Follower Guide

[gajgl 1]

Hi one more thing.

More or less Dps. is not so important for followers in GR's. Wouldn't be more important secondary stat? (after Cool Down Reduction and Increased Attack Speed):

Amulet: Chance to blind on hit.

Shield and Weapon: Chance on hit to (Stun,Freeze,Blind..etc)

 

[Arkpit 101]

6 minutes ago, gajgl said:

Wouldn't be more important secondary stat?

Secondary stats are always more important for a follower. You only have followers for the extra crowd control they offer and some use templar for the extra heals + resource regen ofc.

I'm mostly a fan of using Enchantress due to The Sultan of Blinding Sand since the blind works on GR bosses which can't be said for all the other CC the followers offer.

For the Amulet, while the extra blind chance can be good it's down to your build since if there is any aoe in your build you probably still want to use The Ess of Johan for safety and the nice bunch up to get them all in one place.

[gajgl 1]

3 hours ago, Arkpit said:

Secondary stats are always more important for a follower. You only have followers for the extra crowd control they offer and some use templar for the extra heals + resource regen ofc.

I'm mostly a fan of using Enchantress due to The Sultan of Blinding Sand since the blind works on GR bosses which can't be said for all the other CC the followers offer.

For the Amulet, while the extra blind chance can be good it's down to your build since if there is any aoe in your build you probably still want to use The Ess of Johan for safety and the nice bunch up to get them all in one place.

Ok,thanks.

But you can for example equip The Sultan of Blinding Sand on Enchantress plus reroll the secondary blue stat. on the The Ess of Johan and get an extra 5,1% blind on hit chance so on the end you can get 40% blind on hit chance from the sword plus 5.1% from the amulet.Huge 45,1% blind on hit chance. Reroll can be done on any amulet and you can get only blind on hit.

Example no.2:With my Scoundrel i rerolled Dovu Energy trap and also got 5.1% Blind on hit plus the legendary affix.So he is freezing withBuriza-Do Kyanon  that i rerolled to lightning damage.Got him Wyrdward ring for stun from lightning damage.And he is blinding with his Dirty Fighting skill plus 5.1% blind on hit chance from the amulet.Slowing with Crippling Shot ,stun with Wyrdward and Powered Shot  and prolonging stun with legendary affix.

Example no 3:For templar you reroll sec. blue stat.on Freeze of Deflection and Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker get an extra 2,6% freeze on hit from each= 5.2% Freeze on hit,slowing with Intimidate, stunning with Charge, knocking back with Guardian,freezing with Freeze of Deflection ,stunning with Wyrdward and blind 5.1% on hit chance from rerolled  The Ess of Johan plus the legendary affix.

 

Edited January 16, 2018 by gajgl

[Arkpit 101]

36 minutes ago, gajgl said:

But you can for example equip The Sultan of Blinding Sand on Enchantress plus reroll the secondary blue stat. on the The Ess of Johan and get an extra 5,1% blind on hit chance so on the end you can get 40% blind on hit chance from the sword plus 5.1% from the amulet.

I'm 99% sure that all of the questions have the same answer here.

Because of the fact that the legendary items effect have different properties it will not add to a combined %chance in any of the cases for Blind and similar effect. The example above would become 40%, then 5,1% chance to blind with separate rolls.

I do not think the secondary on amu can actually blind a rift boss while the sultan can.

So, if all of the above is true I would not use blind hit on other items since if the 5,1% chance would hit then the sultans blind does not but there is also the calculation of individual cooldowns on the legendary items effects which could be an infinitly complicated calculation.

Edited January 16, 2018 by Arkpit

[gajgl 1]

On 1/16/2018 at 2:35 PM, Arkpit said:

I'm 99% sure that all of the questions have the same answer here.

Because of the fact that the legendary items effect have different properties it will not add to a combined %chance in any of the cases for Blind and similar effect. The example above would become 40%, then 5,1% chance to blind with separate rolls.

I do not think the secondary on amu can actually blind a rift boss while the sultan can.

So, if all of the above is true I would not use blind hit on other items since if the 5,1% chance would hit then the sultans blind does not but there is also the calculation of individual cooldowns on the legendary items effects which could be an infinitly complicated calculation.

Ok you are right.

But still i think that the guide should be change in Stat Priorities per Gear Slot because we are all use undying tokens on followers so Vitality,all Resistance are not important.

And we need them only on solo above 90 GR's,so High Damage Range,Sockets,Primary Stat,Critical Hit Chance are not important as well.Because the damage they do is almost 0.

