zircon

Wow, two popular streamers (Kripparian and Krippi) just beat Inferno Diablo... on Hardcore. Amazing.

It's up to our discretion, case-by-case, etc.

Note to all: McVaffe and I will be discussing what tracks and which ReMixers we'd like to invite to the project. We will be considering EVERYONE, not just the top three. We'll let you know if you're selected!

Uh oh, attack speed nerfs coming. Blizzard is taking their typical heavy-handed approach and basically cutting all IAS values in half. So, base weapon speeds won't be affected, but any attack speed bonuses on other equipment will be nerfed severely. Everyone thought they would be doing a 'diminishing returns' kinda deal, but evidently not. This is going to hurt Monks severely since we depend on IAS not just for damage but for spirit generation and sustain (life on hit).

All entries are up and tagged in a handy little RAR file here, with track #s corresponding to the anonymized versions. http://www.zirconstudios.com/ff6contest/OCR_FF6_Remix_Contest_2012.rar DJ_T-MayN: Don't beat yourself up too much. Like I said in the initial post, the competition was pretty fierce and even your entry didn't have a rock bottom score, so some people liked it. Just keep practicing and improving

Beat Inferno with my Monk, woo! Here's my writeup on it (stats, items, build etc) http://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo/comments/v44km/i_did_it_beat_inferno_on_my_monk_after_111h_total/

THE RESULTS ARE IN! Check the original post for my writeup and full ranking. Thank you all for participating, and I'll have all the entries tagged and available for download within the next few days.

5.5 hours left, vote if you haven't already! I'm going to release some fun stats at the end of all this.

You must have put two different email addresses down. If you received the confirmation message, then I definitely got it. Here's how I checked: * Sorted the doc by email. * Deleted all duplicate emails. * Sent an email to everyone on the list that was listed as COMPLETE. * Sent an email to everyone that was not listed as COMPLETE. So in theory, nobody should have received two letters to the same listed email address, since I checked for duplicates...

Voting will end in about 9.5 hours (midnight EST). I just sent out another two emails to help people confirm whether or not their vote was counted.

Actually, the average gamer is more likely to be an adult. "The average gamer is 37 years old and has been playing for 12 years. Eighty-two percent of gamers are 18 years of age or older." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game#Demographics)

Dunno, but those are specific examples of a handful of skills/runes. In D2, especially at release, nearly every skill was useless in Hell. Seems like in D3 they did quite a bit better, which is impressive given that each class essentially has like 180 skills each. Sirnuts have you tried watching Kripparian or other Barbs stream? From what I hear from other players, Barbs have it even easier than Monks, and I'm doing OK in Inferno...

I don't agree that the itemization is too simple. It is simpler relative to D2, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. They just removed a lot of useless chaff that added nothing but false choice. For example, in D3, you might prioritize any of the following on your weapons: * Raw DPS * Attack speed * Critical damage * Life on hit * Primary stat * Defensive stats In D2, there were a handful of legendaries and runewords that were obvious 'bests'. You couldn't roll an amazing rare or blue weapon for every class like you can in D3. There were tons of useless mods in D2 as well, and the best mods tended to not even roll on blue/yellows, meaning you HAD to trade to get the best stuff. In fact, blue/yellow armor was also basically useless in D2 with the sole exception of extraordinarily uncommon rare rings, amulets and tiaras, which were only good for certain builds of certain classes. In D3, rare armor is fantastic and competitive with legendaries, while blue armor is occasionally better as a low-cost alternative (whereas in D2, blue armor was garbage 100% of the time). I'd definitely like to see stuff like spell procs in D3 but I could do without light radius, ethereal, worthless damage/magic damage reduction, self-repair, insignificant elemental damage, attack rating, mana, etc. Looking at the bigger picture, I think D3 lends itself to greater diversity in item builds. For example, as a Monk, I have a variety of gear choices which may affect my skill build and vice versa. I could choose for a very DPS heavy build with low attack speed and a 2h weapon, and change my build to be based on heavy burst damage and kiting. I could use a dual wield build and focus on dodging and very fast attacks for sustained DPS (Life on Hit, Aspd). I could build tank stats and resistances with physical damage reduction and try to fight stuff head on. I could go for low vit and high armor, prioritizing spirit regen and life per spirit spent, adjusting my skills to generate lots of extra spirit and have a continuous stream of heals. Or a mix of any of these things. In D2, if you picked Hammerdin, there was one set of ideal items and one way to build. My Hammerdin was identical to your Hammerdin, with the added 'bonus' that if I wanted to change anything or try a different build, I had to recreate my character. In D3, BardicKnowledge and I both have Monks, but enjoy tweaking our builds in various ways, either through drastic overhauls or minor tweaks to single runes. Getting back to itemization, saying that legendaries are mostly bad is flat-out false. Legendary weapons are usually not good, however legendary armor is very frequently the best option for a given slot (though not 100% of the time). I can think of dozens of legendary items, set and unique, that are BiS for Monks in particular, and I know from reading D3 forums that other classes are similar. Look on the auction house and you'll see how valuable amazing legendaries like Stormshield are. With regards to skill balance, it's unfair to say that Blizzard should release a perfectly balanced game with this level of complexity. If you compare it to highly lauded games like Skyrim, I think D3 is infinitely more balanced, and certainly FAR more so than Diablo 2 was, even LoD after tons of patches. My understanding is that Witch Doctors are indeed on the underpowered side as a ranged class, but by the same token, they're nowhere near as bad as Assassins were in D2 relative to, say, Sorcs or Barbs. Obviously we'll be seeing balance improvements in the future, but every class has been able to solo Inferno (harder than anything in D2) within weeks of release so I don't think any class is currently broken. At the end of the day, if you're not enjoying your class, try a different one, farm up, or try different builds. I was a little frustrated with my Monk in Act 3 until I swapped to a much more offense-oriented playstyle that lets me really be aggressive and sustain myself. I'm having more fun now.

