A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell HF!!

Ugh, must have missed the edit deadline by something like 5 mins ><

Considering the synergies and else, with that mere +4 all skills, the damage from my lightning skills has grown by nearly 50% =) I think this is the point where finally the full potential of this build is starting to show - as well as the weaknesses. I think against non-lightning immunes, she is at least as powerful as a Meteorb. However, against single targets she is weaker than Meteorb's fire spells (and obviously far weaker than something like a Blizzard sorceress). This isn't that important because first of all, she's an area runner anyway. But I find problems in her area running capabilities as well. Somewhy they've been saying that lightning immunes are rarer than cold or fire immunes. Well, it seems to me that in areas that COUNT (lvl85 areas, that is), she is still behind a Meteorb or Blizzardess. Mausoleum (and Crypt) have LI-s exclusively. The Pit has nasty LI archers, and the only thing that's FIRE immune, are the meager goblins. Ancient Tunnels has no cold immunes, thus is owned by Blizzardess. Even bloody Maggot Lair is filled with stupid LI beetles. This leaves us with Worldstone Keep and perhaps Chaos Sanctuary and cows - well, I lack experience with those :P But as far as I can tell, efficiency-wise she does not beat anyone in anything, which is probably why she's not used as much. But she is still very good, very universal (she can kill nearly anyone, even if not as fast as the specialists) and thus certainly one of the, if not *the* "best" starting single-player Softcore MF charachters. Meteorb was in my opinion slower in Normal.

I think I might make a Blizzardess next :grin: She is too overpowered MFer to not see use ^_^

EDIT: Haha, I even forgot to check what the roll was! *checks* 28% Hmmm... Well, it is more than enough anyway ^^ Luckily I had 35 unused stat points. I'm at lvl 77, I think I'll continue doing lots of LK with her while building that Blizzardess =P

The runes needed are super easy to come by.
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You'd THINK that - but I have spent all my Amns and have maybe 1 Thul ^_^ Oh god being poor is so cool :laugh:

EDIT 2: Forgot to mention that one of Pindle's lads gave me ANOTHER Heaven's Brethren's mace :/ That has got to be the most improbable duplicate so far.
 
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Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

EDIT 2: Forgot to mention that one of Pindle's lads gave me ANOTHER Heaven's Brethren's mace :/ That has got to be the most improbable duplicate so far.
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Dangoon's Teaching? My old BNET sorc has probably found 50 of those things, hehehe. :rolleyes: I don't know why they're so common.

I'm really feeling like I need not just better gear, but great gear for the lightning half of my build to be really useable. I have invested more points into the lightning tree than the cold tree, and assuming a random monster not immune to either cold or lightning, the cold skills kill way faster. Maybe it's just my imagination, but my cold/fire sorc was not having nearly this much trouble in hell... of course by act 3 hell I had found much better gear, while with this sorc I'm still soldiering on with stuff from act 3 normal. :sad2:

Anyway, updates:

Slow and careful won the day in the Claw Viper temple. I even managed to keep my merc alive, but did go through about 30 TP scrolls.
Eventually we made our way to the Summoner and sent him off to never-never land. Somewhere in the Arcane Sanctuary I found my first skiller GC... a "Graverobbers" (+1 Summoning Skills). This might be the first hint as to what type of character I shall build next (the next hint will come later).
I was concerned that Duriel would be a pain, but actually went down without too much fuss. I had to feed my merc a few purples, but that was it. Static + Blizzard + Lightning = WIN. Duriel's drop made me sad. An Isenhart's sword and a Vidala's bow.
On to act 3... No real issues here. Cleared everything up through LK. Once into Kurast Bazaar however, things got suddenly hairy. Many, many NDE's. If this was an HC character, I'd have double the gray hair after today. Eventually I gave up and decided I was going no further until I upgraded some gear! I started running the LK area, Ancient tunnels, Pits, Countess and Andy. Nothing of any real consequence dropped after many runs... And then suddenly everything changed. I started a new game, Ran LK and noticed that a HUGE amount of items were dropping as "Superior". I thought "Wow, this is odd" and kept on killing stuff. A random boss pack dropped me a Trang's Wing... (this is my second hint as to what character to build next!). I decided to go around killing as much as possible to see what was up with all the Superior items dropping. That trend held up everywhere I went! Of course I was hoping for a Superior elite light armor, such as Archon or Dusk, with 2os. Nothing like that dropped, but it was still neat to see soooo many items drop Superior.
The last place I visited that game was Countess. The reult can be seen in the following screen shot!

http://s262.photobucket.com/albums/ii104/xxn0thing/SP%20D2/?action=view&current=Screenshot008.jpg

:jig: :thumbsup:

Well, back to the grind... I gots ta get me some better gearz!!!
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Today's update...

