Diablo 2 (again) - regarding the Barbarian

YautjaElder

Edit history:

YautjaElder: 2007-07-03 10:34:42 pm

2007-07-03 10:33:28 pm

Speed is the key.

Odds of andariel dropping hsaru's iron heel are 1:105 (first kill).

She can't drop vidala's fetlock though.

AquaTiger

2007-07-03 10:37:42 pm

Never give up!

I figured Vidala's Fetlock was impossible - it has a REQUIREMENT of level 14, which I believe is higher than Andariel's own level (12 is what I last heard).

Duriel or The Summoner would probably have been my earliest chance for Vidala's Fetlock, but IMO that might be too late.

....by the way, YautjaElder, where are you getting these numbers? I suspect it's either a special program or it's a site other than Arreat Summit, but if it's the Arreat Summit site I'd like to know where on it these would have come from.

YautjaElder

Edit history:

YautjaElder: 2007-07-03 10:44:08 pm

2007-07-03 10:43:48 pm

Speed is the key.

I'm using ATMA, which is a single player muling program but it also has a nice drop calculator.

Downloadable at http://atma.diabloii.net/

Btw, gorefoot would be another good choice for boots, with 20% frw, 2% mana leech and a +2 to leap. Odds of andariel dropping them are 1:160.

Argg0

2007-07-03 10:44:10 pm

Hmm... pie?

Problem on Concentrate is that against Double Swing it seens like slow motion...

I doubt the bonuses would be worth the speed loss.

marlaska

2007-07-03 11:02:51 pm

Quote:

.. how many seconds was it? 30? 45? 60? 90?

From Battle.net: "This potion restores your stamina instantly. You also receive super Stamina recovery for 30 seconds."

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-03 11:30:07 pm

2007-07-03 11:16:37 pm

Never give up!

Okay, so I've been looking at the drop chances for some of the items I'd considered, and if I'm using the program correctly, these are the chances of them dropping with a few candidate monsters I'd have considered for them:

Berserker's Headgear:
-From Fangskin or Fire Eye: 1 in 1217
-From Coldworm the Burrower: 1 in 1248
-From The Summoner: 1 in 1226
-From Mephisto: 1 in 187 (first kill)

Berserker's Hauberk:
-From The Summoner: 1 in 12420
-From Duriel: 1 in 240 (first kill)
-From Bremm Sparkfist: 1 in 5673

I'm not going to discuss our other big drop, runes, in detail, although I should note that the Countess has better than 1 in 10 odds for all the runes we mentioned specifically in here while I notice that except for the El rune, Duriel's the next best shot at the specified runes and chances of him dropping them are 1 in 100 or worse. (For the El rune, Andariel's the next best chance at 1 in 32.) What's with the Countess and runes?

It doesn't list the drop rates well for any of the middle-quality gems, because I've seen Andariel drop Rubies and Amethysts yet the drop calculator claims she can't. (I believe one gem drop from her is guaranteed.)

CLEARLY Act bosses are going to have to be abused for drops, and we can't count on other enemies to drop what we want.

Okay, so I've been looking at the drop chances for some of the items I'd considered, and if I'm using the program correctly, these are the chances of them dropping with a few candidate monsters I'd have considered for them:

Berserker's Headgear:
-From Fangskin or Fire Eye: 1 in 1217
-From Coldworm the Burrower: 1 in 1248
-From The Summoner: 1 in 1226
-From Mephisto: 1 in 187 (first kill)

Berserker's Hauberk:
-From The Summoner: 1 in 12420
-From Duriel: 1 in 240 (first kill)
-From Bremm Sparkfist: 1 in 5673

I'm not going to discuss our other big drop, runes, in detail, although I should note that the Countess has better than 1 in 10 odds for all the runes we mentioned specifically in here while I notice that except for the El rune, Duriel's the next best shot at the specified runes and chances of him dropping them are 1 in 100 or worse.  (For the El rune, Andariel's the next best chance at 1 in 32.)  What's with the Countess and runes?

It doesn't list the drop rates well for any of the middle-quality gems, because I've seen Andariel drop Rubies and Amethysts yet the drop calculator claims she can't.  (I believe one gem drop from her is guaranteed.)

