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Gorash: 2005-06-09 11:22:53 am
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If you search a bit around for it you'll find that I was against searching ahead before too. The reason I chose it was that seeing someone exploring is boring like hell, and Diablo2 will never become a speedrun competition like Metroid or Quake. So I adopted the entertainment view of it, and entertainment comes from fast battles and huge monster masses on screen.

As for the /players8 command (explanation for radix: if you enter /players x in single player game the monsters hp get multiplied by that value but the exp they give is also increased by half of that multiplier, similar to the behaviour of the game if more than one real player joins) I figured if I only used it for bosses it would be a truely beneficial code. Now everyone can see that it isn't solely beneficial if kept constant all the way, and the strategy discussions here are proof alone that it's an interesting thing to optimize.

Also it takes a lot of the challenge from the bosses. In that last video andariel takes me from first contact to death 51 seconds. You can roughly divide that number by 6 to get the one player time. 9 seconds for an act boss? C'mon... where's the challenge?
"Challenge" and "Normal difficulty" shouldn't be used in the same sentence, really Tongue
${$uid.$user}{' usertext'}
You clearly haven't played the game for speed Tongue
Try Diablo with a melee fighter around 25 with crappy equip on /players 5-8, then come back and state that again Wink
Sleeping Terror
Personally, I'd rather see /players1 than /players2-8. Why? Because, as someone who played a good amount of Diablo II but was never "hardcore" into it, that's what I'm familiar with. And if I see a good run on something I'm familiar with, I'll appreciate it more than if it's on something I'm not quite so familiar with.

As I understand it, higher /players are easier, because the only things that increase are experience gained and monster HP - not monster damage, resistance penalties, or other things which normally increase the difficulty as you go further. Thus, the game becomes imbalanced in favor of the player until you max out your level, which won't happen in a Normal difficulty speedrun.

That's another reason why I'd rather see a /players1 speedrun. I find harder runs more interesting, even if they take longer.
A Crab
The point of the seed command was to level the playing field and make it so one person wouldn't have to try over and over again to try and get a map with a lot of experience shrines.  If everyone used the same seed, you'd know if someone cheated too.
Jack of all Trades
Can someone educate me on the -seed thing? Before this thread the only thing I heard about it is that it drastically increases the amount of monsters...going into a1 fields would be like heading into an ocean of zombies and fallen (insert funny screenshot here). I did some google searches and looked around the top D2 sites a little and found only one reference on a forum that relates to map creation but it just vaguely said it "seeded maps."
D2 uses a random number (probably taken from the system clock) to produce maps and monster locations. This behaviour can be overridden by providing a 'seed' value at the command line. Given the same number, D2 will always produce that same map. Usefull for learning the routes and monster locations before starting a proper run.
Jack of all Trades
So if someone has a "good map" then how does that translate to a seed value? Does the seed value affect all maps in the game or just one map or...?

I just don't understand how to (ab)use it.
Edit history:
Gorash: 2005-06-09 07:46:48 pm
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I think he means you could always start Diablo with a seed, start a game and see if the map pleases you. If it does, start all runs from there on with that seed, and you'll always have an exp shrine near Rakanishu or something like that.

If the map does not please you, choose a different one.

Abusing that you could do full knowledge runs even on Multiplayer mode, where the map is normally generated at loading, and could even gamble the map to fit your needs.

Using this you could even skip whole maps by choosing a seed where the waypoint is at the beginning of the map, save+exit, restart with a different seed and get the wp near the exit of the same area (Frozen Highlands in act5 come into mind)

Frankly I don't like it.

As for Strangeness: I'd like to start an argument now about how much harder to play higher players are, but in fact I haven't played real solo in a long time, so I'll catch up on that and give you an estimate afterwards.
Jack of all Trades
You should check your pms, Gorash, you silly goose.
Edit history:
marshmallow: 2005-06-10 05:14:52 am
Jack of all Trades
Well, screw all you guys and your weirdo seed thingy-majiggers! I'm doing a Diablo 2 run, sin, players 1 (I tested it and I believe it will be much quicker than, say, 4 or 5 or 6 players).

Hopefully I can work around the poor FPS OK.
I love YaBB 1G - SP1!
mr. gibbons, is this speedrun considered a "problem" that will soon be fixed by you completing it???

everyone else ignore this post
not that I'm playing myself, but I'm divided whetever I'd like to see a seeded run or not.

non seeded runs would be fun just because the randomness forces decisions (during the run) and it puts exploring skills at test, and the fact that it's kind of exciting "will i be lucky or not?" xP

seeded runs should definetly be either -seed0 or -seed1 (everyone should agree about the same one and it should not be some "fixed" lucky seed) which would put the run much closer to normal runs (since now you can do planning  and retrying). any other seed would be just stupid imo xP
18 to the diablo2 holy grail
yeah i think there should be 2 categories, a "seeded" with some number where you can practise the map prior to give a level playing field, and another where yoiu get just 1 go and no looking ahead prior to the run.
I agree on the seed-business. If we do decide to use seeds, we should all use the same one, as that'd show who's boss, and no who had most time to pick a cheesy seed with many xp-shrines and area-exits close to eachother.

