Diablo 1 Strategy Guide

Warrior

The Warrior is the first character every newbie should consider starting off with. The Warrior is the best survivor early on in the game and is decent throughout the game. The warrior doesn't have to worry about spells very much. The only spells they really use the most is town portal spell and fire wall. When you find books just sell them to Adria the witch unless it is town portal and you are able or almost able to read it, fire wall, and holy bolt which is really good against King Leoric. When you level up early on put most of your points to strength and vitality. Their skill for repairing items helps a lot early on in the game, later don't use repair skill to repair your really good equipment, just go to Griswold to repair it. I find that early on in the game get a Large Axe as soon as you get 600 bucks. A large axe can really do some serious damage early on in the game and make things much easier for a while. Try to get a cap with pretty good armor also. You might get lucky and Griswold might sell you a leather armor 13 for 300 bucks which is really nice. Armor 11 or 12 is also okay. Sell all the scrolls you get besides, town portal and identify. You also might need to buy some few town portal scrolls earlier on in the game. In the later game get rid of your axe and start getting a sword and shield. The bastard sword is the best 1-handed sword. When you get swords, try to get +damage to it. Later on try to find a Full Plate Mail, if anything try to get +armor to it. Warriors are able to wear Full Plate Mails the earliest out of the 3 character classes. Really later in the game, like level 35 you should have gotten the King's Sword by then and have gotten a pretty good armor. The best sword in the game in my opinion for the warrior is the King's Sword of Haste, which can kill things very quickly and you are able to level up faster. Overall the Warrior is the Worst of the 3 classes when it comes to leveling up the fastest. And once they reach level 35 or so, you basically want to quit on them because they get boring and they work pretty slow. But I think Warriors are fun to use early on. The highest I got a Warrior was level 39.

Rogue

Rogue's are for the intermediate player. They are not that hard to use, but probably a little more harder then the warrior. As a Rogue you start off with a bow. Rogues should stick with bows throughout their whole life. With a combination of their bow and the spells they do, they can easily level up quicker than the warrior. As with the warrior try to get a cap with good armor and leather armor later on. One thing I don't like about the rogue is the fact that you got to keep going back to town to repair the bow that you use all the time. Later on you get bows that have higher durability which makes it last longer. Never use bows that have higher attack rate, such as swiftness, etc. Rogues can't fire a bow any faster than they normally do. Try to get damage or ATT's for a bow. Rogues have to rely on mana and life hit points. If your mana becomes much higher then your life points use MANA shield. Early on use fire bolt, lightning and fire wall and try to get holy bolt for king leoric. Later on use fire ball, chain lightning a little bit all the while using your bow. Later on when you get to hell is when the game starts to get tough for a rogue. You have to be quick and think smart of what spell to use for the enemies you're fighting. Always use hot keys for your spells, you can configure them from f5-f8. Try to get resist magic lighting and fire when you get to hell. That helps all 3 classes very well. When you get to Level 35 you should have gotten a Long War Bow with +damage to it and a Full Plate Mail with +armor to it. Rogues can level up faster than the warrior and is less boring than the warrior later on. Usually when Rogues reaches early 40's they usually just quit on them. The highest I got a rogue was level 41. I never really got into a rogue that much as I did with a Sorcerer.

Sorcerer

Sorcerer's are for the experienced players who have already played with the warrior or rogue a little bit. They are difficult to control most of the time because their main attacking weapon is spells. Sorcerers die easily at the beginning of the game, but get tougher as the game progresses. Staves are very important early on in the game. In my opinion the staff recharge skill is the best skill in the game, it allows you to keep having charges with the staff you are using and makes the staff last a lot longer. Charge bolt is the staff you start off with. Other good staves you can find early on is the staff of fire bolt, and holy bolt which can REALLY help you out a lot, and lightning staff, lightning has to be the best staff early on. Never buy staves from Adria. Adria sells expensive magical staves which are not that important at all, basic staves with charges you find in the labyrynth are just as good. When you start try to get a cap with good armor and leather armor later on. Books are very important for a sorcerer, read every book you get. Early on you should use charge bolt, fire bolt, and holy bolt. Later on you should be using lightning. Then even more later you should be using fire ball, and chain lightning as your main spells. When you level up put all your points to magic and some to strength. Don't put any to vitality!, you should get mana shield later and won't even need life hit points. You could put a few to dexterity, but it's not that necessary. When you have about 30 base strength start putting all your points to distribute to magic.

