Season of the Construct has begun in Diablo 4, and the new seasonal mechanics, including the Senechal Companion, have made their way into the game, giving players another way to alter their builds and playstyle and play around with some new abilities.
The Senechal Companion has loads of Governing and Tuning Stones that can alter how it plays, and players will have a lot of options in how they want their robotic companion to aid them in battle. To give you some pointers and ideas on building your companion, we’ve put together this guide with several options we think could be good builds for your Senechal Companion, whether as starting points or ones you want to keep as they are.
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Disclaimer
As we said with our Season of Blood Vampiric Powers list, this shouldn’t be taken as the gospel or make you view other powers or potential build ideas for your Senechal Companion as less viable or worthwhile. Instead, think of these as good general builds that can work with multiple builds and classes, albeit with slight leans to specific playstyles, and use them to come up with your own combinations that fit your class and build.
Additionally, expect some of these to potentially change as we jump into the season and see these stones and abilities in action.
Best Senechal Companion Builds in Diablo 4 Season of the Construct
These builds are ones I believe will be viable for various builds and playstyles, with each fitting a certain kind of gameplay that should benefit you, the player, as you play through Season of the Construct. Each will fit more into specific roles, such as support or tank, and can be used as templates to tweak to help craft your own builds or be used as good options for those unsure of the system or want a bit of direction at the start of the season.
With that said, here are my recommended builds for the Senechal Companion.
Damage Dealing Frenzy
- Governing Stone 1 – Gyrate (AoE attack)
- Voluminous – Increases Skill Effect Size.
- Initiative – Teleport to the target if out of range.
- Arcing – Skill hits additional enemies.
- Governing Stone 2 – Pummel (Single Target/Cleave attack)
- Resource – Generate Primary Resources when the Skill first deals damage.
- Breaking – Destroys enemy Barriers and makes them Vulnerable.
- Any Damage Over Time effect or buff.
This build is focused on pure damage dealing, with an eye for single target and AoE encounters that should make it a good option for those wanting to maximize their damage output.
For one side, you’ll want Gyrate, which, thanks to the Voluminous and Arcing Stone, can hit a large group of enemies with ease, and the help of the teleport provided by the Initiative Stone can make this much easier for your companion to get in a deal damage quick.
As for the second slot, Pummel is a quick attack that we can make even better by giving it Breaking. it can be an excellent option for dealing with Elites of Barriers on stronger enemies, and with Resource, you can have an extra way to generate your resources during combat. As for the last slot, we recommend inserting a Damage over time (DoT) effect, such as adding Bleed or Lighting damage, or a buff like Efficiency, depending on what you feel you need more. For example, a Rend Barbarian could use the extra Bleed to help maximize damage if you choose to have more defensive options in your build.
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The beauty of this build is there is some wiggle room, and you can swap a few Stone around if you want to favor a specific style or particular content that may benefit from a change or two, such as having a DoT on your AoE attack for Nightmare Dungeons.
Support and Safety
- Governing Stone 1 – Protect (Protective Barrier on players for a portion of max health
- Tactical – Reduced Skill cooldown.
- Duration – Skill duration increased.
- Safeguard – Grants Damage Reduction to the player.
- Governing Stone 2 – Gyrate (AoE attack)
- Voluminous – Increases Skill Effect Size.
- Resource – Generate Primary Resources when the Skill first deals damage.
- Fortify – Players gain Damage Reduction.
This build is more focused on giving your character a little more protection from the many enemies you’ll be facing during the season, with a little extra help for generating your Primary Resource and Fortify to keep you in the battle.
For the first Stone, you’ll want Protect, which will provide you with a barrier equal to a portion of your health, giving you some extra defense in combat. With the Tactical, Duration, and Safeguard Stones, you’ll benefit from this barrier appearing more often, for longer periods, and get some extra defensive help from Damage Reduction. Together, it’s a helpful and worthwhile way for a more squishy class like the Sorcerer to get some extra help staying alive.
As for the other Stone, we would be using Gyrate to get some AoE damage in there to aid in combat, though instead of focusing on the damage aspect, we will be using this to generate Primary Resource with the Resource Stone, as well as Fortify from the Fortify Stone. These two will give you an additional way to get your Primary Resource to keep up with combat, and Fortify will provide you with that little extra defensive edge. As for the final slot, we have placed Voluminous for extra range on the attack, but you can swap this out for another buff if you think it would be of more significant benefit.
Magically Infused Destruction
- Governing Stone 1 – Tempest (DoT attack that spreads for extra damage and duration as enemies die)
- Tactical – Reduced Skill cooldown.
- Registered Damage – 50% of damage is registered and explodes as fire damage upon target death.
- Any DoT Stone
- Governing Stone 2 – Focus Fire (Channeled fire damage that does damage over time)
- Breaking – Destroys enemy Barriers and makes them Vulnerable.
- Duration – Skill duration increased/Any DoT Stone
- Arcing – Skill can hit multiple enemies.
This build offers up a more magical damage option that can be great for classes that rely on certain damage types for their abilities or effects while also dishing out considerable damage in the process.
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For Stone 1, Tempest is your option, which is an attack that electrically charges an enemy and causes them to take increasing damage over time, and upon death, it spreads with more damage and time. Combined with Tactical for a quicker cooldown, this can make for a constant barrage of high damage that spreads quickly, especially for spell casters.
In addition, placing your needed damage type, such as Bleed for a Rend Barbarin build, and having Registered Damage for the storing of extra damage on death makes for some potentially huge damage and ways to get effects and damage types onto enemies quickly, which for Nightmare Dungeons could be a major boon.
As for the second Stone, you’ll want to use Focus Fire, a channeled attack that deals fire damage over time. Combining this with Breaking to get rid of Barriers, Duration so it will damage for longer, and Arcing to help it spread across a large group of enemies is another way to deal out massive magical damage easily. You can also swap out duration if you want another DoT effect to litter across enemies.
Boss Buster
- Governing Stone 1 – Pummel (Single Target/Cleave attack)
- Devastation – Increased Critical Strike Damage Bonus.
- Efficiency – Player gains Critical Strike Chance to enemies hit by this attack.
- Resource – Generate Primary Resources when the Skill first deals damage.
- Governing Stone 2 – Bushwhack (Ambush attack to each target, can strike the same enemy multiple times)
- Swift – increased Attack Speed.
- Safeguard – Grants Damage Reduction to the player.
- Any DoT or buff that fits your build
This build has an eye for Endgame Bosses and some tricky single-target encounters you will face during seasonal content and other endgame activities.
First, having Pummel is a good option since it will be effective and quick against bosses, where getting damage in quickly is usually the end goal. With this, you want to use the Devasation Stone, this allows the Construct to deal increased Critical Strike Damage which works of your stats, since your companion shares your power in Season of the Construct. Efficiency will increase Critical Strike Chance against enemies attacked by your companion, giving you more chances to get considerable damage during a fight alongside your robotic friend.
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As for the second Stone, you will be using Bushwhack, an ambush attack that can affect multiple enemies or, in this case, attack a single enemy multiple times. This, coupled with Safeguard, can be a great way to give yourself Damage Reduction, helping you take some of the bigger hits flying your way during boss fights. You also want some extra Attack Speed, which comes from the Swift Stone. As for the last Tuning Stone slot, this is more preference and should be filled with either a DoT that works around your build or a buff like Attack Speed if you need extra oomph for your fight.
