LoD Singularity Necromancer Group Speed Farming Variation

The LoD "Rat" Skeletal Mage Necromancer can be adapted to be a group Greater Rift speed farmer, especially when coupled with an appropriate team composition of Support Necromancer and Support Barbarian. The build deviates in some ways from the base solo progression spec, most notably in weaponry and its approach to fights.

Active Skills
Simulacrum Reservoir Skeletal Mage Life Support 1 Blood Rush Metabolism 2 Devour Devouring Aura 3 Land of the Dead Shallow Graves 4 Bone Armor Harvest of Anguish
Passive Skills
Dark Reaping Extended Servitude Final Service Overwhelming Essence

A large part of your skill selection from the solo build will still make sense during GR XP farming. The basis of your damage still lies in the synergy between the (free) Skeletal Mage Singularity rune and the near-instantaneous Essence refills provided by Devour during Land of the Dead uptime, coupled with the extension of your overall Essence pool reserve via Simulacrum Reservoir and Overwhelming Essence. All the alterations made to skills will be made in service of speed and length of buffs, namely:

• The Devour rune will be changed to the speedrun-appropriate Devouring Aura, whose power snowballs very effectively with the kill speed inside speed GR runs.
• Land of the Dead will be changed to the lengthier effect of Shallow Graves, as the CC necessary for the full effect of Krysbin's Sentence will be applied by your support teammates; you only care for the Corpse generating effect and its length.
• Bone Armor will be taken with the farming-oriented Harvest of Anguish, due to the movement speed buff.
• Cursing will not be required from you, so your final active skill slot should be taken by Blood Rush, with the doubled charges of Metabolism.

Most of your passive selection from progression will be retained, with Final Service (cheat death) and Overwhelming Essence (extra Essence for DPS) still providing tremendous value. Life from Death from the solo spec can be dropped, since you will be fed enough globes by your teammates, and the rate of Reaper's Wraps resource restoration has been tamed by its newfound internal cooldown. Extended Servitude is a good replacement, as additional summon duration is never unwelcome. Blood is Power from the soloing spec should be changed to Dark Reaping to provide you with a steady source of life and Essence from the lightning-fast monster kills during farming.

From the Devour-related items, Requiem Cereplate retains its value for the snowballing effect in a speed run, and Razeth's Volition remains vital with the free Singularity and Gift of Death effects it provides.

From the "generic" legendaries, consider using Andariel's Visage over Leoric's Crown for the damage gain, and keep Reaper's Wraps — they remain a cornerstone item in the build for their resource regeneration.

The damage-increasing legendaries are highly desirable in speeds, so you will maintain Tasker and Theo for the pet attack speed, Hexing Pants of Mr. Yan for the damage and resource generation increase, and take The Witching Hour over Dayntee's Binding for the extra attack speed and crit damage.

Since speed is essential in XP runs, you will be wearing Steuart's Greaves over the progression-oriented Ice Climbers, and will be slotting Blood Rush Metabolism in your active skills accordingly (see above).

You will focus entirely on damage-oriented jewelry over the progression spec, with Circle of Nailuj's Evol making way for Convention of Elements and Krysbin's Sentence still amplifying damage dealt vs. crowd controlled foes, and topping the selection off with Haunted Visions as your amulet.

The weapon and offhand are, as always, Scythe of the Cycle, plus your best rolled phylactery with appropriate stats.

To help you with farming the gear you need for your builds, we have two very useful guides that you can access by clicking the links below: a Salvage Guide to help you quickly check whether or not you can safely salvage a piece of gear and a Legendary Farming Guide to help you efficiently farm legendaries and set items.

The former Season 28 theme, the Altar of Rites, has been revised and re-added to Diablo 3 as a permanent character progression mechanic. — For virtually all builds and players of all skill levels — from casual to advanced — we recommend progressing through the Altar tree using the path outlined below. The suggested path is geared towards maximum quality of life first, then amplifying damage, and then mopping up the tree with defensive and edge case utility nodes.

Note that while they require reaching them with a Seal, Legendary Potion Powers are not part of the Seal cost system; Potions unlock with a separate resource called Primordial Ashes, obtained from salvaging Legendary or Set items of Primal (red bordered) quality. Upgrade them as soon as possible, and in the order shown below (courtesy of Caleko's Altar of Rites planner).

You can read more on the Altar of Rites, Seals and Legendary Potion Powers in our dedicated Altar of Rites Mechanics guide.

You will maintain the same legendary gem setup as the solo GR progression build, with Bane of the Trapped, Enforcer, and Legacy of Dreams remaining as your most desirable gems.

