5801

Well, I think the game basically starts on Nightmare, but that annoys the hell out of me too. :)

I thought that D2 Normal was easier by a significant margin than D3 Normal. My girlfriend, who is far from a catasser, agrees with me (and she died more often in D3 than D2).

5802

So they got right the actual GAME, but they fucked up the spreadsheet? OK, pro.

If you want to succeed in Inferno - you’re going to need strong gear. If you need strong gear, you’re going to have to farm for gold (or be incredibly lucky) - and so on. You can’t trade items for items, so you need to farm gold or play the AH. There’s just no other way.

I can’t trade an item for an item?

They ruined replayability with the classes and they made items rather bland.

You’re right. They took out the part where I have to play 20 hours to get to where I was before, and instead gave me the part where I use those hours to actually play the class.

Oh and it’s not like there’s a Hardcore mode with its own separate AH/stash for added replayability or anything. Yeah man everyone in here has exactly 5 characters and that’s it.

Items are bland and the AH is fucked. Great, have fun complaining about not being able to ride your treadmill for years on end.

5803

It has 500+ armor along with, strength , life , and a socket.

I considered them bonuses well worth it over the 2 handed weapon choice.

See:

5804

This game needs a better way to sort the friend list, it gets insane when you have a lot of people on it.

5805

I didn’t consider the blocking chance / amount, only the AC part. From your experience, it noticeably increases your survivability? I am just about to start NM mode with my barb and after completing it with my Wizard, I am wondering how Ill survive in many of those encounters with a melee guy.

5806

Well, melee classes take 30% less damage off the top, and if barbarian is anything like my monk, you have an additional 30%+ mitigation between armor and abilities as well vs what a ranged class has (demon hunter in my case). My monk is having a significantly easier time in Nightmare than my DH did. YMMV. Not valid for Inferno one-shots.

5807

I’m using a shield on my HC Barbarian because I want all the survivability I can get. I still love playing on normal characters, but there’s a lot more tension playing HC for me, even on normal. Fought the Butcher last night and it was a tense fight. I didn’t realize I was walking into the boss room and my skill setup was not at all optimal which probably made things much more tense (I had cleave and seismic slam when bash and hammer of ancients would have probably been better).

The other thing is that this is my first HC character, so I don’t have a bunch of money and finding items on the AH I can afford isn’t trivial. One of the rates I got from the Butcher was actually a pretty decent item for me, but the other one I might try to sell.

5808

Interesting… when I started playing I immediately thought “Y’know, I thought Hellgate got my attention quicker and more forcefully… shame about how it went…”

Is the new F2P version that’s been re-introduced worth checking out? Or is the nickel-and-diming (particularly for a game I already bought) obscene?

5809

Evil has this way of coming back again and again. Haven’t you seen any of the Friday the 13th movies? :D

5810

In terms of level design, I can definitely see the comparisons between Titan Quest and and Diablo 3. Titan Quest was the first ARPG I remember strongly using background set pieces that were just astonishing in scope from time to time.

I actually like TQ’s world more though, since its static nature enabled far more natural design. I’m still completely sick of randomized level as a basic idea, let alone this game’s implementation. I understand why it’s there, but it just leads to endless nonsensical corridors. I don’t think slightly changing up layouts with randomization really adds replayability - it’s everything else the genre does that makes it replayable.

5811

Yeah but on the other hand, you find any ring level 8-11 with decent Vitality on it and you can sell it for a ton (5,000g+)

Crafting actually becomes nominally useful because it longer costs more to make something that might be good than it does to buy it (especially if you’re shooting for vitality).

I think the Vitality Premium going on in Hardcore is a bit misguided. Vitality is not defense, a swarm of enemies will do a lot more damage to you alive than dead, and so the focus on Vitality over damage is strange. I’m level 17 Monk in Hardcore right now and no way would I swap out DPS for a Shield.

5812

The jump from NIghtmare to Hell difficulty was just terrible. I will have to do a few runthroughs in Nightmare (i’m 51 now) to see if I can be lucky enough to get some good item drops (and not all BH gear) to be able to output enough damage to kill anything in a timely manner on Hell.

My DPS is shown as 2000, with a 95 dps mainhand… checking the Auctionhouse I see that I should have near 350 dps weapons by now… but alas, without RMT or enough gold that is beyond my meagre means.

If only crafting worked…

At least I can buy the 3rd bank slot and level alts with all the equipment that never drops for my main.

