Hero Siege Budget Sand Guardian Illusionist Build - Season 10

• Summoner
• Cheap
• Cost efficient at Hell and Inferno farm

Update 24/08/2026: The situation is a bit more grim than planned, the update on projectiles make our guardians shoot backward...

So currently, we are losing a LOT of clearing, and a bit of DPS since cheapshot is near useless, let's pray for a fix (or you can report the bug on Herosiege discord).

Update 21/08/2026: -No big changes happened with SG, the teleport nerf should slow us down in our movement, and the overall Cast Speed / Haste nerf is bad, but it should only be quite a difference in very late (Gabriel+)

Update 04/05/2026: -Added an early video example of the build -Added more step-by-step gear with explications (in "More details on gear" section and new sections in recommended gear) -Added a different chestplate augment choice (Huge DPS increase, and a few fix to issues with gab, see "Gear" section)

- Overall:

A build i recommend for crossing the gap in AP/AoP between hell 4-5 and mid inferno where you will start to need expensives/very expensives gear to push the build further

This one closed that gap for me between 1b AP dps and 10b AP dps (i've been around 10b to 100b SG dps in that period)

- Mercenary

I'm putting it on top since it's often forgotten, but you SHOULD gear your mercenary, it's not super expensive if your not using insane items, and the buff it give you is pretty significant.

I've put my cheap setup in the mercenary section of the build.

- Gear:

I included a few options for more expensive gear/variant in the gear section if you want to push SG further, but i'm not at this point when writing this guide, so try at your own caution.

The shield version is my personal preference, giving a bit more defensive stats which always feel good if your dps is high enough to not have to worry with it (which is the case in inferno with this build).

Gabriel chestplate is mostly for TP confort, allowing you to zoom at supersonic speed around the map, if you have enough damage on Sand Guardians and the Sand Beam incarnation tree node, it's mostly "you tp around, everything die with screen long beams, repeat" so clear is still decent

You can use the Mana Hunger node before the gabs for a lot of extra dmg, since your not casting too many skills, it's sustainable, with the gabs you can't do it anymore as your TP will empty your mana bar in a sec (way too much cast rate) (See Monstrosity augment for fixing that issue -80% mana cost is enough for that issue)

- More details on gear:

Your main focus is Sand manipulator set, Desert Storm and Sandmagi, it's the few items who really give a life to Sand Guardian (their variants are even better, but they are more expensive)

The ring is whatever you have laying around that can help with arcane dmg (+ level, + level arcane, ignore arcane res mostly, attack speed if you'r using gabs), personnaly, i use two dragon's blessings for max MFing and it's still way enough dmg for speedfarming inferno.

Gear update 04/05/2026: -"Final build" (can't change the name) is a preview of what you can use.

-Level 100 - Early SG is what is needed to swap on SG > i added a few charms which are super cheap and help greatly - here your looking for capping your "ignore arcane res", and you should keep this stat capped at all time (even on others variants)

-Level 100 - Gabriel Setup Early is more expensive, here you continue to cap your ignore res but start focusing on stacking attack speed and int, you should make sure your skill haste is capped too, monstrosity help with that. A good Gabriel is 6 all skill, 10 bloodlust at 0 star, 13 at 5 star, highest attack speed and magic skill damage as you can. I added my charm setup at this step too if you want to see what's possible with a mid-budget.

-Gab + Cold Strat is an alternative, Celestial autority convert your cold damage to arcane and absolute zero + glacier talon add an extra damage + freeze, which is pretty great offensively and defensively. For more punch, you can spec your incarnation tree into Vanguard of arcane/other vanguards depending on your hero level (i was around 100 hero level at that time) //end of the 04/05 update

- Stats focus:

Stats wise, you should focus on getting 100% ignore arcane res as your main focus, it's a LOT of damage (Sacred Pendant is great for that, and it's super cheap)

- Runewords:

Runewords are something i personnaly love and would definitively recommend, if you can get a good base (white item with the exact amount of sockets for the runeword, and decent stats like S tier + all skill or S tier + arcane skills (might be even better as they scale with stars), maybe even AS (there's a few multiples goods stats common items laying around, you can try to make the sockets yourself but it can be a pain so i would mostly avoid it for a low budget).

They will need some stars to be very powerful, but since it's S tier item at most, it's not too expensive to star and really can give a huge boost (for exemple, a 5* Sovereignty with a good base can have +3 all skills, +9 arcane skills (+12 levels on weap), 28% faster cast rate, 25% ignore arcane res, 28% arcane skill damage, that seem like an insane item to me, at least for the price it's costing i think it's unrivaled)

Same can be done with the Desert's Wrath runeword helmet for another +12 levels item with a bunch of specialized guardian stats.

- Sockets:

For sockets, it's whatever you need/have/want to put: Res, Amethyst, Attack speed if your using gabs... Bunch of options, no real bad choice here, even Ist runes for MFing can be pretty good.

