Zealot Mercanary

[Aussiefighter]

What type of Mercanary is the best to use?

[sorcguy]

I use holy freeze, but honestly if you have a good weapon you don't need a merc anyway. I use grief and it kills like butter. There are only two things I need to be aware of. physical immunes (which are no big deal, I use gimmershread as a hand held weapon) and iron maiden... which is a pain in the butt, requires either retreating or painfully slow throwing of the gimmershread. Buriza actually works pretty well, but then I'm in trouble with physical immunes...
Maybe Hellrack unique crossbow would work well for both? I'm not sure... never tried it...?

I think the speed killers like the might merc?

[UberB]

I use the might merc because I find that doing more damage is more important than minor freezing. Rogue and Ironwolves suck unless you have good gear and Act2 > Barbs. If I want to freeze people i just stick a small charm with +1-2 cold damage.

[Superflymdf]

I really like Holy freeze merc's but when building my pally I didnt lv him enough and eventually bought an A2 Hell defiance merc with reaper's toll and he hardly ever dies. He can sit in a pack of hell cows and hardly lose life.

[illestkhmai]

I really like Holy freeze merc's but when building my pally I didnt lv him enough and eventually bought an A2 Hell defiance merc with reaper's toll and he hardly ever dies. He can sit in a pack of hell cows and hardly lose life.

You could buy it from any difficulty and it'd be the same level.

[Superflymdf]

I thought if you started with a normal A2 merc and leveled him up to 80 his stats would differ from the same type of merc from hell lv to 80.

[illestkhmai]

I thought if you started with a normal A2 merc and leveled him up to 80 his stats would differ from the same type of merc from hell lv to 80.

I've heard that the normal ones are actually better, and you should only buy in other difficulties if seeking a certain aura.

[Hey]

I've heard that the normal ones are actually better, and you should only buy in other difficulties if seeking a certain aura.

This is true, leveling it up ISN'T. Norm has higher stats for some reason.

[Eilo Rytyj]

This is true, leveling it up ISN'T. Norm has higher stats for some reason.

It's because Mercs have static, pre-determined stats at each level.

http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=304163 - the guide is a little old, but the downloadable Merc statistics spreadsheets are accurate. The only main difference is that Mercenaries now are hired within 1-5 levels lower than your current level, regardless of the difficulty hired in.


Since late 1.10 or 1.11 (can't remember, it's been a long while), we've been able to hire Mercs from any difficulty within 1-5 levels lower than our current character level. That means that even Normal difficulty mercs will be around the same level as the character. And you'll probably notice that Normal difficulty mercs have higher stats at any given level than Nightmare or Hell. That's just the way it is, that's just the way Blizzard did it.

You should only ever hire Mercenaries in Normal difficulty UNLESS:

1) That Mercenary is an Act 2 Merc, and you want the Might, Holy Freeze or Thorns aura as his natural aura.
2) You deliberately want a Mercenary with bad stats for some unknown reason (a challenge?)

So in the case that you want an Act 1, 3, 5, or an Act 2 Mercenary with the Prayer, Blessed Aim or Defiance auras, you will be hiring them in Normal difficulty.


Oh, and on-topic: My vote is for an Act 2 Nightmare Offensive (Might aura) merc. More damage is all good.

[illestkhmai]

2) You deliberately want a Mercenary with bad stats for some unknown reason (a challenge?)


lol on that :laugh:.

[Hey]

Use Act 2 Nightmare Off for Might aura, plus give him pride for Conc aura =].

[UberB]

Use Act 2 Nightmare Off for Might aura, plus give him pride for Conc aura =].

Stay well away from Iron Maiden then. :grin: :grin:

[flamingchen]

Might or no might, IM basically kills zealots anyway.

[Aussiefighter]

yeah Did a multi with my lvl 70 zealot helping a lvl 28 necromancer on normal difficulty, all 1 shot kills and no one could really hurt me, but i still died 3 times when i got IM

[TheChemist]

a bow on switch can help with IM, though zealots probably wont have too much success in higher difficulties with non melee weapons.

[Cast_Raider]

I really like Holy freeze merc's but when building my pally I didnt lv him enough and eventually bought an A2 Hell defiance merc with reaper's toll and he hardly ever dies. He can sit in a pack of hell cows and hardly lose life.

I can't speak for the defiance part, but I would like to add my endorsement for reaper's toll. It's on my zon's merc, and he just won't die, except to IM...and that was with duriel's shell and tal's mask. Now he has ethereal gladiator's bane and ethereal veil of steel. If decrep is triggered (and it triggers a lot), he's just not gonna die, period.

I haven't bothered with a merc for my new zealer/trist runner, but I will equip him with this if I do. I figure I should be just about invincible, since everything will be either life tapped from Dracul's, or decrep'd from reaper's.

[Eilo Rytyj]

Reaper's Toll is an absolutely sick weapon for a Zealot's merc. If you aren't using Life Tap in any form, then Decrepify is going to make your day. Reaper's Toll pretty much makes your merc self-sufficient in terms of killing power and survivability, as Decrepify increases his damage, and Reaper's has a huge amount of Life Leech on the weapon.

Given the way that resistances work, I'd say that Reaper's Toll is going to boost your damage more than Pride's Conc aura will.

As always, it should be a Might merc you use with it.