Mace's Humble Beginning

[okey]

Update

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Did a respec to fine tune Aona with the items I acquired. Coincidentally, Arctic Gear dropt minus the useless armor, so I'm thinking of making Aona one with it here's to hoping for what the future turns out. But I digress, I socketed the bow and put a much needed Psapaphire into it. Now moving on to the next..

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Aona's Normal Summary
Lv 48 , HP: 558/608, MP: 125
STR: 70 , DEX: 109 VIT: 126
FA: 12, CS: 14, LF: 12, Decoy: 1, Pierce: 1
MF: 212
FADMG: 280~
CSDMG: 1-501 x5
LFDMG: 348

 

[okey]

Update

Charsi doing an one night stand

Bain: Hey lady, I want to get my mace repaired.
Charsi: Those muscles! Those washboard abs..
*cue in 80s brown chicken brown cow music*
Bain: By the Ancients..

NSFW (not really, it's just a joke)

hot barbarian action, find single barbarian in your area.

Introducing Bain the Barbarian and he is a frenzier.

With the magic that is Double Swing and WSM glitch, I pretty much blitz'd through A1 and into A2. The moment I acquired enough gold I bought myself a Scimatar and a Mace, and from there I used a Horadric Hammer and Mace and then finally transitioned to War Hammer and Flail.

Things were fast at first but then gradually slowed down by the time I reached Cathedral since the Barb's performance is equally tied down to the performance with the weapon he is usuing. And as mentioned before, I had to get creative with my weapon choices (ie. Horadric Hammer) otherwise my performance would drop (and it did to an extent). Luckily I had Mace mastery.. Bain will be one with the Mace, and from Mace will Bain come into fruitation.. also mainly because he is Mace (because why not?).

On a seperate note, I was blessed with having access to 2 gem shrines during this run through, which I utilized on the Ruby to turn into a Pruby. This is really nice because it'll give me a very early access to crafted blood gloves and that combined with Aona's Gtoes will potentially give me a 1/3 CB on my Frenzy/Doubleswings..

Now on to the not so good news, one of the major obstacles of Bain is acquiring life leech which I hope to gain through jewelry and perhaps gloves. And since I've pretty much neglicted defense, PDR is important as well. So to sum it all up, being the crazed barbarian that Bain is, he is driven more than any of the past heroes in the search for better and better gear. I feel I'll be more inclined to gambling as well as crafting while playing playing as Bain.

 

[okey]

worthy mini update

While going on a shruken head rerolling spree (in all my characters I collect the damaged heads, els and chipped dias) RNGesus graced me with his holy presense! I was just hoping for a 3/3 rs/sm head, but no there's even an additional 1 to amp attached! Now awaiting to socket it and christen it Bain's Perserved Head then chuck it to Mace.

 

[okey]

Update

Bain has become a Destroyer..

And coincidentally he'll be passing his perserved head over to Mace.

Now on to the nitty gritty..

A lot has happened while I neglicted on posting the update, apologies on that (it's pretty hard to make an update every day :/ ). But yes, I digress. For the past few days I've been doing my utmost to sweep on through, and that was what happened. Weapon selection was slim to say the least, as it was pretty much capped once I arrived at A3. In order to make the best out of what I had available, I had Bain buy two random magic War Hammer and Flail and rerolled them until I felt comfortable with the modifiers they spawned with. Fast forward a bit and I ended up using about 2-3 dozen chips to get a Deadly Warhammer of Leech with 2os, which I then socketed the highest ED and MaxDMG jewel I had available at the time.. I ended up with this stranger here..

Which lasted me the entire run.. yup from beginning of A3 all the way through Destruction End. And I paired the weapon first with a magic flail with +10 IAS and +4 mp after kill (forgot the name of it) then once A5 came around, I moved onto a Steel Flail. The reason as I mentioned before was to utilize the WSM to maximize on the DPS of Frenzy. The damage shown is lack luster to say the least, but with combination of 33% crushing blow given from blood gloves and gtoes I was able to get pass through normal without too much difficulty. Now besides all that's mentioned, my gear was a mixture of cathan ring and amulet a 2% mana steal ring and random magic items for resistances and it worked.

Now the odd part about playing this Barb is that surprisingly even with 0 MF, he scored some pretty decent drops.

Diablo dropt all yellows, and a unique, btw that Infernostride was a 145ed/70gf. Speaking of drops, I managed to score two Amns and a Shael in A5, which I used to make a Edge Short Bow and Rhyme Bain's Perserved Head (Bain's Rhyming Head hehe) I posted earlier. All in all it was a good run, one thing I'd have to say is: playing as a Frenzy barb is similar to playing as a Fury Wolf albeit one that's able to cast.

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Bain's Normal Summary

 

[okey]

Short little update

Mace is back, this time with a Partizan Insight

and it came out to be a very crappy roll of 13 meditation and 230ed, at the very least the merc can now produce some corpses quickly with out much difficulty.

