Summon Druid Endgame Guide

Terrible idea for a Summon Druid.
The -defense is meaningless because the Summons already hit at pretty much 95% chance.
And the Spirit Wolves damage is so low to begin with that's not really worth buffing it.

CB is nice but outclassed by

Decrepify.

mockingbirdreal wrote: 3 years ago

basicnecromancy wrote: 3 years ago

Thank you mates, got informed well thanks to you. Experimenting with Pride and later with RT.

Another option is good old Infinity.
Merc has 40% CB.

Conviction reduce 83 defense so more physical damage.
And also reduce 85 res so more damage for Spirit Wolf.

Thanks, should consider it, too.

Let me re-iterate a bit.
You have 4 types of Summons plus the Merc.

The Merc and the

Raven are your best damage dealers by a wide margin.
Grizzly and Dire Wolves are roughly equal but deal less than 50% of the above each.
Spirit Wolves are even further down dealing about 30% the damage of a Grizzly or the Dire Wolves.

Now let's look at the Weapons and what type of Summons / Merc they buff.

Infinity: good damage for the merc (you could argue the best due to CB but only if you play on high player counts or against

Baal) and some damage increase for the Spirit Wolves. Irrelevant for all the other Summons
Pride: ~12% damage increase for the Grizzly and Dire Wolves. 0 effect on the

Raven and the Spirit Wolves. Absolutely horrible damage for the merc itself.
Reaper's Toll: great damage for the merc (even better when ethereal), great damage increase for the Dire Wolves and Grizzly especially against bosses, only way to buff the

Raven damage. No effect on the Spirit Wolves. Does need to be procced though and theoretically the

Raven can overwrite it although in practise if a

Raven hits a cursed monster it will pretty much die on the spot.

Summary:
Infinity buffs your worst Summons and is great on the Merc (5th and 1st).
Pride slightly buffs your your 3rd and 4th best damage option while ruining your 1st.
Reaper's Toll is great for the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th best damage option you have.

Is this even a question which one to take?

basicnecromancy wrote: 3 years ago

Thanks, should consider it, too.

Can you also try Act 5 merc with Lawbringer + Grief?

I can give you Lawbringer or

Lem if you want to.

That is a strictly worse version of an Act 2 merc with Reaper's Toll
Even if you replaced the Grief with a Last Wish it would be worse.

Lawbringer on Act 5 merc is a good start for Single Player though when you don't have access to a Reaper's Toll.

I have act 5 merc with my Sorc and he swings Lawbringer. But knock back would be an issue with summons I guess. Have you guys ever tried it?

Tried it during the 2.4 PTR with Lawbringer + Last Wish and yes the knockback is an issue if you farm in areas with undead.
There is also the problem that the Act 5 merc runs so fast that he is always ahead of the other Summons.
If you build an act 5 merc like that it's pretty much always just the merc doing all the work which more or less defeats the purpose of even having the other Summons in the first place.

+2 Grizzly, +3

Cyclone Armor, +3

Hurricane, 3 OS pelt worth making Delirium and using instead of Jalal's?

of course, if u run Wind druid. those all 3 r skills he use.
i prefer jalal's for all resist and socket, but that is just my view on Wind build. i also rather use

Stormshield instead of Spirit.
anyway, u cant be wrong. if it turns that doesn't suit u, u can get nice trade for it.

basicnecromancy wrote: 3 years ago

+2 Grizzly, +3

Cyclone Armor, +3

Hurricane, 3 OS pelt worth making Delirium and using instead of Jalal's?

No, not even close.

Sorry to necro this thread! But I am planning on making a summon druid as a start for the up and coming ladder reset with the new Warlock expansion thing.

I just wanted to see what your thoughts are in relation to the changes and more specifically in new unique 2 handed sword "

Dreadfang" that has a 33% chance to cast level 3 amp damage on hit. Yes you have to give up Might on Act 2 merc and Decrep from Reaper's Toll but you gain a reliable Amp Damage applier from the act 5 merc.

I wondered if that changes anything about the build as Amp damage is quite a big deal, especially for the Ravens.

Thoughts?

It's a really good idea actually. I had a similar idea with

Witchwild String or Wrath bow for a Act 1 Rogue or self-wielded by a 'Hunter/Ranger' Druid summoner. Amp Damage would be strictly speaking better than

Decrepify and would help almost all your summons more than say a Might aura from an Act 2 Merc.

If you want to go real off-meta tho I've been toying with an Arctic Shaman druid summoner lol (

Arctic Blast + summons)...

yes and also a

Bone Break is now very useful!

I guess I'm just wondering what the numbers would be in terms of DPS.

Would it still be higher with an Act 2 Might and Reapers Toll Decrep setup or does the additional damage from Amp Damage make Might less useful because it buffs all minions?

Yeah and I wonder how bonebreak would now factor into that?

krathkor wrote: 6 hours ago

yes and also a

Bone Break is now very useful!

Not sure how Bone breaker on summon will help the druid himself since the

Bonebreaker only effects self cast skills.

So the summons wont benefit from the

Bonebreaker…

Unless im missing something…

d2rppa69 wrote: 1 hour ago

Not sure how Bone breaker on summon will help the druid himself since the

Bonebreaker only effects self cast skills.

First,

Bone Break, not

Bonebreaker.
Second, some pets inherit Sunder effects (and also -enemy resistance).

DreamLoft wrote: 11 hours ago

Sorry to necro this thread! But I am planning on making a summon druid as a start for the up and coming ladder reset with the new Warlock expansion thing.

I just wanted to see what your thoughts are in relation to the changes and more specifically in new unique 2 handed sword "

Dreadfang" that has a 33% chance to cast level 3 amp damage on hit. Yes you have to give up Might on Act 2 merc and Decrep from Reaper's Toll but you gain a reliable Amp Damage applier from the act 5 merc.

I wondered if that changes anything about the build as Amp damage is quite a big deal, especially for the Ravens.

Thoughts?

I'm not sure.
You'd gain

Amplify Damage instead of

Decrepify which is a boost for sure.
But you not only do you lose the Might aura, the merc itself (which is a big part of your damage) will deal less damage simply because the Act 5 merc is weaker.
For a

Raven build it's more viable since most of the damage there comes from

Raven which don't benefit from auras.
I do not have the time to test this myself though.

The new sunder is probably worth it though to lower the physical res of enemies over a skill charm.

That's true!

Dreadfang has bad damage, even if you find an

Eth variant. So I think you're right, the overal benefit is not as good as an Act 2 Might merc with Reaper's Toll