'Pity the warrior who slays all his foes.' -
Klingon poet G'trok
Well, we did it. We've really gone and done it now. There's no more enemies left to fight
.
Yes, that's right. It appears my tournament journey has come to an end.
Hell Act V has been full cleared by my Trapsin at players 3. Which also means, that my Trapsin has pulled off the full, full clear, clear ... (I'm going to have to work on the name for that) ... in other words, my Trapsin full cleared every act, every difficulty, every monster! There was not one monster survivor anywhere. My Frozen Orb Sorceress was close, but left three unique PI/CI Wraiths alive ... er, um ... undead? ... A bit of a shame given I had the means to kill them (open wounds armor for the merc), but it was in the stash not the chest. Oh well, D2 life goes on ...
But back to my Trapsin. Hell Act V went well. Players 3 from start to finish felt very good. And why shouldn't it? This character has a lot of tools at its disposal. Lightning damage from traps. Fire damage from Fire Blast and Death Sentry. Physical damage from Death Sentry and the merc. And lots of choices for crowd control from the well geared merc, summonable (and very tanky) Shadow Master, Mind Blast, Life Tap wand, and Teleport staff. So, yeah. If you can't get it done with all of that ... you're probably doing something wrong.
But that's not to say that even if you're doing everything right, things still can't go wrong:
Here's a mob of Souls that dropped on my head when I activated an evil urn. The initial barrage of spectral hit enhanced lighting really did a number on my health ... this screenshot is from when things calmed down a bit. I was ready to stun whatever came out of the urn with Mind Blast but the Souls were faster on the draw
. I don't think I could have done anything better there to avoid the damage ... except, well, not activate the urn ... but then it wouldn't have been a full clear. Anyhow, maxed resists (75) were good enough to save the day and the journey went on ...
The hardest area for my Trapsin was Nihlathak's Temple. I had been expecting trouble there based on the number of LIs that my Frozen Orb Sorceress had encountered. And the area certainly lived up to my fears!
Level 1 had LI Frenzytaurs and Beetles. Both seemed to have pretty good physical resistance as well
. What are you going to do? Well, Mind Blast for crowd control, Teleport for positioning, Fire Blast and merc for a corpse, and then ride the corpse explosion train with Death Sentry! Very workable, but certainly slower than if there hadn't been so many lightning immunes.
I was hoping for a break on Level 2 ... but no such luck:
My Trapsin's most hated foes from Act III (maybe anywhere), made a guest reappearance. Nihlathak's Temple Level 2 is rather large, and those LI Zealots (and their healers) are very annoying. The problem? They run away mid-battle
. So they're hard to hit with Fire Blast. They're hard for the merc to finish off (when one retreats he just starts anew on the next and we get nowhere). And even if they did stand and fight, their healers could heal them much faster than I could damage them. Unless, I could get a corpse explosion train going ... but with all the factors going against getting that first corpse it was an annoying area. Things got better when I just started tele-bombing the healers (and sometimes the Zealots), but it was still annoying ... oh so annoying ...
Level 3 only had one LI foe. But it was kind of an important one:
A lightning immune Nihlathak meant that I had to get
way closer to him than I wanted to. You see where I'm standing in the screenshot above ... that wasn't good enough. At that distance the merc just sort of wandered around taking in the sights
. Okay, so closer we must go. KABLAMO! Nihlathak gets his corpse explosion off faster than my Death Sentries ... and there goes more than half my hit points
. If I'd let him have two corpses with which to work with in short succession I imagine that would have been the game ... Fortunately I had a way to clear corpses (Death Sentry). And once the merc actually entered the battle, it wasn't much of a fight (though Nihlathak's teleportation did mean we had to set up on him a few times
).
But Nihlathak's Temple was the worst of it! There were certainly other foes that got our attention, like all LI Ancients:
Or fanatic dolls in the Throne (there were actually two groups right by the entrance):
But in the end we handled them all!
The full clear of cows started off in doubt:
The portal was in a lousy location right next to the stockade. Two uniques (not including the Cow King) came wandering right out to greet us. I thought I might try getting some maneuvering room by going to the right but only found a third unique there ... and that one was cursed
. So back to the portal we went to make a stand. Mind Blast proved important here and throughout the Secret Cow Level. Mind Blasts' conversion provided lots of cover for the merc and bought us enough time to get a corpse so the Death Sentries could do their thing. Once we got rid of these first two uniques and got some maneuvering room it became a pretty fun area. At some points I had my own private army of ... I'd say, up to a dozen cows
. I wish I'd bothered to get a screeenshot. Alas ...
What else ... Drops! There were a surprising number of interesting drops!
Here's the set/uniques that resulted from a full clear of Hell Act V at players 3:
With 82 mf (+23 mf if the merc kills).
The Battlebranch, Poleaxe (Bloody Foothills)
Bladebone, Double Axe (Frigid Highlands)
Skin of the Vipermagi, Serpentskin Armor (Crystalline Passage) <-- 34 resist all, 13 mdr!
Arreat's Face, Slayer Guard (Crystalline Passage) <-- Awesome! ... you know, for a Barb ...
Blackhorn's Face, Death Mask (Frozen River) <-- Interesting, but not if you've got Tal's Mask.
Crow Caw, Tigulated Mail (Frozen Tundra) <-- Nice, but doesn't beat the Duress I just made.
