Blizzard has been busy pushing hotfixes onto their on-and-off broken auction house system, in an effort to quell the rage of the unhappy Diablo III community.
After many reports of Diablo III’s Gold Auction House’s connectivity problems, bugs and glitches, the Real Money Auction House integration has been pushed back to June 12th, only a few days after E3 ends. Is this an honest effort at fixing a budding problem? Or is it an excuse to ride the E3 hype train?
Will Diablo III's "Real Money Auction House" Put An End To Gold Farmers? Greg Voakes Greg Voakes Contributor
A few days ago, Diablo III community manager Nethaera posted on the forums to explain the upcoming hotfixes, and to address the outstanding issues the auction house is struggling to cope with before they can securely launch a real-currency auction house:
In light of the post-launch obstacles we’ve encountered, we have made the decision to move the launch of the Real Money Auction House beyond the previously estimated May time frame. As we mentioned in our original announcement, our goal has always been to ensure everyone has the smoothest experience possible when the real-money auction house launches, and we need a bit more time to iron out the existing general stability and gameplay issues before that feature goes live. While we don’t have a new launch date to share just yet, we’ll have more information soon.
Gold auction house errors are currently the elephant in the room between Blizzard and the D3 community. The growing number of recent compromised accounts pose huge security issue. If we’re about to see whether our account security can be breached by hackers—allowing them to potentially access our Battle.net account funds (once we’re able to add them, that is.) A hacker could simply exploit our accounts to use our money to buy themselves gear, either to use themselves, or sell it for gold.
Tracking where an item goes may seem like an impossible task, but I don’t underestimate Blizzard’s capabilities. World of Warcraft Game Masters seemed to come to the aid of players that were hacked, in turn losing their fortune of rare loot and gold—but the muscle Blizzard hasn’t flexed yet is that ability to restore items case-by-case. The solution taken to fix the issue of lost or stolen items of compromised accounts has been a simple character roll-back. Restoring the state of that account from a previous time/date, where the gold, and level of a character may have been significantly lowered.
Diablo III’s “Real Money Auction House” delay has been tentatively rescheduled right in the middle of when E3 is happening. My initial thought was that it was a convenient way for Blizzard to hop on the E3 hype train, but may be an honest effort to combat those glaring problems as I mentioned earlier.
What's that Blizzard? You made the game always online so you could regulate the real money auction house and the items on it? Gee, hows that working out for ya?
For those who haven't been tracking the events of passed weeks, a lot of crazy crap is going down. Hackers have cracked Diablo 3's net code, and are now able to transfer the gear drops of every player in a game to their own! The authenticators, which have always been a waste of money mind you, have also proved ineffective in stopping the hacking of accounts, which hackers are also using the acquire gear by taking them right off other people's characters. Much of this gear has already made it onto the online black market. As an aside, none of this would be possible without the online logging system. Right now there are rumors that the RMAH has actually been shelved indefinitely.
And as a special treat, hackers have busted open Blizzards code, and are now opening dark nets for the game.
Good job Blizzard. I'm so glad you're out there making me play your game online 24/7 to protect me from those mean hackers.
I think i have had my finnal stray with D3, the last four times i ahve used the auction house i loose ALL my gear the very next day and have to get my account rolled back, anyone else having this problem as its enraging me to no end..... all i know is one more time and il be done with d3 for life (or at least a good few years lol)
That's one of the glitches that has seen the auction house being taken down every now and then. Hackers are exploiting code that lets them gain access to accounts without knowing the password. Its been going on for more than a week and Blizzard has somehow not managed to fix it.
Also just as a special measure change your pass if you haven't. I use 16 character hash strings for most of my pass words (or 15 as some places don't let me go that high)
LordofHats wrote:Hackers are exploiting code that lets them gain access to accounts without knowing the password..
LordofHats wrote:Also just as a special measure change your pass if you haven't. I use 16 character hash strings for most of my pass words (or 15 as some places don't let me go that high)
But this is not a problem with Passwords as you say?
Something to do with session keys IIRC.
My password thing was just an extra precaution. Regardless of cause, if an account is compromised, always change the password. EDIT: I haven't found articles mentioning the exact method of the exploit. Some people think its related less to D3 and more to Bnet.
LordofHats wrote:
What's that Blizzard? You made the game always online so you could regulate the real money auction house and the items on it? Gee, hows that working out for ya?
