Dear exiles! Welcome to the top 3 PoE Minion builds. These builds contain Mage Skeleton, Archer Skeleton, and Poison SRS.
1. Mage Skeleton Guardian
Let's start with this classic minion build that is like having fireworks on your screen, the Mage Skeletons Guardian with the Templar class. I'm sure you will remember that to transform a regular Skeleton into a Mage ones. You used to need a unique jewel called Dead Reckoning, but that's changed because of the new Transfigured Gems. Now we have the Summon Skeletons of Mages gem, which naturally summons Mage Skeletons without the need for any mandatory unique item and for a much lower price. This means that Mage Skeletons became an even better starter than before.
Pros
Super tanky
3 free auras
Awesome boss damage
Safe gameplay
Cheap
Easy to build
No mandatory unique item
Cons
Mage Skeletons don't move
No evasion or spell suppression
No elemental resistance buff
Budget
We need around 50 Chaos Orbs – 4 Divine Orbs.
Clear Speed 8/10
You have many skeletons firing many projectiles at a high cast speed rate. I took two points out because the Mage Skeletons don't move, and you need to keep re-summoning them. I also took note that the Guardian does not get the Flesh Offering speed buff like the Necromancer.
Boss Damage 9/10
The boss damage is also amazing. With the new Returning Projectiles support gem, 100% of projectiles will hit enemies twice. But since it's not as powerful as the nerfed Anomalous Faster Projectiles, I took one point out.
Survivability 10/10
This build has a big load of defensive layers, such as high armour, 75% chance to block attacks and spells. A minion that takes 20% of the damage for you, and since it's a minion build, you are far from danger all the time.
2. Archer Skeleton Guardian
Let's take the previous build to another level and make the Archer Skeletons Guardian with the Templar class. I'm pretty sure that, at this point, you all know about the very popular Mage Skeletons build. With the new transfigured gems, we now also have the Archer Skeletons. I spent my weekend trying that out, and I got this super fun build as a result. I hope you guys all enjoy it.
Pros
3 free auras
Awesome boss damage
Safe gameplay
Currency farmer
Cheap
Easy to build
Smooth gameplay
Cons
Less block chance
No evasion or spell suppression
Budget
We need about 80 Chaos – 4 Divs.
Mandatory Uniques
You only need one mandatory unique item for this build - the Lioneye's Vision Armor, which already grants the Pierce Support and allows us to have one more Support Gem for our Skeletons.
Clear Speed 9/10
We have many Archer Skeletons firing many arrows with high attack speed. And unlike the Mage Skeletons version that uses the spell Echo. Here, we can easily cast 4 skeletons at a time in different locations and increase the angle of destruction a lot.
Boss Damage 9/10
This build was capable of destroying big bosses in just a few seconds, even before the recent buffs.
Survivability 9/10
As a minion build, you stay far from danger while they tank and kill everything for you. It's a very safe playstyle. But this build also counts with over 90,000 effective HP because of high armor, block chance, and a minion that takes 20% of the damage for you. I only took one point out because since we're not using the staff like the Mage Skeletons version, we end up with less block chance and effective HP.
3. Poison SRS Guardian
Finally, we have an amazingly strong endgame build, the Poison Raging Spirits Guardian with the Templar Class. This build takes advantage of the high number of Raging Spirits we can summon to stack an absurd amount of poison on our enemies. Originally, I was trying to build it as a Necromancer. But with the Guardian, we lose just a little bit of damage but get almost three times more survivability.
Pros
Safe gameplay
Amazing boss damage
Great clear speed
Currency farmer
Easy leveling
Easy to play
High armour
High block chance
High life regeneration
Cons
Little evasion
Can't leech life or mana
Spirits need to be casted all the time
Budget
Need around 10 Divs.
Mandatory Uniques
You need four mandatory unique items for this build. The first one is the United in Dream Sword, which grants the Envy aura for a large amount of chaos damage to our minions. It also grants them a 60% chance to poison on hit.
We also need the Darkness Enthroned belt with two abyss jewel sockets to achieve a 100% chance to poison on our minions.
Nest, we need Covenant armor that grants our Raging Spirits a level 29 Added Chaos Damage support, which means a lot more chaos damage.
Finally, we also need the Ancient Skull, which grants our minions a huge damage and attack speed boost.
Clear Speed 9/10
Even though we have many fast minions that destroy everything in seconds, they have a short duration and need to be re-summoned all the time.
Boss Damage 10/10
You easily end up with over 30 million DPS. That is more than enough to decimate every boss in the game.
Survivability 10/10
As a minion build, you stay far from danger. But with this one, you also count on many defensive layers from the Guardian Ascendancy that grants this build the amazing amount of 250,000 effective HP.
Conclusion
Here is the end of Daniel's 3 Minions Builds. I hope you like this guide.