Regardless, lv 56 Mace is currently in nightmare A2 ready to raid Jeryhn's Wine Cellar yet again.

 

[okey]

Update

Diablo really loves his play doh

Kidding aside, Mace is lv69, currently at WP near Crystaline Passage entrance.

With 277MF, rune drops has been good, items though has been subpar. I managed to acquire runes to make a Lawbringer which I am probably going to make and pass on to Bain, unfortunately no damaged Cadecaus have dropt (would the meager damage boost matter on Lawbringer?) if it doesn't drop I will probably make it in a Legend Sword and then have Bain respec in order as a Sword Barb. Oh right, for what its worth I also managed to get a Viscertaunt.

Suggestions?

 

[okey]

Update

Well scratch what I said earlier..

Since I didn't get any input I figured on saving the runes, instead I decided on so(u)lbinding the Viscerataunt.

My run through nightmare was pretty decent, I ended up ramping my MF to 355 while also boosting survivability-- how did I do it? Ali-baba. I socketed a -15% req/10lr and a 1dex/15% all res jewel into it allowing Mace to glitch equip it on (wear a +stats equip then wear the item you want to equip, now remove +dex equip, since the item you want to equip gives enough stats to hit the req you'll be able to wear it, just don't switch weapons or you'll unglitch yourself).

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Mace's Nightmare Summary:
lv75:: 1028 HP // 242 MP :: 355 MF // 508 GF
Stats: 60 STR / rest VIT
Maxed: RS, SM, CE,
1pt up to: Decripify, Summon Resist
Misc: 2pt in Revive, 9pt in Dim Vision

Noteable drops: Lem (Hell Forge), Um (Nith. Temple), Ko (body in Kurast Sewer), Viscerataunt, 2os 257 Sharktooth Armor, 35 all res Rondache, 4os 32 all res/10ed Heraldric Shield, Ali-baba, 112mp/10fcr ring

 

[okey]

Update


Enter the fight club staring Rose..

U wot mate?

Time to see the dentist!

Booo! (lousy cgi effects!)

Kidding aside:

Since Rose is bound to Sol bounded Mace's Visceratuant, I was thinking of making her into a Spellblade-isque themed char..it went well initially.. but that fell through after I found out the progression was going very, painfully slow, and figured it'll get even slower come harder difficulty.. So I did the next best thing, respec'd and went as a fireball-orber (having a +3 FBall Staff helped a bit, took x5 20 minute power shopping session to get though, jesus). But yeah, after I respec'd, Rose zoomed by pretty fast, fastest character thus far by several.

Oh gearwise, I plan on making Rose be 0 MF and focus purely on Res, PDR, Skills, FCR, HP in those order.. Funnily with 0 mf, I ended up getting uniques faster than I did with MF focused Mace, however this is up to end of A2, so we'll see.

Loots and other bits:
Best MF'd loot so far, Mahim-Oak Curio amulet.
I had 2 gem shrines during the entire Act 2 so I left decided on leaving my Diablo client running (putting it on sleep when I head off), and made a Perfect Sapphire (as it was my highest gem tier of a Saphire).
Other than that, while crafting polearms, I made two partizan, one of em was meh (which I'm still in process of rerolling, hoping toget a 20ed/2os) but the other one is monstrosity.

I'll conclude with this.. while playing the sorc, I am now often reminded why they are so OP in so many ways.. They got some really game changing spells in their arsenals, static, telekinesis, teleport being some to name a few.. not to mention a really over the top, easily accessible runeword which can potentially become a very devastating gamebreaking weapon of mass destruction (hint: +3 Fireball Staff Leaf) for much of Normal. Then I shift my head and look at what the other classes have to offer and just shake my head in disappointment.

 

[okey]

Updated

With an astoundingly large MF of 0%, Rose was able to score a pretty sweet looking belt.

Rose's Normal Summary

 

[okey]

Update

!!! - Aona

So far the above Chaos Noose is the best drop I've encountered, it's like a poor man's version of Mara's. But back to the topic at hand, Aona lv53 is currently in A2 ready to trek through the desert and the journey to get to this point was mired with many NDE.. Nightmare has been plagued with countless LE, Multishot uniques (zombies, imps, those toads that spit lightning balls at you, archers, you name it Aona nearly got plagued by them). And for that I am glad I thought in advanced and respec'd towards 40:60 split of FA:CS skill distribution otherwise the progress would've been painful at best, dead at worse! But yeah, that concludes this post.

 

[okey]

Belated Update

Aona lv 60 has finally reached the beginning of A3.


Duriel was a tad bothersome. I had a Cleglaw Gloves in stash which I forgot to use but luckily HF merc help slow him down somewhat as his attacks were in fact interrupting my own quite a bit. It wasn't all that bad though once you get up to a wall..

That is until it came to drops..

Oh well I came out 90k richer.

