How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

[pearce]

How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Hello all.

I am a level 28 druid. These are my most notable skills, the ones I use.
Summon dire wolf, level 8
Transform to werewolf, level 9
Transform to werebear, level 5 (I dont use werebear anymore)
Lycanthropy, level 6

Dexterity - 44
Strength - 81
Vitality- 73
Energy - 24

These below are all when im a werewolf, cause I always am one
Attack rating - 561
Damage - 81 - 121
Defense - 282
Life - 482.

I have a mage from the kurast level, he is level 27 and has cold spells. He has a high defense, he has all the same armour as me.

Then I summon 3 dire wolves aswell.

I can open all the diablo seals, but as soon as diablo spawns, boom, dead.
He kills my army in less than 10 seconds, and I have to retreat. Im sick of resurrecting the mage.
Any tips on how to defeat him or are my levels to low? Should I wait till I can summon a grizzly?

Where at the best places to level up? Everyone suggest baal runs, but I havent beaten baal yet, I'm still trying to kill diablo. They also say cows, where are they
Any tips on this are appreciated.

 

[smips]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Your skills placement is less than ideal, but I'll just ignore that for the time.

What does your gear look like? What players setting are you on? If I had to guess, you probably need a better weapon, more leech, and some resistances. You can't really rely on summons to kill Diablo in Normal, they usually bite the dust from his high damage. Also, I'd use an Act 2 merc rather than Act 3. The auras can be useful.

 

[Drystan1]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I imagine that your resistances are pretty low (Fire being the main priority, followed by Lightning.) It is possible to level up to 30 to get your summon, but most summons are very weak against Normal Diablo.
The positive is that Diablo won't heal, so if you can get small chunks off his life, he will eventually fall.

The cows are in Act 1, AFTER you've defeated Baal - then you can get access to the Cow Level, so that isn't an option yet.

If you list your gear, we can probably provide some easy low level alternatives to help you out.
For example, a Strength (Amn+Tir) in a two socket weapon will help with Crushing Blow, or Black (Thul+Io+Nef) in something like a Flail may help as well.
Rhyme shield (Shael+Eth) will boost your resists by 25%, giving you a decent boost to survival against Diablo's attacks. Alternatively, a Shield with 2 Perfect Diamonds will give 38% resist all, another good boost, but lacks Rhyme's 'Cannot Be Frozen.'

I too would go for an Act 2 merc (Prayer) for Normal, however, he won't really last against Diablo for too long either.

As you're still early game, I'd suggest taking a look at Druid's in the Mat/Pat/Guardian thread (stickied,) and looking for a build you may like. Summons or Shapeshifting, as he's currently looking like a misshaped build (we've all had a few of these, so don't worry too much.)

 

[In The Name of Zod]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

What is it that diablo does that kills you? Presumably its his lightning hose, this is deadly mostly because 50% of its damage is physical which you probably have little to no resistances against. You best bet is getting some life leech and increase your damage. You could run river of flame at /players 8 to get some more experience, put points into strength for more damage, use perfect skulls in weapons for leech. Forget about resurrecting your merc at this point, you need much better gear - that will come later.

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Hi all.

Some things I have no idea what you guys mean. As you guessed, my resistances are all 0. I just choose the best defensive things I can get my hands on. Here are my armour and weapons -
Massive maul of craftmanship. 44 - 63 damage. 50% damage to undead.

Armour
Helm - Strong crown of balance , defense 61. 10% faster hit recovery
Amulet - Amulet of Centuar - 21+ to life
Body plate - Glorious plate mail - defense 168
Gloves - Strong Light gauntlets of self repair. Defense 16
Belt - Gold plated belt of equilburim, defense 16, 10% faster hit recovery
Boots - Strong greaves, defense 22
Ring - Angelic halo. 22 + life, 6% replenish life
Ring - Wraith master - 19% to attack rating, 1% to light radius, Damage reduced by 1.




By act 2 mercinary I assume you mean the desert guys, what weapon should I give him? Any 2 handed pole arm? I cannot find any that do good damage, also, which one should i get? offensive, defensive or the other one, I forget the name at this point

 

[smips]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

The thing you need to keep in mind is that defense in D2 is pretty much useless. It would be much better to have armor with a defense rating of 2 that has some resists than to have armor with a defense rating of 1000 with no resists. For your mercs polearm, you can buy a belt, staff, and kris, then cube them with any form of a diamond(chipped, flawed, ect) to roll a good polearm for him.

