Necromancer Class Guide: Skills, Stats, and How to Play

This is a guide to the Necromancer class in Diablo 4 (Diablo IV). Read on to learn everything about the Necromancer class including the Necromancer's Class Specialization, Necromancer's skills, all the strengths and weaknesses of the Necromancer, the best stats to increase for the Necromancer, and how to play the Necromancer!

All Necromancer Guides
Class Guide	Best Builds	Book of the Dead

Necromancer Overview and Rating

Stats Overview
Necromancer
Main Stat	Intelligence	DMG Type (Primary)	Magic
Base STR	Base DEX	Base INT	Base WP
7	7	10	8
Core Stat Modifiers
・Critical Chance x+0.02% per point in DEX ・Skill Damage x+0.1% per point in INT ・Resource Generation x0.1% per point in WP

Necromancer Strengths

Can Play Solo and Summoner Type Playstyles Strong Flash Farming Skills Skill Archetypes and Book of the Dead offers multiple archetype playstyles.

Can Play Solo and Summoner Type Playstyles

The Necromancer can focus entirely on being a backline caster and having its underlings fight on the frontlines. This allows the Necromancer to fight from a safe distance while also having free DPS from its summoned skeletons which the Necromancer can resummon again from slain enemies. Alternatively, the Necromancer can use the Book of the Dead and then sacrifice its Skeleton-Raising abilities to enhance the Necromancer's main fighting capabilities.

Strong Flash Farming Skills

Flash Farming refers to entering a mob group and clearing them immediately then moving on to the next one. This is due to one of the Necromancer's signature skills “Corpse Explosion” which allows you to consume a corpse (either from slain enemies or those generated by corpse-creating skills) and then make it explode to deal high amounts of damage near the corpse's vicinity.

Using Corpse Explosion allows you to create new corpses from the slain enemies and it costs 0 resource (and even generate Essence with the right passives). This means you can simply kill one weak enemy in a group then create a chain explosion from that one corpse and move on to new mob groups!

Skill Archetypes offers multiple archetype playstyles.

There are multiple build archetypes you can play as the Necromancer! Manipulate blood and be a blood-draining magic caster, raise skeletal walls and sling sharp bones as a bone-slinging magician, or even enhance your skeletal army with curses and shadow spells! All Archetypes have their different playstyles and properly using the Book of the Dead is key to maximizing each archetype to its fullest!

Necromancer Weaknesses

Weakness Change Depending on Chosen Archetype Single Target DPS often comes from the Fragile Skeletons

Weakness Change Depending on Chosen Archetype

Since the class has multiple archetypes and each archetype greatly affects the necromancer's playstyle, it's hard to single out the Necromancer's weaknesses. Solo builds will greatly affect the Necromancer's defenses so being fragile is often an issue on summoner archetypes while focusing on blood skills means you deal less damage if the enemy's DPS is too high to build up fortify.

Single Target DPS often comes from the Fragile Skeletons

For summoner builds, the main DPS of the Necromancer comes from the damage you get from all the slowly stacking Necromancer auto attacks. This may seem great at first glance but what this means is that if your skeletons eventually get annihilated (most often during a lengthy boss fight), the Necromancer's DPS will greatly plummet. This makes the summoner Necromancer archetype weak against bosses, especially after the Post Beta Severslam nerfs to the Necromancer which greatly reduced the skeleton's durability.

Necromancer Class Specialization

Book of the Dead

The Book of the Dead is a unique Necromancer specialization that allows the Necromancer to use Raise Skeleton and Raise Golem. Both are summoning skills and are not included in the Necromancer's main skill tree and the Book of the Dead also gains new skeleton modifiers as the Necromancer gains more levels.

NOTE: Both Skeletal Warriors and Skeletal Mages belong to the Raise Skeleton skill while Golem belongs to Raise Golem. You can have all three summons up by equipping both skills at the same time!

Necromancer Book of the Dead Guide

Book of the Dead Upgrades

Necromancer Skill Tree

Necromancer has two sections in the Skill Tree called Corpse and Macabre, each with a selection of Skills labeled Corpse, Skills labeled Macabre, and Passives without labels. To avoid confusion, we've simply divided the Skills into Corpse and Macabre 1 and 2 sections depending on their section in the Skill Tree.

