Looking for cheapest builds.

[LukeJames]

Looking for cheapest builds
Penny builds

I'm currently looking for the absolute least expensive builds that can be made. When I say it, I mean it, I'm looking for builds that are so cheap even a person just starting off could build it. You guys usually say, "A rare ____ is cheap if you find the right person..". I want even cheaper than rares, in-fact that is the theme of the builds, I want to know if there are decent PVP or PVM builds that can be built without a single rare.

What builds are possible without a single rare?

I'm serious, I don't want a single rare on the entire setup of the character. Just sets, uniques or magical items. And by rares I also detail items such as a 30/20 *20 magical shield, as those are a rare magic item to find. Can you think of some builds that use easy gear?

Anyone have any ideas?

[purplelocust]

Anyone have any ideas?

Here are my opinions about a couple of builds that get good mileage out of poor gear. Most melee builds are out as they require good weapons (although if you have Cleg's set, there are a bunch of feasible builds there.) You are looking at some cookie-cutter builds-- not surprising, since you want builds that kill well with easy-to-obtain gear. This is basically builds that do well untwinked.

1) Lightning Javazon: max LF + Charged Strike and you can use the javs you were born with. Some IAS gear is nice but not essential and you can get along way with that. Mana can be a problem if you don't have +mana per kill when you visit the cow level but you can afford mana potions, presumably.

2) A standard Skelemancer can go very far with a blue +3 Raise Skeleton, +3 Skel Mastery wand that you can shop early in the game, or even just a more ordinary wand.

3) Tesladin/Frostalot are both builds that don't need much gear to do fine, since it is the skills that deliver the punch, not the actual weapon. A Tesladin with the Angelic Set is very impressive in my experience.

4) Similarly, a Shock Ranger does well and is a safe character to play. I had one who was using a 3 flawless amethyst composite bow for a long time, until he found a Rogue's Bow. Again, it's the skills delivering the punch, all that really matters about the bow is the speed.

5) Pure Orb Sorc can do well with blue gear. Sorcs get so little life from their Vitality points that a rubied helm or +life belt (of the Whale is great) is a good investment.

I think any of these 5 can do well enough, well into Nightmare easily, and by then you're finding better stuff that is useful. A Holy Fire paladin is very quick out of the gate but doesn't manage in NM well at all, unless he comes across Raven Claw and even then it's not nearly as good as any of the above builds, in my experience.

A hammerdin is also quite playable with poor gear. A +1 pally +2 BH +2 Concentration scepter (for example) is shoppable without too much boredom and if you get some FCR from rings you can hit the 30% FCR breakpoint without much trouble and have powerful enough hammers. Yes, they won't be superfast 10 frame 9k hammers, but fast 12 frame 4k hammers are still plenty strong. I had a hammerdin using a blue +energy +mana 20FCR wand for a long time until he found a decent +3 BH scepter.

Lightning/fireball sorcs need lots of mana and FCR gear, usually, so I don't think they are as easy to play with poor gear as a Frozen Orbstress. A pure Blizzard sorc would also be pretty managable and quite similar to the Orbstress.

So in summary, for each class here are the cheapest easily playable builds:

Amazon: LF cowazon
Barb: Clegster WW, Bonesnap WW
Necro: skelemancer
Paladin: shock, freeze, Clegger fanatic zealot, hammerdin
Sorc: FO or Blizzard

[LukeJames]

Okay, let me tell y'all a sad little tale of drunken rage and regret. Remember that stone of jordan I found, well, I won't dwell into details but it was about three in the morning sometime last week and I was tired as heck. Anyways, there was a trade game, yada-yada, I accepted a deal, the items were good but in no way were they worth an soj, mostly rare pally skill gear and a tri-res helm. I looked at them for a few moments afterwards, and realised, I'm an idiot for accepting that trade. Problem was, I wasn't so calm about it, I was just getting my high off sugary treats and sodas so I was bouncing around like a pinball and started getting quite frustrated. Anyways, I eventually got so pissed off, I went out to my account screen and deleted every single character I had in my account. Then I took the Diablo II LoD disk out of my CD-Drive, threw it in the back off a cupboard and uninstalled all of it's files.

There, I was finally done with Diablo II and it's strange addictiveness.

Next day, around noon hour, the addiction hit me again and I couldn't fight it. I reinstalled my files and came back to Diablo II, I tried going singleplayer but it was so boring I just couldn't do it. So I came back to battle.net, luckily I had a mule account with a few items left on it (Sigons, Tarn, Hsaurus, Shard, P.Ruby Masks, Swordbacks, Goblin Toe, Manald, P.Diamond Tower, Generals..). Basically just a few sets and minimal uniques. I managed to bum Angelic Wing and only one Halo off a friend as one twitch and full cleglaws off another friend.

So, I'm extremely poor and I need to build something that can destroy bosses and slowly rebuild my fortune.

