View Full Version : Best 3-Team combo for Private HC?
I was wondering what a nice 3 team combo would be for private HC. Private as in it'll only be us 3 to get through hell. 80% of our games will be private with just us 3. We are open to crazy combos. And please, no over lapping characters (3 sorcs or like 3 Summon necros).
Lord Penguin
31-07-2007, 22:54
summon nec zeal pally dual tree sorc.. or convic pally light sorc fire claw bear.
wouldn't Iron Maiden be an issue if we were to get through Act 4?
inanefedaykin
31-07-2007, 23:04
Summon nec, light sorc and conviction zealot.
PhatTrumpet
31-07-2007, 23:07
Too many combos to list... maybe if one or two of you had a particular character build in mind we could help suggest the second and/or third build.
What do you guys think about:
Summon Necro, Fire Claw Druid, and Zealot Pally w/ Fant.
We'd have Amp Dmg, Oak, and Fant (besides our merc auras).
AgentMarth
31-07-2007, 23:10
If you have the option for three characters, I'd do -
Sorc
Barb
Paladin
Sorc for high damage and Teleport, Barb for BO and tankage, Paladin for utility auras like conviction and nice damage himself.
You could maybe switch out the Paladin, but I would still want BO and Teleport, a Necro could work for curses and Skeletons as tanks.
Fun for i'd try a Light Sorc, Singer Barb, and Conviction Zealot. IM wouldn't be a problem except for maybe the Pally, but then he could switch to ranged and with his Conviction, let the Sorc go to town while the Barb stuns everything.
If you want a Necro, go poison, so LR would benefit more than one character, and then a few revives for tankage.
Lord Penguin
31-07-2007, 23:13
Fire claw bear normally uses a very low phys damage weapon so iron maiden shouldnt bother him... convic pally could get by with a high ele damage throwing weapon/wand during iron maiden parts.
If you have the option for three characters, I'd do -
Sorc
Barb
Paladin
Sorc for high damage and Teleport, Barb for BO and tankage, Paladin for utility auras like conviction and nice damage himself.
You could maybe switch out the Paladin, but I would still want BO and Teleport, a Necro could work for curses and Skeletons as tanks.
Fun for i'd try a Light Sorc, Singer Barb, and Conviction Zealot. IM wouldn't be a problem except for maybe the Pally, but then he could switch to ranged and with his Conviction, let the Sorc go to town while the Barb stuns everything.
If you want a Necro, go poison, so LR would benefit more than one character, and then a few revives for tankage.
Seems like a nice combo.
We planned on not having a sorc since we play sorcs all the time.
I might consider using a Barb instead of the druid in the necro/pally/Tank combo. What do you think?
Fire claw bear normally uses a very low phys damage weapon so iron maiden shouldnt bother him... convic pally could get by with a high ele damage throwing weapon/wand during iron maiden parts.
In your idea, the convic pally, what would his main skill be for damage if his convic is always up, vengence?
Lord Penguin
31-07-2007, 23:17
you could go vengence or zeal with an elemental damage weapon.
Fireclaw bear, convic pally, singer barb would be a fine group too.. and very safe with bo and a little oak.
we just spoke about it on vent. We'll do your idea Lord Penguin:
Fireclaw Bear, Pally, Barb.
Would a Vengence Convic Pally work well though?
Lord Penguin
31-07-2007, 23:24
Personally i prefer using zeal.. throw 1-4 in zeal.. all you need is enough + skills to make it do 5 hits.. its not for phys damage. Get a cute ele damage weapon.. theres alot of nice ones.
max holy sheild conviction and w/e else you want.
I'm looking at the Singer barb, and it's kinda interesting. It looks like I don't even hit... I just war cry. How effective will this be?
Well a singer barb can be a very solid build, primarily for crowd control and BO in a group atmosphere because the other chars will kill so much faster.
Re: the Conviction Pally, definitely go at least enough in zeal to make it 5 hits, because it is much easier to find a wand with 1-397 light dmg or something than it is to find a high dmg one hand weapon untwinked.
We recently had this issue in our Call to Arms game, the pally was never a killer in any difficulty and got bored of just standing around being a convic *****.
Cheers
-Tai
Trapper
Windy
Skellymancer
Nice group of solid soloers, not terribly powerfull that can each help each other without either of them not contributing like a melee build will have to do in some areas.
Its not your "synergized" group like say a Conviction Pally + others but it will do just fine.
Best part is if 1-2 people decide to stop playing any one of these builds can go on and finish solo just fine where some Conviction Pally may not, ot a group of melee guys may not.
Socialism
02-08-2007, 09:13
Scary overpowered threesome:
Summoner Necromancer (Might merc), Hammerdin (Defiance merc), Lightning Javazon (Holy Freeze merc).
