Diablo II: Lord of Destruction (Version 1.09)
For DOS/Windows
Written by Zabunny

[Reanimated Horde Exploit Guide Version 1.03]



This guide is protected by international copyright laws. This is original
work by me, Zabunny, and may not be copied in any way, shape or form.
This guide may not be reproduced, altered, or used elsewhere under any
circumstance whatsoever. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.


1. What Is It?
2. What You Need
3. Let's Do It
4. Rumors/Additional Information
5. Credits


The "Reanimated Horde Exploit" is a game exploit (duh) in the Diablo II Expansion
Set. An exploit is something in a game that is a potentially unfair and therefore
abused mistake or feature that is used to ones' personal advantage. In this case,
you can rake up a literally unlimited amount of items, experience, and gold using
a simple tactic. It is called the Reanimated Horde Exploit, after the enemy that
is used to accomplish this task. They appear in different locations around Act V;
in the Halls of Vought, the Worldstone Keep Level 1, or any other number of places.
However, they are most numerous in the Halls of Pain, near where you find Nihlatak.
A Reanimated Horde has a different name, depending on where it's found. The
following names for this creature are: Rot Walker, Reanimated Horde, Prowling
Dead, Unholy Corpse, or Defiled Warrior. They are undead creatures each in the
shape of a human skeleton wearing leather armor of some sort, and gray rags.
They also carry a large sword, which they tend to drag behind them as they walk. 

What makes these things so interesting is that after you kill them, in about ten
seconds or so after death, they stand up again and continue fighting. (That is,
unless you shattered them with an ice attack, a Barbarian used a Warcry on them,
or a Necromancer blew up their corpses, etc.). Also, unlike the Devilkins found in
Act 1, you can kill them as many times as you want, and they will keep giving you
items and experience!

Abbreviation note: "RH" means "Reanimated Horde."

Here are the most effective characters to use, etc:

1) A lot of Firewall Sorceresses with a lot of magic find. This, of course, is
so you can rip through enemies and reap incredible treasures!

2) A Barbarian with any level of the Grim Ward Warcry (a higher level is
preferrable so that it lasts longer, and you don't need to permanently kill
too many RHs)

The reason for using a Sorceresses in particular, instead of any other character
class, is that Firewall kills extremely quickly and efficiently. Also, since
Sorceresses don't physically attack, a Sorceress could use magic-find gear and
weapons, and not have to worry about their attack power. Plus-to-skills items
are not an issue here if you have Firewall and Fire Mastery maxed out. It's
perfectly fine to use any other character class instead, but Fwall Sorcs generally
kill fastest. Hey, you wanna be efficient with your time, right? ^_^


This section will discuss exactly how to do this easy trick. Go into the Halls
of Pain, but do _not_ kill anything. Have the Barbarian run out all over the map
and round up monsters using Grim Ward (this will require killing a monster to
"Grim" it's corpse). Since the Halls of Pain are in a maze-like format, you can
easily block off monster's exits with Grim Ward, like so:

g = Grim Ward
B = Barbarian
S = Sorceress
x = Enemies (Reanimated Hordes, of course)
---> = Marks an arrow (where they're going)

g   xxxxxxxx ---> B
g   xxxxxxx 
g   xxxxx
++++++++| g g g g |+++++++++++

As you can see from this diagram, the Barbarian needs to kill just
a few enemies, like one or two behind the enemies, and then raise Grim Wards
from their corpses. You can lead the enemies _exactly_ where you want them to
go by blocking off exits with Grim Ward. They're totally afraid of those things,
so they'll avoid them. Essentially, they're just running from the Grim Wards, but
also following your Barbarian. With your Barbarian, you need to take them into a
bend like this, to meet up with the Sorceresses:

+++++++++++|     (S)(S)(S) ++
            (S)(B) g  g  g ++
                  g xxxxxx ++
             (S)  g xxxxxx ++

The Grim Wards act like a wall. The Reanimated Hordes would never walk near them, but
Terror will be continuously be cast from the Grim Wards, which keeps them packed into
that corner. All the Sorceresses need to do is continuously cast Firewall over the
entire area, and every once in a while the Barbarian may have to use a corpse to
recast Grim Ward.

Reanimated Hordes will live, die, live, die, and so on. They never _really_ die
unless you shatter them or cast Grim Ward on them. So, you can continue this
exploit as long as you want, provided you still have corpses to cast Grim Ward on.

That's about it as far as the guide goes. I hope you enjoy this trick, but don't
abuse it too much! ^_^

 _ _ _            _ _ _
*_-_-_END OF GUIDE_-_-_*

4. Rumors/Additional Information

The following section contains e-mail messages that I found particularly
important or interesting. All these messages relate to the facts or
information presented in this guide. If a message is labeled [UNCONFIRMED],
it's unconfirmed and could very well be incorrect. But we'll never know until
it is tested by someone. Outside opinion is always appreciated, so if you know
some of these people are wrong (or right!) tell me and I'll add it to the
next version of the guide. Some questions are not labled with [CONFIRMED] or
[UNCONFIRMED]. These are simply questions or statements that I have
responded to. Whew! Anyway, here's the stuff.

"It is in fact true that the reanimated corpses do regenerate after 10 seconds
or so, but it just so happens that not 100% of them regenerate.  After you kill a
group of say 20, it has been tested that aproximately 33.3%-50% ressurect, the other
half just stay dead.  So that means, you could do this for a while, but after about
3 rounds, they will all be dead."

* Zabunny's findings:
"I have noticed as well that not all of them regenerate. This could be a new
feature implemented in D2LOD Version 1.09, but I won't be sure until I check
this a bit more."

* from black_quagmire:
"Although i understand what your saying i think your making the process way
to complicated. All you have to do is find a sorc and go down to where ever the
creaturs are hanging out. Get the undead dudes to follow your sorc around the maze
like halls untill you come to a bend in a river. Make sure that the creatures are
on the inside of the bend. If you do it right the creaturs will be stuck on the
other side of the river and you can fw them to death as many time as you would
like with out sacrificing them to grim ward."

* Zabunny's findings:
"That is correct. There are a few ways to use the exploit, but the one I wrote
about is the most popular. Though your method works, I prefer to use the Grim
Ward method because sometimes the Reanimated Hordes just wander off when they're
offscreen like that. It's weird, I know, but it does tend to happen."

* from Morgan524:
"have found that they get back up about 3 times and then wont anymore... did
they fix this?"

* Zabunny's findings:
"This question seems very related to Question One. Perhaps they did modify the
Reanimated Hordes in 1.09. This helps confirm Question One... I wonder if it's
true? Any other opinions on this?"

Final notes: if you find a factual error in this guide, please e-mail me, and
you will be credited for your help. Please, however, don't correct
grammatical errors, spelling errors, or anything else simple like that. I
can fix those myself. Thanks!

You can't just make a guide without at least a little help. Thanks go out to:

** DudeYourMom for helping me test this.
** Blizzard, of course, for some facts on the Reanimated Hordes, for making one
of the best games of all time, etc.
** Morgan524, VANDERLYKE, and black_quagmire for their questions.