Tips for Diablo 2?

[KidGalaxy]

So I am more excited than I have any reason to be over the upcoming Diablo 3. The game looks excellent, and I know it'll have that same level of polish that Starcraft 2 and previous Blizzard titles have led us to expect, but I've never played Diablo 2.

I just bought it off of Blizzard's online store (I also really need a game to fill my time before Skyrim) and figured I would ask the Escapist community for any tips to play through the game.

I'm pretty set on playing a necromancer, because the Witch Doctor looks cool us fuck and from what I can gather necromancers play the most similarly. So, any Diablo veterans out there who can help a newbie? Any important things to remember?

 

[Sniper Team 4]

Necromancer and Sorceress break the game. Your character will become so powerful that you will be able to slaughter entire dungeons with a few clicks. The Necromancer also can summon an army of undead creatures, making it so the enemies can never really get to him. Have fun!

Oh, melee attacks eventually become nigh impossible to land on the higher level monsters and difficulty. So yeah, learn some magic attacks, and if you play a melee combat character, get ready for some serious clicking and annoyance as your character swings and swings, but never seems to hit.

 

[Najos]

I can barely remember playing D2, but I did play a necro for a while. All I remember is that the summoning tree got sort of useless on the harder difficulties because your skeletons would die really fast. I think the best strategy back then was to focus on a golem and the offensive spells...poison nova or something, I think. Anyway, I'm sure the game has changed since then and none of this applies any longer!

Don't be afraid to play around, though. I had tons of fun on just about every class. I especially enjoyed the amazon. Oh, and be sure to look up the secret cow level if you don't already know about it. Sooo much fun.

 

[targren]

Necromancer and Sorceress break the game. Your character will become so powerful that you will be able to slaughter entire dungeons with a few clicks. The Necromancer also can summon an army of undead creatures, making it so the enemies can never really get to him. Have fun!

I played (Single-player only, so no sets or fancy runewords or anything like that) a Necro all the way through, but even on Normal, my minions fail against the big D himself. He just wipes the whole army with a puff of fire. So I run away like a little girl to go get more from the corpses, rinse, repeat until there are no bodies left on the damn map.

Give me a hint here? He's sitting on my character selection screen, mocking me...

 

[Mr Thin]

Spread your points amongst as many different skills as possible, and sell all your potions and scrolls, you won't need them.

Also, spend all your money on gambling, it's the only good use for it.

And if you're playing a necromancer, stay away from the Raise Skeleton spell, it's practically useless.

Spoiler

In case you didn't figure it out, I'm being a smart-ass. Do the opposite of everything I said, and you'll be fine.

 

[Keava]

Since they added option to respec in latest patches... It really doesn't matter all that much any more. Prior to that, if You wanted a good max level character You had to sacrifice a lot in early game, stacking skill points till You had access to the useful ones.

Nowadays just play how You feel it, You can always change it up later on when You'll finally get a feel of Your character.

For necro, if i recall correctly, prime builds were either resolving around Poison Nova or Bone Necro (Spear/Ghost along with Wall), attributes mostly go for minimum DEX for 75% block, about 90 STR for armor needs and rest goes into VIT.

 

[Jandau]

Don't spend any stat points on Energy, or only a little. Mana is only really a problem early game. No more than a point every level or every other level. Yes, this applies even to dedicated spellcaster characters. On the other hand, you can never have too much Vitality, so spend a point or two there every level.

 

[Silverfox99]

Best tip I can give is to go in every area and kill everything. You will find better items this way and have a edge level wise against the monsters you are killing.

Get your resistances as high as you can. This matters most in boss battles. Diablo is much easier with a good lightning resistance.

Never leave an area without getting the way point for it.

 

[Zanaxal]

I did play a necromancer up to lvl 70ish long ago.

They did some synergy changes so i dont know all those. But what i do know is the summon iron golem thing is one of the best, The way to get a Crazy good necromancer was to go down the golem line. And having a huge 2 hand weapon that you make the iron golem into.

As for playing through, well you should do alot of "loot" runs on the last bosses, mephisto being generally the easiest for farming.

Saving up on fire and electrical resistance would help to, nightmare difficulty and above just plummets your resistances and having some gear to boost it makes the bosses alot easier to deal with.

