Returning player with questions

Hi!

Introduction
I have played MedianXL a lot before, specifically the last version by BrotherLaz. I had tremendous fun, unlike with anything else recently. I have just realised that the mod is further developed by MarcoNecroX so I looked around curiously. There is significantly more content to experience, however they are mostly impossible-level uberquests.

Previously in MedianXL
I have had a lvl120 Sorceress with:
- all challenges
- all uberquests up to moderate and some tricky/hard
- unique(6) or unique(sacred) gear with runes/unique jewels and buffed with orbs
- also had around +400 attribute points from some disenchanting stuff
Suffice to say I played a lot. I liked the warpblade and built the char on maxing its pontential out. I used fire/lightning line for passive health/defense and usually ice to have ice elementals for distraction.

Problem in detail
I have gotten to the point that some uberquests and uberlevels were an ordinary walk-in-the-park... and then I hit a brick wall. Most higher level places I attempted ended with instant deaths.
I have read the documentation and (I hope) did everything right. I had a high amout of defense (200k+) and dexterity with shield (trying to max block chance). Yet I still died very frequently in one hit most of the time. I also tried going for high HP so even if I get hit I'll live enough to heal. That had next to no improvements overall. I tried gathering special items and trinkets with "Damage reduced by %". That modifier is not very common so I only got to 35% maybe. That proved to be useless as well. Lastly I tried to do a caster build which required an insane amount of time to do since all my stuff was for melee-warpblade. My reasoning was: If I'm far away I'll get hit less. I never finished this conversion completely because that playstyle was not really my thing and it was objectively less effective... I dare even say inferior to the warpblade because of the elemental-immune enemies.
With that said I'm afraid of getting back into Median without knowing if I can avoid the same brick wall.

Questions
1. Have I been messing something up with my build? (I'll get my char details up if needed)
2. Are most one-hit deaths avoidable at all?
3. What steps should I take to avoid the same problem once again?
4. I feel like there is some fine test somewhere that I missed... and I got pummeled by every ubermob. Is there such a thing?

TL;DR
I love MedianXL but higher level uberquest mobs one-hit kill me even though I think I did all I can to best them. What do?

Thanks,

Hi there,

I assume your exposition was about the classic median xl. That version has been abandoned for more than 4 years now so it will be hard to give any specific advice.

1. From what I read your defence seems low. 200k on a melee sorc is what you should have once you step into destruction as a fresh 120, at your stage of character development you should be pushing upwards of 400k. You also need to be more specific what levels/ubers are causing you problems. I suspect your damage is also low which can compound the low defence issue.

2. All one-hit deaths are completely avoidable. However they require some experience in knowing when to expect them and knowing how to react.

3. You have to provide more details for a specific answer. Also you should really play the latest version - there is a lot more content to experience (apart from impossible diff too) and many nice QoL features, also you can play on our realm which is getting a ladder reset tomorrow incidentally.

4. See above. From the sounds of things you would do well to take a look at one of the in-depth guides in our guide section and do a read through. Even if you don't want to play the exact same character you will learn plenty about the game's mechanics.

I do not have my final char unforunately. The one I've found is a year earlier and has most trophies missing and it is from the time when I tried to go for damage reduction. This has 100k defense as a compromise.

I guess if I had to refine my question: how do I improve my gear substantially after reaching unique(6)? I had a hard time finding anything that's better. In theory a set (with bonus) and unique(sacred) items are superior to them. I think I had some of the melee set... I don't remember.

