Character Overview

AMAZON

The Amazon plays like a slightly more battle-capable Rogue from Diablo I. She can hold her own in one-on-one combat but truly excels at ranged weaponry. Her two options are the Bow and the Javelin. You need to make a decision which one you will specialise in. The javelin is best if you prefer to keep you melee skills particularly sharp. Don’t try to keep both weapons at maximum, as this will mean that you won’t reach full potential in either. The Amazon is the thinking fighter. You can’t just take her hip-deep into demons and start slashing. She’s best as a guerrilla terrorist. Hit and run, attack and fade. Ambushes are a speciality of the Amazon. (Much like the Vietcong guerrilla tactics of the Vietnam War)

Obviously, Dexterity is you prime statistic, but Strength can’t be ignored either. At every level advance, think about placing two points into Strength, two into Dexterity, and one into Vitality if you want a well rounded character. Otherwise keep Dexterity as your dominant stat with for points added at each level and one to the other stats every consecutive round. You may want to think about keeping Vitality up as well as you’ll be running a lot. Once you have a decent set of combat stats, think about diverting some skill into energy. While you won’t be using high-cost powers constantly, there will be a constant drain on your Mana. You’ll need to have enough magic power to ensure you won’t be just getting off a few shots then having to run away continually.

The bow-using Amazon has a few important skills that she needs to be particularly efficient with. Magic Arrow is the most important and is an essential early level skill. It creates a surprise magic arrow. Interestingly, the higher skill point you have in it the more damage it does and the cheaper it is until by level 12, it’s free. It is a handy default attack for this character. Cold Arrow is also a vital skill. Freezing attacks are one of the most useful attack types in the game, and piking off a rampaging horde can certainly dictate the tempo of battle to your advantage.

One nice little combo is Critical Strike, which means you’ll basically never miss with Multiple Shot. There is nothing quite like a 120 degree arc of death on your screen.

If you want to get into more melee fighting with the Amazon, try for the javelin skills. Jab is the basic skill that allows more attacks for a compromised accuracy. It doesn’t pay off too well until, say, the fifth level. But keep putting points into it for a good all-round attacking skill. Lighting and Poison are the two sub-trees for the javelin Player. Lighting is probably the more damaging but Poison can sometimes work more insidiously. Javelin combines extremely well with a high-level critical strike. Even the hardest bosses can’t survive too many of those.

Generally. The Amazon is a bot more flexible than the Barbarian but misses out on the sheer skill with weapons. However. If you like playing it fast and loose and don’t mind being on the run, she impresses with a wide range of baffling powers.

ASSASSIN

When good mages go bad, that's when they call in the Assassins. Human weapons against corrupt mages such as the infamous Horazon, Assassins perfect the powers of the mind, channelling their magic inwards. What does this mean for the player? Basically, kick-ass martial arts powers.

The Assassin is one of the most flexible classes. Fast, strong, with potential for some truly damaging close-in work or some ranged combat, she can be shaped into the perfect jewel for a variety of combat scenarios.
Of the three schools of training the Assassin can indulge in, only one is truly unique: the Shadow Disciplines. Part Summoning, part Stealth, they alone in the game are designed to avoid combat until the time is right. The Traps are essentially spells. If you like ranged combat and sneaking around getting things right then this is the path for you. Martial arts add a r.ew zest to melee, allowing even the most routine Fight to become a delicate ballet of charging-up and finishing moves.

The Assassin most certainly benefits from a strong mastery of one school. The martial arts tree has a variety of different effects, relying on elemental attacks and allowing Life-draining.

The advantage an Assassin has in hand-to-hand combat is her speed. Many of her specialty powers come from twin claw-class weapons. These are extremely quick and can be boosted with martial skills. It is even possible for the Assassin to go weapon less to give an extra boost to speed. Appealing, certainly, but beware of this conceit. The difference between very fast claws and hands is essentially nothing at all.

The temptation to use charge-up and finishing strikes is great indeed. Sadly, these are mainly Elemental attacks and in the latter stages of the games they can lose their potency. Shadow warrior, an almost-done of you, is therefore one of the most important skills for the Assassin, as are finishing moves.
Traps, nasty things, can take a bit of time to learn to use correctly. They require more forethought than simple spells, many having proximity triggers or other specific uses. It's the heavy artillery of the character. Beware of over-reliance on them though. Like the charge-up skills, elemental resistance is strongly stacked against you later on. The Assassin is straightforward to get down and dirty with, but getting maximum use out of her is a definite challenge. Like the Druid, she does best with one strong specialisation and an assortment of secondary skills to augment her strengths.

