Diablo 3 Do Follower Items Affect You

Introduction and Basics

With a massive rework in Patch 2.vii (Season 23), followers are at present fully fledged characters with some interesting limitations and constraints, as well as some incredibly valuable boons that are transferable to the player graphic symbol. They now possess the same 13 item slots as the actor character does, plus an additional 14th slot for the follower-specific items (i.e. Enchanting Favor, Smoking Thurible, Skeleton Key). Their skills were as well majorly revised in Patch 2.7 to meliorate reflect the current state of the solo metagame, with an overall pregnant strengthening in the followers' contribution during solo play. At that place are several follower basic principles you demand to keep in mind, irrespective of your selection of companion.

Followers are establish in town, and hiring i replaces the previously selected companion, if applicative. The only way to break that dominion is the proc-based 3-piece bonus of Asheara's Vestments set, which lets all followers come to your side every bit you attack. The follower inventory is accessible via the F push (default demark) or right clicking their portrait on PC, or via the party sub-menu in the character card on consoles.
Follower skills tin be chosen and re-specced at any time, just cannot be unlearned, disallowment the creation of a new character.
When slain, the follower revives after a 20 second timer. If the actor character dies, the follower goes down with him, and his cooldowns are reset.
Multiple offensive stats are applicable to followers: Critical Striking Chance, Critical Hitting Impairment (at a 150% cap), Elemental Damage, Damage vs. Elites, Increased Attack Speed, as well as defensive ones — Life %, Life per Hitting, Life per Kill and Block Run a risk. Cooldown Reduction is a special instance, every bit it applies only to the Templar'due south Heal.
Risk stat-wise, followers share 20% of their Magic Notice, Golden Find and Experience Proceeds stats from their equipment to the thespian character.
Followers will benefit from your role player character's defensive buffs, and will do good from crowd command reduction stats on gear (including legendary furnishings that mitigate them). Conversely, followers do not benefit from resource- or movement speed-related bonuses, volition non benefit from offensive gear up bonuses like Bastions of Will or Endless Walk, and will not benefit from legendary gems except for Esoteric Alteration and Mutilation Guard.

Ane affair that has not inverse when it comes to the general philosophy of using and gearing a follower is that trying to make them into a harm dealer is a futile exercise; your efforts are much ameliorate spent at improving the follower for the utility and defense force he or she can provide to your character instead. The following guide takes this into business relationship and will only strive to amend the follower characters in those areas, depending on the content yous are trying to clear.

The bones rundown of the changes in Patch 2.7 leaves you with the post-obit rules of thumb when picking and gearing your follower:

Stack 25,000 of the mainstat of the respective follower (Forcefulness for Templar, Dexterity for Scoundrel, Intelligence for Enchantress) to maximize their abilities. This task is assisted past the innate 2.5x multiplier to mainstats for all followers. The followers get the same main stat benefits as playable characters, i.eastward. Strength and Dexterity feed into Armor, Intelligence feeds into All Resistance, and Vitality feeds into Life.
Invulnerability follower items ( Enchanting Favor, Smoking Thurible, and Skeleton Key) are all just mandatory. Alternatives tin only exist considered for speed farming and/or extremely buff-oriented characters (i.e. Inna Monks, HotNS Frenzy Barbarians).
In full general, y'all will be using the Scoundrel for Greater Rift solo progression, and the Enchantress for GR speed farming and standard rift farming for keys. The Enchantress can be considered for GR progression as well in builds that will do good from her CDR and IAS buffs, if they are relevant to your build for reaching specific breakpoints. If your build contains a stiff class of monster deportation (i.e. Cyclone Strike), the Scoundrel is without equal due to the area-based Night'south Veil vitrify. The Templar is currently considered sub-optimal due to his overly defensive powers, but tin can be considered for some of the squishiest builds, or when playing Hardcore.
The tl;dr of follower equipment is to include an immortality item, The Flavor of Time and Nemesis Bracers, and a combination of ii-piece Sage and 2-piece Cain sets plus a Ring of Purple Grandeur for standard rift central farming, or 2-piece Cain and XP items (Ruby socketed Leoric's Crown, Hellfire Ring of Strength) or CC items ( Blind Religion, String of the Sherma) during Greater Rifting. Obviously, these are very stripped and quick recommendations, and we highly recommend that you read on to optimize your follower for your current content.

