Conviction and Act 3 Iron Wolves

[Coldfire]

Conviction and Act 3 Iron Wolves

So, by and large it seems that the act 2 merc is the hireling of choice in 99% of the diablo2 world...but...

I was wondering what some opinions were of the idea of hiring an act 3 mercenary (the iron wolves) if running Conviction as my main aura...since immunities will be broken that means they won't be useless anymore right? Especially if I got a lightning version and gave them Crescent Moon (offering an additional -35% enemy lightning resist)

Give me some feedback!

 

[Clervis1]

Check out my Conviction/CB guide, it's stickied right now. Generally, speaking lvl 25 Conviction will up you damage display 43%, 48% for lightning. With your Crescent Moon it will be at around 80% and there won't be very many immunities you can't break.

So, hypothetically, your merc's damage will get to be around this:

Lightning: 2-1217= 610 before resists * 1.80= 1,098 average damage
Charged bolt: 19 bolts, 28-34 damage= 589 before resists* 1.80= 1,060 average damage

However, I believe that lightning damage is bugged somehow making it much less affective, I don't know if that means it's useless though.

Cold:
Ice blast: 603-622= 613 before resists * 1.43= 877 average damage
Glacial Spike: 371-409= 390 before resist * 1.43= 558 average damage

Fire:
Inferno: 356-378 per second= 367 /sec * 1.43= 525 /sec ave. dam.
Fireball: 364-401= 388 before resists * 1.43= 555 ave. dam.

So you can see that lightning does the most damage, but do to it's bug Cold becomes more useful. How useful? 877 and 558. Not a tremendous contribution, but he does freeze baddies and he has Frozen Armor to help keep himself alive. And if you're still not satisfied, you can equip him with some pretty gnarly things like Last Wish for the Might aura or Lawbringer for the Sanctuary aka Oblivion Knight B****slap aura.

 

[Vegetall]

Of course, it would be a good idea but what about a act holy freeze merc pumping out like 4K damg with fort and bonehew and plus he will tak all the hit while ur pulses go off....

but i had the same though since i found a 14% eth FB ormus i was going to build a merc around it, with dual spirits and a nice skill helm....

but its def a decent idea, i would give it a whirl, just need to get my pally to 80 so the merc hire will be high enough for the armor...

personally i havent heard/seen anyone useing them since stated above ac2 mercs are prime for mercs... but i would hope there is someone that has done this before, that could give alittle more info

well Clervis to the rescue as i was writing this... hahah, nice on the post.. i didnt even think of Sanctuary... hmmm somone has something to do after work tonight...

 

[Coldfire]

Cool, thanks for the info...

On a related note, what do you guys think of giving an A2 NM Holy Freeze mercenary Doom....I'm pretty sure the aura's would NOT stack, but the -60 enemy cold resist would still apply right? I'm just trying to think of ways to utilize Conviction as much as possible... (like I'm planning on loading him up w/ a 3 socket helm with some Rainbow facets, stuff like that)

Go ahead and tell me if it'd probably be better to just load him up w/ more standard gear too and forget it I'm just trying to think outside the box :wink3:

 

[Vegetall]

Well no the auras wouldnt stack but the -60 would aplly to his attacks yes, so possibly a might merc would work better... but then again ur not pumping out much damg with out synergys but would still slow the enemys and in a nice eth CV or CA or a warpike prolby be pumping out some good damg, as with facets still probly not enough to waste since u would wnat to go for +5 damg/X-% since u have conviction that wouldnt really matter, expecially if ur running a nice lvl 25 conviction....

