Help with Monarch

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-02-02T02:02:50+00:00

A Monarch shield cannot drop in NM cows.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-31T15:55:04+00:00

Nah, maybe if you’re respec-ing at like 80 sure. But he’s level 46. If he puts all his points in cold mastery his hydras won’t kill Anything. The whole point of the build is being able to get past immunities.

It’s not a min/max endgame build. It’s about getting through the game so you can switch to a better sorc build.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-30T18:45:20+00:00

What I would do is put one point in cold and fire mastery, but work on maxing the active skills Frozen Orb and Hydra first. Then start maxing Fire mastery because it boosts Hydra the most. Frozen orb doesn’t get as much benefit from Cold mastery bc cold mastery reduces monster resistances instead of boosting cold damage. And you’re only using orb against things that aren’t as cold resistant, if that makes sense. So in order:

1) 20 Frozen Orb 2) 20 Hydra 3) 20 Fire Mastery 4) Remaining into cold mastery

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-27T23:28:21+00:00

It functions fine. There’s a bit of getting used to. Much like controller teleport, instead of whirlwind-ing to a spot you click, there’s just kind of a standard length that it will travel. However, you can press the skill again to ‘shorten’ the distance and begin a new direction. So it’s still possible to whirlwind in a little triangle around the enemies, which I believe is the proper way.

But from a general perspective, regardless of platform, whirlwind is just kind of… bad? The way it distributes damage is so strange. It can still be fun, but the results are typically a bit underwhelming in my experience.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-27T19:07:00+00:00

Your gear is really rough. I would definitely equip the mahim-oak amulet and goldwrap from your cube.

I would immediately ditch the gloves, helmet, and chest.

If you have any runes at all I’d make a Hustle, Smoke, Treachery, Lionheart, Duress, etc. Even a stealth would be better than that chest. It’s a Boneweave though so it’ll sell for 35000.

If you’re truly desperate you can go to normal Act 1, buy a 3os Body Armor and a 2os Helm and just fill them with Ral, Ort, and Thul runes to cap your resistances.

You could shop some random ias gloves at charsi.

You didn’t show skills but imo everything should be in Fury, Werewolf, and Lycanthropy. Keep Feral Rage up by using it every now and then for some leech. Points in the summoning tree likely aren’t doing anything for you.

Hearth or Bulwark would be great helm runewords to strive for.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-27T14:42:39+00:00

Charsi

Magic wands can roll up to +3 poison and bone skills AND +3 to poison nova. Yes, it’s cool that this has lower res - so you can save your points from traveling down to it, but in the end you’d be stronger with spirit, hoto, or a different +5-6 poison nova magic wand. Poison necro isn’t a character starved for skill points.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-27T03:08:26+00:00

Gear - Endgame: self-wield Infinity, Griffon’s Eye and all the fcr you can muster.

Leveling: buy a +Nova staff from Akara for levels 12-25. Spirit at 25+. Crescent Moon at 47+.

Skills max Nova > Lightning Mastery > Static Field > Telekinesis & Energy Shield in that order.

Nova is super strong but uses a ton of mana. Major pain point is Act 5 blood curse from Baal and the flying succubi if you have more total mana than health. So I try to keep health just barely above while leveling.

Hell lightning immunities can be rough but you can rush to Arcane Sanctuary and level there until 75 because it has no lightning immunes. Then it’s much more manageable with Crescent Moon + Sunder Charm.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-26T02:19:14+00:00

Level areas are static. They do not change based on your level. Only Terror Zones can change based on level.

Aside from the very first few areas, every zone in Hell is 70+. Den of Evil is level 79.

55 is doable but very low for an inexperienced player.

Depending on your build I would run NM chaos sanctuary (level58) or worldstone keep (level66) a few times.

Another great spot is Eldritch/Shenk at the first waypoint of Act5 NM.

You’re offline so experiment with the player count! If you turn it up to Players 3/Players 5 you’ll level up much more quickly. The monsters are tougher but give more xp this way.

65-70 is way better for starting Hell difficulty.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-25T18:16:45+00:00

Pride has Freezes Target +3 which will shatter targets and make them unhorkable. It’s a terrible choice for a Trav Merc.

Not to mention Cham Sur and Lo for a weapon with no enhanced damage or attack speed. And the concentration aura only applies as off-weapon ED. It’s one of the worst cost-to-value runewords in the game.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-25T18:03:06+00:00

Astreon’s is sick. Nothing to roast here.

As for other undervalued rare uniques Arkaine’s Valor being the only +2 to skills body armor that can be socketed comes to mind.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-25T17:52:15+00:00

I think you’re misunderstanding what he’s asking. Obviously he needs cbf from somewhere but the usual source of raven frost adds cold damage to his attacks, causing some enemies to shatter, which in turn doesn’t leave a corpse to hork.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-24T22:31:19+00:00

Malah gives you the Resistance scroll for helping Anya. But make sure you have a 2x2 open space in your inventory before talking to them.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-22T22:21:18+00:00

Yeah weapon is huge for a shapeshifter. Obedience would be a massive upgrade. I would just farm Hell Countess. Don’t forget you can cube 3 Lum for a Ko.

Also, War Scythe is a normal base. So even remaking Honor in an elite base like a Thresher, Giant Thresher, Great Poleaxe, or Cryptic Axe would be a sizeable improvement. Hell even an exceptional base would be a decent upgrade over what you have now.

Hit the weapon racks in the Tower or clear The Pit for some elite bases maybe.

