Sorry to hear that, @RIP . Good luck with the new Sorc. May she avenge Kaira_II.
If it can be any comfort ... highest character I ever lost was a lvl 95 as well, my first character when joining the SPF here, starting all over again. The loss obviously hurt, but at the same time not that much. I had enjoyed playing her the whole journey through, gotten some real good luck with 2x Ber, Windforce, eth Reaper's, DFathom and Griffon's. I knew that death could be part of the HC experience, and she had gotten me so much, both in terms of drops (for her, but also for other characters) and fun, that I could actually live with it rather well.
@RIP sorry for your loss, that must have hurt a lot. My respect for you and all the other HC players for playing with the always looming risk of death.
On a positive note, congrats with your new character. Welcome fulgora. The name actually rings a bell....
Not with that attitude, you can't. Have you considered that keeping an up to date table of runners on the front page might actually HELP you cure cancer? Better do it just in case.
So it turns out that the thread is not yet ready for an update, as the 99er awaiting inclusion in the front page does not yet have a 99er thread. So.... Get to it!
I need to figure out how to stream Diablo II sometime, even if nobody ever ends up watching.
So, no news on my end, still NM Mephing, and the only worthwhile drops after countless runs (and still going) are a Duriel's Shell(!!!), a Spirit Forge for my merc (what should I put in those sockets?), and, something that's going to help my magic-finding quite a bit:
Coupled with my "Rhyme" sacred rondache, that 125% MF will help me out a lot on switch.
HoZ... I will look for you... I will find you... and I will equip you.
I'm the player who always has to make "Insight" in non-ethereal Colossus Voulges for lack of anything better (shakes fist at drop gods), so my Spirit Forge almost always end up with two PAmethysts.
I am probably going to move on soon, honestly, I think I've geared up enough to push through to Hell and use my NM respec to switch to a Fanaticism Zealot. I have a Bloodletter, a Butcher's Pupil, a Headstriker, I could try out any one of those and see which one works best, though I'm unsure how to deal with any PIs, should they show up.
Gwynt is still in LK. He is only getting some odd runs as I’m enjoying playing guardians just now and since my time is going to be sporadic, I will likely focus on guardians for the time being.
Some loot from the last ~10% below. I decided to take it easy until 98 and still picked up quite a few things. Will cut back on this quite a bit now at 98.
No idea what to do with this.
Staying hot with facets:
Third Mara's, finally a good roll.
Perfect ED on this one:
Arach #3
Now I'll need to see if it's realistic to hit 99 within the next 2.5 months since I'll be going away for a while then. Based on my last tests, his XP for 97-98 was just under 4m/h, i.e. something like ~2.9m/h for 98-99. That would mean ~100 hours run time, provided no deaths. Could be possible but I'm not sure I'll be able to do it. Otherwise I'll park him at 98 (likely for a long time) and wrap up a few other D2 projects of course, and may end up running S-Dawg.
Also managed to set up a stream here. Seems my computer can handle it and I'll just start it whenever I run (most likely only after-hours during the week ).
Annex to the above: Timed a couple of sessions now and found he's faster than I thought, with XP/h around ~3.5m depending on spawns and XP shrines. Run times are around 25 seconds now, except for FI or Stone Skin spawns which take a little longer. Recorded a batch of runs extrapolating to ~3.47m/h below:
So at that pace 98-99 will take ~85 hours, again provided no deaths. I think I'll go for it and try doing this over the next 2.5 months. Let's see how it goes. Also a couple of nice drops early on:
His first +1 ring plus the 5LL roll, but a little too late for him unfortunately. His double Dwarf Stars are too good to drop vs. Nihl's CE and allow me to be more aggressive (sticking around and finishing runs I might S&E otherwise), while extra PN damage does not have much of an impact.
Also posted in IFT, first perfect skiller of vita for me overall. @Bewitch that's why you should pick Nihl GCs.
Shortly after his first nicely rolled Mara's above, another one:
@ffs 3,5m/h, Necromancer?! Awesome, you guys keep pushing the limits farther! Really smooth runs overall, wouldn't have thought how seemingly easy it can be with Nec.
But leaving SCs or rare rings on ground is just gross, going for max exp or not
Actually had some time to make some progress as if i only have a shoer amount of time i generally have been dabbling in one of my several other characters. Have finally gotten both insight on the moron and a spirit weapon so far. Still awaiting a 4 os shield to drop to get second spirit item up and running. Been walloping Bone Ash for a few levels this mroning as its a handy spot to park and level up a bit with the potential of something dropping to improve current equipment. Just a Stormguild swordback hold double drop same run. I have the stormguild and stash has other. Did have a failed athenas wrath too but it wouldn't have gone anywhere but the stash.
Probably move on through the catacombs to Andy next but only for the kill as i prefer Act 2 as there is more pace to operate and its rare to have a quick route to get back to Andy. That and i have maxed Frozen Orb so have only just started boosting up the fire balls again. Oh and the small matter of poison being my weakest resistance
@Grape Yeah I picked up a lot for 97-98, but now cutting back quite a bit as mentioned. It's basically down to HRs, rare S&Us/grailers, GCs, rare circlets, as well as Ral/Tal and making sure I always have 2-3 flawless Amethysts or Rubies in stash to upgrade. Jewels/rings/amulets and SCs I pick up sometimes, depending on mood.
Played a little more yesterday and today, started running LK combined with Arcane sanctuary (there are no LI monsters, so its good place for experience/base items and hopefully runes aswell)
As for Spirit shield, its funny story...Found first white monarch, tried socket recipe in cube, got 4 sockets and then only at third try scored 35%FCR...Very lucky i guess And to surprise You even more, i've found my first 4 socketed sword AFTER i scored Spirit shield
@ffs smooth gameplay on Nihlatak .you almost make him seem harmless. Kind of ironic to use his most dangerous weapon, CE, against him. Major congrats on the life skiller!
I cruised through the rest of NM, and up until the end of Act V, needed to actually move UP in /players count instead of down, as it had become so easy with the items found from NM Meph.
Made one more quick stop in Act II to switch on over to a Might merc, then to Normal to respec, as my previous one I used was my NM respec, and, simply put, I should have done this much, much sooner:
I had forgotten how awesome Fanaticism is, especially after slapping on my Butcher's Pupil with that sweet 30% IAS. I'm working my way through the Den now, going to use the skill point from Akara to get Vengeance, as I forgotten about that when I respecced.
Should I max Sacrifice before Holy Shield, or vice-versa? HS is 10+4 right now, Sacrifice 13+4. I'm leaning towards Sacrifice, as it looks like more points in HS are really only defence% increases at this point.
I very easily burn out from diablo 2 when grinding LK, so I took a break from my barb and decided to roll a javazon for a bit of fun. I didn't actually think I'd continue playing her, but I found myself enjoying killing andariel / mephisto / pindle way more than popping chests on my barb. I'm very close to enigma on the barb (Ber + 3 Surs) so I think ill finish that sometime soon.
Wow, awesome progress @Bewitch -- and continued nice rune drops. That first near RIP would have been an immediate bail for me; vipers on two sides and confuse not proc'ing immediately was generally a quick end to the run with Hiatus. Best of luck on continued quick progress for the last half level and stay safe!
The first screenshot of my javazon is actually from all the way back from 12th of october and I've really been putting off posting anything.
After that, I did andariel / mephisto / pindle / arreat plateau runs. I haven't bothered with downloading and installing the run counter yet, but I did keep every single essence that mephisto dropped. Currently im at 29 essences, and the drop rate is around 1/15 (435 runs on average)
really good map after half an hour to an hour of rerolling
good merc armour
Pindle or the minions dropped me a 2 socket monarch which I made a rhyme in first, then they dropped me a 4 socket monarch for a spirit.
useless but rare?
Haven't used this one yet, its non-eth
First gheed of this guy, mid roll.
I was running around act 1 trying to get 4 perfect topazes for an armour and this guy dropped
After hundreds of runs with the 4 socketed topaz armor, a skullders decided to drop.
And then it happened again, 2 runs and 3 real life minutes later!
I wish this would have dropped on my barb, but its useful until I get a razortail
And finally, the item I started dropping mephisto for dropped. Non-eth and 198% ed if I remember correctly.
Went to do some diablo runs for the red essence to be able to respec and a 14/14/14 blizz ormus dropped. I don't think ill actually use it, but pretty cool.
Good ol' shako https ://i.imgur.com/tsDrXQ7.png
Thundergods, +3 Lightning fury is better than +1 all skills, and you even gain stats and lightning absorb on top!
https ://i.imgur.com/zLOCWBS.png
Low roll and non-eth, but I've yet to get a 4 socket eth elite polearm, so this will do. It does interfere with my lower resist wand, but atleast my merc stays alive.
This is when I got bored of pindleskin and mephisto, so I decided to meet Thresh socket for some items. At this point I was rocking a good 275 mf. There are actually 2 potential spawns for champions / uniques at the very top, so taking a bit of a detour seems to be better for efficiency? I'm not sure about the monster level of arreat plateau, but they did atleast drop me one elite unique
Useful for bowazons! This is actually my first ever legit tc87 item after restarting and not using the P. I haven't actually used it at all, since I don't really want to waste a socket quest on it, if its not very good. Also I don't have any respecs left so I'll have to farm diablo and baal if I want to try this thing out.
And for my very last item, a vamp gaze. Nothing special about this guy, 15mdr / 12% dr
As for the playthrough, I used poison javelin skills for 1-18, then 18-8'8 using lightning skills. I tried to kill ancients with lightning, but a lower resist wand didn't break the immunity and my merc wasnt strong enough, so I decided to use a respec. Killing the ancients with poison javelins was really easy, and I respecced back as soon as they were dead.
Playing a untwinked javazon is way faster and more fun compared to the barbarian, but the accomplishment of finishing the game was not as strong.
Currently the main goals for items are: Razortail, griffons eye (probably never getting this), thunderstrokes. Maybe ill shop 3/20 gloves from anya, but only that is more boring than popping LK chests. I don't think I'll do any LK on this character, but do cows instead.
At some point I did get a cats eye and trang oul belt from mephisto and pindle respectively, but apparently I didn't manage to save a screenshot from those. They are in my character readout though.
EDIT: I completely forgot about my sick LLD boots, since I've been wearing them for so long
Dire Spur
Light Plated Boots
Defense: 16
Durability: 18 of 18 Required Level: 18
Required Strength: 50
Fingerprint: 0x3d07918e Item Level: 38
Version: Expansion 1.10+
10% Chance to cast level 3 Charged Bolt when struck +20% Faster Run/Walk
+39% Enhanced Defense Lightning Resist +33%
Fire Resist +34%
63% Extra Gold from Monsters
Some readouts below
Windforce
Hydra Bow
Two Hand Damage: 35 - 472
Durability: 34 of 55
Required Level: 73
Required Strength: 134
Required Dexterity: 167
Fingerprint: 0xcf0a001a
Item Level: 84
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+20% Increased Attack Speed
250% Enhanced Damage
+234 to Maximum Damage (Based on Character Level)
7% Mana stolen per hit
Knockback
+10 to Strength
+5 to Dexterity
Heal Stamina Plus 30%
Amber Small Charm
Small Charm
Required Level: 32
Fingerprint: 0x38800509
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Lightning Resist +10%
Tome of Identify
Fingerprint: 0x7c3b4986
Item Level: 8
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Tome of Town Portal
Fingerprint: 0xfa3f2b26
Item Level: 8
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Gheed's Fortune
Grand Charm
Required Level: 62
Fingerprint: 0x5d1427d8
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
117% Extra Gold from Monsters
Reduces all Vendor Prices 14%
33% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Russet Grand Charm
Grand Charm
Required Level: 7
Fingerprint: 0x780a4066
Item Level: 84
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Fire Resist +18%
Russet Grand Charm
Grand Charm
Required Level: 7
Fingerprint: 0xb35e0229
Item Level: 84
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Fire Resist +20%
Ruby Small Charm of Life
Small Charm
Required Level: 32
Fingerprint: 0xd79977f
Item Level: 55
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+7 to Life
Fire Resist +10%
Small Charm of Vita
Small Charm
Required Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0xba1c7425
Item Level: 73
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+20 to Life
Small Charm of Vita
Small Charm
Required Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0x338cfad6
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+18 to Life
Sapphire Small Charm of Frost
Small Charm
Required Level: 32
Fingerprint: 0xaf76668f
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Adds 1 - 2 Cold Damage Over 1 Secs (25 Frames)
Cold Resist +11%
Ruby Small Charm
Small Charm
Required Level: 32
Fingerprint: 0xc87e7f29
Item Level: 62
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Fire Resist +11%
Lapis Small Charm of Greed
Small Charm
Required Level: 15
Fingerprint: 0x3128154
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Cold Resist +7%
9% Extra Gold from Monsters
Small Charm of Vita
Small Charm
Required Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0xa351613f
Item Level: 73
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+18 to Life
Ocher Small Charm of Strength
Small Charm
Required Level: 10
Fingerprint: 0x4e88415a
Item Level: 33
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+1 to Strength
Lightning Resist +6%
Iron Large Charm of Inertia
Large Charm
Required Level: 26
Fingerprint: 0xc0493b65
Item Level: 84
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+5% Faster Run/Walk
+42 to Attack Rating
Sapphire Large Charm of Sustenance
Large Charm
Required Level: 34
Fingerprint: 0x211a33b2
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+22 to Life
Cold Resist +14%
Thundergod's Vigor
War Belt
Defense: 146
Durability: 24 of 24
Required Level: 47
Required Strength: 110
Fingerprint: 0x1ce0e316
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
5% Chance to cast level 7 Fist of the Heavens when struck
Adds 1 - 50 Lightning Damage
+3 to Lightning Fury (Amazon Only)
+3 to Lightning Strike (Amazon Only)
+177% Enhanced Defense
+20 to Strength
+20 to Vitality
+10% to Maximum Lightning Resist
+20 Lightning Absorb
Ocher Small Charm of Dexterity
Small Charm
Required Level: 16
Fingerprint: 0x123d4613
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to Dexterity
Lightning Resist +7%
Harlequin Crest
Shako
Defense: 139
Durability: 12 of 12
Required Level: 62
Required Strength: 50
Fingerprint: 0x10ad8b07
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to All Skills
All Stats +2
+132 to Life (Based on Character Level)
+132 to Mana (Based on Character Level)
Damage Reduced by 10%
74% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
1 Sockets (1 used)
Socketed: Perfect Topaz
Skullder's Ire
Russet Armor
Defense: 727
Durability: 90 of 90
Required Level: 42
Required Strength: 97
Fingerprint: 0x8eea6ea3
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+1 to All Skills
+198% Enhanced Defense
Magic Damage Reduced by 10
110% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items (Based on Character Level)
Repairs 1 Durability in 5 Seconds
+60 Maximum Durability
Doom Whorl
Ring
Required Level: 9
Fingerprint: 0x5fa0325
Item Level: 16
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+10% Faster Cast Rate
Replenish Life +4
+18 Maximum Stamina
Cold Resist +18%
Lightning Resist +16%
14% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Trang-Oul's Girth
Troll Belt
Defense: 155
Durability: 17 of 18
Required Level: 62
Required Strength: 55
Fingerprint: 0x69fdf44
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+91 Defense
+66 to Life
Replenish Life +5
+43 to Mana
+30 Maximum Stamina
Cannot Be Frozen
Requirements -40%
Set (3 items): Cold Resist +40%
Dire Spur
Light Plated Boots
Defense: 16
Durability: 18 of 18
Required Level: 18
Required Strength: 50
Fingerprint: 0x3d07918e
Item Level: 38
Version: Expansion 1.10+
10% Chance to cast level 3 Charged Bolt when struck
+20% Faster Run/Walk
+39% Enhanced Defense
Lightning Resist +33%
Fire Resist +34%
63% Extra Gold from Monsters
Lancer's Gauntlets of Fortune
Gauntlets
Defense: 12
Durability: 24 of 24
Required Level: 45
Required Strength: 60
Fingerprint: 0x6583c6f
Item Level: 81
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+3 to Javelin and Spear Skills (Amazon Only)
17% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Harmony
Long Battle Bow
TirIthSolKo
Two Hand Damage: 19 - 73
Durability: 22 of 44
Required Level: 39
Required Strength: 40
Required Dexterity: 50
Fingerprint: 0x8f3c2cbc
Item Level: 80
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Level 10 Vigor Aura When Equipped
261% Enhanced Damage
+9 to Minimum Damage
+9 to Maximum Damage
Adds 55 - 160 Fire Damage
Adds 55 - 160 Lightning Damage
Adds 55 - 160 Cold Damage Over 3 Secs (68 Frames)
+6 to Valkyrie
+10 to Dexterity
Regenerate Mana 20%
+2 to Mana after each Kill
+2 to Light Radius
Level 20 Revive (25/25 Charges)
4 Sockets (4 used)
Socketed: Tir Rune
Socketed: Ith Rune
Socketed: Sol Rune
Socketed: Ko Rune
Tir Rune
Required Level: 13
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Weapons: +2 to Mana after each Kill
Armor: +2 to Mana after each Kill
Shields: +2 to Mana after each Kill
Ith Rune
Required Level: 15
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Weapons: +9 to Maximum Damage
Armor: 15% Damage Taken Goes To Mana
Shields: 15% Damage Taken Goes To Mana
Sol Rune
Required Level: 27
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Weapons: +9 to Minimum Damage
Armor: Damage Reduced by 7
Shields: Damage Reduced by 7
Ko Rune
Required Level: 39
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Weapons: +10 to Dexterity
Armor: +10 to Dexterity
Shields: +10 to Dexterity
Ring of Fortune
Ring
Required Level: 31
Fingerprint: 0xbb2fdfcc
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
25% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Large Charm of Vita
Large Charm
Required Level: 50
Fingerprint: 0x930080f4
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+29 to Life
Fine Small Charm
Small Charm
Required Level: 21
Fingerprint: 0x5fff6d9
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+3 to Maximum Damage
+16 to Attack Rating
Bone Wand of Lower Resistance
Bone Wand
One Hand Damage: 3 - 7
Durability: 15 of 15
Required Level: 36
Fingerprint: 0x756c8c65
Item Level: 91
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Level 2 Lower Resist (68/75 Charges)
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Mana Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenishes Mana 250%
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Super Healing Potion
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Replenish Life +320
Titan's Revenge
Ceremonial Javelin
Throw Damage: 78 - 210
One Hand Damage: 78 - 153
Quantity: 40
Required Level: 42
Required Strength: 25
Required Dexterity: 109
Fingerprint: 0xf624fa4
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to Javelin and Spear Skills (Amazon Only)
+2 to Amazon Skill Levels
+30% Faster Run/Walk
197% Enhanced Damage
Adds 25 - 50 Damage
7% Life stolen per hit
+20 to Strength
+20 to Dexterity
Increased Stack Size
Replenishes quantity
Spirit
Monarch
TalThulOrtAmn
Defense: 134
Chance to Block: 0
Durability: 86 of 86
Required Level: 54
Required Strength: 156
Fingerprint: 0x5c5a426d
Item Level: 86
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to All Skills
+27% Faster Cast Rate
+55% Faster Hit Recovery
+250 Defense vs. Missile
+22 to Vitality
+104 to Mana
Cold Resist +35%
Lightning Resist +35%
Poison Resist +35%
+3 Magic Absorb
Attacker Takes Damage of 14
4 Sockets (4 used)
Socketed: Tal Rune
Socketed: Thul Rune
Socketed: Ort Rune
Socketed: Amn Rune
Duriel's Shell
Cuirass
Defense: 927
Durability: 126 of 126
Required Level: 41
Required Strength: 55
Fingerprint: 0xade5f153
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+169% Enhanced Defense
+110 Defense (Based on Character Level)
+15 to Strength
+** to Life (Based on Character Level)
Cold Resist +30%
All Resistances +20
Cannot Be Frozen
+100 Maximum Durability
Ethereal
Vampire Gaze
Grim Helm
Defense: 252
Durability: 23 of 40
Required Level: 41
Required Strength: 58
Fingerprint: 0xe680b8e5
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Adds 6 - 22 Cold Damage Over 4 Secs (100 Frames)
6% Mana stolen per hit
7% Life stolen per hit
+100% Enhanced Defense
15% Slower Stamina Drain
Damage Reduced by 15%
Magic Damage Reduced by 12
The Reaper's Toll
Thresher
Two Hand Damage: 36 - 427
Durability: 57 of 65
Required Level: 75
Required Strength: 114
Required Dexterity: 89
Fingerprint: 0x899f12b3
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
33% Chance to cast level 1 Decrepify on striking
203% Enhanced Damage
Ignore Target's Defense
Adds 4 - 44 Cold Damage Over 1 Secs (37 Frames)
13% Life stolen per hit
33% Deadly Strike
Requirements -25%
Well, so initially Ric continued his early 98-99 mission with renewed motivation and some success, not only in terms of XP gain but also regarding drops, with this one being the most useful to him:
Only his second P&B skiller and plain again, but I'll take it. As previously mentioned, I prefer the double Dwarf Stars over using his recently found BKWB, but the skiller I incorporated with a little charm reshuffle at the justifiable cost of 26 life after BO and a little poison resist. He also found his 6th Summon skiller (too bad he's not a Fishymancer anymore), another facet (5/4 fire) and a couple of further nice drops:
Alas, some bad news were inbound. After >250m XP worth of pretty smooth running, he suffered his first death since early 97 when first testing Nihl runs. So much for trying to manage 98-99 without deaths this time. Similar to when running 98-99 with my Sorc, it happened just after getting down the first 10% of the level:
What happened? I have no idea! Well it came form a CE, but that was very surprising. As you can see, this is a completely harmless Nihl roll, and there were neither Vipers nor Witches around, nor were there Spiders whose corpses can result in high damage CEs. Probably the strangest death at Nihl I've experienced. Admittedly I was a bit tired though and I definitely made a mistake given there are Ice Spawn corpses left, I should have just CE'ed on instead of moving around weirdly. In any case, I was able to retrieve the body quickly and only lost ~2 hours of running. Somehow it didn't bother me much, more than anything I was surprised about this death since it came in such a seemingly safe situation.
Ugh, sorry for the death @ffs but way to bounce back strong! Maybe you misclicked and didn't have BO active? That's really the only circumstance where the pally has had a NDE and was quickly solved by always checking for "3" at start of life pool bulb while teleporting to CS.
That's too bad @ffs but nice bounce back! I was going to say the same thing about BO, the vast majority of Klaus' non-LK NDEs have been due to me forgetting it/not casting it properly since I'm in a hurry.
Hm could be actually. After swapping out a few life charms for the P&B skiller, I've only recently started casting Battle Command as well in order to make up for that. Since it was kind of late and concentration was lacking (always a bad idea, and in fact there was another relatively close call some time before that), I might have just cast BC that run. Anyway, I'm more relaxed about it than when I died with my first 99er, also considering progress was rather smooth generally. And given drops were nice so far I'm still motivated to blow up his face another ~10k times.
@Ashenshugar He had one for his previous character, I suppose he has one now too. Most if not all of us had at some point, certainly for those last few levels. Mine consisted of the following items for my Fire Sorc (I think, from memory):
CtA, Moser's, HotO, Mara's, Skin of the Vipermagi, Credendum (because I needed the Dex to be able to equip HotO)
Yes I do, actually quite a few items: +6 PN White, Rhyme, Smoke, Shako, Mara's, 2x Dwarf Star. Better safe than sorry I guess.
EDIT: And CtA of course! Could be a bit overkill maybe but it's fine, by now I don't pick up a lot of stuff and it doesn't result in all that much extra muling.
It is quite a while, since my last update for Blackwell.
If I recall correctly, last update was when he finished enigma at lvl 87 and moved to farm Meph for some missing gear.
It went smoothly, I was running him at p3 and in first couple hundred of runs I obtained Gore Riders and Guillames Face. These two items as well as Reapers, which followed short after the previous drops, improved my killing speed by alot. In 500 or so runs, during which Meph gave me
I became bored by it. I still didnt have end game equip and I wasnt satisfied with WW, so I respeced to Berserkr barb and start running other places, such as pits, CS, ancient tunnels and so on. It granted me some faster leveling, but I also realised, that it is far more dangerous, since I was chugging rejuvs at really high pace. That led me back to Meph, to find that missing Stormshield and Highlords wrath.
And this is where I am sitting now. Fresh lvl 92 with over 1500 Meph runs under my belt, still missing that damned shield and optional amulet. I dont want to respec right after I find it, so I invested 1 skillpoint to battlecry, to compensate for upcoming switch of angelic combo. Do you think that it will be sufficient?
3x SoJ ... that is crazy. Also ... less than 100M to go. For me mentally that was a huge step, and from there it was all counting down to 99. Good luck !!
Nihl seems to like dropping SoJs and BKWBs, I got 5 in total from him on my two 99ers so far. Same for Mara's somehow.. GL with that last stretch @Bewitch!
After having a second Duriel's Shell drop from my Hell Andariel quest kill, Orion, level 79, has smashed hard into a brick wall in Act II. There are simply far too many Returned minions with their hard-hitting Hollow One masters that I just can't take down packs of them without chugging my entire belt, since leeching is off the table.
I know I committed to a Zealot for this challenge, but man, it's moments like these that make tapping out and becoming a Hammerdin something to seriously consider.
After having a second Duriel's Shell drop from my Hell Andariel quest kill, Orion, level 79, has smashed hard into a brick wall in Act II. There are simply far too many Returned minions with their hard-hitting Hollow One masters that I just can't take down packs of them without chugging my entire belt, since leeching is off the table.
