[2018] Tournament: Set/Unique Worshippers 2017 [by jiansonz]

[Grisu]

Quick question - I found a gem shrine in Blood Moor. It won't stay a gem shrine if I S&E right? I want to use it on a topaz, but it would be nice to save it for a potential normal topaz from Andariel. I've never done Act 1 without a muling trip though...

Correct, only way to save it would be to play through to Andy without S&E.

And good luck with the Rabies Druid!

 

[Grisu]

Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,
Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth
Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth,
Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood
Changes and off he goes!) within a rood---
Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim,
Now patches where some leanness of the soil's
Broke into moss or substances like boils;
Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him
Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim
Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.

And just as far as ever from the end!
Nought in the distance but the evening, nought
To point my footstep further! At the thought,
great black bird, Apollyon's bosom-friend,
Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned
That brushed my cap---perchance the guide I sought.

For, looking up, aware I somehow grew,
'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place
All round to dire fell---with such name to grace
Mere ugly bogs and heaps now stolen in view.
How thus they had surprised me,---solve it, you!
How to get from them was no clearer case.

Yet half I seemed to recognize some trick
Of mischief happened to me, God knows when---
In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,
Progress this way. When, in the very nick
Of giving up, one time more, came a click
As when a trap shuts---you're inside the den!

Burningly it came on me all at once,
This was the place! those two shrines on the right,
Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;
While to the left, a tall scalped cliff ... Dunce,
Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,
After a life spent training for the sight!

What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?
The square squat turret, blind as the fool's heart,
Built of grey stone, without a counter-part
In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf
Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf
He strikes on, only when the timbers start.

Not see? because of night perhaps?---why, day
Came back again for that! before it left,
The dying sunset kindled through a cleft:
The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay,
Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay,---
``Now stab and end the Countess---to the heft!''

Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled
Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears
Of all the lost adventurers my peers,---
How such a one was strong, and such was bold,
And such was fortunate, yet, each of old
Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.

There they stood, ranged along the hill-sides, met
To view the last of me, a living frame
For one more picture! in a sheet of flame
I saw them and I knew them all. And yet
Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,
And blew. ``_Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came._''

Poem: "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" by Robert Browning with slight modifications (and apologies to the long dead poet for those changes).

That's the last of it, I really just wanted to get to that final line as I reached the Tower, I will go back to more literal and informative updates from now on.

Explanation: I've been thinking about writing tourney updates or a Guardian thread in poetry for a bit, but I'd rather play D2 than write about it and so never made the investment in time to do it. I'm currently reading Steven King's Dark Tower series (again) and it is partly inspired by the above poem. The snippets of the poem presented in the books, made me wonder if it would be possible to modify the poem to fit a character's D2 journey. When I read the full poem I found so many D2 references that it seemed like the poem had also inspired the D2 creators. There are references to Baal, the tree of Inifuss is there, the Cold Plains, the Dark Wood, the Black Swamp, Deckard Cain and of course the Tower. There are also quill rats and spear cats (well, water rats and feral cats) and the whole feel of the poem is similar to the dark feeling of D2. So I made a paladin called Roland and off to the Dark Tower he went, with a few words changed here and there to make the D2 connections more obvious. I also left out some parts of the poem that didn't really fit the D2 journey so well. Now that Roland has found (and cleared) the Dark Tower, he will continue on his way and I'll do a full update (without the limitations of the poetry) when we get to the end of the Act.

 

[Grisu]

Imagine how surprised I was to see that I never ever participated in one of your S/U Worshipper Tournaments, @jiansonz!

The closest thing was the Envious of the Green and Gold tournament, which was hosted by Morathi though in 2013.

And now even some of the old forumites from way back have entered (hello, @logoutzero! The crappy random character you rolled for me in 2012 ist still dead ;-) and then @ioupainmax, @Kitteh, @OldSoldier, @Drystan, even @Wolron!!!! I still try to do that Obsession tournament sept xD ... my dear, was that really in 2006? ) Good to see you all again, I'd like to give this a try.

Oberon, the "I don't know yet what I will be" Druid, Level 1, Rogue Encampment next

 

[Grisu]

Imagine how surprised I was to see that I never ever participated in one of your S/U Worshipper Tournaments, @jiansonz!

