Brainstorming a PvM Fire Claws + Armageddon druid. Skill + equipment recs welcome!
Hey all. I'm a long time Druid player, and while in the past I have done Elemental and/or Summoning builds, my mainstay has always been Fury Wolves.
But, you know, I've been doing that for 10 years... and in the twilight of Diablo II's life, I'd like to try something different!
Inspired by the old Earth Shifter druid guide that does Fury with Armageddon backup, I was thinking instead I could possibly get a ton of fun fire damage going by combining Armageddon (castable in Wereform) with Fire Claws as they have common synergies (with the fallback plan just being physical damage with a gigantic maul... seems fine!). When I encounter Fire Immunes I'll be worse off by a lot, but, it's not like I'm making a god-tier build lol.
Here are my ideas:
Skills:
13 points for the direct prerequisites to Armageddon + Fire Claws
20 points in Armageddon
20 points in Fire Claws
1 point in Lycanthropy
That's 54 so far. While there are theoretically 110 available, I usually only get to the high 80s. So let's say I'm working with 98.
Functionally, that's 2 more maxed skills and a couple of dump-off points. I think one for sure has to be a pure damage synergy for Geddon/FC. I'm not sure if I'd ever even use any of these other spells (as I'd have to be non-shifted), but which is the most compelling? If it doesn't matter, let's just say we max Volcano.
At 73/98 now, and it gets trickier. How important is increasing the timer on Armageddon? It's an expensive spell, but if I expect to be mana leeching with my attacks, I should be fine with frequently re-casting. So Fissure is probably out.
Now it's basically between:
-Maxing another damage synergy (Molten Boulder, Firestorm)
-Maxing, or at least putting more points in, Lycanthropy (for survivability)
-Making a run down the Summon tree to put a point in Grizzly Bear and max Dire Wolves to make it the best possible tank.
Any advice there is welcome.
Stats:
The most basic part of all. Enough strength to equip Earth Shifter (more on this next), the rest in Vitality.
Equipment:
Weapon: Earth Shifter, though other suggestions are fine (perhaps weapon/shield combos with high +skills / + fire skills). Assuming Shifter though.
Because this is a hybrid magic/physical build, it's hard to want to slam all the way up to 250+ strength for Thunder Maul eligibility. A 'Hel' rune would make this equippable for ~50 less, which translates directly to hundreds more life via vitality. A Shael rune helps it not be tankishly slow. There aren't many other great choices, really.
Armor: I'm really compelled to pick Enigma here. Once again, with such significant savings in the strength category, we're talking hundreds more life. Everybody loves +skills and being faster, and hell, the teleport is useful despite not being castable while transformed.
Other choices are probably the usual, tankish stuff. Skills, resistances, damage reduction, etc.
Gloves: Hard to argue against Drac's here, though anything with +skills is compelling and Magefist covers both our mains.
Totally open to suggestions for the rest. I will probably be piece-mealing this thing together so it would be a while before I could make a perfectly optimal outfit.
After that, it starts to get fuzzy
Merc:
I'm such a homer for Act 2 Nightmare Defensive Holy Freeze mercs that it's hard to pick anything else. Counterarguments will be heard, though.
Fire away.
Hey all. I'm a long time Druid player, and while in the past I have done Elemental and/or Summoning builds, my mainstay has always been Fury Wolves.
But, you know, I've been doing that for 10 years... and in the twilight of Diablo II's life, I'd like to try something different!
Inspired by the old Earth Shifter druid guide that does Fury with Armageddon backup, I was thinking instead I could possibly get a ton of fun fire damage going by combining Armageddon (castable in Wereform) with Fire Claws as they have common synergies (with the fallback plan just being physical damage with a gigantic maul... seems fine!). When I encounter Fire Immunes I'll be worse off by a lot, but, it's not like I'm making a god-tier build lol.
Here are my ideas:
Skills:
13 points for the direct prerequisites to Armageddon + Fire Claws
20 points in Armageddon
20 points in Fire Claws
1 point in Lycanthropy
That's 54 so far. While there are theoretically 110 available, I usually only get to the high 80s. So let's say I'm working with 98.
Functionally, that's 2 more maxed skills and a couple of dump-off points. I think one for sure has to be a pure damage synergy for Geddon/FC. I'm not sure if I'd ever even use any of these other spells (as I'd have to be non-shifted), but which is the most compelling? If it doesn't matter, let's just say we max Volcano.
At 73/98 now, and it gets trickier. How important is increasing the timer on Armageddon? It's an expensive spell, but if I expect to be mana leeching with my attacks, I should be fine with frequently re-casting. So Fissure is probably out.
Now it's basically between:
-Maxing another damage synergy (Molten Boulder, Firestorm)
-Maxing, or at least putting more points in, Lycanthropy (for survivability)
-Making a run down the Summon tree to put a point in Grizzly Bear and max Dire Wolves to make it the best possible tank.
Any advice there is welcome.
Stats:
The most basic part of all. Enough strength to equip Earth Shifter (more on this next), the rest in Vitality.
Equipment:
Weapon: Earth Shifter, though other suggestions are fine (perhaps weapon/shield combos with high +skills / + fire skills). Assuming Shifter though.
Because this is a hybrid magic/physical build, it's hard to want to slam all the way up to 250+ strength for Thunder Maul eligibility. A 'Hel' rune would make this equippable for ~50 less, which translates directly to hundreds more life via vitality. A Shael rune helps it not be tankishly slow. There aren't many other great choices, really.
Armor: I'm really compelled to pick Enigma here. Once again, with such significant savings in the strength category, we're talking hundreds more life. Everybody loves +skills and being faster, and hell, the teleport is useful despite not being castable while transformed.
Other choices are probably the usual, tankish stuff. Skills, resistances, damage reduction, etc.
Gloves: Hard to argue against Drac's here, though anything with +skills is compelling and Magefist covers both our mains.
Totally open to suggestions for the rest. I will probably be piece-mealing this thing together so it would be a while before I could make a perfectly optimal outfit.
After that, it starts to get fuzzy
Merc:
I'm such a homer for Act 2 Nightmare Defensive Holy Freeze mercs that it's hard to pick anything else. Counterarguments will be heard, though.
Fire away.
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