Feel my pain!

[Grogtank]

Feel my pain!

I'm sorry but I must vent my frustrations! I'm a level 85 CL/FO sorc. I have -35 resists to everything but lighting, which sits at a nice -10. I love the build though and with insight (obtained at level 83) I get by just fine.

I remember getting a Goldwrap from Gheed only to be disconnected seconds later and the belt lost. At level 80 I finally found a 4os sword for spirit, with which I promptly rolled the worst FCR possible.

I began to think my luck was turning around when running the pits yesterday. I got 2 unique drops in one huge fight. A Slayer Guard and Dusk Shroud! We all know the potential trade value of these items. Stunned, I finally remembered where my TP hotkey was and ran to Cain for ID's. I pop open my inventory to learn that BOTH items are ethereal. Just wonderful.

Today I had my first ever drop of War Travelers. You guessed it, ethereal! So the 3 best drops in 85 levels have all been useless to me. I'm going insane!

Grog

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Feel my pain!

lol

Wait until you start getting rare Dream Spirits or Vortex Shields with triple durability (i.e. failed uniques), then you can think to yourself... that could've been a Death's Fathom, or DWeb, or even the super-rare-but-useless Tyraels...

... yep, those D2 gods can be cruel buggers, that's for sure. I feel your pain.

 

[-=Slaye]2=-]

Re: Feel my pain!

I'm sorry but I must vent my frustrations! I'm a level 85 CL/FO sorc. I have -35 resists to everything but lighting, which sits at a nice -10. I love the build though and with insight (obtained at level 83) I get by just fine.

I remember getting a Goldwrap from Gheed only to be disconnected seconds later and the belt lost. At level 80 I finally found a 4os sword for spirit, with which I promptly rolled the worst FCR possible.

I began to think my luck was turning around when running the pits yesterday. I got 2 unique drops in one huge fight. A Slayer Guard and Dusk Shroud! We all know the potential trade value of these items. Stunned, I finally remembered where my TP hotkey was and ran to Cain for ID's. I pop open my inventory to learn that BOTH items are ethereal. Just wonderful.

Today I had my first ever drop of War Travelers. You guessed it, ethereal! So the 3 best drops in 85 levels have all been useless to me. I'm going insane!

Grog

Well my first best find was an arachnids in the Mausoleum. And guess what... It was ethereal too. Drops can sometimes be really nice, but there can also be long streaks of bad luck. Just keep on playing and eventually the stuff will come. I have the feeling though that you're sacrificing a lot of nicer resist gear for mf gear. My advice is don't. Put on some resists gear and be able to kill faster. MF is but a small factor for finding those nice items. Killing speed, survival beats MF.

 

[Grogtank]

Re: Feel my pain!

Well my first best find was an arachnids in the Mausoleum. And guess what... It was ethereal too. Drops can sometimes be really nice, but there can also be long streaks of bad luck. Just keep on playing and eventually the stuff will come. I have the feeling though that you're sacrificing a lot of nicer resist gear for mf gear. My advice is don't. Put on some resists gear and be able to kill faster. MF is but a small factor for finding those nice items. Killing speed, survival beats MF.

I wish that I was sacrificing too much good gear for MF. I simply don't have the gear. My crutch has been my near 1100 hp's. I am running Pits, Andy, Eldritch, Shenk, Countess and Meph. With Meph I just clear the side room with the least monsters then pull Meph to the side and let my merc tank him (Shaftstop and a L2 Life Tap wand). Here's my gear:

Dusk Shroud with 4x Ptpaz (Heavenly Garb is my only alternative)
Spirit Sword
Rhyme
Magefist
Silkweave boots
Godly Demonhide sash of the Whale (lol)
Raven Frost ring
Nagelring
+1 skills ammy of the Whale

I have runes for a Lionheart and a Spirit shield. I just haven't found a 4os archon plate yet and I don't want to use the spirit shield without atleast some help with STR requirements. What should I do about getting a some str. for a spirit shield? Just pump str and forget about it? Is trading for a low torch and anni difficult on the ladder? I'm still undecided here but would really like to use the spirit shield. My ultimate goal is Tal's but at the rate I'm progressing lately it seems that is a long way off.

Grog

 

[melianor]

Re: Feel my pain!

Grogtank, go to the trade forum for the realm you play in. There's usually a few simply rules to follow, which you can read about in the respective forum, but you will be able to get a white monarch, that you can socket with the socket quest from larzuk. It will get 4 sockets. If you are playing single player, there are alot of people in the SP forum you can trade with as well.

