Usefull beginning 1.10 builds?

[LucianDK]

It could be an idea to think of builds that could be good for starters, and not especially item dependent, when you begin on the ladder and have nothing to twink to your characters.

The most obvious would be a holy shock paladin. With holy shock and both damage synergies at level 20, you can reach near 1-4000 lightning damage per strike. And it doesnt cost any mana! And its independent of your weapon. Though you may need something for crowd control, and better AR.

One question though. Ive heard conflicting things about physical attack skills with elemental components, that you dont need AR for the elemental component, that it would autohit. But you would need AR to conect with the physical part.

So in this case, could you merely go along with 4 levels of zeal for max swings, and deal out a lot of lightning damage fast?

[Dixen Andomiel]

It could be an idea to think of builds that could be good for starters, and not especially item dependent, when you begin on the ladder and have nothing to twink to your characters.

I'm thinking Necromancer would be the way to go there... Obviously a HS Pally would be good too.

One question though. Ive heard conflicting things about physical attack skills with elemental components, that you dont need AR for the elemental component, that it would autohit. But you would need AR to conect with the physical part.

It depends on the skill in question. Now, I assume you are refering to only attack type skills with both Physical and Elemental damge (Vengeance) as oppossed to those with one or the other (Warcry, Poison Nova)... Attack type skills require AR (unless otherwise modified, ITD, etc.) in order to deal damge. I.E. In order for Vengeance to deal any of it's damage, physical or not, you must actually hit the target. However, for skills like Warcry, Poison Nova, or Frozen Orb then AR isn't required and those skills will hit anything in range. Hope I understood your question correctly.

[Loki]

Well there is always the sorc, or necro, or any casting build for that matter. And if you were to make a kicking assn that would work too, since kick damage is based on type of boots str and dex only (and normal boots do same damage as rare/unique).

[LucianDK]

Well, to take Holy Shock in question, would you need AR to keep up with being able to hit? Im asking because the aura provides no AR improvements like fanatisism.

But perhaps the autohit thing only applies to ranged attack skills with elemental components? If i remember right, the amazon elemental skills was autohit, ie the elemental parts always hitting, but you needed AR if you intended to leech out of the physical part.

[Obi2Kenobi]

Yes, you would. You could just put your extra points into zeal. There are some moves, however (like the elemental arrows on the amazon, or the "Fires exploding arrows or bolts" property on some unique bows/crossbows, like the hellcast, that also are ITD for the elemental part, but physical damage for leeching purposes is based on your AR, IIRC. The good thing about these are that they can spread certain effects, like poison)
:P Your edit edited in the stuff in parenthesis.

[Crystalion]

It could be an idea to think of builds that could be good for starters, and not especially item dependent, when you begin on the ladder and have nothing to twink to your characters.

This is an excellent line of thought, but not, imho, specific enough.

You see, there are probably well over a dozen significant builds that aren't especially item dependent, but what those builds can accomplish (i.e. what tasks they do well) and in what difficulty vary widely.

Ferengi has, for example, brought up this issue with the additional qualification of "bootstrapping" being the motivation. So, for his problem, you would tend to think of useful things characters can do, even if they aren't destined for act 5 hell. Examples would be: location rush other characters; do countess runs; hellforge runs; item runs; high clvl shopping; etc.

If, OTOH, your goal is merely to have fun and play for a while until your character has incidentally found some nice gear to bequeath to new characters, then you have a lot of options. Probably you should just follow your whims.

But if your goal is to complete the game (hell) with your initial character, without ever necessarily getting good drops (or gambles or runes), while not finding the experience too difficult or time consuming, then there are probably only a few builds (solo) worthy of consideration. Some more if you're willing to play an "unbalanced" build that does well except in certain circumstances (e.g. vs. Fire Immunes) when things become temporarily awkward.

I know this is all platitudinous, but if you clarify your intent, you'll probably get a variety of more specific suggestions.

[dkass]

In my experience, any class and any reasonable "mainstream" build will work. While you're unlikely to find more than a few incredible items, but decent items are more than enough for a good build to finish the game. The uber equipment just isn't necessary to play or finish the game in my experience. I'm assuming that the player is reasonable and stays on the mlvl=clvl curve and doesn't try silly things like soloing hell 8 player.

By mainstream, I mean a build that does not rely on a specific piece of rare twinked equipment. Basically pick any class and any two good skill the class has and go for it.

I realize it may be heresy to some players, but there is absolutely no need for twinking at all in the game. Just about any non-crippled build can finish nightmare, regardless of the equipment they find/buy/gamble. And even in Hell, there is just no need for uber equipment (one does need decent equipment, but that is not hard to come by with a little patience or trading).

