My lightning merc is getting tired of lugging around the same sword he has had since Nightmare and wants me to get him something new for Christmas. Here is what he currently has:



I could just craft him a new sword and hope for a -20% Lightning resist roll and then toss in some moonstones for another -40% to bring it up to -60% resist. Or I could try to find him a fathom, even though as I understand things the +sorc skills won't benefit him. Another option might be to build him a HoTo and go for the skill boost there. It might be easier for me to uncurse a sword though since I think my rabies druid can farm all the pieces pretty easily.

Any other suggestions for what to put under his Christmas tree?

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I think this might not be the right image, but you should get the reference

Nah - lightsaber is weak for a caster:

LightSaber
+7 to Light Radius
25% Chance to Cast Level 33 Chain Lightning when Attacking
Ignore Target's Defense
Lightning Absorb 20%
+50% Increased Attack Speed
Adds 200-300 Magic Damage
Adds 1-500 Lightning Damage
25% Mana Stolen per Hit
+300% Enhanced Damage
Adds 20-40 Damage
-10% to Enemy Lightining Resistance
25% Chance to Cast Level 40 nova when Struck

Nothing good for my merc there.

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People who live in cinder block houses can throw whatever they want.

sword of wanderer I'll help u get it.

6os Crystal Sword with 6 ThunderPrisms for -72% enemy res. I think the closest alternative is Ondal's with 4 Prisms, but then you'd lose the shield slot... I'd have to do the math, but it'd be a close finish I think.

In general, just think of -%Res as a caster's DeadlyStrike. However, if you have -100%Res, then at worst (monster had 0%Res) you'll double your damage, while at best (monster had 99%Res) you'll multiply it by about 100. Unlike DeadlyStrike, it is always applied. I think it's fair to say most monsters will have about 50% res to your element, so you'll usually triple your damage with -100%Res.

<edit> Did some informal math, I think Ondal's will win, since the only shield worth considering (we're only talking damage, right?) is HHGlory, which has no FCRate and only 2 sockets for facets. Using Ondal's you lose 24% pierce, but gain 7 skills and 100% FCRate, while getting some fantastic mods</edit>

i think you have missed something in your calculations brevan. when talking about the 6os sword + headhunters VS ondals, i think you are neglecting the headhunters alltogether. considering headhunters gives 2 to all skills, you are losing 5, not 7 all skills. and then if you put 2 perfect lightning facets in that headhunters, you also are gaining 12 more pierce and 12% more lightning skill damage than youve calculated for (24 is only the 2 uber topazes, the shield providing another 12). also, % skill damage is very good for mercs who dont have access to a mastery.

ondals still may win out, but its a lot closer than originally expected.

i think medusas might be a better shield though in terms of pure damage... the chance to cast lower resist would negate the need for all that pierce and instead focus on +skills and %skill damage gear.

another thing to consider is that pierce is capped (iirc) at -100% for enemy monster res. so a monster that is not immune is getting the full brunt of your conviction aura, the holy shock aura, and then all the gear pierce. your merc would need a maximum of 199 pierce for unimmune monsters, and i bet holy shock and conviction take care of almost all of that. add in lower resist from medusa's gaze, and youre definitely hitting that amount. the only way you dont is with immunes, and in those circumstances you will almost never reach that amount of pierce. you should definitely look at a balance of both %skill damage and pierce.

a fathom/medusas combo versus an ondals will be pretty similar (i think) in terms of overall damage. ondals is a very sexy staff, though, with some great protective mods on it.

What about Chance to Block? Do mercs block? If they do, then go for shield, if not, staff all the way

nope.
Here's a link to info on mercs in HU: http://blue.arimyth.com/Mercenaries.html I am posting it also so that people can tell me if I have things wrong in it

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How about ThunderSky Stalagmite, for the 50%fcr, -25% res, and best of all, +40 to charged bolt.

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I was never more at home than I was in battle. - Solomon Kane

Has anyone tested and proven that +oSkills for mercs act as more than +3? Anyone know how it was tested?

I had not considered ThunderSky earlier, but if it does give +40 ChargedBolt, then I think it's possible that it still won't be better than Ondals.

1) Thundersky with a socket has -37%Res, while Ondal's has -48%
2) Thundersky gives +33 levels more to ChargedBolt, while Ondals gives +7 more to LitMastery, Lightning, and ChainLightning (it's worth going NM for them, since the CLightning synergizes so well, even though that skill's quite weak).
3) The merc probably only uses CBolt 25% of the time, since he's got 3 alternative skills to cast. I don't know if he's more likely to cast one skill over another.
4) Ondals has 50% more FCRate (not sure this really matters, A3 mercs' cast rate is relatively slow at its best, so getting that extra breakpoint isn't even an extra attack per second).
5) Ondal's has better non-offense mods, like +%Life, more res, -Dmg/MgcDmg.

ThunderSky would certainly be useful from lvl 75 to 85 though, assuming that +40 CBolt had the expected effect.

<edit>
Didn't notice Muleofal's post just following mine. It's true that I forgot to put some numbers in my post. I had considered the +2 skills of HHGlory, but forgot to say anything explicit about that. A3 Mercs have Masteries, which is why I only considered the -%Res from the facets (the +% is so small compared to a mastery). You're right that I should have stated that Ondal's had 36% less pierce rather than 24%, and essentially Ondal's only has +3 Mastery rather than +5 (each +5% facet is essentially +1Mastery) compared to the sword+shield. I'm glad you can appreciate why I originally considered that Ondal's over the 6osSword+Shield would be such a close match. I think it comes down to which set of gear is easier to come by.

The -Res% cap is really hard to hit in HU. I think it's practically impossible, because Conviction and LRes cap out around 80% (I mean no one seems to get them higher than this), and the availability of LRes is only common nowadays due to the influx of Poicros. Conviction is the component of that cap you won't easily get nowadays. Considering that most monsters with any resistance at all seem to have about 50%, you'd need about -150%Res to reach the -100% cap you mentioned. With Conviction + LRes + HolyAura, that cap doesn't need any passive pierce (sans immunity), but I never see Conviction pallies and Poicros playing together. For that fairly flimsy reason, I state that it's practically impossible to have too much -%Res.

Level 6 LRes from Medusa shield gives -55%Res for 18 seconds over 6 yards. I've used this shield on my characters in the past, but I never noticed it being consistently cast (probably because it was on a high-def Convictor at the time). I agree that the extra pierce makes up for the loss of +2skills and a facet.
</edit>

I went with boneshade for my a3 fire merc.

It has chance to reanimate horadrim ancients. They have conviction aura.

Went with the Sword of Wanderer socketted with a moonstone topaz, mostly because I could get all the purification glyphs without too much trouble. He is also using a HHG with 2x diamonds for resists. If I had some extra facets, I would consider tossing them in tehre, but for now all my light facets went in to his Griffons. Any other facets I am saving up in case I run across another templars in which case I will swap out his Ormus robes for the templars.

The unique wisp though was very mean, even with stacked resists and salvation running I got 1 hitted on my paladin. I guess I should have gone in with dual shock absorbers, but I was a bit lazy. Rabies druid took him out without any issue though since I didn't have to get close to the little bugger.

I think that the Ondals' suggestion is really a strong option as well as the bone shade for the ctc resurrect conviction (holy crap!) and this generated some great discussion so I am glad I got the discussion rolling.

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People who live in cinder block houses can throw whatever they want.