Is using Gomule for an extended stash allowed? Or things need to be self found and self stored.
Do you all play on P8 for as long as you can, or at least normal? I was thinking all my twinked chars had Khalim’s will among others and now I’m thinking about fighting Andy on p8 and how that would go..
My plan is to power through to normal Baal, gain some XP, MF NM Mephisto for a while, get to NM Baal. Start hell low 70s or so, MF Mephisto and when the time is right live at LK until I can make the “necessary” runewords. Even typing that now I see the gaps. I’ve been running LK with my sorc and my finds have led me to go untwinked to 99! Go figure.
Anyway I realize anyone going to 99 will have a depth of knowledge I lack but I’m hoping to bypass the learning curve somewhat as the expense is time in this case.
Thanks for the continued congrats, all! And welcome @ddknoll
I recommend checking out our SPF 99er compendium, linked here, which compiles a lot of good info and has a section on approaches to the leveling process, including early play. It includes a subsection specific to untwinked for each of the four "phases" of play. Also, it's definitely okay to use GoMule; most people have, but I few play with the extra restriction of limited stash. Good luck!
As for the first part ... try to get through normal and nm fast, only stopping at Pindle or Eldritch to level up. Depending on the build that can mean anything from p1 to p8, but usually in an untwinked setting it's only p3 or so.
As for the first part ... try to get through normal and nm fast, only stopping at Pindle or Eldritch to level up. Depending on the build that can mean anything from p1 to p8, but usually in an untwinked setting it's only p3 or so.
After doing this a few times, I would go p7 with direct play through and some MF at NM Meph and leveling at NM Eldritch and Pindle as needed before moving to Hell. The higher p-settings help with better gem drops and MF rig for the NM playthough, which can make the starter kit for Hell easier to acquire. But:
I remember being in this situation about a year ago, trying to plan my route to 99. Adapting and learning untwinked Single Player play has been such a rewarding experience thus far.
I always play all of Normal on p8, for three main reasons: the challenge level feels right, more items drop to help gear my early-game character, and also because I hate not having access to my level 30 skills by the time I reach Diablo/Harrogath.
After that, running Eldritch for a bit until the mid-30s is always the next step, which makes Act V go smoother in general. I find I don't really run Normal Baal that much at all, to be honest, I find it takes too long, and my higher level and planned skill distribution tends to be what carries me through the earlier parts of NM.
One important thing I've learned so far is to not ignore the fruits of running NM Meph, especially if you're a Sorceress. There are a million questions, guides, and opinions on everything to do with Hell Meph, but he can actually drop a lot of really useful items even in NM which will let you push into Hell, things like Oculus, Skin of the Vipermagi, Rockstopper, Skullder's, War Travs, Shaftstop, Titan's Revenge, Duriel's Shell, and even HoZ (good luck with that one, though).
BabyNinetyNiner's map disclosed here, i personally find that combo really nice, after completing the lvl 91 at cows mainly trying to drop elite bases for Exile craft.
The elite shields drops are for now:
Code:
Kurast Shield
Defense: 167
Chance to Block: 0
Durability: 32 of 55
Required Level: 55
Required Strength: 124
Fingerprint: 0x6bfc57e2
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
All Resistances +44
Sacred Targe
Defense: 152
Chance to Block: 0
Durability: 34 of 45
Required Level: 47
Required Strength: 86
Fingerprint: 0xec44d3c0
Item Level: 84
Version: Expansion 1.10+
All Resistances +43
And a Sanctuary base - Mal still needed:
Sacred Rondache
Defense: 147
Chance to Block: 0
Durability: 54 of 68
Required Level: 52
Required Strength: 109
Fingerprint: 0x49ea6258
Item Level: 81
Version: Expansion 1.10+
All Resistances +32
3 Sockets (0 used)
Runes are already available as the lacking Ist has been dropped lately, while questing to be Patriarch
Edit: sadly i would have preferred the other base, but well...
Lucid moved to 98.1 – time for a brief update given a couple of nice drops and some information on initial experiences with the Dream Avenger build.
Frequency of S&U drops increased in comparison to his CS stage, given ~220 MF and Nihlathak being a decent MF target of course. The early big boys were Earth Shifter, Azurewrath, 3os Head Hunter's Glory and Griswold's Valor. I also made an eth Scourge 'Oath' for corpse recovery, which got a nice 336 ED roll, and found a couple of cute eth uniques. These and others:
As with my other 99ers, I started the Nihlathak stage by pushing him hard to get a feeling of what he can handle while not risking significant XP amounts. This resulted in one death around 3M into the level when testing different gearing options, during a Cursed + LI + Vipers run. That roll is indeed dangerous, and while I sometimes complete these runs, going forward this will likely just be S&E'ed immediately for the sake of a smooth routine.
