Baal, Lord of the Cheese?

[Albion Child]

Here are some things I've learned about killing bosses while rushing.

1.) When fighting Duriel, the characters being rushed don't need to be in the room with Dury. They just need to wait outside the hole in the wall til he dies.

2.) Against Meph, set up a portal next to the infernal gate and instruct the people getting rushed to stand still there. If you are a sorc choosing to teleport past the council members, a better place for the portal is just below and to the left of the gate along the ledge. This area is less prone to get plastered with hydras from the council members.

3.) Diablo is cake! Clear the river of flame up to the chaos sanctuary and set up a TP there (If they want to leech). Continue to clear all the monsters up to and around th pentagram. Instruct the other players to move to the pentagram. Set a new TP for emergency escape and go start opening the seals. Before you open the last seal, give the other players time to hide behind the outcroppings at the corner of the wall.

4.) Baal...The safest place in the throne room is theleft hand corner by the entrance, but I prefer them to wait in town while killing Baal's minions. Once the minions are gone, enter the Worldstone chamber and protect the other players from the tentacles while they move to there position in the lower left corner (No appendages spawn in this area). Once they are safely in position it is pretty easy to keep them out of Baal's way.

Hope I was some help! :)

[AtomicKitKat]

SoB with Spirit Wolf cycling could perhaps help (are you sure that they need to be able to live past 1 hit?)

Mayhaps the word "hit" was misleading. What I meant was that they'd have to survive at least one spell attack(cheese breath, cheese nova, cold wedge, appendage) and HOPEFULLY, Baal would switch to melee mode, hurting himself.

Certainly with melee characters(summoners included), Baal is an extreme PITA, because that ice wedge is EXTREMELY over-powered. Just a while ago, I was running my brother's Necromancer through again, and this time, I got 5 Ice Wedges in a row from Baal+clone! I mean, WTH? I got pushed from the centre(the path leading to the bridge to the WS) all the way into the bottom right corner. Now THAT is too much. To the best of my knowledge, no other knockback in the game even comes CLOSE to that. Not Smite, not Charge, not Bash, NOTHING. And Baal gets to fire those off non-stop... I eventually kicked his ass back into oblivion of course, but he got the last laugh. A "Realms Down" and a "Game Does Not Exist" later, he robbed me of a Twitchthroe, an Angelic Sickle, and a bunch of gems. :_(

[WarBlade]

Baal is an extreme PITA, because that ice wedge is EXTREMELY over-powered. Just a while ago, I was running my brother's Necromancer through again, and this time, I got 5 Ice Wedges in a row from Baal+clone! I mean, WTH? I got pushed from the centre(the path leading to the bridge to the WS) all the way into the bottom right corner. Now THAT is too much. To the best of my knowledge, no other knockback in the game even comes CLOSE to that. Not Smite, not Charge,  not Bash, NOTHING. And Baal gets to fire those off non-stop... I eventually kicked his ass back into oblivion of course, but he got the last laugh. A "Realms Down" and a "Game Does Not Exist" later, he robbed me of a Twitchthroe, an Angelic Sickle, and a bunch of gems. :_(

The Cold Wedge is not one attack yielding one big knockback. It is one attack that knocks back, hits you again, knocks back, hits you again etc.

Basically it's just knocking you back into its own personal line of fire as it comes barreling through. You're swallowing one attack about 5 times or so, hence the reason why I advocate MDR.

And BTW, Charge can basically pull off much the same stunt. ;)

[AtomicKitKat]

I meant he literally fired 5 wedges at me, one after the other. Each wedge caught me on the outer edge and I STILL got knocked back the same distance, but since knockback is based on your facing, I got knocked out of range of the same wedge each time. Somebody has obviously not heard of "spell timers", all cooped up in that throne room of his! :P

[AssA]

Oh yes, and you consider a brand new 1700 AMD(actually 1800 but I don't need THAT much speed), with an Inno 3dD Tornado GeForce 4 MX graphics card and 256MB RAM SLOW? Even on THAT computer I can lag when Lister and company loads, which leads me to wonder, why not pre-load all the graphics when summoning Colenzo? I find it very unlikely that any reasonably well-equipped player can die against Colenzo due to lag, but then again... Or at least pre-load the graphics SOMEWHERE(like with Duriel), so that players wouldn't keep getting killed by the lag. Some days the lag on B.Net is sp bad that I move in 2 steps to trigger Lister, my computer freezes, and 1/2 a minute later, I find myself 3 screens away, dead(or at least severely dizzy)

If appendages cause lag on that system, there's something wrong with it.

Lister and company are bugged; I once was in town, meanwhile the minions of destruction arrived, and when I came back through the portal I didn't have to load at all. And that was on my old 733 which froze for around 7 seconds when I was in baal's throne room.