However looking at the set with all its bonus effects, it seems underwhelming. For example:

Cauldron

Cauldron
Large Shield (Sacred)
Defense: (3474 - 4342) to (3904 - 4880)
Chance to Block: 1% + Class%
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 420
Required Dexterity: 423
Item Level: 1
+150% Bonus to Miasma Haunt Duration
10% Chance to cast level 25 Spike Nova when Attacked
+1 to Sorceress Skill Levels
1% Base Block Chance
35% Block Speed
+(100 to 150)% Enhanced Defense
Requirements -20%
Socketed (4)

The Mysteries
(Sorceress Melee Set)

has almost half of the defense of the Doomfall that I had.
The

Pentacle

Pentacle
Gambeson (Sacred)
Defense: (6091 - 6852) to (6492 - 7303)
(Sorceress Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Dexterity: 486
Item Level: 1
+3 to Sorceress Skill Levels
Adds 25-50 Damage
5% Chance of Crushing Blow
+(140 to 170)% Enhanced Defense
+(31 to 50) to all Attributes
Physical Resist 10%
(21 to 25)% Bonus to Defense
Socketed (6)

The Mysteries
(Sorceress Melee Set)

also has considerably lower defense than this I used:

Granted, other items (boots and belt) has this the other way around... but doesn't that mean the set is mostly the same with a different distribution on the attributes?

A one-hit death example: Duncraig
The mobs were... a bit cheap (I guess I was not well geared for them), but I got ahead slowly. However I died to the exploding barrels every time, they blend in the brown texture of the ground and even if I notice them, moving away is not always an option when mobs surround me. I had a lot of trouble with that. Are they not supposed to kill me isntantly?

The screens are from MedianXL 2012 v005

In regards to your Duncraig issue, the barrels will always kill you in one hit. It's a "feature" of the uber. The easiest way that I have found is:

1.) When you go into the level, choose a path around the outsides of the room, so when you see a barrel/fuse coming towards you, you simply move about one screen ahead and continue attacking. Backtracking instead of progressing will generally lead to you walking right into a barrel explosion.

2.) When I say barrel/fuse, you just need to practice and know what to look for. The barrels are always thrown higher, so if it's from far across the screen, they will generally be higher than the screen will show, but you can usually see them thrown up and land. I think the better key sometimes is to look for the fuse. There's a few second delay between the barrel landing and when the fuse comes in from off screen to the barrel point to explode it. It just looks like a moving patch of fire... like a lit fuse would. Dunno how else to explain that. But when you see that, move a screen forward.

There isn't really much else to explain about Duncraig. You either kill them or be killed. They hit hard and the barrels are instakill. You need to be able to clear them fast and have some type of movement to progress, especially if you get surrounded (teleport/blink/etc.), let alone moving from room to room because about 95% of the Duncraig rooms are separated, meaning you actually NEED some type of teleport or blink to go any further in the level.

Duncraig is one of the hardest farming zones. Mobs auto attack for a lot and to dodge barrels you need good killspeed to keep moving forward through the hordes.

Your gear consists basically of tier 6 items - those are not going to allow you to farm any hard zones with a melee sorc.

My suggestion - farm k3kba & tran athulua; the sorc set and any random SUs you find will be huge upgrades. Make a crafted sword / use runewords instead of crappy TUs (for example that sorc armour / weapon / helm are just abysmal), get more charms etc. Also your items are not capped with Mystic orbs + you have used bad mystic orbs, your socket fillers are also suboptimal, you don't know how to prepare base items for runewords, you don't know which stats to prioritise. There are just too many problems to fix piecemeal.

Seems like you have barely scratched the surface in terms of Median endgame and you have a lot to learn. Playing on an antiquated version is obviously not doing you any favours either since it's harder to get good advice. If you enjoy the Median gameplay then upgrade to Ultimative and start over by following a guide or looking up some melee sorc advice on these boards (since there is no melee sorc guide).

Well i am just going to post some gear i have been using . Tiered uniques serve you well for most of the game but why would you want doomfall instead of Banner of Duncraig ? Fortress proc is very useful . TU warp blade best use imho is MO 15% crushing blow and insert perfect rainbow stones and enhance ED% to 350% as usual later. Version is 2012 because well i don;t play much i play a few weeks now and a few more weeks half a year later and 2012 allows to turn TU into signets lol.

