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I see a lot of people complaining about the story for D3. Do you guys actually play Diablo for the story?
Story is like beer. Everything is better with story, and in this game's case, a little more time in the story fermenter would've gone a long way. Magda in particular seems like a Power Rangers villain.
I'm not gonna lie, I enjoyed her. Because she shares a name with a shitty ex of mine, that is.
I'm basically with you. If it weren't for the skill unlocks, this would be Dungeon Siege 3.5 (and for the record, I kinda liked that game). I wasted around 35k on my armorsmith so far, but I don't consider it wasted because the items in shops tend to be sub-par relative to the loot drops. Money is useless.
The skill unlocks are keeping me going. It took me to level 20 to finally come around on the system. This won't have the legs that either of the previous games did, but I get the appeal.
Covetous Shen is by far the most interesting character in this game, and he's just an Egg Shen clone. Still, I'd much rather James Hong had voiced all of the looooong and boring expositional conversations in this game.
The skill system gets less annoying the more I play. Still not nearly as rewarding as a skill tree system to me. Guess I'm old fashioned, but I never made a "broken" character in D1 or D2. I still don't agree this wheel needed to be reinvented.
The CG cut scenes are tits! Blizzard nailed that aspect of the game. I love it when a developer actually still goes to the trouble of making beautiful prerendered films for cut scenes, rather than just getting lazy and running them in engine.
The environments are beautiful too! Love Caldeum, even though it is pretty similar to Lut Gholein.
I miss the pygmies.
Dammit, double post.
I miss the pygmies.
Play as a WD - you can summon them.
Story is like beer. Everything is better with story, and in this game's case, a little more time in the story fermenter would've gone a long way. Magda in particular seems like a Power Rangers villain.
"Ha ha, heroes!
While you were out doing one thing, I was causing trouble somewhere else! Ha ha!"
And then you fight her, and she goes out like a bitch.
At one point she actually says "You win this round!"
Could. not. believe.
Unless Blizzard is just being ironically goofy and I'm missing it.
At one point she actually says "You win this round!"
Could. not. believe.
Unless Blizzard is just being ironically goofy and I'm missing it.
This is keeping in mind how unrelentingly dark the first Diablo was. In that game, your character discovers a slaughtered child on a altar, and ends on a similarly gruesome note. Dark doesn't equal good, but at least it strikes a consistent tone between the story and the gameplay. Diablo 3 is a slaugherhouse simulator wrapped in a children's cartoon. The story doesn't fit the content.
I now have a superior storyline to imagine during my Nightmare run (with voices muted and dialogue balloons off). The Demon Huntress' quest to find the best slice of pizza in all of Sanctuary: Diablo's Diabolical Meat Lover's Supreme.
This is keeping in mind how unrelentingly dark the first Diablo was. In that game, your character discovers a slaughtered child on a altar, and ends on a similarly gruesome note. Dark doesn't equal good, but at least it strikes a consistent tone between the story and the gameplay. Diablo 3 is a slaugherhouse simulator wrapped in a children's cartoon. The story doesn't fit the content.
All of Blizzard's franchises have gone through similar tone changes. Their games are all arcade-y and a bit silly now.
In terms of story, I always felt that Throne of Baal was a high point for them. Very straight forward, but that opening cinematic set up the stakes really well and helped it feel bigger. D3 feels a bit more like a Warcraft game this time around in terms of its tone.
Aren't a lot of the original Diablo/Blizzard North guys gone from the company now?
A PSA from your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man:
You know how Diablo II describes some skills as plus 3 yards this, plus 7 yards that? When it says yards, think feet.
Been playing the Starter Edition (thanks to a fellow chewer's generosity!), since the launch date here is June 7th.
Ive tried each class and while at first i was dissapointed and even a bit jaded about the game being more "casual friendly", once I hit the "search for the crown" quest with each class, the love and addiction was back on full force; the rune system is pretty damn fun and works wonders, and i loved the shared stash between characters and the artisan upgrades being shared.
