Diablo 2 Questions

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I disagree with that. My barb was the most successful character I ever made, and I still have him saved on battlenet. He is level 85, and he is virtually unkillable at this point. On his weapon switch I have two howling weapons that each give +3 to all warcries. So before every battle, I buff him with battle commands and battle orders. His battle order skills go off at level 33, meaning it more than doubles his hitpoints, mana, and stamina. He has over 2,000 hitpoints. His primary attack - concentrate - gives him a bonus of over 300% defense. Combined with an Act II mercenary with defiance aura, his defense is over 20,000. NOTHING touches him in combat. Not even Hell Baal. With damage reducing items, and maxed out resistances, he is all but indestructible. The key - as is the key with my paladin - you single wield and use a shield. Even characters with relatively low defenses can be capable with a shield if they spend enough points in dexterity to get max block to 75%.

Not much, as I think the elemental druid is the most difficult path to take. The only advantage is that the elemental attacks you get to choose from cover a range of damages. Make sure you use them. Don't concentrate only on fire based attacks, or only on cold based attacks for example. The downside to elemental druids is to keep the spells coming, you'll need a large mana pool, meaning you're going to have to sink a lot of points into energy. The end result is that your strength suffers, it's hard to invest a lot into dexterity to get max block, and you simply can't neglect vitality if you want to survive the higher difficulty levels.

I'm also a big fan of Act II mercenaries, because their auras benefit not only themselves, but also you and any summons. I generally prefer the defensive merc for his defiance aura, which eventually will get to the point of giving over a 200% defensive bonus for both of you.

However, on the higher difficulties, defense becomes more of an all or nothing proposition. An elemental druid is going to be sinking more points into vitality and energy, and limiting his investment in strength. I do not think pumping defense is going to be effective, because your stength will never be high enough to wear the better armors anyway. I doubt you'll even get your strength up to 100. Sure, 200% defense is nice, but 200% of a very low number is still a pretty low number.

From what I have seen in playing on hell difficulty, if your defense isn't at least 5,000 then it doesn't matter. Whether your defense is 4,000 or only 400, you're still going to be hit by virtually everything anyway. The advantage however, in taking a defiance merc is that HIS survivability will be better. So there is still some merit in that choice. The other thing I've seen employed with decent effect is a combat merc with the thorns aura. This works particularly well with a summoner druid, as the summons get the thorns aura as well. On hell difficulty they get hit, and return close to 1000% damage back on the attacker, which effectively kills any attacker. (The caveat being it only reflects PHYSICAL damage, so any creature that uses an elemental attack won't be affected by thorns.)

 

Update:

Level 77 now - Andariel has been defeated - Act II is hard - those beattles that give off lightning every time you hit them are a pain with 46% LR.

 

Mine was something like lv.70, might remember it wrong, but then again I don't like to grind my characters. Nevertheless, with a stone-skin of 23pt he got a bonus of 250% to his armor and with a sword master of 23pt a bonus of 138% to dam, 204% attack rating, and ~23% chance of critical strike. Count in two swords and that two-handed strike -skill:

...And still he couldn't handle a single zombie in Hell difficulty. But so didn't anyone else from the groups I was playing with. So guess this makes you real "l77t" for getting past act 1 and actually beating Andariel. Or just a super-rambo.

Wonder if I still have my account active... Now that I think of it, two Bloodletters is a pretty awesome find.

 

For one, you weren't using a shield. A shield alone allows you to get 75% block rate, which basically equate to 75% damage reduction. Plus, with a socketed shield, it's easy to get maxed resistances, even on hell difficulty.

Secondly, what was your primary attack - frenzy? Actually, with two Bloodletters you were probaby using Whirlwind - I think they each give +3 to that skill. I had my primary attack as concentration, granting me an additional 270% defense bonus, with an inunterreptable attack, so basically, if I kept swinging I wasn't getting hit. Oh, and I had a defiance merc from Act II to boot.

Don't get me wrong - this is not a fast character. Your level 70 barb could probably deal out damage at a much faster rate than I could. It was a slow killing process, but because I had a huge life pool, and significantly reduced incoming damage, I was all but unkillable. When you have close to 2000 life points, you can take even the hardest of hits.

