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

PSYCHO with ASCII symbols I don't know the Alt+numbers to do for said:
It is unfortunate that has occurred, however I hope you have enjoyed being a part of this tournament during your stay. Your presence is always welcome

Yes, I had a blast playing in this tournament. I had decided to give up video games altogether and felt that removing them from my computer would keep me from being tempted to start again. I was wrong, obviously. :rolleyes:

Heck, if it wasn't for the fact that I've now got a girlfriend and am already joining two other tournaments, I would be tempted to make an exhibition team...but I think that would eat into my sleeping time. :D
 
[highlight]Exhibition Team Bavarian Forest II[/highlight] - 182 points
Conqueror Franz - Barb (Warcries/C. Skills) – lvl 72 – Act I HELL - 67 points
Destroyer Mich - Necro (Bone/Curse) – lvl 56 – Act III NM - 45 points - RIP
Conqueror Theres - Sorc (Fire/Ice) – lvl 77 – Act I HELL - 70 points

Franz - WP: Cold Plains - Last Quest: Cleared the Den
Theres - WP: Black Marsh - Last Quest: Killed the Countess

The last few days I played on with Franz.
First I went down into the Halls to kill Nihlathak. After some killing I found the stairs in the two upper levels. When I entered Nihlathaks room I immediatly leaped onto his platform stunned everything in range and killed him first. The fight really gets easier once he is dead (no more poping corpses). After I told Anya about it, she was really happy and gave me a crappy helm as a reward.
After that little detour I continued on my way to the Ancients. On the way I meet a lot of ranged attackers. They could have been really dangerous if I hadn't been using Taunt.
Finally I reached the Ancients. The first draw was one LE and another Cursed. Reroll. The second draw was ok. No FE, one Mana Burn. They fell in no time. Even the Merc survived the fight.
Next up was Baal. The first wave was quickly killed. I had some problems with the second wave. The skeletons were slowing me down to a crawl with their cold attacks. So I had to Taunt and stun them while I killed Achmel. The other waves were killed easily. Only the last wave toook some time to kill.
The only thing left to do in Nightmare was the Cow level. Halfway through it I switched from p4 to p1, because I wasn't receiving good exp out of it and I wanted to get it over with. The Cowking died after a short fight.
I entered Hell and cleared the Den for that extra kill point.
 
Hi everyone,

Played a little bit last weekend, and got bored quickly of leveling runs, so decided to move at least my two highest lvl chars into Hell. I'll try to level (and did level) Morpheus some more, but I may just move on to Hell with him as well.
Played Merovingian mostly, he did really well, allthough things are a bit slower now. Bloodraven was difficult to kill, and only went down when she ran out of zombies to summon. Everything else died slow but sure under the weight of my army of skeletons. One problem though; what to do with my skillpoints.
I now have maxed skelly mastery, raise skelly, raise mage. Further: one point in all curses and all other summoning skills, and about 2-4 extra in Golem mastery, amplify damage, summon resist and revive.
Usually i would now put points in CE, to get the radius to full screen, but since that is not allowed I can put them somewhere else, to strengthen my army further. But where?

Maybe just save them and dump them into CE after the tourney?

Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 200 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act V NM - Leveling till 74.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 75 – Act I Hell - rescuing Cane.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 74 - Act I Hell - Clearing the DoE.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda
 
Gouda said:
One problem though; what to do with my skillpoints.
I now have maxed skelly mastery, raise skelly, raise mage. Further: one point in all curses and all other summoning skills, and about 2-4 extra in Golem mastery, amplify damage, summon resist and revive.
Usually i would now put points in CE, to get the radius to full screen, but since that is not allowed I can put them somewhere else, to strengthen my army further. But where?

I put my remaining skill points into Summon resist, Golem mastery and some into Revive. The points into Revive are a matter of personal taste (I really like to revive Udars or the vipers in act 5). The points into golem mastery are good if you are using golems heavily. But I think the points into Summon resist are worth it when you get into later acts of hell when elemental attacks really hurt. This makes your army more durable.
 
