While the Poison Mages are pretty alright (insane amounts of buff compared to before; other than you can't poison something for 10 minutes while you get a beer) and the others are buffed; you have to compare to Poison + Summoner.
60 PNova, 20 Skeleton, 20-ish single points to skill LR, Revives, and Summon Resist. Your skeletons end up doing maybe half damage compared to a 20 SM build, but you gain 6+K poison damage on everything on the screen. Anyone can tell you that most of your damage as a pure summoner comes from the Merc and CE. By halving your Skeleton's damage but gaining screen-wide poison damage you get to keep a ridiculous meat shield for you/your merc while having great kill speed. Mages might be more fun than they were for leveling; but they don't help the issue summoners have: Spread out damage or tight areas.
IMO, it makes mages more fun if you skill them, but you'll still likely only be using them for decoration or meat shields; or possibly to apply chill.
NOTE: With decent (not godly) gear; you'll still have 15+ in SM and 15+ in Mages with only 1 hard point.
This post was edited by CyborgBipBoop on Jan 24 2022 11:23am