The closest thing was the Envious of the Green and Gold tournament, which was hosted by Morathi though in 2013.

And now even some of the old forumites from way back have entered (hello, @logoutzero! The crappy random character you rolled for me in 2012 ist still dead ;-) and then @ioupainmax, @Kitteh, @OldSoldier, @Drystan, even @Wolron!!!! I still try to do that Obsession tournament sept xD ... my dear, was that really in 2006? ) Good to see you all again, I'd like to give this a try.

Oberon, the "I don't know yet what I will be" Druid, Level 1, Rogue Encampment next

Grisu, you old dawg!

 

[Grisu]

I just got the first report from Jens-Rune the barbarian!


Andariel is dead.

He has huffed and puffed and horked but he still needed to kill one of the lesser evils to finaly see his first set/unique item. Might not be the most useful piece of equipment in the long run, but for now, it could have been worse.


Perfect MF Nagelring!

See you in Lut Gholein!

 

[Grisu]

My entry in this tournament, a Paladin, has made some serious progress in terms of MF. My son Andrew named the character AndrewNiteTorch, and as such Mr. Torch has found some really hopefully game changing items. See below:





The felicitous ring was the reward from Akara and takes his full time MF to 146%. We've already received quite a few charms and a Stoutnail. Woo hoo!

 

[Grisu]

Wuzhul and Kyoko ventured out in the Jungles surrounding Kurast. They had built up the magic finding somewhat better and then S/U items started to finally fall robbing them of most of their MF potential. Sszark dropped the Milabrega's Orb, Sarina dropped Isenhart's Case and Hawkmail was dropped in Sewers Level 1.



Then a boss pack in Upper Kurast dropped Isenhart's Lightbrand, so that was when Wuzhul decided to hire an Iron Wolf and send Kyoko packing for home.


After beating the Council fairly easily and shattering the Orb, they ventured down into the Durance of Hate and found Stormguild.


As you can see Mephisto dropped nothing of use and we ended up taking him down at /p8 with very little stress. Just before hitting level 3 Wuzhul swapped Rhadge (CIW) for Jabari (LIW), due to the cold spells shattering too many corpses that were needed to rebuild his army.



Wuzhul and Jabari, Pandemonium Fortress, Level 32

 

[Grisu]

Destroyer Jathnolf, level 49, NM Stony Field

Progress through Act V was easy, if slow. Goreshovel carved through the monsters well enough and after I found a second Angelic item I was able to remove Hsarus' Iron Heel to improve my Cold resistance with Sigon's Sabot while still keeping a high AR.


Not long before I got to Baal, Sigon's Shelter dropped from a random frenzytaur pack. Since I now had 3 pieces from that set I wore it for the Baal fight to get the +50% MF set bonus on the boots, figuring it was worth the drop in AR. Baal still didn't drop anything very good (the merc got the War Sword) but oh well. This is the first time I've beaten Normal with an HC character and I was chuffed.



Now in NM things are a lot slower. I've dropped to p4 to stop the game being a total crawl. I've got real mana problems and drink a lot of blue potions. I have to use Battle Cry a lot to give myself a decent chance to hit monsters because I don't want to give up that +50% MF. A handful of low end uniques have dropped, nothing useful to me so they all went into the ATMA vaults. Crushflange does my heavy hitting with Goreshovel on switch to prevent regen with Open Wounds. I think right now it's just a case of persevering until some kind of meaty weapon drops.

On the plus side this character feels fairly safe. I have high HP with maxed Battle Orders, and various war cries are great crowd control. Even if my character doesn't kill stuff quickly, I still feel I can break down any situation into manageable chunks with tactical use of Taunt, Howl and War Cry.

 

[Grisu]

Lots of progress in a few days! Congrats on not only finishing Norm in HC for the first time, but doing it with such restrictions and untwinked as well!
In terms of drops, /pl1 = /pl2, /pl3 = /pl4, etc. So you're better off on /pl3, unless you want to slight increase in monster health, damage, and experience.

@Oakbrain - I don't think the extra poison is from a Crit. I could understand the extra damage, but the poison lingers for probably at least a few minutes. I know I've tried waiting it out before, but gave up and went to heal.

