Diablo II Single Player Thread - 2

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@aldeth i just had a razortail drop the other day, as i already have one, and see no reason why i would need two, i would be happy to email you the item file from atma.

 

If I decide to go with a bowazon, I may take you up on that offer. However, I don't know how I can load an item into ATMA that you e-mail me. So in addition to giving me the file, you'd have to give me instructions.

 

Gone?!?! I've had crashes where I have lost equipment that I had recently acquired. I've never had a crash where I lost my character. The game autosaves everytime you step through a TP or go through a WP (it doesn't say it's saving, but it does). So in crashes past, the only items I have ever lost were the items I acquired since my last trip to town.

Yeah, the only benefit you have in using a very heavy armor for a RW is if the RW gives a significant boost to +%ed. Duress is pretty good, as it has +150%-200% ed. (Comparitively, Chains has +70%). I looked through the armor RW yesterday, and I found that there are just two RW that give bigger boosts to %ed than Duress - Gloom and Stone - and Gloom happens to require 3 sockets as well. However, Gloom doesn't provide much of a wow beyond the +%ed.

Gloom (Fal-Um-Pul)

15% ctc level 3 Dim Vision when struck
10% FHR
+200%-260% ed
+10 strength
All resists +45%
Half Freeze Duration
5% damage goes to mana
-3 light radius

So you'd get better defense and resistances, but at the cost of damage, as you'd lose out on +20% damage, open wounds, and crushing blow on Duress.

Stone (Shael-Um-Pul-Lum)

+60% FHR (WOW!)
+250-290% ed
+300 def vs. missile
+16 Strength
+16 Vitality
+10 Energy
All Resist +15%
Level 16 Molten Poulder (80 Charges) (?)
Level 16 Clay Golem (16 Charges) (useful)

This one isn't bad, but it goes against the original argument of having a 3-socket armor. Actually, this one is pretty freakin good - for reasonably priced runes to boot. It's probably about the equivalent cost of Gloom, and it gives the single highest defense boost in the game. The Molten Boulder is useless. Fire druids don't even cast that skill - they only pump it as a synergy. But a level 16 CG sounds at least somewhat hardy.

I beat Duriel last night, and I stupidly forgot to weapon switch to Ali Baba before he died. It's stuff like this that happens when you stop playing for a month to try a new game. You get one chance at a boss for a quest drop, and I blow it by not maxing my MF (sigh).

Have you used a respec on your druid yet dmc? I actually quite interested to see how that turns out. It's been years since I've tried a windy druid, and I've never used one that had a bow as a backup attack for PIs. Windys are fun though. And you use two skills almost exclusively - Tornado and Hurricane.

Tornado will probably be your left click. (Remember, for best results, you should use Tornado like a barb's WW attack - aim past the mosnter for maximum effectiveness.) Tornado looks weak on paper - I don't know what type of +skill items you have, but I'll go conservative and say it's only level 25. At that level, you are looking at what looks like a rather paltry average damage of 432. However when you max the synergies of Cyclone Armor (7%), Twister (10%), and Hurricane (9%), you are looking at a much more respectable 2,678 damage per cast (more obviously if you have more +skills).

Hurricane is simply a great spell. It does pulse cold damage, not unlike the paladins Holy Freeze aura, only the damage is much higher. Again, the initial damage looks bad on paper - 338 average damage per pulse at skill level 25. But once you max Tornado (9%), Twister (9%) and Cyclone Armor (+2 sec duration), you get 1,555 pulse damage per second for a full 60 sec. (Although it's not all cold damage, which is why you need a PI solution although Hurricane will obviously speed the process.)

The good thing with Windy Druids is that their two main skills synergize each other, and they both share the same two synerigies. So four skills that all synergize each other. Every point spent increases the damage of everything else. You even get a useful defensive skill out of the deal in Cyclone Armor. It absorbs 328 damage at skill level 25, but it gets a 7% absorb syerngy from Twister, Hurricane, and Tornado - the three skills you were maxing anyway. So that's another +420%, which takes the absorb to 1706. Even with a modest life total, that's a hefty amount of damage you can take.

