Frozen Army, Literally!

Rating

by StrangeLeGrange last updated Aug 22, 2017 ( Patch 2.6.1 )

Regular

Solo

BBCode Link

Edit

Skills

Decrepify Enfeeblement
- Decrepify
Cost: 10 Essence

A crippling curse that reduces the enemy units' movement speed by 75% and reduces damage of affected enemies by 30% for 30 seconds.
Enfeeblement

Increase the potency of the movement speed reduction to 100% and decaying to normal potency over 5 seconds.
Command Skeletons Freezing Grasp
- Command Skeletons
Cost: 50 Essence

Active: Command your skeletal minions to attack the target and increase their damage against it by 50%.

Passive: Raise skeletons from the ground every 2 seconds to a max of 7 skeletons. Skeletal minions deal 50% weapon damage as Physical per attack.
Freezing Grasp

The target of your command is frozen for 3 seconds.

Command Skeletons' damage is turned to Cold.
Blood Rush Molting
- Blood Rush
Cost: 5% Health
Cooldown: 5 seconds

Shed your mortal flesh and reappear up to 50 yards away.
Molting

Leaves a corpse at your original location when used.
Revive Recklessness
- Revive
Target an area reviving up to 10 corpses within 20 yards for 15 seconds.
Recklessness

Revived minions deal an additional 25% damage but last 10 seconds. Damage dealt is turned into Cold.
Army of the Dead Frozen Army
- Army of the Dead
Cooldown: 120 seconds

Raise a massive skeletal army to pummel the targeted location dealing 12000% weapon damage as Physical in a 15 yard radius.
Frozen Army

The army tramples enemies in a line. Damage turns into Cold.
Skeletal Mage Skeleton Archer
- Skeletal Mage
Cost: 40 Essence

Raise a skeleton from the ground to attack your foes dealing 400% weapon damage as Physical over two attacks. Lasts 6 seconds.
Skeleton Archer

Raise a Skeleton Archer that deals 400% weapon damage as Cold.

Skeleton Archers increase your attack speed by 3% for 5 seconds each time they deal damage. Max 10 stacks.

Extended Servitude
- Extended Servitude
Increase the duration of your Skeletal Mage and Revive minions by 25%.
Final Service
- Final Service
When you take lethal damage, you are sustained preventing all damage for 4 seconds. In addition, all minions are consumed to heal you for 10% of your Life. This effect cannot occur more than once every 60 seconds.
Rathma's Shield
- Rathma's Shield
You cannot lose Life for 4 seconds after using Land of the Dead, Army of the Dead, or Simulacrum.
Grisly Tribute
- Grisly Tribute
You are healed for 10% of your Life on Hit when one of your minions hits an enemy.

Items

Rathma's Skull Helm

Set Helm

21 - 24 Armor

Primary Stats

Sockets (1)

Bones of Rathma
Rathma's Skull Helm
Rathma's Spikes
Rathma's Ribcage Plate
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
(2) Set: Your minions have a chance to reduce the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 1 second each time they deal damage.
(4) Set: You gain 1% damage reduction for 15 seconds each time one of your minions deal damage. Max 50 stacks.
(6) Set: Each active Skeletal Mage increases the damage of your minions and Army of the Dead by 1000% up to a max of 10*4*100 %.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties
Rathma's Spikes

Set Shoulders

59 - 68 Armor

Bones of Rathma
Rathma's Skull Helm
Rathma's Spikes
Rathma's Ribcage Plate
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
(2) Set: Your minions have a chance to reduce the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 1 second each time they deal damage.
(4) Set: You gain 1% damage reduction for 15 seconds each time one of your minions deal damage. Max 50 stacks.
(6) Set: Each active Skeletal Mage increases the damage of your minions and Army of the Dead by 1000% up to a max of 10*4*100 %.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties
Hellfire Amulet

Legendary Amulet

Primary Stats

+4 Random Magic Properties
One of 3 Magic Properties (varies)

+626–750 Intelligence

+626–750 Dexterity

+626–750 Strength
Rathma's Ribcage Plate

Set Chest Armor

51 - 68 Armor

Primary Stats

Sockets (1)

