Just want to say I’d be interested in a reset-practice. I’m kind of busy the next week or so so my time is a bit limited, but I’ll keep an eye out here.
When we do get to the reset, are we planning on building a specific party to begin with, or are we being a little loosy-goosey about that? I’d love to start another druid.
I’m working on a trapassin too, mdsl, and though I found myself struggling a bit from Mephisto through most of act V, now (NM, lvl 45) I’m kicking some serious butt.
I did put a point in Shadow Master. I don’t know that I’ll put very many more there. Much as a barb uses echo weapons on switch to power up Battle Orders, I’m planning to use +shadow skills claws on the switch for a decent shadow master. They will also help with Burst of speed/Fade.
I use dual claws on the main slot too. Teh weapon block is great since it blocks any kind of attack or projectile. At about 50% you can survive pretty dang well. The +skill on the claws serve traps well too.
For the rest of my skills I dump them into traps. Not the fire traps (except for the grenade one) since they suck. Max Lit. Sentry, Bolt Sentry and the grenade. Take shock web to slvl 18. It’s not one that you will use, but the synergy with bolt sentry is great.
If one person becomes clearly dominant, it might make sense for everyone else to keep doing some Baal runs and have the other person perhaps join a public party and get further (particularly act 2 NM). Whether we’d want that person to save the staff and use it to get the group through A2 or chance the possibility that this person would be able to get to Durance 2 is a big gamble, though if we have a sorc with capable teleporting ability it becomes much less of one. Just from what I have seen so far, a summoning necro will be more powerful at clvl 25-45 than will be a conc barb, based purely on the fact that a necro will get guaranteed skellys and damage from them (and added from decrep), whereas a melee fighter has to have a good weapon.
On a somewhat tangential note, I will remind folks who may have forgotten that when +3 to an individual skill tree spawns, the character must be at least level 45 (and, depending on the other mods, sometimes higher) to use it. If you’re looking to boost your fire sorc’s +skills, I might wait until level 45 before going to NM, since that +3 ammy sitting in your stash ain’t helping you much in NM, whereas in Norm you can just do a Baal run or 3 to get that extra level or two.
I’d humbly submit, from recent SP experience, that it isn’t just levels but gear and build that matter. I can have a level 70 conc barb, but if he’s still using his soulflay at that level 20 more levels won’t give him much more than a lot of life. He’ll still be packing a tiny punch, though. My suggestion therefore is to do runs until we have two or three people who are good enough to go into Hell and have the rest keep doing Baal runs for XP and drops. Eventually when we start mule rushing we will have the runes to get/make the gear we need.
I have not noticed a significant difference in Hell from starting about level 70 to starting at around 78. I have noticed a difference in good gear vs. better gear, and since we’ll be doing private (i.e. less xp) Baal runs for drops, I think that we should stick with that until folks feel they are handling things well enough. Four player Baal runs can get you to level 72 without a lot of trouble, and level 75 with a bit more work, but anything beyond that and most of the run is useless.
theckhd made a comment that he’d like to be included if we do another ladder practice. Is there any interest in doing another “from the start” ladder reset practice? I really do enjoy playing untwinked in good groups so if we want to do another, count me in. If anyone is interested, just say so and when you’d be available. We can jointly decide when to do this, if at all.
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I prefer playing new characters to doing seventy billion baal runs, to be perfectly honest. I think I have gotten a good handle on the strengths (when he leeches) and weaknesses (when he doesn’t, and/or before level 24) of the conc barb and would be willing to try out a new sort of character (not that I have any ideas) if anyone’s interested in giving me an idea on one. If not, I have no problem making another one. I will be home tonight by about 9:30, so any time around then I should be on. However, don’t feel you must wait up for me:) Oh, and let’s please keep things to no more than one of any chartype. Two trapsins, while they did fine damage, spreads the trapsin gear around a bit too thin, I think.
Since we will be going with another fake reset, MDSL, I won’t be using that +1 helm:) Had an IK anyhow. And since we will be going with another fake reset, let’s make sure this time that we have enough variety not must in terms of damage but in terms of gear we will use. Finding Heavenly Garb and Magefists from one Baal drop were lovely, but it could have been easier to decide who got those in the end. And if one of you who made a trapsin could make something else (a zeal/convadin would be delightful), that would also be keen:)
I would like to keep my spot as trapsin, but I can make a paladin for the sake of variety. I usually go with Zeal, but why would I want to put more than one point into Conviction? The way I see it Conviction is only a prerequsite of Fanaticism. You get better speed and damage bonus from that skill and conviction isn’t a synergy anyway. Can you explain the apparent love of Conviction? Is there a bonus that I’m not seeing?
I won’t be home until about 10:30-11pm tonight, but I’ll see if you guys are on anyway.
You’re confusing Conviction with Concentration. Conviction boosts your elemental damage via dropping enemies’ resists and defense. It’s a fantastic skill.
