Here's your first problem. Act 5 Nightmare goes up to level 75, which
means you still have a lot you can do there. Act 1 Hell is *much*
tougher.

Hell is rarely fun solo, although it can be done...or so I'm told.

<<
I'm playing Gemstone with an assassin and reached Hell. Until now >>

cool, glad I am not the only one who still loves playing this mod. :) I play
gemstones in 1.09 alot more now since I REALLY hate 1.10 changes on realms

<< Her gear is not that hot. She is still wearing Sigons Armor, Gloves
and Belt from Act 1 normal, has the uniques Blackhorns Face for a helm
(ugly, but the Lightning Absorb really helps), Infernostride as boots.
The Amulett is an Eye of Etlich, rings are Manald and a rare ring
which gives + Lightning Res., +AR, +Dex, and +20 Mana. She leeches
17% Life from the Amulett and Sigons and 7% Mana from Manald. Which
in Hell means she leeches barely back her life versus normal monsters
and not enough mana to recast the quickly dying Shadow Master.
Resistances in Hell are 67/-19/59/-2 (light/cold/fire/poison) with
fade and 22/-64/14/-47 without.>>

Ok for being into act 1 hell in gemstones your gear is way low end for what can
be easily found in the game.  first your rings--remember rings can be socketed
and and gems/rune mods are all doubled.  and socketed rings take on the mods
listed for weopons so an soj (which can be farmed from corpsefire in act 1
normal) with a perf skull in it will have 8% life leech, 7% mana leech in
addition to the reg soj mods so two of these should handle all your leech
needs. for gloves get best two sockets you can get (you can craft them  check
out the read me for making crafts with specific number of sockets --not sure if
it works for nonweapons but even if not 2 sock gloves arent hard to find, then
use the glove runeword "Deft"  (ko sheal) you will be hard pressed to find
better gloves for a melee char, for boots you want best pair with 2 sockets and
runeword for boots "Storm" (um ort). use the read me for the stats and you will
be very happy with it. farming NM countess you will get the runes eventually
either by drops or by cubing em up (use players 8 and you will even get a
little experience.) farming the countess will also get you a ton of chance
stones--use em NM anya sells greater claws shop her for some or pick up any you
find and use the stones sooner or later you will get bartucs (war fists, and
scissor suwayyahs are also worth cubing but they are a bit rarer to come by so
greater claws are your best bet) sigons sheild isnt "bad" I have a level 89
barb using one simply because he hasnt found better but he still picks up every
monarch, dragon shield, grim sheiled he finds  and cubes it with chance cubes.
do the same with any uni you'd like  demon hide sash's  for string of ears,
curiass for a duriel's shell etc just keep cubing and you WILL get some nice
gear maybe not the gear you are targeting all the time (like my barb and his
quest for a sheild) but you will get much better gear. and use the sockets a
perf diamond in a sheild  has 38 res all an um 44 res all. socket your belt and
ammy and armor too (use the read me to figure out which stats they will get
like sockets in a belt will get the "armor" mods and gloves will get the
"shield" ones  etc.  So even without any resistance charms your resistances by
nm with 2 anya quests and runewords and other sockest should never be a prob.
Also look at the crafting recipes for a melee char you can craft "blood" jewels
and if the craft is junk  use the chance stones and reroll em you may get a uni
gem or a blue gem to recraft  or reroll again.  you can gamble gems and charms
so gamble gems for       crafting and charms for rerolling 3 blue charms gets a
new blue charm so even junk charms are worth keeping until u have enough to
reroll with enough patience you should get plenty of 15-20 life small charms
100 poison dam small charms cool rare charms and even skill charms. This is the
games big plus for single players who dont use a trainor program or go online
to mule  with the extra storage space and the cube recipes you can eventually
make alot of VERY useful gear.

<<Jackie has a Hell Act 1 Cold Rogue as a companion. She was always
with rogues from beginning. The rogue has just signed on with level
53, and is shooting with Magewrath. Her Armor is Heamosu's Adamant
Cuirass and the Undead Crown. She is not dying as fast as Jackie,
but when those extra strong spectral hit aura enchanted boss monsters
hit her she also doesn't live long. Actually versus Boss monsters
the rogue delivers most of the damage, because Jackie is mostly on
the run.>>

best merc gear is the wirts set and farming hell griswald can get it for ya  
try making gris runs in hell till both pieces drop (rem in hell ya dont lose
exp for dying so just run and hope for a good roll on his mods and if not
restart till ya can kill him  pick up the gear and run. until ya get that same
rules apply  use runewords or gear you have rolled using your cube and chance
stones there is a nice 3 rune word called 'fey" (thul hel shael) that can make
a nice merc weapon.  for an assassin my choice would be a holy freeze act 2
merc  or a concentration act merc until hell when you can get a fanatacism aura
act 2 merc --although ya might want to stick with the concentration since it
does have better range than fanatacism even though fanatacism does give ya a
bit more punch when ya are in range but if the merc wanders off or gets stuck
in a corner  concentration will stick on you more (remember in gemstones the
mercs all have improved skills in the diff levels so check the read me  even
act 1 rogues get better fire and ice skills in nm and in hell (like an hell
rogue with fire skills uses immolation arrow and not just fire arrow and the
cold hell rogues uses freezing arrow--although what ya want is the plus 3
skills lightning hose which ya can get from the wirts set)

Currently playing in Hell is not much fun. I'd like to ask, can I do
better and how? Or is this character so badly skilled as to be
unplayable anymore?  >>

well at level 63 you can still get alot out of NM use "players 8" and doing act
5 swweps, boss runs will get your exp moving very nicely till around 80 or so.
also if you have a PC you can get some fix to the .dl that will among other
things improve your MF and allow you to run cows all ya want even if you kill
the king check out the read me for specifics on that. I have a mac so that fix
is unavailable to me but even without it doing bloody runs and baal runs and
all the tunnels in NM at players 8 does just fine exp wise till ya hit 80 but
by then if you have been using your cube you should have some very nice gear
and be ready to move on.  hope this helps :)

Jess
aka zebrawings, zebrawings2  
USWest