Barbarian

The king of close quarter combat, they don’t come more vicious than the savage Barbarian. The Barbarian has more weapons and armour options that any other character. There isn’t much subtlety to this class, as it basically revolves around being in a position to get close enough to something to hack it open.

Therefore, Strength is obviously the stat you want to beef up on. At every level, three points should go into strength, with the defensive Dexterity coming in as the second most important. Like the Amazon, when Strength reaches about 60, you are assured use of almost every item in the game.

Unlike the Amazon, the Barbarian does not require a high level of specialisation. Indeed, one of his advantages lies in his capacity to pick up anything damaging and go wild on evil with it. Axes and swords are the default setting of weapons, but don’t discount the Anti-Undead Mace or the rare but powerful Pole-Arms.

Barbarian specialty skills are many. They can be combined in many thousands of ways. Choose one weapon specialisation, such as Pole-Arm or Axe and drop every bit of skill into it. Keep pumping up your strength and you’ll be easily taking out daemons with each hit. Take a few points in Leap, a few points in Two-hand Attack, a few points in Bash and suddenly you have a hit-and-run warrior. Mana and life stealing weapons can turn a high-level Barbarian into an unstoppable foe. An essential skill for the Barbarians is definitely Leap. This is a skill that can utterly change your combat strategy. Instead of simply being a war machine, this turns you into a whirling dervish. It can get you in and out of combat, allow you to pick out specific targets and is of especial use against Diablo himself.

The Warcries are an underrated Barbarian skill. The Warcry itself at level 30 is basically the best weapon you’ll have. Nor should you ignore Bash. A simple level one skill, even a few points put into it will give you an extra strong punch that can give you the edge against the powerful Super Unique creatures

DRUID

Constantly in harmony with nature, the Druid is an offshoot of the Barbarian peoples of Harrogath. While Heaven and Hell battle with magic, the Druid can wield the forces of Sanctuary's living creatures and the elements themselves.
The Druid has three distinct paths he can follow: Summoner, Melee fighter or Elementalist. He combines a lot of skills from different classes and comes up with something quite unique. The trick with the Druid is to discover how best to use a combination of these skills. It comes down to what you prefer to play. If you enjoy using spells, take the Elemental abilities. If you want to get in close, choose the shape-shifting powers. Prefer the general mode of the Necromancer? You'll want Summoning. The advantage of the Druid is that you can play at any of these styles and freely fall back on secondary skills to add spice.
Stats should thus be divided and allocated along these lines. Strength and Dexterity should get two points each per level for the Shape-Shifter, allowing a good attack and defence ability to be augmented by your Wereforms. Please take note here that a Were attack still depends on the weapon equipped. Strength obviously is a factor here. Adding one to energy and one to Vitality sequentially is also useful. But if you want big spell casting to take place, you'll have to go along lines similar to a Sorceress.
Druid skills pay off nicely at the higher levels. Lycanthropy, the basic mastery skill of the shape-shifter, may seem to be unduly tempting to max out on, but keep some points to add to Maul. Another example for the Summoner is the Carrion Vine. Converting dead enemies to life, it can keep you standing against tremendous odds. Feral Rage is not to be laughed at either. Don't forget about Oak Sage for both Shape-Shifter and Elementalist. Feel free to save some points to add to your higher-level skills.
The trick with the Druid is to focus on one branch but combine just enough other skills to pack an extra punch. This nature boy is one of the hardest of the classes to master but can work out nicely for those willing to invest the time.

NECROMANCER

The character is for those of you who like to think tactically. A master of death, the Necromancer summons the Undead. He eventually has the power to bring the dead back to life. The early creatures you can control are Golems, Skeletons, then Skeleton Magi and increasingly powerful Golems.

Necromancers should have an early run on building up their Life stats. Bring you mana up so that you can achieve a better level for spell casting. Bear in mind that some of your later skills have a very high Mana quotient. Then you’ll need some strength so you can wear decent armour. After that you’ll want more Vitality. Necromancers barely ever engage in hand-to-hand combat so your Dexterity isn’t the big deal it is to hands-on warriors.

As far as combat goes, your essential skill for the early game is Summoning Skeletons. You’ll note you have two skills, Skeleton Mastery and Raise Skeletons. Mastery increases the actual power and damage potential of your Undead. It’s a matter of preference if you’d rather have a few powerful Skeletons or many weak ones. It might be best to start out with a lot of Skeletons, and then master them up in time to have strong Skeleton Magi.

