[SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

helvete1

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[SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Full Tal Rasha BlizzBaller v. 1.00
by Helvete

Introduction

This guide is based on single player 1.12 RWM play, using items already available to us using ATMA (most likely) or some other means of transferring items.

I've had a hard time doing hell Baal and his minions efficiently. Runs would either take too much time, or they would be aborted too often due to immunes, Iron Maiden curse, or monsters with high elemental damage. This changed two weeks ago, when I had another close look at Tal Rasha's Wrappings. You can read more about it here. There are a few things about the set which makes it extremely good for dual element sorcs. We will get back to that in the gear section.

Taking into concideration the fact that Static Field will bring any non-LI monster down to 50% or less of its HP in hell, it seems obvious to me that building around fire/cold elements while using static field as a one-point wonder would be king. And with our build, we'll manage ~3.5k fireball and ~5k blizzard.

Skills
I focused my sorc on the cold tree, as Blizzard gets very strong with higher levels, and cold mastery helps it very much, even with one skill point. I opted for this skill point placement:
Fire bolt: 20 (synergy)
Fire ball: 20
Meteor: zero, saves three points in prereqs
Fire/cold mastery: zero, get it free from the orb!
Warmth, tele and static: 1 each (one point wonders)
Telekinesis and Frost Nova: 1 each (prerequesites, and only Frost Nova is completely wasted if you use TK to grab waypoint to make runs one second faster).
Blizzard: 20
GSpike: 20 (synergy, awesome skill to freeze minion waves)
Rest in blizz synergies. (By 95 you will have maxed another)

Stats
156 base strength (for using spirit), everything else in vita.
(Adjust this for torch and anni if you are bnet)

Items
As you can see above, heavy investment in blizzard, not as much in fire ball. However, we'll get a LOT of help from equipment. These are some highlights from Tal Rasha's Wrappings:

+6 sorc skills with the full set
VERY good resists
good life and mana
Decent MF
Decent FCR
Free masteries from the weapon
-15% enemy fire/lightning resist
+15% cold skill damage

Now, we add in Magefist and 35FCR Spirit Monarch. We get:
105%FCR total (breakpoint for tele and fireball, next is at 200%)
+2 all skills and +1 fire skills
Big mana and FHR
25% mana regen
A lot more resists. Enough that lightning resist is maxed.
80% Faster Hit Recovery. (We need 6% more to reach a breakpoint)

Most of our items are now covered. What's left is:
2x ring
Boots
Charms
Switch weapon/shield
Sockets

Rings
Nothing will beat dual Stone of Jordan for rings. You don't need more FCR, the only stat you have use for is strenght (for using spirit), and +2 all skills and 50%increased mana cannot be beaten, unless you have a 1.10s beta BKWB or two. (only legit +2 skill ring I know of). But that's unlikely at best.

Sockets
I went with cold facets in helm/armor/weapon. Fire facets would make for a stronger fireball, but I found I didn't need it. 4k was good enough. Ptopaz helm/armor is a strong MF option as well, not sacrificing much, especially if you don't have facets to spare.

Boots
If you take a close look at your resists (we're SP, so we don't have access to torch/anni. If we did, we'd go with War Traveler boots in a heartbeat). we lack:
-5% cold resist
-45% poison resist
-40% fire resist

There are a few choices here:

Rares
- 40psnres 35%fireres 10%FHR
This in conjunction with a 5% all res SC would MAX every resist, and shave another frame off hit recovery. (The breakpoint is at 86% FHR so a LC/GC would do just as well). Poison and fire resistances are not in as high demand as lightning and cold, so if we skip the FHR and use a charm instead, we only have two "musts" on our rare boots. Nice adds are FHR as mentioned, MF, 40/40 fire/psnres with 5 cold res (would leave 5% psn res left to cover with charms) and ofc FRW for use in town.

Sets
Aldur's Advance comes with at least 40% fire resist. It also has 50 life, 40%FRW and 10% damage taken goes to mana. Very nice, and if you have a full Tal set, chances are you'll have tons of these.
(Credit to Sirpoopsalot for pointing me to this option)

Crafted
Crafted Safety boots have small inherent fire resist, which is nice. Caster boots have properties to help our mana. Our mana shouldn't need help, and the fire res on safety boots isn't much unless the boots can compare to good rare ones, so I'd stay away from crafts unless I had something godly.

Uniques
War Travelers have +10 str, which can be exploited if you don't care for maxed resists (remember our lightning resist is maxed anyway). Decent FRW and very good MF.

