Diablo 1 on GOG?

[haphazard1]

Welcome to the ongoing battle against Diablo's evil, shallow_thought! More heroes are always needed.

T-hawk is correct: you can pause in single player mode. Very helpful if something/someone (phone, pet, spouse, child, etc.) interrupts your game session. Single player also has various quests, which I enjoyed when I played my rogue in SP mode. Unfortunately SP does not properly support nightmare and hell difficulties. (There is a sort of hack to get harder difficulty in SP; I have not tried it myself.) Talk to all the towns folk for more backstory and also some of the quest triggers.

You are probably correct that your staff fell somewhere that was not visible/obvious. The key to highlight objects on the ground was probably one of the most useful/popular additions in D2. If something is in a corner or near the base of a wall it can be very hard to see. I have also seen items drop on the far side of a wall if you were fighting close to one -- I have killed monsters inside rooms and heard gold or an item drop, and later found it in the corridor outside the room, on the other side of the wall.

Good luck with your sorceror! They may become the most powerful class long term, but I started with a warrior and later played a rogue because I was worried about being too squishy at the beginning. I found the warrior to be a bit more forgiving as you learn the basics of the game; doing hit and run ranged tactics with the rogue is also fun.

[shallow_thought]

Welcome to the ongoing battle against Diablo's evil, shallow_thought! More heroes are always needed.

Good luck with your sorceror! They may become the most powerful class long term, but I started with a warrior and later played a rogue because I was worried about being too squishy at the beginning.

Thanks for that haphazard1.

I'm not sure I will ever reach competence in a game that relies on me remembering the difference between left and right in a crisis, but the atmosphere has got its hooks in me. I'm enjoying single player mode. Partly because of the pause button (cats, wife, phones - none of these things like to wait while you deal with the latest mob), partly because I do like story. Also, the side quests (well, the one side quest I've done so far) keep the sense of progress ticking along.

[haphazard1]

the atmosphere has got its hooks in me. I'm enjoying single player mode.

The game is very atmospheric. Searching through the shadowy hallways and rooms of the labyrinth under the old church, never sure just what might be lurking in the darkness about to attack. The music and sound effects help a lot with establishing the tone.

I like how you can (with some practice) get so much information from the audio cues. The kinds of creatures near by, how a fight is going, what was dropped by the latest monster is all communicated very well.

I liked the quests in single player mode, and wish that more of them were in multi player mode. (Or that SP mode properly handled nightmare and hell difficulty.) They add a lot of flavor to the game. The quests that are in MP mode -- the Butcher and the Skeleton King -- add a lot to the fun and challenge.

[haphazard1]

My warrior (who should probably be renamed 'Slayer of Barrels' ) has reached level 26. Finally a much less tedious option for spending his excess cash. The first few elixirs of strength and magic (dex is already maxed) have been purchased for some welcome improvement.

He is currently battling through hell. If he gets a good draw (such as a recent balrog/cave viper level) then clearing the level is a straight forward process without too much risk, as long as he avoids getting mobbed by too many enemies. If he gets a poor draw (witches, witches, and more witches ) then life is considerably more difficult. The balrog boss (Blackskull I think?) did drop an amber amulet of the stars, a nice upgrade from what my warrior had been using.

I also tried a nightmare game and visited the church. It was an odd mix of very easy (scavengers and fallen died almost instantly) and surprisingly dangerous (burning dead and horror skellies could do a lot of damage if they managed to mob him). I do not really have a good feel for how to play nightmare yet. Also, extreme care is needed on every new level until the presence or absence of black deaths has been determined.

My warrior took on the on nightmare and it was a very tough fight. All by himself the Butcher was hitting fast enough and hard enough to lock my warrior in blocking or hit recovery much of the time. An occasional swing got through to hit the big demon, and eventually I got a string of good hits and stun locked him. Did not drop anything useful, sadly.

I plan to continue working the normal hell levels for a while, turning cash into strength and magic elixirs. And also looking for better rings, which could use an upgrade. Then...I guess normal Diablo? Or perhaps more nightmare church levels. Is it typical to defeat normal Diablo before shifting to nightmare?

[KingOfPain]

Is it typical to defeat normal Diablo before shifting to nightmare?

 
Yes. And you are doing alright for the first round.

