CONTENTS
1. Introduction
2. How to use this Guide
3a. Skills (discussion)
3b. Skills (investment)
3c. Skills (variants)
4. Stats
5. Equipment
6. Hireling
7. Leveling
8. Game play
1. INTRODUCTION
The Fire Skills in the Druid Elemental tree aren’t popular even with players who favour Druids. They are clearly underpowered compared with the Wind skills, and the Fire skills are hard to use. Nevertheless Fire Druids are fun to play, and with the right equipment and skill investment it is possible to finish the game solo.
In this guide I will try to give a complete picture of Fire Druids. Over the last 2 months I have built several variants and tried different equipment setups, so that I can be confident about what works and what doesn’t.
The skills section is quite extensive because there are many setups that work. I will start with a basic recipe, and then go into the different variants that are possible and how they perform. The equipment section is equally large because I have tried covering all items that suit the Fire Druid.
Dealing with Fire Immunes
There are a lot of Fire Immunes in Hell. This is a problem for every Fire-based character, and so too for the Fire Druid. If you have Enigma you can teleport around them, but even then there are superuniques to kill so you need a way to handle Fire Immunity.
Therefore the effectiveness of this character depends on a single item: An Infinity Polearm. With your merc swinging Infinity all your trouble will go away; apart from a few monsters in Act 4 all will lose their immunity and will be quickly taken care off.
If you cannot afford Infinity or if you play non-Ladder, you will have a harder time getting through Hell. In this case your best option is to go with a build variant that includes summons (at least a strong Grizzly, preferably 3 Dire Wolves. And you will use Volcano more often for the physical damage it deals. Combine this with a well-equipped Mercenary and possibly a missile weapon to deal some physical damage yourself, and you will slowly but surely get through Hell, with the Ancients being the only major obstacle.
Read this guide on breaking immunities on why you need Infinity and what it will do for you.
Casting Delays
One of the peculiar things about the Fire skills is that they all have casting delays, as follows:
Firestorm – 0.6 seconds
Molten Boulder – 2 seconds
Fissure – 2 seconds
Volcano – 4 seconds
Armageddon – 6 seconds
This means that after you cast for example Fissure, you have to wait 2 seconds before you can cast another Fire skill (or other timered skill). In the meantime you can do other things, such as use Normal Attack or cast Summons.
My experience is the casting delay of Fissure (2 seconds) is rarely a problem; after a bit of practice it you start using those 2 seconds to look for the right place to cast the next. In the case of Volcano (4 seconds) it is a bit slow; especially if you try to combine Volcano with Fissure you constantly feel like you have to wait. But with Armageddon the casting delay is downright annoying. In one variant I built my intention was to have both Hurricane (1-pt, 50 seconds) and Armageddon (20 pts + synergies, 50 seconds) running at the same time. But because both have a casting delay of 6 seconds, that meant I would have to wait 12 seconds before I could casting Fissure and Volcano again.
2. USING THIS GUIDE
Abbreviations
I use the following abbreviations:
FS – Firestorm
MB – Molten Boulder
FSR – Fissure
VLC – Volcano
ARM – Armageddon
HUR – Hurricane
CA – Cyclone Armor
GR – Grizzly
DW – Dire Wolves
SW – Spirit Wolves
RAV – Ravens
OAK – Oak Sage
Damage Notation
I used the following notation for presenting damage:
20 +40s -> 2.5k-3.0k fdmg + 1.0k-1.5k dmg
This means: with 20 points (including equipment bonuses) and 40 points in synergies, the skill does 2500-3000 Fire Damage and 1000-1500(physical) damage.
All damages are calculated as listed on the Arreat Summit.