Bones of Rathma
Rathma's Skull Helm
Rathma's Spikes
Rathma's Ribcage Plate
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
(2) Set: Your minions have a chance to reduce the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 1 second each time they deal damage.
(4) Set: You gain 1% damage reduction for 15 seconds each time one of your minions deal damage. Max 50 stacks.
(6) Set: Each active Skeletal Mage increases the damage of your minions and Army of the Dead by 1000% up to a max of 10*4*100 %.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties
Reaper's Wraps

Legendary Bracers

Primary Stats

+8 Random Magic Properties

Secondary Stats

Health globes restore 25–30% of your primary resource.
Frostburn Gauntlets

Legendary Gloves

280 - 308 Armor

Primary Stats

+373 - 397 Armor
Increases Gold and Health Pickup by 1 - 2 Yards.
Health Globes and Potions Grant +2355 - 3732 Life.

Secondary Stats

Cold skills deal 15 - 30% more damage.
Cold skills deal 10 - 15% more damage.
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates

Set Pants

33 - 38 Armor

Primary Stats

Sockets (1)

Bones of Rathma
Rathma's Skull Helm
Rathma's Spikes
Rathma's Ribcage Plate
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
(2) Set: Your minions have a chance to reduce the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 1 second each time they deal damage.
(4) Set: You gain 1% damage reduction for 15 seconds each time one of your minions deal damage. Max 50 stacks.
(6) Set: Each active Skeletal Mage increases the damage of your minions and Army of the Dead by 1000% up to a max of 10*4*100 %.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons

Set Boots

30 - 35 Armor

Primary Stats

+78 - 83 Vitality

Bones of Rathma
Rathma's Skull Helm
Rathma's Spikes
Rathma's Ribcage Plate
Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
(2) Set: Your minions have a chance to reduce the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 1 second each time they deal damage.
(4) Set: You gain 1% damage reduction for 15 seconds each time one of your minions deal damage. Max 50 stacks.
(6) Set: Each active Skeletal Mage increases the damage of your minions and Army of the Dead by 1000% up to a max of 10*4*100 %.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties
Circle of Nailuj's Evol

Legendary Ring

Primary Stats

Critical Hit Damage Increased by 26 - 28%

Secondary Stats

You now raise an additional Skeletal Mage with each cast and they last an additional 2 - 4 seconds.

+ 3 Random Magic Properties
Krysbin's Sentence

Legendary Ring

Primary Stats

Attack Speed Increased by 5 - 6%

Secondary Stats

You deal 75 - 100% increased damage against slowed enemies or triple this bonus against enemies afflicted by any other type of control-impairing effect.

+ 3 Random Magic Properties
Jesseth Skullscythe

Set Scythe

461.5 Damage Per Second

Primary Stats

Increases Attack Speed by 6 - 7%

Secondary Stats

One of 2 Magic Properties (varies)
+66 - 132 Minimum Damage
+88 - 176 Maximum Damage

Jesseth Arms
Jesseth Skullscythe
Jesseth Skullshield
(2) Set: When the target of your Command Skeletons dies, your skeletons are automatically commanded to attack a nearby target.
While your skeletons are commanded to attack a target, all of your minions deal 400% increased damage.

+ 3 Random Magic Properties
Jesseth Skullshield

Set Shield

8 - 9 Armor

Primary Stats

+10 - 20% Chance to Block
0 - 0 Block Amount

Jesseth Arms
Jesseth Skullscythe
Jesseth Skullshield
(2) Set: When the target of your Command Skeletons dies, your skeletons are automatically commanded to attack a nearby target.
While your skeletons are commanded to attack a target, all of your minions deal 400% increased damage.

