Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

[twillight]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

I was long here, so I'm in dept telling you how I've ended:
My meleemancer defeated Hell Baal! In Single Player, Hardcore mode. With ladder only runewords activated.

Big Thx for Mantis for the tip about caging the Ancients, it really helped.
Actually my strategy was: put down bone walls, because that prison requires target, so you can't do that until you activate the guardians. Then click on the pillar, and run to the edge of the screen, so only 1 ancient will follow you there (usually the one with whirlwind). Kill him.
Then go up, cage Madawc, kill the other. If you manage to kill the second Ancient, even if your merc dies, you will be able to survive (assuming you dropped down a couple of manapotions to be able to keep Madawc caged). The other two might come out from boneprison, but not Madawc, and your weapon can reach through your own walls remember. So it is a safe end.

To Mantis: in the end I had 175+ Dexterity. In multiplayer mode I'd get on the top of things Anni and Torch. With this stat I had bloody high hitchance. With Enchant and the Blessed Aim (from the merc) ca. 90%. So no problem can be there with my equipment-suggestion I earlier made.


Now to Ghoulz's description: being able to survive, and being a meleemancer are two different things. Being a meleemancer means, you can kill things.

Bone runeword SUCKS HARD. It overrides your own bone armor, what is 1000% more efficient (and reliable). Just compare the data: from Bone rw you get 110 dmg (on normal difficulty), while from your own skills you can get 810! Or if you never spend into BA itself, still 690. Darn high difference.
The other stats of the armor are useless too, only the resists are acceptable (the mana is ok too, but the merc will have insight, and that'll give you enough mana). Get sorrounded without BA, and you'll die, no matter what.
Also in multiplayer, where you only do runs, and "the sorceress will blast them with magic, and the barbarians will hit face to face", you might rely on support, but what you actually do? If you build a support character, then you are not meleeing. If you actually meleeing, then you'll need Dim Vision, in wich case you won't be hit many times, you won't face large groups. So Bone rw's bone spear ability will not appear often (and it is weak anyway). The dmg red. will also be useless, as you have BA. The +skills also won't mean much.

The other main problem with Ghoulz's idea is the use of the shield. When you meleemancing, shield gets in your way. Necros block in a horribly, fatally slow way. Do not use a shield with a meleemancer, you'll regret it. For example: you won't be able to recast your BA, what is basically your life.

Also to be safe amongst Souls, no Thundergod's required. Interrestingly the elemental percentage of attacks are always acceptably low (if your resists are high of curse). The thing that CAN hurt you are Nihlatak's snakes. They are even ridiculously hard to be DimVisioned, better just quit if they are there, but Nihlatak himself even on Hell difficulty is a joke (so a good character to gather destruction-keys).
Oblivion Knights worth also squat, you just go there and beat them while the rest is blinded.


Now on the item-section of Ghoulz:
Weapon: for Normal bring The Chieftain, for Nightmare bring Insight (with high AR), and for Hell I brought Obedience and I was very satisfied. Obedience covers everything this build needs all at once, I don't see a point overcomplicating things.
Shields: big no-no here.
Helms: Gaze has no use (remember: BA comes first before dmg red.). Guillome is a good choice, but I went with Biggin's Bonnet for the AR and life.
Gloves: fcr is not usefull for this build. At least definitly not so useful to sacrifice a whole item for that purpose. So no on Trang. The best choice I still think is a Blood Crafted gloves, that'll work against anything.
Belts: fhr do not plays for this build (remember, we have BA). So any suggestion on that is worthless. Get instead come nice resists and statboost here (that's why Credencum is suggested).
Armor: Forst: you don't need the fcr, but otherwise sounds nice. But if you invest into the build, go with Tyrael. Fort gives dmg what is nice, but still remains second compared to what Tyrael offers (RIP, CBF etc.). Enigma is not good as you don't need the mobility (you take away the monsters' mobility with DV remember?). CoH is an ok suggestion again, but still beyond Tyrael.
Amulet/ring: in the end you won't need the angelic combo even without a BA merc.
On switch a Safety Crafted shield with high elemental + magic resistance is suggested, and not just for Hell. Multiply shot monsters with magic projectiles (oblivion knights, greater mumies) can be a pain, especially early on. Later a CtA maybe.
The merc's weapon should be INSIGHT to be able to cast your spells. This build casts its spells frequently.

