Diablo 2: An Illustrated Adventure - Page 4

The second half of Act 4 takes place in an area called the River of Flame. As you might imagine, this area consists mainly of lava and annoying enemies.


someone better fix these goddamn rickety steps

From the City of the Damned waypoint, I took the stairs down to the River of Flame. In the first section, there are two types of monsters that make up the majority, as well as champions and bosses that can be of any type. What types did I get? Hags and maggots.


i hate bugs

This combination turned out to be slightly easier than I first imagined. Shiver Armor helped to kill the minions and teleport + Ilzan helped to focus damage on the bigger targets. The hags still hit like trucks, but Ilzan and my cold damage and teleport helped to mitigate most of the damage. As I was exploring, the quest button popped up to let me know the Hellforge was nearby. Right on cue, Hephasto the Armorer came out all by himself. In Normal he's a major wuss anyway, so let's ignore that whole part and skip to a picture of my incredible Hellforge drop!


a nef rune, amazing!

At this point I would like to draw attention to the depressing state of my gem collection. One of my future goals is to make a Perfect Diamond shield. As of right now, all I have in my stash are two Flawed Diamonds.

With Hephasto dead and my gem collection securely stashed away, my journey through hell continued. I warped to the River of Flame waypoint, the halfway marker between the two areas. The ground in this area changed from ash-covered stone to chiseled steps and carvings. It was some sort of demonic bridge crossing the River of Flame on its way to the Chaos Sanctuary.


I took this only because I liked the statues

This section is home to Abyss Knights, monsters who regularly end up killing hardcore newbies with their magic attack. Although they have a strong attack, their defenses are weak. With a little timing, I could teleport next to individual knights and murder them.


abyss knights? more like rainbow knights

I made it across the bridge to the entrance of the Chaos Sanctuary. The enemies inside are extremely dangerous, so my strategy would be to force them into small groups if possible to lower the incoming damage to a bearable level. I fought a fierce battle at the door and when the dust settled, Ilzan and I were the only things alive.


lets see you try shutting the door now Diablo

The Chaos Sanctuary is home to Oblivion Knights, a special type of enemy that have an elemental attack and a repertoire of necromancer curses. The most famous ability they have is the Iron Maiden curse, which reflects a percentage of your physical melee damage back to you. Generally, if cursed while attacking, this results in your death. Even now I still jump whenever I hear the sound of Iron Maiden.

Inside, the Sanctuary is split into three wings, with a giant pentagram taking up the central area. Each wing holds a magic seal which must be broken to summon Diablo. I had to move slowly and stick to the walls to avoid activating too many monsters. I broke the first seal and summoned the first boss, the Grand Vizier of Chaos. This guy is a finger mage (read: wuss) and I had no problem feeding him a big mug full of murder.



The second wing is is guarded by Lord De Seis, an Extra Strong Oblivion Knight who always has a Fanaticism aura. Those attributes plus Amplify Damage/Decrepify are extremely bad for my safety, so I led his minions out of the Fanaticism aura and dealt with them first. With his minions gone, De Seis was just another Oblivion Knight.


thirsty for danger

My battle against De Seis wasn't without reward. He decided to drop a shiny new circlet for me! I wouldn't be Level 27 in time for Diablo, but I'm sure it'll be useful later on.


pretty sure that's supposed to say "Sorceress"

The final guardian was the hardest of the three. This guy is so dangerous that I wasn't sure how I would even survive opening the seal. The Infector of Souls always spawns with Extra Fast and Spectral Hit attributes. A pack of Extra Fast Venom Lords is not something to take lightly, and the Spectral Hit attribute doubles their physical attack with a random type of elemental damage. If a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll save time explaining how I dealt with the boss by showing you this picture. Basically if you don't get it from the picture, I microed around the terrain to prevent the majority of the enemies from fighting me at once.


click for fullscreen!

