My 14-day Diablo 3 Marathon has come to an end. Real Life called and wants me back. So what have I accomplished in these 2 weeks of playing D3? More than I bargained for and less than I hoped. Let me explain.
I leveled a Monk to 60 and unlocked Inferno, though I'm still stuck at the very beginning of Act 1 due to the steep difficulty curve.
I leveled a Demon Hunter to 40, actually my first class choice, whom I subsequently abandoned in favor of the Monk.
I leveled a Barbarian to 34. Because he inherited a lot of good gear from his forebears, he breezed his way to this level.
I leveled a Witch Doctor to 19 and unlocked Gargantuan, one of the skills I was most interested in.
I leveled a Wizard to 14.
More importantly, I got 2 of my oldest and dearest friends who are all the way across the world, one in Europe and the other in Asia, to play Diablo 3. I played a game with each of them but it was very imbalanced in my favor because their gear sucked while mine was much too good for that level, being passed down from my high level characters.
On the financial side, I'm disappointed. I now have less than 2 million gold but I do have "assets" in excess of that amount, currently gathering dust. I was hoping to make a lot more but the Auction House conspired against me. Here's hoping that patch 1.0.2, which was just released today, will correct this.
After this marathon, I'm going to take it easy. I plan to level my other characters some more and build up a set of better gear for the Monk, slowly and painfully, to get him to the point where he can farm Act 1 Inferno comfortably. I want to expand my storage and, most of all, do some real trading on the Auction House.
How about you? How were these first two weeks of Diablo 3 for you? Are you going to continue playing or is the game already "dead" for you?
Showing posts with label D3 Marathon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label D3 Marathon. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Monday, May 28, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 13
There isn't much to say about day 13. I was gone most of the day and only got about 3 hours of play, spent exclusively on farming Acts 2 and 3 in Hell with my Monk. I make about 100K an hour doing that, during which the 5 stacks of Nephalem Valor also built up quickly.
I didn't find a single upgrade for the Monk, though I did get a couple of rare drops for my other classes. On the other hand I spent about 200K on the Auction House for some incremental upgrades that I thought were "cheap" but they barely raised my DPS from 10K to 10.8K. At least my Monk looks better now without that ridiculous helmet he was wearing previously.
It has become clear to me that the only way I'm going to get 15-20K DPS is to buy a much better weapon. My current sword gives 500+ DPS along with some Dexterity. I would need at least a 800+ DPS weapon in order to progress. The problem is that those weapons are very expensive, usually upwards of 1 million gold. I pretty much have 2 options right now: spend most of my gold on getting a better weapon or continue to grind Hell in the hopes of getting better drops and more gold.
I'm reluctant to spend so much money though because it might still be worth something when the RMAH finally decides to show up. But this is a catch-22. Don't spend gold - can't progress. Spend all the gold - be broke but progress and perhaps make some of it back before the RMAH is released. What to do?
My plan is to keep an eye out on the AH for some good deals on a better weapon. While in the past I've been able to snag some really sweet gear for very low prices, all of a sudden, from level 59 and up, a wall has been erected and the bar has been set a lot higher for those items. Up until then, I considered a good deal anything south of 50K. Now, I'll be very happy to find a 800+ DPS weapon for less than 500K.
Build and skills
My build has changed a little bit now that I'm farming Hell.
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#UZXgQT!YZX!cZZaaa
I've replaced Mystic Ally (because he kept dying at higher levels and I was tired of wasting Spirit refreshing him) with Seven-Sided Strike runed with Sudden Assault. This is my "emergency" nuke and helps me a lot especially for champions and rare bosses. Besides, the cooldown is low enough that I can use it often, including on annoying monsters who like to run away.
Barbarian
I have also put in a few hours over the past couple of days on my Barbarian who's level 30 and has just finished Normal difficulty. Because he does 700 DPS at this level, everything is a piece of cake for him. Why so much? Because he has some of the best items courtesy of his big brothers the Demon Hunter and the Monk. He does have some issues with survivability, though he hasn't died once in all his 30 levels. I can tell, though, that he will never be my main.
Next, I'll be continuing to attempt to gear the Monk for Inferno Act 1. Will I succeed? It remains to be seen.
Follow the D3 Marathon
I didn't find a single upgrade for the Monk, though I did get a couple of rare drops for my other classes. On the other hand I spent about 200K on the Auction House for some incremental upgrades that I thought were "cheap" but they barely raised my DPS from 10K to 10.8K. At least my Monk looks better now without that ridiculous helmet he was wearing previously.
It has become clear to me that the only way I'm going to get 15-20K DPS is to buy a much better weapon. My current sword gives 500+ DPS along with some Dexterity. I would need at least a 800+ DPS weapon in order to progress. The problem is that those weapons are very expensive, usually upwards of 1 million gold. I pretty much have 2 options right now: spend most of my gold on getting a better weapon or continue to grind Hell in the hopes of getting better drops and more gold.
I'm reluctant to spend so much money though because it might still be worth something when the RMAH finally decides to show up. But this is a catch-22. Don't spend gold - can't progress. Spend all the gold - be broke but progress and perhaps make some of it back before the RMAH is released. What to do?
My plan is to keep an eye out on the AH for some good deals on a better weapon. While in the past I've been able to snag some really sweet gear for very low prices, all of a sudden, from level 59 and up, a wall has been erected and the bar has been set a lot higher for those items. Up until then, I considered a good deal anything south of 50K. Now, I'll be very happy to find a 800+ DPS weapon for less than 500K.
Build and skills
My build has changed a little bit now that I'm farming Hell.
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#UZXgQT!YZX!cZZaaa
I've replaced Mystic Ally (because he kept dying at higher levels and I was tired of wasting Spirit refreshing him) with Seven-Sided Strike runed with Sudden Assault. This is my "emergency" nuke and helps me a lot especially for champions and rare bosses. Besides, the cooldown is low enough that I can use it often, including on annoying monsters who like to run away.
Barbarian
I have also put in a few hours over the past couple of days on my Barbarian who's level 30 and has just finished Normal difficulty. Because he does 700 DPS at this level, everything is a piece of cake for him. Why so much? Because he has some of the best items courtesy of his big brothers the Demon Hunter and the Monk. He does have some issues with survivability, though he hasn't died once in all his 30 levels. I can tell, though, that he will never be my main.
Next, I'll be continuing to attempt to gear the Monk for Inferno Act 1. Will I succeed? It remains to be seen.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Sunday, May 27, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 12
This update will be brief and very late because I was away on business for most of the day.
On day 12 I moved to Inferno after reaching 60 but I haven't even met the first champion/rare pack and got scared. Those zombies at the very beginning hit hard and have a lot of hit points.
I checked my stats and it took me 48 hours and 30 minutes of play on the Monk, to finish Hell. I finished it with 10K DPS and 26K health. I beat Hell Diablo on the first try, though it was quite challenging and I came close to dying several times. Luckily, I kept using my defensive cooldowns successively, along with health potions and health shrines, keeping myself alive.
The problem is that I hit a big tall wall in Inferno. My 10K DPS doesn't cut it anymore. I was hoping I could kill the Skeleton King quickly and go on to farm Fields of Misery. Alas, that ain't gonna happen soon. I need at least 15K DPS, preferably 20K or even more, to get to that point.
So I did the only thing I could: went back to Hell, Act 2 this time. I'm farming the zone where you get the quest to find Zoltun Kulle's body parts. With 5 stacks of Nephalem Valor (which build up fairly quickly) I can make 100K gold in an hour. I need some serious gear upgrades if I'm to farm Act 1 of Inferno.
That's it for today. Have you made it to Inferno? How's your progress so far?
Follow the D3 Marathon
On day 12 I moved to Inferno after reaching 60 but I haven't even met the first champion/rare pack and got scared. Those zombies at the very beginning hit hard and have a lot of hit points.
I checked my stats and it took me 48 hours and 30 minutes of play on the Monk, to finish Hell. I finished it with 10K DPS and 26K health. I beat Hell Diablo on the first try, though it was quite challenging and I came close to dying several times. Luckily, I kept using my defensive cooldowns successively, along with health potions and health shrines, keeping myself alive.
The problem is that I hit a big tall wall in Inferno. My 10K DPS doesn't cut it anymore. I was hoping I could kill the Skeleton King quickly and go on to farm Fields of Misery. Alas, that ain't gonna happen soon. I need at least 15K DPS, preferably 20K or even more, to get to that point.
So I did the only thing I could: went back to Hell, Act 2 this time. I'm farming the zone where you get the quest to find Zoltun Kulle's body parts. With 5 stacks of Nephalem Valor (which build up fairly quickly) I can make 100K gold in an hour. I need some serious gear upgrades if I'm to farm Act 1 of Inferno.
That's it for today. Have you made it to Inferno? How's your progress so far?
Follow the D3 Marathon
Saturday, May 26, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 11
On day 11 I accomplished more than I set up to do. I went to bed late but I decided to play until...
Aye me hearties, my Monk reached level 60. He's currently in Act 3 on Hell.
The day was marked by a steady and huge improvement in my DPS. From the previous day I progressed from 4000 DPS to 5200 DPS (and 30K hit points). I had been stuck in Act 2 for a while, being unable to compete the quests for the various body parts of Zoltun Kulle. The problem was that every time I tried, I ran into some extremely vicious champions or rares inside those tombs that I couldn't bypass. I died a few times but mostly I ran away.
The solution? I needed more DPS to burn down those nasties much quicker. So I shopped a bit on the Auction House and found a nice pair of daggers which improved my DPS by 1000+. I found myself at level 59 with 30K health and 5200 DPS. As a result, I was able to complete Act 2 without too much hassle, at level 59 9/10. For the record, I hate Belial, the Act 2 boss. The encounter is very poorly designed. Still, I beat him on the first try.
Moving on to Act 3, I found out that 5200 DPS wasn't nearly enough. It was decent but there was room for improvement. Back to the AH. I found a nice fist weapon and a shield, whereupon I switched back from dual-wielding to 1H + shield. DPS shot up to 7500 but life dropped to 28K with Mystic Ally and Earth Ally. It's all good. My survivability went up anyway, thanks to the shield.
Just before reaching 60, I found a bunch of other upgrades, some of them drops, which further increased DPS to 8100. Before going to bed, I decided to do a quick search on the AH and found this very nice upgrade for only 40K.
DPS at the end of the night? 9700. Not bad at all, eh? Here's how the Monk looks. A little better than the previous two days, except for the helm which is the same one. I also changed my banner again. Arr!
Now, the best thing about level 60?
Nephalem Valor. You get a stack each time you kill a rare boss or a group of champions. What it does is, it simply increases your Magic and Gold Find. Each stack gives you an additional +15% You can have a maximum of 5 stacks (for a total of +75%). That gave me +88% Gold Find and +94% Magic Find. If it seems puny it's because my gear has very little amounts of GF/MF but overall it made a big difference. I started getting tons of rare item drops. In fact, I'm running out of space again on my alts because many of these items are future upgrades for them, as well as stuff that I want to sell on the AH.
In other news, the damn Auction House still won't allow commodity trading. I don't understand what Blizzard is playing at. I'm itching to trade some commodities and try out some new ideas I have. Ironically, it seems that on the European side you can trade commodities just fine.
