- Feb 24, 2006
- 1,060
- 1,975
- 113
Thanks in advance for reading the long ramble that follows!
For a couple of years, I didn't have a machine that was capable of playing this game. However, I did have all of my characters and GoMule stashes backed up, and so now that I have a working D2LoD I am able to pick up where I left off, which is nice. Before my hiatus, I had accomplished a number of fun and lucky things in my SP softcore project: I achieved 10 Mat/Pat characters, participated in a few tournaments, found all normal sets and uniques (except for 3 elusive TC3 uniques), found all except 6 exceptional uniques, found/cubed every rune except zod, and completed two of the class-specific sets (Immortal King and Tal-Rasha's Wrappings). I'm a terrible pack-rat; one of my GoMule files, stash.d2x, has over 4000 assorted items in it.
Anyway, among the dozens of other characters that I have saved, one that interests me at the moment is a singer barbarian that is currently level 74 in Act II Hell. His favorite weapon is a Razorswitch. I must emphasize up front that my project is vanilla. I have read singer guides that recommend Spirit runeworded swords, and making a mercenary carry an Insight runeworded polearm, but I do not use RWM, so those aren't available to me. I found this guide by purplelocust, who managed not only to Pat a vanilla singer but also to give it 200% faster cast rate! I have some but not all of the gear he used; my singer's war cries repeat much slower. Also, I believe my play style may be quite a bit different. He wrote (and every other guide seems to agree) that playing a singer is all about the mana pool. On the other hand, I have accepted the fact that my singer will often run out of mana, and therefore he cannot afford to be a snooty "prima donna opera star." He'll simply have to learn to shut up and get his hands dirty, and swing his weapon just like any other respectable barbarian. So that's why I'm now calling my build a "singer/swinger."
Here is a list of the gear he currently equips:
Regardless, he remains a singer: war cry is his primary skill, normal attack (swinging) is a support skill. I decided to do some experiments with war cry and the weapons he currently has. Of course, I'm not as good at this as onderduiker, so I'm sure my methodology could be improved, but here's what I tested:
So this comparison clarifies to me why Razorswitch is my favorite singer/swinger weapon. With its huge mana boost, he can let loose with more war cries, and when his mana is gone, he doesn't have to wait as long before he can sound another war cry. As for the long full-regen time, blue potions are cheap and plentiful enough, so I'm perfectly willing to stock his belt with at least one column of them, and willing to make him chug them a lot.
What improvements would you like to recommend? I'm definitely on the lookout for better armor. At this point, the only real benefit his current armor provides is +1 skills, and if he loses that, I think it only weakens his war cry damage by 34 points per yell. I thought about stuffing perfect sapphires into a 4-socket armor; I think that would give him enough mana for 3 or 4 additional war cry yells, which would more than make up for losing 34 points of damage per yell. (I also have one Que-Hegan's Wisdom in GoMule, but it's ethereal, so I want to keep it as a trophy rather than put it on a character and deplete its durability.)
Anyway, those are my thoughts on this character, mid-build. I'd love to get suggestions and feedback. Even if your suggestion is "just use RWM, dude," which I'll ignore, I'll still appreciate that you made it.
For a couple of years, I didn't have a machine that was capable of playing this game. However, I did have all of my characters and GoMule stashes backed up, and so now that I have a working D2LoD I am able to pick up where I left off, which is nice. Before my hiatus, I had accomplished a number of fun and lucky things in my SP softcore project: I achieved 10 Mat/Pat characters, participated in a few tournaments, found all normal sets and uniques (except for 3 elusive TC3 uniques), found all except 6 exceptional uniques, found/cubed every rune except zod, and completed two of the class-specific sets (Immortal King and Tal-Rasha's Wrappings). I'm a terrible pack-rat; one of my GoMule files, stash.d2x, has over 4000 assorted items in it.
Anyway, among the dozens of other characters that I have saved, one that interests me at the moment is a singer barbarian that is currently level 74 in Act II Hell. His favorite weapon is a Razorswitch. I must emphasize up front that my project is vanilla. I have read singer guides that recommend Spirit runeworded swords, and making a mercenary carry an Insight runeworded polearm, but I do not use RWM, so those aren't available to me. I found this guide by purplelocust, who managed not only to Pat a vanilla singer but also to give it 200% faster cast rate! I have some but not all of the gear he used; my singer's war cries repeat much slower. Also, I believe my play style may be quite a bit different. He wrote (and every other guide seems to agree) that playing a singer is all about the mana pool. On the other hand, I have accepted the fact that my singer will often run out of mana, and therefore he cannot afford to be a snooty "prima donna opera star." He'll simply have to learn to shut up and get his hands dirty, and swing his weapon just like any other respectable barbarian. So that's why I'm now calling my build a "singer/swinger."
