Twenty-six years later, some of those skeletons still have trouble getting through a doorway.
Then Blizzard created the Warlock.
Suddenly Diablo II had a new summoner with built-in movement tools, better ways to reposition demons and minions that generally feel considerably less committed to standing behind each other while something murders their master.
Necromancer players have noticed.
A community discussion that became active again on August 24 is asking Blizzard to take some of the lessons learned from Reign of the Warlock and apply them to Diablo II's original summoning class.
The request is not necessarily:
Make Necromancer stronger than Warlock.
It is much simpler.
Please make the skeletons stop fighting the architecture.
The Warlock Has Exposed How Old Necromancer Summons Feel
This is one of the more interesting side effects of Blizzard adding Diablo II's first new class in 25 years.
The Warlock was designed in 2026.
The Necromancer was designed when Windows ME was considered a current operating system.
Put them next to each other and the difference is difficult to ignore.
Warlock's Demon tree allows the class to summon Goatmen, Tainted and Defilers, while Bind Demon can turn powerful existing demons into allies.
The class also has abilities that give players much more direct control over where those summons go.
Death Mark can reposition Warlock demons onto a selected area or enemy, while Blade Warp provides the class with its own movement skill without requiring Enigma.
That means a Warlock summoner can actively decide where the important part of the army should be.
Necromancer players frequently have another strategy.
Walk forward.
Wait.
Wonder why the Skeleton Mages are still standing in the previous doorway.
Necromancer Players Have Asked for Minion Control for Years
This is not a complaint invented after Warlock appeared.
There are Blizzard forum threads from 2022 asking for a dedicated Necromancer command or teleport ability for minions.
The argument was essentially the same then as it is now.
A Summon Necromancer can create a large army.
They cannot meaningfully tell that army what to do.
Players asked for something as simple as:
- Click a location and order minions there
- Click an enemy and make summons focus that target
- Teleport only the summons rather than the Necromancer
- Or simply improve pathfinding so minions stop blocking one another
One player made the point particularly well years ago:
For most Diablo II characters, Enigma's Teleport is primarily a movement upgrade.
For a Summon Necromancer, Teleport can feel like the ability that finally makes the army function correctly.
That has never been an ideal situation.
Skeleton Mages Are Still Excellent Doorstops
Body blocking is at the centre of the current complaint.
Diablo II's maps contain plenty of narrow spaces.
Doorways.
Dungeon corridors.
Bridges.
Tight corners.
A Skeleton Mage can stop in exactly the wrong place and prevent melee Skeletons from reaching the enemy.
Revives can make the problem even worse because some revived monsters are enormous.
The player's army may contain twenty or thirty creatures.
The actual frontline may contain three.
Everyone else is waiting behind a Necromancer traffic jam.
The original poster in the latest discussion says simply allowing Necromancer minions to stop blocking one another would dramatically improve the build.
No huge damage buff.
No new ultimate skill.
Just let the skeletons occupy enough overlapping space that they can actually reach whatever they were summoned to kill.
Warlock Minions Are Not Perfect Either
To be fair, Reign of the Warlock has not completely solved Diablo II minion AI.
Warlock players have reported their own problems with summons clumping together after teleporting.
There are cases where melee demons remain stacked on top of each other until the Warlock moves.
Players have asked Blizzard to make those demons spread out automatically when nearby targets exist.
So this is not a story where Warlock has perfect 2026 AI and Necromancer is trapped entirely in 2000.
Diablo II monsters remain Diablo II monsters.
Sometimes their deepest strategic insight is:
Stand here.
But Warlock at least gives the player tools to correct the problem.
That is what Necromancer players increasingly want.
Players Also Want Control Over Skeleton Mage Elements
The other remarkably old complaint is Raise Skeletal Mage.
Skeletal Mages can spawn using different elemental attacks.
Fire.
Cold.
Lightning.
Poison.
The Necromancer does not simply choose the element they want from the skill interface.
If you are trying to create a particular composition, you summon, inspect, dismiss and summon again.
That was quirky in 2000.
In 2026 it feels more like unpaid administrative work.
The newest discussion asks Blizzard to let players directly choose which Mage type they summon.
That would have obvious practical value.
A player could avoid Cold Mages when they do not want corpses being shattered.
They could build around enemy resistances.
They could create an intentionally specialised elemental army.
Or they could summon nine Poison Mages because they enjoy making questionable decisions.
The important part is that it would be a decision.
Blizzard Has Buffed Skeletal Mages Before
It is not as if Blizzard has completely ignored Necromancer summons since Resurrected launched.
Patch 2.4 gave Skeletal Mages substantial improvements.
Poison damage scaling increased by roughly 750%.
Cold damage scaling increased around 50%.
Lightning received a smaller improvement.
Their life scaling was increased.
Blood Golem and Fire Golem were also buffed as Blizzard tried to make lesser-used summons more competitive.
At the time, Blizzard explicitly said it saw an opportunity to improve underused Necromancer summons.
That was a balance solution.
The current complaint is slightly different.
The numbers may be better.
The controls remain ancient.
Some Players Think the Problem Goes Much Deeper
Once Necromancer players start discussing summons, things rarely stop at doorways.
