Prologue
Symphony is a little novice sorceress happily adventuring with her first cantrip, just like any other sorceress. But unlike her elder sisters, who aspire to be masters of firewall or frozen orb or some such super-draining spell, Symphony has much more worthwhile goals. (And no, it has nothing to do with the fact that she just somehow seems to lack the aptitude to learn those "higher-level" spells. Her Zann Esu Recruiter sighs in exasperation, "I just don’t understand. She was so well attuned to the elements when she was twelve. Where did I go wrong?").
Symphony dreams of becoming a balanced ice-lightning sorceress, capable of shooting fatal projectiles while raining mass destruction down upon her hapless foes. And she dreams of reaching the big 40, when she’ll finally, completely master her ice and lightning spells (and she is going to do that without wasting any skill points.) In conclusion, she is going to specialise in Icebolts (for one-on-one bouts) and Charged Bolts (for crowd control). She also dreams of finding the UberStaff (Fastest Cast Rate, +3 Icebolt, +3 Charged Bolt). She is very much a dreamer.
Symphony will evenly distribute her naturally acquired (through levelling) skill points in her two main spells, with priority to Charged Bolts. Award skill points from quests will be allocated to Warmth, Cold Mastery and Lightning Mastery. (Note: one of the reward skill points will have to be counted as a naturally acquired skill point for levelling from level 0 to level 1 if she is going to max her spells at 40.)
Sadly, no matter how many motivational videos she watches, Symphony hates pumping muscles, so her strength will only increase by a factor of 1 for every 2 cycles until she reaches 30. After that she is going to fire her fitness trainer (for putting her through such torturous exercises) because (with a hefty strength of 25) she’ll have more strength than she’ll ever need in her life and concentrate on her other attributes.
Oh, and after the horrific tales of Sanctuary her sisters tell her, Symphony decides that she will make an exception in her adventures. She will use a staff that will impart the ability to create Static Fields in her stand against Duriel. Being in a big ugly pit with a big ugly bug is not her idea of a dream date, especially as the hideous insectoid has these really mean charge-one-shot-kill-attacks that could put a serious crimp in her dream to reach duchess-hood. She will otherwise stay away from that nasty spell though it puts some serious frizz in her hair.
Chapter 1
It’s another clear and beautiful day in the Rogue Encampment and another sorceress begins her career. Symphony is her name and this is her story.
Act1 Normal
Symphony bravely marches out to Blood Moor with nothing but a stick that grants her fire bolts. Yes, evil beware, for Symphony is going to wreak some havoc.
Symphony starts out with the same problem that every sorceress has: mana. Mana amount and its lack of regeneration truly limit the number of orange balls she can cast before resorting to that absolutely common act of melee (*she shudders in disgust of the word*). But she does what she has to and quickly completes Akara’s quest. She decides it would be beneficial to invest one point of warmth this early on.
Symphony forages across the Cold Plains for experience and treasures. While there, she stumbles upon Bishibosh and his little red crew. The others are no problem, but Bishibosh... with all her spells being so ineffective and mana intensive right now, she’s gonna have to melee! Ewww!
*Symphony’s Discovery Moment: Symphony notices that she is a major gem magnet. At level 3, she already has 3 gem chips.
Symphony dreads facing Blood Raven. Well, c’mon, don’t all young sorceresses hate that demoness? A fast ranged attacker, with all that extra fire damage, and the kind of undead summoning that would make necromancers jealous... yeesh, enough to make her blood run cold. Ok, time to stock up on potions; and maybe practice a little on Coldcrow in the Cave?
What a rush! Symphony dealt with Coldcrow and boy was it easy! With a little fancy footwork, she used only one minor health potion! Now Blood Raven, on the other hand...
Symphony had lots of good intentions to go kill Blood Raven immediately, but she chickened out and decided to make a little side trip to the Crypt first. Hey, she was gonna go there anyhow, it was just a matter of when. Besides, Symphony didn’t think she had enough potions stocked. And she hadn’t found any nice armour yet (i.e. a quilted armour that isn’t damaged, cracked, crude or low quality).
