Hammerdin and Magic immune?

[Squeek111]

How did/do you people deal with the MI when running a hammerdin?

Im currently at lvl93 doing TZ, I WANT to run the Tal Rasha Tomb, but there are so many fiends that are MI, and my Act2 merc cant kill them fast enough compared to how fast they res mobs..

I tried the "Holy Bolt" but that one got nerfed and basically deal nothing atm, Im looking to find a Black Cleft sunder, but so far Im out of luck getting 87 fire and ice ones -.-

[Copanele]

Hey hey!

 

I also run as hammerdin, level 98, exactly Tal Rasha runs (best exp farm on P8 TZ imo). I simply ignore the stupid fiends and just telestomp the mobs (I have an Engima on me)

BUT! If you are hellbent on beating them, I suggest the budget smiter build. A build that I also used when facing the Uber bosses (I see you haven't gotten the Standard of Heroes yet, so this build might help you )

 

What I used:

Weapon - Heart of the Oak runeword (or Grief if you want to go for Ubers)

Weapon swap - Call to Arms runeword for the Battle Command and Battle Orders

Shield - Spirit (any 4 sockets shield). If you have Herald of Zakarum, then that's the best shield

Helm - Guillaume's Face for Crushing Blow

Gloves - anything with Crushing Blow such as Steel Rend (I used Dracul's Grasp for Open Wounds and Life Leech)

Belt - String of Ears or Thundergod's Vigor for that random Fist of Heavens

Boots - Goblin Toe OR Gorerider for even more Crushing Blow

Rings - anything with +skill

Amulet - anything with +skill

If you find a SoJ, duplicate glitch it, sell it to a merchant and get an Annihilus from Uber Diablo (it gives you +skill, attributes, resistances and most important +x% experience)

 

As for skills, you should definitely have one point in Smite, since I assume you went for some Holy Shield.

 

Basically when you get to a fiend, Smite the living shit out of him  of course, with the help of your Act 2 Nightmare merc. If you want him to be mega buffed, get a Might mercenary and give him an Infinity (super hard to do, I simply use Insight instead)

 

That should be it. My advice though - just ignore the goobers and move forward  they barely give experience anyway. For exp farming, you need to focus on speed killing as many enemies as possible.

Edited October 27, 2023 by Copanele

[Squeek111]

12 minutes ago, Copanele said:

Hey hey!

 

I also run as hammerdin, level 98, exactly Tal Rasha runs (best exp farm on P8 TZ imo). I simply ignore the stupid fiends and just telestomp the mobs (I have an Engima on me)

BUT! If you are hellbent on beating them, I suggest the budget smiter build. A build that I also used when facing the Uber bosses (I see you haven't gotten the Standard of Heroes yet, so this build might help you )

 

What I used:

Weapon - Heart of the Oak runeword (or Grief if you want to go for Ubers)

Weapon swap - Call to Arms runeword for the Battle Command and Battle Orders

Shield - Spirit (any 4 sockets shield). If you have Herald of Zakarum, then that's the best shield

Helm - Guillaume's Face for Crushing Blow

Gloves - anything with Crushing Blow such as Steel Rend (I used Dracul's Grasp for Open Wounds and Life Leech)

Belt - String of Ears or Thundergod's Vigor for that random Fist of Heavens

Boots - Goblin Toe OR Gorerider for even more Crushing Blow

Rings - anything with +skill

Amulet - anything with +skill

If you find a SoJ, duplicate glitch it, sell it to a merchant and get an Annihilus from Uber Diablo (it gives you +skill, attributes, resistances and most important +x% experience)

 

As for skills, you should definitely have one point in Smite, since I assume you went for some Holy Shield.

 

Basically when you get to a fiend, Smite the living shit out of him  of course, with the help of your Act 2 Nightmare merc. If you want him to be mega buffed, get a Might mercenary and give him an Infinity (super hard to do, I simply use Insight instead)

 

That should be it. My advice though - just ignore the goobers and move forward  they barely give experience anyway. For exp farming, you need to focus on speed killing as many enemies as possible.