Demon Hunter is my favorite class so far, followed closely by the monk; barbarian is a vainilla class for me, and wizard and witch doctor are growing on me; hell, i love that just when i was about to give up on a class, a new skill opens up that changes the way to play with it entirely; Witch Doctor was my most disliked class untill the voodoo dogs and firebats skills were unlocked.
I love the little details you can find; hell, the Monk's charge skill seemed silly at first, but when i equipped a spear as a secondary weapon, she just charges while twirling it around and makes mincemeat of my enemies.
the 7th cant be here soon enough.
At this point I think it's fair to say that Bob Loblaw and I are Diabros.
That's a thing, right?
I want to thank you guys for saving me the $60 I might have spent on this game.
Unsurprisingly, people are now using the Starter Game invitations to phish. Be careful. I just got an "invitation" which of course would have dragged me to a site looking just like Blizzard's in order to put in my login and password. I'm sure this is to try to steal more WoW accounts. At any rate, the people are too stupid to spell management correctly if you check the link that they send you.
Holy balls! The biggest numbers analysts predicted for this was 4 million sold in the year. Today Blizzard released sales numbers. As of now, a week from release, it's at 6.3 million. 4.7 of these on day one. That was an underestimation if there ever was one. Which goes a long way to explaining the mess on the first day.
With 0 of those purchased on sale, unless I'm mistaken. I don't believe there were sales on it anywhere and I'm still curious how Blizzard pulled that off.
What sales? It's still impossible to buy on retail here and from what I've been told copies get bought as soon as they're brought in. Besides, Blizzard games remain full price for years and years. They are notorious for never being discounted.
I hate wasps.
I hate wasps.
A Diablo franchise tactic for dealing with ranged units. If their shit moves slowly, avoid at all costs. If their shit moves fast, ignore and go straight at them. And move away from shapes on the ground.
So, I finally found some time to move my barb to nightmare and start leveling my alt dh. Rapid Fire is tons of fun and practically endless. Combined with a snare like Caltrops it's practically demon genocide. As fun as my barbarian's FusRoDah, sorry Seismic Slam.
I finished Normal with my monk a couple of days ago. Nightmare feels like what Normal should have been. Except the champions, depending on the combination, they can be quite hard.
I've decided to play Hardcore characters till the game gets patched. I find I pay more attention, go slower and do more exploring. This is good as there's a lot of cool content hidden in places that other wise I'd ignore on the way to the next quest marker. (I found a giant rock worm bursting out of someone's cellar which was cool)
The game is out of whack right now, with the worst offender being the Auction House. I feel in a couple of months it will be something special.
For all you Demon Hunters out there, lets talk strategy!
Got a level 37, currently in A2 of nightmare. Im using a lot of rapid fire (with web shot). I like the slowing effect vs the higher dps of withering fire. I like the sentry, that will probably remain a staple. Everything else Im a little less sure about.
I like to use Strafe, especially when surrounded by enemies. Its efficient (all attacks hit enemies) and it keeps me mobile. Every other archery skill looks cool in theory, I just don't know how useful they would be. Plus Strafe costs the least amount of hatred by far.
I can't really imagine using anything other than caltrops, typically with the Tortuous Ground rune. The whole point is to keep enemies at a distance and the traps work as well as anything. Maybe Smoke Screen or Shadow Power for the top-end boss fights, but for everything else the traps would be of more use.
The Tree I am the least sure about is the Hunting Tree. I like all 4 skills. Most of the time I have used a companion, either a spider or bat. Preparation (with punishment) - instant hatred restorer. Vault would be more useful if you could jump over walls (the walls created by enemies, not the walls in a dungeon). Marked for death right on top of a caltrop is pretty effective, although I don't know how much extra damage you are getting by using it.
As far as passive skils go, Archery and Vengeance are automatic, right? The third skill ive been using is Cull of the Weak, since so many of your enemies are going to be snared or slowed in some way.
Thoughts?
I just passed where you are, Act II NM with lvl 40 DH.
My main is hungering arrow+cinder, see no reason that will change anytime soon. You can't beat aiming that offscreen knowing it will bounce around to find all the targets.