Well, was Symphony ever glad she explored the Crypt first! Upon his untimely demise, Bonebreaker bequeathed an almost uberstaff (+5 Life, +1 Charged Bolts, +1 Icebolt, +3 Warmth) upon her. Now properly equipped and stocked with tomato juice, it was time to face the music! (No puns intended.)
Symphony charges head on into the graveyard and clashes with the former rogue captain. Crackle, crackle, crackle: shoot those charged bolts into the swarm. All dead? Negative, ma’am, Blood Raven is still hovering at the edge of the screen, reanimating dead matter. Okay, give her a few shards of ice. Uh-oh, newly recruited undead swarm approaching, switch to charged bolts again... and so the cycle goes. Repeat as necessary.
"Ouch, this hurts! I’ve already guzzled 5 minor healing potions and 2 minor mana potions like some boorish barbarian and that ***** is still so ******* healthy! Why isn’t she dead yet?"
Finally, after a lot of dodging, running, chasing, spell casting, potion drinking, cursing, and even some occasional melee-ing, the witch goes down. Is Symphony perhaps making a too big of a production about Blood Raven? Maybe, but she really hates that corrupt rogue, especially at this early and vulnerable stage of her life, so leave her alone.
Symphony goes and gets her new mercenary from Akara; it’s a little fire archer named Paige. Symphony hates getting mercenaries because she always feels guilty when they eventually die, as if she failed to protect them or something. And she hates having to worry about Paige’s health as well as her own when they get swarmed by baddies. Oh well, at least Paige will be good company. Symphony gets a little lonely sometimes questing all by herself.
And on a totally unrelated tangent, boy, is Symphony ever jealous! See, Paige is wearing a skullcap, and Symphony loves skullcaps. Symphony wants to wear one, too! But, she is a little too weak for that right now... boohoo!
Onward with the journey! Symphony warns Paige about Rakanishu, a horrible merc killer, and advises Paige to stay away from him. Paige doesn’t believe her... and barely gets away alive. Symphony is getting the impression that Paige is not too bright!
Symphony and Paige explores the twists and winds of the Underground Passage, finally emerging in the middle of the Dark Wood. Yay! Daylight! Okay, one nanosec for rejoicing over; now quickly kill all those incoming monsters! As the dynamic duo clear the Dark Wood, soon enough they hear the heavy panting of the Super Brutes. "They sound like such perverts, panting after us!" Symphony exclaims to Paige as she shoots out some scouting charged bolts. Symphony sees the three stooges and switches to ice bolts to slow them down for Paige.
Symphony cannot believe this! Woodfist must bear some really huge grudge against rogues! She doesn’t know what AI Woodfist is running on but from the moment he charges onto the screen, and the first character he sees should have been Symphony, he passes her and starts pounding on poor little Paige. In desperation, Symphony offers herself as sacrifice, something she never did before, standing right next to the big oaf and whacking him with her staff. And he ignores her again! The bastard does not even give her time to open a town portal when she realizes Paige is in major trouble. One hit and about slightly under half of Paige’s HP disappears!
Symphony laments over Paige’s passing away... *wipe tears* "C’mon Woodie! At least give me a second to grieve before resuming the fight!"
Well, life goes on and Symphony forges forward in her quest; she still has to free good old Deckard Cain. She is not going to hire another rogue, though. She doesn’t want the death of another one on her conscience, even if Kashya doesn’t seem to mind. And she doesn’t want another not-too-bright merc slowing her down.
Symphony knows that Tristram won’t be a happy place: too little room to manoeuvre and too many bosses and champions and things. Still, she expects something slightly less crowded than a teleporting goat boss, a multishot skeleton archer boss, two champion carver shamans (shamen?), tons of supporting minions and non-minions as well as Griswald after five steps into the cesspool!
Ok, room rapidly disappearing as more monsters join the fray, and none of them appear to be dying any time soon. The multishot archer and his inconsiderate minions are especially vile, making Symphony gulp the red stuff way too fast... panicking, panicking, RUN! Symphony dashes madly through Tristram, making sure she has a big following behind her. Yes, Symphony likes mobs chasing after her; it makes her feel popular... When Symphony finally reaches Wirt’s body, she opens a town portal, steps through and collapses. Her stamina bar is empty.
"Must *pant, pant* breathe *pant, pant*..."
