The Great Race; a proposal for "Khalim" awards

[Crystalion]

Nice times.

I agree. Zofox has nice times.

I've been doing a lot of diddling, partly in response to some techniques Zofox mentioned, so I've not had any time to post comments. Good stuff Zofox.

But here is a Ferengi inspired thought for "team" play... (in other words, I am not recommending this, merely toying with the theoretical efficiency issues, as inspired by some of Ferengi's comments on the realities of team xp/item grinding)...

Imagine, for v1.10 Ladder, we have a loose association of 8 players (or more, so always 8 are "available) who each have double character access (e.g. two accounts, possibly two PCs... in any event they can always log in a character easily when called upon by the association). This could be friends or a club or a guild, whatever. (It could also be fewer than 8 people, if some of them have more than double access).

Now let's add in the thought that they have access to a teleporting character (Sorc or via charges) that can open the way to the MooMooFarm (whatever difficulty) and teleport about in that level without undue risk.

If that character creates a game (Ladder), and summons 7 associates to bring in (temp, not for play) characters, then when that character zips about the Farm rapidly they will instantiate Bovines, locking them in at Players 8 xp.

This should not take long at all (start game, waypoint to Stony Field, tele about for Stonehenge, warp into Tristram and Wirt's body for his leg, TP, create red portal, 7 others now in game, enter Farm and do rapid full map teleport, TP).

At this point any of the association's real characters that wants to clear a cow level for xp can enter the game (or they could already have been one of the 8, which I suppose means 7 people in the association is really enough) and proceed, even though all the transient characters leave.

The teleportist and the transient characters are now set to quickly do this again, so another association member can have a cow level to themselves. Given the likely amount of time to clear a cow level vs. the setup/tele time, I imagine we can effectively mass produce players 8 cow levels for all members of the association to be leveling in "simultaneously".

Naturally, if there is a public no-PK or cow competition players 7 game acceptably open, then this overheard wouldn't be necessary. But in my conception you don't want to waste time if such a game isn't available, since the team is churning though cow games back to back with rapidity. In the suggested scheme, except for the teleportist, the members of the association have very little extra effort required (they must respond to the call to put their dummy char into the new cow game being set up within the game start to red portal up window and that's it).

[Crystalion]

So, not counting the twink xfer time and game start time, I have ~5 hours to make level 24. The only location rush I did was after I killed the Council, I quickly made a game to be given the Durance 2 waypoint (and then returned to SP Players 1).

That was for a twinked (probably not strictly necessary for the build, if you pump BoS and drink lots of mana pots) WoF Assassin. This report is for a run using a completely different set of (race) criteria.

v1.10s, Great Race to be 20+ and do Ancients plus kill Baal (I'll benchmark the nm rush to hellforge later, separately). I stopped the clock when I took breaks, but otherwise timed including overheads (game creation/joining, WinXP user switching). The overall time to nail Baal and make nm was 2:41, with the character almost level 22 after the kill.

Concept: players 2 (Win XP user switching), Enchantress in game to give high level enchant (1400+ fire damage) and to give waypoint/location rushes when desired. For convenience, she was used to kill the Grand Vizier of Chaos, who is a Fire Immune required kill from the left seal in Diablo's lair. Due to the nature of the location rush (aka Tyriel sleaze) she also killed Duriel (though this wasn't necessary actually). The enchantress was not on hand for combats (i.e. though partied, the rusher and rushee we never "played" at the same time, nor in combat together) as my constraint is to play only one character at a time (unlike, say, a Static Field assist).

I also initially transfered misc. useful twink gear (because this is not meant to be a purely skill-based "challenging" rush--although the gear is also not meant to be uber/impossible-to-acquire, just very helpful). An Amazon was picked for the following useful skills to go with enchantment: Poison Javelin, Lightning Javelin (for when you want to deliver non-fire damage); Multishot (for efficiency in wiping out crowds, pre-clvl 15); Guided Arrow (for the occasional safety around-the-corner-or-through-the-door killing). Since she was a zon and I needed only 5 skill points in Multishot I also threw one point into each of the passives (which has not been significant/used thus far).

My subjective opinion is that the concept is successful, but that perhaps spliting out the location rushing and the leveling up would be more efficient (location rushing first--remember I can rush to act 5 in under half an hour). The only speed bumps for this build are Talic and the Grand Vizier (my character, named "HotStuff", did Talic by herself with no special preparation, which was a mistake, as I used up all my nice Javelins completely and drank all my belt potions such that I actually had to play keep-away to regen some mana to finish him off).