[aznpwner]

Okay, let me tell y'all a sad little tale of drunken rage and regret. Remember that stone of jordan I found, well, I won't dwell into details but it was about three in the morning sometime last week and I was tired as heck. Anyways, there was a trade game, yada-yada, I accepted a deal, the items were good but in no way were they worth an soj, mostly rare pally skill gear and a tri-res helm. I looked at them for a few moments afterwards, and realised, I'm an idiot for accepting that trade. Problem was, I wasn't so calm about it, I was just getting my high off sugary treats and sodas so I was bouncing around like a pinball and started getting quite frustrated. Anyways, I eventually got so pissed off, I went out to my account screen and deleted every single character I had in my account. Then I took the Diablo II LoD disk out of my CD-Drive, threw it in the back off a cupboard and uninstalled all of it's files.

There, I was finally done with Diablo II and it's strange addictiveness.

Next day, around noon hour, the addiction hit me again and I couldn't fight it. I reinstalled my files and came back to Diablo II, I tried going singleplayer but it was so boring I just couldn't do it. So I came back to battle.net, luckily I had a mule account with a few items left on it (Sigons, Tarn, Hsaurus, Shard, P.Ruby Masks, Swordbacks, Goblin Toe, Manald, P.Diamond Tower, Generals..). Basically just a few sets and minimal uniques. I managed to bum Angelic Wing and only one Halo off a friend as one twitch and full cleglaws off another friend.

So, I'm extremely poor and I need to build something that can destroy bosses and slowly rebuild my fortune.


anger management? lol. Anyways, I bet you could make a bvb barb. I think I saw somewhere that Fred made a guide that included clegs and sigs stuff. You should ask him.

[fledgeling]

orb sorc is best, because you can MF with her
you need to put as much in life as possible, because it will be hard without a good armor
you can use a +2 staff, which can help a lot (the problem is the level 42 req + it costs like 300k gold)



skeleton necro works ok



ww barb = WONT work, you wont trade even a bonesnap if you are poor

hammerdins = hmm, seem to work well if you have sigon parts

javazon = not enough damage, you need to be rushed all the time



I think you need to start with an MF sorc. A salamander wand would help you a lot, so as a sigon armor/boots/helmet/belt/gloves. Then in theory you should switch them for a gull/goldskin/ward/chancies/nagels/tarn? 3ptopaz helmet ->> the dupes/good rares.

[LukeJames]

Kay, I'm thinking a PVM Tesladin.

Gear
Angelics
Deaths
Generals Tan Do Li Ga
Iratha Crown (30FR/30LR)
3 Sock P.Diamond Shield
Goblin Toe

He will be able to run nightmare chaos sanctuary to find a few items, I used to do it with my javazon who also was pure lightning so I can assure myself of having no problems with monsters in those parts. I could swap the Iratha Crown for Tarn Helm but I'd rather have resists than +1 and magic find. As it's still possible to find nice rares with 0% MF. Any immunes that get in his way will be dealt with by crushing blow and a decent physical whipping.

[fredsta54]

check out my mini guide library

WW barb are easy to play from scratch







Fred

[Zodijackyl]

Orb sorcs are tough to solo to 30. Every time I start out again (new ladder, another realm/hc on new ladder, etc.) I make a blizz sorc. I've always been able to solo effectively through hell with a blizz sorc. Once you're up to act 1 hell, you'll probably want to play in a team. From every new realm I started on, I've been able to solo a blizz sorc until I can get to hell CS. The main gear I need for a sorc is:
20FCR/res wand from Drognan in A2
Decent shield either gambled at level 18ish or 30/20 bone bought from drognan
3soc helm with gems: Easy to get 3 perfect rubies if you beat norm, then make cows and harvest some gems.

Also, I consider a few decent rares on the same level of availability as general sets/uniques. When I started HC this season, I was able to solo to nightmare CS pretty fast, and then I started getting my good gear. By making norm cows a few times and not killing the king, I was able to get 3 perfect diamonds. Normal act 2 Fara gave me a 3soc large shield. Normal cows gave me 3 perfect rubies and a 3soc mask. One of the merchants in normal gave me a 20fcr wand with near 40 fire res. 38 fire res off a wand, and 57 off a 3x pdia shield is enough to MF nightmare CS. You can obtain 25MF boots usually in under ten runs to the blacksmith in act 4 (forget the name), and gambling gloves also yields some MF ones. Nightmare Charsi usually offers low req armors with a nice resist and 50+ life. FCR rings and amulets aren't hard to find, neither are MF ones (just do a few norm cow runs and check all the magic ones)
Patience is needed to do a few dozen MF runs of nightmare CS until you get nice stuff. If you want more MF, you can use a 3soc topaz helm, which is easy to get. Chances are, by soloing to here, you'll already have some decent gear. Don't rush through packs of monsters, kill everything on your way to CS. It's also a good idea to weaken Diablo with static field, then throw on a few more MF items, then finish him.

Everything goes faster when working with a team. A good 1.1 team would include a barb, a sorc, and an hdin. The barb does not even need a wep until one is found because he just needs to provide BO. The pala and sorc need 3soc shields and magic gear for FR to do hell CS, and you can improve gear from there. Have find item on the barb to get more items+juvs off of unique+champ monsters. These monsters give you nice drops and pots, and also great XP at lower levels.

[IvyHC]

Hammerdin

Iratha set, 3d shield, shard, whatever rings you want, tearhaunch boots, twitch.

85 all resists in hell and you'll do 6-7k damage a hammer.