Right click changes a lot. With fewer and more annoying enemies, like in act 2, Elemental frost arrow is frequently the best. Most situations call for Elemental electroball or dual Chakrams to slice and dice thick meaty packs, and they practically never drains hatred all the way.
The mandatory offensives: Rain of Arrows + extended time/following rune. Pop this at the beginning of most any battle. It'll be ready to go again 15 seconds after the rain stops. This is a better use of a slot than any of the other offensive arrow moves that eat hatred that should be used by your right click. Then Turret+rockets, which you already have. With these two skills, you can maneuver around and protect yourself while they do the work.
I loved the slow rapid fire+slow enhancing passive early in normal, but it jsut isnt viable anymore. You have to go for maximizing damage and self preservation as Nightmare gets more and more brutal.
Caltrops+hurty rune has been my mainstay forever, though I find it getting slightly less useful in certain parts of Nightmare. At certain times, and at bosses of course, it has to be swapped for Discipline preparation to give more chances to Smoke Screen.
Vault got replaced by Smoke Screen early on in Nightmare. Why vault out of a waller wall, when you can just walk right out of it? It's absolutely essential to avoid getting targeted by all the crazy ability mobs.
Also, couldn't tell by your post, but you know about Elective mode in the gameplay options, right? Right click on any skill button at the bottom of the screen, then use the yellow arrows up top to put any skill on any button.
Man, shit gets real for barbarians in Act II nightmare. I'm lvl 40 and, despite a couple of visits to the AH, feeling a bit under-geared. I have 4.8k HP 2.5k armor and 700 dps and trying to solo big groups of mobs and champions, I have to be on my toes 100%. This game is now on. Seriously, when people are calling normal a tutorial they are not kidding. I'm having twice the fun now.
And another thing that made me appreciate the new skill system some more. On my way to work I thought of a new kiting build for my barbarian. Only now instead of having to put another 25 hours in order to build it, I can try it the moment I get back home.
Bob Loblaw and I are heading into Act IV in Nightmare now, with my Monk and his DH. It's interesting talking to a friend who purely solos and his monk uses very different skills from what I use. We've both died a few times in Nightmare (although less than expected) with the only true issue so far coming tonight when we somehow clumped 2 Champion mobs on top of us. One was a combo molten/freeze which was bad enough by itself, but then we had mortar champions as well. They only killed us twice and I felt pretty lucky that was it.
We should finish up Nightmare together tomorrow and then we'll see just how much this thing kicks up the difficulty.
Yeah, builds have to definitely be different in solo and co-op.
I just passed where you are, Act II NM with lvl 40 DH.
My main is hungering arrow+cinder, see no reason that will change anytime soon. You can't beat aiming that offscreen knowing it will bounce around to find all the targets.
Right click changes a lot. With fewer and more annoying enemies, like in act 2, Elemental frost arrow is frequently the best. Most situations call for Elemental electroball or dual Chakrams to slice and dice thick meaty packs, and they practically never drains hatred all the way.
The mandatory offensives: Rain of Arrows + extended time/following rune. Pop this at the beginning of most any battle. It'll be ready to go again 15 seconds after the rain stops. This is a better use of a slot than any of the other offensive arrow moves that eat hatred that should be used by your right click. Then Turret+rockets, which you already have. With these two skills, you can maneuver around and protect yourself while they do the work.
I loved the slow rapid fire+slow enhancing passive early in normal, but it jsut isnt viable anymore. You have to go for maximizing damage and self preservation as Nightmare gets more and more brutal.
Caltrops+hurty rune has been my mainstay forever, though I find it getting slightly less useful in certain parts of Nightmare. At certain times, and at bosses of course, it has to be swapped for Discipline preparation to give more chances to Smoke Screen.
Vault got replaced by Smoke Screen early on in Nightmare. Why vault out of a waller wall, when you can just walk right out of it? It's absolutely essential to avoid getting targeted by all the crazy ability mobs.
Also, couldn't tell by your post, but you know about Elective mode in the gameplay options, right? Right click on any skill button at the bottom of the screen, then use the yellow arrows up top to put any skill on any button.