+ 4 Random Magic Properties

More Details

Head
- Rathma's Skull Helm
- Stat Priority: Skill: Skeletal Mage CHC
Shoulders
- Rathma's Spikes
- Stat Priority: AD Reduced Resource Cost
Amulet
- Hellfire Amulet
- Stat Priority: Cold % CHC CHD
Torso
- Rathma's Ribcage Plate
- Stat Priority: Reduced Elite Dmg
Wrists
- Reaper's Wraps
- Stat Priority: Cold % CHC
Hands
- Frostburn Gauntlets
- Tasker and Theo
- Rathma's Macabre Vambraces
- Stat Priority: CHC CHD AD
Waist
- Stat Priority: Life Armor +
Legs
- Rathma's Skeletal Legplates
- Stat Priority: Armor +
Feet
- Rathma's Ossified Sabatons
- Stat Priority: Skill: Skeletal Mage Armor +
Rings
- Circle of Nailuj's Evol
- Krysbin's Sentence
- Convention of Elements
- Stat Priority: CHC CHD AD
Weapon
- Jesseth Skullscythe
- Stat Priority: Dmg range Dmg % AD
Offhand
- Jesseth Skullshield
- Stat Priority: CHC Reduced Resource Cost Elite %

Legendary Gems
- Bane of the Trapped
  Bane of the Trapped
  
  Gem
  
  Primary Stats
  
  Increase damage against enemies under the effects of control-impairing effects by 15.00%.
  Gain an aura that reduces the movement speed of enemies within 15 yards by 30%. (Requires Rank 25)
- Enforcer
  Enforcer
  
  Gem
  
  Secondary Stats
  
  Increase the damage of your pets by 15%.
- Esoteric Alteration
  Esoteric Alteration
  
  Gem
  
  Primary Stats
  
  Gain 10.0% non-Physical damage reduction.
  While below 50% Life, your resistances to Cold, Fire, Lightning, Poison, and Arcane are increased by 75%. (Requires Rank 25)

Kanai's Cube

Trag'Oul's Corroded Fang

Legendary Scythe

461.5 Damage Per Second

Primary Stats

+626 - 750 Intelligence

Secondary Stats

The Cursed Scythe rune for Grim Scythe now has a 100% chance to apply a curse and you deal 150 - 200% increased damage to cursed enemies.
One of 7 Magic Properties (varies)

+(1199 - 1490) Physical Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Fire Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Lightning Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Cold Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Poison Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Arcane Damage

+(1199 - 1490) Holy Damage

+ 3 Random Magic Properties
Trag'Oul's Corroded Fang
Tasker and Theo

Legendary Gloves

309 - 366 Armor

Primary Stats

+626 - 750 Strength
+626 - 750 Dexterity
+626 - 750 Intelligence
Attack Speed Increased by 5 - 6%

Secondary Stats

Increase attack speed of your pets by 40 - 50%.

+ 3 Random Magic Properties
Tasker and Theo
Ring of Royal Grandeur

Legendary Ring

Primary Stats

+416 - 500 Strength
+416 - 500 Dexterity
+416 - 500 Intelligence
Attack Speed Increased by 5 - 6%
+7737 - 9214 Life per Hit

Secondary Stats

Reduces the number of items needed for set bonuses by 1 (to a minimum of 2).

+ 2 Random Magic Properties
Ring of Royal Grandeur

Hellfire fifth passive: Life from Death - necessary for resource regeneration from Reaper's Wraps. Bottomless Potion of Rejuvenation also helps.

The Necromancer has a very nice Convention cycle, and I've tried many variations of this build that cut RoRG for Convention, but ultimately I think being able to pair Frostburn and Tasker & Theo is the best combination. Without Frostburn, there is no reliable way to I've found to consistently proc the empowered Krysbin's Sentence multiplier, and losing Krysbin's for Convention doesn't help the build. Attack speed translates into damage, sustain, and cooldown reduction on Army of the Dead, so Taskers are also too valuable to lose. If you are going the RoRG route, it doesn't matter which gloves are worn and which are cubed.

Topaz goes in the head for Resource Cost Reduction. Paired with RCR in paragon, shield, and shoulders, this should net you about 33% reduction. With the Maximum Resource Paragon and Maximum Essence secondary on Jesseth Skullscythe, you will have ~270 max Essence. In this scenario, it costs ~27 or 10% Essence to cast Sekeletal Mage, and each health globe gives you 30% Essence back (slightly boosted if you run Templar follower). Command Skeletons costs a little more than this, and you will also be throwing out curses, but on average to be resource stable you want to be able to spawn 4 mages (2 casts with Nailuj = full Rathma bonus) and net a health globe back between the kills and Life from Death when you Revive the corpses.

