[2012] Whacky Wand Tournament [by Merlin The Wizzard]

Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

@zaphodbrx. Haha i just realised as well :(. Thankfully though Phoenix Strike does not require a claw to be used. Problem is getting to level 30 to use it :p. I guess my plan is to take it slow and rely on my merc to deal the majority of the damage.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

Actually they don't require a claw weapon, you can use them with your bare fists at least I know. I've never tried it with a wand, but I mat'd a martial assassin that didn't use any weapons and she used those skills.

edit: I confirmed that the left three skill will not work with wands but tiger, cobra, and phoenix will. Also confirmed that all 6 of the charge up skills work with fists. I suppose just fists is against the rules though.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament


kestegs said:
Actually they don't require a claw weapon, you can use them with your bare fists at least I know. I've never tried it with a wand, but I mat'd a martial assassin that didn't use any weapons and she used those skills.

Actually you are right, they can be used with fists, but not with any other weapon other than a claw. But i take it as soon as we are able to afford/find a Wand then we must use it? Merlin correct me if i am wrong?

It would be against the spirit of the tournament to use fists over wands if they are available.
 
Last edited:
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

Hi,

was there any ruling on the case Smite as a utility skill together with a high level Holy Shield? Smite will start to damage then, and it is a little time consuming to wait for the Holy Shield to wear off until you start smiting in a mêlée :). Perhaps it expires if you unequip the shield, does anyone know?
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

Took my druid out for a spin. This is hard. And really boring. First I found p3 taking forever to kill, so I lowered it to p1. Anyway my damage in werbear form is 19-22 which is not terrible I guess, though half of that is poison. The rogue's is 10-13. Killed coldcrow and blood raven now sitting at level 7, only found one chipped topaz yet. I'll probably not continue any further, but I now have a big appreciation for those of you who will go on to finish the game. Good luck!
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

With an Assassin, you could also put points in Blade Fury, which could be a helpful skill later on anyway.

@zaphodbrx: /players 8 is the way to go :) You will "turn 18" near the Inner Cloister, from then on it should be smooth sailing with Fireclaws.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament


zaphodbrx said:
The rogue's is 10-13.

Get her a Long Bow instead. It averages 6.5 damage per hit, compared to 4 for a Hunter´s Bow, and is only slightly slower. In Dark Wood, my rogue pretty much one-hitted everything small (two hits for corrupted rogues), and even Treehead´s pack didn´t take too long for her to kill. And that was /p8.
(OK, the Jewel of Envy probably had a part in that this was easy, but I think it would have been OK even without it)


I am impressed that you took on Blood Raven without hiring a merc first.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

@Morathi - The problem with using Dragon Flight is that, afaik, you need a target for it to activate. That would in fact allow it to be a finishing move for a charged up Phoenix Strike. Seeing as how PS has already been under discussion, and I thought it would be ok given that you need to charge it up and unleash it with the wand, as it stands, I don't really like the idea. Besides, the assassin has cloak of shadows in her arsenal as well for crowd control...
Interestingly enough, it does not state that the fists of fire needs a claw weapon on Arreat Summit. It does explicitly say so, however, for Blades of Ice and Claws of Thunder. I never tried if it would work with another weapon though... At least, I don\t think I did.


@Brakstav - I suppose, if you look at it like that, Holy Shield does not exactly synergize with Smite, but it does increase the damage potential. So, as an effect, it is still synergizing, avant la lettre, so to speak. So, If you want to use Smite as an utility skill , stay clear of Holy Shield. If you can forego using Smite, feel free to pump Holy Shield to your hearts content.

EDIT: You can, in fact, synergize Smite with 1 point in Holy Shield, since I amended the rule. Just a heads up.

@kestegs - Bare fists is indeed against the spirit of the tourney. Wands are the way to go. As soon as you can, you should buy one, if you had not already found one. After that, you can look for better wands. Mind you, from the very start of the game, you can find stuff that easily nets you 100+ gold, such as broken javelins, broken staffs (with mods on them), and rings and the like.It shouldn't take you very long to get a wand to equip.

