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Diablo III |OT4| Antiques Roadshow: Sanctuary Edition

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scy

Member
This is another bad argument.

While the AH is not fundamentally required to progress, it exists and is, without a doubt, the best way to progress. Thus people complain because the INARGUABLE BEST WAY to progress in this game is through a monetary investment, not through playing the game.

The game is balanced (admittedly by Blizzard) 100% around loot, not around player skill or (supposedly) even build choice. They want you to use loot, and the best way to get loot is the AH.

So ya, people feel shafted that playing the game (that they paid for, this isn't a F2P game) is a gimped experience.

Very few people have made this the complaint; I know you have and I don't really disagree that it feels a little "weird" to be gearing through the AH because it's the best route. But, at the same time, most "best routes" weren't really playing the game either (e.g., boss runs for loot vs clearing entire areas for loot).

As long as an AH exists, there's literally nothing to be done that changes this besides having amazing items become guaranteed drops and making the AH effectively worthless. 1.0.3 won't solve this issue; it just means you can get potentially better drops from farming than before. You still need to farm to progress (or farm to sell to buy on the AH to progress).

I'm talking about the people who complain that they use the AH because it is actually impossible to get a drop that allows them to progress. This is completely false. Or, if it is true (e.g., ilvl 63s in all slots and in Act 1 or Act 2), then it's entirely a player issue that's causing them problems and not their gear.

This isn't a completely fair assesment. I've done a fair amount of farming act I inferno and have only a couple rings to show for it (equipped). I've found some stuff and sold some stuff and bought some stuff, but I feel like even that's not enough to progress into act II. I'm willing to put in the work to find the gear I need, and I still don't find it.

If act II requires iLvl61 and a mix of iLvl 62+ gear to succeed and I can barely get iLvl 61 stuff to drop in Act I, we have an issue with the way the game progresses it's players.

Change your build if need be. My Monk was facing a pretty harsh gear wall and ended up not having issues with Act 2 at relatively low stats (sub-5000/500 Armor/Resists) due to build changes. And you may have more ilvl 61+ stuff equipped than you think, especially if you bought stuff on the AH. It's hard to gauge it properly when you can buy ilvl 62/63 things to use and trying to farm for an ilvl 61 replacement on those is insanely rare :/
 

Radec

Member
Holy fuck at Act II's Blood and Sand quest.

Those little black thing that jumps/teleport right through you almost insta-killed me every jump. (Thanks Force Armor).

Thank god for the teleport and got away with pulling those 2 levers.
 

Sophia

Member
This isn't a completely fair assesment. I've done a fair amount of farming act I inferno and have only a couple rings to show for it (equipped). I've found some stuff and sold some stuff and bought some stuff, but I feel like even that's not enough to progress into act II. I'm willing to put in the work to find the gear I need, and I still don't find it.

If act II requires iLvl61 and a mix of iLvl 62+ gear to succeed and I can barely get iLvl 61 stuff to drop in Act I, we have an issue with the way the game progresses it's players.

I don't think I've seen a single damn ilevel 62+ piece drop. The ones I've got were from friends or from the AH.
 

Woo-Fu

Banned
If somebody thinks they can prepare themselves for Inferno Act II with the junk that drops in Act I they have a different definition of "prepare" than I do. I don't know anybody currently effective in act 2 whose effectiveness doesn't center upon a weapon that dropped in act3/act4.

You can farm Act 1 for years at the current patch level and not get a witch doctor to 50k base DPS.
 
If somebody thinks they can prepare themselves for Inferno Act II with the junk that drops in Act I they have a different definition of "prepare" than I do. I don't know anybody currently effective in act 2 whose effectiveness doesn't center upon a weapon that dropped in act3/act4.

You can farm Act 1 for years at the current patch level and not get a witch doctor to 50k base DPS.


