Rowe check PM
That was fun Chappers. I’m definitely going to roll out a Necro on PS4 when they go live. Still not sure on this monk.
Can someone walk me through how parties work on PS4? I set mine to open last night and one guy joined for a bit, but it didn’t seem like it activated voice comms and there didn’t seem to be a way to easily invite him to a voice party within the game…
I started a Barbarian with the kids, but then started a Season character as a Monk a week or so ago. I love the MOnk the mostest and had very little problem adjusting to the control scheme. I got to 70 and have started doing Bounties and early level rifts. I literally put in 100s of hours into the PC version and seems I have not burned out and it really doesn’t make a lot of sense as I don’t have that much time for videogaming and it is all still fairly repetitive in the mechanics and the content I have done a bajillion times. I think it is the crazy good quality of the production. The effects and especially the collision visuals (that’s not the technical phrase but I am drawing a blank). I played a decent amount of Torchlight, but the feel was never the same.
I have played many ARPGs again since DIII came out and none of them come close to the amount of enjoyment I ge4t or time I wish to dedicate to it. I know some people the game has bounced off of, but it is easily the game I have pled the most in probably my entire life and that is not an exaggeration. I only say probably because my memory is shit and I could be forgetting something easily.
What difficulty level do you play on that you got to 70 so quickly?
I was going to say, I was sure you were a mega PC veteran!
Usually Hard is the sweet spot for the early 30 levels or so. As you begin to get a few decent items drop (legs in particular), you can ramp up from there. Generally, the trick to this game is clear speed. Fast clearing for less XP ends up being waaay more efficient than banging on a blue for 6 minutes. Also if you are leveling via bounties, then the XP you get from completing them is significant, so the faster you can complete them, the faster you level. There are also other tricks, like running highly dense areas for maximum efficiency - like Halls of Agony levels 2 and 3 (bonus if there is a Butcher bounty on offer)! Experienced players will usually level to 70 in 5 hours or so, less if they get lucky with drops.
Oh, and crafting. Level your blacksmith as you go and every time a new level of weapon becomes available (every 5 or so levels), craft a couple and pick the best. Weapon DPS is king and this will keep your DPS progressing way easier than hoping of a better weapon drop while farming. As soon as sockets are a thing, put your best red gem in your weapon as it is the best choice until level 50 or so. Sockets on weapons are mandatory.
I find the easiest way to level quickly (unless you are crazy efficient, I.e. Great at maintaining big kill streaks) is to do rifts. Run bounties to get some starting gear and if you need materials or just need a change of pace.
After I get to a certain sweet spot where I am mowing things down I bump it up to hard and then maybe by sometime around level 40 or so I go up to Master. I really can’t tell you exactly when I do the bumping up and I am not a hardcore min/maxer despite playing so much. Just kinda do it when it feels comfortable. I play whatever combinations of skills are fun and if I get gear that gives me a good benefit with one. I concentrate on switching to those which compliment whatever gear give me bonuses. Also or alternatively, with the Enchantress available, make sure, even on rare gear, to swap out useless abilities on your gear for those that aid in whatever you are focusing on. I like Seven Sided Strike. SO if I get a piece of gear that assists some other ability that I am not using, I will also enchant and replace that hoping to get Seven Sided Strike. I realize that can be a waste of time as you often get an upgrade pretty quickly, but if it doesn’t cost too many materials and you have enough, you aren’t going to do anything, but billed a huge reserve of them otherwise.
Also, get a ruby in your weapon as soon as you get a socketed weapon and/or go to the enchantress to change one of your weapon’s abilities until it is replaced with a socket.
Plus what sharaleo said, which I seem to have duplicated a bit. :)
I did all my leveling in Adventure mode as I was playing with the kids, but certainly Bounties and Rifts can speed the process up.
I imagine I have also simply gotten better at fighting some of the bosses after doing so many times, but I really think it is simply stat management. My old ass is not that good and videogames anymore. The Butcher can be a pain, but learning how to dodge his rush, using your strongest ability at the right time and having an escape skill to circumvent the fire helps. It is all about timing and when you fire off skills and using your main resource ability efficiently.