After finding that Mal yesterday, I became a little more excited about running Countess. After about 4 runs, the armor rack that previously seemed to only drop Kurast shields suddenly popped a grey dusk shroud. I picked it up, hoping for the best...YES! 2os! Back to my stash, Nef... Lum... Smoke! Instantly my resists climbed out of the gutter and my DEF got a huge boost.

Smoke
Dusk Shroud
'NefLum'
Defense: 738
Durability: 20 of 20
Required Strength: 77
Required Level: 49
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 78
Fingerprint: 0x3e915a76
+10 to Energy
+75% Enhanced Defense
+280 Defense vs. Missile
All Resistances +50
-1 to Light Radius
20% Faster Hit Recovery
Level 6 Weaken (18/18 Charges)
Socketed (2: 2 used)

I donned the shroud, and continued the run. I decided to clear the tower as a test to see how much more survivability I'd have with the new armor. Down in tower 3, a random boss pack dropped me a Skin of the Vipermagi. Not even 60 seconds later, someone else dropped a Dark Adherant. What's this? I finaly make the Smoke, and suddenly armor is dropping left and right? :rolleyes:

Countess gave me a couple of Eld/El type runes...and a gold Amulet. I was expecting something like a Mahim-Oak Curio... bit it turned out to be...

The Cat's Eye
Amulet
Required Level: 50
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 82
Fingerprint: 0x982e436b
+25 to Dexterity
+100 Defense
+100 Defense vs. Missile
20% Increased Attack Speed
30% Faster Run/Walk

Not too shabby! Maybe save it for a bowazon.

So now I felt better equipped to continue questing. I headed back to Act 3 and cleared my way to Trav. I had a couple of scary monents in the Sewers when some of those Horadrim Ancients kept resurrecting a pack of Undead Dolls. Yikes!

Trav wasn't too bad, I managed to keep my merc alive while taking out the Council. I cleared the area around first, then tried to lure them out one by one.

Sparkles fought her way down to the Durance WP, and explored enough to find the way down to Durance 3. Looks like a decent, if not great, map for Meph running. At that point we called it a night.

Noteable finds:

Cliffkiller bow, Bloodrise morning star, Heartcarver rondel...and a white Monarch! Now I'm tempted to spend some of the 151 unspent stat points on STR and shoot for another Spirit.
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Wow, Mal, Cat's Eye, Skin, very nice! :thumbsup: Looks like you're having a lucky streak as well! :D I wonder, what player setting did you run Countess on and how many points have you invested in that Blizzard?

As far as Lightning power goes... How much FCR do you have? Because FCR *REALLY* boosts lightning skills. You can never improve the rate at which you cast Meteor or Frozen Orb or Blizzard, but with high FCR you can shoot CL thrice per second. If you think about it this way, compared to 0% FCR, 105% FCR virtually doubles your CL damage. You're probably at the 63% breakpoint I think? That means you're still looking at a whopping ~40% increase to go. And yes, to really shine the lightning tree needs some decent +skills. Go for the second Spirit, say I :) With the additional skills as well as breaking 105% FCR with a few rings,

After that Ancient Tunnels testing I decided to fill up the XP-bar before further LK-ing, so that I would not lose any experience. A smart decision: as I was moving around items in my stash in a Lower Kurast hut (intendedly only a few runs before quitting to ATMA: that's why I was sitting around moving items), a super-fast eagle boss with the orange aura sneaked in and knocked me out in 3 very fast hits before I realised what had happened >< Had the whole screen covered with inventory and cube.
Not much finds to report... Another Io. Lots and lots of various charms and gems or course. And... A yellow Shako! The plot thickens! :grin:

I've also started another charachter as promised - Blizzartek the Blizzard Sorceress. She has already reached a whopping level of 13, and is wielding various pieces of Cathan's and Sigon's set :) And despite 0% MF ALREADY she has found her first item of greatness, from Rakanishu's pack: Biggin's Bonnet! =D I will interpret this as a sign of extraordinary luck in finding Uniques, and that's exactly where she will exel ^_^ I think I'll keep Vanteress as a LK&Countess runner to satisfy my charm/gem/rune needs, and hunt S/U-s at Andy, Meph, Pindle, Pits, Mausoleum (&Crypt) and Ancient Tunnels with Blizzardtek.

