Duriel was not as generous as Andariel, most of his drops offered rare or even magical items.
Still, Yahiko found Isenhart's Case (only one additional item is missing from the set), Cathan's Seal and Cathan's Mesh.
Yahiko kept trying and was rewarded with 2 unique items: the Centurion (nay) and the Manald Heal ring (yay, it's one of the must-have items for a hardcore run).
Yahiko now reached the 24th level and started the Act III.
Yahiko has got some experience in using the Tornado spell skill. While his Tornado is only of the 3rd level, it's already understandable the skill is very promising - it inflicts physical, not magical damage. It's a bit hard (so far) to target enemies with the Tornado but Yahiko will get used to it.
It will take some time to mentally switch from Assassin's melee playing style to Druid's casting playing style. But this is what makes this run different from Hexxat's story.
Right now, the damage inflicted by the Tornado is сomparable to the weapon damage Yahiko is using, but the Tornado can harm several enemies at a time.
Yahiko went through the jungles and defeated the Council in Travincal.
And you know, Khalim's Will is a very good weapon. It steals 6% health AND 6% mana per hit. So Yahiko will keep this weapon for additional Council visits.
Yahiko reached the 27 lvl. The Council folk were quite stingy. Numerous petitions by Yahiko resulted in Malabrega's Orb (so that future Meph runs will be done with an additional 20% better MF chance), Goreshovel unique axe, and a rare circlet improving Cast Rate and Mana.
Now, uncle Mephisto. Yahiko had to teleport to the town twice but still was victorious.
Man, this game is good at rolling items. This is probably my favourite part of it. Yahiko greatly enjoyed facing Mephisto again, and again.
Unigue gains: - Bverrit Keep (Tower Shield), giving 75(!)% Fire Resist - Chance Guards (Chain Gloves), granting +30% better chance of getting Magic Items (invaluable for all further boss runs) - Griswold's Edge (Broad Sword), having a Knockback effect with Fast Attack Speed - Nokozan Relic (Amulet), giving +10 Maximum Fire Resist - Treads of Cthon (Chain Boots), offering 30% Faster Run/Walk
Set gains: - Sigon's Gate (Gaulents) - Sigon's Wrap (Plated Belt) Two items combined give 30% Increased Attack Speed and 10% Life Stolen per Hit (I remember Hexxat couldn't get the gaulents and missed them on Normal and NM) - Giverb's Icon (Amulet) with Replenish Life *4 and Regenerate Mana 40% - Giverb's Ward (Large Shield)
Rune gains: - Ort
It let Yahiko to create Ancient's Pledge Kite Shield before the Act IV even started.
Below are screenshots of Yahiko (lvl 28) who is ready to go to Hell. 83% average chance to hit, 20% average chance of being hit, 75% Fire and Lightning Resist (Diablo anyone?), 556 Life, +40% IAS, 10% Life stolen per Hit, 7% Mana stolen per Hit, Regenerate Mana 60%, Replenish Life *9, only 20% better MF chance (playing it safe and hoarding +MF equipment for additional boss runs).
Yahiko breezed (pun intended) through the Act IV. For the first time since the start of this run, Yahiko felt like a true Wind druid, spamming Tornadoes and fighting right at the centre of storm. Items from Mephisto proved to be the difference.
Izual
Hephasto
The Hell's Forge gave Yahiko 2 topazes. Now the gothic plate armor granted 40% of MF.
The Chaos Sanctuary was done in several minutes. Tornadoes are scary!
Now, the Lord of Terror himself. The game stuttered a bit during the fight, but it didn't lead to anything scary.
Never before I had a character who could farm the Lord of Terror so easily. After Yahiko reached the 30th level, Hurricane and Grizzly Bear greatly improved his overall performace.
Diablo himself was quite generous.
Unique items: - The Patriarch (Great Sword) - Hawkmail (Scale Mail), which makes you immune to Freeze - Venom Ward (Breast Plate), which gives 90% Poison Resist - Undead Crown (Crown), which offers 5% life stolen per hit attribute - the helmet of Hexxat's companion till the end - Steelclash (Kite Shield), which improves all resistances at +15 - Soulflay (Claymore), which offers 9% mana stolen per hit and 4% life stolen per hit attributes - and Culwen's Point (War Sword), which gives +1 to all skills, +20 IAS and +20% FHR
Yahiko was lucky, of course, to get such good drops, but he teleported to his chest and equipped all available +MF gear (about +140%) each time Diablo reached the "Near Dead" status .
On his way to Baal, Yahiko found the Battlebranch (unique Poleaxe) and Berserker's Hauberr (Splint Mail), so Yahiko managed to collect all 3 parts of the Berserker's Arsenal set on Normal difficulty (the first time I complete the set ever, thanks to the PlugY).
The battle against Baal was the first recording of Yahiko where he looked like a true Wind druid. The fight took only 1:50. At the end of the video I show Yahiko's inventory and stats.
I've made a habit of farming the final act boss each time after completing the act. So, in this case it meant Baal runs (visiting Pindleskin each time). I've decided to farm till getting an actually useful item (like Manald Heal from Duriel and Culwen's Point from Diablo.
One of the next visits to Pindleskin let Yahiko find the Shael rune, quite unexpectedly on Normal. This rune was needed for the Rhyme runeword, known to me from Hexxat's run (gives +25% of MF chance, +25 to all resistances, regenerate mana at +15%, Cannot be Frozen). The new shield was better for farming than Milabrega's Orb (+20 of MF chance). But Yahiko had to find a shield with 2 sockets first, - he managed to do that in Lut Gholein, in the form of the Bone Shield (best of light shields).
So many attempts already and no useful items from Baal...
Then I remembered the Gull dagger (+100% of MF chance) from Zaraki, the barbarian of @O_Bruce . So I included all the act bosses to the farming, along with Coldcrow (an archer from the cave under the Cold Plains from Act I).
Alas, inspite of many efforts, the Gull dagger has been escaping Yahiko.
But Baal finally dropped something useful. Actually, he dropped a very good item, a weapon for Zanarchi, - Woestave (Halberd), which slows, freezes and blinds targets, opens wounds, takes -50 defence off with each hit and also prevent mosters from healing.
