Your army is bigger than mine  

At level 29, i'm still with the 4 Skeletons (Raise Skeletons at level 6), though my Skeleton Mastery is at 21 now, so each skellie does 55 - 56 damage, has 235 of life and an attack rating and defense of 400  

I won't be able to hop online until later tonight (around 8PM).

All good, eastern time I assume? I don't have to work for the next few days (since they decided to cut inventory levels at my plant) so I have a ton of free time this weekend.  I am almost lvl 12 already (pretty easy to lvl when you played the game about a billion times).  Also, I just found this bad ass shield for my necro.  +3 to skeleton mastery and +1 to amplify damage and 2-7 damage over 3 secs.  lol you should see this club I'm using.. It has +27 poison damage over 5 secs.  I'm like a warrior now...

That's a damn fine shield! It should last you a while!

It'll last him a very long time. Mine's pretty similar and I've been using it since it dropped from the Countess (one of my first rares as well):

When I first tried to load D2 it said there were compatibility issues with Windows 7. I just ignored it since it provided me with a worthless link on bnet that didn't talk about it at all. Seems like the only issue is that the videos do not play. I hear the sound from the videos but it is just frozen on the first part of the vid. Not too big of a deal since I already seen them all a long time ago. It would be nice though if everything worked as supposed to.

I also just got done with Act 1.  Took me about 1-2 hours I believe with no help besides my skeletons.  I made a public game at first (when I was lvl 1) and nothing but spam bots entered.  They were all lvl 1 so I assume it would be safe to make a public game with lvl restrictions.

I also wanted to know what merc from Act 2 should I get. It has been awhile but I believe might is pretty good for a summoner necro right? What is the best aura merc for a summoner?

One more thing... Should I invest in a Golem or go skeletons / demons and then pump points into decrepify? I heard you talking about it and it looks like an awesome curse. From what I remember the Golem isn't too good plus it takes away points from making your skeletons bad ass.  I think I'd rather go for skeletons/demons and decrepify curse.

lestatdark said: Mummelmann said: Witch Doctor Endugu just dropped Griswold's Edge and Hailstone Wrap armor! I'm back! I got Griswold's Edge from Duriel, but Hailstrone Wrap is quite a find!. Full Plate Mail correct?

Yeah, full plate! 111 defense and some decent stats. I have all resistances around the 60-ish level now, halfway to level 32. The Council was a walk in the park, did they nerf some bosses in 1.13? Even on "players 8" I kicked their ass hard along with the frost mage. He died once though. Mephisto was also fairly simple, I usually keep my distance since his poison paired with melee can make healing a disaster but when my mage died I simply rushed him and killed him up close. Took a little while but I barely spent a beltfull of potions and my HP was never below 50%.

I do dread the seal bosses in diablo's shrine on "players 8" though... I imagine this is the worst area in all of the original.

I've found a slew of other rare items but none of note. I did find a decent ring though, a unique one that sports 20% mana steal (!) among other things. First truly worthwhile piece of jewelry I've found so far!

Well since now you can re-stat your character, I've been much more careless in how I spend my points. What I plan on doing is use every point I get, try out skills and when I reach level 30 or so, I'll reset him and spend my points more wisely.

I'm still with my Act 1 Cold Arrow mercenary. Act II Normal mercenaries don't have good auras (Prayer, Defiance or Blessed Aim), so I'd rather have someone that can slow enemies down (couple that with Defiance and the enemies slow down to almost nothing). Nightmare Act II mercenaries are the ones you should be looking into for Summonecros. 

Personally I invest a point in Clay Golem and Golem Mastery but only to get Summon Resist. I rarely, if ever, use golems. I'm pumping everything into my skeletons. Decrepify is the curse to go, it slows enemies, cuts their attack in half, makes them take double damage (like Amplify Damage) and it's all kinds of awesome. It's also extremely mana costly (11 per cast at level 1) and only lasts about 4 seconds (it gets better with level), so you'd better have a good mana pool by the time you start using it more often. 

As for your Win 7 problems, have you tried running the game in compatibility mode and under Win 95/98 mode? I'm running in those modes and I've had no problems whatsoever with DII.