Diablo 2 Questions

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That damnable D3 thread. Got me playing D2 again. I decided to try a character that I have never beaten the game on Hell difficulty with previously - the paladin.

I have the basic framework of my character worked out, but I'm in need of some opinions to flush out the details.

My first decision was, of course, what type of paladin to make. I went with the Holy Freeze Paladin for a couple of reasons:

1. As I've said, I have never had a paladin who was effective on hell difficulty, and since I've never tried a Holy Freeze Paladin before, I suppose there's a chance this option will be better than previous attempts.

2. Holy Freeze apparantly works on EVERY creature in the game, even those that are immune to cold, except for the Minotaur-like creatures in Act V. Cold immunes don't take damage, but they are slowed, so that means I'm effectively moving at double speed since their speed is halved. As a bonus, at high levels, Holy Freeze extends beyond the visible screen.

So the next decision is where to place one's skill points. One thing I've discovered with D2 is you can't go willy-nilly with skill points and wing it if you want a good character. You need a plan from very early on, or your character will absolutely suck at higher difficulty levels.

As paladins cannot avoid melee combat to reduce the chance of them taking damage, and they can never attain the life points of a barbarian with skills like Battle Orders, it seems like maintaining the maximum 75% block rate is essential, and keeping a very high armor class is really important too. That means that I definitely want to take Holy Shield as a skill, and I probably want a defiance mercenary from Act II.

Now, I have realisticly around 90 skill points to work with. The maximum is 110, (98 level ups + 12 freebies) but that's assuming a level 99 character, which isn't happening. Setting a much more realistic goal of around level 80, it gives me 91 points to distribute. So that's four skills maxed out and would also meet any prerequisities along the line. As I've said, I'm pretty much locked in to taking 20 in Holy Shield and 20 in Holy Freeze, so I can really only max out two other skills.

Here are the viable options as I see it:

1. Zeal - As Holy Freeze adds cold damage, Zeal seems like a very worthwhile skill to have, as it allows you to damage multiple enemies in quick fashion, and helps keep them frozen to boot. Number of attacks max out at level 4, but you keep getting attack bonuses all the way up to level 20. This is easily the most obvious skill selection for my primary attack, so it seems like the question here is whether to max it out, or go to level 4 (which I've already done) and stop. It's uninteruptible as well.

2. Defiance - even though I already have a merc with defiance, and my character will be using Holy Freeze as his aura exclusively, Defiance is synergized with Holy Shield, adding an additional +15% to your defense for every point invested in it. As "not getting hit" seems to be a running theme with this character, this option has merit, even though it's a skill I will never actively use.

3. Resist Cold - again, not a skill I'd actively use, but it has merit as a synergy. Resist Cold adds additional cold damage to Holy Freeze, and since that's my main aura, it makes sense to max out this as well. However, cold immunes will not take more damage from this. There's also a passive bonus with Resist Cold in that it increases your maximum cold resistance (normally 75%) by 1% for every two points spent in this skill.

4. Sacrifice - Another synergy. Assuming Zeal as my primary attack, Sacrifice adds +12% to attack damage as a synergy, thereby maximizing my damage with my primary attack.

Now, given that I've already picked two to max out, I can realisticly pick only two if these four options to work on. Even if you are very optimistic and assume that I'll get closer to 100 skill points, it still means I can only chose 3 out of these four options.

So the questions are, which ones, and just as importantly, what order would you recommend? Finally, my paladin is currently level 15. I have a boatload of saved up skill points as the only thing I've spent points on are the prerequisites for Holy Shield, Holy Freeze and Zeal, and four point given to Zeal.

[ April 26, 2006, 23:20: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

 

The last time I played D2 I finished it with a barb. Really, it doesn't matter that much anymore on the highest difficulty since you will be struggling just to get past the very first quest in the first act. The recent updates (v1.11?) have beefed up the HP/damage ratio of the monsters so much that it is nigh impossible to beat a single zombie even with four(!) maxed out characters. In fact, the basic zombie at the beginning of act I (hell) has roughly as much HP as the final boss of the previous difficulty level.

So don't wonder if you can't find any playing company and remember: you won't stand a chance alone. Okay, maybe a small chance if you trade über-items enthuastically and grind your char enough (the latter being less important since, after all, you have everything important maxed).

 

Yep, she's brutal these days on Hell difficulty. Necromancers stand the best chance solo.

 

Actually, I HAVE finished the game on Hell difficulty v1.11 with a solo barb. That was my war cry/iron barb. With two howling weapons on my weapon switch, I cast battle commands, battle orders, and something else I can't remember, which go off at level 33 with all the bonuses. It effectively over doubles my hit points and mana, and since I use concentrate as my primary attack along with a definance mercenary, I rarely get hit. I admit that it does take me a while to defeat the act bosses (I'd say it takes me about a full five minutes to beat Bhaal from the time I first hit him to the time he finally dies. In that time, I probably hit him several hundred times.