Oh, I announced a couple of days ago that I reached my first million gold. 2 days later I've got over 2 million, despite purchasing a number of upgrades. One of my "investments" panned out but, I will repeat this, I would have made a lot more if commodity trading had worked.
Next on my "to do" list is to finish Hell difficulty. I can't wait to get to Inferno and start farming Fields of Misery.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Aye me hearties, my Monk reached level 60. He's currently in Act 3 on Hell.
The day was marked by a steady and huge improvement in my DPS. From the previous day I progressed from 4000 DPS to 5200 DPS (and 30K hit points). I had been stuck in Act 2 for a while, being unable to compete the quests for the various body parts of Zoltun Kulle. The problem was that every time I tried, I ran into some extremely vicious champions or rares inside those tombs that I couldn't bypass. I died a few times but mostly I ran away.
The solution? I needed more DPS to burn down those nasties much quicker. So I shopped a bit on the Auction House and found a nice pair of daggers which improved my DPS by 1000+. I found myself at level 59 with 30K health and 5200 DPS. As a result, I was able to complete Act 2 without too much hassle, at level 59 9/10. For the record, I hate Belial, the Act 2 boss. The encounter is very poorly designed. Still, I beat him on the first try.
Moving on to Act 3, I found out that 5200 DPS wasn't nearly enough. It was decent but there was room for improvement. Back to the AH. I found a nice fist weapon and a shield, whereupon I switched back from dual-wielding to 1H + shield. DPS shot up to 7500 but life dropped to 28K with Mystic Ally and Earth Ally. It's all good. My survivability went up anyway, thanks to the shield.
Just before reaching 60, I found a bunch of other upgrades, some of them drops, which further increased DPS to 8100. Before going to bed, I decided to do a quick search on the AH and found this very nice upgrade for only 40K.
DPS at the end of the night? 9700. Not bad at all, eh? Here's how the Monk looks. A little better than the previous two days, except for the helm which is the same one. I also changed my banner again. Arr!
Now, the best thing about level 60?
Nephalem Valor. You get a stack each time you kill a rare boss or a group of champions. What it does is, it simply increases your Magic and Gold Find. Each stack gives you an additional +15% You can have a maximum of 5 stacks (for a total of +75%). That gave me +88% Gold Find and +94% Magic Find. If it seems puny it's because my gear has very little amounts of GF/MF but overall it made a big difference. I started getting tons of rare item drops. In fact, I'm running out of space again on my alts because many of these items are future upgrades for them, as well as stuff that I want to sell on the AH.
In other news, the damn Auction House still won't allow commodity trading. I don't understand what Blizzard is playing at. I'm itching to trade some commodities and try out some new ideas I have. Ironically, it seems that on the European side you can trade commodities just fine.
Oh, I announced a couple of days ago that I reached my first million gold. 2 days later I've got over 2 million, despite purchasing a number of upgrades. One of my "investments" panned out but, I will repeat this, I would have made a lot more if commodity trading had worked.
Next on my "to do" list is to finish Hell difficulty. I can't wait to get to Inferno and start farming Fields of Misery.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Friday, May 25, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 10
On day 10 I didn't get very far on my Monk in comparative terms but I did beat my goal, which was simply to reach level 57. At the end of the day the Monk was about 57 3/4. I spent most of the day farming Fields of Misery in Hell Act 1. Follow the link to read why this is such a good area for farming, at any difficulty level.
Once I exceeded 4K DPS through some upgrades, I decided to push on to Act 2. Now I'm about halfway through.
At the end of the day, my DPS was 4047 and my health 27K.
I also attained my first million gold. Woopty-doo.
Oh, I got to play with a buddy all the way in Asia. Very neat. Today I might join up with another friend in Europe.
Apart from that, I'm still pissed that commodity trading has been offline for the past 2 days on the Auction House. WTF Blizzard?? Fix it already!
My goal for the day is to get as close to 60 as possible. Will it happen today? Who knows. I'd also love to finish Hell but I'm not sure that's doable with less than 5K DPS.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Once I exceeded 4K DPS through some upgrades, I decided to push on to Act 2. Now I'm about halfway through.
At the end of the day, my DPS was 4047 and my health 27K.
I also attained my first million gold. Woopty-doo.
Oh, I got to play with a buddy all the way in Asia. Very neat. Today I might join up with another friend in Europe.
Apart from that, I'm still pissed that commodity trading has been offline for the past 2 days on the Auction House. WTF Blizzard?? Fix it already!
My goal for the day is to get as close to 60 as possible. Will it happen today? Who knows. I'd also love to finish Hell but I'm not sure that's doable with less than 5K DPS.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Thursday, May 24, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 9
Though my progression in terms of levels gained has slowed down, I am fairly satisfied with what I accomplished on day 9.
The Monk is level 55 and he has just finished Act 1 in Hell. I beat the Butcher without major issues (also at level 55), on the first try. Before reaching 55 I also spent a few hours farming Azmodan on Nightmare for XP.
When I logged out for the day, the Monk had 3400 DPS and 21K hit points (with the Earth Ally rune for Mystic Ally). Not bad at all. I started Act 1 Hell with about 2200 DPS and I was having a hard time burning down certain groups of champions/rares fast enough. There was a lot of running and kiting involved.
Eventually, I decided to shop a little on the Auction House and I found these two beauties. I'm sure they were being sold by the same person.
Remember yesterday's weapons? The new swords improved my DPS by over 800 (from 2359 to 3221) and health by 1000. The truth is that these cost me 50K gold each but they were worth every penny. This is certainly the most expensive upgrade I have bought so far but just look at those stats! The rolls are almost perfect, if it wasn't for Intelligence on both of them.
Thanks to these new weapons, I've got Act 1 Hell pretty much on farm mode. There are, of course, situations when I come across groups of champions/rares with bad affixes and I either spend 5 minutes kiting them carefully or just quit the game and start a new one. While dying isn't expensive at this point (thanks to my relatively crappy gear), I don't want to die if I can help it.
Speaking of Hell, I love seeing weapon drops with 200+ DPS on them and I also love the frequent 600+ gold stacks. I even saw a 800+ gold stack once.
Auction House woes
I'm very pissed at Blizzard and their crappy Auction House. Commodity trading is completely screwed up. Thanks to this I lost a few hundred thousand gold over the past few days. It was partly my fault because I should have skipped trading until they fixed the damn thing but still... if this happens with the RMAH, I smell some lawsuits.
On the positive side, I discovered a surefire and risk-free method of making easy gold, something that I also used to do in WoW. Sorry, I won't disclose what it is because the competition this time is everyone on the US server. You'll have to discover it on your own.
Build and skills
My build has changed little from the previous day.
Build @ level 55 (available at 53)
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXgQj!ZYX!ZZZaac
The only difference is the access to the Earth Ally rune for Mystic Ally at level 53. This rune is pretty cool for survival because it gives you a 10% health boost, as long as your Ally is up.
Next, I will try to move slowly into Act 2 of Hell and will probably shoot for level 57 at the end of the day. Or, alternatively, I can go back and farm Act 4 Nightmare or Act 1 Hell.
Follow the D3 Marathon
The Monk is level 55 and he has just finished Act 1 in Hell. I beat the Butcher without major issues (also at level 55), on the first try. Before reaching 55 I also spent a few hours farming Azmodan on Nightmare for XP.
When I logged out for the day, the Monk had 3400 DPS and 21K hit points (with the Earth Ally rune for Mystic Ally). Not bad at all. I started Act 1 Hell with about 2200 DPS and I was having a hard time burning down certain groups of champions/rares fast enough. There was a lot of running and kiting involved.
Eventually, I decided to shop a little on the Auction House and I found these two beauties. I'm sure they were being sold by the same person.
Remember yesterday's weapons? The new swords improved my DPS by over 800 (from 2359 to 3221) and health by 1000. The truth is that these cost me 50K gold each but they were worth every penny. This is certainly the most expensive upgrade I have bought so far but just look at those stats! The rolls are almost perfect, if it wasn't for Intelligence on both of them.
Thanks to these new weapons, I've got Act 1 Hell pretty much on farm mode. There are, of course, situations when I come across groups of champions/rares with bad affixes and I either spend 5 minutes kiting them carefully or just quit the game and start a new one. While dying isn't expensive at this point (thanks to my relatively crappy gear), I don't want to die if I can help it.
Speaking of Hell, I love seeing weapon drops with 200+ DPS on them and I also love the frequent 600+ gold stacks. I even saw a 800+ gold stack once.
Auction House woes
I'm very pissed at Blizzard and their crappy Auction House. Commodity trading is completely screwed up. Thanks to this I lost a few hundred thousand gold over the past few days. It was partly my fault because I should have skipped trading until they fixed the damn thing but still... if this happens with the RMAH, I smell some lawsuits.
On the positive side, I discovered a surefire and risk-free method of making easy gold, something that I also used to do in WoW. Sorry, I won't disclose what it is because the competition this time is everyone on the US server. You'll have to discover it on your own.
Build and skills
My build has changed little from the previous day.
Build @ level 55 (available at 53)
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXgQj!ZYX!ZZZaac
The only difference is the access to the Earth Ally rune for Mystic Ally at level 53. This rune is pretty cool for survival because it gives you a 10% health boost, as long as your Ally is up.
Next, I will try to move slowly into Act 2 of Hell and will probably shoot for level 57 at the end of the day. Or, alternatively, I can go back and farm Act 4 Nightmare or Act 1 Hell.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 8
On day 8 of my D3 marathon I went on a roll on the Monk and managed to level from 44 the previous day to 51. My DPS also jumped by a lot, from 900 to 2200. Current health is 14K.
I'm afraid he's an ugly-looking bastard at this point, with that nasty helm and hodge-podge equipment he's wearing. Oh well, good looks don't kill monsters.
I also finished Nightmare on my own and beat Diablo easily on the first attempt (also at level 51). I can tell you that 2200 DPS really makes a difference. I wouldn't have been able to plough through the last two acts in Nightmare if it hadn't been for the dagger/sword I am now wearing. I found both of these on the AH for about 6K each. I slapped some Rubies on them and there you have it: uber-DPS.
I have moved on into Hell but I'm still at the very first quests in Act 1. What's interesting is that the monsters aren't that hard to kill but their hit points have jumped up significantly. Also, when they hit, they hit hard. Luckily, those zombies at the beginning are slow as molasses and hit once in a blue moon. I'm pretty sure that, in order to beat Hell, I'm gonna need a lot more than 2K DPS, perhaps more along the lines of 5K-10K.
Speaking of weapons, I much prefer 1-handed fast weapons to the 2-handed polearm I was wearing yesterday. The Monk becomes a machine-gun with these fast weapons.
Now, the cool thing is that I got Azmodan (Act 3 boss) on farm mode in Nightmare. From levels 47-50 I farmed this dude exclusively. The reason why this works so well is that when you pick the quest "Kill Azmodan" and complete it, you get two different quest credits (along with XP and gold rewards). One is right after killing Azmodan, while the other is after going back to town, speaking to the guard dude and then climbing on the ramparts.