I would be terrible at writing an FAQ or How to guide. ;)
If anyone asked me why the hell I would still play on the PC or why I am playing solo on the PS4 when I really got it to play with the kids, I am still not sure I have a good answer. Maybe, “The Fun”. It certainly isn’t purely due to a love of ARPG mechanics and/or the reward systems as I should be similarly enthralled with Path of Exile and Grim Dawn or the Victor Vran games. All of which I tried, but none of which have kept my attention for more than 10-20 hours each.
If Blizz did anything right with D3, it was absolutely nailing the moment to moment gameplay. It is so sublime that it just draws you in, even when, as you say, other ARPG’s may not tend to have the same effect.
Grouping is faster exp right? Is there an equivalent to /r/destinyfireteams for Diablo?
I’m still looking for info on party/game voice chat for PS4. It seems like players dropping in to your party should have voice on by default if mics are working? Maybe that guy just didnt feel like talking…
Since Necro is down till Tuesday I started up my WD again. Super fun playing low level torments in Adventure Mode. Will have to try some rifts soon and see latest builds that may be better than what I made on my own.
Are there any good diablo related twitter accounts I should be following besides Blizzard themselves and Icy Veins?
And can someone explain the cube to me? I thought I could use it to reroll legendary items, but it tells me transmuting fails but not why. What materials do I need to do that?
And I have a bunch of old materials in stash, those didnt get put in the new material auto bin, any idea how I move them there?
It only fails for one reason as far as I know - you don’t have the correct items inserted into the Cube. The UI tells you what you need for any of the 7 functions.
So to Reforge Legendary you need to put these into the Cube’s slots:
1 Legendary item
5 Khanduran Rune
5 Caldeum Nightshade
5 Arreat War Tapestry
5 Corrupted Angel Flesh
5 Westmarch Holy Water
50 Forgotten Soul
Then hit Transmute. I actually haven’t seen the PS4 interface for it yet but I imagine it’s not too dissimilar.
Ah ok, this was on PC so that makes sense
Rerolling legendaries is one of the most expensive recipes. The main reason to do it would be to try and get an ancient. Not generally something you would do early in the game. Is there something specific you were trying to do/get?
I got my first legendary recipes and made 2 of them. Their effects were weak. I thought maybe it would be cheaper to refill them than to make more. I was way wrong :)
There’s a LOT more to figure out at the high end these days, trying to piece it all together in my mind without anyone I can just chat with who understands the game is a challenge. My personally developed spell line up is perfectly viable to complete the game but falls apart at Torment levels so I’m trying to adapt.
Maybe I need to join an active guild with folks who play via voice chat
Plenty of people here who would be happy to help.
When I started the season in January. I hadn’t played since launch. It was rather overwhelming. By FAR the fastest way to gear up for torment level stuff is with a seasonal character doing the tiers and getting the free set pieces.
Let me help by quoting myself ftw! It’s just easier to find my posts on the subject in the main D3 thread, than all the others by all the other seasoned vets around here, so please excuse the ego stroking. Nevertheless this info is a fairly good guideline on progression and should help you, sans anyone to talk to live.
In case it is not obvious, it’s all about sets, legendaries that are complimentary to sets and all crit you can get, all of the time. :)
On weapon DPS, primarily while leveling:
In D3, weapon DPS is king - everything scales from that (for the most part, until you get to 70 and start equipping sets with other item interactions). However, while leveling and presuming non-legendary, always equip the best DPS weapon you have and as soon as you get one with a socket, insert a ruby. Rubies will typically out-perform Emeralds until you actually begin to work on your crit chance which you won’t really do until you are 60+ and moving towards endgame content and torment levels. For level 70 and end game, emeralds in weapon sockets rule the roost because crit is mandatory.