 

[Inkognito]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

Bone runeword SUCKS HARD. It overrides your own bone armor, what is 1000% more efficient (and reliable). Just compare the data: from Bone rw you get 110 dmg (on normal difficulty), while from your own skills you can get 810! Or if you never spend into BA itself, still 690. Darn high difference.
The other stats of the armor are useless too, only the resists are acceptable (the mana is ok too, but the merc will have insight, and that'll give you enough mana). Get sorrounded without BA, and you'll die, no matter what.
Also in multiplayer, where you only do runs, and "the sorceress will blast them with magic, and the barbarians will hit face to face", you might rely on support, but what you actually do? If you build a support character, then you are not meleeing. If you actually meleeing, then you'll need Dim Vision, in wich case you won't be hit many times, you won't face large groups. So Bone rw's bone spear ability will not appear often (and it is weak anyway). The dmg red. will also be useless, as you have BA. The +skills also won't mean much.

The other main problem with Ghoulz's idea is the use of the shield. When you meleemancing, shield gets in your way. Necros block in a horribly, fatally slow way. Do not use a shield with a meleemancer, you'll regret it. For example: you won't be able to recast your BA, what is basically your life.

Also to be safe amongst Souls, no Thundergod's required. Interrestingly the elemental percentage of attacks are always acceptably low (if your resists are high of curse). The thing that CAN hurt you are Nihlatak's snakes. They are even ridiculously hard to be DimVisioned, better just quit if they are there, but Nihlatak himself even on Hell difficulty is a joke (so a good character to gather destruction-keys).
Oblivion Knights worth also squat, you just go there and beat them while the rest is blinded.

First off, I'm not sure if you've researched the bunch of UPDATED INFO before you posted on this build, but there is alot of good updated information you might be interested in. Search for Acrid Axemancer or other recent meleemancer information.

BONE RUNEWORD:
The bone armor casted from the runeword can be SYNERGIZED by Bone Wall and Bone Prison. This equates to ALOT MORE than the 110 damage absorbed you mentioned above. Thats why this is the armor of choice for many a meleemancer builds. I myself have been tinkering with this build and I LOVE this runeword.
Also, the bone armor cast by itself without cast delay or any kind of delay of movement, even if your running/walking. As long as your not blocking or successfully defended an attack, your bone armor has a chance to recast itself.
Have you tried recasting bone armor yourself when being mobbed?

The merc's weapon should be INSIGHT to be able to cast your spells. This build casts its spells frequently.

Insight on your mercenary? Out of all your choices? :scratchchin: What spells are you talking about? This is a melee build. You should be casting curses and thats about it. Even with level 3 curses (low radius curses), you can curse the whole screen 5 times over without running into mana problems that are critical enough to validate using Insight. The only way I'd be using insight on a meleemancer is if I plan on using Corpse Explosion every 4 seconds, and that just boggles the mind. If you go thru the trouble making a meleemancer just to use corpse explosion frequently...........that's just crazy talk.

 

[twillight]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

BONE RUNEWORD:
The bone armor casted from the runeword can be SYNERGIZED by Bone Wall and Bone Prison.

Have you tried recasting bone armor yourself when being mobbed?


Insight on your mercenary? Out of all your choices? :scratchchin: What spells are you talking about? This is a melee build. You should be casting curses and thats about it. Even with level 3 curses (low radius curses), you can curse the whole screen 5 times over without running into mana problems that are critical enough to validate using Insight. The only way I'd be using insight on a meleemancer is if I plan on using Corpse Explosion every 4 seconds, and that just boggles the mind. If you go thru the trouble making a meleemancer just to use corpse explosion frequently...........that's just crazy talk.

In relation of the Bone rw you talk about the Marrowalk bug? That was eliminated. Also if things would work that way, a lot of people would wear X% chance on strike/attack equipments, but they don't.
Also YOU must not have checked the infos: THERE IS NO HIT RECOVERY if Bone Armor is active! Shield gets in your way, and you'll be block-locked even by a single monster, so shield is to avoid (except against Normal Duriel, and multiplyshot magic-missled bosses)!

