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Bonemancer
Game Diablo II
Class Necromancer
Primary Attack Bone Spear, Bone Spirit
PvM/PvP Either/Both
Can Solo Hell? Yes
Creator Kickin_It
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The Bonemancer is a Necromancer build that relies on the use of the various bone skills to provide a potent combination of direct magical damage and defensive utility. This build can be successfully applied to nearly every mode of gameplay: PvM, PvP, Magic Finding, and even Hardcore. The play style of this build is one of a high-damage caster; it dispatches of enemies from afar, preferably without ever entering melee range. The build does not rely on large numbers of summoned minions like some other Necromancer builds, though it is fairly dependent on the Mercenary. As all of the Bonemancer's damage is magic, it does not encounter a great deal of immunities in Hell difficulty, and those monsters that are immune can be easily dealt with through use of Curses and dispatched by the Mercenary. As such, this build is fully capable of soloing Hell. Unlike most Necromancer builds, the Bonemancer lacks a Curse that directly increases his damage, so he instead focuses his curses on crowd control, defense, and utility. This build will typically be completely finished in the mid- to upper-90's, so it will require some dedication to finish, though it is completely viable before the build is fully completed.

Stat Placement[]

  • Strength: Enough to use your gear. This should be a fairly low number, as this build will utilize Enigma.
  • Dexterity: Most players will want to keep this at base, as this build does not require max block. Hardcore players, however, may wish to increase this to buff their blocking, though it is not strictly necessary for survival.
  • Vitality: All your spare points will be poured into Vitality. Necromancers gain 2 Life per point of Vitality.
  • Energy: Despite the steep mana cost of Bone spells, this should be left at base.

Build Variants[]

Pure Bonemancer[]

Pure Bone Skills (Diablo II)

The Pure Bonemancer will invest all of his skill points to increasing the damage of his spells, with little regard for secondary abilities.

Summoning Spells[]

  • Clay Golem: 1 Point. This little fellow will assist you with tanking and crowd control. With +Skills and his life scaling with difficulty, one point will suffice.
  • Golem Mastery: 1 Point. A useful synergy for your Golem.
  • Summon Resist: 1 Point. This will make your Golem more resilient to elemental damage, with minimal investment of your skills.

Poison and Bone Spells[]

  • Teeth: 20 Points. This will provide an important synergy to your main damaging skills.
  • Bone Armor: 1 Point. This is a very important defensive skill, and should be kept active at all times. However, its synergies (which also synergize your damaging spells) will add more absorption per point than Bone Armor itself will.
  • Corpse Explosion: 1 Point. This is one of the most effective skills in the Bonemancer's arsenal, but additional points do not increase its damage, only its radius (and mana cost). +Skills will get you all you need from this spell.
  • Bone Wall: 20 Points. This spell is mildly useful as a defensive structure; more importantly, it is a main synergy to your damaging spells and Bone Armor.
  • Bone Spear: 20 Points. This is the Bonemancer's primary attack spell. Max this as soon as possible.
  • Bone Prison: 20 Points. Like Bone Wall, this skill is maxed for the synergies it provides.
  • Bone Spirit: 20 Points. Spirit deals significantly more damage than Spear, but also costs much more mana. This should generally only be used when dealing with single high-life monsters, such as Act Bosses.

Curses[]

  • Amplify Damage: 1 Point. This is useful for increasing the damage of your Merc and Corpse Explosion, and will be one of your most frequently-used curses.
  • Dim Vision: 1 Point. Dim Vision is one of the most powerful defensive spells in the game. When cursed, monsters will essentially be rendered passive unless there is a target standing in melee range. It can be used to take the heat off from both melee and ranged monsters, and will also prevent monsters from using special abilities, including Fallen Shaman's and Greater Mummy's resurrection spells. At low levels, it is difficult to use due to its minuscule radius, but with +Skills, it will become incredibly useful in nearly all situations. Don't leave home without it.
  • Iron Maiden: 0-1 Point. This is typically very useful in defeating the Act Bosses in Normal difficulty, but provides little in Nightmare and Hell.
  • Confuse: 0-1 Point. This is a very useful crowd control spell, as it will make monsters attack random targets (generally each other) while you pelt them with Bone Spears.
  • Life Tap: 0-1 Point. This can be irreplaceable for keeping your Merc alive when he's surrounded by hard-hitting monsters. I recommend picking this one up, since this build is very Merc-dependent.
  • Attract: 0-1 Point. Another good crowd control spell, this works similarly to Confuse, but other monsters will always attack the cursed monster.

Mercenary[]

As this build is not particularly corpse-dependent, it should make use of the Act 2 Nightmare Defensive Mercenary, who will provide Holy Freeze Aura to slow enemies.

