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Impossiable
Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 4:03 pm
by Piff
Im in Act 4 nightmare difficulty and I almost die alot of times so i have to quit or else i die. Can anyone give me pointers on what i should do tol be able to survive.
Im playing a Druid character with a werewolf build. I have 809 defense, 883 health, A might Aura henchman, and do around 69-222 points of damage and i weild a shield so i can put perfect dimonds in it so i can have some resistances.
My character is level 59 and my henchman is level 51.
Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 5:03 pm
by C Elegans
I haven't played a shapeshifter since 1.09, but some general points:
1. What other skills do you have apart from shapeshifting, do you plan to use Fury and Rabies, Fire claws, or some other build?
2. Do you have good resists? With the 3D shield, what do you have?
3. Your damage is very low, what weapon do you use? You need to find a better weapon.
Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 5:20 pm
by Siberys
As for weapons, I would suggest runewords. Runewords can be found here,
Runewords
For instance-
Puting Ral+Ort+Tal is WAY better than 3 diamonds in a shield. Here are the stats.
+50% Enhanced Defense
Cold Resist +43%
Fire Resist +48%
Lightning Resist +48%
Poison Resist +48%
10% Damage Goes To Mana
For your weapon, say it is a Flail (Exceptional).
With Ith + El + Eth
You get-
+33% Enhanced Damage
+9 To Maximum Damage
100% Chance Of Open Wounds
-25% Target Defense
-100 To Monster Defense Per Hit
Prevent Monster Heal
+50 To Attack Rating
Drain Life -5
Though the drain life is a burden, the -100 to monster defense per hit TOTALLY makes up for it. Runewords are the best feature to the game by far and I suggest you USE them EXTENSIVELY!!
This combo got me through Act 3 Nightmare with a breeze. I am currently on Act 4 with the same weapons currently, and I only have a 75 strength at level 50. (Sorceress is using this combo as a battlemage)
Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 5:43 pm
by Dottie
I agree that cheap runewords is an underapreciated part of Diablo 2, but I don't agree that Ancient's Pledge is a good use of runes. The two extra mods are not worth the runes and slightly lower resists imo.
If you have godly patience but not a lot of items I would actually try to buy a Scintillating or Prismatic Tower shield of Deflecting from a shop, and then have Larzuk socket it with two Perfect Diamonds. It will take some time, but is both cheap and quite good.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 6:55 am
by Piff
1. Some other skills i have are Feral Rage, Summon Grissley Bear, and Summon Heart of the Wolverine.
2. My risitances are good. I have 75 lightning, 33 cold, 75 fire, and 72 poison.
3. As for my weapon. Right now i'm wielding a Runeblade with a perfect sapphire, rubby, and a ort rune i think.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 7:12 am
by Siberys
How about armor. If you can find this...
Enigma
3 Socket Body Armor
Jah + Ith + Ber
+2 To All Skills
+45% Faster Run/Walk
+1 To Teleport
+750-775 Defense (varies)
+ (0.75 Per Character Level) +0-74 To Strength (Based On Character Level)
Increase Maximum Life 5%
Damage Reduced By 8%
+14 Life After Each Kill
15% Damage Taken Goes To Mana
+ (1 Per Character Level) +1-99% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items (Based On Character Level)
Then you would be pretty good. The teleport will let you escape danger for a moment while healing yourself and then you just go right back in later.
A thought.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 8:37 am
by Piff
well i dont have many runes. And since i dont play multiplayer I cant find the ones i need and i can not get them from other people.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 8:40 am
by Siberys
Your in act 4 nightmare and you DON'T get runes. Man, runes should be dropping all over the place there.
Try gambling. that's all I can tell you at this point.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 9:13 am
by Dottie
[QUOTE=Piff]1. Some other skills i have are Feral Rage, Summon Grissley Bear, and Summon Heart of the Wolverine.
2. My risitances are good. I have 75 lightning, 33 cold, 75 fire, and 72 poison.
3. As for my weapon. Right now i'm wielding a Runeblade with a perfect sapphire, rubby, and a ort rune i think.[/QUOTE]
Putting stones and single runes in a weapon is not a good option at your level. Decent options are the ones with modifications that give you lot of enhanced damage, preferably > 100 or so. The things that can give you that is:
A rare (yellow) or magical (blue) weapon
A Runeword, for example Honor(Amn + El + Ith + Tir + Sol) or Insight(Ral + Tir + Tal + Sol). Use the link Siberys gave you to check them out.
