Wussie entered Hell at clvl 40, with 25 Strength, 25 Dex, 10 Vit, 225 Energy.

Frozen Orb @ 11
Cold Mastery @ 5
Static Field @ 12
Teleport @ 1
Lightning Mastery @ 1
Hydra @ 4
Warmth @ 4
All necessary Prereqs @ 1

I'd list her gear, but who cares. One softcore wussie is as good as another, right? Like, does it really matter if her flavor is cheddar, swiss, or monterey jack? She's just here to kill stuff. It's all in good fun. Wussie's Mission? Full clear, of course. Nothing to fear. In fact, the whole point of this character is to stare death in the face and laugh at it, so it wouldn't do to avoid danger.

ACT ONE

This is a picture of a move I call "Walking the Orb". What better character to practice goofy stuff, looking for tactical possibilities, than with a wussie girl? Like, it doesn't even matter if the moves don't work. If you get killed, you just pick yourself up in town, dust off your skirt, make a note that that particular tactic is a flop, and move on. Yes, I kept track of Wussie's deaths, but that's such an unpleasant topic. We're not going to talk about that for now. OK?

Walking the Orb is great for fighting speedy opponents. Oh sure, the best moves still boil down to firing just to port of the targets (to their port if they are approaching you, and to their port if they are fleeing from you. I went over all that in the Nightmare report, check back there if you need a refresher). The purpose of walking/running along the path of the orb is when targets aren't neatly grouped in one place. If you have them coming at you from multiple directions, Walking the Orb is the best way to "shoot behind you" and pick off, or at least chill, the chasers.

Frozen Orb is such an indirect skill. You have to love it. It was made for wussies. I don't mean that derogatorily, either. I mean it works beautifully, so much so, that you can focus everything into offense and just not care. You move quickly, kill quickly, and die quickly. Lots of action, it's very exciting.

Wussie ran into a small problem in the cave, OK? Well, OK, maybe more than one problem, but let's it take one crow at a time. OK? Good.

First up was the cold birdy-girl. Multiple Shots, Cursed, and of course Cold Enchanted. Bosses like that frighten all those Hardcore snobs, but not my wussie girl. We won't talk about the bloody nose she got. Nope. Just going to show the victory shot. (Ah the wonders of selective photo journalism!)

I thought that was bad. But no, that was just the warm-up. The stairs trap on level two, now THAT was a fight. Here comes birdy-girl number two, and uh, she's NOT cold enchanted. Nope. She's everything else, though.

"Wussie Girl? Welcome to Hell."

Yep, gettin right into it, is my wussie. Lay down your catcalls, jeer the cheese, I don't care. I see a battle, and by golly, no matter how much it may hurt, I'm going to fight it. Woo! Let's rock it, Pulse Crow. I've got your pulse right here!

SMACKAGE!

OK, fine. I read you loud and clear. Yep. I understood that. Now you're talking wussie language.

Wussie arrives back there from town, and I decide to stop a moment to reflect on what to do. I mean, sure, I can just charge my way in there, but um that didn't work the first time. I know some people think that the size of the vitality stat equates to the size of the player's brain, but this isn't automatically true. Just because I'm playing a no-cares-in-the-world china doll of a sorcie doesn't mean I'm going to play stupid and die extra on purpose. So OK, what to do? I've got not only an MSLEB on my hands, but she's RIGHT THERE at the stairs, and guarding the whole nine yards. Not to mention that she's fire enchanted, too -- and though I didn't know what that meant at the time (it has since been discovered that LEBs who are fire and/or cold also will apply the fire/cold damage to EVERY BOLT EMITTED, but only within the natural range of the fire explosion (short) or frost nova (medium)). Well, no wonder this crow hit so hard! (Not that you could tell with a wuss like this. She'll drop dead from a good scare, even. No physical violence necessary! ... Let's not talk about that any more, OK?) I still knew that it HURT. Oh wow did it hurt.

OK, then, here's the plan. DO NOT FIGHT HER. No hydras, not even shiver armor. (Don't want that going off from tempting the birdy-girl and killing wussie with no chance). Get in there, run past, teleport around the joint, and find some safe harbor, then work it from there. Like, what the Hell. What good is it being a wussie if you can't take stupidly insane risks? If I can keep the death count low, it will be something to brag about. :) And if not, well, who the Hell cares? (Don't look at me like that. Oh fiddle. Let's not talk about it now.)

Down we go, run Wussie run! Pulsy shoots her arrows, wow does one of those ever sting! Like, ouchie. OK? OUCHIE. But that's what the purple joy juice is for, for drinking. (Oh, yeah, and for covering the floor in pretty purple -- but we're NOT talking about that part right now, OK? I'll pick up my mess later. I promise.)

Oh yeah, baby, check that out. Isn't wussie just the baddest lil thing? She's got her gear! It's all over now! Give it up, Pulsy. Surrender. You're dead and just don't know it yet.