 

Good luck on the new business venture - I can only imagine that there's a lot to do when just starting up.

I got a Lycander's Aim last night form just a regular boss drop. So my inventory is slowly growing.

One thing I started doing last night is just leaving Ali Baba equipped all the time. I only keep my wand on for summoning purposes. Skeletons and mages remain at the level they were summoned at, even if you later switch equipment. The only downside is that the number of skeletons you can control at one time is determined by your current equipment, so I do lose one skeleton and one mage when I switch. (Actually, I just summon to 11 instead of 12.)

I only have one point in all curses, and with the rest of my gear, my curses are just at level 6 with Ali Baba equipped (level 8 otherwise) but I'm finding level 6 is adequate.

 

Scored my second natalya's claw, making me tempted to start an assassin also found an atma's wail. Is it of any use like mercwise or should I rather use duriel's shell or corpsemourn instead?

EDIT: I would be very reluctant to give up like five points in the skeletons and their masteries for some magic find. Besides king leoric's arm is THE weapon to have for skelly necros and while I would no doubt make due without it, it's still way too awesome to shift to ali babas sword.

 

The thing is, you wouldn't be giving up any points to your summoning tree. Here's the way it works: A summoned skeleton or mage remains at the exact level you summoned it at, even if after summoning, you switch to other gear that does not have bonuses to summoning. I'll use my character as an example. I use a graverobber's wand (+3 to summoning). I equip it to summon my skeletons, mages and clay golem. My skellies are summoned at skill level 31, with a 31 point mastery, and my mages are also summoned at level 31, with a level 31 mastery. The Clay golem is summoned as level 11 with an 11 point golem mastery. Once they are summoned, they stay at that level until they are killed and/or resummoned.

The only thing switching out of +skill gear does once you have your army summoned is limit the total number of skeletons you may have at a single time. So when I switch to Ali Baba, my skill level drops to 28, so my max skeletons goes down from 12 to 11, but those 11 still hit the same as the 31/31 skill level they were summoned at. (In your case, you'd also probably lose one - possible two - off your maximum total number of skeletons and mages, but the ones remaining would be to same level you summon them at.) This is a trick you can exploit when you run across a skill shrine as well. Resummon as many skeletons as you can before the timer runs out, and you get the +2 bonus to the skill itself and the mastery, and even after the effects of the shrine wear off, the skeletons remain at their increased level. (Again, you may lose a warrior and mage due to the cap imposed at the lower skill level once the skill shrine wears off, but the skeletons you keep remain in their buffed up form.)

The vast majority of summon necros use the AoKL as the switch weapon, used to summon their army, and then switched out to something that grants an additional aura to help out the army. The favorite choice is usually "Beast":

Beast - Ber-Tir-Um-Mal-Lum Requires Axe, scepter or hammer w/5 sockets
Level 9 Fanaticism Aura when equipped
+40% IAS
+240-270% enhanced damage (varies)
20% Crushing Blow
25% Open Wounds
+3 to Werebear
+3 to Lyncanthropy
Prevent Monster Heal
+25-40 strength (varies)
+10 energy
+2 mana per kill
Level 13 Summon Grizzly

A decent weapon in its own right to be sure, but summoners use it only for the first and last modifier on the list. The level 9 fanaticism aura makes everyone around the necro attack and move much faster, and a level 13 Grizzly is a stout enough summons to be of use. Other, not as popular options include "Doom" (level 12 Holy Freeze, but that one is able to be made in polearms, so it's considered a second aura for your merc, and has the issue of corpses shattering on death), and "Hand of Justice" (Level 16 Holy Fire, any 4 socket weapon). If you have the runeword mod, it also allows "Infinity" (Level 12 Conviction, polearms), "Insight" (Level 12-17 Meditation aura, also polearms), and "Pride" (level 20 Concentation, polearms). There are a few other choices that require bows, if you wanted to give an Act I merc an aura.