Weapon switch
The absolute best would be a Call to Arms runeword in a one-handed weapon, with a Spirit shield to boost BO. If you don't have access to this, see the switch as a MF boost for Baal kills. Gull+Rhyme is +125%MF, not to be underestimated, as our MF will "only" be around 200%.

Charms
I opted for Gheeds, and one fire and four cold skillers. Mostly because I didn't have five cold skillers. Nice adds here are life, but also FHR. Next breakpoint is at 86%, so if you do not have 10% on your boots, a skiller with FHR would net the next breakpoint.
Small charms I used to max my resists, give me some more life, and MF. Try to reach 86% total FHR, but don't let resists and life suffer. Do NOT use +str charms, as you'll regret it when you find the same charm with huge life.

Merc
I highly recommend a "pocket cleric" merc, which is an act 2 combat merc hired in normal, and given an "Insight" polearm. The mana regen is outstanding, as you'll have good mana already, and Baal can drain mana, which is annoying at best. Prayer is a synergy to Meditation, which works very well with autoauras, and thus we have *two* healing auras as well as one to regen mana. Neeto!

His armor and helm should be geared towards survival rather than damage. Gaze/Shaftstop with a resist jewel or UM in either should keep him alive fairly well, but feel free to experiment. You might find that a merc with kelpie or reapers suits your play style better, and rather go for a holy freeze or might merc. Or if you're disgustingly wealthy, you'll probably borrow your light sorcs infinity merc weapon just for the hell of it.

Early strategy
If you don't get rushed, or respec an old character, you still won't have much trouble playing on your own with a little help from muling on gear. I used a +3 fire bolt orb, and Hsaru's set early on, pumping fire bolt and one point in warmth and static for bosses later. When fireball became available, I switched to that, and at lvl 17 I started using a "Leaf" short staff which had +3 fireball already. After this, I started building for Blizzard at lvl 24 (I was in early act 4 then) and I put on a "Spirit" eth crystal sword at lvl 25. From this point on it gets stupidly easy. Lvl 27 merc gets insight. Lvl 29 we get 2x SoJ, visceratuant and Vipermagi, giving us +4 all skills and the 105% FCR breakpoint with a crafted caster belt and a FCR amu, OR a 20% FCR circlet. Leveling is FAST at /players8 pindle, and in normal, lvl 10+ blizzard kills him with no trouble, even though we didn't put any points in cold mastery.

At lvl 39, I killed ancients and baal (lvl 42 when baal died) and my skillers started working. Teleported my way through NM, only stopping to do skill quests. Stopped at NM baalruns, where I leveled to 71, which is the requirement for the Tal Rasha armor. Killed Baal, then teleport through Hell, When I reached Act 5, I stopped at Pindleskin, and leveled as long as I could stand at Pindle. When I couldn't stand it any longer, I leveled a little more, and reached lvl 90 with the 60M I got from ancients.

Baal run strategy
(Starts with players set to 3, mostly because I'm too lazy tho change often)
Very straightforward. Start by doing BC/BO at the WP (if you have CtA). Tele down, I stop to kill easy bosses such as flayers (they can drop anything) but that's a matter of preference. Clear the throne room. If you feel confident, you now change players to 8.

First wave
Cast two blizzards before the first wave spawns, then a Glacial Spike just before they spawn, so that it hits them the moment they spawn. This to avoid the flayers to run away in all directions as soon as the first one dies.

Second wave
Change left click back to fireball. Start casting blizzards where you estimate Achmel will spawn. As soon as they do spawn, spam fireballs and blizzards towards the greater mummies. Ignore the Death Mages as much as possible, tele around if necessary, but kill the mummies first. Then finish off the rest with fireball. If your merc got poisoned bad, you might want to pop back to town to heal him,

Third wave
If you haven't already, change players to 8. Change left click to GSpike. Start spamming blizzards, and as just as Baal summons the council members, spam GSpike right in the middle of them. This keeps them in a tight group, more vulnerable to blizzard, and it keeps them from spawning too many hydras, which can be a pain to your (already poisoned?) merc.

Fourth wave
Spam blizzard, as they spawn, Gspike them, and do three-four statics, then another gspike and more blizzards. They die even faster than the last guys,

Final wave
Lister is the only boss baal summons who can spawn Cold AND Fire immune. If this happens, you can either kill off the rest, then use Telekinesis and your merc to stun/kill him, or just park him. I usually park him, If he isn't FI/CI, then just kill him. Unless you're surprised by the pack being extra fast, you shouldn't have trouble using gspike and blizzard to freeze/kill them pretty fast. If lister is CI/extra fast, he can be a pain too, but just feed your merc potions, and concentrate on killing the others. Static works wonders here when you get the hang of Gspike to freeze.