As the Infector of Souls' corpse steamed and melted into the floor, the Chaos Sanctuary began to shake. Diablo had finally arrived. I felt properly prepared from the last battle and my belt was restocked and full of potions. My fire and lightning resist were both 75%, so I hoped I had enough life to survive Diablo's red lightning breath. As I made my approach, a wave of fire washed over me, not harming me in the slightest, but bringing Ilzan's health dangerously low. I teleported on top of Diablo as fast as I could to force him into melee combat. I kept Diablo occupied at close range with Static Field while Ilzan poked at his scaly hide from behind.

Noticing that his claw attacks were useless against me, Diablo inhaled deeply and I watched in horror as he started to unleash his lightning breath attack. Something happened next that may be a Diablo 2 first: Sander's boots saved my life. The extra running speed allowed me to move out of the way quickly enough that I was only mildly singed and still very much alive. He tried to catch me with his breath again, but I was too fast and furious. When his attack momentarily paused, I assume to breathe in again, I took the opportunity to teleport on top of him and end the battle permanently.


posing for the victory photo

Sadly the only thing of any value he dropped was this belt, which I immediately put on:



I took a few victory laps around the Pandemonium Fortress before leaving for Act 5. More danger and excitement were sure to await me there.

Here's a list of my equipment at the beginning of Act 5:
Helmet: Garnet Mask of Brilliance (26 Defense, +8 Energy, Fire Resist +28%)
Weapon: Fiery Bone Wand of Piercing (25-59 Fire Damage, Ignore Target Defense)
Shield: Ocher Gothic Shield of Deflecting (32 Defense, Lightning Resist +18%, 56% Block)
Armor: Gemmed Breastplate (67 Defense, +34 Life, Fire Resist +30%)
Gloves: Ocher Light Gauntlets (11 Defense, Lightning Resist +17%)
Belt: Rare Belt (14 Defense, Lightning Resist +30%) from Diablo, pictured above
Boots: Sander's Riprap
Ring1: Rare Ring (from the picture)
Ring2: Coral Ring (Lightning Resist +28%)
Ammy: Russet Amulet (Fire Resist +15%)

Fresh off the boat to Act 5, I cracked open the gate that lead out of town and entered the war zone that was known as the Bloody Foothills. A semi-interesting fact about this area is that no random bosses or champions will spawn here on Normal. There are two enemies that spawn here: Enslaved and Lurkers. They both do physical damage, so I have no problem fighting them. Compared to Chaos Sanctuary, this place is like a field of daisies.


random combat posing!

Halfway up the Bloody Foothills, Dac Farren harasses travelers. He has a fireball attack and an annoying habit of teleporting and running away. I grabbed him by the hair and kneed him in the face several times, then tossed him off the nearby cliff Double Dragon style.


hold still you little shit

Shenk the Overseer lives at the top of the Bloody Foothills. He's big and fat and carries a whip. One of the special talents of the overseer-type monsters is that they can changed enslaved into suicide bombers. The explosion does some cold damage and can be blocked. Another interesting fact: Ilzan is immune to the suicide explosion attack.



Above the Bloody Foothills lies the Frigid Highlands, guarded by the friendly and well-mannered Eldritch the Rectifier and even more annoying imps.



Also, there are catapults in Act 5.


catapults!

Trying to catch the Imps with my wand brought back memories. I had played this scenario out before and I had memories of a character very similar to this in the distant past. This character reminds me of playing a high-level warrior in Diablo 1.

If you've never played a level 40+ warrior, let me give you some kind of mental image. In hell, every monster with a ranged attack runs away when you start to get close to them. Because everything walks at the same speed, it is literally impossible to get close to them. The only way you can catch them is by herding the monsters into a corner where they have no place to run.

What ends up happening is that you need to cast teleport to get next to monsters and then lock them in place with hit recovery animations and a fast sword. This means you have to wear +mana and +magic gear so you'll have enough mana to cast Teleport every time you want to kill a monster. I could go on and on, but the main idea to take away from this is that Diablo 1 is fucking hard with a warrior. It brought back memories of how I lost my leg back in 'Nam.


