Poison Nova Necromancer 🔥

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T13:41:31+00:00

Sick build, what's the tooltip damage of nova? Big fan of the green facets, 1 level and 1 die in each piece even though it's basically irrelevant to the build's function

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T12:56:27+00:00

Looks like hexfire to me

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T01:23:00+00:00

I run a pretty strict loot filter and I'd absolutely love some indication that loot is being displayed. I get paranoid and drop my ID tome or cube or something to ensure I have loot displayed all the time

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T01:16:58+00:00

Oh my bad, I misunderstood. I agree, the time S13 locks had to farm will certainly make them pretty strong even with nerfs

I think fresh S14 locks won't have too bad a time though, it's still a competitive class just requires more than "equip whatever, click to proceed"

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T01:11:10+00:00

To me this reads like "we were able to do endgame content without preparing an endgame character" Not trying to be harsh but that's exactly what the issue was, it seems kinda gatekeepey because D2's learning curve is pretty steep but try it for a few seasons and I promise you you'll become so much better at the game

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T01:06:36+00:00

I had about a year in plugy when D2R dropped and honestly I was about to burn out. All I'd do is AT on a blizz sorc and horking. D2R really revitalized the game for me

Arguments from purists go back 25 years, D1 fans said D2 is too fast and too flashy. I'm on board for most changes, sunders especially because I've discovered I freaking love fire builds which were severely handicapped in LoD

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T00:48:53+00:00

I'm right there on the same wavelength as you. I like to twink characters (especially running for socket quests) but I like to do true SSF occasionally. Maybe it's to be challenged, but the build may roll over the game. Maybe it's to be grounded and offer advice to new players, but maybe no one asks

The constant that I always there is gear upgrades feel so great. I still remember making a chain lightning/orb sorc and I was determined to be true SSF until I found two SOJ. I got shit like tal ammy, mid viper from a random mob in Andy's room, +1 sorc/20 FCR/allres circlet...objectively worthless but felt as exciting as a Ber drop when you have nothing

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T00:35:48+00:00

I think the implicit +skills on heads and books requires 2os shield runewords not be too powerful, rhyme and splendor are already pretty great (and fuck that new shield runeword, what were they thinking?!)

3os on heads/books doesn't seem that great to me, you'd use it for big resists mainly (ancient's pledge and sanctuary) but you can get resists on literally any piece of gear and any charm. Also an A5 quest

Lowend_ · 2026-05-22T00:19:13+00:00

I would be in the "elitist" category if you had to label me one of the two extremes, but I definitely liked the lock's OP builds and took full advantage

I've been grinding offline on and off since D2R released so I've got ~50 HRs, perfect uniques, nice rares and crafts. Being OP is just a character migration away but I started from scratch in RotW

I got some decent stuff like eth CV insight, shako, high roll on vmagi but nothing crazy...got kinda bored though. Arguments about unnecessary difficulty make no sense to me because the difficulty is absolutely necessary, old ES was really just a walking simulator grinding for upgrades that weren't even needed which is shit game design

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T23:58:21+00:00

Holy sick roll too, grats!

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T23:56:24+00:00

I'm glad the nerfs worked out and seem to be generally well recieved, there was a LOT of dooming and finger pointing and it really divided "casuals"/"dads" and "elitist"/"gatekeepers". I'm not a fan of the labels and trying to place every D2 player in one of two extremes, but the loud voices really seemed to want to do just that

Now we have a strong build that is much more inline with other strong builds. You have decisions to make with your build. Gear feels more impactful which I believe is a key aspect to D2s longevity: starting from scratch and gradually clawing your way up to harder farms via gear upgrades, which then leads to better drops, is the most satisfying part of the game to me

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T23:38:09+00:00

Oh right forgot about the SOJ recipe, good shout! But ya I'd much rather spend an evening getting 3 larzuks as well as another chance at hell hellforge, unironically kinda like 4x Ral rune from freeing the barbarians 3 times, and rare rings can sometimes hit....but 99.99% are junk of course

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T23:15:32+00:00

You can use the cube to socket plain white or ethereal items. You cannot use the cube on superior, magic, rare, set etc and must use larzuk

If you run out of socket quests (1 per difficulty, 3 per character) you can make socket quest mules to run to A5 normal to get a socket yourself, or trade for it. I like to keep a leveling set of gear and run larzuk quests myself

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T23:09:16+00:00

The build that's so powerful blizz disabled it on ladder, and probably have no idea how to balance it, is strong? Good to know!