I know I committed to a Zealot for this challenge, but man, it's moments like these that make tapping out and becoming a Hammerdin something to seriously consider.
NO, don't do it!!! Resist the temptation!!! (errr....again)
Also, @RIP - man, you've had a rough last couple of weeks. So sorry to hear about your losses. But chin up, get back on the horse, and use what you've learned to make you stronger!
So, a lot has happened since this last update (including a trip to Los Angeles and a bout with the flu bug that knocked out my whole house). I'll update the tote board later, but here goes with a summary:
1178 - Ist & Fal
1197 - Um
1206 - Mal
1273 - Pul
And then 1313:
At this point, it was Horadric Cube time!
6 Pul + 3 Flawed Diamonds --> 3 Um
8 Um (3 from above + 5 in stash) + 4 Topaz --> 4 Mal
6 Mal (4 from above + 2 in stash) + 3 Amethyst --> 3 Ist
4 Ist (3 from above + 1 in stash) + 2 Sapphire --> 2 Gul
2 Gul (from above) + 1 Ruby --> 1 Vex
2 Vex (1 from above + 1 in stash) + 1 Emerald --> 1 Ohm (JACKPOT)
Time to make me some runewords!!!
For the merc:
And a couple of little somethings for me:
I'm pretty happy with the CtA roll, and the Death roll is slightly above average as well. That's it for the LK runs, at least for the foreseeable future - I don't wish to expend any more energy given my rather sad luck at the first 1,313 of them:
Lem - 2
Pul - 5
Um - 5
Mal - 4
Ist - 3
Vex - 2
Now I'm left to decide whether to reroll my maps to get a better Pits map (with the downside being losing that great LK map if I ever decide to return). Decisions, decisions....
I always like seeing those marathon cubing sessions turning out decently. It always seems like so much input (runewise) at the time, but it's so, SO worth it.
I always like seeing those marathon cubing sessions turning out decently. It always seems like so much input (runewise) at the time, but it's so, SO worth it.
It left quite the whole in my rune inventory, but as you said - it was SO worth it! And to be honest, I don't recall ever equipping a Military Pick, Crowbill, or War Spike before so there is that, too!
Just rip'd necro level 81 in Lower Kurast. Thought I'd paused the game but apparently not! Tabbed back to Diablo and was dead in one of the superchest huts. Really one of my more stupid deaths, although it's not even the first time I've done exactly this. I didn't even take a screenshot of the death sorry, you'll have to make do with a character select ghost.
I'd only found one Sur rune so I wasn't very far with this one. Not sure how much I enjoyed the necromancer playstyle to be honest, I might spin him up again or try something else next time.
Wow, that was a lot of cubing, @sanguillen! On losing the map vs a good Pit map is there much you need from LK? If you're going to do a lot of Pit runs you'll get at least some runes from there.
Alright, another 30 mio done, so 20 mio left till ancients and 99
Also watch the dropvideo, i was just talkin about that blizz, if they make a d2 remaster etc they would never do it like this that u never or nearly never find this or that item and then zod dropped haha
Well, i guess u guys know what the next update will be haha
Drops: ZOD, ondal helmed, rbf 3/5 psn, off sk 4 str, catseye, Gul, set ward shield, Mal
Meant to post a bigger update on Ric when at 98.25, but decent drops kept coming so let's settle for 20%.
Smooth sailing again after his odd death recently. Not much to report as far as runs themselves are concerned, though I'm still trying to find a few tweaks, mostly regarding use of curses, to squeeze out a second here or there. In terms of drops, his facet streak continued with three more dropping in quick succession, as well as a couple of juicy runes.
Another interesting circlet for a teleporting Bowie.
More facets, now at 23 in total. For comparison: My Sorc found 11 from 1-99.
This one got muled off to my Pitzerker immediately.
Low ED but who care's it's a PB also my first one with 13 Aura.
Quite happy about this one, eth and good MF roll.
Another Jah and Lo. Still looking for an Ohm for another CtA try though.
While nothing spectacular, he's got a number of further nice drops (no screenshot due to 10 picture limit):
More runes: Mal, Mal, Um, Um, Pul
+3 Bow 5os GMB – possible CtA base at some point
Rixot's Keen (#2)
Torch of Iro (#3)
Arkaine's Valor (#3)
Giant Skull (#4)
eth rare Dimensional Blade fool's mod/84 ED/5 ML/6 max dmg – no idea if this is any good or even stylish?
Demon's Arch (#11)
Demonhorn's Edge (#3)
40% Chancies
Verdungo's
10/54 Sharp GC
Lacerator (#6)
WC Skiller
Btw fun fact: To this day he hasn't found War Travs!
I'm getting buried in work currently and was out of town visiting friends for the weekend, but happy with the pace so far. Hopefully I'll find the time to keep it up and Nihl doesn't get too boring any time soon.
Just rip'd necro level 81 in Lower Kurast. Thought I'd paused the game but apparently not! Tabbed back to Diablo and was dead in one of the superchest huts. Really one of my more stupid deaths, although it's not even the first time I've done exactly this. I didn't even take a screenshot of the death sorry, you'll have to make do with a character select ghost.
Ever since finding that Lightsabre, Hell has been going rather swimmingly. Offensively, Orion has become a high-powered buzzsaw (as opposed to a low-powered buzzsaw? I guess they're high-powered to begin with?) that's cutting through nearly everything he comes across, save for Stone Skin PIs, which takes a bit of time. The Life Tap wand advice was great, as well.
Hell Mephisto was a relative breeze, it was actually the slog through the Durance, particularly level 2, that was the tougher task here. Or until Bremm Sparkfist spawns again with some kind of FE/LE/Conviction combo that strikes fear into the hearts of men.
I have a few questions about going forward at this point. While I feel confident I can continue through to Act IV right away, I'm wondering what my options are, and if I should gear up, and if so, where.
Here's what I'm rocking right now, and it's been serving me well (except YOU, 73 lightning resist *eye twitch*). Lightsabre (dog bless that ignore target defense), Ancient's Pledge akaran rondache, Duriel's Shell, Guillaume's, The Mahim Oak Curio amulet (not much luck with amulet drops, honestly), Lava Gout gloves, good ol' trusty Tearhaunch, String of Ears, Raven Frost, and a rare ring with 5% life leech, +7 all resists, and a hefty +15 to Dexterity. Block chance is about 60-63, and my ever-impatient merc is rocking a Vamp Gaze, Duriel's Shell, and an Arioc's Needle, for lack of a better weapon.
Now, considering the following:
That's a pretty short distance to the Durance level 3, and has me questioning what to do from here. Should I try running Hell Meph to gear up, after finding some kind of item that gives me Teleport charges? What's the best way to find such an item? I would really love to be able to avoid the council members on the third floor.
Or should I try out some level 85 areas/The Countess instead? I figure I could rip through places like The Pit and The Countess's tower at this point, and get some decent runes in the process. Sure, having to walk everywhere sucks, but that's Paladin life.
OR, do I just continue on to Act IV + V and get that Pat?
Wow, that was a lot of cubing, @sanguillen! On losing the map vs a good Pit map is there much you need from LK? If you're going to do a lot of Pit runs you'll get at least some runes from there.
Good question. That Death War Spike I created will be my end-game weapon, save for if a Lo rune ever drops. But even then, with Death already hitting 4 fpa Zeal, I would consider just putting a Lo into a Fortitude to replace the Treachery Embossed Plate I'm currently wearing, instead of switching to Grief. So to answer that question, I don't anticipate grinding LK runs at the moment just to find that Lo (or the materials to cube up to it), so I guess I might as well roll a more amenable route to the Pits and possibly Ancient Tunnels. Thanks!
@AlexTheNextOne - To me, your weapon and your amulet would be the first two items to try and upgrade. What is your current rune situation like? Do you have the runes to make an Oath? That would represent a pretty significant damage upgrade right there, with little-to-no loss in attack speed. As far as the ammy goes, gamble....gamble....gamble. Or craft....craft....craft. Given that Duriel's Shell is your only source of Cannot Be Frozen, I'd be loathe to switch that out until you find a Ravenfrost ring or something, so I'd focus on the above two.
I do see that your stash is rather lacking in charms, and that is reflected in your Life of 1040. If you try some LK runs to try and find the Mal and/or Pul needed for Oath, then you can also pick up all the charms that drop as well. A TON of them drop, and you'd be amazed how quickly your Life will increase as a result. So this might be what I would try first, and then graduate to the Pits....
@sanguillen - Thanks, I forgot there's also LK to try out. My rune situation is pretty bad, I only have a Lum, Lem, Fal, and a few Shaels, so that's the easy half of Oath out of the way. What kind of eth weapon would I put that in?
I do actually already have a Raven Frost, so what would be a better armor option? I did just find a normal Archon Plate, maybe I should use the socket recipe on it?
@sanguillen - Thanks, I forgot there's also LK to try out. My rune situation is pretty bad, I only have a Lum, Lem, Fal, and a few Shaels, so that's the easy half of Oath out of the way. What kind of eth weapon would I put that in?
I do actually already have a Raven Frost, so what would be a better armor option? I did just find a normal Archon Plate, maybe I should use the socket recipe on it?
That Lem you have is key to a couple of different avenues that come to mind at the moment:
1) Use the Lem to make Treachery armor for yourself, and put on the Ravenfrost. The Fade that procs helps reduce physical damage received, and that 45% IAS allows you much greater flexibility weapon-wise in terms of still reaching 4 fpa Zeal. You can figure out exactly what you need here: https://planetdiablo.eu/diablo-2/calculatoren/angriffsgeschwindigkeit/
2) Save the Lem and hope that an Ist drops, to make Delirium helm for your merc. The Confuse triggers a LOT, which gives you a crowd-control mechanism that is otherwise lacking with Paladins. In this case, you could also use your Lum and Fal (presuming you have a Hel rune too) to make a Lionheart Armor, which would be a big boost to your Life, and also boost your Strength (damage) and Dexterity (AR, blocking). Here again, equip the Ravenfrost for added AR and blocking boost. In this case, you could skip the Delirium part for now and proceed with the other stuff too if you want.
Well, i've decided give it a last try...It seems, that four deaths are not enough for old stubborn man
So meet Diana, mighty physical based bowazon (Multishot, Guided arrow, Penetrate, Critical strike and Decoy to be maxed), holding a last hope against countless minions of Hell
Edit: And thanks once again to everyone for kind words
Ever since finding that Lightsabre, Hell has been going rather swimmingly. Offensively, Orion has become a high-powered buzzsaw (as opposed to a low-powered buzzsaw? I guess they're high-powered to begin with?) that's cutting through nearly everything he comes across, save for Stone Skin PIs, which takes a bit of time. The Life Tap wand advice was great, as well.
Hell Mephisto was a relative breeze, it was actually the slog through the Durance, particularly level 2, that was the tougher task here. Or until Bremm Sparkfist spawns again with some kind of FE/LE/Conviction combo that strikes fear into the hearts of men.
I have a few questions about going forward at this point. While I feel confident I can continue through to Act IV right away, I'm wondering what my options are, and if I should gear up, and if so, where.
Here's what I'm rocking right now, and it's been serving me well (except YOU, 73 lightning resist *eye twitch*). Lightsabre (dog bless that ignore target defense), Ancient's Pledge akaran rondache, Duriel's Shell, Guillaume's, The Mahim Oak Curio amulet (not much luck with amulet drops, honestly), Lava Gout gloves, good ol' trusty Tearhaunch, String of Ears, Raven Frost, and a rare ring with 5% life leech, +7 all resists, and a hefty +15 to Dexterity. Block chance is about 60-63, and my ever-impatient merc is rocking a Vamp Gaze, Duriel's Shell, and an Arioc's Needle, for lack of a better weapon.
Now, considering the following:
That's a pretty short distance to the Durance level 3, and has me questioning what to do from here. Should I try running Hell Meph to gear up, after finding some kind of item that gives me Teleport charges? What's the best way to find such an item? I would really love to be able to avoid the council members on the third floor.
Or should I try out some level 85 areas/The Countess instead? I figure I could rip through places like The Pit and The Countess's tower at this point, and get some decent runes in the process. Sure, having to walk everywhere sucks, but that's Paladin life.
OR, do I just continue on to Act IV + V and get that Pat?
@AlexTheNextOne I would use that Lem for a Treachery Armor for now. As for which area to run, there are a few options. You could run Meph, but as Tatterson says, in that case reroll until the exit is only one left turn from the waypoint. But I think you'll find better upgrades in the form of runewords, so there's not that much to find at Meph (other than Gores and Laying of Hands probably, but you'll find these eventually).
When it comes to runes, LK is probably your best bet. Having said that, I'm doing that with a Paladin myself right now, and find it very, very boring, and that is with maxed Vigor. So instead you could try running Council if that works for you. Otherwise, push for xp for now and hope the right runes drop eventually. In that respect I'd go to Pits or push through to Act 5 and do Pindle runs on the highest player setting you can handle at decent speed.
As to which items to look for as upgrade ... Like I said, make Treachery with the Lem. It will give you so much flexibility, due to the ias, but also the hidden DR% and the big resist all when Fade procs (which should be all the time). That way you can ditch the Ancient's Pledge and make Rhyme in a Paladin Shield instead for faster blocking and increased block chance, as well as res all and some MF. The main switch you want is, as already pointed out, to switch the weapon for an Oath first and ultimely Grief. Grief goes in a Phase Blade, Oath you should run the numbers for different weapons in the attack speed calculator. Obviously definitely in an ethereal weapon, since it has the indestructible property.
@AlexTheNextOne I'll just +1 Oath into Grief, and skipping Meph altogether.
Pindle/Pits for levels after a weapons upgrade; LK for life/resist/max charms.
@Tatterson Numberpad8? ?? do you switch skills with your right thumb..
@AlexTheNextOne I don't know about zeal breakpoints, but eth Berserker Axe has always been the most recommended one for Oath. To be honest though, I'll be happy with any eth elite base for the time being. Pick your favourite and by the time you get sick of it, you should have Grief ready to go.
@RIP also, I'll just quietly recommend that you go for 1 point in Strafe and higher MA with low(er) GA. Damage gain from + skills in GA is negligible and you need a PI solution until you get Atma/Reapers. Even with Atma, MS is bad at proccing anything, strafe is nice for trying to proc Amp against a group of mobs with a PI boss, and MA when there's only the boss left alive.
Nice @ffs - hope things continue to go smoothly for Ric. And really great progress @Bewitch - very impressive to move through this last level so quickly. Keep things safe over the last stretch!
It's really nice to have company through the last stretch. Speaking of which . . . Phaedrus made his way to the summit:
To check out the view and make sure he knew how to get there. He’s a little past three-quarters of the way through the level, at 3.450B. With Ancients quest reward, just at 30M left to go!
Drops over the last quarter level slowed down compared to first half, but still quite some nice ones due to volume of runs involved. In terms of drops meriting screen shots (at this point), things started off nicely with Sur #4, then a big dry spell before the Cham posted in find item thread fell to complete his rune drop grail just from 98-99: Gul #6 fell shortly after, followed by Ohm #2 and Mal #4. Then we picked up Metalgrid to complete unique amulet drops for Phaedrus, and another dry streak before BKWB (his second), as an upgrade. It threw off his gear symmetry, but the +life relative to SoJ is worth it and brings him back close to 3700 HP with Battle Orders active. His final meaningful drop was Jah #2 (from Diablo, feeling generous after the Zod), which was nice:
Mixed in were Pul #7-9 and Um #3. There were lots of other S/Us—another set corona, Medusa’s x3, HHG, Spirit Keeper, Messerschmidt’s axe, multiple unique pelts and barb helms , another IK armor, multiple Arkaine’s, another Horizon’s, and Fleshripper. The highlight was this, my overall first eth one:
Code:
Vampire Gaze
Grim Helm
Defense: 378
Durability: 21 of 21
Required Level: 41
Required Strength: 48
Fingerprint: 0x1de88cdb
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
Adds 6 - 22 Cold Damage Over 4 Secs (100 Frames)
7% Mana stolen per hit
8% Life stolen per hit
+100% Enhanced Defense
15% Slower Stamina Drain
Damage Reduced by 20%
Magic Damage Reduced by 15
Ethereal
Which made me look at my stashes and presented an interesting data point. There are some items that I always picked up from the start of this restart, no matter how many I had in the stash, due to possibility of improving overall rolls. Vamp was one of them, others were War Travelers and Reaper’s. I stopped picking up the regular Vamp Gazes sometime during Hiatus’ journey. There were 24 in the my overall stash (a consolidated project in GoMule that I use to check grail status), before this eth one. I have not stopped picking up Reaper’s Toll, and we are at 47 without an eth one. What are the odds of that?
Anyhow, to round things out, the nice charms and rares from this stretch are in the spoiler:
Code:
Ruby Grand Charm of Balance
Grand Charm
Required Level: 22
Fingerprint: 0x4877a88e
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+12% Faster Hit Recovery
Fire Resist +29%
Steel Grand Charm of Balance
Grand Charm
Required Level: 41
Fingerprint: 0x85571867
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+12% Faster Hit Recovery
+129 to Attack Rating
Sounding Grand Charm of Balance
Grand Charm
Required Level: 42
Fingerprint: 0xfac96dcd
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+1 to Warcry Skills (Barbarian Only)
+12% Faster Hit Recovery
Fine Small Charm of Balance
Small Charm
Required Level: 29
Fingerprint: 0xfb11ee09
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+5% Faster Hit Recovery
+3 to Maximum Damage
+20 to Attack Rating
Fine Small Charm of Inertia
Small Charm
Required Level: 27
Fingerprint: 0xf4a84ca7
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+3% Faster Run/Walk
+3 to Maximum Damage
+18 to Attack Rating
Arcing Small Charm of Shock
Small Charm
Required Level: 57
Fingerprint: 0x915ce398
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
Adds 2 - 44 Lightning Damage
Sadly, we are still on 3 pally combat skillers. He picked up two more offensive aura skillers and another defensive, which was a bummer that it didn’t roll to the other skill tree. Oh well.
Progress-wise, he went to p7-p1-p7 with p1 switch before de Seis and back to p7 for Vizier for almost this entire stretch. After a near death in the 3.42B range from convicted Infector and being not fully focused, we went to p1-p7 when I was a bit tired or distracted, for the extra safety. XP/hr was close to 2.5M (probably averaging 2.45M) when focused, but I wasn’t pushing things too hard so it was likely lower than that overall.
He was still hitting boss packs along the way, with a disappointing zero unique TC87s for this entire quarter level. The last 2M to hit 3.450B skipped boss packs, which sped things up a bit.
I think we’ll go back to hitting boss packs, hoping for a grailer in the last 30M even if it’s slightly longer than otherwise. I thought he might finish up this weekend with the extra day due to Monday holiday here. But it looks like we'll be able to go backpacking instead, which is nice. So it may not be until next weekend that Phaedrus pings the final level. But he is close!
@AlexTheNextOne Any elite one hander probably. At least one that fits into your current strength / dex points. BA is always nice, but other ones should work as well.
@PhineasB Very nice !!! Good luck on the final stretch. Your posts always make me want to start doing CS runs with my Hammerdin as well. Unfortunately that last Sur or Ber refuses to drop for ShouldBeEasy. I'm currently at 3200 LK runs, and iirc my previous Sur dropped before the 2000 mark. I can't complain though, as statistically I'm still ahead of the amount of runs needed to make Enigma. Wait, did I just say that? Of course I can complain. Because complaining always helps .
@AlexTheNextOne , I agree with @Gynli and @T72on1 regarding the base - between ethereal weapon bases that drop with no sockets (that you thus have to cube) and ethereal weapon bases with exactly 4 sockets, I think it would be prudent to use the first one you can get (assuming you have the runes for Oath at that point). The way I understand the attack speed calculator for one-handed weapons:
Code:
FPA 10 0 -10 -30
5 19 7 0 0
4 86 60 40 11
These are all based on lvl 20 Fanatacism, with 5 & 4 being the Frames Per Attack, 10, 0, and -10 being the Weapon Speed Modifiers, and the six numbers being the minimum total IAS (on or off-weapon, it doesn't matter which) you would need to hit that FPA. Your Lightsabre already comes with 20% IAS on it, so you're already over the 11% IAS required to achieve 4 FPA without needing any other IAS. Oath comes with 50% on it, so any weapon with a WSM of -10 would get you to 4 FPA. A Berserker Axe has a WSM of 0, so any gloves with even 10% IAS would do it for you (or one IAS jewel socketed into a shield, helm, or body armor).
One note about Berserker Axes - the way I understand it, they are the only one-handed melee weapon with a range of 2 (the others being either 0 or 1). This helps you reach more monsters with your Zeal swings, reducing the number of "single swing whiffs" you might notice you see/hear when attacking (someone please correct me if I'm wrong).
Also, for those weapons with WSM of 10 - at lvl 23 Fanaticism, the IAS needed to achieve 4 FPA drops from 86 to 83%. That is not insignificant when you consider Oath gives you 50% and gloves will generally give you 20%, because all of a sudden you're only one IAS jewel away from 4 FPA....
@Gynli : Thanks for the welcoming and for the advise, but i have different plan i want to follow...I've played couple of Strafers in the past, so i don't want to use this skill, if at all possible...also, i have another idea how to deal with PIs, at least before i get some really good gear (if ever )
Nevertheless, thanks alot for Your effort
Edit: Well, after re-reading some threads, i might go for Strafe/MS hybrid, with lack of Valkyrie i have plenty of skillpoints to distribute, so we shall see, how it goes
Forumite Character SC/HC Class Level Exp Date E/S S/U Grail Deaths Hours
--------------- --------------- ----- ----- ----- ---- ---------- --- ---- ----- ------ -----
RIP Kaira_II HC Sin 95 2.55 2018-09-06 Yes - 399 - -
Bewitch itsreal HC Sorc 87 1.xx 2018-04-24 No - - - -
MizzouFTW Pure HC Necro 86 1.15 2018-01-10 Yes - - 1 -
Vildecor Celia HC Ama 84 0.99 2018-05-30 Yes 125 97 1 -
coju NintyNine_orRiP HC Sorc 81 0.74 2016-04-07 Yes - - 1 -
RIP Attila HC Barb 78 0.59 2018-09-26 Yes - 73 - -
TwentyMuleTeam Valus HC Barb 76 0.48 2016-10-27 Yes - - 1 -
Pb_pal Stevesy HC Pala 76 0.48 2017-06-19 Yes - - 1 -
weezaard Cypher SC Druid 66 0.00 2018-02-21 Yes - - 20+ -
Tenecabo OldShatterhand HC Druid 49 0.04 2016-06-16 Yes - 0 1 -
Pijus Pyrestarter HC Druid 36 0.00 2018-05-21 Yes - - 1 -
coju fB HC Sorc 29 0.00 2016-04-09 Yes 1 1 1 2
Kitteh Verallus HC Druid 26 0.00 2016-03-25 No - - 1 -
logoutzero Rolex HC Barb 21 0.00 2016-03-26 Yes 0 0 1 1
Day off work cos i stayed up sorta for US midterms.
Progressd thru 2/3rds act 2 and a bit of act 3. Annoyingly 4 OS shield dropped, it was a pally one.... still its been spirited and added to my hammerdin for when it reach lvl 25. Nothing major dropped to date although did get a new high rune from this play through of a Ko. Next bit is flayer jungle for gidbinn and dungeon befor progressing into the Kurasts. If i have a decent Meph set up there is a small potential of parking for a bit to Meph run for stuff.
Huge congratulations, @Bewitch! It has been amazing to see your drops in those drop-clips, thanks a lot for those.
Like @T72on1 I am also looking forward to that write-up.
Ty guys!
Im pretty bad at write-up stuft, as u may alrdy noticed by my normal updates ^^
But im gonna do it tomorrow, also have to check how that posting of the gomule stash stuff works ^^
Awesome job @Bewitch Nice drops and great efficiency for sure. That 99er list is growing like crazy now. You guys are just too damn good.
As for myself and my 99er Sorc, she is still plugging along at a tortoises pace. Slowly but surely I guess. I have also been working on my Frenzy Barb that has been geared up from the spoils of the Sorcs journey, and he is fun to play. The last one I made was Grief/Lawbringer PB’s where this one is BotD/Death CB’s. The PB’s are definitely faster and IMO Lawbringer is the ultimate offhand weapon for Frenzy, but the newer character is a tank and can rip it up for sure.
Ultimately I want to end up with a character for each class that is geared to the max.
Running LK on /p8 right now to hopefully find a Pul and Mal to make Oath, and I've run into a pretty good map with a pretty good armor rack near the chests:
I'm still trying to figure out what exactly I need to do to manipulate what drops from these stable racks, but as long as I very quickly run to the WP from town and get to this rack, even stopping by Ormus for a second to heal up, a monarch drops 8 times out of 10. I've already found two 4os ones that are getting shipped off to my Meteorber, and one to a mule.
I wonder if it's possible to get a Stormshield from this? MF has to factor into these racks, because I've already had my second Lava Gout drop from this very rack after 5-10 normal battle gauntlets.
Another thing I'm wondering is, should I consider re-rolling the map until I get another close set of superchests, with an armor rack that spawns gilded shields very often? Maybe get a chance at that HoZ?
Oh, and I blitzed my way through Act IV Hell, but stopped at the Frozen River, seems it's gotten really hard there now.
@AlexTheNextOne re-rolling is only worth it if you run enough sets to make up the time lost rerolling. I recommend just sticking with the 1st semi-decent one you find; and reroll only when you plan on doing thousands of runs.
