Anti-Swarming Kung Fu

[Nicodemus Phaulkon]

This stems from a conversation started on the Basin, which promptly degraded due to an overwhelming inability to actually read, it seemed. Let's try it here, instead.

Melee classes are dealing with a single dominant, troublesome situation in 1.10 beta: Swarming. The improved speed and AI of the monsters are combining to have characters activate and be surrounded in the blink of an eye. In Hell, this is by far the deadliest situation that arises from various murderous monster types. Even a character that can handle most situations on Players 8 suddenly finds themselves unable to handle certain Swarms, even on Players 1.

Case in point:



Extra Fast, Cold Enchanted, Mana Burn, Physical Immune Frenzytaur bossgroup... which would have been "fun", except for the fact that our presence ALSO activated a Fanaticism-aura Succubi bossgroup at the same time (from the same place on the map).

These were high level 1.09 imports into the beta. The paladin was a Fanated zealot, with skills akin to Tommi's "Walking Paladin" (having adapted to every D2 patch thus far). So: maxxed Fanaticism, Concentration, Holy Shield and Vengeance... with Conviction sitting at slvl 15 with adders. A typical melee "power build". The amazon was a Strafe/Guided bowazon with a maxxed Valk, optimized Passives and typically low investment into Freezing Arrow.

The little debacle pictured above was found in the Crystalline Passage. The end result was the two of us fighting, retreating, dying and recovering... trying to string out the opponents along the corridor which we had came in. Not pretty... and very difficulty to deal with, since the only true skills we had to deal were mana-gluggers: Freezing Arrow and Vengeance. Considering that a Zon and Paladin can construct one of the most powerful and adaptive offenses in the game, the fact that we two (very much used to each other's gaming style) had such a difficult time with this situation on P1 raises some eyebrows.

So... how would this be best approached? Please don't quote basic strategy movement to me, I've been playing this game sufficiently long to know the benefits of slow advance, diagonal approaches and circulation, when to run and when to stand. My concern is that there doesn't seem to be many viable strategies to offset the difficulty of these "Swarming" situations for melee characters.

The only advice that was offered from the Basin on this topic was "Holy Freeze and Conversion". *looks askance*. I remain unconvinced; my experiences with Conversion in 1.10 do not give me sufficient reason to consider it worthy of point investment, and the changes in Holy Freeze seem to activate more problems than it solves.

Case in Point:



THIS debacle is in the feared Frozen River, one of the deadly "sub-basement" levels of Act 5. Holy Freeze, which I was attempting to utilize as more than a "utility" aura, ended up activating EVERYTHING, despite my careful and slow progress. The screenie above is the result; anyone care to determine how Conversion would benefit THAT situation? :blink:

I refuse to believe that a melee-based paladin (with a bow on the switch, I'm not a complete fool) who has adapted to EVERY PATCH BEFORE THIS, cannot adapt to this one.

Thoughts?

[Brista]

You have to retreat to string them out or if you don't have space you have to accept that sometimes there are fights you simply aren't going to win. Consequently you might have to respawn the map, go a different route, park the monsters, and other such tactics

Consider what would have happened had those monsters been by the way point in the Crystalline Passage, a spot which already had some hardcore notoriety in 1.09 as a dangerous place....

[lemekim]

Well, seeing that in 1.1 patch a lot of items became a "must", such as Cannot be Frozen items, PMH/Poison/OW items, and Faster Run items, I think adding one more type of item to the mix is not too farfetched. At least in this particular situation, you could try using "Chance to cast Amplify Damage", such as Atma's scarab, or even "Chance to cast Decrepify" or even items with such charges on them, since they will erase the physical immunity, and enable you to leech/deal significant damage.

Yes, it will probably require a trip to town to switch into appropriate gear, but I think in the situation depicted in the first picture, if you and valk could tank for just a bit, the amazon could "cast" the amplify damage on a few monsters, which you can use to leech from and tank further, while the amazon keeps shooting strafe and casting more amplify damage, until you reduce monster numbers to something you can handle.

Of course, if in this case amplify damage will not be enough to wipe out the physical immunity, then ignore the whole post.

~lem.

