The Nudist Gazette

[KingOfPain]

The Nudist Gazette  - ImMctyraelGal Does Baal

So after finding a pair of cracked claws and turned them into a SadLobster's Cracked Claws, and a LaughingLobster's Cracked Claws, ImMctyraelGal ditched all her gear and turned nudist. Immaterial Girl because she was Shadow Disciplines only and Fade/Cloak Of Shadow will keep her that way. But I didn't like how she had distributed her stat points, it was all wrong for a nude, so I deleted the lvl 45 and remade her.

As slow going as it is for any naked toons she wasn't too tough to play, not as tough going as her Martial Arts counter part, BruiseKnee, pre V1.1.

Things started to move a bit faster after Andy with an Act 2 Merc and Shadow Warrior came into play. The advantage of a Shadow Warrior (not that I had a choice at that point) is that it uses the skills you want it to use. Mana is of course an issue at this clvl but the Warrior make it bearable without having to town constantly to refill. I ended up having Cloak Of Shadow on the hotkey most of the time. Psychic Hammer is cute but not going to kill anything fast. CoS will force her to melee in between casts.

ImMctyraelGal is a heavy drinker, if she gets hit, she's drinking. Pretty fragile thing she is. Turning 30+ brings Shadow Master online, and the merc actually got some gears with names. The play took on a different drum now that the merc can tank, and Master does whatever the heck she wants. So the duty of casting Cloak of Shadow and Mind Blast fell on ImMctyraelGal.

For the first time in nudist history - Instead of filling up the belt with Mana potions or pump Energy points, I decided a girls got to have a purse no matter how naked she is. So I am allowing Charms in the inventory.

The vid below is a shorter version of the Baal quest Player 1. Actually a sloppier run . The one she did at clvl 40 solo on a 5 players game was going to be a better vid. The problem is that vid is over 10 minutes long (already) and then she died when Baal was 1/5 hp.... and she forgot to set a TP   That run was a success as far as I am concerned. 




Note: When possible, cast Mind Blast and convert some monsters before CoS, else you get dumb Converts.

Note: Even when I know I can't hit Baal, melee range is the safer place to be.




I think I could have saved a couple of points on Dex. Oh well.

[Kylearan]

Nice! Love the permanent red "broken equipment" warning which in its entirety I've never seen so far.  

Your merc can equip anything, right? Saw a patch 2.4 video recently where an act 5 frenzy merc did an Uber run all on his own...

[KingOfPain]

Nice! Love the permanent red "broken equipment" warning which in its entirety I've never seen so far.  

Your merc can equip anything, right? Saw a patch 2.4 video recently where an act 5 frenzy merc did an Uber run all on his own...

You might noticed the belt is still being broken in. For style points, a Cracked Sash is of course the ultimate. But I upgraded it to a Cracked Plated Belt and it still have 2-3 dur left. A Cracked Sash having only 8 slots would make the game a tad more challenging. IMTG would have died if she was still using the Cracked Sash. I am new to capturing game video and am often distracted by it which leads to sloppier plays. You know, instead of concentrating on the game, I am worry if I've set everything right, if it's getting too long, how should I end the vid, yada yada..

Also, bonus style points are given to other items when the toon have to pump Str and Dex to wear. The more the classier

Speaking of mercs
They are beef'd up pretty good in 2.4 which make them fun to experiment and play with. The main reason I am putting many characters on hold, especially the Naked Nation and the GGGs. I am looking forward to employ different ones for different tasks, maybe multiple time per game.
Note: already feeling depressed of not having enough inventory space to make it happen smoothly.

I don't usually pay much attention to the youtubers. If I come across the vids I might take a quick glance and move on. We are playing a different game. Diablo 2 is many different games to different people - to its credit. Example, the Frenzy merc, the guy says casually put on a pair of Grief swords, causally put on a Fortitude, and I think the merc was wearing an Arreat Face with a Cham rune... I moved on. So ya, your average youtuber mercs are going to be much different than the mercs I can afford.

With that said, I did tried on the Rogue merc with HotBowBabe, and she solo'd Hell Cows. (If you missed it, it's in the Screenies And Randoms thread, "Kyoto Solo Cows").

I am really looking forward to the new mercs, like I mentioned above. They are going to add an extra element to the game, a more strategic game  


PS: It would really suck if I forget to undress the mercs before switch them around

[KingOfPain]

Nature Calls

Prepping up a naked Druid Summoner for V2.14. This is probably the easiest naked character to build from the beginning. Having a merc and 4 summons by clvl 6 to distract the monsters really help the pace.