- Augments:

balanced/tanking: I personnaly recommend Drunkard Mayhem augment, as you have a bunch of active buffs, it's costing between 1 and 6 angelic key for the augment (1 for entrance, 5 for choosing the augment, if it's not one of the two choices offered) the first level upgrade augment is "free" (1 key for entering and 0 for upgrading) so you should go for a +2 drunkard at least.

You can swap augment if there's already one on your chest, you need 1 angelic key, and you should talk to St. Peter in Dawn's Chapel for opening the area for doing your augment (don't change map after opening the portal even if you forget something, IT WILL CLOSE IT, so ask a friend to bring whatever you forgot if it happen)

DPS: Use Monstrosity, nothing much to say about this one, it's a huge magic % increased and the 80% mana reduced cost built in make the use of Manahunger in incarnation tree extremely easy, adding another 25% total magic damage on top. I don't think any augment will be better DPS wise.

- Charms:

For charm, there's not really mandatory charms as they are mostly here for adding extra damage/tanking, i would recommend what's in the charm section, and filling the space with life/res/stat charm depending of what you have at hand, you can use a few others options if your already confortable with your tanking, without order (and not exhaustive, i don't know every charms in the game): -Graxy's mom lure: MFing -Fulgurite: Extra + level, damage, res, attribute (1x2) -Torch of shadow (Illusionist): mostly same as Fulgurite, difference is damage is replaced with light radius, which is a % multi for movement speed (1x2) -Torstein's Anvil: +1 level, all attribute, resistance (1x1) -Eye of Rakhul: Movement speed (Light Radius), All attributes, experience gain, not so sure about the missile defense, it don't seem to work but it's here so... deal with it(1x2) -Finger of despair: + Level, + Level for SG, all attribute (take care if your using it with graxy's mom lure or other items like that, too much - max res and your dying everywhere, not super fun) -Chaos gemstone: + level, LOTS of interesting stats variants (I guess all of the usual "red line" stats, so +arcane, as, cast rate, mf, exp... You name it) -Arcane Pumpkin: + level, + arcane level, arcane damage flat and %, arcane res -Mysterious Monkey paw: + level & Attribute -Overloaded dice: +1 to sub Sand Guardian -Soul collector: + Skill, Attribute, Lot of life, Light radius (Movement speed multi), nice random proc of mf/attack speed/cast rate (so 2 chance of having cast rate if your using gabs), might be challenging to fit

- Special Part aka Jewel stacking incarnation tree:

For now you can stack jewels in the incarnation tree, 12% AS are pretty nice (with some other decent stats on it)

Personnaly, i'm using 12% Attack speed + MF but you can get life, arcane skill damage, Cast rate, Magic skill damage... Lots of interesting stat here and i'm sure i don't know all of the options.

You can use a bunch of angelic gems too for a bunch of + levels, it's a bit of a secret strat and might be nerfed/deleted so use at your own risk (they cost a fair amount per angelic gems), it's not needed, and if you have a more charms with + levels than what i put in the charm section of the guide (which is the cheapest charms you can use), it might even have close to no impact on your dps (may even be worst than AS or other damage oriented jewels)

- Special thanks:

• SleepyCat for making me start with illusionist, been a blast
• Nahrungsmittelunvertraglichkeit aka Misinformation Merchant on HS discord for his SG guide, you should check it for more info/in depth about SG ( https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xLM6T7sgzR_dqBTWhw0TadVc-B9-3MRAldoX4QlJ0RE/edit?tab=t.0 )

-Huge thank to vinao1998 on HS discord for the Monstrosity augment and cold variant info, it really helped with pushing the build further

No real leveling order as it's not a leveling build, i personaly don't think it's viable before Hell and whatever a bit of gear laying around (most part are pretty common drops) or a few golds in pocket if you'r in trade (i'd say around 250k for everything mandatory if you take lowest rolls on cheapest items, might be a bit more with the charms)

Rotation and how-to-play:

First of all, always have temporal Heroes buffs ON (HP, Mana, Dmg taken reduced)

For ST, start stacking your SG before the encounter if possible: -Circle of guardian when available -Sand guardian when available

You know you are full guardian and ready-to-go when your oldest guardian start despawning when you summon new ones.

Then, you should do this rotation for max damage when you start the encounter: -Age Proliferation around the spawn of your enemy (will spawn a mirror image who will use AP for debuff) -Link of sand every few second depending of the duration of your buff (for me it's around 8s so every 7s) -Sand of time for a huge 25s dmg buff -Temporal Heroes for another huge 25s dmg buff -Use your flasks as soon as your guardian start lowering the boss HP, if you can run around him in range for your orbiting SG, that's even better since the sand guardians orbiting around you hit HARD

For clearing, you just teleport around spamming Sand Guardians and Circle of Guardians, maybe use Link of Sand if you need extra damage

Call for War is a cool tool to have in your hotkey, as sometime you will need to recall your guardians to you (if you spawned them somewhere far from boss or they are busy hitting something two screens away)

You can Link of sand for movement if you wanna feel like spider man too.