I did act II with 31k dps, and only got that high in the latter half
 
Put some stuff on the RMAH yesterday afternoon. Had some trouble with getting the texts on time but it finally worked after awhile then suddenly at like 12am the next day I started getting a bunch of late confirmation text codes that I failed to receive before o_O Cmon Blizz
 
Seriously, Blizzard, how the fuck am I supposed to kill these without dying like 15 times as a Demon Hunter? Soul Rippers ARE ALREADY FAST. + FAST? +REFLECT DAMAGE?
The worst I've seen (on Hell) is Fast + Mortar (screws over distance) + Molten (now you can't get close either) + Shielded (screw what little opportunities to attack you get)
 

scy

Member
If somebody thinks they can prepare themselves for Inferno Act II with the junk that drops in Act I they have a different definition of "prepare" than I do. I don't know anybody currently effective in act 2 whose effectiveness doesn't center upon a weapon that dropped in act3/act4.

You can farm Act 1 for years at the current patch level and not get a witch doctor to 50k base DPS.

My Monk has 600 DPS Weapons and my Wizard used a ~700 DPS Two Hander for quite some time. I didn't get her a 900 DPS 1Her until Act 3. When I could've gotten one as a drop.

I don't think I've seen a single damn ilevel 62+ piece drop. The ones I've got were from friends or from the AH.

I think the bigger problem for ilvl 62 stuff is that Act 2 is such a hassle to farm until Terminus. It's such a pain in the ass to try and gear up through Act 2 drops with how disproportionately hard the areas are due to enemy design (Wasp bullet hell, Lacuni invuln start ups, Sand Sharks/Worms invuln when diving, Snakes immune when cloaked, etc.). Probably why the Goblin farms in Act 2 are still so heavily utilized.

Well, that and how fast and easy the loot is.
 

Ashhong

Member
Question: I don't think anybody has ever bid on my item so I'm not sure. If someone bids on your item, does the buyout go away? Or does the bid have to go higher than the buyout before that happens?
 

C.Dark.DN

Banned
And they don't want to farm for the drops themselves. The AH is never required to progress. It's required to progress at the speed the player wants to, yes, but it's not required to actually make progress.

Every single "never get loot drops that are upgrade" complaints are missing the key part of it: "as soon as I want them."



TL2 and PoE are the only two I haven't.
A blue has said the auction house affects the drop rate design. That it has to.

To progress without using the auction house would be insane. It is esentially required, no doubt.

Getting into inferno act 2 with maybe 2 upgrades for myself after normal is insane. Why does it matter that I'm mad about that?
 

Sophia

Member
I think the bigger problem for ilvl 62 stuff is that Act 2 is such a hassle to farm until Terminus. It's such a pain in the ass to try and gear up through Act 2 drops with how disproportionately hard the areas are due to enemy design (Wasp bullet hell, Lacuni invuln start ups, Sand Sharks/Worms invuln when diving, Snakes immune when cloaked, etc.). Probably why the Goblin farms in Act 2 are still so heavily utilized.

Well, that and how fast and easy the loot is.

There's just so much wrong with Act 2 that it's hard to even fathom it. Anyone can tell from running through it that it's over-tuned, even on lower difficulties.
 
Change your build if need be. My Monk was facing a pretty harsh gear wall and ended up not having issues with Act 2 at relatively low stats (sub-5000/500 Armor/Resists) due to build changes. And you may have more ilvl 61+ stuff equipped than you think, especially if you bought stuff on the AH. It's hard to gauge it properly when you can buy ilvl 62/63 things to use and trying to farm for an ilvl 61 replacement on those is insanely rare :/

With those stats, how did you fair against the elite packs? I have 540 resists and 4.5K armor with decent LOH and APS. I don't have problems with the normal mobs. I can actually handle mass groups of normal mobs. F those elite packs though.

I've not been kiting to suicide to progress. I've not been quitting and reloadig either. It just feels cheap. I feel like if I have to do that, I'm not where I need to be. About 20% of the packs are a combo I can take.

And so I'm back to farming act I. As I said ... I just don't think your assesment that people who are frustatrated with the loot system are all unwilling to farm for gear.
 
It's the bnet interface that took away from diablo experience, if anything. No public games and the auction house means no human interaction required. Focus is turned to loot which makes for a pretty lonely, boring experience.

