09-15-2003, 03:20 AM
MALDAR: ACT II, THE ARCANE SANCTUARY
I ran quickly through the palace levels (which was easy, because it always has the same layout) and entered the dimensional portal to the Arcane Sanctuary. I touched the waypoint and then I had a decision to make. Which direction was I going to try first? I decided to try the northeast direction (upper-right).
![[Image: Maldar2_arcane1.jpg]](http://www.idiom.com/~gmonsen/diablo/Maldar2_arcane1.jpg)
The pathways in the arcane sanctuary are too narrow to allow someone to slip past monsters and anyway, ghosts can come upon you from all directions and block your path, so the way to deal with the Arcane Sanctuary if you're not allowed to use Teleport is to draw monsters from the direction you want to go and park them in the three directions you don't want to go.
![[Image: Maldar2_arcane2.jpg]](http://www.idiom.com/~gmonsen/diablo/Maldar2_arcane2.jpg)
Parking normal ghosts is pretty easy, actually, since it's easy to lead them to where you want them to go and then send them off to the nether reaches of the sanctuary. You lead them as far as you feel you can safely go in the direction you want to park them, Dim Vision them, move around behind them, cast Terror on them repeatedly until they fly off the screen and then cast Dim Vision at the edge of the screen. The last thing the ghosts remember is that they were flying away from you, so they keep on going for a decent distance and if everything works out well, you won't see them again.
![[Image: Maldar2_arcane3.jpg]](http://www.idiom.com/~gmonsen/diablo/Maldar2_arcane3.jpg)
But things don't always work out well. At some point while I was parking some monsters in the southwest, I woke up a ghost boss pack and he seemed to have picked up some of the ghosts I thought I had ditched. Unfortunately, casting Dim Vision on the minions wouldn't do any good, because now that they were already locked onto me, they would keep coming at me even after they get blinded (until their next "decision"). Plus, that wouldn't stop the boss in any case.
![[Image: Maldar2_arcane4.jpg]](http://www.idiom.com/~gmonsen/diablo/Maldar2_arcane4.jpg)
In a panic, I used the bone prison-tp trick by spreading a few bone prisons, going to town, and coming back. As expected, the ghosts switched to attacking the bone prison. I booked it up the northeast direction, figuring that the waypoint area was now offlimits. I had already made some progress in parking some of the monsters from the northeast direction, though, so I thought that maybe I could park the remainder of the monsters in some of the side paths up there.
Unfortunately, the ghosts must've broken through the bone prison quickly, because it wasn't long before I saw a mass of ghosts closing in on me from behind. I tp'd to town.
Now I had another decision to make. I had effectively managed to park the whole ghost pack up in the northeast, but I had already pulled out about a third of the monsters from that direction -- and parked them in the other three directions! Should I leave the ghosts and switch directions or figure out another way to deal with the ghosts?
I ran quickly through the palace levels (which was easy, because it always has the same layout) and entered the dimensional portal to the Arcane Sanctuary. I touched the waypoint and then I had a decision to make. Which direction was I going to try first? I decided to try the northeast direction (upper-right).
The pathways in the arcane sanctuary are too narrow to allow someone to slip past monsters and anyway, ghosts can come upon you from all directions and block your path, so the way to deal with the Arcane Sanctuary if you're not allowed to use Teleport is to draw monsters from the direction you want to go and park them in the three directions you don't want to go.
Parking normal ghosts is pretty easy, actually, since it's easy to lead them to where you want them to go and then send them off to the nether reaches of the sanctuary. You lead them as far as you feel you can safely go in the direction you want to park them, Dim Vision them, move around behind them, cast Terror on them repeatedly until they fly off the screen and then cast Dim Vision at the edge of the screen. The last thing the ghosts remember is that they were flying away from you, so they keep on going for a decent distance and if everything works out well, you won't see them again.
But things don't always work out well. At some point while I was parking some monsters in the southwest, I woke up a ghost boss pack and he seemed to have picked up some of the ghosts I thought I had ditched. Unfortunately, casting Dim Vision on the minions wouldn't do any good, because now that they were already locked onto me, they would keep coming at me even after they get blinded (until their next "decision"). Plus, that wouldn't stop the boss in any case.
In a panic, I used the bone prison-tp trick by spreading a few bone prisons, going to town, and coming back. As expected, the ghosts switched to attacking the bone prison. I booked it up the northeast direction, figuring that the waypoint area was now offlimits. I had already made some progress in parking some of the monsters from the northeast direction, though, so I thought that maybe I could park the remainder of the monsters in some of the side paths up there.
Unfortunately, the ghosts must've broken through the bone prison quickly, because it wasn't long before I saw a mass of ghosts closing in on me from behind. I tp'd to town.
Now I had another decision to make. I had effectively managed to park the whole ghost pack up in the northeast, but I had already pulled out about a third of the monsters from that direction -- and parked them in the other three directions! Should I leave the ghosts and switch directions or figure out another way to deal with the ghosts?