While levelling, every five levels or so, craft a new weapon at the blacksmith if an improvement has not dropped as you can easily fall behind the DPS curve if your current weapon’s ilevel is too low. You should have plenty of mats if you have been salvaging.
Exception - mostly in endgame you will need to be running a certain legendary weapon to compliment your particular set peices/build. Often the DPS multiplier boost or damage mitigation you get from running a complimentary legendary weapon will trump a higher DPS non-complimentary weapon.
On general post 70 progression:
Typically I play seasons until I get the stash reward via the journey and/or until I can solo near GR70. About that point I tend to peter out and it pretty much becomes an unenjoyable (for me) gear optimization and paragon grind.
But getting a fresh 70 to up to TX is still plenty fun and there are enough interconnected systems and gameplay content to keep it interesting. Ultimately is it all about collecting gear, but the progression to TX is all about optimising the content and systems to maximise your power progression. If it takes you hours upon hours upon hours, I would humbly suggest you are doing it wrong (as I admittedly did for many years). Half the journey is understanding how to game the system to get the items (Legs and Sets) you require.
Get the cube, run bounties to cube a few legs to get you started, run low rifts and GR’s to start building your leg gem collection. Optimise gear at the Mystic, spend shards for gear, craft at the blacksmith or cube to get gear. All these things empower you. 3 items in the cube will elevate you a couple of torment levels, 3 leg gems will do the same. Same each time you hit a new set bonus.
Are you using these systems effectively? Are you running at too high difficulty, thereby taking too long to kill and curbing your effective drop rates? Are you using an effectively useless L63 legendary weapon instead of crafting a far superior yellow L70? Are you prioritising sockets on jewelry above all other stats for the power amplification legendary gems provide? Does all your gear that can have crit, have crit? Are you running bounties solo (for the love of all that is holy, at least run bounties in public groups - you are taking 4x as long as necessary otherwise and pubs will pretty happily share drops with you if you let them know you need something).
On clear speed and general gear guidlines (CRIT!!!):
I would generally say that if it is taking more than 5-10 seconds to kill an elite pack, your effective drop rate/efficiency is suffering. Bosses and Guardians can vary and take a little longer.
The exception to that can be getting into Torment levels to begin with. You kind of want to be playing T1 as soon as possible as some items won’t drop otherwise, but that is usually trivial for a even fresh 70 with either at least a two piece set bonus and/or proper crit chance and crit damages rolled onto gear (helm, ammy, wrist, bracers, rings).
I also can’t overemphasis the importance of crit in D3. The vast, vast majority of builds (I can only think of one exception) fundamentally rely on crit hit and crit damage - that is your power scaling. If an item can roll crit, your goal is to get crit on it via the mystic, or replace it with a version that has crit - preferably both hit and damage. Your crit needs to be at 40-50% and crit damage at 300%+. Though in fairness, sometimes a socket for a beneficial legendary gem may be the better option during progression and until a better item drops.
It almost does not matter your build, you will generally be served well by the following advice:
DPS slots:
- Rings and ammys - main stat, socket, crit hit chance, crit damage
- Wrists - main stat, crit hit chance, crit hit damage
- Bracers - main stat, crit hit chance, relevant elemental damage
- Weapon - socket for an emerald for crit damage
- Helm - main stat, socket, crit hit chance
Survivability slots:
- Shoulders, Torso, Pants, Waist, Boots - main stat, vit, resist all, life%, armour
It’s kind of why the itemisation of Diablo 3 is pretty crap. It is so heavily reliant on main stat, crit and sockets that they are mandatory on any item that can roll them, making other affixes irrelevant as they are comparatively useless.
On sets (and more CRIT):
Ultimately, this game is about sets. That aside, the most powerful you can be with whatever gear you have equipped, is with stacked crit. Build your sets and complimentary legendaries, then stack crit on all of them - there is pretty much no substitute. Along the way, sure, a set bonus may well trump crit, but generally I presume everyone is aiming for sets anyway.