I honestly don't see the point in a non-seed speedrun, it'd be trying until you finally get a good map-layout and set a good time, then someone else'd come in who's possibly not even half as good as you are, but gets an incredibly favourable map-layout and beats your time Lips Sealed it'd be like speedrunning Metroid Fusion^4 or something <_<

As for the Seed commando turning the map into a swarm of monsters, that's what it did in the 1.10 beta, but that rather strange side effect seems to have been removed. I have a pic of it stashed away:



And finally, in my opinion, the Trapsin's greatest strenght is the fact that those traps flatten hordes of enemies in the blink of an eye, as long as they die quick. If you play on Players1, you can simply toss a trap somewhere while you pass by, proceed rushing through the level yet still killing the critters next to the trap. On higher PlayerX levels, you have a few more levels under the belt, which makes for higher trap damage, but I still doubt it'd be enough for the increased monster hp's, so you might have to spend actual time farming for xp later on.

Oh well, we'll see what's better eventually Tongue
Edit history:
J.C: 2005-06-10 11:31:08 pm
I tried a run about 4 years ago on Diablo 2, it was before the extension pack was released and solo offline : I killed Diablo hell with a level 45 necromancer, after 36 hours of game and 111 deathes (I written a log) : what a pity I didn't know SDA this time Grin ...


Personnally, I wouldn't like to spend 36 hours, and even just two, to see a diablo run : this game isn't dedicated at all for video runs in my opinion, not only because of the randomness, but because there are nothing interesting to watch in this kind of game if you aren't playing ...
Quote:
Personnally, I wouldn't like to spend 36 hours, and even just two, to see a diablo run : this game isn't dedicated at all for video runs in my opinion, not only because of the randomness, but because there are nothing interesting to watch in this kind of game if you aren't playing ...

I was totally amazed by what I've seen by now, and I would watch the complete run regardless of 2 or 5 hours. I think this game is interesting.... so, if you don't like it, don't participate and add stupid comments.
Ben Goldberg
It wasn't a stupid comment, it was his opinion. Anyways, it wasn't even offensive, so there's nothing to whine about.
It was stupid in that way that it didn't help the thread in any way (like our discussing now, I'll stop ti with that post however... at least for my stupid posts). It's like going to a political forum and saying you're against anything without backing it up with reason.
If you're not interested in a game why don't you just ignore it? Do I post everywhere that the game isn't interesting because I didn't play it? I don't, so if you want to criticise a run or a plan to run then you should give it at least another idea what you would do it else to make it interesting. Or just leave it - no one forces you to watch it.
I love YaBB 1G - SP1!
I too am amazed by what i have seen so far. If someone decides to do a run from start through hell I will download, watch, and LOVE it  Grin
Hey Ho Let's Go
I hope this isn't too much off topic, but what would the best skill tree be to advance in for a Paladin? Are there any specific skills which are better or worse than others?

Secondly, let me say that I'd love to watch a run through LOD!! I cross my fingers and hope that someone will be brave enough to attempt it!  Wink
Edit history:
Gorash: 2005-06-11 02:23:24 pm
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Marsh's on it at the moment, so I don't even know if I should continue my efforts. Wink

Pala skill tree? That would be combat skills, because without it you don't do damage, but I doubt that was what you had in mind.

Hammerdin is extremely powerful. So powerful he's also refered to as lamerdin. That would be 20 in blessed hammer and concentration aura, use them together. I personally favor then 10 points in holy shield because you get insane defense with it and boosts your block chance, but more damage oriented people will tell you to keep maxing synergies to get even more damage out of the hammer. Which is what I'd tell you to do after the 10 points holy shield.

Other variants:
- holy shield is always a good idea
- zeal + fanaticism is a nice combo
- zeal + holy shock aura too
- if you aim for a fun char try fist of heavens + conviction, a bit challenging to play though
- even more fun: give a paladin with fanatcism a kuko shakaku, or later a demon machine. the result is hard to explain, but it looks like he firing mortars.
- next to unplayable fun: give him a huge shield and max smite. slap'em!
Edit history:
Stubgaard: 2005-06-11 03:35:18 pm
Hey Ho Let's Go
Cool, thanks!

How about the stats points then, how would you deal those out?  Wink Again I'm sorry if this is too much off topic, but I've actually never really tried to play a decent paladin before, so Im curious as to what is best.

Anyways, to get back on topic, I'd prefer to see a run WITHOUT the /seed and /players command (it's like using the Godmode command in Quake), but that's just my 2 cents. On second thought, maybe D2 is just too damn random if you'd were to make a run, so I can't quite make up my mind on this issue...
Jack of all Trades
I am almost done. For a short while I was tickled pink with the possibility of sub 2:00. I doubt this anymore, but it might be close.
Jack of all Trades
I scrapped by and got sub-2h.