nice guide
maybe u can also swao arach for verdungo/tg and use 2 druid 20 fc amu
that gives u more dam reduce if someone gets a lucky hit on you
firestorm is a usefull skill in there too,southwalk and firestorm up can deal some serious damage(atleast vs es sorcs it drains their mana very fast)
skills to look for on helm are imo 1-3 armageddon,3 grizzly,1-3 cyclone armor(if that is at all possible)

Infernostride > wall of text guide.

sorry, but unless you get 10K+++ fire damage, its no use, unless you like 10 minute duels..

if you need res 20/15 are nice.

on d2pk with my res satisfied by other items, I ended up leaving on LoLo pelt equipped after trying out many various pelt socketings (berber, chamshael, 2x facet, rare jewels) BerBer pelt got some use for teams with multispamming zons, but was mostly left in stash otherwise.

Yup yup. Its hard to really say in these sorts of guides, since I could either say "It will be a tough duel when they farcast and teleport!", but then a shaman crushing 9/10 cs zons he meets in pubs, and wonders wtf I was talking about. And then the crux of the whole thing revolves around an exploit, which is only argueable gm or not, and which will probably (hopefully) be patched in 1.13. Heh. About the ratings: they're really loose guidelines. Its not like I'm using thousands of duels of data, I'm just recalling how difficult it is in generalities. Like if I see two duel games on the list, one full of paladins and barbarians, and one full of sins/necros/sorcs, I'll join the sin/necro/sorc one. Overall I just tried to think; two competent individuals playing each other with relatively equal skill, who has the advantage? Its tough to say, since in some duels at low skill levels, its different than at high skill levels (hammer vs anything at low, hammer wins, hammer vs anything at high, anything wins)

So I guess instead of talking about vet vs vet or pub vs pub specifically, I was just trying to approximate it all in one big lumpy goo



Oh yes, I"ve dueled hundreds and hundreds of 4v4's (4v4gm a lot)
Its really not the best TvT character- I switch to my barb, or wish I had a bowazon, for those moments, but TvT is a much different landscape. I definitely agree that volcano + mindblast is one of the hideous combos that spawns in TvT (and a boon to delirium druids), but most of my shaman duels would end up like this:

1) Duel starts
2) I teleport around throwing a few fissures impotently
3) Some barb or necro chases me, I defwhore for a little bit
4) Everyone else dies, and it winds up a 1v1 or 1v2 or I'm already dead
5) *long drawn out 1v1*

I mean, I've had lots of games where I can carry it as our last alive and win 1v2 or 1v3, sure, but its not at all like playing a zon who can just spam multiarrows and pretend shes the heavy from TF2, my shaman at least, couldn't do very much with his allies. I mean you can survive and fight on your own just fine, but hes not a team contributor like captain battle orders/leap, or mr "hide in my hammerfield and get +500% damage!"

This post was edited by deathwinger on Aug 11 2009 02:12pm

this is quite possibly true

However fire druid with "basic" fire druid eq can easily pierce it. Charactrer having 75 allres and wearing rising sun will die in few fissure hits.
A key to make fire druid is in getting as much -enemy fire res as possible, and many of those who chose to use hoto/spirit fail.

Which is quite fun for sitting on the edge of town.
Unfortunately, thats a completely different character. This is a guide to the Shaman.

Who, as it so happens, doesn't particularly need -resists.

yea sure bearstrike isnt easy to master
just had some fun duels with shaman on a different realm with better synergies for fire skills and it wasnt actually bad, I really couldnt use bear that well though
it didnt affect me that much there but I guess in realms with lower damage on fireskills bear plays a lot more important rule

its cuz u gotta namelokk to hit ppl with ur bear
and namelokk is bm hax

idk why you bring this up again and again. It's not like d2 isn't full of quirks here and there in how skills work, its a legitimate tactic that gives more depth to cs zon gameplay, a tactic that both the zon player and the opponents should be aware of, something that is strong yet not imba, much like a lot of the tactics used in d2.
Im sure you at some point have cast fissures offmap to your opponent, teleported into them, then watched the opponent chase you down and attempt a telestomp on you only to get pk'd by invisible fissure. Isn't abusing invisible projectiles/attacks offmap just as much of an exploit? same as ibs trains or iga sniping, both of which are very common tactics. d2 is full of these things, nothing wrong with them. imho they make the game more fun. same as bugs allowed in competitive gaming in other games, nothing wrong with most of them, just more tactics to watch out for.

YES, for the love of god

YES


and people think they got ''skill' @ d2

This post was edited by gr8ape on Aug 11 2009 02:29pm