Edit: I'd go with a Prayer merc, which is an Act 2 Combat merc I believe.

 

[Hitman1]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Another thing you can try is running Mephisto for some sets/uniques. That should give you some better chances at taking down Diablo.

 

[Drystan1]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I imagine the Maul is a very slow weapon, so that may limit your damage. Those 'Black,' 'Strength,' and 'Rhyme,' are all Runewords, made by inserting runes into socketed items in a specific order. The runes for these items can be obtained from the Countess in Act 1 fairly quickly.
Defense is highly overrated, and most of your defensive gear should be things that increase resistances and give life/life leach.

Act 2 mercs are the desert guys, and the highest damage polearm/spear is what you give these guys. At the early stage, little else matters. I would go with an Act 2 "Combat" one, who (should) give you Prayer and constant health.

A way to get a decent polearm for this guy is to place
1 chipped diamond,
1 'belt' from Akara (specific belt, not 'light belt'/'sash'),
1 'kris' from Akara
and the cheapest staff from drognon
into the Horodric Cube and transmute.

This recipe will give you a Savage Polearm, and can do some decent damage. Other options are Pikes (although slow, they do give good damage.)

On your equipment - errr, most of those items are doing nothing for your character. Look for items with '+% to Cold/Fire/Lightning resist,' '+life,' '+life leach.' These items will help you so much more than items that give more defense.

 

[In The Name of Zod]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Act 2 mercs:
Combat: Prayer (healing)
Defensive: Defiance (defence booster)
Offensive: Blessed Aim (attack rating booster)

What you are looking for is a Lochaber Axe for this merc. You might want to spend charsi's imbue quest to make it a rare item. I would choose the offensive merc for you. A 2 handed weapon is your problem at this point because you have no shield which can boost your resistances.

Go and collect 1 perfect gem of each type, put all 6 of them in your cube with an amulet and hit transmute. This will give you a prismatic amulet (all resistance booster). It will have a level requirement of 31 which you will find very helpful at that point.

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

The thing you need to keep in mind is that defense in D2 is pretty much useless. It would be much better to have armor with a defense rating of 2 that has some resists than to have armor with a defense rating of 1000 with no resists. For your mercs polearm, you can buy a belt, staff, and kris, then cube them with any form of a diamond(chipped, flawed, ect) to roll a good polearm for him.

Edit: I'd go with a Prayer merc, which is an Act 2 Combat merc I believe.

Hi.

I made the polearm, its very strong but it requires 95 strength, which the mercinary does not posess.

 

[Cius]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Id' recommend reading up a bit more on druid's in the druid forum. In the stickies are some guides on fury wolf, fireclaws bear, etc. Your skill points are too valuable to spread all over like that so you should really be working towards maxing your 4 final main skills.

For instance a decent first build could be:
20 points in Lycanthropy
20 points in Wherewolf
20 points in Fury
20 points in oak sage

You could also get a 1 pt bear if you feel like it.

That build will be much stronger.

Next point is that defense is a rather useless stat unless you have tons of it. Completely ignore it for your fight against Diablo. All that matters for you is maxing fire and lightning resists, and getting as much damage as fast as possible.

Shop the vendors in act 4 and 3 and get equipment that has high lightning and fire resists. If you have weapons with the right number of sockets then you can also try make those runewords that may be a better weapon overall. Definitely try an Act2 merc instead as they are more durable and can help you with their aura's.

Welcome to the forums!

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I imagine the Maul is a very slow weapon, so that may limit your damage. Those 'Black,' 'Strength,' and 'Rhyme,' are all Runewords, made by inserting runes into socketed items in a specific order. The runes for these items can be obtained from the Countess in Act 1 fairly quickly.
Defense is highly overrated, and most of your defensive gear should be things that increase resistances and give life/life leach.

Act 2 mercs are the desert guys, and the highest damage polearm/spear is what you give these guys. At the early stage, little else matters. I would go with an Act 2 "Combat" one, who (should) give you Prayer and constant health.

A way to get a decent polearm for this guy is to place
1 chipped diamond,
1 'belt' from Akara (specific belt, not 'light belt'/'sash'),
1 'kris' from Akara
and the cheapest staff from drognon
into the Horodric Cube and transmute.

This recipe will give you a Savage Polearm, and can do some decent damage. Other options are Pikes (although slow, they do give good damage.)