Verdungo's Hearty Cord, Mithril Coil (Frozen Tundra) <-- 15% DR, +38 Vitality! Amazing!
Lidless Wall, Grim Shield (Halls of Pain) <-- Could be handy ... if I didn't have a Spirit shield.
Arcanna's Deathwand, War Staff (Halls of Pain)
Laying of Hands, Bramble Mitts (Worldstone Keep Level 2) <-- Nice, for a different character.
Aldur's Rhythm, Jagged Star (Worldstone Keep Level 3)
M'avina's Icy Clutch, Battle Gauntlets (Baal)
Sigon's Guard, Tower Shield (Baal)
Some great stuff there! For my Trapsin there were two standouts:
Skin of the Vipermagi
Serpentskin Armor
Defense: 279
Durability: 23 of 24
Required Strength: 43
Required Level: 29
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 85
Fingerprint: 0x5b35a7e1
+120% Enhanced Defense
Magic Damage Reduced by 13
All Resistances +34
30% Faster Cast Rate
+1 to All Skill Levels
This one beats the socks off the one I've been using (found at normal Diablo ... 25 resist all, 10 mdr). But I don't really need more resistances (they're at the 75 cap), and the one I've been using is already socketed with a Sol Rune ... so given how late in the game it was, I didn't see any reason to make a change.
However:
Verdungo's Hearty Cord
Mithril Coil
Defense: 129
Durability: 16 of 16
Required Strength: 106
Required Level: 63
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 81
Fingerprint: 0x726a734e
+38 to Vitality
+107 to Maximum Stamina
+96% Enhanced Defense
Damage Reduced by 15%
Replenish Life +12
10% Faster Hit Recovery
When something this great comes along, it doesn't matter how much game is left. Time to make a change! I had been using the Immortal King's belt, but it really wasn't doing much for me. With Fade active the added resistance were moot. The +25 strength that was helping get me to 156 for the Spirit monarch, could have meant +25 to vitality ... except I wasn't sold on the belt so I was sitting on 25 stat points just in case something better came along. And I'm glad I did! I spent the 25 stat points on strength and got so much more! I only got to use it in Nihlathak's Temple and the Ancients' Way onward, but it was still a great find!
Also:
A bit anticlimactic after the Verdungo's, but I am playing in 1.11b ... so it seemed worthy of mention!
Code:
SP Forum Name Characters Level Furthest WP Points
-- ----------------- ---------------- ------ ---------------------- -------
Y Hanshotfirst Sorc/Sin 88/87 Guardian x2 200
N Booble Sorc/Druid 54/65 (H) Rouge Encampment 124
N PhineasB Necro/Druid 73/74 (H) Rogue Encampment 124
N Crudesash68 Zon/Paladin 46/49 (N) Jail Level 1 67
Y skoolbus Druid/Sorc 48/49 (N) Dark Wood 60
Y Gynli Zon/Necro 32/48 (N) Rogue Encampment 51
N Swamigoon Sin/Druid 34/31 Harrogath 39
Y Pb_pal Sorc/Zon 33/29 Pandemonium Fortress 39
N DariusTriplet Sorc/Zon 31/24 River of Flame 32
Y Vildecor Zon/Sorc 21/20 Lut Gholein 12
Y Maltatai Druid/Druid 21/15 Lut Gholein Sewers 9
Y b1ur Paladin/Druid 20/1 Lut Gholein 6
N CaseyJones Sorc/Druid 1/1 Rogue Encampment 0
Up next: Er, I guess there is no up next. Maybe a double Guardian thread? Though that seems pretty redundant given everything that I've already written here. Single pass, untwinked, hardcore has emerged as one of my favorite play styles. So, it's tempting to go again with two different character classes ... but seven weeks is a pretty big investment in time ... on the other hand, it appears I could get it done before D2R launches ... but single pass, untwinked, hardcore is what I want to do when D2R launches ... so maybe I should just hold that thought and come at it fresh. Oh the decisions ...
Final thoughts (if I don't go again): It was a fun tournament idea. 'Dual twinked' was a play option I hadn't considered before. It was always untwinked or fully twinked. Nothing in between. So this was certainly worth a try! Having tried it though, I'd probably just go with two characters that didn't share gear if I was to do it again. I can't say that my characters ever developed a 'team' feel. It was more like two roommates that were never home at the same time and used each others stuff when the other one wasn't around ... it never felt quite right.
Another bit of let down was that by Hell I was essentially playing two 'normal' characters. If not for the rules, my Frozen Orb Sorceress would have had a point (or more) in Warmth ... but that's not much of a difference ... My Trapsin however, would have been exactly the same. Sure, I could have chosen two character builds that would have been more impacted by the rules ... but it's hard to want to hit yourself in the face for no reason
. I think it would have been more satisfying if the rules forced the challenge all the way to the end. How? I'm not exactly sure. Maybe giving up on the skill tree restrictions and instead focusing on stat and/or skill points? Maybe something like the stat and skill points earned need to be split between the two characters (i.e. half the collectively earned stat/skill points would go unused)? It would require keeping track of stat and skill points across two characters ... which starts to make things complicated ... probably not the best thing for a tournament to be fun ... but I think it might have been interesting and would certainly preserve the 'tournament challenge' all the way to finish line!
Anyhow, if I make it to the finish line, it's not the tournament's fault. It just must mean I didn't choose hard enough characters
. Best wishes to all those who remain! I look forward to reading about your adventures!