Diablo 1 HD Hellfire Mod | Awake

For reference I played the original game at launch and cleared Hell/Hell legit with every class, so I am familiar with the game, and how it plays mechanically.

I know it’s a mod, and it's supposed to be difficult, but this is just silly. I would easily be able to farm Hell in Nightmare or higher right now, but alas, I am stuck in this bottle neck with way too OP of bosses.

Instead of progressing through the game I am stuck drudging through trivial content looking for an elusive upgrade. I am literally using the same bow I found in the Cathedral. Granted it’s the Needler, and its damage is weird, and its Attack speed is really good. Even a Savage Bow of Slaying (Long Battle Bow base, 14-55 dam) is less DPS.

I can get past the first boss, the Balrog one, but the Knight wrecks me so hard. I’ve been trying to kite him using teleport, but I’m just not doing enough damage, one slip up and I am dead. There is 0 room for error. His teleport is not too bad to avoid, but if he hits me with Shield Charge, I’m pushing up daises. Sometimes when he gets going with Frenzy I’m unable to get away as well. Again, I get he’s a boss, thus should be hard, but this is normal difficulty. I would expect this from nightmare and up, not normal.

Using both bows results in the same result... dirt nap.

Relevant Stats;
Rogue LVL 30
DPS: 243.97
STR: 49
MAG: 64
DEX: 202 <-- All stat allocation went here.
VIT: 47
AC: 118
Resists : Maxed Scavengers Carapace / 46% fire and Max rest with Iceblink on.
HP: 197
Mana: 142
-8 or -16 Damage take from enemies. Depending on which chest I am using.

BP is Iceblink or Scavanger Carapace depending on needed resists. I got the Maiden&#8217;s Broach Amulet for Mana leech, which frankly due to my low DPS isn&#8217;t all that useful. The aforementioned Needler, and the rest is a collection of rares.

Golem level 3 is utterly useless. One hit wonder.
Guardian level 4 does 10 damage. So that&#8217;s useless as well.

All the quests are done save the ones that give spell upgrades which reading here its best to leave those for way later when the MAG req. is too high to use books to upgrade them. Kinda beating my head against the wall doing Laz runs, Lost Treasure runs, Hell level 15-16 runs, etc. I can get about 80% MF but it doesn&#8217;t seem to really help much, I would rather kill faster. MP also just slows everything down due to my less than stellar DPS.

Again I enjoy difficult games, but for the &#8220;Normal Setting&#8221; this is a bit too much. I&#8217;m sure I sound like I am just going on a rant here, but I&#8217;m at a loss on what to do. I really love this mod, it&#8217;s amazing. Taking a break from PoE and this is just the thing for me. However, this is just frustrating, and at times, not fun.

I&#8217;d hope to think it wasn&#8217;t purely skill based, or lack thereof on my part. I didn&#8217;t die at all until this area, and now it&#8217;s insta-death after insta-death. It&#8217;s defiantly a wall, or bottle-neck, but is it gear related? I just think any boss you have to be 100% perfect on and not get hit at all is a bit much this early in the game if it&#8217;s not gear related.

I guess I just have some questions, and I hope this information helps others out there as well.

1.) What kind of upgrades are possible in normal? Is there a chance for good stuff, or do I just need to keep attempting the final level until I beat it?
2.) If yes to #1 what are the best places to farm? I&#8217;ve read something about the infested cellar for set items, does this apply to normal?
3.) What tricks are there for fighting and winning on the Knight boss? As I stated before Guardian does little damage, and Golem is a one hit wonder at the cost of 2/3 of my mana pool, it doesn&#8217;t seem viable yet.
4.) Crafting &#8211; anything worth it in normal, if so what recipes should I be on the lookout for?

Bottom line is I&#8217;m not opposed to farming if I know I will find an upgrade, but with this mod I&#8217;m not sure what&#8217;s gated behind difficulty. There is also no Unique item list out there to my knowledge to look up stuff. I&#8217;m not expecting to find GPoW, or KSoH, or Merc&#8217;s bow of Thunder in normal, but something better than what I have would be nice.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Well I guess it's one of those things you have to publically complain about in order to proceed. Got a new belt and tried it again and beat Normal. Granted the Knight is harder than Diablo, which I think is strange.

This time I just used Multishot. I would walk forward, turn and shoot, walk forward, turn and shoot. When he teleported, I did as well. Repeat. Before I was using Guided arrow which didn&#8217;t work out very well. Multi shot hit him at least three times each shot, and with such a fast bow I could get off two sometimes three salvos before he got too close. With this method he also never did his shield charge, which was nice.