So the "farming" part is solely for the XP. Azmodan himself doesn't drop anything of worth, nor does he give much XP. But I also take the time to clear the mobs in the zone leading up to him. Another cool thing about this quest is that the zone that spans from the waypoint to Azmodan's lair is static. You could even rush through it without engaging mobs, if you can stun/slow them somehow. But I wanted to kill them each time, both for XP and items/gold.
It's pretty cool, if I start having difficulties in Hell I'm definitely going back to farm Azmodan for some more XP. At level 50 you need about 3 of these runs to gain a level. Pretty nifty. A run shouldn't take more than 10-15 minutes, depending which champions/rares you run into. It happened that I came across some nasty Arcane enchanted mobs with another dangerous affix, and instead of risking dying (I knew they would be trouble), I simply started a new game after porting back to town.
Auction House adventures
If it hasn't sunk in already, I highly recommend looking for bargains on the AH. It's a very easy way to increase your damage and survivability and it shouldn't cost you a lot. After all, that's how I bought my two nice weapons, as well as other upgrades. I paid a total of 17K for these two weapons. Totally worth every little penny.
Build and skills
My build has continued to evolve, little by little. Now I just run with a single build instead of having a grinding and a boss build. Things have become tougher and I am trying to play more defensively. It amazes me sometimes how the Monk can escape some very hairy situations.
Build @ level 51 (available at 39)
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXgQj!ZYX!ZZZaab
(Sorry about linking it this way, I'm still having trouble with linking the build properly)
The main highlight is that I picked the Sweeping Armada rune for Lashing Tail Kick because it helps a lot with those nasty mobs. If I get surrounded or my health is dangerously low or if I'm facing champions/rares with dangerous affixes, I can just kick them away and they are thrown much farther thanks to the rune, not to mention that their speed is also slowed for 2 seconds. This allows me to regroup/escape/heal or simply pick them off one by one.
I'm keeping Mystic Ally for now because this little dude continues to impress me. First, I don't have to micro-manage him. Second, he seems very tough and very often can take more damage than me. For example in Act 4 there are some huge monsters called Mallet Lords. These dudes can kill me in 2-3 hits, despite my Monky Zen and they also have a lot of health. But with the Mystic Ally, I can use him as a meat shield. I will stay back, let him engage, and then rush to engage the monster myself. My dude will take 2 hits and die while in the meantime I can whittle the monster's health down to 50% or so. Then I can pop a Serenity and finish him off.
So that's about it for now. I'll be fighting my way through Hell, next.
Follow the D3 Marathon
I'm afraid he's an ugly-looking bastard at this point, with that nasty helm and hodge-podge equipment he's wearing. Oh well, good looks don't kill monsters.
I also finished Nightmare on my own and beat Diablo easily on the first attempt (also at level 51). I can tell you that 2200 DPS really makes a difference. I wouldn't have been able to plough through the last two acts in Nightmare if it hadn't been for the dagger/sword I am now wearing. I found both of these on the AH for about 6K each. I slapped some Rubies on them and there you have it: uber-DPS.
I have moved on into Hell but I'm still at the very first quests in Act 1. What's interesting is that the monsters aren't that hard to kill but their hit points have jumped up significantly. Also, when they hit, they hit hard. Luckily, those zombies at the beginning are slow as molasses and hit once in a blue moon. I'm pretty sure that, in order to beat Hell, I'm gonna need a lot more than 2K DPS, perhaps more along the lines of 5K-10K.
Speaking of weapons, I much prefer 1-handed fast weapons to the 2-handed polearm I was wearing yesterday. The Monk becomes a machine-gun with these fast weapons.
Now, the cool thing is that I got Azmodan (Act 3 boss) on farm mode in Nightmare. From levels 47-50 I farmed this dude exclusively. The reason why this works so well is that when you pick the quest "Kill Azmodan" and complete it, you get two different quest credits (along with XP and gold rewards). One is right after killing Azmodan, while the other is after going back to town, speaking to the guard dude and then climbing on the ramparts.
So the "farming" part is solely for the XP. Azmodan himself doesn't drop anything of worth, nor does he give much XP. But I also take the time to clear the mobs in the zone leading up to him. Another cool thing about this quest is that the zone that spans from the waypoint to Azmodan's lair is static. You could even rush through it without engaging mobs, if you can stun/slow them somehow. But I wanted to kill them each time, both for XP and items/gold.
It's pretty cool, if I start having difficulties in Hell I'm definitely going back to farm Azmodan for some more XP. At level 50 you need about 3 of these runs to gain a level. Pretty nifty. A run shouldn't take more than 10-15 minutes, depending which champions/rares you run into. It happened that I came across some nasty Arcane enchanted mobs with another dangerous affix, and instead of risking dying (I knew they would be trouble), I simply started a new game after porting back to town.
Auction House adventures
If it hasn't sunk in already, I highly recommend looking for bargains on the AH. It's a very easy way to increase your damage and survivability and it shouldn't cost you a lot. After all, that's how I bought my two nice weapons, as well as other upgrades. I paid a total of 17K for these two weapons. Totally worth every little penny.
Build and skills
My build has continued to evolve, little by little. Now I just run with a single build instead of having a grinding and a boss build. Things have become tougher and I am trying to play more defensively. It amazes me sometimes how the Monk can escape some very hairy situations.
Build @ level 51 (available at 39)
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXgQj!ZYX!ZZZaab
(Sorry about linking it this way, I'm still having trouble with linking the build properly)
The main highlight is that I picked the Sweeping Armada rune for Lashing Tail Kick because it helps a lot with those nasty mobs. If I get surrounded or my health is dangerously low or if I'm facing champions/rares with dangerous affixes, I can just kick them away and they are thrown much farther thanks to the rune, not to mention that their speed is also slowed for 2 seconds. This allows me to regroup/escape/heal or simply pick them off one by one.
I'm keeping Mystic Ally for now because this little dude continues to impress me. First, I don't have to micro-manage him. Second, he seems very tough and very often can take more damage than me. For example in Act 4 there are some huge monsters called Mallet Lords. These dudes can kill me in 2-3 hits, despite my Monky Zen and they also have a lot of health. But with the Mystic Ally, I can use him as a meat shield. I will stay back, let him engage, and then rush to engage the monster myself. My dude will take 2 hits and die while in the meantime I can whittle the monster's health down to 50% or so. Then I can pop a Serenity and finish him off.
So that's about it for now. I'll be fighting my way through Hell, next.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 7
On day 7 I'm becoming even more comfortable with my Monk. At the end of the day he is level 44, with about 1.1K DPS and 7K+ health. This may not seem enough but I can explain.
I was playing with this Demon Hunter who was lower level than me. I asked what his DPS was. Mine was 900 at the time and I was feeling pretty good about it. He surprised me when he said 1600. But then he said that he spent a bunch of gold on the Auction House buying upgrades. Fair enough.
Regardless of DPS, the Monk feels just right. I run a defensive build, with a lot of passive and active healing and it seems to work very well so far. I will detail the build shortly.
Here's my Monk, at level 44, with his new polearm. I gave up a shield for now, but I'd like to take one up again, for the extra armor. Also, I prefer a faster weapon, but this 2-hander was very cheap on the Auction House and it gave me a very nice DPS and health boost.
Also notice that I changed my banner. Yeah, ok, banners are not so bad after all.
I'm tempted to play with some armor dyes but I realize it would be a waste of gold right now so I'm putting it off until much later, after the RMAH is released.
Build and skills
I love how my build evolves slowly from one day to the next. Today I'm using a slightly different build than on day 6.
Grinding build @ level 44 (available at 39).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXfQj21aYaaaaaaaaab!ZYX!ZaaZab
The main highlight is that I replaced Crippling Wave (regretfully) with Fists of Thunder runed with Lightning Flash. The reason is twofold: first, it generates more Spirit; second, it increases my Dodge by 16% as long as I'm hitting stuff with Fists of Thunder.
The other thing is that I replaced the Water Ally rune for Mystic Ally with Air Ally. While the little dude seems to do slightly less damage, occasionally he gives me a huge Spirit boost thanks to the rune.
The main reason for these changes is that I kept finding myself starved of Spirit. I need a build which could generate lots of Spirit, especially since spending Spirit also heals me thanks to the Transcendence passive. This build is an improvement but still not perfect. If you have any suggestions on how to improve my Spirit generation even further, I'd be grateful.
Boss build @ level 44 (available at 39).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#UZXgQj21aYaaaaaaaaab!ZYX!ZaZaab
The boss build remains almost unchanged, except for the Mystic Ally rune. The other minor change is that I'm now using Breath of Heaven with Circle of Life instead of Circle of Scorn, for even more healing. Truth be told, I'm not even sure this last change is warranted. With this build I'm not taking enough damage from act bosses to make the extra healing mandatory.
I can see myself later on replacing Mystic Ally with Inner Sanctuary runes with Safe Haven or Consecration or Circle of Protection. So many choices. This would make for the ultimate tank.
Auction House
Speaking of the Auction House, I have become a convert. Not that I wasn't before, but I didn't expect I would end up searching actively for upgrades. I decided to upgrade some lousy pieces of equipment I had and in short order bought, for a total of 6K gold, 3 rare pieces which boosted my DPS by over 100, as well as my health and other stats. Was it worth it? Hell yeah! I can make 6K in less than 5 minutes on Nightmare.
The polearm/pike thing you see in the screenshot was also purchased for 6K gold and this alone improved my DPS by an additional 200.
I have also discovered an easy method to search for the best deals on the AH, but I will have to write a standalone article on the subject. UPDATE: never mind. Great minds think alike. Meldora posted the exact same thing, along with a video showing how it's done, on d3artisans.
A friend from Europe has also mentioned he was using the AH for upgrades. I'm telling you, if you want to rely solely on items you find on your own, that's fine. But in Nightmare things are getting hairy and you might suffer greatly for it. My friend's Wizard has 2K DPS and 12K health at level 47 but still struggles in Nightmare Act 3. Now, this is very subjective because, in comparison, my Monk has a bit over half his stats but he doesn't have a lot of problems, also in Act 3 Nightmare.
Auction House bugs
The AH might be great for finding item upgrades but it suffers from some serious bugs, currently. First, there's a major bug that prevents you from selling high(er) level gems. This is especially true of Perfect Square and Radiant Square gems. Basically you post the gem on the AH but other players can't buy it. I don't even think they will see it, even if it is the lowest priced. There's an elaborate trick involved that seems to fix this issue but such workarounds are ridiculous and shouldn't be needed at all. Damn you Blizzard, fix this right now!
Apart from that, I got some serious errors when trying to purchase some Tomes of Secrets. These are reagents for crafting some higher level gems. I spent over 20 minutes trying to buy 6 lousy Tomes. After placing the buy order I waited for several minutes while the order was "processed". Then, each time I got an error that my request failed. Problem was, the gold was deducted from my account. In the end, I found that I had purchased 2 stacks of 6 Tomes each, instead of just 1 stack, but there was a lot of gold missing (about 100K or so). Each time I clicked "Buy" my gold seems to have disappeared into a black hole of some sort.