A question: is it possible&legal to change the names of your charachters? I assume just renaming the save file will not work?

And another question: is there a legit way to REDUCE the durability of items? ATMA's tip of the day was smart enough to tell me "Did you know... ATMA IV no longer has any editig functions enabled". But as far as I can tell, reducing the durability of items would in no way be cheating, and I have an idea I really love that would require this function.
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Sparkles has indeed been lucky, at least where runes are concerned. I'll give the questing updates, and then give you some gear/stats/etc background.

The trip to visit Mephisto was uneventful. Thanks to the moat seperating him from Sparkles, there was no real danger, and he fell pretty quickly.

http://s262.photobucket.com/albums/ii104/xxn0thing/SP%20D2/?action=view&current=mephy.jpg

Sadly, there was nothing exciting in the drop.

Arriving in Act 4, I decided to spend a few points in STR and equip a Thundergod's. Sparkles was concerned about the possibility of encountering Gloams/Souls, not to mention Big D's lightning hose of doom attack! I also dropped down to /p1 here, since I did not feel the need for the extra EXP at this point, and wanted to get to my forge as quickly as possible.
In the end , we did not have any problems here, and Izzy fell without much of a fight. A bit of exploration revealed the stairs down to the River of Flame. Knowing this is a lvl 85 area, we cleared everything, hoping for a nice drop or two. Some random pack of monsters obliged us and left a Mal on the ground! :jig: Now I was getting really excited to see what the Forge would give up.
Hephasto gave up his hammer without too much fuss. Sparkles equipped it, and the Soulstone was smashed... I kept my finger off the ALT key, I wanted to see what dropped, but was worried I'd be dissapointed. After staring at the screen for a minute, I hit the key. There on the ground, nestled amoung a few shiny gems... an Ist. Woot!

On we battled, through the Chaos Sanctuary. Other than some IM-related issues that resulted in a large amount of gold spent on resurrection fees, we did not have any real troubles here. Sparkles stood before the final seal... and opened it. She teleported right onto Big D and started with Static. The merc went down to the first blast of lightning hose. We left him lie, knowing it would be wasted gold to resurrect him. The game of chicken began, and Sparkles handled it beautifully... Teleport, blizzard, dodge attacks... a few blue pots later, Diablo lay dead on the ground.

http://s262.photobucket.com/albums/ii104/xxn0thing/SP%20D2/?action=view&current=BigD.jpg

Oooo... a gold Truncheon... Nord's Tenderizer... Frost Zealer anyone?

On to act 5 we traveled. Things went smoothly here. We quested without drama up through the Anya quest. Then suddenly, as if someone flicked a switch, things got hairy in the Ancient's Way. Many NDE's, many merc resurrections.
I decided to take a break from questing and go do some loot runs for awhile. The Countess blessed me once again, with a Pul and an Io. A random monster in the Pits gave up another Pul. The rack near Meph gave up another white monarch. I found several good 3/4os armors, as well as a couple of good eth armors for possible future e-bugging. An eth Colossus Voulge (will socket for a massive Insight upgrade soon!).

Seems most of my luck has been with runes as opposed to items. I'm currently sitting on Io x2, Pul x2, Mal x2 and Ist x1. :thumbsup:

So right now, this is what Sparkles looks like...