Use the skill damage calculator for your own setup
Equipment rating
I use the following rating for equipment:
*** - top choice
** - Good alternative
* - Acceptable if nothing else is available
$$$ - expensive (Ist or higher)
$$ - Affordable (Pul to Ist)
$ - Cheap (less than Pul)
# - Ladder Only
3A. SKILLS (discussion)
Firestorm
Synergies: MB, FSR
30 + 20s -> 1.6k-1.8k fdmg
40 + 20s -> 3.0k-3.2k fdmg
30 + 40s -> 2.8k-3.1k fdmg
40 + 40s -> 5.3k-5.8k fdmg
With the highest listed damage of all Fire skills and the shortest Casting Delay, FS seems to be a great skill. Unfortunately this is not the case. The listed damage is per second, and since a ‘wave’ passes through a monster in less (a half second if you are lucky), the actual damage is lower. On the positive side, if you stand very close to a monster all 3 Firestorm 'snakes' pass through it, and you do tripple damage.
Although personally I don't like using Firestorm, some players consider it a good skill to use beside others (Fissure / Volcano). Unlike Fissure, Volcano and Teleport you can use Firestorm on your left button, so there's nothing wrong with having it there for emergencies.
Molten Boulder
Synergies: FS (fire dmg), VLC (physical dmg)
30 + 20s -> 250-300 dmg + 670-770 fdmg (with FS synergy)
30 + 20s -> 780-880 dmg + 280-320 fdmg (with VLC synergy)
40 + 20s -> 420-460 dmg + 1.1k-1.2k fdmg (with FS synergy)
40 + 20s -> 1.2k-1.4k dmg + 450-500 fdmg (with VLC synergy)
30 + 40s -> 780-880 dmg + 670-770 fdmg
40 + 40s -> 1.2k-1.4k dmg + 1.1k-1.2k fdmg
MB is slow and impossible to aim. The knockback effect is fun, but this only happens with smaller monsters. With other monster the boulder simply disappears as soon as it hits the target. Even in a place such as the Maggot Lair other skills outshine MB.
This makes MB nothing more than a synergy for other skills
Fissure
Synergies: VLC, FS
30 + 20s -> 1.4k-1.5k fdmg
40 + 20s -> 2.2k-2.3k fdmg
30 + 40s -> 2.3k-2.4k fdmg
40 + 40s -> 3.6k-3.8k fdmg
Fissure is the best skill in the arsenal. It works particularly well with moving targets, because it damages them several times. It has the tendency to miss monsters that stand still if they stand between the burning areas, but these monsters rarely form a threat until they do move, and a second Fissure will take them out swiftly.
Fissure has a number of unknown effects, which make it do enormous damage in certain cases. This normally happens when (1) it is placed under a large group of monsters, (2) when those monsters are fast and (3) when they are big. As said, the exact nature of these effects is unknown, but it adds to the already impressive performance of Fissure.
Fissure with a single synergy maxed will be strong enough to kill any monster in Hell. This includes Fire Immunes if your Mercenary uses Infinity. But they won’t die immediately so you need your Merc and summons to keep them away from you. Fissure with 2 synergies maxed will take out monsters immediately, whole batches at once.
Volcano
Synergies: FSR (Fire dmg), ARM (Fire dmg), MB (Physical dmg)
30 + 20s -> 175-180 dmg + 540-560 fdmg (with FSR synergy)
30 + 20s -> 530-540 dmg + 160-170 fdmg (with MB synergy)
40 + 20s -> 270-300 dmg + 920-1000 fdmg (with MB synergy)
40 + 20s -> 870-880 dmg + 270-300 fdmg (with FSR synergy)
30 + 40s -> 540-550 dmg + 550-570 fdmg (with FSR and MB synergy)
40 + 40s -> 870-880 dmg + 920-1000 fdmg (with FSR and MB synergy)
The damage from Volcano doesn’t look like much, but a single cast under any static monsters will kill him quickly. It combines physical and fire damage, so it’s a great way to deal with Fire Immunes. This is the skill you will use to take out bosses while your Grizzly and Merc keep him in place.
