Changes

There are four types of mercenaries, Rogues (Act 1 archers), Town Guards (Act 2 spear carriers), Iron Wolves (Act 3 sorcerers), and Barbarians (Act 5 warriors). Players can only use one mercenary at a time, and hiring a new one permanently dismisses the current merc.

In v1.10+, mercs are all available for hire at levels near those of your character. In earlier versions of the game, they were often much lower, and newly hired Mercs had to be leveled up extensively to make them useful and hardy enough to survive, especially when obtained on Hell difficulty.

[[Image:Npc-flavie.jpg|frame|Rogue Mercenary]]Rogue mercenaries are obtained from [[Kashya]] in the [[Rogue Encampment]]. (She gives one as a reward for completing the [[Blood Raven]] quest, and will hire them after that point, or to any character over level 8.) Rogue mercs are ranged attackers who use bows to attack from a distance. They are fairly fragile and must be kept from harm, but can dispense solid artillery support from behind the front lines. Their AI largely keeps them from harm, but they can be come confused as to how far they should stand from the action, and will sometimes wander back and forth uselessly.

* '''Allowed Equipment:''' Armor, Helms, Bows (no Crossbows or Amazon-only bows).

The names are randomly selected each time a list of mercs for hire is generated; the names do not have any connection to their other abilities or damage types. As is the case with lots of weapons in the game, and especially with the names of NPC mercs, the Blizzard North designers worked in the names of Blizzard employees, and notable members of the Diablo II fan community. This was taken to an extreme with the Rogue mercs, as seemingly every male Blizzard North employee worked in their girlfriend or wife, and every Blizzard North female employee threw in her name or alias. Fans were honored too, Elly and Gaile were webmasters of Diabloii.net, as was Flux (found in Act Three).

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[[Image:Desertmerc.jpg|frame|Desert Mercenary]]The Hirelings of Act II are available from [[Greiz]] in [[Lut Gholein]]. They are melee attackers and use spears/javelins or polearms to great effect. These mercs are the most popular hires in the game, since they come with various auras that can greatly benefit their employer.

'''Allowed Equipment:''' Armor, Helms, Spears, Polearms, Javelins (Ued solely for melee weapons.) They can not equip Amazon-only javelins or spears.

The names are randomly selected each time a list of mercs for hire is generated; the names do not have any connection to their other abilities or aura types. As is the case with lots of weapons in the game, and especially with the names of NPC mercs, the Blizzard North designers worked in the names of Blizzard employees, and notable members of the Diablo II fan community. Azrael was the webmaster of Diablo2.com, back in the 1999ish.

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[[Image:Npc-iron-wolf1.jpg|frame|Iron Wolf Mercenary]]The Hirelings of Act III are available from [[Asheara]] in the [[Kurast Docks]]. These are the only magical mercs, and each one specializes in Lightning, Cold, or Fire. Their AI is similar to that of the Rogue mercs and they tend to stay behind the lines and attack from a distance, even though they carry shields and can achieve fairly high defense and resistances.

Each Iron Wolf is either fire, lightning, or cold based and although they can each use two or three spells, this only adds slightly to their variety.

'''Notes:''' Iron Wolves very rarely hit anything with their weapon, so are best equipped with a sword that has spell-caster bonuses.

There are quite a few tongue-twisting names available for Iron Wolves. One is randomly assigned to each of the Iron Wolves your character sees on the hireling menu. As is the case with lots of weapons in the game, and especially with the names of NPC mercs, the Blizzard North designers worked in the names of Blizzard employees, and notable members of the Diablo II fan community. The last 3 Iron Wolf names (they are listed in this order in the game database file, making it clear that the honored fans were added last) are all fans; Jarulf is the author of the famous [[Jarulf's Guide|Diablo guide]]. Flux was one of the webmasters of [http://www.Diabloii.net Diabloii.net] (co-webmasters Elly and Gaile both showed up as Act One rogue mercs). And Scorch was the author of the first monster specialty site, Darkness, which was hosted by Diabloii.net.

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There are no Mercenaries available for hire in Act Four. [[Tyrael]] will resurrect fallen Mercenaries, at least.

[[Image:Npc-barbarian1.jpg|frame|Barbarian Mercenary]]The Hirelings of Act V are available from [[Qual-Kehk]] in [[Harrogath]] once you have completed the Rescue the Barbarians quest. Unlike Kashya in Act One, he does not reward you with a free barbarian merc.

* '''Allowed Equipment:''' Armor, Helms, Barbarian Class-specific Helms, One Sword (can't dual wield).

The names are randomly assigned to each of the Barbarians when the hireling menu is generated. As with the other mercs, Blizzard North worked a lot of employee and friend names into the list of Barbarians, and honored a few fans as well. Varaya and Khan were two of the best known mod-makers from the days of ''Diablo'', famed for their well-made Lord of the Rings-themed mods. Lanth was another of the early staff members of Diabloii.net, but likely earned his merc name by being a regular in the Diabloii.net chat room, which was regularly frequented by Peter Hu (AKA Isolde, see the rogue merc names), the chief architect of the v1.10 patch, in which Lanth's name was added.