@Grisu - Hello! Been a while. I don't think I was a part of that tournament. The style didn't really take my fancy. But this one popped up pretty recently, and there were many people still around (I lurked for quite some time again,) and that drew me back in.
Oh yeah, does Oberon have a human named Atticus? Or a different reference?

Is there a way to bulk-upload the screenshots? I have to do it one at a time using the Embed Image/File. I haven't had to use this feature much before.

 

[Grisu]

Goldilocks ventured into the jungles of Kurast, and didn't really run into any real trouble. She managed to find a few new Sets.
Isenheart's Case - Well, there goes all the MF. And not long after, a second Isenheart's Case to replace the previous Cathan's Mesh.
Arctic Bindings - The Cold Resist is good, but the potion storage is a bit of a pain. I'm expecting a nasty fight from Mephisto, so have stockpiled all the potions I can fit in the stash.
Cleglaw's Tooth - Not bad, I could definitely swap this with the Goreshovel for the extra damage, AR, and everything else if I can get another piece.

Goldilocks soon reached level 30, and a skill point went straight into Valkyrie. This will be simple, good tank, Azrael is doing damage with his Eth Bardiche still. Everything's lining up.

And Beserker's Hatchet... I did not want to see this. That makes two Set weapons, and one Unique weapon. I now have only the Goreshovel doing damage at the moment, as I had to strip Azrael of his weapon.

Running through the Flayer Dungeon, we came across this potentially nasty pack, but it was actually pretty harmless. It did get a couple slivers of health from the Valkyrie, but the outsiders fell quickly enough to reduce their damage significantly.


I also got this ring from Ormus. I wasn't going to use any rares as a personal rule, but after stripping Azrael's weapon, and the terrible drop in damage, I'm tempted to scrap it, and wear the ring.





Goldilocks, Level 30 Amazon, Lower Kurast, S/U Found: 9

 

[Grisu]

I just realised that my mercenary was using a 3 chipped ruby bow, thus disqualifying me, so Viridiana has withdrawn. I will re-enter at some point, but I was only at Tristram anyway

 

[Grisu]

I also got this ring from Ormus. I wasn't going to use any rares as a personal rule, but after stripping Azrael's weapon, and the terrible drop in damage, I'm tempted to scrap it, and wear the ring.

I am planning to skip the quest reward jewelry as well, as a personal rule. I'm only in the Lost City right now though.

 

[Grisu]

I am planning to skip the quest reward jewelry as well, as a personal rule. I'm only in the Lost City right now though.

Same, nothing but sockets and the green, white and gold (of Ireland!).

 

[Grisu]

@OldSoldier ! Great finds! I need to get your son to name my characters in future.

@Oakbrain congrats on reaching NM! Nicely done.

Roland has defeated Andy and moved on to Act 2.

Starting out there was an XP shrine right by the Rogue Camp, by the time the shrine expired Roland was level 4. The benefit didn't last long however, and by the time he reached the Cold Plains he was levelling pretty normally. Hit level 8 on the Cold Plains and hired Elly the Fire Rogue to keep him company. Mostly just running around hitting things with 1pt Holy Fire aura and a scepter at this stage. Javelins on switch for throwing.

His first cTopaz dropped in the Crypt. The Mausoleum dropped two more and by the time he reached the bottom of the Tower we had a full complement of 10 socketed. Had good luck buying 3os Ring Mails. Our first shopping trip at level 6 got us our first and two shopping trips later there was our second. Nice and easy.

Akara's reward was a Ring of Health, so useless I was going to sell it but changed my mind. It's not often I get to wear a ring from Akara. Countess dropped good, shame that most runes are useless.


Elly got a Hunters Bow with 3x cEmeralds, at some stage Roland got rid of the scepter and started using a Bardiche with 3x cEmeralds. When a 3os Voulge dropped in the Catacombs we put some cEmeralds in it and upgraded.

Andy of course dropped mush.


S/Us - Arctic Binding from Griswald (yes, he actually dropped something!); Pelta Lunata on the Tamoe Highlands; Arctic Furs in the Jail (a small boost to MF); Death's Guard in the Catacombs (nice to have a source of CDF, even if it is on a sash).


