (75 Chaos damage at 12/12 is the same as Hellfire’s 75 Chaos damage at 22/12), great percentage damage boost (120% at 12/12, 180% if you’re playing Pierce), and Total Speed. These totems are like Wendigo Totems in the sense that they need enemies near it to activate and grant the abilities, so make sure you are built tanky enough to reap the benefits. To compliment the totems is the level 1 skill Detach, which grants -34% stackable RR to the three damage types at 12/12. At Mastery level 40 is a great passive that grants Aether + Chaos resistance; there is nothing that pet builds need at Mastery level 50, which grants the player necessary skill points to invest in the other class.
Zenith classes - thanks to the wonderful Grimarillion devs - are represented in the Satyr craft, and you can craft jewelry + Chest piece that grants +1 to Riftstalker. The bonus that comes with the craft? CDR! That’s right, CDR - one of the most highly sought-out bonuses to get - is packaged with the Riftstalker class, which means you can stuff even more CDR in your rings + medals that you couldn’t get in Vanilla. You thought the fun ended there? The Zenith mod - crafted by Ceno - stuffed additional bonuses in Mastery leveling, and no points for guessing that Riftstalker grants even more CDR just by leveling your character. Just by getting to level 40 Mastery and making one Satyr craft with + Riftstalker skills and you have as much CDR as an off-hand. If your other class has a main-skill nuke that does major damage in one of these three types and has a long cooldown, Riftstalker is sure to help that class enormously.
An example build template to follow for easy playing is Riftstalker + D3 Necromancer. D3 Necromancer has a Level 50 buff that gives pets 100% Physical to Aether conversion, and Riftstalker compliments the pets wonderfully through the above skills. D3 Necro has Frailty to provide flat RR, so you have the freedom to build around Aether damage as you’d like. 2-pc Rathma set grants your pets 100% to all damage and 20% Crit damage. I’d probably go Chest and gloves as the Chest piece gives you 5% DA and there’s not nearly as much competition for pet builds in the glove department. Shoulders and Boots can be Fiendflesh for the nice damage absorption, Head is Beastcaller’s Cowl as the Physical damage is converted. For relic I’d go with Menhir’s Bastion for the nice AoE Heal + flat damage boost. Amulet, Rings, and Weapon I’d go all out and get as many +All Skills as you can get while maintaining your resistances, as the amount of Skeletons you get increases while overcapping the skill. Medal I’d go for either Satyr craft with Riftstalker bonus or Mythical Combat Medic’s Mark depending on whether I think the pets need more heals or not.
Devotion Set-up for Riftstalker / D3 Necro Aether pets
I’d highly recommend the above devotion set-up as you get Tree of Life for healing you and your pets, Ishtak for survivability and flat Physical damage (and the CDR you have lets you proc this often), and a good smattering of Health, DA, and resistances so you can breathe a bit easier with your equipment.
Flat damage, Total Speed, Flat OA, great RR, a passive that grants rare resistances (including Stun resistance), passive CDR just by leveling the Mastery and the chance to get massive Crit damage, all within a reasonable amount of skill point allocation? Let’s get some pets and blow this baby wide open.
