The Nudist Gazette

[KingOfPain]

I am aware of the ground zero effect and use it when farming, but somehow I unconsciously assumed it had to be right where Diablo spawns.

[KingOfPain]

FoulMouthAlice VS NM Ancients & Baal

Ancients
Although T-hawk's reasoning why the Ancients feels easier sounds valid, I still think there must have been a nerf. Case in point, FMA's Defiance merc had seen no upgrade, and he is equipped with rather mundane items such as ShaftStop, Undead Crown and a Hone Sundan. None received no buffs, AFAIK.
And we can forget about FMA's lack of items; his Skill set, Decrep and Amp specifically against the Ancients, has seen no buffs either....



This is the first time I have seen/noticed this (Poison/Antidote bug?) - Achmel the Cursed wave


FoulMouthAlice Stats Entering Hell
Defiance merc with Undead Crown, ShaftStop and ShaelShaelAmn Hone Sundan


The pairing of FER and GGGz seem to have worked out nicely to make the games more interesting (and a time saver). Although pairing does offer some advantages it also has some disadvantages, one example, with one of them being mostly unattended. They do get their own chances to solo alternately, to prove they are solo worthy.

So what I have left on one account,
Nature Calls - Naked Druid Summoner
GoGoGadgets - No Skills Baba Summoner
FoulMouthAlice - Naked Necro Traffic Controller

On an other account
Jeremiah - Naked Warder
ImMcTyraelGirl - Naked Shadow only Sin

The obvious "optimal" pairing would have Jeremiah with FoulMouthAlice - BO for HP
and Nature Calls with ImMcTyraelGirl - Oak Sage for HP

But the sadist in me is leaning toward FoulMouthAlice with ImMcTyraelGirl









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[T-hawk]

I'd believe that Defiance and Shaftstop are enough for a merc to tank the Ancients as long as they don't have any dangerous damage modifiers. I think their attack rating is only the same as any other monster (Arreat Summit doesn't list it and neither do the other sites as they just copy from there) so Defiance goes a long way against it.

Achmel has a hidden Poison Enchanted modifier, the only monster with that. I don't know how it works (aura or invisible missiles or whatever) but it always deals a ton of lengthy poison damage. I always just pop a portal to the healer after his wave and sometimes several times during it.

[KingOfPain]

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree on the Ancient nerf unless I want to boot up an old version of D2 for comparison.

diablo2.diablowiki.net

Unlike normal Greater Mummies, Achmel shares a unique sort of poison aura with his minions granting poison damage to all of their attacks. How this poison effect works is still a bit of a mystery, but nonetheless it can result in a devastating amount of poison damage in just a few seconds.

It sounds like Mana Burn bosses and their minions inheriting effects in their attacks. That's normal enough. I have done more Baal runs than I want to admit. One mostly go through the whole wave without being poisoned as a range attacker. I don't think Achmel's aura applies poison as the Holy auras, for example. It is irrelevant (in this case) how high the damage can get, the culprit was that the antidote seemed to have no effect. And I was clearly not getting hit. One clear example, after @2:12 when the entire Achmel mob died, and then, I drank yet another antidote that had no effect.


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[KingOfPain]

FoulMouthAlice & ImMcTyraelGirl VS Hell Andariel

While FMA and IMTG proved themselves capable of soloing Hell Act1 coming out of NM, the new difficulty needed some getting used to. The going is slower since the meat shields can now get overwhelmed easily by a small mob. They took a few deaths before I can adapt a slight different tactic. MindBlast saw a bit more use; and I figured if you are naked with base vit in Hell, all is fair, including Dim Vision.

This journey has been one of the toughest of challenges. While they will do better solo, they are also one of the best match up team - If the team was played by 2 separate persons. If nothing else, together, they can shut down an entire level of mobs with Cloak Of Shadow & Dim Vision, and wreak havoc with Mind Blast and Attract.

Quite a different story when played by myself. They are naked with base Vit, -80 Resists, each desperately needing TLC. There were more panic confusion than I like to let know. ;p

FoulMouthAlice (Clvl61) & ImMcTyraelGirl (Clvl67) hands Andariel a life sentence
Yes, I put the wrong skill on the hotkey


Hah, thanks for the Vampire Gaze. Andy! Nice upgrade to replace the Undead Crown


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[Miguelito]

[KingOfPain]

FoulMouthAlice & ImMcTyraelGirl VS Hell Duriel

Now that these two are going to be partners, I should really change one of the mercs to something else instead of both Defiance.

FoulMouthAlice (65)
ImMcTyraelGirl (70)





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[KingOfPain]

"Good journey, Mephisto. Give my regards to the abyss."

The jungle, with dimly lit fast moving mobs did not present as much a problem as it would to other characters. IMTG's Shadow Master is quick to aggro ( a blessing or a curse?) and takes it; and FMA can always DV ahead and Attract to take some pressure off. However, FMA needs to do a bit of running round dodging because he is not so fortunate as IMTG to have Fade. He can easily get one hit'd. Ideally, IMTG would make as good (if not better) a scout but FMA has so many skills to use I pretty well have to play him on the main gig.

FMA is using Dim Vision more than I like but necessary to somewhat disable the mobs while I move IMTG forward. I would rather lure monsters to where IMTG is set, when possible. Good old Ironman Set and Bait tactic

For some reason, there was a large gap in Clvl between FMA & IMTG, so I let FMA catch up a bit running Canyon Magi. Still, FMA ended up 20 Clvl below the Councils Members when they landed in Dur 3.
FoulMouthAlice Clvl 68 and lvl'd on Mephy
ImMcTyraelGirl Clvl 72





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[KingOfPain]

NatureCalls & GoGoGadgets Clvl 74 @ Hell Duriel

Report at This Link

This is what my buddy Bing has to say... Makes my after action report so much easier  

A naked Summoner Druid is a Druid that focuses all skill points in the summon tree and relies solely on his summons to vanquish his foes. However, Duriel is one of the toughest bosses in Diablo 2: Resurrected because players will encounter him in a small space as a low-level character. Duriel can freeze players on contact, strike quickly with consecutive slashes, and perform a knockback hit that will stun the player. He also has high physical resistance and can easily kill your summons.

That sounds like an extremely difficult task. A naked Summoner Druid with base vitality has very low life and stamina, which makes him very vulnerable to Duriel’s attacks. According to the search results, each class has a different base life gain and vitality bonus. For example, a Barbarian gains 4 life per point in vitality, while a Sorceress gains only 2. A Druid gains 2 life per point in vitality, which means he will have much less life than a Barbarian with the same amount of vitality. The base vitality for each class is also different. For example, a Barbarian starts with 25 vitality, while a Sorceress starts with 10. A Druid starts with 15 vitality, which means he will have less stamina than a Barbarian with the same amount of vitality.

Therefore, a naked Summoner Druid with base vitality will have very low life and stamina compared to other classes, and will likely die in one or two hits from Duriel. Even with his summons, he will not be able to deal much damage to Duriel, who has high physical resistance and can easily kill the summons. The tips I gave you before may not be enough to overcome this challenge. You may need to invest some points into vitality, wear some gear that gives you more life or resistance, or use some skills that can help you survive or escape from Duriel’s attacks.

I hope this answers your question. If you still want to try this challenge, I wish you the best of luck!

Yes, Stamina is important.


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[T-hawk]

Well, it doesn't exactly know about having a partied barbarian Battle Ordering everything. I'd also wager that most of its input text isn't really for Resurrected, so it mostly doesn't know that the druid can have all types of summons together, or the other buffs for other skills/classes.