 

The monsters dish out a lot of damage too. IIRC, it takes some four hits from a regular zombie to finish off my barb and having a few hundred points more makes only a small difference: perhaps one or two extra hits. Then, in contrast, they have easily over 20,000 HP plus immunities. Like said previously: even with a group of five lv.70 characters it takes a good few minutes against *one* zombie.

Man it would be a bore against quicker monsters and champions, having to edge bit-by-bit and lure them in one-by-one... Is this what you are currently doing? If your character can't do as much damage, it has to be a real chore.

 

^ Are we playing the same game? Yes, I imagine that there are a great many monsters on Hell difficulty that have 20,000 HP, but by the time you get that far, 20,000 shouldn't be that much. My Zeal attack does between 1,000 - 1,500 damage per swing, and I swing 5 times per attack. So, assuming I'm hitting each attack (which doesn't always happen, but for ease of calculations) that means I'm doing between 5,000 and 7,500 damage per zeal cycle. So that's like 3 Zeal cycles per kill. That's nowhere near the several minutes you describe - I'd say it's around 5 seconds per kill.

Now that I think about it, I'm a little dubious about monsters havnig 20,000 HP, because most monsters don't take me three Zeal attacks to kill - many take one, and most not more than two, with the exception of cold immunes, as 75% of the damage I do is cold based, and of course the unique monsters, champions, etc take more than one zeal cycle.

Still, a zeal attack between 1,000 and 1,500 per swing is not a lot. Most people who use zeal max out sacrifice for the synergy bonus of 12% damage per point spent, and easily have zeal damage triple what I have. And a whirlwind barbarian dual wielding bloodletters should be doing way more than 1,500 damage per whirl.

Here's the only thing I can think of why you might have had problems, and also explains the disparity in the hitpoints and damage of monsters:

You do realize that for each PC beyond the first in the game mosters are given a bonus of +35% hitpoints and +35% damage, right? They also give +35% more experience per character too though. That means with 5 characters, that each monsters you encounter has +140% hit points, and +140% damage. So the monsters you were running into had nearly 2.5 as many hitpoints, and did 2.5 as much damage. A 20,000 HP monster you encountered in a 5 player game would only have 8,333 HP in a single player game.

Of note here is that mercs DON'T count as additional players, and neither do any summons, even powerful ones. So you should always have mercs, as they take the heat off your PC, and can deal out considerable damage. Your best bet is usually the paladins, as they share their aruras with you and with each other. So if you have two players, one has a might merc, and the other a holy freeze merc, then both mercs and both PCs will be under the influence of both auras simultaneously. Obviously, if the two PCs are paladins, you can have up to four auras active on everyone simultaneously. (NOTE: Paladins using the same aura DO NOT stack. You can be effected by multiple auras, but only if they are all different.)

 

Guess the experience has just been so different for us then, because even at Nightmare my barb could not survive alone and even less so in Hell. But if a group of five grants even tougher monsters in relation, it is no use to group up either. No wonder I quit playing at that point.

Anyway, after reading THIS article, I guess a shield really makes more difference than increased damage. Damn, should had kept that Sigon's Guard...

 

My experience regarding groups is the only time they provide significant benefit is if you play with one or two other people regularly, and you picked your characters to complement each other. Two or three randomly grouped characters don't make the game any easier, due to the buffed up monsters you encounter. The fact that they take more damage is one thing, but it is that they inflict significantly more damage that is really the largest problem. A hit that you might be able to shrug off if you are by yourself will kill you if you are partied up with other players.

That having been said, a party set up the complement each other can be very beneficial. For example, a paladin that has maxed out conviction (or whatever the aura is that lowers enemies resistances) and a cold sorceress with maxed out cold mastery completely pwns. With two characters lowering enemy cold resistance, even cold immune monsters have their cold resistance dropped into negative numbers. Just bring along some mercs (Act 3 cold mercs if you're feeling particularly sadistic) and you can mow down anything.

