Newbie Aura question

[underthewronghat]

My Freezealot made it to act 2 nightmare (with an ironwolf frost merc)... Since I'm using the cold aura (offensive), can I get a combat or defensive Pally from act 2 and use our two auras at the same time?

Not sure how this works, but I figured since my aura affects enemies, I might could get a merc to aura me (us)...

I'm guessing I couldn't do combat and defensive auras at the same time...

[IGotSoul]

If youre using holy freeze Id reccommend getting a Might aura merc from Act 2 NM to help your melee damage.

[underthewronghat]

Yeah, that's what I was thinking... Will this work? My Holy Freeze with Merc's might Aura --or can there only be one aura active in the area?

[IGotSoul]

yup they will both work

[thegiantturtle]

Yeah, that's what I was thinking... Will this work? My Holy Freeze with Merc's might Aura --or can there only be one aura active in the area?Not only can you have 1 aura affecting the party and 1 aura affecting the monsters on at the same time, you can actually have multiple auras affecting your party and multiple auras affecting the monsters on at the same time.

If a paladin was running concentration and a merc was running might, then both would be affected by both auras. If both the merc and paladin were running might, then only the higher level might would take affect. Essentially, you can have 1 of each sharing aura on at any given time. There can be as many pinging auras on in an area as possible (4 different characters with holy freeze would each have their aura damaging enemies as it pinged).

[underthewronghat]

So I guess the question is --with the act 2 Merc (nightmare) should I get thorns or might or should I just stick with the Act 1 iron wolves?

I kinda like the iron wolves (cold) because I have no problem keeping them alive, they can carry a shield and they use ranged attacks which hit (and freeze) small annoying targets like the pygmies or the imps who run around all over the place... I've gotten kinda good at running around behind ranged attackers (so they miss) drawing fire, while my Merc freezes them from the front...

Of course if I make it to hell difficulty, the iron wolves may become a lot less useful...

Also, how do the Act 1 Rogues fare?

[Feysal]

I have 3 characters, two of them with act 2 mercenaries and one with an Iron Wolf from act 3.

I'm fairly convinced that the Iron Wolf is not a very good idea. If I had a might aura merc with that character instead, it would give a significant boost to her killing speed. Sure, he freezes monsters all the time, but he also gets killed all the time because he can't leech life. Also, since frozen corpses shatter and can't be used for skills like corpse explosion, he may not be a good choice - depends on whether you use such skills.

I also had a rogue mercenary for a long time. When that character hit hell though, it became obvious that her days were numbered. The rogue died all the time. I replaced her with a defense aura merc, and since then I've been doing fine. Can't remember a single merc death (except when I died, of course).

[Mursilis]

So I guess the question is --with the act 2 Merc (nightmare) should I get thorns or might or should I just stick with the Act 1 iron wolves? ...how do the Act 1 Rogues fare?

Might, as the Thorns aura is fairly useless on a mercenary and not very good after Normal anyway. Act III iron wolves are decent in Normal/NM, but only the cold one really. Problem is you do cold damage as well, and in the later stages of NM and all of Hell there are monsters that will be immune to cold attacks. You need a backup, which is why Might was suggested for a physical component to your attacks.

You could also go with an Act I fire rogue. She'll do fire elemental damage to deal with those pesky cold immunes, and she won't die too much due to her AI.