Running LK on /p8 right now to hopefully find a Pul and Mal to make Oath, and I've run into a pretty good map with a pretty good armor rack near the chests:
I'm still trying to figure out what exactly I need to do to manipulate what drops from these stable racks, but as long as I very quickly run to the WP from town and get to this rack, even stopping by Ormus for a second to heal up, a monarch drops 8 times out of 10. I've already found two 4os ones that are getting shipped off to my Meteorber, and one to a mule.
I wonder if it's possible to get a Stormshield from this? MF has to factor into these racks, because I've already had my second Lava Gout drop from this very rack after 5-10 normal battle gauntlets.
Another thing I'm wondering is, should I consider re-rolling the map until I get another close set of superchests, with an armor rack that spawns gilded shields very often? Maybe get a chance at that HoZ?
Oh, and I blitzed my way through Act IV Hell, but stopped at the Frozen River, seems it's gotten really hard there now.
Pretty sure MF doesn't factor into rack drops. I 99.9% know that it doesn't in 1.07
If you want more HRs then maybe getting a gilded shield spawn would be okay, but that might be really hard to get. In 1.07 I would spend hours on getting a decent rack spawn, not caring about if there is 1 camp or 2 as long as the rack drops the item I want.
Sorry about the wrong information I provided in that case. To my defense: I've been finding a lot of uniques in LK lately. It is only now that I realize only one of those was from a rack. All the rest was from a corpse .
Heres the list of all the runes I picked up. I tried to pick up every rune, probably missed less than 1/20 runes. Gems I did sometimes skip, probably 1/10 to 1/15
I think I can make a 6 ist phase blade / crystal sword if I skip having delirium? Might do that.
Not sure what base for the enigma.
Next step: Craft the blood rings (I picked up hundreds of ilvl 80 rings from LK) as I'm level 85. After that level to +90 and gamble+craft amulets.
I might make 2 hotos with the 2 vexes I have. My second grief isnt that high, but its not very low either. I have 2 socket quests left, and I don't want to use them for suicide branch + wizardspike (If I decide to play as a pitzerker for a while) Maybe I'll farm mephisto for arachs to get 2x hoto + arach + 5fcr ammy setup.
I don't know what I'll do for the cannot be frozen mod if I go pitzerker. I don't think I have a trang-oul belt and using a death belt is questionable.
I did get some sick fine charms from LK though, which I'll post sometime when I sort them out. I think I can fill my whole inventory with 2max/decent ar per slot charms.
Grats on the runes and sounds like a great plan @Tatterson! Also agreed re socket quests. As tempting as it might be to go Berserk for that MF supremacy, I'd go WW and save the Ancients and not respec until going Conc for Nihl and 98-99. Baal waves with WW may drive you almost insane, but Zerker is just so painfully slow at levelling.. I went back and forth with my Pt Zerker too many times.
Grats on the runes and sounds like a great plan @Tatterson! Also agreed re socket quests. As tempting as it might be to go Berserk for that MF supremacy, I'd go WW and save the Ancients and not respec until going Conc for Nihl and 98-99. Baal waves with WW may drive you almost insane, but Zerker is just so painfully slow at levelling.. I went back and forth with my Pt Zerker too many times.
If you haven't cashed in the Ancients XP reward, it might be worth testing out XP/hr for Pit and CS (three-seal) runs to see how they work for you, at least at the earlier levels. The Ancients reward is worth saving for later levels when XP penalties pick up, assuming the difference between Baal and the other targets isn't too large in favor of Baal runs.
It seems to be accepted that Baal waves are fastest for barb, but I don't know if it's been thoroughly tested.
Some progress on barb done^^(Full baals p1/8/3 baals)
Since i found gorerider now i actually got all eq beside Highlords, using metalgrid so far which is also fine.
@Bewitch congratulations on reaching 99. The efficiency with which you did this is mind boggling. Amazing feet of perseverance. And of course being absoultely crazy pumping so many hours in it ;-). Kidding aside, congrats!
Phaedrus made it!
The drops for the last bit were solid: Mal #5, Ghostflame, Ist #4, Mal #6, Gul#7, and Mal #7. He also had another Griffon's but the screenshot didn't seem to take for some reason.
Um #4 was his last meaningful with a few million left before Ancients and the final run, and he also got an 4os eth Cryptic Axe that got a nice Insight roll.
Highlight was Ber #2 between the Gul and Mal #7:
In all, very pleased with the drops for 98-99 and nice to have him finished. I'll try to post the write up tomorrow evening!
I must say, strange as it might seem, that I'm already kind of starting to miss the endless runs for 99 with Neverland. So I can definitely see myself going for 99 again, maybe even more than once. It's the LK farming for the usual stuff first that I don't like at all, and which will probably prevent me from doing it again untwinked.
I must say, strange as it might seem, that I'm already kind of starting to miss the endless runs for 99 with Neverland. So I can definitely see myself going for 99 again, maybe even more than once. It's the LK farming for the usual stuff first that I don't like at all, and which will probably prevent me from doing it again untwinked.
@T72on1 Interesting because for me, the exciting part is getting those runewords (and other rare things) no matter if I already have them. E.g. farming Enigma and Infinity from scratch provided much more of a sense achievement than gaining a handful of levels later on, when gear is barely improved anymore. With the exception of hitting 99 ofc. But if it was only the XP grind and not about the gearing progression, I wouldn't enjoy it much I think. So ironically I would never do this twinked I guess.
@PhineasB Congrats on the 99er! Getting to 99 is an incredible feat, but 3 times is astonishing. Only 4 to go, right?
I'm going to give the 99er another try. If Phineas can do it three times surely I can do it once
After reading the other 99er write ups from this thread, I've been inspired by Izuna and Mercy's journeys, so I'll be entering with a trapsin. Introducing Chore! (which surely this project will eventually become)
She's currently in the arcane sanctuary. Looking forward to progressing with her!
@T72on1 Interesting because for me, the exciting part is getting those runewords (and other rare things) no matter if I already have them. E.g. farming Enigma and Infinity from scratch provided much more of a sense achievement than gaining a handful of levels later on, when gear is barely improved anymore. With the exception of hitting 99 ofc. But if it was only the XP grind and not about the gearing progression, I wouldn't enjoy it much I think. So ironically I would never do this twinked I guess.
It's not that I don't enjoy the gearing progression. In fact that is the main attraction to go untwinked, and one I thoroughly enjoy. Every drop can have a significant meaning. What I don't like is LK farming. Not on the whole, certainly not with a non-teleporting character, and definitely not to make something I already have. If I would have a decent change to do it in other places, by just farming (Pindle, Pits, AT, CS, depending on the build), I would start another untwinked 99er right away. But hoping for the equivalent of Jah and Ber, sometimes even 2x Ber on top of that, by just farming is not realistic. It will happen eventually, but would take far too long. So you basically have to do it in LK.
@T72on1 I found my Ber from Mephisto, and I have found two Jah runes in the wild. One from AT and one from Pindleskin or his cronies. I think I made Natur's Enigma at around level 91 or so. I also dislike LK on foot.
Thanks for the responses and congrats all. As I've said before, no way I would have made it without the community and this thread to provide company along the way.
Write up is here, and table update is below to add link to the write up.
A few quick things before I start playing for the MFO tomorrow (possibly, I have some time but not a lot)
Made it in a breast plate because it looks cool on a barb, and I don't have to think about strength requirements at all
I also started crafting the blood rings but ran out of jewels. Haven't gotten anything super special, but a few 10fcr / 80 mana rings.
Plague Grip
Ring
Required Level: 44
Fingerprint: 0x6e2fb4dd
Item Level: 82
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+10% Faster Cast Rate
+1 to Maximum Damage
1% Life stolen per hit
+1 to Strength
+15 to Life
+55 to Mana
Lightning Resist +15%
Order Eye
Ring
Required Level: 51
Fingerprint: 0xdba93442
Item Level: 82
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+10% Faster Cast Rate
2% Life stolen per hit
+5 to Strength
+13 to Life
+82 to Mana
Cold Resist +19%
Poison Resist +10%
1. How do I add myself to the list? Do I just copy paste the whole thing and try to format my line the same as everyone else?
2. Best place to get 4os flails and a 4os eth elite polearm. I would do cows but they're super slow on a barb (Or atleast thats what I imagine, I actually haven't tried them
3. Should I run pits or snapchip for the MFO
4. 6 ist'ed phase blade or crystal sword? How does it affect the berserk speed with a grief pb?
1. There is a guide how to add yourself in the very first post of this thread.
2. Best way is to not luck for them . Other than that, trying to rack one might be an option, but probably not fun at all. I'd just play the area you want to play, and they will drop eventually.
3. Would it be with this character? In that case I'd run Pindle, because both Pits and Snipchap require quite good gear, not something you can efficiently pull off on an untwinked character probably. If you run it with another character, definitely Snapchip. For science of course .
4. Common wisdom says PB, so that's what I took. Not sure how much of a difference it makes though, you'd have to check the german attack speed calculator.
@Kitteh Two 99ers still not added to the OP. Get to work !!
1. There is a guide how to add yourself in the very first post of this thread.
2. Best way is to not luck for them . Other than that, trying to rack one might be an option, but probably not fun at all. I'd just play the area you want to play, and they will drop eventually.
3. Would it be with this character? In that case I'd run Pindle, because both Pits and Snipchap require quite good gear, not something you can efficiently pull off on an untwinked character probably. If you run it with another character, definitely Snapchip. For science of course .
4. Common wisdom says PB, so that's what I took. Not sure how much of a difference it makes though, you'd have to check the german attack speed calculator.
@Kitteh Two 99ers still not added to the OP. Get to work !!
1. Thanks!
2. Yeah, I guess you're right. Only if they weren't as rare as an eth mang songs lesson.
3. I actually think that my barb is very well geared for the MFO. Enigma, 6 isted offhand whenever I find a base, good grief, decent charms. No good source of CBF though, so that might be a problem. I can get a solid 400mf if I gear for it.
Nice. No CBF is definitely no good vs Snapchip. It might be an issue in Pits at times at well, so I still think that Pindle is your best bet. Also because you don't need to roll maps in that case.
1. There is a guide how to add yourself in the very first post of this thread.
2. Best way is to not luck for them . Other than that, trying to rack one might be an option, but probably not fun at all. I'd just play the area you want to play, and they will drop eventually.
3. Would it be with this character? In that case I'd run Pindle, because both Pits and Snipchap require quite good gear, not something you can efficiently pull off on an untwinked character probably. If you run it with another character, definitely Snapchip. For science of course .
4. Common wisdom says PB, so that's what I took. Not sure how much of a difference it makes though, you'd have to check the german attack speed calculator.
@Kitteh Two 99ers still not added to the OP. Get to work !!
Just curious if anyone has actually had something useful given to them by Anya as the quest reward for rescuing her? DirkStruan received the following, and is actually using it at the moment - it's not that it's so great, it's more a commentary on what rubbish has dropped for him so far :
If I can find a 3 OS Elite Pally shield, I might just go ahead and make Sanctuary (or maybe a Rhyme with 2 OS Elite Pally Shield, though I don't need the CBF as I have a Ravenfrost ring).
I must say, strange as it might seem, that I'm already kind of starting to miss the endless runs for 99 with Neverland. So I can definitely see myself going for 99 again, maybe even more than once. It's the LK farming for the usual stuff first that I don't like at all, and which will probably prevent me from doing it again untwinked.
I have been thinking a lot about this lately, and yes, that's probably what's going to happen in the end . I just need to think some more about which character I want to do it with.
yay, lvl up.
no nice drops since last update. Manaburn on on lister is just absolutly annoying.
i also thought about how to run nihla with 98, therre arent a lot of 99ers barbs so far, i only found 2, the crazy no-gomule and no ladder runeword guy and 1 wolfbarb (which is also pretty crazy^^)
i mean, using a beast in offhand to boost mainhand dmg/ar is what perkele did, ofc a storm or anything would also be an option but wouldnt a damn 2hand gpa botd also be nice?^^
@Tatterson With Grief Berserker you definitely want to use a PB as an offhand. Then again, @NanoMist ironically didn't know how a slower base messed with FPA and still won the MFO. I think it's only one FPA difference though not sure atm.
@Bewitch An archetype of Barb Nihl runners is this guy by @scrcrw, also with Beast – and a lot of time-traveled items. But in particular I really doubt you can run with a Merc without a beta Delirium as @scrcrw used (much higher CtC basically guaranteeing procs every run).
How about Grief + Last Wish PBs? Seems perfect to me for a no-Merc Nihl running Barb (with ladder runewords). And surely you always find the runes.
@Tatterson - First of all, a proper congrats on all your progress. I've just caught myself up with your posts, glad to see you've finished up the LK segment of the run, that's a fantastic milestone. As @ffs said, Phase Blade for the off-hand is the best option, especially since you're using a PB main-hand so it doesn't cost any stat points.
@Bewitch - Nice progress on the barb! Beast off-hand should definitely be the best option. As for the merc and his gear, @ffs has set you up well there. I'd be extremely wary of bringing a merc along when you're telestomping Nihlathak without that beta-Delerium unless you just bail every viper roll. The good thing is, once you get there you can always just test out different setups and see since it doesn't cost anything at the beginning of the level.
As per this post I've become more and more vulnerable to the idea of joining this (finally).
No promises yet, but let's say it aloud; I'm considering. I've level 97 Amazon twinked, and she may see her through to 99 one day, I tried some CS runs with her a little while back and it was great fun actually. Paladin and Sorceress I've done twinked already, and I think I'll try to avoid doing it with the same class again.
What we have... Druid, Assassin, Necromancer and Barbarian. I also intend to do another Travi 99er in 1.07, a Barb this time, and that's also something to take into account. Hmm, hmm.
I made a necro (twinked, lvl 27 so far) so i have a char to run some mf (pits) if i dont want to make progress on the barb and my question is if it is allowed that i take the enigma of the barb for the necro AND put it back on the barb when i run with him?
With the runes from my sorc i can just make infinity or enigma (dont have lots of runes below jah haha)
its absolutly okay if its not allowed, im just gonna make a enigma and make a botd warpike then
That is music to my ears--it would be very cool to have Zod God pushing an untwinked 99er forward. I had a blast with Mercy, so I'd recommend strongly consider an assassin
@Bewitch - until now, the view was not to allow switching items from untwinked 99er to other characters and then back again. It's up to @Kitteh as the host to provide the final word, but one possible tweak could be to allow it if the item has been personalized through the Anya reward. That way there isn't any risk of mixing up whether the item originated with the untwinked character or not.
I think that is allowed @Bewitch and @PhineasB. It's not different from muling into stash and back on after all, it's not like the item "improves" by being used by another char (ofc you don't socket it etc). @Kitteh mentioned a few times that he personally runs a once-off-it's-off policy, but that it's fine to do it of you want.
I must admit that I did it too with some gear of Neverland, since I didn't want to spend my HRs on runewords I already have, and as @ffs it's no different than muling off and back on. I understand the hesitation, since it's not completely the same, because you can possibly mix it up with other gear if you're not careful. Couldn't happen with my CoH for example though, as I only have one.
I like the idea of @PhineasB to personalize the item to avoid the risk of confusion.
I thought about it some more. Most likely I'll go with a SC Paladin. He will be a Fanazealot to start with. Endgame depends on ShouldBeEasy ... if I manage to keep him alive, the other Paladin will remain a Fanazealot. If not, I'll most likely convert him to a Hammerdin at some point.
Personally, I am uncomfortable with items being muled off, used and muled back. However, if the feeling amongst most participants is that it's ok, then I will go along with that. Just declare it and be very careful please
I thought about it some more. Most likely I'll go with a SC Paladin. He will be a Fanazealot to start with. Endgame depends on ShouldBeEasy ... if I manage to keep him alive, the other Paladin will remain a Fanazealot. If not, I'll most likely convert him to a Hammerdin at some point.
Maybe I should call that Paladin 'Grapefruit' or 'Grapelike'. You know, because we are trying to get someone whose name begins with 'Gra' and ends on 'pe' into this fun challenge and stuff .
I must admit that I did it too with some gear of Neverland, since I didn't want to spend my HRs on runewords I already have, and as @ffs it's no different than muling off and back on. I understand the hesitation, since it's not completely the same, because you can possibly mix it up with other gear if you're not careful. Couldn't happen with my CoH for example though, as I only have one.
I like the idea of @PhineasB to personalize the item to avoid the risk of confusion.
I sort of personalize as @PhineasB does, What I do is for each untwinked character, I create new separate stashes for that character and that character only. There are certain items that the untwinked character in question finds that I know will never use, so I mule those off to existing twinked characters. Those items are never to be seen again untwinked, as it's too easy for me to confuse. The only items going into the specific untwinked stashes for that particular character are items that he/she finds and might be using at some point.
I thought about it some more. Most likely I'll go with a SC Paladin. He will be a Fanazealot to start with. Endgame depends on ShouldBeEasy ... if I manage to keep him alive, the other Paladin will remain a Fanazealot. If not, I'll most likely convert him to a Hammerdin at some point.
Same story for this guy. Already had the runes, just had to get the base First eth polearm that dropped and cube decided to grant me 4 sockets
BiS belt?
I might use demon limb for the huge AR boost it gives whenever I start to baal (possibly?)
This among with all my mf charms (4mf per slot on average) give me 469 mf on kill and 289 on hork. Buffed hork level is 20 for a 51% chance of popping a tyraels. For mf upgrades I want IK helm (I can't spare a socket quest for a shako if I find one) and chance guards, but I'd lose a ias breakpoint for berserk. Maybe IK helm + IK boots would be good for the ar/life/mf, but I like my trires mf boots more.
As for actual 99 progress, I've gained 2 levels running p1 pits and chaos sanctuary. Someone mentioned saving ancients quest for 98 and running pits and diablo instead.
Running diablo isnt that bad at p1, but you cant leech from lord de seis and ghosts take all your mana away, which does make it quite annoying to run. Howl is a necessity (with berserk). Maybe p8 infector and vizier seals and p1/p3 diablo and de seis would work. I popped in Bewitch's stream and asked for his opinion, and he said the exact same things as mentioned above.
Currently standing at lvl 87 with no idea how to put myself on the table without screwing it up
EDIT:
It is 28 mf roll, but still 76mf more than my gface. Killing speed shouldn't decrease that much. 548/368 mf now
20ias
350 dmg demons
80 fr
19 cr
13 lr
22mf
VS
20str
20dex
25 ias
40frw
235 ar
44 life
2 combat skills
25mf
IK gives such a big boost to ar that I think losing resists is worth it
BIG EDIT:
Chaos sanctuary is actually decently runnable after testing with a new setup. I kind of made a mistake with socketing my gface, since I probably want to use an arreats instead. Not sure yet though.
The leech issue isnt actually that bad at all. De seis is still the worst pack of the area and I do take major damage when the surrounding monsters are p8, but the seal is p1. Howling does work somewhat, but it doesn't fear all the monsters and sometimes breaks really easily. I remember reading something about clvl and howl interacting, so the issue might fix itself whenever I level up.
Mana burn is still an issue, but not with ghosts and Vizier. Vizier goes down relatively quickly and always without issues. The problems come when De Seis and Infector are mana burn. I did some googling and reading and other CS barb guides have suggested using a Phoenix shield. Not sure if they play at p1 or p8 (probably p1 since its a battle.net forum) With berserk I don't see how they get that many corpses, even with the merc killing one or two occasionally. I'm not sure how good the 350ed it gives is. I tried doing chaos without LoH to simulate not having it (or having it after putting LoH back on) and the runs felt way more smooth.
P8 Vizier and Infector, P1 Seis and P3 Diablo seems to be the battle plan.
Coming in at 3620 life and 562 mana, I still occasionally do die (sometimes stemming from mana burn) Resistances are very low without arreats or a shield, but thats easily fixable. Even using something exotic like Sanctuary seems like a good idea, so I don't have to use charm space on shimmering charms. Although berserk does gain significant bonuses from all skills so Spirit might be the best option after all. Also you can make Sanctuary in a bone shield for the best look in the game.
I hope someone else can shed some light on the experience gain from only killing p8 Vizier + Infector and p3 diablo. (p1 de seis probably not even worth mentioning here)
Lastly, rerolling grand charms is probably going to be my best approach to getting good fine grand charms of vita, which are really needed for CS. I think the likely hood of getting 10 3/+15/+15 SC from a few hundred rerolls is less than winning the lottery, making GCs the best bet.
@Tatterson The first post of this thread describes how to use the tables and even links to a detailed guide for table formats.
Regarding XP gain, there's no way around doing your own tests. Generally I'd be really surprised if CS (be it seals or including Diablo) comes even close to WW spec running Baal waves at least until 97 and likely until 98. If you have a twinked Barb that you can simulate your gear with somewhat closely, you could compare Baal waves XP gain without killing the Ancients just yet. That kind of simulation is how I determined the XP targets for my Necro. Then again I do second running what you feel like, I didn't take the most efficient XP route overall with any of my characters. However, when it comes down to saving ~100 hours or so, that does have an impact on the decision.
Been meaning to share my experience tables with everyone. I used it to help theorycraft my Baal runs and it's fairly accurate. My 95 -> 96 stretch was done via Ancients + 177 P8/P3 Baal runs. Without Ancients it would have taken 215 Baal runs, extrapolated from the 177 count. My table gave me 216 runs to 96, so it's very close to reality. As expected since clearing P1 throne is negligible in regards to additional experience.
I also have CS exp. numbers, but it's trickier due to random monster packs that are normally killed on the side. As always, it's best to do in game testing here, like Gripp. Still useful to see the exp. breakdown by seals and Diablo. Vizier + Infector contributes a major percentage of the total exp at sub-98, but that is something already known long ago. Although most leveling strats have already been dissected in the past 99 threads, it didn't hurt to reconfirm the strat or do a minor variation with our untwinked characters. Factor in actual run times for best use, although deaths, random monster packs, exp. shrines, etc will change the numbers.
Spoiler tag for wall of (intimidating) numbers:
Spoiler: Exp. Tables
First table contains P8/P7 Diablo and P8/P3 Baal.
Same as first but with P1/P7 Diablo and P1/P3 Baal. Included due to P1/P7 Diablo being a common 98 strat.
The P8/P3 Baal runs are fairly close to jjscud/reborn's table, which is a good sign. Let me know if there are any mistakes and I will correct it. For example: the number of minions.
Developed the spreadsheet with the basin exp. page and german d2 exp. online calculator as the references.
Finally an update as Ric has managed 1/3 of the final level:
Most of this stretch was done after the MF/Snapchip tourney started, so no Elite S&Us to report as the tournament is still running. Even though I'm the only Nihl runner so I guess it wouldn't be much of a spoiler anyway. A few nice drops in the spoiler below nonetheless. In addition to these, there were those drops mentioned in the tourney thread including another Lo, eth Hexfire, 1/20 Paladin amulet, Lenymo and three more facets (plus the two below making it five since the last update, and 28 total ).
Another one of these, again immediately moved to Pit Zerker.
Speaking of SCs...
I recently respec'ed my secondary Javazon to a P8 Pindle runner, and this is quite a nice fit for her:
Another Lo (actually dropped before the MF tourney started)
One (nice) cold facet before the tourney started...
...and one after the 3 from the post linked above (3/4 Cold)
Then getting trolled by D2 with Summoning skiller #7 overall, while still at two P&B... Still a nice collection to have on an untwinked Necro though, think I'm going to respec him to Beast Summoner again after hitting 99 and have him be my "pure Fishymancer" for good.
To be honest I am starting to have doubts whether I'll be able to finish him within the next 6 weeks. Work hardly allowed me to make progress these last weeks, moreover weekends are packed recently, with no end in sight... I mean it's cool to have RL buzzing, but still I hope I'll find some more time (and motivation!) to squeeze in all those runs until the end of the year.
GOGOGOG @ffs !!! If you don't make it, don't worry. I've been number crunching with Klaus and it's going to take him a loooong long time to make it all the way, so Ric will have some company no matter what.
SPEAKING OF COMPANY.
Has @Grape joined yet? I'll throw my hat in the ring again if you do. I need some insurance on Klaus anyways.
Holy moly, I never knew that stormshield was this strong. I can do p8 de seis without too much of a worry, and infector is super easy now. I have yet to socket it, but after a few test runs I feel like I will. I don't want to run baal for very much, since I dislike the waiting between the waves. I was going to use an upped mosers with 2 elds or something for decent block and resists (since I barely get any from gear) but I guess ill use the stormshield now that I have it. The test runs I did didn't even use my fine charms, so I guess I'll be slightly faster in the future. I did p8 seals p3 diablo in 2 minutes flat, with the seal refresh trick. 2:20 for a run with seal popping and 1:45 for plain runs or so
Really this update was more for me to get the table thing finally working
Also a new eth grailer
Also I found a sick fine charm of vita from somewhere (either pits or cs)
Fine Small Charm of Vita
Small Charm
Required Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0x1bd37a69
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+3 to Maximum Damage
+15 to Attack Rating
+16 to Life
If @Grape joins, I'll also add another character . . .
Also @Tatterson - in case it's helpful, the jpg files and links to some examples of how people have used Nano's tables are available in teh Compendium here, in section 3.3.
@Tatterson You are clearly on a roll, great stuff!
I managed to hit 97 with Natur, yay!
An odd level with regards to finds, found 3 Lacerators and 2 Guls. Some other stuff as well, but those are the things that stick out, a Carrion Wind dropped as well.