Stat Priorities per Gear Slot:

Amulets:Cool Down Reduction,Increased Attack Speed,% Blind on hit,Primary Stat,Critical Hit Chance.

Shield:Block Chance,%(Blind,Freeze,Stun..etc)on hit,Primary Stat,Critical Hit Chance,Sockets/% Chance to inflict Bleed for X Weapon Damage over Y Seconds if using  Pain Enhancer

Weapons:Cool Down Reduction,Increased Attack Speed,%(Blind,Freeze,Stun..etc)on hit,High Damage Range,Primary Stat.

Always better some extra CC than DPS that does not do much.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 24, 2019 by gajgl

[Arkpit 101]

13 minutes ago, gajgl said:

Always better some extra CC than DPS that does not do much.

Yep, I do agree with above stat priorities for followers.

While I agree, the need for them beyond Unity and some blind chance is limited if any relevance at all so it's not a whole lot that changes even if you swap around the stats.

Edited January 16, 2018 by Arkpit

[Guest Guest Diamond]

Some questions about using Unity in solo with follower, and Cannot Die relics. I realize the follower wearing a Cannot Die effectively negates their damage they take but I wonder if anyone knows if there is more to it than they simply stop taking damage.

Does blizzard have any official statements how it works in more complete detail other than the tooltip description?

I wonder if you are running your templar with Unity ring for the damage sharing benefit, would it not be better to stack him with stats like Vitality, +Resist all, %life, Life Per Hit (questionable since their health never drops whether they would negate incoming damage they would take that would translate to my character?)

ex. for my Templar I have Primal Ancient Nutcracker (Viatility, CritDmg, Life per hit) considering rolling Crit to Str for block

and

Primal Ancient Enchanting Favor (Str, ResistAll, CritDmg, LifePerHit) considering re-rolling the crit to Vitality

This combined with putting ancients in rings, neck, shield, enchanting/augmenting for vitality, etc I'd be curious what people's thoughts are on if it would have a benefit to the damage mitigation ability of Unity?

My thought is the follower only has so much Vitality so whatever the limit is would be the maximum damage they could absorb for the 50% I would be sending. If I have 5634 vitality on my crusader, and my templar has 12,042  seems like he should be able to absorb any single hit which might one shot kill me and reduce mine by 50%. But if he had only say 2300 vitality I would receive no "oh sh.t" moment life saving benefits from the follower wearing Unity?

Anyways just thought I would ask, I'm not sure it's going to work or even matter as I'm not pushing very high anyways but I thought it seemed like the posibility existed for there to be more to the Unity ring connection than a straight 50% damage reduction. I usually don't even like wearing Unity with follower because they get stuck fighting packs that I might need to get away from and they keep sending me their damage.

Some questions about using Unity in solo with follower, and Cannot Die relics. I realize the follower wearing a Cannot Die effectively negates their damage they take but I wonder if anyone knows if there is more to it than they simply stop taking damage.

Does blizzard have any official statements how it works in more complete detail other than the tooltip description?

I wonder if you are running your templar with Unity ring for the damage sharing benefit, would it not be better to stack him with stats like Vitality, +Resist all, %life, Life Per Hit (questionable since their health never drops whether they would negate incoming damage they would take that would translate to my character?)

ex. for my Templar I have Primal Ancient Nutcracker (Viatility, CritDmg, Life per hit) considering rolling Crit to Str for block

and

Primal Ancient Enchanting Favor (Str, ResistAll, CritDmg, LifePerHit) considering re-rolling the crit to Vitality

This combined with putting ancients in rings, neck, shield, enchanting/augmenting for vitality, etc I'd be curious what people's thoughts are on if it would have a benefit to the damage mitigation ability of Unity?

My thought is the follower only has so much Vitality so whatever the limit is would be the maximum damage they could absorb for the 50% I would be sending. If I have 5634 vitality on my crusader, and my templar has 12,042  seems like he should be able to absorb any single hit which might one shot kill me and reduce mine by 50%. But if he had only say 2300 vitality I would receive no "oh sh.t" moment life saving benefits from the follower wearing Unity?

Anyways just thought I would ask, I'm not sure it's going to work or even matter as I'm not pushing very high anyways but I thought it seemed like the posibility existed for there to be more to the Unity ring connection than a straight 50% damage reduction. I usually don't even like wearing Unity with follower because they get stuck fighting packs that I might need to get away from and they keep sending me their damage.

[Guest lhkgh]

Rerolling whatever into whatever on follower is a waste of resources, because follower is not capable of dealing damage nor it is capable of defending itself.