It would be logical to max MB to make Volcano deal more physical damage. This does indeed improve the effectiveness of Volcano, but in my experience it isn’t necessary. Volcano is fast enough without it, and it is a backup skill anyway.
Armageddon
Synergies: FS, MB, VLC, FSR (Fissure only increases duration)
30 + 20s -> 2.9k-3.3k fdmg
40 + 20s -> 4.4k-4.9k fdmg
30 + 40s -> 4.7k – 5.4k fdmg
40 + 40s -> 7.3k – 8.1k fdmg
Armageddon does a lot of damage when it’s synergized, but it has a number of problems. First and foremost, it rarely hits anything. Second, Armageddon requires you to invest 5 points in the Wind skills as prerequisites. And third, it has a Casting Delay of 6 seconds, during which you can’t cast any other Fire skill.
I have made a Druid with Armageddon (20 + 30s), but I felt that the 25 points were wasted, certainly compared with other options (another Fire skill or summons).
Note that in his PvP Fire Druid Guide, FWI considers Armageddon an essential part of his strategy.
Summon Grizzly
Synergies: DW (adds life), SW (adds AR and defense)
10 + 1s -> life 3k, damage 300
10 + 20s -> life 6k, damage 300 (synergy: DW)
30 + 1s -> life 3k, damage 2.4k
30 + 20s -> life 6k, damage 2.4k (synergy: DW)
You need a Grizzly, period. At the very least you invest 5 skill points (GR and 4 prerequisites) for an extra meat shield. Even with this minor investment your Grizzly won’t die often (in fact his life bar rarely goes below 90%), and especially if you use Teleport (Enigma) your Grizzly will provide great safety. However, I believe that the optimum Fire Druid setup includes max Summon Grizzly. This will give you an additional source of physical damage along with Volcano and your Merc. Maxing DW to give your Grizzly more hit points is a waste; your Grizzly will survive without it.
Summon Dire Wolves
Synergies: GR (adds damage), SW (adds AR and defense)
10 + xxs -> Too low life – it won’t survive
30 + 1s -> life 1k, damage 50
30 + 20s -> life 1k, damage 2.3k
Dire Wolves should only be used in Fire / Summoning hybrids, because for them to be effective you need to invest 40 points (max DW and GR). In this case they will be pretty effective both as shields and in dealing with Fire Immunes. I do not recommend only investing only in DW; although this will give you 3 meat shields I believe that a Grizzly (that you get for the same investment) is far superior because it gives you an additional source of non-Fire damage.
Raven
Ravens blind monsters, which can be very useful at times. Especially if you use the helm Ravenlore (with +7 to Raven) I recommend using these cheap minions all the time.
Oak Sage
10 -> 250 life, +80% hit points to party
30 -> 450 life, +175% hit points to party
Oak Sage gives you and your minions extra life. Even single-point investments with some bonuses can double your hit points, although you will need to recast him regularly. Investing up to 20 points will make him stronger and more effective, but I wouldn’t consider this the first priority since you have so many others.
Carrion Vine
1 point here will give you some life replenishment. Your vine will die a lot, but recasting is simple enough.
Cyclone Armor and Hurricane
10 CA -> 160 dmg absorbed
30 CA -> 388 dmg absorbed
You’re making a Fire Druid, not a Wind Druid. But a single point in Cyclone Armor (plus a prerequisite) will make it absorb up to 200 elemental damage. Another setup I tested and liked was 20 points in Cyclone Armor and 1 pt in Hurricane. This give you 400 elemental damage absorb and a 1-pt Hurricane that slows everything that comes close to you. And it looks great.
3B. SKILLS (investment)
I recommend the following investment:
Elemental
1-20 Firestorm
1-20 Molten Boulder
20 Fissure
20 Volcano
0-20 Cyclone Armor
0-1 Hurricane
(and up to 3 prerequisites)
Summoning
1 Raven
1 Oak Sage
1-20 Dire Wolves
1-20 Grizzly
0-1 Carrion Vine
(and up to 2 prerequisites)
This gives you a lot of flexibility, and in the next section I will show a number of variants to clarify the choices. The most important things you should notice:
- I suggest that you max Fissure and Volcano, because these are the most effective Fire Skills, and both have their usefulness. They are also each others’ synergy.