Area Damage is necessary to deal with large groups quickly. Without Area Damage, the damage of this build scales from a single target up to a handful of enemies, and then hits a ceiling. Krysbin's Sentence and Jesseth Skullscythe have Attack Speed as a fixed stat, and compared to the 50% Attack Speed coming from Taskers this additional 7% is not as good as more Area Damage. Between shoulders, gloves, weapon, and one ring, try to squeeze in all the Area Damage you can. (It's more important to have a socket and crit stats on Krysbin's, so that is stuck with Attack Speed.)

Caldesann's Despair and Paragon will eventually account for quite a bit of Resist All, which is in turn boosted by Esoteric Alteration, so try to avoid this stat on your gear. Instead, prioritize Physical Resist as a secondary to make up for the gap in Esoteric. The priority for secondary affixes is Melee/Ranged Reduction > Physical Resist > Pickup Radius, but there is space to throw in a few other targeted single element resists if you roll well.

The final primary affix in the shield is pretty flexible, but I prefer Damage vs Elites. This especially helps if you get stuck fighting a Juggernaut. You don't really need a socket in the shield, but with that exception the priority for any unlisted primary affixes is Socket > Intelligence > Vitality.

Paragon Priorities

Core

Maximum Resource
Movement Speed
Primary Stat
Vitality

Offense

Attack Speed
Critical Hit Chance
Critical Hit Damage
Cooldown Reduction

Defense

Armor
Life
Resist All
Life Regeneration

Utility

Resource Cost Reduction
Life on Hit
Area Damage
Gold Find

The first 150 points in each tree are the most important; don't sweat the fourth ranked stat if you are short on paragon.

Build Guide

My favorite playstyle from Diablo 2 was army Necro with hoardes of skeletal minions. Skeletal Mage places heavy constraints on the Necromancer resource pool in the Diablo 3 implementation, but the changes to the Bones of Rathma 6-piece bonus make it possible to yet again amass an overwhelming army of the dead. With careful resource management via the Life from Death passive and Reaper's Wraps, it's possible to cut out a resource generating skill to make room for more summons and utility. This build is therefore focused on solo pushing dense Greater Rifts; it farms stably once over-geared for T13 content, but until then it is prone to running out of resources.

At the start of an encounter, it is a good idea to get all of your buffs online and then hold, instead of fully casting out your essence pool. So, cast 4 Mages for the full Rathma 6-piece bonus, use Command Skeletons once for the Jesseth bonus, then toss out a couple curses as needed for Trag'Oul's and Dayntee's. At this point you can judge the situation. If it looks like more enemies are coming and you're in for a long fight, cast up to 10 mages and keep going. If it's only a small group of enemies, don't spend any more resources, but instead try to Blood Rush forward to find more enemies in time for your skeletons to automatically be Commanded to attack the next group. Your goal is to maintain full army strength (skeletons + 10 mages + 10 revives) when the health globes are flowing freely and to fight with a small guerrilla force in between. If you ever have downtime, Blood Rush in place and consume the corpse from Molting to fish for another globe.

The build runs two invulnerability passives, Final Service and Rathma's Shield, and Blood Rush also makes you briefly untargetable. Managing these 3 cooldowns is essential to survivability. In general, Blood Rush should be your go-to first answer to a situation, and Final Service is the one you want to protect as your last resort. Rathma's Shield is an amazing 4 seconds of on-demand invulnerability, and in sustained combat the cooldown comes back much faster than Final Service, so you can use Army of the Dead as an offensive or defensive cooldown. For example, if there is a hard to traverse corridor in front of you, you can Blood Rush forward into that molten frozen fire chains desecrator elite pack, immediately cast Army of the Dead, and then use the following 4 seconds to decide if you want to hold your ground or Blood Rush elsewhere.

DiabloFans