'Three Way Dance II' - H.C 1.10 Tournament

[a_shikoff]

[highlight]Team 'Three Old Men'[/highlight] - 188 points
CONQUEROR CallOfTheGraves[/b] - Necromancer (P&B/Summoning) - lvl 72, Act V NM (66 points)
CONQUEROR AngerOfNature - Druid (Elemental/Summoning) - lvl 71, Act V NM (66 points)
Destroyer CatchThis - Barbarian (Combat/Masteries) - lvl 68, Act V NM (56 points) - R.I.P. Ancients


Yeeah 1 less of my old men.
NM Ancients kill my barb so no 3 conquerors for me :-(((

 

[Porius]

Team Venom (Porius) – 36 points
Adder – (Amazon – Passive/Jav.) – lvl 26 – Act III Nml
Asp – (Assassin – Shadow/Trap) – lvl 28 – Act III Nml
Viper – (Necro – P&B/Curse) – lvl 26 – Act III Nml

Well, I got some playing done this week, but I probably won't get anything else done until this weekend at the earliest. So far, I'm pretty happy to have gotten as far as I have without any deaths.

This is the furthest I've gotten with an Assassin or Amazon. Actually, this is my first Amazon, ever. Only Viper had any problems with Duriel, mostly due to the lack of good tanking and the fact that I actually had to go up to him and hit him to do any damage. Gave me more than a couple scares, but finished off the bug. Now, just a couple more levels and I will own the jungles. We'll see.

Be safe out there.

Porius

 

[steelsixtyIV]

Wow, nice progress everybody. I just got back in town and played some over the weekend. Looking a the scoreboard I should update my points:

Team Steel (steelsixtyIV) - 111 points
Destroyer Steel_Sword - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) - lvl 46 - Act II NM
Destroyer Steel_Poison - (Necro - P&B/Curse) - lvl 46 - Act II NM
Destroyer Steel_Magic - (Sorc - Fire/Light.) - lvl 50 - Act II NM

Magic smokes everything right now and is a few levels ahead because I MF with her. Sword and Poison did fairly well in Act I considering both are meele characters and Poison had his first NDE with Andy when she b-slapped him a couple of times.

Nothing spectacular has dropped so far and I am not currently using any of my reward slots. I am hoping my luck will change in Act II :uhhuh:

 

[Mage11]

Wow, a Guardian already! Congratulations, Erimatbrad on a fine achievement. It looks like you're going to make all three Guardians, and win this thing before anyone else gets there. :thumbsup:

I have made some decent progress with Klaudia, taking her all the way to the final (Durance) waypoing in Act III. She didn't have any real troubles on the way, using her cobra strike to quickly leech when needed. Mephisto should be interesting, however, if the leeching doesn't work. However, he will have to wait until the others get to the Act. Sara is next to go.

I may have edged ahead of Gouda, but I'm sure it will only be a matter of time before he streaks past me.

*quickly closes his eyes to avoid looking at a streaking Gouda* :surprise:

Current Status:

[highlight]Team Mage1 (Mage11) [/highlight] – 31 points
Sara – (Amazon – Passive/Bow) – lvl 23 – Act II Nml - 7 points
Klaudia – (Assassin - MA/Shadow) – lvl 31 – Act III Nml - 17 points
Starm – (Sorc - Cold/Light.) – lvl 22 – Act II Nml - 7 points

 

[Jaffa Tamarin]

[highlight]Team Gods of Egypt (Jaffa Tamarin)[/highlight] – 45 points
Anubis – (Necro - P&B/Curse) - lvl 28 - Act III Nml - 12 points
Horus - (Druid – Shape/Summon) - lvl 36 - Act V Nml - 21 points
Sekhmet - (Sorc – Cold/Fire) - lvl 28 - Act III Nml - 12 points

Horus made himself a Malice maul, and powered through the rest of Act III and Act IV. Diablo dropped a whole bundle of rare spears and polearms, which was nice for my two Act II mercs (Anubis is using a rogue merc).

 

[Gouda]

I may have edged ahead of Gouda, but I'm sure it will only be a matter of time before he streaks past me.

*quickly closes his eyes to avoid looking at a streaking Gouda* :surprise:

Do not challenge me, oh young grasshopper.
No playing time for me as predicted. Hopefully a few hours in the weekend, we'll see.

Gouda, still fully clothed!

