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Hello,
[Second time posting this, if you see this twice, my apologies]
I've been posting about Merc's and their equipment semi-regularly the last
several months, maybe even more than a year, always looking for people's
opinions on merc type and gear. Keep in mind the following merc setup is a
Might merc, which accompanies a Skelliemancier with an army of 13
skeletons and 6 mages, and a Clay Golem. This is my main MF character, and
I use this Skelliemancier for some change of pace between levelling other
chars.
My aim is to have a merc which is more or less an all-rounder; I know some
people view a merc as a support character at best for a Skelliemancer,
only there to provide an aura (or two, or three, if you're rich), but I
disagree with this. It has been my observation the merc is paramount in
getting that first body (to start the CE chain-explosions), and also to
put down the big bosses using Crushing Blow mostly. However, CB is notall,
the merc also need high physical damage, to finish that ~1/3rd last part
of the life bar of the bosses, and of course to deal big physical damage
to regular monsters. Also, life leech is very important for a merc,
because it has also been my observation mercs without life-leech (or a low
amount) die a lot.
If you're still here after all the text I wrote above, I have the feeling
I'm slowly getting there, with getting a merc which may not excel at a
specific part, but which is very durable, and helpful.
OK, the merc and his equipment:
Lvl92 Might Merc
Helm..: Guillaume's Face (clean)
Armor.: Duress ethereal Wire fleece
Weapon: Upgraded ethereal Hone Sundan, socketed with Amn-Amn-Shael
He deals about 2000-4500 physical damage when the Might aura is activated.
He has 95% CB. 14%LL from the Hone Sundan. Resists are about 70+ all in
Hell.
The only thing he dies to is (of course) IM from Oblivion Knights, and
sometimes, very rarely, a heavy crossfire of Gloam lightning streams
and/or those red balls shot by the flying witch type monsters in
Worldstone keep. He's also the one who lowers Hell baal's life bar with
big jumps when hitting him, for those first ~2/3rd, and is still a nice
help for the last part.
I've been looking around for different equipment, and haven't really ran
into anything which could improve him more. To give some examples, I'll go
through each of the 3 slots:
Helm:
In my opinion, I need Crushing Blow, to kill those bosses. Guillaume's
Face is about the only helm that provides that. It also has Deadly Strike,
FHR and some other mods. I could of course equip a helm which has
res-all/life/maybe some life leech, but I'd loose the CB.
Option left: socket the Guillaume's with something nice, but the only
options which would gain me something are all very expensive (and
unaffordable by me): Cham, for Cannot Be Frozen, would be very nice. Ber,
for some extra Damage Reduce would also be nice. Maybe some of the runes
below that, to raise the maximum resists by 5% _could_ help, though I'm
not sure how much that would help. Also, since he hasn't maxed his resists
in Hell yet, upping his maxed resists isn't goin to help, yet.
So, Helm, I know of no alternative.
Armour:
Duress adds another 15% CB, _40%_ FHR, 15% res-all and a jump to Cold
Resist (just the jump he needs to get close to max in Hell), and some
other nice mods. Especially the 40% FHR, combined with Guillaume's Face,
makes him much less vulnerable, even if he his hit: he resumes jabbing,
and regains any life he lost quite quickly again.
I see no real alternative. A double-upgraded Rattlecage could be an
option, but it also has monster flee, and I don't want that mod.
Rattlecage also lacks the gravy of Duress (FHR, resists, etc).
Weapon:
He used a perfect (320%ED) ethereal Bonehew before this, and while the raw
physical damage of that polearm is a bit higher than that of an ethereal
Ghost Spear, it's the 45% CB, and the three sockets (Amn-Amn-Shael, to get
nice LL and hit the next speed breakpoint) which make it the best
all-around polearm in my opinion.
Alternatives could be: Obedience polearm, great damage, 40% CB (getting me
to 90% CB total), but, _NO_ Life-leech on the polearm. So I'd have to swap
something else out to still get LL. LL is, in my opinion, very important
on a merc if you want a durable one, and one you don't have to baby around
a lot. Infinity polearm also looks very cool, but is not only out of my
reach price-wise, it also has no life leech again. The Conviction aura
would be 'interesting', but if it keeps the merc alive: I doubt it.
(Reason: I played a quick round of MF together with a Sorceress
yesterday-evening, whose merc was carring an Infinity polearm: the merc
was constantly dying while my merc was still stabbing away, and probably
even more into the action than my merc was.) So, no option.
Ethereal unique elite polearms would be nice, but they either lack CB, or
have a Chance to Cast stuff like Decrepify, etc which would override my
own curses: not nice! Finally some of the 1.10 runewords could be nice
(Doom, Hand of Justice, Eternity), but they are both very expensive, and
lack LL/CB, or a combination thereoff).
Thank you for reading this far.
The only question I have left, unless someone provides me with an
improvement to my setup, is: what do i socket the Guillaume's Face with?
Since I don't have any of the high runes needed for CBF or 8%DR, the
things I thought about:
PRuby: Just add some life to make him that bit more durable
Ort : Add 30% lightning resist, since Gloams lightning streams are his
biggest enemy. Will also keep res higher when Convicted...
Shael: Add some more FHR, but I probably need to hit a breakpoint? Which?
Dol : Replenish life +7, hmmm?
Fal : More str = more damage (PAmethyst would be cheaper one for this)
Lem : More gold when merc kills something, hmm, useless?
Um : Max those resists!
Ist : For that extra bit of MF when and if the merc is the one dealing
the killing blow to one of the big bosses. Sounds tempting.
I do have one Gul, and one Vex, but am not going to use it in the merc's
helmet.
So, your opinions please?
Regards,
Patrick.