It is possible that I will get a refund of all that gold. Last night when I went to bed I didn't see it, but I'm hoping today, after their damn maintenance, I will.
So yeah, be very careful when buying certain commodities. If you get a very long delay when placing an order and then an error message, stop buying.
Crafting
I managed to sink a couple hundred thousand gold in leveling my Jewelcrafter. My intentions were good. Studying the gem prices on the Auction House it became clear that I could make a profit by crafting the highest level gems available so far in the game. Currently these are Radiant Square Rubies. Well, Rubies seem to be the most profitable.
There were two problems with this strategy. First, I lost all that gold trying to buy Tomes of Secrets. Second, no one can buy the first gem I crafted because I forgot that the trick I linked above involved exactly 2 gems. So now I have 2 choices: take a loss and use the gem myself on my Monk's weapon (which would give him yet another DPS boost), or risk crafting a second gem. In the meantime, prices may drop even further, nullifying any profits.
I'll see how it goes after the game is back online. But the outlook is grim. I don't understand why it's so hard for them to fix these serious AH issues. I can't even imagine if shit like this happens with the RMAH. Either way, this is inexcusable. Gold will translate very shortly into real money. So if the system eats my gold, it is essentially eating my hard-earned cash.
Items and farming
In Nightmare Act 2 you will start seeing Perfect gems drop. In Act 3 you will see Radiant gems.
I did a tally of how much gold I can "farm" in an hour and it comes to about 50K per hour in Nightmare Act 2. 30K are from picking up gold and vendoring blue/rare items. The rest are from the value of gems and pages of crafting which I find in an hour and sell on the AH. Not too shabby. I'm sure that amount would be even more if I focused exclusively on farming, but now's not the time. Gotta get to 60 first.
While killing stuff in Act 2, my Monk found this really nice 117.6 DPS bow, the first weapon with more than 100 DPS. He, of course, passed it on to the Demon Hunter whereupon the latter's DPS rocketed up to about 1600. And by the way, these are exactly the stats I'm looking for in a DH item: Dex and Vit. This bow has plenty of both.
Another Scoundrel piece of wisdom
In closing I will leave you with another lol moment, courtesy of the Scoundrel follower.
Follow the D3 Marathon
I was playing with this Demon Hunter who was lower level than me. I asked what his DPS was. Mine was 900 at the time and I was feeling pretty good about it. He surprised me when he said 1600. But then he said that he spent a bunch of gold on the Auction House buying upgrades. Fair enough.
Regardless of DPS, the Monk feels just right. I run a defensive build, with a lot of passive and active healing and it seems to work very well so far. I will detail the build shortly.
Here's my Monk, at level 44, with his new polearm. I gave up a shield for now, but I'd like to take one up again, for the extra armor. Also, I prefer a faster weapon, but this 2-hander was very cheap on the Auction House and it gave me a very nice DPS and health boost.
Also notice that I changed my banner. Yeah, ok, banners are not so bad after all.
I'm tempted to play with some armor dyes but I realize it would be a waste of gold right now so I'm putting it off until much later, after the RMAH is released.
Build and skills
I love how my build evolves slowly from one day to the next. Today I'm using a slightly different build than on day 6.
Grinding build @ level 44 (available at 39).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aZXfQj21aYaaaaaaaaab!ZYX!ZaaZab
The main highlight is that I replaced Crippling Wave (regretfully) with Fists of Thunder runed with Lightning Flash. The reason is twofold: first, it generates more Spirit; second, it increases my Dodge by 16% as long as I'm hitting stuff with Fists of Thunder.
The other thing is that I replaced the Water Ally rune for Mystic Ally with Air Ally. While the little dude seems to do slightly less damage, occasionally he gives me a huge Spirit boost thanks to the rune.
The main reason for these changes is that I kept finding myself starved of Spirit. I need a build which could generate lots of Spirit, especially since spending Spirit also heals me thanks to the Transcendence passive. This build is an improvement but still not perfect. If you have any suggestions on how to improve my Spirit generation even further, I'd be grateful.
Boss build @ level 44 (available at 39).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#UZXgQj21aYaaaaaaaaab!ZYX!ZaZaab
The boss build remains almost unchanged, except for the Mystic Ally rune. The other minor change is that I'm now using Breath of Heaven with Circle of Life instead of Circle of Scorn, for even more healing. Truth be told, I'm not even sure this last change is warranted. With this build I'm not taking enough damage from act bosses to make the extra healing mandatory.
I can see myself later on replacing Mystic Ally with Inner Sanctuary runes with Safe Haven or Consecration or Circle of Protection. So many choices. This would make for the ultimate tank.
Auction House
Speaking of the Auction House, I have become a convert. Not that I wasn't before, but I didn't expect I would end up searching actively for upgrades. I decided to upgrade some lousy pieces of equipment I had and in short order bought, for a total of 6K gold, 3 rare pieces which boosted my DPS by over 100, as well as my health and other stats. Was it worth it? Hell yeah! I can make 6K in less than 5 minutes on Nightmare.
The polearm/pike thing you see in the screenshot was also purchased for 6K gold and this alone improved my DPS by an additional 200.
I have also discovered an easy method to search for the best deals on the AH, but I will have to write a standalone article on the subject. UPDATE: never mind. Great minds think alike. Meldora posted the exact same thing, along with a video showing how it's done, on d3artisans.
A friend from Europe has also mentioned he was using the AH for upgrades. I'm telling you, if you want to rely solely on items you find on your own, that's fine. But in Nightmare things are getting hairy and you might suffer greatly for it. My friend's Wizard has 2K DPS and 12K health at level 47 but still struggles in Nightmare Act 3. Now, this is very subjective because, in comparison, my Monk has a bit over half his stats but he doesn't have a lot of problems, also in Act 3 Nightmare.
Auction House bugs
The AH might be great for finding item upgrades but it suffers from some serious bugs, currently. First, there's a major bug that prevents you from selling high(er) level gems. This is especially true of Perfect Square and Radiant Square gems. Basically you post the gem on the AH but other players can't buy it. I don't even think they will see it, even if it is the lowest priced. There's an elaborate trick involved that seems to fix this issue but such workarounds are ridiculous and shouldn't be needed at all. Damn you Blizzard, fix this right now!
Apart from that, I got some serious errors when trying to purchase some Tomes of Secrets. These are reagents for crafting some higher level gems. I spent over 20 minutes trying to buy 6 lousy Tomes. After placing the buy order I waited for several minutes while the order was "processed". Then, each time I got an error that my request failed. Problem was, the gold was deducted from my account. In the end, I found that I had purchased 2 stacks of 6 Tomes each, instead of just 1 stack, but there was a lot of gold missing (about 100K or so). Each time I clicked "Buy" my gold seems to have disappeared into a black hole of some sort.
It is possible that I will get a refund of all that gold. Last night when I went to bed I didn't see it, but I'm hoping today, after their damn maintenance, I will.
So yeah, be very careful when buying certain commodities. If you get a very long delay when placing an order and then an error message, stop buying.
Crafting
I managed to sink a couple hundred thousand gold in leveling my Jewelcrafter. My intentions were good. Studying the gem prices on the Auction House it became clear that I could make a profit by crafting the highest level gems available so far in the game. Currently these are Radiant Square Rubies. Well, Rubies seem to be the most profitable.
There were two problems with this strategy. First, I lost all that gold trying to buy Tomes of Secrets. Second, no one can buy the first gem I crafted because I forgot that the trick I linked above involved exactly 2 gems. So now I have 2 choices: take a loss and use the gem myself on my Monk's weapon (which would give him yet another DPS boost), or risk crafting a second gem. In the meantime, prices may drop even further, nullifying any profits.
I'll see how it goes after the game is back online. But the outlook is grim. I don't understand why it's so hard for them to fix these serious AH issues. I can't even imagine if shit like this happens with the RMAH. Either way, this is inexcusable. Gold will translate very shortly into real money. So if the system eats my gold, it is essentially eating my hard-earned cash.
Items and farming
In Nightmare Act 2 you will start seeing Perfect gems drop. In Act 3 you will see Radiant gems.
I did a tally of how much gold I can "farm" in an hour and it comes to about 50K per hour in Nightmare Act 2. 30K are from picking up gold and vendoring blue/rare items. The rest are from the value of gems and pages of crafting which I find in an hour and sell on the AH. Not too shabby. I'm sure that amount would be even more if I focused exclusively on farming, but now's not the time. Gotta get to 60 first.
While killing stuff in Act 2, my Monk found this really nice 117.6 DPS bow, the first weapon with more than 100 DPS. He, of course, passed it on to the Demon Hunter whereupon the latter's DPS rocketed up to about 1600. And by the way, these are exactly the stats I'm looking for in a DH item: Dex and Vit. This bow has plenty of both.
Another Scoundrel piece of wisdom
In closing I will leave you with another lol moment, courtesy of the Scoundrel follower.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Monday, May 21, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 6
Well, I just had to do it. On day 6 I decided that I would forsake my Demon Hunter and make the Monk my main, instead. So far it seems I made the right decision. I am enjoying my Monk a lot more than the DH. Not only does he kick ass but he can hold his own easily in Nightmare, something that the DH was struggling with.
The Monk
At level 26 the Monk already had 354 DPS in Act 3 (Normal), thanks to a nice rare spear found by my Demon Hunter, socketed with a +10-20 damage gem.
At the end of the day I managed to level him to 35 (!!) and beat the Skeleton King on Nightmare. Do I even have to mention that I killed Diablo on my own? That's nothing. Big, bad Diablo didn't even put a scratch on the Monk. I was telling you on day 4 that the Demon Hunter struggled with Diablo and I didn't feel at all confident that I could take him on my own.
The Monk snorts in disdain at this ridiculous concept. He stormed through Act 4 in 1 hour and kicked Diablo's ass so hard that he won't even be there in Nightmare difficulty.
I won't lie to you, I managed to die a couple of times by random mobs. But the keyword here is "couple". With the right combinations of active and passive skills the Monk shines. Well, at least so far. I'll have to see how he performs in Hell and Inferno.
At level 35 the Monk has 530 DPS and he's not even wearing his "boss boots" which give an additional 40 DPS, as well as hit points, at the expense of movement speed.
Build and skills
On the Monk I use two different skill setups depending on whether I'm playing through the levels or fighting a boss. Here they are.
Grinding build @ level 32
I had to give up the Fleet Footed passive but survival has become more important than running speed. Besides, I found a pair of 10% movement speed boots, so that makes up for it. I also adopted Mystic Ally and this little dude kicks some serious ass. He can finish stray mobs on his own, even on Nightmare. I've only seen him die once, on Diablo, I believe. But he's a short cast away.
Boss build @ level 32
My boss build swaps Cyclone Strike for Serenity and also Crippling Wave for Way of the Hundred Fists. In other words, I'm giving up a couple of AoE skills for single target damage and even more survivability. There's so much passive and active healing in this build, it's not even funny.
Grouping
I am starting to wonder what the point is in grouping with other people when I'm running with my Monk. Most often, I do more damage than they do, so they are essentially dragging me down. And then, they are always slacking off, usually AFK. One chap was even busy leveling his Jewelcrafter while I was kicking monster butt for more than half an hour.