Rather balanced threesome:
Fireclaw Druid (Prayer merc), Conviction Zealot Paladin (Defiance merc), Lightning Trapper (Holy Freeze merc).
Ok, here is my 'off the wall' choices.
Any Sin with strong masteries, it doesn't matter if she is MA, Fury or Trap. It's the CoS, MB, SW or SM that will help the team the most. If she knows how to be a team player,(oxymoron) a sin can be a major help, to someone like,
An FA/strafer. CoS can turn an average strafer into an (almost) 'Silence' strafer.
Add a Druid, Babba, or Pally and you are good to go.
I spent most my days on my hammerdin (who also has some other utility skills like maxed vigor, and salvation with plenty of +skills) along with a cold sorc and a trapper. Between the 3 of us and our mercs, we have faced just about every challenge easily.
LuckyDwarf
13-08-2007, 01:14
My vote goes for . . .
Fire Sorc
Javazon
Wind Druid
A good solid combo, from early game up.
Lucky
NightShade
13-08-2007, 01:16
Zerker barb
Smiter paladin
summoner necro
Necro has the crowd control abilities, paladin gives fanat to all the melee power and the zerker barb cuts through things like there was no tomorrow. vs regular monsters they will all be tied up where the barb can cut them down like they were nothing and vs bosses the smiter/zerker will do a very quick job of mopping him up. Let the minions engage first and then the both of them run in unmolested.
CombatShrine
13-08-2007, 09:12
Before I go off here, there are many logically defensible solutions to this question, and I am in no way asserting that my conclusion here is the final answer. This is simply an interesting thought exercise :)
Important Assumptions:
1. This is untwinked, with no hope of waypoints from other players, so it is imperative that we be able to get past all of the various problem spots in the game (for example, a maxed melee build of HoW druid, fanaticism zeal paladin, and ww barbarian would almost certainly be routed in an area where there are oblivion knights.)
2. Also, since this is untwinked, we cannot rely on any special builds of characters that revolve around certain items. (i.e. whirlwind assassin)
3. As requested, no duplication of the characters classes. (Although, there are some interesting ideas here.)
The most pronounced synergy between any two classes is probably between summoner necro and some form of paladin (hammerdin, or, for spellcasters, conviction aura), so we'll put those two in and examine what the other classes bring the table.
What the Necro will do:
There is something of a fork in the road here. We can either go maxed skeleton warriors/a few points in revive, combined with maxed CE for the quintessential untwinked fishymancer build. We can, however, also make a lich lord (maxed skeleton mages), which allows us to more fully exploit lower resist, which has tremendous synergy with several other classes.
Personally though, I feel the CE/warrior build is superior for untwinked group play. Skeleton mages cannot tank, and they are pretty wussy in hell (although I suppose this would be remedied with a -125 resist conviction aura). This necro should however, put a point into lower resist, since it is indispensable against immunes. He also fulfills the role of tank in the party, as long as he keeps his resistances up and plays carefully. Clay golem is probably the way to go here, since blood golem is terrible, we dont have good items to use on iron golem, and fire golem's brings no useful abilities to the table. Plus, Clay golem is excellent against bosses.
Damage types provided: Fire, Physical
What the Paladin will do:
Again, two possible builds. The first is the typical hammerdin build. His concentration aura will catapult the damage from the skeletons and revives to simply astronomical proportions. He won't have to "rough it" as much, since the necro minions will make excellent tanks. The other one, is the conviction zealot or conviction avenger.
Conviction aura renders all immunities useless, and that is saying something. This is a tough call. I think however, the conviction paladin offers a greater degree of flexibility in areas where there are oblivion knights (one IM can wipe an entire rank of skeleton warriors). The conviction aura makes corpse explosion's damage absolutely phenomenal, easily capable of wasting several enemies with one corpse.
Damage types provided: He doesn't even have to do anything! Although I suppose if he's an avengers its non-magical, non-poison.
1. Barbarian - The main things I see here are BO and berserk for handling PI's. I think we can do better than that, since the druid gets oak sage and more synergistic skills, and berserk, while great, won't be needed with a conviction paladin running loose.
2. Assassin - Well, the traps wouldnt be too bad with lower resist, but why send in an assassin to a sorceress' job?
3. Druid - Depending on the build, this is probably not too bad of a choice. We get oak sage or heart (probably oak sage on hc), extra tankage if need be from the animal summons, and his elemental tree. In this build, he would probably function as a half-barb, half-sorc hybrid, by giving everyone life with oak sage and casting damaging spells.
Damage Types Provided: Fire if using the fire tree or fire claws, physical if using Tornado, or Cold if using Hurricane. Hurricane is probably the best here, so Cold.