The key concepts for the twink gear: Exploding Arrow bow and 85% resist all from clvl 15 on. This means, of course, Ravenclaw and Iratha's set (plus some additional resist gear to max out--Arctic body armor and clvl 1 req resist charms). I did not socket the unique weapon, set helm or set armor I used, although putting a Tir or two (assuming the v1.10beta bug is fixed) would be an alternate to the two rings of +1 mana/kill that I did use (I know this is probably giving me +4 mana/kill due to the bug, but, as I am pointing out, that is in range with what the build permits, sans bug).

Once I got to act 5 I discarded my level 7 rogue hireling and hired a level 19 act 3 cold sorc. I had previously gotten a Blood Crescent (+15% resist all) sword as a drop during the rush, so I gave him that. Baal dropped an Arcanna's light plate, so he's now wearing that. He is still hatless. The build concept doesn't really care what the hirelings wear. While I did not die once, the hirelings croak quite often, but this really isn't a problem (and so special gear for the hireling's is not needed to remedy it).

I'm not sure, at this point, for the post-nm-hellforge rush, getting to clvl 40, if I want a nm act 2 HF merc, or my current act 3 cold sorc (I'll be playing in normal, so no reduced chill duration factor to fret over).

When the character is older an upgrade to Sander's boots and the Kuko bow (25 and 33, iirc) will be in order. For now I'm still using Hsarus boots, even though Vidalas or Cthon or CowKing boots would be better.

The first couple of levels I just tossed my Javelin to kill things (I was immediately location rushed to the Burial Grounds and waited to kill Blood Raven until after I'd made clvl 3 on her groupies). This gave me a rogue hireling (enchanted) very quickly and we both used bows from that moment on. I rather suspect that Zofox's right-mouse-action-button-to-move-and-auto-attack is more efficient through at least clvl 7.

I'm afraid that once I made clvl 12 I decided to wait until clvl 15 for Exploding Arrow (from the bow, instead of using two points for the skill). This was probably a mistake, as EA turned out to generally be far more effective than MS in practice (which means, of course, that I don't think my particular times here are significantly better than you could achieve with a non-amazon Ravenclaw enchanted build with any other class).

Here's a breakdown of the 2 hours and 41 minutes (times, rounded, are listed for completion of tasks noted)...

00:00:30 new amazon created and game hosted

00:03:00 Enchantress joins, invites, drops twink gear

00:05:30 (twinkee/rushee) "HotStuff" collects and stows gear, accepts invite, stands near town exit

00:08:00 Enc travels to Burial Grounds, TPs back and enchants HotStuff (has to stand outside town to do so fyi)

00:12:30 HotStuff uses TP, kills undead to make clvl 3, equips some twink gear, kills Blood Raven and claims hireling

unknown:Enc enchants HotStuff and hireling, makes TP at Stony Field waypoint

unknown:HotStuff takes the TP/wp and travels about SF and underground passage leveling up

00:20:00 HotStuff make clvl 6, rehires a clvl 6 rogue, dists her first skill points, dist stat points, dons gear

unknown:Enc enchants HotStuff and hireling, makes TP at Outer Cloister waypoint

00:28:30 HotStuff bumps Multishot each level up (Tamoe Highlands mostly), making clvl 9

unknown:Enc makes a TP at the Catacombs 2 waypoint, and re-enchants

00:35:00 Hotstuff, using that TP, makes way down to Andarial, killing her and making act 2

00:44:00 HotStuff makes clvl 13 and finishes Radament/Atma quest

00:49:00 Enc zips to Claw Viper Temple basement, wipes out the room and TPs; HotStuff lifts darkness, talks Drog & Jer

01:00:00 HotStuff clvl 15 (from killing in Lost City zone by granted wp), dists stats and equips Ravenclaw and Iratha's set

01:07:00 Enc makes TP near Summoner; HotStuff kills Summoner, takes Canyon of Magi waypoint

01:21:00 HotStuff makes clvl 18 by doing Canyon and true tomb leveling; exits game

unknown:"Duriel" mule makes pre-staffed game; Enc enters and kills Duriel; makes TP; parties HotStuff

01:28:00 HotStuff talks Tyriel, Jeryn, Meshif and makes act 3; exits game

unknown:new game; Travincal waypoint granted; Council broken; Durance waypoint granted; TP to stairs to D3 made

01:43:00 HotStuff wipes Durance 3 incl. Meph, making act 4

01:56:00 HotStuff finds and dusts Izual; now clvl 19

unknown:Enc grants RoF waypoint; is called in when HotStuff has cleared to left Seal in order to kill Grand Vizier

02:15:00 HotStuff kills Diablo; is a ways into clvl 20 iirc

unknown:Frigid Highlands, Ancient's Way, Worldstone waypoints given as part of Ancients/Baal location rush

02:41:00 Hotstuff kills monsters and minion waves in Throne; kills Baal; exits as Slayer, nearly clvl 22.

