The Exposure Tournament

Re: The Exposure Tournament

Haven't tallied the points, just a quick update.

SeymourKrelborn, the dentist, is level 23 and alive and kicking around in tal rasha's false tombs.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

My Internet access availabilities are in questions in coming months. Hoping for best, but could be without as well. I'll continue tourney, but the possibility I may not beable to update when connection is lost.

Was a good run while it last.

On side note new character has cleared up to rescuing cain. Will post more when and if I clear Act I.

If someone can move Nispart to Deeds as she died battling Andariel, Score 39.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Thalestris made it to level 30 at the Lower Kurast waypoint. She hasn't found anything good yet, and hasn't been able to find any good weapons, so right now she's stuck using a Long War Bow with 3-42 damage and KB. Some hits are great (like one where Critical Strike checks) and others do nothing.

Strafe is at level 6 and so far not used often. Her main skill for the most part is MA, so I am not tearing up the game either. She did find a Leadcrow but that weapon stinks so it'll sit on the shelf.

Someone please add me to the table.

[highlight]Thalestris, level 30 Strafezon, Lower Kurast[/highlight]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

This will be my last update for a week or so as I will be out of town.

Scaven has continued his journey from the desert to the shores of Kurast. He had intentionally brought his MF down quite low in the hopes of finding some decent bases for 'honor' and/or 'black'. He was, however, to be surprised by finding two game changing uniques. The first came while battling in the Arcane Sanctuary where he found a Coldsteel Eye cutlass with 248%ED (200-250)! Having a weapon with that speed and damage allowed him to really pick up his pace and confidence. The next one came in the second of the false tombs, where the Spirit Shroud dropped. At first he was hesitant to loose all that CB and the annoying safety of monster flee, but after pondering, it was a no brainer. CBF, a skill and 10 MDR are huge at this stage. He can always go back to the Rattlecage later when the CB may be more useful at a lower /p setting. The rest of the Tombs were smooth sailing, even when surrounded, things typically turned out well. Duriel was a bit of a tank, but no real problem. His only useful drop item was Scaven's first +2 warcries weapon- a throwing spear. He may not get to use it for long, as he is anticipating the need for a 2-handed berserk switch soon.

[highlight]Scaven, lucky screaming frenzy barb, lvl59, NM Kurast Docks, 200points[/highlight]

notable items equiped:
rare barb helm (+2BarbCombat/+1IncSpeed/+1GWard/+2WCry/ScalingMana(44)/4energy/6fireres)
The Spirit Shroud (10MDR)
Coldsteel Eye cutlass (248ED)
sharp large charm (4/25)
iron grand charm of greed (70/33)
garnet grand charm of the glacier (25/3-7)
fine large charm of inertia (2/19/5)

Best of luck to everyone and I look forward to reading all the progress when I get back.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Trying my hand with a barbarian this should end up in a quick deeds. Enters BloodQuencher a barbarian that is sure to meed deeds along the way. Took a rouge with me to meet blood raven little did she know that the gods demanded blood so she was the sacrifice. Act 1 first acts were completed with a rare bardiche that I gambled on first go. Had LL/ED/2-4 fire damage Worked well in as it was like 1-79 so most stuff died in one hit life was good. Moved to a Voulge next it only had LL yet auto attack was killing things in 1-2 hits. Gambled on scythes until got one with LL that took forever for them to appear on the screen let alone to get one with LL. That took me to the until could gamble for a Polearm. Gambled one with LL 5%/IAS 10%/9% psn/li res that was the weapon that ended out act 1. Andy was an easy Drink antidote, drink red, drink full row of blues, concentrate to death fight. Her drop was rather lackluster as well. First thing upon reaching act was leaping across the desert to the halls of the dead to run in and get the cube. Have lot of power shopping and rolling savage polearms and trying to increase resitences from 0 as imagine beetles will tickle a little if I don't.

[Highlight] BloodQuencher , Level 21 Polearm/"WW" barb, Lut Golein [/highlight]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

He had intentionally brought his MF down quite low in the hopes of finding some decent bases for 'honor' and/or 'black'.


Note that 5-socket items will not drop in NM. You (or Larzuk) will have to add the sockets if you want to make Honor before Hell difficulty.