The way I play has changed so much while playing acts 2 & 3 in nightmare. I've taken a number of your suggestions and have found that smokescreen is a must. Its the only defense for a DH when you find yourself in the middle of chaos. Using frozen arrow as my primary attack. I like the way it hits multiple targets and snares without draining all of your hatred. Does anybody know which click attack does the most dps vs. a single boss. Could it be the Electroball? Also, I wonder which Rain of Arrows rune everybody uses. I feel as if the one where the gargoyles drop the bombs do the most dps (at least at this point, Im lvl 49). The seeking arrow attack lasts the longest. The gargoyle swoop attack doesnt seem to do much of anything far as I can tell.
Bob Loblaw and I are heading into Act IV in Nightmare now, with my Monk and his DH. It's interesting talking to a friend who purely solos and his monk uses very different skills from what I use. We've both died a few times in Nightmare (although less than expected) with the only true issue so far coming tonight when we somehow clumped 2 Champion mobs on top of us. One was a combo molten/freeze which was bad enough by itself, but then we had mortar champions as well. They only killed us twice and I felt pretty lucky that was it.
We should finish up Nightmare together tomorrow and then we'll see just how much this thing kicks up the difficulty.
Yeah, that attack came out of nowhere. What was great is that it seemed like they were aggressively waiting for us to respawn...like they couldn't wait to kick our ass again. Everything else though was pretty easy. I died once at the end boss in A2, but I always seem to die with him. I find him tougher than Diablo. And a couple of lag related deaths. But overall we just kind of motor thru. For all of you that don't know, A-Pathetic is a treasure whore. He will literally drop whatever he is doing if he sees a treasure gnome and start chasing. Even if he has to run the length of the map to kill him, attracting the attention of 25 mobs along the way. Also, he has found 5 legendary pieces already and several high quality rares. He's the fucking Indiana Jones or Nathan Drake of Diablo with all the treasure he uncovers. I have found zero legendarys in all my hours of total gameplay and all the rares I find seem to have the very useful Intelligence + Strength + attacker takes 3 damage combination of stats.
Chasing blindly after treasure goblins has led to some of the most fun "OHSHITOHSHITOSHIT!" fights in the entire game. You'd be a fool not to go after them on sight.
The goblins are a great mechanic - I've followed them into some real trouble spots. They drop the same gold and loot all the other monsters drop, but Blizzard knows how to push our 'I must have them!' buttons.
My Witch Doctor is in Act 2 NM, and I'm doing well. I use leaping spiders and locust swarm as my main attacks, and I use spirit walk when I get in trouble. I use Hex with healing rune every fight - that little guy is my best friend - he heals me, and (sometimes) turns elites into helpless chickens.
My other best friend is the Gargantuan. He tanks really well, and with the restless giant rune does decent damage too. My last skill is fetish army - 2 mic cooldown, but these little guys are runed to do great damage on arrival, and they draw aggro.
I use the Templar - decent tank and some minor heals.
Passives:
Jungle Fortitude - 20% damage reduction
Pierce the Veil - 20% more damage across the board, in exchange for a 30% mana cost increase. I don't have a mana-heavy build so it works out.
Spirit Vessel - basically a 'get out of death' card, with a 90 sec cooldown. Upon taking fatal damage, you turn into a spirit and return with a bit of health. I'm glad I have it when I get sloppy, such as when I'm chasing down treasure goblins.
The treasure gnome glows, and drops gold and treasure. Like I'm supposed to have any defense for that? Plus, the little bastard will portal away with all my loot if I let him go.
Right now I'm using this:
Cleave with Rupture rune. Less damage than Bash and doesn't give +attack speed like Frenzy but hits multiple mobs and with Rupture killed mobs explode for some extra AOE damage.
Seismic Slam with Shattered Earth rune. 202% weapon damage and extra knockback range makes some kitting possible for mobs I can't get in melee range. Plus in a group I use it to push mobs into my teams AOE.