Generally he is very tanky, though. Witches are no issue, though they can make quick work of the Merc in case of Might or Fana rolls. He has a comfortable window to react to Viper clouds, often even offsetting their damage via leech. His death was really slow S&E reaction on my side. All other rolls I usually finish unless there are numerous Vipers, in which case S&Es aren't uncommon irrespective of Nihl roll, albeit usually for reasons other than his own safety: Merc dies very easily to them (resulting in time lost resurrecting), and Lucid being exposed to possible danger often isn't worth it considering those runs take longer in general. Certainly Vipers were less of an issue with my previous caster-type 99ers, but probably that's just life when running Nihl with a melee + Merc approach.
Somewhat counter-intuitively, I found the best approach is to just teleport right into the fray next to Nihl every time, including Viper spawns. Being surrounded immediately maximizes chances of CC effects proccing quickly, thanks to CTC from two Dreams and Delirium. Even if e.g. Vipers launch projectiles immediately, there's plenty of time to reposition slightly out of the clouds and finish the run safely with CC effects triggered, or to S&E if things get ugly.
For now I settled for this setup:
Code:
BotD eth BA (366 ED, 12 LL)
Dream ST ([email protected], 30 FHR)
Dream GC ([email protected], 28 FHR)
Enigma BP – somehow I like the green pants now :)
WT (39 MF)
Mara's ([email protected])
Magefist
Ravenfrost (perfect 250/20)
Blood craft ring (53 life, 11 FR, 11 LR, 40 CR, 33 PR, 3 LL, 2 Str)
Arach
6 BO CtA, 35 Spirit switch
Merc (A1 Cold): Faith DB (2/14) , Delirium BV, Gladiator's Bane
While I liked Bloodfist, my FCR ring/amulet options don't have very strong adds, so in the end I preferred having >3800 life, extra leech and high resists throughout with the above setup. I also ran with Nature's Peace for a bit but eventually dropped it as well. (Btw I found NP will not deny a corpse if the HS pulse from Dream kills a monster, FYI.) As for A1 Faith Merc setup, she hasn't been used around here so there's plenty of things to try out. For a while I went with Gloom for a fourth source of CC (Dim Vision), but it didn't trigger enough to make it worthwhile IMO. Currently I like Gladiator's Bane, providing CNBF and iDR to help her with Viper clouds.
@ffs - Interesting stuff! Also, some sweet sweet finds in there too, love the crafting!
--
I have a small confession to make. I'm a little bit behind in my writeups, and with having some time off from work lately I've been running more than usual. Put those together and we have ourselves a DOUBLE UPDATE!
Finds started off right away with GBane, another Andy's and then a little fright:
Do you notice what's extra stupid (by me) about this picture? I took the screenshot BEFORE hitting ESC. I didn't even realize that when it happened but there it is. Yeesh.
Oak Sage got toasted straight away and Klaus was put into hit recover by the archers (thanks, amp!). I tried a couple teleports with no luck and then had to S+E to avoid my stubbornness leading to Klaus' death. Fun stuff, those NDEs.
He was however rewarded slightly for staying alove by some actual decent drops. First he found a Lightsaber, and followed that up with a Wizardspike, and then a nice 9% csd Nightwings:
Something I'm surprised about is that motivation to keep running has not waned. It's some weird combination of the runs not being all that fast, but (mostly) very safe. Not worrying about my XP/hour constantly has allowed it to be much more leisurely and keeps the burnout away, but still allows for quite steady progress.
Onwards!
I guess he wasn't satisfied with the rolls on his S/U during the last 10%, so Klaus went ahead and found the same two items, in reverse order and both with better stats. First a Nightwings:
Code:
Nightwing's Veil
Spired Helm
Defense: 315
Durability: 24 of 40
Required Level: 67
Required Strength: 96
Fingerprint: 0x4f003112
Item Level: 95
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Unidentified
+2 to All Skills
+15% to Cold Skill Damage
+97% Enhanced Defense
+10 to Dexterity
+5 Cold Absorb
Half Freeze Duration
Requirements -50%
15% csd, significantly better than his previous one. Lightsabre was next, 194%ed, vs 189% on the last one. It's actually his 4th Lightsabre so far, and the highest ed roll on any of them, cool!
and then right as he crossed the 3.4B border:
Awesome! That's his 2nd from Nihl.