Around here at RBD? It is normal to defeat Diablo in Hell Diff at level 30, aka, 3@30.

No Pressure ™

[T-hawk]

Black Deaths occur on a particular set of dungeon levels, I think it's 5 through 7 or thereabouts, the Jarulf guide would tell you for sure.

Amber Amulet of the Stars is excellent, many a character would never find anything that would top that.

There's typically not much reason to play the middle levels of Nightmare difficulty. The church can give you easy experience and gold against easy monster draws, and the hell levels are where the biggest action and most experience is. But there's really nothing particular to gain in levels 5-12 over playing more runs through the normal-difficulty hell levels instead.

It's typical to beat Normal Diablo before starting Nightmare, but only because it feels like logical progression and closure. There's no real inherent reason to do Normal Diablo at any time, or the middle levels of Nightmare, or Hell Diablo at clvl 30, other than for the challenge. There's no direct reward for any of those. For both experience and items, generally the most efficient way is to repeatedly clear the hell levels up through the Lazarus boss pack. When that no longer yields full experience on Normal (around character level 30 I think?), then jump right in to the same thing on Nightmare.

[Gustaran]

This thread makes me feel rather old.

Somehow it seems a bit weird that there are people out there who haven't played the original Diablo. I mean it's Diablo - basically every gamer played it back in the day, right?
Then I looked up the release date: 1997 for the EU, so 22 years ago ... and yet people here still know all the details.

[haphazard1]

No Pressure ™

Uh, yeah. Right. I'll get right on that one.

I ran into black deaths on one of the nightmare church levels. Saw a zombie type moving, checked it, and it was a black death. Time to back away slowly and leave the area. Just not worth risking taking any hits from those things.

One thing my warrior is doing is hunting spell books. With slowly increasing magic from elixirs plus some boosts from gear, his mana pool is getting sort of vaguely respectable. For a warrior, anyway. Higher spell levels reducing mana costs per cast may eventually result in him being able to use a few spells without draining his entire mana ball for one cast.

Gustaran, I somehow missed Diablo (and Diablo 2) when they came out, and only found the series with Diablo 3. I was mostly into turn-based and strategy games back then. (Still am, but now I do other stuff as well. )

Lots of classic gaming here at RB: Diablo, MOO, original X-COM, MOM, and of course old civs. And probably more -- I don't check every subforum.

[haphazard1]

Elixir purchasing continues. My warrior finds himself in the unusual position of actually needing more gold. At least he has some free space in his inventory now when exiting or starting new games.

Adria having items with a higher level/better prefixes and suffixes than Griswold is annoying at times. Seeing a king's staff makes me wish that prefix was available on a sword.

Found another book of stone curse but even with my reading gear it is two points out of reach. Well, I have space to hold on to it until two more elixirs of magic show up. But the spell level beyond that is going to require better reading gear. My warrior's magic stat is nearing maximum. Not that max magic for a warrior is very high. But every point helps.

[haphazard1]

More adventuring in hell as my warrior encountered the gold viper boss, Fangskin. Apparently this is the D1 version of the boss who caused my lightning sorcie so much trouble in D2. It was fun to stomp him and his mob.

Apparently monsters can not destroy barrels. I ran into a corridor on level 14 with a line of barrels across it (and what are wooden barrels doing in hell, anyway? ), and a bunch of balrogs and vipers were stuck behind it. When I realized they were trapped, I laughed and my warrior brought out his bow. It is mostly a last resort weapon for dealing with ranged enemies, and he does not hit with it nearly often enough for it to be a primary weapon. But sometimes it is useful, and it was fun to plink, plink, plink arrows at the helpless monsters.

Two uniques dropped during these latest adventures. While not the mixed good/bad items several have been, they were still disappointing. The Needler is a bow (graphic of a crossbow) that has a nice +50% to hit and fast attack, but a base damage of only 1-3. The Rainbow Cloak had +1 to all stats, about +10% resistance, and a really small armor class. Both might have been useful for a character of level 5 or less. Dropping in hell they were distinctly unimpressive. The only solidly good unique item I have seen in the game is Arkane's Valor, the quest reward in single player for the valor quest. For the level you can obtain it, it is a nice set of armor. It does get out-dated by hell levels, but at least it is good for a while.