WHAT HAPPENED? VIET GODDAMN NAM'S WHAT HAPPENED

While I was tossing grenades and machine gunning my way through Charlie, I found a Kite Shield with golden letters! What ever could it be?


my shiny new Steelclash!

While exploring, I came across this portal. I wasn't feeling particularly stupid today, so I declined to enter.


noooooooooooooope

There was a fatty guarding the Crystalline Passage, but I threw his cheeseburger on the ground and made him cry.



Next my adventure would take me to the Crystalline Passage, Frozen River, and beyond! (scary!)

My heroic quest for today was to rescue Anya from the Frozen River. First, I had to do some shopping to even out my gear. While browsing the stores, I saw a set of interesting knives that I had to try out.


what exactly makes a throwing knife massive?

I equipped the massive throwing knives and ran around a bit to test them out.



I replaced my tired old breastplate with some +Life platemail and also bought some new gloves and a slight wand upgrade. With that done, I started down the Crystalline Passage.


i'm somewhere in this picture

I feel I should mention the Evil Urn. When opened, it spits out a random boss somewhere on the screen, usually right on top of you. Balls of steel are certainly helpful but not mandatory.



While exploring, I ran into some yetis and managed to capture photographic proof of their existence. I was stunned by their being much uglier than expected


the elusive samswanch (you must be canadian to get this reference)

I found that the yetis were guarding the entrance to the Frozen River. Inside, there were even more yetis as well as zombies and other creatures. There is a lot of murder in this game, and this area was no exception. Some time passed and I found Anya's prison, guarded by Lord Frozenstein, ruler of all yetis.



Cold damage is never fun to deal with, but Ilzan still had his Hawkmail and my static isn't slowed by chilling. It didn't take long before I had permanently ended the yeti dynasty.


fullscreenable!

There were a few die-hard stragglers, but I put them into the ground to rescue the princess.


the princess, being "rescued"

Thankful to be rescued, Anya gave me a shitty wand in gratitude. I made sure to sell it in Act 4 where she wouldn't notice.



For fun, I thought I would give Pindleskin a quick run and see what shinies he would drop.


this is probably a familiar screen to the majority of you

To my absolute surprise, he dropped a rare sorceress wand! I rushed back to town to identify it and was not disappointed, although I imagine the majority of sorceresses would be.


muhuhwahahaha

I had reached Level 30, which gave me access to the wonderful Lightning and Cold Masteries! My weapon damage doubled with a single skill point, and Shiver Armor's chilling power was increased to new levels.

My journey would next bring me face to face with the Ancients. I would need some time to improve my gear and gain a few levels before I decided to take them on.

+ Show Spoiler +

Before I could hope to defeat the Ancients, I had to get some better gear. Glorious Platemail of the Tiger and a bone wand wouldn't be enough to win that battle. I started doing some basic Magic Find runs to hopefully find something to boost my chances of success against the Ancients. I ran Shenk, Eldritch, Pindle, and then the Crystalline Passage for experience and so the game timer would be long enough to not lock me out.

I found a few useful things and a lot of useless things. For the useful, I found a Rattlecage (on my very first run!), a rare pike for Ilzan, rare gauntlets for me, and a Sol rune to eventually make the mighty Insight runeword. For the useless, I found several Isenhart's pieces, a Cleglaw's sword, Civerb's Cudgel, and piles of garbage rares. I also found two Skull Splitters and a Cathan's ring which I donated to a dirty hippie who was starting a new character. Why didn't I wear the Cathan's ring myself? I'll answer your question with another question: What's 6% of 7?

My friend joined a free item giveaway game, so I helped him put his shiny new items on a mule for safekeeping.

if you're one of those people who puts shaftstop on a merc, i hate you



My good deed done for the day, I returned to Act 5. I traveled across the Frozen Tundra to the hidden tunnel known as The Ancient's Way. My favorite boss in the game lives here, in an area called the Icy Cellar.


best. name. ever.

The Ancient's Way opened out to the Arreat Summit, where the Ancients silently waited.


most of these are fullscreenable

I sent out my challenge and the Ancients came to life and attacked.


can you guess which ancient is my favorite?

