TbXie's Detonate Dead Necromancer Build Guide (PoE Trial of the Ancestors 3.22)

Out Of Date

November 22nd, 2023, 22:04

Due to the latest balancing changes, we do not recommend playing this build anymore, as it does not meet the high standards we apply to our guides in terms of fun and performance. We are leaving it up as a reference and it might be revived in a later patch.

Updates

Due to the nature of the nerfs that Detonate Dead has had, we ‘ve shifted this build to be an excellent mapper but no longer want to state that it’s a dedicated “boss killer”. The investment you need to be able to reliably kill those just isn’t warranted anymore. Obviously, you’ll be able to do most normal bosses (up to likes of Shapers & Elders) but in no ways is this build going to take on an uber fight.

Introduction

While I personally would have never considered the possibility of Detonate Dead being a viable skill outside of some special shenanigans, this build in particular caught my eye during one of the Shopify races that was organized by someone in the community. When I saw how insanely well this build was clearing maps and killing bosses, in a Hardcore private League with every single extra damage modifier enabled, I immediately knew I wanted to share this with you guys!

Luckily for me, Waggle and me have some history so I immediately hit him up and asked him to elaborate a lot of the mechanics behind the build, as I obviously needed to understand everything there was to know about interactions before being able to transfer over this knowledge and write it into a guide. The build originally was played by another Hardcore resident in PaakHC which this build was undeniably based off of. After getting through all of the hurdles I had to take to understanding all of the ins and outs of this very special build, we have arrived at the point where I present to you a build guide that offers enough damage to very comfortably clear the highest tiers of maps and bosses while getting over 11000 effective HP Pool.

Important to note is that at the time of writing the profile of gear I used was gear being used in a Hardcore Solo Self-Found race that had been going on for Six Days. While I’d argue that the player in question most likely has a better understanding of how to acquire gear in Solo Self-Found than the average player, that should go to show how acquirable all of this is even for you! If you’re looking for a very tanky build that packs a decent chunk of damage and clear speed, this is what you should be reading about!

Build Summary

Pros and Cons

Pros

+ Strong build with amazing clear
+ Requires no uniques to function whatsoever
+ Therefore SSF viable – Leaguestarter viable
+ Loads of HP Pool / Block Chance to make for a smooth playstyle

Cons

– You don’t use this build until after act 10
– Pretty heavy on buttons to press (2 Button Build + Buffs)

Map Modifiers to be Avoided

No regeneration is incredibly annoying to run, as you’re relying on life/mana/es regeneration quite a bit. If you insist on doing it anyhow, you need to bring an Enduring mana Flask to fix your Mana Regeneration. Otherwise Elemental Reflect is a no go. Even though the Corpse Explosion part of Detonate Dead is unable to be reflected to you, the lesser spell part will definitely still kill you. If you’re running Physical Reflect maps, that’s fine, but you have to either un-socket your Wave of Conviction or swap in a Level 1 version of the Gem to not die to its reflect.

Playstyle, Mechanics & Strengths

Since Detonate Dead scales mostly off of the monsters it detonates, you’re looking for ways to create monsters with as much Health as possible since the corpse detonation is based on monster Health. This is why many people are confused when they see Detonate Dead players run around with spectres that initially seem useless. The underlying story here is that those specters, while seemingly random, are specifically summoned because they have a really high % increased Heath modifier. If you have certain monsters as spectres the Desecrate gem will add those spectres to the monster pool significantly increasing the average Health your detonated corpses will have, thus vastly increasing you damage output.

Comparatively if we’re looking at random monsters we encounter in the game, the average increased life modifier you’ll find is around 80%. If you target summon specific spectres, you can go up to as much as 750% (or more in specific scenarios). This equates to a 500% more damage multiplier for Detonate Dead and Vaal Detonate Dead and obviously is an important part of your damage. Additionally, Necromancer scales corpse life by quite a significant amount and you’re picking up increases to your spawned corpses’ Health in the tree as well making it so Detonate Dead has such high base values to go off of that you really don’t need any damage on gear.

So since the damage we deal mainly gets taken care of by spawning incredibly tanky corpses, what do we do with gear & passives is the million dollar question. The answer is fairly simple, we become an unkillable tank. The means through which we achieve this are a couple of layers on top of one and other. Again, I feel like this is worth mentioning again, all of the builds stats are based off of gear that was acquired in 6 days of playing Hardcore Solo Self-Found (by an exquisite player however) but the build fairly easily reaches about 6300 Health. On top of that, it uses the Mind over Matter keystone and around 2500 unreserved mana to further increase that Health Pool. Lastly, it also runs about 2000 Energy Shield which gets sustained by Necromancers Essence Glutton. This effectively comes down to just over 11000 maximum Health Pool to play with which is then further amplified through a bunch of mitigation mechanics.

