[1.00] A Fresh Beginning, Gantrithor's Debut

[DarkMaster]

Well, I've gotten my setup all figured out (shaders, settings, OBS, etc.) so it's now time to begin another 1.00 adventure, this time without cheating respecs.

I'm probably just gonna go with your old generic pike-barb, not feeling too adventurous for now haha.

Gantrithor will be softcore, players8 when possible but might have to lower the player count for tough spots. I'm playing for both the experience of this patch but also for the insane pre-LoD rares of course. I'll probably fire up a sorc later as well, but for now I'm just gonna focus on my barb. Wonder how far I'll make it until 2.4 and Ladder release for D2R.

But yeah anyways, hopefully it goes smoothly and I'll post updates as I go. Let's go!!!

[DarkMaster]

Well, already off to a fantastic start. 2 experience shrines, and now these lovely gloves. Good omens I hope.

[DarkMaster]

Holy cow, look at that damage and AR! This is with a 3-9 damage superior short sword and no points in any masteries, just the 40 points in strength. I don't remember if combat shrines acted as a different multiplier in 1.00 but it's certainly quite a powerful increase. Hope to find Corpsefire and cut him down before it expires.

EDIT: Errr on second thought the damage isn't that amazing, I suppose it's quite good for Den of Evil though. I guess I was just excited on seeing that huge attack rating though haha.

[fearedbliss]

I would recommend playing on 1.05b if possible for the best prelod experience.

[DarkMaster]

I would recommend playing on 1.05b if possible for the best prelod experience.

I'm aware of 1.00s many flaws, bugs, and overall clunkiness compared to 1.05b, but thanks. I wanna try and (ab)use some of 1.00s mechanics. I agree with you for anyone new to time traveling that's playing it for the experience though.

On a separate note, instead of creating a post for each update I think I'll just make a big batch post as to not spam too much.


Corpsefire went down without too much trouble, the combat shrine did greatly help in this regard as he and his minions were very tanky on players8. For our troubles he dropped us a plain axe which one might find odd. One of the many differences pre-LoD has is that higher tier items can drop earlier than expected, I forgot the reasons why though. Something to do with TCs (treasure classes) I'm sure but I lack the knowledge on that so I won't comment any further haha. Apologies for the weird cropping on Corpsefire's image, I normally use Snipping Tool to take screenshots (that's why you see the window name/border) but I forgot so I grabbed a screenshot from my OBS recording instead.

So contrary to my initial post, I actually did decide to be adventurous and decided I'm going to try a frenzy build. Let's see how that goes.

Gonna try swords, my end goal is to try and find a nice rare executioner sword and/or flamberge.

[fearedbliss]

@DarkMaster Ah ok. I misinterpreted when you said "I'm playing for both the experience of this patch but also for the insane pre-LoD rares of course.", that's why I thought it was for the experience since 1.05b also has the "prelod rares". Although "experience" in your case doesn't necessarily have to mean "most stable, least buggy" experience but just the "experience" of patch 1.0.0 itself with everything it brings . Carry on then haha.

[DarkMaster]

@DarkMaster Ah ok. I misinterpreted when you said "I'm playing for both the experience of this patch but also for the insane pre-LoD rares of course.", that's why I thought it was for the experience since 1.05b also has the "prelod rares". Although "experience" in your case doesn't necessarily have to mean "most stable, least buggy" experience but just the "experience" of patch 1.0.0 itself with everything it brings . Carry on then haha.

Ahaha, I can see how my post could be interpreted that way. Yeah I chose 1.00 on purpose mainly because of the ability to kill the Cow King with no repercussions (admittedly this is something that I've gotten used to from my time playing 1.13 PlugY and D2 Resurrected) and uhhh, that's it I guess. I think there were some other player beneficial reasons to play 1.00 over 1.05b but I actually don't remember since it's been so long.

