Diablo 4 Necromancer Build – Defiler: In this Diablo 4 Endgame Necromancer Build Guide, I’ll show you how to play an evolved version of the Corpse Explosion Build, specifically the Defiler Necromancer. The Defiler Necromancer is a burst DPS Diablo 4 Build that focuses on dealing high damage and landing one crit after the next. If you’ve been looking for a Diablo 4 Endgame Necromancer Build that is aimed at World Tier 3, and one that heavily makes use of Corpses and bones to obliterate enemies efficiently, then this guide is for you!
Diablo 4 Necromancer Build (Level 50+)
The way this Diablo IV Endgame Build works is you’re going to initiate combat using Bone Spear, especially against Elites. Doing so will make them Vulnerable right from the very start so it’ll be easier to slaughter them. Next, you’ll be blasting Corpses with Corpse Explosion to deal insane damage. Alternating between Bone Spear and Corpse Explosion will still make you destroy enemies quickly even in World Tier 3.
Not only will you restore Essence regularly upon detonating Corpses, but you’ll also be able to heal your Minions with the Raise Skeleton Skill. The cycle will then be repeated where you consume Corpses to maintain high resources at all times, followed by hitting hard due to the Critical Strike Damage you deal. Furthermore, because of the Ossified Essence Key Passive, you gain 1% bonus damage when using your Bone Skills for every Essence you have above 50, making you lethal on the battlefield. Because of your 180+ Essence, the increased damage you inflict will be more than 100%!
For Elites and Bosses, you’ll also be making use of Bone Storm for the amplified Damage over Time you and your Golem deal, together with the improved Critical Strike Chance.
Skill Distribution
Each Diablo 4 Necromancer Build comprises the 6 Active Skills they have equipped and changing these Skills can drastically alter the way the Necromancer Class in Diablo IV plays. In this section, we’ll take a look at what Skills you should slot for the Defiler Necromancer Diablo 4 Endgame Build. By the time you reach Level 50+, you’ll approximately have 58 points, assuming that you’ve accumulated enough Renown from different regions. So your Skill distribution should look something like this:
The above list gives you the general order to invest in Skills, but keep in mind that you should prioritize picking up new Active Skills over investing in passives, so pick up passives later if you can get new Active Skills when you level up.
Diablo 4 Defiler Endgame Necromancer Build – Skills
In this section, I’ll discuss the key similarities and differences in Skills between the previous Corpse Explosion Beginner Build and the current Defiler Endgame Build for the Necromancer Class. The strategies will change depending on the type of foe you’re facing whether they’re comprised of a large group of enemies or Elites and Bosses.
Bone Spear & Passives
Bone Spear is still going to be one of your major sources of damage, and it’s made all the better thanks to the passives and aspect of this Diablo IV Defiler Necromancer Build. Similar to the Corpse Explosion Beginner Necromancer Build, you’ll be maxing this Core Skill and unlocking Enhanced Bone Spear with Supernatural Bone Spear for the extra damage.
Speaking of passives, you’ll heavily invest in Unliving Energy to raise your Essence cap and Imperfectly Balanced to deal greater damage with Bone Spear even if you’re going to spend more resources. And then later on, you’ll be allocating 3 points into Death’s Reach to further increase your damage against targets who are far away from you.
You’ll then want to obtain the Splintering Aspect, which performs best when imprinted on a Two-Handed Weapon. This allows you to apply Vulnerable to several enemies, not just the first enemy you hit. As such, you can clear groups much faster than before. The Splintering Aspect can be acquired by completing the Guulrahn Slums Dungeon in Dry Steppes.
Corpse Explosion & Corpse Passives
Next is Corpse Explosion, which not only deals more damage against Vulnerable enemies but also generates a lot of Essence. As such, you’ll want to invest all 5 points into this Corpse Skill and then gain access to Enhanced Corpse Explosion and Plagued Corpse Explosion. The passives you’ll also need to max out to make this more effective are Hewed Flesh, Grim Harvest, and Fueled by Death. With these, you’re able to spawn more Corpses, restore Essence faster, and deal greater damage every time Corpse Explosion is triggered.