 

[erimatbrad]

[highlight]Team Eddings (erimatbrad)[/highlight] - 285 points
Guardian Polgara - (Sorc - Light./Cold) - lvl 82 - All Quests Complete
Conqueror Liselle - (Amazon - Jav./Passive) - lvl 76 - Act IV Hell
Conqueror Zedar - (Necro – P&B/Curse) - lvl 76 - Act V Hell

Not a major change in the score today. Zedar managed to kill the ancients, and had an exceptionally easy time of it. I prisoned two off screen, and led one next to a pillar (or the buildings!), trapped it, slid off to the side so my spears barely went through the building and on to the trapped Ancient. This would leave them to sit there contentedly as I blasted them into oblivion.

The point gaining stopped there, though... because I can't get a WSK map that's 'safe' enough to risk going through. Everytime I step in there, I see a million lightning bolts flying at me. Heirophants and Black Souls are not a good combination. I've decided to up my lightning resist a bit, since I think it's still in the negatives on him due to the fact I'm pumping my +P&B skills.



Right now I've got +3 P&B on a circlet and amulet, +3 on the White wand, and a +1 skills head. I've never pumped any skill to the point where it was level 30+, so this is very exciting for me.

I spent most of the rest of the evening running Pindle and his garden for money, and then gambling it on rings, amulets, boots, gloves, and circlets. Nothing good came of the gambling, but pindle did drop a 305ish% ED throwing spear with 8 or 9% mana leech. A decent weapon for a furyzon, I think... although I don't think Liselle will use it (since I don't have the runes to upgrade it to Elite)...

I'll only have half an hour or so to play tonight, so hopefully that'll be enough to kill Nilly (although I'm personally doubting it...)

 

[AndiDi]

[highlight]Team Bavarian Forest (AndiDi) [/highlight] – 117 points
Resl – (Amazon – Passive/Bow) – lvl 24 – Act II Nml - 11 points - R.I.P. Duriel
Conqueror Hias – (Necro – Summon/Curses) – lvl 71 – Act IV NM - 57 points
Destroyer Sepp – (Paladin – Combat/Offensive) – lvl 62 – Act IV NM - 49 points

Hias: WP: Harrogath - Last Quest: Baal
Sepp: WP: Pandemonium Fortress - Last Quest: Mephisto

Hias went into Act V. The first time Hias stepped into the Bloody Foothills he got these spear throwing cats. There Hias had the first real and very close NDE.
After killing Shenk I went for the WP and payed a short visit to Eldritch. The Frigid Highlands although had the Spear throwing cat things. Reroll. After this it went a lot smoother.
The Arreat Plateau had Carvers and their Shamen guys this time throwing ice instead of fire. No real danger there, just slow progress.
Rescuing Anya was really easy, as the Frozen River didn't had Gloams, just these Women with Wings. After getting a crappy Shrunken Head from Anya, Hias went through the rest of Act V to meet with the Ancients. The Ancients were really easy. They only killed a few of my revives, but none of my Skellies.
After that I decided to take look at Baal. The WSK had Serpent Magi, Gloams and these teleporting gritters. The Throne had WwW (Women with Wings) and again Gloams. The first 4 monster packs from Baal were easily dispatched. Even Lister and his friends were not very dangerous. After refreshing my revives I went for Baal. He summoned his Clone like ten seconds into the fight. So the fight took longer, as my army had to focus on 2 Baals. He died after what I think was 2 minutes.
He only dropped yellow items which weren't any good (as always).
I think I am going to do a few Baal runs after killing Nihlathak to get some more levels before killing the Cow King.

Recent Set/Unique Items:
- Isenhart's Parry
- Baezil's Vortex
- Civerb's Ward (The second)
- M'avina's Tenet
- The Battlebranch
- Naj's Circlet

 

[tenaka]

Team “OfTheYear†(tenaka) – 135 points
Destroyer February – (Sorc - Cold/Light.) – lvl 62 – Act III NM
Destroyer March – (Paladin – Combat/Offensive) – lvl 60 – Act III NM
Destroyer April – (Assassin – Shadow/Trap) – lvl 50 – Act II NM

I've taken February and March through acts II and III and had Feb do a hundred or so Meph runs. No NDEs for her but March had 2 on his way to Meph. First he ran into a champ pack of stygan dolls and had already swung once on zeal so I had to drink 2 purples fast. Then one of the Council members on the third level was LEFE. Not good for melee even though he has max resists. I did find/cube/craft a few nice items though.