With meleemancer you will not be mobbed, or if you're mobbed, you'll simply die, no matter what. But I tried to recast while being ATTACKED at most by 3 monsters at the same time, and it can be done there without problem.

Insight, yes. As you in every ca. 10 seconds recast Dim vision (slevel 17-20), in every 3 seconds you cast an Amplify Damage (slevel 1, as you don't want radius - one of the reasons why you want to avoid +skills - and the resist reduction is the same) or Decrepify (fixed radius), and according to the situation (like against the Ancients, or on the Cow Level just to mention the two main example) you'll occasionally infest the screen with Bone Prison, Insight is a must! (Or they'll swarm you, and you'll die.)
Now on CE: in A1 Hell (against Fallen hordes), and occasionally at other places you'll cast it in the presence of resurrecting monsters (assuming you don't have one of the few RIP-items) on a large scale.

 

[Inkognito]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

In relation of the Bone rw you talk about the Marrowalk bug? That was eliminated. Also if things would work that way, a lot of people would wear X% chance on strike/attack equipments, but they don't.
Also YOU must not have checked the infos: THERE IS NO HIT RECOVERY if Bone Armor is active! Shield gets in your way, and you'll be block-locked even by a single monster, so shield is to avoid (except against Normal Duriel, and multiplyshot magic-missled bosses)!

With meleemancer you will not be mobbed, or if you're mobbed, you'll simply die, no matter what. But I tried to recast while being ATTACKED at most by 3 monsters at the same time, and it can be done there without problem.

Insight, yes. As you in every ca. 10 seconds recast Dim vision (slevel 17-20), in every 3 seconds you cast an Amplify Damage (slevel 1, as you don't want radius - one of the reasons why you want to avoid +skills - and the resist reduction is the same) or Decrepify (fixed radius), and according to the situation (like against the Ancients, or on the Cow Level just to mention the two main example) you'll occasionally infest the screen with Bone Prison, Insight is a must! (Or they'll swarm you, and you'll die.)
Now on CE: in A1 Hell (against Fallen hordes), and occasionally at other places you'll cast it in the presence of resurrecting monsters (assuming you don't have one of the few RIP-items) on a large scale.

No I'm not referring to anything near the marrowwalk bug. The bone armor on the runeword "bone" can be synergized just as you can synergize bone armor without the runeword. It works. I will post a video of my necromancer soon.

I don't need ANY curse besides decrepify with my meleemancer. But like I said, i'll post a vid soon.

 

[Ghoulz]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

My homoculus is shael'd and I don't have any problems with my blocking getting in the way. You talk about a shield being a death trap, yet your the one forced to keep recasting bone armor over and over. Fort is a big NO NO as chilling armor overrides bone armor.

You haven't done much research.

Obedience has nice damage, but it's slow. It has no ias, so your forced with ias gear. I could get in many more hits with grief in a pb plus the safety of a shield. It's not like your going to be swarmed and end up in some block-lock. You have a merc and a golem, decrypt, dim vision to divert blows when needed.

Hell I just amp monsters most of the time because of my merc's doom runeword keeps everything slowed down.

Again, you don't do enough research.

And your mana problem can easily be solved with a potion and a dual leech ring. Curses and bone wall aren't costly when your that high of a level.

 

[Inkognito]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

http://www.purediablo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=717093

Maybe start here for some good conversation about a meleemancer. This is a "chance to cast" meleemancer but there is still some good mechanics about some builds that utilized the "bone" runeword and have some success.

I know from doing my own research that Ghoulz is a HUGE advocate of Grief as the main weapon. Personally I have grief in the stash and its a very close #2 option for me, but I love the eye candy/area damaging effect of my BotD on my necro. I won't make any efficiency argument between the two, because I don't build these kind of builds for absolute maximum efficiency.