On reaching Lut Gholein we shopped a 3os Claymore and filled it with cEmeralds, then hire Hazade the Prayer merc and gave him the Voulge. All set for Act 2.

Roland the Avenger, Level 20, Normal Act 2, Lut Gholein

 

[Grisu]

Finished off act II fairly easy on p8. Duriel dropped Isenhart's Horns, despite my protests not to get a S/U helm..



Then picked up this handy axe at the beginning of Act III. The 4 to Mana worked out well with Fissure!


I then had a set wand drop! Yippee....


To my surprise, the 20% fcr was much better for my build!



Further along Act III i had these drop in LK along with Vidala's Fetlock. I'll keep Vidala's handy if i find anything else from the set.



I've just finished Mephy and he dropped nout interesting!

KalKunta, Level 29, Normal Act IV, Pandemonium Fortress

 

[Grisu]

I have decided that the Quest Reward Rings are off-limits for me. Given the green/gold aspect, I feel it goes against the spirit for me. I want only Green and Gold (or white/grey.)

Mephisto has fallen. The first danger came from Bremm Sparkfist. I only saw a split second of it, but a single hit (with one or two lightning shards,) took Goldilocks from ~520 health down to 200's, maybe low 300's. It was somewhere around half (the red bulb was slightly lower than the half way mark, and I took a glance to see a number in the 200-300's.
Goldilocks has found several Lightning Shrines, so she ran off to find one of two Lightning Shrines in Travincal, and returned, easily finishing off Bremm.
She did the same with Mephisto, but lowering the /players setting to /players 3, only for Mephisto himself. Mephisto took a while, but posed no danger whatsoever. He killed Valkyries in seconds, and then focused on Azrael, but a few healing potions kept him topped up on life. Mephisto dropped no Sets/Uniques at all.

Full clears are no longer on the table (those Sewers...) although the small side areas are still being cleared. It's mainly just the Sewers area at the moment. Same with /players settings; I will drop that for the bosses only at this stage (starting from Mephisto.)



Finds in the later half of Act 3:

Angelic Halo - Set Ring - A nice Set Item; hopefully can combine it with another part of the set.
Razortine - Unique Trident - This is very welcome. Azrael has a weapon again.
Steelclash - Unique Kite Shield



Goldilocks, level 32 Amazon, Pandemonium Fortress, Sets/Uniques Found: 12

 

[Grisu]

Wow, quite some progress there from many of you! *thumbsup*

@OldSoldier: That's some pretty sick MF you have there!

@Grisu - Hello! Been a while. I don't think I was a part of that tournament. The style didn't really take my fancy. But this one popped up pretty recently, and there were many people still around (I lurked for quite some time again,) and that drew me back in.
Oh yeah, does Oberon have a human named Atticus? Or a different reference?

Oh, no, not that one. I didn't even know that series. Is it worth reading? The name simply came to me and is based ond Oberon, the Elf King (who, in turn, is based on Alberich from the Nibelung).

Oberon defeated Andariel without problems. I decided to go for a Fire Claw Druid - it's a compromise between a less item-dependant caster and a very hard to finish Melee character in this tournament.

Some landmarks of my journey:
Gem shrine one, two and three combined to a flawless Topaz, which is currently awaiting the fourth Gem shrine. *crosses fingers*




My Akara reward is ok, but nothing like OldSoldier's reward...

First Set dropped was Hsarus' Iron Fist, then followed by Infernal Cranium. First unique was a ring, Nagelring of course. ALthough I'd rather have zoo's one



Andariel dropped a failed Set Axe and a failed Skewer of Krinitz...the latter would have been great for my character (ML, ITD) :-(

Well, see you around!

Oberon, level 20 Fire Claw/Elementalist Druid, and Haseen, the Defiance Town Guard, Normal Lut Gholein next.