Necromancer Basic Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Bone Splinters Fire 3 bone splinters dealing XX% damage each. Each subsequent time an enemy is hit by the same cast of Bone Splinters, you gain 1 Essence.
		1	Enhanced Bone Splinters Bone Splinters has a 25% chance to fire 2 additional projectiles if cast while you have 50 or more Essence.
		2a	Initiate's Bone Splinters Bone Splinters has a 20% chance per hit to make enemies Vulnerable for 2 seconds.
		2b	Acolyte's Bone Splinters Hitting the same enemy at least 3 times with the same cast of Bone Splinters grants 8% Critical Strike Chance for 4 seconds.
Reap Sweep an ethereal scythe in front of you, dealing XX% damage. Hitting an enemy with Reap increases your Damage Reduction by 15% for 2 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Reap If an enemy hit by Reap dies within 2 seconds, you gain 30% Attack Speed for 3 seconds.
		2a	Acolyte's Reap Reap forms a Corpse under the first enemy hit. Can only occur every 4 seconds.
		2b	Initiate's Reap Reap instantly kills targets below 5% Life. This does not work on bosses or players.
Decompose Tear the flesh from an enemy, dealing XX% damage per second and forming a usable Corpse with the flesh every 2 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Decompose If an enemy dies while being Decomposed, you gain 10 Essence.
		2a	Acolyte's Decompose You and your Minions deal 10% increased damage to enemies who are being Decomposed.
		2b	Initiate's Decompose Decompose Slows enemies by 50%.
Hemorrhage Burst an enemy's blood, dealing XX% damage. Hemorrhage has a 20% chance to form a Blood Orb.
		1	Enhanced Hemorrhage After picking up a Blood Orb, your next Hemorrhage also deals damage to enemies around your target and grants 2 additional Essence per enemy hit.
		2a	Acolyte's Hemorrhage Hemorrhage gains an additional 20% Attack Speed while Healthy.
		2b	Initiate's Hemorrhage Hemorrhage grants 1.6% Maximum life as Fortify each time it hits an enemy, and has a 1.5% chance per enemy hit to Fortify you for 100% Maximum life.

Necromancer Core Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Sever A specter of you charges forward and attacks with its scythe for 110% damage then returns to you and attacks again for 45% damage.
		1	Enhanced Sever Sever damages enemies along its path for 40% of its initial damage.
		2a	Paranormal Sever Every 3rd cast of Sever makes enemies Vulnerable for 2 seconds.
		2b	Supernatural Sever Sever deals 2% increased damage for each Minion you have upon cast.
Blood Lance Throw a blood lance that lingers in an enemy for 3 seconds, dealing XX% damage to the enemy and all other lanced enemies.
		1	Enhanced Blood Lance Blood Lance pierces through enemies who are currently lanced, dealing 10% reduced damage to subsequent enemies after the first.
		2a	Supernatural Blood Lance After casting Blood Lance 8 times, your next cast of Blood Lance is guaranteed to Overpower and spawns a Blood Orb under the first enemy hit.
		2b	Paranormal Blood Lance While at least 2 enemies or a Boss are affected by Blood Lance, you gain 15% Attack Speed and Blood Lance's Essence cost is reduced by 3.
Blood Surge Draw blood from enemies, dealing XX% damage, and expel a blood nova, dealing YY% damage. Blood Surge's nova damage is increased by 10% per enemy drained, up to 50%.
		1	Enhanced Blood Surge Blood Surge Heals you for 3% of your Maximum Life when drawing blood from enemies. If 4 or more enemies are drawn from, then Heal for an additional 3% of your Maximum Life.
		2a	Supernatural Blood Surge Each time an enemy is hit by Blood Surge's nova, you are Fortified for 1% Maximum life. While you have Fortify for over 50% of your Maximum Life, Blood Surge deals 20% increased damage.
		2b	Paranormal Blood Surge If an enemy is damaged by Blood Surge's nova while you are Healthy, then gain 1 stack of Overwhelming Blood. When you have 5 stacks of Overwhelming Blood, your next Blood Surge Overpowers.
Blight Unleash a concentrated blight that deals XX% damage and leaves behind a defiled area, dealing 135% damage over 6 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Blight Blight Slows enemies by 25%.
		2a	Supernatural Blight You and your Minions deal 15% increased damage to enemies within Blight.
		2b	Paranormal Blight Blight has a 30% chance to Immobilize enemies for 1.5 seconds on impact.
Bone Spear Conjure a bone spear from the ground, dealing XX% damage and piercing through enemies.
		1	Enhanced Bone Spear Bone Spear breaks into 3 shards when it is destroyed, dealing 6-7 damage each.
		2a	Supernatural Bone Spear Bone Spear makes the first enemy hit Vulnerable for 3 seconds.
		2b	Paranormal Bone Spear Bone Spear has a 5% increased Critical Strike Chance. If Bone Spear's primary projectile Critically Strikes, it fires 2 additional bone shards upon being destroyed.

