The
Valar Guild

Diablo

Tips

Tips compiled from Valar Guild Members in 1999. The content of this page has been left mostly intact, with changes made only for the purposes of layout and outdated information.

Valar Guild Guidelines for Playing Diablo

Sent by Melkor-(Valar) on November 25, 1998

Each individual must find his/her own comfort level for playing Diablo games within the overall Valar Guild philosophy. The governing Guild rules for play are that there is cooperative play (no pk's), no items are to be duplicated (no cheating) and players are not to restore items to characters killed in play. Battle.Net induced losses may be recovered by restoring the character with a grey area existing where a character has been killed and there is a game crash while trying to recover your artifacts - use your own sense of fair play in such a case; if there was a reasonable chance of recovering your stuff, restore - if it was really hopeless, take your licks and rebuild your character's inventory.

In general, there is a continuum for accepting help (gifts) while playing. The most restrictive being that you don't use anything that you don't find yourself (including shrines and town portals to deeper floors--V) and the least demanding mode of play is that you accept any and all artifacts from other Guild members (only). Personally, I enjoy helping out new players with gifts but i don't want to detract from your enjoyment of working up a character.

My personal preference is that when a group of similar level characters are playing as a team, then items found are for the good of the group and whoever needs the artifact may accept and use it. When I was playing up Melkor, if there were other higher level players playing more difficult levels in the same game, I would not accept items from them. This makes it more difficult to work a player up but for me, if it is too easy, I end up with a high level, powerful character but no sense of accomplishment. The same can be said for getting your 'dots' - if your character is not powerful enough to play the hell levels of the game (Normal, Nightmare, or Hell level games) - you should probably not join at the last minute just to be present when Diablo is killed, you have not really 'earned' your dot in such a case.

In summary, each new player must think about his/her personal philosopy and reason(s) for belonging to and playing in the Valar Guild. Then within your own ethical guidelines, select a 'rule of play' for yourself. The main thing is to enjoy yourself and the camaraderie of playing with other Guild members.

Good hunting, Melkor

Warrior

Tips on Building the Character

Sent by Gothmog-(MoH) fka Gothmog-(Valar) on February 2nd, 1999

As the warrior the best way I have found to play is like a big hulking "idiot". Go for strength, vitality and an occasional dexterity or magic level in the beginning, later on work on whatever you didn't in the beginning. The warrior rarely can survive without the proper armor, health rings etc. with a mana over 100, so you can't really rely on magic to do your thing. When I first became Gothmog I did this, and finally came out to be a level 38 warrior with 647 health (I still tease Ulmo that my warrior was better :) ). I had 42 mana at the time. The only real hard part about being a warrior is chasing those darn witches in Hell. The trick is to be like a sheepdog herding a flock of sheep into a corral. You gotta chase them into a corner, then come at them from a 45� angle from the corner.

Surviving in Hell/Hell

Sent by fka Gandalf-(Valar) on February 10th, 1999

Hell Difficulty (levels 13-16) can be a warrior's worst nightmare. The monsters move fast, they are immune to spells, they hit too quick and a relatively strong character can be paralysed by their quick hits until your belt is empty and you are dead on the floor. The key to surviving is strategy, not brawn and bravery. Blizzard has been kind to us in that some of the monsters chase and others do not. Knights, snakes, witches, acid dogs, balrogs all will chase you. The key to survival here is running back to a clear area. If you run far enough the baddies will give chase but will become strung out in groups of 1-4. This allows you to regroup and work your way back taking them on 3-4 at a time. The main thing to remember here is running back to a clear area. If you run back into unexplored territory you will stir up a worse mess than the one you are running from. (been there, done that, got killed :)). In most cases the stair area where you came down will be relatively free of bad guys. Upon arrival open a portal away from the stairs and then begin exploring carefully. The portal is necessary to get your stuff back if you are killed. (My next article-"getting your stuff back"). The trick here is to walk ahead in small steps. As soon as some baddies start responding to you, retreat and deal with those that chase you. Take small steps and you should only have to deal with 3-5 monsters at a time.