Ok! I'll see what I can do!
Atm Im rocking this gear:

 

Weapon - Heart of the Oak

Weapon swap - nothing

Shield - Spirit w ~80% resistances (been looking for zakarum)

Armor - Enigma

Helm - Shako

Gloves - Trang Oul set

Belt - Trang Oul set (looking for aracnids)

Boots - War Traveler

Rings - SOJ + Carrion Wind

Amulet - +2 to all paladin skills

 

My merc have a Vampire helmet together with Insight and Fortitude as most people recommended the Insight instead of Infinity when I looked..

You are right I havent faced the ubers yet, I have killed the regular Uber Diablo though for a 9& XP (good enough for me)

 

For some reason I still feel like I cant take damage at all though, even with full res against everything and a 75% dodge with Holy Shield..

Ok so your tip is basically to teleport in and kill the mobs and leave the Unravelers alone?

[Copanele]

2 minutes ago, Squeek111 said:

Ok! I'll see what I can do!
Atm Im rocking this gear:

 

Weapon - Heart of the Oak

Weapon swap - nothing

Shield - Spirit w ~80% resistances (been looking for zakarum)

Armor - Enigma

Helm - Shako

Gloves - Trang Oul set

Belt - Trang Oul set (looking for aracnids)

Boots - War Traveler

Rings - SOJ + Carrion Wind

Amulet - +2 to all paladin skills

 

My merc have a Vampire helmet together with Insight and Fortitude as most people recommended the Insight instead of Infinity when I looked..

You are right I havent faced the ubers yet, I have killed the regular Uber Diablo though for a 9& XP (good enough for me)

 

For some reason I still feel like I cant take damage at all though, even with full res against everything and a 75% dodge with Holy Shield..

Ok so your tip is basically to teleport in and kill the mobs and leave the Unravelers alone?

Yep pretty much. At least that's what I do. I tried to focus on killing them, but by the time I kill them I could already teleport on another corner, killing even more mobs.

You do have a great equipment and a ton of survivability though...you are Walking instead of Sprinting, no? Sprinting (L3 button, consumes stamina) completely removes your blocking stats.

 

And yes, for Hammerdin, Insight is a ton better than Infinity.

 

Another idea - if you have spare skill points, put one point in Redemption Aura. I normally run Concentration, but when I kill skellies, I switch to Redemption and I suck the health and mana out of the corpses. That means no more resurrections  

[Squeek111]

9 minutes ago, Copanele said:

You do have a great equipment and a ton of survivability though...you are Walking instead of Sprinting, no? Sprinting (L3 button, consumes stamina) completely removes your blocking stats.

 

 

THIS!!!!..... why is there no info about this xD! of course I've had sprinting on hahaha...

But if I use the Vigor Aura to run faster, does that remove the blockingstats aswell?

[Copanele]

3 minutes ago, Squeek111 said:

 

 

THIS!!!!..... why is there no info about this xD! of course I've had sprinting on hahaha...

But if I use the Vigor Aura to run faster, does that remove the blockingstats aswell?

Nope, if you walk, it's ok. Vigor will increase your walking speed but as soon as you simply Walk, your defense bonuses apply.

(there's absolutely no reason to use the Vigor aura if you have Enigma though 😂)

[Copanele]

Just a little bit of info - at level 98, I need roughly 6-7 Tal Rasha runs to fill an exp bar, and that's ignoring the unravellers.

It does take a bit of time, but it seems that it is indeed the best place to level up your character.

[Squeek111]

9 hours ago, Copanele said:

Just a little bit of info - at level 98, I need roughly 6-7 Tal Rasha runs to fill an exp bar, and that's ignoring the unravellers.

It does take a bit of time, but it seems that it is indeed the best place to level up your character.

Yeah I've noticed reaching higher lvl that it becomes annoyingly slow progress..
But Tal Rasha is where it is? I see alot of people saying Chaos or Flayer/Pit is "better"...
I've tried to find someone who done some stats on it and just found a page but that was just when TZ was released so I dont know if there is any changes since then.

