Another way to play Diablo!

[LemmingofGlory]

First point, as far as tackling tough foes:  “Blocking's your best bet here.”

Um, disagree completely with you here.

Code:

CLVL  17
DEX  60
AC  50    70    90    110    130

MON TO HIT

MAW  49    29    9    -11    -31

MAELSTORM  72    52    32    12    -8

VORTEX  102    82    62    42    22
BALROG  116    96    76    56    36

CAVE  66    46    26    6    -14
RED  85    65    45    25    5
GOLD  104    84    64    44    24
AZURE  118    98    78    58    38

BLACK  92    72    52    32    12
DOOM  116    96    76    56    36
STEEL  110    90    70    50    30
BK  124    104    84    64    44

I picture a 1@17 warrior as a character who, with good finds, has the best equipment that scrounging around in early catacombs has to offer. If he's thrifty, he may have saved quite a bit of money and tried to buy something nice from Griswold, but given that most players aren't anal enough to shop Griswold at clvl 16 until he offers Hell-worthy armor, I'm going to doubt this guy has very much in the way of good AC -- hardly anything in the realm of 130. This means, versus tougher foes (i.e. the low guys lower on the list), he's going to want to stock up on "of Accuracy" junk he can get. (It's not so hard to buy that because, when one goes for blocking, base type hardly matters. With good armor, Enchantment and Base Type matters.) Any AC that he can get with that is gravy, and no doubt he should try to mix in some resists.

Suppose two (or more) fast attackers have engaged you and you have started blocking their attacks.

Why is a (supposedly) well-played character waking up so many monsters at once?

Secondly, if you've engaged even 2 monsters, you need to take advantage of chokes so that you don't get killed. If there are no convenient chokes, then you've made a big error in activating that many baddies.

Sure, blocking will help you survive all 1-on-1 and even 2-on-1 encounters with Blood Knights -- but why are you fighting BKs?  Why in the world would you want to hang around tackling one of the toughest and most experience-laden foes in the entire game?  To get the drops?  Killing bosses is MUCH more effective in terms of dangers endured and items drops and experience avoided.

You're fighting BKs because, in general, it's quite likely that you'll have to fight at least a few en route to Diablo, regardless how many your magi (read: sample size = 2) fought. Frankly, it doesn't matter how "experience laden" BKs are, because to a clvl 17 the give the same amount of exp as any other damn thing in Hell. This was shown earlier.

Having high Dex and “perfect block” gives one a false feeling of security that lasts as long as you are attacked by only one foe at a time.  High AC lets to try multiple opponents and gives you a true feel for just how much you can “push” on the level, take damage, and still survive and work the level.

And you should not engage more than one foe at a time. If you do, you're asking for it; I don't care what your AC is.

Leather 13 purchased at clevel 1
Butcher drops Wisdom’s Wrap at clevel 7
Valiant(63%) Armor17 drops in Cats when clevel 8
Valiant(65%) RingMail 19 drops in Cats when clevel 8
Glorious(+87%) Breast Plate 20 drops in Caves 9 at clevel 9
Plate 48 of Accuracy +13 drops in Caves 11 at clevel 10, and then one level later in the same game, Glorious(73%) Plate40 of Stars+10 drops on Caves12 at clevel10.  (THAT’S why I go to Caves.  In addition, it _could_ have been up to a GOTHIC Plate dropping on Caves 12 -- mine was just regular Plate though.)

...and as convincing as a singular case study may be, I still doubt AC's the best way to go for every character.

(1) Clvl 10 characters cannot normally enter Caves (clvl 13 restriction). While careful playing obviously got you down there, you have to begin on Cats5 every time you want to go there. It's great to be a mage with 275 mana and phasing, but I wouldn't want to be a warrior doing that... dozens of times.

(2) Your case study used a mage. In a discussion about AC and blocking, how about we talk about a melee character?

Um, being Mortal makes the game really tough; the cheese factor barely enters into the equation when you’re just trying to stay alive.  Plus, if you don’t want to play in whatever way you consider cheesy, you don’t _have_ to play that way. 

It's just funny to see "And you can repeat dlvls as much as you want!" when you're afraid co-op play will lead to people exploiting it at every turn. Listen: People who play these sorts of challenges do so for the challenge. Someone genuinely interested in doing 1@17 is not going to shadow his Sugar Daddy Tank Mage for his Hell leave-behinds. As such, rules such as "PLAY LEGIT!" and "THIS CANNOT BE DONE BECAUSE IT IS CHEESE!" are quite extraneous.

But in looking at your comment, you don’t think playing multi- rather than solo dot@level is cheesy?

I don't see any direct cheese in typical co-op play. As I said, players who exploit co-op situations aren't really interested in the challenge in the first place. The dot runs should, of course, be done solo; otherwise it's not the same challenge (but it might be a fun co-op game).

What challenge is there if one can continually re-animate oneself?

Number of deaths during a particular run is usually noted so that readers can determine whether their deaths were in such excess as to render the run unimpressive. Immortal Hero 1@17 is very impressive. Someone who died 2 times along the way, but still got 1@17, is pretty neat to me, too. Someone who died 2 dozen times... gets points for trying. :P

For the clevel 30 character (making his 3@30 run), the point is moot -- stone ‘em all and kill em all.

How dull.

-Lem