I haven't done a spot report in for-bloody-ever, so herewith and theretofore and all like that there, is an account of young Beobear's doings this very day.
YOUR CONNECTION HAS BEEN INTERRUPTED was an all too common visual. Followed by the Black Screen of Might As Well Reboot. I refused to let these minor setbacks cool my enthusiasm (aka bloodymindedness) for leveling Beobear the Barking Barb to a point and an Act where barking might begin to pay dividends. Starting from scratch in A4 Normal, at level 25 he was given to whimpering when faced with packs of Burning Souls in the Plains, but having handily cleared the Outer Steppes I felt he was putting it on a bit and needed to just grit his teeth and grunt. Izual raced up quite early on in the OS, and Beobear prudently teased him onto the entryway steps where Izzy was easy pickings for him and his rogue merc, Whatshername. He uses a mix of Concentrate and whatever that cry is that lowers monster defenses, not War Cry but the one just two down from the first yell. (If anyone ever expects intellegible spot reports from me, you're in for a wealth of disappointment.) He sometimes switches to Leap Attack, but Concentrate, that idea so alien to the Barbarian Soul that its practice is termed a "skill", delivers the goods for Beobear at this stage in his life, and looks a keeper for some ways into the future.
So anyway, he grunted and thought really hard through the Izual problem and went on to clear the Plains of Burning Souls and similar affronts, much to his and my surprise. Into the City of the Damned, and I assured him he was doing fine and didn't need to level up more first, whatever he thought (No, I don't have issues with disassociative personality, why do you ask?) and now Abyss Mages made his life a misery with their huge, shooting blobs of colourful pain. However, he did level up to 26 and that cheered him no end, and he sank a few stat points into vitality and a skill point into Iron Skin. (I forget what he did with his Izzy points, think one to Concentrate and one to a prereq for War Cry, it's not important, there's no plan here, I'm really not very good at all this.)
Grunt, grunt, grunt, think! and with visions of the Music Man floating through my brain, Beobear picks up the waypoint and wanders down the stairs to the River of Flame. There's a lot of Grotesques and their Wyrms, plus Stranglers and the occasional Pit Lord, and Beobear crosses a bridge to another section and his quest button appears. Hm, wonder what that could signify, eh?
While I'm wondering, Beobear is jogging, an effort that costs him, boy has no stamina, to a safe place for casting a town portal. Back to the fray, the minions are strung out (a Pit Lord bosspack is paying a call on Hephaisto, isn't that nice and sociable?) and one of them drops Bonesnap. Beobear tries that on for a bit, it makes him look so slim and trim, but before he can tease Hephie out, YOUR CONNECTION HAS BEEN INTERRUPTED and try as I might, I cannot get back onto USWest, let alone back into my game.
I accept this philosophically, I don't know if my boy is dead or alive or if he even gets to keep the gains he's made this morn, but such is the Way of Battlenet and no use getting excited. Lot of people have lost more to lag than I stand to right now, after all. So I get a bit of lunch, read a book, play with my cat, and a few hours later, try again.
There's Beobear, in full regalia, Bonesnap in his hot little hands, so I figure I've dodged the bullet. Back into the fray. Orchid pops on after a short time, and we have a nice chat before she hoves off to nightmare games with her uebermensch character. More grunting through the OS, to warm up on, and YOUR CONNECTION HAS BEEN INTERRUPTED. This time, I end up back in the chat screen. My game is garbled, password no match game name, (sigh) start another and YOUR CONNECTION HAS BEEN INTERRUPTED.
This is getting old, and I'm glad I'm not trying to mule anything. However, it proved to be the last foolishness of the session, and Beobear went on to the RoF again, stopping long enough in the City to pick up another level.
Maw Fiends, Pit Lords and Stranglers are the order of the day, and after a bit Hephaisto wanders out of a side canyon, his feet covered in a swirling green aura. "Ick!" is my response, as Beobear has enough trouble hitting things anyway, but as he's carefully lured out most of the lesser beings in the area and disposed of them (grunt. Grunt!), he's able to focus solely on Hell's speedy smith. The gems of the forge aren't that exciting, so onward and, well, onward.