Congrats on Coldsteel Eye and The Spirit Shroud!
In this tournament, CBF is much harder to find than usual.



 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Running_Scared has moved on to what has proved to be a much more difficult act 3 NM!

First real challenge came from Szark, in the spider cavern, as I expected it would. But I did not expect him to be extra fast! That was a very tough fight, He followed me all over the cavern before I finally got him pinned down.

The Gidbin was an unexpected NDE, I usually expect that guy to spawn off screen, but he and his pack popped right on top of me, and with some nasty mods. Found a LUM in the forest as well, which is my high so far. I hadn't been able to find a 40s armor yet so I tried my hand at the cube, and got it!

The swampy pit had dolls, but were not as bad as expected, they could take off 200-400 on death and about 100 per hit, which was manageable, and FO puts them in hit recovery pretty often. The only problem was a CE boss pack, that one was pretty tough.

I could have sworn they fixed the frozen leaper bug...but obviously not.

Next real challenge was my greatest fear of this act: the temples
First temple was the quest one, and it was a real test! My original plan was to try to punk her from off screen with hydras, but you never know if you've got them all or not with that method. So after burning a belt of mana pots on hydras I decided to move in. I saw her running at her normal suicide pace and decide to hold them off at the door, so as not to get swarmed. That was a good plan for the .5 second before she cursed me! Crap!, life went down 1/3 at a time, and I tele'd out to a side corridor while she and a few others chased me down, just managed to get in my tp in time! Came back in the entrance and was able to slowly break them apart, I can tell you that its been a while since my adrenaline has gotten going that good from D2! The rest of the temples were not so bad except for a pack of snakes that was cold immune. Travincal was pretty tough with a champion pack of Cantors, mostly just really hard to kill, not that dangerous. Durance 1 had dolls and vampires, the 2 worst IMO, but it is small, so that's ok. lvl 2 had dolls, corpses, and urdars, that was a good roll IMO. I used the terrain to advantage to trap boss packs of dolls, and all went pretty well, just long and tedious.

But the real challenge lay ahead, Durance 3. I expected this to be ugly, but I underestimated it by far! the lower section had two vampire packs, both extra fast, and 1 cursed, I kept trying to find some stable ground to start at but there were too many. Nearly died too many times to count and used a full belt of potions before I decided that wasn't going to work. Took a blind tele up to the top left section, luckily no more boss packs up there and the council was far away. Came back to the middle area and slowly killed them a few at a time, using the moat to my advantage. Bremm was nasty, showing off his favorite aura, I'm really glad he never got mixed in with the blood lords!

Meph was moated (hey I'm a sorc! what do you expect?) fight took a good 3-4 minuets and at least 6 mana pots, and the reward was not worth my trouble, a ripsaw!
Did the entire act on /p8 again, and ended up with 320 mf when I killed meph.

Notable finds: Trang glove, blackbog’s sharp, graven spine, worm skull (apparently I should have played a necro), wall of eyeless, Lidless wall, eth grave palm, infernostrides, 3rd nagel(19%), and a dozen or so other normal S/Us at least.

Did a little rearranging of charms and such to get resists up to a little better on lightning and fire for act 4.

[highlight]Running_Scared, FO/Hydra Sorc, lvl 64, NM A4, 226 points[/highlight]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Well that didn't last long, went against a pack of "dogs" in Catacombs 3 and my dodge/avoid kicked in super high gear and I got locked and amp'd at the same time. Run out of potions and couldn't get away from being surrounded even with a level 3 charged strike.

Not sure if I'm going to re-enter..if so it'll be on a barbarian.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

I decided against a new necro and as I've never done a hammerdin so I started one. Little debate in my head about 1.12 vs. 1.13 and the runes got it. So what do you think: Can Charge kill the few magic immunes I'll meet?
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

This tourney is not for impatient individuals. Obvious my aggressive playstyle relies on defensive equipment. As a result no shield means trouble for most of normal for me.

I may have misread, is Decoy banned as well? Just curious. Correct me if I'm wrong...

Necro Summons, Druids Summons (except Ravens), Assassins Shadows, Amazons Valkyrie, and Paladin Smite/HolyShield are all Forbidden.