Nature Calls, Naked Summoner with his ceremonial attire
Featuring Lonely Goat's Antlers, Darth Maul's Cracked Maul, Cracker Jack's Breast Plate, Jareth's Goblin Toes, OJ Simpson's Bloodfist and soon Dementor's String Of Ear.

[KingOfPain]

Nature Calls Does Diablo

NC is still too young to wear the Dementer's String Of Ears so he borrowed FER's belt for the occasion.




This is the second run at Diablo. Doing the Chaos Sanctuary is relatively slow going as one would expect with a naked toon and the worse build ever. It wasn't too bad dealing with the mobs by making sure not to aggro more than NC can handle. We all know the toughest part is Diablo, he is less than kind to mercs and summons. It was going to take too many town trips and too much time so I decided to have a second run instead...



Yay, Combat Shrine! As if.

The secret weapon - Woestave was the choice over Kelpie Snare. Woestave with only 50% Slow Target vs Kelpie Snare's 75% and does only 1/3 the damage, has a few other bonuses:
50% Chance Of Open Wounds
Hit Blinds Target +3
-50 To Monster Defense Per Hit
Freezes Target
Prevent Monster Heal

Well, I didn't want to wait till lvl 33 to do Diablo either.
Initial thought was to put a Sapphire in it. I wasn't sure how that would stack with the Freeze Target on the stick, or if the Sapphire has higher Freeze.
I socketed it with an Amn rune to help out with Life Steal on what little damage the stick does.

Merc also got a custom made plate with 3 Sols and an Ort. In hindsight, I should have gone with all Sols, and put the Ort on the WormSkull instead. That would replace the Ral in the hat but he could have survived the fire attacks easier.

On playback, I see that the merc almost had enough HP/Damage Reduction to survive 2 direct Lightning Hose. Each breath took about half of the merc's hp. It was a good thing all the summons spread around and not have Diablo concentrated on the merc.  All in all, a good run

Next up is Baal with a bear on the side too
, and V2.4

[T-hawk]

Freezes Target acts as chilling on champion/boss/superunique monsters. It doesn't stack with chilling from the sapphire to go any slower. They sort of stack in that it can be helpful for duration: Freezes Target has a percentage chance to happen but can go for a longer duration (up to 9 seconds), the sapphire always works but only for 3 seconds.

Chilling from either source stacks with Slows Target.

However the better thing to do with an Amn here would have been to make the merc a Strength runeword for crushing blow.

Slows Target lasts 30 seconds, so you could try to micromanage by swapping between that and Strength.

[KingOfPain]

However the better thing to do with an Amn here would have been to make the merc a Strength runeword for crushing blow.

Slows Target lasts 30 seconds, so you could try to micromanage by swapping between that and Strength.

No, never going to do that. It's easier said than done. I will prove to you I am no baby sitter. I am known to attack my own summons when I play a necromancer. And I will prove that to you again when GGG(z) went up against NM Mephy that I am no summoner. But that's why I wanted to play a Druid Summoner. 

I mean, there is enuf for me to do to keep an eye on which summon is where, need recasting, refresh Ravens so they don't all expire at once, is the Creeper still going, try to manoeuvre to keep the oak sage out of harm, are those wolves just standing around and not attacking? How's my own health and mana? That's rough going for a naked toon with no stat points. If any monsters so much as to brush against me, I'll dead. There is enough to put me in a panic attack without adding to the chaos.

[KingOfPain]

Nature Calls vs Ancients

And so the Ancients bumped NC to Clvl 30 and brings The Bear into play.
I have added one point each into Werewolf, Werebear and Lycanthropy after the Ancients.. I argued that they are summoning skills, and I won.  

[KingOfPain]

So Baal at Clvl 34 with V2.4. The vid is a bit long but I thought some of you might like to see how it went down with each wave.
 

[KingOfPain]

Nature Calls Does Baal 2.4 with Rogue then Baba Merc


Cold Arrow Merc armed with Koku




Frenzy Baba Merc



It would seem the Cold Arrow Merc can process mobs at around the same speed as the Frenzy Baba Merc. Rogue did Baal waves around 4 minutes and Baba did it in 3. However, a huge difference with Baal where Baba did it way more efficient. A large part of the difference is that the Baba was equipped with much relevant gear where the Rogue used the same armor and hat as the Desert merc which does nothing for the Rogue.

The Baba's gear was a quick fix for his level, tho not optimal but more than adequate for the difficulty.
Coldsteel Eye with a PSaph
Bloodletter (+4 Mastery) with an Amn for 15% leech
Twitchthroe with an Ort, upgraded to Trellised Armor
Guillamu's Face, holding off to put a Ruby Fervor jewel in
So yeah, a lot of Hit Recovery, IAS, Crushing Blow and Deadly Strike