I would probly be worth checking out a act 3 merc and if u have like stuff laying around to just outfit him, possibly a crappy ormus/spirit items/shako, from other chars just to see and if it works nice then persue it... but other then that i would just say stick to a might or defiance act 2 merc... cheap gear for act 2 i was running all self found stuff (so cheap for me) but griz armor socekted ral/thul/ort (fire/cold/light res) any gaze and a bonehew socketed with hel and some crappy ED jewel defiance and he was still pumping out about 3K damg if not more... all IMO, people iwll have diffren opinons

but im going to try the act 3 merc tonight myself if i can get to the right lvl

 

[Clervis1]

To be honest you, if you are really interested in having your merc take advantage of your Conviction. You'd probably end up dealing more elemental damage with a non-elemental caster merc (kind of rediculous, I know). I included the magic damage even though Conviction won't help that.

Recommendations:
Act 1 Merc:
Level 30 Cold/Fire Arrow
Fire: 195-222
Cold: 151-160
Cold is much better because it freezes the enemy.

Equipment:
Ice=Holy Freeze (155-160), +30 Cold dam., -30 resists
Wrath=85-120 Magic, 41-240 Lightning, Decrepify (-50% monster phys. res.)
Harmony=55-160 Cold Dam., 55-160 Fire Dam., 55-160 Lightning Dam., Vigor Aura

With Harmony Cold you'll get 479*1.43=684 damage plus Vigor

Act 2 Merc:
Level 16 Holy Freeze (125-130)

Equipment:
Destruction= CtC a whole Schlew of spells.
Rift=160-250 Magic dam., 60-180 Fire dam., CtC Tornado & Frozen Orb!!!!


Personally that sounds like a sweet idea. I'd like to see someone try it. A Rift-a-merc!! The frozen orb damage does 276-291 but it spews out a lot of little things, and it happens roughly every 7 hits.

Act 5 Merc:
Equipment:
Voice of Reason(Mini-Rift)=100-200 Cold Dam., CtC Frozen Orb & Ice Blast, -24 cold res.
Lawbringer=150-210 Fire, 130-180 Cold, CtC Decrepify, Sanctuary
Destruction=Again, CtC all sorts of elemental damage.
Azurewrath=250-500 Mag. Dam, 250-500 Cold Dam., Sanctuary
Djinn Slayer=250-500 Fire Dam., 2 sockets


So you can see that an Act 5 Merc w/ Azurewrath is going to do more non-physical damage than an Act 3 Merc, plus you'll get Sanctuary. But I don't even think he'll do as much damage as the Act 2 Riftamerc with Holy Freeze. But you can even drop the HF in lieu of the Frozen Orb and supplant it with something else. Let me know if you try this out. I'd like to see what he's like.

 

[Vegetall]

Well with the act 5 barb what armor and helm would best go with the wep..... os faceted? or just stick with a COH and say Delerium or Dream... or possibly just for kicks dragon armor with dream helm... o this can be possibly the best way to accully use the barb runeword for the howl and taunt...
or even the sorc runeword for the CtC fireball/blaze
sounds like fun.. haha

 

[Clervis1]

I wouldn't use Dream or Dragon, they're both useless without synergies. You could use facets but that borders on insanity consider the improvement will be minimal and you're sacrificing the defense that mercs need dearly. CoH isn't that great of an idea either because an Act V merc already has really high resists. I'd say go with either a Guardian Angel, Fort, or Shaftstop.

Those 1.11 runewords sound like an intriguing idea, too, especially Treachery which gives Fade (15% damage reduction, 60 resists, curse length -79%), 45 IAS (important for those elemental attacks), and Venom (788 dam/sec before resists).

 

[Coldfire]

I was actually looking at Treachery...too bad Conviction doesn't affect poison damage :wink3: but yeah the dr and ias would be nice...

 

[kohlman]

with conviction, dream/dream and dragon armor and a spirit sword or some other sword would work well with your conviction. he might not deal the synergized 8k before conviction, but still, a lvl 30 holy shock by itself is 270 pulse damage, then with your conviction, a cold act 3 could deal decent damage (nothing that will slaughter monsters in hell) and stop most monsters in their tracks. this is only if you want to go outside the box. To be honest, the holy freeze act 2 merc with some decent runewords deals way more damage while still slowing monsters down to a crawl.