[Rataxes]

I'm sure you've heard this plenty of times already, but I'd like to start out by saying that no v1.09 builds, no matter how powerful or versatile they were, can be expected to be successful in Hell now. That yours has been able to adapt to every single new patch up until now means nothing, since no previous patch really comes close to containing the same amount of balance tweaks, improvements and other additions.

As for crowd control, being able to manipulate the monster AI looks like it will be one of the keys to success in v1.10. I have a Frenzy/Taunt Barbarian in Act 3 NM and I can tell you that there have been dozens of occasions in NM alone where I would've been fried ten times over if it hadn't been for Howl and Taunt. Howl to break them up when I'm getting swarmed, Taunt to to help me to pick off monsters one by one. Taunt in particular has been absolutely vital against most boss packs I've encountered in NM, and they've been plenty, and that is still only NM. I expect my reliance on Taunt and Howl to increase exponentially as I advance through to Hell. Paladins and Amazons don't have such skills though, so your best shot is to look for blinding or howling items. Howling items will allow you to take out the boss on his own since all of his minions will be running away screaming.

Simply getting a wand with charges of any AI-curse you want is of course also an option. I can't think of any simple tactics that will give you better crowd control though, you're going to need the aid of items and/or skills for that.

[Crystalion]

Melee classes are dealing with a single dominant, troublesome situation in 1.10 beta:  Swarming.  The improved speed and AI of the monsters are combining to have characters activate and be surrounded in the blink of an eye.  In Hell, this is by far the deadliest situation that arises from various murderous monster types.

Cool, ain't it? "The Monsters Strike Back; Diablo part V"

Holy Freeze, especially once they allowed everyone to get it on their act 2 nm merc, was just too powerful. While they publicly claim a "no nerf" policy on the patch, I think anyone who studies the changes will agree that quite a few things got *deliberately* nerfed. Having been one of the original Holy Freeze advocates in D2C I am nonetheless pleased to see it now has an active downside (monster activation, LEB spark triggering).

So, more directly to your problem. as a Paladin... while Sanctuary, Holy Freeze and Smite are great monster controls available to the Paladin, the first two don't work vs. all monsters, and the last is a bit slow to control a crowd when you are swarmed.

Since your partner's Valk (AI) is so lackadaisical and Paladin's don't have (non-Hireling) minions I should perhaps mention that this swarm/activation problem is even more common for some other classes with summonables (e.g. I love my Shadow Master, but her nickname is "Looking for Trouble", which is rather opposite to my usual style of play).

So, assuming you can't/won't run away to fight another day, you need to import one of several (easily acquired) abilities for this situation via items. Generally speaking, crowd control on regulars and minions is pretty easy. So the real horror is having Aura bosses next to Champion packs (afaik Champs follow the same default exemption rules as bosses for the various crowd control effects). If your Smite has enough stun duration, then that would be my suggest to control Champs. But for swarms of regulars and minions...

Some candidates:
=============
(switching to/having) knockback/blind or 100%flee with Zeal (at least to get them going) can be very effective
(I don't mention freezes target because, in hell, the duration typically is way too short)
weapon switch to items with charges of Confuse, cast, switch back
weapon switch to items with charges of Dim Vision, cast, switch back
weapon switch to items with charges of Terror, cast, switch back
runeword helm with charges of Cloak of Shadows (naturally followed by isolate/assassinate boss(es))


Misc. notes:
=========
I don't list Attract for the same reason I don't mention Convert: in a swarm situation Confuse is going to be vastly quicker to throw off and be effective. Additionally Attract can not be overridden with another curse, making it potentially a liability.

If Smite carries Blind these days but you have a low Stun duration on Smite then that might "fix" it for crowd control without bumping your Smite skill points/duration.

Another factor to consider, is that with swarms you are more likely to be splitting your damage up, both due to the chaos and as a side effect of monster control. This puts a huge premium on the elimination of monster regeneration through poison (harder these days due to low durations), Open Wounds (better these days due to 8 second duration and much higher damage) and Prevent Monster Heal. If you look at the new uniques and runewords you'll see a lot of OW/PMH--Blizzard is broadcasting a hint there.

Naturally I omitted the exceptional unique grave wand Blackhand Key with charges of Grim Ward because I figured that is a bit hard to acquire (fyi, items with charges of Confuse are very easy to come by in the shops) and also requires that first corpse to get it going.