AndiDi said:
I put my remaining skill points into Summon resist, Golem mastery and some into Revive. The points into Revive are a matter of personal taste (I really like to revive Udars or the vipers in act 5). The points into golem mastery are good if you are using golems heavily. But I think the points into Summon resist are worth it when you get into later acts of hell when elemental attacks really hurt. This makes your army more durable.

My golems tend to die rather quickly, so I'll dump a few points in Golem mastery. I now have 5 or 6 revives, so a few more points there wouldn't hurt either. My problem is that i have only +2 to all necro skills, and no general + skills on circlet (teleport charges), amulet (MF) or shield (res), So i am still hoping and gambling for a nice +3 summoning amulet, and hope to find a better shield with also some + necro or +summoning skills.
That would boost all my summoning skills by 3 - 5 and immediately making all my investments worth a lot less.

For combination for example (from my stash):
Ghoul Shell
Unraveller Head
+6 to Strength
+34% Enhanced Defense
All Resistances +17
Adds 12-28 poison damage over 4 seconds
+1 to Necromancer Skill Levels
+1 to Decrepify (Necromancer Only)
+1 to Confuse (Necromancer Only)
5% Chance to cast Level 3 Frost Nova when struck

Viper Hood
Coronet
+17 to Strength
+42% Enhanced Defense
All Resistances +15
+2 to Necromancer Skill Levels

Golemlord's Amulet
+3 to Summoning Skills (Necromancer Only)

Graverobber's Grand Charm
+1 to Summoning Skills (Necromancer Only)

would give me a total of +5 to all skills, +9 to summoning skills. The difference between a lvl 10 and lvl 12 summon resist is very small, so i feel a bit uncomfortable putting points there. Still, i don't have this equipment (yet) so i'll distribute a few points.
I think I'll save all my points from lvl 80 onwards, so i can get CE as soon as i finish the tourney.

Gouda.

P.S. Did also play yesterday. Merovingian is now lvl 76, but no other changes in the score.
 
Hi everyone,

Trying to get my tourney chars finished before september, so more progress.
Played Persephone yesterday, gaining two points by clearing the Den and killing bloodraven. I declined the offer for a rogue mercenary though.
She also gained a level, while clearing the mausoleum (or the other one, can't remember). No serious finds in this lvl 85 area, but another cathans seal. Oh well, still happy at my progress, so I'll continue the walk towards the pit, and see what i can find there.


Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 202 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act V NM - Leveling till 74.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 76 – Act I Hell - rescuing Cane.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 75 - Act I Hell - rescuing Cain.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda
 
Gouda said:
Oh well, still happy at my progress, so I'll continue the walk towards the pit, and see what i can find there.

Hi Gouda,

How do you handle the cold immunes? My meteorb has a HF merc to slow them, but they are a real pain in the rear for her.

Besides the Pits have a lot of cold and fire immunes (so my visit to the pits was really short).
 
AndiDi said:
Hi Gouda,

How do you handle the cold immunes? My meteorb has a HF merc to slow them, but they are a real pain in the rear for her.

Besides the Pits have a lot of cold and fire immunes (so my visit to the pits was really short).


Well I don't know yet how i will handle them...
I also have a HF merc, with some halfway decent gear (read blackthorns or tal rasha's mask). No good weapon or armour though, which is why i would like to do some MF/rune hunting. The mausoleum wasn't too bad so i may just try that one, instead of the pit.
I was hoping to do ~20 countess/pit/Andariel runs with each of my chars, just to see if i can find something usefull. I'll check out all the area levels to see if i can find some less difficult area's though.
Hopefully some more runs, but I'll probably get bored so I hope i'll be able to make 20 each, a 100 in total is my dream.

We'll see, hopefully on sunday.

Gouda
 
[highlight]Exhibition Team Bavarian Forest II[/highlight] - 187 points
Conqueror Franz - Barb (Warcries/C. Skills) – lvl 75 – Act II HELL - 72 points
Destroyer Mich - Necro (Bone/Curse) – lvl 56 – Act III NM - 45 points - RIP
Conqueror Theres - Sorc (Fire/Ice) – lvl 77 – Act I HELL - 70 points

Franz - WP: Lut Gohlein - Last Quest: Killed Andariel
Theres - WP: Black Marsh - Last Quest: Killed the Countess