For those who haven't been tracking the events of passed weeks, a lot of crazy crap is going down. Hackers have cracked Diablo 3's net code, and are now able to transfer the gear drops of every player in a game to their own! The authenticators, which have always been a waste of money mind you, have also proved ineffective in stopping the hacking of accounts, which hackers are also using the acquire gear by taking them right off other people's characters. Much of this gear has already made it onto the online black market. As an aside, none of this would be possible without the online logging system. Right now there are rumors that the RMAH has actually been shelved indefinitely.
And as a special treat, hackers have busted open Blizzards code, and are now opening dark nets for the game.
Good job Blizzard. I'm so glad you're out there making me play your game online 24/7 to protect me from those mean hackers.
Please provide a source, because this is absolute bs, and nowhere CLOSE to what is actually happening.
Define 'actually happening.' I assume you mean the bit about drops which was an error on my part as I misunderstood at the time of posting what the hackers were doing. Mainly its stuff like this that gets the most attention:
If you can understand the poor english. If you can enjoy that, enjoy the weirdness of the situation because its really bizarre. A lot of the weirdest stuff is going on on the EU servers where there are reports of good old account selling too. As far as I know no one knows yet how they're doing it.
The best part is that the only response I've seen from Blizzard is 'get an authenticator.' Anyone who knows WoW knows thats crap.
EDIT:
Went to youtube instead of yahoo search and got a better video with proper english and an explaination:
did you even read the first few lines of that article ?
It's not clear if it was a mobile authenticator or a physical authenticator, or if he tried to use a dial-in authenticator or the SMS option, in which case the latter two don't work with Diablo III.
What does that thread prove? It states that blizzard doesnt think that an account can be hacked if it has an authenticator...That is all.
I just think that it is disturbing that for some reason, blizzard gets hacked so much. It was a huge issue in WOW, and it is still a huge issue. I have never seen any other company or game have such a massive security issue. It really just makes me not want to trust blizzard, which is unfortunate because I have been a die hard blizzard fan for a very long time.
Authenticators are crap and anyone who pays attention knows it. Accounts on WoW have been getting hacked in spite of authenticators for years. Blizzard just likes to pretend they're 'lying' so they can keep selling authenticators. This of courses has the added bonus of scaring the people who don't already have authenticators into buying them.
Blizzard has claimed that session spoofing is impossible in Diablo 3, but as I posted above, there is video of hackers session spoofing. Blizzard is living in denial. They have been for many years when it comes to how horribly insecure Bnet is.
On Tuesday Diablo 3 community manager Bashiok hit the forums and responded to numerous complaints about the loss of gold and items due to account hacking. In short, Blizzard is blaming the problem on passwords that aren't backed up by an official Battle.net authenticator.
"We've been taking the situation extremely seriously from the start, and have done everything possible to verify how and in what circumstances these compromises are occurring," Bashiok writes. "Despite the claims and theories being made, we have yet to find any situations in which a person's account was not compromised through traditional means of someone else logging into their account through the use of their password."
But Bashiok also verifies that the authenticator isn't a 100-percent guarantee of account security. "We have yet to investigate a compromise report in which an authenticator was attached beforehand," he adds. "If your account has been hacked, please view the previous post for information on contacting our support department."
As pointed out on Monday, Diablo 3 players are reporting hacks on both sides of the authenticator fence. They have also been able to watch the hacking take place in real time while taking screenshots in the process. Even Examiner journalist Tara Swadley saw her gold and character items drained after using a Battle.net authenticator.
"This reporter, after having her own account with authenticator hacked, firmly believes this is a serious security breach on Blizzard’s side, though they either do not want to admit it, or are still unaware of the problem," she writes. As hanted to on Monday, there's speculation that this flood of hacking is just a prelude to what's to come once Blizzard launches the real-money auction house next week.
In addition to Bashiok's forum post, another lengthy statement was issued around midnight EST. Blizzard says it isn't uncommon to see increased reports of hacking when a new game or expansion pack is released. Users are suggested to check out the company's new Battle.net SMS Protect which allows customers to use their text-based smartphone to modify their Battle.net account.
"Historically, the release of a new game -- such as a World of Warcraft® expansion -- will result in an increase in reports of individual account compromises, and that's exactly what we're seeing now with Diablo 3," Blizzard states. "We know how frustrating it can be to become the victim of account theft, and as always, we're dedicated to doing everything we can to help our players keep their Battle.net accounts safe -- and we appreciate everyone who's doing their part to help protect their accounts as well."
"We also wanted to reassure you that the Battle.net Authenticator and Battle.net Mobile Authenticator (a free app for iPhone and Android devices) continue to be some of the most effective measures we offer to help players protect themselves against account compromises, and we encourage everyone to take advantage of them," Blizzard adds.