Ah, actually I think it was because of Whirlwind changes maybe. I don't remember if 1.05b has 2 hitchecks per 4 frames for WW, but I do remember that one of the in-between patches nerfed WW damage but reduced the mana cost to compensate. I'm not sure that it's really another valid reason to play 1.00 over 1.05b but eh haha.

On another note I forgot how slow pre-LoD is/feels, it took me around 1 hour to get to Tristram. Maybe it's just because I'm playing on a barb on players8 but it reminds me a lot of Diablo 1, walking a lot as to reduce the chances of getting hit and trying to engage monsters tactically as to preserve life (and potions as a result). Trying to use doorways to reduce surface area and constantly moving around to prevent getting surrounded. It actually reminds me of StarCraft 1 where Protoss players have to be careful with their Zealots as to not get surrounded and killed by Zerglings easily. Compared to 1.13+ D2 where I'd probably be to the Inner Cloister or Catacombs by 1 hour. Heck, even 1.07 seemed a lot faster from what I remember. I suppose the resolution plays a part in this as well, 640x480 is quite cramped.

But yeah anyways, I think I'm getting tired of typing so I'll leave it at that. I'll post more updates tomorrow.

[hedgesparrow]

As you mentioned the reasons for playing 1.00 are no Cow King penalty, and Whirlwind and Corpse Explosion are overpowered. Those skills don't get nerfed till 1.03.

In 1.00 you have to be careful when doing self-multiplayer with a Barb that has Battle Orders. If your Barb logs out with BO on and then joins a multiplayer game the other characters will crash when they mouse over or invite the Barb to a party.

If one character speaks to Tyrael at the end of Act II with another character present it can break that character. If the character present has already killed Diablo then they may not be able to get back to higher difficulties ever again!

Rares don't drop often in 1.05b and there is no bosses to reliably farm. Magic Find gear and clearing Hell Act IV and other areas may be the answer there!

Good luck with your 1.00 adventure .

[fearedbliss]

Lol yea I love Diablo 1 (even more than Diablo II in a lot of ways) and this is how I described 1.05b in Singling (but applies to all prelod versions):

If you are looking for a stable version of Diablo II that closely resembled the design, feeling, and balance of Diablo I, this is the patch for you. Patches 1.07-1.09 departed from a lot of the original Diablo II game design by refining and extending core elements of the game, but overall still had some resemblance to the original Diablo II. Two years later, Patch 1.10 was released and fundamentally changed the way the entire game was played. Original Diablo II before the Expansion is pretty much a completely different game. Even though Diablo II still retained a Classic mode after the Expansion was released, the Classic experience was fundamentally altered.

Regarding WW, yup, 1.05b has the regular classic WW, which is still independent of IAS, still way faster than LOD WW, but slower than the 32 attacks per second or something like that thay 1.00 has.

I love 640x480 and actually switched to it about 1-2 years ago. You might be interested in reading this post .

You'll want to keep in mind the two handed weapon bug in 1.00 since I saw you were looking for two handed weapons and swords. Fruit from another forum said the following:

The 1-1 is not unused, which is exactly the problem; +%ED is applied to one-handed damage, but for those specific weapons (Maul and such), the one-handed damage is really low in the weapons.txt file, so the bug is just a small error there. The bow bug is a different one, where the +%ED is not applied at all (bug in the missile code). Finally, the off-weapon +%ED also is not really the same; I assume they meant for the +%ED to get applied to the weapon, but in stead it is applied to the armor itself, which have 0-0 damage. But afaik the damage is correctly displayed for melee weapons, so that Ancient Axe really does deal disgusting damage. :p

[fearedbliss]

@hedgesparrow Also remember MF in prelod doesn't affect bosses, super uniques, and champions. Only white monsters are affected. The same thing goes for Crushing Blow. The low drop rates is the curse and the fun of prelod but I loved that about it just like I enjoyed that particular characteristic of Diablo 1 since it makes everything feel scarce and even the crappiest item could potentially be an upgrade. This feeling still remained a bit in 1.07 versions of Classic (albeit it's a different but still very addicting) Classic experience. Am I a masochist? Haha