Getting the most out of your Followers in Diablo 3 (Part 2)

Welcome to part 2 of our Follower guide. In this article I will be talking about the spell casting Follower; the mystical Eirena. I recommend this Follower to any melee class in the game as she is very effective with her AOE (Area of Effect) spells when farming and also gives good buffs to the player.

Eirena the Enchantress

Like we did in our previous article, we will first take a look at a sample build then list equipment that you can buy for your Follower.

The Build

The following build is the one that was most effective for me. I will list each skill chosen and why I chose it, so you can better understand my decisions.

• Forceful Push – Deals 100% weapon damage to all monsters (while also knocking them back) in an 8 yard radius around the target monster. The Charm skill may look good on paper, but it is actually pretty useless. Forceful Push is much more effective against large packs of monsters because each monster you hit with the skill has a chance of activating your weapon’s proc. For example, if your Follower’s weapon has a “Bleed on Hit” affix, all monsters caught in the blast have a chance to become bleeding.
• Powered Armor – The choice was obvious here. Powered Armor gives you more armor which works against all attacks, while Reflect Missiles only works against ranged attacks. As an added bonus, Powered Armor also slows down any monsters that hit you by 30%!
• Erosion – Picked this skill for the same reasons I picked Forceful Push: AOE damage and more procs!
• Focused Mind – This one is a little debatable and I have used both myself, but I found that the 3% bonus attack speed is better.

Equipment

The choices for equipping Eirena are pretty broad, but here are my top picks:

• Maximus or Skorn – The choice here depends on what you prefer. Maximus has a chance to summon a demon with each attack that deals good damage and is also chained (similar to Fire Chains for Elites) to your Follower, while Skorn has more damage and a guaranteed Socket. When going with either weapon make sure it also has a Bleed affix on it, as this will cause Eirena’s AOE attacks to have a chance to cause multiple monsters to bleed.
• The Star of Azkaranth – You can put this on Eirena for the same reason you put it on Kormac; the Crowd Control affixes!
• Band of Hollow Whispers – Gives a chance for each attack to also apply a DOT (Damage Over Time) debuff on the enemy, providing a little extra bonus damage to your Follower.