Low level guides to leveling and playing

jamesixgun said:
@Smancer: as long as the modified files are in the D2 folder, any launch of the game will launch the modified runeword version. The two files replace the d2 patch file, and become an integral part of the game operation. There is no need to launch from the files themselves, just drop them in the d2 folder and *poof* you're modded.

There is a mac guide, by the way... /shameless self-plug.
Click to expand...



Yea I have read it, but I am a moron.

This is what I did. I copied my entire d2 folder into a second folder called D2_backup

Then I copied the two files into my original d2 folder.

But I got one of those messages that said, do you want to replace the current file? This was only for one of the two files in RWM. The second one got copied in the folder, but didn't replace anything. Is that normal? I am just paranoid.


 
That's normal.

There's a file that replaces the patch, and *I think* it adds instructions to read runewords from the second file. I'm not too sure how it works, but it's definitely normal.

Edit: and I'm not sure what level of detail I went into on installing RWM. I might go back and check that out, see if it can be made more clear.
 
well all in all the mac guide is insanely well done - with that and the search function i got everything done that i wanted ^^
 
It definitely is a good guide.

I am tempted to do the playonmac just for the better experience.

However according to the guide it has to be a fresh install... so how do I move my characters to the new install?
 
Hi all, I've just recently restarted Diablo 2 LOD SP /p8, playing a WWS Bowazon as a start.

She is now lv19, I saving the points for Strafe, Pierce, etc. I'm still at Act 1, currently going to kill Andariel.

I'm not familiar with the runewords recipe.

I've a 27% MF Ring Mail, 7%,8% MF Rings. Only found a Clegraw's Claw and a Hsaru's Belt. Can anyone suggest some low level runewords or set item for a Bowazon perhaps up to lv30?
 
menifest said:
Hi all, I've just recently restarted Diablo 2 LOD SP /p8, playing a WWS Bowazon as a start.

She is now lv19, I saving the points for Strafe, Pierce, etc. I'm still at Act 1, currently going to kill Andariel.

I'm not familiar with the runewords recipe.

I've a 27% MF Ring Mail, 7%,8% MF Rings. Only found a Clegraw's Claw and a Hsaru's Belt. Can anyone suggest some low level runewords or set item for a Bowazon perhaps up to lv30?
Click to expand...

Hi there. I recently started single player from scratch and I have a few tips to help your first character without outside help. First of all, get a merc and equip her/him as best as you can. An act 2 merc I would imagine would be the best for a low level amazon. You'd be surprised how much damage they can do with just a simple magic poleaxe, and they will tank and make your life so much easier while you're saving those skillpoints.

Secondly, check out runeword.info - It's a really readable/searchable website that has all the runewords. Some of my personal suggestions would be:

Lore - Helm - Ort Sol (if you can find a sol) - This is a great runeword with +1 skills. It is level 27 though.

Stealth - Body armor (lvl 19) - Tal Eth - practically the easiest rw to get. I like it, I use it on my low level chars 'cause it's sweet.

Zephyr - missile weapon (lvl 21)- Ort Eth - If you can find a decent 2 socket bow, this is the lowest level bow runeword at clvl21, then you can get the next highest RW FOR MORE POWER WITH:

EDGE - Missile weapon (lvl 25) - Tir Tal Amn (I think you can get all these from normal countess) - BIG bonus damage to demons and undead, which is like everything in the game. I would total get this.



Then the big guns. When you get to NM and run countess a few times and snag a KO rune, do:

HARMONY - missile weapon(lvl 39) - tir ith sol ko - seriously kick *** runeword - gives the vigor aura, 150 of all elemental damages, and 200-275% ED. I might level a bowazon just so I can make this and kick ***.

I personally find it hard to complete any runewords before normal cow runs because finding stuff with sockets is sort of hit or miss before then. I spose it might be more likely since you're set on running on p8


 
clicky for runewords
there a little list of all runewords and what they do - after the alphabetical list is a list by value - with the most expensive at the start

the diablowiki in general is pretty useful

for edge you will need the RWM
on another note - make a Intro thread - we like those around here

*goes off preparing the cranium shin basher of destruction*
 
I had about 5 hours to play this weekend. A crazy amount of time that I have not had before. Definitely had a mild case of carpal tunnel on my right index finger. Clicky Clicky.

I got to act 2 and hit level 24 on my assassin. I had enough topaz to make 3 flawed. According to the guide, I should by a 3os Breast Plate from Fara. Holy Heck. I refreshed her inventory at least 100 times and didn't see a 3os one. So I decided to move to cubing all the ammys and rings I have saved up to this point.

I have a great set ammy (civerbs) already that has regenerate mana on it (and something else), so I was mainly looking for better MF rings. I think the best ones I got had maybe 13% mf. Not great but I have 2x of them.

I started to gamble circlets. At 34k a pop, that didn't last very long. However I did find one that had adds 1 - 110 lightening dmg. I gave that to my merc, because well, more dmg. The other ones I gambled during the rest of the weekend were crap. Not one had MF on it.