Here’s a tried and true tactic for the Necromancer: Iron Maiden Curse, which you’ll get at level 10, causes cursed monsters to take damage when they harm others. It’s a very inexpensive skill with additional skill points increasing the percentage of damage returned and the duration in seconds. The Iron Golem, a tough summoned monster, has the Thorns ability, which causes damage to the attacking unit. Combine both skills, and you’ll have monsters severely weakening themselves as they attack the strong Iron Golem.

Blood, Iron and Fire Golems are forged from magical weapons. If you have a magic sword that causes fire damage, so will the Golem. There is a temptation for magic users to simply identify and sell magic weapons. Hold on to a few sweet ones, just to be sure. The Golem remains one of the most significant weapons in the Necromancers arsenal and you should make every attempt to get at least the Blood Golem, with its power to filter life back to itself and the player.

Like every character, there are different specialisation paths. For Necromancers, Summoning is probably the best. The Necromancer isn’t really there to fight. Get some points in Teeth and at least one point in Bone Armour, but some of the poisoning skills rely on you getting into a mêlée, which is something you should avoid. Too often you’ll be facing Undead, who have strong poison resistance, But then again, Bone Spear, which passes through creatures, is a handy weapon. Life-tap is an often overlooked skill, which can drain energy from the foe to your summoned creatures. Even the simple Teeth skill can give support to your beasts.

Curses, those vicious little skills, can make the difference between life and death, especially against particularly large groups of creatures. Decrepify, the penultimate skill of this tree, can virtually incapacitate monsters. Curses aren’t your major weapon, but can be very useful. Enhancing Damaging before you charge with a dozen Skeletons is a sure was to tip the scales in your favour. Revive is a must-have skill if you have put lots of points into Summoning.

A final tip: Battle.net players who suffer from bad lag may find the Necromancer the ideal player. Minions exist on the game server, not on yours, so while you are gritting you teeth, your unholy armies of the night will still be killing just fine.

The Paladin is the character that is perhaps more suitable to the multi-plater game. But make no mistake; he is still capable of taking on the greatest of battles. Many of his aura powers can affect more than one player so he should always be part of a group.

A Paladin should start with Strength and Dexterity to improve melee combat, which will start to pay strong dividends by the time you’re implementing Zeal and Concentration. Put other spare points into Vitality to keep your health and stamina high. Energy, though, isn’t as important to the Paladin. While combat skills require Mana, the auras are all simply turned on and off and don’t use Mana upon activation.

Your Mana is important, but as many of your powers wok for some time and are not overt weapons, you can probably let it slide for the first few levels before pumping it up as you gain more abilities later in the game. Conversely you can put Energy up early but this will leave you less capable of hack and slash combat.

Using your hotkeys is important for the Paladin. Most of the Paladin’s offensive and defensive auras work best is specific battles. A switch to resist cold against cold-enhanced enemies is a vital move in several pitched battles, especially late in the game. By assigning there auras to a function key, you can quickly load them into your right mouse button and activate the aura without going through an onscreen menu.

The Paladin skill tree is particularly convoluted. No class must more carefully choose which area of specialisation to focus upon. A choice must be made. Are you a defensive plater preferring the role of support, or do you want to get right into it? Scattering points widely will simply leave you unfocussed and ineffective.

The paladin can use Might and Prayer to boost attack and damage rating and healing. This is like a Barbarian, but affects many players instead of just one. Mediation can help you gain Mana faster. Elemental resistances prove essential against Unique creatures. Mephisto, for example, has damaging lightning attacks and the creatures of hell have many fire powers. For a level 30 skill, Salvation is pretty damned fine, and Redemption can keep you on your feet against even the toughest odds.

There are a few basic powers a Paladin needs to get down. Smite is a strong early attack, and Holy Bolt is a useful ranges attack. Zeal becomes your essential attack allowing you to hit several foes at once. The Paladin, unlike all other characters, is flexible.

SORCERESS

The Sorceress is Diablo 2's true mage, a character bristling with powerful magics of every kind.

A rebellious woman who has wrested the secrets of magic use from the male dominated Mage-Clans of the East, the Sorceress is an expert in mystical creation ex nihilo. Though somewhat lacking in the skills of hand-to-hand combat, she compensates for this weakness with fierce combative magic for both offense and defense. Solitary and reclusive, the Sorceress acts based on motives and ethics inscrutable to most, and sometimes seems capricious and even spiteful. In reality, she understands the struggle between Order and Chaos all too clearly, as well as her role as a warrior in this battle.
-Spitfire wrote all but the Sorceress