Leaves me with small window for builds I would enjoy.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Necro Summons, Druids Summons (except Ravens), Assassins Shadows, Amazons Valkyrie, and Paladin Smite/HolyShield are all Forbidden.

Well I'm pretty sure you can play a summoning Druid/Necro.....you just wouldn't be able to summon anything and would have to do all attacking yourself :whistling:

Even though the Decoy doesn't actually attack, I think it's still considered a summonable. I know what you mean though about it limiting build selections.



 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Yes, Decoy is banned, and it is currently annoying the living hell out of me, as the Zon has zero crowd control without it.

[highlight]Vanessa, level 33 Bowazon, City of the Damned, 98 points[/highlight]

This tourney is definitely not for the impatient. Managed to get through Act 3 - just. Had to skip a couple of the underground temples due to stair traps. Had a NDE to the one stair trap I decided to stick around and fight. By the end of the act, I was thoroughly sick of monsters that run away as soon as you start landing a few blows on them. Vampires in particualr sucked. They must have really high hitpoints (or physical resistance) even in normal, as they take for ever to take down with an underpowered weapon. Durance 3 was scary. Luckily I managed to moat trick Meph, but I was deadset lucky to even reach him. Blood Lords and LE Council Boss = yikes!!! Naturally, in keeping with my entire journey thus far, Meph dropped crap. I've been forced to drop back to p3 for Act 4, my damage just isn't good enough to cope with p8 any more. Hopefully I find an Amn and a 3os exceptional bow soon, then I'll finally get to deal out some decent damage. Act 4 has actually been relatively easy, with the exception of Izual. Took me something like 20 minutes to take him down. I am really, really not looking forward to Big D. My resists are 25/25/53/who cares, which is going to mean serious pain, and I don't have enough cash after endlessly gambling bows to try for some resist gear. Watch this space for a deeds report later today. ;)

Oh, and while I'm here, may as well get this off my chest:

[rant]Curse bloody Blizzard and their approach to fixing over-powered builds. Because physical Bowazons pwned everything in 1.09, Blizzard felt compelled to nerf the living hell out of them in 1.10. Effectively physical Bowazons were triple-nerfed. 1) Multishot and Strafe copped a 25% damage penalty (yet Zeal, Frenzy, Fury didn't - how the hell is that consistent?), and GA copped effectively an 80% damage penalty (1 hit instead of 5 per shot). This would be all well and good, except that 2) monsters are now much, much tougher than in 1.09, magnifying the damage nerf. For the final insult, 3) pretty much every other physical damage skill in the game picked up a damage synergy (or synergies) to deal with the much tougher monsters (actually it was probably the other way around), including Frenzy and Zeal (Fury got bummed too, either that or it must have totally owned 1.09 - 423% damage at level 20!!!), but naturally the physical bow skills missed out. Now I know full well that a physical bowazon is more than viable in 1.10+, but they've gone from being cookie cutter, to actually quite underpowered unless you have the right gear. In particular, and this is the point that really pisses me off, they really don't make very good boss runners, even with Windforce (except for stubborn people like me who insist on doing it anyway ;)). Seriously, damage nerf + buffed monsters + absence of synergies was just a slight overreaction to the 1.09 situation. But that's typical Blizzard, every patch they manage to screw something up that makes some build ridiculously overpowered, then in the next patch they nerf the living hell out of that build, and stuff something else up that overpowers a different build. Do they ever think through the consequences of their changes? Methinks not.[/rant]
 
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Re: The Exposure Tournament

I know the irritation all so well... WhirlWind has been hit every major patch. As if a Level 30 Physical skill is to sacrifice gear to be used. Sorceress must be their favorite class. Not once I've seen a crippling nerf sent their way. Each one of their top end skills can kill fast in hell without gear.

They need to beef up physical attacks by 25% on selected skills. Either by synergies or by addition.

This tourney really shows which class has it going an what doesn't.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

If you're looking for a near unkillable character, I'd go with an Assassin. Weapon block blocks all attacks, and it is pretty easy to get 50-60% CTB, Fade gives you built in %DR and easy to max resists, COS and MB are some of the best crowd control skills in the game. Then, the rest of the Assassin skills are all pretty good for dishing out pain. It's still not going to be a speed demon (you'll need patience) but you should be able to reach hell fairly easily with one.