With the Ancients clustered around me, it only took a few static fields to end the battle. I was victorious without using a single potion. The gate to the Worldstone Keep stood open.



I found this demon inside the keep, somehow floating in the air.


photo taken shortly before murder

My journey down to the Throne of Destruction ended up being rather short.



The angry red glow of the chamber glowered up at me. The Death Lord/Frenzytaur monsters here are terrifyingly immune to being chilled/frozen and the Succubus use a Blood Star spell which ignores my magical resistances. None of that would stop me.

I gathered my power level for 5 minutes and then unleashed my severe fighting spirit to clear a path to Baal.


kameeeeeee hameeeeee haaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

My attack had killed every living creature in a 5 mile radius, but Baal sat on his throne completely unharmed. He cackled maniacally and his minions appeared in a flash of light between us.



I dispatched Baal's minions by pulling them out of the range of Baal's Decrepify curse and then viciously Static Fielding their life away. Even with his minions dead, Baal continued to laugh. He played his trump card and summoned his strongest lieutenant, Lister the Tormenter.



The Minions of Destruction have the strongest physical attack in the game, capable in Normal of dealing up to 60 damage in one strike and with a knockback and stun component. Ilzan and I weren't capable of winning this battle while outnumbered, so to even the odds I slowed some of the minions with Shiver Armor and made a tactical retreat, separating some of the beasts from Lister and friends. With the numbers temporarily thinned, I had no trouble defeating the minions for good. Lister's Spectral Hit was still very dangerous, but my armor caught the majority of his attacks while I worked to end his life.



Baal's laugh sounded hollow as he retreated into the Worldstone Chamber. The final battle was close. I knew that there were only two ways for it to end: Baal would die or I would.



I entered the chamber and teleported to Baal's side to begin the final contest. Baal had a variety of deadly attacks at his disposal, but I was prepared for all of them. I countered his lethal frost wave attack with high cold resistance and by using teleport to return from the knockback. Baal's powerful mana-draining inferno spell was easily recovered from with a mana potion.



My static field bit into Baal's life bar, taking large chunks away with each cast. Baal pushed me away with a frost wave, but I was close to unharmed and Ilzan's Hawkmail made him immune to Cold damage. Baal's attacks were too weak to harm me. The battle was over and I was victorious.


hows that floor taste

Having defeated Baal, I was crowned with the title Destroyer, signifying my clearing of Normal Difficulty. My quest would continue again in Nightmare Difficulty, where the monsters would be even stronger. I would have to train and improve my kung fu before I could set foot in Nightmare.


congratulations me!

Here's a list of my gear at the end of Act 5:
Helmet: Rare Circlet (the same one from A4)
Weapon: Rare Jared's Stone (pictured above)
Shield: Steelclash (57 Defense)
Armor: Rattlecage (332 Defense)
Gloves: Rare Gauntlets (22 Defense, +10 Attack Rating, +1 Strength, +4 Dexterity, Lightning Resist +27%, 11% Better Chance of Finding Magic Item)
Belt: Garnet Belt of the Wolf (+18 Life, Fire Resist +28%)
Boots: Sander's Riprap
Ring1: Rare Ring (from the picture in A3)
Ring2: Coral Ring (Lightning Resist +28%)
Ammy: Dragon's Amulet (+35 Mana)


nightmare resistances hoo boy

I had the option to go into Nightmare difficulty, but I knew that was a terrible idea. Nightmare random bosses are incredibly powerful. I could see myself getting ambushed by an Extra Strong Cold Enchanted Quill Rat and ending up on the ground full of icy holes. My measly 300 life and 10ish cold resistance weren't enough to protect me. Clearly I had to find some new gear and level up.

Several hours later I was level 40 and had sifted through a mountain of garbage. I had only found a total of two items that I could make use of:





I was tired of leveling, so I decided to go into Nightmare. "Why not?" I told myself. "You only have to do the Den of Evil. What's the worst that could happen?"

