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Goliath v Goliath Forever
by Chris Clarke
Background
Enter Pushkin the sorceress. She started of as a pure Blizzard but with Hell's immunes I decided Blizzard/Ice Blast/Meteor/Fireball. Go saved stat/skill points.
Act III
Act III was it's usual hideous self. I would like to make a promise to the person at Blizzard who thought up Gloams: If I ever find you, I am going to drop a naffing big Meteor on you. I zipped her through it eventually killing the Council, once I realized that an all-out frontal assault with a sorceress was not a good survival plan. "Hey, sweetie Council Member, wanna play with my Orb ... just you and me?" Blizzard/Meteor, repeat. Memphy went down fairly easily and onto Act IV.
(Don't worry there is a point later.)
Act IV
Good roll on the monster types (IE not many Gloams). I was tired but wanted to keep going. Found the City of Damned Waypoint but missed Izual out. I was trying to find him when Pushkin got killed, so retrieved body, picked up an Ith rune and went to bed.
Next day, I start off as I always do: ATMA's off anything interesting and my Ith rune is an IST. Way better than anything else I have, so I do a little dance and restart Act IV. Fairly uneventful: cold immune Flesh Beasts meant Pushkin got a LOT of practice with Meteors.
Usual entertainment in the Chaos Sanctury. Pushkin kills everything in sight as the merc kills himself. I leave him dead a lot of the time but a couple of the bosses are fire/cold immune so I have to wake him up eventually. Confused a huge group on one of the seals, when I hit it and then scrolled out. Waypointed back in and came up behind them. He he.
Diablo was a surprisingly easy kill (I love Static). Drops weren't anything to write home about but hey ho, I can always kill him later.
(Really point later, honest.)
Acti V
Walked out the gate to be met with Spear cats, not my favourite but keeping to the edge, killed Shenk and then hit the Waypoint. Blanched at the firey arrow guys, so quit out and came back. They're still there so I decide to do "Rapid Teleport Protocol", hitting waypoints and that's it.
Left Anya where she was; she always gives me rubbish and frankly I hate those Temptresses. By some miracle I avoided killing us and shazam: Arreat Summit.
Arreat Summit
Now don't flame me if this is normal but I hit one fire, one cold and one cold/fire immune. Expletive. My dear barby Wulfgar, started getting frelled and I am hardly in a position to help so, TP UP! Next roll seemed about the same, so tactics required. I hid behind a stone pillar. Seriously.
Well, Mr Fire Immune wandered over, so I thought it would be polite to introduce him to Mr Blizzard and Ms Ice Blast. They didn't seem to hit it off and he left. Next up Mr Cold Immune. He didn't like Ms Meteor or Mr Fire Ball either and then there was one: Korlic.
(Point, told you.)
The Point
You will have noticed by now that this left Mr Cold/Fire Immune. Anyone remember what sort of sorcy this is? Hmm? Well done, have a cookie. That's what mercs are for, you say? Ya. So I pootle over, Static like crazy and Korlic's down to half health. Wulfgar, KILL!
I stand back, ready with some potions in case the Life Leech isn't enough. It seems OK, Wulfy is holding his own, so I watch. And watch. And watch. After about 3 minutes, and Korlics health bar is seemingly GLUED to that O, I start to worry. No my merc isn't dying but neither is Korlic. I don't have any other (Lightening) skills and I really don't want to open a portal in case I have a hard time killing the other two; the last kill was the easiest I have ever known them die..
So I look at that little Wizardspike Pushkin is holding, I think "It's a dagger". Pushkin looks at Korlic, sighs and stab him in the back with it. He doesn't seem to notice but he does turn green. I had completely forgotten Pushkin was carrying a poison charm. All my melee chars do but I must have forgotten to ATMA this one off. Hmm, let's see what happens. Was movement in the health bar? Dear Tyreal, I hope so. Is it? Did it move? Really? Maybe: stab, stab, stab.
Oh yes, yes it was definetly movement. Not much but movement but movement nonetheless.
So picture the scene, ladies and gentlemen. Act V barbarian Wulfgar v Korlic. A duel of gigantic and muscly proportions. And there behind Korlic is Pushkin the Sorceress stabbing him in the back with a Wizardspike.
Over fifteen minutes later, Korlic finally succumbed to the nasty green and died opening the way to the WSK.
Rapid Teleporting to the last Waypoint and Pushkin, Wulfgar and I all retired to the pub for the night.
The End
Sorry but I really needed to share that.
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