After some leveling of Theres I got back to Franz.
First I had to kill Bloodraven. That always takes long, because she doesn't hold still. Once I managed to stun here. That was a nice change.
On to rescue Cain. I had a nice meeting with a Bone Archer boss pack in Tristram. The Boss was Cursed, Multishot and Cold Enchanted. It took me some time to kill him.
Next up was the Countess. I had a short map to here. She died by the hand of the merc. After that I ran here a few more times. The best runes I found were a KO and a LUM. Franz got a Smoke rune word in a Great Hauberk.
The journey to Andariel was without any noteable events. Except maybe that the Smith was a real pushover.
Andariel died quickly. She dropped a unique Giant Sword, the rest was rare junk.
 
[highlight]Exhibition Team Bavarian Forest II[/highlight] - 193 points
Conqueror Franz - Barb (Warcries/C. Skills) – lvl 78 – Act II HELL - 78 points
Destroyer Mich - Necro (Bone/Curse) – lvl 56 – Act III NM - 45 points - RIP
Conqueror Theres - Sorc (Fire/Ice) – lvl 77 – Act I HELL - 70 points

Franz - WP: Lut Gohlein - Last Quest: Killed Duriel
Theres - WP: Black Marsh - Last Quest: Killed the Countess

The last few days I played again with Franz.
First I went into the Sewers to kill Radament. He died quickly and his minions managed to kill the merc. Next up was the Maggot Lair. There I had my first real NDE with a FELE Beetle Boss pack. I let the merc kill them while I waited around the corner feeding him potions.
Next was the claw viper temple. It had the snakes and the mummies. The mummies are really nasty, because they are immune to magic and I had to switch to concentrate to kill them.
After I assembled the staff, the next stop was the Arcane Sanctuary. There I found the Summoner on the first arm I explored (the plain arm with the lightning spires). As I wasn't gaining any significant exp I stopped exploring the Sanctuary any further.
I made my way directly into the true tomb and meet no mummies there. So easy going there. After some time I found the entrance to Duriels lair. He died without being dangerous at all. Only the merc needed a few red potions. He dropped nothing worth mentioning.
Franz now went back to Act I to run the countess a little while longer. I have found out (by accident), that Franz can tank the Countess death explosion which made killing her a lot quicker.
 
Played a little bit over the weekend, with no effective progress. Tried a bit of shopping to get Morpheus two +3 warcry weapons, but no luck yet.
Also explored the underground passage and the forest afetr it with Persephone, but failed to find the waypoint before i had to leave for a diner party. So through the passage again next time..

Gouda
 
Hi everyone,

Another update by me. Must be one of the last active players in the tournament. Come on Psycho, SimeonB and everyone else!

Anyway, I am offcourse still a long way behind the leaders on the board, so maybe it is my slow playing speed that is the cause.

for the update: played Persephone again, she is easier to play for small stretches. Merovingian always has to go out and kill ~20 monsters to turn into various types of minions, so it takes a bit of time. Persephone re-explored the underground passage, found the waypoint and the tree in the dark forest, rescued Decky, and went on to find the tower in the black marsh, together with the waypoint. Haven't explored the tower yet, except for the firts level, to get my last few xp for lvl 76. Called it a day at that point.

My observations for my sorc in Hell so far:
Cold immunes are annoying, esp. because i keep forgetting my wand of lower resist on switch. They do die in 1,2 meteor on avarage, but i have to convince them to stand still or aim very well. My merc tends to keep them standing still, but his equipment is not good enough to keep him alive (no life leech). Otherwise no mayor problems, so that is all well.
I have saved a grey hyperion spear for a while now thinking i may give it a go for either imbuing or getting some sockets made into it, to make an honor weapon. I would prefer an ethereal weapon for my mercs, but right now i only have one semi-decent weapon with some leach (another hyperion):
Shadow Dart
Hyperion Spear
Two-Hand Damage: 53 to 187
Durability: 21 of 30
Required Dexterity: 120
Required Strength: 155
Required Level: 43
Spear Class - Fast Attack Speed
Item Version: 1.10 Expansion
Item Level: 64
Fingerprint: 0xbe9aa723
+52% Enhanced Damage
+116 to Attack Rating
+7 to Maximum Damage
Adds 3-10 cold damage over 4 seconds
6% Life stolen per hit
Socketed (1: 0 used)

I'll look up the chanche to get 5 sockets into it, and maybe give it a go. Else it will get imbued, hopefully giving a better weapon then the Shadow Dart.

Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 203 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act V NM - Leveling till 74.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 76 – Act I Hell - Rescuing Cain.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 76 - Act I Hell - Killing the countess.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda


Edit: damn can't access the main page, or the arreat summit from work. If anyone can tell me the amount of sockets an i-level 66 hyperion spear will get from larzuk i would be gratefull. Counting on six, but you never know.
 
Gouda said:
Edit: damn can't access the main page, or the arreat summit from work. If anyone can tell me the amount of sockets an i-level 66 hyperion spear will get from larzuk i would be gratefull. Counting on six, but you never know.

A Hyperion Spear can have up to 3 sockets.

Why don't you wait to find a Thresher and socket Honor in it. It has descent life leech (7%), 20% Deadly Strike and gets 40-380 damage. If your merc is level 76 he should be able to equip the Tresher.

BTW: I found 4 Tresher while doing my first 20 countess runs with my Barb.
 
[highlight]Exhibition Team Bavarian Forest II[/highlight] - 196 points
Conqueror Franz - Barb (Warcries/C. Skills) – lvl 79 – Act II HELL - 78 points
Destroyer Mich - Necro (Bone/Curse) – lvl 56 – Act III NM - 45 points - RIP
Conqueror Theres - Sorc (Fire/Ice) – lvl 78 – Act II HELL - 73 points

Franz - WP: Lut Gohlein - Last Quest: Killed Duriel
Theres - WP: Lut Gohlein - Last Quest: Killed Radament

Another update for me.

I did 30 Countess runs with Franz. The best runes I found were IO and MAL. Then I retired Franz for the time being and went back to Theres.
As is always the case with a Meteorb she was nearly unstoppable. Everything fell withing seconds to here mighty orbs and meteors. Andariel fell very quickly. But she just dropped one rare and a Topaz. I think Theres will pay her another visit soon.
After arriving in Act II, Theres went straight into the Sewers to kill that Radament guy Atma told here about.
 
Hey hey, I'm still here :)

The last time I checked the forums out they were under maintenance so I decided to stay away for a few days...then had a busy weekend :)

I'm just moving Cristahlia through the Viper Tomb at the moment (I still can't bloody get to the amulet because of Fangskin. I've restarted at least four or five times without success and it's becoming annoying as ****).

[highlight]Team P§ÃÇHÕ[/highlight] – 224 points
Conqueror Cristahlia - (Amazon - Passive/Bow) - lvl 79 - Act II Hell
Conqueror Dysarinad - (Necro - Summon/Curse) - lvl 79 - Act II Hell – R.I.P Scarab Beetle
Conqueror Martabian - (Druid - Summon/Elem.) - lvl 81 - Act III Hell
 
[highlight]Exhibition Team Bavarian Forest II[/highlight] - 203 points
Conqueror Franz - Barb (Warcries/C. Skills) – lvl 79 – Act II HELL - 78 points
Destroyer Mich - Necro (Bone/Curse) – lvl 56 – Act III NM - 45 points - RIP
Conqueror Theres - Sorc (Fire/Ice) – lvl 80 – Act III HELL - 80 points

Franz - WP: Lut Gohlein - Last Quest: Killed Duriel
Theres - WP: Lower Kurast - Last Quest: Found me a Brain

I moved Theres through Act 2. She had major difficulties in the Viper Temple. Because the Snakes are all Immune to Cold. On the second level I had major difficulties with Fangskin. He managed to kill the merc and I had to make a hasty retreat up the staires. I tried to come back with a resurrected merc, but that was no good idea, all the snaked were around the staires making one scary stair trap, I managed to get out of it and saved to try it again. The next time I managed to kill 2 or 3 of Fangskin minions before he showed up. This time I was able to kill him. But the Level had 3 champions of greater mummies that resurrected their skellies constantly. I decided to cut it short and teleported onto the altar, smashed it and took a TP with the amulet.
The rest was a walk in the park (read: not that many cold immune monsters) until I reached the true tomb (I skipped the false tombs as always when I don't want to level up). There I encountered vampires (cold immune) and greater mummies.
After that fight I reached the big Bug. He managed to kill the merc after only half his live was gone. So I had to make a trip to town, but when I came back Duriel was history. BTW he didn't drop anything worth mentioning.
Then I took Theres throught the Jungles of Kurast. There I discovered that Flayers are cold immune (Cold immune and fast is a dangerous combination for Theres).
She is now sitting in Lower Kurast after getting herself some Brain.
 
