[Tempest] Sarah the Self-Found Solo Summoner

Rapid progression through the Coast (no tempest), Tidal Island (no tempest), Mud Flats (Ethereal Tempest of Animation), Fetid Pool (Quickening Tempest of Lightning), and the Ledge (Crushing Tempest of Animation). Just a few minor encounters of interest, like the rare with cannot-die aura spawning right next to Fire Fury, necessitating some kiting to get them apart. Saw Haku in the Mud Flats, stopped by to do his mission, but failed because it was infested with those unkillable totems spawning ice nova and I couldn't safely get past them fast enough. Found a Strange Sinkhole (extra fire damage, frenzy charges) and Concealed Cavity (extra lightning damage, power charges) and cleared both, got a Sacrifice at Dusk out of each.

Grand total of useful loot from all the quest rewards and drops: one shield with slightly higher life and fire resist than I had before, and a Meginord's Girdle unique heavy belt (which went to the guild stash). I did keep a few of the rares that were at least item level 60, though, as I'm starting to see a few of those. Saving up for the full-set-for-a-chaos-orb vendor recipe.

On to the Climb (Shimmering Tempest of Poison). Found and cleared a Remote Gulch corrupted area, no trouble except one zombie down against the boss, Sheaq, and his shock nova. Found a Sacrifice at Dawn. Hit level 64, and took the last life/mana node near Heart and Soul. Found the Prison and the waypoint, then back to town. Got an amulet from Nessa for the quest reward, decent but not useful at the moment.

No tempest in the Prison. Lots of necromancers but no trouble. Cut down all in my path through the lower and upper prison. Brutus had no chance against the horde, especially after I summoned the Vaal Skeletons just to add to the overkill. Nothing of use from the quest reward. Prisoner's Gate also had no tempest, and I was fortunate to guess right and avoid about half the zone by taking the correct turns through the hills. Found a strongbox with the additional unique item mod, a lucky break, and got Heartbreaker from it. The damage/crit stats and culling strike are useless for Sarah, but I'll use it for the mana and ES bonuses.

Catarina got to level 5 a while back, so I was able to invite a third master to my hideout. I got Vorici, but doing his daily mission is nigh impossible. Failed three in a row now, because I just can't keep the horde from killing things in the wrong order. I even tried running with no zombies or spectres, just spirits, but I think my level is just too high for his level 35 mission. Oh well, eventually I'll track him down in the wild. I did find a Ungil's Harmony unique amulet on the last failed attempt, so it's not all bad. Put it in the guild stash.

Shimmering Tempest of Aberrance in the Ship Graveyard, prefix is helpful and suffix just means watch out for blue and rare packs even more than usual. Two packs of monsters came at me from opposite directions right out of the waypoint, which was no big deal since the horde was with me, but it's a good thing I always summon them somewhere safe first. Found another unique, Lavianga's Wisdom war hammer, another low level one for the guild stash. Hit the cavern waypoint and got a decent rare helmet from Nessa, but it's not quite as good as the one I already have.

Found the graveyard cave (glad to see no tempest) and cleared it, then took out Fairgraves. He actually hit Sarah with his spectral throw...I didn't realize until now that it can stop and hang in the air. Took a few hits before I realized it wasn't moving and I needed to get out of the way. No lasting harm done, though. With the skill point, started up toward Sovereignty. Time to start boosting my auras.

Into the caverns (no tempest). Found a rare Gemcutter's Strongbox which dropped a 7% quality Summon Skeletons, neat. I'll level it up on weapon switch for a while before I swap it in. I see the final zone is the only level 59 area in all of Act 1. Another instance where there's no other place to level before fighting a boss. In this case it doesn't matter, because I'm already +5 and it's only Merveil, but the zone level structure still sucks. Anyway, cleared through the caverns easily and headed in to fight the siren. Totally unfair fight, didn't lose a minion and all I really had to do was dodge the water spouts and occasionally resummon the totem or refresh Enfeeble. No useful drops.