The third boss (mage) was a joke. Diablo was a really well balanced fight though, hard but not frustratingly hard. A thousand times cooler than the original Diablo fight, well done. Looking forward to getting my butt handed to me in nightmare.

Right now, my lvl 45 rogue in Hell is using Needler with a shield that has +dex +damage +steal mana . Other items increase attack speed and +damage. It is like she has a machine gun pistol. My DPS is around 2200 with needler

So it's end game viable huh? Didn't expect that. I do like the ability to use a shield with it though.

Yes, and steal enough mana that I always use guided shot or multi shot without running out of mana.

What % of mana leech do you need to always use Multi or Guided?

Wait a sec how is your DPS around 2,2k with a needler?
I have
http://imgur.com/S7amQ9q
and my DPS is only half that much.

@Tirpitz721

Im not too experienced with the mod yet so take my answers with a grain of salt.
1.)Not sure what you mean with upgrades. If you mean item-upgrades then no there arent very nice items to find in normal mostly items usable with lvl 25 and lower. I would advise progressing to nightmare lvl 15-16 area. There you will find okayish items. You will find superb items in hell lvl 15-16 area and torment.
2.)I found quite acceptable items in hell lazarus runs.
3.)The one you already found out multishoot-kiting.
4.)IMO crafting is not worth it in normal. Later on (hell/torment) you will find more impactful recipes.

I have changed things up a bit with rogue and couldn't come up with exact equipment since I have swapped things around.
Currently with upgraded complete set Iratha, Needler, and Dragon Breach shield, DPS is 2034.44. With Demon machine DPS is 2294.14. These are with not good resistances.

With other armor combination and better rings, DPS for Needler was about 2200, and Demon Machine was about 2425. resistances were very bad.

Normal play is with Iratha, Needler, Dragon Breach, rings with mana leach total +11 DPS is 1890.12 with all resistances 75-85.

Most of my best items are either upgraded set items, or crafted. Low level crafted items are fairly useless. You have to make a lot of junk before you are rewarded with a good one. Current Scout's Razor Bow, +123% dam, +39% speed, +24-78 dam, steal 4% mana is my go to bow.

@Dryu

Yeah my question was really directed at item upgrades pre-nightmare. I just felt really bottle-necked. I was destroying the content then I hit this wall that was the two first bosses in this area. Perhaps this was intended, but I found it frustrating. It wasn&#8217;t because it was hard, but it was because it was exponentially harder than the surrounding content, even Diablo was easier. It just killed the flow of the game for me.

So essentially my question was are there better weapons than what I already had available in normal, or was my farming a fruitless effort. In the end it didn&#8217;t matter I powered through it. As for Laz runs I found some decent gear, but not for my class, the bane of ARPG&#8217;s if you want a Rogue upgrade, play a Warrior&#8230;

It would be nice to see some sort of list of unique items or affix&#8217;s based on level range. I guess I&#8217;ve been spoiled by having information available for the ARPG&#8217;s I&#8217;m playing from sites like the Path of Exile Wiki, or Diabloii.net for all these years ;+)

@ Ugily
4% is all you need huh? Interesting.

Demon machine is great for normal and nightmare, it has piercing attack, use multishot as main attack. Item with mana steal is essential.
DPS does not count critical hits, ignore targets armor.
Rogue on later levels can crit with every (or almost every) shot.
Harbinger's, Fanatic's items have critical chance bonus.
Hearthseeker is the best bow in the mod, it has 20-33% critical hit chance.
Sightless eye on 55 lvl has crazy +400% damage (+160 dexterety from items).
So every shot is about 5.5k damage.
And using elixirs of strength, dexterety + battlemaster's coat - 8-9k...

@denton77

So this stuff you are talking about is Torment drops correct?

Yes, most extreme items are found at Torment and at higher $PLAYER x levels of Hell. Even then are they seldom found unless you have +Magic Find items.

Just keep grinding. Sometimes, bosses are just way OP and all you can do is start a new game. The bosses and maps will be somewhat different each time. You can slug through one dungeon level getting killed a lot then and when you go down to the next you may be able to breeze through it quickly.

It is just a game. The whole point is that it is random so it can be played over and over again. Once you encounter the enemies on a level, you may have to go back to Tristram and change your equipment up a bit to fit the enemies.

It's possible to find Hearthseeker on Hell.
Hearthseeker + random/crafted items better then Mavina's set.
High level recipes on torment, maybe hell on $player x +MF.
That knight on terror domain - on nightmare i shot him point blank (items with +HP, +faster hit recovery, potions and guided arrow).
It's better to have at least 100 MF if you want to farm items/recipes.