Yet another bow/summoner druid thread

[Brindor]

Since this is my first post here I have to start by thanking Brother Laz for an excellent mod.

Might as well issue a warning right away: this post will be pretty long, sorry in advance.

I've been playing the mod for about a week and since I like cookie cutter builds, my first char became a hermit druid following the guide in the sticky. I've now realised that the guide is somewhat outdated but the basics worked well enough. Today I reached level 120 and I've been trying out some of the uberquests but I have a few things I'd like opinions on.

I guess it would make sense to give some brief stats of my druid first.
Skillwise I've maxed the Acid Fiend skills + synergies and also Elfin Arrows. My gear consists of mostly uniques with a few runeword items sprinkled in. No sacred items yet unfortunately. I've finished the easier uberquests and most of the summons, but honestly I Gamma cheesed most of them. My playstyle is pretty much: buff self with MotW, spam Nova Shot, resummon fiends/bear when necessary and throw out a charm or two when things get too hectic. It feels pretty simplistic and I'm sure I'm missing the finer points of gameplay still. As for my stats I've got 80 resist all, around 5.5k hp and around 7k defense.

I guess the first question I have is which uberskill to choose? Since I pretty much only use charm to avoid getting swarmed, LotP feels unnecessary but I can't really decide between the other two. Both seems useful at times.

Lets go on with the rest of the skillpoints. I've got about 40 unused points saved up mostly because I don't really know where to put them. The feeling I have is that I should probably pick a bow skill to max and since I mostly use Nova I guess that's the obvious choice. I've also thought about using 3 points to get Pagan Rites which seems pretty useful although I've managed so far without it. If I get the harder ubercharms I'll have to spend some more points in my main skills (I think that's how it works?) but there should still be a few more points left. Maybe put a few of them in MotW? Other suggestions?

Next stop, equipment. This is my current setup:
Weapon: Unique T6 recurve bow
Helm: Unique T6 hawk helm
Body: Unity runeword
Gloves: Unique T6 chain gloves
Belt: the unique druid one, T3 I think, will change this
Boots: low lvl rare ones to boost stats, have to switch these as well
Jewelry: Rare +skill ones, will gamble better

Basically, I'm not really sure if I should try to upgrade my equipment to boost my summons or myself. Up to Destruction or something like that my acid fiends did most of the work, but after finding the unique recurve bow and upgrading it I'm doing most of the damage now and the fiends are mostly a meat wall. The fiends also last way shorter now and I'm resummoning quite often. Should I try to make them stronger or is it simply not possible?

Specifically, I could fill the sockets in gloves + helm with Kur-crafted jewels and upgrade every piece of armor with +% minion life, which should be a significant upgrade for the fiends but would it be enough?

I've briefly considered the necro crafted jewelry for this purpose. Seems pretty nice and making a lvl 60ish char won't take too long, but I have the same problem here. I'm not sure it would make enough difference?

I managed to roll the bow pretty perfect so it has 350% ED with only one upgrade used. For a while I thought about adding some stun attack, but I believe that doesn't work with missile attacks, so the best bet would be to add slow attack upgrades I think?

The belt and boots will be replaced and I'm thinking about Ley and Sundance runewords right now. With all the charms and stuff I have resists to spare, so I'm looking for more utility like FRW and things like that. Any other more reasonable suggestions?

A problem I have is that I'm pretty fragile when the mobs squeeze by my meat wall. This is especially a problem in the cow level, but also in places like Kurast where the archers just ignore my pets. 5.5k life seems pretty low from what I've read in other posts, but I've also got 1k unspent stat points since I'm dreaming of the 1kAC, however unlikely that will be. Maybe get the unique +life belt or barb crafted to get some more life and maybe survive 2 hits. More defense would be nice, but a bit hard to get without spending tons of points in Str to wear better armor.

I guess the post is already way too long so I'll stop here. More questions to follow shortly . Some of the "questions" are pretty vague but I hope I can get some pointers.

[DemonicAngel]

If you're a bow/acid fiends druid and still have 40 points... for more personal damage, you should max LotP & KI.


If you are still thinking LotP/KI is unnecessary (which is up to you, but it will increase your damage by a ton) then I'd recommend Tremor. It will lower the health of all enemies within range by a percentage. Meaning you can get a lot of monsters' health very low with just a few Tremors, and then take care of them with another skill.

[pza]

and throw 1 point into motw. also, try wearing tao runeword in helmet, it is really nice.

long question, short answer

edit: whoops. note to myself: don't post when in hurry.

[DemonicAngel]

My playstyle is pretty much: buff self with MotW, spam Nova Shot, resummon fiends/bear when necessary and throw out a charm or two when things get too hectic.

pza, he already has at least a point in MotW!

[Brindor]

Yep, I've learned to like MotW despite the constant spam it requires. This is one of the reasons why I thought about putting additional points in the skill but the returns are pretty small and the duration will never be long enough, so it'll stay at 1.

Glad I made this post since I didn't really know how commands worked before. I always figured you had to charm stuff to be able to activate them, but after maxing out KI + LotP earlier today I'm very impressed. Gave me quite a boost to damage. I have 12 free points now, but I'll probably save them for when/if I get some of the ubercharms with +maximum skill level.

However, a few points in Nova Shot could be nice since it gives some synergy effects to Elfin Arrows.

So, what about my equipment upgrade ponderings? My fiends still die pretty fast and this stops me from nonstop arrow-flinging since I have to stop and resummon all the time. I figure to have around 40-50 upgrades total on my armor which should land me about +150-200% minion life. This is probably the best idea since there really aren't any spectacular options? Adding two necro rings to this would boost it even further and even add some much needed damage to my wussy fiends.