Gorm (who I just noticed is the barb name in the first post :P) has also reach the City of the Damned, but unlike Vanessa, his trip has been void of any NDE's and has just been slow. I'm still using level 1 Conc to kill just about everything, as I don't have a good enough weapon to WW with, but I'm nearing the positive damage of WW. I found an Amn rune in Act 4, so now I'm waiting on a perfect sapphire and a good gambled rare bastard sword to upgrade to a gothic sword and amaze myself at the damage it will do. I'm trying to get by with as few points in Dex as possible, in order to pump Vit to eke out as much HP as I can get. My AR already sucks, I'm on the hunt for visionary helms and AR GCs. I don't know where I'd be without BO right now, probably dead.

Jason, a crowd control suggestion would be make 'Nadir' in a helm. The level 13 COS is annoying, and the 9 charges is super annoying, but if you're getting swarmed, it's a good option. Hang in there with the bows, I sometimes get Riphooks or Kuku's in Act 5.

[highlight]Gorm, level 33 WW barb, City of the Damned, some number of points[/highlight]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

I know she'll come good eventually, with a little bit of luck (either an exceptional unique or the runes and base for Edge). But I hate being forced to drop the players setting due to a low damage bow (I had to get leech from somewhere, and unbelievably I haven't found or cubed a single bloody Ring of the Leech).

And I just gambled a 26% EDam, +38 Life circlet... I'll be reluctant to part with that, even for CoS.
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Just polished off Diablo. He dropped Bloodfist and the rest was junk. For a WW barb, are Cleglaw's gloves any good? I've been saving them for later since the mass slow seems pretty good, and knockback is always useful, but Bloodfist are endgame worthy for a melee character. Don't need either of them for normal, but don't see the point in keeping both. Still trying to get a good weapon to upgrade, I plan on gambling some more after the level boost of Act 5 once I get to NM. Hopefully I can find a piece or two of the IK set (especially the belt) soon.

[highlight]Gorm, level 35 WW barb, Harrogoth, points![/highlight]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

I also just polished off Diablo. He dropped junk. I discovered something as well - if you have a TP up, he casts his "evil force" around it instead of you. Why has nobody ever told me this before? A lot of running around, dodging lightning hoses, and a hell of a lot of blue pots (to feed Guided Arrow) and Big D went down. By the way, am I the only one who thinks the grand-daddy of all demons running around on all fours like some sort of spiny red cat is just lame? Diablo is meant to be the Lord of Terror, not some cutesy fury animal! :p

I finally got a wee bit of luck weapon-wise. Enough Tals dropped for me to purchase a 3os Hunter's Bow and create a 226 Poison Damage over 5 seconds weapon. Progress is still slow, but at least it's now fun to watch to sit back and watch the poison do its thing. Solves the problem of regen, which was starting to be a real pain as well.