The first problem was when i was doing Fauztinvillle for BRC on terror and for it i changed weapon to runeword and shield to a defense oriented version as well as changed lifesteal belt for SOR proc deadfall for some bonus killspeed .

The only problem i see with your build is that Featherclaw and Athulua's Oracle are way overkill . You will never need that much attack rating and you run fast enough as it is . For build i recommend Lightning + Cold because that is what worked for me . Believe me i tried to make a melee sorc from 1f9 till 1z9 and the fire tree passive only left me disappointed . As for rings i would recommend Emp Bands for stats , %hp mana and MO space . Amulet for now is a nice idea to get 3-4 skills amulet with 150-200 life and maybe that lightning arena oskill - stuns enemies that move into and out of arena . I personally like Toorc gloves for the glacial nova .

You will want to make a staff first of all for minions and for prebuffing Baneblade:

Then you can just pass trough Destruction and clear all ubers along your way . You need Acid Fiends oskill from armor in order to do Judgement Day because ice elementals have 400+k defense and like 40% avoid .

For some dumb places like cow lvl and Bremmtown you need some crafts to get closer to max block but otherwise you can keep TU gloves and boots and socket with LUM runes or MF% jewels while farming :

Well they alone won't be enough so you would need a shield with 1% extra block and some sick amulet like beads but a high Dex lamen helps too :

Out of the regular areas TA is a good place to hang out . Ask the girls about girly stuff you know ? Maybe you will gift each other some souvenirs :

But sometimes the hands of fate must be forced . Keep an eye out for a good base item type and use the chaos reroll inside TA before your game regularly autosaves and makes ilvl 99 out of 121 (in case you are wondering that is a gemword shield because magic find > all):

Here is where she retires because as i have mentioned before I don't play all that much :

Doing fauztinville is slow at best and Duncraig is pretty much impossible even with 21k dmg spiral dance and stuff hits very hard that you run out of cookies fast but your kill speed is so low it means you have to move all over the place to dodge barrels sadly . Or it is just me being a noob even tho i have played since alpha . Well alpha came when i was succesfully dying with judgesin and invincibarb in Median 2008 so it counts as some progress

I know if i am lucky and find an AOTOR and maybe farm 2 Auhe runes for path of flames prebuff i could swap for some proc based build but it is too tedious for me . I think i managed to get 4-5 stash pages of SU so far and best item i got was an Ethereal Yaggai Sagaris Labryss

Also if Tran athulua doesn't treat you well or kurast makes you hate your life you should try farming Diablo. That fella has decent drop rate for SU items.

LHawkins1: Thanks for the hints. I don't think I have ever noticed the fuse trail for the barrels. I wonder if there were any at all for me, but I'll be sure to keep an eye on that next time.

suchbalance: I have had the feeling I was doing a multitude of things wrong somewhat. The items are so suboptimal because they are from a much older version of my char. I've lost the latest save. Regarding the sockets: I have read in a guide before that elemental protection is a must at uberquests, and so I put perfect gems in the sockets. They grant a lot and also improve the maximum. Is this not a good approach?

Xplosive: Very detailed post, thanks. What I mostly get out of it is that I got ahead of where I should have been. I'll need to farm better items.

Draak: Kurast was my favorite UL. I guess because that's the one I practised the most and I could clear it 9/10. I'll try knocking Diablo out for some sweet loot too.

Since my first post I installed Ultimative XVI and I was pleasantly surprised with the many little changes. The new towns are non-functional changes for the most part, but give a great freshness feeling. I'll retraverse my steps to where I was and post what I get stuck on this time.

Thanks to all who replied!

Tu Warp Blade is just horrible. Try crafting a decent Warp Blade with Balefire on attack proc and your killing speed jumps to roof. My last melee sorc used t6 rare Warp Blade with that proc for a long time.

But if you use balefire proc you get life degeneration and lose 15% TCD