Edit: Did a quick run to get some numbers. At Players 8 killing Colenzo's pack up to and including Ventar's pack gained me 147,5k XP. Lister's pack is another 42,3k XP and players 3 Baal was 64,2k XP. Lister and Baal is going to be too slow, they just don't take enough damage for this to be viable. With these numbers I get from anywhere from 1050 to 1807 runs depending on configuration. I suspect that I will start doing Lister's pack and Baal at players 1 just to reduce travelling while still getting XP. I forgot to get numbers for players 1 Lister's pack, so I don't know for sure how many runs I have ahead of me.
@Tatterson Seal refresh trick. 2:20 for a run with seal popping and 1:45 for plain runs? I don't know what the difference is, can you explain?
@PhineasB Nice that finally someone is pushing @Grape to join . However, we all knew you would be joining with another character anyway (have to get that 99er Sept somehow, right?), so that won't help .
Btw, about that new character I will be joining with ... I want some advice .
As I have stated several times now, the one thing I don't want to do (or at least not a few thousand times) is run LK for Enigma, Infinity, ... I probably won't mind to give it a shot for CtA / HotO if needed, but not 3000+ runs like I'm doing now with my HC Hammerdin.
So, the character I'll be joining with has to have a reasonable shot at finding the runes in the field (Pits, CS, Pindle, ...). I know this isn't efficient in the long run, unless I get very, very lucky, but I don't mind. It's about playing the character and enjoying it, and LK isn't part of that, certainly not on a non-teleporting character, and not after the initial 1000 or so runs, when you usually still need some charms and rares alongside the runes anyway.
So, with that in mind, what would be a good choice for a build? I have already done Sorc, so that one is out. Thinking about it myself, I'm mainly looking for builds that don't need Infinity, as that means another 2x Ber on top of the Enigma. Hence I was thinking of the following:
Paladin: start out as a Fanazealot to have something different than my current HC Hammerdin, respec to Hammerdin if I would deed my HC one, otherwise stay a Zealot for the entire journey
Barb: I found @zticazzy's Barb Perkele very inspiring. So a WW Barb doing mainly Travincal for runes early on sounds like a plan. However, starting an untwinked Barb at one point where I got so fed up with my HC Hammerdin finding nothing at LK, reminded me how hard the going is early on untwinked. And I suspect it will be a while before I can get some good gear doing Travincal in the first place. So not sure about that.
Windy Druid: isn't too hard to get going, I think. But my experience with Windies is limited to 1, a very long time, so I'm not entirely sure about that. I'm also not sure if I'd like him enough to play all the way through 99, as people seem to be either very much in favor of the build, or very much against it, mainly due to the pathing of Tornado
So, yeah, I will certainly join, I can't wait to do so in fact, but I'm not sure yet what to play. So ... I'm looking forward to suggestions, advice, ...
Btw, about ShouldBeEasy: I will do a proper update soon. For now I can tell you that, after 2000 runs without a Sur, during which period almost no other HR dropped either, and over the last 1500 runs not even many Pul+ runes, I got so fed up with LK that I decided to just start running areas again and see where it gets me. I tried some Travincal, CS and Eldritch, but settled on /p8 Pits. Hopefully he'll luck out on a Sur / Ber eventually. Otherwise I'll probably play him until I reach the next level, level 91, and then get back to LK.
@T72on1 - This is an interesting question. My take would be that the Windy will be easiest to play in the sense that he can perform best out of the 3 with minimal gear, and likely have the easiest time MFing because of that. He will probably be the fastest of the 3 overall too, other than 98-99 where the Barb will overtake him. The Barb is your best bet to get high end runewords quickly, due to Trav (as you mention). The problem there is gearing him out sufficiently to run them, though that shouldn't be too hard, especially if you spend some time running Meph or something (plus, Oaths are not hard to make, other than finding good bases). Assuming you stay a Zealot, he will likely fall short of both of those characters in efficiency, but damn will he look cool doing it. Zealots can do Trav too, but extra squishyness may be a problem early on. At least all 3 will have similar leveling paths (ie. Ventar/Lister/Baal), so you don't have to make any decisions there.
If I was playing it, I personally would choose a Windy out of the three, as casters will just have a generally easier time Untwinked. I also fall firmly in the "I really like Windys" camp though, so I'm biased there. Barb would be my second choice, and Zealot my third (I don't really like their playstyle). Do you have a Druid you can respec and run with some Windy gear to see if you like it?
What I would like to SEE though, would be the Zealot. I think it could be a super cool character and be a really cool story watching him grow.
Whenever youre finished with all seal bosses, you leave one seal still untouched. Then you teleport back to the entrance of chaos sanctuary, turn around and teleport back to the last seal to pop it. The monsters stay "active" even though youre multiple screens away from them. They stay active for 4-6 seconds or so. With 105 fcr and the inventory screen teleport trick you can make it to the seal without them "deactivating". So effectively, you're killing a bunch of monsters without actually taking the time to kill all of them. Decent way of getting white items, gems, charms and runes. MF doesn't work for these guys, since you don't deal the killing blow. I think p8 has an effect on the nodrop% though.
T72on1 said:
Btw, about that new character I will be joining with ... I want some advice .
Barb: I found @zticazzy's Barb Perkele very inspiring. So a WW Barb doing mainly Travincal for runes early on sounds like a plan. However, starting an untwinked Barb at one point where I got so fed up with my HC Hammerdin finding nothing at LK, reminded me how hard the going is early on untwinked. And I suspect it will be a while before I can get some good gear doing Travincal in the first place. So not sure about that.
If you do a barb, plan out your socket quests and don't give much thought to saving the ancients quest. As for the actual leveling, it is slow but its not that bad. I went a really unoptimal route with swords (and being determined not to respec) so it took me probably 5 or 10 extra hours to get to hell act 3. If you decide to play a barb (which you should) then I'd go polearms from the get go. Insight and Obedience are really strong and cheap. The speedrunners use a war cry barb to complete the game "fast" (+10 hours lol) so you might want to look into that.
@Ashenshugar - congrats on hitting 97. Nice steady progress, and cool to see another class represented in the last couple levels with you and @Pb_pal
@T72on1 - I agree with @Pb_pal although I would lean to the Barb for a couple reasons: (1) no need for CtA, and really don't need HoTO with decent unique drops; (2) dual Oath starter kit and lower p-setting will allow farming Council as primary search for runes (hork is always p7 anyway); (3) hork, in general, makes for added speed to early gearing progression, especially starting in late NM/early Hell; (4) Insight is easy to make and allows lots of horking without mana issues; (5) War Cry / berserk is a great equalizer for questing/early leveling in areas, and coupled with WW I think would be a nice build progression up to runes for dual oath; and (6) no need to deal from frustration of Tornado
That's the route I would to follow with the Barb, and may end up following if I make it that far. Good luck!
I am also debating between Windy Druid and Zealot/Smiter (but melee all the way) as a possible third entry. Though I don't mind farming LK either way.
Tatterson said:
Whenever youre finished with all seal bosses, you leave one seal still untouched. Then you teleport back to the entrance of chaos sanctuary, turn around and teleport back to the last seal to pop it. The monsters stay "active" even though youre multiple screens away from them. They stay active for 4-6 seconds or so. With 105 fcr and the inventory screen teleport trick you can make it to the seal without them "deactivating". So effectively, you're killing a bunch of monsters without actually taking the time to kill all of them. Decent way of getting white items, gems, charms and runes. MF doesn't work for these guys, since you don't deal the killing blow. I think p8 has an effect on the nodrop% though.
Just normally popping the last seal only kills the currently active mobs, which are the ones near you. With teleporting back to entrance and back you activate all the monsters from the entrace to the star, near the star and around the last seal. Then you zigzag back the way you came to see if any good stuff dropped. Ill try to record a video
Doesn't give exp, just loot
Here is a video
The Redeemer
Mighty Scepter
One Hand Damage: 151 - 197
Durability: 29 of 50
Required Level: 72
Required Strength: 50
Required Dexterity: 26
Fingerprint: 0xb85205fe
Item Level: 94
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to Paladin Skill Levels
279% Enhanced Damage
Damage +108
-33% Target Defense
+240% Damage to Demons
+150% Damage to Undead
+3 to Redemption (Paladin Only)
+4 to Holy Bolt (Paladin Only)
+3 to Light Radius
Requirements -60%
also as off-topic, you also need to see this magnificent beast I've made in 2015
@Tatterson Thanks for the video. Sounds interesting, but not my cup of tea. I like things rather straightforward. But interesting nonetheless.
@Pb_pal I could respec a Druid yes, that might be a good idea to try it out.
@PhineasB Do I read there that you will go Barb? At least that's what I take from that last sentence .
If that is the case, and @ffs is debating between Windy and Zealot, I could also say I'll just take whichever is left, so we get to see the leveling of a WW Barb, a Windy and a Zealot, as future reference for others .
FWIW - I'm also leaning melee for my entry. Though I'm not positive what yet. I don't like Whirlwind at all, but I'd be open to another type of Barb. All I know for sure is that it will be HC and melee, my old Stevesy must be avenged properly after all.
Well @Grape only checks these forums once in a few days, I think. So it's not that unusual. Having said that, I think in this case he will suddenly appear again in a few days, to tell us all that he has joined and has done some minor leveling, leaving him at level 95 somewhere at the top of the table. 'Oh yes, and I also found Tyrael's and a Zod on the way', he will let us know.
Btw, @Grape, how does it feel to come back after a few days and have 100+ alerts?
Indeed he seems to only visit here once in a few days, which begs the question @Grape do you not have a phone?
So I've decided I am starting a Dream/Physical Zealot as my third entry. Will introduce him once there is some progress to report. Since I'm still trying to finish the Necro within the next ~6 weeks or so there won't be much of that early on. Generally he will have very slim chances of ever hitting 99, but I really enjoy the untwinked experience and gearing up all the way to crazy gear, so why not have him run here whether he makes it or not.
Plan is this:
First stops likely at NM Meph and NM Pindle to grab a semi-decent weapon before entering Hell.
Next stop Hell LK for the runes for Enigma and CtA, and hopefully Grief. But will take CM or Oath if no Lo drops.
Hell Meph for essential S&Us. Will be looking in particular for String of Ears and LoH for the Pally, and especially Reaper's, Guardian Angel and Kira's for Merc.
Travincal for two Jahs and Lo (if LK didn't deliver).
Baal runs until 98
Smiting Nihl for 98-99
Reasoning: From the Zealots I built so far, hybrid Dream/Grief variant was the strongest overall, and pairs well with a teleporting melee Pally (not using Fortitude). I found it to be more balanced than the pure Dream/CM variant due to good leech and extra punch in particular vs. Demons with LoH, while not sacrificing much kill speed vs. broken LIs. Damage output is higher than that of a pure physical Zealot, and AoE from Dreams will be very helpful in speeding up Baal runs. Travincal is an attractive target to get those Jahs after Enigma, as opposed to LK it grants decent XP along the way until early 90s, and Zealot can run it rather well. So, pretty sure this will work out, but gearing up might take a little longer this time.
Maybe that's what I need to do, run LK repeatedly for those runes for something like Enigma. Been trying to Hell Meph for a little while now but it's a tad slow.
So I started an untwinked hc barb. Since he’s untwinked, I guess I’ll add him here once I’ve gotten him to a somewhat respectable level.
Currently I’m in the inner cloister at lvl 42 running on low p-settings. I’m aiming for Andy for now to make a pitstop to gather some gear to get me to Meph.
Any ideas on a decent zerk weapon? Currently I’m running with a blue partizan and both damage and safety feels lacking. I did just make a rhyme though, so I’m looking for something 1-handed... would honor be a decent alternative? Can I find 5-socket bases this early on?
Well @Grape only checks these forums once in a few days, I think. So it's not that unusual. Having said that, I think in this case he will suddenly appear again in a few days, to tell us all that he has joined and has done some minor leveling, leaving him at level 95 somewhere at the top of the table. 'Oh yes, and I also found Tyrael's and a Zod on the way', he will let us know.
Btw, @Grape, how does it feel to come back after a few days and have 100+ alerts?
Haha, by now I'm used to those alerts building up from time to time, but just imagine what it would be for @Gripphon by now.
My precious D2 time is sometimes quite limited so I make most of it by playing a bit and possibly quickly scanning through forums I check the forums about daily but when I'm not going to stay it's only short lurking instead of loggin in etc, heh.
SO, to the main issue at hand:
I can tell you I had a very strong instinct to go straight to the GoMule and start picking some random twinking gear for him... probably a good time for me to do an untwinked character for a change, especially a melee one.
Why Barb? First of all my new Sept is going to need a big big bunch of runes. My plan is to have this entry as my main Travi runner for a while, gathering some good enough equipment for his own end game, as well as some extra runes for my other characters.
Secondly, I have level 95 Necromancer and Druid twinked (with rather great gear I must admit), which I intend to run some more Pits etc. with in the future as well. I also plan to take one of my twinked Assasins towards levels 95-97.
Between all this, I still can see a use for a really high level Barb (hopefully 99 one day), for example participating in an MFO. So, doesn't this sound as a win-win-win, and this won't be time wasted, no? Not so sure, but let's carry on...
Coke has a hazy future ahead, but I think I'll go towards WW from the beginning.
Hmm, you take a Barb too, probably WW. Well, I was leaning towards that as well, but with you taking Barb, @ffs taking a melee Paladin and @Pb_pal going melee as well, maybe I should go for that Windy after all. Decisions, decisions ... I'll make up my mind in a few days, maybe even sooner.
@ffs Nice choice of character. Good luck !! I'm sure you'll do great with him.
@Bobbo Very cool, yet another entrant !! This thread keeps to be full of win. And levels ... . HC Barb definitely is a brave choice. Certainly when going with Berserk. Honor would definitely be a good choice early on, although you'll want better afterwards obviously. 5os weapons should be able to drop in early NM I think.
Maybe that's what I need to do, run LK repeatedly for those runes for something like Enigma. Been trying to Hell Meph for a little while now but it's a tad slow.
Are you still using the Lightsabre? I would try LK runs until I had the runes for either Oath or Death (or, if you're really lucky, Grief) before doing another Hell Meph run. You don't need Enigma to become a Guardian - but a big hurty stick will help a lot.
@AlexTheNextOne Meph is the best target for those rather common S&Us like String, LoH, Reaper, Gores/WT, Raven etc., but after that he's completely useless. If you're looking for high runes, indeed LK. If you're looking for high-end S&Us, I'd hit Pindle or lvl 85 areas.
Enigma: It is somewhat of a grind taking ~30-35 hours of LK running depending on run times, but that is nothing in comparison to hundreds of hours saved on the way to 99 (yes that is how much it speeds up things). And farming it untwinked is a very cool accomplishment.
Actually, the Barb entry will be Death from my Trio of Twins project, who is progressing as a zerker with no extended stash. But he hadn't moved from A1 NM for more than a year, so that's the reason I'm not sure I'll get to it. But with the great discussion here as motivation, I got back to him and just took down NM Andariel. Questing through is a nice break from repetitive runs at the moment, so we'll see if he can make it through A2 over the long weekend. Speaking of progress . . .
Matriarch Quinta and Kasim the Might Desert Merc, Lvl 94 (pic)
As mentioned in Phaedrus’ write up, Quinta had progressed to just shy of 93.7, and she finished the last stretch in the week after Phaedrus hit 99.
No major upgrades since her last update at 93.4, sadly, but it was smooth progress for the most part. One dumb death mixed in: I often ran with her as a short break from Phaedrus, and clearly forgot to lower the p-setting to p1 before realizing what was happening. Exhibit Q as to why I don't play hardcore
Early in this stretch, she picked up a Leviathan and Horizon’s, followed by a minor troll with a Fletcher’s skiller, and then an Um as her only Lem+ rune. After another 7 yellow Shako’s (and 31 total at Pindle), it finally dropped, but of course: Another five yellow Shako’s before she hit the level. But that allowed her to run on p3 for the rest of level, with 1 durability left when she pinged. The +skill without too much loss of MF and extra life were key.
She finished up with BK CB, Arkaine’s (+2 skills on the roll), another Spirit Keeper, and another Leviathan. The Arkaine’s is actually pretty interesting, and may be the armor she uses for Baal runs once she gets Infinity. The +skills and vita will be welcome, and I’m not sure what else would beat it in my current stash except maybe Naj armor for +1 skill and resists?
As for Infinity, we have moved to LK again, hoping for a Ber equivalent to complete that runeword and then do at least 94-95 on Baal before reassessing whether to go back to LK for Enigma.
Quinta is doing 50 runs on promising maps before rerolling, and still haven’t found an @ffs quality map at 200 LK runs completed. Only two Lems to show for it so far. In the meantime, she rolled a CtA to make runs more comfortable and keep deaths to a minimum, and the roll (+1 BO) perfectly matches her experience with useful drops so far.
* * *
Pestilence is also moving again. I hadn't touched him since the end of the MFO-warm-up tourney in July, but I think there is a good chance he will hit 97 over the holiday weekend. I'll hold off on a full update until he finishes the level.
Admittedly playing little at the moment- mostly been playing HOTS when people are online and I took a brief foray into MTG: Arena for a while (it's decent, but ultimately playing Magic without the social aspect is not great).
Been chipping away at LK and Travincal in the hope of getting the Ber required for Enigma.
No dice yet, but a few interesting drops have at least kept me coming back sporadically.
Well, I made up my mind about my next character . Grapelike, the Barbarian, will join the fun soon !! Seems like we'll see an influx of Barbs ...
I respecced a Druid to Windy yesterday and did some runs. It was fun, but not in a way that I can see myself getting to 99, or even close. I think it's a build I might use once in a while, for example for some AT runs, but not one that I'll enjoy for extended periods.
Next to that I was leaning towards a Paladin first. But I have to admit that the main reason for that was because I enjoy my Hammerdin so much that I want to have a backup in case he dies. But then I thought about how he would have to search for Enigma all over again, about how I would always have to gear towards FanaZealot, but also with Hammerdin in the back of my mind in case ShouldBeEasy would die, and in the end about how I just should stop thinking that ShouldBeEasy will probably die at some point at all. Because obviously he won't !!! If you believe strongly you can do something, it will happen. So, yes he'll make it to 99 .
Anyway, maybe the biggest reason to go for a WW Barb is that I realized just how well he can run several targets without Enigma. Obviously that one will still greatly speed up things, but up till then the journey should still be very interesting and even rather efficient, with various targets possible. I mean, a Barb doesn't need his weapon switch for CtA, so he can use Harmony there for more FRW. Add some points into Increased Speed to the mix, then the beauty that is Leap, and there should be plenty of places to go.
Pindle is always a good target, and that's definitely true for a WW Barb, with FI on top of good killing speed. The same goes for Eldritch obviously. But he can also run Meph very fast, CS, Pits, Trav, Baal waves ... .
So yeah, sorry about the rambling, but I wanted to get my reasoning out . You all know me by now ...
I'm not sure when I'll start this one, as I'm still enjoying the Hammerdin so much. Making the move to Pits with him already payed off a bit with an Ist and Lem only a few runs in. Not much, but better than what I got in hundreds of LK runs. XP is also building up steadily, currently at 90.5.
Well I said I'd join the newest round of fun, so here we are!
I had 2 main concerns when deciding what class to take.
1. Be melee
2. Something I can reasonably keep alive (HC)
The only reason Klaus has made is as far as he has is because of his gigantic life pool, so that was my first point of priority. My options for inherant big life are either a shape-shifting druid, or a barb. Well, Klaus is a druid so I didn't want to double up there, and I figured what better class to take than the one chosen by the Zod God himself? I also thought it could be fun to add another barb to the mix and see how we all end up, and the differences in our experiences along the way.
Barb it is!
As mentioned before, I seriously dislike WW. My favourite offensive skill of Barbarians has always been Frenzy, and since @Bobbo already started up a HC Zerker, my decision was all but made for me.
I'm also tempted to go the no-LK route and get my high runes primarily from Trav runs, though this is not set in stone just yet. The choice to take a barb also lines up with several points made by others:
- No need to farm a CtA
- Get a reliable rune-finder in HC (at least someone a bit more efficient than Klaus)
- Potential for MFing at a later time too, to bolster the HC grail
This will be a slow journey. I still have to finish up Klaus, amidst all the other projects I'm in the middle of or want to start, so the updates will not come quickly. I'm also going to take a more relaxed approach to playing him in general, since that seems to have helped keep Klaus alive too. Doesn't matter, I'm here for the long haul.
I'd be terrified of starting a Barb in HC, I don't know how you guys do it. How do you keep those guys alive when you don't have the massive defense boost from Holy Shield, the ability to escape from danger with Teleport/Vigor, the meat shield (or bone, I suppose) from Raise Skeleton, or the fashionable translucency of Fade?
@Pb_pal Very cool. Good luck !! Will be interesting to see how all those different Barbs fare. I feel a bit wimpy for going SC. I don't regret it though .
@AlexTheNextOne Barb has high life pool, Taunt to disable dangerous ranged attackers, Leap and War Cry to stun enemies, Howl if things get too hairy, relatively easy time to get resists up due to Natural Resistance, very fast attack speed with WW and Frenzy to leech life back, ... I consider them to have such great crowd control that it's definitely doable, and in fact one of the best classes, if not the best class, to do so. Notice that I don't say it will be easy .
@Kitteh I'm actually considering going completely Enigma-less. We'll have to see what I do when I find the runes. The biggest factor for taking Enigma wouldn't even be fast traveling as such, but the fact that without it, it takes so long for the merc to get to you and provide that Might aura / proc Decrep, and overall reposition him if needed.
I couldn't resist to start Grapelike during my lunch break. I'll add him to the table soon. He's currently level 11 and has rescued Cain. I decided to go for Polearms early on, and respec into swords later, when I get to make Oath / Grief. Reasoning is that it's usually quite hard to get your hands on good weapons early on, but Polearms have a lot going for it, because of the cube recipe for a Savage Polearm and then later on Insight and Obedience. I know, they are all slow, but they should pack enough punch with quite easy to come by materials to do the trick until the endgame stuff.
@AlexTheNextOne - Taunt and Howl, my friend. Taunt and Howl.
Barbs are sneakily one of the best crowd-controllers in the game. It takes a bit of investment, but Taunt/Howl/War Cry and even Leap can handle all but the most aggressive bosses/champ packs. Being careful and maxing BO helps too
@AlexTheNextOne well... so far it seems the trick to staying alive is called howl and not-ww. Had I gone the ww route I’m sure I’d already deeds’d due to whirling into something nasty without being able to pot.
Cool to see the untwinkedly overlooked barb get some attention... And in all different shapes and sizes as well but question is, who’s going for throw then?
@AlexTheNextOne - agree totally with @T72on1 and @Pb_pal on Taunt and Howl. When I first returned a couple of years ago, I started an untwinked WW barb (though I never even thought of entering him here until he hit lvl 87, which was too late). It was there that I discovered the benefits of Taunt and Howl for crowd control. They are very powerful on their own but when used in combination, they are quite a difference maker indeed.
T72on1 said:
@Kitteh I'm actually considering going completely Enigma-less. We'll have to see what I do when I find the runes. The biggest factor for taking Enigma wouldn't even be fast traveling as such, but the fact that without it, it takes so long for the merc to get to you and provide that Might aura / proc Decrep, and overall reposition him if needed.
That's been my philosophy as well. I kind of like making my way about Sanctuary without Enigma, and have no intention to ever start using one. If I ever somehow come across the runes for them, I'll use them for something else like Infinity or Chains of Honor.
Doing ancients gave me so much freedom in being able to test other builds and freedom to do baals (although I still favour CS over baals, but the stormshield I got still doesn't give me enough survivability to really go hard in the paint. I haven't socketed it and I only had 55% block, which could be the causes of the occasional death from de seis) Maybe I have to completely scrap the idea of doing p8 or even p3 de seis.
Getting that extra 20% block and maybe the next FBR breakpoint with a shael does sound good, but I don't want to commit yet. Maybe a delirium merc could be useful too.
Leveling in baals got me thinking: Enigma only gives barbs teleport and a bit of strength. CoH and fortitude give you enhanced damage, which is quite substancial.
With a good map you have a few teleports per level then the usual 7-10 to the throne. Using a najs staff is probably more effort than its worth, which got me thinking about other ways of getting teleport. You could keep a fortitude in your inventory to swap in whenever you get to the throne, and 220ed (enigmas 80str gives you 80ed) is a way better bonus than 20 max dmg / 140ar / 80 life with the best possible charms. OR you could teleport to the throne, swap your enigma with a fortitude from your merc, kill the waves and swap back when baal goes to the chamber. Just a few ideas that I haven't tried. Maybe the armor swapping would get old really fast.
Doing ancients gave me so much freedom in being able to test other builds and freedom to do baals (although I still favour CS over baals, but the stormshield I got still doesn't give me enough survivability to really go hard in the paint. I haven't socketed it and I only had 55% block, which could be the causes of the occasional death from de seis) Maybe I have to completely scrap the idea of doing p8 or even p3 de seis.
Getting that extra 20% block and maybe the next FBR breakpoint with a shael does sound good, but I don't want to commit yet. Maybe a delirium merc could be useful too.
Leveling in baals got me thinking: Enigma only gives barbs teleport and a bit of strength. CoH and fortitude give you enhanced damage, which is quite substancial.
With a good map you have a few teleports per level then the usual 7-10 to the throne. Using a najs staff is probably more effort than its worth, which got me thinking about other ways of getting teleport. You could keep a fortitude in your inventory to swap in whenever you get to the throne, and 220ed (enigmas 80str gives you 80ed) is a way better bonus than 20 max dmg / 140ar / 80 life with the best possible charms. OR you could teleport to the throne, swap your enigma with a fortitude from your merc, kill the waves and swap back when baal goes to the chamber. Just a few ideas that I haven't tried. Maybe the armor swapping would get old really fast.