- I do not recommend investing in Armageddon, because these points are wasted.
- I do not recommend maxing Oak Sage because there are other options that have more use. But I do suggest always using the 1-pt OAK
- I recommend always taking at least a 1-pt Grizzly.
3C. SKILLS (variants)
(All these variants assume about 95 points to invest, i.e. completed at level 83)
Variant 1 – Fully Synergized Fire Druid
20 Fissure
20 Volcano
20 Molten Boulder
20 Firestorm
1+ Grizzly
1 Oak Sage
1 Raven
2 Prerequisites
This is the most obvious setup; you max all 4 Fire skills (ignoring Armageddon) and put the rest in Grizzly. Your Fissure and Volcano will do awesome damage, and you will race through Hell, especially if your Merc has Infinity. Without Infinity you will need to rely on your Merc and Volcano.
In this variant you can also elect to keep Grizzly at 1 point and invest in Armageddon as a synergy for Volcano.
Variant 2 – Fully Synergized Fissure and strong Grizzly
20 Fissure
20 Volcano
20 Firestorm
20 Grizzly
1+ Oak Sage
1 Raven
2 Prerequisites
This is my favorite setup; I believe that what Volcano loses (investment in synergy) is more than compensated by the stronger Grizzly. Even without Infinity Fire Immunes will be a minor problem because your Merc and Grizzly will tank them and (slowly) take care of them.
Variant 3 – Fire / Summoning hybrid
20 Fissure
20 Volcano
20 Dire Wolves
20 Grizzly
1+ Fire Storm
1 Oak Sage
1 Raven
You have 3 Dire Wolves instead of one Grizzly. In this setup Fire Immunes are no problem at all. This is the setup I described in my Fire Hunter guide, where I equipped my Druid with a bow to do additional damage (see equipment section).
Variant 4 – Dual-elemental Druid
20 Fissure
20 Volcano
20 Grizzly
20 Cyclone Armor
1 Hurricane
1+ Firestorm
1 Oak Sage
1 Raven
4 prerequisites
With Hurricane and Cyclone you will had some extra safety (also for your Merc and Grizzly), at the expense of some power in Fissure. If you really want to put a point in Armageddon, go ahead. Just remember that you will need 12 seconds to put Hurricane and Armageddon up. But it looks awesome.
In this variant you can also choose to max Firestorm before Grizzly for more Fissure power at the expense of versatility.
4. STATS
Strength
You will need to invest enough to wear your equipment. Ideally you allow for equipment strength bonuses but this requires some patience. The heaviest item will probably be a Monarch (for Spirit or Phoenix), which requires 156 strength.
Dexterity
I do not recommend max block because you are a caster and normally you are quite far behind your Merc and minions. Most danger comes from elemental ranged attackers (Vipers, Gloams), which you cannot block anyway. This means that normally your Dexterity can stay at base (because of bonuses from equipment). If you use a missile weapon I do not recommend investing in Dexterity beyond the requirement; your bow/crossbow is not your main weapon and survivability is more important
Vitality
Everything that you do not invest elsewhere goes here.
Energy
You don’t need much mana because all your skills are timered. If you use Enigma and want to tele around a lot, make sure you wear some equipment with energy/mana bonuses.
5. EQUIPMENT
You have a lot of options when it comes to equipment, but here is roughly what you are looking for:
- Skill bonuses to boost your Fire skill damage. You prefer items that give a bonus to all skills (not just elemental), because that will also make your minions stronger
- Increased Fire damage, Reduced Fire Resistance. This boosts your damage further and helps you deal with Fire Immunes (with Infinity)
- Fast Cast Rate – This is especially useful if you use Enigma for fast Teleport. It is less relevant for the Fire Skills since they are timered, though it does allow you to get out of casting animation quicker so you can move again.