Currently one hacking theory suggests that an exploit allows for session hijacking. "You will lose connection to the game," reports Frobozz as he describes what will happen when the account is hijacked. "This can result in just the 'Lost connection to server' error message or no message at all."
"A good sign that the connection loss is a hijack attempt and not just a server error is if you are also having trouble surfing the web (i.e. slow connections, or can't load pages)," he continues. "People are reporting that their IP is getting DDOSed to prevent them from relogging into Diablo 3 and thus getting a new session and stopping the attack."
Of course Blizzard won't admit they have a serious security problem. That would mean admitting the fact they've had one for years and that they've never bothered fixing it.
In all the hours I've played in the presence of D3s General Chat, I've never heard a single complaint about having been hacked or account security being compromised in any way.
In Blizz forums, however, I've witnessed a lot of Blizzard hate. It's far more probable that people are spreading these unsubstantiated accusations out of rage over Blizzard's success.
It's really quite petty if you step back and look at it. I harbor my own frustrations about the mandatory online requirements and such, but you don't see me getting carried away by fantastical conspiracy theories and dubious 2nd hand testimonials. Such things reek of deliberate, inane deception and attention whoring.
Yes. The gaming media and the journalists who report being hacked are also in on the conspiracy... Because... Just because.
There's Blizzard hate because this problem has been going on in WoW for years. Of course they're hating on Blizzard they keep denying the problem exists.
Well, I am experiencing alot of frustration because my account was either hacked into or the most recent patch erased everything? I have an authenticator as well.
Honestly, the thing that bugged me the most (and I am not hating on blizzard, I love blizzard in fact) is that the customer support people that responded to my ticket basically told me to go figure out my issue on the forums. I honestly dont even know what to look for. I dont know if my account was hacked. In fact, I do not believe that it was, I think the patch erased everything off my account. However, I cant get anyone at blizzard to actually talk to me about it, they just tell me to go and find out myself.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also - The mobile authenticator app is free.
KingKodo wrote:Well, I am experiencing alot of frustration because my account was either hacked into or the most recent patch erased everything? I have an authenticator as well.
Honestly, the thing that bugged me the most (and I am not hating on blizzard, I love blizzard in fact) is that the customer support people that responded to my ticket basically told me to go figure out my issue on the forums. I honestly dont even know what to look for. I dont know if my account was hacked. In fact, I do not believe that it was, I think the patch erased everything off my account. However, I cant get anyone at blizzard to actually talk to me about it, they just tell me to go and find out myself.
This seems to be their answer to every ticket. Both myself, and my friend who i play with have had troubles with the Auction House (delayed completions, winning an auction that then comes up as not won, but you dont get the gold back either...that sort of thing). The only respnse we have received from our tickets has been 'look at the Forum'....
So ... is it supposed to be impossible to solo in nightmare difficulty? My demon hunter dies so easy it's just funny now. I made a warrior now who's plowing through normal difficulty, but now I'm wondering if I'll be in the same boat later on with this character too.. my DH used to blow through stuff too in Normal, then nightmare became a nightmare.
Necros wrote:So ... is it supposed to be impossible to solo in nightmare difficulty? My demon hunter dies so easy it's just funny now. I made a warrior now who's plowing through normal difficulty, but now I'm wondering if I'll be in the same boat later on with this character too.. my DH used to blow through stuff too in Normal, then nightmare became a nightmare.
I'm solo'ing in hell, so yes, you shouldn't have any problems with NM.
Make sure to keep your equipment snazzy via the AH, and check the forums for the one good build available to you (nice going on that front blizz)
KingKodo wrote:Well, I am experiencing alot of frustration because my account was either hacked into or the most recent patch erased everything? I have an authenticator as well.
Honestly, the thing that bugged me the most (and I am not hating on blizzard, I love blizzard in fact) is that the customer support people that responded to my ticket basically told me to go figure out my issue on the forums. I honestly dont even know what to look for. I dont know if my account was hacked. In fact, I do not believe that it was, I think the patch erased everything off my account. However, I cant get anyone at blizzard to actually talk to me about it, they just tell me to go and find out myself.
This seems to be their answer to every ticket. Both myself, and my friend who i play with have had troubles with the Auction House (delayed completions, winning an auction that then comes up as not won, but you dont get the gold back either...that sort of thing). The only respnse we have received from our tickets has been 'look at the Forum'....
