Minions Build and End-game survivability

I'm currently in cruel mode with a level 43 Templar, and I have gotten together a small army of minions that can more or less tank whatever damage is thrown at them. I have minion life/damage, vitality, discipline and purity gems as adjuncts, and they are doing reasonably well.

Only problem is, they are lacking when it comes to area effect damage, like explosive arrows, or some elemental AoE... they get wiped out instantly (and this is in cruel mode only). There is very little I can imagine adding on to their survivability. 3 auras is probably the max I can do, and there are only so many gems you can link to minions.

I am wondering if there are high level players (level 60-70+) who are running merciless or maps, and are finding it smooth in OB. If so, what measures/gems have you taken to do so?

Thanks!

Minion instability passive keystone ability provides minions with some aoe damage.

Also try getting a totem to cast your skel for you. It gives you way more mana to use for other skills and you don't have to stand still every few seconds to cast the,

I already have minion instability, and my spell totem tied to summon skeletons.

Thing is, cruel mode is pretty ok, except for when spellcasters come into range and blast AoE spells. A 20 minion strong army can be decimated within seconds, which is the problem I face. I'm just curious how well minions take elemental damage towards end-game. I understand they will die from time to time, but ideally not with the entire army going down in 1 or 2 shots, leaving my relatively weak Templar exposed. It takes time to get the minions up again.

I'm actually suspecting the intrinsic elemental resists for minions are insufficient. They can take physical damage decently, but when it comes to elementals they simply melt. Plus, there are only so few avenues to increase the elemental resistances of your minions, namely purity aura and necromantic aegis only.

I can't imagine chaos damage later on. Probably GG.

I wonder the same now and just finnished cruelty act 3 , lightning just destroy them and purity cost freaking 40% of reserved mana pool and must blood magic the crap just so they can survive and max out energy shield, even than they just very weak vs elementals


even with MR on shield it never is lightning (that is the bane , fire I don't care a little about and frost is just annoying but easy to dodge)

I am fine that AoE is effective vs minions but it is frustrating when everything get wiped out in 1 spell even when invested heavy in minions,aura ,necroshield , curses ect not help that much and make it feel frustrating to see 3k+ hp get sweep down in one spell and silly me on around 800 with hp and barrier can survive few hits (this is something I ponder on why the big diffrent? is the tooltipe wrong?)

give the level up gem on summons inbuild Elemental resistance at later level?

i am fine they die in coupe of spells but not 1-2 chain casted and all dead in kess than 2 sec^^

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Freakymudcrab a écrit :

I am fine that AoE is effective vs minions but it is frustrating when everything get wiped out in 1 spell even when invested heavy in minions,aura ,necroshield , curses ect not help that much and make it feel frustrating to see 3k+ hp get sweep down in one spell and silly me on around 800 with hp and barrier can survive few hits (this is something I ponder on why the big diffrent? is the tooltipe wrong?)

give the level up gem on summons inbuild Elemental resistance at later level?

i am fine they die in coupe of spells but not 1-2 chain casted and all dead in kess than 2 sec^^

OB has seen some changes made to minions, with lesser life progression, but higher elemental resistances. Still, I feel the resistances are not sufficient. Minions with the full works i.e. purity, vitality, discipline and resistance from shield, should be ideally able to survive merciless, assuming all minion passives are taken.

I'm currently level 47, and I hope to hear some input from those with a minion build who have reached level 60-70 in merciless. Does it get better, or do they still get the shaft when it comes to elementals?

GGG should add another passive somewhere.

It should be a large orb and maybe attached to +% Elemental resistance before you get to it.

New Passive gives something along the lines of:

All Elemental Resistance on you is instead given to all summoned minions.
(Not Chaos resist to allow CI be useful with summoner)
Minion's Maximum Elemental Resistance is raised by 30%.

It's a give and take like CI, so assuming your army can defend you, you shouldn't get hit by Elemental Damage... Walking into pools of fire or taking on a boss will be extremely challenging though, but your minions won't be 1-shot by elemental damage anymore. The increase to resistance is to allow resistance be stacked with auras to make them better in later difficulties (unless the resist debuff doesn't happen to minions?)

Summons are fine for me except when in act 3. I'm level 67, my summons get destroyed by the undead chemist (Sewers) and those LMP cobras (marketplace). The zombies have 8666 hp and the skeles 4500 something and both drop like flies to those guys. Other then that they are fine and I think the trade off is ok. I mean playing a summoner lets you cruise through cruel and merciless (almost).


I should probably mention I use purity in areas that I know have a lot of casters and it helps the minions out a lot.

Well minions are an "accessory". Helps the fight while you do your work. You cannot expect a pure minionmaster build or an army of minions playing for you while you smoke your cig.
I don't see anything needed to be changed about minions. Minion instability is more than enough of a powerful addon.