Interested in a detailed breakdown of the skills? Check out the skill guide here: The Core Fire Skills - ruclips.net/video/e8s74d2HRFw/видео.html Armageddon - ruclips.net/video/insM5DBnhcQ/видео.html Want to see most videos a day early, without ads, while supporting the channel? Check out the Patreon @ www.patreon.com/alzorath (every tier gets access)
I've always liked Armageddon, even back when it was crap. It was actually one of the big pieces of one of my first thematic characters back in the day. It makes my soul happy now to see that it's gotten some of the respect that it deserves!
Thematically it's definitely always been an awesome skill - the updates have made it a lot more reliable (even though I prefer the targeted casts, the change makes it much easier to justify putting points into in the mid game)
I just started a fire Druid based solely on your video, flickering flame is OP.. I didn’t realize it gave you a fire resist aura while equipped.. seems like a must for using a fire sunder charm !
This was very well-timed for me! I just started a Fire Druid the other day, and I've been having a lot of fun leveling him through Normal so far. I don't play ladder, so no Sunder charms for me, but it sounds like that won't be a huge drawback anyway!
yea, they really don't come into play until the post game at the earliest - so sundered isn't super important (if you play SP though Gingergamingmentor has a file set with the sundered charms on a character)
Speaking of decrep and Reapers, I always wanted to try a Holy freeze merc with a Cham’d reapers toll, and Blackhorns mask for the slows target. Enemies would be froze, chilled, slowed, and decrep’d.
there is a limit on the amount of slow that can be applied - but it is pretty fun (big downside is that slow/chill/frozen all countdown at the same time)
@@Alzorath Have you noticed that if hell baal is both decrepified and getting hit with cold damage he never teleports? (Or maybe just decrepify is sufficient, never tested that exactly.)
Been maining this build since last season, decent guide sunder is a huge buff to this build which is awesome! Fully kitted out you can hang with the cool kids up to about p5 then it slows a bit, but is still totally viable up to p8. One note, undisputed best weapon is gonna be a 6x faceted weapon +30 fire damage/-30 resist is absolutely nutzo damage multiplier! the +30 is much more effective on a druid than a sorc since we have no other source of +% to fire damage so it actually ends up just a straight +30% damage buff not to mention that the -30 is better than HoJ or phoenix as well
Fire druid is still only A tier at best for me. It is absolutely viable endgame, but with the same gearing Fireball is doing 80k while fissure is running 40k and the FCR frames makeup the final mark bringing the druid down a rank. That being said, its a super powerful build and way more fun than trying to track tornadoes so worth running in any ladder moving forward. Personally I would like to see Flickering Flame be boosted to -30 Fire rez as it feels like fire in general is lagging way behind light as it has easy access to Crescent Moon to help capitalize on the sunder charms midgame.
I have both with endgame gears. I would say fire Druid is still faster because of the multiple area damage skills. Fire ball is still area damage but with much smaller range despite no cool down.
I just did a free respec over to fire/summon druid on my lvl 81 druid. Fun stuff! I'm using fissure, and the trangs gloves and belt, so I can cast the fireballs between fissures, 20 fizzure, 20 poison creeper, like 8 into firestorm, one in bear and dire wolves 8 in oak sage and 14 in ravens, 20 into cold wolves act 1 cold merc insight bow. My lore helm gives me armegeddon w/o putting any points in so I can hit that and it fires for 50 seconds! I'm going to try it for act2 stony tomb farming, after I make it thru to act 5 hell to get all the quests.
heh, was intentional, and honestly was driving me nuts even while recording ;) (mainly did it for 'lols' - but also because there's been a channel stealing my footage the past couple months and I decided to do it as sort of a watermark)
I do love fire sorceress but fire druid is so much more satisfying to me especially when immunities are concerned just because of how THE BOULDER works. I stick with an Obedience Freeze merc for utility and have Branch Spirit with a Ravenlore. Always liked caster druid builds and so happy that fire gets its time to shine
flickering flame is absolutely godly with the fire sunder charm since u get so much fire res from the aura, i just respec-ed into fire druid and with a 2-20 druid helm with 18 res all but flickering flame drops insane damage while retaining fire res, so the FCR 163 BP isnt absolutely necessary unless your running baal runs for your friends, i cant wait to find a nice base for my flickering flame since ive already got the runes for it :)
Was going SS Druid this Ladder, but going to start off with Fire first, so thanks for the info, who knows maybe I’ll enjoy fire so much I’ll just stick with it.
