Back in the day, I ran summon necro with an act 2 might merc using infinity, and pride on my iron golem. The merc handled most early kills and bosses, CE did the rest.

Now act 5 mercs seem much stronger. I’m thinking of using one with grief + last wish, which means dropping either pride or infinity.
However dropping Infinity loses the merc’s -defense from conviction; dropping pride lowers the damage of this merc (and skeleton warriors, revives).

With the new sunders and ancient jewels, I am thinking about min/maxing my merc and CE damage:
- Wear a phoenix shield
- Socket a -5 fire facet & -10 ancient facet in circ
- Keep a -10 fire sunder in stash

This gives -53 fire res and sundered enemies. Against fire immunes, it's stronger than infinity; against normal monsters, it's 33 res lower. Redemption removes corpses, but because of its delay CE should be fine and it allows me to skip maek, and pride could go back on my golem.

What do you think: Worth it, or is the -defense from infinity (and +3 skills in build) still better? Anyone tried this setup?

This post was edited by J33 on Mar 12 2026 06:50am

Phoenix shield and corpse explosion isn't a very well thought out plan

You won't have any corpses to explode

Phoenix is just bad because all your corspe gonna transfer into life/mana

mentioned this, there's a delay in redeeming. The corpse explosion is cast right at kill, I have plenty of time. Summoning can be done with the cta/spirit, it gives as much +skills as hoto+phoenix

This post was edited by J33 on Mar 12 2026 06:54am

Nah, forget about act 5 mercs. Infinity is the CORE of a necro. And act 2 merc is the HERO, you are there just to help him. I will say as many times as it needed.
Infinity has:
great damage
awesome crushing blow to kill bosses
greatly increases your corpse explosion damage (fire)
greatly increases your chance to hit for your merc and your skeletons

Corpse explosion is all about having the first body, and no one is better than the act 2 merc to do that. Skeletons are nice, but they are just a body shield for your merc.
Absolutely do NOT wear phoenix, it removes your corpse explosion bodies.
You can drop the pride in golem and change it for a insight if you don't have many items with +mana.

There’s only 2 upgrades in RotW compared to the BiS previous setup.

75fcr > 125fcr
125fcr lose a lot of dmg/AoE radius and merc kill speed (no beast), and it’s only useful for longer tele distances cuz you can’t cast faster than your merc kills after telestomp anyway.

Enigma
Beast
Homunculus, fire facet is replaced by protector fire (only -res matters)
FF -15
Arach
Magefist > trang (your amp radius is already bigger than CE)
2/15fcr amy
2x 10fcr rings
Any boots you like
Torch anni cta
Fire sunder is replaced by renewed with -fire%
Phys sunder (absolutely worth using dual sunders, even if only 1 can be renewed, unless you farm an area you know doesn’t have native phys immunes)

FF is a helm that people still doubt on this build, but it shines here.
+3 CE and -15 is max you can get on helm slot, but it also gives good mana, fixes your fire res malus, fixes your merc’s fire res malus from Andy so you can either put a Cham or 15/40 in there to buff him, makes all your summons immune to fire (which is the only thing that often kills them cuz they don’t have mdr/sorb to reduce all those small ticks of dmg).

You could replace homunculus by spirit, and use 2 soj and mara instead (trading 35fcr for 35fcr), but you lose 10 fire pen and huge maek, leaving no room for this new protector jewel which also comes with nice other mods. You can get you want, like mf or whatever, on those 2 rare rings and crafted amy.

Phoenix… I read what you wrote. I experienced a lot of game time with all options. For me, Phoenix is the worst of them.
Sure you can get an extra 18 fire pen here, but it’s an overkill most of the time. You lose big time on everything else you need that homunculus brings to this build. Spirit also feels better than phoenix.
Redemption is ticking each 50 frames. Even if you can cast CE on the single corpse your merc provided you after telestomp, it still happens that redemption cleans it right before you can cast CE. This is a massive waste of time, much worse than whatever small dmg increase you could get against immunes.

Now… the merc…
A2 is king.
A5 is just clunky, no matter how good he looks on paper, even if you find a way to calculate higher dps or whatever, he never beats the kill speed of a well built a2 merc. The bash one is overriding amp with battle cry, the frenzy one is wasting time casting taunt, and his 2nd attack is bugged and almost always miss.
Not only a2 gets you a kill faster on telestomp, but he also provides a higher might aura lvl (not that your summons dmg really matter at this point), and infinity. It’s a no brainer choice, not even close.

With beast on nec, the best infinity base is GPA.
CoH or Fort, I prefer CoH to make sure I never shatter a corpse, and it gives practically as much dmg with 200ed vs demons, 100ed vs undead, 2skill (might and jab for extra ed close to 300 from Fort).
Andy, with either Cham or 15/40. Feels similar, Cham is bringing a more constant flow cuz CbF, 15/40 is great until frozen, so the power spike varies.

Merc is seriously the most important part of your build. You can use any cheap rand rolls on all the items on nec, but you really want a perf or near perf ed% infinity. You can push his dmg to almost always kill any mob with a single jab, which let him kill the target on frame 9 of his 2nd attack, and your cast rate is 10 frames, right on time to cast CE after telestomp. It’s fast. And on p1, with enough -fire/dr you can nearly guarantee to 1-hit KO the whole screen, as long as you telestomp the right mobs (target those with higher base life, not the squishy ones in mixed packs).

Hope that helps.

This post was edited by SinsOfTheSun on Mar 12 2026 07:55am

Thanks a lot! I haven't tried the a5 merc myself yet and testing would cost me some prides and infinity. Your point on phoenix feels valid, even though in my experience 50frames is a lot of time. But with infinity added, it's overkill anyways indeed.
Doesn't physical immune completely get covered by amp however? it feels like a big sacrifice to me to add that extra sunder

Oh and do you feel 5maek from homunculus is enough?

About fcr, i really like having 125. That makes you tele faster, curse faster, explode faster. Everything is so much smooth.
circlet 20fcr
amu 20
spirit 35
gloves 20
arach 20
ring 10
With this setup you have you weapon free to use beast, an alibaba for mf or anything you like.
Ofc you can go with hoto in hand for easier items.

yeah me2, hoto isn't a bad option either but fanaticism is really good for your merc ias

but i'd go your way as well...
thought about using the new hellwarden helm, 1 skill 20fcr -8fire res 6maek... that's pretty solid I guess, though it's just 3 more -res than a 2sox circ

This post was edited by J33 on Mar 12 2026 08:07am

Act 2 merc is a monster and can be loaded with shitloads of crushing blow. Skeletons do lots of damage when telestomping, + skills matter. There is a delay between each attack, however you can accelerate the attack animation itself with fanatism to achieve more dps. Even hustle is good enough, doesn't have to be beast.