Only useful stat on follower is cooldown reduction (so he/she uses skills more often) and some of the legendary affixes, ias in some scenarios.

AFAIK damage transfer with unity transfers pure damage split into half, before taking any stats into consideration, so it also doesn't matter whether your follower has all res and tons of vit as the damage will be split the same way between you two and then the toughness is taken into consideration. Even if you would pump his toughness by a lot the cannot die relic is still a must have, otherwise unity kills him on first shot, when the first dose of damage is transferred (with an obvious overkill).

Also when your follower is equipped with cannot die relic the damage split from unity is unilateral and damage is not transferred to you, because the follower takes essentialy 0 damage. Basically wearing unity with a unity on follower and cannot die relic doubles your toughness, with no drawbacks.

[Guest BulletProof]

What ring do I substitute for unity? Or do I not in this build, I’m squishy and really struggling to get to the gr100 due to time loss on death. Any advice?

[Freyja 12]

I'm using the Templar, and he has three items that have sockets: Thunderfury, Freeze of Deflection shield, and Justice Lantern ring.  Which gems, if any, should I put in the sockets?

[positiv2 950]

On 9/3/2018 at 6:01 PM, Freyja said:

I'm using the Templar, and he has three items that have sockets: Thunderfury, Freeze of Deflection shield, and Justice Lantern ring.  Which gems, if any, should I put in the sockets?

Hey, you should be using main stat gem (Flawless Royal Ruby in the case of Templar) for all non-weapon items, and Ruby for all weapons. So, in your case, you want to slot all sockets with the best ruby gems you can. Deadset submitted an extra clarification which should be up soon, so thank you for pointing out this missing information.

[Guest Luca Aeris]

Hello, I have a silly question regarding Unity. So, my crusader Akkhan build is supposed to have Unity in Kanai's Cube, not equipped on me, and equipped on follower (with immortality trinket). This is for solo play and it works great. However, if I join a multiplayer game and my follower leaves the "party", should I change my Kanai's Cube bonus to something else? Will it still apply a damage reduction with a missing follower? It shouldn't, but I have no way of knowing, if someone can help, please ?

[positiv2 950]

On 10/29/2018 at 11:53 AM, Guest Luca Aeris said:

Hello, I have a silly question regarding Unity. So, my crusader Akkhan build is supposed to have Unity in Kanai's Cube, not equipped on me, and equipped on follower (with immortality trinket). This is for solo play and it works great. However, if I join a multiplayer game and my follower leaves the "party", should I change my Kanai's Cube bonus to something else? Will it still apply a damage reduction with a missing follower? It shouldn't, but I have no way of knowing, if someone can help, please ?

It will apply a damage reduction effect if someone else in your group also has Unity and is taking less damage than you, but generally this is not worth the cube slot, as your party takes the same damage in total either way. Most of the time, you would be better off with a different item in your cube depending on your build.

[Guest Elekim]

Great guide! Just a few comments/questions:

1) I think that Cooldown Reduction should be a suggested (and highly desiderable) stat for the Templar's Shield too (instead of Vitality).

2) Can I suggest you to include a few more words about Followers in your class build guides? I suppose that each build has a preferred "Best-in-Slot" follower, or am I wrong? Maybe you should also mention a "Best-in-Slot" potion for each build, if any?

[Guest Elekim]

Another one:

3) When discussing alternative rings for builds that cannot equip Unity, you do not mention Wyrdward (which is suggested only on the tables). Isn't Wyrdward far superior than the "damage" options (Nagelring and BK's Wedding Band), supposing the Follower's equipping a ligthning-damage weapon? Following what you wrote, Oculus Ring seems a must, and thus all other options seems alternatives for Unity only (but your tables suggest them as alternatives to Oculus Ring too...)

[gajgl 1]

On 1/21/2019 at 10:50 AM, Guest Elekim said:

 

 

 

Edited January 27, 2019 by gajgl

[Guest Thunder]

On 1/24/2019 at 11:07 AM, gajgl said:

Hi

You can not reroll Cooldown Reduction on a shild.

Best rerolls on a Templar's shild are:

If using  Freeze of Deflection (100% best in slot) ,Defender of Westmarch are:

Block Chance,%(Freeze,stun,Blind..etc)on hit / Crowd Control Reduction,Primary Stat,Critical Hit Chance,Sockets /Chance to inflict Bleed for X Weapon Damage over Y Seconds if using  Pain Enhancer.

