Part Two: Strength Training
Ember continues in Nightmare Act One at clvl 27 with the following skills, stats and equipment:
Firebolt @ max (+3 from staff)
Warmth @ 11
Str 10, Dex 25, Vit 100, Nrg 80
Rare Heavy Gloves - +12 Fire and Lit Resist, Half Freeze, -25% Poison Dur, +1 Life - gambled Act 3 Normal
Amber Light Belt of Tiger: +32 Lightning Resist, +28 Life - bought from Gheed in NM
Boots: Faster Run, Fastest Recovery, +14 Lit Resist, +11 Life, +7 Stamina - gambled Act 2 Normal
Gemmed Battle Staff: +3 Firebolt, +2 Frozen Armor (unused), w/ flawless ruby and diamond, normal amethyst
Ring: -2 Damage, +35 Cold Resist - flesh spawner boss, Outer Steppes in Normal
Ring: +29 Poison Resist, -1 damage, +1 Light, Half Freeze, +2 mana, +79 AR - Duriel in Normal
Ruby Amulet: +45 Fire Resist, +12 Dex - beetle boss in the Disused Fane in Normal
Amber Quilted Armor of Simplicity: +33 Lightning Resist, -40% Requirements - gambled Act 4 Normal
Tangerince Cap of the Colossus: +14 Lightning Resist +42 Life - bought from Charsi in NM
In stash: Greyform, Lennymo, Broc, Hotspur, Snakecord, and a gemmed battle staff with +3 Blaze (for use on Duriel ONLY, if Ember survives through Act Two). Also some spare jewelry starting to accumulate: amulet of Defiance, ammy +29 Cold Res +13 Dex, ammy +18 Life, ring +43 Fire Resistance, ring +29 Poison Resist and Regenerate Life +3. Also more than twenty full rejuvs, most of them being carried in main inventory.
After the latest crash, Ember had lost all her spare potions and an armor she was waiting to upgrade her strength to wear. She was close to leveling but not quite there. Time to begin again collecting spare potions as possible, or... if really necessary, to buy some. That did not turn out to be necessary.
I redid the Moor and the Den (now referred to as the Cave). I redid the Cold Plains and leveled up somewhere in there. Ember underwent an absolutely grueling workout regimen at the hands of that tyrant Kashya and finally managed to increase her strength to a mighty rating of twelve. Whew. She cursed out that evil Kashya for torturing her so mercilessly, took her sore muscles to Akara for some medicinal relief, then pulled her Greyform out of stash and sold the other armor. Her shoulder pads went from polished brass to dull gray, but the improvement in protection was worth the sacrifice in fashion even if it was dreadfully drab. :)
Ember faced down Raven again, and Rak, skipped Bishi but decided to clean out the Mausoleum this time around. What the Hell. There turned out to be no teleporting Fire Enchanteds down there so it was fairly routine. In fact, some of the barrels hurt more than most of the undead.
I even revisited the UGP and rekilled the archer champs. Probably not the wisest move, but the risk was low and Ember was feeling bold. Or maybe that was just me. :)
The UGP was enough of a chore, though, to convince me not to bother a third time. In fact, Ember wouldn't bother with anything earlier than Dark Woods ever again. I carried her through the woods (full cleared, including the Mana Burn Treefist) and the Marsh (a spectral hit, mana burn Brute boss there again) and ventured for the first time into the Tamoe Highland. Experience here was on the rise and I was pleased with my gains considering I didn't have to kill twenty thousand fallen shaman as I did back in the Cold Plains. The area was cleared faster and on top of that, more experience per kill. Yes, the Dark Woods to Outer Cloister run seemed just the ticket for some strength training of a different sort: leveling up a bit.
I arrived at the Cloister to find it jam-packed end to end with Razor Spines. Good grief, those things really sting in large numbers when you aren't packing a shield and have no minions.
That one nest required the drinking of more healings than you need to know about. :)
Throw in some devil kin packs, with shamen offscreen resurrecting some annoying warriors who kept pestering me while I tried to kill the porcupines and this was a real mess. In laggy conditions this would actually have qualified as an extreme threat! Amazing.
I ended off after reaching the waypoint and clearing the Outer Cloister.