Yahiko then kept trying to find the Gull dagger, but instead found the following:
Unique items: - Wizendraw (Long Battle Bow) - Wall of the Eyeless (Bone Shield) - Steelgoad (Voulge) - Lance of Yaggai (Spetum) - Razortine (Trident)
Still Yahiko had no luck with the Gull dagger. I think it's time to start the NM.
The Countess (killed for the first time) dropped Shael and Ort.
Now the fun begins! For Hexxat, NM Andariel provided a lot of useful items. With MF+ gear, Yahiko is expecting better loot than what's seen in the video.
So, Yahiko indeed took his time to visit Andariel.
Unique items: - Langer Briser (Arbalest) - offering 34% better chance of MF. It meant Yahiko switched to the Arbalest for farming. - Rockfleece (Field Plate) - reducing damage by 5 and by 10% - Waterwalk (Sharkskin Boots) - giving +15 to DEX and +46 to Life - Venom Grip (Demonhide Gloves) - leeching 5% life per hit and offering 5% of Crushing Blow - Fleshrender (Barbed Club) - good damage, +1 to all skills, +2 to shapeshifting skills (this part is not useful for Yahiko), 20% of Crushing Blow, - the new weapon for Yahiko - Ginther's Rift (Dimentional Blade) - Yahiko found 2 of them; a prototype of the Lightsaber, being very fast, offering huge Magic damage and reducing Magic damage (one blade reducing it by 7, another - by 12) - the Chieftain (Battle Axe) - this one was not useful, but it was another reminiscence of the Hexxat run - Darkglow (Ring Mail) - +5 to all maximum resistances, - this one is interesting but the armor rating is low - Bloodthief (Brandistock) - a low-level weapon, but it will be added to the collection of Zanarchi's weapons in the chest - Ichorsting (Crossbow) - a low-level weapon - Snakecord (Light Belt) - a low-level belt - Soulfiest Tine (War Fork) - better than Bloodthief but Yahiko will still keep Woestave on Zanarchi because of that halberd's effects
Set Items: - Arcanna's Sign - Milabrega's Diadem - Magnus' Skin - Angelic Halo, - this one is interesting, in the combo with 2 other items from the set, which Yahiko has, the ring offers 50% better chance of MF.
Socketed Items: - Ancient Armor with 4 sockets - different Spirit Masks but without interesting attributes, - Yahiko is looking for a 2-socketed druid helmet to make the Lore runeword (Sol + Ort, Yahiko already has the runes)
Magic Items: - Amulet giving +1 to all skills and +10 to DEX
Yahiko used the Horadric Cube to make Hawkmail (the unique Scail Mail with Cannot Be Frozen attribute) a Tigulated Mail, thus improving its armor rating. Yahiko is planning to use this armor as his main armor for the time being.
Also, Yahiko again created the Ancient's Pledge runeword, this time on a tower shield (which offers better blocking chance).
Waterwalk, Venom Grip, Fleshrender became Yahiko's new main items, while Rockfleece was given to Zanarchi. Combine all that with the improved Hawkmail, - and Yahiko is ready for the Act II, NM.
I ended my previous gaming session with a lightning amazon. She died on the way to on a Baal farming run. It was just my lack of caution, she was mobbed by frenzy taurs. But she was the first character, who could defeat the Guardians with ease. So i restart with a lightning'zon this time too. The concept is to use lightning fury and power strike/charged strike as primary attack and using plague javelin for lightning immunes.
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
The Mysterious Shield Swap
The first chapter went well. Gadget got an acceptable Dark Wood map, where i will farm Treehead Woodfist for some time and visit the two custom shrines for buffing and upping gems.
First superunique (Corpsfire) drop
Blood Raven
A useful grand charm
Drop from Rakanishu
Some gadgets from the stony fields
Griswold end
First greeny
First chipped topaz from the tower cellars
First Countess drops
The Smith
Two large charm
I would like to record boss fights, but i managed only record the sound at Andariel. It still catches the battle lenght, power strike finished Andy quite fast.
Next i rushed to Act II and fetched the Horadric Cube asap. It always makes me calm, when i finally posess it.
After that i went back to cut Treehead tree head hundred times.
It provided some shiny gems and first the death belt, and the death gloves followed that soon. In the meantime Gadget collected some runes for a stealth armor by the Countess.
It's a shame that the set items can't be upped to have an exceptional death belt with four rows of potion. 30 IAS, 8% life steal, +15 to all res. , immune to frozen, and high poison immunity is still OP at this point, so Gadget will use this nonetheless.
With these improvements i went back to the track. Radament
A surprisingly good drop from Coldworm
The bottom of the claw vipers temple:
That kite shield came from the Maggot Lair. I saw it drop, but don't remember to pick it up. I had even searched for it in the bug tunnels, because i'd like to examine it, if it have enough sockets or not. Then it was in my shield slot, the other shield missing. I didn't complained, but levelled to 21 fast and made an Ancient's Pledge.
Yahiko is no longer alone! Good luck to you, grinding pays off greatly in this game and, to me, is the only way to survive on Hardcore.
I use Fraps for recording D2 and then edit it with the Video Editor from Wondershare. Fraps works well for D2 but does make my system slow if I attempt to record the EEs. For BGEE, I saw a recommendation to use OBS (in the LoB thread).
Gadget spent some more time in the Chaos Sanctuary. Besides others the drops there were a Magefist (Not very useful for Gadget) and Iceblink, what went to the merc.
Gadget then went on to the Barbarian villageto follow Baal.
Shenk
A new Stealth armor
After some visits around the first waypoint a Lance of Yaggai for Ilzan
A nice rare ring drop on the way
A useful javelin at the store
Nihlathak
Bladebuckle, a 3os Gothic Plate and Tearhaunch from a further N visits
and a Shael rune too! With one visit at the Countess a Rhyme shield is ready for use
My first ever fervor jewel
A Dol and a Sol
The Ancients
And Baal's end
I tried Fraps, but it ended up with audio only record too, so i recorded the third battle against Baal once more to share something with you.
Gadget continued to visit the throne of Baal after some time her efforts gave her the Sigon belt. Now that Rhyme shield had the freeze immune property Gadget could change her Death set to the Sigon set. The Death gloves and the belt served Gadget well through the normal quests from Act I to Act V.
Walking in the woods in her free time let Gadget to fill in the last empty socket in her magic finding armor.