I also had the "go hump a stump and figure it out yourself" email sent to me from blizzard, im pretty much done with supporting their crap even though i thoroughly enjoyed my time on D3 :(
Necros wrote:So ... is it supposed to be impossible to solo in nightmare difficulty? My demon hunter dies so easy it's just funny now. I made a warrior now who's plowing through normal difficulty, but now I'm wondering if I'll be in the same boat later on with this character too.. my DH used to blow through stuff too in Normal, then nightmare became a nightmare.
My friend playing as a barb and myself as a monk managed to get all the way through Hell without having to use the AH.
It just takes a little farming for gear, and occasionally switching up your skills. Inferno is where things really become hard....
Been checking the AH but generally stuff there that I need is too expensive for me :( I've mostly just stocked up on anything that gives me DPS, but my life and armor is pretty low.. guess I need to find a good middle ground. I can handle the trash mobs but blue or yellows usually take like 3 or 4 deaths for me to burn em down :/
Necros wrote:Been checking the AH but generally stuff there that I need is too expensive for me :( I've mostly just stocked up on anything that gives me DPS, but my life and armor is pretty low.. guess I need to find a good middle ground. I can handle the trash mobs but blue or yellows usually take like 3 or 4 deaths for me to burn em down :/
Agreed. Most of that stuff is way too expensive for anyone not around level 55-60. I'd suggest farming Act 3 and 4 once you get to Hell. Should put a couple hundred thousand gold in your pockets.
Necros wrote:Been checking the AH but generally stuff there that I need is too expensive for me :( I've mostly just stocked up on anything that gives me DPS, but my life and armor is pretty low.. guess I need to find a good middle ground. I can handle the trash mobs but blue or yellows usually take like 3 or 4 deaths for me to burn em down :/
Contrary to popular belief, farming gold will serve you much better than farming items. Just look up some good ways to get gold fast and you'll be able to gear up much faster.
As a general rule, I won't support outrageous AH prices no matter how good the item is. There's no excuse for charging 50,000,000g for an item with 400 duplicates up for auction. 'Sorry seller, your legendary item just isn't that extraordinary... It appears to be quite common in fact.' There are always people asking a reasonable price in the midst of gougers. As the one with the gold, you have all the power.
I spent a long time searching and got ahold of a lot of gear now that's my level so I'm doing much better. Started selling my blues and yellows in there too.
I was out of money mostly because of smithing .. so now I'm starting to wonder if it's even worth working on that anymore.. I can get better stuff in the AH, but stuff I craft that's my level doesn't come close.
Necros wrote:Been checking the AH but generally stuff there that I need is too expensive for me :( I've mostly just stocked up on anything that gives me DPS, but my life and armor is pretty low.. guess I need to find a good middle ground. I can handle the trash mobs but blue or yellows usually take like 3 or 4 deaths for me to burn em down :/
Contrary to popular belief, farming gold will serve you much better than farming items. Just look up some good ways to get gold fast and you'll be able to gear up much faster.
As a general rule, I won't support outrageous AH prices no matter how good the item is. There's no excuse for charging 50,000,000g for an item with 400 duplicates up for auction. 'Sorry seller, your legendary item just isn't that extraordinary... It appears to be quite common in fact.' There are always people asking a reasonable price in the midst of gougers. As the one with the gold, you have all the power.
Agreed, its INSANELY easy to find a good deal on the AH, just the same as its ridiculously easy to find bad deals on the AH.
Be careful with how you are searching (ie, enter the exact minimum skills that you want) and search from there. Be aware of buyouts (i will quite happily pay more than i wanted to to get something there and then instead of bidding for it). Look for auctions that are running out soon as you can snipe them (the update time for bidding is approximately 5-6 seconds, so if you know EXACTLY when the 1minute count started from, and bid at say 10-15 seconds, you should be golden).
And yes, watch out for common items being hugely priced by d-bags. Dont bother picking up the legendary items, they arent really worth it. you are looking for rare (yellow) items, or high level blues if they have a big boost for what you need. Dont be afraid to buy a couple levels ahead of what you need, that way you are prepared, and have something to look forward to apart from potentially stale runes...
Soloing is entirely possible on Nightmare with a DH, mine is doing it at the moment quite happily. Just be aware you have NO health and normally very little armour. Use the Templar to tank for you (feel free anyone to chime in with a better strategy tbw, mine is based entirely off my own play style), and stay the HELL out of the way of anything that can catch you (teleporters, wallers, jailers, fast all become a HUGE problem). Running to a better position instead of attacking is often a better strategy, theres no benefit to dying, and even though the fight may last a LOT longer, you will still win eventually. Vault is the BEST skill for getting out of the way (no surprises there), so USE it. You are a glass cannon (as are the WD and Wizard), so act like it. run and shoot, run and shoot...
