It took more than 50 hours of gameplay, but MacroBioBoi(opens in new tab) finally accomplished it: Completed the “world’s first completely unwinked solo self-found Hell pacifist Sorceress run” in Diablo 2: Resurrected.

Macro beat Diablo 2: Resurrected on the hardest difficulty level without attacking anything, using only items found during the run. (“Twinking” in Diablo 2 means that you obtain items for your character using the trading system). Diablo 2 speedrunners have come up with theoretical ways to do this run before, but Macro was the first to really do it.

“The only people who ever got past Normal were twisting a character with edited inventory to see if it was possible,” they said in an interview with PC Gamer.

The Diablo 2 speedrunning community has created a detailed set of rules that define what a pacifist run is. You can’t attack, of course, but that’s not all. You also can’t force anything else to attack, set traps or use damaging auras. In most cases, the damage you deal must be inflicted as a direct consequence of some creature deciding to attack you. To achieve this, Macro loaded his Sorceress with items and “chance to cast” abilities, which sometimes cause a spell to be cast when a character is hit. By the end, they had a set of armor that caused them to cast a powerful Nova area spell every time an enemy hit them. They also threw points into the Cold Armor passive skill, which increases defense (the Sorceress doesn’t have many hit points) and deals cold damage to enemies who hit them.

Macro, who has the Pacifist Paladin speed record in Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction on Normal in 2h 25m 45, thought switching to Resurrected might make things easier for this run on Hell difficulty. However, it didn’t work out.

“I thought this run would be difficult, but with the addition of Synergy to the Nova skill in Diablo 2: Resurrected [bonus damage for related skills], I figured it would actually be much easier than in Lord of Destruction,” Macro told PC Gamer. “That quickly fell apart after eight hours of trying a specific spawn pattern for Seal Boss Lord De Seis in Chaos Sanctuary. I couldn’t survive his minions long enough to kill him, and if you die and return to the city, he often casts a Bestow buff on himself that makes him regenerate faster than any amount of Nova procs from my inventory could put out.”

In order to deal damage faster than Lord De Seis could regenerate health, Macro needed an item that gave his character a 5% chance to cast Blaze, a spell that creates a burning stain on the ground. If Lord De Seis was on fire, he would receive damage every frame, preventing him from regenerating. (The full explanation is even more complicated than that; it can be found in the video(opens in a new tab) embedded above, starting at about 5:05).

“I had to make it fire, and it’s a very difficult monster to manipulate to get it to move,” – Macro said. “We were actually lucky that on my last attempt it didn’t Bestowal and after about 10 deaths we managed to get it.

It’s one hell of an accomplishment, but Macro, who’s been playing Diablo 2 since he was a kid, is already plotting another attempt at the run, this time with the Paladin. Unlike the Sorceress, Macro says the Paladin doesn’t have any skills that can kill Lord De Seis.

“I have to farm a very specific weapon from Mephisto in Nightmare to have a chance to do it,” – Macro said. “It’s called Boneslayer Blade and it takes me about five minutes to kill Mephisto every time I do it. I started the challenge two days ago and I’m streaming it all over again so people can watch my suffering.”

MacroBioBoi streams on Twitch and also reports on Diablo 2: Resurrected for Maxroll. However, they are not Diablo 2 purists, and after the current run is over, Diablo 4 will be on their minds.

“I come from a very MMORPG-heavy background (EverQuest and WoW), and I think Diablo 4 will instill a lot of social gameplay that I really miss when playing most ARPGs,” – Macro said in an interview with PC Gamer. “I like the restriction of trading for BIS gear [top items], and the clean aesthetic seems like a beautiful return to form after Diablo 3 and Diablo Immortal. Unlike most Diablo 2 players, I’m a fan of Diablo 3, but the aesthetics were lacking. Adding to the fact that the Necromancer is a launch option for the game won my preorder.”

Once the socials are over, I wouldn’t be surprised if Macro starts building characters according to unreasonably restrictive rules in Diablo 4 as well.

“My background is in microbiology and science in general, so I’ve always been willing to ask impossible questions,” they said, “and if there’s no answer, testing something until I figure it out.”