Cleared out the Southern Forest with a Galvanizing Tempest of Intensity (of which I approve, lots of minion extra lightning damage). Went through Old Fields (Enlarging Tempest, yay giant zombies) to the Crossroads (no tempest) for the waypoint, and hit level 65 on the way. Backtracked to the Den and cleared it out, did a mission for Catarina on the way. Yeena gave me a decent belt with fire resist, life, and ES which I'm not using yet, but will keep in case I need to swap gear around for better resists at some point.

Took advantage of good weather to go tempest-free through the Riverways to the waypoint and the Broken Bridge to Kraityn. Kall Foxfly made another appearance in the Riverways, and actually got through Sarah's ES and took out a zombie before going down. Kraityn was a lot easier, never touched Sarah or took down a minion. (I'm intending to kill all the bandits again, no point in getting the extra charge reward from any of them.) Then onward to the Western Forest, took down Alira and Arteri with no losses to either. Back to the Crossroads, beat up Thena Moga on the way, and into the Chamber of Sins. Found Tora on level 1, did her mission though not without losses. The lair was home to a bunch of chimerals and that massed suppressing fire attack is a doozy. Ended up reviving a couple as spectres, might as well get some use out of them.

Chamber of Sins level 2 was interesting. Mostly just the usual necromancers with lightning skeletons, and I hit level 66 while clearing them out. But then it got rough when I found a rare necromancer, with the usual bunch of skeletons, all with Arsonist's Touch. You have never seen so much fire raining down, and it was toasting the horde. Almost got me at first, before I hit flasks like crazy and ran away. I almost just left them alone, but I'm stubborn. So I did several rounds of sending in skeletons and hitting Flesh Offering to clear the corpses, to limit the overall numbers. Couldn't clear them all, but got it down enough to where I could summon the Vaal Skeletons by the boss, and they took him out before dying to the fire. Then the cleanup was easy. After all that, Fidelitas was a pushover, just threw all the skeletons at him and let them chop him up.

Finally got a Quartz flask from Greust for the quest reward, and spent a ridiculous number of Alteration Orbs to finally roll movement speed on it. It is now a Perpetual Quartz Flask of Adrenaline and replaces the Quicksilver flask as my "use right before opening a strongbox" and "run away from bad stuff NOW" button. (I'd have preferred an Ample prefix to Perpetual, but I'll wait to find another Quartz flask before trying for a better roll.) I'm keeping the Quicksilver as well, and ditching my animation life flask. The minions really don't need help on life any more - if they're taking massive enough damage to be a problem, my piddly little life flask isn't going to help.

No tempest in the spider lair at the moment, so I went there, though I had to brave an Electrocuting Tempest of Cataclysm in the Western Forest along the way. Glad there was no tempest, because the tiny hallways with flicker-strike spiders and devourers was plenty bad enough by itself. Had a couple of different rare devourers pop up right next to Sarah and smack her with enough damage to get through my 854 ES in a single hit. My new Quartz flask got quite the workout. Compared to those, the Weaver was easy. Let the horde go nuts, kept her cursed, and dropped Vaal Summon Skeletons about halfway through to make sure there was enough horde to match all the spiders. Nothing useful from Silk for the quest reward.

Moved on to the Wetlands, got into a tempest-free instance just before the winds shifted. Found the tree, used up the spike and gem, grabbed the waypoint, and backtracked to kill Oak. Easy enough fight, though he jumped on Sarah a couple of times with enough force to wipe out my ES. No trouble getting away, though. Also found and cleared a Fleet Narrow Ravine of Endurance, where the monsters were 11% faster. Had one very nasty point with a Massive Shrine and three rares that required quite a bit of zombie resummoning, but two Chaos Orbs dropped from that fight so I'm not complaining. Dealt with Kamaq as per usual...inch forward until he makes his appearance, then make sure to be on the move as soon as he drops down so you're not a stationary target when he pops back up. Found yet another Sacrifice at Dusk.

With the skill point from Eramir for the bandit quest, I picked up Sovereignty. Running just Purity of Elements I'm at 68/69/75 on resists, but now I can do better since I can run two Purity auras and still have 200 mana free. Swapped in a belt I had in the stash, and a new gloves that I rolled off a 4-link white set picked up earlier, both with fire resist. Then I moved gems around to have both Purity of Lightning and Purity of Ice going, giving me 75/77/77 resists. The new belt/gloves have less life but more ES - current totals 2831 life, 1009 ES. Moved Desecrate to my weapon switch to make room for the new aura. The downside to all this is that the horde has less fire resist (since neither aura grants it), but we all have extra cold/lightning resist. If I get into a situation where fire resist is key, I can always swap the Purity of Elements back in, replacing the Purity of Lightning.