I'm still mostly using firestorm mostly at level 22, starting to use Fissure more often for far away enemies or those on the other side of a barrier. Firestorm is just so cheap and powerful!
Im really liking Act2 merc. Ive read somewhere that holy freeze aura is bad for fissure damage some say it isnt. For my understanding there is kind of a sweet spot for too slow or too fast monster types. Do you have any info on that case? Btw i really dont need might aura.
Question is a Phoenix shield better than 4 5/5 facets? I can see the shield gets -8 less resist but gets and extra 20% damage bonus. And not using the physical bump from the runeword am I missing much else?
-% Resist is generally the priority trait unless you're already reaching -100% resist, but the main reason to use phoenix is that it combines this damage boost with one of the best recovery skills in the game: Redemption - which is basically a full-rejuv as you tear through groups of enemies.
Also I forgot to ask, did you experiment with a physical sundering charm? Especially with decrepify from reapers toll? It seems like it could be an effective niche twist on the build with the physical damage in the elemental spells.
it's a lot less reliable, and since I'm a huge fan of fissure, it doesn't benefit my playstyle as much when it does trigger. That said, it is "functional" in spite of this.
I'd use the plague on an a5 merc so it would trigger - but it's not terrible, though generally for sunder to be worth it (at least for me) I kind of want it to be at least 25% reduction in resists (which ravenlore can get with a facet) - lower than that, and I'd rather just dodge the immunes or use another skill. If given the choice though - I'd go a facet ravenlore and a reapers toll a2 merc for this build though, rather than ravenlore and plague.
I have a fire sunder and rather budget gear for my fire druid. He’s just about at 5k damage Armageddon. That being said, I am excited to max this character out because he’s already doing pretty well with budget gear.
few questions. Struggling on itemization. Should i go hoto instead of hoj for 99fcr breakpoint? perf. Ravenlore with 5/5 and phoenix would push -fire res to -53%. enough? So i could go insight on merc or infy recommended? Could go 6 socket rbf weapon, ravenlore, phoenix for max dmg and -res but fcr breakpoints crashed down under 68.. so many decisions :D question is how much difference make the fire dmg compare to the physical dmg. maybe go for only -fire res isnt best? so hybrid between +skills, fcr and -fire res maybe best
There are a lot of choices for sure - and it does vary a bit depending on your playstyle - personally I go for full clears, so spamming teleport isn't super useful for me (I'm also mostly hunting for bases, runes, jewels, and charms though - other stuff is nice, but I am holy grailed). As far as specific item questions: More -% Fire resist will generally be better than plus skills, while 53% is "enough", more is better. 6 socket RBF crystal swords are an option - though I put them on the "gg list" due to it generally needing 6 perfect 5/5 rainbow facets (since the guides are meant to work for single player and online, people generally won't be holding on to the 7 facets for the build) Fire damage vs physical is a deal of "All your skills deal fire damage, only some of your skills deal physical" - with high -% Fire res, you can almost ignore the physical part if you have a fire sunder. Pre-2.5 (or in LoD) - leaning into the split damage was more desireable (via decrepify on merc) since there were key unbreakable fire immunes. As far as infinity vs insight - Infinity all the way, mana really isn't that harsh of an issue for this build unless you're teleporting heavy and not killing (thanks to the redemption on phoenix)
@@Alzorath thanks for your assessment! Made an excel sheet that says that flickering flame, 6sox crystal sword with rbf and phoenix does the most dmg and got the highest amount of - fire res. only 4 + skills less then hoto, ravenlore setup. The Fcr cap with 68 is enough in my opinion. Mostly built for cs and so on. Think maybe (in terms of comfort) i can waive on infy and go for insight. Have to test it, maybe a matter of taste. Dont know how it feels just with red aura from phoenix. Fire res also no problem but the other res. Need to go for life/res scs but cant max light and psn. Doesnt rly matter in cs.
a lot of poison builds are super fun in normal, but struggle beyond that, and while poison creeper is one of those, it's one of the strongest early summons.