The visits to Baal made Gadget pockets overflowing with gold, so she spent her money gambling amulets. There were an awful lot of skillers, with one plain amazon amongst them.
There was a nice magical one too with +20 res. all and +84 to life
Next mentionable find was a rare +2 maiden javelin.
Heavenly Garb happened to be Gadget's next armor for guesting
After she finished throning for now, Gadget revisited the coalition camp to open a portal to the cow's greenfields.
The Cow King approved the usefulness of the Deth Gloves too
A quick selfie in the nightmare camp (the minimap trolling in it badly)
Rainkashakishuku (or something) gave Hsaru's boots, it's good, but Gadget had better
and then i found this prescious javelin only problem: it's not rechargeable
Countess
Gadget tried herself in crafting. She managed to make some interesting items, but nothing to change her current gear
One of her first LI opponent
Gadget got such a convenient Catacomb map, that she must buy a new teleportation staff in the near future, to visit aunt Andy (the old teleporting staff was sold to save space).
Tried to gamble a teleporting amulet, without success
An interesting good gamble... just not for Gadget
The teleport staff came after some time (was near the gate fortunately).
Now the grind can begin!
Uniques From Baal: Pierre Tombale Couant Soulflay The Diggler Venom Ward Wizendraw - fires magic arrow and decrease enemy cold res. , was tempted to keep this for secondary attacks Duskdeep(2) Brainhew The Battlebranch Groeshovel Hellplague Heavenly Garb Tancred's Crowbill Fleshrender
Act I Questing: Wormskull Tread's of Cthon
Sets From Baal: Isenhart's Case Cleglaw's Tooth(3) Iratha's Cuff Cathan's Mesh(2) Sigon's Wrap(2) Death's Touch Sigon's Shelter - it didn't add anything interesting to the Sigon set (at least for Gadget) Isenhart's Parry Civerb's Cudgel Civerb's Ward Arctic Horn Death's Hand Arcanna's Flesh Cathan's Seal(2) Whitstan's guard - the lack of resistance made this otherwise nice shield a no choice for me Arctic Binding Vidala's Snare
Act I Questing: Hsaru's Iron Heel Arctic Binding Vidala's Snare Isenhart's Lightbrand Arctic Horn Arcanna's Flesh Cathan's Seal
Other: a nice two socketed +2 combat skill mask for Barbarians
Ok, i gave up to list all the set and unique i found, it's too time consuming for now, maybe i'll do a grailer list in the future.
So here are the mentionable finds from Andariel: Vidala's boots, it has 30% faster run, and i have the amulet too, which has a considerable +50% magic find with the boots.
Goldwrap, if i will find better gloves than the Sigon ones this could be useful, but now it's go into the stash.
Hwanin's justice, it's not much better, than the current weapon of Ilzan, but i changed it because of the big damage.
A Venom Ward, i changed this on Ilzan too, hopefully he will bear better Andy's poisonous attacks with this.
Spellsteel, I changed this for the teleporting stick, Spellsteel has some nice Decrepify charges as a bonus.
A new javelin for my amazon
A large charm with some lightning res boost
Infernostride, another nice pair of boots, it's go to the stash
Nokozon Relic
And Andy's best drop for this series of run, a Kelpie Snare!
I use this opportunity to retire Ilzan and hire Hazade, a new mercenary with the cold aura. A sol rune
A Kuko, but Gadget still not respecs for bows
The Spirit Shroud, +1 skill and cannot be frozen, it goes for Hazade
In the end Gadget went on to questing. Radament
Coldworm (no unique drops this time)
A Io rune in the viper 's temple
And the second floor
The Summoner
And The Tomb of Tal Rasha
Duriel fight (it's Gadget's second fight against nightmarish Duriel, because i still had problems with capturing) https://youtu.be/Tv61ZJ8V8nY
Character sheets for Gadget and Hazade
And a Pul rune from the Spider cavern, just for the giggles
Yahiko has repeated the experience of Gadget Hackwrench and killed Duriel on NM.
For the first kill, Yahiko was equipped with his best items (not MF-improving stuff), so Duriel was dead in less than 20 seconds (a little bit faster than @lolien 's character ). The rest of the video shows the inventory, stats and skills of the druid.
Yahiko has made a dozen of visits to Duriel and Andariel (because why not multiple the chances of getting good items while visiting two, and not one, bosses).
Unique items: - Duskdeep (Full Helm) offering 54 Defence, reducing Damage by 7 and giving +15 to all defences - Blackbog's Sharp (Cinquendeas) aka Poison Necromancer's Choice - Rattlecage (Gothic Plate) providing a 25% chance of Crushing Blow - went to the mercenary (and reminded about Hexxat) - Razorswitch (Io Staff) - Hellplague (Long Sword) - The Salamander (Battle Staff) - Magefist (Light Gaulents) - Silks of the Victor (Ancient Armor) providing +1 to All skills and flavor - unique Ancient Armor, a beauty! Yahiko still kept his Tigulated Mail, Hawkmail, - Cannot be Frozen and +15 to max Cold Resistance are more important than +1 to All skills - Heavenly Garb (Light Plate) - Ripsaw (Flamberge)
Set items: - Telling of Beads from the Disciple set (Amulet) providing +1 to All skills, giving +18% Cold Resistance and +49% Poison Resistance - Rite of Passage from the same set (Demonhide Boots)
Several of these items became new regular items for Yahiko - a new Amulet, a new Full Helm and a new Gothic Plate for Zanarchi.
Time has come for Mephisto!
On the way to him Yahiko found a unique Cudgel, Dark Clun Crusher, which provides +2 to Druid Skills. The weapon is ethereal, though, but now Yahiko is more a caster than a melee fighter anyway.
This demon has outlived Duriel for the mere 2 seconds (the fight took 22 seconds). I'm looking forward to hearing about @lolien 's record here.
Mephisto dropped a unique Partizan with insane (for this stage) damage - Pierre Tombale Couant:
I plan to check if more damage from Zanarchi is better than Woestave in his hands (which slows, freezes and blinds targets, opens wounds, takes -50 defence off with each hit and also prevents mosters from healing). Yahiko's Hurricane and Tornado kill enemies quickly, so maybe the additional attributes of Woestave are not needed, - Mephisto NM runs await!