CLEARLY Act bosses are going to have to be abused for drops, and we can't count on other enemies to drop what we want.

Argg0

2007-07-04 03:18:20 am

Hmm... pie?

Countess odds:
1 : 2.03 El Rune
1 : 2.83 Eld Rune
1 : 3.36 Tir Rune
1 : 4.67 Eth Rune
1 : 4.84 Nef Rune
1 : 5.53 Tal Rune
1 : 6.83 Ith Rune
1 : 8.12 Ral Rune

From Duriel (first kill)
1 : 240 Berserker's Hauberk
1 : 216 Berserker's Headgear

Andariel (first kill)
1 : 105 Berserker's Headgear

You forgot the cube room... for the helmet.
Bloodwitch the Wild -> 1 : 1095

I hope these numbes help somewhat.

I think you should aim to get the helmet from andy and the armor from duriel. The odds aren't that bad.

DYC

2007-07-04 06:14:10 am

Smashboards > You.

Also remember that with the whole mace-type thing you can manipulate act 5 to get a good set of undeads.

I'm sure this is pretty much just a common sense thing, but sometimes the obvious things go overlooked.

gia

Edit history:

gia: 2007-07-04 08:54:09 pm

2007-07-04 08:50:47 pm

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

even at level 1 battle orders would do a lot, and get enhanced by your berserker armor and also if you can bear getting an eye of etlich (+1 BO, leech for dswing and cold for dswing), and a +skill helm, just get some +X ar so there's something to get enhanced by the the +%AR from your skills

btw a military pick would give 50% against demons (same as 5 bash synergy for dswing) and can be blood crafted for more enhanced damage, although that needs a pruby

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-05 12:27:05 am

2007-07-04 09:43:54 pm

Never give up!

Military Picks have very low damage compared to a War Hammer or even a Flail (though they're much more consistent than the latter). So I doubt any race-specific enemy bonus (are you sure that was a NORMAL Military Pick and not a magical one?) would offset an overall damage drop.

A +skill helm is right out, as I've already reserved the helmet equipment slot for Berserker's Headgear (when combined with Berserker's Hauberk, I get bonuses to AR and Defense, as well as a bonus of 50 Life). As for the Eye of Etlich, I doubt it.... Duriel has a 1:1372 chance of dropping it on first kill, but he's already taken up with Berserker's Hauberk in my notes. Next best shot is Diablo, but on the first kill he only drops it with a chance of 1:3035.

Argg0: I didn't mention Andariel for the helmet because I'm already trying to get a drop of either Gorefoot or Hsarus's Iron Heel (both of them being boots with fast run/walk) from her - having fast run/walk even THAT early can make a significant difference. 1:105 for Hsarus's Iron Heel, 1:160 for Gorefoot, as mentioned by YautjaElder earlier - and I didn't feel like repeating what he said. I am ABSOLUTELY NOT trying for two drops from the same boss.

Military Picks have very low damage compared to a War Hammer or even a Flail (though they're much more consistent than the latter).  So I doubt any race-specific enemy bonus (are you sure that was a NORMAL Military Pick and not a magical one?) would offset an overall damage drop.

A +skill helm is right out, as I've already reserved the helmet equipment slot for Berserker's Headgear (when combined with Berserker's Hauberk, I get bonuses to AR and Defense, as well as a bonus of 50 Life).  As for the Eye of Etlich, I doubt it.... Duriel has a 1:1372 chance of dropping it on first kill, but he's already taken up with Berserker's Hauberk in my notes.  Next best shot is Diablo, but on the first kill he only drops it with a chance of 1:3035.