 

It's for that exact reason that I got so bored with Diablo 2.

 

Dunno, but for any other class it is impossible. But I do remember that pallies had this awesome aura that increases everyone's ROF. I remember this because I had at the end of act 4 two Bloodletters and with this aura my barb basically ripped through Diablo in a matter of seconds. Nightmare difficulty though, so it would had been kinda mandatory in Hell.

So it's a pity that majority of players quit before that point.

 

I believe it's fanaticism. It's a level 30 paladin aura, and it increases % hit, % damage and ROF.

 

I assume the old cheese tactic of a Paladin with Maxed out Aura of Thorns no longer works. I remember back in the day where all you'd have to do is go stand in front of Diablo or any other boss and watch him kill himself in with a handful of attacks.

 

Well, they greatly increased the amount of damage the bosses can take, as well as the damage they deal, so no, it doesn't work. While a paladin with maxed out thorns will certainly be able to put a good dent in Big D's hitpoints, the paladin will likely die in the process. Plus, Thorns only reflects physical damage, so it's not like you can use that tactic to avoid damage from his fire attack or his PLBoD.

 

Well, so far so good. Finished normal, and I'm cruising through nightmare. So far, I have Holy Freeze and Holy Shield maxed out, and I'm working on Zeal. After that, I'm going with Resist Cold for the synergy with Holy Freeze, and after that, (although I won't be able to max it out), I'll go with Defiance as a synergy to Holy Shield.

 

Do you play online or offline? Do you have the latest patch installed? Those two can make you gaming a pain in the arse even when the power-gamers can still continue to solo (against whom the patch was aimed, I believe).

The normal difficulty is always a boring cruise and things start to pick up only once you reach Kurast in Nightmare difficulty. Nothing impossible yet, but the monsters start taking some serious beating especially if you have three players soloing.

 

I play online, solo. I am using the latest patch, version 1.11. I'm certainly not a power gamer though, as I only use items found by my character in the game. I don't have a dozen different mules loaded up with items that I give to my character to make him uber powerful from nightmare on.

Right now, I'm desperately in need of an Amn Rune. That's the last component I need to upgrade my rare crystal sword into the exceptional version using the cube. The sword is uber, with increased attack speed, enhanced damage, adds lightning damage, and dual leech, but the problem is it's a normal weapon. It has served me well throughout normal, but now it's damage is getting a little low for nightmare. Upgrading it to the next level (dimensional blade maybe?) will help immensely.

 

You should; the damage is pretty pitiful, IIRC, when compared to a dimensional blade. Of course, almost any nightmare-level weapon should be better. You could, of course, try socketing ice to a bastard sword and combining that with some RoF+ auras. Should be pretty decend even if you can't dual-wield.

 

Can't go with a bastard sword, as they are 2-handed weapons only. While I agree that they are much more damaging than what I currently have, the whole character is based on using a shield. I have already invested way too heavily (20 points) in Holy Shield, so there's no way I'm going with anything other than a one-handed weapon.

I'm OK for right now, as I am doing 300-400 points per Zeal hit (meaning my potential damage per Zeal cycle is actually 1500-2000). However, 3/4 of that damage is cold damage. I've only run into a handful of cold immune unique monsters at this point, and I do have Vengence (1 point wonder skill) for use in those situations. Unfortunately, as I'm sure you're aware, Vengence is a mana intensive skill, and there's no way I can use that skill regularly. Once I hit hell difficulty, and a large number of regular monsters are cold immune (including all undead), I'm going to need something that deals significantly more physical damage than what I'm currently doing.

As it currently stands, I'm not in bad shape. I can kill everything I run into, and I'm not taking tons of damage due to high resistances, pretty good defense, and 75% chance to block. I'm already thinking ahead to hell difficulty, and the things I need by then are: at least a good exceptional weapon. The best one out there is the unique war sword Atlantean (great stats including +1 to all paladin skills). Also, I will need a 4-socketed paladin shield to take care of my resistances in hell difficulty. Finally while my current body armor of 323 is adequate for nightmare with all the bonuses from holy shield and defiance, that's not going to cut it in hell difficulty.

I also made a slight change in strategy last night. I was working on Zeal exclusively, but I switched things up and I am not building Zeal, Resist Cold and Defiance simultaneously. The way I look at it, doing it in this manner, I'll have all of them at level 10 by the time I reach level 70. Level 70 is typically when I start Hell difficulty. It will be at that point that I decide which of those three I want to max out (currently leaning towards defiance).

 

If you happen to across any good "Faithful" equipment, be sure to keep it. All good drops become increasingly rare as you progress whereas this kind of enhanced armors retain their value. Add some sockets and you have a gear you can keep for the rest of the game.

As long as the base-armor is high enough, that is.

