I’m a super rusty and playin a casual 09 baba soft core walk through. Currently lvl 41 starting nightmare, wanting to go whirl wind, so far I’ve almost maxed battle orders then I’m going to start on whirlwind, but yet to find any mana leech items.

I’ve had bad luck finding anything good so my weapon is a rare grand scepter and concentrate, basically a tank while my merc kills. Not really planning to do any “runs” for gear but any tips on good early weapons would be great. I haven’t committed to a mastery yet.

I’ve also been walking through on players 8, but considering some nm countess runs if it’d land me a rune to be able to do damage

You might want to Research Gloom magic find Rituals

This is LoD right? What 09 patch are you using (if using something like Plugy)?

Reasoning is because in later 09 patches you have synergies and access to 1.10 runewords.
Caster Knights in Chaos Sanctuary & Worldstone (some other areas) can cast Iron Maiden, so as a WW / Frenzy or Conc barb, you would kill yourself, thus have 1 base point into Berserk skill. Oh, melee mercs will die often also, so be cautious.

If I remember correctly, the main hand to off hand still works with IAS ... you will need to check some old guides about those.

Not much of a WW user in the day, so can not help you that much.

If you can get an Eth Axe with 4 sockets and runes to make Oath, you can use that at level 49, I forgot the best axe to use and keeping the level req low.

At your level, just do some Norm Baal runs, you will have the same map and may find some decent gear in Worldstone and Throne room. You also have the Tower if you are hunting runes in Norm. Also, if you are confident, you may want to run cows in Norm, just a thought.

If going to Nightmare, you can do Andy and Tower runs as well. Get to act 3 and do Lower Kurast, not sure if the runes there will be great, and of course if confident, Meph runs.


If you are using the patch where 1.10 runewords can be made, Oath is one of them, so you should know that Grief would be one of your main weapons etc.

Goodluck and have fun, I am sure someone else will give you better advice.

Read it all and i agree

Haven’t played much but got a few hours in last night. I’m currently level 45 and on nightmare ancients. Even on players 1 they kick my ass.

My current weapon is a savage magical naga that does like 70 damage, haven’t been able to find anything better. I did a few meph runs and kurrast chest runs but all it did was generate gold for me, no good drops.

09 countess has a different way of dropping runes so it makes her pretty useless to farm.

My whirl wind is still terrible so I’m using concentrate, I’m thinking I should farm chaos through level 55 or so and try to take ancients again, but without a breakthrough on the weapon I’m not really going to progress.

This post was edited by SagittariusA on Aug 9 2025 08:11am

classic tale of a barb, you progress nicely then hit a wall without a weapon upgrade.

you could always roll a savage polearm, and hope for a partizan. but you'll need a LOT of strength. ideally you'd find a unique like bonesnap or steel driver. or butchers/headstriker would be even better.

best u can do now is farm whatever you can consistently kill quickly, andy/meph/chaos in NM. even better i'd target pindle and shenk/eld. high ilvl for your current setup and fast kills, plus u can hork them.

Doing shrenk/eldritch on P1 then using item find on them is going to be your best option in terms of finding gear upgrades. It’s also pretty good experience, particularly eldritch.

Once you cycle them enough you should be able to find enough gear upgrades, particularly weapon, to help make your progress faster.

I don’t suggest doing act bosses, other than chaos, due to the time it takes to get to them. That’s a lot of running around not killing stuff.

Travical is also a decent option to add some diversity into your farming efforts but that will likely be harder than eldritch/shrenk depending on your gear, but you can be the judge.

Ultimately, until you find a better weapon in particular, your progress will come to a stop.

also, for a solo climb, lvl 45 is pretty low level to try to kill ancients in general. Not sure exactly what the ideal lvl is, but I would say you are at least 5+ levels away from ancients being a reality

Quite honestly, since you got his far and are playing 09 LoD pre 1.10 & synergies, using Black Runeword is out of the question with ideal CB setup of items.

I would have suggested early levels hunting Hsarus Belt and Boots with Angelics Rings (x2), armor and Amulet all the way to Hell Act 1 and just focusing on a better weapon (s), helm and gloves... oh the other thing would be a simple Sigons Helm + Glove setup for IAS and Life Leech... weapon is still open.

Butchers Pupil is still good... the Black Runeword Maces would be Ideal maybe?

Also, I would have suggested Frenzy, at least you can run out of packs faster than being stuck in WW animation, your skill setup should have been designed for end build since you can not respec, your stat placement would have also been essential to your build at the end result... thus holding back stat points as going up levels for gear options.

Skulders Ire would have been great to use and if lucky found early... but Eth would have been even more desirable etc.

How did you compensate for the "Fire Enchanted" Council member in Trav? If I remember correctly it was bugged to 1 hit kill you off when you killed it off, pretty much no matter your hit points? Oh, sorry forgot you are playing SC.

What is your Barbs Weapon Mastery? Sword, Axe etc?

Black and oath runewords.

Its painful playing a barb in 09

So update on my progress, I got a lucky meph drop of storm rider tabar so I shall socketed it and it’s been carrying me. I found worldstone keep level 2 runs were the best exp in nightmare and leveled up to 60 and went to hell. I basically speed ran through hell as my chance to hit dropped off a cliff and now I’m level 63 and rushed to hell ancients.

Overall this run is feeling cursed on the drops, I have around 150% and been doing some hell meph even though it’s been slow I’m using a 3 socket armor with orts to max lightning resistance. But even with this I haven’t seen a single unique drop,, almost always magic and random rare here and there.

I remember my last char a few years ago was a sorc and I had no problems finding gear.

I’m trying to make honor runeword in a bec for my merc but I need sol rune, I’ve had no luck finding any runes at countess above this even in hell.


Anyways I’m looking for a good leveling spot at 63 but needing to solve my chance to hit issue or get a lucky drop. I have a really good map seed but considering going back to nightmare to do some magic find runs