Also worthy of note is that items with charges of Lifetap and Teleport could sometimes save a melee class a world of grief (Lifetap ignores all the norm/nm/hell difficultly and monster leech nerfs--only physical resist is relevant to the 50% physical damage returned as life). Lifetap is easy to purchase (for weaponswitch) in shop. The new gambling %s make going for a rare Circlet/Coronet and rare Amulet very doable, and (level 48 req.) you can get Teleport there (without having to use a weapon switch to a sorc staff).

I do not know if imbue would allow you to hunt for a weapon switch item with, say, both charges of lifetap and confuse, but that would be pretty handy. Barbs have it "easy" in this regard, as they can weapon switch to a dual wield (daggers/throwing daggers) for dual temporary charges. Of course they already have an arsenal of crowd control skills, so it hardly seems fair, eh? ;)

IMHO, a big being-swarmed win for the Paladin in v1.10 beta is that you can get a huge passive DR boost now with Holy Shield if your build had points to spare for Defiance. Monsters have pretty good AR but not 4xAR cheese anymore, so, as far as I can tell, a max block high DR Paladin ought to be a pretty sturdy tank (for, say, being in the midst of a swarm and smiting them senseless--duration of stun again being key to allow time to get in your primary attacks).

Loved the screenshots. Hope you're having more fun than frustration.

[Ruvanal]

I do not know if imbue would allow you to hunt for a weapon switch item with, say, both charges of lifetap and confuse, but that would be pretty handy. Barbs have it "easy" in this regard, as they can weapon switch to a dual wield (daggers/throwing daggers) for dual temporary charges. Of course they already have an arsenal of crowd control skills, so it hardly seems fair, eh?

All the charged suffixes belong to the same affix group (44). As such you can not have two affixes for charges appearing on the same item. But on the up side you might find charges of Confusion on rings and circlets.

[kandrathe]

Two Ideas;

I'm having some success in NM by equiping my Act 2 Merc with 2 "Hit Causes Monster to Flee" items, Rattlecage and Howltusk. Tough for hell as you would need better equipment, and IIRC, your level needs to be near or exceed the monsters level. Anyway, causing many of the bosses minions fleeing in terror away every few seconds helps to reduce the convergence, but you can still be overcome.

Also, you might need more meat. Add a Necormancer or a Druid to your party, or stoop to use conversion. It has been my experience though that conversion is not optimal unless you have a (very)high chance to hit with every swing. The biggest downside is that Conversion is so much slower than Zeal.

Blizzard has claimed to have reduced the problems with desync, but we shall see. Otherwise, along with Holy Freeze you might also add "Hit Slows Monster" gear. Holy Freeze is not the panecea as it removes your other auras which may be more important to your survival.

One last strategy idea. I team play almost exclusively with a group and for the toughest of boss packs we always employ multiple town portals. Employing one until it gets too mobbed, then reverting to the second placed well away, and if neccesary a third or fourth. If your Amazon knows that one TP is mobbed, she can safely manuever to within two screens and fire blindly toward the portal. My Amazon has two important indicators for distance killing, she wears items that steal life so I know if I hit something (not PI), and she has an item that adds mana per kill. So red swirl, red swirl, etc, until I see a blue swirl. She can employ the portal strategy alone by using WP's. She runs around until she is swarmed, TP's out and then returns safely via a WP to sneak up on those lurking by her TP.

[pbrain]

Some good ideas have been mentioned already and i'd like to stress how usefull having something with Hit Causes Monster to Flee on it is. Either your merc or yourself, this makes it feasible to break up and string out any pack provided you have lots of free space behind you to withdraw into. I know howltusk on my sorcs holy freeze merc has saved her bacon plenty of times. Theres also no substitute for Prevent Monster Heal if you are stringing them out or fighting any kind of hit and run battle. I really hope they cut down regen rates to keep this game from turning into "go PMH or go home".

