D2 trivia generation for "quiz"

[Crystalion]

I'm planning on giving away some stuff to folks over at AB from my unneeded v1.10 uswest sc ladder wealth (e.g. prizes: 64 pgems; runes for HotO; runes for Delirium; misc. +skill GCs; a sample PDR/thorns themed generic rush kit; etc.).

To have some fun and determine who gets goodies I thought I'd come up with a few "contests" in-game and some trivia questions (for the lesser prizes--so secrecy isn't a huge issue).

I figured I'd start a trivia thread here, since some of my trivia question ideas clearly need review or discussion and probably some folk here will come up with some neat questions too.

My thought is to list each question as a reply to this original post and then have the answer in reply and discussion in reply to either. But feel free to post however makes sense to you.

As more questions get posted I'll come back and edit this post to include all the "polished" questions right here--so if you don't wish to delve into the discussion and spoilers you can check back here later.

....

to be edited

edit #1: Contest thread over at AB (my second post has contest ideas)

[Crystalion]

Trivia question:
A player bets you that if you join him in nightmare he'll summon a minion that you won't be able to summon a minion (not a revive) that can beat it or even harm it (PvP minion duel, no direct participation by the players).

You ask him if it is unbeatable and he replies that even a level one character could defeat it in battle (supposing that a level 1 were allowed to hostile--they aren't).

What is his minion and why is it hard to defeat? What are the details of a level one character could defeat it. How will you summon a minion that defeats the arrogant bastard anyway?

[Crystalion]

A player bets you that if you join him in nightmare he'll summon a minion that you won't be able to summon a minion (not a revive) that can beat it or even harm it (PvP minion duel, no direct participation by the players).

You ask him if it is unbeatable and he replies that even a level one character could defeat it in battle (supposing that a level 1 were allowed to hostile--they aren't).

What is his minion and why is it hard to defeat? What are the details of a level one character could defeat it. How will you summon a minion that defeats the arrogant bastard anyway?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia above...

The big clue is "nightmare". If he summons (item granted skill) a druid sage (e.g. Oak Sage) and he is a Paladin with Salvation active he'll end up with a quint-immune minion (immune physical, poison, fire, lightning, cold)... this is rather hard to harm! AFAIK only magic damage and Open Wounds will do the trick (and the OW only if, afaik, accompanying/applied by a successful attack damaging the sage by magic).

Since minions don't come with magic damage attacks by default (revives were excluded) and, afaik, a Valk or Shadow can't roll a rnd affix granting magic damage, our only out seems to be to summon an Iron Golem from something that grants magic damage.

Clearly the trivia question could be (and will be) worded differently. One could, e.g., stipulate that the "unbeatable" minion won't even attack (this could be accomplished arbitrarily for a minion by asymetric aka faux PvP)

If a level 1 Necro could (be allowed to) hostile the Sage, he could use a wand of charges of slvl 10 teeth to deliver damage fast enough to kill it (the alternate of zon and magic arrow isn't really practical). clvl 1 is stipulated so that you can't come up with a v1.10 way to use PMH or OW (so that Magic Arrow would be successful, e.g.).

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: A player character is at full health and not taking any damage. He drinks a healing potion and comments "ah, that did the trick!"... what trick? (i.e. why is he not crazy).

[lfd]

What is his minion and why is it hard to defeat?

Hydra? ;-) bit of a sneaky definition of minion, mind.

What are the details of a level one character could defeat it.

Any that stands out of the radius of the hydra until it "dies", unlike a hireling/minion that'll just stand around and take the punishment?

How will you summon a minion that defeats the arrogant bastard anyway?

Fire Golem?

Edit: Ah, you're answering your own questions... didn't think I was right as I wasn't paying any attention to the 'Nightmare' part of the question ;-)

[Crystalion]

A player character is at full health and not taking any damage. He drinks a healing potion and comments "ah, that did the trick!"... what trick? (i.e. why is he not crazy).

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia above...

The player has just (instantly) healed his Blood Golem (to the extent of the particular healing potion).

[Crystalion]

Hydra? ;-) bit of a sneaky definition of minion, mind.

Excellent answer! This is why I'm RFCing here. Clearly the trivia question needs to stipulate that he will summon a mobile minion (or some such). Thanks.

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: a new character has completed normal difficulty... what is the minimum number of areas other than towns that they had to visit?

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: a new character has completed normal difficulty... what is the minimum number of areas other than towns that they had to visit?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia above...

One. Ala Ruvanal et al one may just sit on one's behind in town, partied, and get all the act completion credits. However, in order to enter Act 4 one must actually travel through the Meph red portal... therefore one must visit Durance of Hate level 3.

[electricblue]

Hydra? ;-) bit of a sneaky definition of minion, mind.
Any that stands out of the radius of the hydra until it "dies", unlike a hireling/minion that'll just stand around and take the punishment?
Fire Golem?