Baal
Change players back to 3. The expirience from a baal kill is bugged to not increase past this players setting, so what's the use. He'll drop six items 99% of the time too. Change left click back to fireball, tele in, static him to half life, and start spamming fireball and blizzard. It's not really a problem unless your merc died and you didn't revive him. If you have Gull/rhyme on swithc, switch before baal dies. If not, you could always switch anyway, since CtA has 30% mf.

Rinse and repeat.

(I made lvl 92 in one week, and still had time for 9h work, 8h sleep each day...)
 
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Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

I think there's a blizzballer guide (or three) around here somewhere, but I don't recall how up to date or accurate they are. Definitely check the stickies before going too far with any expansions or ammendments (unless you're unconcerned with redundant info :wink:). A few comments on your version:

1. For boots with the Spirit shield, I've always liked Aldur's Advance. Nice fire resists to cover what your shield lacks, +50 life, good FRW for in town, and even a little bit of DamageToMana. Rares can work too, but good ones are expensive while Aldur's are PGem-fodder that's pretty common.


2. Personally, with a partially-synergized Blizzard, I much prefer IceBlast as my main cold synergy. I have tried both.

Glacial Spike has better area of effect and missile speed, but IceBlast has better power (by quite a bit). Considering Blizzard's ability to occasionally fall on top of a monster for several seconds without hitting :)doh:), I find the extra power of IceBlast a better compliment to my build's speed & power.

And if someone does choose Ice Blast over Glacial Spike for their backup attack in the cold tree, then that actually makes Ice Bolt a better final synergy than Glacial Spike too. There's no difference as far as Blizzard's synergies, but there is when it comes to Ice Blast's (i.e. Ice Bolt adds damage to Ice Blast, while Glacial Spike only adds freeze duration).


3. Since you skipped Meteor, but left it as a potential final synergy, you might want to mention that it's possible (read: probable) that investing extra points in FireMastery will provide more damage to your Fireball than points in Meteor. Part of the reason is that Meteor has 3 prerequisites that don't help your damage (and you're not likely to have enough skillpoints to max it), and another part is that Masteries are multiplicative while synergies are additive (and how that works within the damage equations).

So 10 points in FireMastery might be better for your Fireball than 7 in Meteor (& 3 in prereq's).


One more comment - not a critique of any sort:

Your guide is kind of like the cliff-notes version so far. I tend to prefer a more detailed and thorough approach to guides, but iirc (I didn't check) the existing guide from the stickies is pretty comprehensive & accurate already. If that's the case, staying as the cliff-notes version might be an advantage.

Short & to the point isn't necessarily bad, afterall. And it makes it easier to quickly find info in a guide.
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Thanks for the input. I read through the stickies, but could only find very very old info.

I know this looks like a sketch, that's what it is, but I'll tune it up if there's interest. I have found that not many builds can solo p3 baal and p8 minions easy and fast, without going completely crazy with HRs.

About your points:

1 - Thanks for the tip about the aldur boots. It sure is a very good pgem range option. I do know rares can be very expensive, however, dual fire/psn res (the two "lesser" ones) with some MF should not be very expensive, unless there are other affixes pushing the price. And in SP, you find half-decent rare boots all the time, so it is probable that people playing sp have at least some rare ones laying around in a forgotten atma stash.

On Bnet, torch/anni resolves all the resistance lacks alone.

2 - I know Ice Blast has far higher damage, but GSpike is a MUCH better utility skill. Extra Fast Extra Strong Minions of Destruction aren't as frightening when they are standing still, merc tanking Lister The Terminator as Blizzard tears them apart. It also keeps Council Members from spawning those pesky hydras, which in high numbers are a danger to your (poisoned from last wave) mercenary. And it's invaluable for Pindleskin runs, which is how I do my leveling until I reach the high 80s.

3 - I didn't leave Meteor as a potential final synergy. If my post can be understood that way, I didn't intend for it. My intention was to skip meteor and its prereqs completely, to make for a stronger blizzard.

This whole character is aimed for baalrunning, throne at /p3 (lazyness, I don't like to change the players setting more than twice a game), minions (at least the last three waves) at /p8, then baal at /p3. Fireball is needed to kill off cold immunes, and it is nice to damage baal in between blizzards. Static and blizzard decimates everything else very very fast. Especially the last three waves. Lister can sometimes spawn CI, but if he does, I just park him.

