Hey, some of you will try to play hardcore for the first time so I would like to help you to survive. I will talk about most dangerous encounters you can face and will provide some tips for you to give you better chance to survive. I hope this will help anyone who would like to try hardcore.
ACT III NORMAL
General Tips:
- You will need enough Fire, Lightning and Cold resistances for ACT III.
- Do not forget to make first quest to get +20 Life potion from Alkor.
- You can buy stronger Health and Mana potions from Ormus.
- Ormus can sell you Staff with teleport charges so you can skip places where you would need a lot of walking around.
Common places and events which can get you killed
Fetish Shamans:
Fetish Shamans can be found in wilderness maps before Lower Kurast and in Flayer Jungle dungeons. Their fire inferno is doing very high fire damage and can easily kill you without high fire resistance. Let mercenary to deal with them if your fire resistance and Life is not high enough. You can kill them youself too, just avoid inferno and then you can attack them. Be careful with Unique and champion shamans as if you kill them, there is still melee fetish left and he will be also Unique version. Magic damage reduction also significantly helps against inferno from shamans.
Thorned Hulks:
Big and slow, they are similar as Blunderbores, because they have stun. They have also Frenzy skill which helps them to deal a lot of dmg pretty fast and more frequent stunning so try to not get between few of them or you will struggle to get out. Thorned hulks and their variants can be found in many ACT III locations.
Flayers/Soul killers:
Weak solo , strong in numbers. Flayer jungle is just swarming with them. AoE attacks will really help against them. Dont let them surround you or you will have problem to get out sometimes even with town portal as it can be casted out of your reach if there wasnt any place around you.
Sszark the Burning:
Super unique spider in Spider Cavern, extra strong and Cursed. Very dangerous at close range as he tends to do a lot of physical damage. If you have amplify damage on you, he is able to do 200 Life hits if he is lucky with critical strike. Sszark is guarding sparkly chest with Quest item "Khalims´s Eye.
Undead Stygian dolls
Undead version of fetish warrior but a lot more deadly. Dolls will explode if they die, dealing aproximately 10% of their Health as damage if you stand close to them. Thats not that high on Normal, but its a lot more dangerous on Nightmare and extremely deadly on Hell. Explosion can be blocked but also it can deal critical strike with 5% chance and deal double damage.
Gloams
Also called as “Souls”, ethereal monsters with Lightning attack. It stings on normal, it can be extremely deadly on NM and Hell. High lightning resist helps against them. Gloams can be found in Great Marsh. Do not try to run directly in line towards them. Always move to left and right to get close to them so you can avoid their lightning spell.
Stormtree (Trasher):
Super Unique Trasher. He and his pack is very dangerous and they will most likely kill you if you get surrounded by them. They will deal more dmg and attack faster because Stormtree is Extra fast and Extra strong. You will encounter Stormtree at entrance to Lower Kurast. If you dont want to fight him, just run around his pack. If you are fighting him, use hit and run tactics and try to always face only one of them.
Battlemaid Sarina:
Super Unique Flesh Hunter guarding quest item Lam Esen’s Tome. Sarina is not super dangerous on normal, but I wanted to include her as she is always there if you are making quest. She has bigger pack of minions than unique monsters usualy have and they are extra fast so they can surround you easily.
Vampire Lords:
You already saw them in ACT I and II, but they are a lot more dangerous in ACT III because they will get new ability to cast Meteor which does a lot of damage. They can be found in Kurast Temples and Durance of Hate. If you see them casting Meteor, just move away. Fire resistance will really helps against them. The Blood Lords in Durance of Hate are extremely deadly with their fire attacks if there is more of them fighting you at once.
Icehawk Riftwing:
Super Unique Bat in Sewers 1. He and his pack will drop on you if you get close. He is Cold enchanted so he can slow you down with his attacks and also releases Cold nova on death. Chance of you dying here is not high tho.
Travincal Council Members:
3 members of high council with few of minions. They are quite dangerous, dont ever try to face them all together as they have nasty combination of abilities and also can heal each other sometimes. They all can cast a lot of Hydras so your mercenary will benefit from having some fire resistance. You will too btw.
- Ismail Vilehand - Extra Fast and Curse
- Geleb Flamefinger - Extra Strong and Fire Enchanted
- Toors Icefist - Cold enchanted and Stone skin
Durance of Hate
Blunderbores, Vampire lords and Stygian Dolls are common enemy monster types in Durance of Hate making this really unpleasant place. They all can spawn on first two levels together with less dangerous Mummies. On third level usualy Blood Lords spawn, but it is chance that Stygian dolls spawn here also. It is rather rare tho.
Durance of Hate 3 Council members
Durance of hate has also 3 council members.
- Wyand Voidbringer - Mana burn and Teleportation
- Maffer Dragonhand - Extra fast Extra strong
- Bremm Sparkfist - Lighting enchanted and Aura enchanted
Wyand and Maffer are really not hard but Bremm is extremely dangerous. He often get Conviction aura which together with Lightning enchanted ability results in taking a lot of lightning damage. If you want to kill him, try to use hit and run tactics because you will most likely wont be able to tank him for too long. Your mercenary will have also trouble to survive against him.
Mephisto:
ACT III end boss. He has strong damage at close range and can cast Poison cloud, Lightning, Charged Bolts, Cold Nova, Blizzard and Skull orb. So high lightning and cold resistance really helps. If you are spell caster, use time between his spells to use yours and then again evade his. If you are melee fighter, you wont have to deal with most of his spell at close range, just have antidote ready against his poison cloud. Mephisto can be also safely killed across the river of blood if you have some spells with range. If you are far enough from him, you can shoot at him while he will be stuck. His Skull orb is doing cold and physical damage and can be blocked.
and it will get lost eventualy in general channel.
I never read it but i saw some of it on MrLama stream. I cant tell if its all good or bad really 