Mmmm, Symphony is having a tight moment in Act 1 Normal. She wonders how she will ever get through later, in the harder world of Nightmare! Oh well, only time will tell. Now that she has divided the mess into two, she ventures into Tristram again. The two bosses and some others welcome her return at the gate, but this time she can deal with it. After clearing that, she turns her attention to the remainder half around the town portal. "I don’t think your new look suits you, Griswald, it makes you look sort of lifeless!"
Once that problem is taken care of, she finally frees Cain and clears the rest of Tristram. She finds that there are only a few stragglers, i.e. the other two shaman champs and carvers, left. Mmmm, *pensive expression on her face*, Symphony has a sinking suspicion that the entire monster population was somehow generated at near the entrance just for her.
Symphony rescued Cain; cheers and wine! Akara conveys deep gratitude to Symphony for the brave deed and awards her with... drum rolls... a ring of health! Isn’t it wonderful? Well, Symphony likes the rings she already has better (a ring of lizard and a ring of jackal), so she conveys her deep gratitude for the ring to Akara by selling it back. It’s on to the next quest.
Side note: look, look, a hallmark moment for Symphony. She levelled after Tristram and now finally has enough strength to wear a skullcap! She must find one now!
Symphony attempts to strike gold in the Tower Cellar. Thankfully, the Tower Cellar is very cooperative, populated with only goat and ghost bosses on every level. Good experience plus no archer boss equals happy Symphony. In fact, Symphony is so happy she decides to explore the Hole, too. Unfortunately, it’s getting late, so Symphony rushes through the Tomoe Highlands to the Monastery Waypoint and calls it a day. Stay tuned for the next episode!
Symphony starts her new episode at the Monastery. She is suppose to explore Tomoe Highlands and the Pit before the Monastery but... since she’s here, might as well.
The last barrel there dropped Pelta Lunata for Symphony. How annoying! She drools over the +10 Life and +10 Mana... metaphorically speaking of course, Symphony is an elegant lady and elegant ladies don’t drool. But, oh so sad! Symphony is a true-bred sorceress and by golly she is determined to use the staff! She gives the buckler one last wistful look as she sells it to Charsi. Oh but she could have really used that huge boost to life and mana!
Symphony revisits the Tomoe Highlands and cleans out the Pit.
That done, she goes to the monastery to search for the Horadric Malus. So Symphony is there, in the barracks, proceeding cautiously with charged bolts when suddenly, a deep guttural voice booms out, something about weapons and bones! Yikes, here comes the Smith, isn’t he scary looking? Symphony switches to Icebolts for this fearsome battle. and the Smith feels the wrath of Symphony’s Icebolts! "Ha, take that! And that! And that! ..." Ok, so he chased her out of the barracks, but he is dying! That’s right, dying by Icebolts!
Symphony fetched the Horadric Malus for Charsi (Charsi says "good Lassie!", Symphony gives her the evil eye). Oh, be still her heart, a precious imbue! Well, Symphony is going to cherish this imbue and save it for... well, for later. Now she is going to Jail. (Does she have to miss Go and not collect $200?)
Oh no! In level 2 of the jail, Symphony trips over Pitspawn! But she woke him up and now she’ll have to kill him; otherwise he’ll do the Mary’s lamb thing and follow her around everywhere (and his lightning balls sort of hurt too much for that!)
Once the jail is cleared, Symphony graces the Inner Cloister with her radiant presence. why aren’t the monsters kissing her feet in worship?! In fact, those stupid little red pin cushions nearly kills her! Good riddance to those pests.
Symphony has no protection against poison, poison length-wise or poison resistance-wise; poison is Boneash’s element. Even so, Boneash is not particularly dangerous, as Symphony can dodge most of the green bolts. However, because he is magic resistant, it takes forever to chip a fraction off his life! In fact, her brain got so numb with boredom from doing the same thing again and again and again, she forgot he is also cold enchanted and nearly falls prey to the frost nova of his death throes. And all he drops for her is... wow, happy, happy, happy! Symphony finally finds a skullcap she can get into! A Lizard’s Skullcap of Health! No more peasant-hood look for her. Symphony looks much more distinguished in the skullcap, don’t you think?