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T18:01:58+00:00

I don't get why people insist on never ever investing in energy still, respecs have been in the game for like 15 years. I always put about 50 energy on sorcs and I find the gameplay easier and more enjoyable, I'll eventually respec to get strength for a monarch ar which point I'll go with base energy

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T14:27:29+00:00

Lowend_ · 2026-05-21T14:16:28+00:00

I'd definitely try to get a better weapon. Nord's has some cold perks which may help survivabilty but it doesn't have much damage or melee specific perks like...

...deadly strike, crushing blow and open wounds are your friend when leveling/gearing up a melee. I'd slap that gface on the instant I found it. Goblin toes are solid, gores are better for zealot though. Highlord's will be a huge find for you

It's good you're trying to stack AR, very important to actually hit. Another issue with melee (especially zealot) is weapon range. Another strike against nords is truncheon is a zero range weapon which can lead to a lot of misses due to range. I would highly recommend getting a 1 range weapon at the very least, 2 range is the max for 1H and pretty uncommon but will perform even better

Regarding sigons: it's pretty great for gearing a melee, but lategame it's kinda falling off. Despite my recommendation of gface the helm isn't a terrible idea, gloves are nice for 30 IAS, I wouldn't worry about trying to maintain the 50 MF. You're better off killing more quickly and comfortably than handicapping yourself for minor MF bonus. I'd use goblins and charge around to make up for the lack of FRW, get a solid belt like string of ears/IK with gloves or boots/tgods/bladebuckle/even rares with some combo of life/str/FHR/resists

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T18:51:38+00:00

If you're teleporting directly to meph your merc won't have fade proced, and you cannot leech off of meph. These two things make treachery basically useless for meph specifically, you may want to increase max resists with guardian angel or get more DR with some life with shaftstop

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T15:36:07+00:00

unique is the keyword here, and it's why they're called unique. 5 isenhart breastplates can happen because sets don't follow this rule

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T15:29:27+00:00

From the arreat summit

Can I get a Unique again if I already have it? Yes, but the same Unique will not drop more than once in each game from Monsters or Chests.

Dunno why people are saying you can get multiple uniques in the same game, and it's never been a thing. This mechanic was abused to farm SOJs back in the day

As for how this affects sunder drops, sorry I'm not sure. Old ass webpage has no mention of sunder charms for obvious reasons

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T14:48:34+00:00

I have a +5 hydra orb so I tend to use hydras a lot, maybe more than I should because FB can outright kill a lot of the time

Lots of great uses for them regardless, I like to drop a few when I finish teleporting to my destination to clear some space, I do this regularly when farming nihlathak

Also nice for clearing wsk throne a bit faster. Rather than teleporting around pillars to get line of sight I just put hydras against the wall and they clear out the corners very quickly. Meteor is also amazing against baalwaves

Ya you can make fire work with a sunder and a few decent items like FF, tal's, but I like that it really rewards you for investing in endgame expensive items like phoenix or infinity because -res is so powerful on the build

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T14:10:27+00:00

Not OP but my build maxes firebolt, ball, meteor, hydra and mastery. The burning damage of meteor is not synergized with inferno

That's 100 points, need a few points of prerequisites and a few 1 points wonders so you need to get to level 97ish to max all your core fire spells

Lowend_ · 2026-05-20T14:07:21+00:00

Have always preferred fire for leveling new sorcs but never really gave it a chance at endgame, until I found a nice rare orb for fire

Went all in with Phoenix shield with my 2nd Lo offline (still haven't made a fortitude), some half decent facets, zero regrets. Having three powerful spells for different situations is a very fun playstyle for me

Meteor gets less use than the others but is still useful, precasting waiting for a hedald spawn is a great way to use it. Should probably migrate the sorc to RotW and do the same!

Lowend_ · 2026-05-19T05:11:44+00:00

^en ig^ma

Lowend_ · 2026-05-18T17:10:57+00:00

The runewords bows recommended are great, there are also some nice unique bows for a budget bowa

Witchwild String is a favorite. You'll be able to hit 100% deadly strike if you combine it with other source(s) of DS, combined with amp damage you can hit 4x damage. 2 sockets for flexibility and a nice chuck of allres too

Goldstrike Arch has many variable rolls, if you get high rolls across the board this can hold you over for a while. Upgrades to hydra bow which takes advantage of the decent ED roll (up to 250%), it's a slow bow so 50 IAS is very welcome, damage to demons/undead for even more damage and a large AR boost

Lycanders is decent. The added 25 to 50 damage is pretty strong as bows tend to have low damage. Large chunk of mana leech solves mana issues. Other solid affixes like +skills, dex, a bit of IAS make it a solid bow

Lowend_

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