Argg0: I didn't mention Andariel for the helmet because I'm already trying to get a drop of either Gorefoot or Hsarus's Iron Heel (both of them being boots with fast run/walk) from her - having fast run/walk even THAT early can make a significant difference.  1:105 for Hsarus's Iron Heel, 1:160 for Gorefoot, as mentioned by YautjaElder earlier - and I didn't feel like repeating what he said.  I am ABSOLUTELY NOT trying for two drops from the same boss.

gia

2007-07-04 11:32:02 pm

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

all axe type weapons do 150% damage to demon type monsters and the pick can be blood crafted if it is magical

1:1000s sounds quite good, where are the days you would kill mephisto for an item in the billions Tongue

getter77

2007-07-05 01:00:01 am

100% runs=great to watch

I've never heard of axes having any kinda built in enhancement....only undead damage mods on stuff like maces, scepters, and the like. With a prefix/suffix, YES....but not otherwise AFAIK. Besides, with this being Normal run only with no twinking....I'd be surprised if crafting was a viable thing to pursue.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-05 03:18:08 am

2007-07-05 03:15:59 am

Never give up!

I did another set of calculations using the AR and hit chance formulas from earlier.

And I've determined that at level 21, if we have Mace Mastery level 10, we only need a Dexterity of 45 (I'm dealing with multiples of 5 here because that's how I figure my stats would be best distributed) to get roughly 30% hit chance on Baal. At Mace Mastery level 4, we need 60 Dexterity to get a comparable hit chance. (Note that both of these calculations used Double Swing level 1 as the attack - and neither one used Battle Cry because that modifies our chances more than any AR differences.)

My calculations don't seem right to me, as I find it hard to believe that an AR below 500 (both sets of calculations generate roughly 475 AR) can hit Baal roughly 30% of the time and a much higher AR doesn't hit all that much more often. (This probably has to do with the level difference being so massive. Also note that using the same formulas, an AR of exactly 313 - equal to Baal's Defense - would get a 26% chance of hitting Baal. I imagine it goes downhill much faster from there.)

With this kind of thing being the case, that Malice runeword is becoming more and more attractive.

I should note one curiosity I fully realized recently. Any number bonuses to Attack Rating (hint: magic items) are actually added BEFORE any multiplications are done. (I found this out by taking off and putting on a ring that gave +10 AR and finding that the AR changed by 16 instead of 10.)

I did another set of calculations using the AR and hit chance formulas from earlier.

And I've determined that at level 21, if we have Mace Mastery level 10, we only need a Dexterity of 45 (I'm dealing with multiples of 5 here because that's how I figure my stats would be best distributed) to get roughly 30% hit chance on Baal.  At Mace Mastery level 4, we need 60 Dexterity to get a comparable hit chance.  (Note that both of these calculations used Double Swing level 1 as the attack - and neither one used Battle Cry because that modifies our chances more than any AR differences.)

My calculations don't seem right to me, as I find it hard to believe that an AR below 500 (both sets of calculations generate roughly 475 AR) can hit Baal roughly 30% of the time and a much higher AR doesn't hit all that much more often.  (This probably has to do with the level difference being so massive.  Also note that using the same formulas, an AR of exactly 313 - equal to Baal's Defense - would get a 26% chance of hitting Baal.  I imagine it goes downhill much faster from there.)

With this kind of thing being the case, that Malice runeword is becoming more and more attractive.

I should note one curiosity I fully realized recently.  Any number bonuses to Attack Rating (hint: magic items) are actually added BEFORE any multiplications are done.  (I found this out by taking off and putting on a ring that gave +10 AR and finding that the AR changed by 16 instead of 10.)

Zurreco

2007-07-05 05:41:48 am

Just call me the cynicism machine

Quote:

My calculations don't seem right to me, as I find it hard to believe that an AR below 500 (both sets of calculations generate roughly 475 AR) can hit Baal roughly 30% of the time and a much higher AR doesn't hit all that much more often.

I'm pretty sure that you're using the "implied" calculation of hit%, rather than the actual formula that the game's internal hit detection uses As I've said before, you have to use the peterpaulreuben's formulas to find out these things legitimately. Unfortunately, the site that I've had bookmarked, http://dpw.bounceme.net/d2 , no longer works.

Needless to say, ~500 AR is going to miss Baal way way more than you think. Is there a minimum hit% in D2?

AquaTiger

2007-07-05 06:49:42 am

Never give up!

I think the minimum hit chance is 5%.

