Well, this is MDSL :smack:
I guess I had given up on the venture as futile. Darn it. Oh well. More faith next time!
What are everyone’s account names? I know they’re lurking in this thread someplace, but it is elephantine and I have been unable to find them. I’m going to be at a science fiction convention most of the weekend, but will be on Sunday night and Monday, so I can give people stuff/get stuff from people/get in on that Hell rushing.
I expect to start my 8th character around then (Bonemancer, I think, or perhaps Trapsassin), and all of them are in late nightmare (ie, everything but Baal), so if lots of people are on then we could potentially get huge quantities of Hell Hellforge action.
Chronos,
I believe I have stored away a four socket (all p.diamonds) superior crown (well I think it is) shield with another +36 to all resist for level 30 pally or higher. I also have one character that has his full stash of all perfect gems saved for a rainy, transmuting and socketing kind of day…
Whatever it takes for us to search and destroy each act…
In my account now, I have 1 character of each class, all of them at least level 11 or higher (so they can equip a good deal of extra decent items for low level characters)…I have an extra barb in the 8th spot (Og_Crush!) and I have been wondering which character I should start promoting. When possible, I have not distributed very little or no skill points so I can learn from the rest of you on strong skill recipes for each class (and also to compliment other player’s characters in US West)…
My lightfury/frozen arrow amazon is at level 77 and I’m pumping up the cold arrow now because it adds quite a bit to the frozen arrow damage (synergy). I have a 3 points on penetrate, 6 or 7 on Pierce, 3 or 4 on Crit Strike…I think I screwed up early putting points in the poison skills, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.
I’m only going to speak about my own usernames…
numbnut
numbnut1
numbnut2
numbnut3
numbnut4
But just check out games SDMB, SDMB1, SDMB2, SDMB3,… etc… with the password Cecil. You’ll find us.
I just created a new thread for account names only (so it won’t get cluttered):
Vets, go over there to post your account names once and for all (and any updated account names). Bookmark that thread for easy refrence and direct all newbies to this post (or the link to it) so they can look and add their own names, so they don’t have to go over the 1200+/- posts before this one…
I do. Hurricane druid.
For what it is worth, the fastest hell baal runs I’ve been in have consisted of two paladins (conv and conc), a necro (skellys), a sorc, a javzon and a barb for BO and such. Adding a summoning druid made things faster, but only marginally; we were already doing disgustingly high damage.
If you can get Dracul’s, you’re set. The leech from those things is really REALLY high. I’m not kidding when I say I fill up my life orb from a few hits (2 or 3) using those. I do 1500 avg/1400 avg (lh vs. rh) with my maces; if you can get to about 1K average damage per hit you’d be looking at a full orb pretty much instantly.
Re: hell rushes, so long as you have capable people working diligently, you should expect a hell rush to take no more than 2-3 hours. If you have two capable sorcs and a barb, it shouldn’t take more than 2 hours. Most of that is:
A1: 15 mins max
A2: 1 hour min unless you’ve got both sorcs working on it, or a very good barb (better than mine)
Act3: 30 mins, max (used to be about five seconds in 109)
A4: 30 minutes, maybe 45 to an hour if you do Izzy and the Forge.
A5: 5 minutes if you only do ancients, 30 mins if you do all the way through Baal.
A1 and A3 are obviously the easiest parts, and A2 and A4 are by far the most difficult. A friend of mine back in 109 who did almost all his play on HC told me that A4 Hell was almost impossible to buy as part of a rush because it was so dangerous. My guy is made to tank (1500/1400 dmg with Dracul’s and frenzy, so I can stop attacking at a moment’s notice, plus 75/75/75/61 res in Hell and 4K hp and 5K defense) and he still has issues.
Almost forgot to mention how much fun I had dueling last night.
We were done with runs for the most part (vol and I did a few after and found not much), so I figured I’d give dueling a go.
Not to be vain, but y’all need to pump that vit a bit. The only person who gave a good fight (unless I used my echo weps, which I started doing later) was vol, and he just kept using Orb and TPing away:D
And then, after everyone had brought in anyone who could beat me, I brought in my level 12 barbarian with all of 200 HP.
Ow.
I’ll stick to the level 89:D
It would be fun, tangentially, to make a level 9 dueler. The two strategies I’ve seen are to use Khalim’s Will with Pelta Lunata on a paladin and to find 3-socket claws with decent damage and put a Hel in each (reduce the reqs) and max dmg jewels. And then put max dmg in everything else (I don’t recall if they use Biggin Bonnet or other caps). Would be a fun toy if nothing else.
Good deal. I have an Earthshaker Battle Hammer for you then if you’re interested.
Keep talking Punha. You had all of us beatby 9 levels and I would have had you eventually with those blade sentinels. 