The reason why "Beast" is considered the best choice is because it is one of only two that I listed that can be made in a one-handed weapon. (The other being "Hand of Justice", but you'd definitely take Fanaticism over Holy Fire.) The second issue you run into is with the exception of "Insight", all of those runewords require at least one high rune (and in some cases, multiple high runes).

 

How many Bers do you need for a Zod? Eight maybe? I think Jah and Cham come after Ber and before Zod. Ber also holds the distinction of being my highest self-found rune. The problem of course, is actually getting runes of any kind that are that high. Countess cannot drop higher than Ist (typically - you have long odds on a Lo), and the Hellforge in Hell difficulty cannot drop beyond Gul. So anything beyond that is ultra-rare. I agree that if your current necro has no issue speeding your way though, then it is probably not a great idea to spend a Ber on something that will not greatly improve a character.

I must admit that I find it unusual that you still use your necro with such frequency. Necros are great mfers for everything up to a point. They excel at acquiring everything you can reasonably hope to find in normal and nightmare. They are still good in hell difficulty for clearing areas, but they typically lack the speed of other characters. Once you have a good starting supply of equipment, most people switch over to something faster, which usually means a sorceress. In fact, if the only thing you're really after at this point is high-end sets, uniques, and runes, I cannot imagine that the necro is still your fastest character. (Although it certainly would remain the safest.)

The standard meteorb setup can run just about everything (except the Countess who always spawns fire and cold immune), and even there she's pretty fast. Sorceresses planning on running the Countess usually prefer the CL/FO variant. Looking at the Level 85 areas - Mausoleum, Pit, Anceient Tunnels, Maggot Lair, River of Flame, Pandemonium Fortress, and WSK - none of the standard bosses spawn dual immune. Sorceress can also probably take out PIndleskin, Eldtritch and Shenk very quickly. (Well possibly not Eldtritch and Shenk - as soon as the first body drops CE would clear them out, so it really comes down to if the Sorceress could clear the pack in less time than the necro's minions could take down the first monster - that's a close call.)

I do have a plan for my next sorceress, but I still need the shield. I plan on making a variant of the meteorb. I found a guide called the Orbitaller. The author tried Meteorbs and discovered that he hardly ever used Meteor, and Fireballed almost everything. I also find that I use Fireball and Frozen Orb to the virtual exclusion of Meteor, and so this was the guide for me.

The basics are the same as the Meteorb. The main exception is that the three fire skills you max of Fire Bolt, Fire Ball, and Meteor, (and one point in Fire Mastery) as opposed to Fire Ball, Meteor, and Fire Mastery. Those three give the biggest damage output of Fireball, because of the excellent 16% synergy from Fire Bolt (and it conveniently gives your sorceress something to dump skill points into early on.) Meteor is still selected because it is Fireball's second largest synergy, at 14%. The first point in Fire mastery is worth 30% (so it's a no-brainer), but subsequent points are worth just 7%. The classic Meteorb maxes it because it's the last synergy worth pursuing for Meteor (Meteor receives no synergy bonus from Fire Bolt).

The result for your fire tree is a much more powerful Fireball, with a somewhat nerfed Meteor. (Only somewhat because any +skills you have will benefit Fire Mastery - but +skills would not give a synergy bonus to Fire Bolt.) The remaining points go into Frozen Orb and Cold Mastery obviously.

 

For some reason, I find this thread interesting, even though it is highly unlikely that I will ever play D2 again. I have a question:

Am I reading this right? Are you saying that you can switch characters mid-game, and not have to start a new game on normal? I don't remember that from when I used to play; how does that work?

And what is a “mfer”?

