Diablo II single player questions

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So I've had this game for a while but never really played it. That changed and I've been running a Paladin specializing in cold and zeal (seemed the easiest to me, freeze them, slow them and whale away on them).

Anyway, I have some questions.

I have more things I want to keep than I can comfortably stuff in the stash. There are some of those set items where I am not sure that I like the ones I have, but I imagine the synergy of the set might help. Is there any way to keep things other than in the stash, on me, or on my hireling?

Right now, I am saving every single gem and rune that I find and upgrading them in the cube when I can. Does this make sense or should I limit what I save? I am not really saving the jewels I find as I am underwhelmed with them.

I also am not socketing the gems, runes and skulls because I figure it will be a waste to do that until I get to the point where I like my gear for the relative long run. How's that strategy work in the "sense-meter"?

I have kept the hireling that the computer gave me at the beginning and given her a cool bow and pretty decent armor and helmet. I like the damage she does and she does not get killed very often, but am I missing out on better hirelings?

Right now I am in Act 2 on Nightmare. Regular difficulty was pretty much a breeze, although some spots were annoying. This difficulty is tougher, because there are things that kill me before I really figure out who they are, and I can only chug potions so quickly.

Any help is appreciated. As I have already gone through once, I don't think there are any spoilers that would piss me off, so feel free.

 

Thanks all, I will look into these things and see if that helps.

 

OK - so I am running the latest patch, 1.12a I guess and the PlugY forum says it is not compatible. Is ATMA? If neither is, am I better off somehow going back a patch step to 1.11b? Which one of these two things is easier to use?

 

Then that's what I will use, thanks.

 

I got Norton's pop up warning with it as well and disabled Norton to allow the DL. It works fine (wish I had it before I sold several interesting items). I am pleased. Thanks to all who responded.

 

Pretty much all trainers/exe hacks induce false positives from virus scanners... I have yet to come across one that was actually infected.

 

So now I have completed Nightmare and leveled up to 70 with my frost zealot paladin dude. I start Hell and basically get owned on the Blood Moors - the quill critters and zombies require that I suck down multiple potions, my mercenary dies a couple of times and, quite frankly, hit and run tactics and watching her shoot arrows is boring. (I see that the zombies are immune to cold, which really blows chunks.)

Is this normal? Am I doing something drastically wrong here?

From memory, my gear is OK - Defense is around 1000 (which is probably low), my attacks generally hit, so I don't think that is an issue. I have a saber that does fire damage, has extra fast to hit (better than normal sword class) and I put a perfect gem of whatever type does poison damage to add 100 points of poison over a few seconds. Plus, it adds +1 to all Paladin skills. I am carrying half my inventory of charms adding various elemental damage types and a I have a couple that are also adding over 125 more points of poison damage.

I run around with Holy Freeze and Zeal active, my boots give me extra fast running and many of my gear items increase my chance to find magic items. Should I ditch the latter in favor of things that are better at defense or resistances?

Also, my armor isn't great on the defense side (like 250-300 or so IIRC) but it has a great lightning resist and I found that during the game, things that did lightning damage just kicked the crap out of me. The shield is so-so - base chance to block isn't great (a little over 50% I think) but it is +70% to all resistances, which I think is crucial on Hell because of the hit I take off the bat on my resistances by the level.

I've used ATMA to save a bunch of stuff and can get better armor defense-wise and better shields blocking wise. My dex and str are in the 130-140 range and the vitality is like 180 or so.

Have I screwed this up?

Last question - I have a few levels in holy shield (I think I took two and my gear raises my skills by another two), but I am not sure how it works or how it is reflected so I can see that it is working.

Sorry for the rambling post, but there are questions here and I probably will have more when someone posts some answers. Right now I find Hell to be tedious and am inclined to ditch it and start another character class (Necro or Sorceress to check out the magic types) because this sucks and I have better things to do with my time.

TIA.


Edit:

OK, now that I'm home, here are the real stats and items:

Str - 125
Dex - 122
Vit - 178

(All without modifications, obviously)

Zeal and Holy Freeze at 19, (plus a couple from items), Sacrifice at 9, Holy Shield at 2, Resist Cold at 11, Salvation at 10, others at relatively mininal.

(Remember that I have a couple of items that boost skills by +1 each)

Sabre - 3-8 damage, +62-120 fire, +99 poison over 7 seconds, 7% life stolen per hit, +1 to paladin skill levels, +40% speed, +5% fire resistance

Shield - chance to block 52%, Defense 149, all resistances +70%

Helm - Sazabi's mental sheath - +1 to all skill levels, defense 175, fire resist +15%, lighting resist +18%

Armor - defense 264, lightning resist +42%, poison length reduced by 50%, 10% faster hit recovery, +24% chance to get magic items

Belt - +5 str, +10 dex, defense 52, damage reduced by 3, attacker takes damage of 8, 30% faster hit recovery

Gloves - defense 107, poison resist +30%, +59 poison damage over 4 seconds, 5% life stolen per hit, 5% chance of crushing blow

Boots - Natalya's soul mesh boots - defense 162, lightning resist +23%, cold resist +15%, 40% faster run/walk, heal stamina +17%

Amulet - +5 str, +11 AR, +1 max damage, 33% chance of getting magic item, +1 summoning skills (druid only)

Ring1 - +16 max stamina, +31 AR, cold resist +12%, replenish life +3, half freeze duration, 12% chance getting magic item

Ring2 - +40 AR, 22% chance of getting magic item

Charms - Generally add: fire resist +15%, cold resist + 12%, lightning resist +21%, cold damage 4-11, lightning damage 1-8, poison damage 131, + 36 life, + 69 AR, +8 dex, +28 defense, 8% faster hit recovery, +5 max damage

Backup weapons -

Broad sword - 7-14 damage, +176 AR, 4-11 cold damage, +1 to paladin skill levels, requirements -20%, 10% increased attack speed

The General's Tan Do Li Ga Flail - damage 2-56, +25 defense, 5% mana stolen per hit, 20% increased attack speed, 150% damage to undead, slows target by 50%


Couple of questions on this - what's the point of reducing requirements? What does that do? What does crushing blow do? I think Ring2 and the amulet are weak links, any thoughts?