**OFFICIAL** Diablo 3 Thread

[ch33zw1z]

Tested out the Natalya's set last night. Paired it with a new belt that buffs RoV damage. pretty nice damage, and RoV cooldown drops fast with the set bonus.

 

[*kjm]

What do you guys think.... Last night I got a Ancient Corrupted Ashbringer I put it on my enchantress for you to see it. Would you roll the socket into damage and gift it or did it not roll good enough?

Also found an Ancient Blood Brother on the same run that does around 4400 damage I want to play with.

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Carmmond-1821/hero/6438275

 

[ChairShot]

Finally got an ancient inna's chest last night!! but I went back the the Torch build.

I'm also up to 890 shards capacity which is pretty cool!

 

[JimKiler]

Finally got an ancient inna's chest last night!! but I went back the the Torch build.

I'm also up to 890 shards capacity which is pretty cool!

Nice, i only got one Inna's piece in the ancient variety and even after a reroll is was not as good as my existing non ancient one.

 

[ChairShot]

I have the ancient Chest piece and the weapon!

 

[Ventanni]

Power creep is relevant, on my view, because what people tend to see in isolation is something like:

Wizard before - firebird for grift; now, tal rasha. So more boom less dot.
DH before - huge dps, in season 3 it's actually buffed higher with Nats and increased survivability.

But firebird and dh dps were incomparable before. And the dancing needed with Tal Rasha compared to other sets is still a joke. A well geared Raekor barb (so imagine last 'era' already) will still be able to clear faster than Tal Rasha, because the nature of a Tal Rasha wizard is to generate the falling meteors. Look at even someone like Reiko Zockt, his Tal Rasha 2.2 (from PTR). Compare that then to Shinobi's raekor barb (last era). That raekor barb will still be better.

I don't like the way that some people think that an action rpg like Diablo 3 should have a 'support class' a 'dps class' etc - this game is fundamentally about killing monsters fast, and all classes should be able to. The fact that zdps crusader/wd and 2 dh feature in top grifts proves this point. And on PTR the DHs I know were actually holding back on a lightning build, I think, so the Wizards that showed in the Grift 60 clear that garnered so much attention are something of a ruse.

My issue is with the fact that even with a wizard with 1.5m sheet dps, 120% fire damage, a further 45% elite damage, I get out-dpsed quite easily by other classes. So much so that zdps crusaders will leave a Wizard, DH, WD group stating 'wizard useless dps' etc.

I have only ever played a wizard as it is the class that appeals to me, and Tal Rasha's is a step in the right direction, but I took a look at a nice ancient kridershot yesterday - look at the way the skills synergize in the DH class - it is simply much better. And APOC has been nerfed like crazy for wizards for a long time now. Does a raekor barb (top gear) face all kinds of resource management issues? No. Even a firebird wizard does, hence why cindercoat becomes so valuable.

To keep up with fast farming T6 I switch to an ancient Aetherwalker - a significant dps loss, and teleport then costs a lot of mana as well. To add mobility to a wizard then, we have to use our weapon slot. I mean, come on.

I just wanted to promote some discussion of the classes here too. In terms of a suggestion - I know that Blizzard are not balancing the game on group rift progression - fine, but to me (even in 2.2) there is still such an amazing disparity between the classes.

Power creep is irrelevant.

You buff class A's damage output by 15%, you buff mob HP by 15% to compensate. Still takes you the same time to kill said mob. Both Diablo and World of Warcraft are balanced on the premise that power creep is inevitable. When there is no power creep, you get games like Final Fantasy Online where people are paying money for an expansion where there's nothing to upgrade to. What's the fun in that?

With that said, I, too, have a Firebird's wizard and ran into the same problem you did. That's when I realized that Blizzard balances sets/classes off of four premises:

1. Single target dps
2. AoE dps
3. Mobility
4. CC/Survivability

A Raekor's Barbarian has fantastic AoE damage, mobility, and CC, but when the final boss comes, suddenly Raekor's isn't so strong. A Marauder kitted Demon Hunter has fantastic single target and AoE damage output, but the fact that they're limited by the cooldown of the turrets makes their mobility suffer. Akkahn's Crusaders are well actually balanced in each of the four areas in my opinion, but I've never seen them keep up with my Raekor's Barbarian in the trash clearing area.