Here is a list of the gear he currently equips:
- Lore runeworded jawbone visor with +3 to War Cry and +2 to Increased Stamina
- Berserker's Hauberk
- Frostburn
- Gloom's Trap
- Crafted wyrmhide boots (+15 mana, +5% maximum mana, +8% regen)
- Raven Frost and Manald Heal rings
- Echoing Amulet of Chance
- three Sounding Grand Charms in the backpack, and a couple of small mana charms
- Wizardspike with Splendor runeworded Grim Shield
- Razorswitch, upgraded to walking stick, socketed with a Turquoise jewel (+20 mana)
- Baezil's Vortex
- Spellsteel
- battle orders at level 27, more than doubling his max base life and mana,
- war cry at level 33, causing a little over 900 physical damage, and
- battle cry at level 30, usually wiping out enemys' base defenses and cutting enemy damage in half.
Regardless, he remains a singer: war cry is his primary skill, normal attack (swinging) is a support skill. I decided to do some experiments with war cry and the weapons he currently has. Of course, I'm not as good at this as onderduiker, so I'm sure my methodology could be improved, but here's what I tested:
- I went to a safe place (Act II sewers 2 waypoint) and held down the right mouse button to spam the war cry skill.
- Using a stopwatch, I measured the amount of time it took to deplete the mana pool, and the number of war cries yelled during that time.
- Keeping the RMB mashed, I measured amounts of time that passed before the depleted mana ball regenerated enough to cast another war cry, and calculated an average of these times.
- Finally, letting go of the RMB, I measured the amount of time that passed before the the depleted mana globe regenerated all the way back to full again.
Code:
Wizardspike+Splendor:
11 roars in 5 sec, regen back to 41 mana in 7 sec, back to 439 mana in 70 sec
Wizardspike+Splendor+BO+BC:
15 roars in 7 sec, regen back to 42 mana in 5 sec, back to 609 mana in 70 sec
Baezil's Vortex+Splendor:
11 roars in 6 sec, regen back to 41 mana in 8 sec, back to 428 mana in 77 sec
Baezil's Vortex+Splendor+BO+BC:
15 roars in 9.5 sec, regen back to 42 mana in 4 sec, back to 708 mana in 77 sec
Razorswitch:
15 roars in 7 sec, regen back to 41 mana in 6.5 sec, back to 570 mana in 85 sec
Razorswtich+BO+BC:
26 roars in 12 sec, regen back to 42 mana in 3.5 sec, back to 955 mana in 85 sec
Spellsteel:
11 roars in 5.5 sec, regen back to 40 mana in 7 sec, back to 418 mana in 73 sec
Spellsteel+BO+BC:
18 roars in 9 sec, regen back to 41 mana in 4.5 sec, back to 690 mana in 73 sec
So this comparison clarifies to me why Razorswitch is my favorite singer/swinger weapon. With its huge mana boost, he can let loose with more war cries, and when his mana is gone, he doesn't have to wait as long before he can sound another war cry. As for the long full-regen time, blue potions are cheap and plentiful enough, so I'm perfectly willing to stock his belt with at least one column of them, and willing to make him chug them a lot.
What improvements would you like to recommend? I'm definitely on the lookout for better armor. At this point, the only real benefit his current armor provides is +1 skills, and if he loses that, I think it only weakens his war cry damage by 34 points per yell. I thought about stuffing perfect sapphires into a 4-socket armor; I think that would give him enough mana for 3 or 4 additional war cry yells, which would more than make up for losing 34 points of damage per yell. (I also have one Que-Hegan's Wisdom in GoMule, but it's ethereal, so I want to keep it as a trophy rather than put it on a character and deplete its durability.)
Anyway, those are my thoughts on this character, mid-build. I'd love to get suggestions and feedback. Even if your suggestion is "just use RWM, dude," which I'll ignore, I'll still appreciate that you made it.