As for Blood Mana, I usually have more life than mana so that's not a problem for me. A nova sorc with more life than mana would be hard to play, I can imagine...

As for the Summoner, yes, MDR helps, but he's still overpowered. Same with Nihlathak; not even maxed resistance helps against him :(

[Iolair]

I remember your reports of your fights with Baal. I don't think you are exaggerating in your post, he was bad back then :)

He was toned down from the beta til now.
I think the cheese-missile got toned down, less damage and not so long range.

I only play SP and I have never had problems with Baal. Diablo on the other hand..ugh, took about an hour for my werewolf to get past him in normal. When one is untwinked and the gear is not very good...it is just not very funny..just tedious.

About Baal. Do you use a mercenary? I often find them useful while fighting Baal, because they can take of the appendages. I had a paladin with smite, after I closed in on Baal on the walkway, no more appendages got out. I could Smite him happily while my rogue shot him full of arrows. Worked fine, perhaps I was lucky :)

[Az3ar]

>I was trying to rush a character through Normal just for the hell of it<

You said it yourself, enyway, if you also have these problems whith other characters, well dont know, I never had eny problems whith baal, except when I'm a spellcaster which sucks because of the Mana-Maiden curse he puts...

I think that the curse, plus the blue wave thing he throws at you are the hardest things that act bosses do, (other than D's lighting and Fire river)...

Firewall, is waaaay too unbalanced, I mean, in level 20 it deals thousands of damage per second, not very fair at all, especially against monsters that are dumb enough to stay in it....

Lag is mainly the biggest problem whith Baal, that especially happens when there are too many appendages summoned, I dont care about what they actually DO, their immobile, just move, but the lag they generate is unbareable.....

[AtomicKitKat]

Like I said, for the hell of it. I don't make a habit of running level 9s through Normal. :P

I would personally say no more than 4 appendages per person in the room.

And D's LBoD is crap if you know how to run. Heck, even my melee characters know how to move away before he starts. As a matter of fact, I'd say the LBoD is actually LESS damaging than any old Firewall. At least in so far as level balance is concerned.

[Az3ar]

Its not the melee chars I'm complaining about, I'v had sorcs.......1 hit.......

Enyway, the real threat from diablo is the flame river in the first place, eny char........2 secs...........

[AtomicKitKat]

To tell the truth, after facing an LI/FI Grand Vizier of Chaos, and the cheese that is LR+Bone Spirit one-hit kills from the tons of OKs in the Chaos Sanctuary, Diablo is a breath of fresh air to me. :P Even his supposedly insane "block" rate(I've never actually noticed monsters blocking, more like you just miss as per normal), has never bothered any of my characters. And I'm not just talking about my smite-din either. Sin, Barb, Zon, none of these characters of mine ever had a problem with the block. Then again, I sometimes stick elemental damage on these characters, so that singular strikes can still do reasonable amounts of damage. But even then...

[WarBlade]

Enyway, the real threat from diablo is the flame river in the first place, eny char........2 secs...........

Not really. For one thing the characters gear can top it. A couple of 15 MDR items will mostly cover your bet in Hell with the right shield to help catch the bleed through. Rising Sun can handle it alone.

If not, then meleeing allows you to exploit the givaway animation that D uses for that attack and one other - Just break off and zip around to the other side before the lethal hammer falls. The fire is deadly, but slow to commence and sticks to one direction for each shot.

The real problem with that attack is when you are stuck out in the middle of nowhere and invisible fire swats your character down from out of nowhere . . . :(

[Occhidiangela]

1. We were all -100% Magic resist, and the orange cheeseball was a magic attack, that got a nice boost from that.

2. The appendages, as I remember them, seemed a bit more commonly cast than versus now.

3. Valk did not seem to attract appendages at all, but that might have been me.

400 HP gets you a one hit kill from Baal in those days. :)

I don't remember if this was confirmed, but there was some talk about whether or not the Cheeseball could do a critical hit in the beta, I left the beta before I ever saw an answer to that.

He has been toned down a touch, but can still be a pain if you aren't set up to handle him.

[Mavfin]

I have a different sort of thing about Baal: He's like all the Act bosses. He's a pain for some, easy for others.

For a barb, get Leap Attack and some resistance, and a shield. Whack, whack, if you get pushed back, jump back in and pound on him. Cold damage helps. Keep purple potions. Whack whack. Bring a rogue along. If you keep his attention, she'll pincushion him the whole time.

For a MA assassin: If you have Phoenix Strike, charge, drop meteor on his head, rinse, repeat. Throw in a charge, charge, charge, Orb occasionally. If you get pushed back, Use Dragon Flight to get back to him. Use cold damage. Let your shadow master draw fire and distract.