Well, time to descend into the catacombs. Symphony would like to find the "25% poison length reduction" on something she can use. She has a feeling she will really need some form of poison resistance soon. Talk about timing! What awesome luck! Symphony found Death’s Hand in a catacombs chest! Please don’t suspect that Symphony is twinking, ‘cause she isn’t. She doesn’t believe in twinking and neither do her sisters. Theirs is a sisterhood of non-twinkers. To be perfectly honest, even she can’t believe her good fortune, ‘cause her sisters weren’t this lucky when they quested.
So Symphony enters the claustrophobic catacombs. Symphony and her sisters hate Act 1 for this reason: so many narrow corridors and places where a non-teleporting sorcie can get trapped in. Of course this eventually became a non-issue for some of her sisters because some of they learn teleport, but Symphony is gonna stay away from that nasty spell. Symphony has a horrid fear.
"What is I melt into the ether and can’t melt out? Then I’ll be stuck in the ether forever! How can you guarantee that Teleport won’t do that?" Her Zann Esu Recruiter is shocked speechless by the... well, uniqueness of Symphony’s concern; her sisters just shake their heads.
Level 1 Report
Well, two Shaman bosses lurked in level 1 of the catacombs and Symphony did not like that. She tried luring them away from each other and minions but they wouldn’t cooperate! She couldn’t go around them either. Symphony finally lost patience and had to stand there, take all of their combined fireballs (minions and bosses) while she tried to kill the bosses. It was a big session of pain and Symphony used up ½ of her supply of Bloody Mary, but they were ultimately dead, DEAD, none of them resurrecting each other’s accursed carcass! You know, Symphony could really start to hate Shamans.
Level 2 Report
The vampire boss was funny! After Symphony took a little punishment and chipped a chunk off his life, he turned to run. Symphony icebolted him and slowed him to snail’s pace so that basically, she could walk beside him and still win the race. The funny part was, he was still running, so Symphony just took free shots at him, with no retaliation. The boss was dead before he could find a corner to crawl to! The spider boss was less fun because it was LEB. Symphony’s learned that for LEB, she needed lots of room to shoot and dodge and shoot and dodge and dodge and dodge and maybe shoot? Symphony’s lucky streak continues, ‘cause she finds a rare skullcap here. It is Havoc Hood (poison length reduced by 25%, +1 to light radius, enhanced defence, magic damage reduced by 1, cold resistance 8%, +9 to life)! Symphony would have happily traded the "enhanced defence" for slightly more life and cold resistance... but nope, no complaints, this is a wonder item for Symphony!
Level 3 Report
Symphony stumbles upon some champions of the zombie species and discovers they are easy kills. She hopes more of these are around. Later, she discovers there are more, sort of, in the form of an aura enchanted boss. The aura is holy fire... ouchie. His hostile aura hurts her deeply.
Well, as much as Symphony loves the rogue community, she’s dying for a change of scenery (mmm, maybe that’s a bad choice of words?). But, to get to the second part of her journey, she has to kill Andariel. Fine then, let’s go visit this maiden of pain or anguish or whatever. Quite frankly, Symphony thinks she was more nervous about confronting Blood Raven!
"Die! Maggot!" Symphony is insulted!
"Oh yeah? Well I’m rubber and you’re glue and what sticks to me will bounce off you! Uh, wait a second, that’s not right..."
Look at Andariel go! Chilled to a crawl, Andariel has no chance of touching her. Because Andariel’s casting movements are also slowed, Symphony knows exactly when to dodge the poison bolts and novas, not that it exactly mattered if she does get hit (with her 75% plus 25% poison length reduction and 50% poison resistance). This is a breeze!
"Well, who’s dying now, maggot?" taunts a vindictive Symphony. Andariel croaks.
"Ding Dong! The demoness is dead! Cool, a column of fire! Hey, what’s that glitter on the floor over there..."
Act1 Ends; the next chapter of Symphony’s adventure commences.
Chapter 2
Act 2 Normal
Yay! Symphony is at Lut Gholein! Symphony is happy that she can work on her tan now. She is also looking forward to acquiring one of those new-fangled Horadric Cubes, so she can stir up some of those pretty and tasty full rejuvs.