I saw people talking about Ragnarok - I believe this is the best example of how one can make these types of games fun. You have many random encounters with people (motivation for better gear to show off, or, feeling of a large world) guilds (organiztional motivation), and character customization(d3 does have a wing and some dyes... for who to see?) and multiple, interesting towns.

Obviously Diablo isn't such a game but they could have moved towards this direction.
 

V_Arnold

Member
You won't find SHIT farming act 1 that will help you in inferno act 2, unless you get absolutely positively massively lucky.

Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.
Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

The only thing that is really "bad" in Act1 inferno is weapons.
Anything else, lv61 is more than sufficient to have great stats on it that can lust until the end of time.
 

scy

Member
A blue has said the auction house affects the drop rate design. That it has to.

To progress without using the auction house would be insane. It is esentially required, no doubt.

And Jay Wilson has said otherwise. Whether you want to believe Bashiok or Jay is up to you, I guess. The game from my experience playing it doesn't feel designed around the AH. But I guess I'm crazy!

Getting into inferno act 2 with maybe 2 upgrades for myself is insane. Why does it matter that I mad about that?

It doesn't, really. Just discussion. Killing time. Etc. I don't really blame people for feeling stuck on progression because they can't farm the required amount (or missed the boat for bypassing content or not the right class for bypassing content or whatever else). I'm just saying that the issue isn't that upgrades don't drop but that they don't drop fast enough to make the Inferno grind feel right.

There's just so much wrong with Act 2 that it's hard to even fathom it. Anyone can tell from running through it that it's over-tuned, even on lower difficulties.

My personal bigger gripe is that farming it is just a pain in the ass. There's the Terminus with three self-contained dungeons that aren't a hassle and then the rest of the act is a clusterfuck of awful.
 

forrest

formerly nacire
I can almost guarantee you that someone who has no proper micro ability will not be able to progress through the first "hard" Act2 elite group (maybe wasts, maybe mortars, maybe Lacunis, maybe teleporting nagas) with their fancy $1000 gear. And that is when they will have to learn how to play the game :p

Yeah I told a lot of my friends that commented on me beating inferno early on that Act 2 demands you to become a better player and then you'll laugh at that difficulty as you hit the brick wall that is Act 3. Act 4 mobs are just a joke in the difficulty spike in my opinion. Once you learn what they do they become more manageable, but it doesn't change the fact that you'll often get one shot cheaply from a mob that isn't even visible on screen. Act 4 in general just seems cheap as opposed to just plain difficult.
 

DSmalls84

Member
450 dps is awful. Might be worth something since it's a set item.

Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.
Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

The only thing that is really "bad" in Act1 inferno is weapons.
Anything else, lv61 is more than sufficient to have great stats on it that can lust until the end of time.

Agreed. Act 1 Weapons are garbage but Armor/Jewelry can net you some really solid gear to sell/use.
 

scy

Member
With those stats, how did you fair against the elite packs? I have 540 resists and 4.5K armor with decent LOH and APS. I don't have problems with the normal mobs. I can actually handle mass groups of normal mobs. F those elite packs though.

With my Evasion, it as basically hoping I didn't run into the ~1% chance that I'd take the few hits needed to kill me before I:

A) Life on Hit enough HP to take another attack.
B) Life per Spirit Spent my way to take another attack.
C) Oh shit Serenityyyyyyy.

And so I'm back to farming act I. As I said ... I just don't think your assesment that people who are frustatrated with the loot system are all unwilling to farm for gear.

I didn't mean that. I just meant that it's not at the pace they want. There's a huge difference between "upgrades cannot drop" and "upgrades take too long to get." The latter I can agree with entirely. Not everyone wants to spend as much time as others. It's the former I disagree with.

Also, Weapon drops do suck for farming. Looking for a Weapon in Act 1 feels awful vs Act 2/Act 3 due to all of it coming down to the DPS.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
I actually found a 550 DPS 1-hander with haste on it in Act 1. Never found anything close to that since, though. Hell, most 2-handers I find in Act 2 don't even have DPS that high.