As far as calculations, I just did several searches and cannot find anything that even suggests the 'peterpaulreuben' formulas exist. EVERY site I've tried uses the same formulas Siyko used earlier. So I can't rely on the formula set you're suggesting even if it's completely right - unless I see them. I have to work with what I know and not pin any hopes or failures on some cryptic internal calculations.

From here until such formulas are found, any mention of the 'peterpaulreuben' formulas will be ignored entirely.

I've been doing a casual playthrough of the save file I plan to use, trying to make mapping clear and such, and seeing how well certain things work. I'll determine what to do for my build after that.

suga

Edit history:

suga: 2007-07-05 05:48:55 pm

2007-07-05 04:30:41 pm

PPR's calculator.
http://www.baronsbazaar.invisionzone.com/ppr/

I think the only added factor to this calculator is the monster's chance to block which no matter how high your AR, you miss.

Also, I heard Eth's -25% To Target Defence works half-effective against bosses so it might be the same for Battle Cry. I haven't been able to find out though.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-05 05:23:33 pm

2007-07-05 05:21:43 pm

Never give up!

Okay.

I couldn't figure out Baal's ACTUAL block chance with PPR's calculator (I don't have a Dexterity value for Baal anywhere) so I had to use the value on Arreat Summit.

I've calculated that a displayed hit chance of 30% against Baal means an ACTUAL hit chance of 18%. Just for kicks, I did an example that had level 21, 90 Dexterity, Sword Mastery rank 20, and Double Swing rank 1. And the ACTUAL hit chance was still only 25%. I upped it to level 24 and the hit chance only rose to 27%.

Yeah, it DOES seem like enemy block chance is the only thing missing from the normal calculations.

Considering we're unlikely to reach 30% actual hit rate EVER with a speedrun-capable Barbarian, and we can't even realistically reach 25% without sacrificing all other valuable skills, I'm going to take several steps back and start with 20% (for all original calculations, unless I say otherwise, I ignore enemy defense reductions due to Battle Cry or the Malice runeword or whatever). To get an actual hit rate of 20% against Baal, I need a displayed hit chance of roughly 33-34%.

Mace Mastery 10, Double Swing 1, and 60 Dexterity gives this hit rate. For curiosity's sake, if we used Concentrate instead, then Mace Mastery 10 (if I go with Concentrate, a War Hammer still does more damage than a Claymore, my most realistic sword choice for a Concentrate build in terms of Strength - if I do the Concentrate build I may even get a shield so I can build resistances), Concentrate 1, and 50 Dexterity gives us the hit rate necessary for 20% ACTUAL hit chance against Baal.

Will try calculations with Mephisto, Diablo (both of which would use just -1 level for the character), and Duriel (test at level 15 with Double Swing as one possibility and Bash as the other - but still Mace Mastery 10) later.

By the way, if Battle Cry works in full, the above numbers would give a 24% actual hit chance instead. Like I said, Battle Cry affects our hit chances more than ANY modifications in AR - which is the entire reason I calculate without it first, because I'd still like my planned hit chance without resorting to a skill that requires activation.

Okay.

I couldn't figure out Baal's ACTUAL block chance with PPR's calculator (I don't have a Dexterity value for Baal anywhere) so I had to use the value on Arreat Summit.

I've calculated that a displayed hit chance of 30% against Baal means an ACTUAL hit chance of 18%.  Just for kicks, I did an example that had level 21, 90 Dexterity, Sword Mastery rank 20, and Double Swing rank 1.  And the ACTUAL hit chance was still only 25%.  I upped it to level 24 and the hit chance only rose to 27%.

Yeah, it DOES seem like enemy block chance is the only thing missing from the normal calculations.

Considering we're unlikely to reach 30% actual hit rate EVER with a speedrun-capable Barbarian, and we can't even realistically reach 25% without sacrificing all other valuable skills, I'm going to take several steps back and start with 20% (for all original calculations, unless I say otherwise, I ignore enemy defense reductions due to Battle Cry or the Malice runeword or whatever).  To get an actual hit rate of 20% against Baal, I need a displayed hit chance of roughly 33-34%.