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Unliving Energy	Your maximum Essence is increased by X.
Imperfectly Balanced	Your Core Skills cost XX% more Essence, but deal YY% increased damage. Unliving Energy required
Hewed Flesh	Lucky Hit: Your damage has up to a XX% chance to create a Corpse at the target's location. This chance is doubled against Bosses.

Necromancer Corpse and Macabre 1 Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Corpse Explosion Detonate a Corpse, dealing XX% damage to surrounding enemies.
		1	Enhanced Corpse Explosion Corpse Explosion's radius is increased by 15%.
		2a	Blighted Corpse Explosion Corpse Explosion becomes a Darkness Skill and, instead of exploding, releases a vile miasma dealing 31 Shadow Damage over 6 seconds.
		2b	Plagued Corpse Explosion Corpse Explosion deals 8% increased damage to enemies that are Slowed, Stunned, or Vulnerable. These damage bonuses can stack.
Blood Mist Disperse into a bloody mist, becoming Immune for 3 seconds. Your Movement Speed is reduced by 20% and you periodically deal XX damage to enemies and Heal for YY% of your Maximum Life.
		1	Enhanced Blood Mist Casting a Skill that Overpowers reduces the cooldown of Blood Mist by 2 seconds.
		2a	Ghastly Blood Mist Blood Mist leaves behind a Corpse every 1 second.
		2b	Dreadful Blood Mist Blood Mist Fortifies you for 0.5% Maximum life each time it hits an enemy.
Bone Prison Unearth a prison of bone with XX Life that surrounds the target area for 6 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Bone Prison If an enemy is trapped by Bone Prison, gain 25 Essence, plus an additional 5 per enemy trapped.
		2a	Dreadful Bone Prison Fortify for 8% Maximum life for each enemy trapped by Bone Prison.
		2b	Ghastly Bone Prison Enemies inside of Bone Prison are Vulnerable.

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Spiked Armor	Gain XX Thorns.
Skeletal Warrior Mastery	Increase the damage and Life of your Skeletal Warriors by XX%.
Grim Harvest	Consuming a Corpse generates XX Essence.

Necromancer Curse Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Iron Maiden Curse the target area. Enemies afflicted by Iron Maiden take XX% damage each time they deal direct damage. Lasts 10 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Iron Maiden Iron Maiden no longer costs Essence. Instead, gain 5 Essence for each enemy Cursed. Does not work with enemies who are already Cursed with Iron Maiden.
		2a	Horrid Iron Maiden When at least 3 enemies are afflicted by Iron Maiden, its damage is increased by 20%.
		2b	Abhorrent Iron Maiden Heal for 7% of your Maximum Life when an enemy dies while afflicted with Iron Maiden.
Decrepify Curse the target area. Enemies afflicted by Decrepify are Slowed by XX% and deal YY% less damage for 10 seconds.
		1	Enhanced Decrepify Lucky Hit: Enemies hit while afflicted with Decrepify have up to a 10% chance to Stun them for 2 seconds.
		2a	Horrid Decrepify When you or your Minions hit an enemy afflicted with Decrepify below 10% Life, they are instantly killed. Does not work on Bosses.
		2b	Abhorrent Decrepify Lucky Hit: Enemies hit while Afflicted with Decrepify have up to a 15% chance to reduce your Active Cooldown by 1 second.

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Precision Decay	Your Lucky Hit Chance is increased by XX%.
Death's Embrace	Close enemies take XX% more damage from you and deal YY% less damage to you.
Skeletal Mage Mastery	Increase the damage and Life of your Skeletal Mages by XX%.
Amplify Damage	You deal XX% increased damage to Cursed enemies.
Death's Approach	You deal XX% increased damage to Distant enemies.