One slight aside, the Strafe, with the increase attack speed rune is DEVASTATING against single opponents, as it ONLY targets that one guy. With the + to attack speed, and the fact that it keeps you moving, is a great little combo. Also very useful for breaking barrels
Hope that helps...
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Necros wrote:I spent a long time searching and got ahold of a lot of gear now that's my level so I'm doing much better. Started selling my blues and yellows in there too.
I was out of money mostly because of smithing .. so now I'm starting to wonder if it's even worth working on that anymore.. I can get better stuff in the AH, but stuff I craft that's my level doesn't come close.
Yes. Thats exactly what i found as well. Blacksmithing is far too random for me (dont get me wrong, ive made some quality items, but it took AGES, and most of my gold). Later on, the Tomes are just not common enough to keep doing this either IMO. Spend your money on the AH or Gem guy instead.
Normal playthrough of act 1 will net you about 30k gold if you sell all the blues you get.
Buy 2 of the biggest rubies you can find and afford from the AH (Level 1-25 thatd be Perfect ruby (600g), 25 to 50 thatd be a perfect square(1.5k or so)
slot it on your helmet and weapon. exp% boost and damage boost. Normal will now be a cakewalk.
Buying in AH: Stick to a budget! always use the Maximum Buyout filter to your advantage. if it's beyond your budget assume you're being ripped off.
Here's my budget considerations. YMMV of course:
Level 1-10 = budget 3k max per piece of gear
Level 10-25 = budget 5k max per piece of gear
Level 25-35 = Budget 10k
and so on.
If you're selling gear keep the budget condiserations above so that your stuff moves fast. Its always better to sell for less and move the item than try to fish for that one gullible newb.
Always look for gear that improve your primary stat (which translates to DPS), exp gain and has slots.
Magic find is better than Gold find in normal as the amount of gold youll get from monsters is rarely going to go over 100 but monsters drop a lot of gear.
Attack speed and status effects dont matter much in Normal.
Ignore Legendaries.
Ignore your blacksmith Levelling up your gemcrafter will only be worth it after Nightmare as the AH will have better(and cheaper) gems than you can make on your own.
I'm level 44 now, i've been setting my max at 10k for items. Geared up pretty good now so I'll wait a few levels and save up before upgrading again.
I think I'm starting to run into my usual issue with video games though .. I just don't like playing through a game more than once, back to back. It's OK if I wait a year or so and go back to it, but once I "beat" a game, I start getting real bored real fast when I already know the story. This is pretty much what killed WOW for me too, raiding the same dungeons over and over and over. meh.
Im level 56 on Hell, and im spending WAY more than that on items now. I was keeping myself to a nice limit on items, but its kind of snowballed pretty badly. Its the only way to keep up with the difficulty, cos my item drops are terrible...plus, im getting less patient with auctions.
Still, i pick up about 100g per kill so its not all bad, i make my money back pretty quick, especailly with selling blues/yellows.
Coop is the way forward Necros, allows me to chat to my mate while we play (really need headsets sometimes though, the amount of times one of us dies and leaves a message consisting of numbers purely because we forgot we were typing during the fight ). Plus, challenging each other and helping each other out (along with competing for achievements of all things) keeps it fresh. We tend to skip all the talking now though, as we picked up the story on the first play through.
Loving the game at moment, got to 60 on friday and am now most fo the way through act 3 inferno on the EU servers as a Barb.
Found good gear on the AH for about 100k a time with good resist all, Vit and other stats i needed. so thats got me through ok. Act 2 did lead to many deaths though.
Got a Demon hunter in the runs, anyone looking to duo up?
Necros wrote:I'm level 44 now, i've been setting my max at 10k for items. Geared up pretty good now so I'll wait a few levels and save up before upgrading again.
Gear makes a huge difference. I ran into a wall, like many others, when I got to Belial on Hell difficulty. I spent about 70k on gear upgrades at auction, went back and just wiped the floor with him. I guess once you start feeling delicate, good gear will put you back above the enemies.
Blizzard just nerfed the F out of attack speed and buffed a whole bunch of the bosses in the game. They are grade A experts at messing up a good thing.
LordofHats wrote:I also hear the new patch has a glitch that makes it impossible to gain experience
this was definitely the case, but I think they have fixed it already...