The level up times would be much much better if I were allowing Players 8 (and the enchantment is way overkill in one shot vs. anything that isn't nearly fire immune). This stongly suggests playing in public games, which hopefully will be safe enough on the new v1.10 Ladder.

[Zofox]

Thanks for the kudos -- I would have been tweaking this some more with the stuff that Ferengi/Crystalion have mentioned, but I am currently away on business -- I have IP connectivity, but no Diablo :(

One of the reasons that I did tackle this in my fashion was that I did not really want to be constantly swapping gear to get to 8 -- it is true that I could stockpile a sigons set and high str items, but the time necessary to keep moving that gear back and forth may actually slow me down. Twinking gear with no level requirements was my goal since I can dump it and run....

The reason that I use lyncanthropy instead of WW after the first point is that I am pretty much 1-hit killing everything quickly enough anyway in act 1 -- the WW "IAS doubler" effect using Khalim's means you are swinging fast enough, and the life boost of lyncanthropy is more important that the attack speed boost. Again, as you continue doing this, you do find good no level twink charms, jewelry, etc.

I plan on twinking/tweaking this when I get back at home on Saturday -- the major thing would be finding some no/low level FRW boots and some WP boosting.

The best part about using a druid with this is for the skills -- druids have level ONE skills that give them life boosts, attack speed, and an semi area attack using poison creeper. In addition, a socketable wolf head can give you an even bigger boost right out of the gate (imaging scoring a +3 poison creeper/+3 lyncanthropy/+3 werewolf wolf head with sockets :))

[dkass]

Have you considered using ravens? I've been doing no-twink, no assist to level 8 runs (players = 1) and seem to be around 25 minutes (comparable to some of the other results) using a similar build. I did a number of runs with different skill layouts. I'm converging on my third and fourth skill points go into ravens (fifth is lycanthropy) and rest are for ravens. I do the Den of Evil for the extra skill point (it also has a nice monster density). I usually run to the cold plains waypoint (kill anything in the way) and then either backtrack or return to camp to do do the den (depending on which way is closer). I TP back to camp at the end (I take the chance to dump some loot to buy a belt and good ax) before taking the waypoint to the cold plains.

One point in ravens isn't that great, but when I get to 2 points (level 4) they're effective (one hit kills on nuisances) and they seem to stay that way as I dump the rest of my points in them. I've been considering trying it as first two points in ravens and then getting the wolf, lycantrhopy and then poison creeper. I don't find the oak sage to be very useful (I find enough healing potions in the field to just use them as necessary, in a very D1esqe combat style). Also, by level 5, I don't need any more strenght, so I dump all remaining stat points into health.

One point in wolf and one in lycanthropy work well, but I didn't find that big of a benifit to add more points (I do need to look at the speed break points for the ax to check the behavior).

The killing is roughly 50% wolf, 25% creeper and 25% ravens, so they seem to give me something like a net 20% kill rate increase after accounting for the loss from the lower wolf/lycanthropy).

I'm currently up in the air about doing Bloodraven to get a rogue...

I've also recently started thinking about an extra point in poison creeper to insure that anything it poisons dies.

[Crystalion]

Have you considered using ravens?

While no matter what you do in the clvl 8 race you're only talking efficiencies on the scale of 30 vs. 20 vs. 10 minute finishing times, I do think that in general Ravens suck. As an AB poster pointed out (someone who had played druid builds focusing on Poison Creeper all the way through nightmare) the time efficiency of PC is much better if you are willing to recast it frequently (to key locations) and if, like earlier posts noted in this thread as well, you arrange to get monsters to run over the poison mats. That is, a few earlier points in Poison Creeper (instead of in Ravens) can get you a lot of mileage.

