Diablo III

[GlassCobra]

Hey all, hope no one minds me jumping in. Loving this game so far, it keeps some of the best elements of D2 and makes it way more visually appealing. I do miss the old skill point system a little bit, I enjoyed the uniqueness from a very specific skill build that would completely eschew unneeded skills and allow you to overpower your chosen skills slightly by loading all the points into those. But at the same time, being able to try every skill your class offers and having it scale to your level and difficulty (instead of pumping points in) so that it's immediately viable is very nice.

Release day was crazy, I slept from 10 PM til 2 AM, then got up for the 3 AM eastern launch. Thankfully, my friends and I managed to all get in through the massive traffic influx after about an hour and create characters, and played until I had to head to work.

I just finished Normal playing as a Monk, and he's epic. He's so fast, and does crazy amounts of damage. Final boss dropped a rare Daibo staff that basically doubled my damage - doing 499.90 DPS in the early stages of Act I Nightmare. (How does that compare to the rest of you? Should I be trying to find an upgrade?)

Anyone tried the auction house yet? I've tried putting up a few rare items, but haven't gotten any bites. Tried dropping the prices, but still nothing. It's a shame that items sell for diddly squat in-game, otherwise I wouldn't have to try the AH.

 

[Dan Dan]

Just a heads up GlassCobra, have you got Elective Mode ticked in the Advanced Options? That allows you to mix up your skills a lot more, allowing for more than one from the same skill type to be at your disposal at once. IE having 2 primary skills on left and right click.

I'm also maining Monk, playing through with a Wizard, currently about to be done with Act I Nightmare ~lvl38. So far I haven't really noticed much that really tested me, but some of the blue/yellow mobs do sometimes give me a scare. I'm at work at the mo but i'll screenshot my build when I get in for you, but one thing I do like to do is mix up the Mantras I use. My favourites are the Mantra of Healing and Retribution. The Overawe Rune on one of the Mantras (I think it increases damage taken by enemies by 48% for 3 seconds) is really good too. I actually haven't died yet on this character, which is pretty cool. I know that won't last in Hell/Inferno though.

Been using the Auction House quite a bit, selling and buying. My tip would be ALWAYS set a buyout, and remember anything above vendor price is profit for you, so don't just set it to something ridiculous.

 

[GlassCobra]

I did tick Elective Mode, though I haven't changed anything around. I'm comfortable with Crippling Wave + Mangle rune as left click and Lashing Tail Kick + Sweeping Armada rune as right click, it's a great combo.

Then I run Breath of Heaven + Blazing Wrath rune as Skill 1, Sweeping Wind + Master of Wind rune as Skill 2, Mystic Ally + Water Ally rune as Skill 3, and Mantra of Conviction as Skill 4. Passive skills are Exalted Soul (+100 Max Spirit), Chant of Resonance (+7 minutes for Mantras, +2 Spirit/sec), and Seize the Initiative (+Armor = to DEX)

Level 32
Equipment/Attributes:

Hide

Head: Divine Hunger (Spirit Stone - Rare), 96 DEF: +39 STR, +18 DEX, Health Globes grant +126 life, 1 socket - Amethyst, +7% Life
Shoulders: Feral Spaulders of Cruelty (Spaulders - Magic), 76 DEF: +55 DEX, +12 VIT
Torso: Barren Tunic (Chest Armor - Rare), 107 DEF: +31 VIT, +8% MF, +7 EXP for kills, Health globes grant +166 life, 1 socket - Emerald, +14 DEX
Hands: Wealth Clasp (Gloves - Rare), 86 DEF: +92 DEX, +49 INT, +25 VIT, +10% gold, +7 EXP for kills, +5 yards globes/gold pickup
Wrists: Feral Bracelets of the Hawk (Bracelets - Magic), 43 DEF: +58 DEX, +18 VIT
Waist: Dread Myth (Belt - Rare), 46 DEF: +24 DEX, +27 VIT, +10 EXP for kills, melee attacks take 5 dmg
Legs: Clever Plate Leggings of Cruelty (Plate Leggings - Magic), 95 DEF: +40 DEX, +13 EXP for kills
Feet: Mending Sabatons of the Hawk (Sabatons - Magic), 65 DEF: +58 DEX, Health globes grant +65 life
Ring1: Keen Ring of Wounding (Ring - Magic): +2-4 dmg, increase atk speed +6%
Ring2: Vital Faze (Ring - Rare): +35 STR, +37 DEX, +11 INT, increase atk speed +6%, hits add +8 life, regen 6 life/sec, 1 socket - Flawless Amethyst, +18 VIT
Amulet: Biting Rosary (Amulet - Rare): +3-6 dmg, +36 VIT, hits add +3 life, 1 socket - Flawless Emerald, +18 DEX
Weapon: Slaughter Tomb (Daibo - Rare), 29-54 dmg/50.2 DPS, 1.21 atks/sec: +2-4 Cold dmg, increase atk speed +10%, gain 1.2 Life per Spirit spent, 1 socket - Flawless Ruby, +10-20 DMG