It would lower your mercenary's survivability compared to other options pretty severely but it is an option (you would only benefit from the ravenlore -% fire resist )
I agree on a few of the skills - personally I don't juggle molten - I put it on my left click, and only switch to firestorm for specific things - my right click is volcano/fissure/teleport and armageddon refresh.
tried this build, without phenix shield, but with decent stuff, +14 @skills, raven helm, sunder charms, etc... It's so slow... so boring... Compared to what a blizz sorc and any other good build may do... it's so... slow and bad... Or i'm missing something, or this is actually really bad...
![The Laziest D2 Build [2.5 Druid Summoner]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/XCjLx2eoyj0/mqdefault.jpg)
Interested in a detailed breakdown of the skills? Check out the skill guide here:
The Core Fire Skills - ruclips.net/video/e8s74d2HRFw/видео.html
Armageddon - ruclips.net/video/insM5DBnhcQ/видео.html
Want to see most videos a day early, without ads, while supporting the channel? Check out the Patreon @ www.patreon.com/alzorath (every tier gets access)
My OCD kicks in when I see your shield in the 1st slot 😂 Great video.
heh, it bothered me recording it that way too if it's any consolation ;) (I do it every now and then as a sort of inside joke)
I've always liked Armageddon, even back when it was crap. It was actually one of the big pieces of one of my first thematic characters back in the day. It makes my soul happy now to see that it's gotten some of the respect that it deserves!
Thematically it's definitely always been an awesome skill - the updates have made it a lot more reliable (even though I prefer the targeted casts, the change makes it much easier to justify putting points into in the mid game)
I just started a fire Druid based solely on your video, flickering flame is OP.. I didn’t realize it gave you a fire resist aura while equipped.. seems like a must for using a fire sunder charm !
Flickering Flame is definitely an amazing helmet, and I love using it in so many builds :)
agreed, dont need a 2-20 helm if your dropping that much damage and gaining that much res ^.^
This was very well-timed for me! I just started a Fire Druid the other day, and I've been having a lot of fun leveling him through Normal so far. I don't play ladder, so no Sunder charms for me, but it sounds like that won't be a huge drawback anyway!
yea, they really don't come into play until the post game at the earliest - so sundered isn't super important (if you play SP though Gingergamingmentor has a file set with the sundered charms on a character)
Speaking of decrep and Reapers, I always wanted to try a Holy freeze merc with a Cham’d reapers toll, and Blackhorns mask for the slows target.
Enemies would be froze, chilled, slowed, and decrep’d.
there is a limit on the amount of slow that can be applied - but it is pretty fun (big downside is that slow/chill/frozen all countdown at the same time)
@@Alzorath Have you noticed that if hell baal is both decrepified and getting hit with cold damage he never teleports? (Or maybe just decrepify is sufficient, never tested that exactly.)
Its less damage but you can use Kelpies snare and Blackhorn 95% slow bosses barely move alot of HC builds use this for bossing.
Been maining this build since last season, decent guide sunder is a huge buff to this build which is awesome! Fully kitted out you can hang with the cool kids up to about p5 then it slows a bit, but is still totally viable up to p8. One note, undisputed best weapon is gonna be a 6x faceted weapon +30 fire damage/-30 resist is absolutely nutzo damage multiplier! the +30 is much more effective on a druid than a sorc since we have no other source of +% to fire damage so it actually ends up just a straight +30% damage buff not to mention that the -30 is better than HoJ or phoenix as well
Fire druid is still only A tier at best for me. It is absolutely viable endgame, but with the same gearing Fireball is doing 80k while fissure is running 40k and the FCR frames makeup the final mark bringing the druid down a rank. That being said, its a super powerful build and way more fun than trying to track tornadoes so worth running in any ladder moving forward.
Personally I would like to see Flickering Flame be boosted to -30 Fire rez as it feels like fire in general is lagging way behind light as it has easy access to Crescent Moon to help capitalize on the sunder charms midgame.
I have both with endgame gears. I would say fire Druid is still faster because of the multiple area damage skills. Fire ball is still area damage but with much smaller range despite no cool down.