I think the main thing here is your misconception about "bone" runeword I honestly would urge you to look at a thread like the one above.
He even has posted video's of it in action (albeit he's in act 1 taking out little peons of rambling demons)

 

[Ghoulz]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

http://www.purediablo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=717093

Maybe start here for some good conversation about a meleemancer. This is a "chance to cast" meleemancer but there is still some good mechanics about some builds that utilized the "bone" runeword and have some success.

I know from doing my own research that Ghoulz is a HUGE advocate of Grief as the main weapon. Personally I have grief in the stash and its a very close #2 option for me, but I love the eye candy/area damaging effect of my BotD on my necro. I won't make any efficiency argument between the two, because I don't build these kind of builds for absolute maximum efficiency.

I think the main thing here is your misconception about "bone" runeword I honestly would urge you to look at a thread like the one above.
He even has posted video's of it in action (albeit he's in act 1 taking out little peons of rambling demons)

Eh, Botd is nice, but deals less damage, no ITD, no %dmg to demons. The mods from Botd aren't very useful for a meleemancer who worrys little about leeching. Mainly just a fun toy for a poison version.

If you got bone RW on and are being pelted by a massive mob of skeleton archers or w/e in A5.... That's all I have to say about that. Makes an ES sorc jealous.

 

[Inkognito]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

Eh, Botd is nice, but deals less damage, no ITD, no %dmg to demons. The mods from Botd aren't very useful for a meleemancer who worrys little about leeching. Mainly just a fun toy for a poison version.

If you got bone RW on and are being pelted by a massive mob of skeleton archers or w/e in A5.... That's all I have to say about that. Makes an ES sorc jealous.

Yup yup. I'm just a sucker for area damage while I do my nasty work. My games aren't usually 8 player games. I'd say I'm solo pvm 70 to 80 percent of the time. I agree, when mob hp levels are alittle more insane (due to number of players in the game) BotD loses alot of effectiveness and thus a LITTLE of its fun play.
Nonetheless, I love the leeching it gives. I've found in my experiences, it helps me be that much beefier without switching curses or tactics in certain circumstances.
-25% target defence
+Prevent Monster Heal
+30 to All Attributes

I know they aren't the godliest mods. But they still maintain usefulness. But as you said, the particular build is built around the Poison Nova CtC so the other things are just semi-useful eye candy. I know Grief happens to have two of the above mentioned mods + ITD + Raw Damage + Venom + higher rate of attack. And I know for the best target to target damage it would be the optimum choice. But I just chose a different path. :thumbup:
(I still keep a 31ias/+399dmg Grief in the stash along with an Eth Oath)

 

[Ghoulz]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

I have a maxed out blood golem for non-boss situations and I love it. I don't need any gear with life leech. If they're undead, well, you need life tap for that anyways.

I like maxed out games. My necro 1 hits most demons in A5 in an empty game.

 

[Valhauros]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

After seven years of inactivity, I found my old discs a couple of weeks ago and decided to revive my Hardcore Meleemancer. Unfortunately, it's been a long time and I've forgotten a lot. The first act was a breeze (with the exception of some Ghostly Champion Tainted), but the second was harder; the Unraveler packs are problematic when mobs are blocking a door and sometimes there is no angle to cast Dim Vision on them, and I just have to draw the mobs out of the room. Eventually, I reached Duriel, but I died so fast I had no time to quickly save & quit. Here is a picture of my items, stats and skill distribution (in green) before I died.

How do I approach Duriel? Were my items and build not ideal? Should I use Bone Prison and let a Rogue kill him? Would it be more effective to apply Iron Maiden than Decrepify if caged? In other matters, are FHR and Damage Reduction really useless?

 

[Ghoulz]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

After seven years of inactivity, I found my old discs a couple of weeks ago and decided to revive my Hardcore Meleemancer. Unfortunately, it's been a long time and I've forgotten a lot. The first act was a breeze (with the exception of some Ghostly Champion Tainted), but the second was harder; the Unraveler packs are problematic when mobs are blocking a door and sometimes there is no angle to cast Dim Vision on them, and I just have to draw the mobs out of the room. Eventually, I reached Duriel, but I died so fast I had no time to quickly save & quit. Here is a picture of my items, stats and skill distribution (in green) before I died.

