INTRODUCTION

As you may know, I have already undertaken an attempt to complete the game at the lowest possible clvl with the fewest deaths, unassisted. Spedara, a sorceress, is halfway through Nightmare at clvl 20, with two deaths so far.

However, it occurred to me that clvl 18 (and teleport) isn't necessarily the lowest possible way to make it through unassisted (without endless deaths). For death is the great experience reducer, allowing one to die on purpose to suppress character level. Even if you don't die on purpose, a few accidental deaths can just about ensure a complete halt to progress once you enter nightmare.

Well, there is no experience penalty for death in Normal. So it occurred to me to wonder just how low the game could be completed unassisted through Normal only, and in how few deaths. Thus, Hermes was born.

Hermes was the name of the Greek messenger god, the god of speed. Winged boots were his signature item.

I conceived a barbarian and named him Hermes. Hermes would attempt to complete Normal at as low a clvl as possible, COMPLETING ALL QUESTS, without any assistance or interaction with others.

The barbarian seems best equipped for the job because of the Leap skill. At clvl 6 (and slvl 1) Leap is just too short range, but at slvl 3 it starts to blossom. What would I do with the rest of my points?

The best weapon to target seemed to be a war scepter. I wouldn't rise to high enough level to get one of peircing, but I might still do better than that than with a flail or morningstar. I could put all my meager points to strength and vitality, none to dex. Dex wouldn't help much anyway, seeing as at low level, I would have an automatic miss rate above 50% even if I had a piercing scepter (thanks to clvl vs mlvl penalties). Better to get some hit points (no way could I boost life with items, since mammoth, colossus, even tiger suffixes require clvls 15+). More stamina would help out with all the running I'd be doing, also.

Swords were another possibility. Broad swords could be used with 48 strength, no dex requirement. A shield seemed to be a must, not only for blocking, but also to get some extra affixes into play, such as reduced magic damage or whatnot. The anti-twink level requirements on items would shut Hermes out of many possibilities, restricting him to the weakest magical items. Luckily, fastest hit recovery is ilvl 6, so I could get plenty of that. Boots would be restricted to Fast Run only, unless I landed a unique (Gorefoot or Treads).

Uniques. Those were the only options for getting strong equipment. I could go for the unique sabre and get piercing. I kept that in the back of my mind, but I would need 25 dex, and it would still require cash for gambling -- about as much as it would take to get Nightsmoke. As for gloves, I could get forty life and bonus damage on Bloodfist, or I could get 20 mana (hey that would more than double my natural total, don't laugh) and some weak leeching and poison resistance from Hand of Broc. Nightsmoke on belt would give me 20 mana and some resists, plus mana recovery from taking damage. I already mentioned boots. On helm, I might get Biggins Bonnet if I wanted it, but more likely I would need that slot for fastest hit recovery. For shield I had no idea: maybe a bone shield, if a good one dropped. Otherwise, whatever I could find. For armor, the clear winner would be Twitchthroe: SIAS, more blocking, and a whopping +10 to both Strength and Dexterity. That right there, if I could land it, might shave a level or two off the needed total all by itself.

There are two problems with gambling, though. First is the cost. I would level up to clvl 4 or 5 at first, then shift into the mode from there on out of avoiding every fight the game would let me bypass. When you aren't killing things, you aren't earning much gold. You can still collect gold and items from chests, urns, baskets, stashes, and so forth, but that sort of effort doesn't rake in much cash. You have to work quite a bit to earn gold that way. Thus, saying I want an item is one thing, earning enough gold to gamble it is another. Secondly, there is the matter of availability. At low clvls, the gambling merchants will only offer you low end junk to gamble on, no matter how far you go into the game. It's not just the magical affixes that remain low. The base items do, too, at least for gambling. I can gamble on as many bucklers, daggers, clubs, and sashes as I please, but getting a shot at a heavy boots would be rare. I'm not even sure at what point I might have a crack at chain boots (for Treads) much less Studded Armor (for Twitch), nor how long it would take to land them once I got the chance. So I would be trying mainly to get Hand of Broc and Nightsmoke.

