Diablo II: I eat my words. It's fun!

[Felch]

Weird.

Heavy summoning Necros are fun in B.net if you have broadband. There's nothing like having a twenty odd minions around to soak up damage and lag all your teammates. Revives though are much better than either skeleton. The skeletons are both obselete by the end of Normal.

My favorite build was a Tanking Druid. I specialized in Oak Sage, Dire Wolves, and Hurricane, and cranked up my armor and hit points as best I could. Using a Defiance hireling helped out a lot too, it gave my a huge defense bonus. I was able to stand in the middle of packs of enemies near the end of Nightmare and kill them just by using Hurricane. A laid back way of playing that was more interesting than effective. By Hell the monsters simply stopped dying.

Right now I'm working on a lightning Sorc, and plan on using Static Field heavily along with Thunder Storm, and an Act V merc. My buddy has a Fire sorc, so we'd complement each other well enough to do Cow runs in Hell.

[The Mad Monk]

My werewolf-summoner actually uses a rogue; the party already kicks in melee, the rogue adds decent ranged combat.

I used to favor ice mages, but the more time I spend in the higher difficulties, the more I favor rogues. Except for zookeeper necros -- I use a thorns merc there, assasins (ice mage), and bowazons (also ice mage).

[The Mad Monk]

for those characters who have problems with the dart blowers, there are a couple options:

1) Ignore them. The melee specialists that have the most trouble with them are also usually the best equipped to just run right by them and on to targets more worthy of their consideration.

2) Get a rogue or ice mage, and let them worry about the plinkers.

3) Carry a pack of throwing knives, or a bow, whatever -- for those 'special occasions'.

I have a paladin who actually has all three options.

The rogue and bow options will also work with death and oblivion knights. In normal difficulty, plug a couple perfect emeralds in a bow and go sniping...

[Father Beast]

BTW, after starting again on nightmare, I noticed my resistances were all dropped significantly. to be exact, all my resistances went down 40%

is this pretty standard?

[FrustratedPoet]

yes, that's exactly standard .... it's supposed to be a 'nightmare' ....

They drop even more on Hell difficulty, if i remember correctly it is a 100% drop ... that is indeed 'hell'.

This is where things will start to get very tough if you have a sub-optimal set of skills for your character. Almost any character is good enough to complete Normal mode, but unfortunately you might find that your character simply isn't good enough to cope. That's what happened to me with my first character ... I completed Normal quite easily, but couldn't get out of Act 2 on Nightmare ... my latest character is finding things very easy on Hell difficulty, though ... we live and learn.

Other differences about Nightmare difficulty:

a) monsters have LOADS more hit-points ... I expect you noticed that the zombies in the first zone of Act One took longer to kill than most of the monsters leading up to fighting Baal.

b) monsters do LOADS more damage, but give LOADS more experience.

c) you will start to see Exceptional items drop ... you might have seen a couple in Acts 4 and 5 of Normal, but they're quite rare there. They're better versions of the normal weapons you'll notice that they have improved stats and a different (usuall weird) name from the base type... use them if you can.

d) many basic monsters will be immune to some kind of attack. Most commonly this is Fire, Poison, Ice or Lightening ... pure melee characters won't be too bothered by this, but it can be very tricky if you are playing a Sorceress with only one decent damage spell. Some of the champion and random boss monsters will also be Immune to Physical ... if you don't have a good elemental attack then these guys will be almost invincible ... if they have Stone Skin too they probably will be invincible if you can't do elemental damage. If you don't have a good skill to counter these (Vengeance for a Pally, Berserk for a Barb) then keep your eyes out for an Exceptional weapon with either 3 or 4 sockets or good base elemental damage.

I'm sorry if you knew most of that already, I don't mean to be patronising ...

Have fun

BTW, what character are you playing? what level? what skills do you have and at what level are they? what equipment do you have? We can give you a few helpful hints if you find things tough going on Nightmare.