He cruised the rest of the way and now sits comfortably at 98.6
Anyway, I am taking two weeks holiday form 19th August, so I will be buying a new monitor (my last one started spewing smoke and it was all very dramatic) and playing some D2. I've decided to dive back into the Untwinked 99er Tournament with a CS running concentrate barbarian. He will be called Stonewall. Hopefully, I will have him running CS by the end of my holiday and his CS running can then be a source of relaxation like Fordyl's was. Yey!
I think I am 10 days in but now sitting at level 76. Normal and NM were pretty uneventful, with stops at NM Meph and Baal but the drops were dismal.
First good find was a 5os Great Poleaxe so after a visit to the help forum and two hours my Merc has obedience. Not sure why I didn't get RWM before, it is awesome.
My plan is to just gear up in the most boring way. I am looking for a 3os helm and will put three Ptopazes to try to move things along.
I went heavy in BH so hammer, conc and vigor are all maxed. 2 into HS and 15 so far into Baim.
Stats have been standard with 55 unspent. Again, the main issue is gear. I am currently using a +1 to BH scepter I bought a week ago. If anyone has a recommendation other than getting MF and running Pits I am all ears. I will claw away at Hell as I get bored of running.
I don't know how to do a scroll within a post and I don't want to spam the page but I will try to figure it out and give you a peek into some very sub par gear later on.
I have never seen this mentioned but it seems relevant to this thread: When you run p8 Pindle with a pure Blizzard sorc and get killed you are usually screwed because the guys in the garden rise and they're all CI, right?
Well, I made a bad teleport and landed right in Pindle's pack. I was dead instantly and in a desperate move to get my 7,5% back I revived the merc and went through the red portal only to find that there were hardly any resurrected skeletons!
I think because I pressed 'esc' immediately after dying the skeletons in the garden didn't have time to rise yet (or at least not all of them) and their corpses despawned when I 'left' the area. (even better: I didn't cast any spells before my death but I found Pindle dead when I returned; the Snowclash Blizzard proc must have killed him )
I guess this means that you shouldn't linger on the 'was slain by' screen in Pindle's garden or you won't get your XP back.
Finaly done with LK for now!
yesterday i got crazy ber rune drop and today another sur. so 4 surs and ber now, all i need for enigma
gotta do some work now, so gonna mak it tomorrow i guess.
Drops: SC 19l 6 mana, SC 2 max 10 ar 10 life, mal, Vex, Ber, jool 39ed 13l, mal, sc 3 max 19 ar 5 fhr, Sur
Time for a pre-MFO update! Quinta made it through the first quarter level to 97.25, so 275 of 1100 Baal runs down for this level. She did a little CS early on, but settled into Baal, with this great map rolled after a few tests in CS showed continued faster XP gain from Baal:
She’ averaging > 5M XP/hr, so maybe a little faster than Phaedrus but certainly no slower, which is really nice at this point. I haven’t timed runs, but she always finishes before BO wears out (170 s) unless I have to park Lister (in which case I recast before Baal now so it doesn’t run out mid-fight).
She was just shy of 97.15 when Pestilence hit 99 two weeks ago, with Baal runs on-and-off as he made the push through June and July. She shared time with my Overburdened tourney Druid since then and finished up her runs yesterday before we leave for two nights away.
Finds were pretty solid despite only 198 MF up until 97.2, when she dropped a cold resist/life SC for 7MF SC. The first was a Sur from early testing at CS, then an eth Heaven’s Light, Spirit Keeper, and Shadow Dancers. Only rune from Baal was an Um from the Waves, and he recently rerolled an Elemental Skiller of Sustenance, which is quite nice! Other notable finds were Cerebus’ Bite x2, eth TStroke, Boneshade, Tomb Reaver x2 (both 3os), and GBane, plus a few lower eth items for my eth grail.
She's now Ist x2 short of CoH and Delirium, which she will want for Nihl at 98 (Delirium for sure, as I think life leech may not be needed for the merc on those runs). If she can complete them during this level, she will also test out the Delirium set up to see if it speeds up the Waves.
I’m hoping that she gets another quarter level during MFO. Depending on how much time I have the first weekend, she may get further along. I can settle into long stretches of Baal: although the pauses between waves are annoying, it does make for a leisurely play style
Good luck to everyone else, including untwinked entries in the MFO!
