The way I’m doing this is to be as concise as possible. My single best piece of advice I can give ANYONE is: Gear for the future. Do some research. Figure out the best leaderboard builds. Those builds are the best because of item/skill synergy, but they are still the best. If you want to be a single individual snowflake, go for it, but still PLAN for it. You need to know the clutch items you are going for because Kadala will be your primary resource for getting individual pieces of gear. Yes, a lot of your gear won’t come from her, but when you really need a certain unique, 2500 blood shards can get most items (not all, some are absurdly rare, do your research here as well. If the build you are going for “requires” one of the highest tier finds in the game, build something else until it drops). Look at what gear the people are using. Look at their skills. Try to see the synergy. I assure you there is a lot.
Most builds require a lot of setup. Every class has a defining set bonus that breaks the T6 barrier for them and makes it doable, some have multiple choices. But for Wizard’s for example, I don’t think you could find one in the top 100 leaderboard without Firebird’s Finery 6 piece bonus. So do a few minutes of homework. Figure out what build you are aiming towards and make good decisions with Kadala and the Mystic. Proper planning ahead can save you a hundred hours, easily when your frost wizard build turns out to be uncompetitive in the late game environment. I should know.
On to the meat and potatoes. This is as dumbed down as possible in an attempt to provide a reference for each gear slot. I must stress again that based on certain unique items, you may end up having to make a weird or bad choice to make a set bonus happen. It happens a lot. The important part is to realize which of the lesser evils you are picking and why. I have omitted PRIMARY stat on all items, as it will happen 100% of the time and isn’t worth giving up in any situation, this is your STR/DEX/INT depending on your class. So when I am discussing the 3 primary affixes you are working with, I am ignoring the PRIMARY stat. It’s always going to be there. I am not forgetting a 4th stat, just clarifying.
Every item slot on this list needs to be filled with a unique or set item, it is your job to do the 5 minutes of research to find out what those are. Below are guidelines on how the best versions of those items should look. Unique affixes are completely ignored because they are item-specific. Also, this should be VERY helpful for new people gearing with yellow, because the best yellows are much easier to find than the best legendaries.
*BDSM is forthcoming defined as: Best defensive stat man (I added the man for the sake of the acronym), figure it out by moving a few paragon points. Depending on your current mitigation, it might be vitality, life%, all resistance, or armor. What your BDSM at the moment is will always be determined by the other stats, relative. Fortunately with even a handful of paragon levels you can math this out easily.
*SAD is forthcoming defined as: Specific ability damage. It defines a trait like +15% disintegrate. If I offer this as an option, take it if you are using that skill only. Obviously.
*Forthcoming stars are non-negotiable. If your item does not have a starred affix, it is garbage and throw it in the dumpster.
Helm: *Crit 6%, *Socket, YOUR CHOICE: BDSM or SAD. Helm sockets should have your highest level diamond in most builds for cooldown reduction, unless you are using a build without cooldown or are dying for toughness, then use an amethyst, I won’t judge you.
Necklace: The worst slot psychologically. It will physically pain you if you like math. But, generally *20% elemental damage, *10% crit, (the next star is only if you have a legendary gem here)*socket. If you don’t have a legendary gem, go for crit damage 100 as your last slot. The reason I choose crit% over crit damage here as a generality is that there are a lot of game features that happen “on crit”. Mathematically, if no “on crit” effects apply to your character, crit damage 100 may be better. But you can’t expect me to do everything for you, so open your calculator app and suss it out!
Shoulders: Tough slot because they have no crucial affixes. It’s a great place to shore up on toughness as you can hypothetically build 3 BDSM’s here, only missing one. This is my generic one fits all recommendation. If you’re never dying and toughness isn’t a consideration, take cooldown redux for builds with cooldowns, otherwise take resource redux or SAD.
Chest: *3 sockets, *BDSM, your option BDSM or SAD. Figure out your own self expression with this last slot between toughness and damage.
Bracers: *Elemental Damage 20, *Crit 6, BDSM. Virtually every class wants Strongarm Bracers here if they have an easy access to a knockback skill. It’s a free 30% damage boost, and easily one of the best legendaries in the game.
