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. I hope this will help anyone who would like to try hardcore. This guide is about ACT IV normal.
ACT IV NORMAL
General Tips:
- You will need high Fire and Lightning resistance for ACT IV.
- Dont forget to do Izual quest to get +2 skill points reward.
- You can buy stronger Health and Mana potions from Jamella
- You should be atleast level 22 before you go to ACT IV
- If you struggle with resistances, try to farm a little bit to get some runes to make Ancients Pledge runeword in shield before Diablo fight or you can use gems in 3 socket shield to increase resistances.
- You can make first crafted items as you will get few high level gems from Hellforge quest.
- Making 3 socket breast plate with higher level rubies might be great way how to increase your chance to survive Diablo fight.
- Dont run into big groups of monsters at once, especialy in Chaos Sanctuary.
Common places and events which can get you killed
Venom Lords:
Common enemy in ACT IV, they have very strong fire damage with Inferno skill like Fetish shamans in ACT III, but they are a lot harder to kill because of high Life. Be carefull to not face more of them at once at close range if your fire resist is not high. They also have strong melee attacks.
Burning Souls
I already talked about Gloams in ACT III guide, these are subtype of same monster. They are really not that dangerous on normal, but its not wise to move in zones with them with very low lighting resistance. They can be found in Plains of Despair, but not always.
Knights:
They have 3 versions: Doom Knights who are melee fighters, Abyss Knights who are half mages shooting elemental projectiles and half fighters wielding sword and Oblivion Knights who are full casters using curses, elemental projectiles, Bone Armor and Bone spirit. All versions are very capable fighters. Caster class is most dangerous because they can cast some nasty curses like Amplify damage or Decrepify. They can be found only in Chaos Sanctuary. Other versions are in several locations of ACT IV. All knights have 40% chance to deal elemental dmg together with their physical damage. They are considered as one of the most dangerous monsters.
Oblivion knights have also Lower resist curse they had back in 1.10. It was later removed or didnt work but they have it in D2R version of game again. You will take a lot more damage from elemental attacks if you are cursed with it.
Izual
Super unique monster who can be randomly found at Plains of Despair. He hits hard at close range and can slow you down with cold damage and Cold Nova. Fight is little bit long because of his high health, but chance to die to him is not that high if you keep your life above 50%. Your merc is usualy able to tank him well.
Regurgitators
These guys have special behaviour. They can attack you a melee range, but if there are dead monsters around, they will try to eat their corpses and them shoot their remains at you. Try to kill them before they do that, because their shots are doing a lot of physical damage.
Hephasto the Armorer:
Super Unique Monster guarding Hellforge in River of Flame. He is Aura Enchanted, Spectral hit and Magic resistant. He hits hard at close range and is fast. He is mostly dangerous because of aura ability, especialy if it is Conviction. Try to use mercenary as bait while you kill him.
Chaos Sanctuary
Place full of nasty enemies, Doom knights, Oblivion Knights, Venom Lords and Storm casters who will drain your mana. Take it slow and dont just rush in because you can be cursed with Amplify damage,Decrepify or Lower resistance and easily killed.
Grand Vizier of Chaos
One of 3 seal bosses. He can be spawned by seal on left side of Chaos Sanctuary. Storm Casters have quite low health so they are easy to kill, just be carefull to not get into their group as they will drain your mana and you will be unable to use skills which require mana to get out or fight them effectively.
Lord De Seis
Super unique Oblivion knight, he will be spawned after you activate Chaos Sanctuary Seal in the middle. He is always Extra strong and Aura enchanted with Fanaticism. His minions are Doom Knights who are more dangerous than him as he is usualy busy with just casting curses or bone spirit. If you lure minions away, they can be killed one by one while they are out of fanaticism aura range. If you will fight them under fanaticism influence, you will be in trouble. And dont forget that De seis can also cast decrepify or amplify damage on you on top of that.
Infector of Souls:
Super unique Venom lord with minions, he is Extra fast and Spectral hit. This is definitely one of the most dangerous monsters on normal difficulty. Infector and his minions are doing extreme amount of damage with their inferno. If they will manage to surround you, you are going to die unless you have some good escape ability. Carefull hit and run tactic with usage of mercenary and crowd control skills is best aproach. If more of them is closing the distance on you, run away. There are two options where the pack will be spawned based on the layout of Chaos sanctuary. You can see example of one on picture below where your path will be blocked by spawned Infector and his pack after you click on seal so i suggest to use TP and go back from River of Flame Waypoint if you dont feel confident to fight Infector there without way to escape.
Your escape route is blocked by Infector here:
Diablo:
Final ACT IV boss. A lot of HP and plenty of spells with a lot of damage. Caster and ranged classes have advantage because they dont have to face Diablo at melee range where he is most deadly because you will have less time to react to his spells and face them directly. Diablo has many spells, some are less dangerous like Firewall, Fire Nova, Cold Hand. And then there are his two most powerfull spells, Firestorm dealing a lof of Fire and some physical damage and Lighting Hose with a lot of lighting and also physical damage.
Firestorm is not that extremely dangerous but Lightning hose definitely is. If something will kill you when fighting Diablo, this will be most likely that. If you see Diablo casting animation, run to side and dont stop until he is done casting as he will follow your with the Lighting. Be carefull because it has pretty long range. Diablo can also cast bone prison, trapping you inside of it. If you cast town portal close to him, he will often use his bone prison on it and you will be blocked when you come back. High Lightning and Fire resistances are definitely required. Boost with some Faster run walk on them can be also highly usefull so you can get out of inferno or lighting faster. Damage and Magic damage reaction works alse very well to mitigate some damage who inferno and Lightning because they are partialy elemental and physical.
