Diablo 4 Waypoints

Diablo 4 Season 9 is another reincarnation of the main line. I will choose the Necromancer no matter what season it is. It does not mean that it is very powerful, but it is simple enough and I can leave everything to the skeletons.

But in the endgame, the disadvantages of relying on summons are exposed, such as the AI of summons is not high enough, the survivability is not strong enough, and the damage is insufficient. So Necromancer who pursues efficiency and high damage usually switches to another build in the endgame.

But Blood Wave Necromancer and Spear Bone Necromancer have been popular for several seasons. What are the options if you want to play other Necromancer builds? Maybe you want to try Shadow Blight Necromancer Build that can create 1 billion damage.

Advantages And Disadvantages

Advantages

• The requirements for Diablo 4 items are very low.
• The rolling order of skills is simple.

Disadvantages

• Skills need to be released frequently.
• It takes some time for the damage to stack.
• Requires high attack speed and crit.

Shadow Blight Necromancer Skills

• Reap (Rank 1): Enhanced Reap
• Blight (Rank 1): Enhanced Blight and Supernatural Blight
• Corpse Explosion (Rank 1): Enhanced Corpse Explosion and Blighted Corpse Explosion
• Corpse Tendrils (Rank 1): Enhanced Corpse Tendrils and Blighted Corpse Tendrils
• Decrepify: (Rank 1): Enhanced Decrepify and Abhorrent Decrepify
• Soulrift (Rank 5): Supreme Soulrift and Prime Soulrift
• Shadowblight (Rank 1): Key Passive
• Melee Skeletons: Melee Skeletons Reapers
• Mage Skeletons: Mage Skeletons Golds
• Skeletal Golems: Golem Iron

The operating principle of Shadow Blight Necromancer is actually very simple. You just need to focus on causing Shadow damage, which is the core of this skill.

First up is the passive skill, Shadowblight. Every time you attack eight times, the enemy will take additional Shadow damage, which can stack up to 450%. To trigger this damage, you need a faster attack speed, so you need to Reap from time to time to increase your attack speed and gain resources.

Blight and Corpse Explosion are the core of this skill set, and you need to use these two skills to amplify your shadow damage. The skill roll order is as follows:

• 1. Release Decrepify to weaken the enemy.
• 2. Release Corpse Tendrils to gather the enemies together.
• 3. Use Reap to gain attack speed and movement speed buffs.
• 4. Use Soulrift to get close to the enemy.
• 5. Use Blight and Corpse Explosion to bombard the enemy.

You may not run this build smoothly in the early stage of the game. You can use summon builds to get through the early stage first, and then use Diablo 4 gold to change skills in the later stage.

Shadow Blight Necromancer Gear

• Helm: Aspect of the Embalmer
• Chest Armor: Aspect of Hardened Bones
• Gloves: Aspect of Grasping Veins
• Pants: Blood Moon Breeches
• Boots: Yen’s Blessing
• Amulet: Ebonpiercer
• Ring 1: Sacrificial Aspect
• Ring 2: Aspect of the Damned
• Weapon: Blighted Aspect

Looking at the gear selection, you can see that this set requires almost no Mythic unique items to run, which means you can almost immediately switch your Necromancer to this set without wasting time farming.

However, in order for this build to run smoothly, you still need two unique items: Blood Moon Breeches and Ebonpiercer. Blood Moon Breeches increase critical chance and critical damage, and can be obtained by defeating Duriel, King of Maggots. Ebonpiercer can enhance Blight, which you can get by killing Grigoire, the Galvanic Saint.

Masterworking

If you have enough materials and Diablo 4 gold, then Masterworking improving your equipment should be done as soon as possible.

First, improve your survivability and make sure your armor has been increased to the upper limit of 1000 armor. Then improve your critical hit rate, critical hit damage and attack speed. Golem Mastery and Hellnemt Commander are useless to you.

Horadric Spells (Blight)

Catalyst

• Disintegrate: Shoot a beam between Arcane Conductor and you. Enemies passing through the beam will be damaged and slowed.

Infusion

• Nebulous Extract: Catalyst skills deal shadow damage and reduce enemy damage for 10s.

Arcana

• Sapping Crux: Enemies affected by Catalyst skills have their damage reduced by 10%.
• Shifting Powder: Release Catalyst skill and increase your movement speed.
• Bloody Charm: Enemies below a certain health will be executed (except for bosses). Since you are using Disintegrate, the execution threshold for non-elite enemies is doubled.

There are not many choices for the best Horadric Spells in Season 9. Sapping Crux can reduce the enemy’s resistance, while Bloody Charm can execute. This is very useful in high-level The Pit.