Symphony starts Act 2 Normal with these stats: 17 strength, 39 vitality (156 life), 69 energy (133 mana)... nice eh?
Symphony’s Apparel:
Havoc Hood (rare skullcap): Poison Length Reduction 25%, +1 Light Radius, Enhanced Defence, Magic Damage Reduced by 1, Cold Resistance 8%, +9 to Life.
Death’s Hand
Light Belt of the Wolf: +13 to Life.
Leather Armour of the Fox: +9 to Life.
Boots of the Jackal: +4 to Life.
Ring of the Jackal: +4 to Life.
Ring of the Lizard: +2 to Mana.
Long Staff of the Fox: +5 to Life, +1 to Charged Bolts, +1 to Icebolt, +3 to Warmth.
Symphony did not do this on purpose, it just happened that most of the gear she found useful and wearable have +Life on them.
Symphony’s Skills: 1 Warmth, 7 Charged Bolts, 7 Icebolts.
While Symphony was at the Rogue’s Encampment, she faithfully browsed through Akara’s selection of staves for The Uberstaff (Fast/est Cast Rate, +3 to Charged Bolts, +3 to Icebolts). During her stay, Symphony found Akara to be a cruel and twisted woman because Akara kept on offering her staves of (Fast Cast Rate, +2 to Icebolt, +3 to Ice Blast) or something more useless. She is sure that Akara was mocking her because Akara once tried to sell her a staff of the apprentice (+3 to Charged Bolts, +3 to Firebolts). Symphony will continue to browse for The Uberstaff in Lut Gholein, but she doesn’t hold any high hopes. She has in her stash one long staff (unfortunately n magical) close to The Uberstaff (+2 to Charged Bolts, +2 to Icebolt) and is saving it for Nightmare. She also has a short staff that has +3 to Charged Bolts which she is also safekeeping for good measure.
So many new people to meet in this desert city! One woman, named Atma, even asks her to do an errand! Symphony likes to be helpful. "What can I do for you?"
"I don’t expect this of you, but if you want to help me..."
Egads! Symphony hears two things. One, it involves going down to the sewers ("yucky, that sounds so disgusting!"). Two, she has to get acquainted with a human-flesh-eating monster. Well, Symphony thinks this errand sounds hazardous to her health and that Atma is mean, sending a perfectly innocent tourist to such an atrocious place. This is turning out to be a very disappointing city. First, she didn’t get an invitation to the palace ("I don’t mind messes, really, you should see my room at the Zann Esu Headquarters!"), and now this... Meanies!
She’ll go anyhow, though, since she heard that Radament has this really neat library with this book in particular about skills...
Symphony fights a cursed mummy boss in the sewers. That’s fine. Then Symphony fights a cursed burning dead archer boss in the sewers. That’s not fine. It’s undiluted pain. Archers are Evil. Anyhow, she eventually finds Radament.
Eh! Luring out his group of followers is proving to be impossible. Out of patience, Symphony dashes into the chamber and decides that she is going to stand toe to toe with Radament, even if it’s going to kill her! Wait a minute, on second thought...
Eventually, with lots of potion guzzling, Radament is no more. As for the book, well, in Symphony’s opinion, the book is overrated; it is helping her icebolts though. She also found some reading material for Cain and he seems ecstatic over it. Well, as long as someone is happy.
Symphony has had enough of this city with its rude people. She decides to venture out into the desert... and receives an enthusiastic greeting from a large party of Spear Cats, their champions, Leapers and Dung Beetles, complete with a beetle boss. What a welcome wagon! Symphony shows her appreciation by conjuring some Charged Bolts fireworks.
While Symphony is strolling across the desert, she sees the Stony Tomb, and its entrance is open! Being the Good Samaritan that she is, Symphony closes the rusty doors and bolts it, but not before going down to check for grave robbers.
!Symphony’s Discovery Moment: she doesn’t particularly care for beetles and kills them on sight, even if they have pretty names like Night Cloud. After Symphony completed another good deed for the day, she explores further into the desert to look for the Halls of the Dead. There is supposed to be this great store there that sells Horadric Cubes. Symphony thinks that Halls of the Dead is a bizarre name for a mall though.