Guess I have to start grinding a necromancer...

[DemonicAngel]

I always figured you had to charm stuff to be able to activate them, but after maxing out KI + LotP earlier today I'm very impressed. Gave me quite a boost to damage. I have 12 free points now, but I'll probably save them for when/if I get some of the ubercharms with +maximum skill level.

However, a few points in Nova Shot could be nice since it gives some synergy effects to Elfin Arrows.

Why only one bowskill?

So, what about my equipment upgrade ponderings? My fiends still die pretty fast and this stops me from nonstop arrow-flinging since I have to stop and resummon all the time. I figure to have around 40-50 upgrades total on my armor which should land me about +150-200% minion life. This is probably the best idea since there really aren't any spectacular options? Adding two necro rings to this would boost it even further and even add some much needed damage to my wussy fiends.

To improve minions:
Weapon + Skull + ID Scroll: +x% minion damage
Armor + Rainbow Stone: +x% minion resists
For normal/superior/rare/crafted, x = 3
For unique/set, x = 2

Armor + Diamond + ID Scroll: +x% minion life
For normal/superior/rare/crafted, x = 5
For unique/set, x = 3

Weapon + Rainbow Stone: x% bonus to minion attack rating
For normal/superior/rare/crafted, x = 10
For unique/set, x = 8

And there are also items (rares/uniques/sets/runewords/gemwords) that increase minion life, resists, attack rating and/or damage.

For example:
'Aegina' Runeword
(Vith+Lah+Thur+Yul+Kra+Nas in Spears or Polearms only)
+(301 to 320)% Enhanced Damage
+(151 to 175) to Maximum Damage
50% Bonus to Summoned Minion Attack Rating
+(41 to 50)% Bonus to Summoned Minion Damage
+(21 to 30)% Bonus to Summoned Minion Life
+5% Bonus to Summoned Minion Resistances
+5% Increased Healing Rate from Potions
40% Chance of Uninterruptable Attack
Level 1 Eagle Stance (1 Charges)

[oneillz808]

i made a complete list of items that give bonuses to minions...

here it is ^.^

viewtopic.php?t=47000&start=0

[Nocte]

Alright..
question.
I have 100% bonus to Minion Resistances
Took me awhile to reach it, but I can't tell a difference between 100% or none at all.
So was it was it a waste?

(Not really pertaining to the druid summoner, but I do use a summoner.)

[pza]

they should be (nearly) immune now - but only against elemental attacks, say spells. problem is only that in median most of monsters deal physical damage and therefore resistances are not that important.

[aerial]

Try chameleon levels with those mobs using black lotus strike, flash, or frog prince. Without maxed resistances (you need 75% on items to max it) minions die almost instantly - lot faster than from physical attacks.
But in regular game monsters with such powerfull elemental attacks are rare.

[Nocte]

[quote=aerial";p="367309"]Try chameleon levels with those mobs using black lotus strike, flash, or frog prince. Without maxed resistances (you need 75% on items to max it) minions die almost instantly - lot faster than from physical attacks.
But in regular game monsters with such powerfull elemental attacks are rare.[/quote]

Alright, thanks. I was just wondering if I wasted too much time getting the gear.

[Dawakening]

I've started an hermit too to begin my journey in this mod, but I found out that this druid does not rely too much on his minions. They keep me away from any kind of danger, but they get crushed like leaves and got some problems with crushin' other foes too, except they are in a larger amount than one hundred - one hundred and an half. So it's better to let your bow do the Job. I suggest you to max both Leader of the Pack and Killer Instinct too, cause they'll boost your damage in an insane way and don't spend any point in bow skills, cause there's no profit at all. At this moment I'm level 118 and I can do all areas in player 8 and many uberquests in an easy way without any Gamma Cheese technique (not on players 8 obviously) with a gear based on a good bow damage with some good modifiers like Knockback, slow attacker by %, and ow, ds. Try to rely more on yourself. Now I've got ~20 unspent points and I don't know how I'll distribute between Mark Of the Wild and Elfin Arrows.

[DemonicAngel]

[quote=Dawakening";p="369360"]I've started an hermit too to begin my journey in this mod, but I found out that this druid does not rely too much on his minions. They keep me away from any kind of danger, but they get crushed like leaves and got some problems with crushin' other foes too, except they are in a larger amount than one hundred - one hundred and an half. So it's better to let your bow do the Job. I suggest you to max both Leader of the Pack and Killer Instinct too, cause they'll boost your damage in an insane way and don't spend any point in bow skills, cause there's no profit at all. At this moment I'm level 118 and I can do all areas in player 8 and many uberquests in an easy way without any Gamma Cheese technique (not on players 8 obviously) with a gear based on a good bow damage with some good modifiers like Knockback, slow attacker by %, and ow, ds. Try to rely more on yourself. Now I've got ~20 unspent points and I don't know how I'll distribute between Mark Of the Wild and Elfin Arrows.[/quote]

Bowskills are getting improved in 1.57, even though they aren't as bad as most of you seem to think...
And also some skills are getting replaced, so in 1.57 you may want to put points in whatever new skill we get.

[Moja]

Get a new bow with knockback - runewords and jewelwords are an easy way to do this...

look for slow and freeze target and HCMTF also, on your bow or other items...

This will increase your minions life a lot more than + minion gear, since it keeps the monsters off them (and you)...