Diablo 4 – The Necromancer’s Guide to Dead Henchmen

Necromancer is one of the strongest classes in Diablo 4 due to its summoning ability. You will have the means to raise fearsome creatures to fight by your side. Here’s our Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead guide to help you unlock the undead minions you can unlock, as well as their ideal upgrades.

Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead minions guide

Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead mechanics will appear fairly early in the campaign. However, most of the other minion options can only be unlocked as you level up. You can open this panel by pressing Shift + C on your keyboard or checking the appropriate tab after you have opened the character/ability menu.

Likewise, it should be mentioned that there are specific groups or categories: Bone Warriors, Bone Mage, and Golems. Each group has its own type of creature variation, as well as selectable perks.

Furthermore, each variant also has a Sacrifice perk. With it, the Necromancer gets a passive benefit, but you won’t be able to summon a minion from that type anymore (i.e. get an X effect, but you won’t be able to summon a Golem). Therefore, you will need to change to other perks if you want to be able to increase them again. Last but not least, in addition to Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead mechanics, you may want to check out our overview of Active skill, talented / passiveAnd ground filling.

bone warrior

skirmish – Increases damage by 30% but reduces life by 15%.

• Perk 1 – Allows you to gain one Skirmisher.
• Perk 2 – Critical Strike causes the Fighter to crit for 50% crit damage; can happen every three seconds.
• Sacrifice – +5% crit chance; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Warriors.

defender – Shieldbearers with 15% increased life.

• Perk 1 – Every 8 seconds, Guardians can nullify a case of direct damage they take.
• Privilege 2 – Guardian gets 50% of your Gai’s value.
• Sacrifice – +15% physical resistance; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Warriors.

reaper – Scythe users perform a high damage attack every 10 seconds.

• Perk 1 – Reaper’s attacks against immobile, slowed, stunned, or vulnerable enemies reduce the cooldown of their burst attacks by two seconds.
• Perk 2 – +15% chance to spawn corpses through their attacks.
• Sacrifice – +10% shadow damage; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Warriors.

Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead has Skeletal Warriors as the first category/group. Reaper with their first skill is the ideal choice here. If you have weakening skills (i.e. Decrepify) you can guarantee that their cooldowns will decrease frequently.

bone mage

Dark – Spirit caster deals shadow damage.

• Perk 1 – +10% chance to stun for two seconds; can only happen to the same enemy every five seconds.
• Perk 2 – Fires an extra ray of darkness after every sixth attack.
• Sacrifice – +15 max nature; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Mage.

Cold – The soul cools, then freezes the target.

• Perk 1 – Gain +2 essence when Cold Mage deals damage with their normal attack.
• Perk 2 – Enemies frozen or damaged while frozen by your Cold Mages become vulnerable for three seconds.
• Sacrifice – +15% damage to vulnerable enemies; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Mage.

Bone – Mage deals damage using a portion of their own HP.

• Perk 1 – HP lost per attack reduced by 5%; +40% damage if Bone Mage is still alive after five seconds.
• Perk 2 – Gain a percentage of enhancement and leave a corpse every time the Bone Mage dies.
• Sacrifice – +30% overwhelming damage; cannot summon all types of Skeletal Mage.

Cold Mage (second skill) is decent, if only to add crowd control and vulnerability effects. However, the Bone Mage Sacrifice also adds a large amount of overwhelming damage. Assuming you’re using Paranormal Blood Surge, this leads to a decent chance of proc.

leprechaun

Naturally, the Golem is the strongest summoner of all the Diablo 4 Necromancer Book of the Dead minions. Golems are unlocked when you reach level 25, at which point you will receive the Call of the Underworld quest.

Bone – A bull giant that can provoke nearby enemies.

• Perk 1 – Acquire a corpse whenever a Bone Golem loses 20% of its maximum HP.
• Perk 2 – Bone Golem gains +10% of your maximum HP and 50% of your Thorns value.
• Sacrifice – +10% attack speed; It is not possible to summon all types of Golems.

Blood – Mainly uses its lifespan to assist you (i.e. absorb damage or reduce/increase damage).

• Perk 1 – Blood Golem absorbs 15% of the damage you take.
• Perk 2 – Blood Golem will have 25% damage reduction and 25% increased damage while healthy (ie 80% HP or more).
• Sacrifice – +10% Max HP; It is not possible to summon all types of Golems.

Iron – This variant has huge AoE attacks and attacks.

• Perk 1 – Each Iron Golem’s fifth attack generates a frontal shockwave.
• Perk 2 – Iron Golem’s hit leaves enemies vulnerable for three seconds.
• Sacrifice – +30% Critical Damage; It is not possible to summon all types of Golems.

Due to Diablo 4 beta’s level 25 limit, only Bone Golems are available. However, others can be summoned once you reach the required level after the game officially launches. We recommend Iron Golem for this category.