Curses are also very helpful, like the damage curse.

And yeah summon skeletons and such are horrible later in the game.

Also a easy way to have mana on a necromancer while leveling is just gathering cracked skull etc and combining them into gear for mana regen, made mana not a issue.

 

[Fishyash]

General:

Stat wise, strength for gear, dex for max block (if you're playing expansion, if you're just doing classic, for gear), a little in energy (since you're new you can't really fix it with gear but levelling up gives you more mana anyways afaik) and the rest in vitality.

Try to think of a build before you spend any points. This is very important because you don't want to waste your respecs or anything (a new thing for patches, otherwise you'd have been forced to make a new character or something).

Necro:

Summon skeletons and those kind of spells all the way until the final boss on act 4, then respec into bone spear or something.

EDIT: Clarifying the 'can't fix that with gear' on battle.net a veteran can easily buy/trade for gear with the stats he needs. If you're playing solo you will not get that privelige. People with good gear will never spend any points in energy, but I don't think it would be the case with a solo player only just starting out with the game.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

Check out this mod sometime. Eastern sun is awesome. It adds so much to the game.
http://homepage3.nifty.com/miyoshino/es/es3top.htm

 

[VladG]

make sure you get the latest patch (it's more recent than you'd expect from a 11 year old game) and look around the internet for a strong build for your class. Once you spend a point in Diablo 2 you are never getting it back, and come nightmare or hell difficulty some spells are quite useless some are very strong. Make sure you look into it so you don't regret your build later, as there's no way to change it (well, not without resorting to hacks and such)

 

[Cenequus]

If you want to have everything that ladder offers to single player just download a mod called plugY. It's less that 1 Mb and the only extra thing it offers beyond hell events and unique items and words it gives you 2 more screens with all the hidden stats.

As for class builds just go to diablo 2 wiki it has all the possible builds both for PvE and Pvp and you'll learn everything there is to be known about Diablo 2 in less than an hour. And believe me it's worth it.My last char i remmeber was a melee sorceress that was doing around 10k fire damage,also thanks to best merc ever the act 2 one equiped with lower resist aura. Enjoy!

make sure you get the latest patch (it's more recent than you'd expect from a 11 year old game) and look around the internet for a strong build for your class. Once you spend a point in Diablo 2 you are never getting it back, and come nightmare or hell difficulty some spells are quite useless some are very strong. Make sure you look into it so you don't regret your build later, as there's no way to change it (well, not without resorting to hacks and such)

You can respec for free from the act 1 shopkeeper since last patch,no hax.

 

[Thedutchjelle]

A sorceress is very, very hard to play, as higher difficulty enemies usually have immunities. So if you come across a monster with fire immunity and you only got fire skills, you're kinda fucked. I had a level 68 sorceress that could deal sick fire damage, but many monsters in higher difficulties were immune to it.

See what skills you think you'll use and max that + the appropriate synergies for a nice damage boost.

 

[Levethian]

Check out this mod sometime. Eastern sun is awesome. It adds so much to the game.
http://homepage3.nifty.com/miyoshino/es/es3top.htm

Second that.
Shared stash, re-balanced & new skills, lots of items, new areas etc etc.

 

[Zanaxal]

runewords also help alot on new chars, look up on the arreat summit page, it has the most guides and item lists and general info u will ever need.

Edit : oh its just called classic.battle.net diablo 2 now oldschool diablo webpages

 

[Don Savik]

wirts leg + tome of town portal + horadric cube = ??? profit.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

The one biggie that springs to mind is: never underestimate the importance of socketed items. Try and balance out holding back for the next flawless gem and the need for an immediately stronger weapon. Shoving every cracked gem into every socketed leather armour out there will mean your socketed items are full when you find really good plug-ins, but on the other hand constantly squirreling away socketed items and plug-ins will mean you're running around with underpowered gear.

Oh, and don't play for extended periods of time. You will end up with RSI in your mouse hand and no-one will believe you got it from playing Diablo, if you get my drift...

 

[nukethetuna]

If you are feeling a little bored with it... give Hardcore mode a try. It's especially fun with friends.