Ravens, alas, don't have any tricks you can pull to try to make them more (rate of kill) effective (I imagine they 'port along with you if you teleport, but that is beyond the scope of this race).

However, if you are doing an assisted race, with a Sorc staticing everything nearly to death, it may very well be that Ravens are useful (as any hit they successfully make is likely a killing blow).

...

I have experimented with two race to 20 ideas lately that might be of interest. In the first I revisited my Envy "solution" (clvl 1 req +20/2 sec poison jewels) with the additional new idea that slvl 3 Inner Sight is a thing of beauty. And indeed, if you are gong to twink with massive Envy or assist with Enchant and Multishot 'zon does well to have -90 DR on tap, as it is very speed efficient to not miss (unless mlvl vs. clvl is too far).

While doing that test I happened across an interesting tidbit that I think many power levelers will find useful: The Far Oasis is devoid of ranged attackers, has a waypoint, and often has Itchies, who are very nicely overlapped for any mass-kill technique. Plus the mlvl there is 15|16 making it ideal for leveling from clvl 11 to 20 with no xp dilution.

Obviously then, a location rush or self-rush to get there seems like a good idea. For Ladder zipping into a Players N game and waypointing to FO and quickly wiping it out seems like an excellent plan.

To test this concept, I decided to do something I'd been curious about: how well a completely untwinked WoF Assassin build would do (earlier I reported times for my twinked one). My concept was to get to Andarial and act 2 ~clvl 12 and proceed asap to Far Oasis, doing a clear and taking the waypoint. Then, to simulate Ladder play opportunities, I would then play at least Players 2, doing a new game every time I cleaned out the Oasis.

In practice what happened was that I made clvl 13 shortly before Andy, and 14 before I got the Far Oasis waypoint. I then ramped up to Players 2 until I was somewhere in clvl 17, at which point I did, iirc, 3 games at Players 8 and thus made clvl 20.

It took me ~1.5 hours to get to the Jail 1 waypoint, clvl 10. About an hour from there to get to act 2 (clvl 13).

It took less than an hour more to make clvl 20.

I have a lot of difficulty keeping myself from picking up goodies (gems, throwing potions, magic items) so I'm sure any sensible player would turn in a significantly better time than that (under 3.5 hours to clvl 20, notwink).

While I like my previous twink build concept of Serpent Lord staff and Dragon Talon kick for mana, in practice the mana drops plenty fast enough to fuel the hungry Wake of Fire skill, as long as you have a buffer (I ended up dedicating 6 belt spots for mana, 3 for heals, and 3 for stamina potions--which, if I had to do it over, I'd reassign to mana).

It is a bummer that WoF can't "triumph" (+mana/kill) but the v1.10 availability of mana in town makes it moot.

The only downside to the Far Oasis power leveling is that when you're toasting beetles you need to keep your distance or a terrain obstacle handy, because WoF kills them so fast the torrents of charged bolts can occasionally be super intense (my poor act 2 merc got dusted a few times that way).

To recap, the WoF build starts by using the prereq point in Fire Blast to dust weenie monsters (deliberately let them swarm, on you if need be) rapidly, then, at clvl 6, Burst of Speed to run around quickly. In this trial I made good use of a point at clvl 8 for Blade Sentry (I thought it would be fun to use the 6-15 Horadric Malus to contribute weapon damage to the skill). Of course, at clvl 12 you get Wake of Fire, and proceed to pump it.

In this test I saved surplus skill points until I was clvl 17 and about to do Players 8, at which point I dumped them all into Fire Blast (had been slvl 1) for the WoF synergy. This probably made very little difference. In the race from 20 to 40 I think it might matter, but then so could 2 points for CoS and it's prereq.

...

On a different note, for a twink I did a couple days ago I didn't have an amulet in mind (I'd planned all the other slots) so I gave the twinkee the Claw Viper Amulet (no clvl req, +10 life, +10 mana, -25% poison length, iirc). This is kinda amusing. If you don't pass it along to a younger character, at some (quest point) the game will eat it.

[Ferengi]

The reason that I use lyncanthropy instead of WW after the first point is that I am pretty much 1-hit killing everything quickly enough anyway in act 1 --

Actually it is the attack rating bonus that is handy. I was a clvl 7 WW going after Rad in Act2 with those bonuses and a handy sword. Keeping your chance to hit at 95% makes those 1-hit kills possible.