Character name : Sparkles
Character type : Sorceress
Character level : 83
Character exp : 924954263

Strength : 102
Energy : 37
Dexterity : 39
Vitality : 208
Stat Points Rem : 119
Skill Points Rem: 2

Life : 735 / 578
Mana : 488 / 203
Stamina : 447 / 354

Pertinent skills:

14 Glacial Spike
20 Blizzard
2 Cold Mastery

3 Charged Bolt (synergy)
20 Lightning
20 Chain Lightning
5 Lightning Mastery

Gear:

Lore in a Superior Shako (6% Enhanced Defense)
Smoke in a Dusk Shroud
Rhyme in a Grim Shield
Spirit in a Crystal Sword (34 FCR)
Thundergod's belt
Rare light gauntlets (14 FR/22 LR/17 MF)
Rare heavy boots (13 FR/23 MF/posion length reduced 25)
Tal's amulet
Dwarf Star ring
rare ring (8 energy, 36 mana, 21 LR, 16 PR)

Charms are almost all dedicated to resists, life and mana, with some MF and FHR in there as well.

It appears, looking over everything, that I have FCR only from the Spirit sword! I haven't even hit the 48 break point....heheh. I could thrown on Magefists for 20 more, but then I'd lose significant fire and lightning resists. I can make up the lightning resists in charms, but would have to give up some MF/life/mana charms to make room. I have no fire resist charms, so I couldn't make that up.

Also, switching to a Spirit shield would lose me Fire resist... I'll just have to soldier on for now, and hope for a couple of good rare rings with resists and FCR. Soon as I get some resists on charms or rings, I'll trade in the gloves for Magefists.

What I wouldn't give for a Lidless Wall right now! I've saved all my socket quests, so I could plug a pDiamond into it if I find one.

By the way, since I had two monarchs, I gave the cube recipe a try, hoping to save my socket quests. The result: a 2os monarch... darn.

As to your questions about changing character names... I've wondered that myself! I noticed in ATMA it appears as if the name field is editable?

OK, And why on earth would one want to reduce the durability of an item???

EDIT: Countess dropped that Mal at /players 3 setting.
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Update...

It is finished.

http://s262.photobucket.com/albums/ii104/xxn0thing/SP%20D2/?action=view&current=Screenshot012.jpg

Same gear, stats and skills as listed in previous post. Baal was stingy with his drop, as you can see in the screenshot (Why, oh why is that Zakarum shield YELLOW and not GOLD???). Best find on the way to Baal: IK gloves.

:thumbsup:

Now... what kind of character to build next? Necro? Paladin? Zon? Barb? Hmmmm...
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Well done! *applauds* I still haven't visited the ancients. And OMG that luck is crazy! O_O Second Mal and a Pul from random monsters?! And where did you get that first Pul?! And I thought I'm being lucky with my LK 2xIo, Ko and Lum while my highest is still Um from the HF! :laugh:

With Vanteress I've been doing a little more LK but no find is worth a mention, apart from perhaps several white Monarchs and two more 4-socket Wire Fleeces, and of course again lots of charms&gems ^^ Meanwhile Blizzartek has killed Andy, and neared level 20. In the catacombs she found two Arctic Belts within 5 mins of each other, they're her first Set items. I don't know how to take this =P But she also got a Tal rune from a ghoul in Andy's room - didn't even know that's possible :S I've never recieved so much as an El before Act 2. ATMA tells me there's a higher probability for NM Andy dropping a Stone of Jordan >< Her Ice Blast absolutely owns but she has huge mana problems, I wish I had something with lots of sockets that I could fill up with Tirs. 4*3=12 mana per kill would just about break even with her lvl14 Ice Blast cost. Oh crikey, checking the ATMA stash, I have a 5-socket Flail! =D Haha I never thought I could be so happy over Tirs! Oh my, I wonder if I could fill EVERYTHING with them?! She'd get like 30 mana per kill! :shocked: =D

EDIT: Haha, that idea seemed so funny I had to try it. Gave her that Flail, 3-sox Kite shield and a 4-sox Gothic Plate (kept Cathan's mask for the strength from the ring for wearing Sigon's) and filled them all with Tirs (only had a couple left :D). So that's what, 24 mana per kill :laugh: It fills my bulb with 3 kills, it's hilarious XD With that Ice Blast I can mostly 1-hit kill at p5, I think I should gain XP very quickly and if I learn a kill+teleport routine I should be able to pass through quickly as well =D
 
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Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

YES! YES! YES! Vex rune from a superechest! :jig: Oh god I love Lower Kurast! :laugh:
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

And where did you get that first Pul?!
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Countess.

Yes, I had insane luck with runes!