- Safety, i.e. resistances, vitality/life, damage reduction. I like to aim for max fire and lightning resistance and positive Cold and Poison resistances; that is normally enough to survive in Hell.
To look up items, look at the Arreat Summit items section.
Using Enigma
Most non-sorceress caster characters benefit greatly from Enigma. Ignore all the nice features such as the strength bonus and damage reduction; it is all about the +1 to teleport. I used Enigma for all my setups, though I do believe that Fire Druids do fine without it. I use Teleport mainly to skip certain areas, but rarely in combat. There are several (much cheaper) alternatives that will do fine. If you use Enigma try to get some FCR to speed you up. Relevant breakpoints: 46% for 13 frames, 68% for 12 frames, 99% for 11 frames. Also make sure you have enough mana by wearing the right equipment (Torch, SOJs, Gloom’s Trap, Silkweave)
Using Aldur’s Watchtower
If there is one build for which you can use the Druid set, it is this one. You don’t need FCR without Enigma, and the set gives you lots of safety and sufficient skill bonuses. I have not included the Aldur set items in the lists below but this is a serious option.
Caster Weapons
Heart of the Oak (rw) *** $$$
This is the ultimate all-round caster weapon; +3 to skills, 40% FCR and 30%+ resists. It is the best choice available for Fire Druids
Doom (rw) ** $$$
You won’t get FCR and lose a skill point, but you get the Holy Freeze aura in return.
Spirit (rw) ** $ #
Earth Shifter ** $
+7 to elemental skills is awesome, but you need to invest a lot in strength to carry it
Earthshaker ** $
Gaea’s Club (magic weapon) ** $
This weapon is shopable (a great choice for untwinked) and gives you +3 to Elemental skills
Mang Song's Lesson ** $$
This two-hander gives you +5 to skills and potentially -15% enemy fire resistance
Dark Clan Crusher * $
Islestrike * $
Athena’s Wrath * $
A polearm with +1-3 to Druid skills; you get points for looks but it’s two-handed so you lose some skill points.
Missile Weapons
Faith (rw) *** $$$ #
This bow is especially great if you use summons because it will provide them with the Fanaticism aura.
Widowmaker * $$ #
Put this on switch and use caster weapons as your main setup.
Harmony (rw) * $ #
Put this on switch and use caster weapons as your main setup.
Silence (rw) * $$$
One of the few options you have on non-ladder, and it's damn expensive.
Shields
Phoenix (rw) *** $$$ #
-28% to enemy fire resistance makes this my first choice. And some other nice mods such as a redemption aura and some fire absorb.
Monarch 4x Fire Facet ** $$$
This will give you up to -20% to enemy fire resistance (and +20% extra damage), so it’s a close second to Phoenix.
Spirit (rw) ** $$ #
+2 to skills also gives your damage a boost, though it does nothing against Fire Immunes
Lidless Wall * $
Splendor * $
Sigon’s shield * $
Moser’s Blessed Circle * $
Armor
Enigma (rw) *** $$$
Teleport, FRW and an enormous strength boost
Chains of Honor (rw) *** $$$
A great alternative to Enigma, with a lot of safety (resists, DR).
Skin of the Vipermagi (rw) ** $
Cheap and with great mods for a Fire Druid.
Rain (rw) ** $$
The 1.11 Runeword give +2 to Druid skills, lightning resist and a lot of mana.
Spirit Shroud * $
Smoke (rw) * $
Arcaine's Valor * $$
If you get one with +2 to skills it's quite a decent choice. No resists though.
Helm
Ravenlore *** $$
This helm is specially made for Fire Druids, with -15-20% to enemy fire resistance and +3 to elemental skills
Jalal’s Mane * $
The all-round Druid choice will work if you don’t have Ravenlore.