The entrance of the halls is filled by Hollow One Champions who had with them a thick pack of skeletons. They are starting a fan club for Symphony. "Please, I know I’m popular and everything, but one at a time!" For hollow monsters, they sure feel solidly painful. But Symphony is not discouraged. The Horadric Cube beckons. She has to have one!
After three levels of greater mummies and skeletons with some odd greater mummy bosses and Bloodwitch, she is finally getting a Horadric Cube... for free... no cost at all... as soon as she gets rid of these straggling pesky shopping competitors!
"It’s mine I tell ya, I saw it first!"
The hype surrounding the HC is all true. It’s stylish, it’s space saving, it’s multi-functional; not to mention it is user-friendly and travel-ready. The Horadric Cube is an essential for any adventurer! Symphony is a happy customer!
Symphony strolls further into the desert. She sees more sand and rocks and big head statues; yay, what exciting scenery. Enter the Far Oasis: Symphony thought that oases usually are pools of drinkable water, not muddy, murky, I-have-no-idea-what’s-in-there swamps. Whatever. She does find something of extreme interest though, which bring us to another...
!Symphony’s Discovery Moment: the insect swarms: more than half of them died in one icebolt! Her icebolts haven’t been this powerful, well, since Black Marsh with the birds. She finds her icebolt killing spree quite heady. The beetles are unfortunately sturdier, requiring more icebolts. "Beetleburst?! Phooey! I wanted Beetlejuice." But once summoned, Beetleburst, like Beetlejuice, took its sweet time going away. Stupid magic resistant piece of ****!
Symphony would have went hunting for the Horadric Staff but, seeing as how close the waypoint is to the Maggot Lair, and since her inventory room is severely limited right now due to potion hording, it’s easier to come back and look for it later. (This also gives her another chance at those wonderful insect swarms! They really are great confidence boosters!)
Symphony’s desert wanderings finally lead her to the Lost City. It’s a dismal place, with a lot more debris of wagons and buildings than anywhere else she visited. But as far as archeological interests go, it’s no Pompeii. Since she toured the sewer system of Lut Gholein, she might as well as tour the sewer system here, too. Desert people seem to flush gold and weapons and stuff down their toilets.
In the Ancient Tunnels, Symphony sees an invader boss by the name of Rust Weaver. Now there’s a unique profession.
"So, how do you weave rust? And more importantly, why would you want to?" As Symphony continues her exploration of the Lost City, she finds it not deserted. In fact, it’s quite teeming with life... and the undead. Symphony has to repeatedly thin plague-bearing crowds with electric power, to prevent the biohazard from getting out of hand. Later, Symphony employs ice power on the Dark Elder. Dark Elder, a magic resistant PITA, takes time to kill with icebolts, but it’s the best she has. With him packing such a hard punch, a competition of melee isn’t exactly an option.
Symphony also sees a pretty cat, in pretty green armour matching its pretty green fur and giving off a pretty green aura; very well colour coordinated. It keeps on following her though, despite Symphony’s best efforts to dissuade it.
"No, I can’t take you home. Elzix specifically told me no pets. And I’m especially not going to keep you if you keep on scratching me like that!"
On the other side of the Lost City is the Valley of Snakes; Symphony doesn’t think it’s much of a valley though. She reads the sign: Viper Temple. Well, temples are usually good tourist places with lots of things of look at. Symphony makes sure her camera still has lots of film.
Symphony meets a mummy that goes by Snot Growler the Hungry in the temple. "Yewww! What a disgusting name! And is that frozen snot cubes coming out of your nose?"
To be perfectly honest, Symphony really dreads meeting Fangskin. Why? Because the bastard is fast and lightning enchanted and the 2nd level of the Viper Temple has virtually no room to allow her to manoeuvre around it. Symphony is happy that she fought against many normal viper demons on the 1st level, as a practice of sorts. She discovers that this super fast charge move they do is very unpleasant because it knocks back, stuns, and bites a big chunk out of her life all in one. If a swarm of these, i.e. Fangskin and minions, continually did this to her, they could knock her back into a corner while making her so stunned that she can’t even open a town portal to run away. With no hit recovery boosting items and a crappy hit recovery to begin with, this could potentially kill her!
