Act 5. Things should get easier ;).

The Bloody Hills are relaxing after the battles in Act 4. UltraLow is rarely attacked with all the babarians tanking for him :).

Time to try the Smite/Crushing Blow combo on Shenk (I had swapped in Crushflange (33% CB) for Rusthandle before starting Act 5). Oh man this works great. Thx Ian for that great tip, I really should have tried it earlier. Once the critters around Shenk are gone, make Shenk turn green and start treating him with Smite. It hits all the time despite the huge level difference, knockbacks and stuns even Bosses quite often, allowing them to land only a few attacks. The only problem is the lack of mana - leech doesn't work with Smite. Mana costs are only 2 at any slvl, but UltraLow's low mana pool will allow only 23 Smite attacks. Again the 20% dmg goes to mana from Angelic Wing has to help.

Eldrich was the next test for Smite. He spawned LE, but I managed to let UltraLow attack him at a certain angle preventing the sparks to hit him (Still using the PDiamond Steelclash, resists are 75/75/75/19 in Smite gear).

  Lvl 23 Frigid Highland
I stopped resurrecting the merc more or less - low life and fire resists makes him an easy target for the Demon Imps. I only needed him to open some of the poison immune doors to complete the quest.

A Moon Lord boss pack showed up near the entrance to the Frozen River. LE/spectral hits. It was a bit hard as there was no save place to retreat except going back to the Crystalline Passage, but again Smite helped a lot. Same with the next Moon Lord Boss - Extra strong/Cursed. Poisoned him, knocked him around with Smite, he gave up without landing a single hit :). Same thing with Frozenstein. What an improvment compared to the pain with Abnominables in Normal difficulty !

  Lvl 24 Halls of Pain
Before starting the way down to Nihlathak, I decided to say goodbye to the Arctic set pieces, and equip some of the end game gear: Twitchthroe (PRuby), Sander's Riprap, a rare Demonhide Shash with +37 life, 29% lightning resists and 24% FHR - hurray a belt with 4 rows finally ! Bloodfist and Wall of the Eyeless for the merc and some charm improvments lead to 805 life, 57 mana, 1426 AR with Blessed Aim and 66/39/74/-20 resists (Ranger setup).

Pindleskin was a bit hard to beat for UltraLow (Poison Immune/ Cursed/FE). You know already how it was done ... Nihlathak required some time, and I did not took the risk to nail him down with Smite - poison had to do the job. Seems I still prefer a cautious playing style after all.

To have different options to attack critters has brought back some fun to the game. So the travel from the Crystalline Passage waypoint to the entrance of Arreat Summit was more than just a trial of patience. I skipped the Frozen Tundra more or less - Sanders Riprap and lvl 2 Vigor allowed UltraLow to pass it in less than two minutes :).

Ok now let's face the Nightmare Ancients at lvl 24. Suicide you say ? I have a different opinion. After some preparations (dropping some healing potions and all mana/rejuvs kept in stash on the ground) UltraLow triggered them. In Smite gear of course. Attack Korlic first. Hmm his life isn't dropping as fast as I expected. One successfull Smite Crushing Blow seems to take less than 1/10 life from him. Time to change tactics (the merc is dead already as expected). Try to hit them with poison arrows and run is the other option. And switch from Blessed Aim to Vigor before running out of stamina. The flexibility of a Paladin is really cool :). Madawc has no poison resists, so he is the first victim to creeping death. Korlic's life has dropped to half from the Smite attacks, he is next. Talic turned golden last and made UltraLow's a conquering hero - well not really, as you have to be lvl 40 to complete the quest :-/. BTW surviving the battle required 23 healing potions and only 1 rejuv.

  Lvl 25 Worldstone Keep II
UltraLow was close to lvl 25 when entering Arreat Summit, and a few critters in WK2 got him the lvl (an other of my chars had to give him the waypoint). This will activate the leveling pace overdrive.

I took a short look at WK I, but went back immediatly - Defiled Warriors are poison immune. As compensation to not getting the Ancients quest by killing them solo I decided to skip WK I.

  Lvl 26 Worldstone Keep III
WK II alone was good for gaining nearly one level, and so would be WK III. But I found the way to the Throne of Destruction soon and skipped half of it.

Those Death Lords hurt quite a bit, especially when cursed by Succuby. UltraLow could fight no more that two at the same time. But he had to fight them, as I wanted to clear all of ToD to have some space to retreat to.

Let's trigger the first wave. Colenzo is a laugh even for UltraLow. Not so Achmel: Multishot ! When poisoned by him (-20 resists in Ranger gear, 14 in Smite gear), the red bubble drops to zero in about 5 seconds. TPed out for some Antidote potions from Malah. Hmm let's try to Smite him. The knockback/stun doesn't work good enough to prevent him from sticking poison on UltraLow, so this is a dangerous thing. 8 Antidote and a bunch of rejuv/healing potions later Achmel's life is down to a quarter. Time to change tactics. Of course Achmel is immune to poison, so UltraLow had no other option left: run away and take the rest of his life away with the tiny non poison dmg of the bow.

Bartuc isn't much easier: LE/FE. I tried to Smite him, but a close to death experiance when hit by the nasty sparks changed my mind. A longish runaway chased by a green monster which only stops sometimes for a selfheal has to do it. And like the Council Members in Act 3 Bartuc stops the healing after 5 or 6 times, allowing UltraLow to proceed to the next waves.

  Lvl 27 Throne of Destruction
Ventar and his pals had to feel the power of Smite. They weren't too much of a problem, and so was Lister and his gang. Of course UltraLow had to distract them, but once they are chilled by the merc's attacks, Smite and then poisoned arrows killed all of them. And of course Smite/Thorns was the number one attack against Baal too. I could have tried the poison route, but the resists were much better in Smite gear, so UltraLow just ran up to him clearing away the last obstacle on his way to become Conqueror at lvl 27.