Lore Druid pelt (rw) */** $
If you find a pelt with +3 to Fissure and insert the runes of Lore, that will be a pretty good option
Delirium Druid pelt (rw) ** $$$
It's expensive for what it does, but if you find a pelt with 0/3 sockets and the right mods, it can be pretty good.
Gaea's Druid Pelt ** $$/$$$
With +3 to elemental skills and other good mods, a good option
Belt
Arachnid’s Mesh *** $$
The only belt with +1 to skills
Rare belt with good mods * $
Resists and FHR would be good.
Gloom’s Trap ** $
Extra mana is helpful if you use Enigma
Verdungo’s Coil * $$
Thundergod’s Vigor * $
Nightsmoke (upped) * $
Boots
Sandstorm Treks *** $
A good Strength bonus and FHR make this the first choice
Rare with FHR and resists *** $
Potentially better than Treks
Aldur’s Advance ** $
Silkweave ** $
Extra mana is helpful if you use Enigma
Gore Riders ** $
War Traveller ** $$
Wear one of these if you use a bow
Waterwalks * $
Treads of Chton * $
Natalya’s Soul * $
Gloves
Magefist *** $
The only option here; it’s cheap and offers +1 to Fire skills.
Crafted Hit Power gloves * $
If you wield a bow, this will give you knockback (which works great in combination with Fissure). The additional mods must be pretty good for these gloves to surpass Magefist though.
Rings
Stone of Jordan *** $$$
+1 to skills and a lot of extra mana
Bul Kathos’ Wedding Band ** $$$
Slightly cheaper than SOJs, and also with +1 to skills
Rare ring with good mods * $-$$$
Resists, strength and life/vitality.
Amulet
Mara’s Caleidoscope *** $$$
+2 to skills and resists make this the top choice
Rare with +2 to druid/elemental skills */** $
Potentially a lot cheaper than Maras
Gaea’s magic amulet ** $
+3 to elemental skills
Rising Sun ** $
Highlord's Wrath ** $$
A great choice if you wield a bow
Eye of Etlich * $
Telling of Beads * $
Inventory
Druid Hellfire Torch *** $$ #
Druids Torches are cheap so get one if you’re on ladder.
Annihilus *** $$$ #
Elemental skillers *** $$
If possible with other mods such as life or FHR
Scs 5% resist all / 11% resist fire or lightning ** $$
Use these to bring your resists up to 75%
Switch
There are 3 options for switch weapon/shield:
a) Call to Arms + Spirit for extra life/mana for you and your merc/minions
b) A bow (e.g. Widowmaker, Harmony) to deal with Fire Immunes
c) HotO + Spirit or Spirit + Spirit or Mang Song's Lesson for casting stronger minions (e.g. when Faith bow is normal weapon)
6. HIRELING
Hireling selection
In case you missed it: this build benefits greatly from Infinity, so we prefer Act II Mercenaries. They are also strong meat shields and provide an aura by themselves. Act V Barbarians would work as well but I never use them so cannot judge.
Act II Might ***
Great if you have summons and/or bow
Act II Holy Freeze ***
Provides additional safety with its aura. No need to equip Doom. Probably the best choice for a pure caster
Act II Prayer **
Life regeneration can work great. Unless you have Infinity, give this merc an Insight for double healing
Act II Defiance **
This will help mainly to make sure the Merc survives.
Weapon
Make sure your Merc has life leech on weapon, helm or armor.
Infinity (rw) *** $$$ #
The conviction aura is all we really need, but the other mods are just as juicy.
Insight * $ #
If you can’t afford Infinity this will allow you to teleport freely
Reaper’s Toll * $
The Decrepify curse will slow down enemies, lower their defense and increase the physical damage of your merc, minions and Volcano.