Mace Mastery 10, Double Swing 1, and 60 Dexterity gives this hit rate.  For curiosity's sake, if we used Concentrate instead, then Mace Mastery 10 (if I go with Concentrate, a War Hammer still does more damage than a Claymore, my most realistic sword choice for a Concentrate build in terms of Strength - if I do the Concentrate build I may even get a shield so I can build resistances), Concentrate 1, and 50 Dexterity gives us the hit rate necessary for 20% ACTUAL hit chance against Baal.

Will try calculations with Mephisto, Diablo (both of which would use just -1 level for the character), and Duriel (test at level 15 with Double Swing as one possibility and Bash as the other - but still Mace Mastery 10) later.

By the way, if Battle Cry works in full, the above numbers would give a 24% actual hit chance instead.  Like I said, Battle Cry affects our hit chances more than ANY modifications in AR - which is the entire reason I calculate without it first, because I'd still like my planned hit chance without resorting to a skill that requires activation.

suga

2007-07-05 06:08:07 pm

Hsarus combo (belt + boots) > Berserker combo. Hsarus combo gives better AR and Berseker mail is Medium sized armor which slows your run speed. I personally think you should be fine with some AR weapons and rings though.

Manipulating something off Duriel might be a bad idea, since he's one of the toughest time for melee class, I think you'll have a hard time killing him with a constant time.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-06 12:41:17 am

2007-07-05 06:23:03 pm

Never give up!

Hsarus's Iron Stay drops from Mephisto at a rate of 1:187 (from Duriel at 1:216 first kill as well, but I'll get to that in a moment). And it's still a 3-row belt, so we're okay there. PLUS that gives us room for equipping a +2- or +3-to-needed-skills helmet down the road. I'm a little concerned about the diminished life bonus, but I'm not seeing a whole lot of other reasons to stick with Berserker's and avoid comboing Hsarus's.

I'll examine Duriel when I get there with the mapping/casual test play. If that one has low amounts of trouble we can continue examining him for speedrun drops. If it has MOUNDS of trouble we'll drop the manipulation.

Edit: I did another test, and our actual hit chance against Baal CANNOT go over 31% even if his defense is reduced to 0. So striving for a lot of AR-increasing items simply won't help - anyway, though I may have room to put Dexterity even lower with such numbers if we DO get such equipment, I'm still going to act in our calculations like we don't have the luxury of AR-increasing equipment.

Edit 2: I did a little more playing around with my casual/mapping play of the Barbarian, this time testing Double Swing. I'll examine it more once I face the next Unique. Until then, while Double Swing is NOT a skill you can just jump into (I'd already used a lot of gems and runes by the time I made the choice to test Double Swing, meaning I'd have to rely solely on luck to get decent weapons), I find it to my liking - and that Double Swing 'glitch' mentioned a while back made the case (I had tested it with Long Sword + Falchion, since my casual/mapping playthrough specializes in swords).

Hsarus's Iron Stay drops from Mephisto at a rate of 1:187 (from Duriel at 1:216 first kill as well, but I'll get to that in a moment).  And it's still a 3-row belt, so we're okay there.  PLUS that gives us room for equipping a +2- or +3-to-needed-skills helmet down the road.  I'm a little concerned about the diminished life bonus, but I'm not seeing a whole lot of other reasons to stick with Berserker's and avoid comboing Hsarus's.

I'll examine Duriel when I get there with the mapping/casual test play.  If that one has low amounts of trouble we can continue examining him for speedrun drops.  If it has MOUNDS of trouble we'll drop the manipulation.

Edit: I did another test, and our actual hit chance against Baal CANNOT go over 31% even if his defense is reduced to 0.  So striving for a lot of AR-increasing items simply won't help - anyway, though I may have room to put Dexterity even lower with such numbers if we DO get such equipment, I'm still going to act in our calculations like we don't have the luxury of AR-increasing equipment.

Edit 2: I did a little more playing around with my casual/mapping play of the Barbarian, this time testing Double Swing.  I'll examine it more once I face the next Unique.  Until then, while Double Swing is NOT a skill you can just jump into (I'd already used a lot of gems and runes by the time I made the choice to test Double Swing, meaning I'd have to rely solely on luck to get decent weapons), I find it to my liking - and that Double Swing 'glitch' mentioned a while back made the case (I had tested it with Long Sword + Falchion, since my casual/mapping playthrough specializes in swords).

