I equipped the act 1 skeleton doll with a crossbow, and then had it and my hero use splitting arrows. With my hero into the room a bit and to the right and the doll near the entrance, the shadow creatures in the crossfire didn't last very long, and I then switch to power arrows against Samuel (my DK targeted him from the start). That fight was the first time I had used non-normal arrows in the game, other than briefly trying some of the first elemental arrows I found; playing again I would switch to power arrows as they were readily available.