Another bug that they have yet to fix from this latest patch is in the various challenges for achievements... I had over 900 "Ashes" smashed in Chapter 1, and suddenly I have 75
There is also a constant buff on my character since the new patch. As soon as i kill a set of Elites, my character gains 'Nephalem's Valour' that increases my mf and gf for 30 minutes....and resets back to 30 minutes every time i kill another set of Elites (which on Inferno is every 5 bloody minutes, trust me)
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Brother Heinrich wrote:Blizzard just nerfed the F out of attack speed and buffed a whole bunch of the bosses in the game. They are grade A experts at messing up a good thing.
Did they?
Did they release the details of the patch? Couldnt find one after a (admittedly REALLY short) look on the forums...but then, i wasnt really looking that hard either
This is not against LordofHats but I hear the comment a lot.
I never did understand the "dumbing down" that some people claim the game went through.
It was more streamlining and accessibility really than a total "dumb down to please the masses" thing
for example: In D2 it was routine for me to keep a few skill and stat points unallocated because I didnt know what to put them into. And if I did finally put them in I was running the chance of regretting that choice later because id get gear that would alter my playstyle. The funny thing was I'd be following a guide that someone else wrote and researched and most people would claim that it was the "best" build and everyone else would be making the same cookie cutter stat allocation. I've accepted that as part of the Diablo 2 experience
now on D3: Skills are unlocked depending on your level so by level 60 you have access to everything. Sounds boring right? Well it looks like that until you start experimenting on different combos and start noticing how your gear affects your game. You dont have to look at a webpage or textfile to see the effects of your combinations, you do it while playing. Your experimentation doesnt cost you anything as you can try others out as often as you like.
You'll eventually find something that works for your playstyle and gear.
And the best part is not everyone will be following the exact combination that you have. At one point I was playing an Hell Act IV and i was in a party with 2 other wizards and I thought "UGH! this is gonna be boring". To my surprise the other wizards were using different spells than me and were playing in different ways. We would have a spell or 2 in common (Hydra) but even then the runes would be different. I even found myself changing my spell list to compliment the playstyle of the other folks in my party.
You cant do that in D2.
The strategy, skill and know-how that D2 required is still there in D3, the game just doesnt smack you on the head if you make the wrong choice. It just lets the monsters do that instead Inferno is a bitch.
I don't get it either tbh, hence why I put it in ' '
I didn't care about D3 back when this 'dumbing down' happened, so I have no idea exactly what it was that got dumbed down or if it was just generic nerd rage. EDIT: That's just what was going on then, but Blizzard hasn't talked about a console port since, and they clarified at the start that they were only exploring the idea.
Bakerofish wrote:This is not against LordofHats but I hear the comment a lot.
I never did understand the "dumbing down" that some people claim the game went through.
It was more streamlining and accessibility really than a total "dumb down to please the masses" thing
for example: In D2 it was routine for me to keep a few skill and stat points unallocated because I didnt know what to put them into. And if I did finally put them in I was running the chance of regretting that choice later because id get gear that would alter my playstyle. The funny thing was I'd be following a guide that someone else wrote and researched and most people would claim that it was the "best" build and everyone else would be making the same cookie cutter stat allocation. I've accepted that as part of the Diablo 2 experience
now on D3: Skills are unlocked depending on your level so by level 60 you have access to everything. Sounds boring right? Well it looks like that until you start experimenting on different combos and start noticing how your gear affects your game. You dont have to look at a webpage or textfile to see the effects of your combinations, you do it while playing. Your experimentation doesnt cost you anything as you can try others out as often as you like.
You'll eventually find something that works for your playstyle and gear.
And the best part is not everyone will be following the exact combination that you have. At one point I was playing an Hell Act IV and i was in a party with 2 other wizards and I thought "UGH! this is gonna be boring". To my surprise the other wizards were using different spells than me and were playing in different ways. We would have a spell or 2 in common (Hydra) but even then the runes would be different. I even found myself changing my spell list to compliment the playstyle of the other folks in my party.
You cant do that in D2.
The strategy, skill and know-how that D2 required is still there in D3, the game just doesnt smack you on the head if you make the wrong choice. It just lets the monsters do that instead Inferno is a bitch.
I wish half the people on the Blizzard forums were capable of making a coherent argument like this. Kudos good sir.
Exactly. Whenever I've had a problem with a boss, I just change up my skills and it goes a lot better. I still grind an extra level before going up against an end-of-act boss, but that's just making sure I won't get smacked down the first time I try it.
warpcrafter wrote:Exactly. Whenever I've had a problem with a boss, I just change up my skills and it goes a lot better. I still grind an extra level before going up against an end-of-act boss, but that's just making sure I won't get smacked down the first time I try it.