 

I also see people saying that they cleared Tal Rasha all tombs in ~10-15 min, hell for me it took the whole hour to clear all tombs and I had my merc killed ~8 times 😂

Edited October 28, 2023 by Squeek111

[Copanele]

15 minutes ago, Squeek111 said:

Yeah I've noticed reaching higher lvl that it becomes annoyingly slow progress..
But Tal Rasha is where it is? I see alot of people saying Chaos or Flayer/Pit is "better"...
I've tried to find someone who done some stats on it and just found a page but that was just when TZ was released so I dont know if there is any changes since then.

I would say that Chaos Sanctuary is about the same, you just have to reload the map more times. Chaos Sanctuary has those elite bosses, BUT I find that level to be way more dangerous than Tal Rasha. Lord De Seis is an absolute nuisance for instance and all those knights can slap you with Amplify Damage and Decrepify, messing up your run. It's way more straightforward than Tal Rasha though, you don't have to run around columns or crap + every monster can be killed by the hammerdin there.

 

Pit is very good for item farming, most of the mobs there drop some good stuff and yeah the experience is pretty sweet. Caves suck tho  

 

I honestly disagree with the Flayer Jungle map. The monster density is amazing but there's so few elite monsters (the ones you want to aim at) that it's really not worth running the stupid jungle.

 

Another fun map that I enjoyed was Catacombs-> Andariel. Tons of Elite monsters and Quest Bugged Andariel always dropped goodies (so many SoJ, Shakos, Arachnid Mesh etc)

15 minutes ago, Squeek111 said:

I also see people saying that they cleared Tal Rasha all tombs in ~10-15 min, hell for me it took the whole hour to clear all tombs and I had my merc killed ~8 times 😂

During endgame, the regular monsters are stuck at level 96 and only the elites go lvl 97-98. That's when you score 15 minutes per run.

VERY IMPORTANT THOUGH! For max clearing speed, you need to reach the 125% Faster Cast Rate breakpoint. I had like 115% FCR and I wasn't that efficient. Once I reached the 125% mark, I started spamming way more hammers and the clearing speed increased. Faster Cast Rate does make a difference!

[Squeek111]

28 minutes ago, Copanele said:

I would say that Chaos Sanctuary is about the same, you just have to reload the map more times. Chaos Sanctuary has those elite bosses, BUT I find that level to be way more dangerous than Tal Rasha. Lord De Seis is an absolute nuisance for instance and all those knights can slap you with Amplify Damage and Decrepify, messing up your run. It's way more straightforward than Tal Rasha though, you don't have to run around columns or crap + every monster can be killed by the hammerdin there.

 

Pit is very good for item farming, most of the mobs there drop some good stuff and yeah the experience is pretty sweet. Caves suck tho  

 

I honestly disagree with the Flayer Jungle map. The monster density is amazing but there's so few elite monsters (the ones you want to aim at) that it's really not worth running the stupid jungle.

 

Another fun map that I enjoyed was Catacombs-> Andariel. Tons of Elite monsters and Quest Bugged Andariel always dropped goodies (so many SoJ, Shakos, Arachnid Mesh etc)

During endgame, the regular monsters are stuck at level 96 and only the elites go lvl 97-98. That's when you score 15 minutes per run.

VERY IMPORTANT THOUGH! For max clearing speed, you need to reach the 125% Faster Cast Rate breakpoint. I had like 115% FCR and I wasn't that efficient. Once I reached the 125% mark, I started spamming way more hammers and the clearing speed increased. Faster Cast Rate does make a difference!

Ok, thanks alot for the tips!

I will try and switch it up a little then between Tal Rasha, CS and Pit... my only problem with pit is the archers, deals so much more than the melee guys and looking for defense vs missile feels a bit over the top.

 

Yeah the Catacombs I did alot, however just the Andy part ... Did only Andy runs from middle of lvl 91 to 70% of 92 in hope of a SOJ.

I got 1 Shako and all but Black Cleft Sunders, aswell as some other decent stuff, until I finally got my SOJ...... from the second CS run I did because I got bored of Andy haha!

Still looking for my Cleft and Arachnids though, and a Zakarum.

 

Btw, the Call to Arms as secondary that alot talks about... Whats the use of it? and is it good for the hammers?

[Copanele]

1 minute ago, Squeek111 said:

Ok, thanks alot for the tips!