Necromancer Corpse and Macabre 2 Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Corpse Tendrils Veins burst out of a Corpse, Pulling in enemies, Stunning them for 3 seconds and dealing XX% damage to them. Does not consume the Corpse.
		1	Enhanced Corpse Tendrils Enemies who are in range of Corpse Tendrils are Slowed by 50% before being Pulled.
		2a	Blighted Corpse Tendrils Corpse Tendrils has a 35% chance when damaging enemies to drop a Blood Orb.
		2b	Plagued Corpse Tendrils Enemies damaged by Corpse Tendrils are Vulnerable for 3 seconds.
Bone Spirit Consume all of your Essence to conjure a spirit of bone that seeks enemies. Upon reaching an enemy, the spirit explodes, dealing XX damage to the target and all surrounding enemies, Damage is increased by YY% for each point of Essence spent casting Bone Spirit.
		1	Enhanced Bone Spirit If Bone Spirit Critically Strikes, its Cooldown is reduced by 6 seconds. This effect can only happen once per cast.
		2a	Ghastly Bone Spirit Bone Spirit has an additional 10% Critical Strike Chance.
		2b	Dreadful Bone Spirit After Bone Spirit hits an enemy, you generate 30 Essence over the next 4 seconds.

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Reaper's Pursuit	Damaging enemies with Darkness Skills increases your Movement Speed by XX% for 3 seconds.
Gloom	When you damage enemies with Darkness Skills, they take XX% increased Shadow Damage from you and your Minions for 2 seconds, stacking up to 3 times. Reaper's Pursuit required
Crippling Darkness	Lucky Hit: Darkness Skills have up to a 15% chance to Stun for XX seconds. Reaper's Pursuit required
Terror	Shadow damage deal XX% bonus damage to enemies who are Chilled, and YY% bonus damage to enemies who are Frozen. These bonuses stack and apply to Shadow Damage dealt by your Minions. Gloom or Crippling Darkness required
Gruesome Mending	Receive XX% more Healing from all sources.
Coalesced Blood	While Healthy, your Blood Skills deal XX% increased damage. Gruesome Mending required
Transfusion	Lucky Hit: Blood Skills have a X% chance on hit to spawn a Blood Orb. This can only occur once every 4 seconds. This chance is doubled against bosses. Gruesome Mending required
Tides of Blood	Your Blood Skills deal XX% increased Overpower damage. This bonus is doubled while you are Healthy. Coalesced Blood or Transfusion required
Necrotic Carapace	When a Corpse is formed from your Skills or your Minions, Fortify for XX% Maximum life.
Serration	Your Bone Skills have a XX% increased Critical Strike Chance for each 10 Essence you have upon cast.
Compound Fracture	After Critically Striking 10 times with Bone Skills, your Bone Skills deal XX% increased damage for 5 seconds. Serration required
Rapid Ossification	Every 100 Essence you spend reduces the cooldowns of your Bone Skills by XX seconds. Serration required
Evulsion	Your Bone Skills deal XX% increased Critical Strike Damage to Vulnerable enemies. Rapid Ossification or Compound Fracture required

Necromancer Ultimate Skills

Active Skills

Skill / Effect		Skill Upgrades
Blood Wave Conjure a tidal wave of blood that deals 450% damage and Knocks Back enemies.
		1	Prime Blood Wave Blood Wave Slows enemies by 50% for 4 seconds.
		2	Supreme Blood Wave Blood Wave leaves behind 3 Blood Orbs as it travels.
Army of the Dead Call forth the deep buried dead. Volatile Skeletons emerge over the next 7 seconds that explode when around enemies, dealing 45% damage.
		1	Prime Army of the Dead When Army of the Dead's Volatile Skeletons explode, they have a 100% chance to leave behind a Corpse.
		2	Supreme Army of the Dead Army of the Dead also raises your Skeletal Warriors and Skeletal Mages.
Bone Storm A swirling storm of bones appears around you and your Golem, dealing 180% damage to surrounding enemies over 10 seconds.
		1	Prime Bone Storm Your Damage Reduction is increased by 15% while Bone Storm is active.
		2	Supreme Bone Storm Your Critical Strike Chance is increased by 20% while Bone Storm is active.
Soulrift For 8 seconds, you corrupt surrounding enemies, dealing XX% damage per second. Every 0.25 seconds of this duration, you absorb the souls of up to 3 enemies, gaining 2 Essence and a Barrier for 2% of your Maximum Life for 5 seconds. You absorb 3 souls at a time from Bosses.
		1	Supreme Soulrift Every soul absorbed increases your damage by 1%, up to 30%. This bonus persists for 5 seconds after Soulrift ends.
		2	Prime Soulrift Enemies with their souls absorbed become Vulnerable for 2 seconds. When damaging enemies affected by Soulrift, you have a 5% chance to absorb their soul.