The August 24 response that revived the current thread comes from a player who says they have:
- A level 99 Summon Warlock
- A level 92 Summon Necromancer
- A level 92 Summon Druid
Their comparison is considerably more aggressive.
They argue Skeleton Warriors need better Attack Rating and damage.
Skeletal Mages need dramatically stronger elemental scaling.
Summons need better movement speed and AI.
Iron Golem should be easier to restore.
Revives should last longer.
And all summons need better PvP behaviour.
Other players push back against that scale of change.
Summon Necromancer remains perfectly capable of clearing Diablo II's endgame, particularly once Corpse Explosion enters the equation.
Giving the class every modern Warlock advantage could easily turn quality-of-life improvements into massive power creep.
That is where the discussion becomes useful.
The Necromancer Is Strong — But Is the Army Actually Doing the Work?
This question has been appearing repeatedly since Warlock launched.
Summon Necromancer is traditionally considered a safe and effective Diablo II build.
Skeletons form a wall.
The Mercenary kills something.
Amplify Damage goes up.
Corpse Explosion turns one dead monster into seventeen dead monsters.
Everything works.
But some players argue that description reveals the issue.
The strongest part of the so-called Summon Necromancer is often:
Corpse Explosion.
Not the summons.
A March discussion after Reign of the Warlock launched asked whether the Necromancer is truly an endgame summoner or simply a Corpse Explosion build surrounded by pets.
Warlock makes that comparison uncomfortable because its summons can contribute much more directly to the actual killing.
Even after Patch 3.3 dramatically reduced Bind Demon's unintended bonus damage, Warlock still has a summoning kit built around actively controlling and supporting its demons.
Necromancer often feels like it controls the battlefield around the army instead.
Death Mark Is the Feature Necromancers Keep Looking At
If Blizzard stole one Warlock idea for the Necromancer, players repeatedly come back to something resembling Death Mark.
Warlock can use it to place demons where they are actually needed.
That solves several problems at once.
Minions stuck behind doors?
Move them.
Boss hiding behind trash enemies?
Send the demons directly there.
Need summons on the other side of terrain?
Reposition them.
A Necromancer equivalent would not necessarily need to deal damage or debuff enemies.
It could simply be:
Command Minions.
Target location.
Skeletons go there.
Target monster.
Skeletons attack it.
That would be revolutionary technology by Diablo II standards.
The invention of pointing.
It Could Also Reduce Necromancer’s Dependence on Enigma
This is perhaps the strongest design argument.
Enigma is already one of the most dominant items in Diablo II because Teleport is extraordinarily useful.
Summon Necromancer gets an additional reason to depend on it.
Teleport instantly gathers the entire army onto the player.
Experienced Necromancer players use this aggressively to “telestomp” targets and force Skeletons, Revives and Mercenary onto the same enemy.
It is extremely effective.
It is also a workaround provided by a high-end Runeword rather than something inside the Summoning skill tree.
Giving Necromancer a limited minion-only repositioning ability would not necessarily replace Enigma.
The Necromancer still would not teleport.
It would simply make the summon build function better before Jah and Ber finally decide to exist.
Reign of the Warlock Has Created This Problem for Every Old Class
Necromancer is probably not going to be the last class to experience this.
Warlock was created with a quarter-century of hindsight.
Blizzard knows which parts of Diablo II feel awkward.
It knows players want mobility.
It knows summoners need control.
It knows modern players expect cleaner feedback and better quality-of-life systems.
Then that modern class gets placed beside seven characters designed under completely different assumptions.
Old mechanics suddenly become much more visible.
We have already seen players ask whether Diablo II should finally receive a dedicated Charm Inventory now that Reign of the Warlock has modernised other parts of inventory management.
The same philosophical question applies here.
How much of Diablo II should Blizzard preserve because the inconvenience is genuinely part of the design?
And how much is simply old because nobody had gone back and rebuilt it yet?
Not Blocking Each Other Seems Like a Reasonable Place to Start
There are enormous Necromancer redesigns Blizzard could attempt.
More Skeleton damage.
More Mages.
Better Golems.
Permanent Revives.
New summon skills.
Different Corpse Explosion scaling.
Any of those would trigger weeks of arguments about whether Blizzard had destroyed Diablo II.
The current request is much smaller.
Make summons better at reaching enemies.
Give the player basic control.
Let Necromancers choose their Skeleton Mage element.
None of that requires turning the original summoner into Warlock 2.
It would simply mean applying 26 years of lessons to a class Blizzard clearly still intends people to play.
Necromancer does not need the Warlock's demons.
It does not need Blade Warp.
It does not necessarily need another 400% damage multiplier.
But perhaps the Skeleton Mage standing in the doorway could move slightly to the left.
We have the technology now.
Sources
Diablo II: Resurrected Forums: Warlocks Have Everything Necros Have Asked For
Diablo II: Resurrected Forums: Necro QoL — Control or Teleport Minion Skill
Diablo II: Resurrected Forums: Improve All Other Summoners
Blizzard: Rain Annihilation in Reign of the Warlock
Blizzard: Diablo II: Resurrected Patch 2.4 — Necromancer Summon Changes
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