Strength: 113
Dexterity: 510
Intelligence: 99
Vitality: 238
Armor: 1234
DPS: 499.93

 

[Dan Dan]

Heroes List is down for me at the moment, so I can't log in and show you my armor/weapons, but I used the character builder thing to get my skills. Keep in mind this is for co-op.

Fists of Thunder - Thunderclap: Got this at level 6 and haven't looked back. The teleport to enemy saves a LOT of hassle running after them. Also means I don't need to use the weak Dashing Strike.

Crippling Wave - Concussion: Another Spirit Generator, and soften big hitters (my wizard partner is running a mainly DPS build). Third strike is AOE which is useful for larger groups.

Breath Of Heaven - Blazing Wrath: I mainly use it for the damage boost, but having a health source in a pinch is useful. I can see this becoming more redundant later on, and will probably switch for Serenity once I get the Ascension rune.

Sweeping Wind - Fire Storm: I change this one quite a bit, but I really like this for the AOE and the fact you can keep it sustained indefinitely if you can keep finding things to fight. I can see Cyclone Strike being useful for drawing enemies away from other players but you have to hit them a few times to cause them to move their focus to you.

Seven Sided Strike - Pandemonium: The Monks highest DPS move and my favourite in the game :D Looks so awesome. I really want the level 60 Rune because that looks insane. Pandemonium causes Slow afterwards and combo'd with Concussion really let's you take back control of fights.

Mantra of Healing - Sustenance: Pretty straightforward, gives increased Life Regen. Sustenance doubles it. I change Mantras a lot depending on the situation, all of them can be really useful so give them all a go.

Passives:

Exalted Soul - 100 more spirit, simple.
Chant of Resonance - Boosts Mantra length by 7 minutes and restores 2 Spirit per second.
Seize the Initiative - You should be heavily invested in Dexterity anyway so this just tanks you up to insane proportions..

I haven't changed these since getting them, but I think I could lose maybe Chant of Resonance for something else.

 

[GlassCobra]

Thanks for posting that Dan, looks good! Perhaps I'll experiment with Seven-Sided Strike instead of Lashing Tail Kick.

 

[bojangles]

I ended up going with the wizard and it's a lot of fun. This is what I'm currently using:

Hydra is really hilariously good, and its awesome to just drop in some enemies while I take other mobs. I haven't needed to use Diamond Skin other than with the Butcher's grab move but its a nice spell to have just in case. Teleport + Wave of Force is a hilarious combo and I got a pretty sweet 30-kill shot with it.

I'm so badly overgeared right now it's insane. I had a bit of cash (~100k) left over from when I beat Normal with my Barb so I went bargain hunting in the AH and found some nice stuff. I have around 550 Int and 2.5k Life, and I do around 500-600 with my magic missile and upwards of 750 with my Arcane Orb, despite most mobs only having about 200-250 health...

 

[aamto]

goddammit. it's like someone ramped up the difficulty even more in Act III. Soul Rippers are the bane of my existence and i quit on sight of a unique pack of them.

