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Necromancer Summoner builds tend to fall off in Diablo 4's late game, but with the right gear, skills, and playstyle, they can be just as strong as the other fan-favorite setups. The same applies to hybrid builds that involve a bit more active participation from players themselves.
Blood skills give Necromancers a versatile suit of offensive and defensive options, and the addition of minions allows players to fill in the gaps that their core abilities leave behind. Here's one Diablo 4 Necromancer build that uses both blood and bone to help players ease into Nightmare difficulty and beyond.
Game Rant's Endgame Blood Summoner Necromancer build guide is still relevant and accurate after Blizzard released the latest patch for Diablo 4, update 1.0.3.
Diablo 4 Blood Summoner Necromancer Build Guide
Skills | Total Points |
Acolyte's Hemorrhage | 3 |
Paranormal Blood Surge | 7 |
Blighted Corpse Explosion | 3 |
Plagued Corpse Tendrils | 7 |
Book of the Dead | Upgrades |
Reapers | 2 |
Cold Mages | 1 |
Bone Golem | Sacrificed |
This is primarily a Blood Surge build that uses Skeletal Warriors and Mages to solve its single-target damage and Essence generation issues. Players will be producing tons of Blood Orbs and consuming a lot of Corpses with this setup to deal very high Overpower damage that can clear entire screens' worth of enemies.
Use Acolyte's Hemorrhage for the attack speed buff. This results in faster overall Essence generation. However, if players feel like they need more Overpower damage, then use Initiate's Hemorrhage for the Fortify generation.
Paranormal Blood Surge, Blighted Corpse Explosion, and Plagued Corpse Tendrils all work together to clear large groups of enemies as quickly as possible. The latter skill will be stacked with offensive effects that help the other two deal more damage, making it an essential part of the build.
As for minions, take Reapers and Cold Mages for the extra Corpse creation and Essence generation. Blood Surge is a resource-hungry skill, so the extra Essence from Cold Mages will help a lot.
Passive Skills
Skills | Points |
Unliving Energy | 3 |
Hewed Flesh | 3 |
Skeletal Warrior Mastery | 3 |
Grim Harvest | 3 |
Fueled by Death | 3 |
Death's Embrace | 3 |
Skeletal Mage Mastery | 3 |
Gruesome Mending | 1 |
Coalesced Blood | 3 |
Transfusion | 1 |
Tides of Blood | 3 |
Bonded in Essence | 3 |
Death's Defense | 3 |
Rathma's Vigor | 1 |
Hewed Flesh triggers more frequently than players anticipate—it's needed to fuel Corpse skills and the player's own Essence generation via Grim Harvest. Also, players will need more Corpses in order to take advantage of one of the Legendary Aspects below.
Take all the Blood and Skeleton Mastery passives as well as Bonded in Essence and Death's Defense to boost the survivability of minions. Players will have to rely on Death's Embrace, Blood Mist, and Blood Orb healing to keep themselves alive.
Rathma's Vigor takes priority over Kalan's Edict since the build depends on the player being close to enemies. Be mindful of the stack counter on top of the EXP bar so as not to waste the Overpower proc on a Hemorrhage cast.
Gear and Aspects
Offense | Defense | Utility |
Blood-bathed | Disobedience | Potent Blood |
Reanimation | Might | Blood Getter |
Grasping Veins | Embalmer | Viscous |
Frenzied Dead |
Take Blood Getter and Viscous for more skeletons and Reanimation to increase their damage. Players should ideally have Deathspeaker's Pendant to make mini-Blood Surges explode from minions on-cast, but since this is a rare Unique item, many players will have to settle for an amulet with Frenzied Dead instead.
The majority of Blood Surge's damage will come from Overpower procs, which means players don't have much of an option when it comes to offensive Aspects. Blood-bathed will make Blood Surge explode twice, but that's about it. Socket Rubies onto weapons to increase Overpower damage and use Essence sources like Potent Blood to be able to spam Blood Surge.
As for gear, players will want to stack as much Overpower and Vulnerable damage as they can. Sprinkle in some extra Life, Essence cost reduction, and minion bonuses whenever possible. Cooldown Reduction will help with Corpse Tendril spam while enabling near-permanent uptime on Grasping Veins' crit-related buffs.
Paragon Boards
Players will want to go straight to the Bone Graft board and take the Reinvigorate node, which grants +2 Essence on Kill. This will let players spam Blood Surge so it can reach that Overpower proc more often each fight.
Next, make a beeline straight for a new board and attach Blood Begets Blood. The nodes here will greatly improve the Necromancer's damage upon picking up a Blood Orb along with bonuses to max health and healing received.
Bloodbath is a great third option since it buffs Overpower damage, and its Fortify bonuses will help sustain the Necromancer's health and damage output in long fights.
As for glyphs, prioritize Blood-drinker for the Fortify generation on Blood Orb pickup and Dominate for extra damage against enemies hit by Overpower damage.
Diablo 4 is available now on PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, and PS5.