Congrats on that Vex!!! You're getting close to a HotO!

Today I'm going to reroll my hell maps and hope for an LK map with two sets of the superchests (or even 3 maybe?). Hopefully my rune finding luck will hold out.

I think I've also decided on what to do for my next character... One build that is hugely popular, yet I have never done... a Hammerdin *cue cheesy dramatic music*. There must be a reason why they are so popular, and I guess it's about time I try it and find out what all the hubbub is about.
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Haha, a hammerdin eh? I seem to have a personal issue with them. Not only are they too overpowered, IMO the magic hammer just looks and feels stupid. I don't think I'll ever use werebear either for an example, because it looks like a joke. Which isn't even to say I don't like the joke, but in my perception at least this one doesn't fit to this universe, and neither does that goddamn hammer :P I have never went to the cow level either =P

I wonder, what are the odds for a 3 campfire map? On one hand, I have a slow PC so I think a 3 set map would be more profitable. On the other, my current is 2 sets nicely aligned in a row along with the waypoint, probably as good as double maps get, and I hate map rerolling.

I suppose HotO is the most meaningful thing to make with that Vex? +1 all skills, 7% FCR and above all 30-40 all resists compared to my Spirit. While nothing extraterrestrial, you gotta love those resists! I wonder... I've heard that Raven casts Dim Vision and makes it impossible for targeted enemies to cast curses? What's the rate and extent? Will it keep up with, say, SC MF-ing tempo at the Chaos Sanctuary for an example? Then again, Baaling is probably even easier, and brings better results >< I wonder what's it like if we throw Hephasto in the equation... :scratch:

With Vanteress, been doing some more LK running, and while nothing very valuable has popped, I had another experience which makes me think the game reads my mind! :shocked: I started the game, and while I was running in town, thoguth that I could really use Natalia's boots for that fat 40% FRW, and BANG! Very first runs, I hit a Hollow Log, and I get green Mesh Boots! :laugh: That's even far more unlikely than the one with the Monarch which I also got first ever JUST when I thought I'd need one for Spirit.

Blizzardtek has entered Act 3. At least now I have access to Mana Potions, and Greaters drop in the jungle. I think I'll mule on some massive Mana gear and just start teleporting through at 63% FCR while eating gallons of blue once she reaches level 25 (23 atm) and can equip Spectral Shard (50% FCR).
 
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Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

I rerolled my hell maps one time... I lost my easy Andy map, but got good maps for LK (with two sets of chests) and a good Meph map, so I'll keep it. Teleporting to Andy isn't that bad anyway, there's not a ton of danger of dying in the Catacombs unless you land right in the middle of a mana burn mob with some sort of nasty aura.

I'll probably run a bit tonight, and possibly start my new character. Yeah, I always felt hammerdins were a little cheesy, but I've never actually tried one, so I owe it to myself to give it a go.
Congrats on the Nat's boots! The highest set item I've found (besides Tal's ammy) is a pair of IK gloves. :-/
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Had enough of LK and did some Countess instead - VERY SLIGHTLY hoping for that Pul I'm missing from the HotO, but mostly just for the runes up to Hel, and experience. Unexpectedly, various uniques start to drop! First, Nightsmoke, a normal Belt but with surprisingly good stats for that level actually. Then, a second Buriza! Exactly how useful are those? Then, another elite unique - Demon Limb, a Tyrant Club. Again, quite impressive stats to the eyes of the n00b like me, but in any case you do have to love those lvl24 Enchant charges! IMO every unique item should have something funky like this. I also found The Scalper, the unique Francisca.
But the best of all was when I saw a gold Tulwar lying on the ground. I actually thought it's another one of that somewhat pretty but totally useless unique kind :laugh: What a surprise when I identify it and see the fabled Blade of Ali Baba! =D If my meager knowledge is correct, it might quite be my most valuable S/U so far!
Naturally, I also gained quite a bit of runes up to Shael, as well as a level and a half.

I realised for some odd reason I have NEVER found a Dol rune. Counting pre-restart as well, loads of Sols and Shaels, lots of Hel, several Lums, couple of Io-s and Ko-s, but no darn Dol! :laugh:
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

That's funny, the other night I got two Dol runes off Countess...heheh.

