Reanimater Rework Ideas

[Penguincha]

I was an avid Reanimator Necromancer player back in late Ultimative/Median 2017. This was my favorite build of any ARPG, and i was (am) sad to see it go in Sigma, when Death's Fury Totem and Howling Totem no longer affected non-Undead units (and the removal of them in the patch after), as well as the removal of Devil's Fang Totem on the TU Demon Head (which I admit never belonged on it, more on this later though). I've been thinking about doing a post like this for at least a few seasons.

But before I go into the problems, let us address the problems of reanimates as damage:

1. Low Base Damage - This one is obvious, as the ratio of monster health to player health mid to late game gets quite massive. Because of this, enhanced weapon damage does little except to the high damage reanimates. Death's Fury Totem (Along with the Spell Damage increase of the Skeletal Flayers) and the crushing blow of Howling Totem was the means that the Necromancer Reanimator was able to revert this.

2. Low Attack Rating - Even with the Reanimators of the past, their was no way to increase the attack rating of the reanimates. Less Attack Rating means less damage, especially against bosses. It was to where you would optimally hybrid with crossbow/carnage to kill monsters and bosses. The pseudo-means was to get a specific monster type to reduce the defense (Alpha Centaurs and Rust Monsters, for example).

3. Sometimes Low Movement Speed of Monsters - Some Monsters do not have this problem, but other monsters, such as Skeletons (the main reanimate pre-Sigma) have low movement speed and low aggro. This means potentially low clear speed, which can feel awful mid-late game. In Pre-Sigma, a few Hidden Crafts, Devil's Fang Totem with Pestilence, and some SUs were enough to have decent clear speed. Which brings me to the next point.

4. Nerfed Reanimate Chance - There were a few passes in Median 2017 - Sigma that nerfed the reanimate chances and procs. Even with the Death's Fury Totem and Howling Totems of yesteryear, reanimates would be too few to do meaningful damage alone.

5. Lag - The reason of the nerfed Reanimate chance was this. This doesn't affect damage, but it does affect quality of life. You see, each entity (units, sounds, and even auras) counts near equally for lag. With about 20-50 units with the two totems' aura effects, that generated a lot of lag. When I used to play with people with this build. People used to note the lag that this build brings, and I or others told them that turning the sound off helped. It was a problem with the build, and I understand why the changes were done.

Edit: I learned that this is not quite true.

A quote from LeQuebecois

"Sounds generally operates in a separate thread , so not supposed to affect your gameplay ( turning off sound in game settings may help ,which can desactivate the sound system itself and give back some proc to the game engine ).
Generally , FX are what makes the lag. Read/Write ( more read than write ) on a graphic card is slow. If ressources are not managed correctly ( i.e. texture pool ) this is generally what will cause the lags."

So with that in mind, let us go into the rework ideas:

A. Level 30 Necromancer Skill: Essence of Wrath

This would be a death devotion skill that would summon an invulnerable unit that has an aura (reanimate only) that does the following:
Increase Attack Rating by 100 percent/10 percent per base point
Increase Movement speed 20 percent movement speed
Adds a flat magic damage bonus (10-20, +3-5 per skill level) + percentage bonus (40%) based on total strength (for build scaling); flat damage increases by a percentage per base point (15%)
Casts Level 1 Sacrifices

It also would receive synergies from each of the Ultimate Skills:

Jinn - 10 percent spell damage for each base point (to support caster reanimates along side the elemental pierce)
Veil King - Added Cold Damage (75-150) to the aura for each base point (for versatile damage with farming; nothing too great, since he offers some reanimates as well)
Rathma's Chosen - 3 percent increased movement speed to the aura per level (the aura already does quite a bit, so just a little more to not be invalidated by the other options)

The Devotional Part would remove the ability to invest points in Famine in the Melee (and maybe Dragonfire Oil, but I am not sure that is necessary) and Below, as having both of this and Famine would be crazy.

B. Hidden Shrine\Reanimate Item Rework

Perhaps the more direct and clunky option is the following:

Hidden Shrines would do:
1-Handed Weapons - Adds "Level 1 Wrath Aura" (Wrath Aura would be a reanimate-only aura that gives +100% attack rating, +20% movement speed, and magic damage based on 50% of total strength), -150% Enhanced Damage, and 3"%1 Reanimate as: Random Monster"
2-Handed Weapons - Adds "Level 3 Wrath Aura" (Level 3 Wrath Aura would give +130% attack rating, +30% movement speed, and magic damage based on 80% of total strength), -150% Enhanced Damage, and 3"%2 Reanimate as: Random Monster"
(Elemental Weapons would instead receive -75% Attack Speed)
Body Armor - +1 Sacrifices, -25% Spell Damage, -15% Maximum Mana and 3"%2 Reanimate as: Random Monster"
Armor - Increase Wrath Aura's Attack Rating by 10%; Increase Wrath Aura's Magic Damage by +7% of Total Strength, and 2"%1 Reanimate as: Random Monster"