Tbh i like the idea of swapping armors with your Merc. But we are talking theory here, right? I mean it's untwinked and finding all these runes in first place is enough to keep you busy for a couple of weeks?
Well, I made up my mind about my next character . Grapelike, the Barbarian, will join the fun soon !! Seems like we'll see an influx of Barbs ...
I respecced a Druid to Windy yesterday and did some runs. It was fun, but not in a way that I can see myself getting to 99, or even close. I think it's a build I might use once in a while, for example for some AT runs, but not one that I'll enjoy for extended periods.
Next to that I was leaning towards a Paladin first. But I have to admit that the main reason for that was because I enjoy my Hammerdin so much that I want to have a backup in case he dies. But then I thought about how he would have to search for Enigma all over again, about how I would always have to gear towards FanaZealot, but also with Hammerdin in the back of my mind in case ShouldBeEasy would die, and in the end about how I just should stop thinking that ShouldBeEasy will probably die at some point at all. Because obviously he won't !!! If you believe strongly you can do something, it will happen. So, yes he'll make it to 99 .
Anyway, maybe the biggest reason to go for a WW Barb is that I realized just how well he can run several targets without Enigma. Obviously that one will still greatly speed up things, but up till then the journey should still be very interesting and even rather efficient, with various targets possible. I mean, a Barb doesn't need his weapon switch for CtA, so he can use Harmony there for more FRW. Add some points into Increased Speed to the mix, then the beauty that is Leap, and there should be plenty of places to go.
Pindle is always a good target, and that's definitely true for a WW Barb, with FI on top of good killing speed. The same goes for Eldritch obviously. But he can also run Meph very fast, CS, Pits, Trav, Baal waves ... .
So yeah, sorry about the rambling, but I wanted to get my reasoning out . You all know me by now ...
I'm not sure when I'll start this one, as I'm still enjoying the Hammerdin so much. Making the move to Pits with him already payed off a bit with an Ist and Lem only a few runs in. Not much, but better than what I got in hundreds of LK runs. XP is also building up steadily, currently at 90.5.
That’s why I ended up retiring my first attempt at this, because Njord the Windy Druid was just so frustrating to play with those darn sporadic Tornadoes. Enjoy your new Barbarian hero. I’m going to start a Necromancer Zookeeper, since it’s my all time favorite build to play I don’t see myself getting tired of him before I get the the coveted 99.
Just for the info, my Bowzon died while fighting Diablo Normal two weeks ago, thats 5th dead character already, more then enough for old man...Thus i'm done with this tourney, not saying for good, but certainly for very long time...
I wish all of You best of luck, and enjoy Your journeys, they are always special...
Really enjoyed my 5th? return to this forum, always nice place to be with lots of knowledgeable and friendly people, but its time to leave again
With the awesome additions of the Barbs by @Grape and @Pb_pal – welcome Coke and (reincarnated) Stevesy! – I guess I might as well introduce my melee character and third entry of choice, Lucid the Dreamer-to-be:
I briefly thought about HC but screw that. Here's hoping he will not distract me much from Ric's 99er mission, and once that is done find his runes quickly!
I'm starting to believe that I might have underestimated the difficulty of leveling untwinked with berserk, probably should have gone frenzy until after I've farmed NM for a bit. Well, too late now, I'm too stubborn to go about switching now.
Currently I've just about killed Meph at lvl 48 ish and it feels like my best option right now is getting to act5 to farm Shenk and Eldritch. I'm just worried that Big D might be a bit too much at this time. I guess I'll have to farm some more res gear before tackling him. At least things got a bit safer after I made a King's Grace to use with my Rhyme instead of a savage polearm.
Now that I think about it, I think I have an Ancients pledge in my stash so grabbing that instead of Rhyme and cubing some res amulets should get me to satisfying levels on the resists... Smoke should also help if I can find the runes I guess. Any other tips from all you pros?
Edit: RIP @RIP. Hope to see you back rather sooner than later.
@RIP Sorry to hear that . I guess doing some SC for now isn't an option for you? I sincerely hope you stick around. If not in this tournament, then just in general, by doing something non-untwinked 99er related in D2 maybe?
@ffs Great !! Good luck . Knowing you, you'll do tremendously well with Lucid, and maybe even discover some new stuff when it comes to efficiency with this kind of character. Since I'm updating the table for ShouldBeEasy and to include Grapelike, I'll take the liberty to add Lucid to the table as well. The same applies to the new Barbs of @Grape (gotta keep that alert count high ) and @Pb_pal . O yes, and I added your Barb too, @Bobbo. You'll have to adjust / add your details though.
@Bobbo Berserker definitely isn't easy, and certainly not untwinked. You are allowed to respec, but of course that is up to you. A lot of people switch at least one time during their journey towards 99. I'd keep the Rhyme shield if I were you, since it has CBF, faster block and increased block chance. Try to get your resists elsewhere. Eldritch is probably your best bet to level up, and maybe even find some gear while doing so. You'd have to get past CS indeed, which isn't an easy area. It might even be harder than big D himself, since you can avoid his lightning hose by standing on this toes.
@Pb_pal I forget to mention that I agree with you that Frenzy is by far the most fun Barb skill. I just took WW because it's much easier to get other skills, like some Increased Speed, Natural Resistance and FI. Frenzy needs it's synergies to shine, so it's much harder to also include horking, mf gear on the whole, and a few other useful skills.
As for progress. ShouldBeEasy reached level 91 yesterday by doing some more Pit runs. Not sure what I already mentioned here and what not, so here's a short overview.
I spent most of my time in LK, but as I already have said, rune drops Pul+ were (almost) non existent. I found my last Sur at run 1819, and the only other HR after that, a Vex, at run 2388. Right after hitting level 90 I found a Mal, at run 2639. After that, it took me almost 900 runs to find a Pul+, which was ... a Pul rune:
When I finally found a Gul rune at run 3753, but couldn't pick it up because I was being chased by monsters and couldn't reach the rune anymore, nor exit through a tp to come back, that did it for me. I switched equipment and went back to do area runs. After briefly testing CS, Travincal and Eldritch, I settled for Pits. I had quite a good map there and could handle it well on /p8, so it was a clear winner.
I got from level 90 to level 91 quite fast and without too much trouble, although I do have to stay on my toes all the time, as a combination of Amp, Fana and Might on a dual boss pack almost got me deeds. But most of the times it's really safe, and I also got an Ist, Lem and Fal on my way to 91, so that's nice.
Luckily LK wasn't all bad news, as I found a few good items. Not for ShouldBeEasy himself, but still. I had a period where a lot of S/U dropped. Mainly from a corpse in front of the first hut I hit, like this one:
In terms of charms I got a few nice to very nice ones too:
Also this 2/20 Sorc Circlet:
After hitting 91 I've returned to LK. I'm determined to find that Sur/Ber, but we'll see how long that lasts ... At 40s average run times (including stashing, selling, cubing gems and rerolling GCs), I'm at over 40 hours of LK to make an Enigma. Time to get rid of that area and hit up Meph for some essentials and CS (or Pits, if CS is still too hard) after that.
As for Grapelike, I created him yesterday during my lunch break, so on November 22 2018 at 12:22 to be precise.
As I already stated, he will be aiming for Polearms and as such Polearm Mastery from the start, until he can be respecced into dual wielding Oaths or Griefs or something similar. Unless maybe a pair of Bloodletters or Butcher's Pupil's decide to drop, which would almost be a moral imperative to switch earlier.
I mainly played him on /p1 early on, as moving through these early parts fast is important in terms of efficiency. I reran some areas a few times if I got a good map. For example I did Bishibosh a few times on /p5, because he was next to the waypoint. Same for Tristram, because it is an easy place to gain xp, and the WP wasn't too far from the entrance.
As a weapon I started out with buying a Scepter, as those are usually the strongest early on. However, after my first Bardiche dropped, I kept with Polearms from then on.
Best drop from early game was definitely this amazing jewel, the only jewel I have gotten so far:
The plan is to get through to Eldritch as fast as possible and level up there. I might rerun some other targets before that, if I happen on a good map for that. I suspect the part before WW to be really slow though, since the available prereqs for WW (mainly Concentrate at level 18) aren't the fastest killers out there, certainly not untwinked.
When I finally found a Gul rune at run 3753, but couldn't pick it up because I was being chased by monsters and couldn't reach the rune anymore, nor exit through a tp to come back, that did it for me.
Pff, I can imagine that this cures you of any leftover-motivation to run LK. That would definitely piss me off.
Good luck with Grapelike, nice to see an influx of melee chars.
@RIP sorry to hear that, good luck with other projects and RL.
@Grape Welcome Zod-God to another crazy time sinking project, seems just right for you .
Unofrtunately no significant updates on StormRider. RL has been crazy busy, so for now reading up on everybody's progress is as much time as I now have. Congrats on all the progress everyone!
@T72on1 Wow, had no idea it's possible to dodge the hose that way, it does however feel a bit scary to do a first attempt at that in HC. Too bad I deleted all my SP characters and can't do a test run.
I think howl and taunt should get me through CS fine if I take it slow. I guess Infector will might a bit scary though.
Sure, sounds reasonable to keep the Rhyme. I think it's time to gamble some boots and get a hold of an amulet with resists, I hope I have enough materials for some Pgems to roll some res amulets.
I'll update my info in the table as soon as I've read up on how to do it, I'm under the impression there's some guide for that, right?
@Hookipa It's my biggest fear that, what happened with the Gul there, would happen when that Sur / Ber finally drops . This was no fun, but it was merely the one thing too much to get me switch from LK to something else. For practical purposes, it doesn't really matter that much.
@Bobbo Just remember that the trick to stay very close to Diablo to avoid his lightning hose only works in NM and Hell, not normal !!!
The OP of this thread has a link to a guide how to edit the table. It might sound a bit difficult, but really it isn't. Basically you make sure to have 'Use Rich Text Editor' setup in your preferences (which might be by default actually, I don't think I have ever changed it), quote the last post containing the table, delete everything except for the table and add / adjust your data in the table.
They're actually super simple to make if you have access to a cnc machine. Make a template of the runes (I used inkscape), machine the image(vector template?) on some acrylic plastic and go through it with a tool (screwdriver maybe, something sharp-ish with a circular head) yourself to get the rough patches out. Pretty sure you could bang out lights like these for less than 10 dollars a piece. Maybe even 5?. Not sure what the electronic components cost if you order from china, but they're quite cheap I've heard.
here is a super detailed and well done drawing of the electronical components
To not go completely off-topic, I'm glad that plenty of other people have decided to play the worst and best character in the whole game. Good luck in getting through Nightmare and Hell!
First raven frost after finding dozens of dwarf stars, two carrion winds and one natures peace. Huge boost to AR (and block with a shield.)
22% mf -> 31% mf, also 1% off perfect vendor and gf% !
Non-eth, nothing special. Currently using this, might not in the future. Don't know yet.
'
3ll. 95% sure I won't use this guy.
Standard goreriders
Both non-eth
The Reaper's Toll
Thresher
Two Hand Damage: 40 - 476
Durability: 34 of 65
Required Level: 75
Required Strength: 114
Required Dexterity: 89
Fingerprint: 0x5419f9c8
Item Level: 87
Version: Expansion 1.10+
33% Chance to cast level 1 Decrepify on striking 238% Enhanced Damage
Ignore Target's Defense
Adds 4 - 44 Cold Damage Over 1 Secs (20 Frames)
14% Life stolen per hit
33% Deadly Strike
Requirements -25%
Almost max roll though, so happy with that.
Next order of business: Baal until 3 essences drop, then some tranvical.
It's definitely going to be an interesting route for the Pally, in particular regarding targets. Apart from the HRs (3x Jah, Ber, Lo, Ohm) there's not much a Dreamer needs to be honest. Nothing but some relatively common Meph gear really. So it should be just a matter of time – though quite some amount of that possibly. In any case there's not much else to run apart from LK/Meph/Trav, in particular A85 or Pindle don't have much to offer. The rarest S&U he'll be looking for probably is HLW.
I like the idea of running Travincal a lot. Potentially it can singlehandedly deliver everything he needs, and as I said it moreover provides decent XP at least until ~92-93 or so. Like @Grape I'm always running with twinked characters in mind as well, so even though he won't be looking for specific charms or jewelry, I'm confident a few goodies for my other characters will come from it and keep me entertained.
As for transitioning to XP gain and which targets – I will surely try out everything in attempt to save Ancients for once (neither of my chars so far did)... but let's be honest, it's going to be Baal.
After some number crunching and revisiting some of my twinked Paladins, I think this is the outline of what he will be trying to achieve for the Dreamer stage (post-Travincal, pre-Nihlathak):
Build is straight-forward: Max Conviction, Resist Lightning, Salvation, Sacrifice, 16+ Holy Shield (and remaining points), of course 1 Zeal (4 after gear) and pre-reqs
Gear:
Dream helm and shield (ideally 40+ @ Sacred Targe)
Grief PB (needs 32+ IAS)
Enigma
LoH
HLW
Ravenfrost
Rare leech/res/stat ring
Arach, SoE or Nos Coil (depending on Grief IAS roll and target)
Gores
Switch: CtA + Spirit
Merc: Reaper's, Treachery, Andy or GF
That's two socket quests spent on the Merc gear and one remaining for a headpiece for the Paladin at some point before/after using Dream.
Inventory: Whatever, mostly resist/life charms I guess. I'll take the occasional fine/light SC but he's really not dependent on any kind of inventory whatsoever.
Like @Tatterson, I also thought about a Fortitude to swap in during Baal runs, but likewise expect it's probably not worth the hassle, in particular given physical damage has more of a safety net or at most balancing function.
He needs 72 IAS with a PB (be it Grief or CM) to hit 4 FPA. A Grief roll of <32 IAS would be painful to say the least, so let's hope he'll get it right with the first try. While Grief was strongest in my experience overall, I will need to test in-depth for the targets he'll run. CM could be better for Baal waves in particular.
Starting out and until that, he's just going to go standard Fana/Zeal. In the far, far away future, when (if ever) arriving at Nihlathak for 98-99, he'll respect to Smiter and shuffle things around again. But for now let's try to find a Steel or Strength first.
Took me 4 months to hit lvl 96; lvl 97 took 5 months; next lvl must take 6.
Going by the same format as last update...
EXP NUMBERS
- ~250k per run at ~5m per run => equates to about 3m/h. (/p8 RoF/2-seal)
- fluctuated between 3~5m/h (according to the exp calc)
- but in reality, between extra Boss packs and under 5m runs, it probably stayed closer to 4m/h for most of the level.
- for last 10% or so, I switched over to /p1 RoF and /p8 CS(2-seal) which bumped up exp/h to about 4.5m
DROPS
1) 4os GMB (made Faith and got +1/14Fana)
2) Cat's Eye
3) SoJ - which I used to socket my tiara.
-- With Cat's eye, 15ias from helm, and switch from 12Fana Shadow to 14Fana GMB; clear time improved by A LOT!
3) Fleshripper
4) Hel'd out Stone, and made Fort for the merc.
5) Hone Sundan
6) Guillaume
7) Made Pheonix in eGT
NOTES
Initial plan was Fleshripper/SS on switch for Diablo. After finding a Ber, I changed the plan to Beast/LanceGuard. But then I thought, if I gave myself an excuse to switch to another setup, I might let myself use Charged Strike on switch; and with having found Griffons/Titans/SS/and like 3 lit jewels already, I could might as well go full Java.
I didn't want any of that, so I decided to stay pure bowa with Harmony and no Enigma.
So, that means, the merc needs to take aggro and tank Diablo while I pluck away. To ensure Diablo would always stay on merc and not me, I did a whole research and a half on how Diablo chooses his target. Found that max-damage from gear is the biggest deciding factor; which is the reason why anyone with Harmony is almost always targeted. Thanks to @Fruit and @Zyr. Link to discussion here.
I get about 1100 max damage from gear (~420 from GMB Faith, 507 from Hunter bow Harmony, ~120 max from charms/WT/Razor). With Pheonix and 1 jewel of Lightning, merc goes over that threshold and Diablo now always targets him.
Why Pheonix? Fire absorb. I don't have a steelshade; so Pheonix was the only alternative option. Now, he actually heals from Diablo's Firestorm.
On that note... WISHLIST
1) Amp. Desperately need it.
- Atma is ideal obviously; but I'll take WWS or any rare bow with ctc amp, and keep it on switch until I find an Atma.
2) Steelshade - will let merc use Obedience instead of Pheonix for CB.
2a) OR, Guardian Angel and Jah - GA/Dream/Kelpie might be another possible setup for merc.
2b) OR, GA/Dream/Pride is another possible setup.
3) Superior Diamond Bow/Jah or Ber/ 14 or 15 Fana roll.
=> LoH > Cleglaw's because 350% demon
=> Atmas over Cat's Eye/Highlords for Amp. (no ias from ammy)
=> with helm/belt slot open, 35~75% is the possible range of ias.
=> key breakpoints: 45~50% for MB Faith, 50 for GMB Faith, 65~70% for Diamond
=> 45% from helm, 20% from LoH, 14/15 Fana Diamond bow (65%ias breakpoint) == ideal.
4) 3os/30frw circlet. any 3os will do for 15%ias jewels, but 30frw is always nice to have.
Future Plans
- I was avging 4m/h at lvl 96. That's the kind of number I saw from some people at lvl 98! I definitely need to speed up the time it takes to get to CS, reduce time spent on white mobs, and probably include Diablo into the mix. /p1 to Pentagram, /p7 for Seal bosses/Diablo seems to be the way to go for now.
To do all that...
1) Amp. Amp. Amp! Will do couple hundred Andy runs and see if that results in anything.
2) Because no Enigma, need frw. I can fill the inventory with frw scs; see if that improves run time more than +max dmg does.
3) CB setup. CB sucks on ranged; but it's good against bosses nonetheless. I hate the look of Guillaume on a bowa, so it'll just be CB gloves and gores. 25% CB should be good enough... right?
- Respec once final gears are in place. Probably max dex... Would love to pure Dex; but need 100 str to equip WT or Gores.
E: Links, tags, slight edit.
E2: added images to Fort and Pheonix
Until now, I had never been able to imagine using a SoJ to socket a rare. But in this instance, doing so was clearly a Moral Imperative. Congratulations!
I would have a very hard time burning a SoJ for a socket. On an untwinked character it might be a little easier for me since the three quests are your only option for the whole journey. And it would have to be one helluva rare.
On the leveling front, my Sorc is still making progress. Her driver is slow, and goes off track on side adventures too often. I need to update the chart since I know she is past 3 billion XP now. My Barb has been getting a good workout though, and that has taken away from the main project. The thing is you gotta have fun along the way.
First, congrats to @Gynli - amazing progress and mad style for pushing the bowazon to 97! Second, very cool to see the flurry of new entries, including the melee builds. Looking forward to following their journey! As for me:
* * *
Champion Pestilence and Alhizeer the Might Desert Merc (and Insight IG), Lvl 97 (pic)
Pestilence got back moving, and got the last half of 96 to reach the next level. I hadn't touched him since MFO warm up tourney in July, so it's nice to push him ahead again.
He was still focused on Pit runs, and was probably averaging ~8M/hr or so, as I was generally running pretty relaxed. No deaths, and only a few S&Es when mis-teleporting into fanaticism/might mob while amp’ed.
The one interesting moment was right around 2.95B, finally losing the IG (not sure to what actually). And then realizing that I hadn’t saved any Rals due to rolling caster amulets as he went. And I really haven’t picked up any low runes on the playthrough. He had just enough to cube up from Eld to remake the runeword He has been picking those low runes up ever since.
Griffon's Eye
Diadem
Defense: 201
Durability: 17 of 20
Required Level: 76
Fingerprint: 0x75fee21f
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+1 to All Skills
+25% Faster Cast Rate
-20% to Enemy Lightning Resistance
+11% to Lightning Skill Damage
+147 Defense
Other notable drops were Trang’s Helm #2, Stonecrusher #4, an eth 4os Thresher, Um #4, Pul #7 and #8, a 4os eth Giant Thresher, Medusa’s, Spirit Ward, eth Duriel’s shell, a 5/5 cold/die facet, Nat’s Mark, and these fun little charms/rares:
Code:
Doom Spiral
Ring
Required Level: 74
Fingerprint: 0x3561afe
Item Level: 88
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+10% Faster Cast Rate
+2 to Minimum Damage
+45 to Attack Rating
6% Mana stolen per hit
All Resistances +11
Poison Resist +24%
Natural Grand Charm of Balance
Grand Charm
Required Level: 42
Fingerprint: 0x97751a37
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+1 to Elemental Skills (Druid Only)
+12% Faster Hit Recovery
Witch-hunter's Coronet of Life Everlasting
Coronet
Defense: 36
Durability: 23 of 30
Required Level: 67
Fingerprint: 0xa6e5b802
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+2 to Assassin Skill Levels
Damage Reduced by 22
Amber Small Charm of Balance
Small Charm
Required Level: 32
Fingerprint: 0xe9a89fbf
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+5% Faster Hit Recovery
Lightning Resist +11%
Graverobber's Grand Charm of Strength
Grand Charm
Required Level: 42
Fingerprint: 0x6896df6b
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
+1 to Summoning Skills (Necromancer Only)
+6 to Strength
I really liked the map he rerolled and made a vid of a run at the end, which ended up being the one where Nat’s Mark dropped It shows how I approached the runs on the map pretty well.
As you can see, Pestilence has three shrines right on the path, which actually helped with XP gain average due to picking up XP shrines. The map also had up to six boss packs in the first little circle after entering, and then a carver nest that often had boss packs if not high numbers in the circle, and then the room immediately to the north. There weren’t regular boss spawns on the rest of the map if any bosses spawned after the shrine downstairs, so he could just skip the whole north portion and go straight to Level 2. The only drawback was average of 2-3 boss packs in Level 2, with one pack occasionally rolling.
Anyhow, now it’s time to consider next steps. He has only one respec, so I may do some testing with a twinked necro that’s been retired. I can pretty much replicate Pestilence’s gear, although the tester will be ~10 levels lower if I recall correctly. He also has one socket quest left, and I think it will go to the Griffon's, due to still not having improved on 1/20 rare. I guess he could luck out, but it seems like the socket will get put to use in meantime for +life, resists, or vita depending on the target. Which brings us to:
-- Pits: Pestilence did 2 runs on the Pit map, and he’s getting around 60k/run, which is about half of the average for 96-97. So continuing in the Pit would likely mean ~4M/hr. We'll do a few more runs to get a more reasonable estimate of XP/hr on the current map though.
-- CS: CS could theoretically be faster XP gain, but I hadn't been able to make it work in earlier levels. I didn’t spec for Attract (or any in the Dim Vision curse tree arm), so maybe that would make a difference to take the heat off Pestilence while he waits for the first few corpses. Based on testing by @ffs it seems he will want that for Nihl anyhow. And he also will have to assess whether the 6 skill points sunk into LR are worth it (seemingly not for 98-99 at Nihl, but maybe needed for CS; so if attract is needed to make CS work and LR is needed, that may be ruled out due to limited respecs and wanting to maximize skill points to CE).
-- Nihl: And Nihl remains the most intriguing choice. I’m a bit worried about having only ~2600 hit points, but Hiatus did fine with around 2550, and Aldurs and Dwarf Star would bump him closer to 2800, I think. He could drop from 125 FCR and wear Shako for extra vita and mana, but that's likely a big efficiency trade off.
So I think I’ll focus testing on Nihl with different set ups and CS. Feedback is most welcome, especially from @ffs based on his testing. Either way, I think I'll take a little break from him for at least a few days and maybe until after I get back from trip east to visit my family the first full week of December. So I won’t have to make the decision right away.
Instead, I will spend the more limited time I’ll have for the next 10 days on some testing with the twinked necro, the Trio of Twins barb (inspired by recent Barb entries to get him moving again), and LK runs with Quinta. Speaking of which . . .
* * *
Quinta finished another 500 LK runs (for 1000 total) and is half way to her Ber for Infinity. Sur dropped on run #326, along with an Ist on run #424. Aside from that, 4 Lems and some Kos and Lums. A Sur, Ist, Mal, and Um over the first 1000 runs, so not too shabby.
The map she used for 200-500 had a semi-stable Matriarchal Javelin rack next to a super chest, which is why she stuck with it hoping for Thunderstroke. It also rolled Scepters regularly, and so that was the one that rolled unique obviously. She rolled a new map after that, and landed on a nice one where she will stay until she finds another Sur:
@PhineasB good to see Pestilence advancing! Regarding Nihl running, my thoughts on some points you mentioned:
FCR: Winning the CE battle is really about 125 FCR, I wouldn't drop to 75. Even at 125, Nihl gets a few CE steals, which not only can be dangerous when Amp'ed but in particular it's annoying because it significantly increases run times if that happens on the first or second corpse.
Curses: 95% of the time I only use AD and/or Confuse. Attract somewhat faded out of my rotation because it's rather situational. I still use it sometimes but the two main curses are sufficient and more relaxed to switch between. Something I started after a while is to use both simultaneously, there are often situations where that makes sense. Confuse has a bigger AoE, so you can cast it to defuse Vipers and then cast AD (low level) so that it hits Nihl and whatever the Merc is hitting. Better explained by this video (e.g. run at ~5:30).
Generally an important factor for run times I felt is to have AD active (at least on a few monsters) when the first CE goes off. It's not as important after that as long as Nihl is Amp'ed. When there's a semi-difficult spawn I often try to cast Confuse only after the first CE and before spamming CE until Nihl drops.