I did have a very nice group late last night. One of the buddies on my friends list was in a group and they had a free spot. Even though I was already in Nightmare and they were running through Act 3 Normal, I decided to join them. That was a very good group. Massive damage and the mobs were dropping like flies. Unfortunately, him and his wife (both were playing) had to put their kids to sleep so we called it a night.
It's a pleasure to be in groups like that. But most often I end up with people who just don't seem to want to play. But it's ok, as a Monk I don't need any help and I can tackle most situations on my own.
Gold and auction house
At the end of the day I had 721K gold with over 100K stuck in a failed "investment". I could kick myself for being so rash but now it's too late. Playing the market can backfire sometimes.
Other thoughts
I just love it when I'm playing a melee character and a caster champion/rare has the Vortex modifier. It makes for a very lol moment. Thanks buddy! Now I don't have to chase you down.
Follow the D3 Marathon
The Monk
At level 26 the Monk already had 354 DPS in Act 3 (Normal), thanks to a nice rare spear found by my Demon Hunter, socketed with a +10-20 damage gem.
At the end of the day I managed to level him to 35 (!!) and beat the Skeleton King on Nightmare. Do I even have to mention that I killed Diablo on my own? That's nothing. Big, bad Diablo didn't even put a scratch on the Monk. I was telling you on day 4 that the Demon Hunter struggled with Diablo and I didn't feel at all confident that I could take him on my own.
The Monk snorts in disdain at this ridiculous concept. He stormed through Act 4 in 1 hour and kicked Diablo's ass so hard that he won't even be there in Nightmare difficulty.
I won't lie to you, I managed to die a couple of times by random mobs. But the keyword here is "couple". With the right combinations of active and passive skills the Monk shines. Well, at least so far. I'll have to see how he performs in Hell and Inferno.
At level 35 the Monk has 530 DPS and he's not even wearing his "boss boots" which give an additional 40 DPS, as well as hit points, at the expense of movement speed.
Build and skills
On the Monk I use two different skill setups depending on whether I'm playing through the levels or fighting a boss. Here they are.
Grinding build @ level 32
I had to give up the Fleet Footed passive but survival has become more important than running speed. Besides, I found a pair of 10% movement speed boots, so that makes up for it. I also adopted Mystic Ally and this little dude kicks some serious ass. He can finish stray mobs on his own, even on Nightmare. I've only seen him die once, on Diablo, I believe. But he's a short cast away.
Boss build @ level 32
My boss build swaps Cyclone Strike for Serenity and also Crippling Wave for Way of the Hundred Fists. In other words, I'm giving up a couple of AoE skills for single target damage and even more survivability. There's so much passive and active healing in this build, it's not even funny.
Grouping
I am starting to wonder what the point is in grouping with other people when I'm running with my Monk. Most often, I do more damage than they do, so they are essentially dragging me down. And then, they are always slacking off, usually AFK. One chap was even busy leveling his Jewelcrafter while I was kicking monster butt for more than half an hour.
I did have a very nice group late last night. One of the buddies on my friends list was in a group and they had a free spot. Even though I was already in Nightmare and they were running through Act 3 Normal, I decided to join them. That was a very good group. Massive damage and the mobs were dropping like flies. Unfortunately, him and his wife (both were playing) had to put their kids to sleep so we called it a night.
It's a pleasure to be in groups like that. But most often I end up with people who just don't seem to want to play. But it's ok, as a Monk I don't need any help and I can tackle most situations on my own.
Gold and auction house
At the end of the day I had 721K gold with over 100K stuck in a failed "investment". I could kick myself for being so rash but now it's too late. Playing the market can backfire sometimes.
Other thoughts
I just love it when I'm playing a melee character and a caster champion/rare has the Vortex modifier. It makes for a very lol moment. Thanks buddy! Now I don't have to chase you down.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Sunday, May 20, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 5
Demon Hunter
Well folks, I'm in a bit of an impasse. You see, I have run out of steam with my Demon Hunter. He finally made it to level 40 after long struggles. He's in Nightmare Act 2 right now but he's having a very hard time with the monsters.
There are very frequent packs of champions and rares now which the DH can barely survive on his own. In one instance I kited a pack of champions across the whole map, all the way back into town, with barely a sliver of my life remaining. In the end I killed them at the town entrance where they couldn't pass.
His DPS is 698 at this point, with 4786 hit points.
Grouping up with people didn't help a lot. I hate the fact that the game, more often than not, teams you up with just one more person, instead of 2-3. And very often, this other person is also a ranged class, another DH or a Wizard. Two ranged classes in Nightmare are a recipe for disaster, with the sort of mobs that spawn.
Some of my "favorite" champion/rare modifiers are Jailer/Mortar. Then there's Vortex, of course, which is the bane of any ranged character, and Fast, which pretty much ignores all your slowing attempts with Caltrops or whatnot.
No, at this point I am giving up on the Demon Hunter. It has stopped being fun and now it's downright frustrating. I don't want to spend 5 minutes running away each time I encounter a pack of champions.
Monk
I have decided, almost a week too late, that perhaps the Monk would have been a better first class choice. I spent most of day 5 leveling my Monk who is now level 21.
I find the Monk's gameplay incredible, so far. His moves are out of this world. Here's my level 21 build. Crippling Wave and Exploding Palm are my favorite skills.
I am hoping, over the next couple of days, to get close to level 40 with the Monk and then compare his survivability with that of the Demon Hunter.
Once, I ran in a group with my Demon Hunter, a Monk and another class, on Nightmare. The Monk was so badass, she could handle entire groups of monsters on her own, without our assistance. Her equipment didn't seem out of the ordinary so I'm thinking that Monks are probably better at holding their own.
At any rate, I'm hoping that a melee class won't need to run away from monsters like the Demon Hunter is forced to.
Banners
About a week ago I was being dismissive about banners. Well, maybe they're not so bad after all. I also spent a few minutes playing with my banner and you might have noticed that I changed it a bit. I just wish there were additional ways in which to customize characters cosmetically.
I'm keeping it short for today because I want to put in some leveling time with my Monk. Catch y'all tomorrow!
Follow the D3 Marathon
Well folks, I'm in a bit of an impasse. You see, I have run out of steam with my Demon Hunter. He finally made it to level 40 after long struggles. He's in Nightmare Act 2 right now but he's having a very hard time with the monsters.
There are very frequent packs of champions and rares now which the DH can barely survive on his own. In one instance I kited a pack of champions across the whole map, all the way back into town, with barely a sliver of my life remaining. In the end I killed them at the town entrance where they couldn't pass.
His DPS is 698 at this point, with 4786 hit points.
Grouping up with people didn't help a lot. I hate the fact that the game, more often than not, teams you up with just one more person, instead of 2-3. And very often, this other person is also a ranged class, another DH or a Wizard. Two ranged classes in Nightmare are a recipe for disaster, with the sort of mobs that spawn.
Some of my "favorite" champion/rare modifiers are Jailer/Mortar. Then there's Vortex, of course, which is the bane of any ranged character, and Fast, which pretty much ignores all your slowing attempts with Caltrops or whatnot.
No, at this point I am giving up on the Demon Hunter. It has stopped being fun and now it's downright frustrating. I don't want to spend 5 minutes running away each time I encounter a pack of champions.
Monk
I have decided, almost a week too late, that perhaps the Monk would have been a better first class choice. I spent most of day 5 leveling my Monk who is now level 21.
I find the Monk's gameplay incredible, so far. His moves are out of this world. Here's my level 21 build. Crippling Wave and Exploding Palm are my favorite skills.
I am hoping, over the next couple of days, to get close to level 40 with the Monk and then compare his survivability with that of the Demon Hunter.
Once, I ran in a group with my Demon Hunter, a Monk and another class, on Nightmare. The Monk was so badass, she could handle entire groups of monsters on her own, without our assistance. Her equipment didn't seem out of the ordinary so I'm thinking that Monks are probably better at holding their own.
At any rate, I'm hoping that a melee class won't need to run away from monsters like the Demon Hunter is forced to.
Banners
About a week ago I was being dismissive about banners. Well, maybe they're not so bad after all. I also spent a few minutes playing with my banner and you might have noticed that I changed it a bit. I just wish there were additional ways in which to customize characters cosmetically.
I'm keeping it short for today because I want to put in some leveling time with my Monk. Catch y'all tomorrow!
Follow the D3 Marathon
Saturday, May 19, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 4
On day 4, because my Demon Hunter was having some difficulties in Act 4, I decided to trade some Dexterity for Vitality. It was very risky going with only 1600 HP. Even though my DPS dropped, my survivability improved.
Performance metrics
At the end of day 4 my Demon Hunter was level 38. On this day, I had only played 6 hours on the DH, for a total of 26 hours 15 minutes. On the other hand, I did put in some time on my Monk, that I leveled to 15, as well as the Witch Doctor (10) and Wizard (9).
My Demon Hunter's DPS went from 406 to 690.
My gold is now 465K, and that's after buying the remaining space in my first shared stash tab for 20K.
Inventory management
My inventory was becoming a big problem. The shared stash was full and I had to make frequent trips to town on my Demon Hunter to sell stuff. Eventually I took the time to create 4 more mule characters (for a total of 5) and successfully transferred all the crap that was taking up space in the shared stash. I will probably do a post on this aspect of inventory management alone, because I think it is a fairly organized way to do it.
Beat Normal
I finally finished Act 4 and the act's boss. OK, at this point it shouldn't be much of a spoiler if I tell you that the boss is Diablo. After all, the game is called Diablo, right? When you're solo, your follower is disabled before the last battle. He gets trapped in a bone cage. Not fair!
The fight has 3 phases and I died on the second phase. I realized that, due to the nature of the fight, I would have a very hard time completing this on my own. So, once again, I decided to join a group. A Barbarian and I managed to kill Diablo but we both came close to dying. It was the first time for both of us. I have to say, it's a tough fight. I wouldn't have stood a chance if I hadn't donned that Vitality gear, I can tell you that.
In the end, I finished Normal difficulty on my Demon Hunter at level 33 with 21 hours and 50 minutes on this character.
Zones and monsters
After I beat Normal, I couldn't wait to start Nightmare. Man, Nightmare is a lot harder than Normal, I can tell you that! Even at level 33 (which, I believe, is ahead of the curve) it was tough for me. Starting in Nightmare, I grouped up every time. The mobs are vicious, they have tons of HP and there are packs upon packs of rare bosses and champions, now with 2 modifiers. They kick ass so hard that I died a dozen times in the first half of Act 1. I wasn't alone in my predicament. Many of my group mates also died about the same number of times even though they seemed to be better equipped.
I was glad to be back in Act 1. After going through it again with the Demon Hunter and also my lower level characters, especially the Monk, I realized how much I like the design of this act. The zones are very varied and change often. The only repetitive zones are the Cathedral levels but that's ok. I seriously believe that Act 1 is the best act in Diablo 3. It feels leagues ahead of Acts 3 and 4 in terms of diversity and art.
Items and Gold Auction House
In Act 1 Nightmare flawless gems have started to drop. Also, there's been an abundance of Jewelcrafting and Blacksmithing pages of training. Guess what? I sold all of those (a few dozen of them) on the GAH. There's no point in using them right now because the prices are relatively high. I'm gonna sell them now and, if I need to, buy them later for much less. Besides, they sell almost instantly.