To prevent trapping herself at the entrance of level 2, Symphony races into the room, all the while jetting charged bolts around her and hoping that Fangskin won’t notice. She desperately darts around the viper shrine, hoping to fry all of Fangskin’s demonic friends before Fangskin catches up with her. She levels in the middle of the battle but is way too busy to deal with it.
Kudos to Symphony! She killed Fangskin safely (as safely as she could arrange it anyway) and found a nice necklace to wear. Too bad she’ll have to give it up to open Tal Rasha’s chamber.
!Symphony’s Discovery Moment: Isn’t it amazing? With Death’s Hand and the Viper Amulet, Symphony has maxed poison resistance (while having 0% Fire Res, 8% Cold Res and 0% Lit Res). And with the 75% poison length reduction plus 25% poison length reduction, now Symphony would rather be subjected to the poison breath of the greater mummies than their unholy bolts or melee swipes.
Whoo hoo! Lord Jehryn finally invites her into the Palace! Should she dress up for the occasion?
Well, what a let down. Instead of pretty rooms and exciting people, all Symphony finds in the Palace are dead bodies, monsters and the Cellar. Who wants a tour of the Cellar? Much worse though, horror archers galore! And they hurt and they hurt and they hurt! They are everywhere; Symphony encounters them in the Harem Room and in level 1 and 3 of the Palace Cellar. They’re getting her addicted to the red stuff again...
Fire Eye is way too fast.
!Symphony’s Discovery Moment: extra fast turns out to be one of the most worst modifiers for Symphony; it’s on par with lightning enchanted right now. You see, icebolts wade through the air slowly. If the monster, even after chilled, still swerves around like Kentucky derby racer, the bolt will miss. No bolt means no damage means we have a problem. Plus, any speed advantage over chilled monsters become nil, so Symphony stands a greater chance of being hit while trying to create the shard of ice, which is also a relatively slow process. Being hit means no bolt comes out means no damage and also life disappearing at the same time, which all together means we have more than a problem, we have a road block... call out the cavalry! It’s charged bolts time.
The Arcane Sanctuary looks amazing. It reminds Symphony of the Space Centre except without the anti-gravity machine for the tourists to take a ride on (so they can find out what being weightless feels like). Unfortunately, just because she is relegated to the narrow walkways, the dark shapes aren’t. Many of them charges at her from all directions, and she has the additional responsibility of making sure that they don’t die in the voids of space, thus depriving her of their potentially valuable drops! She normally wouldn’t have cared, as she can get gold and potions anywhere, but gnarled staves tend to be somewhat common here. Since her luck with Mr. Condescending Jerk (a.k.a. Drognan) about the Uberstaff is in the Uber-negative, she’s hoping the denizens of the AS would be more generous. A dark shape drops her a rare fast cast wand. *Sigh* At least it fetches a pretty price for her in the marketplace.
The Summoner conjures some pretty amazing firewalls, and Symphony is a little envious about that. She would have liked being a pyromaniac, too. The glacial spikes, however, do not impress her. "Ha, my icebolts are infinitely better! Feel the power of icebolts, shortie!"
Symphony feels as if she is on a wild goose chase. Everyone keeps on talking to her about this dark wanderer passing through his or her abode, but she has never seen him. Not even his footprint. Symphony scrunches her eyebrows and ponders. Maybe there is no such person and that it’s all a big conspiracy to make her destroy her nifty viper amulet? Or maybe he’s like Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy... Anyhow, she thinks she has plenty of time to intercept this dark wanderer, if he exists, so she goes exploring the TRTs (Tal Rasha’s Tombs), all of them. There are a lot of boss monsters in the TRTs; each tomb has no less than two such super powered gangs and often one of them would be composed of greater mummies. There even exists some magic resistant and lightning resistant greater mummies; they are incredibly annoying, but Symphony will not be stopped, not by the likes of them. "I will triumph over Kaa, I will! And you're small fries compared to him." Well, her coffers are getting richer quite rapidly; time to start gambling. Her third try on boots nets her, oh my goodness, a wonderful pair of footwear! Dread Stalker: fastest speed boost, boosted stamina healing rate, lightning resistance boost by 16%, boosted light radius and dexterity and magic finding by 21%, why these boots are real boosters! "I guess 3 is the magical number!" She also receives from that wonderful Elzix a rare ring bestowing her fast cast rate, +3 to mana, +7 to life and 41% extra gold from monsters. Now properly equipped, she is ready to take on the world. The extra speed is so unbelievably addictive. Symphony will never wear another pair of boots that isn’t fastest run/walk.