Another good example is the way I designed my level 85 Barb to essentially be a brick. He kills slowly, but because he rarely gets hit and can absorb so much punishment when he does, him combined with a bow wielding Amazon (who is safely away from the front lines) can similarly be a very powerful combination, provided the Amazon has learned both ice and fire arrow skills for her artillery support.

The bottom line is that the more party members you add, the less likely you're going to be complementing each other well, and the penalty of tougher monsters won't be overcome simply by having more people.

 

Which is kinda silly. Since when having more people at the opposite side has made *you* stronger? A not-so-funny quirk in the design, perhaps?

Still, wish that D3 would come soon and hope it will be even better than D2. A bit more story and diversity (in all areas) can never hurt.

 

Yeah, it's silly, but I see why it exists. They want the game to be challenging to all players. If they set it up so that everything was killable for a solo character, then any significantly large group would easily go through the game. Similarly, if they set it up for large groups, then soloing would be impossible. The 35% buff up per additional player is the compromise to make it more difficult for groups, but still possible for individual players.

 

That doesn't sound very logical, since is already a "single-player" component. In fact, it pisses me off to no end that majority of players on Battle.net come there to play ALONE just for the fun of having lag. This leads to all kinds of side-effects, like lamers.

IMO, it would had been so much better just to make the enemy groups big, tough, and mean. Just like you would expect from the spawns of Hell. This would had forced people to team up like in Guild Wars (the only aspect I really loved in it) because they know they will not survive otherwise. Single-players could play ( ) possibly toned down "single-player" -mode.

But unlike in GW, the designers would also need to offer alternatives. For example: assassin could actually start sneaking around to get the items/quests done without having to fight with spam. Druids could take over areas and create fortifications against masses of rushing enemies. And so on...

Come to think of it, GW's P2P -type networks could fit like a glove to D3. You really have to wonder how long they intend to maintain current Battle.net when it only eats money without producing any revenue...

 

That's true, but I don't like using the single player function too often. There are times I like to play online with my brother. Also, with my higher level characters, if I find something really good for a class I likely won't ever play (like the necromancer - for some reason I never like them much), then I'll trade the item for something I CAN use. So even though I often go solo, I don't like the single player function very much.

The main reason why I go solo instead of teaming up with someone is because the other players are freakin' vultures when it comes to good items. With my brother, we have an agreement that whoever has more use for the item gets the item. With multiplayer no such agreement exists. In fact, when playing with a lot of people, it doesn't even matter who gets the kill. Everyone crowds around the boss when he dies (there's usally a lag of a couple of seconds from his death to when the items drop), a clicks like mad to scoop up as much as possible before anyone else. There's no equitable way to distribute the treasure.

 

Oy, necromancers are my favorite class, although a bit boring if you don't have support. No going against bosses alone, you know, since necros only spawn meatwalls to suck out the damage. In the hardest difficulty, a single necro can make the game *so* much easier, especially with the help of paladin's auras.

And having to stay behind the lines also gives them a lot of time to prepare to scoop up the best items. Was pretty good in it too, since while others were busy beating the boss, I could just watch and grab the stuff the moment he died.

Not that there were that good stuff that often... Usually the best items come from regular champs in places like Kurast Bazaar and Hell. Anyway, it's part of the game. In GW, they have solved this so that all drops are automatically divided for player-names and only the corresponding name could pick them up. The negative side is that if there is this really kewl item but the player has no idea of it, it usually stays on the ground and rots without anyone being able to put it into good use...

 

Yes, necromancers are definitely excellent support characters. The problem is that if you can get past the summons and the revives, they are ever-so squishy. My brother got a necro leveled into the 70%, and he did it by focusing on the poison ability tree. He didn't spend any points at all on summons, and he only used one or two curses. The character worked great to hurt enemy monsters who weren't poison immune, but he needed to party, because he couldn't kill anything that was immune to poison. Because necros are almost exclusively spell based, they need a large mana pool, and as such, their other attributes tend to be on the low side. One of the advantages with Barbarians and Paladins is because they are melee based, you don't have to sink any points at all into energy.