Siyko

2007-07-06 01:24:43 am

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

I don't think anyone has mentioned it before, but with this hit chance looking as depressing as it is, it is very important that you get poison damage somewhere... the longer lasting the better. As I'm sure you know, when an enemy is taking poison damage, they stop healing, and with the kind of time it will take to kill Baal, it will be hard to even outdamage his own constant healing. I don't know if there's a hard number for it somewhere, but I bet it's significant

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-06 03:29:09 am

2007-07-06 01:53:51 am

Never give up!

Someone mentioned Tal runes for damage somewhere in one of the Paladin topics, but they never discussed it as a method to stop enemy healing. I guess it was implied.

The longest poison damage on an item that I see anywhere is 7 seconds with a Perfect Emerald - but unless we do the Hellforge quest there's practically zero chance of getting those. Flawless Emeralds do their damage over a span of 6 seconds. Our most likely outcome is that it's done over 5 seconds, which comes from normal Emeralds, some magic prefixes..... and Tal runes.

I should make one note as far as armor. I'm seeing two possible end choices for armor - Breast Plate and Light Plate. They are the only light armors that can get 3 sockets - and I am almost certainly going to need something like Sapphires, Rubies, or MAYYYBE Diamonds in them (Skulls won't cut it and none of the other bonuses in that equipment slot really help), with Sapphires being MUCH preferred. Even better, both armors are within my Strength limits. Breast Plate is more likely on the virtue of "it's gotten earlier", but I may use Light Plate later if I find enough decent Sapphires to override the mana bonus that the Breast Plate armor would have. (The Barbarian is probably the class that gets the most benefit in a speedrun from a socketed item, and their very tight Mana supply is why. One decent Sapphire adds more mana than they'll ever get from their levelups or large boosts to Energy - but due to the way they use mana, as in hardly at all, maybe I only need Sapphires in one or two sockets and can put Rubies for extra health in the remaining ones.)

Edit: More tests with Double Swing are drawing me ever closer to believing that it is going to be the skill of choice. I have to test Concentration before I completely decide, but Concentration is going to have to do a LOT to have a chance at beating Double Swing, and I just don't see that happening. The attack speed is just insane (especially with the secondary weapon having the "Steel" runeword and the primary weapon having enough bonuses to push its attack speed to "Very Fast").

Someone mentioned Tal runes for damage somewhere in one of the Paladin topics, but they never discussed it as a method to stop enemy healing.  I guess it was implied.

The longest poison damage on an item that I see anywhere is 7 seconds with a Perfect Emerald - but unless we do the Hellforge quest there's practically zero chance of getting those.  Flawless Emeralds do their damage over a span of 6 seconds.  Our most likely outcome is that it's done over 5 seconds, which comes from normal Emeralds, some magic prefixes..... and Tal runes.

I should make one note as far as armor.  I'm seeing two possible end choices for armor - Breast Plate and Light Plate.  They are the only light armors that can get 3 sockets - and I am almost certainly going to need something like Sapphires, Rubies, or MAYYYBE Diamonds in them (Skulls won't cut it and none of the other bonuses in that equipment slot really help), with Sapphires being MUCH preferred.  Even better, both armors are within my Strength limits.  Breast Plate is more likely on the virtue of "it's gotten earlier", but I may use Light Plate later if I find enough decent Sapphires to override the mana bonus that the Breast Plate armor would have.  (The Barbarian is probably the class that gets the most benefit in a speedrun from a socketed item, and their very tight Mana supply is why.  One decent Sapphire adds more mana than they'll ever get from their levelups or large boosts to Energy - but due to the way they use mana, as in hardly at all, maybe I only need Sapphires in one or two sockets and can put Rubies for extra health in the remaining ones.)