I made my way through Act 2 with ease. Although the maggot liar sucked. I had to throw Fireblast at everything and my merc just couldn't seem to figure out how to follow me.

Everything else was a breeze. I found the right tomb, and then came Duriel. This is why I play SC. My merc died in about 4 hits, and my Shadow guy even less. Then I had to run around in circles casting Wake of Fire over and over again.

I died a few times. It was really frustrating.

I should say I decided to go Fire traps leveling up after watching a youtube video of someone doing a speed run. Wake of fire seemed like a really good choice for leveling because it can kill everything, receives bonus from fireblase, and 13 mana isn't that much compared to the 20 of lightening.

I found a couple really awesome uniques and set items. And the runes are piling up. granted they are el - ral but still. I love goMule :-).

I found Dimoak's Hew. Which was great until my merc was strong enough to use the savage weapon I crafted him.

I also found Sanders gloves, knell's striker, 2x isenheart's sword and helm (seems to like to drop), and of course civerbs ammy.

The knell's strike has 25% crushing blow. Currently I am running with a leaf runeword. I do this for the +fire skills. I think once I have a shael to make a rhyme, I will invest one point in kick. Then I can use knells, + rhyme, this will help with bosses because I can lay traps then kick for crushing blow.

Act 3 is going well. I found the brain, the eye, and did the gibbon quest and the jade statue quest. The map is a complete maze. The zombies seem to be really resistant to the fire traps, but the dolls and the gloams all die with just a 1 or 2 traps.

I stopped at around level 27.

Any and all advice for leveling an untwinked assassin is welcome here.

And I just want to say, that my welcome thread is obviously awesome because 2 other people also decided to post their first posts in my first post. Holy inception.
 
I clear Normal untwinked single pass with my lighting trap sin a couple of day. Killing speed is slow but really safe since u can use Merc and shadow to tank for you.
 
Time for an update. I have lots of questions.

I completed Normal difficulty. On Meph, Diablo, The Ancients, The World Stone Keep, and Baal I had to drop the difficulty down to players 1. I had too many deaths and it was just too much for me.

I used my respec, because fire traps just started to suck in Act 4. I couldn't kill anything, so I decided to spec into my Hell build of a kick Trapper.

I found greaves, that do 10 to 20 kick dmg, and have 24 MF. I have found a bunch of useful uniques, including two belts including a nightsmoke.

I found an ethereal Ginther's rift. Are these usually ethereal? It has the repair one durability mod, so it can be useful as a twinking item, or I might think about upping it... really cool weapon.

I am level 50 and I raced through Act 1 nightmare to get to Act 2 to get my holy freeze merc.

He is super fragile with my MF topaz gear. Even on players 1. I gambled a circlet that has some great mods as well as 6% Life steal.

I have the runes to make a Spirit sword for myself, and an insight for him. I found a sol doing some countess runs on nightmare.

Leveling is super slow, and I am struggling on players 1 in act 1 nightmare at level fifty. My Lightening trap is level 20 and my death sentrry is level 6 or 7, and my kick is level 16. I think I am playing correctly, I use cloak of shadows, lay 4 lightinening traps, 1 death sentry behind that, and then go kick some stuff to try and leech back mana for the next trap round by kicking.

Unfortunately I only have one unique weapon with crushing blow. And it is that unique 1h Mace. But I end up using a different 1 hand just for some mana leach.

Is level 50 too low for Nightmare?

Every Polearm I check is iLvL 55 in GoMule. I really want to find a base for insight. And a base for both a spirit sword and a spirit shield. Any advice? Is there an easier way for checking the ilvl of an item besides logging out of D2, and opening up goMule?

Where should I farm to level up? Should I go back to Normal and do more baal runs? Nightmare pit runs on like players 3?

Andy runs are ridiculously hard. I swear those ugly guys that shoot the balls of death are lightening immune even though they don't say it. And Andy takes soooo long to kill on players 1. I have to just run around in circles and drink a whole belt worth of mana pots to get a kill. Ugh.
 
I've got a lvl 50 kick/trap sin too. She's moderately twinked but also has difficulty on higher player settings. You might already know lots of this stuff, but I thought I'd just answer everything I could:

Player Settings:
It's fine to set it to /players 1 for act bosses/the ancients. Especially untwinked. You lose out on some experience, but usually the nodrop chance on quest kill bosses is pretty low, so you probably don't miss many drops at /p1.

Greaves:
those are probably ok, but to max your kick damage you need the highest str requirement boots you can find. Be on the lookout for exceptional boots since you are in Nightmare now.

Ginther's Rift:
Not always ethereal, grats on the find.

Merc fragility:
That circlet should help a lot.
Also, aren't you worried that his holy freeze will shatter corpses for your death sentry? Could be worth it anyway, just wondering.

More crushing blow:
try to craft some blood gloves when you get the mats. Also, a good kicker weapon is a 'Black' runeword socketed in a mace. 40% crushing blow. Try to get the mana leech on a ring or something, or if you make an insight for the merc just drink blue pots.