Butchers Pupil
4 Socket Pal shield with +48%ed (put 4 PDs in it)
Unique Ancient Armor (name escapes me atm, at work)
crafted blood gloves with
- 2% ll
- 6% CB
- ~20% lit res
- ~28% fire res
- ~30% cold res
cubes 2 nice small charms
- 9% fire res, 5% mf
- 3% res all

 

[erimatbrad]

crafted blood gloves with
- 2% ll
- 6% CB
- ~20% lit res
- ~28% fire res
- ~30% cold res

cubes 2 nice small charms
- 9% fire res, 5% mf
- 3% res all

Ooh, those are pretty gloves (and charms!)

I did a few more Pindle runs with Zedar, trying to get him to a slightly higher level (and a slightly higher set of resistances. -50/-10/-10/-50 will not do!). I'll probably harvest some of the charms Polgara has.

Two finds worth noting. A 2 socket Wire Fleece, which got filled by a Nef and Lum rune, giving Liselle Smoke (and 75 to most of her resistances!).

The other? A Crescent Moon amulet, which went right into the stash. Hurrah for that.

I still have 9 imbue quests, 8 socket (soon to be 9, if Liselle gets her butt in gear).... I'm not at all sure what to do with them. I'm thinking about socketing something in the Viperfork for Liselle....

I'll probably blow all the imbue quests on circlets / coronets.... and, luck holding, spend the socket quests on my imbues. The only concern being losing my good Mephisto map with Polgara...

What are ya'll (whee, southern words!) planning to do with those quests?

 

[tenaka]

Socket quests I'm planning to use as soon as I know what gear I'm starting Hell with. I'll socket all of that. Imbues, I figure I'll either try imbuing elite weapons for mercs and my sin who didnt chose weapon or imbue whatever slot I havent found a nice rare for.

 

[Jaffa Tamarin]

I usually use imbues on +skills items that can't be shopped or gambled -- for my tournament characters that would be druid pelts for Horus, shrunken heads for Anubis, and maybe orbs for Sekhmet, though I might well end up using those on circlets instead, depending on what I find. Imbuing high-end ethereal armor for the Act II mercs is another possibility.

Socket quests get used on whatever looks like being end-game equipment that doesn't already have sockets.

I will be using all the Anya personalizing quest rewards too, if my characters live long enough

 

[jiansonz]

[Highlight]Team jiansonz[/Highlight] - 117 points
Destroyer Herne (Druid, Shapeshifting/Summoning) - level 53 - Lut Gholein, NM - 37 points
Destroyer Odysseus (Paladin, Offensive/Defensive) - level 60 - Kurast Docks, NM - 43 points
Destroyer Elayna (Assassin, Martial Arts/Shadow Disciplines) - level 53 - Lut Gholein, NM - 37 points

I got Odysseus through Act 2. He didn´t fire many arrrows there, heh. Greedy as I am, I want the merc to kill almost everything. I got a lot of practice with leading monsters into good choke points, feeding the merc potions, distracting monsters to take the heat off the merc, etc.

Only erimatbrad had a suggestion for the mercenary choice for this character, and I went against what he said. :lol: I took Holy Freeze instead of Blessed Aim. I hope I know what I´m doing...

I have almost +500% MF for the merc´s kills now. To give you an idea of the rate of S/U items I find, let me tell you that on the last session in act 2 (one full clear of Canyon of the Magi & the Seven Tombs) I scored 6 uniques and 8 set items. I dump them on the ground in town and pick them up before I save.
I sell the ones I already have in the prize stash. Still, I had to take a muling break before the two major tombs (the last false tomb turned out to be Kaa´s) because I had Blastbark, Stormchaser, Guillaume´s Face and Blade of Ali Baba stored in a neat little pile in front of Fara...

I also find a LOT of rares. Most are crap (of course), but every once in a while, something really cool can turn up. Like these gloves:

Eagle Knuckle
Gauntlets
Defense: 25
Durability: 24 of 24
Required Strength: 60
Required Level: 24
Item Level: 49
+1 to Strength
+58% Enhanced Defense
Lightning Resist +20%
Cold Resist +28%
25% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
Level 2 Weaken (22/25 Charges)

Perfect on the MF, almost perfect on the cold resist, good lightning resist and some useful (and cheap to recharge) Weaken charges.


