I'm new. Yes, new. Please enlighten me.

[Donquonz]

Hello everyone. I'm new to Diablo II. Yes, new. I have a few questions, but first I'll briefly explain what relatively little experience I do have to avoid some possible confusion and, well, introduce myself to this forum.

I've played the first 5 quests about 25 times (clvl14-18 each time) in an effort to find a character and build to my liking. I've found some. Using different Barbs, I've reached quests 3-5 in Act II a few times. Using different Necros, I've reached Act III 2-3 times. I've been as far as normal Diablo (Necro), but decided to start over due to poor (but viable) SP allocation (among less significant things) which, as I had found, would've resulted in a very tedious battle. Too tedious. And my level was too high to fix that. In all of those cases I quit due to the fact that I was reaching relatively high levels, but with poor SP allocation. It's faster to just start anew than continue on after poorly spending anywhere from 5-15 points, anyway.

Is the color of any item's text (aside from white text and Rares) different due to the presence of Sockets or Etherealness, whether the Sockets were created or existed upon drop? (Can an item be made Ethereal?) I had a tough time articulating that :). The reason why I'm asking is because I'd like to avoid standard Socketed and Ethereal drops to save a lot of time. I have received exactly 1 double-Socketed Rare since I've been playing, so I'm only sure about Rares and the usual. It's better to be safe than sorry.

I play offline because while my computer is very nice, it's obsolete. The game runs great offline, but online it slows when I engage large groups, and then goes turbo speed for a moment to make up for the pause. It's not that bad, so it can be funny at times. The chop is mainly due to the processor, everything else is sufficient. It's not really that bad, but I can live without Battle.net for awhile. (I've played at least about 4700 games of Brood War since 2000.)

I'm aware of the vulnerabilities and issues with items on Open Battle.net, but was wondering how useful it can be for trading.

I think this is a very solid website, BTW. So, to Bolty in particular and all great contributors, great job! The work shows.

Thanks for your time.

[adeyke]

Is the color of any item's text (aside from white text and Rares) different due to the presence of Sockets or Etherealness, whether the Sockets were created or existed upon drop?

Non-magical (low-quality, normal-quality, or superior-quality) items have a grey text if they're ethereal or if they have sockets (regardless of where the sockets come from). Otherwise, they're white-text.

Only non-magical items have this distinction. Magic is always blue, rare is always yellow, crafted is always orange, unique is always gold, set is always green.

(Can an item be made Ethereal?)

No.

[Scrape]

Going a bit further about that which adeyke stated (or perhaps just wording it differently), regardless of whether a rare, set, or unique item has sockets or is ethereal, it will still retain its rare, set, or unique color (yellow, green & gold respectively).

Certain set and unique items have a pre-fixed number of sockets. For rare items, it will be random as one of the attributes.

Whether or not an item (regardless of its form) is ethereal is strictly random.

Since you do not really play online, you do not have to worry about trading for set and unique items that do not normally have sockets, but do have a socket(s) from the socket quest in the last act.

As for your first bit on finding the right character, it is understandably a common thing. Many players go through a process of finding the characters they enjoy, from different skill points to different item setups. Some players might just like to try low-level combinations, and others are in it for a longer run.

This is one of the great things about the game; there is plenty of versatility when it comes to customizing one's characters (and playing in general).

Good luck, as it goes.

[Fragbait]

As for your first bit on finding the right character, it is understandably a common thing. Many players go through a process of finding the characters they enjoy, from different skill points to different item setups. Some players might just like to try low-level combinations, and others are in it for a longer run.
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Hi,
That's entirely right. Many players were fooled by the new skill point allocation system when the game was released back in 2000 and made chars that turned out to be complete crap, if I might say.
Yours truly managed to f*** up a paladin and a sorceress (yes, 2 chars one after the other) as a startup to the game. But after several years, several comps and several dozen chars - it must be over 30 (and I don't mean to brag about it, there's some mad people with 50+ chars out there) - the game continues to be fun. Ironically even, with patch 1.10 some older 'variants' I thought would never see the day again suddenly weren't too bad at all...
Thus, be it for nostalgic reasons or whatever, I would like to advise you to never delete old chars. It isn't that they take up much space anyway - just compared to the saves of Diablo back in the days.
Oh yes, and have a heap of fun!


PS: this post is originally and rightfully replying to you, but is also meant to speak to the topic starter.


Greetings, Fragbait

[Occhidiangela]

Hello everyone. I'm new to Diablo II. Yes, new. I have a few questions, but first I'll briefly explain what relatively little experience I do have to avoid some possible confusion and, well, introduce myself to this forum.

I've played the first 5 quests about 25 times (clvl14-18 each time) in an effort to find a character and build to my liking. I've found some. Using different Barbs, I've reached quests 3-5 in Act II a few times. Using different Necros, I've reached Act III 2-3 times. I've been as far as normal Diablo (Necro), but decided to start over due to poor (but viable) SP allocation (among less significant things) which, as I had found, would've resulted in a very tedious battle. Too tedious. And my level was too high to fix that. In all of those cases I quit due to the fact that I was reaching relatively high levels, but with poor SP allocation. It's faster to just start anew than continue on after poorly spending anywhere from 5-15 points, anyway.

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Are you playing straight up Single Player? Or, are you using the "character's 8" function.

I am assuming you are playing Diablo II, not the Expansion Pack, Lord of Destruction.