True to the previous strategy, Yahiko made a dozen of visits to Mephisto and Duriel before continuing into the Act IV. The main aim was to get several new items that would be an improvement to Yahiko's previous equipment.
Unique items: - Spire of Honor (Lance) - very solid damage but a slow weapon - The Spirit Shroud (Ghost Armor) - a nice option, but Hawkmail and Silks of the Victor both provide the same options ("Cannot be Frozen" from Hawkmail and +1 to All Skills from Silks of the Victor) with better defense - Ribcracker (Quarterstaff) - Humongous (Giant Axe) - Blastbark (Long War Bow) - Howltusk (Great Helm) - not bad, but it's for the earlier game stage - Kinemil's Awl (Giant Sword) - Swordback Hold (Spiked Shield) - but who would change a shield with +48 resistances?
At that moment I thought Mephisto and Duriel wouldn't provide anything useful but kept trying, and finally found...
Unique item: - Raven Frost (Ring) - gives Cannot be Frozen, among other things. This ring allowed to try and swap Hawkmail for Silks of the Victor.
Set item: - Sazabi's Mental Shealth (Basinet) - this helmet is hands down the best helmet Yahiko found. Now from all items equipped Yahiko could get as much as +5 to All Skills
Now Yahiko felt he could proceed to the Act IV.
He got the Ko rune from the Hell's Forge.
Here's a fight with Diablo (inventory, skills and stats start at 0:48):
During a bunch of Diablo runs, Yahiko has found a Mal Rune (so he needs only another Ko rune for the Sanctuary runeword, available for a 3-socketed shield).
He also has found a Mesh Belt from the Tal Rasha's set, - finally a new belt and a big improvement on Yahiko's previous belt.
The video of the fight against Baal (my PC lagged a bit, so 2 parts of this fight didn't make it into the video, sorry) is below. Yahiko's inventory, skills and stats all start at 0:30.
Yahiko, lvl 68, will henceforth be known as Conqueror Yahiko.
Now, the fun begins! The task is to survive till the Pit (a Level 85 Area) in the Act I on Hell and then farm there till finding enough good stuff (a 3-socketed Monarch shield would be a good start). This is the way Hexxat found her Hell equipment.
Congrats on the Mal drop Julius! It's a lucky one on Nightmare.
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
"Get me out of this hell-hole!"
Gadget charged through nightmare ActV, till she faced Baal, and conquered the demon.
Sorry, no video from this one
Some further visits to the Throne provided a Helm from the Sazabi set.
Gadget would like to improve her current helm to a Lore one, but this was slightly better.
A visit to Hell camp showed that Gadget has inadequate resistances for Hell.
On the bright side, Hazade in his ethereal Smoke templar coat had not such a problem.
Gadget went back to Nightmare to gear up a bit. Baal was scrimpy with useful drops, so Gadget visited the Nightmare Cows' meadow for a better scenery.Loots were a Manald Heel
an interesting magical amulet
another fervor jewel
Cow King's Hide was not useful, but it's the first item i see from the set
a small charm
In the end, the cows didn't solved Gadget's resistance problem. So Gadget went for the King
and proceed to Hell. She did a Peace armor to try it out
and made some nice amulets for a Paladin
In the end, with changing some clothes Gadget managed to pump those resistances to an acceptable level
The first Hell mini boss, Corpsfire, went down with relative ease.
The lightning immune spearwomens on the Cold Plains were managable too
Blood Raven had no real protection against Gadget.
Now the Crypt was another piece of cake.
The undeads there were all lightning immunes with high poisonand physical immunity too. Gadget could handle them, but she must have been very cautious and progress was very slow.
Stony Field had the LI undead locals too,
but the biggest danger were the LI rangers with their deadly arrows.
They were slightly more fragile than the undeads, but a pack of them could kill Hazade and the 17 level Valkery with scary pace. In the Underground passage came some LI horned demons to the mix
Treehead Woodfist and Griswold went down without much problem however
The Tower Cellars was inhabited with LI ranger packs too, so Gadget cleared it just once.
After defeating Mr. Smith
Gadget tried her chances at the Pit.
The drops were promising, but the LI ranger boss packs there mopped the floor with Hazade and the Valk, and the one visit was expensive, the progress slow.
The Monastery and the Catacombs shared their LI enemies too
Hell can be tricky, @lolien, don't force yourself though it. If you're having troubles with enemies in the Pit, Act IV will be impossible for you. Take your time and do the Pit runs, - but it's only an advice, of course. You need to gather new levels and better equipment for the rest of Hell. This area can provide you any type of an item, inlcuding elite armor and shields.
In the same situation, Yahiko arrived to Hell. Here're his resistances (with equipment focused only on surving, not on any Magic Find chance - only 13% from the belt):
Most of the enemies were OK. But with Physical Immune+Cold Immune+Stone Skin Yahiko encountered a problem - they can't kill him, he can't kill them (Hurricane does Cold Damage, Tornado does Physical Damage). Yahiko will either have to skip such enemies, or buy a necromancer Wand with Amplify Damage or Decrepify. Till then, his unique dimensional blade with magic damage can help.
Akara's reward for saving Deckard Cain was an actually very useful ring:
Finally, Yahiko reached the Pit. Enemy archers were dangerous, yes, but Physical Immune+Cold Immune enemies were rare after the Cold Plains. But still Yahiko (still of the 72nd level) felt the need to get additional levels (for Elite items Yahiko needed STR) and better items.
He was rewarded during the second Pit run. At first, it was a unique Jewel (useless for non-necromancers), but then - a unique Russet (exceptional) armor with +1 to All skills, high Defense (675) and 90% MF chance.
I decided to switch to this armor for the Pit runs - it will make them more effective. Yes, resistances went lower, but still were OK, and in the same time the MF chance reached 134%.
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Still, Yahiko found Isenhart's Case (only one additional item is missing from the set), Cathan's Seal and Cathan's Mesh.
Yahiko kept trying and was rewarded with 2 unique items: the Centurion (nay) and the Manald Heal ring (yay, it's one of the must-have items for a hardcore run).
Yahiko now reached the 24th level and started the Act III.
spellskill. While his Tornado is only of the 3rd level, it's already understandable the skill is very promising - it inflicts physical, not magical damage. It's a bit hard (so far) to target enemies with the Tornado but Yahiko will get used to it.It will take some time to mentally switch from Assassin's melee playing style to Druid's casting playing style. But this is what makes this run different from Hexxat's story.