Link with Diablo Affix Planner:  http://wireframewebsolutions.com/d3affix/

 

 

 

Wrong: https://eu.diablo3.com/en/profile/Tobs-2866/hero/116082530

[gajgl 1]

On 1/29/2019 at 1:04 PM, Guest Thunder said:

Wrong: https://eu.diablo3.com/en/profile/Tobs-2866/hero/116082530

Sorry my wrong.Mixed up with AS.

Best rerolls on a Templar's shild, if using  Freeze of Deflection (100% best in slot) are:

Primary Affixes: Block Chance, Cooldown Reduction, Primary Stat and 3rd:Socket or Critical Hit Chance or Chance to inflict Bleed for X Weapon Damage over Y Seconds if using  Pain Enhancer.

Secondary Affixes: %(Freeze,stun,Blind..etc)on hit or Crowd Control Reduction.

And some other linx for followers:

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/d3/topic/12945954611

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/d3/topic/20419913563

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/d3/topic/20754897356

 

[Guest Guest]

Hello.

Ive been experimenting with a lot of different builds and my conclusion is that I dont need Ess of Johan.

Using lightning Azure, Wyrdward and Oculus on Templar and Enchantress.

The problem is I cant decide between Dovu and Overwhelming Desire.

Ive red somewhere that for your Wyrdward stuns to be really effective against RGs and Elites you have to use Dovu to go over their CC treshold.

I dont know if this is true, since when I tried their were some stuns certainly without Dovu too (on Enchantress as well).

Another question would be: why should I use Thunderfury over lightning Azure if im Using WoL Monk with Pinto or MS DH with Thrill of the Hunt.

I see no reason for it, and Azure gives a good chance for freezing too.

 

Thanks for the help.

 

[Guest Dr. Phil-Good]

Just out of curiosity, what about using legendary gems on follower jewelry? I cannot help but think that there are gems out there that would be far more useful than some of the lower priority stats on the jewelry. Sorry if this is a dumb question. I know followers really aren't there to do noticeable damage, but I feel like some other effects could be quite fun and interesting. Besides, lord knows I got leveled gems I don't need for any of my builds.

 

If utilizing legendary gems on a follower is in fact a viable thing, which ones would you recommend?

[Elekim 4]

Some notes on the Follower Skills section:

1) The Templar's skill Intimidate is said to be important for builds that use Bane of the Trapped, while Loyalty for those that use Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard. If I remember well, Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard is recommended (as best-in-slot or alternative) only in four Necromancer builds, three of which also recommends Bane of the Trapped. Thus it is not clear if for these 3 Necro builds the Templar is the recommended follower, and if so with which skill. Moreover, since builds which benefit from Life regeneration are so few, I think it shoul be worth mentioning explicitly the Loyalty Templar skill in these build's guides (either as the "best-in-slot" follower or as an alternative). Finally, since most builds use Bane of the Trapped, does this mean that the Templar is the best follower for them? Probably not, but this should be clarified (both here on the Followers page and on each individual build's page...).

2) Guardian lacks the icon and link.

3) I'm not experienced enough to judge how good is the 190k healing from Heal, but reading this guide Heal seems far superior than Intervene (which is not even mentioned). Similarly, I cannot judge how good is the resource regeneration given by Inspire, but by reading the guide Inspire seems better than Guardian for all builds that use resources heavily. Some builds are pure cooldown ones, while others use resources so intensively to recommend resource-generating affixes on gear too, and both are no-brainer for which Templar skill to choose (given the Templar is the best follower for them, which is an information that cannot be found on the guides): but which skill is better for all other builds that use some resources but not so heavily? To help unexperienced players a line should be added to the guides of this kind of builds stating if the Templar is their recommended follower, and if Inspire is recommended over Guardian or not.

4) These are not notes about the guide, but "newbye questions" that may let me better understand the game. By reading their text, Guardian seems to me superior than Heal: its healing is only 5% smaller but it adds knockback. Am I wrong? However, Inspire is still recommended most of the times: is it that good? And finally, Intervene seems so worse than the "simple" Heal not to be even mentioned in the guide: is Intervene really so useless?

5) Which are the builds that are "reliant on precision" that should opt for an Enchantress with Charm? And which are the builds that "rely on Attack Speed breakpoints" that should opt for an Enchantress with Focused Mind? Shouldn't this be explicitly written on these builds' guides?

[Elekim 4]

Some notes on the General Follower Gearing section, and some newbye questions:

1) Cooldown Reduction, which seems to be one of the most recommended affixes for a follower's gear, can be rolled on shields too: thus, the Templar's shield should have it as one (probably the first) of its stat priorities.