@Everybody I missed: Welcome, I hope you will have fun! Given the participants so far, I have high expectations of seeing people get very, very far in this tourney as well :)

@Jiansonz - I always take her on without a merc myself. It's usually the place where I burn through my starter belt of red potions/ With the wand, you'll probably need more potions to kill her, but I still reckon it's possible...
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament


RuddyC said:
you can do that? i thought you had to kill blood raven first to get access to hirelings:scratchhead:

I also thought this.......i don't think i have ever hired a merc before killing Blood Raven in normal.

edit: @ Merlin. Fair enough, your tourney your rules. I will do without it then :).

Btw, ingame it says FoF, CoT and BoI all need claws to be used. Phoenix strike does not however.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

p8 would take forever to kill, i don't think that is an option.
Though it is a little better now since I have little more dmg and merc, so I might raise it to p3 for a bit.
I was actually thinking of getting rabies at 18, as that is a much less annoying skill than fireclaws.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament


zaphodbrx said:
p8 would take forever to kill, i don't think that is an option.
Though it is a little better now since I have little more dmg and merc, so I might raise it to p3 for a bit.
I was actually thinking of getting rabies at 18, as that is a much less annoying skill than fireclaws.
Actually your rogue merc can kill pretty fast even at /p8, but you have to get used to not joining the fray...I usually equip a 3 os Long Bow with 3 chipped rubies/chipped emeralds/jewels of envy/any combination of those and it speeds up things a lot!

About Fireclaws: Keep in mind that even with a Shael Shael Bone/Tomb/Lich Wand the fastest attack speed probably isn't greater than 8fps (and slightly faster for Rabies), because both skills are entirely dependant on weapon speed IAS - off-weapon IAS isn't of any use. Unfortunately, you cannot calculate the IAS for Wands in Dragoons Wereform IAS calculator...
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

One small amend: If you find that you'll need to invest 1 point in a skill just to advance through the skill tree, and said skill synergizes an utility skill, then that is allowed. In order to remain consistent, then, it will be allowed to synergize any given utility skill with any other skill by exactly ONE point.

@Grisu - I usually go for a 3os Superior(+1 max dam) long bow with a chipped ruby, emerald and sapphire. Unless I desire corpses, in which case the sapphire is replaced with another emerald. In general, I find it greatly convenient if my mercenary can chip away packs of Fallen from around their shamans without me needing some sort of corpse disposal skill.

@felixbavaria - She tends to have poison damage on her bow though. I tend to go through health like crazy, while I'm mucking around with her on Normal, tbh.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

u live, u learn, never knew the martial arts tree could be used without claws.
i usually go with a 3 soc bow of whatever filled with the first three chippies i can get of sapphires, rubies, emeralds or jewels.
it does enough damage while i wack at things with scepter

gonna join this one, as someone needs to choose the "cookie-cutter" paladin ;)
tesladin-to-be Nikola reports for duty!

The merrily whacking ones
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drewgie        LittleStick    Sorceress   1               5
Grisu          Sophia         Sorceress   1               1              0
zaphodbrx      wendigo        Druid       1               1
felixbavaria   Ruby           Sorceress   1               14            -4
Kokojo         Wandacro       Necromancer 1               17            --
jiansonz       Embrus         Druid       1               15
Morathi        Bella          Assassin    1               1
Krupa          Nikola         Paladin     1               15            -2
RuddyC         Panoramix      Druid

The dewanded ones(ie, Dead!)
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

The "secret" to making a rogue merc effective is to not let her bump into monsters (or at least not let her get stuck in a pack of them). She needs to be left in peace to do her thing. Then she will be at her best.

When you move around the map (character moves ahead of the rogue) and encounter monsters and start tanking them, what often happens is that the merc has "old speed" left and will often either walk into your back (i.e. she will be too close to monsters to be effective) or past you and will often wake up more monsters and get attacked by them.

What is a good thing to do when you see the monsters is to stop about half a screen from the monsters, have the merc bump into you (intercept her by moving sideways a little if she is about to move past you), then you move in and tank the monsters. This final movement needs to be short enough so you do not get the merc moving again, but still long enough so that the merc will not have any monsters close to her.

(Since I do this with just about every character once the rogue wears some topazes, I have years of experience with it - it´s second nature to how I move in Act I)


About the Martial Arts skills:
- FoF, CoT and BoI require a claw (or two) or that you go bare-fisted.
- Phoenix Strike works with any melee weapon, plus it works bare-fisted as well.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

ok i've officially joined.

