Being pure cold is tough, and severely limits what you can do. It sucks, I know. I currently run Frozen Orb + Fire Wall and have had great success with it. I solo Chaos and Baal runs, carefully. Of course, with a doodoo merc (everyone’s early game plight), Fire Wall is a very strange ability and not my favorite. However, since putting some basic gear on my merc, Fire Wall has proven to be a powerhouse.
My build:
1x Frozen Armor
1x Telekinesis
1x Teleport
1x Static Field
20x Fire Wall
20x Fire Mastery
1x Warmth
20x Frozen Orb
10x Cold Mastery
??x Ice Bolt (all my remaining points will be going here)
However, as I said, I have a survivable Mercenary. So, suggestions for pure cold?
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First thing’s first, because of hugely diminshing returns, the first 200% MF are more important than the next 800% combined. So keep that in mind, and don’t push maximum MF% while neglecting your ability to be mobile and kill things. If you take 5 minutes to kill a boss at 500% MF, and 2 minutes at 180% MF, I can promise you, the 180% will win out in the long run. Especially if you die less while teleporting (stupid Dolls).
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You say you finished Act 3? You should be doing Mephisto. For certain. Look up strats on cheesing him and you basically can’t die. Worst case scenario, you might have to teleport around a bit to get the council out of the room while you cheese it, but you need to kill Meph, hit the armor stand and the weapon stand to his left and right, and hit the super chest in the very back of the room.
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Put a MF shield on your swap weapon. Rhyme runeword (Shael + Eth) in a 2 socket Bone Shield / Grim Shield / Troll’s Nest / any other shield (lower strength requirements is better, Bone Shields look coolest) and you’ll have another 25% as well as solid resists. It’s not quite as resist-y as Ancient’s Pledge but it is still great. Splendor (Eth + Lum) used to be the go-to, but since Spirit is so dang good and you can simply swap to a MF shield, it’s lost its luster.
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Keep in mind, MF is calculated at the moment of a monster’s death. If you’re standing Mephisto in a Fire Wall, as long as you swap to your MF weapon set BEFORE he dies, it does not matter what you’re wearing to do the majority of that damage.
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Ancient Tunnels are great for both XP and drops, so you’re good there.
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Even with a moderate merc, you could do Pit runs in Act 1. (Outer Cloister waypoint, head outside and follow the path til you find the Pit. Clear it, floor 1 and 2.)
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Andariel is always a treat. (Did you Quest Bug her? If not, that’s big! All you have to do is talk to Warriv and travel east in the game in which you competed the quest BEFORE logging out. Best habit is to not talk to anyone after killing her for the quest and just go directly east. If you aren’t sure, kill her again. If she ever drops gold, you did not quest bug her.)
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Your merc is huge. Keep looking out for specific Merc items.
–Tal Rasha’s helm is crap for a sorceress unless you’re finishing the set. But it’s got 10% life leech for a merc.
–Stealskull you’re wearing isn’t terrible for him, but he life leech is low.
–Maybe farm up some gold and gamble circlets until you get one with a decent amount of leech!
–For armor, mine uses Griswold’s, which you’ll find in no time if you just keep playing. They come with decent armor and 3 sockets (usually good for Ral and Ort runes for good resistances) as well as +20 strength to help wear an Insight Colossus Voulge (easiest to find).
–If you find a Lem rune, Treachery is a fantastic and easy runeword. You can get Lem from your Hellforge or by doing cows and just normal MF runs. It’s not terribly uncommon.
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Go back and finish quests. Lem Esen’s Tome is 5 extra stat points per difficulty. Izual nets two extra skill points per difficulty. Rescuing Malah three times gets you 30 resist all in total. Etc etc etc. There are some useless ones (like the second quest in A1 that rewards you a Rogue merc unless you have a merc already), but there are plenty that give you decent rewards.
Faster Cast Rate has breakpoints. They are as follows (for Teleport / other spells without internal cooldown like Blizzard or Frozen Orb or Fire Wall):
- 0%, 13 frames
- 9%, 12 frames
- 20%, 11 frames
- 37%, 10 frames
- 63%, 9 frames <----you are here
- 105%, 8 frames
- 200%, 7 frames
This means each time you cast teleport, it will be a 9 frame animation, and since you’re at 63% faster cast, you will be completely unaffected by FCR until you get all the way up to 105%. That’s gonna require some solid gear upgrades, so don’t focus on that too much right now. Teleporting at 9 frames is totally doable. Be on the lookout for things like Skin of the Vipermagi, Trang Oul’s gloves / Magefists, and the elusive white/4os Monarch for spirit.
For finding that monarch, or a Mercenary weapon base for that matter, do hell cows with as little MF as possible. (This also slightly increases rune chances, so it’s a win-win!)
If you have any other questions, I’m happy to help the best I can!
. So now cows, chaos sanctuary and Baal runs are on the table too. Should I just run bosses for unique drops and cows for better base items now?