Dwarf Star: Most damage you'll take is from Nihl's CE and I'm running double Dwarf Star to be able to tank those much more easily. Even when I found BKWB from Nihl, after running with it a little bit, I quickly went back to double Dwarf Star. The mitigation they provide is immense.
CE range: The platform is relatively small and it may seem like you could get away with lower CE range, but confused monsters tend to wander around, plus Nihl often teleports. So I'd still max or near max it.
Given the above, it may seem outright criminal but you might want to consider dropping DWeb for Hoto when running Nihlathak. I didn't test it (twinked) admittedly, but I did test more offensive options than Hoto with Ric. He has a +6 PN White and in particular a Beast, which is generally a great weapon for PN Necro as well if FCR is taken care of, and quite close in performance to DWeb. But Hoto allows 125% FCR while using two Dwarf Stars for 30% Fire Absorb and Shako for 10% PDR, with good resist and a large life pool. Both White and Beast meant runs became noticeably more dangerous, while not speeding things up enough to make it worthwhile.
With you lucking that 2/20 that enables further setups of course, e.g. incorporating at least one Dwarf Star in a DWeb/125% FCR setup. Could end up being safe enough, though the lower damage reduction will require more S&Es here and there, which would need to be measured against any increase in run speed.
Generally, in particular with DWeb, Pit probably remains a very good option for you for 97-98 with ~4m/h. I was at about 4-4.5m for 97-98 at Nihlathak IIRC, but that's without the S&E lag you guys have, and my Pit numbers weren't as good. So Pit might be about the same in your case while being safer and providing better drops. And using that beautiful DWeb for sure.
Crazy activity here, nice to see and grats to all on your progress. @PhineasB promise to give your write up a look when I have time to give it a fair read, good luck with the next one!
Big D went down smoother than I expected, in large thanks to the tip about standing on his toes, big thanks on that!
At lvl 50 now standing in harrogath waiting to get time to do eldritch runs to get the exp and gear to get ready for hell countess where I think I’ll stop to get the runes for an oath... Unless I find something else that will help me skip her.
I guess if eldritch is greedy and holds on to all goodies I’ll go back and farm nm meph at lvl 70... I’m not super stoked for that tho.
Edit: I will update he table when I’m not writing from my phone... by the way “E/S” in the table, that’s extended stash right?
Forumite Character SC/HC Class Level Exp Date E/S S/U Grail Deaths Hours
--------------- --------------- ----- ----- ----- ---- ---------- --- ---- ----- ------ -----
RIP Kaira_II HC Sin 95 2.55 2018-09-06 Yes - 399 - -
Bewitch itsreal HC Sorc 87 1.xx 2018-04-24 No - - - -
MizzouFTW Pure HC Necro 86 1.15 2018-01-10 Yes - - 1 -
Vildecor Celia HC Ama 84 0.99 2018-05-30 Yes 125 97 1 -
coju NintyNine_orRiP HC Sorc 81 0.74 2016-04-07 Yes - - 1 -
RIP Attila HC Barb 78 0.59 2018-09-26 Yes - 73 - -
TwentyMuleTeam Valus HC Barb 76 0.48 2016-10-27 Yes - - 1 -
Pb_pal Stevesy HC Pala 76 0.48 2017-06-19 Yes - - 1 -
weezaard Cypher SC Druid 66 0.00 2018-02-21 Yes - - 20+ -
Tenecabo OldShatterhand HC Druid 49 0.04 2016-06-16 Yes - 0 1 -
Pijus Pyrestarter HC Druid 36 0.00 2018-05-21 Yes - - 1 -
coju fB HC Sorc 29 0.00 2016-04-09 Yes 1 1 1 2
Kitteh Verallus HC Druid 26 0.00 2016-03-25 No - - 1 -
logoutzero Rolex HC Barb 21 0.00 2016-03-26 Yes 0 0 1 1
Rattled through most of Act 5 NM today, first ancients lasted less time than a fart as bam cursed and i assume some extra strong or something too cos MOron was dead instantly and me soon after. Recovering with some pindle/eldritch double runs then once more to the ancients where this time moron lasted longer but still died and i spent some time running around Forbing them to death.
Totally forgot to return via portal so had to go back thru the ancients albeit they already dead this time) after exiting after resurrecting moron. Baal dropped me some gold things i dont recall ever having before but nothing useful. Undecided on what to do next but did go around Act 1 first bit without and major mishaps. Prob at least go into Den of Evil for the skill point then maybe switch back to NM for some equipment running or maybe just push on into Hell some more.
Here goes nothing. Hope I manage to get this updated correctly. I haven't tracked drops or grails for this character yet, but I might start up the grail later if/when I start finding something rare.
Congrats on all the progress folks! That's some seriously awesome stuff @Gynli !
--
Klaus has gone prime for the last time and joined the other recent additions to the 97 club!
A couple middling finds like Oculus kept us occupied, but the star player this update was a nice Lo rune. I have 2 Ohms that I'm hanging on to, but those are being held in case I find a Jah for Phoenix, so this enabled me to make my final piece of merc gear:
I made it non-eth just in case it sees use on a future char some day (assuming it lives that long). This put the merc at 7k+ damage, which I'm pretty happy with.
A Vex soon followed, and then the green counterpart to the Corona that dropped last update gave me the final Set piece I need for my overall grail:
Not much else happened for the remainder, though a Boneflame right at the end was a decent little parting gift.
Skillers:
1 x Entrapping
1 x Shogukusha's GC of Life (+20)
1 X Acrobatic
I haven't been keeping track of his grail progress really, nor have I been religiously picking up all S/U, but I figured this was as good a time as any to actually put his progress into the table (also, I actually remembered to get the Flavie report from GoMule, so that helps!). Klaus sits at 373, which feels a bit low. Maybe I'll make an effort to pick up some lower-end stuff for a while.
--
97 marks a major turning point in Klaus' journey. I've known this was coming for a while, and I knew this would be the case when I decided way back when to go pure fire, but now it's here. Things have gotten sloooooooooow.
I did some quick testing before, but now that he's 97 it needed re-visiting. Luckily my current AT map also has a good layout for CS (plus a shrine), so I could test a bit without having to re-roll just yet.
Long story short, Diablo (/p1 seals/p7 D) has officially become considerably faster than AT running. The flip side is that it's considerably more dangerous, and uses a fair number of rejuvs (at least for now while I get used to it, anyways). Basically now I'm running CS until I get low on rejuvs, then I pop over to the AT to re-stock. The variety is certainly nice after staring down the Tunnels for so long!
Worth noting if anyone is considering following in Klaus' footsteps as a fire druid, the time required for him to level has been roughly DOUBLE that of Eleanor's times at every step of the way for 95+, and will be clocking in at 100+ hours for each of the final 2 levels (even with the Ancients cash-in) so... yeah. Don't expect frequent updates.
I ended up running p5 or p8 seals for the most of 87-90, p5 if I wanted to be more lazy and p8 if I wanted to pay more attention. The ring in this image is actually a 218/18 ravenfrost, which was a decent upgrade to my 180ish/15 one. I don't think I'll use 2 ravenfrosts with seal running, since 75 mana from a ring is huge without insight. Now at clvl 90 I'll start gambling amulets and use the ilvl +90 ones to craft caster ammies with, and hopefully end up with a 5fcr/80mana/mana leech amulet, which I will immediately discard for a highlords if I ever happen to get one.
The drops:
I only get MF from my enigma, so the good drops are going to be pretty darn rare
Current gear:
Gface with 34ed/8str jewel (ends up being 42% ed!)
Dual grief pb
Enigma bp
LoH
Goreriders
String of ears
Ravenfrost
10fcr/80mana blood ring
6 mana leech / all resist amulet
Dual wizardspike on switch for the huge mana bonus and fcr for teleporting.
Charms are a mixture of all resistances, ar/max dmg and life.
CS running build was ww/bo/sword mastery at 20 points, then a mixture of war cry and natural resist. I didn't end up using war cry much at all, so the points may end up being better spent in other skills.
Going to do 90-91 purely in travincal in hopes of getting infinite Lo runes to get better griefs and a fortitude, ist for delirium,(Potentially sur or ber for beast, zod for ebotd)
Great progress @Tatterson, @Bewitch and in particular @Pb_pal! Impressive how far Klaus got, and nice drops. IIRC you already tested Nihlathak with him and it didn't quite work right? Otherwise that could be an alternative for 97-98 as well, as it was for Ric. Yes it is scary for HC, but that life pool of ~4.3k life might just give you the confidence it can be done.
As for Ric, he's about ~10m short of 98.5, will hopefully hit that later this week and update his status then.
Great progress @Tatterson, @Bewitch and in particular @Pb_pal! Impressive how far Klaus got, and nice drops. IIRC you already tested Nihlathak with him and it didn't quite work right? Otherwise that could be an alternative for 97-98 as well, as it was for Ric. Yes it is scary for HC, but that life pool of ~4.3k life might just give you the confidence it can be done. .
I tested it with my SC druid, yeah. The run times are pretty slow (~40s), but even at 96 he was pretty close in terms of efficiency going by the raw numbers. I'll have to do some actual testing with Klaus to get some more accurate run-times specific to him, but I'd be willing to bet Nihl is probably the fastest of the 4 options (AT, Diablo, Ventar, Nihl) at this point moving forward.
I've been enjoying the change of pace of Diablo runs so far with him (the drops from the big guy are nice too!) so I'll probably do that for a while, and when I build up the confidence I'll head down into the Halls and visit my old pasty friend.
@Tatterson Nice progress. As a fellow barbarian player, I have to ask. How safe it is to do dual wield cs runs? My own barb has no luck with finding Stormshield, so I am seriously considering to respec again and go for dual wield.
Problem is, that Im playing HC, so there is no space for mistakes
Ok, progress for ShouldBeEasy and (mainly) Grapelike.
As for ShouldBeEasy ... he is still doing LK runs, but still without any luck. For reference, I'll post a table with his Pul+ rune drops so far (and because complaining helps ??!!), after a bit over 4000 /p7 LK runs and 500 /p8 Eldritch runs:
Code:
126 Pul Lower Kurast
227 Gul Eldritch
315 Vex LK
335 Mal LK
460 Mal LK
503 Pul LK
538 Mal LK
881 Pul LK
1075 Um LK
1083 Sur LK
1281 Sur LK
1299 Lo LK
1450 Mal LK
1465 Vex LK
1534 Pul LK
1539 Pul LK
1580 Ber LK
1735 Gul LK
1819 Sur LK
1975 Pul LK
2144 Gul LK
2303 Pul LK
2306 Um LK
2388 Vex LK
499 Pul Eldritch
2639 Mal LK
3455 Pul LK
3703 Gul LK
NA Ist Pits
As noted before, I didn't get to pick up that last Gul. So yeah ... ;(. After hitting 91 I returned to LK, determined to finish that Enigma, and switch to Grapelike whenever I get tired of the LK runs. Problem is ... currently that's already after 10 minutes ... . I always force myself to run at least half an hour, but even then I'm thinking about switching back to /p8 Pit runs. I'll have to see next time. For now I've always done that: run LK with ShouldBeEasy for at least 30 minutes, then switch to Grapelike.
On the bright side, he did get this nice little charm from LK:
Grapelike has made good progress, and is now level 46, having reached the Outer Cloister waypoint.
My tactic throughout normal, and nm too for that matter, remained the same. Run past most of the monsters, mainly killing boss packs, and stopping at certain targets, if it turned out I had a good map for those.
After my last update, that meant going for the Countess first, in search for runes for Stealth. The WP was next to the tower, so that was very convenient.
After getting the runes, the next stop was at the Inner Cloister waypoint, where I did a few runs on Bone Ash and the 1 - 2 boss packs in the Cathedral. This allowed me to get level 18 when reaching Andariel, giving me Concentrate, which deals some more damage than Bash.
No good drops unfortunately.
In Act 2 the only two targets I reran were Bloodwitch the Wild (the superunique next to the Cube chest) and Fire Eye, who is always easy to reach by just popping in through the AS waypoint and then take the portal back. Sometimes he spawns in another room, but in my case he was next to the portal . This way I was level 24 when taking on Duriel. In the meantime I had been able to upgrade my weapon to a Malice Scythe at level 19 (which looked really, really badass on my Barb, I must say) and then a Savage Halberd of Alacrity, which was the very first weapon I got from the Savage Polearm cube recipe.
In Act 3 there weren't any targets I could run efficiently, so I just rushed through on /p3 and killed Meph at level 25.5. Same story in Act 4, but on /p1, as the higher amount of hitpoints of the monsters meant I was killing too slowly otherwise. CS wasn't easy, and Diablo in particular forced me to do a few town trips to stock up on potions and heal myself and the merc, but we managed just fine in the end. I was only level 26.5 at the time, but I assumed that my best bet to level would be Eldritch.
So that is what I did (on /p5), and it turned out to be a good tactic . Killing him and his pack went rather slow, as the damage from my weapon started lacking, but still xp gain was good.
Hitting level 30 and being able to start using WW obviously helped somewhat, although early on I obviously ran out of mana fast. That changed when a rare Bardiche with mana steal dropped at level 31, allowing me to whirl much longer. A bit later, a Cathan's Seal dropped, severly reducing the need to use healing pots.
This way I did few more Eldritch runs, but then decided to move on to rescue Anya, so I could try out Pindle runs. The rare Bardiche also had a significant amount of AR and damage to Undead, so I figured it was worth checking. It worked out very well, by whirling through the pack, taking the exit and then back to Pindle to get my merc with me, cast Battle Cry and start whirling. Doing /p5 this way got me to level 38 really quickly.
I then continued my way, but after reaching the Ancient's Way waypoint, I did some more Pindle runs. Then I dispatched of the Ancients (easily), the waves (not so easily, at least not Lister's pack) and Baal (annoying, took a while, but not too hard).
So Grapelike reached Slayer status at level 41.
Grapelike continued his adventures in Act 1 for a little while, but then returned to more Normal Pindle runs, as he was struggling a bit in NM and xp didn't come very fast at /p1. This way he gained another 2 levels.
After that he continued in Act 1. The plan was to farm Countess a bit, mainly in search for some Sol runs for Insights and maybe Lore. I had great luck: the tower was pretty close to the waypoint, and the first 3 levels were of the very short variety. So I ran Countess for a while, netting me good xp and a decent amount of runes. It took me a while to also get Sol runes, but I needed other runes like Amn, Ral, Tal and the like as well, so no worries there.
After a while I got my first upgrades this way: Spirit in a 4os Broad Sword that dropped, for weapon switch ...
... and Honor in a Partizan. It dropped as plain white, so I tried the cube recipe on it for 4os (Insight), but got 5os instead.
It still is a major upgrade obviously. I actually forgot how good the mods on the runeword are.
Next to those I also found those, which Grapelike probably will use for quite a while.
Next on I will probably push forward to Act 2 to get a Might merc. After that I'm still undecided. That will probably depend on my drops getting to Act 2.
@T72on1 Being one Sur (or less) short of Enigma after 4000 runs is absolutely within expectations no? Farming Enigma from scratch takes 3855 runs on average according to Grip's guide. So even say 5000 runs would be nothing unusal (though of course it would start to feel like being on the receiving end of RNG trolling ). Then again, a long drought usually ends with a bang, so I hope that happens for you!
We should be grateful for LK anyway. I think very few of us, if anyone at all, would manage untwinked 99 with any non-Sorc without it. (Plus all those charms and crafting materials on top of the runes shouldn't be underestimated either.)
Though I must admit I only ran it in SC while doing something else, like listening to music or watching something while running, which helps in combating the monotony of it. In HC I guess it requires full concentration and I can imagine that considerably adds to how boring it is.
@Tatterson Nice progress. As a fellow barbarian player, I have to ask. How safe it is to do dual wield cs runs? My own barb has no luck with finding Stormshield, so I am seriously considering to respec again and go for dual wield.
Problem is, that Im playing HC, so there is no space for mistakes
I really wouldn't. Even at my current gear listed, at p5 I still occasionally die to vizier and or infector. (ww build). Maybe with holy freeze merc it would be better. I'm not the best barb player, so you should definitely do some testing on SC
With the berserk build, idk, I haven't tried it out with real max block, but p1 de seis still hurts if you teleport straight into the pack.
With both builds I have about max fire resist, but the other resists are mid 30's.
@T72on1 Being one Sur (or less) short of Enigma after 4000 runs is absolutely within expectations no? Farming Enigma from scratch takes 3855 runs on average according to Grip's guide. So even say 5000 runs would be nothing unusal (though of course it would start to feel like being on the receiving end of RNG trolling ). Then again, a long drought usually ends with a bang, so I hope that happens for you!
We should be grateful for LK anyway. I think very few of us, if anyone at all, would manage untwinked 99 with any non-Sorc without it. (Plus all those charms and crafting materials on top of the runes shouldn't be underestimated either.)
Though I must admit I only ran it in SC while doing something else, like listening to music or watching something while running, which helps in combating the monotony of it. In HC I guess it requires full concentration and I can imagine that considerably adds to how boring it is.
Yes, I realize that I'm just below expectation overall. So from that point of view, there is nothing to complain about. But since I dislike the LK runs so much, the only thing I can think of now, is not how long it takes on average in total, but that I have gone without a Sur for 2200 runs now, while statistically I should have found 2 more in that time. Obviously that is me totally neglecting that I got very lucky in the first 1800 runs .
I know it's RNG, but every time it hits as hard as it hits now, I truly hate it . While finding some Pul, Mal or Gul runes in between wouldn't help towards Enigma, it would still make me feel like I have some luck in LK. But as you can see in the stats, drops have been really, really bad for a very long time. That definitely adds to the feeling as well. Looking at Gripphon's guide, you can expect one Pul+ every 133 runs. That isn't even counting the two bodies I also pop on my runs. In that respect runs have been terrible.
If it would be something I enjoy (and yes, I listen to music too as a distraction; HC needs more focus, but LK runs not that much, at least on a non-teleporting character), I probably wouldn't focus on those last 2000 runs only, but more at the total. But like I said numerous times now, I absolutely don't, so ...
But enough ranting. It's off my chest now, gotta get on with it, and decide how I will continue with ShouldBeEasy. Good thing I have Grapelike to shift my attention to at times. And I complained big time now, and since that always helps ... .
Btw, I agree that LK helps a lot in getting to 99 untwinked, and helps a great deal in finding HRs and other stuff in general. However without it, we would probably find even more efficient ways to run for example Travincal untwinked, which is great for runes, jewelry, charms and crafting mats as well.
@Tatterson Nice progress. As a fellow barbarian player, I have to ask. How safe it is to do dual wield cs runs? My own barb has no luck with finding Stormshield, so I am seriously considering to respec again and go for dual wield.
Problem is, that Im playing HC, so there is no space for mistakes
I really wouldn't. Even at my current gear listed, at p5 I still occasionally die to vizier and or infector. (ww build). Maybe with holy freeze merc it would be better. I'm not the best barb player, so you should definitely do some testing on SC
With the berserk build, idk, I haven't tried it out with real max block, but p1 de seis still hurts if you teleport straight into the pack.
With both builds I have about max fire resist, but the other resists are mid 30's.
Howl and Taunt are great skills to use in the CS, in my opinion....especially against De Seis and his Fanaticism aura, and against Ventar and his gang on speed. I don't think I've ever made a Barb with a shield - it's always been either dual-wielding, or a two-handed weapon.
I'm back with another necro. That afk death was deeply unsatisfying, I didn't even get to hear the ridiculous necromancer death scream. I strongly considered a twinked poisonmancer (I have a beautiful Death's Web in my main stash) but just wanted to give it one more go untwinked.
I had a lot of time to play last weekend so just blasted through. Stopped off at Pindleskin in normal and nightmare to get the levels up, otherwise just cleared the game. I had dreamed of something nice dropping along the way... gul dagger, vipermagi, peasant crown, homunculus(!)... you know the dream run. Alas, absolutely nothing dropped and I'm wearing rags.
Sometimes it's not about winning, it's about sending a message.
This wee caster fella was mugging me off, spamming Blizzards constantly, so I decided to run over and smack him in the chops after I'd killed the High Council.
Most of the runs since his last update were done in the context of this little tourney. Non-qualifying drops shared here and here, most notably including two Lo runes, 1/20 Paladin craft amulet and 1/20/dual leech/@ Amazon circlet. However, I was slightly annoyed when in an attempt to finish strong on the last day of the tourney, he suffered his second death (this time more typical: Vipers + Amp and a CE to finish him offf) as a consequence of lack of concentration. He recovered the body again though so XP loss was reduced to a minimum. I was meaning to drop his Gheed's for a bit higher life in any case, and did so when the tournament ended a few hours after the death.
This was his overall haul highlight pic, with some additional information here.
Not pictured: Couple of plain skillers (Pally Combat, Trap, Druid Summon), 2x Fine GC of Sustenance, 2x War Traveler (including his very first one). The Mara's above rolled a perfect 30@ and the TS was eth.
Apart from the abovementioned RIP, runs were generally smooth routine. A minor additional thing I started doing was to step away from the Merc after landing in a way that I'm not further away from Nihl than the Merc. This often results in Nihl casting Arctic Blast on the Necromancer as opposed to the Merc (which he did when I was stepping backwards), noticeably reducing chances of the Merc getting chilled before that first corpse drops.
Item drops since the end of the MF tournament included two further highlights with a high roll Ravenlore and his second nicely rolled Fire skiller (following his first perfect 45 life one).
So it took him about a month for the first half. Given holiday season towards the end of the year, I remain optimistic that he can be completed before. Let's see!
@Hutton gz and gl with the last sur
@ffs gz, gl on the 2nd half
Some1 knows if i can upgrade gems in gomule to perfect gems and/or is it possible to put several gems to a character without doubleclick on every single gem?
Upgrade in GoMule: I would be surprised if that is possible.
You can select multiple items in a stash to get them to the clipboard. But I think from there you have to click every single one of them to get them to the character.
You can select multiple items with shift or control and click the "pickup" (or similarly named) button. There is also a "drop all to (stash/inv/cube)" option on the right hand .
The skeleton army marches on and moving through Hell at a good clip. A Skin of the Vipermagi and a Nightsmoke belt helped with much needed resists. The rest has been filled out with the obligatory untwinked set; Spirit sword, Lore helm, Rhyme shield. Mercenary is now wielding an ethereal Insight Partizan alongside Guillaume's and a Treachery armor. His damage is good enough to start the CE chain and Guillaume's is perfect for boss killing.
Picked up an Ist from the Hellforge which is always nice.
I decided to clear up to the Anya quest and stop there. This opens the Pindleskin portal for some extra levels and gear farm. I've not decided quite how to manoeuvre the later levels yet. I can worry about all that later.
Unfortunately, the fun is now paused until after the LK grind.
@ffs - Gogo Ric! Great progress and good luck on the last stretch. That Mara's is sweet, and nice recovery from the mishap.
@Hutton and @Tatterson - well done! great to the see the progress with the Barbs! And that Sur drop was sweet justice!
And nice to see Grapelike advancing @T72on1
@1have2much3time - welcome back and nice progress so far!
As for me:
Quinta finished another set of 500 LK runs (now at 1500 total), with most of the progress over the remainder of weekend after my last update. It was a busy work week, but I managed to get the last 100 runs in small chunks before bed or with morning coffee.
Mal #2 fell on run #94, followed shortly by Ohm #1 on run 115. She then went until Mal #3 on run #421 with nothing higher than a Lum in the middle, which was a frustrating dry spell. But Ist #2 fell 13 runs later, along with Pul #1 right at the end, so the last 100 runs were productive.
Over 1500 LK runs, Pul+ total is 9: Pul, Um, Mal x3, Ist x2, Ohm, Sur. A bit below expectations, so I expect things will pick up (oh, wait, that's not now is works? )
So still a Sur short of material for Infinity, but she now has enough for a Call to Arms reroll (to hopefully improve on her first with +1 BO). She’s also now in the 500 pgem range, having used the pAmethysts to craft as she’s gone along. So once she progresses to Baal, there will lots of GC rerolls possible.
Unfortunately, no major charm upgrades over this set. A few plain 19/20 vita and now up to three columns of FRW SCs, 2 with +100 poison damage, which will likely get used to speed up for non-teleport Baal runs, and have incrementally sped up LK runs. No Harpoonist skillers for Quinta yet, and only 6 skillers total from last 1000 LK runs (none with good secondary mods), which seems a bit low. Hopefully she can pick up at least one before that Sur drops and moves on from LK, at least for a while.
She also used Hels to reroll her Spirit for a 35 FCR upgrade as a break at the 350-run mark. She got to 29 rerolls without success, which seems extremely low probability occurrence. She finally stopped on a 34 FCR roll due to extreme unlikelihood she will roll a 2/19 or 2/20 caster amulet anyhow, where that 1 FCR could make a difference in combination with still-unfound Griffon’s. Once she gets a second 4os Monarch, she’ll roll more Spirits, so she’s picking up those run ingredients until she has the makings for 25 more rerolls.
I'm playing my Trio of Twins barb again, now into A2 NM, hopefully finishing A2 to allow a progress update this weekend. Aside from that, we're leaving town on Tuesday and there's lots of work to wrap up before leaving, so I doubt Quinta will make much more progress in LK until later this month.
So started a 1.13d Sorc back in January 2018 which sat around dormant in Act 1 Black Marsh Normal for months while I played 1.00 and then took an OVG break.After I decided to kick her over the last 2 and half months from normal. She finished NM at 71, went to the Hell Stony Field, Mausoleum and Crypt 5 players runs for XP until 78 then to the AT from there. No Meph runs and only a couple of Hell Andy runs. I got a nice map where the AT entrance is 3 short teleports from the waypoint
So I am putting her up for a try at untwinked 99 and see where it goes. There is a lot of inspiration from the everyone who had or is currently trying this.