I hate to say it, but maybe it's not possible for your Paladin to fully thrive in this patch. With aura flashing gone he essentially has 20 "wasted" points in either Concentration or Fanatacism. These would serve you far better in Defiance for the Holy Shield Synergy or in Smite, for a ~5 second stun time (for example). 5 seconds of stun should be plenty for stringing out a pack to deal with one at a time. His maxed Vengeance may be better of with 1 in vengeance, 19 in the resist auras for synergies. Your damage would be slightly less, but your mana troubles would drasticly be reduced. Your build is far from an optimal one for the Beta. I won't shed a tear for any 1.09 character that can't fully cut the mustard in 1.10 Hell. If you could replace his skill points, do you think you could make a more viable 1.10 character?

[Loschonorg]

i've to advise against having 'monster flee' mods. the monster regeneration rate is faster than mak-wai popping out gremlins when touched with water (you saw that movie?).

unless you've poison or 'prevent monster heal' which lasts 100% longer than the fleeing to-and-fro duration.

the gloams definitely need a huge nerf. nothing much to be said about them.

about other 'attacking' monsters, i guess you'll have to resort to having substantial slow-downs by stacking holy freeze, cold items and slow mods. dim vision is always good.

other than those, perhaps blizzard really have succeeded in making v1.10 unplayable unless you get into synergised teams (two isn't enough!).

losc

[WarBlade]

With aura flashing gone he essentially has 20 "wasted" points in either Concentration or Fanatacism. These would serve you far better in Defiance for the Holy Shield Synergy or in Smite, for a ~5 second stun time (for example).

Speaking from 1.10 experience, a Defiance investment is equally worthless. Even actively running the Aura with Holy Shield starts to fail in Hell difficulty. It's not as if there are any points to spare anyway.

No, the only reliable way for a Paladin to deal with a pack like that in Hell level is to run.

[pbrain]

The monster flee is mainly for seperating packs. You need to break the AI somehow to break up boss packs. Keep making them flee while you are fleeing in the opposite direction. When you're down to a size you can handle either switch to another weapon or corner whatever is left so it can't flee (not necessary when it's the boss left ;) ). The goal is to seperate and kill 1 at a time so they can't regenerate. Spreading your damage around then sending the baddies running to momma so they can regen is of course pure folly :D.

Does anyone know how long Prevent Monster Heal lasts? I know it lasts a few minutes at least and stays on even if you run to town.

I also think gloams are kinda silly as is. Ranged attackers in general seem pretty beefed up, especially with their sphere of awareness.

[Ice]

Speaking from 1.10 experience, a Defiance investment is equally worthless. Even actively running the Aura with Holy Shield starts to fail in Hell difficulty. It's not as if there are any points to spare anyway.

Speaking from 1.10 experience, a Defiance investment is certainly worthwhile especially if you already have maxed out holy shield. Coupled with high defence gear, hitting about 10-15% chance to be hit works wonders in hell. Really hard-hitting boss, there's always smite (at any slvl) for the stun.

Against a PIMB pack like that, you could try a switch to meditation aura... works even better if you happen to have prayer maxed. That would solve your mana problems and allow you to continue your zeal/vengence/smite attacks. Your party members would likely thank you for it as well.


For the pack in question, I don't see much problems at all for the times I played with a pally-zon combo... defiant zealot + mageazon though :). The amazon can keep the entire mob quiet with freezing arrow while the paladin can shut up the boss with smite until the rest of the pack goes down. Might be a bigger problem since you're playing with a strafeazon, but meditation should help a lot and depending on the freeze duration and mana pool of the zon, it may still be possible to keep the whole mob under control.

I never liked conversion or flee as a solution. Preference for crowd control would be long duration freeze (like FA), assassin skills (CoS and MB), stun (eg. smite and war cry) and confuse. Most of my characters will have at least one such means of crowd control... except for my defiant zealot who relies on high resists and defence (with healing from meditation/cleansing) to tank most monsters.

Gloams are highly irritating though with cannot be frozen, a very harsh lightning attack and mana drain. Most non-frenzytaur mobs are at least barely tankable but for gloams, I'd just string them out and take them out 2-3 at a time. Too dangerous in huge mobs for me.

[Zath]

Nicodemus:

I cannot understand why you hold such a grude against Conversion and Holy Freeze. I would be hard pressed to ask for a better situation than a pack of PI Frenzytaurs with fanatic Succubi on the side to apply these two skills. The stronger your foes, the better is Conversion. While the large radius of Holy Freeze can activate many monsters at once, nothing is stopping you from taking a few steps back before you turn it on. That encounter in the Frozen Rivers with monsters both in front and behind you suggests that you may wish to pay more attention to your positioning in battle as well. Yes, this is all basic strategy. I suspect you will now reaffirm your expertise and promptly dismiss me, but such is my honest opinion.

