The Necromancer is Underpowered Reason 5: Corpse Explosion is overrated

I should dispel the illusion that I'm running out of ideas and trying to draw this out by focusing on a single skill. I'm not going to write one of these for every skill in the necromancer's repertoire. Corpse Explosion isn't just any skill. It's one of the defining features of necromancers. Some consider it to be one of the most powerful skills in the game. Paradoxically, it is both a one-point wonder (because it does its full damage with only a single point invested) and a skill to prioritize (because of the geometric increase in range). For summoners in particular, maxing Corpse Explosion is almost mandatory and it's generally thought of as the main damage source for summoners. Skeletons are there to make the first few corpses. The bulk of the monsters are then destroyed by Corpse Explosion. Since it does both fire and physical damage and necromancers have Amplify Damage to weaken monsters to the physical component of the damage, Corpse Explosion is effective against almost all mobs that leave corpses behind and the few that resist it sufficiently can be dealt with by pets.

Of course, all of this requires corpses as ammunition for the skill. A summoner also needs corpses to raise new pets. But that's a minor limitation and usually not a problem. No skill is perfect, and this consideration wouldn't be nearly enough to stop Corpse Explosion from being awesome on its own. And yet, Corpse Explosion really is overrated. It has two major weaknesses.

The damage from Corpse Explosion ranges between 70% and 120% of the exploded monster's maximum health. Since most monsters in a mob have about the same maximum health, blowing up a single corpse can potentially kill some and blowing up three or four while all the monsters are cursed with Amplify Damage will kill everything in the area (excepting bosses and such). But on higher player counts, the damage remains the same as it would be at /players1, while monsters have much higher health pools. At higher player counts, a single Corpse Explosion isn't likely to actually kill anything. I've seen the sentiment that this is not a problem for Corpse Explosion because it just means the skill must be used more times, which is true for all of the other skills used to kill enemies. This reasoning fails because those other skills don't require corpses as ammunition. I played the whole game on all three difficulties with a summoner on /players8. And I contend that no one who has done that would express the sentiment that Corpse Explosion isn't weakened more than other skills by the player count increase. It's very difficult to get a Corpse Explosion chain going. Letting pets or a mercenary bring down one monster and using that corpse to wipe out everything on the screen might work on /players1, but it's impossible on /players8. In some circumstances, I found it faster to use those corpses for Revives instead of blowing them up. In contrast, other damaging skills really do still work on /players8. The character I've been working through Hell most recently, my auradin, tears right through everything on /players8 without any problems at all.

I realize that this limitation only applies to increased player counts. And one might dismiss it on the grounds that those increased player counts are not the "real" game (unless there really are multiple players, in which case one would have help from other players). If Corpse Explosion is still awesome at /players1, then at least it's still awesome at /players1. I don't buy this. I would buy it if higher player counts were something that limited almost all characters to this extent. That's simply not the case. I now play all of my characters on /players8 (my druid, the character that I started first but only finished most recently, was on /players3 for much of Hell because /players8 was taking too damn long, but I did solo some of the most difficult areas on /players8 and even beat Uber Diablo on /players8, which my summoner couldn't do). Some are certainly better than others. The summoner was so slow that I only persisted because I really, really wanted to. And Corpse Explosion was only moderately useful.

Corpse Explosion has another, perhaps more obvious, weakness. Any idea how much damage Corpse Explosion does to Duriel? Several of the strongest monsters in the game spawn in areas with either no corpses or a very limited supply of corpses. For every other damage-dealing skill the game (except Poison Explosion, which is mainly just a synergy for the other poison skills anyway, on account of its limited range, although it does kill almost anything it actually hits), this is not even a consideration. Corpse Explosion is mostly just nonviable against bosses. And on some level, that's fine. Most classes have skills that are better suited to wiping out waves of weaker monsters and are not the primary method of killing stronger monsters and bosses. As utility, Corpse Explosion is fine. I'm not saying that the skill needs another buff or that it's a bad skill. But it doesn't deserve the hype. It's a situational way to weaken or finish mobs, not a primary killer.

Oh, and its range when maxed is overrated too. Some players seem to think it's like a hydrogen bomb, obliterating every monster for miles around. It does have a large area of effect, but the range has definitely been exaggerated.