She started as a CB/lightning build in Normal then re-speced to a Blizzard and SF build using the Normal quest before continuing to NM. She is currently stated for untwinked play so the build assumes fewer +skills and gear when created
The Merc has no leech but is speced for resists, PDR/%PDR and MDR. I protected him in like a 1.07 at first. He is much more sturdy now
It was generally a grind until the Merc at high 88 and found a his current weapon. Before we using a non eth Insight Partizan.
The plan is level in the AT until she hits 95, then evaluate what gear is collected before figuring the next move. She still has the Act3 to 5 quests improvements to come.
Skills pts allocated in this order
1 Warmth
11 SF
1 TP
Max Blizz
14 CM
Max GS, IBlast
12 IBolt
Stats nekkid
Strength : 95
Energy : 90
Dexterity : 25
Vitality : 320
Stat Points Rem : 20
Skill Points Rem: 0
Gear
Hell starting Gear
Smoke LP
Spirit Crystal Sw 29FCR
Rhyme Kite Shield
Goldwrap
+3 Cold Amulet or Rare 8 Res@, +62 Mana ammy
Rare FCR and other rings
Rare Tri Res/10FRW boots
Rare Dual Res and MF gloves
Switch
Wand of Lvl 1 life tap
Wall of Eyeless
Merc Normal Combat
Insight non-ethereal Partizan
Cirlet of Life Everlasting 18PDR
Rare Plate mail with Tri ResLR,FR,CR 17% FHR, 75% PLDR
In Stash for boss fights
Kelpies 154ED with Shael
Current gear
Tal's Set
Rhyme Heater
2 Rare FCR Rings
Rare Res/MF Gloves
Tri Res/10FRW Boots
Switch
Wand of Life Tap
Wall of the Eyeless
Charms
1 Plain Cold Skiller
1 Shimmering SC +5
Some nice life and mana charms
a few MF charms also
Merc
Eth Insight Bec-DC
Iron Pelt
Rockstopper
End game may look something like what is below. The * means I have already found the item
Shako with nice socket
Maras *
HOTO
COH Dusk or AP
Spirit 35FCR
Arachs *
Rare stat res gloves
Rare FCR ring *
Boots and another ring slot undecided and flexible
Boot options Treks *, Rare Dual Res LR/CR, 30FRW, 10 FHR*
Rings options Rares, Natures Peace* for running Nilly
Switch
CTA >=+3 BO Crystal or WS/Spirit
Merc
Eth Infinity elite polearm
Trechery
Gaze with IAS jewel
Build suggestion
105FCR/55FHR/max res/
Max Vita build
Skills Dual Tree possibly
With Rhyme and Gheeds, she acculumates a nice amount of spare gold that allows her to gamble also one of the FCR was gambled help the non
Have collected eough to start a MF Necro at some stage whoch would help the 1.13 stash
Below are the detailed stats
Character name : Atheyanore
Character type : Sorceress
Character level : 93
Character exp : 2159974149
Strength : 95
Energy : 90
Dexterity : 25
Vitality : 320
Stat Points Rem : 20
Skill Points Rem: 0
Life : 1277 / 792
Mana : 693 / 329
Stamina : 471 / 476
Gear :
Tal's Set
Rhyme Heater
2 Rare FCR Rings
Rare Res/MF Gloves
Tri Res/10FRW Boots
Switch Wand of Life Tap/ Wall of the Eyeless Bone Shield
Number of Items : 48
1: Toxic Small Charm of Fortune
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 55
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xac2b33af
+100 poison damage over 5 seconds
5% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
2: Tome of Town Portal
Quantity: 16
3: Small Charm of Good Luck
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 33
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 77
Fingerprint: 0x33dd4104
7% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
4: Emerald Small Charm
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 32
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x657e27f2
Poison Resist +10%
5: Small Charm of Vita
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 39
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x9bf6aabf
+20 to Life
6: Serpent's Small Charm of Strength
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 40
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x5402a225
+2 to Strength
+15 to Mana
7: Small Charm of Vita
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 39
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xc88151e2
+17 to Life
8: Horadric Cube
9: Key
Quantity: 9
10: Small Charm of Vita
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 39
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xbec5ebea
+18 to Life
11: Small Charm of Fortune
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 18
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 88
Fingerprint: 0x5162af5d
5% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
12: Small Charm of Vita
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 39
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 88
Fingerprint: 0x1a6c1124
+19 to Life
13: Gheed's Fortune
Grand Charm
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 62
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xcc8f7ce9
86% Extra Gold from Monsters
33% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Reduces All Vendor Prices 13%
14: Tome of Identify
Quantity: 13
15: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
16: Super Mana Potion
Points: 200
17: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
18: Serpent's Grand Charm of Sustenance
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 41
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x8d80c1ff
+28 to Life
+58 to Mana
19: Serpent's Grand Charm of Life
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 41
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xa4cda64
+20 to Life
+59 to Mana
20: Viridian Small Charm of Sustenance
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 17
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x3d99b4df
+15 to Life
Poison Resist +7%
21: Shimmering Small Charm
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 25
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x524974b9
All Resistances +5
22: Tal Rasha's Horadric Crest
Death Mask
Defense: 110
Durability: 20 of 20
Required Strength: 55
Required Level: 66
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xdf5f1d27
+60 to Life
+30 to Mana
+45 Defense
All Resistances +15
10% Life stolen per hit
10% Mana stolen per hit
23: Tal Rasha's Adjudication
Amulet
Required Level: 67
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 88
Fingerprint: 0x5e7406d9
+50 to Life
+42 to Mana
Lightning Resist +33%
Adds 3-32 lightning damage
+2 to Sorceress Skill Levels
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
10% Faster Cast Rate
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
24: Tal Rasha's Guardianship
Lacquered Plate
Defense: 873
Durability: 55 of 55
Required Strength: 83
Required Level: 71
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xb7d696bc
+400 Defense
Magic Damage Reduced by 15
Fire Resist +40%
Lightning Resist +40%
Cold Resist +40%
**% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Requirements -60%
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
10% Faster Cast Rate
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
25: Raven Knot
Ring
Required Level: 60
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 97
Fingerprint: 0xfd565e2e
+31 to Life
+20 to Mana
+17 to Attack Rating
Fire Resist +29%
10% Faster Cast Rate
Level 5 Ice Blast (32/32 Charges)
26: Storm Hold
Ring
Required Level: 13
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 80
Fingerprint: 0x1de24de9
+2 to Energy
+9 to Mana
Fire Resist +17%
Lightning Resist +28%
+5 to Light Radius
10% Faster Cast Rate
5% Bonus to Attack Rating
27: Tal Rasha's Fine-Spun Cloth
Mesh Belt
Defense: 95
Durability: 16 of 16
Required Strength: 46
Required Level: 53
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 88
Fingerprint: 0xabdd04bb
+20 to Dexterity
+30 to Mana
12% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Requirements -20%
37% Damage Taken Goes to Mana
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
+60 Defense
10% Faster Cast Rate
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
28: Plague Slippers
Sharkskin Boots
Defense: 35
Durability: 14 of 14
Required Strength: 47
Required Level: 25
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 80
Fingerprint: 0x9e6868ee
Lightning Resist +23%
Cold Resist +31%
Poison Resist +8%
10% Faster Run/Walk
10% Chance to cast Level 3 Nova when struck
29: Blood Hold
Gauntlets
Defense: 19
Durability: 24 of 24
Required Strength: 60
Required Level: 32
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 62
Fingerprint: 0x8cce085
+19% Enhanced Defense
Lightning Resist +17%
Poison Resist +27%
24% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Level 3 Fire Arrow (27/27 Charges)
30: Greater Mana Potion
Points: 160
31: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
32: Super Mana Potion
Points: 200
33: Super Mana Potion
Points: 200
34: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
35: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
36: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
37: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
38: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
39: Chilling Grand Charm
Keep in Inventory to Gain Bonus
Required Level: 42
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x4a9a54bc
+1 to Cold Skills (Sorceress Only)
40: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
41: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
42: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
43: Dire Casque
Antlers
Defense: 47
Durability: 17 of 20
(Druid Only)
Required Strength: 24
Required Level: 27
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x6b0e385b
+2 to Life
+89% Enhanced Defense
Cold Resist +28%
10% Faster Hit Recovery
+3 to Cyclone Armor (Druid Only)
5% Chance to cast Level 3 Frost Nova when struck
93% Bonus to Attack Rating (Based on Character Level)
44: Wand of Life Tap
One-Hand Damage: 2 to 4
Durability: 15 of 15
Required Level: 24
Staff Class - Normal Attack Speed
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 41
Fingerprint: 0xc04e92ae
+1 to Decrepify (Necromancer Only)
150% Damage to Undead
Level 1 Life Tap (65/67 Charges)
45: Wall of the Eyeless
Bone Shield
Defense: 53
Chance to Block: 40%
Durability: 40 of 40
Required Strength: 25
Required Level: 20
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 60
Fingerprint: 0x501b73f4
+40% Enhanced Defense
+10 Defense
Poison Resist +20%
3% Mana stolen per hit
20% Faster Cast Rate
+5 to Mana After Each Kill
46: Full Rejuvenation Potion
Heals 100% Life and Mana
47: Tal Rasha's Lidless Eye
Swirling Crystal
One-Hand Damage: 18 to 42
Durability: 50 of 50
(Sorceress Only)
Required Level: 65
Orb Class - Slow Attack Speed
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x5cc3de3
+10 to Energy
+57 to Life
+77 to Mana
20% Faster Cast Rate
+2 to Fire Mastery (Sorceress Only)
+1 to Lightning Mastery (Sorceress Only)
+1 to Cold Mastery (Sorceress Only)
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
+1 to Sorceress Skill Levels
-15% to Enemy Fire Resistance
-15% to Enemy Lightning Resistance
+15% to Cold Skill Damage
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
48: Rhyme
Heater
'ShaelEth'
Defense: 105
Chance to Block: 62%
Durability: 88 of 88
Required Strength: 77
Required Level: 43
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0xe88417ea
+20% Increased Chance of Blocking
Regenerate Mana 15%
All Resistances +25
50% Extra Gold from Monsters
25% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
40% Faster Block Rate
Cannot Be Frozen
Socketed (2: 2 used)
Shael Rune
Inserted into a Heater
20% Faster Block Rate
Required Level: 29
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Eth Rune
Inserted into a Heater
Regenerate Mana 15%
Required Level: 15
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Mercenary Items :
1: Iron Pelt
Trellised Armor
Defense: 539
Durability: 19 of 157
Required Strength: 61
Required Level: 33
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 88
Fingerprint: 0x4f33fa15
+25 to Life
+69% Enhanced Defense
Damage Reduced by 16
Magic Damage Reduced by 12
+125 Maximum Durability
+279 to Defense (Based on Character Level)
2: Rockstopper
Sallet
Defense: 193
Durability: 14 of 18
Required Strength: 43
Required Level: 31
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x680d0f93
+15 to Vitality
+207% Enhanced Defense
Damage Reduced by 10%
Fire Resist +23%
Lightning Resist +22%
Cold Resist +23%
30% Faster Hit Recovery
3: Insight
Bec-de-Corbin
'RalTirTalSol'
Two-Hand Damage: 76 to 450
Durability: 28 of 28
Required Dexterity: 81
Required Strength: 123
Required Level: 27
Polearm Class - Normal Attack Speed
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x3a8ea385
+5 to Strength
+5 to Energy
+5 to Dexterity
+5 to Vitality
+255% Enhanced Damage
+9 to Minimum Damage
Adds 5-30 fire damage
+75 poison damage over 5 seconds
23% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
+2 to Critical Strike
35% Faster Cast Rate
181% Bonus to Attack Rating
+2 to Mana After Each Kill
Level 13 Meditation Aura When Equipped
Ethereal (Cannot be Repaired), Socketed (4: 4 used)
Ral Rune
Inserted into a Bec-de-Corbin
Adds 5-30 fire damage
Required Level: 19
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Tir Rune
Inserted into a Bec-de-Corbin
+2 to Mana After Each Kill
Required Level: 13
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Tal Rune
Inserted into a Bec-de-Corbin
+75 poison damage over 5 seconds
Required Level: 17
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Sol Rune
Inserted into a Bec-de-Corbin
+9 to Minimum Damage
Required Level: 27
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Continuing with the necro and it was time to prepare for Lower Kurast. I needed some decent faster run/walk boots (at least 30% anyway) and a Ko rune to complete the Harmony runeword. I ran Hell Pindleskin and finally got some Natalya's Boots to drop, by which time I was up to level 85. Customary witness protection program picture:
Never found that Ko rune but I figured why not just find it in LK. Incidentally I didn't find a Ko rune until over 500 runs in but luckily a couple of Lums and a flawed amethyst dropped early on which were cubed up.
I don't mind LK running too much, but re-rolling maps is deathly boring. I found a 7/10 linear style map which I was reasonably happy with and decided to run it for a while. Runs were around 33 seconds including a lot of clickables each run, including an armor rack right by the waypoint that I noticed would occasionally drop a shako. The rate seemed something around 10-15% which (I think) meant that with average luck he would have a golden shako by the time the runes for enigma had been collected.
Not 200 runs in and it actually happens...
Followed swiftly by this dream crushing moment...
Got to love this game sometimes!
Last time I did this grind on the hammerdin I was done with Enigma by 1900 runs. So far I'm 1000 runs in and have 3x Ohms, 1x Vex and 1x Ist. No Bers, no Surs. Having HotO and CtA locked up already is nice and everything but not really why I'm here, where are the big runes!
I'll continue with this map a while longer and see if I can get a real golden shako to drop.
Well, started yesterday, picked up build i've never played beyond Normal difficulty - Fury/Feral rage Wolf - so this should be lots of fun...So yes, You can count with Sucell as non LK partner for Stevesy
I just registered and am about to start a char as well (HC of course ). Staying away from LK sounds fun!
I am thinking about choosing either a Sorc (no Enigma needed, I like Blizzard and maybe Lightning later) or Necro (Bone, versatile and quite safe, but powerful enough?).
@Irenicus_Mfs Great !!! Like I said in your intro thread, I'd go with a Blizz Sorc. You can keep her Blizz until lvl 98, at which point drops may point you to either lightning or fire for the last level at Nihl. Or, since this is HC, just stay Blizz until the end and do CS from 98 to 99 as well.
I'm still undecided for Grapelike when it comes to the one question: to LK or not to LK. We'll see when I get there. If I already have a weapon or weapons with which I can farm Meph just fine, chances are really high that I'll skip LK alltogether.
@RIP Cool, good luck !! Fury Wolves are a lot of fun. Remember that weapon speed is (almost) everything for a Shapeshfiter. Early on Steel is awesome, and you can upgrade weapons as you go, as Tir and El runes aren't that hard to come by.
@PhineasB That's tough luck. I hope that you'll get that 35% fcr Spirit soon. As it always happens, you only get 35% fcr fast when you don't need it. Like Grapelike for example, who only uses it on switch to buff BO, and got this on his second Spirit Sword:
I so wanted that this would have been a lower fcr one, and yours was 35% fcr on second try. Just think that you'll have a lot of luck when it comes to other drops .
Speaking of Grapelike ... he has finished NM ...
... and with a very nice quest drop to boot:
I tried it out briefly, but obviously the Insight Partizan I had been able to make outperformed it due to the maxed Polearm Mastery. Since I didn't think that respeccing just for this drop would be worth it, I just stashed it. Still not entirely sure if I should respec instead, since I should have respecs enough on this char (one to spec into Sword Mastery once I get Grief, maybe one more if I do Nihl for the last level and want to get Concentrate).
Anyway, overall I just rushed through NM after my last update. I wanted to try a few Andariel runs, mainly for xp (but you never know what drops in the process), since I got a very good map on her, but I was getting wrecked too often even on /p3, mainly due to low life and mana leech (and a lot of mana burners ), so I gave in rather quickly and just proceeded. At that point I had already suffered 4 additional deaths (bringing my total to 5). I just still have to get used to not being able to pot when whirling. And here I thought it would be possible to do this without any deaths at all .
Andy did drop a Manald Heal on my second run, so that helped quite a lot with mana management. I got a Ko from the Forge. Nothing else noteworthy happened before I reached Pindle. From then on I did Eldritch and / or Pindle runs. Initially on /p3, but after a Lem (Treachery BP) and a 4os Partizan (Insight) dropped, I could up that with easy to /p5 and also didn't have any further deahts (I had another two before that ). After a while I didn't do Eldritch anymore, but just Pindle. After maxing Polearm mastery and WW I also started putting a few points into FI, so I could do at least a little horking. The rest of the points went into BO, and a few into Natural Resistance.
Grapelike is currently level 70. I might proceed into Hell next time, but if xp still comes in fine, I'll probably gain another level or 2 at NM Pindle.
When it comes to ShouldBeEasy, the update is short: I finally broke the spell, after 527 runs without a Pul+ (or even Lum+ I think):
So yeah, still plugging away at LK, 4230 runs in. But now that I broke the spell, the Sur will follow soon. Right? Right !!
@RIP - Nice! Sounds like an awesome char, will be following closely.
@Irenicus_Mfs - welcome! Blizz is my advice as well. As T said it will carry you easily until 98, and can farm AT/Meph/Pindle/LK/Trav very easily in the meantime without too much thought. At 98 you can take stock of what gear you have and respec to whatever you want. Pure Blizz, pure Fire, pure Lightning, or any combination of those have all been proven quite versatile and efficient for that last level. I hear the coolest kids do Blovas, btw.
@T72on1 - Nice progress! Barbs are a bit weird for mid-game leveling, but I'll be watching what you do and where you get your XP from to see what I'll do with Stevesy. Speaking of Stevesy, he has made some progress but not enough for an update yet. I'll likely check in with him once he's done with normal.
Well, for normal and nightmare, I once again found out that, if all you seek is efficiency, you just want to plow through to Pindle and rerun him until you can advance to the next level. Only somewhat necessary stops could be targets like Countess if you need certain runes. The upside of a WW Barb is you can always progress, even when things are blocking your way . You just whirl through. If you kill them in the process, nice. If not, you still got by .
Note that this is full efficiency mode. I still kill boss packs while advancing, since gear upgrades have to come from somewhere, and it allows me to not be too low a level for Pindle, in which case it can be a struggle. Note that Eldritch provides a very good alternative if for some reason you can't do Pindle well (which was the case for my Hammerdin for example), but overall I had the impression that Pindle gives better xp if you can handle him.
For Hell, my targets might depend on drops, mood, and how well I can handle certain targets / areas. Like many people, I find Pits a very good place to level, even at /p1 if needed, but unleechable skeletons there might be somewhat of a problem. Other than that, like I've said before, I like to rerun targets if I happen upon a good map for them. Not necessarily the most efficient thing to do, but it's something I like a lot, as it gives me the feeling you never know what's going to happen, and at some point the game just seems to tell you to run target X. The way I ran Bishibosh at the very start of Normal for example.
So an update. Remind me to never level as a zerker even if that's the intended build. Geez it's slow.
Normal was a breeze as with any char, but nm went sloooow. Got to Eldritch and stayed there until lvl 68 when I got fed up with that. Up until that point I had a Rhyme in some exceptional base and a King's Grace running p3 for the most part and p5 at the end. Slow and steady wins the race. Somewhere around here I think it was I found a Minotaur which sped things up a bit at least. I also found a duriels shell which helped my res. My might merc got an Insight Poleaxe around this time as well, or maybe at the very start of hell.
When I got to Hell I rushed on to the Countess to start farming runes for an Oath. Still things were really slow. No thoughts about going higher than p1 here. I also started doing some really slow pitruns just for some change and the chance for some better drops. Finally I dropped an elite 5-socket base, a Scourge, to make an Honor and also a Lava Gout to help with AR and dmg to undead which sped things up a bit more.
Finally I settled on the Honor and could move on. I just now reached LK, which I'm highly thinking about skipping since everybody else seems to be jumping on that train, we'll see depending on drops. I'll probablt be going back to Countess/pits soon, perhaps just grab Izual and Hellforge first. Hopefully I can find the runes for an Oath soon since I already have a phase blade to put it in.
I also found 2 4-socket swords and made Spirit so I have them for BO switch and for my 1-point hork. Just to rub some salt in some wounds, the first one was 35% right off the bat. The second 29.
My other gear overall isn't much to cheer for, Sigons belt and Helm, a Res ammy some AR rings and a pair of rare boots with some FRW, 19% MF and some cold and fire res.
I found a wizzy as well which I guess will come in handy once I've lucked out on a Jah and a Ber some time in the next 6 months
I'm a bit suprised that the only unique ring I've found is a Carrion wind.
Yeah, think I will add myself into this. No idea what character to play. I have no real preference if I'm being honest as it's gonna be a long slog anyway. It will be hardcore
As I'm so indecisive, let's start a wee poll. Open for 12 hours, and a straight tally on class.
I must admit I'm not really sure what that means. You want us to vote for builds, or class only? I'm sorry, the phrasing is probably very clear, as a non-native english speaker I just don't know what exactly you want me to vote on: build, character class only, something else?
It definitely depends on what you like really. Getting to 99 takes long, better take a character you will enjoy. So caster, melee, ranged, ... ? Also, will you allow respecs to spec into a completely different build or not? That makes a big difference.
Btw, great to see yet another player join. Crazy amount of people still running, a lot of new entrants too. What's not to love?
@Bobbo I wouldn't make Oath in a Phase Blade. Keep those for Grief. For Oath, you want an ethereal elite base for much higher damage.
@T72on1 right. Forgot about that indestructible mod. well, the phase blade might have to do if I haven’t found anything better by the time i have the runes. Worst case I’ll make another oath later, the runes aren’t Bers after all. On the way to 99 I guess I’ll see a couple of those
Can’t save it for grief anyway, different nummer of slots needed.
Edit: fixed a typo..
Also, any specific bases that are extra recommended? Colossus blades? As I’m aiming for grief in the long run, I don’t want to look for a base for oath until after I’ve found the Lo for grief
On the upside, Druids can have rather high hitpoints thanks to maxed Oak Sage. A Grizzly also makes for a very good tank if you put some points into Dire Wolves to increase it's hitpoints. Hurricane slows enemies and Cyclone Armor adds elemental absorb. So you have some stuff to keep you alive.
The initial going might be slow though, because it takes a while to reach Tornado and a bit more to make it somewhat strong. Once you get hour hands on a Spirit Sword and especially Insight for your merc, progress should be smooth though .
On the upside, Druids can have rather high hitpoints thanks to maxed Oak Sage. A Grizzly also makes for a very good tank if you put some points into Dire Wolves to increase it's hitpoints. Hurricane slows enemies and Cyclone Armor adds elemental absorb. So you have some stuff to keep you alive.
How do you keep your Oak Sage alive in Hell? I have a Fury Druid that made Guardian (lvl 85), but did so without either Oak Sage or HoW because they were such a hassle to keep recasting....
Also, any specific bases that are extra recommended? Colossus blades? As I’m aiming for grief in the long run, I don’t want to look for a base for oath until after I’ve found the Lo for grief
Colossus Swords are the go-to IIRC, though you might want to double check that. Also, I wouldn't worry a ton about it since they are just interim weapons anyways and you can drive yourself nuts looking for specific bases untwinked. Any elite base with decent speed should be just fine.
Basicbhoy said:
So druid it is. Think I'll go windy style and see how he goes. Never really played druids before so this will be interesting (and most likely short)
Nice to see another HC Druid join the ranks! Windys are great, and as @T72on1 said they can be quite safe with proper playstyle. Good luck!
sanguillen said:
How do you keep your Oak Sage alive in Hell? I have a Fury Druid that made Guardian (lvl 85), but did so without either Oak Sage or HoW because they were such a hassle to keep recasting....
I haven't really had an issue with keeping it alive with Klaus. Especially once you get enigma and the merc and bear are teleporting around with you, enemies tend to focus on them (and Windys themselves, since they are usually in the fray). That said, there will still be lots of recasts, but it hasn't been too annoying for me.
The decision has been made and Morgana has started her journey! She is currently doing some tower runs (WP and tower located directly next to each other ) and will continue from there.
I am unsure, if I will keep the Ancients for lvl 98 and want to be as careful as possible with my resets. Therefore she is currently more "meleeing" (Is that a term?) than anything else. Not sure, if I will go for FO/Ball or Blizzard with a tiny bit of Firewall first.
More thoughts on her development to follow.
@Basicbhoy: Good luck with your druid! A Windy was also a consideration for me and I am curious to see his journey.
Edit: First U/S dropped and it is an item that I did not manage to find the last couple of years. If that's not a sign, I do not know what is.
Oak sage, carrion vine and grizzly one point wonders
Points after all that to cyclone armour.
Would think until insight acheiced with Merc, Windy will have a rather unhealthy addiction to blue juice.
Thinking defiance Merc would be fine until nightmare where holy freeze comes in. Only issue then would be CI/PI so may need to look into that before I get to far into hom
Also, any specific bases that are extra recommended? Colossus blades? As I’m aiming for grief in the long run, I don’t want to look for a base for oath until after I’ve found the Lo for grief
The runes for "Oath" aren't terribly time-consuming to acquire, but OTOH, IMO, it would be a shame to waste them in a non-ethereal base type. I prefer faster base types, and I've made two: Eth Champion Sword and eth Feral Axe. I'm quite pleased with both.