Odysseus used three different melee weapons during the latter half of the act:

* His scepter with +2 to Redemption. This was used as soon as there were Unravelers around.
* An Artisan´s War Sword with 3 MF jewels for a total of +23%. In an emergency, it can be used in battle (with Holy Shock) since the weapon speed is reasonably good. This was used (meaning: he held it in his hand :lol: ) everywhere else, except in two battles.
* One of those really cool Flying Scimitars fell to the ground as a Cutlass. I used the socketing recipe on it. Of course, the next session I found one that already had two sockets, so I could have saved those runes :rant: ...Anyway, I made 'Strength' in it. Cutlass is a great weapon type for it because it´s the fastest one-hander there is that is not class-specific (or elite with high DEX requirement and won´t be found for quite some time). DEX 52 isn´t hard to get. Another advantage: Elayna´s companion can use it!

After downing about 8 Thawing potions each, Odysseus and his merc took on /players 5 Duriel. Odysseus had 33% Crushing Blow now, using 'Strength' and some Blood gloves. I used Fanaticism all the way. That is such a poweful aura, I think my Paladin is a respectable melee fighter even without Combat Skills!

Merc died a couple of times but it was no major danger for Odysseus. Near the end, I switched to maximum MF gear and used Weaken to help the merc survive the final seconds.

 

[erimatbrad]

Only erimatbrad had a suggestion for the mercenary choice for this character, and I went against what he said. :lol: I took Holy Freeze instead of Blessed Aim. I hope I know what I´m doing...

I think that a HF merc will work if you get your AR from somewhere else. There are lots of unique bows with massive +% to AR, so you should hopefully be okay. An HF merc is almost always a good choice, really. You'll get more opportunities to shoot them if they're frozen.

Blastbark, Stormchaser, Guillaume´s Face and Blade of Ali Baba stored in a neat little pile in front of Fara...

I assume you kept the Blade for one of your characters to use on switch to squeeze out the last possible bit of MF? This seems to be a very jiansonz thing to do...

Glad to see the rest of things going so well for you. :thumbsup: I've just been doing a million MF runs because I'm too uninspired to run for Baal or Nilly with Zedar, much less to run Diablo and Co. with Liselle...

 

[jiansonz]

I assume you kept the Blade for one of your characters to use on switch to squeeze out the last possible bit of MF? This seems to be a very jiansonz thing to do...

Nope. The only character that is allowed to use it is Odysseus (in Hell) and he already has a Gull waiting for him!




Greed is an EVIL seductress, whose destructive powers is almost on par with those of the FE bosses. Just LOOK at this temptation number:

Fortuitous Amulet of Luck
Required Level: 19
Item Version: 1.10 Expansion
Item Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0x994604da
49% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items

Nice try, but I won´t fall for it. The Scintillating Amulet of Luck stays on.


(Which of course doesn´t mean I won´t use this beauty in certain situations... )

 

[erimatbrad]

Nope. The only character that is allowed to use it is Odysseus (in Hell) and he already has a Gull waiting for him!

:lol: I should have known....

Greed is an EVIL seductress, whose destructive powers is almost on par with those of the FE bosses. Just LOOK at this temptation number:

Fortuitous Amulet of Luck
Required Level: 19
Item Version: 1.10 Expansion
Item Level: 39
Fingerprint: 0x994604da
49% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items

Nice try, but I won´t fall for it. The Scintillating Amulet of Luck stays on.

That's very nice too. At this stage in the game, my equpiment for my characters is fairly well set, even though Liselle is the only one with good resists. I'm actually keeping my MF down on Zedar for the time being, because he's my gambler, and yellows and blues sell for more than golds. He's holding 2.5 million right now, an insane amount, but I was too tired last night to blow it all (although I -do- spend it faster than I make it!)

 

[madmaxxam]

[highlight]Team History Class[/highlight] – 224 points
Conqueror Cleopatra - (Sorc - Cold/Light.) – lvl 80 - Act II HELL
Conqueror Rasputin - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 80 – Act III HELL
Conqueror Ieyasu_Tokugawa - (Druid - Summon/Elem.) – lvl 80 – Act II

Minor update, my sorc is working her way through Act 2. Claw Viper Temple was the only bad part, since everything is immune to her, and the snakes are pretty good at slaughtering mercs. I managed to finally teleport my way to the stairs though, despite 1 NDE (they can also charge really quickly while you are teleporting). I gambled this beauty... too bad I don't have an Amazon.