Next, you’ll want to obtain the Cadaverous Aspect. This increases the damage of your next cast of Bone Spear when you use Corpse Explosion. So as you’re detonating Corpses here and there, you’re also preparing to unleash the true power of this Core Skill by a certain %. And it can even be stacked up to 5x! The Cadaverous Aspect can be obtained from Legendary Items that have it.
Book of the Dead & Minion Passives
When it comes to the Book of the Dead, you’ll make use of all of your Minions. For the Skeletal Warriors, you’ll be selecting the 1st node of the Skirmisher instead of the 2nd node of the Reaper, unlike in the Diablo 4 Corpse Explosion Beginner Necromancer Build. Since you’ll be able to generate sufficient Corpses, you’re better off adding another Warrior to aid you in combat. This works well with the Blood Getter’s Aspect, allowing you to raise a total of 8 Skeletal Warriors when imprinted on the Amulet! The Blood Getter’s Aspect can only be retrieved from Legendary Items that have it.
In total, you’ll be able to command 12 Minions. From here, you’re better off slotting the Requiem Aspect on a Ring to raise your Maximum Essence based on the summons that is currently alive. And because the Ossified Essence Key Passive scales with your current Essence, you’ll end up dealing more than 50% increased damage! You can obtain this aspect in Scosglen.
For the Skeletal Mages, you’ll be selecting the 1st node of the Cold version instead of the 2nd node. Since you already apply Vulnerable to enemies with Bone Spear, you’re far better off generating additional Essence to constantly keep this resource up, hence the change in selection. For the Golem, you’ll retain the same setup as before where you’ll still go for the 1st node of the Bone form. Doing so will allow him to spawn a Corpse.
In terms of the Minion Passives, remember to max out Skeletal Warrior Mastery, Skeletal Mage Mastery, and Golem Mastery in order to significantly boost their damage and Life.
Other Bone Skills & Passives
The Defiler Diablo IV Endgame Necromancer Build becomes more interesting at higher levels because of the additional Bone Skills you get to unlock. You have Bone Storm as the Ultimate Skill where before there was none, several bone passives, Bone Splinters, and Ossified Essence. I’ve already explained what Bone Storm and Ossified Essence do so I’ll move on to the other abilities.
For the bone passives, you have Serration, Compound Fracture, and Evulsion. They not only increase your Critical Strike Chance and Critical Strike Damage with Bone Skills but also boost your damage against Vulnerable enemies. Meanwhile, you’re going to swap Decompose for Bone Splinters to be able to generate Essence better. When you unlock Acolyte’s Bone Splinters, it grants a Critical Strike Chance bonus upon attacking the same enemy for 3x.
Diablo 4 Defiler Endgame Necromancer Build – Equipment, Gems & Aspects
At World Tier 3, you’ll gain access to a lot of items together with their bonuses. It can be difficult to determine the right ones to keep for your Diablo IV Necromancer Endgame Build without the proper direction. So in this section, I’ll discuss the best gear bonuses you should chase after together with the Gems and aspects to place in them. Remember that you can replace unwanted affixes at The Occultist and that you should upgrade your gear at The Blacksmith for the best results.
Weapon
For the Weapon, I highly recommend equipping a Two-Handed Weapon simply because the aspect’s power you’ll end up using here will be boosted by 100% so it’s going to be a game-changer. The bonuses you’ll want include the following:
- Critical Strike Damage with Bone Skills
- Core Skill Damage
- Life On Kill
For the gem, you should pick the Emerald to further boost your Critical Strike Damage against Vulnerable targets.
Armor
For Armor, you have the Helm, Chest Armor, Gloves, Pants, and Boots. The major bonuses you’ll want here include the following:
- Critical Strike Damage with Bone Skills
- Ranks of Bone Spear
- Ranks of Corpse Explosion
- Critical Strike Chance
- Total Armor
- Maximum Essence
- Intelligence to deal greater Skill Damage
- Willpower for the improved Essence generation
- Dexterity for the enhanced Critical Strike Chance and Dodge Chance
Additionally, you’ll still want to slot the Ruby to raise your Maximum Life.