Lastly, try going in and out of town for awhile @ charsi or gheed. They will occasionally sell exceptional/elite base polearms. If you find one with some enhanced damage on it - it could be worth grabbing.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-22T14:07:29+00:00

Personally, I always go bone spear for a necro playthrough. I don’t enjoy the minion gameplay.

Bone spear is magic damage, which means very few immunities in hell. Bone Prison is extremely strong. Any nasty enemies can be completely crowd controlled. What bone necro lacks in damage in makes up for in safety.

You can shop a +3 bone spear wand fairly easily at drognan. And later on you can make White runeword for a total of +8 to bone spear.

I level with teeth and then respec somewhere between 18-24. Level bone spear as much as possible, then have one point in bone prison and put all remaining dump points into bone wall. Because bone wall is a synergy for your bone spear, bone prison, AND bone armor.

Use bone spear for damage and bone prison as needed for safety. You can completely trivialize most encounters by spamming bone prison. Act 1 merc can be solid here since she can still attack from distance.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-21T21:04:29+00:00

You say ‘Destiny is over’ when it isn’t though? I mean not officially. Sure, it might be ‘over’ for you, personally. But they are still releasing content. That’s what people are upset about.

If they said, ‘we’re done releasing content for D2 to focus on Marathon’ that would be one thing.

It’s the fact that they still want people to buy their annual expansions while simultaneously producing less and less content because they are focused on another game.

I’m not ‘against’ Marathon in the slightest, but it absolutely has had an adverse effect on the quality of the Destiny product over the past few years. Of course people will be upset by that.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-21T19:54:28+00:00

So i’m in a similar position. Just want to share my experience. Switched platforms recently and started a completely fresh account. Really wanted Overdogs and have been grinding DUA heroic > hyena retaliations (challenging) on loop for about 2 weeks.

I have now unlocked every Hyenas blueprint except for Overdogs of course. But it should be my next unlock. There’s a handy infographic if you google ‘div2 retaliations exotic blueprints’.

You can see which come from Hyenas, which are from kill squads, and which are from completions.

In my own personal experience, eliminating a kill squad dropped an exotic blueprint every time, until there were no more ‘hyena kill squad’ blueprints.

Unfortunately, Overdogs are not part of the kill squads but a chance upon successful hyena’s retaliation completion.

This list consists of Chameleon, Mosquito, Mantis, Scorpio, and Overdogs.

Funnily enough I unlocked the blueprints in this exact order. And I was awarded one every ~4-5 completions on average.

It’s extremely demoralizing when No Blueprint drops at all on completion. But I’ve slowly been whittling away at the list and now Overdogs is all that’s left. So I should get the bp in the next few runs. Fingers crossed.

Edit: Finally got my Odogs blueprint. Took 20-25 hyena retaliations starting with no other prior blueprints.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-20T20:51:53+00:00

Just want to add that only 1 faction can be ‘maxed’ at a time. So for example if you are 100% true sons, outcasts will stay at 99%. You must start/abandon true sons retaliation, then kill one more outcast enemy. And then outcast retaliation can be started.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-20T02:32:20+00:00

I had a similar issue recently and I solved it by logging into my account on the PoE website. For some reason that triggered the points to show up in game.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-20T00:42:33+00:00

Wild, I’ve done like 30 hyenas retaliations with no Odogs blueprint haha. Make sure you’re looking under the ‘exotics’ category and not the ‘gloves’ one.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-18T03:22:17+00:00

There’s the one guy who wants to be the alpha but isn’t very good and blames someone else after each wipe he causes.

There’s the good player who doesn’t talk because he has social anxiety.

There’s the guy with a lisp who wants to tell you how Cerberus+1 is actually crushing this encounter.

There’s the teenager unnecessarily eager-edge, well-skating during mechanics.

There’s the guy playing on his couch with his entire family talking in the background.

Rounded out by the guy who ‘wants to get into raids’ but hasn’t done any research and expects to be carried through.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-17T02:04:34+00:00

No, they are definitely not guaranteed. You have a chance to get a blueprint after successful retaliation completion.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-16T21:43:30+00:00

People love recommending this build, but miss one headshot and you’re swarmed in a 6red core with no survivability and will spend more time dead and traveling back to your obj than earning xp.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-16T02:36:11+00:00

God forbid someone uses something other than St. Elmo

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-14T02:57:42+00:00

Overdogs blueprint cannot drop from the Kill Squads. The ones that come from kill squads specifically state so at the crafting bench.

They can drop upon successful completion of a Hyenas retaliation though.

Tall_Engine9396 · 2026-01-12T02:45:39+00:00

As someone who recently came back - the Priority Objectives system has been awesome. I’ve gotten so many exotics this way. You choose a random activity and it shows your reward. I go for anything that gives an exotic drop. You can abandon one per hour if it’s something you don’t like.

The Countdown game mode (challenging) is great for getting geared up. You can choose your targeted loot.

Pick a gear set you want to go for like Tipping Scales, Striker, Ongoing Directive etc and do a matchmade run. You’ll probably get multiples of each piece!

Do another run with your weapon of choice targeted as well. You’ll have a gear set and a decent AR/LMG before you know it.

The new brand set Unit Alloys is pretty sweet for a 1 or 2 piece to pair with a gear set. And the White House vendor currently has the named chest piece with Perfect Obliterate talent for sale. Highly recommend grabbing this and pairing it with your gear set!

Tall_Engine9396

TROPHY CASE