The items available in shops would be restricted, too. The base items would not, but the affixes would be. If I could make it to act four by clvl 9, or maybe even clvl 8, I'd be looking at shops full of crimson great helms, glowing crowns, lizard's plate mail of the fox, belts of stability, and if I was really lucky, some sharp or fine weapons with slightly boosted damage. Item drops from critters and chests would cease to be usable, as they would not be tied to my clvl, and the affixes would prevent me from employing those items. I would have to buy or gamble just about everything I would use... or hold on to rares that dropped early in the game. Perhaps an uberdrop would help, if I landed a unique I couldn't otherwise gamble, but I'd be foolish to rely on that happening.

So my skills... one point into Bash, to get a knockback attack and some AR/Damage boost, one point into Mace Mastery, one to Howl for prereq only, and one into Taunt. I expected, sooner or later, to have to Taunt monsters to lure them out of one area and into another, then park them, so I could tackle mandatory fights like the High Council in Travincal without having to clear out the whole city first. I would save points, in case I had to level up all the way to clvl 12, where I would invest in Stun and Increased Stamina. Or... I might decide to go for that unique sabre, to get piercing, and thus I would need to save a point for Sword Mastery just in case. All else would go to Leap. The more Leap power, the better.

So it begins.

THE EASY PART

Act One was the easy part. Because Hermes is completing all quests, he had to clear the Den of Evil and by the time he did that, he was nearly clvl 4. My point in Mace Mastery, plus a spiked club, meant Hermes could smack down just about anything in one hit. I knew this wouldn't last long, so I tried to enjoy it. Blood Raven was slain at clvl 4. I ran past a lot of fights. Without Leap on hand, I had to kill much of what opposed me in the Underground passage, and there were some rather hairy moments as I got mobbed by large crowds I had tried to ignore. I had to corner myself and wipe out an entire mob at one point, drinking a whole lot of red. So Hermes was clvl 5 by the time he got to the Dark Wood.

In the picture below, you can see that Hermes made a quick run to the gold chest on the lower level of the UGP.

At this point I had 36 Strength, 39 Vitality, and over 100 life. Not too bad. I also had a very nice rare small shield drop along the way: +10 blocking, -1 MD and -1Dmg, and three other minor affixes. That gave me blocking of 40%.

I ran to the tree, grabbed the scroll, talked to Akara, then ran to the Stones to activate them. Rakanishu and crew were not happy with me, but I ignored them.

I ran to free Cain, then ran to grab Wirt's gold, then got out of there. Quest completed. Akara handed me a Glowing ring, +2 Light Radius. I'd rather have had -1 Magic Damage, but oh well. Quest completed.

Since I still did not have Leap, I was forced to fight at times in the Forgotten Tower. By the time I reached the Countess, Hermes was clvl 6.

From there, not much fighting was required. I got to the Malus with only another thousand experience or so gained. Of course, I couldn't touch the Malus (you have to be clvl 8) but I got there. Now that I had Leap, even the pathetic little hop you get at slvl 1, I could get myself out of almost any jam, at least for the moment.

Now so far I've accomplished nothing special. Hundreds if not thousands of players have done imbue mules at clvl 8, running running running past everything to get to that Malus ASAP. Most imbue mules now actually play through Normal into Nightmare (albeit often with massive assistance) but back before people realized that imbue results were tied to clvl, there were many Malus runs done at very low level.

So that's been done before. From here on out, though, I have no idea if this has been done or not, or whether it's been done to this extent, untwinked and unassisted. No matter. I am enjoying the game.

On to Andariel, and with Leap still pathetically short, I had to do more fighting. I did not have enough mana to hop-hop-hop through everything like Peter Cottontail. Also, I had to clear out Cats level 4 to make room to fight Andariel, and since I was not yet into the Penalty (mlvls not too high for me yet -- there is a brutal experience penalty for killing things of higher level than you, while you are still below clvl 25. From clvl 25 on, the penalty becomes more reasonable, shaving off a fraction instead of decimating your reward) I was raking in the experience in a big way, just by killing Dark Ones, Afflicted, and Ghouls.

Andariel proved fairly tough as I was missing automatically almost half the time, thanks to clvl vs mlvl penalty. My clvl at 7, her mlvl 12, meant 5/12ths of the time, I missed automatically. The other 7/12ths I had a chance to get a hit, but with 20 dex, my odds still weren't that great, even with one point in mace mastery. I nailed her in the end, though.