I will try and switch it up a little then between Tal Rasha, CS and Pit... my only problem with pit is the archers, deals so much more than the melee guys and looking for defense vs missile feels a bit over the top.

Yeah the archers are a pain, but then again you were probably running. Try to do that map at a walking speed now

Also see what your block rate is (hover your cursor above the Dex stat). It should be a 75% ,the max.

1 minute ago, Squeek111 said:

Yeah the Catacombs I did alot, however just the Andy part ... Did only Andy runs from middle of lvl 91 to 70% of 92 in hope of a SOJ.

I got 1 Shako and all but Black Cleft Sunders, aswell as some other decent stuff, until I finally got my SOJ...... from the second CS run I did because I got bored of Andy haha!

Still looking for my Cleft and Arachnids though, and a Zakarum.

Yeah the SoJ farming is hilarious 😂 I got 2 from Andy and one from a random mob in Lower Kurast because I was farming some chests and a vulture decided to hop on me. It barfed a SoJ outta nowhere. Gambling is amazing 😂

Still haven't found a Zakarum so far.

I had that Sunder charm and honestly...I barely do damage WITH it. I wouldn't bother, because you barely do damage, BUT the magical damage that you will take will skyrocket

1 minute ago, Squeek111 said:

Btw, the Call to Arms as secondary that alot talks about... Whats the use of it? and is it good for the hammers?

It gives you Battle Orders and Battle Commands skill.

Battle Orders buff your health and mana pools by a considerate margin

Battle Commands give you a +1 skill for a set amount of time e.g. if you have 35 in Blessed Hammers, with Battle Commands you will have 36 in Blessed Hammers for 10-15 seconds. Pretty nice damage for those elite groups I'd say!

 

Usually players go with a Call to Arms and a second Spirit shield in the swap hands. At the beginning of the map you swap, cast both auras then swap back to your main weapons and go to town. It's just maximizing efficiency  

Plus a +1000 to HP really makes a difference there!

[Squeek111]

Just some information if anyone else reads in the future... Im still at lvl93 and did 1 hour of Pits, followed by 1 hour of Tal Rasha, I also did 1 hour of Chaos Sanctuary but something strange happened with my XP meter and I was sent back?... Im not really sure, because the XP-bar have not declined, only the number in the stats.

 

1 Hour of Pits gave me ~25 million XP, it took me from 2.208.540.414 to 2.233.627.001

1 Hour of Tal Rasha gave me ~28.5 Million XP (without killing the undeads), I went from 2.233.627.001 to 2.262.148.206.

This is where the weird Chaos Sanctuary happened, because I played for 1 more hour, without my XP bar "going back", but the number went from 2.262.148.206 back to 2.250.751.166 and me still GAINING in the XP bar.

 

This is done WITH a 9% Anni, but always WITHOUT an XP Shrine.

I will do 1 hour of Chaos tomorrow if I have time and update this post aswell.

 

UPDATE:

I continued with 1 hour of Chaos Sanctuary gave me ~27 million xp and took me from 2.250.751.166 to 2.278.120.585

 

I can also add that this can probably be greatly increased (or atleast some) if you reach 125fcr, where as Im currently at 110 because I sold some fcr gear 😅

I persionally prefered CS and Pits (even though seeing all the lightning from scarabs in the tombs were wonderful) CS was a bit more dangerous but with tighter groups and Pits had IMO better, and more frequent, drops. I just reached lvl 94, so I will probably check how much differense (if any) it makes on my XP gaining from the different areas aswell as me hopefully increasing my fcr.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Squeek111

[Copanele]

On 10/29/2023 at 3:15 AM, Squeek111 said:

Just some information if anyone else reads in the future... Im still at lvl93 and did 1 hour of Pits, followed by 1 hour of Tal Rasha, I also did 1 hour of Chaos Sanctuary but something strange happened with my XP meter and I was sent back?... Im not really sure, because the XP-bar have not declined, only the number in the stats.

 

1 Hour of Pits gave me ~25 million XP, it took me from 2.208.540.414 to 2.233.627.001

1 Hour of Tal Rasha gave me ~28.5 Million XP (without killing the undeads), I went from 2.233.627.001 to 2.262.148.206.

This is where the weird Chaos Sanctuary happened, because I played for 1 more hour, without my XP bar "going back", but the number went from 2.262.148.206 back to 2.250.751.166 and me still GAINING in the XP bar.