(OK, so technically that was 4 questions. Sue me. )

 

Well, your necro is using Enigma, right? That alone would greatly speed up the game, as it is a way of insta-consolidating your army to focus attacks on a single target, get a corpse, and blow it up. I don't have an Enigma, so I rely on the not-so-good AI of my minions to target enemies, which means I rarely can get them concentrating on a few targets - especially the mages who will simply shoot at whatever is closest. (When you run into a pack of monsters, when you are in a dungeon passage moving northward, the mages to your left will fire at the monsters on the left side of the corridor, and the mages to your right will fire at the monsters on the right side of the corridor.) The other thing about the mage AI is they will fire at enemies that are immune to their elemental attack - even when there are other targets available - it's just whatever they are closest to. Annoying when your fire mage is attacking fire immune demon, in a mixed pack with some non-fire immunes.

For a little more info for Splunge - there are many fun characters to try out that require pretty specific gear to be effective. If you want to try out a variety of characters, it quickly becomes necessary to spend some of your time running areas and bosses with the hopes of finding items other characters can use. (It is usually futile to make a new character that requires specific equipment and hoping you find it with that character.) In fact, it's quite the opposite - the stuff you find dictates the types of builds you try, not the other way around.

So you take an existing high level character, and go adventuring hoping you can find stuff that other characters can use. The reason necro summoners are popular is they require very little equipment themselves to be somewhat effective, are very safe to play, and provide a means of building your base item wealth. Once you get your base item supply up, you make characters that can mf areas in a shorter amount of time, so you can spend more time playing, and less time looking for stuff.

MF is your chance of finding magic, rare, set, and unique items. All characters (even those carrying no gear that adds mf) have a chance of finding magic, rare, set and unique items. MF is always listed as a percentage, and it is the percent increase from your base chance. So having 100% mf does [edit] NOT [/edit] mean all the stuff that drops will be magical, it means that the chance of having something be magical is twice what it would be without the added mf. And even though the "m" in mf stands for "magic", mf adds to the chance of finding rares, sets, and uniques as well (although at a reduced percentage).

 

Well, the build I listed isn't exactly like Socialism's Orbitaller guide, but it was his guide that was the inspiration to my proposed build. The Orbitaller guide advocates a nearly even split in points between the Cold and Fire trees, resulting in a more powerful Frozen Orb attack. The Orbitaller guide maxes Frozen Orb, and sinks a good 10 points into Ice Bolt (Frozen Orb's synergy) once the returns on Cold Mastery start to steeply diminish.

In keeping with the theory of having a very powerful primary attack, and only using a secondary attack against things immune to my primary attack, I will not do exactly as he suggests. In fact, I'll probably invest just a single point into Ice Bolt and Cold Mastery, relying on +skill items to improve the Cold Mastery. The Ice Bolt synergy is only 2% more damage per bolt (granting that when there are dozens of bolts spraying everywhere, 2% isn't as measley as it sounds).

The build I really want to try is a Conviction Zealot. This one only exists in my own head, so I cannot link to it. The problem is, the only way I can see this build working is if I get my hands on a Baranar's Star, which I haven't been able to do since moving to SP. Thee problem I run into with elemental zealots is that with Holy Shield, I keep my dexterity so low (usually around 100 to maintain max block) that my AR suffers. Conviction would obviously fix that. Alas, I'm not sure it would work nearly as well if I used only the elemental weapons I currently have available, like Djinn Slayer or Crescent Moon.

I also had a bit of a eureka moment last night, and I think I may have a new favorite helm for melee characters - Tal Rasha's Horadric Crest - that's right the helm from the sorceress's set. While the helm doesn't do much for a sorceress, it's stats are phenomenal for just about any melee build:

Defense: 99-131
Required Level: 66
Required Strength: 55
10% Life Stolen Per Hit
10% Mana Stolen Per Hit
All Resistances +15
+45 Defense
+30 To Mana
+60 To Life

The sorceress, who hardly ever goes into melee, cannot really make use of the huge dual leech provided by the helm, but any melee class certainly would. I'm not 100% sure on this, but I think that's the biggest dual leech you can get in the game. I cannot think of any other item that gives that much life and mana leech together on the same item. A perfect roll on blood gloves combined with the "of the lamprey" affix would yield 11% life leech, but 7% would be the maximum possible on mana leech.