2) Given the importance of utility over damage, probably some secondary affixes (chance to blind on the amulet, chance to anything on the weapon and shield; maybe also "Reduces duration of control impairing effects" on amulet, rings and shield?) should be mentioned in the table of stat priorities (and higher than crit and damage stats).

3) Since the immortality follower-specific items seem a must (otherwise they will die within seconds), toughness stats (like Vitality and All Resistence) are useless (even damage stats are said not to be very useful at high Torments or GRs...). Thus I have a question about the "phylosophy" of the tables with the stat priorities: useless ones should be mentioned (for "completeness", in order to provide a list of at least 4 affixes for each item) or not? I think not. Why? Think about the following (hypothetical) situation: an unexperienced player (experienced ones maybe do not use these guides fully...) finds two Enchanting Favors, and looks at this page's table to decide which one to use: suppose one has rolled (as primary affixes) Strenght, Vitality, All Resistance and Armor, while the other has Strenght, Chance to Block, Armor and Life per Hit (with comparable magnitude). According to the table, the best choice may seem to use the first item after rerolling armor into Block Chance (thus obtaining all the four primary affixes among the list of recommended ones); however, if I read the guide carefully, the best option should be to take the second item and reroll Armor or Life per Hit into Crit Damage (the item will have only 3 of 5 recommended affixes, but the missing two are completely useless). In my opinion listing useless affixes as "priorities" may confuse players and make them take wrong decisions: what do you think?

4) A newbye question: does the socket on the amulet (for +280 primary stat) provide more damage output that "+80-160 damage", "Elemental Damage" or "Area Damage"? And is Crit Chance usually worse than Primary Stat as stated in the stat priority ordered list?

5) Are "Increased damage against elites" and "Bleed chance" really worse than a socket or +Vitality on a Templar's shield?

6) Aside the must-have CDR and IAS, weapons can roll many damaging affixes: high base damage range, high "+ elemental damage" range, primary stat, a socket (with a ruby for additional 270 damage), damage %, increased damage against elites, area damage, and bleed chance: are the recommended ones (i.e., if I understood well, base+elemental damage, primary stat, and socket) really the best ones? Why?

[Elekim 4]

Finally, some notes about the Specific Follower Gearing section:

1) When discussing alternative rings for builds that cannot equip Unity, you do not mention Wyrdward (which is suggested only on the tables). Isn't Wyrdward far superior than the "damage" options (Nagelring and BK's Wedding Band), supposing the Follower's equipping a ligthning-damage weapon? Also, I think it should be worth mentionig explicitly the need of lighting damage on the follower in order to use this ring's effect.

2) If I understood weel, the best items for the Templar seem to be: Thunderfury, Freeze of Deflection, Enchanting Favor and the Ess of Johan, but with which rings? Are Unity and Oculus Ring still the best choices (as written in the table), or it is better to wear the synergistic Wyrdward and Justice Lantern (as the text may seem to suggest)? In the second case, the table should switch "Best in Slot" and "Alternative" labels; in both cases, I think, which setup is the best one should be written more clearly...

[Yolo 40]

2 hours ago, Elekim said:

Finally, some notes about the Specific Follower Gearing section:

1) When discussing alternative rings for builds that cannot equip Unity, you do not mention Wyrdward (which is suggested only on the tables). Isn't Wyrdward far superior than the "damage" options (Nagelring and BK's Wedding Band), supposing the Follower's equipping a ligthning-damage weapon? Also, I think it should be worth mentionig explicitly the need of lighting damage on the follower in order to use this ring's effect.

2) If I understood weel, the best items for the Templar seem to be: Thunderfury, Freeze of Deflection, Enchanting Favor and the Ess of Johan, but with which rings? Are Unity and Oculus Ring still the best choices (as written in the table), or it is better to wear the synergistic Wyrdward and Justice Lantern (as the text may seem to suggest)? In the second case, the table should switch "Best in Slot" and "Alternative" labels; in both cases, I think, which setup is the best one should be written more clearly...

Oculus ring is a best choice in every situation, as it procs often (youll see at least one proc per pack) and you can make it work with melee classes with smart and quick reposition. If you dont have Unity, use wyrdward with a Lightning damage weapon. Justice lantern is the worst of all choices, as mobs tend to attack you more, not your Follower. This is especially true to taunting builds. 

[Elekim 4]

3) Talking about the Templar, Lidless Wall is presented as an alternative for Freeze of Deflection for its elemental boost. But for which element? physycal? Also, by equipping Lidless Wall on the Templar and opening the "Details" tab, I see no "+% elemental damage" entry: are you sure that "elemental damage %" works for followers?