A Tale of Woe

[Kasreyn]

Just off the top of my head here.

- Hiring\switching mercs is a lot less of a hassle in 1.11, no more need to stick to one and levelling them up. Since their clvls are a lot closer to yours. (For me this is probably the only great selling point of 1.11, ymmv)

- Uber Tristram, new bonus area for Hell mode and Closed Realm only. Iirc you will need a mod to enable it in SP, otherwise you can get the Keys (the quest ingredients) but can't do anything with it.

- A bunch of new Armor runewords, surprisingly available for SP as well.

- Some previous Realm Only R-words only are now enabled for SP. Duress, Prudence, Splendor, and Wind are now available for SPers.

Thanks, Hammer!

I've restarted on 1.10 for now and am having a blast. I created a new frenzybarb, Ginsu. He's 26 and venturing into the Palace Cellar now. I'm finding that cube formulae and gems are crucial to getting good weaponry for an untwinked melee character in Normal. The only thing I can't decide is - should I keep my cold arrow Rogue for the long haul, or replace her with an A2 spear merc? I'm thinking either defiance aura for DR, or Might aura for max damage. I'm also trying to decide whether I want to focus my synergies on singing (ie Taunt, War Cry) or on armor / power buffs like Shout and Double Swing. Without any end-game items to twink him with, I suspect Ginsu is going to really start struggling to wound enemies once he gets into Hell difficulty. Would Might aura merc + damage boost synergies be best? Because my other worry is I can't twink him the Gladiator's Bane I used to keep for such occasions... he's probably going to be low def also, plus of course no shield... would war cry + shout + defiance aura merc be better, for survivability?

Strategizing and planning a build is certainly tougher when you can't plan for a certain drool-worthy runeword you already own...

Cheers,
Kasreyn