When I first started to use the sorcerer I thought they sucked and were nothing compared to the warrior. But I realized later that the sorcerer was awesome and the warrior sucked. The biggest and most important thing for a sorcerer to survive is Mana Shield spell. When the sorcerer gets the mana shield spell for the first time they turn from a wus to a really strong character. Mana shield allows them to have their mana points also count as their life points. That means sell all of your life potions and stop buying them, start buying all mana potions. From about level 1 - 30 or so only buy regular mana potions, don't buy full mana potions it wastes money. If you find full mana potions in the game that's excellent. Try to get mana shield spell as SOON as possible. If the witch is selling the mana shield book really early on and you have the money to buy it, buy it. Although you should find it somewhere in the catacombs. Finding mana shield scrolls is great, also buy Mana Shield scrolls from the witch if you don't have the spell yet. Use mana shield scrolls WISELY. Don't proceed to the caves without mana shield unless you want to have a really hard time down there. Mana shield, chain lightning, and fireball are the 3 most powerful spells for a sorcerer.

Once you get Mana Shield spell, every time time you enter a level turn it on immediately. As with a sorcerer you NEED to use hot keys for changing your spells. f5 - f8 are your hot keys. You should use hot keys for a characters whole life, that means level one and up. When you go in the church for the first time you should have hot keys for: staff of charge bolt, spell of fire bolt and recharge staff skill and any healing scrolls you get. Healing scrolls are better than potions because they heal more of your life than potions do, use potions if you need to get your life refilled fast right in the middle of a battle. Once you get healing spell change your healing scroll hot key to healing spell. If you find a staff of fire bolt change your hot key for fire bolt spell to staff of fire bolt. Use all your staves until they have no more charges, remember to use recharge staff skill once they get low in charges. Once you get lightning staff or spell make a hot key for it instead of charge bolt. Lighting is MUCH better than charge bolt. Every level up to lightning makes the lightning longer and more powerful, same thing applies to chain lightning, except the higher chain lightning level gets, the smarter it gets, for example the further the enemy is, the better chances a lightning streak will go to it. Later on the next step from fire bolt is fire ball. Every book of fire ball is very important for a sorcerer, every time you level up fire ball its damage goes up tremendously. I had sorcerers that had fire ball damages of over 1000. When you get fire ball, exchange your hot key from fire bolt to fire ball. When you get chain lighting you still may want to stick to your regular lightning spell for a while, as your lightning spell should be a higher level when you get chain lightning. Use chain lightning when its level reaches lvl 3 or so.

With good control and quick thinking, a sorcerer can level up faster and survive better than a warrior and a rouge in the church and and cats, etc. A good player can beat the church without even getting hit much at all. The spells can kill everything fast, and won't even let an enemy come near you before you kill it. I find that early in the game a buckler is awesome for a sorcerer. A sorcerer can swing a buckler as fast as a warrior can swing his sword, and have a better chance to hit too. Use a buckler to attack (with no sword) if you don't have a staff with charges early on, TRUST me it works. Later on stop using staves and start using a sword and shield. And try to get lots of items that give you plus strength points. Sorcerers have the hardest time trying to wear a gothic plate or full plate mail, as their max strength is only 45, you have to find an additional plus 45 strength points from rings and equipment you wear, so you can wear a Full Plate Mail. The best weapon for a sorcerer is the Dreamflange. I actually found the Dreamflange while playing with a sorcerer. Sorcerers become powerhouses really later in the game. Later in the game you should start using teleport instead of walking. That's right, teleport should be your only means of transportation later on in the game, and should be one of your hotkeys too. Sorcerers have the easiest time getting there stuff back after dying, unlike warriors and rogues, they have to use weapons (swords&bows) to kill the enemies to get back to their stuff, all sorcerers have to do is use their spells. Sorcerers always have action going on and they never get boring. That means players can actually get there level to 50 and even want to keep playing them. Sorcerers work the fastest and level up REALLY fast. The only 4 things sorcerers need to improve and worry about after they get Mana Shield spell is1. getting spells and using them 2. bringing up their Mana 3.Getting there Armor Class high, and 4. Resisting fire, lightning, and magic. Sorcerers are my favorite of the 3 classes to choose from. The highest I ever got a sorcerer was level 48. But then I got pissed off when my Diablo folder got deleted and all my characters went by-by. I was actually going to get him to level 50. I got other sorcerers pretty far. I got one to level 46,42,38,and another one to 35, and have gotten over 20 sorcerers past level 20, so that shows you that I have lots of experience with sorcerers.

Other tips that will make you become a better Diablo player

- There is a trick when using scrolls.  Select the scroll in your quick spellbook, then when using it, rapidly spam the button quickly and you will end up using more than one use of the scroll.  For example from one Fire Wall scroll, you can throw up 2-3 Fire Walls, which helps a lot in certain circumstances.  The same applies to any other scroll.