On your equipment - errr, most of those items are doing nothing for your character. Look for items with '+% to Cold/Fire/Lightning resist,' '+life,' '+life leach.' These items will help you so much more than items that give more defense.

I will quickly try find a diamond and get back to you, do you know where the best place to get a diamond is? Also the best place to look for good armour with good resistances?

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I will quickly try find a diamond and get back to you, do you know where the best place to get a diamond is? Also the best place to look for good armour with good resistances?

Thankyou all for the very helpfull posts. I am going in search of a diamond, and trying to find some resistant armours.

I am finding armours with 90 defense and 5+ fire resist, is that better than my current armour with 168 defense and no resists?

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I now have +40 fire resist and + 22 lightning resist. Problem is now I cannot use my maul, so what one handed weapon should I get?

 

[Drystan1]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Unfortunately, using that recipe can sometimes end up in a weapon too high for the merc. Any diamond will work for that recipe I believe, so don't worry about finding a chipped. There is no specific place to have a high chance of getting a diamond, but one'll come around eventually. If you push enter and type "/players8", more items will drop, so running around in an easy area at /players8 will net you a diamond sooner.

While the 5% fire resist is better than your armour, it's not really going to make a different. Basically, it's about upgrading a +%resist, with another higher +%resist. For Diablo, you really do want Fire and Lightning resist as high as you can get (75% max.)

Best of luck with finding the items.

As to the Maul/weapon, I mentioned 2 runewords (Black and Strength,) that may be able to help. Otherwise, a Fast attack speed+ with the highest damage you can find. Normal Mephisto may be able to drop some good uniques. It's all just luck from there on, and you can upgrade to newer weapons with other mods later.

Also, it's easier to see posts if you "edit" your post instead of adding a new one straight after your old one.

 

[pearce]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

thankyou very much all. I now have 70 + fire resist, and 0 lightning resist. I am on the hunt for better resistant armours as we speak. I just tried the players8 feature on the rivers of flame area and died, it is really hard.
I assume players5 would be easier, I might try 4 or 5 see how I go.,



With reguards to resistant things, should the same go for my merc also? I give him as much resistance as possible and not worry about defensive?

 

[Docturnal]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Hi.

I made the polearm, its very strong but it requires 95 strength, which the mercinary does not posess.

Using the cube recipe is not a one off. It usually takes a few tries to get one that suits your current situation. This means youll probably end up selling the ones you cant use to the vendor's, but if you do find one with life stolen it might be worth it to put a few amethysts in an armor to make the merc able to use it. With diablo though, the merc really needs life and resists.

 

[Drystan1]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I should've been more specific there. /pl8 will increase monster hitpoints in Normal, so to be on players 8 to search for a diamond, you may want to go back to Act 2 or 3. /Pl8 in River of Flame at this stage may be too difficult without really good equipment.

Hello from Qld too!

 

[Trim]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

Resists are relatively common on rare (yellow) belts and boots, so if you have a good amount of gold stashed away, you might luck out by gambling some. Also, certain runes (Ral, Tal, Ort) and gems socketed into a shield give you good resists; I'd suggest OrtOrtRal. Shopping a three-socket bone shield isn't too tough with Drognan in Act2. And Drystan's suggestions for runewords are all good.

Remember the fact that Diablo can't regenerate life. That means don't be afraid to gulp down potions more often than needed since you can always buy more. Always be sure to keep a town portal open to either retreat and get more potions or to recover your body in case you die.

Keep in mind tactics, too. You'll notice sometimes Diablo takes a second or two between attacks. When you think he'll make an attack, circle around him and attack only when he's standing around. Even with 75 Lightning & Fire resists, standing directly in his lines of fire or his Lightning Hose of Death (LHoD) can destroy just about every character.

Don't be afraid to take your time. The first time I fought him it took me ten minutes and I probably died a couple dozen times. And don't resurrect your merc every time; Diablo will waste him in a second with a couple of his attacks.

After you beat him, you can do some decent leveling against Eldritch, located just after the first waypoint in Act5. You can easily reach clvl40 in less than two hours using the /players 8 command.

Good luck! :thumbup:

 

[Ashmer Amadeus]

Re: How do I defeat Diablo? He kills me and my team in 1 hit.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Steel RW (Tir El). Its the cheapest RW there is and its not bad. Its also one handed, and will allow the use of either Rhyme (Sheal Eth) or Ancients Pledge (Ral Ort Tal) as a shield.