The Blood Moor wasn't difficult. I cautiously approached a group of Champion Fallen and when I saw their attack was only around 40 damage, my level of worry diminished. The Den of Evil turned out to be easy and Corpsefire went down quickly. Nightmare seemed easy enough from what I had seen. The lure of better items and a 4 socket polearm for Insight drew me on into the Cold Plains. The enemies were more dense here, but still just as easy.

Feeling adventurous, I thought I would fight Blood Raven. Static brought her minions down, and soon we were alone together.


this isn't the intro to a porn, I swear.

It took a while to chase her down and force her below 25% health, but eventually I did and found my amazing reward.



I went through the Stony Field, rescued Cain, and found the final piece to craft an Insight for Ilzan. I also had a very close encounter with an Extra Strong Fire Enchanted boss, which made me reevaluate my stance on tackling Nightmare.


beautiful, isn't it?

I decided I would try the cow level with my new Meditation aura. I thought I could find some new charms and a helm to make a Lore runeword with. The rare circlet I was wearing wasn't exactly ideal.

I wasn't sure how dangerous the cows were. In curiosity I checked my character sheet.


I like those odds

Feeling confident, I teleported around, murdering cows with wild abandon. I could teleport into the largest herds of cows and stand unharmed.


can you spot me in this picture

The cow level was no challenge for my kung fu. I didn't feel like going on with the MF, so I decided I would kill Nihlathak.

Nihlathak's temple looks like the lair of an ancient cult, dedicated to worshiping the horrific old gods and performing daemoniacal rites.


what the hell is that

Fortunately, I was well protected from unknowable, terrifying horrors by my high Insanity Resistance. The mad cultists and their eldritch lords from beyond the void of space were still weak to Static Field.

Nihlathak himself waited at the bottom of the catacombs, standing atop a pagan altar with a horde of misshapen, inhuman minions, all wielding pointy weapons. I heard the high pitched squeal of Nihlathak's corpse explosion behind me. In horror and fearing for my eternal soul, I glanced at my life total. I had lost 30 HP. Confident in my invulnerability, I introduced Nihlathak to the great beyond.



Normal had nothing left for me, but I still had lots of work to do before I could survive Nightmare.

My quest for items was finally complete. I had made a Lore helm, a 3 Perfect Diamond Tower Shield, and I had found enough +life charms where I felt safe attempting Nightmare again.


a fancy shmancy charm

I picked up in Nightmare where I had left off, in the Dark Wood. The extra resistance from the shield and the Lore helm's skill point and damage reduction made a big difference as I encountered the many random Elemental-Enchanted bosses lurking about. I accidentally took a Fire Enchanted's death explosion in the chest when Ilzan killed one boss too quickly and was happy to see my life barely drop.


one of the nightmare random bosses

There used to be a bug in Nightmare difficulty where fire enchanted bosses would deal an improperly calculated amount of damage with their corpse explosion, which would instantly kill anyone regardless of how much health, resistance, or absorption they had. I recall someone made a character specifically to calculate how much damage the explosion did, using various gear to try and survive. If I remember correctly, the damage was calculated to be something around 300,000.

I decided I would kill the Countess for a chance at her increased rune drop rate. On the bottom floor of the tower, I found three random bosses clustered together behind the staircase. There's always a small moment of terror when you see more than one boss and have to quickly identify their attributes before you get in combat. Ilzan was far too strong for such lowly monsters and they were dispatched before I could think to take a picture.

I'll link this amulet because I think I found it somewhere around here:


shiny!

The Countess herself proved to be more than Ilzan could handle alone. When I teleported into the room, Ilzan valiantly gave his life protecting me from the vicious blue women. However, I was far more durable than Ilzan and managed to defeat the Countess and avenge his death. That would prove to be my only reward because the Countess had dropped a Thul rune.



With the Countess defeated, I continued on to the monastery where Andariel lived. Naturally, I intended to stop her from living.



In the jail beneath the monastery I encountered my old nemesis Pitspawn Fouldog. Unfortunately for him, I had grown in power far more than he had since our fight in Normal. He was no longer a match for me.