Congrats on the Baba! I'd LOVE to pair that on switch with a Rhyme. I'm only pushing something like 100 MF right now.

So, I took one of the two monarchs I had, and tried cubing one of them... got 2os :rolleyes:. I went ahead and spent a socket quest on the second and got 4os... plugged in the runes... 35 FCR! :jig: I went ahead and spent some points in STR (thank you T-Gods for the extra 20!). With the two Spirits I'm at 69 FCR, which greatly increased my killing speed (not to mention the extra +2 skills on the shield). I can live at that FCR, I don't feel I really MUST hit 105.
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Congrats on the perfect spirit! I understand you're not wearing the Skin? With that your FCR would be 99%, so you'd only need 6% more to push it to the end. I have 33+28=61% FCR from the two spirits, so with Skin it's 91 and Trang's gloves make it easy. I have plenty of Monarchs from the LK stand and runes from the Countess, so with another sorceress in the making, I might have a shot (shots?) at another Spirit shield to get 65% total from the two spirits, so I'd only need a ring to capitalise.

I've advanced to NM Act 2 with Blizzardess, she has reached level 48. Things were kinda slow up to Act 5 Normal, but once I got some decent points into Blizzard, I really took off. Damn, does that spell pack a punch! The only thing I don't like about it is that it's impossible to understand what it hits and where to aim it, and how it's so unpredictable - it can kill people straightaway, or it can let them through with no harm done. I've met my first CI - the Maggot Lair boss. I staticed her to 33%, then kept hacking away for a minute with the Angelic Sickle :laugh:

She isn't all that fast at killing Andy yet though. I must thoroughly think through my gear. I need the Angelic Sickle to get 100% MF from the dual rings, and +1 skill from the ammy. I think that's an easy one. Snowclash would improve my Blizzard, but then I'd lose 50% MF from Sigon's boots. Sigon's not that great overall anyway though, so I'll probably just dump it. I might replace the Rhyme with that Spirit, and gloves with Trang's, to keep that 63%FCR. Random resist boots... I'll try it! With a few charms as well I should be able to reach max resist and about 150% MF... Not a whopping MF, but I feel I'll improve more from a whopping killing speed. Once I level up properly and max my skills I may drop my skillers for more MF again.

Chaliortek (previously known as Vanteress) has been filling my "RUNEZ" stash with stuff from Countess. Nothing special, just lots of Thul Sol Shael etc. Also my first ever Terror Keys. She was very amused to encounter a Ghostly Ghost ^_^ Also I had my first one-hit-knockout with her - Fire Clan with Might aura I think, possibly under Amplify Damage curse >< I have formed a theory to answer one of my previous questions - I think if you have any gold on you, you will not lose anything from the stash. However, if you have 0 gold in your INVENTORY at the point of death, then you lose from the stash. Had to return to LK to get money to resurrect the merc and buy pots ><

EDIT: 48? 48?! Where did I take that number from? Blizzardess is level 41 and can't equip almost anything of the intended gear >< What the hell have I been smoking :prop: At least her moron can equip the Insight.

I tried to make that Spirit anyway. Anyway? No, before I found out of my miscalculation. Try one. Two sockets. Try two. Three sockets. Surely, four must follow? Try three. Two sockets. >_< Well, at least I kept one Monarch for emergencies. I think I'll waste Blizzardess' Larzuk's on it.

EDIT2: Hahaha at least leveling is NOT a problem with this build. Flew from Far Oasis to Viper Temple in 10 mins while killing stuff at /p3, and gained 2 levels, Just enough to wear Snowclash. Blizzard damage is something like 1600. At this point in the game, everyone she meets but CI-s are greeted with an instant cold death. And yes indeed, Andy is dying a whole lot quicker as well. Once I get to the point of wearing the Spirit I have not yet made, she'll be going down instantaneously.
 
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Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Just so you guys know, it is a myth about three campfires in LK. If you have a decent 2 campfire LK map use it, but if you plan on doing some serious running make sure the map is "perfect" or very close to perfect.

A perfect map would be with all 4 huts in a circle around the waypoint, so you could go through all huts fast and end up at the waypoint and go to act 4. By going to act 4 you skip the long walk in act 3, which is a major part of LK-run, as they can be performed in ~30-40 sec
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

Hey Vantek, watching your thread made me want to try out for myself, thanks :) im pleased with SP really, it's such a nice change. Anyway on topic of LK runs.