The huge dual leech alone would really free up a lot of equipment choices as that's plenty to get by on, but even the other mods certainly qualify as "not bad". You get some resistances which are always helpful, and the boost to mana and life are fairly significant. With the exception of barbarians, all other characters would need to spend at least 20 points into vitality to equal that life boost.

 

I'm still working the necro for now - if I don't find one before I finish, I'll take you up on it.

 

An OK night of Meph running all things considered - I landed a Demonhorn's Edge, Arrioc's Needle (which my merc is actually using - lower than what I had considering base damage, but there's a 50% deadly strike and +3 to all skills), +2 bow and xbow gloves with 20% IAS, and an interesting combination of a +3 bone and poison skills mod, coupled with a +3 bone and poison skills amulet. Hmmmm....

 

With Windies, it's all about +skills to make them work. And by my count, it looks like you have +13 to elemental skills, which is pretty nifty. Even your spirit (Oak Sage I presume) and your Dire Wolves should be quite hardy, since you also have +12 to all skills from your equipment. So with one hard point in each, that's level 13 - definitely doable. Your spirit will still die frequently - there's just not much you can do about that, as it moves to melee range in combat for some reason - just recast it. Your wolves will be pretty hardy (although they will will go down quickly to a pack of Frenzyaurs, which is why a 1 point Grizzly isn't a bad idea).

Are you planning on maxing Dire Wolves? If so, I'd say work on that last. You have four main skills that should be maxed, as they all synergize each other, before working on your summons. Like I said, level 13 isn't bad for Wolves, so you should be able to hang with them with a lowish hard point investment. At level 80, with all quests done in Normal and Nightmare, and the Den of Evil in Hell, you should have 88 skill points to spend. That might be just enough to max out those four skills and prerequisites.

With a high level cyclone armor and hurricane active, you'll find that you'll usually be able to do that. Hurricane slows them down, and cyclone armor offers you some protection. (Incidently, cyclone armor is a great skill for a windy. Not only is it defense against all elemental attacks, it synergizes both of your other spells.) Hurricane is like having holy freeze - except that the pulse damage actually does decent damage, as it is inflicted much more rapidly that the pulse form holy freeze.

If they are just PI (or really anything besides PI/CI) you should be in decent shape. As long as they aren't immune to both tornado and hurricane, they should be easily killable. CI are just business as usual - Tornado + merc + summons. PIs are Hurricane + merc + Hellrack (assuming you went with that option). The merc can cast Inner Sight, and if she's level 80, it's cast at level 20 - assuming she has no +skill gear. IS at level 20 will knock a couple thousand off monster defense.

Note on +skills for mercs (you probably already know this, but just in case): Only the barbarians in Act 5 benefit from +skills to a particular class. So barb helms that give +skills will work on them. The Act 1 rogues will not benefit from anything that gives bonus skills to amazons (as they aren't amazons). But they do get the benefit from anything that gives generic + to all skills. So things like Skins of Vampermagi, Shako, etc., will work. Similarly, +paladin skills don't work on desert warriors, and +sorceress skills don't work on Iron Wolves.

Hmmm... I know with my necro I used the normal respec when I was in nightmare difficulty when I found Ali Baba - I didn't meet the dexterity requirement to wield it, as I had left my dexterity at base. I'm sure I was already in nightmare, because Ali Baba isn't dropable in Normal difficulty. I will check to see if my nightmare difficulty respec is there when I get home tonight. (I am a little displeased that I rerolled a so-so Hell Meph map, in hopes of getting a quicker one, and ended up getting worse and worse maps subsequently - so I need to reroll them again anyway.)

The only thing I've done lately is run Hell Meph with my necro, with the occassional Pit and Countess runs thrown in. Just about all the stuff I'm looking for regarding future character development is dropable by Hell Meph. The odds of TC75 and TC78 are not good, and anything from TC81+ is completely undropable, but there's a heck of a lot of stuff that's still useful with TC72 and lower - like all normal and exceptional uniques, and about half of all elite uniques.