Right now, the damage inflicted by the Tornado is сomparable to the weapon damage Yahiko is using, but the Tornado can harm several enemies at a time.
Yahiko went through the jungles and defeated the Council in Travincal.
And you know, Khalim's Will is a very good weapon. It steals 6% health AND 6% mana per hit. So Yahiko will keep this weapon for additional Council visits.
Now, uncle Mephisto. Yahiko had to teleport to the town twice but still was victorious.
Unigue gains:
- Bverrit Keep (Tower Shield), giving 75(!)% Fire Resist
- Chance Guards (Chain Gloves), granting +30% better chance of getting Magic Items (invaluable for all further boss runs)
- Griswold's Edge (Broad Sword), having a Knockback effect with Fast Attack Speed
- Nokozan Relic (Amulet), giving +10 Maximum Fire Resist
- Treads of Cthon (Chain Boots), offering 30% Faster Run/Walk
Set gains:
- Sigon's Gate (Gaulents)
- Sigon's Wrap (Plated Belt) Two items combined give 30% Increased Attack Speed and 10% Life Stolen per Hit (I remember Hexxat couldn't get the gaulents and missed them on Normal and NM)
- Giverb's Icon (Amulet) with Replenish Life *4 and Regenerate Mana 40%
- Giverb's Ward (Large Shield)
Rune gains:
- Ort
It let Yahiko to create Ancient's Pledge Kite Shield before the Act IV even started.
Below are screenshots of Yahiko (lvl 28) who is ready to go to Hell. 83% average chance to hit, 20% average chance of being hit, 75% Fire and Lightning Resist (Diablo anyone?), 556 Life, +40% IAS, 10% Life stolen per Hit, 7% Mana stolen per Hit, Regenerate Mana 60%, Replenish Life *9, only 20% better MF chance (playing it safe and hoarding +MF equipment for additional boss runs).
Weapon and Armour now looking much more solid:
Izual
Hephasto
The Hell's Forge gave Yahiko 2 topazes. Now the gothic plate armor granted 40% of MF.
The Chaos Sanctuary was done in several minutes. Tornadoes are scary!
Now, the Lord of Terror himself. The game stuttered a bit during the fight, but it didn't lead to anything scary.
Video is now live at:
BTW, I like how Yahiko "caught" Diablo in the end.
The loot from Diablo was very useful for Zanarhi, Yahiko's companion.
EDIT: hmmm, unless the new patch or the enhanced edition did something
Diablo himself was quite generous.
Unique items:
- The Patriarch (Great Sword)
- Hawkmail (Scale Mail), which makes you immune to Freeze
- Venom Ward (Breast Plate), which gives 90% Poison Resist
- Undead Crown (Crown), which offers 5% life stolen per hit attribute - the helmet of Hexxat's companion till the end
- Steelclash (Kite Shield), which improves all resistances at +15
- Soulflay (Claymore), which offers 9% mana stolen per hit and 4% life stolen per hit attributes
- and Culwen's Point (War Sword), which gives +1 to all skills, +20 IAS and +20% FHR
Set items:
- Iratha's Cuff (Light Gaulents)
- Cathan's Visage (Mask)
Yahiko was lucky, of course, to get such good drops, but he teleported to his chest and equipped all available +MF gear (about +140%) each time Diablo reached the "Near Dead" status .
The battle against Baal was the first recording of Yahiko where he looked like a true Wind druid. The fight took only 1:50. At the end of the video I show Yahiko's inventory and stats.
Yahiko (lvl 37) will be henceforth known as Destroyer Yahiko.
I've made a habit of farming the final act boss each time after completing the act. So, in this case it meant Baal runs (visiting Pindleskin each time). I've decided to farm till getting an actually useful item (like Manald Heal from Duriel and Culwen's Point from Diablo.
Unique items:
- Brainhew (Great Axe)
- the Diggler (Dirk)
- Rakescar (War Axe)
- Blastbark (Long War Bow)
- Bladebone (Double Axe)
Set items:
- Tancred's Crowbill (Military Pick)
- Vidala's Fetlock (Light Plated Boots)
One of the next visits to Pindleskin let Yahiko find the Shael rune, quite unexpectedly on Normal. This rune was needed for the Rhyme runeword, known to me from Hexxat's run (gives +25% of MF chance, +25 to all resistances, regenerate mana at +15%, Cannot be Frozen). The new shield was better for farming than Milabrega's Orb (+20 of MF chance). But Yahiko had to find a shield with 2 sockets first, - he managed to do that in Lut Gholein, in the form of the Bone Shield (best of light shields).
So many attempts already and no useful items from Baal...
Then I remembered the Gull dagger (+100% of MF chance) from Zaraki, the barbarian of @O_Bruce . So I included all the act bosses to the farming, along with Coldcrow (an archer from the cave under the Cold Plains from Act I).
Alas, inspite of many efforts, the Gull dagger has been escaping Yahiko.
But Baal finally dropped something useful. Actually, he dropped a very good item, a weapon for Zanarchi, - Woestave (Halberd), which slows, freezes and blinds targets, opens wounds, takes -50 defence off with each hit and also prevent mosters from healing.
Yahiko then kept trying to find the Gull dagger, but instead found the following:
Unique items:
- Wizendraw (Long Battle Bow)
- Wall of the Eyeless (Bone Shield)
- Steelgoad (Voulge)
- Lance of Yaggai (Spetum)
- Razortine (Trident)
Still Yahiko had no luck with the Gull dagger. I think it's time to start the NM.
@lefreut How's Nagash the Necromancer going?
The Countess (killed for the first time) dropped Shael and Ort.
Now the fun begins! For Hexxat, NM Andariel provided a lot of useful items. With MF+ gear, Yahiko is expecting better loot than what's seen in the video.
Unique items:
- Langer Briser (Arbalest) - offering 34% better chance of MF. It meant Yahiko switched to the Arbalest for farming.