You should extend to racing to clvl 20, the major reason for clvl 8 was a quick imbue in order to upgrade the result. That imbue can also occur for clvl 20 if fast times are obtained, since clvl 20 has several other important features. I suspect that clvl 8 is obtainable in many ways, but fast times to the higher levels are probably limited to a handful of custom builds.

I think that a Holy Fire Ranger might be an interesting trial, once the HF range is large enough, a handy non-ally is a Conviction pally. Take a stroll to Baal....

[jahcs]

I logged on to battlenet, downloaded the patch, made a new amazon, and 3 minutes and 41 seconds later I was the proud seller of a cracked sash.

[Ferengi]

...proud seller of a cracked sash.

Actually, as part of a DIablo2 Wine effort, I've been running the demo. Cracked sashes fall like rain in 1.04. I still have trouble believing that I used to pay such prices for vendor goods however...

I've found that using the Cave can provide a good experience boost, something to keep in mind for Khalim runners. Several boss packs and a golden chest await thee!

[Crystalion]

I've found that using the Cave can provide a good experience boost, something to keep in mind for Khalim runners.

I've fallen in love with leveling in Far Oasis and Kurast Bazaar (don't mind the various monsters; no ranged mobs in Oasis; broken council effect in Kurast means the Sexton's have no infantry B) , love AoE vs. insect clouds etc.).

With precedence to Ferengi and Walkiry I'm giving away to rusher Lurkers v1.10 Ladder USWest lowbie twink items that I've more than one of, or don't really want. So far I have...

Civerb's shield (set)
Berserkers axe (set)
Snoutnail spiked club (clvl req 5 unique 1h with attacker takes damage of 8--my other is 10 :) )

I've got three perfect Topazes now, so soon I'll try a bit of MF slumming and see if I can pull up any of the lowbie items I really want (so far Hsarus boots have been my only really nice drop).

[Ferengi]

Interesting, in the various Realm ladder characters I've made since the real 1.10 was released, the pure skelemancer is fastest. Just put skill points into RS, put Den pt into AD and Rad pt into SM. The Izzy points are optional, but since this was working so well, I stuck them in SM. This build just rolls, I guess there is some sort of time delay on the skeletons, I've noticed that fresh skeletons can get wiped out easily, but a group of skeletons I've been playing for awhile in a party can solo parts of Act5 when the party breaks up and leaves. I was in shock at clvl 18 when my skellies took down Blood Lords on the way to Anya.

I'm wearing junk, I got a 4 row belt and finally put some points into HP and mana, but I really didn't need them. Crummy resists, junk items, excess stat points and killer skellies....wow!

[Crystalion]

I've noticed that fresh skeletons can get wiped out easily, but a group of skeletons I've been playing for awhile in a party can solo

I suspect, from my own similar observation in beta, that this may be "evolution in action"... I think skelies may have a chance at creation of having a shield and this may be the natural selection "fitness" factor due to blocking.

As for reporting what worked in beta (great race-ish) that still does: I can report that a WoF build is insanely easy and fun up to at least clvl 41 and early nightmare. I'm now wearing over 200% MF (on USWest Ladder) and can trash anything in normal and act 1 nm while basically looking over the drops (players 2).

Since this means I've been futzing around (slumming) and rushing other chars alot I've not gone on to determine when the build peters out (I assume by hell act 1). OTOH I now have: Hsarus boots, Cleglaw's gloves, Face of Horror mask. This is about a third of the lowbie items I really want to have and I only spend an hour or two a day playing on Realm on average (in other words, I'm a reasonable simulation of a causual player, in so far as time spent).

Of course I also spend half an hour a day muling stuff, seems like. :blink:

On another note, if I weren't slowly building up my enchantress, I'd definitely do the Poison Creeper build switching into the Rabies build, which is another no-items-needed powerful norm/nm build (v1.10 Rabies numbers finally up at AS). The beauty of the build is that you mode shift at clvl 18 seemlessly, having all the synergy points already invested. A minimalist needs only 2 points into prereqs, although I recommend one also into Lycanthropy for duration of werewolf form convenience. But the build is so good (off realm testing) that I think you can pull some points from Poison Creeper just to play around with other skills (like Ravens, Oak Sage, etc.) if you want to.

One thing I've not done on Ladder yet that is tempting is to make one of your Chipadin build Palys for chipped gems. Chips appear to now be really really valuable to reroll sorc orbs (1h level 30 skills). I intend to try this in practice sometime soon. If it works I'll probably kick myself for all the chips I've cubed up.

