Viable Druid Builds?

[meowcoles]

Viable Druid Builds?

Hello all. I'm in the process of beating D2 with all character classes just finished the original 5 with my LF/FA zon. I've put off starting a druid because I never really played a druid before and I'm thinking its going to be the hardest to solo hell with.

Some of the builds I've looked at.

Windy Druid- I dont have any naturalist gc's, so I'm thinking it would be kind of rough to deal a decent amount of damage.

Fury Druid- Looks like a good build, but I dont really have the patience to only attack one monster at a time. I've been spoiled by my other characters with AOE.

Summoner/Hunter Druid- I always wanted to build a summoner druid, but I wonder if this is actually viable in Hell. I don't have the runes to make a Faith bow either.

Any advice or suggestions would be great. I play twinked, but i dont have any of the good runewords, and im missing a lot of elite items. I got frustrated with the ancients last play through, and I dont want to make it all the way to hell just to die every couple of minutes.

Thanks

 

[snickersnack]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Fury attacks multiple targets, like zeal. I went with a fury/summon hybrid on my druid. I'd recommend against using HoW though. I found that it doesn't help all that much since it stacks with the big ed% from fury and the might aura from your merc. Unless, you don't use a might merc, of course.

Edit: fury/summon druid is quite viable in hell, though he has pretty good gear. An upgraded Ribcracker and Dracul's Grasp really help.

 

[meowcoles]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Fury attacks multiple targets, like zeal. I went with a fury/summon hybrid on my druid. I'd recommend against using HoW though. I found that it doesn't help all that much since it stacks with the big ed% from fury and the might aura from your merc. Unless, you don't use a might merc, of course.

Edit: fury/summon druid is quite viable in hell, though he has pretty good gear. An upgraded Ribcracker and Dracul's Grasp really help.

Thanks for the advice. I think I'm going to give the fury/summoner build a try. Idk why, but I really like the summon tree.

 

[snickersnack]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Hmmm, I forgot to say that unless you have really good items at your disposal, you might have AR problems. HoW can help with that. Since I have pretty good glove/belt/boots options, I was able to use Angelic ammy/ring and charms for AR.

 

[Mostly_Harmless]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Don't worry about not having perfect gear for a windy. They're quite capable of beating Hell untwinked, so a lack of skillers shouldn't hamper you much. Pure summoners are also quite viable (I'm working on a single pass one right now), but they're really slow. Just so you know what you're getting into. Fury wolves are also viable, but you should keep in mind that fury has a fairly annoying bug. I think it happens when you miss the first attack with fury, but after that you'll miss everything until you move a little ways. I got way too annoyed with that and parked mine in Act V NM.

I guess the short answer is: all of those builds are Hell viable.

 

[Trim]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Pure summoners are also quite viable (I'm working on a single pass one right now), but they're really slow. Just so you know what you're getting into. Fury wolves are also viable, but you should keep in mind that fury has a fairly annoying bug. I think it happens when you miss the first attack with fury, but after that you'll miss everything until you move a little ways. I got way too annoyed with that and parked mine in Act V NM.

I'll agree with both these statements. I have both a Summoner/Hunter Druid and a Fury Druid somewhere in ActIII NM. The Hunter has been very safe and pretty fun, but it IS slow. And the Fury wolf was built to utilize the Stormlash I have sitting in a stash, but after dying a half dozen times to the Fury bug in completely silly places, I gave up on him. I've sworn off Fury and Zeal as a result.

Still, you never know what's going to be fun for you unless you try it. Just pick one and roll with it! :thumbsup:

 

[smokeeblade]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

If you're looking for AoE, a Rabies SS build is also viable, hoping to get my own started in future.

 

[sorcererbob]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

The only druid I've manage to guardian is a rabies druid. Melee becomes too weak in the late-game for my liking, and the druid spells don't cause the same devastation as other classes

edit: i got bored with my summoning shock bear. I feel confident I could have got through hell though. but: SO DAMN SLOW. Made the game a chore.

 

[snickersnack]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

To be fair, I haven't patted my druid, but he does stroll through the River of Flame on /p5 easily. I say "stroll" because it isn't exactly fast. I've used him to collect forges for rushees, so I haven't really felt a need to finish with him, but I'm sure he could.

 

[Pijus1]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

I'm playing a Rabies/fireclaws druid. Copied the idea, the skill point allocation, and the weapon selection from Nightfish. Rabies is the best skill ever

I do have pretty good gear, I think.

 

[Hrus]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

I'd suggest Fury druid, Wind druid, or Fireclaw bear.
IMHO, the druid's summons are quite weak and deal not as much damage (and druid doesn't have CE like skelemancer), so I would really not go the pure summoning road...

I have played Fireclaw bear, very fun, but I am used to play 1element characters. (To be honest, I usually just used Shock Wave on FI monsters and passed around them)
I also played Fire elemental druid and he is very weak in hell (He is very good in normal and NM thanks to Fissure). He just doesn't do as much damage as any other caster and has insanely long casting delays.

EDIT: Playing Windy now and he is very strong in end of NM. But I'll see how good he really is once he gets into Hell.

 

[Moonfrost]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

My level 50 Wind druid is one of the most powerful characters I have played at that level, mainly because he's heavily twinked - currently, my lvl 30 Tornado does 1621-1722, lvl 24 Cyclone armor absorbs 979 damage, and with +13 mana/kill he can essentially spam those Tornados all day long and 1-shot everything in sight.

I originally planned to equip him with full Aldur set but every item I swap for Aldur's is a skill level lost and those skill levels really do a lot of a Wind druid, so I kind of don't want to do that anymore (man, what is up with Aldur's being such a bad, schizophrenic set?). He's definitely playable with worse gear (like Aldur's) but once you get used to the good stuff, it's hard going back.

If you have good gear lying around and are willing to twink your druid a bit, try a Wind druid!

 

[Thomh]

Re: Viable Druid Builds?

Aaaah, Druids. My favorite class, gotta love them.

All of the options listed here are perfectly viable in Hell, although some of them will be slow. Wind druids are absolutely insane in NM and the first 3 acts of hell as far as I can remember but it will slow down a bit in the last two acts. I find windy`s one of the greatest characters in the game when it comes to having fun, although fun is pretty subjective. It will be a pain to level to 25, though, and he will have nowhere near the power of your Zon when it comes to killing immune monsters.