- Rockfleece (Field Plate) - reducing damage by 5 and by 10%
- Waterwalk (Sharkskin Boots) - giving +15 to DEX and +46 to Life
- Venom Grip (Demonhide Gloves) - leeching 5% life per hit and offering 5% of Crushing Blow
- Fleshrender (Barbed Club) - good damage, +1 to all skills, +2 to shapeshifting skills (this part is not useful for Yahiko), 20% of Crushing Blow, - the new weapon for Yahiko
- Ginther's Rift (Dimentional Blade) - Yahiko found 2 of them; a prototype of the Lightsaber, being very fast, offering huge Magic damage and reducing Magic damage (one blade reducing it by 7, another - by 12)
- the Chieftain (Battle Axe) - this one was not useful, but it was another reminiscence of the Hexxat run
- Darkglow (Ring Mail) - +5 to all maximum resistances, - this one is interesting but the armor rating is low
- Bloodthief (Brandistock) - a low-level weapon, but it will be added to the collection of Zanarchi's weapons in the chest
- Ichorsting (Crossbow) - a low-level weapon
- Snakecord (Light Belt) - a low-level belt
- Soulfiest Tine (War Fork) - better than Bloodthief but Yahiko will still keep Woestave on Zanarchi because of that halberd's effects
Set Items:
- Arcanna's Sign
- Milabrega's Diadem
- Magnus' Skin
- Angelic Halo, - this one is interesting, in the combo with 2 other items from the set, which Yahiko has, the ring offers 50% better chance of MF.
Socketed Items:
- Ancient Armor with 4 sockets
- different Spirit Masks but without interesting attributes, - Yahiko is looking for a 2-socketed druid helmet to make the Lore runeword (Sol + Ort, Yahiko already has the runes)
Magic Items:
- Amulet giving +1 to all skills and +10 to DEX
Yahiko used the Horadric Cube to make Hawkmail (the unique Scail Mail with Cannot Be Frozen attribute) a Tigulated Mail, thus improving its armor rating. Yahiko is planning to use this armor as his main armor for the time being.
Also, Yahiko again created the Ancient's Pledge runeword, this time on a tower shield (which offers better blocking chance).
Waterwalk, Venom Grip, Fleshrender became Yahiko's new main items, while Rockfleece was given to Zanarchi. Combine all that with the improved Hawkmail, - and Yahiko is ready for the Act II, NM.
Screenshots (plenty of them):
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
The Mysterious Shield SwapThe first chapter went well. Gadget got an acceptable Dark Wood map, where i will farm Treehead Woodfist for some time and visit the two custom shrines for buffing and upping gems.
First superunique (Corpsfire) drop
Blood Raven
A useful grand charm
Drop from Rakanishu
Some gadgets from the stony fields
Griswold end
First greeny
First chipped topaz from the tower cellars
First Countess drops
The Smith
Two large charm
I would like to record boss fights, but i managed only record the sound at Andariel. It still catches the battle lenght, power strike finished Andy quite fast.
She dropped sexy leather boots:
Over the rainbow
Next i rushed to Act II and fetched the Horadric Cube asap. It always makes me calm, when i finally posess it.
After that i went back to cut Treehead tree head hundred times.
It provided some shiny gems and first the death belt, and the death gloves followed that soon. In the meantime Gadget collected some runes for a stealth armor by the Countess.
It's a shame that the set items can't be upped to have an exceptional death belt with four rows of potion.
30 IAS, 8% life steal, +15 to all res. , immune to frozen, and high poison immunity is still OP at this point, so Gadget will use this nonetheless.
With these improvements i went back to the track.
Radament
A surprisingly good drop from Coldworm
The bottom of the claw vipers temple:
That kite shield came from the Maggot Lair. I saw it drop, but don't remember to pick it up. I had even searched for it in the bug tunnels, because i'd like to examine it, if it have enough sockets or not. Then it was in my shield slot, the other shield missing. I didn't complained, but levelled to 21 fast and made an Ancient's Pledge.
With that The Summoner was not a big obstacle.
And Gadget waited no more to face Duriel
The battle:
Ehm... sorry for the bad quality
Yahiko is no longer alone! Good luck to you, grinding pays off greatly in this game and, to me, is the only way to survive on Hardcore.
I use Fraps for recording D2 and then edit it with the Video Editor from Wondershare. Fraps works well for D2 but does make my system slow if I attempt to record the EEs. For BGEE, I saw a recommendation to use OBS (in the LoB thread).
So try Fraps and OBS, @lolien!
Ouch, @lefreut , it's never bad to create a new character, though
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
And the clearer watermarkAt the first visit by Ormus, Gadget bought a teleporting staff for acceptable price. That would be helpful in the coming areas.
Then she went back to Duriel to collect some experience and possibly some useful gear.
The first ethereal unique, but no use for Gadget.
Gadget visited Darkwood scrupulously in the meantime, of course.
After reaching level 24 Gadget went on to the Jungle
And then she spent some time in Lower Kurast and by Stormtree.
The Council
And Mephisto fight
Gadget was confident enough to continue to Act IV
Izual
Hephasto
And Hellforge with a nice Thul
Gadget pushed foreward without any delay right to the Lord of Terror.
Diablo fight
The Spetum was given to the merc. Not the best, but better than his current one.
The first revisit provided better loot
Unique drops:
Axe of Fechmar
Horror face
Ichorsting
Crushflange
The Centurion
Set drops:
Sigon's gage
Angelic halo
Cleglaw's Pincers
Infernal Sign
Sander's Superstition (2)
Vidala's Snare
Cathan's Seal
The adventure of Gadget Hackwrench
Gadget spent some more time in the Chaos Sanctuary. Besides others the drops there were a Magefist (Not very useful for Gadget) and Iceblink, what went to the merc.
Gadget then went on to the Barbarian villageto follow Baal.
Shenk
A new Stealth armor
After some visits around the first waypoint a Lance of Yaggai for Ilzan
A nice rare ring drop on the way
A useful javelin at the store
Nihlathak
Bladebuckle, a 3os Gothic Plate and Tearhaunch from a further N visits
and a Shael rune too!
With one visit at the Countess a Rhyme shield is ready for use
My first ever fervor jewel
A Dol and a Sol
The Ancients
And Baal's end
I tried Fraps, but it ended up with audio only record too, so i recorded the third battle against Baal once more to share something with you.