The next several days' worth of sessions involved repetition: Dark Woods, deal with the carver champ and minion mob to the east, clean up the two carver camps to the north along the west wall, circle down around to the east along the north side to the stone wall area, slaying carvers, rogues, two-spike porkies, or skeleton archers, then press on into the Marsh, where I'd inevitably meet the Spectral Hit Mana Burn brute boss, and half the time there was a carver shaman champ 4-pack with carver minions just behind them. Then it was goats, brutes, rogue archers, returned meleers, blood hawks and nests, or more carver packs. I'd sometimes skip some of the fights if the area was heavy on carver packs, but oddly enough I usually could not ignore the carver champs. Something about them must have annoyed Ember or brought out her competitive side, pitting her firebolt against theirs. Then on to the Highland, where I always had to fight a Thorny beast champ pack (or sometimes it was a boss pack) in the middle of the front area, then two carver camps in the east and lots of open space with a well in the northwest. This area was the best for gaining experience. Then I'd do the cloister unless there were too many razor spines. Dang those porkies!
More than once I considered forcing a new map just to get some variety into this routine, but I never did. I did get bored enough, however, to forego my "wait until clvl 30" pledge to attempt the Malus quest. In the game in which I leveled Ember to 29 (and topped out her Warmth at slvl 13) I decided to push on into the Barracks "just to see what's in there". Heh.
Well, open the door and immediately there is a Bone archer champ pack. Yikes! Let me tell you they stung, too. I lured them out one by one to the cloister door and faced them down there, both sides firing nonstop, then drink a red or two and do it again. Kill some devil kin and shamen, then on into the dark recesses, where some windings led me to that square room with the armor rack and chest where there is always a champ pack stationed (it's part of the room specs, in programming terms). And yep, you guessed it, another champ 4-pack of Bone archers! Good grief. :)
I had to get creative here to deal with them:
On the other side of that small partition, there are three champs. I had already lured one out and slain it, elsewhere in the room. Now I had to separate this group and they were being stubborn. I did manage to get one to peek out just enough that I could shoot past the corner and hit it on the edge (I could not target it, I had to shoot at a spot on the floor that caused the firebolt to take the desired flight path) and in effect got a free kill there. The last two I had to coax along for over two minutes before I got one to stand out around the corner. I faced him down and then the last one.
Press ahead a little farther and what do you know? An archer boss pack! Umm... yay?
That Spectral plus Lightning really hurt, and when I took a poison hit it really sapped the life out of Ember with her negative resistance. I killed a minion, then another but it was too much work. I left them and moved on to see what else I might find in the other direction. Well I found another boss pack, this time goats and they were quite sturdy, let me tell you. The boss I lured out to the Cloister, to a TP in a far corner of a side cloister where I intended to park the bastard, then I changed my mind and fought him.
The Holy Shock stung more than the sparks. He dropped a crappy item, but I felt better for finishing him off.
I then found the stairs to the Jail (past that archer boss pack actually, but the boss had wandered a bit and I killed all the minions without him there, then moved on). I decided, while I was there, to hop down to the jail and try to get the waypoint on level one. Night Clan took a good eight shots I think, and it took five or six to kill wraiths. I was NOT getting full experience for them either (I needed one more clvl, thus my original plan to wait until 30). 29/35, that's less than 83% value. -shrug- It was going to happen sooner or later that I'd stop getting full experience. Some more sandbagging would delay it and improve the per-monster experience curve but that would start to diminish once I stopped "leveling" and went back to direct progress anyway.
What I really wanted was the Fire Mastery. Less work and thus less threat for Ember.
I came across another of those spots in the Barracks/Jail where, if it rolls up a certain room, there is always a champ pack there. This time caged rats... er, Dark Ones.
"Oh lookie at the cute zoo animals! Can I feed them? Can I pet them?? Do you mind if I incinerate them???"
I had already found the stairs, they were easy to reach. I kept looking for the waypoint, though, and room by room by room, Ember cleared Jail level one. There was a wraith champ pack, and also plenty of bone mages (fire shooters, Ember showed them how it's REALLY done!) then when I got near the end of the level, still no waypoint and there's a tough goat boss. Yikes. He and his crew ran Ember all over the kingdom and it was a good thing she had plenty of cleared room to run or this might have been a bail situation.
