Summon Zombie Dogs

Good dogs.

Summon Zombie Dogs is a Defensive Witch Doctor skill unlocked at level 4. It summons several zombie dogs, commonly known as "mongrels" which tank for the Witch Doctor.

Mongrels can also be detonated by the Sacrifice skill, dealing substantial damage to anything in the vicinity. This is their most effective way of directly damaging monsters.

Background

Zombie Dogs have good foot speed and are fearless, if not very damaging with their hand to hand combat. Sacrifice deals far more damage than the mongrels ever will.

Skill Rune Effects

The following is a very quick summary. See the Summon Zombie Dogs rune effects page for a more thorough description of rune effects, or any of the individual rune pages for numbers, screenshots, blue quotes, and much more.

Name	Level	Description

<skill subcat="Pet" class="WitchDoctor">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor" rune="Rabid Dogs">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor" rune="Final Gift">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor" rune="Life Link">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor" rune="Burning Dogs">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor" rune="Leeching Beasts">Summon Zombie Dogs</skill>

Skill Design

All versions of the Dog, including un-runed.

Summon Zombie Dogs is the first summoning skill most Witch Doctors will ever use, and forms the backbone of early Witch Doctor strategy. The dogs are not very strong individually, either in giving or taking damage, but they are effective meat shields, allowing the Witch Doctor to use his attack spells from the back row.

At higher levels Mongrels can deal decent damage, and in a swarm they may be useful against individual enemies, especially when their damage is boosted by a runestone.

Synergies

The following Witch Doctor passives provide a benefit to Summon Zombie Dogs, runed or not:

Name	Level	Description

<skill class="WitchDoctor">Circle of Life</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor">Jungle Fortitude</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor">Pierce the Veil</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor">Zombie Handler</skill> <skill class="WitchDoctor">Fierce Loyalty</skill>

Development

Mongrel enhanced with Locusts.

Summon Zombie Dogs debuted with Diablo III in the WWI 2008 gameplay video, where the skill was in the Voodoo Skill Tree at Tier I. Summon Zombie Dog was called Summon Mongrel (as Mongrel was the original name of the Zombie dog), and mongrels could be enchanted with Locust Swarm or Skull of Flame, among other spells.

For BlizzCon 2009, the skill was moved to the Zombie Skill Tree. By then, skill enchantments had been removed, replaced by skill rune enhancements. For a brief period of time, this skill apparently cost health instead of mana.

At BlizzCon 2010, they evinced more damage and improved AI, preferring proximity to the Witch Doctor over dealing with stragglers. Flux described it like this:[1]

I saw them finish off the last zombie on screen a number of times, and I don’t recall ever having to summon new ones simply because the old ones had gotten stuck or lost around some corner of the dungeon. That speaks to their pathfinding as well, since the dungeons in this year’s Blizzcon PvM demo were made largely from narrow corridors and were quite windy and full of sharp corners and obstacles.

Beta

Witch Doctor walking two pets.

Skill tiers were removed shortly before the beta started in September 2011, and Summon Zombie Dogs became a level 1 skill. Flux gave it another try, and discussed the skill's function:[2]

Better known as “Mongrels,” this is the default tank for the beta, and a very effective one. The dogs don’t have a lot of killing power — all three of them on the same normal enemy is considerably slower than any Witch Doctor attack spell — but they’re not meant for damage in their base form. They’re meat shields, and they do a pretty good job of that.

This skill previously worked with “one cast per dog,” so it took three casts to get all three of them out. (And you got more dogs with more skill points.) No more; now a single cast summons all three dogs, or re-summons fresh ones if your current batch are wearing out or one or more have died. It’s a full replacement cast, too; if you have two left you don’t just cast one new one to join the others; you get three new dogs.

The skill system was once again overhauled for the Beta Patch 13 in February 2012, and Summon Zombie Dogs was classified as a Defensive skill and moved to level 4.

Previous Versions

See the Witch Doctor skill archive for more details on previous versions of Summon Zombie Dogs (or Summon Mongrel) and other Witch Doctor skills.

In Other Games

Summon Zombie Dogs is the spiritual successor to Diablo II's Necromancer skill Raise Skeleton, which is also a low-level tanking minion summoning skill.

Media

Summon Zombie Dogs can be seen in action on video here:

• Gameplay: WWI 2008
• Gameplay: Blizzcon 2010 (in the Arena)
• Video: Blizzcon 2010 Rune Effects
• Gameplay: July 2011
• Video: August 2011 Witch Doctor Skill Animations

You can find pictures in the Diablo III screenshot and picture gallery:

• Diablo III screenshots and pictures
• Summon Zombie Dogs specific gallery contents

• 

  Close-up of two Dogs.

• 

  All versions of the Dog, including un-runed.

• 

  Mongrel enhanced with Locusts.

• 

  Witch Doctor with two Dogs.

References

• BlizzCon 2008 Witch Doctor Gameplay Report
• BlizzCon 2009 Full Witch Doctor Skill Trees and Stats
• BlizzCon 2010 Witch Doctor Hands-on Report
• BlizzCon 2010 PvP Hands-on Report
• Zediono's translation of JudgeHype's pre-beta report — IncGamers 1st Aug 2011
• Witch Doctor Beta Skills Mega-report: Part One — IncGamers 30th Sep 2011
• Witch Doctor Active Skills — Blizzard's Official Diablo III Site

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