 

[Heroes Fall]

goddammit. it's like someone ramped up the difficulty even more in Act III. Soul Rippers are the bane of my existence and i quit on sight of a unique pack of them.

They're impossible to kill on any build DH. I just left and resumed praying for a different elite pack over them. Nothing you can do about it.

Act IV also has some real stupid, NES style "difficulty" built in. Angels charging at me offscreen for 150k giving me no opportunity to react, very fun. At least with oppressors you can somewhat anticipate their attacks, but man, act IV is just a slow grind. Think I'm going back to act III to farm a bit.

 

[GlassCobra]

Wow, well I guess Inferno really is as hard as they said it would be.

On an unrelated note, you know what I'm realizing is that I still haven't found any legendaries! Bummer.

 

[monkfish]

there is money to be made in buying & selling. actually find this more entertaining than playing the damn game

 

[Shinryu]

I'm guessing the real money AH isn't up still? Been kinda wondering what the real life money prices are personally.

 

[meddle]

It's not up. The current AH is still broken as all get-out, so it's probably a good thing we don't have the real money one yet.

 

[elcheeso]

6/13/12 according to the currency tab in the top right corner. Wouldn't be surprised if they delay it a bit more though. Apparently they're working on some improvements for the AH for 1.0.3, amongst other things. This thread has a decent list of things they're looking into if you're interested.

http://www.diablofans.com/blizz-tracker/topic/225709-35-small-improvements-for-diablo-3/

 

[Outlaw]

and monk, loan me some gold mans.

 

[xenu]

I can definitely see why Witch Doctor is the least played class - mana is such a ridiculously limiting resource it's impossible to fire off even a few direbats without having to have 4 other spells on cooldown just to proc VQ for the mana regen. It's also worth noting that these "4 other spells" are usually your summons, which are useless past Act 1 Nightmare let alone Hell or Inferno; zombie dogs will be one shot by even normal mobs and gargantuans can serve as 5 second meat shields if you're lucky. Part of what appealed to me about the Witch Doctor was the whole summoning aspect, but the WD's pets are so frail they will barely ever last long enough to inflict their abysmally low damage. Even so, I've tried to make a summoner-WD build work. Believe me, I've tried. I used all the passives that helped my pets - jungle fortitude, zombie handler, fierce loyalty - I stacked armor and vitality - but they continue to be useless as ever. WDs have obviously not been designed to spam spells, and are to rely on their pets to some extent. It just so happens, that when your pets are near useless, you HAVE to spam spells to put out competitive DPS. This is why you'll see VQ on almost every WD build, which entails blowing 4 useless spells just for the cooldowns so you can spam the other two, one of which will be your trust poison dart, the only "viable" primary skill available to the witch doctor. So essentially, you're left with a pet class, only without the pets. I'd play LoL if I wanted to play Teemo.

Considering rerolling as a Wizard until blizz fixes these glaring problems with the WD's design. It's a shame, too, the concept of the WD has so much potential, but it's such a poor answer to the Necromancer from D2.

 

[Trax]

Considering rerolling as a Wizard until blizz fixes these glaring problems with the WD's design. It's a shame, too, the concept of the WD has so much potential, but it's such a poor answer to the Necromancer from D2.

Well they never fixed that exact same set of problems for the necro (revive aside) either..

Key difference: Corpse go boom.

 

[xenu]

necro did have undeniably better pet scaling, though.

 

[vonFiedler]

In my opinion, playing all 5 classes, the worst resource system is the Monk's. This is mainly due to how damn expensive all of their good skills are. Seven Sided Strike, Sweeping Wind, Cyclone Strike all cost 1/3 to 1/2 of your Spirit, Dashing Strike and Tempest Rush easily add up over a fight, and even Mantras (which the designers want you to cast in fights) cost 50 Spirit. Forget Wave of Light, it's a fucking joke for 75 Spirit. I see almost every Monk uses Exalted Soul, but it doesn't actually help because it doesn't increase Spirit Regen. I rarely cap out at 150, the corresponding achievement was a joke. The Barb actively loses Rage but at least half of theirs skills are for free.

