05-03-2003, 05:56 PM
Hi Sabra! Welcome to the lounge, sorta :-).
For the skills that are on the curses tree, there are several ways to go about choosing them. I highly recommend putting at least one point into every skill, with the exception of *maybe* LR, although that will make you much more party friend with sorceresses and other elemental type characters.
Dim Vision is an uber skill that is way underused, especially against ranged attackers. A decent level Dim Vision put on a crowd after Terror (to interupt their AI) will make them sit there and do nothing until the curse either wears off, or something steps into melee range. When something steps into melee range, it will only attack anything in melee range. For indepth use of this curse, and how powerful it is I suggest looking at Sirian's Skeletorr story - its quite a fascinating read about the use of curses and basic ideas. Unfortunately these days something along those lines won't be as viable as it was in D2C.
Amplify Damage is also very useful, it will double the damage of all your minions (in hell it would be the equivilent of trippling it!). It works as follows: it will subtract 100 from the cursed targets physical resistance. So in hell, everything has at least 50% physical resistance it would cut that to -50% so everything you do would be the equivilent of 3 times the damage it would normally do! In normal it will essentially double your damage, but it is cutting the same amount from 0% physical resistance on monsters. Some people use an Act 2 Thorns merc along with this in order to do more damage than otherwise
Iron Maiden is the 'uber skill' that almost everyone on b.net uses. Sure, its powerful, has a nice long duration, but boy is it *BORING*. You just kind of sit there, and watch as everything dies to whatever it happens to be hitting it. Its usually used in conjunction with Revive, to make a beefy meatshield that does a good portion of damage whenever it gets hit.
Attract/Confuse - These two skills really are *extremely* fun and really cool. Confuse is a toned down version of attract but it works on more monsters and is a bit more dangerous, but just as much fun. Basically confuse makes monsters attack the closest non-confused target around, including you or your minions which is why its more dangerous but I've found it to be fairly effective. Attract on the other hand gives the monsters a single target, which when used in combination with amp, or IM, can lead to some very cool crowd controlling possabilities! I'm not sure if exp is receieved for kills made with these skills yet but they are a lot of fun to use. I enjoy making Doom Knights, or Venom Lords in the CS all attack eachother :-).
Either way, those are the real super-skills in the curse tree. I'll probably come back later today and give out some more info on necros, but these are IMO the most fun and the most interesting skills in the curse tree, not counting decreptify which I don't have much experience with or I'd keep going :). There are very few skills in the curse tree which become completely useless later on in the game - and focusing in on one or two seems to limit the strength of the others. Either way, good luck with your necromancer and have fun!
For the skills that are on the curses tree, there are several ways to go about choosing them. I highly recommend putting at least one point into every skill, with the exception of *maybe* LR, although that will make you much more party friend with sorceresses and other elemental type characters.
Dim Vision is an uber skill that is way underused, especially against ranged attackers. A decent level Dim Vision put on a crowd after Terror (to interupt their AI) will make them sit there and do nothing until the curse either wears off, or something steps into melee range. When something steps into melee range, it will only attack anything in melee range. For indepth use of this curse, and how powerful it is I suggest looking at Sirian's Skeletorr story - its quite a fascinating read about the use of curses and basic ideas. Unfortunately these days something along those lines won't be as viable as it was in D2C.
Amplify Damage is also very useful, it will double the damage of all your minions (in hell it would be the equivilent of trippling it!). It works as follows: it will subtract 100 from the cursed targets physical resistance. So in hell, everything has at least 50% physical resistance it would cut that to -50% so everything you do would be the equivilent of 3 times the damage it would normally do! In normal it will essentially double your damage, but it is cutting the same amount from 0% physical resistance on monsters. Some people use an Act 2 Thorns merc along with this in order to do more damage than otherwise
Iron Maiden is the 'uber skill' that almost everyone on b.net uses. Sure, its powerful, has a nice long duration, but boy is it *BORING*. You just kind of sit there, and watch as everything dies to whatever it happens to be hitting it. Its usually used in conjunction with Revive, to make a beefy meatshield that does a good portion of damage whenever it gets hit.
Attract/Confuse - These two skills really are *extremely* fun and really cool. Confuse is a toned down version of attract but it works on more monsters and is a bit more dangerous, but just as much fun. Basically confuse makes monsters attack the closest non-confused target around, including you or your minions which is why its more dangerous but I've found it to be fairly effective. Attract on the other hand gives the monsters a single target, which when used in combination with amp, or IM, can lead to some very cool crowd controlling possabilities! I'm not sure if exp is receieved for kills made with these skills yet but they are a lot of fun to use. I enjoy making Doom Knights, or Venom Lords in the CS all attack eachother :-).
Either way, those are the real super-skills in the curse tree. I'll probably come back later today and give out some more info on necros, but these are IMO the most fun and the most interesting skills in the curse tree, not counting decreptify which I don't have much experience with or I'd keep going :). There are very few skills in the curse tree which become completely useless later on in the game - and focusing in on one or two seems to limit the strength of the others. Either way, good luck with your necromancer and have fun!
I am Baylan
Hardcore is the way to play!
You'll find me on US-East, on the account name Baylan (for now, I'll add more as I get my accounts up and hardcore-capable).
Hardcore is the way to play!
You'll find me on US-East, on the account name Baylan (for now, I'll add more as I get my accounts up and hardcore-capable).