Conviction isn’t a prerequisite of Fanaticism, I believe you’re thinking of Concentration. Conviction works best when combined with Vengeance, but the important part is that it makes other elemental-damage folks very, very happy to party with you when they see that fire-immune monster become flamable. Note, though, that there are some mobs in hell that don’t lose their immunity, even at the max of conviction (-150 resist at level 25 and above). I haven’t tried it in combination with the Necromancer’s Lower Resist curse, though…
With 20 points in Vengeance and Conviction, 1 point in Salvation and 10 points in each Fire/Cold/Lightning Resit, along with a total of +5 paladin skill items gives you plenty of points left for other skills, and gives you a -150 to opponents’ resists, -92% to opponents’ defense, +216% to your attack and 316% damage in each element.
So, let’s see, a paladin with 125 strength wielding a weapon that does base physical damage of 50 to 100 will be doing 75 * 2.25 = 168.75 points each swing. So that physical-immune monster with 50% resist all will be taking 168.75 * 3 * 3.16 * 2 = 3199.5 points of damage each swing. And that’s not even approaching some of the better uniques’ damage. A perfect Heaven’s Light and a total of +9 in paladin skills will be doing 184 * 2.25 * 3 * 3.4 * 2 = 8445.6 to that same monster. With +300% attack and -94% opponent’s defense, it’s essentially Igore Target’s Defense. Not bad for 11 mana.
Those are impressive numbers. I may have to look into that. What do you use to keep up the mana though? I can’t imagine that you put too much into energy, but the leech will be crap from the physical damage and the constant 11-mana drain from Vengence is going to suck down lots of mana very fast against things like fetishes and imps.
Yeah, no points into energy if you can help it. Redemption, Meditation, or a few shots with Zeal (on a non-phys immune, of course) should get you right happy. A couple of +mana per kill items help, too, and a mana pot will do in a pinch.
Bear in mind that level 10 BO will roughly double your mana, and at level 40 you probably won’t have to worry about having 40 mana anyway;) Also there’s Find Pot, which should help some, and with any luck you won’t have to go with a tanking skill like vengeance anyway. Stuff dies fast around a summonmancer:)
You’ll give me a big head if you keep that up Actually a summonmancer is strongest from level… say 15 to midway through nightmare. My practice necro has skelly warriors maxed and needs maybe 3 or 4 more in mastery to max that. Except for getting better + skills, that’s as good as they’re ever going to get. So the skellies I have now won’t be that much better when I get into Hell than they are now, although I’ve heard they get a life bonus in NM and hell (I’ve never checked).
In an 8 person Hell game, the skellies will be doing damage, but they won’t be killing much. They will be able to tank to hold the big groups back to let the big guns let lose the dogs of war on them however. On my level 89 necro, my main killer is my merc and my own Bone Spirit and Corpse Explosion. The skellies absorb the main damage to allow my merc and I time to kill. In one player games they do kill, but it takes time.
When the ladder resets I think we should all be playing in the same game, regardless of level, and having seperate parties for different levels. Well, that is before everyone reaches NM/hell, then split the games because of difficulty.
Debate has ensued in chat as to what time EST this will be (we’re all east coasters) and am/pm. The tentative agreement, not that it makes a difference ultimately, is that it is AM, the ladder season will start around 8 AM, and that we should bloody well make sure people know their roles;) Here is a list of what folks have said they would play:
Anyone who hasn’t decided: from my perspective, casters early on do a lot more guaranteed damage than melee chars do (excepting the HFdin). A 1.5:1 or even 2:1 ration of casters to melee fighters should give us good coverage. Don’t all be making meteorb sorcs, though;)
I probably won’t get to play much until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest, since i have work. I’ll have to play a lot tomorrow, i guess, since MD is visiting this weekend. I probably won’t be on saturday, most of friday, and sunday morning.
Damn…that ladder resets at 4:30am PDT, and I work tomorrow…won’t be in until about 5pm PDT at the earliest, 12 hours after the reset…my son (hereby dubbed “n00binat0r”) wants to join in and he can play while I’m not playing…only thing is that he also likes to have a summoning necro as well as Who, but since he would be #15, that really does make for almost 2 full groups. He currently runs around with his practice necro, “Mr. Phibes”…maybe he can come in and play the early day games and I can come in and do the evening games since we’re down to one computer. Anyways, see you guys tomorrow night if not tonight.
I’m imagining that, given the slowness of work and the relative ease of class (so far), I will have a lot of time to dedicate to characters. And, to make a long story short, I would rather spend an hour getting a char to level 10 or so than getting 2 levels on an already high character, I’ll be very much willing to help level someone else’s char if they don’t have the time for it. I don’t promise to find all uber gear, nor will I trade anything. At all. Never know who will be scamming early on. Email’s in the profile, make sure you include [SDMB] or something similar in the subject so I know it isn’t spam:) This offer is extended, btw, as soon as my barb gets to around 70.
Actually a summonmancer is strongest from level… say 15 to midway through nightmare. My practice necro has skelly warriors maxed and needs maybe 3 or 4 more in mastery to max that. Except for getting better + skills, that’s as good as they’re ever going to get. So the skellies I have now won’t be that much better when I get into Hell than they are now, although I’ve heard they get a life bonus in NM and hell (I’ve never checked).