Skills/playstyle:
Sounds about right. Remember that the CE from DS doesn't scale well with higher player settings, so if you are relying on that then yes the killing will be slow. That's what the crushing blow kicks are for.

50 is not too low for Nightmare.

ilvl:
There's no way to see this in game, sadly.

insight:
in Normal, you can start finding polearms with ilvl 26 in Act 4. A normal ethereal poleaxe or halberd will be good for insight. You can also sometimes find exceptional polearms in Normal act 4, a bill would do good damage too. You have a higher chance of finding a nice exceptional polearm in Nightmare, anyway. Don't forget you can use the cube to socket things, so you could potentially get 4 sockets even in a higher ilvl polearm with enough p amethysts.

lvling up:
you could go back and do Baal runs until 55 if you wanted. Usually you can get decent xp at 50 in Nightmare act 2, although it can be tough. The Pits on Nightmare doesn't have a higher area lvl, so it won't help much.

Overall: I don't see anything majorly wrong with your build or playstyle. I found the hybrid kick/trapper pretty tough to get started, myself. It might be time to put on more gear for killing things instead of mf gear.
 
Thanks for the reply.

SunsetVista said:
Merc fragility:
That circlet should help a lot.
Also, aren't you worried that his holy freeze will shatter corpses for your death sentry? Could be worth it anyway, just wondering.
Click to expand...


With the amount of deaths I had in Normal, and the really tough time I was having in Nightmare. I wanted the safe option.

I am rarely kicking anway, I might use my second respec already, just to go pure trap, Fireblast for LIs, and the extra points in CSB might help my lightening traps actually kill stuff on players 1 nightmare act 1.


SunsetVista said:
More crushing blow:
try to craft some blood gloves when you get the mats. Also, a good kicker weapon is a 'Black' runeword socketed in a mace. 40% crushing blow. Try to get the mana leech on a ring or something, or if you make an insight for the merc just drink blue pots.
Click to expand...

I've got about 5 perfect gems altogether :-/ I can definitely craft a pair, pray for a good roll.


SunsetVista said:
insight:
in Normal, you can start finding polearms with ilvl 26 in Act 4. A normal ethereal poleaxe or halberd will be good for insight. You can also sometimes find exceptional polearms in Normal act 4, a bill would do good damage too. You have a higher chance of finding a nice exceptional polearm in Nightmare, anyway. Don't forget you can use the cube to socket things, so you could potentially get 4 sockets even in a higher ilvl polearm with enough p amethysts.
Click to expand...


Same has blood gloves, I just don't have the gem collection to roll a bunch of polearms.

I think at this point I just need to start clearing areas slowly and looking for bases. I will start to ditch my MF gear in favor of gear that will actually help me.


 
Smancer said:
It definitely is a good guide.

I am tempted to do the playonmac just for the better experience.

However according to the guide it has to be a fresh install... so how do I move my characters to the new install?
Click to expand...

Once you get the playonmac install working, just copy the characters from the Mac save folder to the playonmac save folder.

Playonmac will be buried in your user library folder, an so finding it may be a bit difficult.

Sorry I missed this before... if I do that again, shoot me a pm.


 
Well I got a base for my insight last night. It was something really crappy. I didn't care though because I wanted to kick my blue drink addiction.

Wow. What a difference. I was starting to really not have fun with this, and now I can drop traps and my mana is back. So full of win. level 16 meditation is just amazing. Plus even with the poor base my merc is doing more dmg.

I went back and made a Stealth rune word in a nice base that dropped in Act 2. I did this because I figure I will need some better gear to boss fight or just get through tough areas. I also found a nice +19 res all ammy, although I plan on crafting one sooner or later.

I'll also craft those gloves again for boss fights and things like that. I gambled a +1 Assassin skill circlet, but the other mods are useless. So I don't know if I should just find another sol for lore, or if I should use that.

But at least now I have some MF gear for easier areas and some boss/ tough monsters killing gear for others. I am Constantly running with fade now. A champion monster in the maggot liar dropped some rare demonhide boots. That really will up my kick damage. Again all for boss fights when I can't just load up MF gear.

Now I just want some type of 4os Sword to make a spirit in ^^
 
Oh, I didn't even realize it could be different. Beginners luck with that roll then... I see it could have been level 17 but I'm happy with what I got.
 
Sorry Double post....

I played a little last night. Didn't have time to start my tourny char.

But I found an AWESOME ethereal base for an insight. So I figured I would run countess a couple times to get another sol. The base itself was an etheral poleaxe and did as much damage as the scythe insight I rolled. So I figured an insight in this would do way way more damage.

The new one rolled a level 12 Meditation and 225% ED compared to the 16 Meditation and 247%Ed of my first roll -_-

I do see a noticeable difference between the level 12 and level 16 Mediation. I figure I will use the first insight I made through nightmare. Then in Hell I will give him the level 12 Meditation one because the damage is like triple that of the other one because of the good base. Hopefully my mana pool will be a little bigger by then, and I wont notice the 12 Meditation as much. Or maybe by then I will find another good base.
 
Log in to Reply / Create Site Account
Remove Ads - Go PurePremium

Latest posts

Back
Top