So...I bit the bullet and picked up Diablo III yesterday. Only got a little less than an hour in, and went with the Witch Doctor. How awesome is it that I can hurl jars of spiders at enemies, which burst out of said jars, and proceed to attack anything and everything in their path? If these are just the lower level abilities, I can't wait until I start leveling up.
Quick question for the Diablo 3 players. What is the orange bar under your health bar? And is it really necessary to level up the blacksmith in campaign mode. I seem to be getting good enough drops. I bumped the difficulty up to expert so I really haven't had the need to buy or make anything
The orange bar is experience. You don't have to level him up, you can craft cool items from him but it definitely isn't a necessity.
FYI you will want to upgrade the Mystic first. She's the one who lets you re-roll a stat on a piece of equipment, which is far and away the most important thing a vendor can do for you. Which you do second, Blacksmith or Jeweler, is more up to personal preference. Jeweler is a pretty good option, as higher-level gems make a pretty big difference in end-game (difference between the highest ruby that can drop in the world vs the highest crafted ruby, for example, is something like +62 strength vs +280 strength). Blacksmith is useful for crafting a few legendary set items, particularly Aughild's and Asheara's (you first must get the plans as random drops). He also is how you access/craft the "infernal machine" bosses, and Whimseyshire.
I finally got to start playing last night at 10. I figured with it being a work day, I would play for an hour or two. Finally forced myself to turn it off at 1:45am. Haha man this is not going to end well...
Yeah I leveled him up a little bit but will stop. Just started Act II the other day. Right now it won't let me bump the difficulty any higher then expert. I've died a few times but its only when I get surrounded and can't move or roll out of the way. I'm getting better at not letting that happen
The pre-order items are kinda OP. Solo for about an hour on hard and breezed through it. Joined a friends game online and the game adjusts your level to theirs. What is kind of weird is that we defeated the boss in act II and started act III. Jumped back on my character and it didn't continue my mission in act I, I was still in act III from joining his game. Luckily, I am able to go back into chapter select and continue where I left off. I'm playing as a Monk, I'm not sure why. I get a vibe the Demon Hunter is like the Amazon from D2. Enjoying the game so far. Playing this game reminded me of when I used to play D2 with one of my ex-gf's and I thought, man, that was probably ten years ago. Pretty neat, started a DH and your items in the chest and gold carry over from your other characters.
They're op, and it's awesome. That's really the point. You preorder... You destroy the first 10+ levels.
Yeah. Plus, from everything I hear, "Normal" = Easy, "Hard" = Normal, and "Expert" = Hard. At best. Jeff Gerstmann at Giant Bomb said he made it through the whole campaign on hard without dying, which tells me that even hard must be pretty easy. And there's really very little penalty for dying anyway. BTW, chow_yun_fat, as someone who has played primarily Monk, here's the build I've been using (until recently, but my new setup is more gear-dependent): http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#WZgVSk!UbXW!aYYaYb Exploding Palm is easily the Monk's best skill (and at the highest difficulties, the most powerful attack in the entire game for any class), as it is the only skill for any class in the game whose damage is tied to an enemy's maximum health rather than weapon damage. That means that as you pump the difficulty up, it keeps getting proportionately better and better (works particularly great on blue elites... put EP on one, focus all your attacks on it, and watch it blow up and kill the others). They're actually changing EP to scale with weapon damage like everything else when 2.1 hits, but for now it's still crazy. One With Everything is likewise easily the Monk's best passive, and probably the most unbalanced passive in the entire game, and it's another thing that 2.1 will be changing. But for now, if you can stack one elemental resistance on your items, it's a no-brainer. High level requirement, though (45). I would also heartily recommend the Mantra of Conviction with the Dishearten rune specifically, although it's quite a high level requirement before you get it (47). The Dishearten rune makes it so that all enemies within a radius are slowed by 80%... insanely useful. Fast enemies (including treasure goblins, or those annoying bugs in Act II) are no longer a problem, while you yourself can run away from danger easily. And when playing in a party, you make things much easily for any squishy ranged companions by locking down all monsters around you. I use Lashing Tail Kick mostly because I have the Gyana Na Kashu spirit stone, otherwise I might be using something else. Here's my character, FWIW. I particularly like my helmet (massive damage boost to Lashing Tail Kick), my boots (they let me pass freely through enemies), and my weapons (one stun-locks enemies, the other makes Exploding Palm even more OP than it already is). http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/AtheistPrchr-1203/hero/882312 My Wizard is my only other half-decent character, the others are terrible...
Thanks for the tips! I made a DH and I think the game is a lot more fun with melee characters. My DH gets owned when a mob of monsters attack and the slow trap doesn't help much. I can tank a lot better with my Monk and sit around holding X ftw. Game ramps up in difficulty after lev 10. Is it worth saving any rare items? Or should I stick with saving only legendary items, since those items seem to be really hard to come by? I have over $100k gold and I'm still on Act I. I already leveled the blacksmith a decent amount and the jeweler is maxed out at the moment because I can't get the item to level him up any higher. I find the game a lot more fun/slightly easier when you play with other people. The drops are better too. Playing the game on consoles gives me a Dungeon Explorer/Gauntlet feel. Feels different from playing the previous installments on PC, I don't know why. Oh, if any of you guys get gifts from me, it's because the game drops rare/legendary gifts specifically for you. Thanks D3, not like my character couldn't use those items!
That 100% makes sense for where you are in the game, but I'll also say this is where end-game shines. When all your skill runes are unlocked and you get enough legendaries to enable different styles of play, it really enables ranged characters to shine in solo as well as in groups. The DH, as I noted above, has a godly all-turrets build that makes his squishyness irrelevant, because he can stay on the move. There's also a legendary Crossbow he can get that causes his traps to taunt enemies towards them. Those are just a couple examples of the way options can open up when you're max level and got some legendaries in-hand. For the most part, rares are just fillers until you can get legendaries in every slot. Once you're max-level and playing in Adventure mode instead of Campaign, I think you'll find yourself decked out almost entirely in legendaries relatively quickly. Keep in mind that when you crank up to the higher difficulties, it increases the drop rate of legendaries. Also, legendary drop rates in Rifts (part of Adventure mode) are doubled compared to the rest of the game. So Rifts are the best way to get decked out. The rare items you'll want to save most of all are amulets, as well-rolled legendary amulets are extremely hard to come by. An ideal amulet has a primary stat, +%elemental damage (holy is probably best for Monks), Crit Chance, and Crit Damage. If you get a yellow amulet with that configuration or one roll off, keep it around. Even if you get an awesome legendary amulet, if you have a rare that has a different element, you should keep it in case you want to try a different elemental build later.
The guys that are hacking are called LizardSquad. If you look at their twitter you'll see them posting pictures and talking about updates on the PSN.