 

So it wasn't just me!! I think there's a slight bug where my XP went abit down then...reset!

 

That experiment number sounds super good! Yeah I can see why CS is slightly better there!

If I can offer a weird alternative that I currently use and to this date it's still the best farming spot for me - Catacombs&Andariel, more specifically Elite Monster sniping.

The exp will tank HARD when you reach level 97, because even in Terror Zones, the regular mobs will be stuck at lvl 96 and only Elites and Uniques will go 97 and 98 respectively. What I found was a path in the Catacombs where there are elite packs grouped together. I just telestomp from pack to pack and get to Andariel (and hope I get some goodies from her). 

I also have a shrine that has a relative high chance of giving me an exp boost.

The biggest downside is that you need a really good map layout for efficient farming, so it's from case to case. For me, this works the best, I am not in danger of randomly get one shot by CS elites or get stuck into a ghost loop in Tal Rasha .

 

Sharing a video also, if it would help, for reference  

 

 

[Squeek111]

On 10/31/2023 at 2:36 PM, Copanele said:

So it wasn't just me!! I think there's a slight bug where my XP went abit down then...reset!

 

That experiment number sounds super good! Yeah I can see why CS is slightly better there!

If I can offer a weird alternative that I currently use and to this date it's still the best farming spot for me - Catacombs&Andariel, more specifically Elite Monster sniping.

The exp will tank HARD when you reach level 97, because even in Terror Zones, the regular mobs will be stuck at lvl 96 and only Elites and Uniques will go 97 and 98 respectively. What I found was a path in the Catacombs where there are elite packs grouped together. I just telestomp from pack to pack and get to Andariel (and hope I get some goodies from her). 

I also have a shrine that has a relative high chance of giving me an exp boost.

The biggest downside is that you need a really good map layout for efficient farming, so it's from case to case. For me, this works the best, I am not in danger of randomly get one shot by CS elites or get stuck into a ghost loop in Tal Rasha .

 

 

Using that method I managed to get 26 249 328 xp in 1 hour, so it was basically the same as the others for me... HOWEVER! I had to go to the shop atleast 3 times to sell of items AND I found myself running around and searching for elite monsters a bit more than I probably should, so I could've been ~30mil or something if I didnt waste alot of time.

Oh, and my fcr is still in the ~105'ish and the gear is the same, still looking around for gear that boost fcr and skills.

 

I would like to take on the ubers to get the torch, but I highly doubt I would be able to with the char and gear I have atm

[Copanele]

Yep, that's what I mean that you need a really good layout, else you will definitely lose time. I don't sell anything anymore, I filled all the stashes with gold  

But if the map layout sucks for you, then yeah it's safe to ignore what I just shared

 

On 10/27/2023 at 10:51 PM, Squeek111 said:

Atm Im rocking this gear:

 

Weapon - Heart of the Oak

Weapon swap - nothing

Shield - Spirit w ~80% resistances (been looking for zakarum)

Armor - Enigma

Helm - Shako

Gloves - Trang Oul set

Belt - Trang Oul set (looking for aracnids)

Boots - War Traveler

Rings - SOJ + Carrion Wind

Amulet - +2 to all paladin skills

 

There are some additional items that you need for the Ubers. Assuming your items that you mentioned, what I used extra:

 

Weapon - Grief Runeword slapped into an axe or sword. It applies a ton of damage to your Smite

Helm - Guillaume Face

Belt - String of Ears

Legs- Gorerider/Goblin Toe

Belt - Thundergod Vigor (for Uber Mephisto)

Hands - Dracul's Grasp/Wand with Lifetap for life steal

Ring - Raven Frost so you won't get frozen

 

With one point into smiting, you should lay waste to the Ubers. Uber Mephisto is the most dangerous, he can easily one shot you, so make sure you have max resistance in everything and belt full of rejuvenation pots.

Definitely the hardest trophy difficulty wise in the game  you could also respec into a full smiter and then respec again to your hammerdin, there are options!