The jail was soon behind me as I reached the Inner Cloister. I discovered the gate to the cathedral had a horrible guardian.


lightning IMMUNE? WHAT?

How could I defeat a creature completely and totally immune to lightning? Have you seen a lightning strike before? What am I going to do that a lightning bolt can't? As i pondered these and other important questions, Ilzan solved the problem by murdering the offending monster with a swift pike jab.

There were more random monsters patrolling the way to Andariel and I killed all of them. The battle with Andariel wasn't particularly exciting. Ilzan had a heart attack at the sight of her giant blue breasts and I was forced to fight her alone.


what's with this game and giant naked blue women

An interesting fact about Nightmare: Static Field only brings enemies to 25% health. This means I had to slap Andariel the rest of the way with my wand. Rattlecage and crushing blow helped out a lot here and it ended up taking about a minute of wand spanking before I won the battle and collected my shiny, shiny rewards.


fuck off ilzan, i'm cookin marshmallows

The ring turned out to be surprisingly good.


yes i will be wearing that, thank you for asking

I didn't particularly want Aldur's Rhythm, but it is much better than my current wand. I would have preferred a different item (vipermagi maybe?), but I could have gotten much worse. 3 sockets is also very nice.


I swear I find one of these every time I go through nightmare

Here's my gear as of Act 2 Nightmare:
Helmet: Lore Full Helm (25 Defense, +1 to All Skills, +10 Energy, Lightning Resist +30%, Damage Reduced by 7, +2 Mana after each Kill, +2 to Light Radius)
Weapon: Aldur's Rhythm (shown above)
Shield: Gemmed Tower Shield (23 Defense, 44% block, +57 Resist All)
Armor: Rattlecage (332 Defense)
Gloves: Rare Gauntlets (22 Defense, +10 Attack Rating, +1 Strength, +4 Dexterity, Lightning Resist +27%, 11% Better Chance of Finding Magic Item)
Belt: Rare Heavy Belt (from previous chapter)
Boots: Rare Greaves (from previous chapter)
Ring1: Rare Ring (from normal A3)
Ring2: Rare Ring (from NM A1)
Ammy: Rare Amulet (from the picture)

My quest today was to run through the desert and raid various tombs for the staff pieces and also treasure. Naturally, that would make my first stop the sewers. Strangely, my search through the sewers didn't turn up anything of value.


oh you want this treasure? here, please have it!

After exploring the sewers, I searched the Rocky Wastes and found a tomb inches away from the town gate.


no one noticed this before? seriously?

My quest for booty wouldn't let me pass by such an easy target. After killing a few zombies and a short trip down some stairs, I felt I was close to the treasure. I had a short meeting with Creeping Feature, who it seemed had been keeping up with his kung fu.


no WAY am i getting close to that

The next stop on my treasure hunt was the Maggot Lair to find the first staff piece. The Maggot Lair was bearable because I had teleport to move through cramped areas. There were a lot of bugs here and I splattered them all with my new mace.

Fun Fact: Sometimes people like to replace the first letter of maggot, spelling another word which describes their dislike of the place.


gross

Back in the desert, I encountered some extra fast leapers. What you can't see in the picture is that there are two other bosses to the left.


extra fast leapers, how wonderful

My killing of leapers did not go unrewarded. I found the excellent Darkglow armor and immediately gave it to Ilzan. I upgraded it in the cube for extra defense and threw away his dusty old Hawkmail.



It seemed that the game was packing as many random bosses into a tiny area as it possibly could. When I entered the Viper Temple, I was accosted by a group of lightning enchanted vipers before I had a chance to assess the local threat level.


that's the entrance if you were wondering

Was that the end of the long string of bosses? I still had to deal with Fangskin, the killer of noobs before I could get the last staff piece. I teleported to the middle of the chamber to fight him and his minions one at a time and avoid being surrounded by angry Extra Fast vipers.


fullscreen!