[FrustratedPoet]

Ahhh OK, I just re-read your earlier post about being a level 37 Paladin with 14 points in Vengeance. That is an excellent skill to use, if only because it solves any problems you might have had with Physical Immunes but you will need two things to make it really effective for the harder difficulties...

1) 3-5% mana steal or plenty of rejuvination potions. You'll be using the attack a lot more on Nightmare. This is easy to get.

2) Conviction. (lvl 30-req aura) If you don't have this already then you're gonna need to get it if you want to survive until the end of Nightmare. The basic 'cookie-cutter' Paladin builds are Zeal-Fanaticism and Vengeance-Conviction ... when you get to higher levels you can put points into both those auras and start to flash them. They're not the only ways to do it, of course, nor necessarily the most fun, but they are the most powerful ... and dying lots isn't much fun either.

Your top priorities in terms of equipment should probably be Resistances ... all of them if possible, but I always find Lightning to be the most important, since the Lightning Enchanted bosses are Ultimate Destruction if you have a low lightning resist. Also you will need to get a high damage one-handed weapon ... some people like two-handers, but I always find I die too much without the resistances gained from the Ancients Pledge or a 3D-shield. The biggest problem I had with my first paladin was damage on Nightmare level ... wading through all the monsters was a huge chore and I was dying too much because it took me forever to kill anything.

[tniem]

I just defeated Act I on Normal difficulty with a level 13 Paladin. I know, I am just getting started. I figured now would be a good time to make sure that I am investing in the right stuff. What spells would you suggest I upgrade to so that I can beat Diablo and Baal and possibly move on to Nightmare and Hell?

[Freeze]

There's a BUG in the game that causes ETH runes (#5 or #6 i think. level req is about 13) to give full ITD when socketed in a weapon. It's not all that much help against monsters with high block, like Diablo, but it's useful for leveling up your newest build. There's natch rumors that the BUG will get fixed in patch 1.10, so it's probably best to socket only crappy low-level items with ETH runes.

[SnowFire]

They're not the only ways to do it, of course, nor necessarily the most fun, but they are the most powerful ...

Don't know how things worked out in LOD, but a friend of mine had a Smite Paladin who tore it up. He could stun-lock pretty much any single enemy in the game (be it unique or not), and could still do pretty well against multiple nasty monsters, with only true swarms & Lightning Enchanted giving him problems (which is why a Strafeazon worked very well with him- the aura that does more damage made her arrows rule, and the Paladin stunned any nasty monsters before they could get close to her, which was her weakness).

[The Mad Monk]

One thing to keep in mind about pallys is that they can be hard to stop if they have a high blocking percentage, but they can only get that percentage by boosting DEX regularly.

A monster that can hit you 90% of the time is nowhere near as bad if you can block that hit 75% of the time...

[Chowlett]

I recently played one of the most fun Mephisto runs I've ever done. I was my level 46 Sorc (a minor tri-elemntalist, given my +1 skills amulet, my +1 skills orb and my +3 fire skill coronet) aiding a level 44 Werebear take Phisty down. It's classic - my Barb and the druid just tank, while I hang back and land firewalls on the stationary monsters for 450-550 damage per second, lasting 4 seconds!

She's even better now I've fitted her out with, erm, Stealth armour, I think it is. TalEth, gives Cast Rate and Mana Regen among others. My RalOrtTal is doing well, but I'll upgrade that to a 3D sometime soon.

[FrustratedPoet]

Paladins that put a lot of skill points into Smite or into Charge can also be extremely good, however I didn't have as much fun with my Smite Pally as I did with my Zeal or Vengeance one ... but I suppose because it was my 3rd Paladin I was a bit bored of the class anyway. I've heard that Charge is amazing, especially in PvP, but I've never tried it myself.

Originally posted by tniem
I just defeated Act I on Normal difficulty with a level 13 Paladin. I know, I am just getting started. I figured now would be a good time to make sure that I am investing in the right stuff. What spells would you suggest I upgrade to so that I can beat Diablo and Baal and possibly move on to Nightmare and Hell?