Gloves: *Crit 10, *Crit Damage 50, your choice attack speed 9 or BDSM. For some builds attack speed is great, for others it isn’t really worth it as it consumes resources faster. The first two are, as their stars indicate, non negotiable.
Rings!: This category basically defies description. I don’t know of anyone that doesn’t want a Stone of Jordan and Ring of Royal Grandeur in these slots. If you don’t need a RoRG for whatever reason: *Socket, * Crit Chance, *Crit damage 50 as the lost spot if you have it, SoJ has hardly any chosen affixes so go for the socket highest priority. There is no way to justify not using a Stone of Jordan to a sane person, and I’m not here to argue with crazy people, so just get the best one you can and follow those basic guidlines when it comes to enchanting it.
Belt: Kind of a filler slot. My advice is just to go for BDSM in all your choices here, and hope to pick up a String of Ears or Witching Hour, depending on if you want defense or offense. If you are melee, probably String of Ears, ranged probably Witching Hour.
Pants: *socket 2, 2 BDSM. easy enough. The two sockets is non negotiable just like the 3 on the chest piece. If your pants don’t have 2 sockets, reroll until they do. A notoriously pain in the butt slot for certain items that don’t come with guaranteed sockets.
Boots: The worst slot, go for movement speed if you don’t have it capped with paragon points. If you do, it’s better to leave the paragon points there and just roll a defensive stat unless your defense is absurd. Just make sure you get the best SAD possible here.
The Mystic (aka, let’s talk about this greedy bitch): This is where most of your game-earned resources will go, outside of Kadala, who will mostly end up fueling your crack-like addiction to this abusive woman. So…
A piece of gear I want dropped! Fantastic! But Meleketh, it’s missing one of your “deal breaker, non-negotiable stars”, you may say. Well that is what this awful woman is here for. Turn a non-essential into an essential! So go for it, spend all your money. It’s worth it. You’ll make more. Tons more. Mountains more. You’ll have thousands of veiled crystals and hundreds of millions of gold one day, this woman is just here to delay that.
But, you might say: “Meleketh, my best in slot item just dropped, and I need it to complete my set bonus, but it’s missing TWO deal breakers! What do I do?!?!?!” To which I will say, tough luck kid. Your item is a piece of garbage. If it completes your 6 piece bonus, wear it, enchant it as best you can to make up for its deep deficiency but know in your heart you need to replace that thing because it is a filthy stain on your character, and anyone who looks at your profile will judge you rightfully as the barely out of the trailer park piece of diablo trash that you are. Dedicate every waking moment to earning shards for Kadala to roll a new one, and pray it doesn’t beat you like this one did. Salvage it with righteous justice when you replace it, or keep it as a macabre trophy in your stash, a reminder of darker times.
For all her horror though, the mystic does provide one free service that is slightly more tasteful than a handjob from a hobo for crack money, and that is her useful “?” button she provides. Simply put your item into her enchant box, and for free you can not only see what you can turn that affix into, but the ranges it can roll into! Well, that quick reference guide almost makes up for everything else.
Weapons:
You’re gonna have to go on a class by class and roll by roll basis here. But weapon DPS is the key factor that is multiplied by so many others, so you really want that number to be big. Bigger is better. It isn’t how she rides the waves guys. If you have an offhand, it needs to have *crit 10, or you can just call it a day. Otherwise you lose way too much dps not having a 2hander. The ctrl button is your friend with assessing weapons. How did the base damage roll? How did everything else roll? The ideal weapon looks something like x-1450dmg (1 hander, i dont really remember the 2 hander number off the cuff, use that ctrl key!), +10% dmg, +7% attack speed, +primary stat, +socket. The only way to accomplish this is with really fantastic rolls, and a Ramaldi’s gift to either add a socket or reroll your socket into a missing +10% dmg or +7% attack speed affix. Finding the perfect weapon is totally the white whale of Diablo 3, and good luck with it. If you find a 1 hander with a socket and 2450+ dps, you are in pretty good shape. It’ll probably take 300 hours and a ramaldi’s gift to replace it.
The key with understanding using the mystic, and itemization in general is to take advantage of her little “?” button. You need to know what you could roll there.