When I sell pages of training I look at how much 100 of them cost, not 1, not even 10. Whenever you look at the price of 1 unit (for commodities), you might be fooled into pricing your own items too low. That's why it makes sense to search for 100 pieces or even more.
One final thing about items is that the Skeleton King had some really crappy drops in Nightmare. Just 2 blue items! I guess that was the luck of the draw.
Oh, here's a funny item I found. Department of Redundancy Department? Yep.
Monk
I have started to level my Monk in groups and I am very impressed so far. I'm afraid he might steal the crown from my Demon Hunter. I just love the gameplay. Granted, he inherited a lot of good stuff from the DH, including some kick-ass weapons for his level. In 3-4 man groups he can kick ass on his own, and kick it real hard. But then again, at these low levels, on Normal, monsters aren't very challenging.
Excuse that piss-bucket my Monk is wearing on his head. It makes him look goofy but I'm sure it will be replaced soon. The claws, on the other hand, are wicked.
That's about it for day 4. I'm relieved I finished Normal so that I can now focus on leveling the Demon Hunter exclusively in groups. The monsters are much harder but the loot is also better, not to mention the gold which drops in higher quantities (200 gold stacks anyone?).
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Performance metrics
At the end of day 4 my Demon Hunter was level 38. On this day, I had only played 6 hours on the DH, for a total of 26 hours 15 minutes. On the other hand, I did put in some time on my Monk, that I leveled to 15, as well as the Witch Doctor (10) and Wizard (9).
My Demon Hunter's DPS went from 406 to 690.
My gold is now 465K, and that's after buying the remaining space in my first shared stash tab for 20K.
Inventory management
My inventory was becoming a big problem. The shared stash was full and I had to make frequent trips to town on my Demon Hunter to sell stuff. Eventually I took the time to create 4 more mule characters (for a total of 5) and successfully transferred all the crap that was taking up space in the shared stash. I will probably do a post on this aspect of inventory management alone, because I think it is a fairly organized way to do it.
Beat Normal
I finally finished Act 4 and the act's boss. OK, at this point it shouldn't be much of a spoiler if I tell you that the boss is Diablo. After all, the game is called Diablo, right? When you're solo, your follower is disabled before the last battle. He gets trapped in a bone cage. Not fair!
The fight has 3 phases and I died on the second phase. I realized that, due to the nature of the fight, I would have a very hard time completing this on my own. So, once again, I decided to join a group. A Barbarian and I managed to kill Diablo but we both came close to dying. It was the first time for both of us. I have to say, it's a tough fight. I wouldn't have stood a chance if I hadn't donned that Vitality gear, I can tell you that.
In the end, I finished Normal difficulty on my Demon Hunter at level 33 with 21 hours and 50 minutes on this character.
SPOILER
Diablo seems to be a girl. Well, (s)he should be, considering. But it was hard to tell in the heat of battle. Problem is, the voice is male.
Zones and monsters
After I beat Normal, I couldn't wait to start Nightmare. Man, Nightmare is a lot harder than Normal, I can tell you that! Even at level 33 (which, I believe, is ahead of the curve) it was tough for me. Starting in Nightmare, I grouped up every time. The mobs are vicious, they have tons of HP and there are packs upon packs of rare bosses and champions, now with 2 modifiers. They kick ass so hard that I died a dozen times in the first half of Act 1. I wasn't alone in my predicament. Many of my group mates also died about the same number of times even though they seemed to be better equipped.
I was glad to be back in Act 1. After going through it again with the Demon Hunter and also my lower level characters, especially the Monk, I realized how much I like the design of this act. The zones are very varied and change often. The only repetitive zones are the Cathedral levels but that's ok. I seriously believe that Act 1 is the best act in Diablo 3. It feels leagues ahead of Acts 3 and 4 in terms of diversity and art.
Items and Gold Auction House
In Act 1 Nightmare flawless gems have started to drop. Also, there's been an abundance of Jewelcrafting and Blacksmithing pages of training. Guess what? I sold all of those (a few dozen of them) on the GAH. There's no point in using them right now because the prices are relatively high. I'm gonna sell them now and, if I need to, buy them later for much less. Besides, they sell almost instantly.
When I sell pages of training I look at how much 100 of them cost, not 1, not even 10. Whenever you look at the price of 1 unit (for commodities), you might be fooled into pricing your own items too low. That's why it makes sense to search for 100 pieces or even more.
One final thing about items is that the Skeleton King had some really crappy drops in Nightmare. Just 2 blue items! I guess that was the luck of the draw.
Oh, here's a funny item I found. Department of Redundancy Department? Yep.
Monk
I have started to level my Monk in groups and I am very impressed so far. I'm afraid he might steal the crown from my Demon Hunter. I just love the gameplay. Granted, he inherited a lot of good stuff from the DH, including some kick-ass weapons for his level. In 3-4 man groups he can kick ass on his own, and kick it real hard. But then again, at these low levels, on Normal, monsters aren't very challenging.
Excuse that piss-bucket my Monk is wearing on his head. It makes him look goofy but I'm sure it will be replaced soon. The claws, on the other hand, are wicked.
That's about it for day 4. I'm relieved I finished Normal so that I can now focus on leveling the Demon Hunter exclusively in groups. The monsters are much harder but the loot is also better, not to mention the gold which drops in higher quantities (200 gold stacks anyone?).
Follow the D3 Marathon
Friday, May 18, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 3
It seems that I'm slowing down with each day. If on the previous day I managed 8 hours, on my 3rd day I only pulled 7 hours on my Demon Hunter. In my defense, I spent some time leveling a Monk and Barbarian to 11-12. I had to do that because their inventories were overflowing with items passed down from the DH.
Performance metrics
I have, so far, played my Demon Hunter for 20 hours 40 minutes. He's level 32 in Act 4. I don't know exactly where, but it must be past the middle of the act.
My DPS has increased from 228 to 406 but it's still quite low. Protip: buy the highest quality Ruby you can afford from the AH and socket it in your weapon(s), if they have slots. To give an example, at one point, with a Chipped Ruby which gives +2-4 damage, my DPS was 228. Switching to a Radiant Ruby (for which I paid about 12K on the GAH), which gives +12-24 damage, my DPS jumped to 277. That's a pretty big increase.
At the end of the day I had 265K gold, after buying another 10K worth of shared stash space.
Items and Gold Auction House
Rares are dropping quite often now. In fact, my stashes are overflowing with hand-me-down rares for my other characters. Many of them are useless and I simply vendor them off.
I had the chance to flip some items on the GAH, namely gems. For example, I found some Chipped Rubies posted for 50G, bought them immediately and sold them back for 800G. I also sold all the chipped and flawed gems I had found. It's much better this way because higher quality gems are much cheaper to buy on the GAH than to craft yourself so there's no point in hanging on to low level gems.
I also managed to sell a bunch of weapons/armor on the AH, many of them rare. To keep myself from being frustrated I decided to sell them for very low prices. So if you find decent level 10-20 rares at < 2000 gold, or even < 1000 gold, that might be me. Otherwise they just won't sell. Yeah, call me crazy but it's hard to sell stuff on the AH when everyone and their grandma is doing the same.
In Act 3 flawed gems start dropping and toward the middle/end of this act you will start seeing normal gems.
Story and followers
In Act 4 I decided to switch to the Templar. Survival became a lot harder and the Templar actually managed to save my life a few times with one of his skills which heals you instantly when you are close to dying.
When I was still running with the Scoundrel, I took these screenshots of some of his dialogue. This guy is so hilarious, I can't even describe it.
The story takes a nasty turn with a vicious plot twist, around the end of Act 3. Suffice to say, without spoiling it further, that...
Hmm, that's a mighty fiery Portal to Heaven.
Build and skills
My build at level 32 is almost the same as the day before, with the addition of the Bandolier rune for Spike Trap. This is a very cool rune because you can litter the place with traps, as long as you have sufficient Hatred.
Monsters and bosses
Here are some interesting sights you will encounter in Act 4.
I managed to kill the Act 3 boss (won't tell you who he is though you probably know by now) at level 31, 18 hours and 20 minutes into the game. The fight was one of the most entertaining so far. I didn't die on it but it was challenging. It kept me on my toes, constantly moving and avoiding whatever he threw at me. Actually, Act 3 has a couple more bosses that were very fun to kill.
In comparison, Act 4 is very annoying. I've started to become seriously frustrated with some of the monsters' mechanics. I don't mind enemies with interesting abilities but in Act 4 it seems that Blizzard's favorite monster mechanic is to have them materialize right on top of you and then hit you for 50% of your health, without the least warning. If you get "lucky" and get two of them instead of one, it's instant death.
If you ask me, this is poor design. I don't mind it if monsters are very quick or even if they teleport to you, as long as I can see them coming. But when they can pop up out of nowhere right on top of you and take a massive chunk of your health in an instant, that's not funny. And this is Normal difficulty! Do I really have to start stacking Vitality this early in the game?
Apart from this annoying mechanic, there was one boss that I couldn't tackle on my own. I won't say his name but he's very cool looking. You might have seen him in one of Blizzard's art showcases. He has a shark head and twin blades for arms. Anyway, this was a very frustrating fight. On my first attempt he killed me in 2 hits. This wouldn't be so bad if his main attack wasn't a charge with a hit at the end. So he charges and hits you in a fraction of a second. Traps or slowing debuffs don't work and, as a Demon Hunter, there was no defense against his charge. I did a pathetic attempt at kiting him but he charged me while I was running away and killed me.
On subsequent attempts I got killed in the same way. I decided to join a group for this boss. The first group I joined had already killed him so I just grabbed the quest credit. Later, I joined another group and found myself with a Monk, on the same boss. We managed to kill him together but even then, I came close to dying. So, I don't know, this seemed like another failed encounter design. Note to Blizzard: it isn't funny being 2-shotted without any possibility to defend against it, as a ranged character, on Normal.
Zones
I'm sorry to say this but I am starting to become disappointed in the zones as I progress through the game.
In Diablo 2 the acts got better as you advanced. In my opinion, Act 5 > Act 4 > Act 2 > Act 3 > Act 1.
In Diablo3, Act 1 > Act 2 > Act 3 > Act 4. I am actually finding that I am enjoying Act 1 more than all the other acts! Isn't that weird?
Seriously, Act 3 is very bland. Most of the time is spent around that fortress, on the ramparts or inside endless corridors. The little time spent outdoors is very boring. The scenery is drab and uninspiring. There's nothing to see there and the quests aren't even enticing. It's clear to me that Act 3 was designed to mimic Act 5 from D2, but in D2 Act 5 was really cool to be in. Here, I couldn't wait to finish the act. To be honest, the part inside the volcano wasn't bad, but a lot of it was repetitive.
Unfortunately, Act 4 feels even worse. Endless walkways and marble columns and halls. Granted, I haven't yet finished Act 4 and I have hopes that the scenery will improve, yet I feel a bit let down that the zones, instead of improving as you advance, become more boring.