[Ferengi]

--- The skellies were created over a wide range of clvls, and there was a door trap with one of the supermonsters around, the combination lead to my erronous guess. Brista pointed out that skeletons get your clvl at creation for the Attacker vs Defender calculations.

-- Uh, I can solo anywhere in players8 normal :rolleyes: Don't know about NM yet, seems like at least players4. Just about to go to Act3 and thinking about Countess vs Meph. Need to study some runewords and how I get them. I really, really want teleport for all the narrow (i.e. staff quest maze) passages. Armies and mazes are not friends.

-- Got a HotChippies palidin already, the unique sword with +6 HF just wouldn't stay in the mule stash. He's ready to support rune cubing, or sword making, or rerolling.

-- Started a second necro to test out the "no-twink" rush to Hellforge ideas already. 4 other character builds are already mules!

[Crystalion]

-- Got a HotChippies palidin already, the unique sword with +6 HF just wouldn't stay in the mule stash.

I've been cubing orbs (maybe a dozen or so times now)... have yet to see a +skill above clvl 24 req but I'm going to keep at it. If I got the +6 HF sword I'd immediately make a Chipadin--nice luck for you that you got one (I should add it to my list to watch for in trades, since I doubt most people consider it to have any value--MongoJerry scored a Kuko for a Sol rune today, gesh!).

-- Started a second necro to test out the "no-twink" rush to Hellforge ideas already.  4 other character builds are already mules!

I finally put a "great race" build to the test today on pub ladder games...

v1.10 softcore uswest ladder, great race to clvl 20 (goal: rushable past ancients for baal rush carry-along and eventual nm quest reward claims).

M.O.: twinked Assassin (no assist, public partying okay) with general set niceness, massive thorns, and skill focus on FireBlast then Wake of Fire (supported by Burst of Speed to get around quicker).

Result: I dinged to clvl 20 on Duriel's death, not having died once (i.e. ala Hardcore) at ~2:20 hours:minutes from character creation.

I got the urge to try this build because I had the Arctic set gloves and belt and realized that if I had the body armor to match I could throw in Hsarus boots and my combo Stoutnail/flawed skulls shield for 34 net thorns for a pretty kickass setup. Unfortunately I didn't have a 3 socket Mask handy to stick flawed saphires in, so I actually wasted some stat points into energy (tip: by clvl 16 shop Ormus before he stops selling your character non-magic stuff).

I grabbed some stamina charms out of warehouse and that must have helped because I don't recall needing to drink any stamina potions.

It took maybe eight or nine kills of Bishibosh (with my MFer) before I got the Arctic Furs I wanted. I have to say my experience with low level SuperUniques is that they drop pretty well, if you're looking for charms and lowbie sets/uniques.

Anyway, from character creation it took over five minutes to get everything transferred, organized and the expedition under way. I did the Den of Evil and Blood Raven and then hunted down the Stony Field waypoint before deciding to change into a pub game with bigger Players N (I was in a private Players 2 game, ala twink xferer didn't leave). My character was clvl 6 or so and had equiped all the twinks at this point, about 27 minutes on the clock.

I joined a pub game with some sort of "act 1" byline and solo'ed the passage to the dark wood. I was leveling pretty fast, so when I was clvl 10 I went down the party portal (auto-join-invites on entering pub games must be common) to Catacombs 2 and immediately joined the party down to Cat 3. I didn't make clvl 12 before we killed Andy. That game kinda broke up so I joined a 7 player "act 2" byline game and made the mistake of not joining them for Radament (I later wasted time going down myself to pick up the book of skill that had dropped for me in my absence). I instead focused on getting to the Far Oasis waypoint--I made clvl 12 and WoF as soon as I killed a few monsters outside Lut Golein--because Far Oasis is a sweet zone for this build (np going from 12 to 20 there).

Soon the party caught up to me (I have a tendency to leave TPs up for people at waypoints, etc.) as I entered Lost City (I should mention that Darkness was already triggered, which is annoying, so I figured I'd do the Vipers myself, if need be, just to lift it). Vipers were trivial for me. On the second level the others hung back at the stairs as I charged in, WoF blazing, and wiped out everything in short order. Because of their hesitation I scored the Death's set gloves from my kill of the special viper (generally I wasn't competing for drops if anyone was next to me since pub game drops vanish with an amazing rapidity and I don't care to engage in that--I gave away a couple of class +skill items while in these games and don't recall seeing a thank you).