Several points into Thorns is a must ... it is the most effective skill to use against the big boss characters. You can simply load up on health potions and let them hit you if you really want ... some people even play as a Martyr Paladin. That's where you put all your stat-points into Vitality so you have tons of Life and put all you skill-points into Thorns, don't bother to wear any armour or even carry a weapon and let all the enemies kill themselves by attacking you. This is not a powerful build, and is really only a bit of a silly one for people who want a challenge, but it's quite possible to complete Normal at least using this .. or so I've heard.

Here's a quick rundown of my thoughts on making a Paladin:

General Skills for all Paladins:
5 Thorns - this is great! All paladins should have a few points in this. You can get an Act 2/Nightmare Mercenary with this aura, but by then you probably won't need it much anymore and will want to take the Holy Freeze Merc (see below)

1 Salvation - you need to be level 30 to get this, but it can really help you get started on Nightmare if you struggle to cope with the -40% resistances. Skip it if you think you can manage without it.

5 Holy Freeze? - this is another absolutely awesome skill that most characters would die to get their hands on ... however once you get to Act 2 of Nightmare difficulty you can get a Mercenary who has this skill ... I wouldn't put skill points into it if I were you because I always like to have the Merc with it ... but it's your call.

Specifics:
Right, there's SO many options here. The paladin isn't a broken uber-class like the Guided Arrow/Buriza Amazon, but has several different builds that can work well.

Vengance/Conviction: The Vengeance will give you a high amount of elemental damage, which is crucial at higher levels. It is kind of mana-hungry, so some leeching will be needed here so you don't run out. The Conviction aura will lower the enemy's resistance to elemental attacks ... you don't need to be a genius to see why this is a good combo. However, you can't get Conviction until level 30, but Vengeance and a bit of Thorns will see you through until then with no problems.

Zeal/Fanaticism: Zeal will give you lots of fast attacks, up to a maximum of 5 now (thank God!), and Fanaticism will give your attacks much more damage and will increase you % to-hit. Sweet.

Smite/Charge/Holy Shield: This build requires an excellent shield, but fortunately the Pally has access to several of those because of his class-specific ones. Use them well. The Smite and Charge skills will give you huge damage, Charge especially, and the Holy Shield will increase your blocking percentage and damage with shield attacks. You can supplement this with an aura of your choice if you want. Probably Thorns, Holy Freeze or Redemption would be good fits for this. A few points into Holy Shield with most of the builds will serve you well.

Zeal/Holy Shock: This can do HUGE damage, but it is very dependent on Lighning damage ... when you encounter Lightning Immune monsters later on they will simply laugh in your face. It is powerful in the right places though ... if you just want to do Cow Runs the whole time then this would be good.

For a more thorough and experienced analysis of the Paladin class, and indeed all the classes, you might want to check out the Diabloii.net strategy compendium. The nav-bar on the left has links to several useful guides, and includes guides for strange sub-builds of the Paladin such as the Ranger. Check it out, especially this general guide.

The best resource to plan your skill levels is this website, where you can experiment with putting skill points in different places to see what combinations you can have. It can take a while to load, though.

[Chowlett]

Originally posted by Freeze
There's a BUG in the game that causes ETH runes (#5 or #6 i think. level req is about 13) to give full ITD when socketed in a weapon. It's not all that much help against monsters with high block, like Diablo, but it's useful for leveling up your newest build. There's natch rumors that the BUG will get fixed in patch 1.10, so it's probably best to socket only crappy low-level items with ETH runes.

Really? Cool! Do you hae a link?

[FrustratedPoet]

A link to what? If you mean the rumours/facts about v1.10 then here is a link, most of the stuff on that site is educated speculation, but there are some things that Blizzard have revealed, including Ladder Characters.

[Chowlett]

No I meant to the Eth rune bug - I hadn't heard of it before.