Before you read this, please understand it is not a complaint, just an observation. I'm not attached to the game enough to be bitching about it. This is also probably beating a dead horse so I apologize in advance.
I mentioned earlier in this thread that I was only going to run my character through with gear that I found, crafted or vendored myself to see how far I could get and it looks like Hell will be the end of my journey for this particular character. It's too big of a jump for me to get into inferno and actually survive without AH bought gear. I guess I just haven't been lucky enough with my drops, or I'm just not skilled enough. I've tried a few different builds with no luck.
Then I started thinking, is Inferno considered a "bonus" part of the game? I'm aware that this is the part of the game when you start getting interesting gear and it seems that Blizzard is adding quite a bit of new content to keep people playing in inferno. Why then is it almost impossible to get adequately geared to even play it without basically buying your gear from someone else who has obtained it?
Then I read this quote from Bashiok from a while back:
This isn’t a new concept. In Diablo II gear was randomized and so absolutely ridiculously rare that you could almost be guaranteed to never find the exact item you were looking for just by farming for it yourself. To be the best you had to trade items with others, as you might find an extremely rare item, they may be willing to trade for yours.
http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/diablo-3-auction-house-required-for-success
I have started MANY fresh characters in Diablo 2 in many ladder seasons and been able to level them from 1-90+ and defeat hell without any problems. I never once traded with anyone and I was always able to find the gear I needed to continue. It was challenging, but nowhere near impossible. It's part of what I loved about the game. If you are persistent you get to move on. Also, notice how he mentions "to be the best", but in DIII many people can't even survive in inferno to get the gear they need to survive in inferno. That's a lot different than wanting to be the best.
The article goes on to explain that you can farm the gear in Hell act IV for inferno, but I haven't had much luck with that. Maybe I just need to farm a lot more. The sad part is that if I look on the AH, I can basically get myself geared for a very little amount of time looking and gold spent. I don't know, it feels cheap, almost like cheating.
So I'm either missing something about how to play this game, or it has changed to a game where you collect gold and buy items from the auction house or trade in game. For now, my barb will just sit and wait to see if future patches change anything, and I'll start another character where I buy all of their equipment from the AH when I get to inferno and see if I enjoy that more.
Sorry for the babbling, I think I played too long tonight
Oh, and just a quick question, I'm not fully familiar with the Paragon system and MP, if just keep running hell and increasing the MP to 10, and let my paragon level up, the Magic find bonuses will apply in Hell also right? If that is the case, I might be fine getting the gear I need if I just stick with it. I'm hoping that is how it works, because I'll just farm hell until I'm set for inferno.