A Firebird kitted Wizard's problem (which is the problem you're facing) with Rift grinding is the simple fact that they have no mobility, and what I mean by that is that it takes some time for the full effect of a Wizard to see their full potential. Thankfully, from what I saw today, one of the issues you Wizards were having with Rift grinding was solved with the Tal Rasha's set, cause man, those meteors were falling and it was a beautiful site to see. He was doing so much damage.

Since the patch, I've been able to test out my Roland's Set and my Immortal Kings + Bul Kathos Blades sets.

Rolands = Ho-lee amazing single target damage, batman! I was using a Fire Sweep build, but the damage output was insane; highest I've ever seen imho. Every sweep (or shield bash) reduces the cooldown of your defensive, laws, and Akarat's Champion. That last part isn't listed on the set, but it definitely makes it so you can have a very high up-time as long as you're fighting. Problem is, there's like zero mobility. Despite your dps, it'll take you forever to clear a zone.

Immortal Kings = I'm mixed on this one, because it feels like it's balanced around the Wrath of the Waste set, or at least Whirlwind in general. The Bul-Kathos Blades set increases your Fury generation by 10 per second, not by 10, so this allows pretty much for a permanent up-time of Whirlwind (resources are NOT a problem with this set). Combined with Dust Devils and you can do some pretty spectacular damage due to the fantastical train of tornadoes you create in yoru wake that all do good damage (the tornadoes now travel in the direction you were travelling when they were cast). Not to mention, the +30% attack speed while Whirlwinding makes it so your Wrath of the Berserker is up full time, because with +30% attack speed, you're spending resources +30% faster, which means you're resetting your Wrath of the Berserker cooldown 30% faster... you get the point here. It's a spectacular build. Without the Bul-Kathos set blades though, you need some hefty CDR to make it happen. Survivability is versatile depending on which Ancients you pick. Single target damage is okay. If you go with the Fire Ancients, then your single target is actually quite good. If you don't, then it suffers. With Slaughter going on my Wrath of the Berserker though and +39% physical damage, I clear Rifts faster than my Raekor's Barbarian easily with better single target damage output. Raekor's wins in the CC department though.

Wrath of the Wastes = I have 4 out of the 5 necessary pieces to get the 6-piece bonus (gogo RRoG!). Once I get my 5th piece, I'll let you all know.

 

[pandemonium]

Let me know what works and what does not work, i want the 6 set bonus for Inna's but i don't want to give up Sunwuko to get it. I just got a Sunwuko amulet last night ancient version so i think i will try again, but losing the crudest boots and a second ally makes me sad. Having 2 allies that can do EP, WoL, etc would rock the house!

Alright, I can comment on a few different builds. I've been having a lovely time trying out different combinations and it's been both disappointing and interesting.

I'll list some basics to the builds, but won't go through every detail of them. If details are needed after you've spent some time trying it out, let me know. I've also tried many different variations from these, including using the new Focus/Restraint (which initially dosen't appear quite as good as RoRG/SoJ IMHO due to the lack of Elite bonus damage).

Inna's 6 piece with Crudest boots: The allies do around 10% of your damage on their abilities, which makes this set bonus almost completely worthless. The only thing I can think of that would make this set bonus worthwhile is for Cyclone spamming to be a real nuisance to monsters. Even EP's damage is about 10%, so, those mediocre EP's of 500M that you're doing will do 50M from the allies, which is next to nothing.

Raiment 6 piece: It took me some getting used to, but this set is very powerful; more-so than SWK. I've tried physical and lightning. Physical was the better of the two due to the extra damage tacked onto the end of Dashing Strike. Cold will ultimately be the best in combination with Exploding Palm: Impending Doom (this EP is the key to doing higher GRifts). The best weapons to use with this set are Flying Dragon or Furnace. You'll also likely want to get some LPH and/or LPSS since you'll be attacking quickly and spending a lot of spirit. I need to try some dual-wield builds for this to incorporate more CDR (with Born's) or EP damage (with Fist of Az'turasq).