Cool! It is a fun build for sure, and it is quite safe if you are patient. I'd recommend getting some sort of teleport as soon as you start relying on your tornados. It is so much easier to set it up for doing good damage that way, though I play SC and can be a lot more aggressive with my positioning.
sanguillen said:
How do you keep your Oak Sage alive in Hell? I have a Fury Druid that made Guardian (lvl 85), but did so without either Oak Sage or HoW because they were such a hassle to keep recasting....
I don't. Recast pretty often, but it is worth it and easy to spot dangerous situations for it. It does seem to have a lot bigger apetite for the action than it should have considering its fragility.
My first Oath tends to go in a BB, mostly out of habit from my old Bnet concentration barbarian, and I would recommend that for a barb. However, I believe that some people go for one of the axes, I can't remember which - silver-edged?
Wow, this thread is so active! Awesome going all! And welcome to any new ones.
Quick update:
Coke has defeated Normal! Definitely not fast, but quite easy anyway. My main (and only) leveling spot was Pindle, who was nice enough to drop me a Spineripper, which should help venturing deeper into NM for quite some time. I'm keeping my eyes mainly on swords though, decided to go with my planned-to-be mastery from the start, cause I really want to save my respecs for later time.
Best drop of the normal:
Sweet! It was dropped from the special chest inside the hut in the Blood Moor, just outside the town. I definitely did NOT put this one into use, it was muled away. I haven't muled any items back yet. Not sure will I keep that way or not.
Just wanted to fix the table. Hopefully, the problem with my game freezing has been fixed. Went 1 ½ hours last night without a glitch. I'll do some more updating along with some interesting finds.
Ok so belgarath the windy is rocking his way normal. Level 30 and in the flayer jungle. Man it's slow going. Currently rocking a crystal sword with two tir in it for mpk and have stealth in a rubbish armour. My Merc is just about ready to use the savage bill i rolled for him. Had two uniques drop but nothing of great interest.
Is there a blue potion aholic group available? And does anyone know how to aim Tornados?
Tornados can be aimed, just not with precision. Cast rate is important because you want that pulse damage ticking as much as possible.
Grape said:
Wow, this thread is so active! Awesome going all! And welcome to any new ones.
Quick update:
Coke has defeated Normal! Definitely not fast, but quite easy anyway. My main (and only) leveling spot was Pindle, who was nice enough to drop me a Spineripper, which should help venturing deeper into NM for quite some time. I'm keeping my eyes mainly on swords though, decided to go with my planned-to-be mastery from the start, cause I really want to save my respecs for later time.
Best drop of the normal:
Sweet! It was dropped from the special chest inside the hut in the Blood Moor, just outside the town. I definitely did NOT put this one into use, it was muled away. I haven't muled any items back yet. Not sure will I keep that way or not.
Some more progress with Ric, now at two thirds of the level and counting down from less than 100m to go:
In terms of drops since 98.5, nothing useful for him but quite solid:
Azurewrath #3 for him
Cranium Basher #2
Couple of HRs:
Decent MF tri-res boots:
Stone Crusher #4
2% off perfect
Not pictured:
Mal
Sparking GC #7
Entrapping GC #9
46 MF War Traveler
63 life Waterwalk
3/13/14 Eschuta's
I've been meaning to roll another CtA to try and improve over his +3 BO, but until now somehow Nihl seemed to enjoy dropping Los and Jahs more than in the ~Ist-Ohm range. After the Vex drop above we did some cubing and went for a third try:
Above average at least, which is more than my Sorc could have said until her 5fth try even. When the Ohm dropped a little while after the Vex I considered rolling another one, but the +4 BO roll seems good enough for Ric so he'll stick with that. Hopefully soon and he will not have to worry about his life after all.
With the new CtA, and having dropped Gheed's for mor life SCs as stated in my last post, I reshuffled a little bit and swapped in BKWB for one of the two Dwarf Stars. He now has 3200 life, around 300 more than with the previous setup. For the highest damage CEs from Nihl, the mitigation provided by one extra Dwarf Star is ~230 (or ~340 when under Conviction), so the additional life pretty much balances out up to one really nasty CE. The advantage is the +2 skills from BKWB plus casting BC again. Overall it doesn't make much of a difference, but I figured in the long run the slightly higher PN damage will deliver the first corpse a tiny bit faster on average. I've been running with this setup for ~20m now without any issues so I think I'll stick to it.
Last update I had reached LK (but hadn't done the flayer dungeon yet). I was going to push through to Act 4 to get the skills from Izual, but I chickened out and went back to act 1. Rolled a map that's fantastic for the countess and might be above average for the pit, the layout is nice, but I haven't assessed the density yet, I'm hopeful though.
I'll probably mostly run the countess for a while now to get Treachery for the merc and the runes for Oath for myself. I'll mix in some pits if nothing else for the exp. I'm still running sub-50 on MF so I'm not counting on many golden drops, but at least that might help me find decent bases for Oath and a better insight for the merc who's currently running with a poleaxe. Thanks btw for the suggestions on oath bases.
I've improved my resistances quite a bit so I'm reasonably safe. A String or a stormshield and an Arreats wouldn't hurt though, but as I stated, with my current MF I'm not counting on any miracles there
My current problem is attack rating which is I think just shy of 7k or just above 7k with the enchant proc from lava gout.
I could respec to get more points into my mastery, but as I'm currently on the wrong weapon type compared to my planned endgame, I want to save that for later. I might do a respec for axes if that's the base I find for Oath while waiting for Grief but I'd rather find a decent sword base in which case I'll respec right away.
I'm not sure on whether to max masteries or not though, any suggestions there? If I haven't counted terribly wrong I guess I could max zerk, BO, Howl, and either mastery or shout and almost max the other of those two. I think I'll skip war cry which I seldom use so the uncertainty on how much can go into the last of the aforementioned skills basically boils down to how much I put into natural res and hork. But is it considered better to max shout or mastery for a HC zerker?
7K sounds nice. I'm at act 1 Hell too, and mine is far lower (typical for a WW Barb, I guess). I use Battle Cry a lot, which resolves most, if not all CTH issues. So as long as your merc doesn't have Reaper's, which CTC Decrep you don't want to overwrite with BC, I'd just use that, and your CTH should be fine. In that respect, I wouldn't put more points into Mastery if you still have to respec to another one.
Maxing Shout or Mastery for endgame depends, but since you'll be able to put quite some points into the one you don't max, I'd go for maxing Shout. It gives you more damage, while Mastery, at least at higher levels, almost doesn't give any additional CS and you might not need the AR if you use BC.
Mostly to stay safe now I just use Howl and Taunt though as I don't leech and really don't want to get swarmed, I mostly howl and run past most trash so having them feared when I run into a boss pack really helps with survivability. Maybe I should kill more trash just for the exp at my relatively low lvl (76 I think) but it feels more satisfying to do more runs than to kill everything one mob at a time.
My first and hopefully not last Sucells journey update...
Just finished Normal difficulty, much easier adventure then i've expected, Fury Druids seems to be much more powerfull then i remember or i might be slightly better player...Anyway Ball has been defeated and Cow area cleared
This has been only rune higher then Thul, during entire Normal adventure, but i guess Nightmare Countess will pay for it
Not much to say about journey otherwise, pretty straight run forward except few Countess, and lately Eldritch and Pindle runs
Started with Steel Large axe, replaced it with Superior Steel Large axe and lately by Steel Great axe...I'm really not Druid expert, but i guess that Oath in Eth Feral axe is something i need to aim for in the distant future, so already pumping Strenght to meet the requirement as early as possible, if necessary
As for starting at Nightmare, my resist were really bad, so i need to improve them badly...
Atma's Scarab
Amulet
Required Level: 60
Fingerprint: 0x3b5a48d2
Item Level: 75
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
5% Chance to cast level 2 Amplify Damage on striking
20% Bonus to Attack Rating
Adds 40 Poison Damage Over 4 Secs (100 Frames)
Poison Resist +75%
Attacker Takes Damage of 5
+3 to Light Radius
1:1300 chance to find it from Andy; Took me about 300.
Back to CS/Diablo for me~
E: After trying it out... I'm thoroughly disappointed. I think a Lacerator on switch would be a much better/reliable approach. Thanks to @NanoMist for suggesting; and reminding me of the mid-flight weapon swap trick to proc Amp with GA. /E
After a slow start due to not putting more than one point into any skill I decided to go for a FO/FB build for the initial playthrough. After that it will be Blizzard only for the first reset.
Morgana is currently lvl 53 and has done the Anya quest in Nm. After a long way to lvl 30 nightmare was a breeze, as it is for most characters. An 4os long sword enabled Spirit and an Insight was just made for her bodyguard (A2 normal, Prayer).
Hightest rune so far: Lum
Best U/S: Magefists and 29% Nagelring
Next up are Mephisto and Pindle runs. Especially in hardcore I do not like rushing too much. Therefore it might take some time before Morgana enters hell difficulty.
Still running 44 mf so I’m not expecting anything fancy... been running the countess waiting for a mal and a pul, did get 2 um so the mal can be cubed at least. But back to rng... got a semi-stable rack for heirophant trophies and a not-so-stable rack for gilded shields... guess what happened... no screenies unfortunately, but both of those have yielded golden results.
What irks me tho is that this untwinked thingie has got me not feeling like doing anything twinked now... I think I’ll reconsider tho, since it would be a shame to let the Zak go to waste. I guess I’ll have to do some build which definately won’t get to 99 so I can twink away
We surely could fill books over books with stories about RNG
Like mine from todays CS runs with my hammerdin. I did ~ 100 runs and had 2 unique wirefleeces drop back to back after not showing for at least 3 months. It's ... stupid. It's ridiculous. And it's what keeps me running
Honestly it's an extremely good item with super rare stats. If you're lucky and get 2 sockets from Larzuk, this may be the best AT Blizzy weapon I've seen around here (not sure about the old schoolers though). Damage second only to Death's Fathom and not that far behind, while allowing for 2 Ist runes for higher MF than DFathom. And with two facets it can get somewhat close to DFathom in terms of damage output as well. Plus ES and eth for style.
Honestly it's an extremely good item with super rare stats. If you're lucky and get 2 sockets from Larzuk, this may be the best AT Blizzy weapon I've seen around here (not sure about the old schoolers though). Damage second only to Death's Fathom and not that far behind, while allowing for 2 Ist runes for higher MF than DFathom. And with two facets it can get somewhat close to DFathom in terms of damage output as well. Plus ES and eth for style.
Wow i thought it was good; didn't think it was that good.
Thought there was an unbreakable wall between +cold dmg% and +skills for blizzards...?
Anywho. The good old complaining seems to be doing its job. Or the game must have some voice recognition hidden in there somewhere. Second CS run of the night.
Code:
Lacerator
Winged Axe
Throw Damage: 21 - 183
One Hand Damage: 33 - 171
Quantity: 92
Required Level: 68
Required Strength: 96
Required Dexterity: 122
Fingerprint: 0x5cf977b4
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
33% Chance to cast level 3 Amplify Damage on striking
+30% Increased Attack Speed
206% Enhanced Damage
33% Chance of Open Wounds
Prevent Monster Heal
Hit Causes Monster to Flee 50%
Replenishes quantity
It's more or less +1 skill = +5% CSD. It is lower damage, but if it gets two sockets that means +30 MF, while not being far behind DF in terms of damage output. Enough for me to use it over DF on an AT Blizzy if I had something like that. With two facets instead of Ists, damage output would be pretty much equivalent to a low roll DF, which is not too shabby either.
Kitteh said:
@Bewitch Seems to have disappeared since 99 Phineas needs some competition.
Finally have got round to adding my druid in to the table so hope have not mucked it. Levelled through the CS up to 40 to increase my power and pick up enough amethysts to socket a sword with the aim of getting Spirit. First time, 34%FCR for my windy. Happy with that. It also gave the bonus of plenty of practise with my tornados. Starting to get the hang of them and boy are they powerful, Diablo didn't stand a chance.
Next target is a 4os Polearm for Insight and a Shael for Rhyme.
Another 10 levels today thanks to Pindle. Belgarath the windy druid is now lvl50. Now rocking Ancients Pledge, Stealth and Spirit. Pindle was kind enough to drop Frostburn for me, massive help with mana issues. Still looking for a Sol and a PAmmy to make insight.
ShouldBeEasy gained another level, and is now level 92 !!
After last update, I did some 100 more LK runs, but when I still didn't get anything above Pul (even above Dol to be precise), I was so tired with it (and with myself always complaining about it), that I decided to start running other areas and actually killing stuff again, even if that meant I was doing something quite inefficient in the larger scale of things when it comes to getting to 99.
At first I did /p8 Pit runs again. In one of the first runs I got a 39% all res Sacred Targe, which is very close to my ideal endgame base for Spirit (45% all res Sacred Targe). I was tempted to use a socket quest on it, to be sure I was getting 4os, but in the end I decided to use the cube recipe. 50% chance to get 4os is not bad, right? Right, but in this case wrong, as I got 3os . In hindsight, I should have just used Larzuk, as I'll probably only really want to socket 2 items (Shako and merc's helm). But since there's also a chance that I'll be using Reaper's on my Merc if I find it and don't really need the mana regen from Insight (which is likely, given my own experience so far and that from @Kitteh with his CS Hammerdin), I didn't. Ah well, more Sacred Targes will drop.
Xp gain from Pits wasn't as good as I figured it would be, and nothing of interest dropped, so I gave CS a try. Despite the fact that Diablo himself dies rather fast on /p8, it was too slow to be worth it overall. So after some more thought I decided to give /p3 Travincal runs a try. To my surprise that actually worked pretty well. Obviously slow compared to teleporting characters, but in terms of killing power and especially survivability, it worked better than expected. Well, not for my merc, who only had 5% LL from an Undead Crown and died way too often. So I mainly did the runs without him, until a Tal's Mask dropped, doubling his LL and significantly increasing his chances to live. In between, when the 4 Full Rejuvs in my belt were all used, I did /p8 Eldritch runs to get my stock up again.
While still rerolling maps for Travincal, I got this nice little present on one of the very first runs:
I'll take the roll .
After not too much time I settled on a map where part of the Council spawned in front of the entrance to the temple, the others to the left on the balcony, but usually coming over to the centre quite fast as well. Especially in the first part of the road to 92, I got quite some goodies. These ones very early on:
My first facet, a -3/+5 poison one, and then this green amulet:
Indeed ... obviously you get a Tal's amulet early on when you are not playing a Sorc. Gotta love rng .
Btw, you'll notice these screens being taken in Act 3. The reason was I was often casting a tp and taking the WP to Act 4 for slightly faster runs. The Council drops scrolls of TP often enough to do so. If I ran out of scrolls, I'd just S&E and run through Act 3 town the next time.
Other goodies I got were the Tal's Mask I mentioned (followed by another one not much afterwards), Laying of Hands, Bonehew, Kelpie Snare (which might be useful if I want to do any Meph runs, I think), and then some more of which I took pictures:
Slightly higher MF than on my current boots, so they might replace them when I get Enigma and meet the strength requirement.
My first TC3.
And then this one from a random boss pack, at the other end of the TC spectrum:
Just before reaching level 92 I also got my second facet: a -5/+5 cold one.
After hitting level 92 I needed a change of pace. Since the map I had for Travincal wasn't that good, I decided to reroll and do some RoF Superchest runs, killing monsters when I encountered a boss pack or when needed to reach the superchests. I got the good map after only a few minutes, so that was nice. Only a few runs in, I popped my third facet, a -4/+5 fire one:
So far so good. I'm not sure how I'll continue with ShouldBeEasy though. Although the chances are small, I had obviously hoped that the Council would drop a Sur, Ber or Jah. Even a Lo would have gotten me really close to Enigma. I'll probably do some more RoF runs, but after that I'll have to decide. Travincal and Pits can net me some goodies, but when it comes to xp, I won't gain much there. So I'm afraid it will be either CS walks or LK again, as much as I hate it.
As for Grapelike, he has made some minor progress too. After last update, I did more Pindle runs with him, to get him to level 73. After that I moved on to Hell.
Despite good resistances, it was hard. Even on /p1. The problem is that I only have minor sources of life and mana leech, but my weapon, an Insight Partizan, obviously isn't cutting it anymore. This doesn't only give problems killing stuff, but also staying alive, as leech is too low to keep me alive and keep my mana bulb full.
Because I was struggling, I was hoping that I could run a map with a superunique next to the waypoint (Bishibosh, Rakanishu or Treewood). After some time I got Rakanishu to spawn next to the waypoint, but even on /p3 it just didn't work. So I progressed a bit more, to the Countess, as she looked like she could be an interesting target. I rerolled maps and did some runs, but again, those are hard as well. Also no good runes. I did get a Lem in early Act 1, so that's a start .
So with Grapelike I'll also have to decide how to continue. I can keep on doing Countess runs and hope for good runes and good bases (I get a weapon rack on the third floor on my current map). If those bases are Polearms and I can make Insight or Obedience in it, I can continue with my current spec. If those are other bases and they are Swords, I can respec into my final Mastery, Swords, already. Even two lowly Honor runewords, made in elite bases, would probably beat my current spec. If those are any other base items, I'll have to decide if it's worth it to respec, knowing that I'll have to do another respec later on. I still haven't used any of my respecs, so that's definitely an option.
I have a Ko and a Lem rune in my inventory as hightest runes. So I could also make a Lawbringer. Question is: what would give me highest damage: the Decrep from that weapon triggered by an Act 5 merc, or the Might aura from my merc. If they are on par with each other, the former would definitely win, due to the added safety. Or instead I could make a second Treachery, so my merc also has one. He dies a lot now, so the extra resists and DR% would definitely be welcome.
A last option I just realized I have, going through Grapelike's current Atma report, is the Ribcracker that dropped from Baal. I wasn't too impressed when trying it out briefly, compared to the Insight Partizan. Then again, that was with maxed Polearm Mastery, not Mace Mastery, and on a higher player setting, where CB doesn't make that much of a difference. So that could definitely be an improvement, certainly when I would luck out on a Pul to upgrade it.
So what do you guys think my best option with Grapelike is? Which areas to farm? Thanks.
@T72on1 Through the 70's i've been doing lots of countess runs, killings boss packs along the way, also some pits and lately a bit of eldritch. It's slow going, but as long as there's a secondary goal apart from leveling (runes for Oath from the countess mainly) I don't mind the slow going, aside from Eldritch on p3 it's all been on p1. But as I'm more of a sniper howling at everything than a steamroller collecting packs since I don't leech, I guess it's a bit of a different story.
I'm running with an honor scourge, but as there's no ias on them I guess that's not an option for you either.
If you can get through act2 I guess you could howl yourself through the jungle to get to LK and try to roll some elite polearm or sword racks.
As for my own progress, I'm currently at 78, pushing 79 soon. I just got finished with the countess building up for an Oath after finally finding a Pul (had 2 um since before) so now it's a matter of finding something to put them in. I'm contemplating either rolling a decent pit map and killing trash until I get something one-handed with 4 sockets or rolling some racks in LK for some elite sword. Not sure if that counts as skipping LK though, I guess it does as long as I stay away from p7 chests.
Countess with killing boss packs along the way was my plan as well. Problem is that I can't cope with most of the boss packs either. I guess I should use Howl more. That should solve at least some problems.
To be clear: I don't mind slow either. I just had the impression that even those /p1 hardly were manageable. I'll try some more I guess. I'd definitely be happy with an Honor Scourge .
Well then, howl and taunt as much as you can and roll a countess map where you get at least one weapon rack on the way down there. Also remember the racks in lvl 5 and eventually you'll get something elite to put honor or insight in, or if you've been lucky with the runes, oath.
Hmm funny you literally say 'remember the racks in level 5' ... because that's exactly what I didn't do . For some reason I only remembered the chests from the side rooms in level 5, making me skip them.
Depends on what you want to imbue ... Circlets, weapons, armor ... . In general, people tend to imbue Circlet type items, because for other slots you want runewords or S/U most of the times, and also because they can get such great mods (+2 skills / 20% fcr / res all). If that is what you are looking for, check this answer in a thread about imbues. Lots of good information about imbues, and when certain much wanted mods can be rolled when using the imbue quest. +2 skills for example can roll on any Circlet type when clvl > 83. Check the last lines in that post for all the exact numbers.
I don't think I ever imbue anything else than Circlet type items on my twinked characters, and only when I can get thsoe juicy +2 skills / 20% fcr. In this particular case, it might be different though. If your planned endgame gear certainly is runewords and S/U, there is no use in keeping your imbue quests though, and you might to have a go at them to have an easier time gearing up. Even then, I'd go for Circlet type items though, as your Windy (it's a Windy you are doing, right?) would probably benefit most from those. Other item slots are more easily covered through runewords and crafts. Another option are Druid pelts.
If you think you might need a fcr circlet as endgame gear to reach a certain breakpoint, I'd hold on to your imbues and use them at endgame only.
Thanks for that @T72on1. I'll have a read of that thread. I don't think I'll need fcr if I can get the rings I'm after. From what I have read, the dream spirit would be a potential option to imbue later on. Will have a look at my planning and FCR before I decide .
For me, the LK misery continues. Another 1000 runs since the last update, found the following:
1x Ohm
2x Vex
3x Gul
3x Ist
So now the total is 2000 runs without anything above Ohm. Motivation is decreasing!
That armor rack did drop another golden shako though...
... non-eth this time :>
Now that's dropped I may roll another map, not that this one is bad but after 2000 runs without any progress towards Enigma I'd quite like a change of scenery.
Thanks for that @T72on1. I'll have a read of that thread. I don't think I'll need fcr if I can get the rings I'm after. From what I have read, the dream spirit would be a potential option to imbue later on. Will have a look at my planning and FCR before I decide .
If you can get it I think the 163 fcr breakpoint could be worthwhile. I certainly wouldn't discard the possibility. Every single gold piece I get my hands on are spent gambling +2skills/+20% fcr /good resistance circlets so I can reach the next breakpoint. I've also tried to craft 2/20 amulets as well. It will possibly be a bit more dangerous because of the stuff needed to do 163 fcr, but there is plenty of defense in a overwhelming offense!
Not much to report, just grinding on really. Highlight drops since 98 2/3 included a Ber, Azurewrath #4 and a couple of sweet rares and crafts:
Starting with the latter – pretty sure these will be used at some point:
My first overall Enchant Ormus. Not really pre-buffing it on melee Sorcs so far, but if that changes this will come in handy.
Azurewrath #4
Further S&Us of note:
Other drops:
Highlord's Wrath
2x Mal
2x MA Skiller
Trap skiller #10 (!)
+3 GMB 4os
+3 GMB 5os
Death's Guard
Sharp (7/54) GC of Strength (4)
Waterwalk 62 life
47 MF War Traveler
Marrowwalk (+2)
eth Cerebus' Bite
Despite the good progress recently things will slow down a bit now due to RL being too busy, so I don't really see him finish before Christmas – but hopefully not soon after.
@Basicbhoy Your post somehow broke the links in the first table so I re-included them (don't know exactly the cause but you can check the first post for how to keep table format).
Does anybody have an NPC they prefer to gamble from? I tend to have the best luck from Alkor in Act 3. As in, it seems he offers up the most circlets and coronets for me. I don’t have any statistics for what percentage of rings, amulets, and circlets are rare or better, but my memory seems to be of Alkor being better for that as well, but that would be acceptable since I have gambled the most from him.
One thing I am assuming is that all of them should have equal chance of everything with Clvl taken into account.
NM finished...had amazing luck with unique items (with almost 0%MF), it helped me alot...as for runes, quite the opposite - only one KO, IO and two HELs..and i'm not exactly swimming even in lower runes (SHAELs, SOLs etc)
Stats at start of Hell difficulty
Now about amazing luck with items - somewhere in Flayer jungle dropped from the random Boss Witchwild string Bow...Everyone knows, how effective this bow can be for Strafer, but did You know that this weapon is excellent Fury Druid weapo?Insane IAS thanks to two open sockets (SHAEL, SHAEL), resistances, DS per level and most importantly reliable source of Amplify dmg!Crazy effective weapon, for NM atleast..and its not even losing durability
Lately Hawkmail and Spirit shroud dropped, which means that Sucell and his companion cannot be frozen, and on top that Rattlecage for CB against tough monsters/Bosses...Just love this char, really
So NM Council are gone, Belgarath is now lvl 61 and needing to level up before going too much further. Think will run him against the council for a few more levels. That being said, I need to find a Lum to make smoke so time to run the countess first. Once I get that, I can remove my Ancients Pledge for Rhyme. I decided to go gambling tonight to try and improve my jewellery collection. 2.1M Gold later and one, ONE, useful amulet.
It really is. Brings me to 96%FCR so nearly hitting the next BP, massive help with the resists and extra damage. Don't really think I could ask for more.
Finally found one of these, haven't seen one myself before:
Not the best of rolls, but beats a normal poleaxe insight by miles.
I also finally managed to build an Oath. Now I'm doing quite a bit more damage, especially more consistent damage since the min-dmg of an honor Scourge is quite some way away from its maxdmg,... but I hit way less, under 80% chance to hit things now.
I'm back to discussing with myself whether to respec a bit more into axe mastery or if I should wait for that sweet sweet Lo rune which will get me my grief.
Edit: Tried to get a screenie of the Oath in as an edit, but it seems the file is too large... oh well, it's in an ethereal Ettin Axe
I prefer Anya in Act V, because she can also sell Assassin claws with +skills, and her inventory can be refreshed quickly via the red portal to Pindleskin's garden.
I've never found any indication of any difference between vendors for gambling. They all consistently refuse to offer me what I want.
. Good luck with the new Sorc. May she avenge Kaira_II.
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