They're not tallied automatically, I will be doing it manually. However because the numbers export to a spreadsheet I can easily make some formulas to add up the scores for everything. I should be able to get results in <24 hours of when voting ends.

Haha, no they are not. Vortex is incredibly brutal in general, especially in Inferno when combined with Molten, Arcane Enchanted or Fire Chains.

RMAH is out. Anyone buying/selling on there? Items selling for 30-50m gold, like Stormshields, are selling for $250 (ACTUALLY selling!) so if you have really rare items, consider cashing them in.

I only sent a one-time confirmation to the batch of existing voters, I guess I'll send one more tomorrow.

We are past 80 votes now, but there are still lots of incomplete ones. Vote if you haven't already!

Interesting that you say gear is inflating in value... I don't think that's true at all. Prices have definitely gone DOWN as people progress into Acts 3-4 and farm up better stuff. When I first got to Act 1 I was able to sell a 660dps 1h weapon for a decent amount. Now, that's basically worthless and impossible to sell. You need to break about 800dps for anyone to care. Likewise, 1k 2h weapons used to be millions, now they are 30-50k. It could be that what you're observing is a result of YOUR gear improving... thus upgrades for it are correspondingly rare/expensive. My Act 1-2 Monk gear was worth <4m but now I'm probably at >10m in Act 3.

Did you put a fake email like some people did? What's your email?

ATTENTION! I just sent an email to all voters that finished the survey confirming that their COMPLETED votes have been received. If you did not receive this email, then your vote was not completed and I don't have it.

Yeah that's not canon. Numbered FF games don't take place in the same timeline, or even universe (usually).

Oof, the Tyrael nerf makes Siegebreaker runs a decent bit harder. Elite Lashers, Demonic Tremors and Swift Skull Cleavers are very hard to deal with for me since even with pretty high defensive stats, any of those can basically 2-shot me - to say nothing of their modifiers. It takes more like 45-60 mins now to do a run assuming I run into at least one impossible champ pack (like Fast, Invulnerable Minions, Vortex, Molten). Admittedly it was kind of stupid that Tyrael did like 40k DPS and could finish elites/bosses for you, but now he adds basically nothing, so that makes it a lot tougher.

Inferno Siegebreaker now safely on farm mode, and I'm finally starting to make some money. A good route is to go to Rakki's Crossing, clear Northeast and check for elites or the Underbridge. Then go to Keep Depths 1 and clear 1-2 elite packs. WP to Keep Depths 3, get another 1-2. If you have Underbridge, get your 5th there. If not, go to Keeps 1 and walk to Keeps 2 and get another 1-2 packs. If you STILL don't have enough (unlikely!) then go to Rakki's Crossing and clear southwest. Should take no more than about 30 mins per run.

Compression IS generally used to smooth out a very dynamic recording with lots of spikes, but if they are particularly unpleasant spikes then you might need to look into how they got there to begin with.