Masquerade Bone Spear Necromancer Key Farming Variation

Last updated on Apr 10, 2024 at 09:00 by Deadset 51 comments
Build Variations Updated for Season 30, Patch 2.7.7 Main Build Solo Greater Rift Progression Nephalem Rift Farming
1.

Regular Rift Key Farming

The Masquerade Bone Spear Necromancer deals with Normal Rift quite well, making the build well suited for the purposes of key farming. We have solo speed GR rankings and solo speed T16 rankings if you want to know more about which builds are best for speed farming.

Within the limited scope of regular difficulties, the necessary damage and toughness to triumph over the enemy is significantly smaller. Thus, your best course of action is to improve utility and speed.

2.

Adapting Skills

Active Skills
Left Mouse Button Grim Scythe Icon Grim Scythe Frost Scythe Frost Scythe Right Mouse Button Bone Spear Icon Bone Spear Teeth Teeth 1 Devour Icon Devour Devouring Aura Devouring Aura 2 Bone Armor Icon Bone Armor Harvest of Anguish Harvest of Anguish 3 Blood Rush Icon Blood Rush Metabolism Metabolism 4 Simulacrum Icon Simulacrum Reservoir Reservoir
Passive Skills
  • Bone Spear Bone Spear will still be the main damage dealer, but you should swap the precise, progression-oriented Blighted Marrow Blighted Marrow rune for the AoE convenience of Teeth Teeth, and adjust elemental rolls on gear to Physical accordingly.
  • Simulacrum Simulacrum is still an integral part of the build, and all of its runes will be provided by the Masquerade set bonus.
  • For maximum convenience, you should add Devour Devour to the build along with Devouring Aura Devouring Aura, which automates the consumption effect and synergizes nicely with the worn Avarice Band Avarice Band.
  • As a backup whenever you run out of Corpses to Devour Devour, you should still keep Grim Scythe Grim Scythe around — along with the IAS-oriented Frost Scythe Frost Scythe rune to speed up the resource restoration process.
  • Bone Armor Bone Armor will be taken with the farming-oriented Harvest of Anguish Harvest of Anguish due to the movement speed buff.
  • For maximum mobility, Blood Rush Blood Rush will be taken with the doubled charges of Metabolism Metabolism.

Some of your passive selection from the GR specs will be retained, with Stand Alone Stand Alone (massive armor bonus for non- and low-summoning builds) and Bone Prison Bone Prison (crowd control for Bone Spear Bone Spear) still providing tremendous value. Add to them Final Service Final Service (for the cheat death preventing the occasional mishap) and Fueled by Death Fueled by Death (to further your mobility during standard rift farming.)

3.

Adapting Gear

You will keep most of the items from the progression-oriented setup, with the majority of the Masquerade set remaining in place, but run a 5-piece setup with a Ring of Royal Grandeur Ring of Royal Grandeur in the Cube to attain the 6-piece bonus. You should make the following gear alterations:

Slot Pieces Stat Priority
Head
  1. Intelligence
  2. Socket
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Bone Spear Damage %
  5. Physical or Lightning Resistance (Secondary Stat)
  6. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Shoulders
  1. Intelligence
  2. Area Damage
  3. Resource Cost Reduction
  4. Vitality
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Torso
  1. Intelligence
  2. 3 Sockets
  3. Vitality
  4. Armor
  5. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Wrists
  1. Intelligence
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Physical Damage %
  4. Vitality
  5. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Hands
  1. Intelligence (replaced by Attack Speed at High Paragons)
  2. Critical Hit Damage
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Area Damage
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Waist
  1. Intelligence
  2. Vitality
  3. Armor
  4. Life %
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
  6. Life per Kill (Secondary Stat)
Legs
  1. Intelligence
  2. 2 Sockets
  3. Vitality
  4. Armor
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Feet
  1. Intelligence
  2. Bone Spear Damage %
  3. Vitality
  4. Armor
  5. Physical or Lightning Resistance (Secondary Stat)
Amulet
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Damage
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Physical Damage %
  5. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Ring #1
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Damage
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Area Damage or Attack Speed
  5. Life per Kill (Secondary Stat)
Ring #2
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Damage
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Area Damage or Attack Speed
  5. Life per Kill (Secondary Stat)
Weapon
  1. High Weapon Damage
  2. Intelligence
  3. Socket (preferably from Ramaladni's Gift Ramaladni's Gift)
  4. Attack Speed
  5. Damage %
Off-hand
  1. Intelligence
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Area Damage
  4. Bone Spear %

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.

3.1.

Altar of Rites

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).

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.

4.

Adapting Gems

You will maintain Zei's Stone of Vengeance Zei's Stone of Vengeance as a universally useful damage multiplication gem in the build, but should replace Bane of the Trapped Bane of the Trapped for Boon of the Hoarder Boon of the Hoarder for the Avarice Band Avarice Band-Goldwrap Goldwrap synergy during farming runs, and drop the Greater Rift Guardian-oriented Bane of the Stricken Bane of the Stricken for the generic damage increase of Bane of the Powerful Bane of the Powerful.

Slot Gems
Jewelry
Helm
Torso and Pants
Weapon

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

5.

Adapting Kanai's Cube

For your weapon slot, you can run either Messerschmidt's Reaver Messerschmidt's Reaver (solo normal rift farming) or In-geom In-geom (group normal rift farming) as your cooldown reduction powerhouse; both will work exceptionally well with the build.

Tucked away in the Cube, Krelm's Buff Belt Krelm's Buff Belt will provide you with a considerable and consistent speed boost throughout your runs.

In the base suggested setup above, you will have to slot the Ring of Royal Grandeur Ring of Royal Grandeur in order to maintain the 6-piece Masquerade bonus while enjoying extra utility legendary powers.

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.

6.

Follower

The recommended follower for this build during standard T16 rifts farming is the Enchantress due to her vast array of bonuses that complement this build; most notably, Prophetic Harmony Prophetic Harmony for the Cooldown Reduction and Amplification Amplification for the elemental damage increase, both of which you can attain by using a Hand of the Prophet Hand of the Prophet.

For more information regarding followers, we advise you to read our Follower Guide, which contains detailed advice for choosing the skills and the gear of your follower.

7.

Legendary Potion

Your recommended potion is Bottomless Potion of the Unfettered Bottomless Potion of the Unfettered, which renders you immune to Crowd Control effects for a brief time after consuming it — valuable bonus to a build that lacks means to break away from CC outside of straight up evasion via Blood Rush Blood Rush.

8.

Changelog

  • 10 Apr. 2024: Guide reviewed for Season 31.
  • 10 Jan. 2024: Revised guide for the permanent addition of the Altar of Rites, and added Season-specific Soul Shard recommendations.
  • 13 Sep. 2023: Added Season 29 Paragon Cap and Gearing recommendations.
  • 22 Feb. 2023: Added Season 28 Altar of Rites recommendations.
  • 26 Aug. 2022: Added Season 27 Angelic Crucible recommendations.
  • 14 Apr. 2022: Guide reviewed for Season 26.
  • 08 Dec. 2021: Added Season 25 Soul Shard recommendations.
  • 22 Jul. 2021: Added S24 Ethereal recommendation.
  • 01 Apr. 2021: Minor build revision and added follower recommendation.
  • 25 Nov. 2020: Adjustment to the 4th Cube slot recommendation in Season 22.
  • 19 Nov. 2020: Revision of item, skill, and passive recommendations, alongside advice for Season 22 changes.
  • 01 Jul. 2020: Page added.
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