Dueling huh? Well neither of my zons were there either…
Eeexcellent. That’s exactly what I was looking for in a shield. And I’m getting close to level 30, so I won’t have to wait long. Don’t worry about the gems, btw… I have about 8 diamonds muled, and I’m working on more.
I’ll send my Pally up against your Barb, Pun. It’d be interesting to see how long he survives before you destroy him. I’m betting I could put up a fight, but would lose with dignity!
Btw, what happens when someone "goes hostile’ on you? I mean, they can kill you of course, but do they get your stuff?
Fenris
Piffle. I was dueling vol’s sorc and having fun. He just kept TPing away from me … which, to be sure, is what I’ve read is the thing for sorcs to do for the most part in duels.
It’s not the levels that floor you, either, because I was still killing you with my echoes (for those not in the know, an echo weapon is one with, for a barb, +2 or +3 to warcries. For a druid it would be + to summoning, I guess. The key is that the damage is very low and it’s used only to cast warcries) and you had my shouts on:p
You would not have had me with those blade sentinels. You ran out of stamina after a few minutes, and I was using my echoes.
Who_me?, a javzon would be helpless against my barb. It is a single target, so you would not leech near enough to shoot more than a dozen javs, if that.
Fenris, I dueled someone’s paladin. I asked for no thorns, so that guy put them on just to annoy me.
Berserk doesn’t count as physical damage, so I incurred no penalty by using it. I didn’t leech, but I don’t recall being hit more than once.
It’d be interesting to see how I’d fare against you. I warn, though … this guy hits FAST.
And no, you don’t get someone’s stuff. An ear drops (which NPCs will buy, amusingly enough, for one gold each. Non-stackable), but that’s about it. Also, IIRC you cannot be killed while your corpse is still on the ground. This is AFAIK a safeguard against a hack that was present some time ago where people would … well, take advantage of something that is no longer in place. It would take a few pages to explain it. Suffice it to say it is one reason I did not duel for a very long time.
Pun, be careful with that smack you’re talking, because I was recently able to see Who’s javazon in action and she’s quite the force. Probably more geared to packs of monsters, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she could get the better of your barb once in a while.
While we’re on the subject, I wouldn’t take too much pride in the obfuscation of my sorc, who was made to do two things very well:
- Magic Finding
- Teleporting like mad without running out of mana all the time
She does those two things while still retaining enough killing power and defenses to go anywhere in the (multiplayer/Hell) game and get the job done. Dueling isn’t in her job description. Her main killing power is packed in her meteor, which obviously won’t catch too many people by surprise in duels.
I’ve never really built a dueling character, but maybe it’s time I do. It’s too late for my assassin, she’s already more geared to PvM. It’s not too late for my pally though, if I ever get back to building him. With the synergies he’s looking at, I don’t see how he could lose a duel as long as he’s properly equipped.
So don’t let your barb’s War Cry using, Life Tap having, poison damaging, early dueling victories get to his head. His time will come to pick his body up between piles of ears and gold.
Thanks, vol, for your vote of confidence. 
And punha… IF we ever get bored enough to square off in a duel, I won’t throw more than a single javalin (plague jav… 7000 poison dam)at you. After that, I’ll face you in melee. You may kill me easily… you may not. Remember, first you have to hit me, then you have to hope I don’t block it, then you have to hope I don’t dodge it. And jab gives me three hits on you in one attack. I think it will give me a shot to at least give you a battle.
I don’t duel, I have never created a dueling character. But it is a thought… I know at least I get bored with countless magic find runs on occasion.
And no, this is not a challenge I’m issuing…
My understanding, Who_me?, is that your zon is more built for groups of monsters. As such, facing a single foe would be rather less than ideal. Plus I don’t exactly stay still and let myself be attacked.
Would be interesting if we ever get bored.
Just as an aside, I think I’m the first Doper to manage to take out Pun’s Barb in a contest. We did about…what? 8 or 10 goes at it and I managed to beat him two or three times. 
Fanatacism is absolutely required (if that’s the right name…it’s the one that makes a green swirly aura under your opponent that fouls up their defenses).
Fenris
defense “foul-upper” aura which is green colored is conviction it also lowers the enemy’s resists and lowers the defense.
Um. Selectively count much? It was at least a dozen duels (unless you have the transcript saved … I’m almost positive it was more than 12) and I died twice.
Hit level 90 a short time ago, too. I long since maxed out mace, frenzy and BO, so now I’m working on nat res, which give diminishing results starting about seven levels ago.
Something is "fuXXor"ed with US East. My ping rate was jumping from 37 to 4500 and back in seconds, magic spells weren’t working, but Town Portals and Waypoints were…
I don’t know what’s going on,
< Cleavon Little >
“…but whatever it is, I hate it.”
< /Cleavon Little >
Fenris