As discussed above, the Templar is currently considered the weakest of the three followers and should just be considered for fragile builds, characters that are just starting out and are depression on survivability, or perhaps for boosted condom in Hardcore play. The setup beneath assumes you are taking the Templar for Greater Rift solo progression purposes, as his thoroughly defensive powers are objectively useless in standard rift farming for keys or Greater Rift speed farming. While the rest of his kit is somewhat flexible, his arguably strongest skill is the Heal Heal, which scales with CDR.

If you lot cull to run a Templar for the reasons outlined in a higher place, check out our full guide on him here.

Every bit discussed above, the Scoundrel is a damage buffing powerhouse and a prime choice for your Follower during solo Greater Rift progression attempts. The Scoundrel is specially potent if you can lure enemies into his AoE damage buff, and characters with stiff enemy manipulation skills will benefit the virtually from him. He's as well a dandy choice for dual wielding characters due to their naturally college Crit Impairment stat, every bit he complements them with a Crit Chance vitrify. The highlight of Scoundrel abilities is definitely his Night's Veil Night'south Veil, and should always be taken when he is at your side.

If you cull to run a Scoundrel for the reasons outlined higher up, cheque out our full guide on him here.

The Enchantress is the most versatile of the agglomeration, offer a rest between utility and harm buffs, and offer some excellent speed farming potential when she is fully optimized. Take the Enchantress to GR progression if yous are chasing cooldown reduction or attack speed breakpoints, as she makes both tasks easier, or if you want to have a thoroughly utility-driven character when farming GRs or keystones. The highlight of Enchantress abilities is her Prophetic Harmony, which is a tremendous boon for any CDR-heavy build.

If you lot choose to run an Enchantress for the reasons outlined above, check out our total guide on him here.

General Follower Gearing

When gearing your follower, y'all take to make a conscious choice between utility and damage oriented gear. While it can be tempting to focus on their damage potential (however express), it is highly recommended that you focus on their oversupply control and protective capabilities.

Stat-wise, information technology is crucially important that you reach the 25,000 mainstat point on your follower to maximize the benefits of his or her mainstat-scaling abilities. This should exist quite doable even without detail augmentations, considering followers have an innate two.5x multiplier to their mainstat, and all their sockets (including jewelry, since Legendary Gems do not work on Followers) will be filled with standard mainstat gems. Augmentations can still exist considered to fully optimize your follower (about likely Enchantress) for speed farming, since you have an incentive to drib the invulnerability follower detail at some signal of optimization and go for the "all abilities" unlock 1. Note that when your mainstat differs from your follower's (i.e. you are a Barbarian, but are using an Enchantress), simply reroll the pieces at the Mystic and craft your necessary items with a mainstat-appropriate alt.

The other stats you might want to consider are:

Start and foremost, Attack Speed — in that location are plenty of proc-based items that add together valuable utility to Followers, such as Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker, Cluckeye, Buriza-Do Kyanon, Blind Religion, and Cord of the Sherma, and you volition (logically) achieve more than procs from more attacks.
Survivability stats tin can and should be considered for high end follower optimization — Vitality, Resists, Armor, Life %, Life on Hit — the moment you determine to driblet the invulnerability follower item, getting your companion to survive volition exist a struggle. This is where Esoteric Alteration and Mutilation Guard come into play, as they are the only legendary gems that will work on your follower every bit well.
Cooldown Reduction is only valuable to the Templar, since his Heal is the solitary follower ability affected by CDR. It is quite powerful though, so if you choose to run with a Templar equally your follower, invest in CDR across his gear.

