Title says it all - always wanted to try and beat the game with a HC self-found toon but never been able to quite pull it off. Got close twice with a summonmancer but died both times rune farming the Countess on Hell difficulty.
Hoping third time is the charm - started a new HC solo ladder summonmancer and so far it’s going well. It’s refreshing to have the items I find actually matter as opposed to just waiting until I get to a certain level to use some OP item I’ve had/been using forever.
Normal diablo is where I died doing a solo run with a summon necro. I need more work on playing HC myself. Just got to play safe. What gear setup did you have in mind for end game? I was thinking of a walk necro with shaftstop, homun, hoto, shako, soe, etc. And aim for 60% block with homun. Or do I have the wrong idea?
Take out normal Diablo with +1 Bonespear. Farm Countess for Tal, Ral and Ort to make Ancients Pledge, make Stealth armour (Tal Eth) for frw and fcr and make Nadir helm (Nef Tir) to lower Diablo’s defence. Stay out of his star and run circles around him while hitting him with BS. Ideally you want to be clvl 24 to use Decrepify. With Ancient’s Pledge it should be easy to max Light and Fire resistances with charms and other gear. Find resistance shrine for lowest.
As for navigating hell, it’ll be easy if you make a Lore helm, Smoke armour, Rhyme shield in head and White wand. All runes easily obtained in NM. Buy a teleport charged staff in Act 3 normal from Ormus to control revives. Revive your way through hell.
Normal difficulty diablo is surprisingly simple to beat with the summoner. Open the fight by running ahead of your minions and immediately cast Decrepify and Clay golem in a quick succession. Then just watch as the fight is already won.
Ofc, your Clay golem should have close to 50% slow, relatively easy to get even with only one hard point and skillers.
I had only level 7 golem this ladder at the Diablo fight, If I recall. Got a +3 wand +2 head and a circlet with 1 to summoning skills. Diablo didn’t manage to take out even one of my skeletons.
I’ve sometimes put a few more hardpoints if I’m lacking the gear.
Sorry but its a bit too much of a hassle to make a channel and get recording software. To be honest, the fight doesn’t always go as smoothly, the opening is crucial, as well as a bit of luck that Diablo keeps aggro on the golem.
forget about high runewords (you will probably never build them) so pick builds that don’t depend on them.
always have max block and max rez even if you lose damage (spirit shield might be the best in slot for a sorc in SC but for HC nothing beats a Moser’s shield with 2 diamonds for a sorc. Rhyme in Bone shields are mandatory for all melee chars.
be creative with your builds. with a cookie-cutter build you might not even be able to finish the game.
edit: for a HC SSF necro on normal just cast iron maiden on diablo and let him hit the clay golem until he kills himself ( if you don’t want to respec from summoner.)
I wish you lots of luck OP. I’ve been playing for hundreds of hours in SSF SC, and have only gotten one 4os bow for a fire/ice bowazon. ONE!! Forget anything above that it has not happened.
It gets maddening after awhile, not getting anything one can use. That’s when I take a break and come back after a week or so.
Good luck to you OP. You should keep this post updated, it will be interesting to see how you fare.
Thanks everyone for all the responses! Honestly it’s kind of exciting to play this way, where little things actually matter again, and I’m happy I chose a ladder character to keep myself honest .
I will definitely do that! So far I’m in Act 2 Normal and it’s pretty standard fare. Just got through the Maggot Lair which forced me to ask why I didn’t try this with a Sorc lol. I’m not ashamed to admit I’ve used a hero editor in the past for offline characters in the original D2:LoD to boost my Bone Spear just to get through that area - just so annoying as a summonmancer. Andariel in Act I was pretty smooth at lvl 15, although I was disappointed that Iron Maiden didn’t seem to do much. Probably the best item I’ve found so far is a 2 socket Preserved Head which has +2 to Raise Skeleton and +3 to Corpse Explosion.
I will 100% try this when (if?) I get to him. I’ve beat him in the past but just through restocking my skelies multiple times after they all die horrible fiery deaths.
One of the main reasons why I went with a summonmancer for the run through. Only goal is to actually beat Baal on Hell difficulty - after that, this character gets retired to my imaginary Hall of Fame and I’ll go back to some of my offline toons like my Trapsin.
Now go play hardcore singleplayer self found from act 1 quest 1 to killing Baal in Hell – and try to find high for that character for that run.
When killing Baal, start a new character – because the game is over.
Play the game the way the game was intended to be played, where these runewords exist to be used;
Singleplayer without trading.
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