 

[okey]

Update

Aona, lv64 at the start of her new life in A4.

And for what its worth, Lum is the only thing of worth that dropt outta of A3. The drops have been a bit poor as of late.

 

[okey]

Update

Aona, lv67 left stranded in the beginning of A5.

Pro-tip (pun intended): Jab once, run immediately after.

Noteworthy things of mention: Fal, Io, and Lum (Hellforge) dropt for Aona. But sadly, even with 167 MF, itemwise nothing of worth dropt. I was hoping for titan revenge to drop.

 

[okey]

Yet another begotten updated

Aona: I rescued you and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.. I mean stick. (Now if only it was in javalin form)
Anya:

Noteable Drops/Creations/Powershops:
Lancer's Heavy Gloves of Alacrity (Redportal Powershop from Charsi at lv74, took bout 7~ mins, was hoping for Archer's variant instead but.. eh don't wanna spend time anymore time powershopping)
Smoke Cuirass
Lionheart Mage Plate
Beast Torc, +2 Traps/12all res/26 light res amulet, lv30 req
Bramble Circlet, +1 Pala/49nrg/40fire res/10fcr, lv29 req
Crown of Thieves (94GF, 198ed)
Skin of Vipermagi (23res )
Vex ( !!! I think this probably my only HR that ever dropt for me while playing NM )

Tidbits: I saved talking to Anya (hence Nithalak) for last after killing Baal because I was hoping for some neat javalins, unfortunately it didn't work out too well.

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Aona's Nightmare Summary

Frost Arrow: 700dmg

 

[okey]

As I was undecided on who to give Aona's Lionheart to, it was either going to the Barbarian or the Druid, so after a bit of contemplating I came to the conclusion that with the lack of damage that the current Frenzy is offering me, what with the lack of suitable weapons I have with Bain the Barbarian as well as the skill +% itself compared to a Druid's Fury, I ended up passing it onto Bain. NM A1 went without a hitch, that isn't to say there weren't any NDE (as there were quite a few Extra Fast Cursed packs with Fanatic Aura and others I had much trouble dealing with), but with the careful use of merc shielding and using chockpoints it was all doable. Now the main issue with Bain is his lack of damage, that is to say his weapons, Bain is sadly swinging the same weapon from A3 Normal if I recall correctly.


Lv51 Bain @ NM Jail 1 WP.

Picture not related: Playing paper rock scissors with the Smith

 

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Belated (mini) update (as with everyone, life becomes the biggest obstacle when it comes to Diablo)

Chanced upon Demonsash while advancing where I last left off at.. it is a perfect 15dr/8ll SoE... Alas!

This bloody thing is ETHEREAL! (Yes I was disappointed, very very VERY disappointed.)

And so.. Lv51 Bain @ NM Inner Cloister WP.

 

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Finally after all this..

Bain gets rewarded with an Angelic Ring.

At the very least I made a bit of progress. Bain had to replace his dead merc (RIP Azrael) with an offensive might merc which will help with his severely lacking damage output (still rocking those normal act 3 weapons still).

Bain lv52 @ Lut Gholein NM

 

[okey]

Bain recieved some nifty items for Diablomas.

Bain: Nothing beats Diablomas!

Summarized journal..

I happened to wander upon a couple of 4os Partizan while clearing the tunnels of Lut Gholein and another while clearing the Tomb that contains the Horadric Cube. At that point I made an insight, which made my merc deal 2-3 times more damage than me, which is great all things considering. Fast forward into Viper Temple and a Mage Fist dropt which at this point seems to be a strongest heirloom candidate. A few snippets and commercials more and I've cleared the Arcane Temple. By this point, I was pretty fed up with Bain's lackluster damage output, what with having to spend an unnessecary amount of time vanquishing my first physical immune super monster.. And thus Diablomas occurred and Bain is now happily wearing newly crafted gear in the form of a Holy Thunder (which nicely capped out my Light Res) and a really sweet and nifty Blood Helm.

see full album of what happen here

And so the great Canyon of Magi awaits Bain @ lv 57.

 

[okey]

Rock 'em Sock 'em

Mid way into clearing the series of tombs I switched out the Might Merc for a Holy Freeze. My reasoning is, the less they hit, the better I'm off, sadly it played out better than Might Merc. Getting zerged by skeletons and roaches was not great.

As for drops is concerned, Ancient Kaa (that unique ancient mummy with a lot of nasty mods) dropt me a Rockfleece which I passed on to the merc. And a timely dropt it is because it'll be pretty hard to beat the 10% DR and 5pdr what with have to contending with the up coming slew of A3 blow dart spitters (pretty much cuts incoming damage by 1/2).

 

[okey]

Would you look at that, a Ko. -- Bain

And so I sped Bain through A3 and wound myself having him wait infront of the sewer grate in Kurast Bazaar.

Bain lv62 @ waiting to meet some Teenage Ninja Turtles.