Took the horde for a walk through Fellshrine (no tempest) where they enjoyed demolishing masses of their undead cousins. There was an Energizing Tempest of Precision in the Crypt, which is fine...horde with charges should be fun. Zombies with 3 frenzy charges, Multistrike, and the Flesh Offering buff are amusingly speedy. Cleared level 1 without incident. In level 2, ran into a few places with rare giant skeletons and necromancers that required a bit of work, but nothing too bad until I found Tora. Her mission spawned a whole lot of blue spiders with poison attacks that were pretty effective zombie-killers, so I had to resummon quite a few of them. Ended up clearing the entire area before I managed to track down all the spiders and find Geofri, who was a pushover.

Picked up the Conqueror's Efficiency unique jewel as the quest reward from Yeena. All useful stats: reduced mana cost, reduced mana reserved, and increased duration (good for spirits and Flesh Offering). I'll spend my next couple of skill points opening up a jewel slot for it, on the way down to the Leadership cluster.

Made my way into the Vaal Ruins, where there was a Shivering Tempest of Poison. Not the best weather, but nothing the horde couldn't handle, as long as I kept Sarah from standing in the poison clouds. Found a Forbidden Taste unique Quartz flask, which was exciting at first, but not so much once I read it carefully. It's clearly for use in "oh crap I just got knocked down to almost zero life" situations, what with the 75% life recovery followed by chaos damage over time, but I want to use my Quartz flask proactively. So into the guild stash with it. Hit 67 as I finished making my way through the ruins.

Rolled through the Northern Forest and the Caverns without a tempest in either. Other than dodging the occasional devourer, the only notable encounter was Tailslinger. He did some pretty heavy initial damage to the horde and got a couple of shots in at Sarah, too. Once I got him cursed and moved her out of the line of fire, though, he didn't stand a chance. He dropped the first map I've found, and I got a second one shortly thereafter. Just white level 68s, but it's a start.

Climbed the Pyramid without incident, other than a couple of rooms with cannot-die totems that took some kiting to clear out. The top was level 63, which puts me at +4. Decided to go ahead against the Vaal Oversoul rather than try to grind out another level, since at this level I probably run just as much risk against potential rares spawning in bad combinations as I do against this boss. Besides, the horde has been eating bosses for lunch. This time was no exception. Same tactics as prior difficulty levels: stay out of melee, keep the totem and Enfeeble up, and summon spirits. Took three of the Oversoul's summon-minions-and-disappear cycles, but didn't lose a minion and took no noticeable damage on Sarah. No drops of interest.

Cleared my way through the City of Sarn and the Blasphemous Tempest of Desperation that was present. Had to run around a bit to kite a couple of rare outcasts that had cannot-die auras while the horde cleared their friends, but otherwise uneventful. Killed off the guards, rescued Clarissa, and moved on to the encampment.

Finally managed to complete one of Vorici's daily missions. It was level 35 and wanted the guards dead but the boss alive, and I went in with no minions and used only spirits. This time I was lucky and they killed off the guards before the boss. Sadly it'll still be a good long time before he levels up high enough that the missions are workable with the normal horde, as he's still not even level 4.

Made my way through the Slums (no tempest). Lots of rares, including a bunch of the giant porcupines that normally live in the Imperial Gardens, which killed a few zombies when large packs exploded all at once. Was fighting a couple of rares about halfway through when the screen was suddenly filled with lightning and half the horde died. Ran away and resummoned, then carefully moved back in and kited one rare away to kill it. Found Antalie Napora back behind with the other rare, but once I hit her with Enfeeble the zombies stopped dying and she didn't last long.