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Finality	You deal XX% increased damage for 8 seconds after casting an Ultimate Skill.
Golem Mastery	Increase the damage and Life of your Golem by XX%
Inspiring Leader	After you have been Healthy for at least 2 seconds, you and your Minions gain XX% Attack Speed.
Bonded in Essence	Every 8 seconds your Skeletal Priest's Healing will Heal your skeletons for an additional XX% of their Maximum Life.
Hellbent Commander	While you control at least 7 Minions, they deal 10/20/30%[x] increased damage. Inspiring Leader required
Death's Defense	Your Minions gain XX% Armor and YY% Resistance to All Elements. Inspiring Leader or Bonded in Essence required
Stand Alone	Increases Damage Reduction by XX% when you have no minions. Each active minion reduces this bonus by 2%.
Memento Mori	Sacrificing both Skeletal Warriors and Skeletal Mages increases their Sacrifice bonuses by XX%. Stand Alone required

Necromancer Key Passives

Passive Skills

Skill	Effect
Affliction	Enemies affected by Vulnerable, Crowd Control, or Shadow Damage over Time are Afflicted, taking 15% increased damage from you and your Minions. Your Curse Skills deal 80% Shadow damage when applied to Afflicted enemies. This amount increases by 30% of your Damage to Crowd Controlled, Vulnerable Damage, and Shadow Damage over Time bonuses combined.
Ossified Essence	Your Bone Skills deal 0.5% increased damage for each point of Essence you have above 50 upon cast.
Rathma's Vigor	After being Healthy for 12 seconds, your next Blood Skill Overpowers. This timer is reduced by 2 seconds each time Blood Orbs Heal or Overheal you for an amount greater than or equal to your base Life.
Shadowblight	Shadow damage infects enemies with Shadowblight for 2 seconds. Every 8th time an enemy receives Shadow damage from you or your Minions while they are affected by Shadowblight, they take an additional 44% Shadow damage. Shadowblight's damage is increased by 100% of your Shadow Damage over Time bonus.
Kalan's Edict	After you have not taken damage in the last 2 seconds, your Minions gain 15% Attack Speed, While you have at least 7 Minions, this bonus is doubled.

How to Play the Necromancer

Play Around Your Chosen Archetypes Utilize Corpse Explosion to Defeat Enemy Groups Maximize Skeleton Uptime

Play Around Your Chosen Archetype

The Necromancer has multiple archetypes which greatly change the way the Necromancer plays. Maximizing each Archetype is the key to mastering the Necromancer.

Blood Necromancer and Sustain

Blood Necromancers focus on draining blood from enemies and granting themselves sustain and Fortify. Play on the frontlines and maximize your AoE damage as a Blood Necromancer. Be sure to stay on the frontline and soak up damage to dish out the best DPS the Blood build can do!

Bone Necromancer Slings Hard Hitting Spells

Bone Necromancers utilize Vulnerability and critical strikes. Maximize the Bone Necromancer's dps by fighting from a distance and hurling Bone Spears at enemies to obliterate groups of mobs and even elites easily.

Buff Skeletons With Shadow Damage

Shadow Necromancer utilizes minion buffs to increase the damage your skeleton can do. Play around your minions and golems to maximize everyone's DPS as shadow blight and other shadow skills can enhance the damage they deal to enemies. This build is perfect for dealing single-target DPS to enemies as long as you can keep your skeletons alive.

Utilize Corpse Explosion to Defeat Enemy Groups

Corpse Explosion is one of the signature skills of the Necromancer and for good reason. You can create 1 corpse from a weak mob and then make it explode to eliminate all enemies in the vicinity. All enemies that died will now leave their corpses for you to use Corpse Explosion on. This allows for easy chain reactions to quickly dispose of groups of enemies. Utilize this especially in the early game if you have no focused build yet to get through the game or even create a full set to maximize this skill!

Maximize Skeleton Uptime

Skeletons provide a ton of free DPS but they can die from too many hits or from strong AoE attacks. Make sure to resummon new corpses or heal them with the right passives to ensure that your skeletons are up at all time if you are playing a necromancer with summon skills!

Necromancer Stat Priorities

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