The Arcane Sanctuary was a bit different. There my WoF were under-powered. (this game was Players 6 to 8 most of the time). The Fire Clan guys burned, but rather too slowly for my tastes (their regen was pretty good).

I arrived at the summoner in time to toast everything there and allow the werewolf to claim his corpse. The waypoint had a bunch of brutes (someone must have come through and left them there) which I dusted. The Canyon and tomb were trivial. If anything I held back a little so as not to give the party nothing to do.

Duriel was a different story. The game was around Players 6 or 7 but my party was down to 3 players: the werewolf, myself and another Assassin (melee). I had caught up with them over time, so I think we were all clvl 19 at this point. The Duriel fight took about two to three minutes. The other Assassin kept showing up (my portal was pre-chamber, theirs in-chamber) and dying right away. My Merc died (level 13 act 2 hired fresh for Arcane Sanctuary--I'd not used a hireling previously) shortly in. I never went to town during the battle (I'd stocked up on mana pots prior). Ultimately the werewolf settled into running around the outside of the room so he wouldn't die while my WoF fairly slowly wore Duriel down.

Fittingly, I dinged to clvl 20 on Duriel's death, not having ever died, at ~2:20 hours:minutes from character creation.

I think if I got used to doing it, while still picking up drops and having fun, I could manage sub-2 hour times consistently.

I saw players lag out a few times. It is nice that this build is pretty lag insensitive (WoF and thorns).

I hired a cold merc, level 19, in Act 3, but that's just for style points, as this char is "done" in the sense of now having been converted to a warehouse until such time as I rush her to nm hellforge (while using her to carry-along one other clvl 1 mule). By time you add in all the other overhead, I'm guessing a two account player like myself, using this build M.O., will get one nm hellforge reward for under 2 man hours effort.

I have to say that I saw enough rushing beggars in my foray into public games the last two days that I strongly suspect the more successful of those players are beating that average simply by carry-along with parties that want Players N to be high, without needing real players in the party. I'm not sure I'm willing to test that theory by naming one of my pub games "come be rushed past Baal" or some such.

[Ferengi]

I have to say that I saw enough rushing beggars in my foray into public games the last two days that I strongly suspect the more successful of those players are beating that average simply by carry-along with parties that want Players N to be high, without needing real players in the party. I'm not sure I'm willing to test that theory by naming one of my pub games "come be rushed past Baal" or some such.

I was just trying to take advantage of this! :blink:

But it is too slow and I ran into some problem. I had a clvl 1 in Act2, by joinin the "right game". I joined another where they where tracking down the staff, but had ammy TPs up, and even a spare ammy for me :lol:

Got the staff too, but then I wondered if I really needed a cube, so I tried to enter the palace, but no dice. I joined a couple of games, found one with Arcane runner, got "you may enter the palace" finally. But I could not enter an Arcane TP. That was very puzzling, since I have entered such TPs merely by obtaining the ammy. Hmmm.

Aha! I didn't really get the ammy, I just picked it up after the quest had been cleared. So "SocketMe" needs a twink or something to unlock the Arcane. I'm just setting this aside for awhile, in a week or two, I'll get a second Diablo installation on one of these computers and actually work this stuff out.

---

I've rushed a few groups to see how the Summoner plays, had one group letting me keep all the drops! I got two Death Hands that run, and gave one to the smarter of the rushees. The Summoner (in normal) just doesn't have a poison problem after awhile. Baal runs were supplying some sweet items for awhile, so I was in give away mode. Now they are just gold runs of course.

---
(later)

Ah, OK. Act2 has a history of getting the player quest state out of whack, and it's even worse now. The solution will always be to create a quick game, clear up access and rejoin the public game.

[Ruvanal]

I've been cubing orbs (maybe a dozen or so times now)... have yet to see a +skill above clvl 24 req but I'm going to keep at it. If I got the +6 HF sword I'd immediately make a Chipadin--nice luck for you that you got one (I should add it to my list to watch for in trades, since I doubt most people consider it to have any value--MongoJerry scored a Kuko for a Sol rune today, gesh!).

And you will not see a skill above the clvl 24 req using those formula either. Who told you that you will?

The ilvl of those formulas (25 and 30) will only index the base point for the staffmods at the 4th tier (18 clvl req) and from that point there is only a 20% chance of getting a skill from 1 tier up (the 24 clvl reqs). Do a search around here for staffmod and or Hammerman for more details.