Ignore Pain with Iron Hide Rune. Free -65% damage taken for 7 seconds and usable while CC'd has saved my ass time and time again.
Revenge with Retribution Rune. 286% AOE damage with heal. Quite possibly my main damage skill.
War Cry with Hardened Wrath rune. +40% armor for the entire party for 60 seconds on a 30 second cooldown and generates Fury? Yes please.
Earthquake with The Mountain's Call. Free 2000% weapon damage AOE on a reduced cooldown. Helps me against large groups of mobs and being free saves a lot of Fury for me to spam Seismic Slam.
For passives I use Nerves Of Steel and Tough As Nails for the extra armor, and Relentless. Since barbarians are much squishier than one would think I have a feeling I'm going to love Relentless. You see once below 20% HP it makes all skills free and reduces damage taken by 50%.
I'm basically trying to get as much spammable AOE as possible with a couple of get out of jail free skills. It sucks for single target damage but outside of bosses where I can always change to something like Bash+Hammer Of The Ancients I find AOE much more useful.
The treasure gnome glows, and drops gold and treasure. Like I'm supposed to have any defense for that? Plus, the little bastard will portal away with all my loot if I let him go.
I'm fully anticipating another legendary drop from Diablo tonight for you and 2 random blues for me. Im not bitter or anything.
This server outage is fucking infuriating.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEyk63UaBI4&feature=share
I saw this on the Blizzard message boards and about fell out of my chair laughing. This is apparently the only tactic to survive in Inferno.
Heh. Quite accurate from what I have heard.
Does anybody here have any experience in Inferno? The more I read about it, the more it sounds like a chore, devoid of much fun. Apparently Demon Hunters, Wizards and Witch Doctors can get one or two shot by any enemy. You basically have to play perfect just to survive regular mobs, and there are monsters that cannot be killed. I understand there is a certain appeal to trying to conquer it, but I don't know if dying 1000 times each act sounds like a recipe for fun.
Does anybody here have any experience in Inferno? The more I read about it, the more it sounds like a chore, devoid of much fun. Apparently Demon Hunters, Wizards and Witch Doctors can get one or two shot by any enemy. You basically have to play perfect just to survive regular mobs, and there are monsters that cannot be killed. I understand there is a certain appeal to trying to conquer it, but I don't know if dying 1000 times each act sounds like a recipe for fun.
I have played it, and I have uninstalled Diablo 3. 
Basically Inferno reveals how the game was designed for the auction house. You can't realistically gear your character for it through items you find yourself; you -have- to use the auction house. The random loot math is designed not to give you enough gear to progress - if you're level 30+ and haven't geared through the AH, I bet that right now you're sporting multiple items that are at least 10 levels below your character. Most areas don't even drop items of the level you need to be to fight there - Inferno Act 1 drops a ton of level 53-59 items - trash, essentially.
When a grind feels like a grind, it's time to quit.
Still in Hell myself but my roomate with a level 60 Barb says he gets killed by a few hits in Inferno. However, he has a friend also playing a barb that has, among other phat lewtz, a http://www.diablowiki.com/Stormshield Stormshield legendary that has over 1k armor, 25% chance to block, +65 to all resistances etc etc and is handling inferno like no big deal. I think because we're still only 2 weeks into release, the gear hasnt caught up with the game progress for most players. I really don't feel Inferno, the most challenging difficulty in the game SHOULD be beatable with moderate effort by characters 1-2 weeks old unless they blew fortunes in the AH or have the best drop luck in the world.
Personally I don't understand the rush to beat Inferno. There's literally nothing left to do after that but get better gear for.. playing content you've already beat, or rerolling.
I have played it, and I have uninstalled Diablo 3.
Basically Inferno reveals how the game was designed for the auction house. You can't realistically gear your character for it through items you find yourself; you -have- to use the auction house. The random loot math is designed not to give you enough gear to progress - if you're level 30+ and haven't geared through the AH, I bet that right now you're sporting multiple items that are at least 10 levels below your character. Most areas don't even drop items of the level you need to be to fight there - Inferno Act 1 drops a ton of level 53-59 items - trash, essentially.