Armor
Fortitude *** $$$
A lot of extra damage
Chains of Honor *** $$$
Life leech – allows you to use Infinity and Guillaumes. Plus great resists and DR
Shaftstop ** $
Stone ** $$
Duriel’s Shell * $
Helms
Guillaume’s Face *** $
If you have life leech on armor or weapon
Andariel’s Visage *** $$
Tal’s mask ** $
Vampire’s Gaze ** $
7. LEVELING
Level 1-15
Equip a bow or melee weapon and do Tristram runs. Put skill points in prerequisites until you get to Fissure, then put everything in Fissure.
Items to consider: Hrasus’ set.
Level 16-30
Do Tomb/Cows/Dia runs. By this time your Fissure will be quite strong, so start using it. Also get 1 Dire Wolf (hopefully with some items to boost it to lvl 3 for 3 wolves). Keep investing in Fissure, and put the rest in Volcano. Get a Grizzly at lvl 30. Items to consider: Hrasus Set, Spirit sword, Eye of Etlich, Manald Heal, armor and helm socketed with Tir’s (for unlimited Fissure casting), Magefist.
Level 30-45
Do Baal runs. Keep investing in Fissure until you’re done, then continue with Volcano. Use your Grizzly as a meat shield, and give your mercenary a decent poleaxe. By now you can equip some nice gear.
Items to consider: Jalals, Splendor/Lidless, Spirit sword, Vipermagi, Magefist, Elemental skillers, Hone Sundan or low Insight (for merc)
Level 45-60
Leveling through Nightmare, followed by NM Baal runs. Use Fissure and Volcano (both maxed). Further investment depends on chosen skill setup.
Level 60-75
NM Baal runs. You can equip all your end gear now except for Arachs and maybe Andariel’s on merc.
Level 75+
Hell levelling. I prefer not to get a rush here because this is where your character really gets tested.
8. PLAY STYLE
General questing
In general, Fissure (right mouse button) is your first option and Volcano your second (hotkey right mouse button). Run forward and cast Fissure in front of you when a monster approaches. Let your Grizzly/Wolves and Merc advance. Don’t hesitate to recast your minions at the right spot. Use Volcano to take out ranged attackers and bosses/revivers. Now and then check the health of your summons and if necessary recast (this is rarely necessary with a Grizzly though).
Bosses
Cast your Grizzly next to the boss to distract and keep the boss in one place. Next, keep casting Volcano until done. Keep your distance and focus on keeping your Merc alive. With Mephisto, Diablo and Baal you may need to recast your Grizzly 1-2 times before they die.
Difficult areas
The most difficult thing you will encounter is the Hell Ancients. If you play solo you may well not be able to pass them. With my ideal setup (variant 2, Fissure + Grizzly) it took me several tries to pass them, while with the others I gave up rather soon and found someone to help me. The problem is that your Grizzly dies quite quickly to a leap attack or WW attack. You need to resummon him quite often and in the meantime keep your Merc alive and keep casting Volcano to do damage.
I also had some difficulty in Act 4 with large groups of unbreakable Fire Immunes (Venom Lords). They swamped my Merc and Grizzly and I had to teleport away several times to break the group up so I could take them 1 or 2 at a time.
Without Enigma there are some other areas that may be tricky, such as the Maggot Lair. In my experience it is quite difficult to cast Fissure there, so you should use Volcano more often and be patient.
Thanks their for input goes to:
- Jary
- Lumpor
- MalVeaux
- MYK
- Verashiden
- Xena1985
------|||Amazing job! This guide is 100% gg, I really have nothing else to add lol.
|||Heya,Fantastic and complete. Love it.
I only have two things to add:
1. Mang Song's Lesson. +5 skills is better than Spirit + Spirit and it can get up to -15% fire resistance to enemies. Unfortunately it's quite rare and unfortunately it's got no other perks (life, mana, FHR, resists, etc). More like something for a summoner hybrid since it benefits both summons & fire at the same time, and the summon based builds are much safer and don't have to worry to much about resists and all that in the first place.