I didnt know a map where the WP is close after helps that much. I was considering peasant crown + good frw boots + Harmony switch. But i don't they will be easy to get.


Anyway, something i noticed, It's quite funny how you, Vantek, and Nothing have so good FCR but no mf.

My own blizzard sorc has found some cool stuff, i'll mention a few, Gull dagger @NM baal. Chance guards hell Andy, Goldwrap andy aswell. And a 7% mf charm. + milegras orb 20% mf shield O.o But really, my gear is total garbage :P
So teleporting around with 0% FCR still. imagine that, it's soo annoying especialyl with no FHR.


My NM HF was Lem, but im still in act3 hell...( However when I killed Duriel, she gave me something that happens close to NEVER, a fresh Ber Rune. The highest rune duriel can drop, 1:267000 in a players 1 game appearently.

so that means im quite pleased so far. I also got a 4socket broad sword for spirit, but my STR is too low for a monarch. and the runes for spirit havnt showed.... :shocked:
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

=D OMG Congratulations on that Ber! It's like winning a few millions on lottery :laugh: People do hellforge rushes for MONTHS to be able to cube it :D Give a lot of thought to how you spend it, because chances are, you'll never get another one without a LOT of effort =P Then again, you'd need one more for Infinity... :D Gull dagger is pretty nice find too, as far as I know.

so that means im quite pleased so far.
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You had better be! :grin: You've found more than many people will find in YEARS of playing!

What charachter are you using? Lower Kurast is still probably fastest with a Sorceress with 105%+ FCR (however, you wouldn't be using a Sorceress in Hardcore :P). But neither Peasant Crown, good FRW boots (40%), nor Harmony are too rare or expensive, and unless you have a fast computer, you sure can use these to run to the waypoint from the ship anyway.

If you need runes Tal to Hel, Countess is the girl to visit =) (probably with a sorceress that has heavy investments in the lightning tree or the fire tree) I've probably already got 7 Spirits' worth of runes from her :P Her gang gives decent experience as well.

As for low MF and high FCR... MF has diminishing returns - the higher you go, the less the effect of numerically same increase of MF. The effective difference between 50% or 100% MF is far bigger than the difference between 300% and 500%. So at some point it's far more effective to increase your killing speed than the MF. You shouldn't go above maybe 150% at the cost of killing speed.

Another thing is that my gear is too poor to really kick the bucket in Hell, so I have to put up with low MF if I want to be able to do ANYTHING AT ALL in Hell. But baddies in Hell can (and largely, do) drop the same things that baddies in NM, plus some - so if I ran bosses in NM, I'd be finding the same things over again once I turned to Hell. I hate getting things I already got =P So I'd rather recieve less things but with a chance to get the best, than to get more things with no chance to get any of the really good items. That's why I'm being somewhat "inefficient" - it's my personal playstyle. Something like 60% MF isn't even too bad actually, though I do get a lot of blues and yellows.

Nevertheless, I intend to do a few NM Andy&Meph runs with my Blizzardess, but only for a while, and I'll move forward even if I don't get anything (like Occulus or Tal Rasha's etc).

Just so you guys know, it is a myth about three campfires in LK. If you have a decent 2 campfire LK map use it, but if you plan on doing some serious running make sure the map is "perfect" or very close to perfect.

A perfect map would be with all 4 huts in a circle around the waypoint, so you could go through all huts fast and end up at the waypoint and go to act 4. By going to act 4 you skip the long walk in act 3, which is a major part of LK-run, as they can be performed in ~30-40 sec
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Ah, thanks for the advice! I probably won't be turning "serious" anytime soon though - in my current poverty, I'm pretty happy with just about anything the game throws at me =P
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

I have a little MF happening.... Chanecguards, a couple of 6-7 small charms, Some on my boots, Rhyme on switch... Total of 95 MF when on Rhyme switch +59% if the moron gets the last hit in (36% Stealskull + 23% Insight). I'd love more MF, but right now I can't give up resists and/or FCR. A Gul or Ali Baba on switch with the Rhyme would be great, as would a Shako!
Best drops last night:
Tal's belt from a rack near Countess
white monarch from a devilkin near Countess
Trang's armor from Andy
Spirit Shroud from Andy (same drop as the Trang's)
Ruby jewel (40% Enhanced Damange) from Pindleskin
Emerald GC of Sustanence (27% Posison resist, +31 Life) from same Pindle drop

I keep finding blue/yellow shakos, spiderweb sashes and laquered plates. :rolleyes: I always think of what could have been!