Act One completed at clvl 7.

In Act Two, I took the back door into the sewers and found the stairs right away, then ran through level two without bothering with the waypoint. On level three, I had to portal park two mobs (and run back down through level two again), then I had to fight everything over by Radament to clear a safe fighting zone. I did not use any Taunt yet, and for some unknown reason, I was not yet into the Penalty, even though by all rights (and the math as I understand it) I should have been. Very strange.

So I leveled up in spite of myself. Now at clvl 8, I took on the bug ugly and laid him low.

I read the book and saved up the skill point, giving me two in reserve now. You can also see that I have increased my strength to 46. I bought a full helm of stability and a belt of stability, giving me two stacked fastest recovery items. I was still wearing a rare quilted armor I had found in act one, that gave +2 each to life and mana, and +1 Light. I had a Fine broadsword of Leech in storage now, but I needed 48 strength to use it. So I was still using a magic spiked club from act one.

On out to the desert now, where I ran past everything. Sometimes I'd get such a large mob of speedy leapers on my tail, I'd have to seek out terrain obstacles and Leap over them, to leave the mob in the dust.

I made a run down through the Stony Tomb to grab the treasures there, such as they were. I also tried to hit as many urns and chests and Greiz merc corpses out in the desert as I could safely manage. Yep, already in gold gathering mode. I had already tried for Broc a couple times, to no avail.

In the Dry Hills I spotted a Poison Shrine. I had a very large mob on my tail, mostly speedy cats. Well, why not, I figured. So I hit the shrine and let it poison as many as possible. It may have nabbed as many as two dozen. Imagine my shock and amusement when they started dropped dead by the handful, and MY EXPERIENCE BAR SHOT UP A FIFTH OF A LEVEL IN THREE SECONDS!

Bwahaha! I could not stop laughing. Nearly got killed because I could not contain myself. Watching that experience bar shoot up in large chunks on its own, so rapidly... that was quite a moment. I hadn't even been sure you get credited experience for those shrines. Well, now I know!

Running through the Halls of the Dead was quite a lively exercise. Leap gave me awesome control, but there were limits on my mana, plus you CAN get hit while Leaping. Leaping away from an enemy who is already swinging at you is NOT like Tempting Fate. You get HIT. Ouch. Fortunately, no new attacks can be launched against you, or so it seems. Unfortunately, you can't drink while in midair. Must be careful.

Hermes has a cube. Now what? Well, I'd love to cube myself a coral ring, but I have only one topaz chip. I also have two sapphire chips and a normal skull, from Andariel. No sense cubing full rejuvs. Those gems might be better used in a weapon, at some point. Well, at least I have more storage space now.

On to the Maggot Lair. I braved the mass of bugs several times, to make pit stops at rooms with chests, trying to get some loot. Other times I had to skip such rooms. My plan for Coldworm? Jump in there in a big hurry, grab the staff, and bail.

Well, it didn't work out that way at all. Yikes. A maggot was sitting on the chest and this stupid game would NOT let me click the chest no matter what I did. I was getting beat up the whole time and eventually I had to leap out of there without the staff.

Hermes returned to town to restock healing potions and to buy a few poison gas potions from Lysander. Those are expensive, though, so I threw some into the room, but I used my weapon to bash individual bugs out in the hall as they swarmed out of there. I must have spent ten minutes on this fight before I had enough room cleared to try leaping in again.

This time I had a potion in hand for that maggot on the chest, and he ate poison, then some bashing, then I finally got the staff and got the heck out of there.

No big deal running and leaping through the lost city, where most everything is slow. Running and leaping past vipers had its down side, but there were no crisis moments and I got to the Altar without having to kill a single opponent. I immediately wore that amulet, gaining ten life and mana (a very big deal to a clvl 8 character, mind you) and some poison resistance. The mana is what the biggest difference, providing a 50% boost in my magic resources.

Hermes ran through the Palace with no trouble at all. That's like the one place in the game where designers seemed to expect you to ignore everything and just run through there. The stairs are so easy to reach, and are never guarded at either end. On the up side, no stairs traps, though.

So ends the Easy Part. No deaths so far. Next up, time to get down to business.

- Sirian

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