Diablo II: Lord of Destruction (commonly abbreviated LoD ) is an expansion pack for the hack and slash action role-playing game Diablo II . Unlike the original Diablo ' s expansion pack, Diablo: Hellfire , it is an official expansion designed by Blizzard North.
More than a standard expansion, Lord of Destruction not only added content in the form of new character classes and an additional scenario, but also dramatically revamped the gameplay of the existing Diablo II for solo and especially multiplayer.
Features
Lord of Destruction adds a number of new features to the core gameplay of Diablo II . These include:
- Two new character classes: the Assassin and the Druid .
- A fifth act taking place in and around Mount Arreat in the northern Barbarian Highlands, with an additional act boss, Baal .
- Many new weapons and new pieces of armor :
- Ethereal items that are more powerful than their standard counterparts, but cannot be repaired.
- Runes can be placed into sockets and provide different bonuses from gems.
- "Runewords" are very powerful bonuses that are granted to an item when specific runes are socketed in a specific order.
- "Jewels" gain the same random bonuses that items can. These can be placed into sockets. They have the same effect no matter what the base item is. Unique jewels are "Rainbow Facets" which have different bonuses to a certain element.
- Charms that can be kept in the inventory and provide passive bonuses.
- Class-specific items that can only be used by a certain character, e.g. Claws for an Assassin.
- Additional unique and set items , including class-specific sets.
- An expanded stash for storing items—twice the size of the original stash.
- An alternate weapon/shield/spell setup that can be switched to via a hotkey in gameplay.
- Hirelings can now follow the player through all the Acts. They can also be equipped with armor and a weapon, can gain experience, can be healed by potions, and can be resurrected when killed.
- The game can now be played at 800x600 resolution, up from 640x480.
Act V Boss Levels
There are several boss monsters in Act V.
The player fights Shenk the Overseer in the Bloody Foothills, just outside Harrogath, who is directly in charge of the siege on Harrogath. The player must also rescue Anya in order to gain a valuable scroll of increased resistances. After Anya, the player also has to find and execute Nihlathak , who is sheltered between his minions in the Halls of Vaught. Before gaining access to the Worldstone Keep, the player must defeat The Ancients , which are the three Barbarians guarding the Worldstone and allowing only the worthy to pass.
Finally, the player fights Baal in The Worldstone Chamber, after killing his pack of minions in the Throne of Destruction. Tyrael appears after Baal is dead, congratulating the player and opening a portal to Destruction's End, the conclusion of the game.
Cow Level
After beating Baal, the player can choose to have access to the Secret Cow Level by transmuting Wirt's leg and a town portal tome in the Horadric cube from inside the Rogue's camp. A portal opens in the camp and any player can use it to enter the Secret Cow Level; a grassy meadow filled with polearm-wielding bovines whose leader is known as the Cow King.
New classes
See also: Diablo II character classesAssassin
The Assassin relies on a mixture of martial arts skills and the ability to lay passive traps. She can also open locked chests without the use of a key.
Her Shadow Disciplines tree contains a mixture of passive bonuses (such as Claw Mastery or Weapon Block ) and buffs (such as Burst of Speed or Venom ), along with a few spells such as Mind Blast which stun and confuse the enemy rather than causing direct damage. She also can summon a Shadow Warrior or Shadow Master , which are useful summons that are also capable of dealing significant damage themselves.
The Traps tree provides a few direct attacks, and more importantly, a number of summonable traps. The traps are stationary devices that will attack any hostile target in range a certain number of times before breaking. Traps are either based on fire or lightning, though the Death Sentry trap can explode nearby corpses in addition to shooting bolts of lightning. The blade trap skills are essentially ranged projectiles that cause physical damage.
The Martial Arts tree consists of charge-up skills and finishing moves. Attacking with a charge-up skill increases the number of charges, up to three, then the finishing move releases the charges in a single powerful blow. The charge-up skills include attacks like Blades of Ice and Fists of Fire , which add elemental damage to the finishing blow, and also skills like Cobra Strike , which adds life and mana stealing to the finishing attack. The finishing blows are, for the most part, kicks, such as Dragon Talon , which releases a number of kicks in quick succession, and Dragon Flight , which teleports on to a target and kicks them, releasing any charges.
Druid
The Druid specialises in nature-based magic, with direct damage spells and a variety of minions. The Druid is voiced by Michael Bell.
The Elemental tree consists of the magic of earth and sky. The 'storm' spells have effects like Cyclone Armor , which protects the Druid from the elements, and Tornado , a vortex of swirling winds that moves somewhat randomly and can deal massive damage. The 'fire' spells are more earthly than the Sorceress's, with spells like Fissure and Volcano . The ultimate Elemental spells are Hurricane and Armageddon ; both create a storm that follows the Druid, damaging all that come too close.
The Summoning tree governs the calling of natural allies to the Druid. While the wolves and grizzly that the Druid can summon are traditional melee summons, the other summoning spells are a bit different. Ravens do marginal damage, but can blind enemies and cannot be targeted. Ravens disappear after they have attacked a certain number of times. The Druid can summon sages that provide Paladin-like Auras, such as increasing attack or life. Druids also can summon one of three vines. These can poison enemies from below, or consume corpses to replenish the Druid's life or mana.
The Shape-Shifting tree gives the Druid the ability to become an animal himself, with gigantic bonuses to life. Druids may either become a nimble Werewolf or a large Werebear . Each form has its own special attacks, such as the Werewolf's Feral Rage , which causes the Druid to get faster and faster as he continues to attack enemies, and the Werebear's Maul , which makes the Druid swing harder and harder as he attacks. It is worth noting that all of the Druid's equipment functions as normal when shifted, if at different speeds, but the druid is virtually unable to cast spells, except for Armageddon and summoning ones.
Critical response
Like its predecessor, Lord of Destruction received extremely positive reviews. It is listed at Metacritic with an average rating of 87 (with one perfect score from Computer Games Online ). It is described at Metacritic as an expansion that "should reinforce the staying power of an already legendary RPG." Gamespot awarded the game an 8.2 out of 10, IGN administered the game an 8.8 out of 10 and Gamespy gave the game an 88 out of 100. The game has also won an award for being in the top 50 most important games of all time according to IGN magazine for its online multiplayer.
Within the Diablo 2 community the expansion caused some controversy when Blizzard patched the original game with a patch that made Nightmare and Hell difficulties particularly harder than before; some players felt that Blizzard was effectively forcing them to upgrade to the expansion in order to find the items and gain the abilities necessary to deal with the new challenges.
Patch history
The expansion was released in Summer 2001 as version 1.07, the same version as the beta, but the 1.08 patch was available for download on the same day. Within a few months, 1.09 was released.
Patch 1.10 was released on October 23 2003. The main change was the introduction of "synergy" bonuses, whereby investing points into one skill would increase the power of a related skill. The difficulty of monsters was increased accordingly, making many previously viable builds almost useless in harder difficulty levels. Many powerful items and r
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