[Swarmalicious]

I'm on Crystalion's wavelength somewhat. I think creating an adventurer who will basically fool around in NM while gathering hand-me-downs is the best bet for a first char.

The Barb Find Item skill hasn't failed me in the past, so that's where I think I'm headed. ...And he'll be a Booyaka, of course. :)

[Walkiry]

Well, IMO the easiest character to go along with no good equipment is probably the Poison Javelin Amazon. After ehough points in the poison skills, drop a bunch in Lightning Bolt for the poison immunes, and have as a weapon switch a bow with high fire damage socketed with rubies, dropping some final points into exploding arrow.

With a cold mercenary she should be able to handle just about everything. Main problem is, of course, that a poison immune will have crazy life regeneration, pretty hard to overcome. Where to put the vileness, I wonder :)

[AtomicKitKat]

The first few levels after getting the skill would be a pain, but after you get it to a decent length(range 10? based on weapon range 5 being about 3 tiles away), at about slvl 4-6, it starts becoming more useful. Plus Leaf(TirRal) is pretty easy to come by. Lore(OrtSol) is trickier, since Sol doesn't start dropping till late Act5 Normal. Rhyme is a good choice if you haven't gotten Leaf(or can't use the staff with Fire Mastery), and preferrably with a +3 fire(Inferno/Warmth) skills orb. An Act 2 merc with Holy Freeze or some other aura-granting item in 1.10 would round off her elemental abilities.

[whyBish]

Well, for H.C. I will have to go with the Skellmancer. I tried the HS Paladin in S.C., even with a nice 23/20 killing stuff I dies twice to archer packs in A1NM (using 1.10 not 1.10s). Also, the HS Paladin has the problem of getting to level 24(?). Not sure how I would get past duriel without a thorns sceptre and a better ping than I currently have ;)

[Crystalion]

I think creating an adventurer who will basically fool around in NM while gathering hand-me-downs is the best bet for a first char.

Another thought, if I've understood Ruvanal correctly, is to dip into hell just far enough for the xp/drop sweetspot: Mausoleum and Crypt. This, of course, means vs. undead stuff works quite well.

Another favorite run for me, if you're "slumming" to get goodies (partly because of some of the uniques I want that he can drop) is Fire Eye, since waypoint to Arcane Sanctuary then portal back into his area is pretty quick. From what Ruvanal posted I suspect the niceness of Andariel drops in beta may have been fixed for release, but she's probably worth a shot.

In the beta it was clear to me that farming the pindle area for base items (imbue or socket/runeword fodder) was pretty reasonable.

I neglect, of course, to mention all the (historically) obvious slumming runs for goodie acquisition.

The Barb Find Item skill hasn't failed me  in the past

Yes, that seems like a pretty time efficient idea, as long as the barb has good mobility and killing speed. A slumming teleporting MF equiped FO sorc seems pretty efficient as well.

Since the early (Ladder) MF gear will be heavily biased toward topazes... I think one possibility is an enchantress, teleporting to give her fire arrow rogue "direction" and safety, while both of them wear topazes to the max (that is, the sorc doesn't make any of the kills, and the rogue is a one-shot kill wonder, especially once you (trade to) get her a ravenclaw or kuko). In this scenario I'm assuming that trading for topazes won't be that hard early on (partly because I'm assuming any group of knowledgable players will have Andarial and Hellforge farmers, who will generate some gem surplus).

For nm farming, aside from Walkiry pointing out the poison jav centric build and my mention of the (Ferengi inspired) Frozen Orb build I have to put in two cents worth for Assassin WoF and Druid Fireclaw builds as also being fast killers without heavy item dependency. Unless they nerfed it hard for release, I suspect the skelemancer will be stellar in that category as well. My impression (non-expert) of Lightning Fury builds is that they don't work so well in the absence of crowds (and, afaik, you have to be much higher level than most of the aforementioned builds before you really rock). Still, like my HolyFist build, situationally their rate of kill is phenomenal. A Holy Shock zealot seems pretty reasonable for this purpose, as it is fairly easy to shop some item of ITD with decent attack speed.

As for what items you really want to blow gambling money on, from the profits of non-item-dependent... how about trying to nail "of life everlasting" on circlet type crowns and amulets? Circ/amu gambles are already potentially very worthwhile, especially if you trade the class specific ones around. Life Everlasting, at up to -25 physical damage, times two (both slots), is a huge boon to nm MF/lousy gear builds.