- When dying use Telekinesis to pick up your stuff behind walls where demons can't get to you

- You can keep walking by holding down the move button

- Always have the auto map on when you play

- Before going down to the next stage make sure you have cleared all of the map you are currently on

- Kill every enemy on the map before you proceed to the next map

- Pick up all the gold on the ground the enemies drop, and all the other items that are on the ground

- Kill all the barrels and pick up anything that comes out of them, EXCEPT if you are a sorcerer, because barrels kill them easily. Only kill barrels when you're a sorcerer if you have plenty of life points and there isn't too many barrels lined up around you, or if you are like level 15 or so and you are powerful and don't get hurt badly by them.

- Open all chests and stuff you can open, and collect their goodies

- Use your potions wisely. Don't bother to buy "full" potions until later on in the game and you are rich.

- Keep going back to town when you need to, to sell, repair, and buy stuff

- When you get down to Hell or even caves make sure that you resist the stuff the enemies are throwing at ya

- use hot keys, my hot keys are as follow: F5= a lightning spell, F6= mana shield, town portal F7= healing, holy bolt or teleport F8= a fire spell. For example later in the game I use: F5= Chain Lightning F6= Mana Shield F7= Teleport F8= Fire Ball. I use that for a Sorcerer.

- 2 words: DON'T CHEAT!

- Don't use any Trainer, that just takes the fun away from this great game.

Bosses

- Butcher Found on level 2. A big clue to beating the butcher is fire wall. By the time you get to the butcher you probably don't have the spell of fire wall yet, but scrolls are just as good. Buy scrolls of fire wall from the witch if you can't find any in the labyrinth. Open up the butcher's door then throw up several fire walls inside of the butcher's room right up next to the door, then close the door. The Butcher can't open up the door and will die if the fire wall lasts long enough. If you don't have fire wall, then its going to be really tough. If you have another friend with you, the best bet is double or triple teaming on him. Warriors should use a large axe, Rogues should have at least a hunters bow, and Sorcerers should pump out fire bolts at them. Remember the butcher can't open up doors, so getting behind grates and firing at him is a good tactic. NOTE: when teaming up with friends it's a good idea to dupe items that the bosses drop, so everyone can have the item.

- King Leoric Found on level 3. The king can be very scary at times. The best way to beat him is by using holy bolt. If you don't have holy bolt then don't even bother to face him unless you have an AC of about 35 and have a damage of over 20. Rogues can easily beat them by using a bow of the bear which knocks the king back and lets you keep on hitting him without getting hurt.

- Lazarus Found on level 15. Hopefully by the time you get there you will have stone curse. Simply stone curse Lazarus and kill him. Sorcerers should use fire balls to kill him. Make sure that you resist fire before facing him.

- Diablo Found on Level 16. Throw everything you got at him. Sorcerers should use fire balls, if you don't have fire ball then use holy bolt. Make sure that you have a good AC and that you resist fire.

multiplayer Shrines and if you should go to them or not.

Shrines play an important part in improving a characters life.  If it says GOOD, then that means its okay to go to it. If it says BAD then leave it alone. Try to memorize the shrines before you play.

Abandoned - GOOD - +2 to Dexterity

Creepy - GOOD - +2 to Strength

Eerie - GOOD - +2 to Magic

Quiet - GOOD - +2 to Vitality

Cryptic - GOOD - casts nova spell and refills your mana

Divine - GOOD - restores both health and mana and you get some free potions

Eldritch - GOOD - all potions becomes rejuvenation potions

Enchanted - GOOD - 1 spell goes down a level, all others go up 1 level. MY FAVORITE SHRINE!

Glimmering - GOOD - identifies all unidentified items

Holy - GOOD - casts phasing spell. sometimes annoying

Magical - GOOD - casts mana shield spell

Religious - GOOD - repairs all your items for you

Spiritual - GOOD - all empty slots are filled with a little cash

Spooky - GOOD - all other players playing gets their hit points refilled

Stone - GOOD - renews mana and recharges staffs

Thaumaturgic - GOOD - closes and refills all chests

Bad Shrines (leave them alone)

Fascinating - BAD - permanent mana loss, gain 2 level to fire bolt

Hidden - BAD - takes 10 dur. from one item to another

Mysterious - BAD - one ATT gets 5, the others get -1

Ornate - BAD - permanent mana loss, gain 2 levels to holy bolt

Sacred - BAD - permanent mana loss, gain 2 level to charged bolt

Secluded - BAD - reveals the current map. you cant tell where you've been or not if you go to this.

Tainted -BAD - effects all players in the game. just don't bother with it.

Others

Cauldron - BAD - random effect of a shrine. don't take the chances of getting something good, it might be bad!

Goat Shrine - BAD - random effect of a shrine. basically the same thing as a cauldron.

Fountains

Blood fountain - GOOD - drink it and your hit points go up

Purifying Spring - GOOD - drink it and your mana goes up

Murky Pool - GOOD - casts infravision spell

Fountain Of Tears - BAD - -1 to one stat, +1 to some others