So yesterday I collected not just all 9 keysets, but 2 sets (or 18 keys). I tried to mine organs with my barb, and did fine, but the minute I got Lillith I was handed my ass twice in a row and 10-20 purps later I had no idea how I'd take her out. DUH, then I pulled the uber-mining smiterdin out and was happy to find he made short work of her (though I also used barb's bo to boost him for the job, he seemed fine w/o it). I collected the pieces quickly after I realized my mistake of relying exclusively on the barb.
I tweaked my gear with resists, researched online, and put together a strategy to hit ubers. I decided to risk not making an exile pally shield - partially because of it's low resists, facing the risk of lower defense and less % life tap curse. Ok, mostly because I was too cheap to invest the runes which would represent 1/4 to 1/3 of my entire high-level stash. I decided on Tgod's belt rather than dungo, almost didn't decide on boots due to competing strengths, and watched a yootoob vid or 2 to check out strats for isolating the ubers. I asked a question to my flist, and a summoner necro (old school) responded he could provide backup. Done.
So I loaded the tv computer up to transfer the organ set, then switched with my barb, hit the main computer with the smiterdin, and opened the uber tristam portal. I tp'd to frigid and did cries before exiting the barb, then dove the smiterdin into uber tristam. No bosses were near the portal so I took out the lords, skels, & archers with no issue. I wanted to lure meph first, but instead got both B&D. I hit baal first, and to my joy life tap hit pretty quick and I was able to take almost no damage thanks to my resists (meph was still out of range). Unfortunately, my dumbass forgot to load blues so I got mana-sucked fast - but I gulped some full rejuvs and wasn't taking damage otherwise so that was painless. B&D fell, I wiped up some minions, and ran to switch for some blues. Then I tried to lure meph out, but got him stuck in a building. I wasn't taking much damage and my necro friend was there in the back with a full army so I decided to grow a pair and run in after him. This actually worked well as ranged attackers were behind walls while I wailed on meph up close and personal. If he was whipping me I'd be screwed trying to collect my body, but I never even drank a potion as life tap hit fast, bo had my life over 3k, and he just sat there - convict and all - and let me sliver him down. He dropped a mid-range necro torch with almost the same stats as my current traded necro torch.
I then got a call from my gf who didn't sound like she shared my priorities regarding solo-ing ubers to land another torch. I talked to her as if I didn't see the organ set burning a hole in my horocube and the decaying skels around my stash.
My necro-summon army buddy offered help but I decided to solo with the 2nd set. Solo-ing was pretty uneventful, and I landed a mid-range zon torch. My bowazon with full mav set now has a torch to boot, which may yet make up for the low damage of that set weapon.
Now I'm torn on whether I should keep trying to run nihla with my orb/hydra sorc, holding the barb in tow for bo and the increased difficulty leading to higher drop rates, or just do regular mf and even botted baal runs to land items to trade for keys. I can nail count & summon no problem, but the low drop rate on nihla plus the time to run him w/o drinking 4-5 purps is making uber runs untennable. I guess I don't really need mroe as I have necro, zon, and barb torches - but sorc is likely the most important of all even with tal's set. It might be more efficient to trade for a sorc torch than to mine keys and hope for the 1/6 chance of getting one and then within that of 1/3 of it being what I want.
I also should take the time to play some relaxing games - sometimes I forget how much fun my necro's army is.
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