On day 4 my goal is simply to finish the game on Normal. From there on I can finally start grouping up and perhaps some of the frustrations with certain monsters will end.
Follow the D3 Marathon
Performance metrics
I have, so far, played my Demon Hunter for 20 hours 40 minutes. He's level 32 in Act 4. I don't know exactly where, but it must be past the middle of the act.
My DPS has increased from 228 to 406 but it's still quite low. Protip: buy the highest quality Ruby you can afford from the AH and socket it in your weapon(s), if they have slots. To give an example, at one point, with a Chipped Ruby which gives +2-4 damage, my DPS was 228. Switching to a Radiant Ruby (for which I paid about 12K on the GAH), which gives +12-24 damage, my DPS jumped to 277. That's a pretty big increase.
At the end of the day I had 265K gold, after buying another 10K worth of shared stash space.
Items and Gold Auction House
Rares are dropping quite often now. In fact, my stashes are overflowing with hand-me-down rares for my other characters. Many of them are useless and I simply vendor them off.
I had the chance to flip some items on the GAH, namely gems. For example, I found some Chipped Rubies posted for 50G, bought them immediately and sold them back for 800G. I also sold all the chipped and flawed gems I had found. It's much better this way because higher quality gems are much cheaper to buy on the GAH than to craft yourself so there's no point in hanging on to low level gems.
I also managed to sell a bunch of weapons/armor on the AH, many of them rare. To keep myself from being frustrated I decided to sell them for very low prices. So if you find decent level 10-20 rares at < 2000 gold, or even < 1000 gold, that might be me. Otherwise they just won't sell. Yeah, call me crazy but it's hard to sell stuff on the AH when everyone and their grandma is doing the same.
In Act 3 flawed gems start dropping and toward the middle/end of this act you will start seeing normal gems.
Story and followers
In Act 4 I decided to switch to the Templar. Survival became a lot harder and the Templar actually managed to save my life a few times with one of his skills which heals you instantly when you are close to dying.
When I was still running with the Scoundrel, I took these screenshots of some of his dialogue. This guy is so hilarious, I can't even describe it.
The story takes a nasty turn with a vicious plot twist, around the end of Act 3. Suffice to say, without spoiling it further, that...
Hmm, that's a mighty fiery Portal to Heaven.
Build and skills
My build at level 32 is almost the same as the day before, with the addition of the Bandolier rune for Spike Trap. This is a very cool rune because you can litter the place with traps, as long as you have sufficient Hatred.
Monsters and bosses
Here are some interesting sights you will encounter in Act 4.
I managed to kill the Act 3 boss (won't tell you who he is though you probably know by now) at level 31, 18 hours and 20 minutes into the game. The fight was one of the most entertaining so far. I didn't die on it but it was challenging. It kept me on my toes, constantly moving and avoiding whatever he threw at me. Actually, Act 3 has a couple more bosses that were very fun to kill.
In comparison, Act 4 is very annoying. I've started to become seriously frustrated with some of the monsters' mechanics. I don't mind enemies with interesting abilities but in Act 4 it seems that Blizzard's favorite monster mechanic is to have them materialize right on top of you and then hit you for 50% of your health, without the least warning. If you get "lucky" and get two of them instead of one, it's instant death.
If you ask me, this is poor design. I don't mind it if monsters are very quick or even if they teleport to you, as long as I can see them coming. But when they can pop up out of nowhere right on top of you and take a massive chunk of your health in an instant, that's not funny. And this is Normal difficulty! Do I really have to start stacking Vitality this early in the game?
Apart from this annoying mechanic, there was one boss that I couldn't tackle on my own. I won't say his name but he's very cool looking. You might have seen him in one of Blizzard's art showcases. He has a shark head and twin blades for arms. Anyway, this was a very frustrating fight. On my first attempt he killed me in 2 hits. This wouldn't be so bad if his main attack wasn't a charge with a hit at the end. So he charges and hits you in a fraction of a second. Traps or slowing debuffs don't work and, as a Demon Hunter, there was no defense against his charge. I did a pathetic attempt at kiting him but he charged me while I was running away and killed me.
On subsequent attempts I got killed in the same way. I decided to join a group for this boss. The first group I joined had already killed him so I just grabbed the quest credit. Later, I joined another group and found myself with a Monk, on the same boss. We managed to kill him together but even then, I came close to dying. So, I don't know, this seemed like another failed encounter design. Note to Blizzard: it isn't funny being 2-shotted without any possibility to defend against it, as a ranged character, on Normal.
Zones
I'm sorry to say this but I am starting to become disappointed in the zones as I progress through the game.
In Diablo 2 the acts got better as you advanced. In my opinion, Act 5 > Act 4 > Act 2 > Act 3 > Act 1.
In Diablo3, Act 1 > Act 2 > Act 3 > Act 4. I am actually finding that I am enjoying Act 1 more than all the other acts! Isn't that weird?
Seriously, Act 3 is very bland. Most of the time is spent around that fortress, on the ramparts or inside endless corridors. The little time spent outdoors is very boring. The scenery is drab and uninspiring. There's nothing to see there and the quests aren't even enticing. It's clear to me that Act 3 was designed to mimic Act 5 from D2, but in D2 Act 5 was really cool to be in. Here, I couldn't wait to finish the act. To be honest, the part inside the volcano wasn't bad, but a lot of it was repetitive.
Unfortunately, Act 4 feels even worse. Endless walkways and marble columns and halls. Granted, I haven't yet finished Act 4 and I have hopes that the scenery will improve, yet I feel a bit let down that the zones, instead of improving as you advance, become more boring.
On day 4 my goal is simply to finish the game on Normal. From there on I can finally start grouping up and perhaps some of the frustrations with certain monsters will end.
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Thursday, May 17, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 2
MASSIVE SPOILERS AHEAD
(potentially)
This post contains potential spoilers if you haven't yet finished Act 2. I will have a special spoilers section at the bottom of the post. Be warned!
For my second day of playing Diablo 3 (and my first full day), I was a little disappointed to find out that my total play time was only 13 hours 40 minutes. This means that on my first full day I only managed 8 hours. I was hoping for at least 10. It's really weird because I thought I played more than just 8 hours. I guess real life managed to intrude on my play time more than I intended. But that's all right. I feel rested and ready to start the battle anew.
Performance metrics
At the end of these 13 hours 40 minutes, my Demon Hunter is in Act 3, right after the first quest. He's level 26. While yesterday I finished the game with 30K gold, I now have 108K gold.
It's not a huge amount by any stretch of the imagination but most of it is from drops. I didn't do much on the Gold Auction House. I did spend a few thousand on a couple of additional vendor rings and amulets which had some nice stats on them. These are a decent investment because I can pass them on to my other characters. I also grudgingly spent my first 10K enlarging my shared stash because it was a pain in the ass to switch between characters a dozen times to transfer items.
While at the end of the first day my DPS was 70, after the second day it reached 228.64 with Steady Aim, or 190.53 without.
As you can see, I even changed my banner. I regret not taking a screenshot when I was in Act 2 because I liked the background more.
Items
Once you get to Act 2 you will start seeing a lot more rares. I found so many rares that at one point I was just vendoring the crappy ones because they had bad stats on them and putting them on the GAH would have wasted a precious slot. I did save a bunch of them which I'm now wearing (including some sweet Demon Hunter 1H crossbows) and sent many of them to my other characters. Check out this sweet puppy below.
And here's another nice rare pair of gloves. It kinda mixes Strength with Dexterity but it's still pretty good for my Demon Hunter.
Yes, rares are a lot more abundant from Act 2 onward and I've had several occasions where 2-3 of them dropped in close succession from random monsters.
Apart from rares, you can also look forward to socketed items and gems. I already have a nice collection of chipped gems. Protip: don't waste gold combining gems with your Jewelcrafter. Just buy them from the GAH. Much cheaper that way. In fact, check the gem prices for the various qualities and you might find that you can turn a profit by simply selling chipped gems and then buying the desired quality from the AH.
Characters and followers
I won't spoil it for you at this point but there's an old NPC friend that you will meet again in Act 2. Apart from that, I now have access to all the followers, the third being the Enchantress, also encountered in Act 2. I am still enjoying the Scoundrel. He's barrels of laughs. His dialogue is priceless. Check out this little tidbit below.
It might not seem much but the deadpan way in which my Demon Hunter delivered that "No" had me falling off my chair laughing. Suffice to say that the Scoundrel is a womanizer and he hits on every female companion you happen to have in your party (yes, including Leah). I just love the banter between him and my character. For that reason, I don't really want to try the other followers. Oh and he also has a Multishot bow skill that seems to work well.
Sound
I would like to mention the game's sound, which is simply incredible. I'm not a sound man. I normally turn the music off in games so I can concentrate on the action. But this is the first game in which I'm listening to the music intentionally. And the score is amazing! No wonder - Blizzard employed a full orchestra in its creation. I love how it changes from zone to zone, or along with the action. Simply beautiful.
Monsters and gameplay
Maybe I'm growing old but I don't remember Diablo 2 being so hard on Normal. I died on the final boss in Act 1 and also a bunch of times in Act 2 from random groups of mobs. To those who were afraid that the game would be too easy, rest assured that it isn't. Gear does make a lot of difference but luckily the next upgrade is right around the corner. Yet, skill is very important here and if you concentrate solely on offensive skills you will end up hurting.
The monsters after the Skeleton King and especially in Act 2 are tougher and they use new skills and tactics. There are some very nasty ones which jump right on top of you or burrow under the earth to pop up beneath you or are very quick moving. I've encountered boss groups with some nasty attributes such as Waller or Jailer which can hurt you badly if you are not careful. Luckily, the Demon Hunter has a few tricks up his sleeve.
Build and skills
This is my level 26 Demon Hunter build as of right now. I'm pretty comfortable with this setup. Here's a breakdown of the skills.
Active Skills
Bola Shot runed with Volatile Explosives - I switched back to Bola Shot and I like it a lot. With twin 1H crossbows it fires very quickly. I've noticed that you can hit a monster with this several times in succession and each hit will explode individually, not just the first one that lands. Fired rapidly into a group of monsters will decimate them in a couple of seconds. The rune increases the explosion's radius. Bola Shot is also decent for kiting.Elemental Arrow runed with Ball Lightning - This is my main Hatred dump. The rune makes this skill very interesting. It shoots a blue ball of lightning that moves slowly in the firing direction and zaps each monster it passes. It's another great skill for kiting, or lobbing into a group of monsters because you don't need to aim it specifically at a monster. Just fire it in the general direction and let it do its thing.
Caltrops runed with Hooked Spines - Caltrops is invaluable for survival, especially with some of the fast monsters encountered later in the game. The rune is vital because it slows them down even more. I don't think I'd be able to play without this skill.
Vault runed with Rattling Roll - Vault is another skill which I find invaluable for the Demon Hunter. It has saved my skin a billion times already and I don't know what I'd do without it. It has also almost got me killed a few times and that's because occasionally I press the wrong key and find myself Vaulting inside a group of monsters instead of placing a trap in their midst. For that reason I have chosen this particular rune which stuns and knocks back the monsters at my destination. Now, when I have another of these oops moments, I won't be pummeled to death. The rune gives me just enough time to correct my mistake and Vault back out of danger.