Well, OK, maybe not. Maybe I'm just talkin a lot of trash here. But hey, that's part of the fun. You get into the wussie spirit. Death is not an obstacle, and flirting with it is the whole point here, at least for me. Oh I know some wussies are in it for loophole exploitation: mad magic find, farming certain easy areas for rapid leveling, or just plain stupidity in motion. But not me (well, maybe that one applies to me). I'm here for the thrill ride, and in this fight, I'm gettin my money's worth, I must admit.

Please note, at this point in the battle, birdy-girl is still at two-thirds health. That part I pasted on there is from a later screenshot. You'd think that her globs of lightning would be the main threat, and I suppose they were, but really, those volleys of arrows are the nasty part. How are you supposed to avoid those when fighting in a sardine can? I mean, really now. Those just aren't fair! I don't even want to talk about getting stunned and then having no chance to move out of the way of rolling bolders of cream cheese. You can't avoid the big sugar puffs, the grand LEBness marshmallows, when your wusseress is just standing there stunned by an arrow hit.

Ouchie.

I shouldn't be talking about that. Like, it would be pretty dumb to forget to open a TP in some back corner, too, wouldn't it? And have to run all the back there, across the Cold Plains, through level one of the cave, all without the benefit of fastest run boots. If that happened to wussie, I'm not talking about it. You understand? I'm CERTAINLY not going to admit it to happening several times.

And see, if it was just old birdy-girl, that would be one thing. However, while doing the blinky-blinky routine, trying to be clever and all, I teleported right into the midst of the OTHER boss pack down there, a cursed fire enchanted lightning enchanted zombie named... Pulse Crow. Ha! Double-Boss-Bug in action. (Don't you love this game?) That's why wussie has that nice fat curse over her head in that last shot -- yes she actually lived through the first encounter with the other boss, despite it all. (Don't look so shocked. Really now. Come on. I'm not dying EVERY second you know. Have some faith, will you).

Now that's one pissed-off Crow.

The behavior of MSLEB sparks is so... strange. All those buggy interactions going on. Lightning interacting with Cold interacting with Fire interacting with Fanaticism interacting with Multiple Shots, Teleportation, Spectral Hit, blah blah blah. So very strange. Nice and lethal, too, but we're not discussing that. With all these bugs (or "features"? Ha!) it's no wonder so many people play wussie style. Hardcore is only for the stubborn. Seriously. Who would want to fight THIS crap in Hardcore?

Finally, it was over. Score: Wussie Girl: 1, Pulse Crow: ??? (Yeah right, like I'm going to reveal the painful truth now? Nuh uh.)

Photo op!

OK, so that was a fun opening. Talk about Hell, good grief. Damn MSFELEB stairs trap in the first damn dungeon. I'd have been pissed to lose a hardcore char to such cheese. Even Wussie has a few scars coming out of there. Can you say Experience Loss? (I don't even want to talk about it. OUCH. EE. Ouchee.)

Well, it has to get easier from there, right? Like, smack down the silly lil sorcie first thing, just for giggles, then get on with the real game, right? Right?

HELL? OH!

Hello.

Just look, that picture tells the tale. Your basic psychopathic serial killer on the loose. One shot == dead dead. Spray of arrows, wide coverage. SO PAINFUL. MUST NOT TALK.

That smartass Kashya was no help, either, snickering about all the blood and dirt on Wussie's skirt. "Oh yeah? You snobbish little cur. You think it's so easy, YOU get out there. Go on. Go ahead. You come back with her head, THEN we'll talk about it. OK?" Yeah, I didn't think so. All talk and no walk. I may come home lookin like something a quill rat dragged in, but at least I go out there and fight.

Wussie made a note NOT to invite Kashya to the big "Diablo has been defeated, and I only died X hundred times" party to be held at the end of it all.

OK, can somebody explain to me why the game has decided to pile all the nastiest bosses into Wussie's little game? Like, where are the spectral hit and stone skin bosses? Where are the easy draws? I'm getting Multishot bosses by the bagful here, AND IT HURTS. I'm just wee lil thing, you know. You can kill me with one arrow. YOU DON'T NEED TO SHOOT ENTIRE WAVES OF ICBM's AT ME!

If only the United States could pick itself up, dust itself off in town, and return to the fight, after a nuclear exchange. Sadly, the real world isn't like that. So I'll try to enjoy my privileges here in Diablo 2. :)

UGP level two, at least the Extra Strong Convicted LEB isn't mutliple shots, too. Of course, one hit is all it needs to smack Wussie into next year, but I'm not losing every fight, you know. Seriously. Wussie lives through some of these. (Oh, don't look so shocked. You know I'm not dying at every boss!)

OK, so I get to the Dark Tree. (You can't call that place "woods" in v1.06, sorry. Yes, in the Expansion, that's the Dark Woods. It takes multiple trees to make a woods though. Like, one tree is not a woods. OK?) Wussie gets to the Dark Tree, and she actually kills the big brute there. I mean, out in the open, and I see it coming, and it's NOT a multishot archer, yeah. It's going to die, and I don't mind talking about it, either.

On to Tristram, and here's the big bad goat boy from Hell.