Witch Doctor meanwhile has the two best resource runes in the game, Honored Guest and Swallow your Soul. They are runes on incredibly good skills as well. Gruesome Feast is an extremely good (but not required) passive as well. If you really have mana problems, you should look into these.

The Witch Doctor actually has 3 "Signature" spells, in that you can cast them infinitely and barely even hamper your mana regen. These are Poison Dart, Corpse Spiders, and Firebomb. I don't know why Plague of Toads doesn't fall under this category, but it's not that good anyway (with exception to a few runes).

Firebats is OK but there are other skills that give you much more bang for your buck. Locust Swarm, Acid Cloud, and Zombie Charger are the skills I switch between. They are very fire and forget skills, allowing you to use your Sig for a few seconds while your mana recharges.

People were telling me that their Zombie Dogs were getting killed off too easily in Act I Normal. Xenu, don't stack Armor. You need Intelligence and Vitality. Vitality will go the most towards having them tank, but you need to actually put out damage. Your minions don't need to last forever, just 60 seconds. You also have quite a selection of minions who don't need to tank at all, like Hex (Witch Doctor is most comfortable with chickens), Spider Queen, Toad of Hugeness, Confusion if you really want to stretch it.

Having said all that, the WD's pets should definitely be sturdier than the Monk's. An automatic 30% resistance would go a long way here.

 

[Stagnant]

@monk

Steadfast Defiance - Buyout 350,000
...
...
...
Steadfast Defiance - Sold 1,530,000


haha, nice work.

 

[rekt]

@Dan, GlassCobra, any other Monks out there

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#WiXTgk!ZXU!aZbcaa

This is what I'm using for Act 2 Inferno with relative ease. Obviously you arent a level 60 yet so it's not all applicable.

If anyone is interested I have an analysis of why I'm using what I am along with some other stuff like stats, gear, how to actually play. I'll post it on request or just PM it to you if you'd like.

 

[Cathadora]

On the note of WD pets go read ALL of the following thread. http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5271500086

Tldr pets are semi viable you just have to know how to use them and go far and above what other builds need. Also pets do not scale on vitality atm but blizzard is looking to buff them and may let them at a later point.

 

[meddle]

Started to play a WD recently and I'm finding this guide to be very helpful:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo/comments/uad8p/witch_doctor_inferno_guidesetup_from_a_wd_that/

Basically you can blitz down just about anything with some basic gear guidelines. The class is kind of cooldown-limited as far as I can tell (at least for inferno builds), but man, when everything is up you can really dish out the damage when given the opportunity (or if you give yourself the opportunity by intentionally proccing your spirit vessel and then popping spirit walk). I'm sure people have seen the 3 second inferno boss kills from WDs on Youtube.

Finding my quality of life to be much improved from the Monk, even if I have to stutter step all over the place, which is kind of what I expected anyway. It's nice to not have 4-5 "required" stats on pretty much every piece of gear just to be viable. Yeah, I know I've bitched a lot about Monks in the thread and I know they *can* be viable, but playing the gear game and having gear play so heavily into my success kinda bores me.

@xenu, yeah I agree about the design flaws of the WD, but I've seen devs say that it was never their intention for WD to play like the Necro and that they may consider adding a class like that down the road /shrug (though this doesn't change the fact they've essentially pigeonholed the class into the "blitz" tactics just to win)

 

[Stagnant]

that was informative thanks. Now I know.. build some IAS

 

[GlassCobra]

@Dan, GlassCobra, any other Monks out there

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#WiXTgk!ZXU!aZbcaa

This is what I'm using for Act 2 Inferno with relative ease. Obviously you arent a level 60 yet so it's not all applicable.

If anyone is interested I have an analysis of why I'm using what I am along with some other stuff like stats, gear, how to actually play. I'll post it on request or just PM it to you if you'd like.

Interesting, I'll definitely keep your build in mind when I finally make it to Level 60 - thanks for posting it!

 

[monkfish]

ok so guys seriously you can make lots of money by knowing the market for particular item mods. for example +12% movement speed on boots is undervalued by a lot of sellers...