A unique (golden) weapon.
Uniques, Magical and Rare weapons drop from act bosses, so try to kill those over and over again.
When making a runeword it is very important to choose the right base weapon, otherwise the runeword could be almost useless. Choose a weapon that does alot of damage, and never choose a normal weapon if you can wield an exceptional or elite of the same type.
It is also important that you build your runeword in a type of weapon that is actually allowed for the particular runeword, otherwise it will not work and your runes will be wasted.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 9:18 am
by Dottie
[QUOTE=Siberys]Your in act 4 nightmare and you DON'T get runes. Man, runes should be dropping all over the place there.[/QUOTE]
Runes never drop all over the place, they are a rare commodity. Suggesting to a player who is at act 4 in nightmare to get Enigma is plain silly. There is no chance you can get an enigma by then. Even if he were at another place in the game you will get any unique item you can possibly want before you get runes for an enigma.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 9:53 am
by moltovir
My suggestions:
1) Read some Werewolf build guides, and compare them to your own Wolf. If the difference is huge, you'll most likely have made some build errors, probably making your character impossible to play in Hell. See
this or
this thread for some WW builds.
2) Your weapon damage is horribly low. If you're playing on the Realms and have some perfect gems cubed up, try to trade for a good weapon. A very good Druid weapon is the Ribcracker quarterstaff. Go to the diabloii.net trading boards or make a game called "N ribcrack O pg" or something along those lines (O= offer, N= need, pg= perfect gems), and trade for one. Ribcracker is a very good Werebuild weapon because it has a large amount of WIAS (weapon increased attack speed, IAS on the weapon itself, the opposite of OIAS or Off-weapon IAS), which can easily bring you to a 9-frame attack speed. For Assassins, Were-druids and Whirlwind barbarians OIAS is ignored, so you'll want as high WIAS as possible. The Ribcracker has 50% WIAS and a fast base speed (0), and if you use the Larzuk socket quest you should've gotten in Act 5 Normal and put a Shael rune in it, you can reach an 8-frame attack speed. If you don't have a Shael at the moment, either cube your runes up (recipes found
here) or kill the Countess in the Forgotten Tower Level 5 (Black Marsh area in Act 1) a couple of times until you find one. The Ribcracker also has other desireable attributes, like high % Enhanced Damage, 50% Faster Hit Recovery (rarely found on a weapon, absolutely necessary but ignored by lots of people), and 50% Crushing Blow which is absolutely great against Act Bosses or strong enemies. If your character is a Ladder character you can also upgrade it to it's unique version (Stalagmite), which makes it a single frame slower, but the damage will skyrocket. An upgraded Ribcracker is one of the best items out there for players on a budget and can easily bring you all the way to Hell Baal. To upgrade it, place it in your Horadric Cube together with a Perfect Emerald, a Lum and a Pul rune (those runes are rather rare, you should be able to trade for them easily however). Don't pay too much for trading! A Ribcracker should cost you anywhere between 2 (200% ED RC) or 10 (300% ED RC) perfect gems. If you find a guy who wants to sell you a Ribcracker and he asks a Pul rune or more than 12-13 perfect gems, he's trying to screw you. If he only wants to trade for runes, a Lem rune should be your highest offer. If you're a ladder character and want to upgrade it (be sure to check the Strength, Dexterity and Level requirements before you upgrade a weapon! A Stalagmite requires 63 Str, 39 Dex and lvl 49, you should easily be able to get that if you don't have it already), you'll have to buy a Pul and Lum rune if you haven't got one yourself. A Pul costs exactly 20 perfect gems, no more, no less, and a Lum costs +- 5 perfect gems.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 10:43 am
by C Elegans
Siberys wrote:Your in act 4 nightmare and you DON'T get runes. Man, runes should be dropping all over the place there.
Runes are not "dropping all over the place" in any act, in any difficulty. Check for instance ATMA's Rune drop calculator.
How about armor. If you can find this...
Enigma
Siberys, that is an utterly useless comment to a guy who is still in Nightmare and is doing 69-222 in damage. Nobody who can find the runes for Enigma needs to be reminded that it exists. Try to be more helpful instead.
Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 10:53 am
by Piff
I've only come across 12 diffrent types of ruins. Most of them were elds. The only runeword I can make is malice. But i cant find many socketed items.