Upon further review, I've changed my mind again (this is normal for me) on the auras. I'm going back to Purity of Elements, and adding Discipline as the second aura. I lose the added max resists on cold/ice damage, but I'm still at 75/75/75 and I gain over 400 ES, plus the minions have their fire resistance back. The spectres benefit from the ES as well. (Technically so do the zombies and skeletons, but since they're getting hit all the time, it's not all that effective.) I figure in most circumstances, that extra ES will make up for any additional cold/ice damage I take, and more importantly it helps against physical. Had to reroll my shield from GBB to BBB, and swapped my belt back to the one with cold resist.

There were some nasty tempests, including Molten in the Crematorium, so I took a short break and came back once the winds had shifted. Much better, clear sailing on through the Battlefront. Hatebeat was in the very first room of the Crematorium and presented no problems, though I did use Convocation to pull the horde out of his Firestorm a couple of times, just in case. Found a Cartographer's Strongbox, rolled it to have increased quantity, and was rewarded with five maps (all level 68 white). No problem chasing Piety away, didn't lose a zombie. Quest reward was a decent shield, though not as good as my current one.

Uneventful trip through the Slums again to find the sewers. The Slums and Warehouse sewers were mostly straightforward, although I did find Spinesnap and had to run away at first since he was jumping around in a small room and there was nowhere safe for Sarah to stand. Once he followed me into a larger area, the horde took care of him, in large part due to skeletons repeatedly blowing up in his face. Found both busts, and hit level 68, which opens up a jewel slot so I can use that Conqueror's Efficiency. Here's the current passive tree.

Eventful trip through the Warehouses, starting off with a pack of Undying that jumped me immediately on entering the zone. I think the spawn points near entrances have gotten a bit out of whack in Awakening; it's happened a few times to me. Horde dealt with them, but I'm glad it wasn't anything really nasty. Then, on the way out of one of the buildings, a huge pack of snakes and Undying were waiting, including two rares, and the crossfire just about decimated the horde. Had to pull well back, resummon, and then kill them a few at a time until just the rares were left and I could focus on them with Enfeeble and the spirits. And then there were the Gemling Legionaires, who spawned right next to a cannot-die aura rare, so I had to kite that mess apart before I could take them down.

After that, the Marketplace was no trouble at all. Found the sewer entrance right away, so I grabbed the bust, then headed back up top and found the waypoint. Cleaned Marceus' clock on the way. Went on into the Battlefront and grabbed that waypoint as well, then decided it was break time as the tempests in the Docks and Solaris Temple look less than ideal.

Fought my way through a Morbid Tempest of Lightning in the Battlefront (found a Carrion Crow divination card on the way) to reach the tempest-free Docks. Found the Revenant right away, and had to run around a bit to keep him away from Sarah, but once he settled down it was an easy battle. Found an odd spot where two ice nova shrines were close enough to see on the same screen, don't think I've ever seen two that close together before. I'd cleared the monsters by pulling them away so it wasn't a big deal. Found the Sulfite, Fairgraves, and the waypoint. Also found Vorici and attempted his mission, but it was "keep one guard alive" and that didn't happen against Armios Bell. Also spotted a Stagnant Canal, but I have no desire to face Wiraqucha in Merciless. The horde has a really hard time finding him in all the duplicates that he spawns.

Went back to the (now tempest-free) Battlefront and picked up the Ribbon Spool, since I'm about to go see Dialla anyway. Then off to the (also tempest-free) Solaris temple. Cleared through both levels without incident. Nice to have Flame Sentinels as spectres again. Grabbed the waypoint for the Eternal Laboratory, but I won't be doing maps for a few more levels. Turned all the stuff in to Dialla, blew up the blockage, and grabbed the Barracks waypoint. She gave me the worst itemlevel 64 amulet I've ever seen, but at least it'll go toward a item set.

Seeing no tempests in evidence, I moved on to the Imperial Gardens and grabbed that waypoint, then on into the Library. Monster level goes up to 66 there, which is nice for XP but does mean being a bit more careful. Hit level 69 and ran into Eoin Greyfur, who was an easy kill; he ran over by Sarah, so I used Convocation to gather the horde right next to him and it was over quick. Found the waypoint, but didn't continue just yet to the Archives. I'll go back to lower-level stuff first.