Aha...ha...haaaaaa if only i could still grind upo a level or two to make a difference... Inferno is making me cry, as is the repair cost increase that was put in on the last patch. My friend and i went Gold hunting for a couple hours on Friday, and we ended up getting spanked so hard by one set of Blues, with a Gold in tow, that we ended up making a LOSS of gold ove rthe 2 hours of gameplay, still didnt kill the enemy groups, and my friend then ragequit (lol)...and this is only Act 1.
warpcrafter wrote:Exactly. Whenever I've had a problem with a boss, I just change up my skills and it goes a lot better. I still grind an extra level before going up against an end-of-act boss, but that's just making sure I won't get smacked down the first time I try it.
Aha...ha...haaaaaa if only i could still grind upo a level or two to make a difference... Inferno is making me cry, as is the repair cost increase that was put in on the last patch. My friend and i went Gold hunting for a couple hours on Friday, and we ended up getting spanked so hard by one set of Blues, with a Gold in tow, that we ended up making a LOSS of gold ove rthe 2 hours of gameplay, still didnt kill the enemy groups, and my friend then ragequit (lol)...and this is only Act 1.
Inferno act 1 was a shock to the system but tis doable enough once you get a ok amount of gear depending on class. If you guys want a hand let me know (Send me a pm etc and can fire you oer my Battletag), i'm always looking for more grinding buddies to progress with. (I'm Barb, so lots of grinding for my gear sigh), and if your flag is correct even bette rif their UK based so can get on same times.
warpcrafter wrote:Exactly. Whenever I've had a problem with a boss, I just change up my skills and it goes a lot better. I still grind an extra level before going up against an end-of-act boss, but that's just making sure I won't get smacked down the first time I try it.
Aha...ha...haaaaaa if only i could still grind upo a level or two to make a difference... Inferno is making me cry, as is the repair cost increase that was put in on the last patch. My friend and i went Gold hunting for a couple hours on Friday, and we ended up getting spanked so hard by one set of Blues, with a Gold in tow, that we ended up making a LOSS of gold ove rthe 2 hours of gameplay, still didnt kill the enemy groups, and my friend then ragequit (lol)...and this is only Act 1.
Inferno act 1 was a shock to the system but tis doable enough once you get a ok amount of gear depending on class. If you guys want a hand let me know (Send me a pm etc and can fire you oer my Battletag), i'm always looking for more grinding buddies to progress with. (I'm Barb, so lots of grinding for my gear sigh), and if your flag is correct even bette rif their UK based so can get on same times.
Sweet, thanks Duce! May very well take you up on that, ill PM you when im home, and yes, im UK based so times hopefully shouldnt be an issue.
Act 1 does seem to be pretty harsh, but its a bit of a combination of stuff for the both of us at the moment. That patch lost me around 3k damage, lowering me from 'Owning' status, back down to 'cant hurt anything'. I have since rectified this with some new gear, but im still 1000 dmg or so from where i was to begin with, let alone going above that. My Mate OTOH, lost around 6k due to the patch, but has lost far more than that in the grand scheme of things. hes a Monk, so attack speed is HUGE for him. Plus, his gear is centered around dual wielding weapons with high life steal/life on hit so his health pretty much never goes down. now however, not only is he doing less damage, hes doing it slower as well, so isnt getting anywhere NEAR the life back he was before, its very frustrating to be nerfed that bad in one fell swoop...
Im a WD, so gear is VERY important for me ive found, if only for the Vit and Int boosts. It all seems to be massively expensive these days as well, so im all up for some grinding...
Know the feeling Reiko, thankfully I only had IAS on my neck, but it still dropped form 15% to 6%, so I replaced it... At moment i've managed to get into act 3 just before siege braker, buit keep taking breaks form progressing to farm and helpf riend out who is also a Witch Dr...
Got 1mill from him and went and bought him gear for inferno mainly getting him alot fo vit loads of int and crit % and crit dmg... not bad getting 13 pieces of loot (every slot) for 1.5million odd.
I do enjoy doing act 1 more though and with the amount of elites the smaller dropr ate isn't too bad for till netting some Lvl 63 items... though mostly their still crap.
i only had IAS on bracers and ring i think, but it was still a PITA...
Damn, cos of the troubles weve been having, i dont think either of us has anywhere NEAR that amount lol but not bad purchases Duce!!
Think im gonna have to grind out Act 4 on Hell for a while to get some gold rather than losing stupid amounts every time i step out into Inferno...Might try Inferno again tonight, but theres just definitely some Elite combos i cant deal with at the moment.
Need to play around with my skills again as well. Happy with my Splinter/Grasp/Mass Conf/Soul Harvest/Healing Fetish Shaman as my main 5, but none of the minions last long enough anymore, so ive been experimenting with that last slot....