As other people have been saying, though, you can find some pretty decent armor and accessories in Act 1.

You killed Belial with 31k dps?

Belial is easy as long as you have some mobility options and patience. I killed him with 11k DPS on my Barbarian on the first try and never really came close to dying.
 

C.Dark.DN

Banned
And Jay Wilson has said otherwise. Whether you want to believe Bashiok or Jay is up to you, I guess. The game from my experience playing it doesn't feel designed around the AH. But I guess I'm crazy!



It doesn't, really. Just discussion. Killing time. Etc. I don't really blame people for feeling stuck on progression because they can't farm the required amount (or missed the boat for bypassing content or not the right class for bypassing content or whatever else). I'm just saying that the issue isn't that upgrades don't drop but that they don't drop fast enough to make the Inferno grind feel right.



My personal bigger gripe is that farming it is just a pain in the ass. There's the Terminus with three self-contained dungeons that aren't a hassle and then the rest of the act is a clusterfuck of awful.
I do believe Bashiok. Getting loot is the game and since the auction house affects the loot, then yes, I would say the game is designed around the AH. Especially with the rmah in the picture.
 
The worst I've seen (on Hell) is Fast + Mortar (screws over distance) + Molten (now you can't get close either) + Shielded (screw what little opportunities to attack you get)

Some mobs are even bugged and get super fast just for being champions. Demonic tremors in the keep depths anyone? They're the fastest monsters in the game sometimes for whatever reason.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
I've ran into 4 Legendary items and 2 set items in the last week. Never saw either type of item in the weeks before that, though.

All of them have dropped from normal mobs or from environment items (weapon racks, piles of rocks, etc.)
 

scy

Member
Well I had help but solo I was getting to phase 3 pretty quick, buffed DPS was above 50k solo with soul harvest and other things

Phase 3 is the easy part. Assuming you can manually dodge long enough for the fight. It's pretty easy at low DPS on a Wizard, for instance, since you can set and forget DPS with Blizzard/Hydra and focus on avoiding his easy patterns.

Some mobs are even bugged and get super fast just for being champions. Demonic tremors in the keep depths anyone? They're the fastest monsters in the game sometimes for whatever reason.

Fields of Slaughter or whatever it's called (area with the Catapults and Trebuchet for Machines of War) is the worst for this. At least I can sort of abuse walls in the Keep. Out in the open? Fuck it, time to go find something easier. Like Fast Invuln Soul Rippers.
 

eek5

Member
I didn't mean that. I just meant that it's not at the pace they want. There's a huge difference between "upgrades cannot drop" and "upgrades take too long to get." The latter I can agree with entirely. Not everyone wants to spend as much time as others. It's the former I disagree with.

Also, Weapon drops do suck for farming. Looking for a Weapon in Act 1 feels awful vs Act 2/Act 3 due to all of it coming down to the DPS.

I think the bigger problem is the difficulty gap between a1 and a2, at least from a barb perspective. Yeah you can do A2 with iL61 (a1) gear if you get really good rolls but once you get to about 6-7k armor 500 resists A1 becomes unbelievably easy as a barb so you're basically coasting through EZMODE farming with no challenge whatsoever to hopefully roll a 60 res instead of a 55. If 1.0.3. makes it so you can actually start chipping away at A2, everything will be different. The entire balance/pacing/structure of A2 is so entirely fucked up that I don't know how they're really going to flatten that gap without making the entire act super easy though.



Some mobs are even bugged and get super fast just for being champions. Demonic tremors in the keep depths anyone? They're the fastest monsters in the game sometimes for whatever reason.
If I see elite tremors break through a doorway I just sprint to the WP and leave. It's so ridiculous. I swear, everytime I run into them they have shielding or invulnerable minions too. Yeah.. no thanks.
 