2. Minor thing:
Quote:
Insight * $$$
If you can’t afford Infinity or you are non-ladder, this will allow you to teleport freely
I doubt it was meant to be $$$ and I think insight is # (ladder only).
Cheers,
|||@ JaryI tried to be complete so I am glad that you can't think of stuff to add.
@ Malvieux
Thanks for spotting; I edited both your comments in.|||Nice guide! One thing I'd like to mention:
Even when not moving, Fissure hits a TON when dropped under a large groups' feet. This leads me to believe that it somewhat reacts on a similar mechanic to Creeper. So if you have a big group being held still, cast Fissure and watch the fire damage sky rocket.|||I think Ed got it right actually. Its deffinitely movement based..the way the damage is reapplied, 'cause sometimes standing monsters (or opponents if PvP) can sit and have it miss over and over since the vents only cover about half the area like a checker board (except the squares alternate..sorta), so enemies movement through the hot spots dictates most hte damage. During the duration of the fissure "checker board" lol, enemies can reapply teh damage by passing in and outta the hotspots infinite times. Since enemies in big groups within your vision can't "stop" moving they'll continue to move within the pack reapplying the damage, such as shenk or a big group of hell cows. However, if say... 4 hell cows surrounding you are melee attacking you, so immobile, and you fissure..they'll probably only take a couple burns but not as much as if you were to back off and have them chase you around the mats. Anyways, you know this i"m just babbling 'cause I'm bored >.<|||See, I'd think that too. However, with my Huntermentalist even when a large group is standing still they take LOADS of fire damage. That's why I say it's kinda like Creeper. Movement does dictate a large percentage of damage, especially PvP. I'm not sure how to explain why it works on large groups though. Perhaps only one unit has to be moving to make Fissure go berserk?|||I think Vera is also right; the damage does depend on the number of monsters in some way. But it can still miss monsters in a group if they stand still (e.g. with skeleton archers there are often 1-2 that survive). I also think that the damage depends on the speed of the monster moving over the Fissure mat.|||Heya,
I definitely agree that the damage is quite different in application compared to other skills like it (damage over time, over an area). I did some quick tests just to show it working both in Hell with my Fissure/DireWolf Druid in Act1 and in Act5 for different movement, speeds, sizes of monsters.
It seems to hit them more often when they move and when they're larger. It seems to have something to do with their sprite touching a vent's sprite perhaps and each shift into or out of it triggers the `fire' animation resulting in damage dealt.
I made a quick video of it. Though even at the smaller res on YouTube you can still plainly see how often the fire explosion triggers on the baddies (my original was recorded at 800x600, so it was really clear... YT re-encoded to smaller res, grr).
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_OVQGYcNUw
By the way, this Druid was heavily inspired by a lot of what went into this guide from a lot of you guys. He's really fun. Firestorm/Fissure/Volcano with DireWolves/Grizzly; Might Merc with Reaper's Toll. Nothing is immune to the group completely. Maxed FS/Fissure, DW/Grizzly. Volcano is my synergy. I actually use FS up close because if the three fire streams hit the enemy at close range, the damage is ridiculously high and their life bar just sinks so fast. So I maxed it and use it often when I'm not fissuring a single target.
Cheers,
|||Nice video, interesting choice of music as well. So you're saying that it has something to do with the size of the monster as well. That wasn't apparent from your video, and I can't remember having a problem taking out Dolls or those small teleporting demons. I plan to rebuild my Fire Druid soon so I'll do some testing of my own.My idea was that it had something to do with hit recovery; Fissure doesn't do damage when monsters are in HR ,so if a monster has a shorter HR they would be hit more often. The monsters you have in your video might have a shorter HR than smaller monsters.
You've got an interesting setup. Personally I wouldn't want to miss maxed Volcano because it's the best Fire skill to handle (end) bosses. I used to have Firestorm (maxed and synergized) on left mouse so I could cast it when a monster was at close range, but it never worked for me.
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