It would have been nice to know that it wasn't safe to fire orbs at a FIRE enchanted LEB from close range. I mean, knowing how much extra fire damage would be attached to those sparks (at close range only) would have been somewhat useful information to have had. All I knew was... OUCHIE. Bolts hurt. Hurt bad. No more talking. No further discussion on that subject. A lack of elaboration. Details to come later. OK?

The never-ending stream of multishot bosses continued unabated.

In the marsh, I caught a break. A wonderful bit of equipment dropped. Check it out!

Oh sure, can't wear it for four more levels, which will be deep into act two, but Wussie could benefit from +Life on the glove slot, you know.

Not much going on down in the hole. Finally got some relief from the LEBs and MSers.

Not that a drugged up Extra Fast Fanatic boss is any slouch. (Slouch rhymes with Ouch, OK? Nuff said).

Round one was just plain ugly, and not to be discussed. Round two, just look at that sasquatch rocket racing toward the lil bitty sorcie. Wussie looks brave in that shot, but you can't see the pee stain running down her leg when she saw HOW FAST that thing was charging her. Even chilled he was frighteningly quick. No time to stand and Static. (Brute Boss rhymes with Acute Loss. Nuff said).

OK, now it's time for the Forgotten Tower. If any place in the game is worse, it would have to be the Act Three temples. Still, this is pretty bad. Usually bosses or champs on every level, sometimes more than one. Possibility for Stone Skin ghosts, or Multishot archer girls, or Extra Strong Extra Fast goats. Throw in a stairs trap or two, and it's a complete miracle I'm willing to talk about this area at all, don't you know.

I had to take off a couple of items for this photo op, to get her Poison Resist down low enough to establish that I was, indeed, playing this in Hell. Not that it matters with a softcore wussie, but might as well document everything. Also, as you can see, while her vitality is rock bottom, I'm not walking around in complete "Kill Me" mode. Wussie actually has some life. She's not going to get knocked off by some stray arrow that rolls a critical hit. There's danger around, but it's mostly tied to the bosses. The big, bad bosses. 229 is lower than she had, too. There was good life on her rare cap, along with poison resists and some other nice affixes I don't remember right now.

So down to level two now, and right at the stairs, a brutal trap. Champs AND a boss, all archers, and wow, lots of them. I didn't have much room to work here, and I feared actually being pushed out of the game. If this room were to become overrun, any body recovery would be painful at best. If I were going to die here, I'd better be careful about it.

To make matters worse, the boss was Cursed. Cursed plus a critical hit = dead sorcie. (Oh the pain).

See all the ghost bodies? This was the hairiest mess, I tell you. It was so bad, I'm not even going to talk about it. (Well, OK, maybe I'll talk a little bit. Teleport may have been a good idea in the Cave, with that archer trap. Here, it was an ugly ugly option. OK, enough said.)

Whew, now that that's clear, we can move on in peace, right? The game got in its stair trap, it's happy right?

Guess not.

"And she'll have fun-fun-fun till goat daddy takes her T-Storm awaaaay."

"What choice did I have? I ran."

Ran. Ran headlong into uncharted territory, goat daddy and his chains and whips in tow. I tried to tell him that I'm not that kind of girl, but he was a psycho. He kept telling me I'd like it, that I'd beg for more. Stupid goat. I gave him the Cold Shoulder!

OK, so after these messes, how bad can level four be? Right? Right?

Well, OK. It can be pretty bad. Like, very bad. Like... ouchie it HURTS PLEASE MAKE IT STOP kind of bad. My wee lil hydras were all bark and no bite vs Miss Fire Enchanted, and have I mentioned that Curse + Arrows = Deep Hurting? She was clever enough to stay out of easy frozen orb bank shot range. Just firing them through the door only made her laugh. Walking in there to confront her face to face wasn't the brightest idea, either. I'm shutting up now.

Level Five, The Anticlimax. Countess is a tough customer, but here's one Rogue I'm dragging back to camp to show that snob Kashya that yes, I CAN kill one of her evil sisters without half a dozen Ten Counts being applied to me. Rogues may be tough, they may smack Wussie into next month on occasion, but they aren't always the smartest.

I admit it. I baited her. I ran, then popped through the door to fire orbs up her tailpipe as she reset to her starting position. Not the best game AI, but after all these stair traps and the muggings poor Wussie went through to get here, I had no problems exploiting this little opportunity. Of COURSE I shot the dumb hoe in the back. I am Softcore Wussie, hear me roar.

Here's a look at Wussie's full stats. See? Resists, decent life. I could pile on even more life (remember Duriel in Nightmare?) but at too great a cost. Better to have resists. Wussies dies less that way. And how much is she actually dying? I'm not going to say. (Objects in mirror may be closer than they appear. Tis true, I'm not dying quite as much as I'm letting on. All the better to cover the full extent of my humilations, OK? Enough said, for now).

Thus ends the first half of Act One. If things keep up at this pace, wow, are we going to have something big to talk about when it's all over, or what? Ouchie.

Wussie's going to go hide under the bed, now. She'll be back for more when she finds the courage to come out of there.

- Sirian

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