Inna's 4 piece, Sunwuko 4 piece, and Crudest boots,: This combination is pretty potent, but the problem is spirit regen. This combination doesn't allow for much cooldown reduction, so you can't rely on Epiphany: Insight. You do have the option of using Air Ally for the spirit regen, but losing out on 40% damage is pretty significant. When I was trying this, that meant 700k DPS. So far I've only really tried 2h builds with this. I'll give some more time to dual-wield builds a try. The hardest part about this set combination is getting enough CDR, so that means really specific - and awesome - gear.

Raiment 2 piece, Inna's 4 piece, Depth Diggers, Witching Hour, and Crudest boots: I ran this as an "I'm lazy and just want to run around holding my right mouse punching stuff". Punching stuff, rapidly, for 20-60M is pretty satisfying, but this won't be breaking any GRift barriers. Good for T6 rifting and that's about it.

I've also tried some TR builds with Inna's 2 and 4 pieces and Sunwuko, but TR will never do enough damage to be considerable at this point until they up that damage. It's a boring spec to me anyways. >.>

Definitely a lot of options. The Raiment set is likely the best from what I've seen, but I'm sure there are hybrid builds that could be equivalent or possibly better if I had enough time to play with it.

Happy experimenting!

Edit: I've since experimented more with Focus/Restraint and have found it worthy. It just seems very odd having 0% elite damage bonus on. The theorycrafting will ever continue!

 

[sweenish]

Sticking with M6 for now, my sheet went up to 1.8M. That's exciting, and I don't even have a third jewelry socket right now. which means sheet will drop a bit, but it will more than even out with a gem in there. My gear is probably close enough to the point that I should consider farming decent hellfires now.

I need the belt and the new Nat's pieces, and to re-tool Nat's for reduced resource cost or hatred generation. Then I need decent focus+restraint. Got one piece of UE, that one will be interesting when I have a chance to try it out.

I thought I had enough IK to give it a spin, but I do not. :-(
I'll have to grind that out, and get those set weapons. I really want a spin2win build.

I'll be focusing on my DH for a little bit, just because that's how I'll increase my shard cap the most.

 

[OCNewbie]

I've also tried many different variations from these, including using the new Focus/Restraint (which isn't quite as good as RoRG/SoJ IMHO due to the lack of Elite bonus damage).

Max 30% elite damage or (nearly) full-time +125% damage bonus to ALL mobs - which would you choose? F&R smokes RoRG + SoJ by a long shot. Not to mention you can have (with ideal rolls) +12% CC and +100% CHD from F&R (as well as main stat too, I believe), which you can't get with SoJ + RoRG. Now, I'm speaking from the pov of a DH, so I'm not sure how important combining multiple sets is (thanks to RoRG) as a monk. I've heard some people suggest that that new Convention of Elements ring might be better than a SoJ too (to be used along with RoRG).

I have full UE set now with non-Ancient (but fairly well-rolled) Kridershot on my DH. I did a lvl 39 rift last night (my first attempt) with VERY crappy F&R (one has STR and no CC/CHD) in about 8.5 minutes. The mobs were good (mostly zombies, no fast moving/insta-hit mobs), so that helped a ton. I also got Perendi? (Mallet Lord RG) so he was perfect for Lightning Ball Elemental Arrow. I could have probably done a mid-40 with that same mob makeup. My CC was high (over 50%) but my CHD was lowish (mid 300's IIRC).

 

[ChairShot]

Focus/restraint combo is the way to go IMHO. I think the 50% bonus they add to you generators and spenders is multiplicative. Critting at 1.6B with all buffs on a Cold Dashing Strike build compared to average 900M-1B with other rings.

Even the generator crits at 50-80M with the buffs.

So far, it's a no brainer and my gear is not top of the line...

Ps- scored a nice 3900+ non ancient Furnace last night... i'm happy! first one that drops for me and it rolled decent (42% Elite dmg and high 900 dex)

 

[Alex C]

I'm using the Focus and Restraint set with my monk and trying to figure out which skill combo will do the most damage. I tried to add in combination strike to up the damage further, but it's too hard to coordinate. I had been using EP and 7 Sided Strike, but I think there may be more effective options with that set. Any suggestions? Here's my current build (some of that gear isn't great, but it's the best I've got):
https://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/OsirisRisen-1510/hero/1866623

Aslo, what's Ancient vs non ancient? I don't recall seeing that in the patch notes.

 

[OCNewbie]

Aslo, what's Ancient vs non ancient? I don't recall seeing that in the patch notes.