Spike Trap - Spike Trap has rapidly become one my my favorite skills. It's simply amazing. The damage it does is very high and very often it annihilates entire groups of monsters. I like to place it inside groups of monsters at the edges of the screen, before I am detected, for example. One of my favorite tactics in Act 2 is to place 2-3 of these traps right under me. There are some nasty monsters that teleport right on top of you and hit you hard which is very painful if you are a ranged class. But now I can stand on top of a couple of traps and when these assholes teleport, they teleport right on top of my traps and are instantly killed. Apart from this, Spike Trap is obviously very useful for kiting.
Multishot runed with Fire at Will - Multishot is a very nice multi-target nuke. Very often it will clear a screen-full of monsters in one shot, or perhaps 2 if they have a lot of health. The only downside is that it uses a lot of Hatred so you have to use it sparingly. However, the rune halves its cost, which makes it twice as good.
Passive Skills
Tactical Advantage - For me this passive makes a lot of sense. I Vault a lot so the increased speed is a great advantage, both for moving quickly and for escaping a dire situation.Steady Aim - 20% increased damage when there are no monsters within 10 yards? Bring it on! For a ranged character this passive makes a lot of sense. Most of the time this condition will be met so you can count on the 20% extra damage buff to be up more often than not. I just wish there was a sort of buff icon that indicated when the skill was active.
SPOILER SECTION
Don't read beyond this point if you don't like spoilers.
I mentioned that I died on the Act 1 boss. As expected, the boss was The Butcher. Look at his ugly mug.
This is a fight which keeps you on your toes. You need to be constantly on the move, first to escape the burning sections of floor, and second, as a ranged character, to stay out of range of his grappling hook. Luckily there are the two healing wells that you can use to heal yourself if needed. In the end, this isn't such a tough fight. I hadn't read any tactics beforehand so I didn't know what to expect.
Now, if you listen to Cain's dialogue (I believe from one of the books you find around that section of the game) you will realize that this is not the same Butcher from Diablo 1. Instead, the Butchers are a class of demon. So there are potentially lots of them running around.
The other thing that was revealed was... drumroll...
Tyrael is a black guy! That was certainly unexpected, but very cool nonetheless. OK, did anyone suspect this before? He reminds me strongly of Laurence Fishburne for some reason.
BTW, I really like his story so far. Fallen angel and all, very cool.
The final thing, the Act 2 boss, Belial (as if you didn't know!) was a bit of a letdown. I tackled him at level 25. The fight itself was challenging but I killed him without dying myself. What I disliked was fighting in that cramped setting. For a ranged character who needs to be mobile, it was very frustrating. I couldn't use Vault to best effect and there wasn't a lot of space to escape to. Belial himself is practically stationary. I don't know, but I am sure they could have designed this encounter better. In the end he dropped 3 rares and a couple of gems.
So that's it for the second day folks. I hope you enjoyed this post. Stay tuned for day 3!
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Wednesday, May 16, 2012
D3 Marathon - Day 1
As promised, here's day 1 of my 2-week D3 Marathon.
I've noticed that many people are complaining about Diablo 3's launch and how much of a disaster it was. I don't know folks, but it wasn't at all terrible for me. Granted, I managed to log in about 1.5 hours after the servers went live but afterwards there were no more issues and I managed a solid 3 hours of play before real life took over.
I started a Demon Hunter called Prometheus as my first character.
I reached level 7 in 1 hour and had 5000 gold.
2 hours in, I killed the Skeleton King at level 9, with 13,800 gold.
I spent some of that gold buying a couple of 18.5 DPS 1H crossbows from the fence vendor because I figured they'd give me a much-needed DPS boost. I wasn't wrong, except that a little while later I came across 20 and 22 DPS 1H crossbows that put my vendor-bought ones to shame.
I also bought an amulet with 2-4 damage and 4% increased attack speed. So yeah, the fence now carries amulets in addition to rings, which wasn't the case in the beta. This amulet alone increased my DPS from 33 to 43. Great investment.
The Auction House seems to be a mess. Items are dirt cheap and mats are at rock bottom. I will no longer salvage and attempt to sell mats on the GAH because I will get more money by vendoring them and I won't be needing those low level mats anyway. Even Nightmare mats have tanked. Today they're 1/3 what they were yesterday.
One thing's certain: your first character through the game will be a pioneer and a pathfinder. Keep all the best items you find for other classes and transfer them to your lower level characters. When you start leveling them, they will have a big head start. Here's an example of all the crap my level 2 Monk had in his inventory, courtesy of his big brother, the DH.
The cool thing is that when you move past the Skeleton King you start finding some really powerful weapons. I already have a collection of 22+ DPS 1H weapons that only require level 10. All of them went to my Monk, Barbarian, Witch Doctor and Wizard, which, by the way, are acting as my extended stash because I haven't spent any money expanding the shared stash yet.
At the end of the first day I had played my Demon Hunter for almost 5.5 hours and he's level 15, with 30K gold. He's still in Act I. This is the build I'm using at level 15. Interestingly, I prefer Hungering Arrow runed with Puncturing Arrow to Bola Shot because the latter has that short delay and monsters tend not to wait for it to explode before charging me. My DPS at the end of the first day is 70.39.
Speaking of gameplay, I find the actual game harder than the beta. Maybe it's because of the lack of gear with my first character but I've had a few close shaves and I even died once, stupidly, I will add. I found myself surrounded by a rare boss and his minions and either I was stun-locked or I was out of Discipline because I couldn't escape them with Vault, so I died.
I found Vault and Caltrops to be indispensable. Combined, these two will save your life countless times. The Demon Hunter is turning out to be more challenging than I expected but it also requires more skill and finesse and I pride myself that so far I have found the class very engaging and satisfying.
A final word about followers. As soon as I encountered the Scoundrel, I dismissed the Templar and never looked back. While the Scoundrel doesn't seem to be a good match for the Demon Hunter because it also uses ranged weapons, I just love his personality. He's always cracking jokes and making funny comments, not to mention hitting on female companions (including Leah) all the time. He's a hoot, I highly recommend him.
Now I'm off to start my first full day of gaming. Stay tuned and see you tomorrow!
Follow the D3 Marathon
I've noticed that many people are complaining about Diablo 3's launch and how much of a disaster it was. I don't know folks, but it wasn't at all terrible for me. Granted, I managed to log in about 1.5 hours after the servers went live but afterwards there were no more issues and I managed a solid 3 hours of play before real life took over.
I started a Demon Hunter called Prometheus as my first character.
I reached level 7 in 1 hour and had 5000 gold.
2 hours in, I killed the Skeleton King at level 9, with 13,800 gold.
I spent some of that gold buying a couple of 18.5 DPS 1H crossbows from the fence vendor because I figured they'd give me a much-needed DPS boost. I wasn't wrong, except that a little while later I came across 20 and 22 DPS 1H crossbows that put my vendor-bought ones to shame.
I also bought an amulet with 2-4 damage and 4% increased attack speed. So yeah, the fence now carries amulets in addition to rings, which wasn't the case in the beta. This amulet alone increased my DPS from 33 to 43. Great investment.
The Auction House seems to be a mess. Items are dirt cheap and mats are at rock bottom. I will no longer salvage and attempt to sell mats on the GAH because I will get more money by vendoring them and I won't be needing those low level mats anyway. Even Nightmare mats have tanked. Today they're 1/3 what they were yesterday.
One thing's certain: your first character through the game will be a pioneer and a pathfinder. Keep all the best items you find for other classes and transfer them to your lower level characters. When you start leveling them, they will have a big head start. Here's an example of all the crap my level 2 Monk had in his inventory, courtesy of his big brother, the DH.
The cool thing is that when you move past the Skeleton King you start finding some really powerful weapons. I already have a collection of 22+ DPS 1H weapons that only require level 10. All of them went to my Monk, Barbarian, Witch Doctor and Wizard, which, by the way, are acting as my extended stash because I haven't spent any money expanding the shared stash yet.
At the end of the first day I had played my Demon Hunter for almost 5.5 hours and he's level 15, with 30K gold. He's still in Act I. This is the build I'm using at level 15. Interestingly, I prefer Hungering Arrow runed with Puncturing Arrow to Bola Shot because the latter has that short delay and monsters tend not to wait for it to explode before charging me. My DPS at the end of the first day is 70.39.
Speaking of gameplay, I find the actual game harder than the beta. Maybe it's because of the lack of gear with my first character but I've had a few close shaves and I even died once, stupidly, I will add. I found myself surrounded by a rare boss and his minions and either I was stun-locked or I was out of Discipline because I couldn't escape them with Vault, so I died.
I found Vault and Caltrops to be indispensable. Combined, these two will save your life countless times. The Demon Hunter is turning out to be more challenging than I expected but it also requires more skill and finesse and I pride myself that so far I have found the class very engaging and satisfying.
A final word about followers. As soon as I encountered the Scoundrel, I dismissed the Templar and never looked back. While the Scoundrel doesn't seem to be a good match for the Demon Hunter because it also uses ranged weapons, I just love his personality. He's always cracking jokes and making funny comments, not to mention hitting on female companions (including Leah) all the time. He's a hoot, I highly recommend him.
Now I'm off to start my first full day of gaming. Stay tuned and see you tomorrow!
Follow the D3 Marathon
Monday, May 14, 2012
The Diablo 3 Marathon
Well folks, I wasn't sure about this but I finally went and did it. For a while now I've been freelancing, as opposed to having a regular 9-5 job. Now, I have cleared my jobs for the next couple of weeks and I will spend that time rocking it in Diablo 3.
My plan is to start a new series of articles under the topic "D3 Marathon" in which I will talk about each full day of playing. Stay tuned and subscribe! I am very excited to discover how far I can level in 2 weeks of playing at least 10 hours a day. I heard there are some crazy dudes out there who will play 16 hours a day but honestly I'm not sure how that's possible, assuming 8 hours of solid sleep, as well as time for eating, pissing, shitting and so on. Oh and a shower every now and then. I would like to keep my ambitions low, starting at 10 hours a day. If I can go past that, without other real-life stuff intruding on my D3 time, that's even better.
Tonight I'm off to bed early, because I plan to wake up later when the servers are live. I still have some errands to run during the day so May 15th won't be a full gaming day but whatever. We are finally here.
See you on the other side kids!
Follow the D3 Marathon
My plan is to start a new series of articles under the topic "D3 Marathon" in which I will talk about each full day of playing. Stay tuned and subscribe! I am very excited to discover how far I can level in 2 weeks of playing at least 10 hours a day. I heard there are some crazy dudes out there who will play 16 hours a day but honestly I'm not sure how that's possible, assuming 8 hours of solid sleep, as well as time for eating, pissing, shitting and so on. Oh and a shower every now and then. I would like to keep my ambitions low, starting at 10 hours a day. If I can go past that, without other real-life stuff intruding on my D3 time, that's even better.
Tonight I'm off to bed early, because I plan to wake up later when the servers are live. I still have some errands to run during the day so May 15th won't be a full gaming day but whatever. We are finally here.
See you on the other side kids!
Follow the D3 Marathon
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