Symphony is graced by the appearance of Ancient Kaa in TRT number 5. Oh be still her beating heart! Well, at least that’s what Kaa baby is trying to do to her. But no big deal, this will be a cinch, right? She lures the infamous one far into a niche elsewhere in the tomb, then doubles back and eradicates the skeletons and minions. Then she takes a nice rest stop at Lut Gholein, where she turns some of her burden into gold, and hopes that many corpses will decompose to nothing by the time she heads back. Most do, good enough for her. Once isolated with nothing to resurrect, Symphony just patiently barrages Kaa with a battery of ice bullets, then run/dodge the unholy and charged bolts and repeat this cycle until the damn thing is finally dead. He gives her a nice splint mail she can’t ever hope to wear.
Now that the TRTs are monster-free, it’s time for Symphony to retrieve the Horadric Staff down at the Maggot Lair. Well, the name of the place is definitely apt, for she sees many maggots in her foray there: cold maggots, fire maggots, teleporting maggots, maggot champions... orange maggots, green maggots, red maggots, purple maggots... oh wait, that buzzing noise doesn’t sound like a maggot, is something else here too? It’s black locusts! Those darling, black-specked clouds, how she loves them! She wishes everything else were like black locusts. Only four black locusts fail to fall to her icebolts in one shot and that’s because they are four black locust champions. She’ll truly miss the black locusts when she leaves the desert.
Symphony dealt with Kaa and Coldworm single-handedly without much trouble, so she is feeling pretty gutsy. She has heard all sorts of nasty things about the Lord of the Evil Grins, but she is going to brave it out with her superior icebolts. No static or blaze for her, no sirree. Out of simple practicality, however, she hires a merc by the name of Kasim for this skirmish. Kasim has only 120 life, does pitifully low damage (even compared to a single charged bolt) and has no special skills what-so-ever. But, he is the cheapest to hire and Symphony has always had a thing for the underdogs.
"Are you ready Kasim? Oh, no, it’s not dangerous. It’ll be fun! Honest! Duriel is like a once-in-a-lifetime experience! Not every merc gets to see him, you know."
The moment she and her partner in crime drop into the chamber, she opens a town portal and steps through. Why? She wants to install an emergency exit before attempting anything. Kasim survives his first glimpse of Duriel. Now she is ready to do a serious engagement with the infamous boss. See Duriel run. Shoot icebolts at him. Run, Duriel, run. Not running fast enough. Even chilled by his evil frigid aura, Symphony can still stay far ahead of the thing and feed him ice. She can’t believe how SAFE this experience is turning out to be!
Look, Symphony is well into her fight with the overgrown bug and Kasim is still alive. There is a very good chance here that he will survive this! Nope. Suddenly Duriel notices Symphony has a friend with her and with two jabs, takes care of that. How cruel! Duriel’s rude deed incenses Symphony and she is more determined than ever to destroy him with her icebolts. "I will avenge poor Kasim! Sure, he was a little slow and very clumsy, but he deserved to live, too!"
Duriel dies with little fanfare... and Symphony used no potions for this! In fact, he didn’t hit her once!
SIRIAN'S NOTE: Duriel won't use his charge attack while chilled. That is why long-chill skills like ice bolt, frost nova, or frozen orb will increase your safety, as will stacking high level blizzards. Fighting Duriel without chill help is considerably riskier. In higher difficulty, the chill times are cut, though, and it helps to have cold mastery.
!Symphony’s Discovery Moment: since tackling Normal Duriel is so easy, she’s not gonna use SF for Nightmare Duriel either. This means she will be able to stay true to her code of icebolts and charged bolts, yay!!
As for what Duriel dropped for her... well what it lacked in quality it tried to make up for in quantity. She does acquire an Angelic Halo, though. "Because of my many good deeds, of course! My daddy always said I am an absolute angel!"
Act 2 draws to a close. Intermission now and get ready for Act 3.
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