In Diablo 4, Summoning Damage (or Summoning Skill Damage) is a stat that increases the damage of specific skills and the minions built by these skills—but only if the skill has the “Summoning” tag. So. it’s not the same as minion damage, which applies to all your fight creatures; it only works on targeted summons.
Let’s say, you’re a Necromancer with an undead army of Skeletons, Mages, or a Golem, their attacks will hit harder and destroy the enemies if you’ve stacked Summoning Skill Damage. But for a pet or minion that hasn’t appeared through a Summoning skill, this stat won’t do anything for them.
How Does Summoning Damage Work in Diablo 4?
Not all minion-related abilities in the game are Summoning skills. If a skill doesn’t have this specific tag, the “+% Summoning Damage” stat will not work for it. The bonus damage works as a percentage increase based on the base damage of the skill or minion. For example, if your skeleton warriors deal 100 damage per hit and you have a 20% Summoning Damage increase, their new damage would be 120.
To get this bonus, equip items with the +% stat – it’s usually found on weapons, armor, and amulets. Look for the Damage with Summoning affix if you want to focus on summoner builds. It also affects the auto-attacks of the minions when you conjure them using this tagged skill.
Summoning Damage vs Minion Damage
These are two stats that sound similar but do different things:
- Summoning Damage: Increases damage for summons created by Summoning skills or only affects minions summoned by skills with the Summoning tag.
- Minion Damage: A stat that boosts the damage of all your minions, regardless of how they were summoned.
So, for a summoner build, you can stack both for a few crazy strong minions but remember, they’re not interchangeable. For Necromancers, both stats are useful because all their minions are summoned through Summoning skills, but for other classes or builds might not. You should check your tooltip to see which ones qualify and are valuable for your battle companions.
Here are some key abilities that receive a gain from this damage type:
- Bone Spirit and its variants like Enhanced and Ghastly Bone Spirit
- Corpse Tendrils including Enhanced, Blighted, and Plague versions
- Raise Skeleton (your basic skeleton army)
- Golem Skills like Iron Golem or Blood Golem
These abilities can be your bread and butter in case of a summoner build. Stacking Summoning Skill Damage will make them hit really tough. According to some, this D4 damage only applies to your active skills such as a Golem’s special ability, but it also works on your minions’ regular attacks, as long as they were conjured using a skill with the tag.
When Should You Use Summoning Damage?
Playing with a minion-heavy build, this stat is a no-brainer. It lets you lean into your summoner playstyle, letting your Skeleton army and big tanky Golems do the most dirty work for you while you sit back casting curses or nuking with AoEs.
As mentioned earlier, stacking both Summoning and Minion Damage is the best way to level up your undead army’s DPS. You should build around synergy; Gear, Paragon boards, and Skill trees offer bonuses that can stack with SD such as some Paragon nodes increase the health and damage of your minions. Further, look for items with “+% Summoning Skill Damage.” The higher the percentage, the better. Combine it with other minion-boosting stats like health or attack speed and position your group strategically to maximize their damage output.