All along the way, he's been picking up and saving mana potions, and cubing them with minor healings from Jamella into rejuvs, and the rejuvs into full rejuvs. By the time he stolidly stumps his way through the bridgey bit before the CS, he's gotten about nine of the full rejuvs stored away. It's not a lot, but it'll have to do.
In the CS, there's the usual assortment of OKs, Stranglers and Venom Lords. Whatshername dies a couple of times. Annoying, but as Beobear now travels with town portals on the right mouse button, he's able to escape at will. A jolly good thing, too, since despite working his resists up to as high as he can, the OKs are still hurting him badly and suddenly. He tries Leap Attack for awhile, in hopes of getting around the Iron Maiden curse, but with only limited success. The idea is to actually kill the monsters, and with but one point in LA, that's not on.
He carefully creeps about from one area to the next, waking as few monsters at a time as he can, and in this way clears the CS. Might as well do His Elemental Ugliness first, so he pops the centre seal for Lord de Seis.
My experience with this fight, indeed most fights, is with Amazons, and I was almost confounded by confronting de Seis with a Barbarian, instead of being able to strategically pick a place to hang back in, and target him from afar. Beobear had to tunnel through the minions to get to de Seis, who kept running away.
Then it was down to the right hand arm to pick up the Infector of Souls. The first Seal brought them down and Beobear left the second alone to use as his Diablo trigger. Whatshername lived through this fight, and they jogged waaaaaay across to the left hand arm to finish up with the Grand Vizier. Whatshername dies, and a minion escaped into the fiery void, but there it was—a lone Seal stood between Beobear and Diablo and (possibly) a ticket out of Hell.
I was just waiting for YOUR CONNECTION HAS BEEN INTERRUPTED, but it didn't happen. Beobear ressurrected Whatshername, then loaded his rejuvs, swapped out his rings/ammy for the best resistance combo, still the game persisted.
Right, then. Shall we try Bonesnap? Okay, Bonesnap it is. Portal back and pop the last Seal.
By the time the screen had quit shaking, Beobear was already well into the first row of potions. Ouch! Bonesnap lists lovely damage in the char screen, but one does have to hit first, doesn't one? Slow as molasses normally, it's way too slow when chilled. Swap to mace & shield mid-fight, and try to keep up.
Last full rejuv drunk, Whatshername long dead, Beobear dashes (okay, lumbers) for his portal. He fills up on the super healings lying by his stash, resurrects Whatshername, and jumps back in.
More success this time, Diablo is definitely hurting and Whatshername stays alive (*poink* *poink* *poink*). But the potions run out and so it's back to the Fortress for more.
In the CS, seems Diablo is getting wind of this strategy (if Beobear's panicked grunting and running can be so graced) and is doing things that hurt even more. Beobear's going through potions by the bucket, Whatshername is a dim and distant memory, and when he runs out and dives for the portal, it's been bone-prisoned!
Luckily I recollect the right mouse button in time and cease trying to beat a way through the bones and just cast another, but it was a near thing. A bare sliver of life left. Another beltload from the impassive Jamella, gather in the merc, and back we go.
Bye, merc! Diablo is down to no life, but whatever he's doing is excruciatingly painful to Beobear, and despite everything he has to retreat once more.
Rinse and repeat. He's got gold and to spare, so it's no bother on that score. I remind him that he does have to hit the monsters sometimes, before they'll lose health, and he promises to swish less and connect more.
Three-quarters through this beltload, and all the way through Whatshername, Diablo finally gives it up for my boy. His drop is two pair of rare Assassin thingies (why don't class-specific items sell for more than a pittance?) and a rare Jared's Stone. Plus blue chain gloves and throwing spear. Whatever—Beobear and I are happy nonetheless to gather it in, sell it off, resurrect Whatshername and portal on to Harrogath. A few Bloody Hills sessions, and Beobear will be on top of his game once more.
(No one and nothing deigned to cough up anything much when barked. Shame, that.)