Also, good to see we arent the only ones who have discovered the joys of the Monk/WD team it has worked an absolute TREAT for the rest of the game. Might explain why we are so frustrated now that we are gettting stuck (and losing money.....)
I'm happy do do inferno act 1 with you 2 a few times in a night if want, can do it find on barbarian with few friends so happy to drag you two through if you want.
its better items mostly then hell and doesn't need too much in the form of item to get started on.
I have just recently gotten back into D3 (after a short break for some serious LoL time) and i'm really enjoying the Barbarian, level 53 in Act 2 Hell (Getting my ass whooped though) Struggling to keep up item wise. I think i need to get some gold farming done and hit the AH to gear up enough so i don't just get insta-gibbed. I'm working on Vit, Str, Resistance at the moment, anyone wanna yell out a tip is this the right path for the harder difficulties?
keep to a budget when you go to the AH. You can get some pretty decent gear nowadays without breaking the 40k limit. Barbarians are lucky as they can use almost everything. just set your filters appropriately
keep to a budget when you go to the AH. You can get some pretty decent gear nowadays without breaking the 40k limit. Barbarians are lucky as they can use almost everything. just set your filters appropriately
Thanks man ill keep that in mind. I have picked up a few decent items in that below 40k price range that did boost my survivability and damage output greatly.
I just got several emails from Blizzard stating that I've been banned from the Diablo 3 chat for spamming. I've never used the Diablo 3 chat, I don't even know how and do not care to know how. I would gladly play the fething thing offline if I could. Whoever out there is videogame land is using my account to spam chat, stay classy. I don't care.
flukezor wrote:I have just recently gotten back into D3 (after a short break for some serious LoL time) and i'm really enjoying the Barbarian, level 53 in Act 2 Hell (Getting my ass whooped though) Struggling to keep up item wise. I think i need to get some gold farming done and hit the AH to gear up enough so i don't just get insta-gibbed. I'm working on Vit, Str, Resistance at the moment, anyone wanna yell out a tip is this the right path for the harder difficulties?
Best lvling build I used as Barb (Even with just gear found form lvling) was as follows:
Cleave - rupture rune
Revenge - Best served cold
Ground stomp - wrenching smash
leap - iron impact
War cry - invigorate
overpower - killing spree
Runes:
Ruthless - more crit and crit dmg.
Berserker rage - more dmg with max fury (this build doesn't need fury usage)
tough as nails - more armour and thorn dmg.
How it works, keep warcry up for healing, leap into middle of groups of mobs, ground stomp them dragging them all really close to you. pop over power getting you some good dmg and inreasing crit, then cleave them causing huge dmg and making them pop and cause more aoe dmg and revenge for hp as it pops up.
Boom groups die in a few seconds and that worked for me right up until at 2 inferno.
Gear wise I looked for str/vit mainly until inferno then got all res and such, weapon I did 1h and shield
For bosses you can swap out cleave for frenzy and sidearm and just chop them while still retaining good dmg which is also aoe for any small mobs which spawn.
.
I can second that this works, and not just from seeing Duce's Barb in action either Thats the way im building my Barb and it seems to be working great so far (only at Normal so far though, so pinch of salt and all that).
Revenent Reiko wrote:I can second that this works, and not just from seeing Duce's Barb in action either Thats the way im building my Barb and it seems to be working great so far (only at Normal so far though, so pinch of salt and all that).
Hurry up ang get to 40ish so my demon hunter has a shield to use (you) for keeping mobs at bay
Revenent Reiko wrote:I can second that this works, and not just from seeing Duce's Barb in action either Thats the way im building my Barb and it seems to be working great so far (only at Normal so far though, so pinch of salt and all that).
Hurry up ang get to 40ish so my demon hunter has a shield to use (you) for keeping mobs at bay
Haha im trying, only at 21ish atm, ill get some more play in tonight. Although, saying that, i think ive managed to convince my mate to do a gold run or 2 with his Monk tonight on Inferno, up for it?
). Plus, challenging each other and helping each other out (along with competing for achievements of all things) keeps it fresh. We tend to skip all the talking now though, as we picked up the story on the first play through.
Inferno is making me cry, as is the repair cost increase that was put in on the last patch. My friend and i went Gold hunting for a couple hours on Friday, and we ended up getting spanked so hard by one set of Blues, with a Gold in tow, that we ended up making a LOSS of gold ove rthe 2 hours of gameplay, still didnt kill the enemy groups, and my friend then ragequit (