How do I approach Duriel? Were my items and build not ideal? Should I use Bone Prison and let a Rogue kill him? Would it be more effective to apply Iron Maiden than Decrepify if caged? In other matters, are FHR and Damage Reduction really useless?

I had sigons and even I had issues with him. You shouldn't even bother trying to go head to head with him in normal with lowly gear with such a character. A premature melee necro is pretty meh. And FHR is really important, especially with a 2-hand weapon.

The only thing I can think of is invest into clay golem a bit(if you intend on using it), get an act2 merc with blessed aim, and whip out decrypt(if you have the mana to keep it going). He should be slow enough to where to can let him focus his attacks on you and you should be safe enough and he'll eventually go down.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

How do I approach Duriel? Were my items and build not ideal? Should I use Bone Prison and let a Rogue kill him? Would it be more effective to apply Iron Maiden than Decrepify if caged? In other matters, are FHR and Damage Reduction really useless?

Sorry for the late comment. I completely forgot to reply.

Duriel is massively annoying. He's the boss I absolutely hate. There are two massive problems with Duriel. The first is his freezing aura and the second is his annoying charge attack. You'll have to deal with both.

Your Necro is using a maul and lacks IAS so you aren't going to be doing too many attacks per second. Especially because the freeze cuts into your attack speed. Being glacially slow means you are not going to be the damage dealer. It's going to be crowd control and Merc support for you.

As Ghoulz already said, keeping Duriel slowed via Decrep and Clay will massively increase your life span as well as that of your Merc. It will also keep his more annoying attacks down. This will be your main focus during the fight. Secondly you're going to be looking after your Merc's health with pots and perhaps short bursts of LT. It's not the most exciting strategy, but it works the best for me. Try and get your Merc a weapon with CB to speed up the fight. I favor an Act II Merc.

I don't know if it still works in the current patch, but Act II Mercs used to be able to attack over BP's if they had a weapon with a range bigger than 2. If that is still the case you can add a BP to the strategy outlined above.

Boxing him in and using IM is not my favorite tactic. I've had mixed results with it where sometimes it works really well and the other time he bulldozes through it and kills me. If you are quick with the traps you should be able to do this eventually.

If things really don't pan out you can always run circles around the room, fire off a few BSpears, drink pots and portal away when things get too hairy. I've actually beaten him a few times doing this.

 

[Charan Jaydemyr]

Re: Meleemancer Guide - Preliminary version

Hi there!

MadMantis, I just want to say your Meleemancer guide is just incredible. I waxed a little nostalgic talking to some friends earlier and wondered what sort of hits I'd get if I searched for 'Meleemancer' -- your guide is the first stop, and deservedly so. I think I wrote the first one for this site back when it was Diabloii.net, focusing on the Meleemancer in vanilla D2. It wasn't anywhere near as technical as yours but it did introduce a play-style a lot of people hadn't heard of. I went by the name Dark-Schneider back then. I think it was even translated into a few different languages. Strange days! I think a fellow called Lord Rahn updated the Meleemancy guide extensively, but that's a long time ago. I took the base philosophy of the meleemancer (conjured armour+debuffs+melee, essentially) and applied it to other games, with varying degrees of success. Guild Wars probably yielded the best results, and by then 'Meleemancer' was no longer a term restricted to D2. There was no need to write a guide for what was essentially an accepted play-style: N/W.

I do know I never had the time, bravery or some might say madness to attempt a post-Runeword Diablo 2 Meleemancy guide. I just remember seeing 'Passion' and thinking, wow, if only I'd had THAT back in the day. I eventually threw it onto a phase blade for my bladezon (Tankazon, as some called it) and had a blast with that until she died in HC at level 78 or so. You'd think I'd know better than to try to melee Oblivion Knights with Iron Maiden; even with Berserk, it was somehow a two-hit suicide.

I wouldn't have replied (or indeed re-registered to reply) had I not seen that you are still active here, still carrying the torch and all that. Great work. Really.

PS Duriel was the first Diablo 2 critter to force my original Meleemancer to moonlight as a Bone-spear thrower. Freeze aura is beyond painful.