When a grind feels like a grind, it's time to quit.
I see what you are saying. Personally, I like the auction house component. I liked it in WOW and I don't mind spending time surfing the AH to see what items I can get for a cheap price. I just wished it worked as it was intended to work. I assume they will have the bugs worked out in a few weeks, but last night you couldnt even bid on an item without getting an error message.
I do understand the folks that don't like using the AH, equipping only what you have found or have made. I wish the crafting results were better on average. I would guess 95% of the stuff you craft is worthless. And as you progress you need better gear, fast. I simply can't wait till I get lucky with a drop or with something I have crafted.
I agree. I'm about lvl 23 and just now starting to hit up the AH. I'm thankful that I have some higher lvl friends that keep an eye on drops for me.
Well, I made more AH progress last night myself and I still can't quite figure out the limitations on their searches. As best I can tell there are a finite number of items that will be called up (not just displayed, but called up) for any search. Obviously they display up to 46 pages with however-many per page. What I discovered was that if I made a very broad search (let's say level 55 rare fist weapons with Dexterity, since that's what it was) and then try to sort by the lowest buyout I will have pages of N/A, and the lowest buyouts on page 30 or so. But those buyouts were all quite high and I was disappointed I couldn't find a bargain.
So I searched again, level 55 rare fist weapons with Dexterity but I added the Heal on Hit stat. Because I specified that much more, the items pulled were significantly different. When in reality I should have pared down my choices, the fact of it was that it pulled completely different items that didn't show up in my first search that now included dozens of fist weapons for 5000 gold or so.
I spent some time shopping in the AH yesterday and I'm in a much better shape now. At level 42 my HP is over 9000, armor above 3k and DPS over 1k. I'm having a much easier time. The extra gear allowed me to change up my skills a bit. I gave up on Ignore Pain and I'm using Furious Charge with the rune that reduces the cooldown by 2 seconds, which was already only 10 seconds, for each target hit. Which practically makes it spammable. So right now I can take care of big groups of mobs by zipping through them like an anime ninja.
To survive in the higher levels you have to use the AH. Period. For an average player like me, I need the ability to keep my equipment current or I have no shot in Hell (no pun intended). Crafting your own items just isnt efficient enough to keep your wardrobe competitive. My DH is currently lvl 55. I have a lvl 51 rare crossbow with great stats and it feels outdated already. Just going from A1 Hell to A2 Hell, the monsters are goin down a lot slower. Last night I looked in the AH before going to bed and a your average rare lvl 55 bow did about 75% more damage than my lvl 51. And a lvl 60 crossbow does 100% more damage than a lvl 55. That's a huge jump in just a few levels. The weapons seem to be the most extreme as far as scaling goes. Unfortunately for me, the AH is so out of wack that I will have to pony up at least 300k to get a decent level 55 Bow, and then again at 58...60 etc, not to mention the other slots I need to update.
A2 Hell Difficulty feels about right, but it worries me that Inferno is going to be brutal. For some reason it feels easier with 2 people, as Bob Loblaw and I did our share of dying but nothing too overwhelming last night. Then he logged off and I racked up repair bills. The game likes to clump Champion mobs right next to a Boss mob which in almost all circumstances means dying a few times at least. I went into one cellar last night and by the time the game loaded the Boss mob already had me walled in next to the door (but walled off the door preventing escape) and I was being hit by 3 minions while his arcane beams all slowly turned me to ash. My previous checkpoint was a 4 minute walk across the map, I entered the cellar twice and gave up.
Also, Bob Loblaw and I encountered the most annoying Champion group possible. Wasps with invulnerability, jailer and molten. Especially as a melee that was just hell. Chase a wasp down (stopping to get jailed every 2 seconds), get to him and watch him bring up his invulnerability shield. Get jailed and watch 3 wasps shoot at your helpless butt. Get jailed right as you run across a molten patch. It was a good 5 minutes to take those guys down. Just brutal.
Then he logged off and I racked up repair bills.
I don't think it's a secret that I carry this group. Without my ferrets of death, you are nothing.