Code:
[FONT=Courier New]Name           Character       Class       Location         Level  Points
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
kestegs        Running_Scared  Sorceress   NM A4              64     226
ChrisTheMean   Scaven          Barbarian   NM Kurast Docks    59     200
ancalagon      Umbriel         Assassin    NM Outer Cloister  49     161
sequana        BlackDeath      Necromancer NM Dark Wood       49     155
Tarantells     Uta-Refson      Necromancer Moo-Moo Farm       45     143
skoolbus       Gorm            Barbarian   Harrogath          35     108
Jason Maher    Vanessa         Amazon      Harrogath          33     106
Old Soldier    Thalestris      Amazon      Lower Kurast       30      81?
SoulManZ       Nevermore       Druid       Kurast Bazaar      29      81?
jdkerr         Kobe            Assassin    Halls of the Dead  23      50
GCanada        PoohBear        Druid       Lut Gholein        20      42
liquid_mage    Wulfgar         Barbarian   Lut Gholein        20      42
ILikeRocks     Gragamel        Paladin     Lut Gholein        21      41
skoolbus       Gorm            Barbarian   Inner Cloister     19      37
Brak           TheStreak       Paladin     Inner Cloister     19      37
Krazy_Solo     Nispart         Assassin    Inner Cloister     19      37
CM             Lisbeth         Assassin    Inner Cloister     18      36
DaveW          Blades          Assassin    Lut Gholein        18      36
Shaandore      Irreducible     Paladin     Black Marsh        17      30
daed           Strafy          Amazon      Stony Field        12      19
wielanja       Beowulf         Barbarian   Stony Field        12      19
Sorcererbob    Cabaret         Sorceress   Stony Field        12      19
Ashmer         Fuzzy           Druid       Stony Field        12      19?
wakiki         Polemos         Barbarian   Cold Plains         7      11
Quickdeath     Limber          Amazon      Cold Plains         6       9
scrcrw         Nagisa          Barbarian   Rogue Camp          1       2
Vang           Leeloo          Amazon      Rogue Camp          1       2
NightCraweler  Ragran          Barbarian   Rogue Camp          1       2
vague          Benkei          Barbarian   Rogue Camp          1       2 
Bluechip       SeymourKrelborn Necromancer Rogue Camp          1       2
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
RIP: 
ChrisTheMean   TheLoner        Paladin     NM Underground P   48     148
HanShotFirst   Frost-Fang      Druid       River of Flame     33     100
Morathi        Dorian          Paladin     Flayer Dungeon     30      80
Krazy_Solo     Burn_Notice     Druid       Duriel             27      67
Krazy_Solo     Auriel          Amazon      Halls of the Dead  22      48
Krazy_Solo     Snave           Druid       Act II             21      46
Krazy_Solo     Nispart         Assassin    Andariel           20      39
GCanada        MsGarrison      Assassin    Jail               18      35
tavaritz       Boner           Necromancer Barracks           18      35
Dark Matter    BoneyM          Necromancer Stony Field        12      20
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Retired:
Dark Matter    Arthur          Barbarian   Lut Gholein        20      42
Jason Maher    Fanven          Paladin     Dark Wood          15      25
mattinm        Kamikaze        Necromancer Rogue Camp          1       2[/FONT]
 
Re: The Exposure Tournament

Make Insight in a decent damage staff. It'll work wonders.

That's my idea and why I chose to go with 1.13. Do you think that a battle staff (fast and max 4os) could work in NM? I might be able to get a gothic staff in NM and perhaps a shillelagh in Hell.

Any white battle staff will get 4os from Larzuk and I'm quit sure that I won't have the runes before I get Larzuk's quest done. From NM on 4os staffs will drop once in a while. I'll get my hands first on two-handed swords, then giant swords and before I get the Insight staff I'm going to be using flamberges. Why use slower swords.


 
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Re: The Exposure Tournament

Act two looked like it was going to show promise but for the most part it was like watching grass grow. It was nice on the 20th visit to town to get 24mf/26lr boots and giving me a unique ammy that was 26lr/26pr and other random mods made me think that act 2 would be like act 1. It was horrible for most part. Was always out of mana and was having to run back to town quite frequently if wanted to keep pots on hand.Aas got further away from lut glohein the more progress had started to crawl. The trip to arcane sanctuary almost made me drop from p8. First floor had ice mages with only 6 cr I was slowed and taking lot of damage. Upon making it to the sanctuary progress was further slowed down as taking on groups of mobs was pointless as would use almost a full belt if attempted such a feat. Pulling a few mobs then backtracking hoping that only one or two fallowed was the tactics used for most of the sanctuary. Until a jewel dropped that changed it all.

I had a partizan that I stashed that was 77% ED and +10 max damage that I was working my way up to use was hoping that that plus nadir would help my killing speed. Well when a jewel of freedom dropped that idea went out the window and instead of pressing my luck with rerolling it went with the first 2 socket roll I got. One was filled with the jewl the other one a skull I had. Couldn't have happened at a better time as I was getting flusterated with the progress and knew to meet its requirements would be few more levels. My old max damage became my new minimum. Which easily leaches enough mana to conc all day and keep up bo/shout/battle cry. Guessing it won't be a good ww weapon as will be to slow but 1 shotting most mobs again makes the tempo fun again.

LCS

[highlight]BloodQuencher, Level 26, Canyon of the Magi [/highlight]
 
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