Diablo III

[eternal Zero]

Yeah pro-est of pro tips for hardcore: Never EVER resume game. Always restart the chapter.

Edit: Also don't use the Enchantress' mass chicken spell. There's a chance it will backfire and polymorph you instead of the mobs.

Edited June 10, 2012 by eternal Zero

[zircon]

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.

[Mr. Bottle Rocket]

I'm waiting on 1.0.3 to continue my campaign through inferno as a barb.

[Faustt]

I want to love this game, but progression is a bitch. Stuck at the end of Act 2 Inferno and I just lack the skill to not get hit once during the Belial fight (Playing a WD).

I in no way feel entitled to be able to complete inferno, it's supposed to be hard. Farming Act 2 is horrible because of the mob types (damn you Lacuni and those vanishing snakemen!). Act 1 isn't too great either since a large amount of people are doing the same thing, so the AH is flooded with gear that doesn't equip you well enough for Act 2 and beyond. To top it off inflation is getting worse by the day. When I first hit Act 2 a month ago, gear upgrades were about Half a million to 1 million gold. Now upgrades are 5+ million a piece with rare drops that I get selling for less and less each day. I don't have the time, or will to farm that much.

I'll probably keep at it though. It is digital crack after all.

/rant

[zircon]

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.

Edited June 12, 2012 by zircon

[Faustt]

It could be that what you're observing is a result of YOUR gear improving...

This is true. My stats were a lot worse when I started Act 2. I'm at 30K DPS before soul harvest with ~20% crit chance ~180 crit damage now. Upgrades don't come cheap anymore and that's to be expected. An offensive gold find set would probably be a good investment. As you said, it's hard to sell the low end 60 gear for much anymore which is all you get from Act 1. It would be nice to get a drop that's actually and upgrade without having to hit the AH.

The consensus among most Witch Doctors is that a glass cannon build is about the only way to go post Act 1. As a WD you can basically die once every 90 seconds and be saved by Spirit Vessel. That said, it's really hard to only get hit once every 90 seconds, especially by certain elite groups.

The way I see it, to progress as a WD you can either have skill and kite like a champ avoiding absolutely all damage, or offset it with better resists/vitality to survive a few hits here and there and sacrifice DPS. Of course gear that's Resist all/Physical resist/Vitality are sought after by all the classes and therefore very expensive.

I think I'm just getting older and haven't flexed my gaming muscle as much as I used to. Just need to practice more and learn the meta game and get that fast twitch reaction time back. Maybe I should play Dark Souls again to be reminded how unforgiving one little mistake can be.

[zircon]

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.

[Bahamut]

Hmm, so I should think about selling my Andariel's? I may have to think about it...

[Brandon Strader]

I wanted to sell something but it wouldn't let me input my paypal, it never worked. So I didn't sell anything.

[Hemophiliac]

Double elite mobs with vortex just isn't cool x.x

[zircon]

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

[Brandon Strader]

Is Paypal working yet?

As for enemies, I think I am doing better now. I just surpassed 20k DPS with my DH (only from buying a quiver and using a single handbow -- nothing major) and I am expecting to make some moves in Inferno as a result. Need to get a lot of gold, then buy inventory slots, then get more gold, and buy a new 2-handed bow.

Or if anyone has one lying around with 900+ DPS... Well, I'm open to the idea of... bownations? Bow donations.

[RiverSound]

Thanks, zircon, for the comprehensive answer a few pages back.

Recently, I heard something about them nerfing life per hit. Does anyone know if it's really going to happen, and if yes, how is it going to affect the current system? Like, will it be to the point that life per hit isn't going to work and be worth investing in anymore?

[Sir_NutS]

Yeah I just got my wizard to lvl 60 and boy is it easy mode with a ranged character. I expect to fly past act 2 this week.

[Brandon Strader]

I heard they were going to make attack speed irrelevant, which is bad news for my DH as it'd probably lower my dps by 5k

[Bahamut]

So has anyone else had their quest progress regressed from the patch? I used to be up to Black Soulstone in A2 Inferno (legitimately) and they dialed me back to Enter Forgotten Ruins in Betrayer of the Horadrim.

[Sir_NutS]

So has anyone else had their quest progress regressed from the patch? I used to be up to Black Soulstone in A2 Inferno (legitimately) and they dialed me back to Enter Forgotten Ruins in Betrayer of the Horadrim.

No but I got some achievements I don't deserve, like getting the blacksmith to level 10. I left it at level 6 or 7 yet after the patch I got the achievement.