Baal fight with some Wave action
Unique drops:
Bonesnap
Rogue's Bow
Iceblink
Lance of Yaggai
Shadowfang
Bladebone
Razortine
Bladebuckle
Goreshovel
Rakescar
Fleshrender
Set drops:
Berserker's Hatchet (2)
Berserker's Headgear
Sigon's Guard
Cleglaw's Claw
Cathan's Visage
Vidala's Barb
Iratha's Coil
Isenhart's Horns
Hsaru's Iron Stay
Angelic Sickle(2)
Berserker's Hauberk
Milabrega's Orb
Tancred's Skull
Cathan's Seal(2)
Arcanna's Flesh
Sigon's Gage
Isenhart's Lightbrand
Infernal Torch
Rite of Passage
Cathan's Sigil
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
Revenge of the Cow King and the troll mini-mapGadget continued to visit the throne of Baal
after some time her efforts gave her the Sigon belt. Now that Rhyme shield had the freeze immune property Gadget could change her Death set to the Sigon set. The Death gloves and the belt served Gadget well through the normal quests from Act I to Act V.
Walking in the woods in her free time let Gadget to fill in the last empty socket in her magic finding armor.
The visits to Baal made Gadget pockets overflowing with gold, so she spent her money gambling amulets. There were an awful lot of skillers, with one plain amazon amongst them.
There was a nice magical one too with +20 res. all and +84 to life
Next mentionable find was a rare +2 maiden javelin.
Heavenly Garb happened to be Gadget's next armor for guesting
After she finished throning for now, Gadget revisited the coalition camp to open a portal to the cow's greenfields.
The Cow King approved the usefulness of the Deth Gloves too
A quick selfie in the nightmare camp (the minimap trolling in it badly)
Rainkashakishuku (or something) gave Hsaru's boots, it's good, but Gadget had better
and then i found this prescious javelin
only problem: it's not rechargeable
Countess
Gadget tried herself in crafting. She managed to make some interesting items, but nothing to change her current gear
One of her first LI opponent
Gadget got such a convenient Catacomb map, that she must buy a new teleportation staff in the near future, to visit aunt Andy (the old teleporting staff was sold to save space).
Andariel fight
Tried to gamble a teleporting amulet, without success
An interesting good gamble... just not for Gadget
The teleport staff came after some time (was near the gate fortunately).
Now the grind can begin!
From Baal:
Pierre Tombale Couant
Soulflay
The Diggler
Venom Ward
Wizendraw - fires magic arrow and decrease enemy cold res. , was tempted to keep this for secondary attacks
Duskdeep(2)
Brainhew
The Battlebranch
Groeshovel
Hellplague
Heavenly Garb
Tancred's Crowbill
Fleshrender
Act I Questing:
Wormskull
Tread's of Cthon
Sets
From Baal:
Isenhart's Case
Cleglaw's Tooth(3)
Iratha's Cuff
Cathan's Mesh(2)
Sigon's Wrap(2)
Death's Touch
Sigon's Shelter - it didn't add anything interesting to the Sigon set (at least for Gadget)
Isenhart's Parry
Civerb's Cudgel
Civerb's Ward
Arctic Horn
Death's Hand
Arcanna's Flesh
Cathan's Seal(2)
Whitstan's guard - the lack of resistance made this otherwise nice shield a no choice for me
Arctic Binding
Vidala's Snare
Act I Questing:
Hsaru's Iron Heel
Arctic Binding
Vidala's Snare
Isenhart's Lightbrand
Arctic Horn
Arcanna's Flesh
Cathan's Seal
Other:
a nice two socketed +2 combat skill mask for Barbarians
an assasin skiller amulet
Whoa, I know of sumo wrestlers with more staying power...
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
Pulling forward in nightmareOk, i gave up to list all the set and unique i found, it's too time consuming for now, maybe i'll do a grailer list in the future.
So here are the mentionable finds from Andariel:
Vidala's boots, it has 30% faster run, and i have the amulet too, which has a considerable +50% magic find with the boots.
Goldwrap, if i will find better gloves than the Sigon ones this could be useful, but now it's go into the stash.
Hwanin's justice, it's not much better, than the current weapon of Ilzan, but i changed it because of the big damage.
A Venom Ward, i changed this on Ilzan too, hopefully he will bear better Andy's poisonous attacks with this.
Spellsteel, I changed this for the teleporting stick, Spellsteel has some nice Decrepify charges as a bonus.
A new javelin for my amazon
A large charm with some lightning res boost
Infernostride, another nice pair of boots, it's go to the stash
Nokozon Relic
And Andy's best drop for this series of run, a Kelpie Snare!
I use this opportunity to retire Ilzan and hire Hazade, a new mercenary with the cold aura.
A sol rune
A Kuko, but Gadget still not respecs for bows
The Spirit Shroud, +1 skill and cannot be frozen, it goes for Hazade
In the end Gadget went on to questing.
Radament
Coldworm (no unique drops this time)
A Io rune in the viper 's temple
And the second floor
The Summoner
And The Tomb of Tal Rasha
Duriel fight (it's Gadget's second fight against nightmarish Duriel, because i still had problems with capturing)
Character sheets for Gadget and Hazade
And a Pul rune from the Spider cavern, just for the giggles
Hopefully I will find some time for Yahiko soon.
For the first kill, Yahiko was equipped with his best items (not MF-improving stuff), so Duriel was dead in less than 20 seconds (a little bit faster than @lolien 's character
Unique items:
- Duskdeep (Full Helm) offering 54 Defence, reducing Damage by 7 and giving +15 to all defences
- Blackbog's Sharp (Cinquendeas) aka Poison Necromancer's Choice
- Rattlecage (Gothic Plate) providing a 25% chance of Crushing Blow - went to the mercenary (and reminded about Hexxat)
- Razorswitch (Io Staff)
- Hellplague (Long Sword)
- The Salamander (Battle Staff)
- Magefist (Light Gaulents)
- Silks of the Victor (Ancient Armor) providing +1 to All skills and flavor - unique Ancient Armor, a beauty! Yahiko still kept his Tigulated Mail, Hawkmail, - Cannot be Frozen and +15 to max Cold Resistance are more important than +1 to All skills
- Heavenly Garb (Light Plate)
- Ripsaw (Flamberge)
Set items:
- Telling of Beads from the Disciple set (Amulet) providing +1 to All skills, giving +18% Cold Resistance and +49% Poison Resistance
- Rite of Passage from the same set (Demonhide Boots)
Several of these items became new regular items for Yahiko - a new Amulet, a new Full Helm and a new Gothic Plate for Zanarchi.