 

[Grisu]

Durbanex (level 32 Summoner Druid) has killed Mephisto and moved on. Here are his S/U's so far:

Equipped:
Isenhart's Horns
Isenhart's Case
Arctic Binding
Treads of Cthon
Nagel Ring
Cathen's Seal
Witherstring
(no amulet. or gloves)

Off-Hand:
Arcanna's Head
Gleamscythe
Angelic Mantle

Also found but not using:
another Arcanna's Head
Skewer of Krintiz
Stout Nail

So, that is 13 S/U's so far. I still need an amulet and gloves to be fully equipped. I am using a gray pair of gloves and I did use the amulet that goes with the staff of kings for a while until I had to use it for the quest.

I have been on P8 the whole way until Mephisto where I wimped out and went back to P1. He was so easy for the dire wolves that I am sure I could have gone higher, but wimps will be wimps.

I am reasonably sure that I will wimp out again on Diablo, but maybe my confidence will soar and Diablo will kill Durbanex. Time will tell.

 

[Grisu]

As expected, my new Prayer buddy had no problem killing the critters on the Foothills and the Highlands so that I could get to save the barbarians and hire one that I could equip with the mighty Bloodletter.

Almost halfway through the Foothills, Sigon's Shelter dropped. This was great, because I wanted a helm/armor with potential to last a long way to socket a topaz in. Here was one with good lightning resist (sometimes hard to come by) and with a number of good partial set combos. But I needed 10 more Strength to be able to wear it, and had no saved points at this time. It worked out perfectly, though, because Viri gained two level-ups here, the last one on Shenk himself. So now she is back up from zero to 27% MF (Perfect topaz and a Lucky charm).

I dunno if that 27% helped, if I was just lucky or simply due to that the act is so darn big (and the phenomenon with ilvls being too low for some S/Us fading out more and more) but there was quite the haul to be had during the rest of the act:

Berserker's Hatchet (Frigid Highlands)
Sigon's Shelter #2 (Crystalline Passage)
Blinkbat's Form (Bonesaw Breaker)
Sigon's Guard (Halls of Vaught)
Angelic Halo (Nihlathak)
The Chieftain (Frozen Tundra)
The Diggler (Frozen Tundra)
Cathan's Seal (Ancients' Way)
Isenhart's Case (Throne level)
Venom Ward (Baal)
Tancred's Crowbill (Moo Moo Farm)

Not much to say about the gameplay. My barbarian merc Lanth (and then Damien from WSK 3 and onward*) simply owned everything. Viri has now maxed Decoy and taken Valkrie to level 7. I'd like to keep it there for a while, because there may come a time when my merc wears MF stuff and then I don't want the Valkyrie to steal kills for him/her. A level 7 Valkyrie uses a rare Spear while a level 8 Valkyrie uses a rare Lance (around 8x higher base damage!). Of course, now that I have found Sigon's Guard, I can choose between a Valkyrie that just tanks or one that can actually kill.

Useful Valkyrie weapon mod:



Viri tried out the Chieftain. She liked it so much that she spent a hefty number of stat points to be able to wield this:



I don't usually have my band attack Achmel's pack head-on, but merc + Valkyrie were so strong that I did so here. Viri's job was to smack down those Death Mages as they kept rising:



I still have white/grey items in my gloves/belt/boots slots. All of them are Demonhide items. Gloves are ethereal (5 durability left - I have spare whites if they break).

(* Why switch mercs? I wanted to get the XP for the suicide bombers on WSK 2 so I hired a temporary Cold Iron Wolf for that level. His damage and my Chieftain were enough not to make it tedious. We failed to gain XP for only two of the bombers)


Viridissima the (still!) undecided Amazon and Damien the barbarian mecenary, level 48, NM Rogue Encampment

 

[Grisu]

Durbanex has killed Diablo and now sits in Harrogath. Yes, he too wimped out and played Diablo on P1. At that, he barely lived through it. Thanks to the level 5 Grizzley, Durbanex is still alive. As I collected the five rare and one magic item in the Diablo drop, I decided that it was probably better than burying a dead Druid. Then I noticed this circlet:

+2 to Druid Summoning skills
+1-54 lightning damage
+21-43 Fire damage
+36 life

OK, it was bad enough not getting any S/Us in the drop, but to have to set that one aside really hurts.

In case it is not obviour, Durbanex found no S/Us in Act IV, so he still stands at 15.