My best drop from LK chest? Eth rune! Heheheh.... I have a decent 2 chest LK map, it's not so bad for a Sorc thanks to teleport. I went around and figured out where all the armor racks are as well, so when I run it I get a total of the 4 huts, plus an additional 4 armor racks. One of them drops shakos pretty regularly, I can always hope for a gold one!
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

thanks for the lovely text, love it. :)

I havnt tried Countess, i am afraid my mercenary won't work. He's using an Ethereal 5socket partizan with ith runes :rolleyes:


So i have to hope i get them elsewhere, maybe nightmare count to make my spirit? :/

I can also try NM cows =) never thought bout that actually!!


as for drops, Shako tals amu/maras and the likes are still waiting!, trying to get a good meph map, but first i'll try make my spirit sword. :wink3: Anyway i think, with time, maybe LK will help me with some more runes. Though it's very unlikely i'll get what im looking for, it's still damn pretty though. Btw, i totally agree, do it in hell. You'll have a higher chance to get something you like unless you are just wanting specific items that drop in nm ofc....

edit: using a 20% FCR sorc, ( yay found ormus ) for Lk runs, i do them in 28 seconds unless i stop for monsters or such. theyre abit hard on players 8. however it was brief, quickly rerolled the map a few times hoping for a good meph map, no luck though..
 
Re: A belated introduction, confession, and OMG I got an IST from my first ever Hell

I've been advancing with Blizzardtek. D.A.M.N. Blizzard is CRAZY! I bet Blizzard has deliberately overpowered it as a joke. Up to Hell I effortlessly mow down everything that isn't Cold Immune, at the highest players setting.

When I was going through NM, I began to feel that I can find some nice items here. Duriel dropped me this:
Saracen's Chance
Amulet
Required Level: 47
+12 to All Attributes
All Resistances +24
10% Chance to cast Level 2 Iron Maiden when struck
Looks like a very useful tool for tough situations!
Then somewhere I don't remember I found Tal's Belt. Not wearing it though - without any other pieces of the set the +skill from Snowclash is better :P I also rolled her a nice 33% FCR Spirit Monarch. Not at 105% FCR yet, but that's not so important with Blizzard.

So I quickly quested through NM (HF was a Shael ><) up until rescuing Anya, and then I did first lots of p8 Pindle, Shenk&Elly for XP, and then several stashfuls' worth of Andy->Meph->Eldritch->Meph->Andy->Andy->Meph etc (one Elly included so that I wouldn't have to run in Kurast) at p3. I was rather disappointed with the results though. Mostly Normal S&U, and pretty much nothing useful for these particular charachters (though thins like unique exceptional Wand with +2 all +2 summoning tree). Only nice drops were my first two pairs of Magefists (so I don't have to mule Trang's constantly =P) and this one for humour value. So I decided to go to Hell despite questionable gear. As if as a wish of good luck, Baal gave me Crown of the Thieves =) Finally, FINALLY some decent leech on my Mercenary! Along with Skin of the Flayed One (Unique Demonhide Armor), that totals 17% leech - quite nice ^^

I flew threw Act 1 Hell too. It's not easy anymore though. I couldn't clear the Den because of the cold immunes, and died a few times while teleing through the act like a madman. Crypt and Mausoleum (one of them gave me an Io from a superchest), however, were both ridiculously easy. I might MF some there, and I will of course look into Ancient Tunnels as well. After some leveling at those places perhaps I'll see how I fare at Meph. I believe I shall give Kelpie to Blizzartek' minion now. With this gear, Andy and Meph aren't a joke even for a Blizzardess. But they're probably the best source for things like Shako, Occy or Tal's orb. I think I'll have to dump my Angelic Set along with 100% MF now, for resists and +skill from weapon (dual spirit perhaps? ^^). Things are becoming difficult. I can scrape together maybe ~80% MF from other sources... That should be bearable.
 
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