Edit: More tests with Double Swing are drawing me ever closer to believing that it is going to be the skill of choice.  I have to test Concentration before I completely decide, but Concentration is going to have to do a LOT to have a chance at beating Double Swing, and I just don't see that happening.  The attack speed is just insane (especially with the secondary weapon having the "Steel" runeword and the primary weapon having enough bonuses to push its attack speed to "Very Fast").

getter77

2007-07-06 03:50:48 am

100% runs=great to watch

If things truly beging to look untenable as far as a god hit rate on Baal and co go...I don't see much recourse save for getting some Crushing Blow. I recall Normal makeable RW's and I think a Club with it that can be dropped in Late Act 1 at the earliest.

If you can apply it "fast" via this Dbl Swing trick, then it essentially becomes the Static that would allow for this to not get terribly bogged down in the end game or much else.

AquaTiger

Edit history:

AquaTiger: 2007-07-06 06:16:18 am

2007-07-06 04:29:43 am

Never give up!

I don't see any runewords with Crushing Blow that are within our level range. I do see a couple of unique items that have it however - the Crushflange mace (Bone Ash, the Unique in the Cathedral, drops this at a rate of 1:1097, and he's got the best drop rate there for non-boss Super Uniques that can be reached in a speedrun) and the Goblin Toe boots (the three Super Uniques in Chaos Sanctuary drop it at 1:6503, and the item itself needs level 22 to use). Since our boot slot is essentially occupied, our better chance would be with the mace - I'd probably only use that weapon for boss fights though.

Anyway, I've definitely decided a build around Concentrate is out of the question. It only can ever utilize the effects of one weapon, so you'd need a good 2-handed weapon for it to work.

Siyko, I'm curious about something. Would 'Open Wounds' effects also stop monsters from healing, the same way poison damage does? Because Open Wounds effects last 8 seconds and the Malice runeword carries a 100% chance of causing Open Wounds. (Open Wounds damage is solely based on level, dealing about 26 damage a second at level 21 - though you'd need to halve it against bosses.)

Edit: I think we're going to NEED that Crushflange at the point I suggested. Even with my casual/mapping play at level 21 when reaching Duriel, and though I was hitting him fine (Battle Cry helped there, so I may consider going to level 18 before fighting Duriel), I struggled to put a dent in him damage-wise. It took a good 10-15 minutes to fight him, including one death I incurred from not successfully getting far enough away before healing.

So no, I won't expect to manipulate off of Duriel.

I don't see any runewords with Crushing Blow that are within our level range.  I do see a couple of unique items that have it however - the Crushflange mace (Bone Ash, the Unique in the Cathedral, drops this at a rate of 1:1097, and he's got the best drop rate there for non-boss Super Uniques that can be reached in a speedrun) and the Goblin Toe boots (the three Super Uniques in Chaos Sanctuary drop it at 1:6503, and the item itself needs level 22 to use).  Since our boot slot is essentially occupied, our better chance would be with the mace - I'd probably only use that weapon for boss fights though.

Anyway, I've definitely decided a build around Concentrate is out of the question.  It only can ever utilize the effects of one weapon, so you'd need a good 2-handed weapon for it to work.

Siyko, I'm curious about something.  Would 'Open Wounds' effects also stop monsters from healing, the same way poison damage does?  Because Open Wounds effects last 8 seconds and the Malice runeword carries a 100% chance of causing Open Wounds.  (Open Wounds damage is solely based on level, dealing about 26 damage a second at level 21 - though you'd need to halve it against bosses.)

Edit: I think we're going to NEED that Crushflange at the point I suggested.  Even with my casual/mapping play at level 21 when reaching Duriel, and though I was hitting him fine (Battle Cry helped there, so I may consider going to level 18 before fighting Duriel), I struggled to put a dent in him damage-wise.  It took a good 10-15 minutes to fight him, including one death I incurred from not successfully getting far enough away before healing.

So no, I won't expect to manipulate off of Duriel.

Argg0

2007-07-06 07:34:45 am

Hmm... pie?

Open Wounds works as PMH too.

Siyko

Edit history:

Siyko: 2007-07-06 07:28:22 pm

2007-07-06 07:28:01 pm

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

yea, open wounds is just a fancy word for poison

edit: with cool blood effects!