With that in mind . . .

1. You don't need more than one point in any skill to complete Normal sucessfully.

2. Diablo is a tedious fight for any Melee class due to his blocking, and his rather high hit points.

3. Maxing Resistances for Fire and Lightning is handy, although Diablo's breath weapon also has a physical component.

4. Gambling for gloves, belts and boots is one way to, relatively cheaply, get the resists you need on a rare, but a bit of patience is required.

5. Are you playing in 640 x 480 resolution?

6. Did you download any of the patches from bnet?

Welcome!

'Tis a fun game, for certain.

Occhi

[Wyrm]

Yours truly managed to f*** up a paladin and a sorceress (yes, 2 chars one after the other) as a startup to the game.

That's nothing. It took me about 10 tries before I finally got a nm-viable character, and a few more to get into hell. I didn't really mind starting over, so it wasn't that big of a problem.

The best advice I can give on picking a char is to look through the builds that have been documented both here and at the Basin to get a general idea of what works and appeals to you. Then, just make your own alterations/tweaks to the build to suit you. Generally speaking though, until a build hits level 35, it won't have enough skill points to give you an idea of what to expect for the rest of the game.

A Necromancer is going to have the hardest fight against Diablo on normal, simply due to the fact that he's not going to have any real damage from his skills at that point. Everyone else has at least one skill that will eat through bosses by that point.

3. Maxing Resistances for Fire and Lightning is handy, although Diablo's breath weapon also has a physical component.

That sounds like a very Breath of Fire thing to say. Or maybe I'm just too much of a BoF person...

[Donquonz]

Thanks for the information, everyone.

Hi Occhidiangela. I'm playing standard Single Player Lord of Destruction in 800x600. I got the patches. I'm new, but quite competent. I understand why you asked, though. It's obviously insanely janky without fixes.

[Occhidiangela]

Thanks for the information, everyone.

Hi Occhidiangela. I'm playing standard Single Player Lord of Destruction in 800x600. I got the patches. I'm new, but quite competent. I understand why you asked, though. It's obviously insanely janky without fixes.
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I asked, because some folks still play Diablo II pre expansion. It is what we all started on. :)

The other reason I asked is that I was going to comment on Assassin and Druid things, and then realized that I did not know if you were talking Expansion or vanilla D II.

That said: IMO, most standard Druid builds will have little trouble getting to NM Baal, but without a little care, can run into some serious snags in Hell.

Assassins: Similar issues, depending on the tree focused on.

Me, I am a fool for gambling on Circlets, Gloves, Boots, Belts. Rares make me happy, what with the extra resists, mana steal, etc.

The "improvements" that put immunes and synergies, as well as jacking Monster Hit Points up quite a bit -- not to mention my favorite "I Hate It" feature of 50% global Phys Resist in Hell Diff -- can turn Hell diff into real tedium. I have a couple of chars who have hit tedium in Hell Act III and IV. Endeavour to persevere. :)

Let us know how you do! :w00t:

Occhi

[Fragbait]

because some folks still play Diablo II pre expansion.

Yay!

:w00t:

Greetings, Fragbait

[Donquonz]

I'm wondering about MF, drops, and Resistances.

I read about the issue with MF from way back, but haven't found any information regarding how it works since the fix. I'm assuming more is simply better, now, but was hoping someone could clerify this for me. MF only has an effect on the occurrence of Magic, Rare, Set, and Unique items, right?

I believe Uniques, Super Uniques, and Bosses respectively all have a better chance of dropping any of the 4 magical item types. (Where do Champions fall?) Simply put, higher level enemies = better drops, right?

I'm pretty sure Resistances are capped just like money, in that it's (cap) based on your character's level. Is this correct?

[ShadowHM]

I'm pretty sure Resistances are capped just like money, in that it's (cap) based on your character's level. Is this correct?
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I will leave the MF questions for others, except to mention that this guide is fairly comprehensive.

As to Resistances: They are capped at 75% for any character, with penalties in NM and Hell that make you need more resists to get to 75%. This has nothing to do with character level. However, certain gear items (like Guardian Angel armour) will increase your cap. Further, Paladins with points invested in the Resist Auras have their caps increased.

[Obi2Kenobi]

I read about the issue with MF from way back, but haven't found any information regarding how it works since the fix. I'm assuming more is simply better, now, but was hoping someone could clerify this for me. MF only has an effect on the occurrence of Magic, Rare, Set, and Unique items, right?

I believe Uniques, Super Uniques, and Bosses respectively all have a better chance of dropping any of the 4 magical item types. (Where do Champions fall?) Simply put, higher level enemies = better drops, right?
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Magic find only affects the quality of item that drops. If Monster X is going to drop 1 halberd and 1 buckler, no amount of magic find will change that. What it will do, however, is make that halberd and buckler more likely to be unique, set, rare, or magic. Once your MF gets high enough, more doesn't add as much of an effect (but still helps) as it did early on.
Champions have a higher chance of dropping magical type items, I think... They also drop higher base item types (ie: a monster that can only drop up to an item of base level 50 [base item meaning spear, dusk shroud, throwing knives, etc) could drop up to level 52 if it's a champion, so it gets you better stuff).

Sorry if some of that is confusing, but I tried to avoid using terms like ilvl and alvl and such. Those used to (and still do, sometimes) confuse me like nothing else.