More on clear speed, skill alignment and damage mitigation:
Ah, good question. I guess it comes down to your average engagement time. If your average elite engagement time is 5-10 seconds, I would think you are at the right difficulty for progression. Progression being, “where is my drop rate optimised”, vs pushing being “how high can I actually go”.
Now your engagement time is also also a function of your skills and play-style, so yeah, that can have an effect. Generally, your skills should be optimised to your gear. If you have a few legs or items that boost an ability or element, look to stack that ability and element for best results. If you are confident your skill selection is leveraging the bonuses from your gear, then you are all good. Set the difficulty for a short engagement time accordingly while farming. The rest comes from getting your rotations right. And, to be fair, that can be annoying. I really dislike some rotation playstyles and they don’t gel with me. I am playing wiz this season and the free set is Firebird, but I just dislike the playstyle of that one for some reason.
Also damage mitigation is important - eventually. I talked about this in the Path of Exile thread, but that and D3’s structure ultimately made me realise that to be successful in an ARPG you need a couple of things. DPS, damage mitigation and to optimise for clear speed in order to progress. We have talked about the first (sets and crit, baby, crit) and the third above. The second, damage mitigation, D3 tries to make important during progression by breaking skills up into categories - primary, secondary, defence, etc, as they unlock. Now, the first thing you will do is turn on advanced mode which lets you put any skill anywhere (and by proxy stack all the same skill ‘type’ on all slots). That can make it easy to forget you need to slot a damage mitigation skill or two.
Sometimes the best defence is a good offence (stupid DPS) and that can get you reasonably far in D3, but sooner or later, even though you one-shot whites - all of them will also one-shot you. Many items in D3 will amplify defensive capability by stupid amounts. Aquila Cuirass is a good example - 50% damage reduction when above 90% primary resources! Brilliant if your build hardly uses any spenders. There are dozens of items like this in D3, custom built to compliment the sets on offer and every leaderboard build is leveraging one or more to a certain extent. The effect of this is that sometimes, regardless of DPS, you will be stuck at mid torments until you get that damn item that will make the survivabillity difference. The trick is recognising that and spending all of your crafting mats on trying to acquire that item, which, to be fair, requires fore-knowledge of what is available to begin with - annoying for a casual player.
So, D3 progression is get to 70, craft and re-roll items to crit, cube complimentary items, acquire legendary gems, farm or complete journey for set pieces, re-roll them to crit, acquire complimentary legendary damage mitigators/DPS multipliers, re-roll those to crit, win.
Win is typically faceroll torment X. After that comes grinding for ancients and pushing GR’s, of which some moderate amount is required to complete seasonal journeys.
On paperdoll DPS:
Once you get sets together and start pairing Legendary affixes to create bonuses, paper doll DPS begins to mean less and less. It is still kind of important - more paperdoll DPS is still loosely the ‘foundation’ from which damage is derived (I say that loosely as paperdoll is itself kind of a guestimation anyway). That’s why it is good to say, sacrifice crit on your yellow rings for non-crit Focus and Restraints and lose 15% sheet DPS but effectively gain 125% DPS from the set bonus.
On running public, grouped bounties:
Solo bounties at some point become a tremendous waste of time. Once you are running bounties solely for the mats, which you need for cube recipes (particularly when you get to the point of trying to re-roll pieces for ancients), you just need to get them done quickly and a group effort splitting drastically reduces the time. I can tell you from experience that, unlike something like Overwatch or League of Legends, grouping in D3 is almost totally painless. Folk won’t talk to you all that much unless it is to perhaps communicate a special gob, or vault portal, they will happily drop shit they don’t need if you ask or tell them you need an item and you almost certainly won’t get abused unless you`re obviously only there to be carried for free mats or you collect bounties out of order, costing them bonus caches. Other than that, people just join your game, do their shit, complete all the bounties with you then go their separate ways. You’ll go from clearing all bounties in 60 minutes to 15.
Thank you so much. Tons to digest there. Will do my best to take advantage of it.
Any advice on levelling fast in the seasons with no sash or cash to start?