Skull Mask
Coronet
Defense: 30
Durability: 30 of 30
Required Level: 67
Damage Reduced by 2
Fire Resist +52%
Lightning Resist +14%
Cold Resist +14%
Poison Resist +14%
3% Life stolen per hit
7% Mana stolen per hit
+2 to Amazon Skill Levels

A beautiful rare in my opinion. I've also found plenty more mid level runes, several sol + shaels, another Hel, and another Io. More importantly, I managed to find another +skill charm, a second summoning one for my necro :clap:. As soon as I get a good ammy for him he'll be unstoppable. That makes 8 +skill charms from this tourney, 4 that I'm using. I've had really good luck in that dept. Some more exceptional uniques like Vile Husk and Cold Kill for the stash.

All of my characters seem to be good at their own things. I might run the ancient tunnels with Cleopatra for a bit before moving on, since they don't seem to have any CIs. Cleopatra is completely unstoppable against anything not CI. Also she is the best boss runner. Rasputin just doesn't die or have NDE's, despite somewhat slower killing speed, and Ieyasu_Tokugawa is just good at killing most monsters quickly.

Good luck all, and don't get too comfortable in 1st erimatbrad. :lol:

 

[erimatbrad]

Congrats on making it through, Max. I found the CVT to be easy (because I could either orb or lightning, but not both), but Duriel's tomb was really difficult due to the fact that the raisers were CI (i think...). Are you still using CL? I'd suggest more of an investment in Lightning rather than CL, because chain only works when the enemies are far apart, and you're coming up on areas soon that will have a lot of CIs....

Lightning is also useful in the ancients battle -- I used it to kill the CI one because it drains much less mana (and does comparable damage). Sad that I use that skill more than the supposedly better one...

Skull Mask
Coronet
Defense: 30
Durability: 30 of 30
Required Level: 67
Damage Reduced by 2
Fire Resist +52%
Lightning Resist +14%
Cold Resist +14%
Poison Resist +14%
3% Life stolen per hit
7% Mana stolen per hit
+2 to Amazon Skill Levels

Wow -- I'm in awe! I wish Liselle had that bad boy. She's currently using a +20ish all res +70ish life circlet. Mm.. lifealicious.

No-one on the team can come close to Zedar's life, though, as he's packing almost 1300!

Good luck all, and don't get too comfortable in 1st erimatbrad. :lol:

Ooh - the gauntlet has been thrown. Don't make me get 2 more guardians this weekend, kiddo!.... Or maybe I'll just spend the weekend having a :drink:

 

[Hiedran]

[highlight]Team Melee (Hiedran)[/highlight] - 141 points
Destroyer Axe - (Druid - Shape/Summon) - Lvl 66 - Act V NM - 52 points
Destroyer Claw - (Assassin - MA/Shadow) - Lvl 57 - Act III NM - 43 points
Destroyer Mace - (Paladin - Combat/Offensive) - Lvl 61 - Act III NM - R.I.P. Undead doll boss pack (Sewers 2) - 46 points

Axe isn't really in Harrogath yet, but he has killed Diablo. After about 20 tps and four merc revives.... :/ And then Diablo had the gall to drop 5 yellows and one blue but no golds or greens. The only unique I found while clearing the Chaos Sanctuary was a Deathbit (Battle Dart) and I think a normal enemy dropped it.

I'm wondering if I can get charges for Claw built up if I'm using a throwing weapon.... Otherwise the dual leech (6 life, 7 mana) is somewhat worthless. But then again, I'm already at hand to hand range, so why not use the melee combat? I dunno, I'll have to think about it. The options I have with it are nice since it replenshes quantity and has 160 darts. Since I'm not using Claws of Thunder or Blades of Ice (claw only charges) yet, I'm free to use whatever weapon I want.

Hopefully I'll have two conquerors by the time Monday rolls around. If I don't get distracted by playing my new HC sorc or Bonemage.

 

[Hiedran]

I'm wondering if I can get charges for Claw built up if I'm using a throwing weapon.... Otherwise the dual leech (6 life, 7 mana) is somewhat worthless. But then again, I'm already at hand to hand range, so why not use the melee combat? I dunno, I'll have to think about it. The options I have with it are nice since it replenshes quantity and has 160 darts. Since I'm not using Claws of Thunder or Blades of Ice (claw only charges) yet, I'm free to use whatever weapon I want.

I've answered my question.

1. You can't throw and use a charge-up skill. Duh.
2. Battle Darts are a fast weapon vs. extra fast with my claws.

Into the stash they go!