[2006] The Race to Baal Tournament [by Quickdeath]

[Grisu]

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This tournament has already ended. It was originally started by @Quickdeath on Jul 22, 2006. The last post was made Aug 11, 2006.
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The Race to Baal Tournament

Here's an unusual tournament that I am proposing to the forum.

The Race to Kill Baal

There are many ways to make a character fast afoot. Sorcs can Teleport, Paladins can Charge and use Vigor, Barbs have Increased Speed and Frenzy, Druids have Feral Rage, Assassins have Burst of Speed. Amazons and Necros only have equipment with FRW modifiers but may have other skills (such as Dim Vision and Evade) that will help them in a foot race through Sanctuary. A Race to Kill Baal.

Basic Description

Each contestant will create a level 32 character, randomize their map, and then race through Normal Difficulty from the Rogue Encampment to Baal in 13 sections. The lowest elapsed time for getting from the Rogue Encampment to Baal will win the Race.

1) Each participant will create an untwinked soft-core character and play him/her through Normal Difficulty until the character reaches level 32. It does not matter whether your softcore character is killed once or many times while you are leveling him. While advancing your character to skill level 32 you must not defeat the Ancients. However, as a minimum, you should complete the Act 3 Quest that opens the doorway to the Durance of Hate by the time you reach clvl32.

Immediately upon reaching clvl 32 you must invest your new skill point and stop play.

2) At this point you must change your map seed so that the entire map becomes unknown to you. One correct way to do this is to create a TCP/IP multiplayer game with your lvl 32 character and then create a new Single Player game.

3) Return to the Rogue Encampment in single player mode..

4) You must now keep track of elapsed time as you race through an unknown map to kill all five Act Bosses. You will race and keep track of elapsed time like the Tour de France - by running different legs. Record your elapsed time as you run these 13 legs of the Race:

Act 1
1. Rogue Encampment to Outer Cloister Waypoint (WP)
2. Outer Cloister WP to Inner Cloister WP
3. Inner Cloister WP to Death of Andariel (teleport to Rogue Encampment)

Act 2
4. Lut Gholein /Canyon of Magi WP to Death of Duriel

Act 3.
5. Kurast Docks to Lower Kurast WP
6. Lower Kurast to Travincial WP
7. Travincial WP to Death of Mephisto/TP to Pandemonium Fortress

Act 4.
8. Pandemonium Fortress to River of Blood WP
9. River of Blood WP to Death of Diablo

Act 5.
10. Harrogath to Frigid Highlands WP
11. Frigid Highlands WP to Arreat Tunnels WP
12. Arreat Tunnels WP to Worldstone Chamber Level 2 WP (Kill the Ancients)
13. Worldstone Chamber Level 2 WP to Death of Baal

The contestant with the lowest overall elapsed time from the Rogue Encampment to Death of Baal wins the tournament. We will also honor the fastest of each character class (e.g., the fastest Amazon).

As you may imagine, fast run/walk speed will not be the only important attribute of a character in the race. So, carefully consider your plan for building your character - and hope you find great equipment!

Specific Rules about the Race Phase of the Tournament

1. The only monsters you are required to kill are the five Act bosses, the three Ancients and the various minions necessary to get to Diablo and Baal. You may run around or run past any other monsters you wish to.

2. You are not required to locate any waypoints other than those that begin or terminate the legs. You are not required to complete any uncompleted quests (such as rescuing Anya, rescuing the Barbarians or killing Nihlathak) that are unnecessary to the objective of Killing Baal.

3. The Race Phase is also softcore, but being killed will obviously have a built-in time penalty. If your character is killed, you may use the waypoints to teleport to the last waypoint that your character has already passed and proceed to recover your body. The clock continues to tick, however.

4. If your character is killed and you are unable to recover the body (because you keep getting re-killed), then you are disqualified.

5. You may not use teleport scrolls during a race except for returning to town after killing an Act Boss.

6. You may return to town using waypoints as often as you wish in order to repair equipment, buy potions and scrolls. The clock continues to tick while you are in town. You must always shop at whatever town is associated with the Act you are in, i.e., while racing through Act 1 you may not use waypoints to go to Harrogath to load up on better health/mana potions.

7. As you race, you will probably continue to level up past level 32. You may invest your skill and attribute points gained by leveling up –but you must do so "on the clock."

8. Once you start a leg of the race, you should make every attempt to complete the leg before shutting the game down. If you have a computer failure, just do the best you can by restarting your leg at the last waypoint you had passed and continue to accumulate a total elapsed time for the leg. Obviously, its okay to pause the game and stop the clock, in order to answer the phone or do other real-life things, and then later restart both the game and the clock.

General Rules about the Tournament and Building your Character

§1. Characters are softcore. Version 1.10/1.11. RWM/RRM may be used, but only Runewords that are able to be created unpatched can be used.

§2. You must play untwinked while building your character and while racing. You may use ATMA as an extended stash, but may only provide to your character those items that have been obtained by your character during the game. Once your character begins the Race Phase, you may not twink on any items from ATMA.

§3. You may not use Save & Exit to escape death.

§4. You may play on any /players setting and change it at any time you wish. It is expected that most participants will elect to race in Players 1 mode.

§5. There are no restrictions on skills, attributes, or weapons usage.

§6. You may rerun areas if you wish during the character building phase (but NOT during the Race Phase.)
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That's it. Please provide your comments and/or indicate your interest in this unusual tournament idea.