[1.09b Final Edition (Mod)] Drops Thread

[Manny]

not a drop... but tonight I gambled my first ever pair of perfect Chancies... stoked

[fearedbliss]

Niceeeeee. Congrats.

[ST369]

TBH i doubt anyones playing D2 for the challenge, decades after the release. The bug fixes in 1.09f are huge, though some of the other changes are... questionable . I enjoy doing P8 hardcore untwinked runs, so for me it's the best version around atm.
On topic: My best (or most memorable) 1.09b find was a perfect ethereal Hone Sundan, dropped by Hell Mephisto nearly 10 years ago. It received 1× Shael 2×Amn IIRC, and it was used by my MS/GA BuriZon's Might merc (she was using Atma's Scarab btw ).

[Manny]

TBH i doubt anyones playing D2 for the challenge, decades after the release. The bug fixes in 1.09f are huge, though some of the other changes are... questionable . I enjoy doing P8 hardcore untwinked runs, so for me it's the best version around atm.
On topic: My best (or most memorable) 1.09b find was a perfect ethereal Hone Sundan, dropped by Hell Mephisto nearly 10 years ago. It received 1× Shael 2×Amn IIRC, and it was used by my MS/GA BuriZon's Might merc (she was using Atma's Scarab btw ).

Yeah those bug fixes are really nice, not gonna lie! And I also like having the refined players command as well, although these days i'm safely up to players16 on vanilla 1.09 on my WF Bowazon for hell cows, which is pretty damn fun. That Hone Sundan is no joke. I had an ETH one too on my Bowazon's merc, socketed 2x Shael / 1x Amn, so almost the same! Still have it stashed away of course. I "upgraded" to an Honor runeword in a ETH Thresher I found in Chaos, but sometimes I wonder if the speed is holding me back. It seems like he's a little bitch anytime there's anything lightning related around. He also gets absolutely fked by Diablo within 2 seconds, which is pretty annoying. The issue seems to be his health pool, even at lvl 95 his life is only 1037. I don't even try keeping him up anymore for boss fights (mind you this is on high player count, but still). Currently he's rocking an 08 Gaze (gambled in final edition/thanks again Galaxy) & Duriel's Shell . I'm thinking maybe to swap a Blackhorn's face on him and try that for a while...

And a couple of screenies to keep the thread going xD

[ST369]

Yeah mercenary stats are quite low pre-1.10. For a bowazon, the merc is there mainly for the aura and to offtank with Valk/Decoy, so i'd make him more tanky (maybe Blackhorn, Gladiator's Bane, and if youre on a higher player setting - Hone Sundan with some LL).

[fearedbliss]

I believe in 1.07 the mercs don't even have auras (and they can't leech AND can be eaten by monsters in Act 4.. that's a bug in 1.07-1.08). It's funny cause it makes sense in that in d2 classic you are suppose to fight Diablo alone, and since your Merc doesn't follow you across acts, and A4 is the only act that has those spitters that eat corpses, it makes sense Blizzard forgot to update that code to not eat the Merc xD. I think 1.08 gave them auras and 1.09 tweaked the auras.

From 1.08 patch notes:

Act II hirelings have been improved with additional skills including auras.

From 1.09 patch notes:

Altered Act 2 Hireling Auras.

To be more specific, the 1.08 auras I believe are the same across all three difficulties, where as 1.09 has different auras per difficulty (hence the A2 NM Holy Freeze Merc).

If you haven't read mg 1.07-1.08 analysis where I basically prove that LOD 1.07 is actually a beta version that was burned onto the discs, you can take a look at that here: viewtopic.php?t=17

[Manny]

@fearedbliss holy shit, in 1.07 Mercs can be EATEN?? My my... I have been too hard on my buddy Ashab, lol. You are right though. I expect too much. He already gives me a great boost to DPS with the might aura. And with knockback from my bow his survivability has greatly improved. Just wish he weren't such a pushover with bosses, but I'm going to try your suggestion: hone sudan, gbane, blackhorns

[ST369]

Is it safe to use ATMA on this patch? @galaxyhaxz

[Manny]

I’m not galaxy but I use ATMA to mule back and forth from vanilla 09 and final edition without an issue. Just keep the default d2i setting on 1.09 and you will be fine

[Manny]

Yeah mercenary stats are quite low pre-1.10. For a bowazon, the merc is there mainly for the aura and to offtank with Valk/Decoy, so i'd make him more tanky (maybe Blackhorn, Gladiator's Bane, and if youre on a higher player setting - Hone Sundan with some LL).

Swapping to that setup made a huge difference! I’ll post some screenies later.