I just did a free respec over to fire/summon druid on my lvl 81 druid. Fun stuff! I'm using fissure, and the trangs gloves and belt, so I can cast the fireballs between fissures, 20 fizzure, 20 poison creeper, like 8 into firestorm, one in bear and dire wolves 8 in oak sage and 14 in ravens, 20 into cold wolves act 1 cold merc insight bow. My lore helm gives me armegeddon w/o putting any points in so I can hit that and it fires for 50 seconds! I'm going to try it for act2 stony tomb farming, after I make it thru to act 5 hell to get all the quests.
My only complaint is that your weapon is in your right hand slot lmao, awesome video though, straight to the point and super informative.
heh, was intentional, and honestly was driving me nuts even while recording ;) (mainly did it for 'lols' - but also because there's been a channel stealing my footage the past couple months and I decided to do it as sort of a watermark)
@@Alzorath lmao ahh yea well that's understandable then. I guess I can forgive you this time.
Praise you jebus
I do love fire sorceress but fire druid is so much more satisfying to me especially when immunities are concerned just because of how THE BOULDER works. I stick with an Obedience Freeze merc for utility and have Branch Spirit with a Ravenlore. Always liked caster druid builds and so happy that fire gets its time to shine
What about obedience?
very instructive , cool build
flickering flame is absolutely godly with the fire sunder charm since u get so much fire res from the aura, i just respec-ed into fire druid and with a 2-20 druid helm with 18 res all but flickering flame drops insane damage while retaining fire res, so the FCR 163 BP isnt absolutely necessary unless your running baal runs for your friends, i cant wait to find a nice base for my flickering flame since ive already got the runes for it :)
Was going SS Druid this Ladder, but going to start off with Fire first, so thanks for the info, who knows maybe I’ll enjoy fire so much I’ll just stick with it.
I wanna build a dual dragon, HoJ and flickering flame sundered paladin once ladder ages and dies out again
I'm still mostly using firestorm mostly at level 22, starting to use Fissure more often for far away enemies or those on the other side of a barrier. Firestorm is just so cheap and powerful!
Im really liking Act2 merc. Ive read somewhere that holy freeze aura is bad for fissure damage some say it isnt. For my understanding there is kind of a sweet spot for too slow or too fast monster types. Do you have any info on that case? Btw i really dont need might aura.
Question is a Phoenix shield better than 4 5/5 facets? I can see the shield gets -8 less resist but gets and extra 20% damage bonus. And not using the physical bump from the runeword am I missing much else?
-% Resist is generally the priority trait unless you're already reaching -100% resist, but the main reason to use phoenix is that it combines this damage boost with one of the best recovery skills in the game: Redemption - which is basically a full-rejuv as you tear through groups of enemies.
You also can use Plague in a sword for lower resists
Combine it with Lawbringer and use the act 5 frenzy merc
Also I forgot to ask, did you experiment with a physical sundering charm? Especially with decrepify from reapers toll? It seems like it could be an effective niche twist on the build with the physical damage in the elemental spells.
it's a lot less reliable, and since I'm a huge fan of fissure, it doesn't benefit my playstyle as much when it does trigger. That said, it is "functional" in spite of this.
@@Alzorath did you try the act 5 frenzy merc with plague lawbringer combo?
How do you see this build performing with just Ravenlore and Plague against broken fire immunities?
I'd use the plague on an a5 merc so it would trigger - but it's not terrible, though generally for sunder to be worth it (at least for me) I kind of want it to be at least 25% reduction in resists (which ravenlore can get with a facet) - lower than that, and I'd rather just dodge the immunes or use another skill.
If given the choice though - I'd go a facet ravenlore and a reapers toll a2 merc for this build though, rather than ravenlore and plague.
@@Alzorath I have a friend that memes on the low damage of physical fire compared to Tornado.
So, new Season 1 Rune Words also work in Season 2 ?
yep
@@Alzorath Very good to know, thank you.
I have a fire sunder and rather budget gear for my fire druid. He’s just about at 5k damage Armageddon. That being said, I am excited to max this character out because he’s already doing pretty well with budget gear.