To reiterate, especially for GR solo progression, the recommended follower-specific items for all followers are the immortality ones: Enchanting Favor, Skeleton Key Skeleton Cardinal and Smoking Thurible. Amnesty to damage is as well powerful to exist passed upward in high Greater Rifts, where lackluster AI and limited toughness options hateful certain death for followers inside seconds. The immortality items allow yous to ignore Toughness rolls on follower gear, easing decisions when rerolling and optimizing other utility stats similar attack speed and cooldown reduction.

iv.

Emanate Mechanics: Legendary and Set up Furnishings from Followers

In Patch ii.vii, the Emanate mechanics was introduced in the game. What information technology basically boils down to is that a selection of legendary and set items worn by the follower will utilize their effect to the player graphic symbol as well.

In a way, one of the oldest forms of this bonus was the combination of Unity Unity on yourself and the follower, forth with an immortality item for him or her, which volition halve your incoming impairment without pain him or her. This makes for 1 of the well-nigh powerful damage mitigation combos in the game.

The acme tier, extremely useful items in the Emanate-eligible category currently include Nemesis Bracers and The Flavor of Time The Flavor of Fourth dimension. The former spawns an elite at every Pylon pickup, while the former doubles the duration of Pylon bonuses — their powers combined significantly soften the infamous Greater Rift "fishing" for favorable floors and monster compositions.

Other useful Emanate-eligible items include the Act III compensation cache-specific Avarice Band, and the craftable Sage'due south Journey and Cain's Destiny sets. Avarice Band greatly extends your pickup radius, and will usually be paired with a socketed Boon of the Hoarder and a worn or cubed Goldwrap for an extremely strong combo during regular rift farming, catapulting your gold conquering, movement speed, and survivability through the roof. The Cain set up boosts experience gain (useful for Paragon farming) and Greater Rift Keystone drops, while the Sage set doubles Death's Breath drops. Both sets can have their requirements reduced via a Ring of Royal Grandeur Band of Royal Grandeur on your follower. Final but not to the lowest degree, Homing Pads add a layer of prophylactic and convenience when teleporting to boondocks, while Gloves of Worship should be considered during standard rift and bounty farming for the utility gravy of 10-minute elapsing shrines.

The remainder of the Emanate-eligible items have limited or no usefulness at all, but for the sake of completeness, the list too includes: Broken Crown Cleaved Crown, Spaulders of Zakara, Goldskin, Custerian Wristguards, Gladiator Gauntlets, Dovu Energy Trap, Rakoff's Glass of Life Rakoff'due south Glass of Life, and Krede's Flame.

Follower rings, belts and boots should be chosen according to your current content:

Lastly, it should be noted that a former favorite for the amulet slot, The Ess of Johan, can yet be considered for AoE-dependent builds with depression or no displacement abilities — as it offers a long-range pulling effect on a decent, xx second internal cooldown.

The main stats for the followers are as follows: Strength for Templar, Dexterity for Scoundrel, Intelligence for Enchantress. To match that mainstat, whenever a socket occurs in a follower item, yous should use a Flawless Royal Ruby Flawless Imperial Scarlet (or the highest available) for Templar, a Flawless Royal Emerald (or the highest bachelor) for Scoundrel, or a Flawless Royal Topaz (or the highest available) for Enchantress.

Main stats increment the impairment and skill power of your follower capping out at 25,000 main stat. Followers have an innate ii.5 multiplier per stat point, making this cap more easily attainable.

The weapon socket is mostly irrelevant, only can be filled with a Flawless Royal Ruby (or the highest bachelor) for the apartment damage increase, or a Flawless Royal Amethyst Flawless Purple Amethyst (or the highest bachelor) for the Life on Hit if you lot drop the immortality item from your follower.

10 December. 2021: Reviewed for Season 25.
23 Jul. 2021: No changes required for Flavor 24.
07 April. 2021: Added extra information. Separate off individual followers and their communication into their own dissever pages.
24 Mar. 2021: Major overhaul due to the Follower changes in patch 2.7.

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