Time has come for Mephisto!
On the way to him Yahiko found a unique Cudgel, Dark Clun Crusher, which provides +2 to Druid Skills. The weapon is ethereal, though, but now Yahiko is more a caster than a melee fighter anyway.
This demon has outlived Duriel for the mere 2 seconds (the fight took 22 seconds). I'm looking forward to hearing about @lolien 's record here.
Mephisto dropped a unique Partizan with insane (for this stage) damage - Pierre Tombale Couant:
I plan to check if more damage from Zanarchi is better than Woestave in his hands (which slows, freezes and blinds targets, opens wounds, takes -50 defence off with each hit and also prevents mosters from healing). Yahiko's Hurricane and Tornado kill enemies quickly, so maybe the additional attributes of Woestave are not needed, - Mephisto NM runs await!
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
Missing MephistoSadly I can't compete with Yahiko's Mephisto battle, because i missed to capture the fight.
Anyway, here's a fight against Diablo on Nightmare for future reference:
Unique items:
- Spire of Honor (Lance) - very solid damage but a slow weapon
- The Spirit Shroud (Ghost Armor) - a nice option, but Hawkmail and Silks of the Victor both provide the same options ("Cannot be Frozen" from Hawkmail and +1 to All Skills from Silks of the Victor) with better defense
- Ribcracker (Quarterstaff)
- Humongous (Giant Axe)
- Blastbark (Long War Bow)
- Howltusk (Great Helm) - not bad, but it's for the earlier game stage
- Kinemil's Awl (Giant Sword)
- Swordback Hold (Spiked Shield) - but who would change a shield with +48 resistances?
At that moment I thought Mephisto and Duriel wouldn't provide anything useful but kept trying, and finally found...
Unique item:
- Raven Frost (Ring) - gives Cannot be Frozen, among other things. This ring allowed to try and swap Hawkmail for Silks of the Victor.
Set item:
- Sazabi's Mental Shealth (Basinet) - this helmet is hands down the best helmet Yahiko found. Now from all items equipped Yahiko could get as much as +5 to All Skills
Now Yahiko felt he could proceed to the Act IV.
He got the Ko rune from the Hell's Forge.
Here's a fight with Diablo (inventory, skills and stats start at 0:48):
Impressive, @lolien - it took Gadget only half a minute to finish off Diablo. Yahiko spent 20 seconds more there (as you'll see from the video above).
He also has found a Mesh Belt from the Tal Rasha's set, - finally a new belt and a big improvement on Yahiko's previous belt.
The video of the fight against Baal (my PC lagged a bit, so 2 parts of this fight didn't make it into the video, sorry) is below. Yahiko's inventory, skills and stats all start at 0:30.
Yahiko, lvl 68, will henceforth be known as Conqueror Yahiko.
Now, the fun begins! The task is to survive till the Pit (a Level 85 Area) in the Act I on Hell and then farm there till finding enough good stuff (a 3-socketed Monarch shield would be a good start). This is the way Hexxat found her Hell equipment.
The Adventures of Gadget Hackwrench
"Get me out of this hell-hole!"Gadget charged through nightmare ActV, till she faced Baal, and conquered the demon.
Some further visits to the Throne provided a Helm from the Sazabi set.
Gadget would like to improve her current helm to a Lore one, but this was slightly better.
A visit to Hell camp showed that Gadget has inadequate resistances for Hell.
On the bright side, Hazade in his ethereal Smoke templar coat had not such a problem.
Gadget went back to Nightmare to gear up a bit. Baal was scrimpy with useful drops, so Gadget visited the Nightmare Cows' meadow for a better scenery.Loots were a Manald Heel
an interesting magical amulet
another fervor jewel
Cow King's Hide was not useful, but it's the first item i see from the set
a small charm
In the end, the cows didn't solved Gadget's resistance problem. So Gadget went for the King
and proceed to Hell. She did a Peace armor to try it out
and made some nice amulets for a Paladin
In the end, with changing some clothes Gadget managed to pump those resistances to an acceptable level
The first Hell mini boss, Corpsfire, went down with relative ease.
The lightning immune spearwomens on the Cold Plains were managable too
Blood Raven had no real protection against Gadget.
Now the Crypt was another piece of cake.
Stony Field had the LI undead locals too,
but the biggest danger were the LI rangers with their deadly arrows.
They were slightly more fragile than the undeads, but a pack of them could kill Hazade and the 17 level Valkery with scary pace.
In the Underground passage came some LI horned demons to the mix
Treehead Woodfist and Griswold went down without much problem however
The Tower Cellars was inhabited with LI ranger packs too, so Gadget cleared it just once.
After defeating Mr. Smith
Gadget tried her chances at the Pit.
The drops were promising, but the LI ranger boss packs there mopped the floor with Hazade and the Valk, and the one visit was expensive, the progress slow.
The Monastery and the Catacombs shared their LI enemies too
But Gadget pushed through, till she reached Andariel
In the same situation, Yahiko arrived to Hell. Here're his resistances (with equipment focused only on surving, not on any Magic Find chance - only 13% from the belt):
Most of the enemies were OK. But with Physical Immune+Cold Immune+Stone Skin Yahiko encountered a problem - they can't kill him, he can't kill them (Hurricane does Cold Damage, Tornado does Physical Damage). Yahiko will either have to skip such enemies, or buy a necromancer Wand with Amplify Damage or Decrepify. Till then, his unique dimensional blade with magic damage can help.
Akara's reward for saving Deckard Cain was an actually very useful ring:
Finally, Yahiko reached the Pit. Enemy archers were dangerous, yes, but Physical Immune+Cold Immune enemies were rare after the Cold Plains. But still Yahiko (still of the 72nd level) felt the need to get additional levels (for Elite items Yahiko needed STR) and better items.
He was rewarded during the second Pit run. At first, it was a unique Jewel (useless for non-necromancers), but then - a unique Russet (exceptional) armor with +1 to All skills, high Defense (675) and 90% MF chance.
I decided to switch to this armor for the Pit runs - it will make them more effective. Yes, resistances went lower, but still were OK, and in the same time the MF chance reached 134%.