Bone/Summoner Hybrid[]

Bone Summon Skills (Diablo II)

The Bone/Summoner Hybrid will divert some of the points that the Pure Bonemancer uses for synergy boosting to the Summoning Spells tree in order to pick up Revives, which provide relatively minor damage, but, more importantly, make very useful damage sponges to tank for the Necromancer.

Summoning Spells[]

  • Raise Skeleton: 1 Point. This summons a companion who is useful at low levels, but is mainly a prerequisite.
  • Skeleton Mastery: 1 Point. This will increase the life and damage of your Revives.
  • Clay Golem: 1 Point. Like the Pure Bonemancer, this guy will help out with tanking for the hybrid build.
  • Golem Mastery: 1 Point. Increases the life of your Golem.
  • Skeletal Mage: 1 Point. Prerequisite.
  • Blood Golem: 1 Point. Prerequisite.
  • Summon Resist: 1 Point. Adds elemental resistances to both your Golem and your Revives.
  • Iron Golem: 1 Point. Prerequisite.
  • Fire Golem: 0-1 Point. If you prefer a Fire Golem to Clay Golem, put a point here. Otherwise, leave it empty.
  • Revive: 1 Point. Provides the Bonemancer with extra tanks and some minimal extra damage. +Skills will allow you to revive more total monsters.

Poison and Bone Spells[]

  • Teeth: 10+ Points. This will provide an important synergy to your main damaging skills, but due to the extra points this build spends in the Summoning tree, it will not be pumped as highly as the Pure Bonemancer.

All other spells should follow the same template as the Pure Bonemancer.

Curses[]

Curse selection for this build will be the same as that of the Pure Bonemancer.

Mercenary[]

As this variant is significantly more corpse-dependent than the Pure Bonemancer, a Holy Freeze merc is not particularly desirable. I prefer to use a Might Mercenary (Act 2 Nightmare Offensive) to provide an extra damage boost to my revives.

Skill Placement[]

For either build, skill placement should follow these general guidelines:

  • For all skills, put 1 point in them as soon as they become available.
  • When Bone Wall becomes available, put a point into it each level until 18, when Bone Spear becomes available.
  • Max Bone Spear as soon as possible.
  • Once Bone Spear is maxed, you can put a few points into Bone Spirit if you want (5-10), or you can begin maxing Bone Wall and Bone Prison right away.
  • After Bone Wall and Prison are maxed, bring Bone Spirit up to 20.
  • Finally, after Bone Spirit is maxed, the rest of your points should be placed into Teeth to boost the damage of Spear and Spirit.

Gear[]

Bone Spear Screen (Diablo II)

A Bonemancer in action

  • Amulet: Mara's Kaleidoscope or a rare Amulet with similar bonuses to the aforementioned Circlet.
  • Weapon: Heart of the Oak or White. A HotO in a Flail is generally a better option due to its higher FCR and bonus to resistances, but White can provide significant boosts to your main skills; if made in a wand with +3 to Bone Spear, Bone Armor, and Bone Spirit, it could conceivably add up to 9 points to Bone Armor, 8 points to Bone Spear, and 6 points to Bone Spirit.
  • Armor: Enigma. +Skills, a large boost to Strength, and allows you to use Teleport, which is incredibly valuable for either variant, but is especially important for the Summoner hybrid, as it allows the Necromancer to keep his Revives active and engaged. The base armor will vary depending on how many stat points you want to invest into Strength.
  • Shield: Homunculus, Boneflame, or a Spirit Monarch. Any option is useful, though Homunculus is probably the best option, especially when socketed with a Perfect Diamond.
  • Rings: 2 Stone of Jordan are a great combination, though they are expensive. Since Insight will offset much of the stress on the Bonemancer's mana pool, the life bonus on Bul-Kathos' Wedding Band could be more appealing, and a low life leech BK ring is certainly easier than an SoJ to get your hands on.
  • Boots: Sandstorm Trek is probably the best option for the large amount of Poison resistance and the Vitality bonus. Marrowwalk can also be useful for the hybrid build for the slight bonus to Skeleton Mastery.
  • Charms: Your standard Annihilus and Hellfire Torch are, of course, recommended. Otherwise, try to stockpile Poison and Bone skillers and Small Charms with Life and Resistances (if needed).
  • Weapon Swap: The typical CtA/Spirit combination is recommended.

Mercenary[]

  • Weapon: Insight in an ethereal Colossus Voulge or Cryptic Axe. The most important aspect of this weapon is the Meditation Aura, which will provide the Necromancer with hugely increased mana regeneration, which is absolutely required to combat the high mana costs of his Bone spells. The runes are very easy to find, so it can be made in lower-level Polearms, and upgraded as better base weapons are found. However it is a ladder-only runeword.
  • Armor: Fortitude should be used for the huge damage bonus. It should be made in an ethereal Elite armor.


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