 

The biggest problem with armor is not that it's unattainable, it's that you rarely have the strength to wear it. The highest armor classes have strength requirement in excess of 200 - some as high as 232. However, there's no way you could ever donate that many points to strength, as your vitality would suffer, and everything on hell difficulty would kill you in a single hit. So like you said, it's much better to find lesser armors with prefix's like "faithful" or "blessed" or "godly" that give significant boosts to %defense. My current armor is ancient armor - the highest available "normal" armor - and has a base defense of 441 - good enough with all of my other defensive bonuses.

I just finished Nightmare level last night, and I defeated Baal with relative ease. My merc died in the fight, but that doesn't matter much in the greater scheme of things, as they can be easily raised.

My character is currently level 69, and is almost ready for Hell. He has adequate armor, a good weapon, and his other equipment is reasonable. The only piece of critical equipment I'm currently missing is a 4-socketed paladin shield, which is necessary before going to hell difficulty. I started a hell game last night, but I didn't even bother going into the first area, because I noticed that with the penalty applied to resistances, most of my resistances were in the 30s and 40s. Lightning was acceptable at 71%, but my cold resistance was 34%, and my fire resistance was only at 41%. As I'm sure you're aware, cold enchanted and fire enchanted bosses explode upon death, and with resistances this low, on hell difficulty this would likely kill me.

So basically, I need to boost my resistnaces up another 40% or so, and the only reasonable way I can do that is finding a 4-socket paladin shield and sticking four perfect diamonds in it. Heck, it doesn't even have to be a paladin shield. ANY shield that can take 4 perfect diamonds would have resist all 76% which should be adequate. My current shield resists all 42%, so while the extra 32% I'd get from non-paladin shields would be inadequate to get me up to the maximum allowable 75%, I'd be willing to go into hell difficulty with my resistances in the 60s. I don't care if I get badly hurt when a cold or fire enchanted creature explodes (they usually drop a healing potion so that's easily fixable), it's the insta-deaths that I need to avoid.

EDIT: Against my better judgement, I decided to try hell difficulty last night with less than maxed resistances. Big mistake. I was able to do well enough in combat - I was easily killing most of what I ran across in a few hits, and with maxed blocking and a high defense, I wasn't getting hit much either. The problem was, as I expected, a vulnerability to most elemental attacks. After dying twice, once to a cold enchanted creature, and once to a fire enchanted creature, I decided that the situation was not sustainable, and I returned to doing Baal runs at nightmare difficulty.

Now, it's not as bad as it initially sounds. You can still get pretty good experience points at level 70 doing Baal runs, and I'm assuming that I will eventually get a 4-socketed paladin shield. Repeated Baal runs also allow me a decent chance to land some pretty good equipment. Nightmare Baal can pretty much drop any exceptional armor or weapon, and can even drop some elite stuff.

The problem of course is finding a paladin shield. All class specific equipment (and paladin shields certainly fall into this category) drops at 1/3 the rate of other equipment. Furthermore, socketed equipment is 1/3 as likely to drop as standard equipment, and even if those first two work, the number of sockets you get are random. For all paladin shields, that means that you can get anywhere beween 1 and 4 sockets, so obviously 1/4 of all socketed paladin shields will be the desired 4 socketed variety. So the quick math is that my odds of landing a 4-socketed paladin shield are 1/36th as likely as landing a shield of some other variety. This may take a while, but I don't see any easily-attainable alternatives.

[ May 18, 2006, 15:38: Message edited by: Aldeth the Foppish Idiot ]

 

Grinding = Work. You have basically ended the fun and took the work home.

 

That depends on how long it takes me to find the desired paladin shield. If I find one relatively quickly, it's not bad. If I'm level 75 and STILL searching for one, I'll probably get frustrated and give up on the character. Hopefully, that won't happen, as I have never finished a hell game with a paladin, and from what I've seen from him thus far, I am highly optimistic about his play-ability on hell difficulty.

The one thing I will admit for v 1.10 and v 1.11, is I don't see how the low hitpoint characters survive. Basically, the only workable characters on hell difficulty are the paladin, barbarian, and druid - and the druid only works if you make wise choices with summons and werebear/werewolf skills. There's no denying that ability of a sorceress, necromancer, amazon or assassin to deal out loads of damage in a hurry, but eventually something is going to hit you, and when that happens, you're dead.

 

IMO, this is to force players to team up. Which is a good idea and all, but unfortunately there aren't enough of them at the later stages of the game. You know: necromancer for the meat, druid for the enchaments and more meat, amazon for ranged support and valkyrie, and other classes for dishing out direct melee-damage while the monsters are busy (and dealing with the bosses).

From what I have seen, barbs do not sound even nearly as effective as paladins. Like I said previously: I had two Bloodletters, maxed out skills, and he became an effective choise only under paladin's aura. I suggest you just try to team up with someone(s) and get through the job before you get bored.

 

Yeah, so I'm in act II with a lvl 16 druid, on normal difficulty, and you're all scaring me with all this complicated chat. I'm going down the elemental route, and frying monsters before they get a chance to touch me. Fissures is definitely a nice spell. ANyone got any advice?