...Unfortunately I didn't have a 3 socket Mask handy to stick flawed saphires in, so I actually wasted some stat points into energy (tip: by clvl 16 shop Ormus before he stops selling your character non-magic stuff).

Actually the cut out point for Ormus will be clvl=19. At an ilvl of 24 (19+5) you can still get non-magical items from the vendors. It is at ilvl=25+ that all you will be finding are the magical versions of the items.

--MongoJerry scored a Kuko for a Sol rune today, gesh!).

And you can get uset with me for dropping a Raven Claw on the ground in a game last night and leaving. Tired and getting sick, not thinking, last player, Ladder Game, SC, USwest, didn't feel like chewing up the inventory space with it, asleep 10 min later.

[Crystalion]

And you will not see a skill above the clvl 24 req using those formula either.  Who told you that you will?

:blink: shades of "do the voices in my head bother you?" :lol:

I now feel better about my near standard disclaimer (you will probably get quite a few hits if you search for the phrase...) "if I understand Ruvanal correctly" (I should shorten this to IIuRC I suppose). I misunderstood your post (over at AB) comparing the ilvl 25 and ilvl 30 recubes.

The ilvl of those formulas (25 and 30) will only index the base point for the staffmods at the 4th tier (18 clvl req) and from that point there is only a 20% chance of getting a skill from 1 tier up (the 24 clvl reqs).

This matches my (limited) experience. I have to say I am seeing some pretty nice 1h orbs out of this, so, unless you need to focus on other chippy uses, I can recommend the concept (taking junk magical orb drops from lowbie acts and making decent orbs out of them via 3 gem chip recubing).

Actually the cut out point for Ormus will be clvl=19.  At an ilvl of 24 (19+5) you can still get non-magical items from the vendors.  It is at ilvl=25+ that all you will be finding are the magical versions of the items.

:o I was terribly *unlucky* to ding to 20 on the Duriel kill then, geez.

dropping a Raven Claw on the ground in a game last night and leaving.  Tired and getting sick, not thinking, last player, Ladder Game, SC, USwest, didn't feel like chewing up the inventory space with it, asleep 10 min later.

Bummer. Since I've not seen any games on the Join list with 0 current players I imagine the odds that someone came into the game in the five minute grace after you left were pretty small. Clearly I need spyware on your machine so I can always enter the game after you leave. :P

Thanks for the info. I do searches for things, but, realistically, it is sometimes harder to locate a factoid than the delay to testing/play is worth. I certainly saw that principle demonstrated on pub bnet in party: in softcore at least, coordination and skill in party play was irrelevant the overwhelming majority of the time. I was spoiled back in my prior bnet days by being in a clan with a critical mass of mature players (I don't mean "expert", I mean mature/sensible).

I didn't mention it, but I did check the AB normal uswest ladder game before jumping into pub. I've yet to play in an AB game but I imagine that people might actually type politely to each other and do some planning and coordination from time to time, even in softcore. One can hope. I'm certainly tempted to do my occasional self-rushing in AB games, in case anyone wants a free ride.

[Ruvanal]

Crystalion, I forgot to put this in the earlier post...

concerning the assassin character...

I grabbed some stamina charms out of warehouse and that must have helped because I don't recall needing to drink any stamina potions.

This is one of those little 'hidden' bonuses. Assassins start with more stamina than the other characters, get more stamina per level (1.25 to everyone elses 1), get more stamina per vitality point (1.25 to everyone elses 1 again). Also their stamina drain while running is less than everyone elses (15 factor to everyone else having a 20 factor). And iirc the stamina recovery is one of those stats that the rate actually depends on the max_stamina for the amount that you will get back while not running, so with their naturally larger pool, it is easier to recover enough to start running again in just a few seconds (think time to do a couple of 'combat' actions).

I didn't mention it, but I did check the AB normal uswest ladder game before jumping into pub. I've yet to play in an AB game but I imagine that people might actually type politely to each other and do some planning and coordination from time to time, even in softcore. One can hope. I'm certainly tempted to do my occasional self-rushing in AB games, in case anyone wants a free ride.

You might start getting some hits on that later when the desire for extra socketing quests becomes greater.

A point that I found amusing earlier today was when some pubies found my clvl 1 mule waiting in one of the higher acts. Many comments about how they thought that rushing was not possible and such. I just continued and didn't say anything.