Energizing Tempest in the Barracks, which is fine with me. The horde rolled on through with little resistance up to Gravicius. Usual tactics, let the horde clear his friends while I stayed on the stairs, then walk forward to trigger his attack and just dodge the fire. Used the Vaal Summon Skeletons just to speed things up, but they weren't really needed. No good items from his drop or the quest reward, but he did give me a Carrion Crow divination card, which is my fourth. Traded it in...awful. Oh well.

Freezing Tempest in the Lunaris Temple level 1. Not my favorite, but not really dangerous with my antifreeze flask available. Kind of amusing watching a giant melee between the horde and a bunch of monsters come to a complete halt for a couple of seconds when a tempest goes off in the middle. No trouble with either Fleshrend or Kole, though the latter did get one chain-yank in on Sarah. Quartz flask got me out before he could follow up, though.

I'd rather not face all the miscreations in Lunaris level 2 (and Piety) with any tempest if I can help it, so spent a little while clearing sections of the tempest-free gardens until the winds shifted. Found another strongbox with a unique item, some nice luck, which resulted in a Darkscorn unique assassin bow. Maybe some guild mate will make use of it. Also found an Emperor's Luck divination card.

The tempests disappeared from the Lunaris Temple, so back down to level 2. The tentacle miscreations were out in force. Lost a few zombies on several different occasions when they got caught in a crossfire and I couldn't safely get in position to Enfeeble the enemy, but they never caught Sarah and the rest of the horde always took out enough to make a retreat-resummon-advance tactic work fine. Beat up Spinecrack without incident. Found a Lightbane Raiment unique ornate ringmail on the way, interesting but nothing workable for Sarah.

I feel all right about facing Piety at +4 to zone level, so in we went. She lasted a bit longer than the Cruel version, but not much. Same tactics, skeletotem and Enfeeble with Vaal Summon Skeletons, and then spirits. She changed forms a couple of times, and I had to run around to find her after teleporting (and then dodge away until she attacked a minion). She never got through my ES, though, and no minions went down. Dropped a whole bunch of rares, but none usable. With the skill points, got to the first node of the Leadership cluster.

Back to the Gardens next, and up to open the Sceptre and get rid of this key. Made my way very slowly and carefully through to find the waypoint. Along the way, the horde defeated Armios Bell without me realizing he was there until all his loot dropped, primarily because I was busy dodging all those Undying Evangelist fireblast circles. Caliga was fairly easy because she was waiting through a doorway...I just threw a skeletotem through the door to keep her busy, hid around the corner and cast spirits, repeat with the occasional Convocation so the zombies wouldn't be wiped out. Much easier when you can use the terrain to your advantage, rather than being caught in an open area where the trap lightning goes everywhere. Headed out once I found the waypoint...Dominus can wait a few levels. Or maybe a lot of levels, I'm in no rush.

Back to the Gardens and on the Hedge Maze. Found the plum quickly, got lucky with the correct turns through the maze. Didn't run across the Conqueror Wurm, which is fine with me. Awful ring from Fairgraves, but it finished up a set of items, so I turned 'em all in for a Chaos Orb.

The Library is clear of tempests, so that's the next stop. Found another unique jewel on the way to the Archives, but it's just another Inertia...second one of those that I've found. Headed downstairs, and found 3 of the pages before running into Trinian. Took him down fairly quickly, and hit level 70 just after. Found Tora near the 4th page, so did her mission while I was there. The corrupted rhoas that she had me hunt were tougher than any of the normal monsters, probably all the poison clouds they were leaving behind. Pulled the horde back with Convocation when it looked like the green mist was too thick, and kept everyone upright.

Took the pages back to Siosa and picked up an unset ring for the quest reward, but sadly it wasn't any good. Also used a Vaal Orb to corrupt one of the Inertia unique jewels...hey, it's a challenge objective (even though I know I'll never get them all), and it's not like having two Inertias does me any good. Got a rare jewel out of it, though sadly nothing useful for Sarah. Goes in the guild stash.