For more information about gems, please refer to our guide on gems.

You will maintain Reilena's Shadowhook as your weapon Cube power, St. Archew's Gage as your armor Cube power for some upfront shielding during engagements, and add Squirt's Necklace as your jewelry Cube power for a consistent damage bonus (the toughness downsides of Squirt's should be negated by your support teammates).

Once you get a feel that you are beginning to overpower the GR difficulty you have selected for farming purposes, you can make a quick swap of the weapon Cube power to Messerschmidt's Reaver to further snowball that effect.

The Kanai's Cube can be used for much more than simply extracting Legendary powers from items. Please refer to our Kanai's Cube guide for more information.

Your recommended potion is Bottomless Potion of the Tower, whose Armor-increasing properties complement the naturally high All Resistances stat of Necromancers (due to Intelligence scaling resistances) for optimal survivability.

This Season revives the Pandemonium Kill Streak buff from Season 19. Each stack grants a bonus to movement speed and damage, capping at +50% movement speed and +100% damage at 1000 kills. Hitting specific kill thresholds unleashes powerful effects. Read more in our dedicated Season of the Eternal Conflict Mechanics Guide!

While speedfarming sees limited use from this theme, Greater Rift pushing benefits significantly. Effects like Geysers (150), Meteors (400), and Angels (500) can clear elites and Rift Guardians instantly. Players may reset streaks after 150 kills to repeatedly trigger Geysers or push for 500+ kills near boss fights, often using Nemesis Bracers to spawn extra enemies.

Because the most potent effects (Geysers, Meteors, Angels) can obliterate Rift Guardians instantly up to GR150, players can retool builds for efficiency and comfort. Here’s how:

Since you can rely on killstreak procs to clear the Rift Guardian, Bane of the Stricken can be safely omitted in favor of:

• Another generic damage-scaling legendary gem ( Bane of the Trapped for builds with any form of crowd control and/or melee range, Zei's Stone of Vengeance for far ranged builds, Taeguk for channeling builds, Simplicity's Strength for primary attack-focused builds, Enforcer for pet-oriented builds, etc.)
• A survivability-oriented legendary gem ( Esoteric Alteration, Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard), or additional utility ( Gogok of Swiftness for CDR-reliant builds, Pain Enhancer for attack speed-heavy builds, or Wreath of Lightning for extra movement speed).

Adjust your equipment to items that favor durability, health sustain, and ease of movement. Consider adjusting non-essential skills for the build to ones that pull, reposition, or otherwise displace enemies to facilitate large pulls of enemy packs. In more concrete terms, this means:

• For class-specific items, Necromancers should consider Dayntee's Binding if it's absent from the build; this is a powerful damage reduction item that incentivizes you to be mindful of utility skills by spreading curses on as large of an enemy pull as possible (especially in conjunction with popular Necro passives such as Spreading Malediction). This synergizes well with the killstreak theme.
• For additional options that balance between defense and offense, the class-specific amulet Wisdom of Kalan extends the Bone Armor stack maximum and can fit into several builds, while other helpful cross-class jewelry includes Unity (combined with the same ring on the follower plus a follower immortality token), and the Endless Walk set ( The Traveler's Pledge and The Compass Rose).
• Situational items that can bolster your defenses include Stone Gauntlets, the drawbacks of which are negated via CC-immunity effects like Ice Climbers, or the Altar of Rites CC-immunity node. The class-specific Razeth's Volition and the class-agnostic Aquila Cuirass are powerful and popular choices for low Essence-spending builds, especially ones built around generators like LoD Poison Scythe. A final niche consideration is Mantle of Channeling, which balances between defense and offense for channeling builds, often built around Iron Rose.
• Utility items like Nemesis Bracers are essential as more elites mean more killstreak maintenance and faster progression. When soloing, they should be equipped by your follower; in groups, at least one party member should commit to wearing them. When focusing strictly on speed, Steuart's Greaves can be a powerful inclusion for scouting, but builds that are locked into other items for the slot can turn to niche options like Warzechian Armguards or Krelm's Buff Belt. To facilitate large pulls, consider using a Follower equipped with The Ess of Johan, a proc-based analogue to an enemy-pulling skill (albeit outside your control).
• Skill-wise, make sure to include at least one movement skill tool like Blood Rush. While Necromancers lack an easily available enemy-pulling tool (Rathma Necros build around Army of the Dead Death Valley, but are an exception), a stunning skill like Bone Armor Dislocation can help manage large packs of enemies and doubles as a Krysbin's Sentence proc. Take a look if you can include passives like Final Service (for a cheat-death) or Fueled by Death (for extra movement speed).