First of all, without any spectacular gear the build reaches around 70%/68% block and spell block chance (effectively meaning you’re not going to get hit 70% of the time) and life on block through Bone Offering. This means you’re automatically regenerating Energy shield, Mana and Life and don’t have to worry about doing any of that manually.

This build honestly puts out some of the most ridiculous defensive stats you have ever seen. While being able to take maximum hits that are in the 20’s of thousands, it rivals builds that are absolutely broken that bring stuff like 90% All Elemental Resistance, a ton of Auras and whatnot such as Aurastackers or Low-Life Golemancers. Those builds are most definitely getting nerfed while this is easily flying under the radar and probably wont get hit for a while. For a build that brings those defensive numbers, its damage is unrivaled. It does sufficient DPS not to feel slow on almost any endgame boss, one-shots literally everything but the boss in maps and kills that boss in a couple of casts all while being on day 5 SSF gear.

Passive Skill Tree, PoB, and Gem Links

You can find an optimized Path of Building here. Every build I release will use the community fork of Path of Building. You can find PoB’s Fork, by LocalIdentity, here.

If you are not comfortable with Path of Building, PoePlanner’s website offers you a non-PoB alternative to import the code from the above link. it is highly recommended you install Path of Building to follow builds most optimally.

More information about the Passive Skill Tree, as well as all the Gem Links can be found on our dedicated page.

Passive Skill Tree, PoB & Gem Links

Ascendancy, Bandits, and Pantheons

Our Ascendancy, Bandit, and Pantheon Power page goes into detail about all the choices you need to make in these regards.

Ascendancy, Bandit & Pantheon Power Page

Gear Summary / TL;DR

A lot of this is explained more in depth in the Gear Page, however we will provide you with a basic idea of what gear you’re looking for in this short summary.

Gear Page

Our recommendation:

Item Slot	Item Name
Head	Energy Shield Based Helmet with Life, Mana & Resistances
Amulet	Citrine Amulet with Life, Mana, Energy Shield & Resistances
Chest	Hunter Chest with Increased Effect of Offerings, Life, Ailment Avoidance and Life as Maximum Energy Shield
Gloves	Energy Shield Based Gloves with Life, Mana & Resistances
Boots	Energy Shield Based Boots with Life, Mana & Resistances, Ailment Avoidance and Movement Speed
Belt	Stygian Vise with High Life and Resistances
Rings	Vermillion Ring with High Life, Mana and Resistances
Weapon	Rare Sceptre with Fire Damage, Fire Damage as Extra Chaos, Cast Speed and Trigger Mod
Shield	Energy Shield Based Shield with Life, Fire Damage as Extra Chaos, Spell Block, Life and Ailment Avoidance

Questions & Support

I made it a habit to check all comments in my guides on a daily basis. Obviously, there might be occurrences where getting a reply might take longer but I really do try to get back to you as soon as possible. I prefer you making remarks, suggestions or asking questions that way as it allows others to read through the comments, providing them with a potential answer to their question, without having to wait for me again. If I have somehow missed your question, you can try reaching me on our Discord.

If you enjoy my content to such an extent that you’d like to support me and my work, I have a Patreon you can check out. At no point should you feel pressured to contribute, but if you do, your support means more to me than you will ever imagine.

Leveling

Even though we are very adamant about trying to give you a leveling experience that lies as close to your endgame playstyle as possible, we will recommend you to use the standard leveling setups until after act 10. Detonate Dead just doesn’t function that well until you have all of your stuff going. For more information about leveling, we refer you to the following guides:

Our step-by-step leveling walkthrough, which allows even more experienced players to save time and speed through the leveling process.
Our guide to Unique Items for leveling, which helps you gear up your characters for the leveling process.
Our beginner leveling guide, which answers many of the questions new players might have and will set you on the right path.

Getting to Brutus & Merveil

For starters, create a Witch in whichever league you want to start.

Pick up an Explosive Trap from the vendor to start your journey and go to kill Hailrake and clear Mud Flats. Set up the following links after Mud Flats:

Frost Bomb

Explosive Trap

After killing Brutus, you will be adding an Added Lightning Damage Support to your Frost Bomb.

Level 12 and Onwards Setup

From level 12, after killing Merveil, you’ll be setting up for your road to level 28. You should be breezing through content at this point as these skills are really strong while leveling.

At level 28, swap your Storm Brand for Armageddon Brand as it scales better with the passives you are picking up in the skill tree.

Credits

Massive credit goes to Paak and Waggle for letting me write about a build they created and tweaked in the first place and helping me out figuring out what exactly was important information to pass along and how specific mechanics in the build interacted.

Questions

FAQ

What spectres can be recommended ?

Spectres nowadays have their life capped, so as long as you have a Spectre that has more than that cap, being 300% more life, you’re fine. Examples of these are the A3 Collossus’ or A5 Kitava’s Heralds. Having the 2 highest health Spectres is important as then it adds two in the pool.