In Hell/Hell a warrior's best friend is the Stone spell. You will use up an awful lot of mana potions, my warrior character Gandalf can stone 3 baddies per bottle of mana. (99 witches= 33 bottles of full mana). You should learn how many you can stone per bottle as this will help you determine how much trouble you are in. If you see 6 or 7 sets of Bloodstars, or whatever the witches shoot at you, you know you will need to refill your mana at least three times. If it is knights and snakes, which are causing you problems, the stone spell works well too. If you are being attacked by a large group, stone spell every second one or so. This will give you time to kill the live ones coming at you. You can kill the active ones and then deal with the ones you stoned as they reactivate.

Sometimes you will stir up just too many baddies. In this case you must retreat, then Town Portal back to town and reconsider your approach. As soon as you TP out all the creatures stop chasing you. You can reconsider your approach, taking the stairs back down or restocking your belt and going back at them from your portal. In extreme cases, you should just be thankful you got out and consider a new game. (although I hate this) Pride can get you killed. A phrase from pilot training comes to mind: "There are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no old and bold pilots". I have played in a few games where we stirred the baddies up so bad it was impossible to continue with any hope of survival. (this situation usually occurs when we have been killed and are trying to get our stuff back).

You should also try to identify which spells work and those that don't. Hell/Hell monsters all have different immunities. A Guardian spell spitting fireballs at fire immune monsters will only activate more critters than is healthy for you. I recently played a game with 3 level 30 players(all in their first hell difficulty game), and a couple of them kept doing the guardian spell. While this works well sometimes, it resulted in three dead level 30 characters. In my experience, Chain and Fireball works well on levels 13-14, on levels 15 and 16 the Stone curse is your only friend.

Getting Your Stuff Back

Sent by fka Gandalf-(Valar) on February 10th, 1999

Ok so you messed up, and are dead on the floor. The first thing to do is try to remember what areas have been cleared. Then restart in town and buy as many health potions as you can afford as well as a cheap weapon to place in your hand. ( If you manage to grab your weapon back it will go to your empty hand and not your belt and if you are killed again you will drop it.) Drop the rest of your gold in town as this is not likely the last time you will have to restart. Head back down with a full belt of red potions. When you get to the area you were killed, try to lure the baddies away from your stuff. You must try to not stir up any more than necessary, so lure them away from stairs, your portal, and your route to your stuff. You can only lead them so far before you will be killed so be prepared to repeat this over and over. (remember the gold you dropped in town... this is paying for all the heal potions you need.) Another thing that should be mentioned if the so called useless Telekinesis spell. If you can get to within sight of your stuff without stirring up the critters, use this spell to retrieve your possesions. Some times if you are killed right next to a wall, your stuff will drop on the other side of the wall, the telekinesis spell here is invaluable to retrieve your stuff from the other side of the wall.

Hope This Helps, Gandalf-(Valar)

Level 16 - The Luring of Diablo

Sent by fka Gandalf-(Valar) on January 28th, 1999

Although this may seem old hat to most of our members, I have recently played with some of our newer members who were not aware of this technique for getting the most out of level 16. This will attempt to describe the method most often used to get every last scrap off of level 16. One of the design elements of the game is that when Diablo's room is opened, The Big Guy will invariably give chase forcing battle. This may not give you time to kill all his minions before killing Diablo himself. Once Diablo is killed all of his minions are killed as well and any players on 16 are rewarded with the endgame video. The problem with this is that some of these minions may be carrying the best items of the game and they will be lost when the game ends. I also believe that this is where the myth of Diablo dropping items was born When killed all his buddies are killed and you may see items being dropped. These items are being dropped by baddies standing in close proximity to Diablo.