5813

I think I’ve made a break-through on my Barbarian on Hell. I put purple vitality gems in most of my item slots now to give me around 35000 health. Here’s my new build:

Frenzy (Sidearm rune)

Still experimenting with this ability, but I like the fact that it does a lot of damage on one target while also allowing AOE damage at times.

Hammer of the Ancients (Birthright rune)

Crits have a 10% chance to pop health globes from enemies, which is HUUUUGE. I’m not even that focused on crits and I’ve had success with this rune so far.

Leap (Iron Impact rune)

I really like this ability over Ground Stomp because not only does it allow me to quickly get out of “oh shit” moments, but I can use it to my advantage to gain a ton of armor when I’m jumping into the fray.

War Cry (Invigorate)

I tried using Threatening Shout for a while and it just wasn’t working for me, so I went back to War Cry and couldn’t be more happy with the extra armor and health regen.

Ignore Pain (Ignorance is Bliss rune)

A key ability to surviving really hard-hitting elites. The rune helps with health regen as well.

Earthquake (The Mountain’s Call rune)

I really like the no fury cost when this particular rune is added simply because it allows you to save all of your fury for Hammer of the Ancients and popping out those precious health globes.

Passives:

Pound of Flesh

More chances at health globes = win!

Inspiring Presence

Extra health regen on War Cry = win!

Bloodthirst

This passive ability might be overkill at this point, so I may replace it if my survivability remains solid.

Because I have such a deep pool of health and because my health regen is so high (partly because some health regen abilities tick for MORE the more health you have), added to the increased health globe rate, this build gives me much more time to maneuver elites to my advantage and beat them down.

My DPS is only about 2000 (compared to my brother’s 4000 on his Demon Hunter), so I’m really nothing more than a tank and it does take a while to take out elites, but I’ll take that any day over constantly dying.

I sort of wonder how much of a hit my survivability would take if it dumped my shield and went with a 2-hander or duel wield. Hmm… Maybe find some weapons that have health regen on them or something?

5814

Guys, how different is Nightmare from Normal?

My friends and I just finished Normal and, as you know, it was ridiculously easy - we practically never stopped moving forward, killing all the rares and champions within seconds, sometimes cleaning out different parts of the dungeon at the same time.

If Nightmare is only marginally harder, I am not sure we’ll enjoy it enough to finish it in order to see Hell.

Does the real game starts on Hell or will Nightmare force us to do anything other than roflstomp hordes of mobs with autoattacks?

5815

It seems like there’s a retcon here somewhere since the impression D2 gave me was that destroying their soulstone on the hellforge was what killed them forever. It’s been a while and I might be misremembering, though.

5816

The occasional rare monster with potent abilities will potentially kill you on Nightmare. Hell is where things get real.

5817

Think that is also where the RMT option begins to feel like a good incentive…

“If only I had that item… for only 1$… I could clear Hell instead of toiling at Nightmare mode still…”

5818

I’ve never seen anything even remotely close 350dps drop in NM. Not even half that. Are those hell drops (keeping in mind you rarely/never find items with a requirement of your current level).

5819

No, they got the moment-to-moment gameplay right. They didn’t get long-term gameplay right.

I can’t trade an item for an item?
If you can find people to bother with it. Being your charming self, it shouldn’t be hard - I suppose.

You’re right. They took out the part where I have to play 20 hours to get to where I was before, and instead gave me the part where I use those hours to actually play the class.
Yeah, and removed the part where you want to play the game again with same class. That’s the replayability concept I’m talking about.

Oh and it’s not like there’s a Hardcore mode with its own separate AH/stash for added replayability or anything. Yeah man everyone in here has exactly 5 characters and that’s it.
For fans of Hardcore mode, sure. I’m not a fan, though.

Items are bland and the AH is fucked.
You got the first part right, which is pretty impressive :)

5820

Jailers and wallers. Oh they make me want to punch puppies and punt kittens. As a demon hunter I hate those two abilities on champions. Everything else I don’t mind so much. Vault and my traps can take care of peskiness. No it’s those two types of champions that get me every freaking time. Cut off my retreat with walls or lock me in place to beat on my face. Arg!

Other than that I’m loving the game. I want to like the witch doctor more, but I still feel the character hasn’t exactly bloomed for me. Anyone playing one? What level do they start to get really fun? Because the demon hunter was fun right off the bat, but the witch doctor (as well as wizard) are both taking their time to get there.