4. Amazon - To be honest, I'm not sure. I have never made an LF amazon, but I just can't see it working with the necro and paladin. LF *IS* amazing, but again, just like I said for the assassin, it just seems like a less-than-par sorc replacement.
5. Sorceress - Probably the best option. She provides static field against bosses, and has three trees of damage available. Let us examine each in detail:
Fire - Probably the worst choice, because of CE. Not that the skills are bad, but its just too redundant, and doesn't bring enough to the table to justify it.
Ice - Not too bad, but she will shatter corpses for the necro to pop. I suppose is you REALLY wanted to though, it wouldnt be too much of a problem. Here, I would use orb because of the maggot lair and arcane sanctuary.
Lightning - Also not bad. max the lightning skills and fry'em!
My vote though, goes to lightning, because her key skills come online before the ice sorc's, and untwinked early play can be tough. Also, I find, that lightning immunes are a little harder to come by than FI's and CI's (although it may simply be the areas that I enjoy playing in.)
Damage type: Lightning
So, after all that, there are three candidates for the best over-all 3 player group.
i. Fishymancer-Hammerdin-Hurricane Druid
ii. Fishymancer-Conviction-Hurricane Druid
iii. Fishymancer-Conviction-Lite Sorc
group iii is probably the best of these three. They simply have, well, everything they could need to defeat the legions of the burning hells.
Damage types: Physical, fire, lightning, and prismatic damage from vengeance.
Mercs: NM might merc, NM prayer merc, and whatever the sorc wants.
Just got a few points here for ya Mr Combatshrine.....
Fishymancer is a NOOB build!!!!!!!!! Live it, learn it and accept it.......
No freaking Hammerdin ever needed anything but a little BO since 1.10 to destroy anything and the BO is only to let him play like a freaking lunatic that is nearly unkillable!!!
Playing a Conviction biotch is about as fun as drilling holes into your freaking skull!
Assasin isnt just replacing a Sorc its also replacing part of the Necro with Death Sentry.
Amazon can be one of the single most nasty boss killers and crowd killers all wrapped up in one.
Neither the Zon nor Sin needs a Convic biotch to beat the game they can do it solo.
Furthermore, a Sorc of any tree can kill extremely fast in a 3-man game. Frost Nova + Static paralyzes and destroys, just need mana and pots. Fireball is pretty damn impressive, so is Glacial and there are many ways to use Rune and Gems to give the untwinked Sorc the ability to spam the crap out of anything.......Tir's and Saphires as well as Mana/kill on items. Rather depressing listening to all the noobs talk about how hard it is to start a freaking sorc as its damn simple......Want to try something hard then make one on Classic and then you can cry all you want.
Lord Penguin
13-08-2007, 23:24
Playing a Conviction biotch is about as fun as drilling holes into your freaking skull!
Id imagine thats true for one who builds a paladin just to be a "Conviction biotch".. i always laugh when i hear someone quit their conviction pally cus it was boring then find out that of course, they built it horribly. You may as well play a pure bo barb -.-. A Real conviction pally is one of the most fun chars in the game. No need for WUSSY bo in hell.. no need for avoiding ANY immune... and no need to avoid iron maiden. Mine last reset was my cser.
:laughing:
Oh there are ways to make a nice Conviction based Pally that can do just fine its just when you get a couple outers with big AoE you kill about nothing.....Very similar to a Barb, you can bust your arse and get 1 kill to others 10-20+ or you can just relax and have a beer or dinner and spam shouts. either way in time it gets old. Conviction + Trapper/Java/Sorc and you wont kill squat unless you want to go FoH then you dont have to run up to hit them and you might get some more kills. Although a Convic build is a nice one to get all the good drops!!!
CombatShrine
14-08-2007, 22:08
Fishymancer is a noob build? A character class that can solo the entire game without any sort of gear is noob? I just don't understand where you're coming from.
And the original poster didn't say he wanted all three of his classes to be "fun." He said he wanted the best group. Ergo, Conviction paladin is in there. Although I disagree with you. I made a conviction pally once, and I got a real kick out of knowing my teammates were owning everything because of my aura -.-
How is the assassin replacing part of the necro? The only reason corpse explosion is good is because of amplify damage (or, if need be, lower resist). The assassin doesn't have that.
And where did I say it was hard to start a sorc? Hell, I DO have a classic sorc (although not hardcore), and she wasn't all that hard to make. Simply slow going at the beginning without orb.
CE is 9 yds @20 and 60-100% corpse life and NO it doesnt need AMP to be effective and every CE must be cast by the Necro! Investing 20 in CE is also expensive when those points can be invested into things like Bone Armor and its synergies to up survivability.