Cipherr

Member
I think the bigger problem for ilvl 62 stuff is that Act 2 is such a hassle to farm until Terminus. It's such a pain in the ass to try and gear up through Act 2 drops with how disproportionately hard the areas are due to enemy design (Wasp bullet hell, Lacuni invuln start ups, Sand Sharks/Worms invuln when diving, Snakes immune when cloaked, etc.). Probably why the Goblin farms in Act 2 are still so heavily utilized.

Well, that and how fast and easy the loot is.

Indeed, IMO there are far to many mobs with invulnerability traits. Cloaking, Burrowing and whatnot needs to go. Its compounded when these mobs keep those base abilities when they are an elite pack. You slap their base invuln abilities with crap like shielding, invulnerable minions and mortar and you are sort of screwed.

They had better do a good job reviewing the mobs. They have already said that shield and invuln minions have a change coming. Thats a good start, but get rid of nearly if not all immunity on mobs man, that shit is stupid. And cut soul rippers freaking movement speed.... Whoever though giving them a base 300% movement speed or some shit should be fired.
 

scy

Member
I think the bigger problem is the difficulty gap between a1 and a2, at least from a barb perspective. Yeah you can do A2 with iL61 (a1) gear if you get really good rolls but once you get to about 6-7k armor 500 resists A1 becomes unbelievably easy as a barb so you're basically coasting through EZMODE farming with no challenge whatsoever to hopefully roll a 60 res instead of a 55. If 1.0.3. makes it so you can actually start chipping away at A2, everything will be different. The entire balance/pacing/structure of A2 is so entirely fucked up that I don't know how they're really going to flatten that gap without making the entire act super easy though.

That too. It's almost binary in the way the difficulty is. You reach the right stat combination (and/or stats for your build or whatever) and then it's just pretty easy. If you don't, it's either just not possible or a struggle the whole way.
 
D3 is going to be looked back on as a revolutionary groundbreaking game. Now when choosing which game to play I also have to choose if I want a shot at making some money or not.
 
Basically newcoming barbs will have a much easier time than current barbs... A2 - A3 jump is really hard and now I'm hoping I'll be able to farm act 3.
 

Deadly

Member
Is anyone else not getting anything in their balance? I sold something for 3$ but it's not appearing. Yeah I got the email.
 
I think the bigger problem is the difficulty gap between a1 and a2, at least from a barb perspective. Yeah you can do A2 with iL61 (a1) gear if you get really good rolls but once you get to about 6-7k armor 500 resists A1 becomes unbelievably easy as a barb so you're basically coasting through EZMODE farming with no challenge whatsoever to hopefully roll a 60 res instead of a 55. If 1.0.3. makes it so you can actually start chipping away at A2, everything will be different. The entire balance/pacing/structure of A2 is so entirely fucked up that I don't know how they're really going to flatten that gap without making the entire act super easy though.




If I see elite tremors break through a doorway I just sprint to the WP and leave. It's so ridiculous. I swear, everytime I run into them they have shielding or invulnerable minions too. Yeah.. no thanks.


The difficulty goes up in a massive spike. It shouldn't be a massive spike. It should be a constant line leading to the same end. If I can walk around like a zombie in act I and slaughter the butcher, I should be able to at least start act II. Maybe I won't be able to just get to the Oasis, but if I can handle the begining of the act, then I can farm there and start to progress myself. The goal should be so that the end of the acts are just as tough as what they currently have set up, with the spike at the begingings flattened out.
 

eek5

Member
Is anyone else not getting anything in their balance? I sold something for 3$ but it's not appearing. Yeah I got the email.

It takes like 2-5 days to clear or something. One of my sold items actually failed and I got the item back.
 
To be fair this game is very much luck based, about 80% I would say. I have been farming act 3 for the past week with 5 stacks and haven't had anything that I didn't vendor aside from one weapon I am using (but only worth about 5$ its a 1350 2 handed blue axe)

150 hours played and I believe 10 out of my 13 pieces have been from the ah because nothing drops for ME that is good. Now is it possible to farm act 1 and get geared for everything else? Yes, if you are a very lucky person, or just not unlucky like me. Then again I am the guy with 5 stacks that gets 0 rares from butcher so yea I am just ranting.
 
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