Took a look at where I'm at with strength and dexterity, and decided I can afford to drop a little from the passive tree. I want to aim for about 110 of each, to allow equipping pretty much any potential gems or gear that I'd be likely to use. I'm at 124 strength and 134 dexterity without any item bonuses, so I can afford to drop the +20 each from Practical Application, which gives me back 2 skill points. I'm also going to rearrange the tree slightly and drop Elemental Dominion and another 10 strength node, connecting the tree above Lord of the Dead instead. That frees up a total of three points, which I'll use to (finally) get that Grave Intentions cluster. Added bonus, I'm only two points away from another jewel slot, in case I want one later. Here's what the new setup looks like. End result, I lose 4% cast speed, 30 strength, 20 dexterity, and 10 intelligence (and some other stats I don't use) in order to gain the three minion nodes. I'm down to 94 strength, but I've got +30 strength on one of my rings, and even if I swap that out I'm sure I can keep an item with 15 strength equipped somewhere.

I'd like one more level before I start in on level 68 maps, so took the horde down to the Catacombs (no tempest). Mostly straightforward fights, though the occasional rare necromancer was a pain, particularly the ones with cannot-die auras. Ended up doing seven runs in all.

Found Vorici on my second run, with a mission to keep the target on low life for 10 seconds. Didn't have a lot of hope for that one, but figured I'd try, so I pulled the Culling Strike out of the skeleton link and went out to find the target. It was Jonah Unchained, and he ran out to engage the horde without his guards, so I let them beat on him (no spirits, they hit too hard) until the timer appeared. Then beat a hasty retreat and used Convocation to pull the zombies and spectres with me. The mission succeeded, so he must have lasted 10 seconds against the leftover skeletons. When I went back he was dead, so it sure wasn't much longer.

On the fourth run, found an Entombed Chamber corrupted zone, with elemental reflect and power charges. Got through to the end easily enough, but Ossecati did a real number on the zombies. That big smash of his killed half of them, plus he was summoning a whole ton of extra skeletons. So I ended up doing a running battle, backtracking through the zone to raise more zombies while the horde was wearing him down. Found a Sacrifice at Midnight, now I have the whole set...not that I have any intention of using it.

Found another Entombed Chamber on the fifth run, this time with frenzy charges and immunity to curses. Was even more careful with Ossecati since I couldn't Enfeeble him, and again lost many zombies, but was able to keep him at bay and replenish the horde from nearby corpses without needing a fighting retreat. Found a Sacrifice at Dawn.

Hit 71 right at the end of the seventh run. Picked up Leadership with the skill point. Next one will go to the increased aura effect node that I missed up by Sovereignty.

I think I'm ready to brave some maps. I've got 12 white level 68s stashed, so I can run through those until I'm around 74, then think about going after Dominus. I'm going to start by just making them magical with Orbs of Transmutation rather than using Orbs of Chance, because I don't really want rare maps just yet. (And it's cheaper. Save the Chances for higher levels.) I'd rather start off slow.

First up, Fecund Desert Map of Venom (more monster life, poison on hit). Immediately came across a rare Stygian Revenant with soul eater, which took forever to kill. By the time I'd cleared everything around it, the soul eater bonus was already high, and it kept running away and spawning more little guys. Later I ran into a spawn of three rare Stygian Revenants together, and all three at once was easier than that one soul eater guy. Cleared most of the map before I ran into the boss, Mirage of Bones, and it nearly killed me. Those black arrow bolts were taking out zombies left and right, and one hit knocked Sarah down to less than half life (that's about 3500 damage to get through that much ES and life). Gave up and left...I'm stubborn, but not stupid. Think I'll avoid the Desert Maps from now on. Nothing much in the way of drops, though I did find another map to replace this one.

Picked out a Pit Map next and rolled it into a Freezing Pit Map of Smothering (53% extra cold damage, 20% slower recovery). Obviously I'll want to be extra careful with the recovery debuff, but I'm not heavily dependent on regen so it should be OK. Also a Transmogrifying tempest in play, which is annoying but not adding any danger. And it worked fine right up until I found one of those cage areas that locks you in and spawns tons of enemies. The swarms of incoming monsters were just overwhelming, even when I used Vaal Summon Skeletons to take some of the aggro. In retrospect I should have hit my panic logout immediately once Sarah started getting hit, but...hindsight.