I think I'll do a rewrite, where I put a little more background, and specify that it's all about blizz/static for the big damage, while 4k fireball with -15%EFR and 105%fcr is all you need for cold immunes.
 
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Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Allright, heavy editing in the first post. Have another read, and hit me with the comments!
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Zero Cold/Fire mastery? Makes no sense. At least one hard point is required to get bonus from + skills.
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Zero Cold/Fire mastery? Makes no sense. At least one hard point is required to get bonus from + skills.

Tal-Rasha's Orb comes with +Cold/Fire/Lighning Mastery, and your +skills will take over after that.


Nice update, helvete.

My only nitpick is for WSK/Baal runs I prefer a Cold/Lightning hybrid (mostly since Lister will never be dual-immune to your attacks and overall the minion waves are much more resistant to fire than lightning). Occasionally Bartuc will be CI/LI, but it's definitely much less common than CI/FI overall.

Also, from my own experience, I prefer a pretty moderate level of Cold Mastery: 27. A lot of the monsters you face will have a pretty solid natural cold resistance (Lister is 70%, Baal is 50%, etc.), and I found I like the consistently-doubled damage you get from always having a monster at -100% resistance.

But that's all a matter of preference, and doesn't detract from this build being fun & viable, nor from a well written guide.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

In my expirience, the only wave difficult to kill on /players8 is Achmel and his minions. I usually use only blizzard and freeze the rest in place with spike, but the cold immune mages obviously require fire ball usage. I have such good resists/life it's not a problem to tele on top of the mages so that the merc hits them as well.

But ofcourse, I have my gear cold faceted and I have only one fire skiller, while the rest are cold skillers, so cold mastery reaches a very nice level (+6 sorc skills,
+5 all skills, +2 fire skills, +5 cold skills +2 cold mastery = lvl 18) cold mastery, and then there's facets. I think it sums up to about -120 enemy CR. And blizz is at ~5.5k and will only get stronger as I level.

I forgot to count the FHR from the full set bonus, so I had to make some adjustments to my gear recommendations, nothing major. Basically, it makes 10FHR on boots look very nice. Thinking about it, a very nice FHR rare jewel could be nice as well, but then again, facets = more killing power.

Playing around with a skill planner on a site I can't link to, I calculated that with this setup, a lvl 98 sporting anni and torch on the realms can reach 9k blizzard (with perf facets in gear) and 5k fireball, needing no resists from boots, thus making WT a more solid choice, which would potentially be 50 str saved which could go in vita/energy.

Now I'm thinking about going 51/49 in life/mana ratio (due to blood mana being annoying) and skip the insight merc.... but what would be good... Reapers for crowd control, maybe.
 
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Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

FYI, Nova's every bit as effective against the skeleton mages in the 2nd wave as Fireball - even on /players8. Less damage, but better area of effect means you can stunlock/kill several mages at once. And on /players1 the mage's lower life paired with Nova's superior AoE make Nova a clear winner over fireball.


...and skip the insight merc.... but what would be good... Reapers for crowd control, maybe.

I would say the most common cheap merc-weapon choices are (in no particular order):

- Insight
- Reapers
- upgraded Kelpie Snare (helps slow Baal to the point where he won't teleport or cast a clone)
- I'd also give Obedience a shout-out for the nice amount of damage & crushing blow, though I don't think it's a very popular choice.

... if you've got a higher budget then Infinity never hurts a sorc. There are several other good choices too, obviously.


One other merc-item for Baal runs that I think is very underrated is: Tyrael's Might. It's not exactly the most common item, and it usually gets a bad rap (because its rarity seems to far surpass its benefits).

But if you can get one you'll love how the RIP mod takes the annoyance (and some danger) out of the monsters that get revived. Stygian Dolls? If you let the merc kill them (while you focus on the other monsters) they won't be a problem now. Merc keeps focusing on the skeleton mages in the 2nd wave and ignoring Achmel & Co.? Half the mages will be dead - and stay dead - by the time you've killed the main cluster.

The Cannot-Be-Frozen mod and resistances on Tyraels are an obvious plus, and the FRW, strength and Demon-Damage boost aren't entirely useless either. Altogether it adds up to a pretty nice item for the task of WSK/Baal running.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

The Cannot-Be-Frozen mod and resistances on Tyraels are an obvious plus, and the FRW, strength and Demon-Damage boost aren't entirely useless either.

Hmm, I thought dmg to demons/undead wasn't applied on mercs? :scratchchin:


 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Nova, you say? I use an orb/nova sorc to run countess. Maybe I'll respec a char to try and make a nova-using baalrunner.... But what backup skill?
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Nova, you say? I use an orb/nova sorc to run countess. Maybe I'll respec a char to try and make a nova-using baalrunner.... But what backup skill?