This past weekend, I got to the arcane sanctuary in Act II. My character is now level 79. He STILL has only 15 points in energy - the exact same amount he started the game with. Now his mana pool is higher than that, because like all paladins he gets two points in mana at every level up. So his total mana pool is 79*2 +15 = 173. That's more than enough. His holy shield ability costs 35 mana, but it last four minutes. The only other thing he needs mana for is his standard attack - Zeal. But Zeal only requires 2 mana per use. I have 5% mana leech, so I'm sucking back way more than 2 mana per Zeal. I usually only need one kill to refill my mana bulb after using holy shield.

 

I play a summoning necro, he's lvl 80 now and soloing Hell in Act 2. I didn't sink a single point in energy, I don't think it's necessary for summoners. Got more than enough mana. I've got my Act 2 might aura mercenary and about 12 skeletons doing physical damage, a golem to slow enemies down, skeleton magi for elemental damage and revives for heavy support. You can imagine how crazy it gets in a party with other players who give off auras like the paladin.

 

Level 80 now. I just started Act III. Duriel was surprisingly easy. He took a long time to kill because he has Holy Freeze Aura, which greatly slowed my swing speed. However, he wasn't hitting me all that much. I only went through two super healing potions the whole fight, plus one full rejuv that I had to chug right in the beginning when he hit me with a charge that nearly killed me. It probably took me about a full minute of just standing there swinging at him because me attack speed was so slow, but he wasn't that bad.

 

It's not really an 'advantage' in comparison to a necromancer, since necromancers do not really need strenght or dexterity past the necessary to use good stat items. Even then they only need res, vitality, and skill bonuses, so that leaves 5 points to spend solely on energy and vitality quite often. Okay, necros absolutely need a party, but that can be easily accomplished on normal and nightmare difficulties. After that it's a struggle to find company.

@ Tassadar

Don't know how you got there by 'soloing', but congrats of the feat. Only a handful of players bugger to go that far. But I'm guessing you did get some boost from other players, no? We both know that once the bosses wipe out the summons, the necromancer is like a waiting virgin in a dark barn.

 

I disagree with the feelings expressed about summoning Necromancers. I play hardcore and have had a number of level 90+ Necromancers since D2C including one post 1.10. And I know for a fact that I'm not particularly good player so anyone can do it.

Summoning Necromancers are, in my opinion, the safest untwinked hardcore characters there are followed by the Assassin.

Summoning Necromancers are the best physical damage dealers in the game. Past normal Diablo the summoning Necromancer, if built well, won't have many problems with end bosses relative to other classes. Heck, I know people who have played them naked and can solo in Hell okay.

You can stay alive (which is the point in hardcore) by having enough life to absorb a hit or by avoiding the hit. The Barbarian and some Druids are designed to take hits. Amazons passive skills let them avoid the hit. And a summoning Necromancer has the best armor in the game - summons and curses. Controlling the battle field is the key to staying alive in hardcore in my opinion and the Necromancer excells at this. Once you control the field of battle it is just a matter of killing and moving on and that is the easy part.

I wouldn't put any energy into a summoning Necromancer personally unless you plan to heavily use Corpse Explosion and then I might get it up to 50 to 100. But, with no energy, a strength of ~100 give or take 15, no dex required (though some do raise if for block which I might do if I had better items) a Necromancer is capable of a decent amount of life even with the low return on vitality. Couple a life pool of ~1000 to ~1300 with a decent bone armor and 13 or so skeletons plus revives/mages and curses which can shut down every monster within the screen and the character can effectively solo hell.

Your bane is P.I.'s but amp breaks the immunity unless it is greater than 120%. The only monsters with more than 120% will be bosses and that is where LR and CE come in.

Decrepify keeps skeletons alive against the physical end bosses like Duriel and Diablo. To me, saying the summoning Necromancer is doomed if he loses all of his summons is like saying a s/s Barbarian is doomed if his sword and shield shatter. It's true, but it shouldn't happen if you're careful. And if it does, just go and have your sword repaired.

YMMV.

 

Perhaps you should just 'play' as a solo summoning necromancer and try how long they last under one blast from Diablo. Not two seconds, I'm afraid, and that is a fact no matter what you do. Max skills, resistance, items... It makes no difference. One blast and the summons are dead. Then the virgin better run and pester the boss with measly bone-spears and -spirits until he is dead.