My latest crazy idea: Once the enchantress is all grown up, how about using her for the first two stages of mule rushes? I’m thinking that for each boss, she teleports down, portals in the mules, and enchants them. Then she (and the convictor, for the early quests he doesn’t need) departies, and lets the mules kill the boss. This way, we’d be certain of the mules being present for the quests, we’d get first-kill drops, and the mules would pack on a few levels. I’d imagine that a maxed Enchant backed up by maxed Conviction should be adequate through the end of Nightmare, and for Hell we bring in one of the other sorcs as usual. Thoughts?
Also, next time I and someone else are on, remind me to pass on my Leaf to the enchantress. It’s a good one, with +3 to fireball, which should help her in levelling until Enchant becomes significant.
The only thing is that the mules will probably be very low on life, def, and resists, leading to their frequent demise, imho.
The idea that I have is for dealing with Hell Travancal, which seems to me to be the only slow spot in our rushes. I think that we should try bringing in a summoner necro just for clearing that area, and then bringing back a sorc for the remainder of the rush. I’m going to try doing some Trav runs with my necro (11 skel, 11 mage, 9 revives) and see how well that goes.
Personally, I think the first drop bonus wouldn’t mean much because it’ll be Act1 and Act2 of normal, they can’t drop anything worthwhile anyway. And you’d have the distinct possibility Of Andy’s poison killing the whole crew in one fell swoop… not to mention Duriel killing everybody with his cold aura. I think it would just slow everything down.
In retrospect, back when theckhd was doing the rushes, he usually brought in a different character for Hell Duriel and Travincal, so the general idea might be good. My sorc can easily clear everything in Trav except the three important ones (and about a third of the minion councillors), so my tentative plan is to kill all but those three with my sorc, then bring in another character (my assassin, the team barbarian, or the team paladin should all be able to handle it) for the quest councillors. It might also be wise to switch to a melee character for Duriel, and just stay with him until after Trav. Of course, the alternate rusher should be someone accesible to the person playing the sorceress, or we’ll have too many folks juggling accounts.
Honestly? How are you going to ensure that x mules will survive long enough against Duriel? Against Mephisto? Against Diablo? Unless we do a pre-buff lvl 10 with each of them (lvl 12 for some), pumping Vit except to get the requisite str/dex for gear (dual shadowfang doubleswing sounds best for a barb first-off, though realize that’s after about five seconds of thought), I don’t see that happening. As for having mules kill anything in NM, again I’d point to the lack of life problem - we could pack maybe 250 on a barb by lvl 10, making him a one-hit wonder in NM.
I also have to wonder at how badly we need any items Norm Meph or Norm Duriel could drop. Norm Diablo can drop Goldwrap, but we don’t even get into SOJ territory until NM Andy, I think.
Gaming doesn’t look good for the next two or three nights, I think; class tonight 6-9, club meetings 7:30 until some time tomorrow night, fun fun fun “volunteer” meeting Thursday night.
It’s back up, but I jumped into and out of games too quickly so I’m IP banned at the moment. Yeti, tell n00b that I didn’t mean to desert him. Since we used my barb to kill Baal in normal, I have my bowazon to level 39 now. I can’t seem to find a decent helm for her, but she’s fully equipped except for that. The javazon is level 44 or so and still in normal also.
Don’t we still have a Valkyrie Wing somewhere on the mules? It’s far from ideal, with all the new items available (personally, I’d favor an Andyface for a 'zon), but it’s still pretty decent.
And I did say right up front that that was a crazy idea :). My thought on life was to use bows, stay back, and hope to kill before dying, but you’re right that that might not be realistic. Also, I think that any act boss in any difficulty can theoretically drop the Stone of Jordan, but the chance is so miniscule as to not be worth mentioning.
Sorry, can’t…I’m still at work…and he should be studying his Algebra II!
Tal Rasha’s Mask is still a decent item to use for an amazon at my level…
Use the Valk Wing or Blackhorn’s for now…if the Valk Wing is not with the commie mules, then I probably have it with my mules…I’ll get it transferred to a commie mule, hopefully later tonight.
I saw the one Valk Wing, it’s a level 44 item… the other Valk Wing is on my javazon and I wasn’t going to take both. n00b’s got a stafezon in the works so I was going to leave the other one for him. My zon is specializing in freezing arrow and multi shot. Hopefully, somewhere, sometime, I will find a pure bowazon build that can compete in Hell.
So how would a monster drop something of an ilvl higher than the mlvl of the monster? Here I’ve been listening to blizz and d2.net who say it isn’t possible.
It might be something that only works with the first kill bonus… Alternately, I might be remembering out-of-date information, or I might be just plain wrong. I won’t rule out any of those possibilities.
And my 1.09 SP bowazon used Strafe and Immolation, and she was decent in Hell, and not completely hopeless even when 1.10 came out. Her bows were Witchwild String, Kuko Shakaku, and Cliffkiller (I just used the latter for casting my valk; otherwise my merc used it), so you don’t exactly need killer equipment, either. The skills would be sommewhere between level 6 and maxed Strafe, maxed Immolation, maxed Valkyrie, and pumped Exploding (synergy for Immolation), with one point in Freezing for crowd control and a smattering of passive skills. You can just about fit a Strafe into the casting delay between Immolation Arrows, and with the low mana cost, many hits, and physical damage, it leeches enough mana to keep using the Immolation. You’ll need potions against phys immunes and unleechables, fire immunes will be a bit slow, and forget about soloing Hell Duriel, Diablo, or Baal, but other than that, the build works reasonably well.
I had several bowazons that could handle Hell solo in 1.09. In 1.10, they were relegated entirely to a supporting role. They can survive with parties, but cannot kill anything alone without taking forever. After this Freeze and multi bowazon, I’ll give immolation a try again. Immolation arrow stinks in my opinion but what do I know…
I never max Valkrie… maybe I should. It would probably kill things twice (or more)as fast as the zon. Those bows… I assume they’re upped? They don’t do enough damage normally.
I don’t max Valk either, that’s why I when I start a game, I go to my stash and switch out my gear for Titans (+2 skills), a +3 passive amulet, a +3 passive tiara, and +2 (or +3?) passive gloves to get a level 24 Valkarie, then switch back to the kill gear. As a hybridzon, I can’t afford to max Valk, but 10-12 points in it is usually sufficient.
I also left additional gear for your Amazon(s) in the #5 acct; it’s the TancVidalia set mule that has it…is that where you found the Valk’s Wing, or did you find a different Valk’s Wing somewhere?
With a 1.09-built SP character, I didn’t have nearly the wealth needed to upgrade weapons to elite. The Kuko I mainly used for phys immunes, so elite wouldn’t have mattered anyway, and Witchwild is better than it looks, thanks to the almost-guaranteed Deadly Strike and the amp chance, which is also higher than it looks, thanks to how often you’ll hit. But, of course, Witchwild String still isn’t the best bow; we have a Buriza around somewhere which would probably be better.
You may be right to not max Valkyrie; remember, this was a 1.09 build, before synergies, so I had the points to spare. But any point not put into Valkyrie could be put into Exploding or Fire Arrow to pump the immolation more. In any event, don’t expect your valk to actually be killing anything, unless she’s significantly better than she used to be. My level 30-something valk was an excellent walking wall, but she wasn’t much more than that.
Jeepers, you’d think we weren’t playing. I muled the Messerschmidt’s axe to one of the unique weapon mules although I did toy with the idea of using it with my Fury druid… although I don’t play him anymore.
