DiabloFans

Hi, new player here.

I have never played any of the Diablo series before, although I did play a lot of Titan Quest back in the day which is pretty similar. In TQ there were 3 difficulty levels and you had to complete each level with each character before progressing to the next one. If you wanted to farm, you could go back to any section on any difficulty level that you had completed with that character.

D3 seems to be a bit more 'freeform' and completion of previous difficulties does not seem to be required to go to harder ones. So how do people tend to progress through the game? I am picking my way through Normal mode with a few different characters and it is all pretty easy so far (I think I can count the times I have dropped below 50% health on one hand). Should I move up to a higher difficulty level? Or is it recommended that you compete 'Normal' then move on to 'Hard' then 'Expert' with each character? But I assume if you do that then you will reach level 60 (I don't have the expansion yet) long before you finish all 4 difficulty levels?

Some recommendations/guidance?

Quote from cmagik

where are you playing? EU US?

EU

Quote from Bandyto

First of all, welcome to the forums. Secondly, this thread will probably generate a lot of debate about how to play the game, what is good, what is bad etc. So be warned.

According to your question: I would recommend to play the campaign once on a challenging difficulty level. Take your time, die a few times, experiment skills and lower the difficulty at higher levels in order to still have fun while progressing. After hitting 70, most players do bounties in order to obtain Rift Key Fragments for Rifts. Rifts have increased drop chances and are - most of the time - full of mobs. In addition, if you want to visit the Uber bosses, try to do them on the highest difficulty possible because the drop chances of organs are higher but most builds resp. gear setups do not use the Hellfire ring. This may change with 2.1 and the introduction of the new amulet which grants you a randomly rolled passive skill.

Of course, this is highly subjective. Let the games begin.

I don't mind if this generates a heated discussion. The more discussion the better, I'm likely to learn from it. From what I've read, the forums here are far less retarded than the official forums, so I'm sure it won't be too bad.

So essentially are you saying that most players only complete the game once with each character and that campaign mode is mostlyconsidered a means to an end - the end being having all areas unlocked and getting you to a healthy level where you can access the real meaty content?

Quote from Kueken

However, Rifts have a 100% increased drop chance for legendaries, and Bountys are farmed for Rift keystones and for one of the most desired items in the game, the Ring of Royal Grander, which is an exclusive drop from Act 1 bounty bags. Playing Rifts on the highest torment you can handle in a reasonable amount of time usually grants the most benefits in terms of legendaries over time.

Rifts have 300% increased legendary drop chance, the 100% was from the aniversary that became permanent right?

First time through just enjoy the campaign and learn the skills as they unlock. Bump up the difficulty a little to improve your leveling rate and reduce the pure boredom of normal.

Usually my goal on a new character is to go through the campaign once and finish at 70. Kill act 5 boss for first time only at 70 for the guaranteed legendary. Ideally on torment 1, but if it is your first time through that may not be possible. If you get to the final boss and aren't 70 I would just go level anywhere you find fun until you are 70.

I usually scale campaign difficulty to kill speed. I want to not linger too long on elite packs and just progress quickly. Always a balance of speed and leveling rate.

Those who have other characters to 70 usually have saved some socketed weapons of varying levels, so they can ruby them for a massive DPS increase, which lets you bump up the difficulty and level faster. Level 70 weapons can drop with -15-27? or so level requirements, so ~lvl 40-50 you can get a massive near end game DPS boost from a weapon like that. It is basically steamroll leveling to try to unlock 70 as soon as possible.

As others mentioned most of the end game is spent bounty farming and rifting, but a quest reset and full campaign run is still good loot and a nice change of pace.

At 70 you continue to get experience in paragon levels which can help every character on your account. So while you loot hunt on your main and gain paragon levels you are also making every future character have an easier time as they get a pool of free stats to make their leveling journey that much easier/faster.

Thanks for the help and opinions folks. As for kill speed, it probably takes me >15 seconds to kill most elite packs right now, even on Normal difficulty, although I still haven't died once yet. Maybe this means I am prioritising survivability over DPS too much. Or maybe it's just because I always try out every skill/rune for a while as soon as I unlock it so my builds are a bit 'quirky' (to put it nicely).