All set and legendary items have a chance to roll in their Ancient versions. This just means that they can roll higher for main stats (str/dex/int), all resists, life regen, among other things. If you roll an Ancient version of a weapon, the damage can be quite a bit higher. They can't roll for higher CC/CHD though, tmk. I have seen that an Ancient Sun Keeper can roll higher max elite damage though.

On a side note, I just completed a lvl 42 GR with my DH with 3:01 remaining. Mobs weren't even ideal (occasional Anarchs), but they weren't too bad. This is with horrible F&R and non-ancient Krider (but a good one).

 

[ChairShot]

Tonight, I'll try the Raiment 6 peices cold Dashing strike build with cold EP and gungdo Bracer. Should be interesting if I can find a way to manage spirit regen!

 

[PClark99]

Tonight, I'll try the Raiment 6 peices cold Dashing strike build with cold EP and gungdo Bracer. Should be interesting if I can find a way to manage spirit regen!

I tried playing around with raiment last night and spirit regen is a major issue. Im so used to just dropping bells everywhere the new raiment almost doesn't seem worth it.

On the bright side that slag Kadala gave me a decent Torch last night, not as good as my ancient but with a reroll it does about 3850 damage. Not as good as my ancient torch but perfectly useable for my second monk.

Next up is looking at my ring situation, I did get a decent convention of elements ring, want to see if its better than my nice holy rolled ancient soj.

 

[PimpJuice]

I tried playing around with raiment last night and spirit regen is a major issue. Im so used to just dropping bells everywhere the new raiment almost doesn't seem worth it.

On the bright side that slag Kadala gave me a decent Torch last night, not as good as my ancient but with a reroll it does about 3850 damage. Not as good as my ancient torch but perfectly useable for my second monk.

Next up is looking at my ring situation, I did get a decent convention of elements ring, want to see if its better than my nice holy rolled ancient soj.

I actually love the raiment set better than sunwuko. I am using a build similar to this (obviously without spirit guards) and have no issues with spirit regen

http://www.diablofans.com/builds/53770-quin69-gr55-dashing-strike-monk

 

[PClark99]

I will look at that build in more detail later. I have most of the pieces to make it work.

I will miss my bells though.

 

[Jumpem]

Max 30% elite damage or (nearly) full-time +125% damage bonus to ALL mobs - which would you choose? F&R smokes RoRG + SoJ by a long shot. Not to mention you can have (with ideal rolls) +12% CC and +100% CHD from F&R (as well as main stat too, I believe), which you can't get with SoJ + RoRG. Now, I'm speaking from the pov of a DH, so I'm not sure how important combining multiple sets is (thanks to RoRG) as a monk. I've heard some people suggest that that new Convention of Elements ring might be better than a SoJ too (to be used along with RoRG).

I have full UE set now with non-Ancient (but fairly well-rolled) Kridershot on my DH. I did a lvl 39 rift last night (my first attempt) with VERY crappy F&R (one has STR and no CC/CHD) in about 8.5 minutes. The mobs were good (mostly zombies, no fast moving/insta-hit mobs), so that helped a ton. I also got Perendi? (Mallet Lord RG) so he was perfect for Lightning Ball Elemental Arrow. I could have probably done a mid-40 with that same mob makeup. My CC was high (over 50%) but my CHD was lowish (mid 300's IIRC).

My DH feels way too squishy without Unity + SoJ when I tried F + R. I am not sure which I want to stick with.

 

[sweenish]

Solo might still be unity + SoJ, but in a group, it's going to be F + R.

Got IK6 tonight. Spin2Win for reals.

Took my T4/5 barb right into T6 and grift 30. Need second unity for my follower until I find the bul-kathos weapons and strength based F + R.

But I guess that's more for speed farming? The boulder breaker seems required for higher grifts so you can get the wastes 4-piece bonus. But if bul-kathos gets closer to 40 or at least 35+, I'll be happy.

 

[Ventanni]

(Reference: IK6 = Immortal King's, WotW = Wrath of the Waste, BK = Bul-Kathos Blades, Wrath = Wrath of the Berserker)

IK6+BK is disgusting for Rift clearing, but I don't think it'll get your past GF40-45ish. The mobility on it is just insane, and permanent Wrath upkeep makes it so you're CC immune.