I love this game
ive made a fire druid a while back and it was ok, but with the new stuff.....i really wanna try it out🤙
few questions. Struggling on itemization. Should i go hoto instead of hoj for 99fcr breakpoint? perf. Ravenlore with 5/5 and phoenix would push -fire res to -53%. enough? So i could go insight on merc or infy recommended?
Could go 6 socket rbf weapon, ravenlore, phoenix for max dmg and -res but fcr breakpoints crashed down under 68..
so many decisions :D
question is how much difference make the fire dmg compare to the physical dmg. maybe go for only -fire res isnt best? so hybrid between +skills, fcr and -fire res maybe best
There are a lot of choices for sure - and it does vary a bit depending on your playstyle - personally I go for full clears, so spamming teleport isn't super useful for me (I'm also mostly hunting for bases, runes, jewels, and charms though - other stuff is nice, but I am holy grailed).
As far as specific item questions:
More -% Fire resist will generally be better than plus skills, while 53% is "enough", more is better.
6 socket RBF crystal swords are an option - though I put them on the "gg list" due to it generally needing 6 perfect 5/5 rainbow facets (since the guides are meant to work for single player and online, people generally won't be holding on to the 7 facets for the build)
Fire damage vs physical is a deal of "All your skills deal fire damage, only some of your skills deal physical" - with high -% Fire res, you can almost ignore the physical part if you have a fire sunder. Pre-2.5 (or in LoD) - leaning into the split damage was more desireable (via decrepify on merc) since there were key unbreakable fire immunes.
As far as infinity vs insight - Infinity all the way, mana really isn't that harsh of an issue for this build unless you're teleporting heavy and not killing (thanks to the redemption on phoenix)
@@Alzorath
thanks for your assessment!
Made an excel sheet that says that flickering flame, 6sox crystal sword with rbf and phoenix does the most dmg and got the highest amount of - fire res. only 4 + skills less then hoto, ravenlore setup.
The Fcr cap with 68 is enough in my opinion.
Mostly built for cs and so on.
Think maybe (in terms of comfort) i can waive on infy and go for insight. Have to test it, maybe a matter of taste. Dont know how it feels just with red aura from phoenix.
Fire res also no problem but the other res. Need to go for life/res scs but cant max light and psn. Doesnt rly matter in cs.
For me, phoenix borders on overpowered in regards to recovery on a lot of builds lol - so I'm a bit biased towards it :)
If you want do test something awesome. Try lvl a druid in sp and go poison creeper and play on p8. You are lvl 12 within 5minutes :)
a lot of poison builds are super fun in normal, but struggle beyond that, and while poison creeper is one of those, it's one of the strongest early summons.
I go all poison creeper until Fissure then just use Den of Evil normal to switch, doesnt take long but its way easier than firestorm
Sweet vid even though I was triggered by the shield in the right hand.
I normally don't play with them like that - just swapped them as a sort of experimental watermark of sorts to see something ;)
Couldn't you put flickering flame on your merc, then run ravenlore yourself?
It would lower your mercenary's survivability compared to other options pretty severely but it is an option (you would only benefit from the ravenlore -% fire resist )
@@Alzorath if you go the telestomp route though it may be beneficial.
note: poison creeper is the fastest levelling skill in the game from a1--3/4
I think they need to take the cool downs off. I'd rather spam boulder than keep swapping
I agree on a few of the skills - personally I don't juggle molten - I put it on my left click, and only switch to firestorm for specific things - my right click is volcano/fissure/teleport and armageddon refresh.
Reaper wolf druid 🐺 btw
The real crime here is holding the shield in the left slot.
tried this build, without phenix shield, but with decent stuff, +14 @skills, raven helm, sunder charms, etc...
It's so slow... so boring...
Compared to what a blizz sorc and any other good build may do... it's so... slow and bad...
Or i'm missing something, or this is actually really bad...
-% resists make a massive difference to the build, and juggling skills properly is important.
how can you be this rich after just 5 days , damn
Not ladder? 🤷♂️
@@BS-Reviewz non ladder don have sunder charm
Hero editor to make vids
He play single player, with editor you Can have everything you want..
This is gomule and years of playing, with the exception of sunder charms (the sunders are edited in since they can't drop)