Edit: Ah, you're answering your own questions... didn't think I was right as I wasn't paying any attention to the 'Nightmare' part of the question ;-)
[right][snapback]67650[/snapback][/right]

hydra wouldn't be the answer I think, one could summon a huge life minion, and after some time hydra would just dissapear, which can be counted as a defeat.

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: a Necromancer raises an army and returns to town... he is aghast when, mere seconds later, his army falls to dust, littering the town streets. He asks Anya what happened, but she doesn't seem to have anything useful to say. What did happen?

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: a Necromancer raises an army and returns to town... he is aghast when, mere seconds later, his army falls to dust, littering the town streets. He asks Anya what happened, but she doesn't seem to have anything useful to say. What did happen?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia above...

The Necro was too clever for his own good... he went through Anya's red portal to "the zombie garden" and Revived the zombie corpses already lying there. Those are effectively booby-trapped however, in that their "come back from the dead" timer will trigger soon thereafter, resulting in the premature (and marginally mysterious) death of the Revive.

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: you buy a couple items from a shop, mess with them a little, and then sell it back to the shop at a profit! What did you do?

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: you buy a couple items from a shop, mess with them a little, and then sell it back to the shop at a profit! What did you do?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia ...

While you can occasionally gamble an item and sell it back for more than you paid for it this question is about buying/messing/selling back: you transformed the goods bought in the Horadric Cube.

Note that I need to reword the question to avoid the case where someone has sold gems to the shop and I use them to socket something and make a profit! (Or perhaps this should be one of the trivia answers, since it is an interesting case).

An example of a Horadric Cube transform that makes a profit (no Edge bow or Gheed's charm needed): buy a cheap simple spear from Charsi and some arrows then combine to Javelins in your cube and sell back.

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: what minion(s) can be quad-immune at summoning? (i.e. before some external aura, like Fade or Salvation etc.)

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: what minion(s) can be quad-immune at summoning? (i.e. before some external aura, like Fade or Salvation etc.)

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia above...

This one is a bit tricky (and I'm not sure myself!).

If we look at quad-immune = immune to poison/fireghtning/cold (because the Sages will not be immune to more than phys/poison at summoning) then clearly:

Iron Golems by Necros (easy: make up the diff. to 100% from Summon Resist)

Iron Golems by non-Necros (use a Paladin shield with native resist, socketed with additional resist for a net of 100% or more)

Valks (high enough level for native resist plus lucky resists on their rnd equipment roll--when I tested this tonight I got a quad-immune Valk, slvl 20, on about my six attempt)

Shadow Masters (ditto)

Shadow Warrior--this is the questionable one, as SW don't get as good equipment randomly as SM do, so I rather doubt quad immunity is possible (RFC, natch). Obviously, however, a SW can become quad-immune post summoning via Fade.

One might argue that Ravens are immune, because it is very hard to kill them (ways to kill them might be a good trivia question--feel free to comment).

The Decoy, Vines, Sages, Revives, Skelies, Wolves, Bears all seem to me to be stuck, at summoning, with less than quad immunity (indeed Salvation only "fixes" the fireghtning/cold, so unless they're immune to poison or magic or physical they're stuck, afaik).

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: Diablo does not reward failure! When all three bosses are dead and the final seal is opened, all of the monsters in the Chaos Sanctuary die--or do they? In this case Diablo has so P.O.ed that some of his servants didn't commit suicide that he killed them personally... what happened?

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: Diablo does not reward failure! When all three bosses are dead and the final seal is opened, all of the monsters in the Chaos Sanctuary die--or do they? In this case Diablo has so P.O.ed that some of his servants didn't commit suicide that he killed them personally... what happened?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia ...

Some of the monsters were Converted (Paladin skill Conversion or Assassin/item-proc skill Mind Blast). Judging by how long Diablo took to kill the foul betrayers I'd say he wasn't getting the act boss vs. player minions bonus damage multiplier either.

Conversion is a known problem in Baal's Throne room (can mess up his minion batch spawning logic). I would not be surprised if Conversion could perform tricks in the Den of Evil as well (if so, one has to wonder if eight Paladins with good Conversion % might be able to get the Den herded and simultaneously handslap convert all the heathen?).

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: How much mana/kill can one socket? When one notices that Tir runes grant +2 mana/kill no matter where you socket them (weapon/armor/shield) one might get greedy and wonder just how far can you go? (ignore strength requirement issues and assume maximum possible sockets). What is the total +mana/kill that can be achieved?

[Crystalion]

Trivia Question: How much mana/kill can one socket? When one notices that Tir runes grant +2 mana/kill no matter where you socket them (weapon/armor/shield) one might get greedy and wonder just how far can you go? (ignore strength requirement issues and assume maximum possible sockets). What is the total +mana/kill that can be achieved?

Warning: this is answer/discussion of the trivia ...

Well, we have, for sockets:
6 weapon
4 torso
3 helm
4 shield
======
17 sockets

The question ignores +mana/kill other than socketing, but is nonetheless a trick question!... Jewels can have +3 mana/kill (perfect Aureolin)! So the answer I'm looking for is: +51 mana/kill. :)