The Legendary Aspects you’ll need for your Armor are the Protecting Aspect, Aspect of the Protector, and Cadaverous Aspect. I’ve already talked about the Cadaverous Aspect so I’ll focus on the other two. The Protecting Aspect, which can only be obtained from Legendary Items, creates a magical aura that grants Immunity if you’re hit while below 80% Health. Comparatively, the Aspect of the Protector conjures a Barrier for 10 seconds once you attack an Elite or Boss. Aspect of the Protector can be obtained by finishing the Lost Archives Dungeon in Fractured Peaks.
Jewelry
For Jewelry, you have the Amulet and 2 Rings. The gear bonuses you’ll need include the following:
- Ranks of Death’s Reach Passive
- Critical Strike Chance
- Critical Strike Damage
- Vulnerable Damage
- Damage to Distant Enemies
- Damage Reduction
- Cooldown Reduction
You should then slot any of the gems like Diamonds that will grant additional Elemental Resistances based on what you currently lack.
Diablo 4 Defiler Endgame Necromancer Build – Paragon Board & Glyphs
At Level 50, you unlock the basic Paragon Board, which lets you gain Stat increases and specific bonuses to further enhance your Diablo 4 Defiler Endgame Necromancer Build. What you’ll want to focus on while you’re leveling from Level 50 to 70 is the Willpower Attribute to acquire the 40% damage boost from the Prime and Knowledge Rare Nodes.
In terms of Paragon Glyphs, the best one is the Corporeal Glyph for the increased Armor, Damage Reduction, and Physical Damage. Physical Damage is especially important since you have Minions who will help you attack enemies. Remember to invest in +40 Intelligence Nodes to access the additional Physical Damage bonus.
When you get to higher levels, you’ll eventually choose the specialized Necromancer Paragon Board for your Diablo IV Endgame Necromancer Build. Here, you’ll select the Flesh-Eater for the considerable increase in damage every time you use Corpse Explosion. Alternatively, you can go for Bone Graft so that when you activate your Bone Skills, you not only increase your damage but also your Maximum Essence as well.
Final Tips
There are a couple of things you can do to further amplify the overall damage of your Diablo 4 Defiler Necromancer Build, especially at higher levels. You have the option of imprinting your other Ring with the Aspect of Inner Calm or the Edgemaster’s Aspect based on the playstyle you’d like to adopt. Both of these can be acquired in Scosglen.
The Aspect of Inner Calm builds up your damage the longer you stand still. And because of the total number of Minions you have, you should remain safe. On the other hand, Edgemaster’s Aspect is better suited if you want to pilot a more mobile character. Here, the damage you deal will be based on the Essence you currently have so if it’s full then you’re more likely to inflict greater damage. You can even make use of the Elixir of Resourcefulness to raise your resources further, and therefore your damage as well.
Another way to maximize the effectiveness of Bone Spear is by equipping the Deathless Visage Sacred Unique Helm, which is a random drop. For every Bone Spear you cast, you leave behind “echoes” to deal additional damage so this is going to be very useful against large mobs or tough enemies.
Lastly, since you summon Cold Skeletal Mages, it would be best to imprint the Coldbringer’s Aspect on your Armor Coldbringer’s Aspect is great to have because it allows your Skeletal Mages to cast the Blizzard Spell every now and then to Chill and eventually Freeze enemies. Once Frozen, they’ll be much easier to get rid of, plus, you’ll end up taking less damage. Like the Deathless Visage, the Coldbringer’s Aspect is a random drop.
Be sure to check out our Diablo 4 Wiki for any other questions you have about the game and the Builds page if you are looking for more Diablo IV Builds, as well as our Diablo 4 Review, Getting Started Guide and Best Class to Play if you are looking for more Diablo 4 content!