Hi everyone,

glad to see all of you posting!
Played quite a bit last weekend. I felt very ill on thursday and friday, only going out of the house on saturday for a little bit. All this time sitting at home, with my trusty DII.
Persephone continued killing the countess, so i could take a break after a few runs for a nap or a drink. She has done at least 30 - 50 runs now and reached lvl 78. With no changes in equipment she hasn't improved much in her run time but at least it is not too dangerous, so i will continue to do more runs. Best rune finds: an Io, IIRC, which i needed to cube a lum. Unfortunately i didn't have the required gem, and didn't find one the next 20 runs.

Finally I gave up and Started with Merovingian, finishing the first 4 quests, including the countess. His countess map is very bad, so he'll probably just visit the pits (also a bad map though). He did find my much looked for gem, so i could finally make a beautifull STONE armor :clap:
I put it in an 6% ED boneweave, and ended up with an ~1800 defense beauty! :D Dont have the exact stats, because i didn't send my chars to work, but i'll post them tomorrow.

I had to try it out on Morpheus, together with a blackthorns he now reaches 28K defense when attacking. He did clear the Den, allthough i don't know what to do with my skill points. Probably bash for some more damage.
I already found a three socket blade barrier, and hopefully I'll find a better elite socketed shield for my next project: Sanctuary. I already have 1 Ko, so one more Ko and a Mal to go. After that a gloom armor for my merc, and a
I also hope to replace my (also new) +2 warcry weapons with + 3 ones for a higher boost to shout. I really want to break that 30K defense barrier!

Wishlist: Um runes (for gloom, and hopefully some nice crescent moon weapons), Ko and Mal

Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 207 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act I Hell - Leveling till 74+.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 77 – Act I Hell - Running the pit.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 78 - Act I Hell - Killing the countess.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda
 
Hi everyone,

A bunch of countess runs later: Persephone made another level. And very important: a Mal rune! Probably one of the higgest runes i found from the countess so far. Did also find something to cube a pul out of, so two high midrange runes so far.
Another nice find was a +2 cold skills circlet with massive resists. This got persephone to 75% res. all, with about 50 in poison. No new uniques, allthough arcanna's staff, and some unique gloves dropped. A few more thet are already in the stash, but nothing of note.

Checked my stone armor at home: 1902 defense. Not the best ever, but pretty good for a tournament with all these restrictions.

No points, but i am still happy doing countess runs, so nothing to be expected soon.

Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 207 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act I Hell - Leveling till 74+.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 77 – Act I Hell - Running the pit.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 79 - Act I Hell - Killing the countess.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda
 
Went on to run the countess for a lot more, and reached lvl 80 with my sorc. Haven't found anything good at all, not even able to cube that Ko. Oh well, experience is also good. Must have done about 250 countess runs by now, but with a Mal i think my luck is above average. Items are dropping rarely, but i run with close to zero MF, so i guess it is my own fault.

To combat the boredom that is starting to settle in, I moved Merovingian up towards Andy. He retrieved the Malus and found the pre-last waypoint.

Team the Matrix II (Gouda) – 207 points
Conqueror Morpheus - (Barb – Warcries/Com.Skills) – lvl 73 – Act I Hell - Leveling till 74+.
Conqueror Merovingian - (Necro - Summon/Curse) – lvl 77 – Act I Hell - towards Andy.
Conqueror Persephone - (Sorc Fire/Cold) – lvl 80 - Act I Hell - Killing the countess.

Have fun, don't die,

Gouda

edit: highly overestimated the amount of countess runs i did. May still be less than 250, but that looks about right. Wish i had access to teleport to speed things up. It just seems i have running the countess forever by now, but i am only at it for two weeks.
 
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