Death Sentry is 9.6 yrds @20 and 40-80% damage and NO it doesnt need AMP to be effective and a Sin casts at a MINIMUM 5 CEs/DS which by far exceeds what any Necro can do and she can lay 5 traps quickly which is 25 MINIMUM CEs in like no freaking time and if she lvls Fire Blast she gets one more CE/3 lvls of FB which means if you go FB to the max its 6 more blasts or 11/DS or 55 CE's!!! The Sins investment in DS pays off in all ways, it is a natural skill to max and takes nothing away from the build by doing it.
Put me in a party of killers I would take a Trapper over a Necro any day they kill faster and live better and baring freezing and shattering foes will probably produce more deaths than anyone else in the party.
BTW, a naked Necro can beat the game! So can a naked Sorc, how about a Leaper Barb? Sure he can.....so can a totally screwed up build beat the game but that doesn't make them good builds. This game is a hell of alot easier to beat than most believe.
Fishymancer is a noob build because it totally ignores all the extreme situations and has no personal protection other than minions and it also ignores other skills that can be extremely useful. Bone Armor is what keeps you off the Deeds Screen..........
Ever read the death thread? What do you see from Fishys? Died at stairs or portal or leading my army or in a tight area like Arcane or Tunnels or a couple of bosses hit you at once and the aruras stack up and one hit the skellys before you realize it, or in the common lag you are actually about half a screen farther forward than it looks like on your screen! 1 point in CE or 1-5 with + skills that are easily had will kill anything anywhere any time if its Amped and those 15+ points invested in Bonewall will boost your armor 15/lvl or 300+ absorb which is basically 300+ recastable life!
Try this some time.....
20 RS
20 SM
20 Spear
1-5 CE
1 BA
1 Everything else
The rest in Bone Wall and Prison and use them......
If you feel you need a little extra in something like Summon Resists go for it.
Now you have a build that isnt relying on minions and is a more effective killer. In extreme situations you can help the skellies get you that first kill with your spear which does a ton of damage (to stacked foes) and usually insures your first CE kills several things because Spear penetrates thus you can string off CEs and destroy packs sooner/quicker. But the #1 part of it is you get a really nice absorb from your Bone Armor which greatly enhances your ability to live thru tight spots like the ones mentioned above. All your points invested in Wall and Prison boost both Armor and Spear.....
Khelavaster
20-08-2007, 12:02
my favourite:
summon nec, concentrate barb, pure fire sorc
too many to name
summon necro, hammerdin, zealot (fanat, conc, magic damage)
bo, summon nec, any druid (oak sage, strong summons)
again, summon nec, sorc, sorc
WrongdayJ
20-08-2007, 23:35
Good topic! :thumbsup:
I've done this many times with friends. . .the combo that worked best (for us at least) was:
Necromancer / Paladin / Barbarian
The Necro for the curses (Amp and Life Tap were especially appreciated), the Paladin for the auras (Fanatacism / Cleansing), and the Barb for the Warcries (Shout, BC, BO in particular).
The necro stands back and directs curses and throws up the occasional Corpse Explosion when things get rough (read: Baals minions). . .the Barb and Paladin were the tanks. My friends and I all roll this combo with tricked out Act I mercs for insane amounts of 'cover fire'.
This combo would also work well with Act V Barbarian mercs too, for the ultimate in Tank-fests. Can you imagine the carnage with 4 Barbs and a Paladin all swinging at amped monsters, while benefitting from Fanatacism? I can. . .and it's awesome. Need more damage? :shocked: Trade one of the Act I or Act V mercs for a Might Act II merc. Voila! Instant Blood-bath.
Pallys
Holy freezer
Holy Shock
Veng
Might Merc
Blessed Aim
Defiance
Might even consider some Act 3 guys like the Lightning Hozer, they can be nice at high levels especially with Convic, the Fierballer can be nice also. If you want to rely on a Holy Freeze Merc then one could be a big time defiance Pally.
Could go one as Fanatic if you want i suppose but then you have IM to contend with again.
Re: the Conviction Pally, definitely go at least enough in zeal to make it 5 hits, because it is much easier to find a wand with 1-397 light dmg or something than it is to find a high dmg one hand weapon untwinked.
We recently had this issue in our Call to Arms game, the pally was never a killer in any difficulty and got bored of just standing around being a convic *****.
we ran into this very same situation in Paladine's group, I basically stood there as a conviction ***** while the overpowered lightning zon killed everything.
Kings Grace
Honor
Black
Holy Thunder
Pretty much all of those should be doable untwinked with a group of people. IO's can be uncommon but the rest arent and they would be suitable weapons. Hell a Butchers Pupil would be a sweet find also and they arent usually uncommon.
Even with a good weapon if there are many elemental hosers he still isnt killing much.......
CombatShrine
21-08-2007, 22:16
Amn + Tir works well too.
25% crushing blow on a fast weapon will do well for any zealot.
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