[Nicodemus Phaulkon]

That encounter in the Frozen Rivers with monsters both in front and behind you suggests that you may wish to pay more attention to your positioning in battle as well. Yes, this is all basic strategy. I suspect you will now reaffirm your expertise and promptly dismiss me, but such is my honest opinion.

Indeed, I shall. ;)

An astute observation; but I have to reiterate that it wasn't lack of care that activated the mob-scene, it was Holy Freeze. The Gloams in the screenie came from the exact same placement as the Frozies (ie: in front of me, toward the upper left). Holy Freeze had little to no impact on the Gloams who, free to pursue their avenues, promptly surrounded me before I even a chance to disengage the Frozies. This screenshot was one of a half dozen that I took of the situation as it unfolded.

As for dismissing your opinions, I shan't. In fact, I appreciate the multi-faceted suggestions that have been given to my initial post, thus far. In particular, the usage of specific AI-affecting items on the weapon-switch. However, my distrust of Conversion and Holy Freeze is now somewhat FIRMLY ENTRENCHED, *chuckles*. If you truly feel that it could operate effectively in a similar situation, I only ask that you attempt it, and then write a battle report detailing your findings.

Far be it from me to remain adamant that something is unworkable while someone shows the opposite. So... show me. :)

*tips helm*

[Nicodemus Phaulkon]

No, the only reliable way for a Paladin to deal with a pack like that in Hell level is to run.

That's exactly what's chafing me, WB. The fact that a mêlée-build's skill spread seems unadaptable leaves only the equipment to cover the gap. I find that annoying, essentially leaving the paladin (the so-called adaptable one) in the situation similar to a wereform with a Physical Immune: You need the right stick, nothing you HAVE works alone.

At the moment, I'm toying with the possibility of having a Lacerator and Sanctuary paladin shield on the weapon-switch.

The Lacerator giving a missile/mêlée adaptability, along with the HIGH chance of inciting either an Amp Damage curse or a Howling. Amp Damage would (hopefully) provide a option for zealing the PI packs, and Howling would perhaps help thin out the groupings. Of course, this is all assumptive that the correct curse would fire off at the correct time... EVENTUALLY. At the very least, a Fanatic Zealot can whip these suckers around at a pretty good RoF.

The Sanctuary Shield is essentially there for the maintenance of blocking, resists and the ability to cast Slow Missiles. So far, the Slow Missile charges have proven VERY effective when dealing with Succubi packs.

But, once again, reliance on EQUIPMENT instead of skills, and pretty EXPENSIVE equipment at that. NOT what I'd call a "viable" answer.

[Kensan]

I'm currently running my no-twink solo pally through NM at players 5. I stopped yesterday at the Chrys Passage wp.

Up to this point, I am using Smite/Conversion heavily. I generally smite the first 2 critters that approach me to create a nice little wall in front of me. The rest of the pack has to go around these two, and I can smite/convert the first one to get to me. Once you get a convert, the job gets a lot easier because the monster AI will focus on the converts first. I can back off and zeal one-on-one at the edge of the pack. Or I can smite a monster against my former wall in the middle.

Conversion is a fantastic skill now. It takes a lot of pressure of a pally since he doesn't get to cast minions. I've put 7 points into it, and with a +2 combat skill circlet I have a 33% chance to convert. My swing rate is pretty decent since I'm running Fanatacism, and I find there are several times I'll just convert 5-6 relatively quickly and let them help me against a tough boss/champ combo.

For the ranged characters, I find 1 point in Charge does wonders. You can Charge while chilled (I hope this isn't a bug), so you can close the distance to one, smite it, convert it, and Charge to the next. I had 2 spearcat bosses right on top of the Frigid wp, and this worked wonders for me. Get a couple converts, and smite down the bosses.

I had a similar situation as your second screenshot above. After converting a few of the abominables, the encounter was pretty easy. They would stun some of the gloams, while I was busy smiting the boss.