The remaining one can be matched at will. You can replace Shifting Powder with Fractured Core, which can further reduce the monster’s resistance. Tranquil Stone is also a good choice, which can make you unstoppable. You can decide which one you want to use according to your preference.

The above is a brief information about Shadow Blight Necromancer Build. If you have the DLC, you can use gold to hire mercenaries to share some damage for you. This is a build with very low requirements, but the damage is very high. If you don’t want to farm mythic unique items, you can try this build.

Astaroth debuts as a boss in Season 9, but unlike other lair bosses, in order to defeat it, we must complete Escalation Nightmare, which is also a new endgame mechanism added in the new season.

How To Find Astaroth?

In this dungeon connected by 3 Nightmares, we must continue to advance in order to encounter the new Astaroth boss at the end.

Get Sigils

The first step is to get Escalation Nightmare Dungeon Sigil. These new Sigils can only be obtained by completing Horadric Strongrooms.

However, the spawn rate of Horadric Strongrooms is very high, and in addition to Sigil, this is also a great way for you to get all Arcanas and even recipes for making jewels.

After you get some new Sigils, you’ll notice that they have several affixes similar to the ones we find in normal Nightmare Dungeon Sigils, but we also get new affixes, and basically they either make enemies more deadly or make you weaker. So read the description of the Sigil before opening it, choose the one you think is best and go for it.

Run Escalating Nightmares

Season 9 has been really fun so far, and Escalating Nightmares is one of the main reasons why. This activity is very similar to Infernal Hordes, so if you liked Infernal Hordes, you’ll enjoy it too.

The way Escalating Nightmares works is that when you open a dungeon, it has a few affixes that are more challenging than a normal Nightmare Dungeon, and these affixes keep stacking, which is why each new dungeon becomes more challenging.

I think this idea is great, because not only can you get a ton of Diablo 4 gold, gems, materials, and most importantly XP with one dungeon key, but they’re also fun in their own right.

Once you reach Tier 3, the rest is up to your luck, and things can get pretty crazy at times.

Other Tips

Last but not least, here are a few things I think are important to note when running Escalation Nightmare Dungeons:

• Treat these dungeons like you would The Pit, and don’t forget to use Elixirs and Incenses to farm more efficiently.
• Depending on which Torment difficulty level you’re in, you’ll have access to different Tempered gear and quality gems.
• If you die, you can always go back to town to repair, so you don’t have to stress about it, it just costs you some D4 gold.
• Never stop moving, some affixes will cause monsters to constantly spawn, so even checking your inventory or allocating some Paragon points can cause you to die unexpectedly at any time.
• It’s important to upgrade resistances, especially poison resistance. Because, especially at Tier 3, sometimes elite monsters can be very deadly for this reason, and this is also important when dealing with Astaroth boss.

Astaroth Battle Strategies

Once you have successfully cleared 3 dungeons, the final portal will open, which will take you into Astaroth’s Lair.

Once you arrive, you will find him standing on top of Amalgam of Rage, which we know is the first phase of the battle.

Amalgam of Rage will breathe fire from each of his heads at you, while Astaroth can summon meteors and indicate where they will fall in a split second.

If that wasn’t enough, Amalgam of Rage will jump on you to deal fatal damage. The only way to avoid this attack is to teleport as soon as you see it, and to set up some kind of fortification or barrier and maintain it as long as possible.

Once you have done enough damage to Amalgam of Rage, it will begin to regenerate in a pool of blood and venom. Honestly, I think this pool is very similar to the one that Lord Zir can spawn, so basically don’t touch it.

At this point, Astaroth will fight you, and you have one goal, which is to kill Astaroth before Amalgam of Rage regenerates, otherwise you will have to face them both at the same time.

Astaroth will continue to throw meteors at you, as well as some waves of fire that circle around the edge of the arena. So why is it throwing at this specific location, you might ask? This is because as Amalgam of Rage regenerates, the blood pool will continue to expand, and when it reaches its maximum size, there will be nowhere to escape. Combined with Astaroth’s attacks, it’s simply terrifying.

Remember that the poison in the pool has high damage, so the moment you enter the pool, it’s almost game over.

If Amalgam of Rage revives, try to focus your fire on Astaroth, because he has more health than Amalgam of Rage, so you want to drain his health as much as possible. This way, the next time after Amalgam of Rage dies, you can definitely kill Astaroth. Of course, if you want to do it the other way around, it may be possible, but it will definitely take longer.

All in all, defeating Astaroth isn’t that hard compared to other bosses like Andariel or Harbinger of Hatred, but timing is crucial. Regardless, Astaroth is a significant source of boss materials and gear in Season 9, so it’s definitely worth spending some time farming it!