Traps Assassin: Lay traps where they hit him. Don't get in his LOS. Rinse, repeat. Still the easiest Diablo kill, too.

Necro, arty or summone: Can you say Decrepify? I thought you could. Lay out lots of cheap iron items if using Iron Golem.

Weredruid: Can you say tank? I thought you could.

Paladin: see barb, except you'll have a little more trouble with being pushed back.

Amazon: Spear/Jav: Like other melee chars. Stay with what brought you here. Bring a rogue along.
Bow: Guided arrow if you have it, happy feet if you don't. Keep a Valk on top of him. Recast if she's blinded by her glow.

Sorcie: Depends on the build. Baal can be a major pain in the ass in some cases. A hydra sorcie plays just like a trap assassin. A Blizz or Orb Sorcie is easy, too. Blue Baal. Inferno is fun as hell on Normal Baal. Fried demon. Level 25 CB + Mastery is cool, too. Sorcie has so many weapons, depending on the build.

You just have to do what has to be done to kill him. Much like Diablo. I had to go back to town 5 times and clean out the throwing knives in the stores to kill Diablo with my Iron Golem/ other summon Necro.

That's part of the fun of playing the game.

[Brista]

Thorns or any sort of damage reflection is very ineffective. He has a small chance to do a physical attack and if he does the damage is small

Close contact works pretty well. I quite often target him with Teleport before another attack spell as I think the best position is treading on his toes. In this position you take a small steady amount of damage that you can counter by sipping reds rather than big life-threatening hits. Err usually :)

If I am out-classed by him I town heal

For a necro without Spear or Spirit I usually try and equip a melee weapon. With Amp and golem support he goes down slowly but quicker and safer than IM/Golem.

[Ruvanal]

I don't remember if this was confirmed, but there was some talk about whether or not the Cheeseball could do a critical hit in the beta, I left the beta before I ever saw an answer to that.

The monsters have always had a 5% chance to do a critical hit with any of their attacks, including the magic ones. So yes, Baal had a chance to be doing criticals with his "Cheeseball" attack during the beta. So with the -100% magic resistance in hell and vertually no way to improve it through equipment or skills, this attack was rather deadly. One of the main reasons why they changed the way that magic resistance works now (referring to the magic damage type, not magical attacks in general).

[Bullit]

A one hit kill is still quite possible :unsure:

Take, for example, a Baal run which my sorceress attempted to make recently; 900 life, 1000 mana, 75 all resists, and 60% damage absorb thanks to energy shield.

I entered the worldstone chamber, and teleported over to Baal. He had already duplicated himself, and he and his friend then proceeded to blast me with an orange attack each.

One dead sorcie :o I took more care after that :lol:

[the Langolier]

That is just sad. I don't remember the last time I died to hell/baal with my sorceress. And she has 600 life (52% maan absorb) with -55% resist all.

It is all about tatics. Simply hide behind a pillar so he doesn't have a line of sight so his attacks can't hit you. Cast anything you have that can hit him from there, such as blizzard, frozen orb, firewall, meteor, etc. You will be OK until he creates a clone or teleports. With a clone - take a trip to town. If he teleports, find another pillar that will protect you and repeat.

For a melee character, you should be set as long as you have a multiple attack skill and a little bit of life leech. Run right next to him and start pounding away. You will be able to attack at least 4-5 times before he hits you. His attack will bring you down, but you should get it all back in a couple hits. If he knocks you back with cold, don't forget an old D1 tactic: happy feet. Don't run straight into him so he can hit you with his cheese attack. Run at him in a zigzag pattern. Once you get next to him, you are good to go.

[WarBlade]

Take, for example, a Baal run which my sorceress attempted to make recently; 900 life, 1000 mana, 75 all resists, and 60% damage absorb thanks to energy shield.

I entered the worldstone chamber, and teleported over to Baal. He had already duplicated himself, and he and his friend then proceeded to blast me with an orange attack each.

That is the bane of the melee sorc too. Baal's puke missile chops up mana supplies even before such things as Energy Shield are factored in and suddenly the auxiliary life orb is just gone in a hit or two (taking the ES with it). <_<

Only MASSIVE amounts of MDR can really limit the problem. :(

[Brista]

A one hit kill is still quite possible&nbsp;

I entered the worldstone chamber, and teleported over to Baal. He had already duplicated himself, and he and his friend then proceeded to blast me with an orange attack each.

A slightly silly point but two Baals, each blasting you, isn't a one hit kill ;)

[Cybit]

I remember the beta, Baal was ungodly powerful during that. Took out my 2000 life Salvation toting paladin in one shot, eek. It was more of the teleports in front of you, hits you with that fire attack, then teleports out, back in, and hits you with it again. The short range fire attack was a one shot kill pretty much.

Then I got conviction so it was -400% all resistances. One static field later, Baal was dead :D