Now that I had the staff to open Tal Rasha's tomb, it was time to find Duriel. The palace cellar is small and easy like always, and Arcane Sanctuary is a joke in Nightmare. The Summoner dies just as fast in Nightmare as he does in Normal difficulty. It wasn't long before I was in the Tomb of Tal Rasha and on my way to Duriel. Of course there were more random bosses that needed to be exterminated.


that's probably less than good

A few minutes and a sandwich later, I was at Duriel's doorstep. Normal Duriel is probably the hardest boss to deal with in Normal. Nightmare Duriel is not. The damage from his freezing aura doesn't scale very well to Nightmare and Duriel ends up hitting just as hard as he did in Normal... only I have twice as much health and 75% Cold Resist.



Ilzan died a few seconds into the battle and I was left to fight it alone. Mercenaries take 1000% damage from Act Bosses, so there wasn't much I could do to save him. It took a minute or two for Shiver Armor and my mace to bring his life from 25% to 0%. It was far from an epic battle.


are you sure this is in nightmare?

Duriel's defeat fresh in my mind, I set off on my journey through Act 3. Most people don't know that Act 3 can be a very dangerous place. It's very easy to skip all of Act 3, and most people do.



I found my way into the Flayer Jungle and a horde of knife wielding midgets appeared and attacked me. There were even champion flayer shamans, although that was mostly a waste of champion status because their fire breath doesn't do much damage in Nightmare.



Later on I encountered giant frogs. They have a ranged attack with knockback, which is extremely annoying. The only nice thing about them is the squishing sound they make when I kill them.


grrr!

While killing swarms of flayers, I found this amulet.


shouldn't that read "Sorceress"?

After a particularly large murder session, I found my way to the Flayer Dungeon.


I'm glad I don't have to clean this up

Inside the Flayer Dungeon, I saw the scariest thing I've seen so far: Extra Strong Fanaticism dolls. Hearing the Fanaticism Aura activation sound gave me time to run. I knew I had to get some kind of picture, but the dungeon architecture combined with the high speed dolls made it difficult.


this is probably the scariest thing you could encounter in the game

How did I kill a pack of Extra Strong Fanaticism dolls? One at a time, obviously. My strategy involved using a rejuvenation potion every time my health moved and also lots of praying. Every time a doll died, my health would plummet and I would have to use a rejuvenation potion before the next one died or the explosion would kill me.


aaargh more dolls

I did eventually make it through to the bottom floor. One of the nice things about it is that there are no dolls. A few teleports later and I was at the treasure room, guarded by the Witch Doctor Endugu. It appeared this time he had acquired some magical immunities.


magic resistant? how about mace resistant?

I went back outside... blah blah blah... The second half of Act 3 is boring and easy and nothing happened. I won't even mention the godawful sewers. I did find this entirely useless item, which I donated to a certain dirty hippie.


that sure is a lot of damage

The hard part was the Durance of Hate. After killing the council, I smashed open the door and descended the stairs, praying for there to be no dolls. My prayer was answered and I made it safely through the maze-like Durance levels 1 and 2.

In Nightmare, the hardest part of Durance Level 3 isn't Mephisto, it's the council members and vampires on the way to him. Bremm Sparkfist and his buddy Wyand Voidbringer decided to attack me together. Bremm Sparkfist was Extra Fast and because Wyand Voidbringer is always Mana Burn, I didn't feel it was entirely safe to take a picture of the battle. I shielded Ilzan from as many Hydra bolts and Meteor strikes as I could and together we finished the remaining council members.

Before I fought Mephisto, I had to refill my potions and purchase a few Antidote potions to block his strong poison attacks. Aside from the poison, none of his attacks were particularly spectacular. Mephisto's melee attack is weak, so it was a matter of trading blows until one of us died. I had the advantage of a full set of health potions which helped me win. Even Ilzan survived the battle.



I was very disappointed with Mephisto's drops.


someone really wants me to use a polearm

In Act 4 Nightmare, I would face the terrors of the Chaos Sanctuary and find a good rune from the Hellforge (hopefully!)