i was really impressed with the damage from arioc's
needle. i compared the ethernal one with a ed jewel
in it with ebotd war pike, and the damage is so similar!
is there any situation where arioc's would be a better choice?
has anyone ever personally used arioc's?

It’s a good merc weapon for trav runs. That’s about it

I mean it deals tremendous damage, but lachs leach, war pike has all this, its like boosting you're merc a bit too, with all the +to stats, it's simply a better all rounder.

But it's like, if you try it, and it works better in that one specific situation, then why not use it? It would be un to try it myself too. But it's oh so hard to find, specially eth!! It would be safe to say ebotd war pike is easier to make, jve actually done that, it works so well with the merc.

My comment is not referring to D2:R, however I did try to use it with an Impale Zon and a Berserker Barb... the reason is simply because of the +4 Skills, ED, Psn Dmg, IAS and DS.

The zon has CS, so DS would also have a Hit Check. The Psn Dmg is similar to Bleed (monster can not regenerate hit points) and the +4 Skills to Passive Skills and Impale, Jab etc ... did not like Impale & Durability loss.

Now as for the Berserk barb using it... same sorta reasons, however never really gave it much thought, nor did I check if the Poison Damage hit check worked with a Magical Attack, thus did NOT spend that much time with it, since I get mass dmg using Grief in those days.

Oh, for bosses, I like to types of dmg with a melee character other than Crushing Blose... Bleed and Poison... so the bosses don't regen hit points etc.

Hope this helps a little.


EIDT: I never tried EBOTD anything... wasn't interested with grief being introduced in 1.10 just like Ariocs.

This post was edited by izParagonzi on Jun 4 2025 10:25pm

Omg arioc's on ama impale .............. i can't even imagine the damage xD And with crit xD How much damage does it clap off baal with a good roll? ^^ Can't even imagine. Baal has what, 600 000 hit points on p1? So like 10 000 dmaage x 2 ... shouldn't take too many hits to do the trick..... very cool thought.

Hang on, cool down.

Critical Strike = Double Damage
Deadly Strike = Double Damage
... ONLY ONE(1) Hit Check applies, it does NOT ACCUMULATE.

Example: If your Hit Check succeeds with Critical Strike, the Deadly Strike is ignored and vice versa.

Hope this make sense.

Oh yes i know it :) I didn't meant o present it as a double double strike .... if i did i would mention amp dmg, perhaps from atma's scarab, which i prolly would use anyway.. the amp dmg is such powerful tool. It makes perfect sense. Maybe in terms of using jab as regular attack until amp procs, then use impale, at least with bosse n highter hp monsters.......

So true, this is why I have mentioned in other posts that a Poison Damage Small Charm is also beneficial (even only 1) to slow down the Regeneration speed of that boss (excluding Poison Resistance boss like Andarial ... if I remember correctly).

You can only build from there.