The Wrath Aura increases could also roll variance to keep shrine rolling a thing, but the reanimate rolls might be enough

And Some TU Ideas:

Rework of Wardance into "The Last Crusade" Which replaces the attack rating, crushing blow, and defense from missiles with:

Level 1 Wrath Aura
"2-10% Reanimate as: Templar" depending on Tier
"1-5% Reanimate as: Archon" depending on Tier

Also a Rework to Carmen Arvale:

Retains half of the Enhanced Defense, Total Character Defense, and Regenerate Mana
1-15+ to Sacrifices
-10-30% to Spell Damage (not as steep as the Hidden Shrine penalty because of the Tiered Studded Leather Armor's base armor)
2-8% Reanimate Chance as: High Priestess

Here's a Runeword Shield Idea too:


Vex Rune
+(61-94)% Enhanced Defense
+(4-9) to Kraken Stance
+(8-11) to Enhanced Stance Radius
+15 to Energy
-(50-30)% to Enhanced Weapon Damage
Half Freeze Duration

VexXis
+(168-190)% Enhanced Defense
+(30-40) to Kraken Stance
+30 to Enhanced Stance Radius
+50 to Energy
Half Freeze Duration


There are some ideas on Reanimator items. I have not thought of SUs, as there is so much that could be done with them. Fancy reanimates, penalty removers, and overall superior reanimator items.

In conclusion, a Reanimator does not need to have 50-100 minions on screen at once, he/she just needs to have a few but higher damaging reanimates; quality is better than quantity with this build. Less minions means less lag. The numbers may be all wrong, but I hope my presentation is somewhat solid.
If you have taken time to read this, I thank you. Good Day/Afternoon/Night.

[LeQuebecois]

"each entity (units, sounds, and even auras) counts near equally for lag"

This is false tho.
Some ressources has more bottleneck than others.
Sounds generally operates in a separate thread , so not supposed to affect your gameplay ( turning off sound in game settings may help ,which can desactivate the sound system itself and give back some proc to the game engine ).
Generally , FX are what makes the lag. Read/Write ( more read than write ) on a graphic card is slow. If ressources are not managed correctly ( i.e. texture pool ) this is generally what will cause the lags.

edit : sorry I can't comment your proposition because i've never played nec !

[Penguincha]

"each entity (units, sounds, and even auras) counts near equally for lag"

This is false tho.
Some ressources has more bottleneck than others.
Sounds generally operates in a separate thread , so not supposed to affect your gameplay ( turning off sound in game settings may help ,which can desactivate the sound system itself and give back some proc to the game engine ).
Generally , FX are what makes the lag. Read/Write ( more read than write ) on a graphic card is slow. If ressources are not managed correctly ( i.e. texture pool ) this is generally what will cause the lags.

I thought I heard that each entity caused the same amount of lag. I trust you, and will make some changes to the post. Thank you

[LeQuebecois]

"each entity (units, sounds, and even auras) counts near equally for lag"

This is false tho.
Some ressources has more bottleneck than others.
Sounds generally operates in a separate thread , so not supposed to affect your gameplay ( turning off sound in game settings may help ,which can desactivate the sound system itself and give back some proc to the game engine ).
Generally , FX are what makes the lag. Read/Write ( more read than write ) on a graphic card is slow. If ressources are not managed correctly ( i.e. texture pool ) this is generally what will cause the lags.

I thought I heard that each entity caused the same amount of lag. I trust you, and will make some changes to the post. Thank you

In fact , an ' entity ' is generally just a number identifying the game object. What will cause the lag is the 'components' composing the entity : graphics , velocity (speed and direction), 'clickable' etc ..

Almost everything ( except graphics ) are plain old numerics data ( i.e velocity is a x,y vector , so direction and speed ) , it's all you need to move a character and doing current_location_x + (velocity_x * time_delta) does not take that much proc ..

However , graphics are loaded to the Ram. Reading a ressource image at the location 1.2G in the Ram is slow. Many optimizations are needed to avoid that.
Diablo II does not seems to have a decent graphic optimization and I feel like they don't reuse texture ( i.e. if there is 5 fallen visible on screen , 5 fallen texture will be loaded isntead of one reused.

So you're still right : lowering the amount of entities(summons/totems) will probably help.
You can try lowering graphic parameters : shadows , dept, 2d instead of 3d ..

[Ywinel]

There was similar topic about week ago. Dunno why all the people think that reanimates are unplayable because of removed kraken stance/death fury totem.I think you should reread summoner rework and get the idea.
I'm currently building one, it destroyed Tran Athulura and Karbraxis 3 hours after getting core items (no helmet on head, no capped res, empty sockets, quiet randomly spent skill points). I'm barely playing lately so my progress is slow but I can say already that reanimates are OP. Just instead of flat elemental damage it's depending on % buffs(really insane amounts, 1000%+ phys dmg, 200%+ speed, 35-40% crushing blow, 20% deadly strike, and more possible).

Only good point there is attack rating which can be annoying against some bosses.

[SpamBomb]

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