Hello,
[Second time posting this, if you see this twice, my apologies]
I've been posting about Merc's and their equipment semi-regularly the last
several months, maybe even more than a year, always looking for people's
opinions on merc type and gear. Keep in mind the following merc setup is a
Might merc, which accompanies a Skelliemancier with an army of 13
skeletons and 6 mages, and a Clay Golem. This is my main MF character, and
I use this Skelliemancier for some change of pace between levelling other
chars.
My aim is to have a merc which is more or less an all-rounder; I know some
people view a merc as a support character at best for a Skelliemancer,
only there to provide an aura (or two, or three, if you're rich), but I
disagree with this. It has been my observation the merc is paramount in
getting that first body (to start the CE chain-explosions), and also to
put down the big bosses using Crushing Blow mostly. However, CB is notall,
the merc also need high physical damage, to finish that ~1/3rd last part
of the life bar of the bosses, and of course to deal big physical damage
to regular monsters. Also, life leech is very important for a merc,
because it has also been my observation mercs without life-leech (or a low
amount) die a lot.
If you're still here after all the text I wrote above, I have the feeling
I'm slowly getting there, with getting a merc which may not excel at a
specific part, but which is very durable, and helpful.
OK, the merc and his equipment:
Lvl92 Might Merc
Helm..: Guillaume's Face (clean)
Armor.: Duress ethereal Wire fleece
Weapon: Upgraded ethereal Hone Sundan, socketed with Amn-Amn-Shael
He deals about 2000-4500 physical damage when the Might aura is activated.
He has 95% CB. 14%LL from the Hone Sundan. Resists are about 70+ all in
Hell.
The only thing he dies to is (of course) IM from Oblivion Knights, and
sometimes, very rarely, a heavy crossfire of Gloam lightning streams
and/or those red balls shot by the flying witch type monsters in
Worldstone keep. He's also the one who lowers Hell baal's life bar with
big jumps when hitting him, for those first ~2/3rd, and is still a nice
help for the last part.
I've been looking around for different equipment, and haven't really ran
into anything which could improve him more. To give some examples, I'll go
through each of the 3 slots:
Helm:
In my opinion, I need Crushing Blow, to kill those bosses. Guillaume's
Face is about the only helm that provides that. It also has Deadly Strike,
FHR and some other mods. I could of course equip a helm which has
res-all/life/maybe some life leech, but I'd loose the CB.
Option left: socket the Guillaume's with something nice, but the only
options which would gain me something are all very expensive (and
unaffordable by me): Cham, for Cannot Be Frozen, would be very nice. Ber,
for some extra Damage Reduce would also be nice. Maybe some of the runes
below that, to raise the maximum resists by 5% _could_ help, though I'm
not sure how much that would help. Also, since he hasn't maxed his resists
in Hell yet, upping his maxed resists isn't goin to help, yet.
So, Helm, I know of no alternative.
Armour:
Duress adds another 15% CB, _40%_ FHR, 15% res-all and a jump to Cold
Resist (just the jump he needs to get close to max in Hell), and some
other nice mods. Especially the 40% FHR, combined with Guillaume's Face,
makes him much less vulnerable, even if he his hit: he resumes jabbing,
and regains any life he lost quite quickly again.
I see no real alternative. A double-upgraded Rattlecage could be an
option, but it also has monster flee, and I don't want that mod.
Rattlecage also lacks the gravy of Duress (FHR, resists, etc).
Weapon:
He used a perfect (320%ED) ethereal Bonehew before this, and while the raw
physical damage of that polearm is a bit higher than that of an ethereal
Ghost Spear, it's the 45% CB, and the three sockets (Amn-Amn-Shael, to get
nice LL and hit the next speed breakpoint) which make it the best
all-around polearm in my opinion.
Alternatives could be: Obedience polearm, great damage, 40% CB (getting me
to 90% CB total), but, _NO_ Life-leech on the polearm. So I'd have to swap
something else out to still get LL. LL is, in my opinion, very important
on a merc if you want a durable one, and one you don't have to baby around
a lot. Infinity polearm also looks very cool, but is not only out of my
reach price-wise, it also has no life leech again. The Conviction aura
would be 'interesting', but if it keeps the merc alive: I doubt it.
(Reason: I played a quick round of MF together with a Sorceress
yesterday-evening, whose merc was carring an Infinity polearm: the merc
was constantly dying while my merc was still stabbing away, and probably
even more into the action than my merc was.) So, no option.
Ethereal unique elite polearms would be nice, but they either lack CB, or
have a Chance to Cast stuff like Decrepify, etc which would override my
own curses: not nice! Finally some of the 1.10 runewords could be nice
(Doom, Hand of Justice, Eternity), but they are both very expensive, and
lack LL/CB, or a combination thereoff).
Thank you for reading this far.
The only question I have left, unless someone provides me with an
improvement to my setup, is: what do i socket the Guillaume's Face with?
Since I don't have any of the high runes needed for CBF or 8%DR, the
things I thought about:
PRuby: Just add some life to make him that bit more durable
Ort : Add 30% lightning resist, since Gloams lightning streams are his
biggest enemy. Will also keep res higher when Convicted...
Shael: Add some more FHR, but I probably need to hit a breakpoint? Which?
Dol : Replenish life +7, hmmm?
Fal : More str = more damage (PAmethyst would be cheaper one for this)
Lem : More gold when merc kills something, hmm, useless?
Um : Max those resists!
Ist : For that extra bit of MF when and if the merc is the one dealing
the killing blow to one of the big bosses. Sounds tempting.
I do have one Gul, and one Vex, but am not going to use it in the merc's
helmet.
So, your opinions please?
Regards,
Patrick.
.
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