Well just beyond where the goat boss was stationed, in the very last corner of the level, the waypoint. Not good. Not good AT ALL. If I had to go through that boss just to get out of the waypoint, well, let's just say that wasn't an option. So here I am faced with a useless waypoint, unless I reroll the map. There would be no getting past that boss from the waypoint side, or at least not without a life and death fight I didn't care to deal with. What should I do? Well, nothing for it. Press on to the next waypoint or else have to go through the Barracks again next game. NO THANKS!
Down to level two... and more mages, more wraiths, a few more goats. No archers! Yay! I only had to clear about 40% of the level to find the stairs, and down to level three... oops. Archers, lightning-shooting mages, and lots and lots of goats. Level three was pressed me hard but Ember managed. Again, we found the stairs out of there with less than half the level cleared and we moved on. In the inner cloister there was Flamespike to deal with. I dealt with him mostly from as long a distance as possible. I lined Ember up and shot blindly at multiple angles across the cloister, then moved a bit and shot some more. I killed five of six minions with such offscreen shots and cut into the Crawler's life about one third. Got the last minion from on screen, then some happy feet and some healing potions and he bit the dust. Secured the waypoint and went back for the smith.
Oops, wait. There's still that LEB archer in the Barracks. Well, screw it. Let's get it on, you bag of bones!
Ooh, good thing, too. He dropped an amulet of Colussus +49 life. I sold the one with +18. I might only ever use that ammy vs Duriel (if then) but I was glad to have it.
The Smith, I would just park. Why bother with him? I lured him out to the Cloister, to the same spot I was going to park that LEB goat, and suddenly Ember is hit once again with the need to kick some ass. Don't ask me to explain it, it's stupid from an efficiency standpoint, but I did it anyway.
Pick up the Malus and we're done for the day. A good day's work it was, too.
Time for some more leveling. No matter how bored I might get, I was going to stick the schedule this time. Not moving on to Andi until clvl 32 and three levels of Fire Mastery.
So back to the Dark wood, those carver champs and camps, the Mana Burn brutes and the Thorn Beast champs/bosses in the highland, the archers and rogues and carvers galore, more carvers and then more yet, some Black Rogues and Yetis in the cloister, repeat repeat repeat.
Here's a shot of Ember in the Marsh, playing pied piper to all the children of a carver camp.
Yes indeed, lure them away from their fathers then spank them well and spank them hard. Bad little boys!
More runs from Woods to Cloister. I think I'll be seeing that SH-MB Brute boss in my sleep for the next two years. Nice and safe and boring. Lots of gambles, lots of time spent looking at merchandise. Oh, by the way, I had long since given up trying to upgrade Ember's staff. Why? Well, because level one skills are NOT available from merchants any longer. Level six and up is all they offer now. Why? Not sure. Sucks for Ember, but good for most everyone else who's looking for stronger skills. So Ember will using that gemmed red battle staff to the end of her days. I did keep looking for a better Blaze staff (IE, one with fast/fastest cast) but my heart wasn't in that and I didnt check faithfully. That was an item I'd use for one fight only, assuming I even got Ember that far. And the one I already had would get the job done.
I got a nearly perfect blue gloves from Gheed: +18 Fire Resist, +29 Life. Yes, sad as that is, that is almost as good as it can get on gloves for Ember, barring a rare. She could theoretically get 19 resistance. Heh. Well, Magefist would have been WONDERFUL but Ember could never wear those. Oh well.
I also hit on three rares: two caps and one light belt. All three have fastest hit recovery. The belt has 25ish cold resist and something teens for Lit Resist, plus 19 life and some extra mana I don't need. One cap has +53 Life, along with it's fastest recovery, plus some bonus Light Radius (not to be scoffed at!) and some slight poison resist and something else? I forget. The other cap has 49 Lit resist, 20ish cold resist, +6 Life, and some Dex boost I think. Anyway, I switched to the cap with the high health and stashed the other one, also stashed the belt as my Lit Resist a bit low at the moment just to add in some more cold res and a third instance of Fastest recovery. I had plans for that belt for sure, but only for certain areas.
The rogues in the Highland gathered to celebrate my imminent arrival at clvl 30:
We played "Pin the Tail on the Sorcie" and "Pinata" and Ember won those games. :)
Ahh... the much anticipated arrival of Fire Mastery!