First off let me describe Level 16's geography. Level 16 invariably has 4 rooms, one located in each of the four corners of a square. The only difference that occurs on level 16 is that the adjoining hallways and antechambers are set up randomly each time. We like to assign these rooms a number, one through four. Number one being in the northwest or top left corner, number two in the northeast or top right corner, number three in the southwest corner or bottom left, and finally number four (Diablo's room) in the southeast or bottom right. The numbering of these rooms corresponds to the order in which each room's lever must be pulled to open the next room. The lever in room one opens room two, the lever in room two opens room three etc, etc,.

Upon arrival on level 16, I like to head to rooms 3 and 4 first, (the two rooms on the bottom) and clear the areas around the outside of the rooms. Once this is complete, off to room 2 in the northwest corner and clear around it as well. This makes it much easier to deal with the additional baddies when the rooms are opened. Now it is time to proceed to room one, kill the bad guys, open room two and so on until room 3 is cleared as well.

Now for the technique of the "LURE". Room 2 in the northeast corner (top right) has the shape of a spiral. Now Diablo is not all that smart and if he is lured to the center of the Spiral and the players who led him there teleport or town portal out of the center of the Spiral, he will remain stuck in the center of the Spiral. If all players have the teleport spell it is simply a matter of opening room 4, getting Diablo to chase you (and he will). You then lead him to the center of the Spiral and teleport out. Then you are free to kill off the rest of his minions, collect the goodies, return to town and retrieve or sell any items you have left there. You can then return to kill the big guy if you wish. Now if you don't have the teleport spell you must remember to leave a portal open in the center of room 2 when you pull the lever. This will give you an avenue of escape once you have lured him in to the trap. If there are two players, just leave another portal located elsewhere on 16 and you can return to 16 via that portal and finish the level off. If you are playing by yourself, you must hike back down to 16 as your portal still leads to Diablo in the spiral.

This may seem a little tedious but every now and again you might just find the Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac that would have been lost had the game ended. Good Luck and Good Hunting.

Shrines

Diablo Shrines - shrine listings. Content by Melkor, Fangorn, Ulmo, and Varda. Maintained by Eonwe as part of the Games Site.

Diablo Mods

A Diablo mod is a Diablo game that has been modified by a Trainer/Hack program. It may change such things as numbers of monsters, appearance of monsters, statistics of monsters or items, and add items and shrines from single player. Such mods are usually not synchronous with regular Diablo or each other, since the items may morph. Characters used in regular Diablo or a particular mod should stick with that mod. A very popular mod in the Valar Guild is the DiabloVK with its Tolkien items and monsters. The good and bad characters can race to find particular items first for their "team", such as the One Ring and three elven rings. The precious rings are much more common. Find Gothmog at your peril!

Check out Varaya and Khan's page for more info on their Diablo mods. (update 03-23-17: This page no longer exists)

Restoring Without Using a Special Program

Sent in by Melkor-(Valar)

Finding and using the dlinfo files as backup for your characters in Windows 95/98. (That dlinfo word has an "L" not the number one --V)

select Windows Explorer

under View, select Folder Options

click on Show All Files (this will then show the dlinfo files which are 'hidden files')

These files are your Diablo character files with this structure: dlinfo_n.drv , where n=0...9

I checked again and the reverse listing of characters in Diablo does not correspond to 1 through 0 or 0 through 9 for me, (although it does for Varda --V). So to be sure, I suggest the following method of determining which number corresponds to which character.

select Windows Explorer

select Windows

right click/drag all the dlinfo files to your desktop and select Copy Here so that the files are now in both Windows and on the desktop - for extra safety I recommend also copying to disc by: rt click on the Windows dlinfo files, select Send To, and select 3 1/2" Floppy (A)

Now rt click on all the Windows dlinfo files and select Delete (it will tell you that one of your programs may not work - say: ok). Then rt click/drag/Copy Here the dlinfo files from the desktop one at a time - after each copy operation, go open Diablo and see which character has been added and record the dlinfo number that corresponds to the character.

I save to desktop after each game and to disc once a day in the event that I have to restore

Blizzard

Blizzard Entertainment makes Diablo and maintains battle.net. Gamers can buy games such as Diablo or read tips from their site.

The Valar Guild Games Site is maintained by Eonwë-(Valar).

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