Panoramix the Druid is destined to be a Rabies/Fury Wolf and is now whacking away happily with a wand socketed with a chipped sapphire.
Blood moor was cleared almost entirely with bare fists, until an amulet of regeneration dropped and was sold to shop for a wand (bloody expensive ones with staffmods / had to reroll Akara's vitrine before I got the socketed wand with no staffmods)
Notable finds this early are a bronze large charm of flame and a 4% LR small charm, sweet! no chipped topazes to socket in a cap though :( doesn't really matter this early I suppose.

Waypoints collected - Cold Plains.
Level 6
Quests Collected - 1

Next up Blood raven and Cain.
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

Wendigo has rescued Cain and reached the black marsh. I cleared out every area at p3, including areas I almost never see, like Mausoleum and crypt ( I could have sworn they had additional levels, but they didnt ), Tristram, and 'the hole'. I am actually enjoying the slow paced action for a while. I came across a boss with the name 'Dragon shield the impaler'. wtf blizzard?

Currently at level 14. Hp 193, dmg 32-38. rogue 20-32. 2 topaz leather armor ( charsi was mean ), self, 2 topaz helm self, wand with emerald, 2 topaz helm for rogue, 3os superior hunters bow ( gheed was mean ) with emerald and ruby. I decided to re equip a shield ( normally first thing i do on a druid is throw away the shield ), and luckily I found a buckler with IBR and FBR. Not that it matters much, because my block is at 5%.

Speaking of which I have no idea what to do with stats. All 65 of them are saved up. I don't have a huge need for hp or any armor to equip, so I guess I'll just keep it that way until I come up with a plan. Currently using maul. Its too mana consuming to keep it going really but I had expected that as even two manald heals can't do that for a starting character. Atleast when the mana runs out maul just uses the regular attack instead of standing there and saying something inane like 'I need mana!' (unlike some werewolf skills I could name ) . Something I discovered is that the druid regenerates just enough mana to do a maul and keep the charge going, so its always charged. pretty cool huh.

The merrily whacking ones
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drewgie        LittleStick    Sorceress   1               5
Grisu          Sophia         Sorceress   1               1              0
zaphodbrx      wendigo        Druid       1               14            -3
felixbavaria   Ruby           Sorceress   1               14            -4
Kokojo         Wandacro       Necromancer 1               17            --
jiansonz       Embrus         Druid       1               15
Morathi        Bella          Assassin    1               1
Krupa          Nikola         Paladin     1               15            -2
RuddyC         Panoramix      Druid

The dewanded ones(ie, Dead!)
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Re: Tournament: Whacky Wand Tournament

Progress to act 3 was swift. The merc did most of the damage, but that did not stop me from whacking. The curses are perfectly fine skills, especially attract and confuse (even at one point). Bone prison is just ridicule in how much it can help. Nearly insta cast, blocks enemy line of fire, ect.

Of course I used a ton of fear material to make the enemies run away/attack themselves, since survivability is just so low. I got to 40% block and intend to keep it at 50%. My wand is currently a Ral(countess) + Sapphire combination. My switch is +4 to bone armor, so that gives me about a 200hp shield on switch. Now to get my Cold Iron wolf, this will hurt until level 30 when I get Lower Resist. Duriel was cruel at first, until I realised I could bone prison him and that he would not attack the walls. Decrepify works wonders, but at level 1, it sucks. I've had a few scares with those Undead-raisers uniques, but nothing much troubling. Running at p8.


The merrily whacking ones
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drewgie        LittleStick    Sorceress   1               5
Grisu          Sophia         Sorceress   1               1              0
zaphodbrx      wendigo        Druid       1               14            -3
felixbavaria   Ruby           Sorceress   1               14            -4
Kokojo         Wandacro       Necromancer 3               27            --
jiansonz       Embrus         Druid       1               15
Morathi        Bella          Assassin    1               1
Krupa          Nikola         Paladin     1               15            -2
RuddyC         Panoramix      Druid

The dewanded ones(ie, Dead!)
Code:
Forum Name     Character      Class       Act            Level       Points     
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Diablo 4 Interactive Map
PurePremium
Estimated market value
Low
High