Ah yes, six extra points of damage! Yay! The impact was immediately noticeable. Several monster types got downgraded from a "this" to a "that" with the difference being one less shot required for a kill. Hey don't laugh! That was big news to Ember!
Now back to your regularly scheduled reruns of the DW-OC program.
At clvl 31, I noticed a strange event. Ember could control the weather! By stepping from HERE to THERE she could make it stop raining, then make it rain again, then make it stop, etc. I must have toyed with this for several minutes. Hey, it was more exciting than leveling up, I've got to tell you! Seriously, too! :)
This thrilling adventure ran its course and the excitement faded away, leaving me with the grim reality that Ember still had hundreds of thousands of experience points to earn to reach her goal. Would someone please be kind enough to wake me up when she gets there? Thanks.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
"Are we there yet?" "Are we there yet?"
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Oh look, it's that Spectral Hit Mana Burn boss again! Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Finally, came the day when Ember knew she had just one more rep to do. One more time through the grind would put her over the top and allow me to move on with the desired offensive capability.
And dangit, the last time through, and for once that Brute boss wasn't there! Can you BELIEVE this, I actually missed him! I was sorry he wasn't there to see me off and it was sad not to get to say goodbye. I know that's kooky, but there you have it.
And now that all the repetitious leveling was over for now (it would honestly not have been much less boring in multiplayer. The maps would be a little different, but not enough different to relieve the sameness) it was time to get back to PLAYING. So here we go...
Into the Cathedral, and there's a Dark shaman boss pack. Had to kill the boss first so that got a little lively with all the resurrections going on or all the bodies chasing me. Down to the Cats and level one gave me a kindly draw: namely, no nasty boss right out of the gate. Once there was room to work, Ember could lure away Dark Ones or Tempt Fate with Rat Men, or shoot spitters and get them into ranged mode to lighten the heat. I cleared most of level one before I found the stairs.
Down to level two, and uh oh, things are pretty tight.
I had spiders to deal with immediately, then resurrecting dark ones (had to press into the next room to kill the shaman, and it was a little dicey). Then wake up a tough spider boss and there's little room to work! On the up side, didn't have to go far at all to find the stairs (screw the waypoint, I'm getting out of here!)
I only had to clear a third of level three to find the stairs. Along the way I fought a ghoul boss and some speedy little vampires. For some reason the vampires in Act One always seem more troublesome than the ones in Act two. Maybe their AI is different without firewall as an attack? Hard to say. Could just be a matter of perception (and the frequency of boss/champ packs in the Cats vs the Arcane and Tombs).
Andariel I expected to be routine, but I failed to pick up all the clutter on the floor and this nearly cost Ember dearly. You know, I think the MOST annoying bug in the game is the one in which your character fails to MOVE if you accidentally point to some item on the floor or clickable feature like a chest or stash. You just stand there like a dope and the game does nothing. It doesn't happen every single time either, but I swear out loud every time it happens. When I point and click, I expect the character to MOVE. When it doesn't, it can be dangerous, even fatal in certain situations of dire peril. I bet more than one character has been slain by a one-hit kill from Hephasto over the months, when they tried to move and accidentally pointed to some object and then just stood there and got raped. It only takes a moment!
Well Ember's fight with Andariel was far livelier than it had any right to be because I took three brutal hits and some poisonings to go with them, because of this bug. I cannot express my frustration with it. I'm sure it makes things even worse on Realms, too, adding to desynch and the death rate. When you click an item, your character is supposed to walk (or run) over to it and pick it up or try to. Maybe it's a pathing bug, and the char just does nothing if the game doesn't see an immediate path to the clicked item. More likely it's just a hole in the code. It's certainly NOT intended and it happens to me all the damn time. I will go as far as to move junk out of the way or cart it all back to town even if its worthless, in certain situations, so as to make sure I don't fall victim. In Andariel's room I usually carry all the junk to the corners and dump it out of the way. I didn't do that here and Ember suffered a little for my inattention. Luckily, Andariel is not of those one shot kill opponents (and Duriel's chamber has no items or clickable features). You darn well better clean up the area around Diablo's pentagram though!
Ember will see you in Act Two.
- Sirian
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