I had the chance to finally try out a full set of WotW6+IK2+BK last night. Compared to IK6+BK, WotW6+IK2+BK is exactly the same play style. The WotW vastly increases the tornado damage though (was doing 80 million per tornado with a 2800dps BK mainhand and there are gazillions of tornadoes flying around), as well as allows you to pick whatever rune you want and still get the tornado effect. Since I was already doing a Physical build with IK6+BK, I switched the Whirlwind rune over to Blood Funnel for a very big increase in life on hit.

I think the top Barbarian builds will probably be WotW6+IK4 though. The Bul-Kathos blades pretty much eliminate the need to have to watch any resource management and cooldowns whatsoever, but if you're willing to manage it more closely, having permanent Wrath of the Berserker up will be critical for top level GR play for its utility (whichever rune you select), added mobility, and CC immunity. I'll be honest though, the WotW and IK sets just seem like they have way too much design overlap.

Update on Crusader Roland's Set - I played around with this one a bit more. Mind you, I do not have an Ancient Golden Flense with a new Denial shield, but I could easily see this as being one of the highest dps configurations in the game. I was hitting really really fast for 250 million per hit using Sweep Attack. It is definitely *the* ultimate in-your-face melee build. Using the right gear configuration (Ancient Golden Flense, Denial, Focus+Restraint, Taeguk+Powerful+Trapped), I could see this build potentially hitting 500+ million damage per hit (ish) at incredible attack speeds. It is definitely a boss killing build though, not a fast rift clearing build.

 

[sweenish]

I'd be perfectly happy right now if low to mid forties were my cap. It's refreshing after playing squishy classes for so long.

I still die on occasion, but it's not yet as frustrating.

 

[ChairShot]

started a WD .... deleted it... went for a monk again....


i'm so confused... now I want to level up a barb

Damn you seasons lol

 

[Brainonska511]

Haven't started a season character yet, but I did make some tweaks to my wizards and resurrected one from the trash bin upon finding more pieces of Delsere's Magnum Opus.

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Brainonska-1770/hero/18812024
The combination of slow time + meteors from TR's is actually quite fun to play. I only tested it out in T5 and I need to upgrade a few pieces since it was just a patchwork of stuff I had.

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Brainonska-1770/hero/58912680
On my FB wizard, I gave up black hole for slow time. From what I was reading, Bane of the Trapped isn't tripped by black hole, while it is with slow time. But I'm still not sure whether to stick with Blizzard (apocalypse) or meteor shower - I guess it's a question of area damage versus single-point damage. As it stands, with Blizzard, I cleared a 39 grift without too much difficulty and within the time limit (the layout and monsters probably helped that out a bit).

Edit:
I found another piece of TR's to use (getting the 6p bonus) on my TR/Delsere's wizard and managed to find another legendary ring. Made it easily through a 26, which isn't fantastically high, but still quite nice to see. I'll probably push it more tomorrow to see how far this one can manage.

One thing that may or may not be clear, but with Delsere's slow-time damage effect is controlled by your highest elemental damage bonus. For now, I crafted a +20% arcane damage bracers to make slow-time arcane and get an extra meteor out of it, while using lighting/cold as primary attack and molten impact for occasional fire damage. Overall, it seems like TR or Delsere's alone could be fun builds, but TR's 6p and Delsere's 4p seem to sync nicely together.

 

[Mopetar]

You should get in on the season goodness.

I just managed to scrape together enough gear to clear T6 without too much of an issue so it should be easy to power level.

I might set up a Wizard as an alt because the slow time set does look like a lot of fun and seems to make cold builds viable, which I've always loved since D2.

 

[ChairShot]

I'll need some powerleveling for my lvl 10 barb please

 

[JimKiler]

I actually love the raiment set better than sunwuko. I am using a build similar to this (obviously without spirit guards) and have no issues with spirit regen

http://www.diablofans.com/builds/53770-quin69-gr55-dashing-strike-monk

I will look at that build in more detail later. I have most of the pieces to make it work.

I will miss my bells though.

That is an interesting build since he is picking everything that appears to be defensive yet he is getting insane DPS, i only get 20-30 million crit hit. I was expecting he would at least use the simplicity's strength.