Nova-Enchant works for me (I have done three that kind of sorcs so far and after patch its even more viable, as no more IM).

Reaper's Toll merc with Guillaume+Threachery, he is beast after enchant.

Nova sorc without insight merc has usually mana problems, but max warmth keeps mana up quite nicely while spamming novas. Against immunes, you can melee too, CM (crescent moon, phase) is best nova weapon, but its quite good as melee-weapon too.

Baal is no problem, as you can change to melee if baal burns your mana and enchanted merc helps a lot too. With CM+Griffon you can aim for sweet spot and use static bug and static one extra time.

I have soloed full baalruns in bnet without problems. Only clearing throne is sometimes tricky when IM-knights are around. All waves are easy.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Would that be viable without torch/anni? In SP we'd have up to 40 less attributes and 40 less all resists, and 4 less skills....
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Would that be viable without torch/anni? In SP we'd have up to 40 less attributes and 40 less all resists, and 4 less skills....

I am sure its viable.

Clearing throne + killing baal is problem for nova sorc and of course mana problems. Those waves are pretty easy when merc can tank them. Even extra fast Lister, as you can ambush him at right side behind pillars while decrepify merc keeps him slow and easy enough. Works with laggy bnet too, you don't have that problem.


Both spirit/stormshield works, as nova-enchant is almost pure caster in throne spirit is better there. In some areas (nihlathak,pits) stormshield works better.

Around lvl 30 nova and little higher enchant works just fine. I don't prebuff enchant, magefist+enchant orb at switch is enough to get that high enough. I am aiming for 1.5k enchant even less enchant works in throne as fire is quite useless there, helps at least while clearing throne and agaist baal. I am using mine to clear full game pits/travi temples, travincal etc... too so that why quite high enchant.


I don't always use anni+torch with those chars, those are luxury items at start of ladder, surely those helps but not needed if you have decent items otherwise (shako+CM+vipermagi+Reaper's Toll for merc is nice start, from there you can uppgrade items for more speed).

You don't need max row of skillers (go with 2-4 at start), use others for mana/life and resist charms.
Aldur's boots, spirit, vipermagi and some resist charms are enough for resist, maybe couple lightning resist charms to max lightning.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

A level 30 Nova is pretty worthless against wave 2-5 even in a /p1 game.

Blizzard is miles ahead on Enchant for Baalruns and pretty much everything else as well.
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

A level 30 Nova is pretty worthless against wave 2-5 even in a /p1 game.

Blizzard is miles ahead on Enchant for Baalruns and pretty much everything else as well.

I agree that with zero -lightning resist from gear, level 30 nova is useless, as it takes 2-4 statics and maybe 15-30 novas (monsters have time to regerate life) to kill one wave. Takes time and burns mana way too much.


Level 30 is still quite high when weapon slot (CM) don't give any +skills.

Hell monsters have ~20k life (maybe less). Static takes half life with two casts (when -light resist ~60). Lvl 30 nova makes ~1300 damage (with ~60 light resist monsters lightning resist is around zero or less, so they take full damage), so taking remaing life takes less than 7-10 novas, so wave should be down in less than 5 seconds. And merc is helping there too.

(CM+vipermagi(facet)+Shako(facet) with -45 lightning resist works nicely too, but of course adding griffon helps a bit)

At leat in bnet, those killing those waves have never been problems with nova sorc holding CM and other -lightning items. Not sure if monsters are harder, same or easier in single play.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Baal waves 4 and 5 have much higher HP than that. A minion of destruction has about 40k and Lister about 60k.
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Baal waves 4 and 5 have much higher HP than that. A minion of destruction has about 40k and Lister about 60k.

Good to know. What kind of lightning resist those have. Wave4 seems to have low resist, goes down pretty fast, but Lister pack took always little longer.

Luckily those two last waves follow you, so I tele at right side behind pillars for those two waves. Then merc is not under baal decrepify curse, so he can kill faster. Easier to static too when you don't need to worry about keeping merc alive. Maybe that Lister pack needs 15 novas, but pretty quick anyway.



 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Wave 4 has 0% lr and wave 5 33%. Lister has 53%.
 
Re: [SP/RWM]Full tal blizzballer guide (works on bnet too, just MUCH easier)

Been without internet for a while, so decided to take my sorc to 95. That was painless, so now it's 96 next! About 180 more baalruns to 96, and with 5 minute runs, that's ~16 hours play time.
 
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