Your FCR is below 65%. You should have at least 65% for teleporting and better killing speed. What is your headgear? Hunt for ORT+SOL at NM Countess and make yourself a "Lore" Helmet which will give +1 skills.

Before you run the pit, i would suggest that you farm Andariel and Mephisto on NM to get some decent gear upgrades. My char is lvl75 atm and i have been running both Andariel and Mephisto quite a few times, without much MF and have gotten stuff like Skin of Vipermagi and some other decent items. Luck is a big factor in these things

 

[Grogtank]

Re: Feel my pain!

Sorry I forgot to say I am using Tal's mask.

Yes I have 2 white monarchs, I'm going to use the socket recipe and hope for the best before using larzuk. My main issue is the str requirement on Spirit. Should I just pump my str up to 156 without getting a torch/anni etc?

About NM difficulty. Are some items easier to find in NM because of a smaller loot table or something? I always thought jumping to hell difficulty brought better results as long as you could kill reasonably fast. Maybe I will jump back down to NM and try some more. Thanks.

 

[melianor]

Re: Feel my pain!

Sorry I forgot to say I am using Tal's mask.

Yes I have 2 white monarchs, I'm going to use the socket recipe and hope for the best before using larzuk. My main issue is the str requirement on Spirit. Should I just pump my str up to 156 without getting a torch/anni etc?

About NM difficulty. Are some items easier to find in NM because of a smaller loot table or something? I always thought jumping to hell difficulty brought better results as long as you could kill reasonably fast. Maybe I will jump back down to NM and try some more. Thanks.

Ofcourse please yes pump your str. The shield is vital to your survival and so forth! Not easier to find, but easier to kill Also in Hell the loottable will indeed be bigger, since alot more elite items are available for drop. Doing NM runs will be very fast for you and what actually matters with MF is not the amount of MF, but the amoutn of runs you make

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Feel my pain!

A few excess points in strength won't break your build later, but a spirit shield will help you right now. So I'd just spend the necessary points in strength and then you don't have to worry about things like anni/torch if you can't trade for them immediately.

And yes, many very good exceptional-quality items (Vipermagi, Occulus, WarTrav's, etc.) are more common in Nightmare. But, if you're safe & fast in Hell, then it's a better place to run because of the odd times that you get a really good high quality item. Looking at your equipment though, I'm guessing hanging out in Nightmare for a couple hours and doing a few boss runs could help you.

 

[ioupainmax]

Re: Feel my pain!

I will also add that eth War Travellers are not as bad as they seem. I use a pair on my dedicated Mephy Blizzard sorceress and because she uses the moat trick and only ever gets hit by the odd fireball from a hydra from the council, it never loses durability.

Remember that armour only loses durability when hit with a physical attack and weapoms only lose durability when used for melee. I once had a sorceress with eth Harlequin Crest, eth Oculus and eth War Travellers who didn't have any problems because I limited the physical attacks she was exposed to.

Not to mention this would give you a boost to strength so that you won't have to put quite so many points into strength and instead you could gain a bit more life.

 

[Rhiana]

Re: Feel my pain!

If you do NM runs and get a 2socket armor with decent defense, make a Smoke runeword until you find/get something better. Smoke will give you decent resists and some other nice bonuses.

Smoke
Nef + Lum
+75% Enhanced Defense
+280 Defense Vs. Missile
All Resistances +50
20% Faster Hit Recovery
Level 6 Weaken (18 Charges)
+10 To Energy
-1 To Light Radius

I'm using that on my blizzard sorc (made in a Tigulated Mail, I think, so I have pretty low def) and have had little problems.

 

[Akse]

Re: Feel my pain!

Where do u need def on sorc? You are not supposed to get hit ..

 

[melianor]

Re: Feel my pain!

Smoke
Nef + Lum
+75% Enhanced Defense
+280 Defense Vs. Missile
All Resistances +50
20% Faster Hit Recovery
Level 6 Weaken (18 Charges)
+10 To Energy
-1 To Light Radius

Where do u need def on sorc? You are not supposed to get hit ..

The defense is not the important part on this runeword, but the +280 Defense vs. Missisle and the 20 FHR will certainly help out a while, especially against ranged archer attacks.

 

[MagisterMan]

Re: Feel my pain!

Today I had my first ever drop of War Travelers. You guessed it, ethereal! So the 3 best drops in 85 levels have all been useless to me. I'm going insane!

Grog

You just have to be patient. I was doing tons meph runs today and nothing good dropped, until i decided to try and pop a chest behind meph. Guess what came out? A fresh Lo rune! :thumbup:

Hope your luck will get better
MagisterMan