[Piracy]

I heard they were going to make attack speed irrelevant, which is bad news for my DH as it'd probably lower my dps by 5k

[Sir_NutS]

Diracy;865911']

Attack speed is often misleading as a damage increase. Attack speed only shows its true benefits when you are standing there just casting or shooting, and on inferno we all know that is nearly impossible unless you're running with a group with good tanks. Attack speed reduces the cast time of abilities tho, so it makes you cast and kite easier, but it's not a direct damage increase as the tooltips and damage number in your character sheet makes it out to be.

However, there are some exceptions for IAS on some abilities where it acts as a direct damage increase. For example, Hydra benefits directly from IAS.

The spells that benefit the most from IAS are channeled spells and abilities, and as far as I remember the DH has none.

[Brandon Strader]

I've got multiple items with +14% attack speed, and as far as I can tell they stack. I actually seem to be faster with the single handbow than I was with 2 now. If they disable that, it's gonna be rough ;D

I spam evasive fire with multishot. It is my favorite DH attack.

[Sir_NutS]

I've got multiple items with +14% attack speed, and as far as I can tell they stack. I actually seem to be faster with the single handbow than I was with 2 now. If they disable that, it's gonna be rough ;D

I spam evasive fire with multishot. It is my favorite DH attack.

IAS % stacks, of course. It just doesn't benefits your damage as much as you character sheet makes it out to be. It bloats the numbers.

[Brandon Strader]

Well if I get 2 shots in in 1 second instead of 1 shot, then it doubles my damage per second, doesn't it?

[Sir_NutS]

Well if I get 2 shots in in 1 second instead of 1 shot, then it doubles my damage per second, doesn't it?

It does, but it doesn't really work that way. You won't really do 2 shots per second until you've stacked a hefty amount, what will happen is that you will get 1.50 shots per second, then 1.60 and so forth. To take advantage of this difference you have to stand in place and shoot for quite a few seconds, which isn't really how inferno is played by ranged at the moment.

Some abilities like Hydra benefit the most out of IAS because the hydra attacks the mobs and it doesn't matter if you stand in place or not. Melee take more advantage of IAS because they have to stand and hit the mobs for quite a while. In short when there's lots of movement involved you will get more dps out of raw damage than from IAS, however IAS helps you kite better (faster cast time on abilities)

[Vakri]

The item system in this game is just way too simple. There are too many "essential" stats and the extra bonus modifiers are few compared to D2 (as well as other Diablo-esque RPG's such as Titan Quest). They're also incredibly boring and not very useful. Gold/orb pickup range increase? Extra life from orbs? Skill improvements that amount to "5 less mana per cast" or "5% extra damage?" Come on.

Sure, they help, in an incredibly boring, uninspired way, but ultimately they help so little that no sane person would actively look for those stats on their gear, at least in the higher difficulties.

D3 end-game is all about stacking Primary Stat + Vit + armor/resists and some IAS while doing defense-focused builds. Even if it wasn't, and you could sacrifice, say, some resist for something else, well... there isn't really much else anyway. It makes one of the primary aspects of this kind of game - finding better and better gear - incredibly boring, because a "better" item is just an item with a extra +12 vitality, +16 more primary stat, +15 more to resists, and a bit more armor. I just can't get excited about spending hours and hours farming just to get an item that has 152 vitality instead of 104, and 50 resist all instead of 30. There needs to be more modifiers, and those modifiers need to be more useful.

Legendary items, for the most part, suck, and so do Sets, meaning that collecting a whole Set or finding an uber-rare Legendary item just isn't exciting. And there are no Runes or the like to further customize your gear for a variety of unique and interesting effects.

There's also the fact that I don't think Blizzard even tested many of the skills/runes. For example, there is simply no way that any even semi-competent play tester could have possibly used any of the Witch Doctor's pets, in particular the Zombie Dogs, in higher difficulties. They are completely useless in Hell and Inferno, and not in some obscure, hard-to-detect way either; they are just flat-out useless wastes of hot-bar space. In Normal and Nightmare they are usable, but still sub-par.

Another example: Wave of Zombies. 3 Zombie Chargers that deal 71% weapon damage each, or 3 Zombie Bears that function in basically the exact same way (and cost the same amount of mana), but deal 236% weapon damage, have a larger AoE radius, and can hit targets behind you? Hmm, which should I choose?

How could anyone at Blizzard (anyone with at least a couple of functioning brain cells) possibly found these (among other) skills/runes to be at all adequate? It just boggles the mind.

I think I might just let this game sit for about a year. Maybe after some patches, content additions, skill balancing, etc., it might be worth it. But right now, I just can't get excited about the game. So many flaws, and for me, too few redeeming factors.

Edited June 14, 2012 by Vakri

[zircon]

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.