I don't see how people can dismiss the Smite/Conversion combo in 1.10. It works extremely well so far. Granted I'll need to see how effective it is once I get to Hell. But so far, once I started adding stun duration (I'm at 2.8 seconds now) life got a lot easier.

My char is lvl 66, with 5 skill points saved. And I don't really expect to face anything that I can't handle until Lister when I'll have to run around to try and separate the pack.

[Hammerskjold]

Since I don't have any characters high enough yet to reach Hell Act 5 in 1.1. But I do have one lvl 70 Paladin with a lvl 70 rogue merc in Act 1 Hell.

>Melee classes are dealing with a single dominant, troublesome situation in 1.10 beta: Swarming. The improved speed and AI of the monsters are combining to have characters activate and be surrounded in the blink of an eye. In Hell, this is by far the deadliest situation that arises from various murderous monster types. Even a character that can handle most situations on Players 8 suddenly finds themselves unable to handle certain Swarms, even on Players 1.

I got a taste of that new speed in Act 1 Hell, and it definitely is noticeable.

>These were high level 1.09 imports into the beta. The paladin was a Fanated zealot, with skills akin to Tommi's "Walking Paladin" (having adapted to every D2 patch thus far). So: maxxed Fanaticism, Concentration, Holy Shield and Vengeance... with Conviction sitting at slvl 15 with adders. A typical melee "power build". The amazon was a Strafe/Guided bowazon with a maxxed Valk, optimized Passives and typically low investment into Freezing Arrow.



>I refuse to believe that a melee-based paladin (with a bow on the switch, I'm not a complete fool) who has adapted to EVERY PATCH BEFORE THIS, cannot adapt to this one.

>Thoughts?

I have no advice to give since I have little experience with it, but I do have some questions if you don't mind. That paladin of mine is a maxed Sacrifice, maxed Fanaticism, maxed Holy shock, the rest going into Redemption, and one point into Smite. Armed with "Strength" in one tab and a Howling throwing knife on the other. Got lucky and found a Goblin toe from normal Diablo, so I have 50% chance of Crushing blow and 30% of Open wound from "Boneflesh" armor. Merc is armed with a Riphook and a "Lore" helm.

So far I'm making ok progress using Smite, and Sacrifice as a finisher. With the Rogue helping out very well. (Well when she's not swarmed by the new faster monsters anyway.) Not sure if this is new in 1.1, but now Smite can carry Open Wounds along with Crushing blow. This seem to be ok, not spectacular but definitely do-able in Act 1 Hell. Had anyone run into a wall with this method in Act 5 however? Especially with those swarming situation, does this mean any skill with a large activation radius (eg: HFreeze HShock) is pretty much avoided?

[Nicodemus Phaulkon]

don't see how people can dismiss the Smite/Conversion combo in 1.10. It works extremely well so far. Granted I'll need to see how effective it is once I get to Hell. But so far, once I started adding stun duration (I'm at 2.8 seconds now) life got a lot easier.

Excellent. I'd love to hear how it goes as you progress through Hell with that foundation. Putting a +3 Conversion scepter on my Fanatic Zealot (result: Conversion level 12) is not quite a "thorough" tasking of the situation, so your own example would provide better insight. Ditto on the Smite (although my level 12 Smite does indeed carry over my 83% Crushing Blow... which is very fun on Hell Players 8).

I wasn't so much "dismissing" Conversion as looking askance at it. In my own trials it's been dodgy, at best. Sixteen seconds can disappear rather quickly in the heat of battle... and when the battles involve the sheer populations that Hell can afford, that can turn from "fun" to "fugly" in the blink of an eye. I claim to remain "unconvinced".

Convince me. :)

[Nicodemus Phaulkon]

I never liked conversion or flee as a solution. Preference for crowd control would be long duration freeze (like FA), assassin skills (CoS and MB), stun (eg. smite and war cry) and confuse.

Would anyone be able to tell me what the duration (or length of distance one runs when screaming holy terror) that Howl lasts via weapon strikes?

Let's suppose the situation of the "poor man's scare tactic" for a possible paladin Anti-Swarm Kung Fu: A 4 Dol bow. Duration? Distance? Anyone?

[Swarmalicious]

I scoff at the title of this post.

Your kung-fu cannot defeat me.

:D