As any diablo 2 player knows, Target Lock was a major game mechanic (especially in pvp) that really defined a lot of spells. The ability to right click once and continuously track your opponent with charge, bone spear, guided arrow, fist of heaven etc was extremely powerful.
Target Lock is back in Diablo 3 and is a little more complicated. I have been testing and here is what I've found:
========== Target Lock Basics:
Some abilities like Firebats, Rapid Fire, Ray of Frost, and Electrocute are non-target locking. They will always aim at your mouse cursor and will never lock on to a specific target. It seems safe to say that channeled spells do not target-lock.
To initiate a target-locking attack, just mouse over an enemy and hold down the attack button. It doesn't matter if it is left mouse, right mouse, or a number. As long as you hold down the attack button you can move your mouse cursor away from the target, and the target can move away from your mouse. Your attacks will continue to be aimed at the target. In the case of melee or short-range attacks, you will chase the target if it moves out of range.
========== Target Lock Quirks
If you are target-locked onto an enemy that is out of melee range, your character will attempt to chase them. However, if you collide with any other enemies while chasing the target lock, your character will melee attack the other enemies. Despite this, you do NOT lose target lock on the far-away foe, you will continue chasing it and attempting to hit it. This makes melee target lock quite "smart".
What happens if you run out of resources? It appears to depend on the character. Barbarians and Demon Hunters will autoattack, while the Wizard will stand in place waiting for her AP to regen.
Target lock works for Haunt, which is incredibly bad because multiple haunts on one target do not stack. They really should make it a non-target locking spell like Electrocute.
========== Losing and Re-Acquiring Target Lock
There are four basic ways to break target lock:
1) The target dies
2) The target becomes unattackable (ie Grotesque death animation, Jondar)
3) The target moves excessively far away (ie teleporting enemies)
4) You go into hit recovery
In case of dying targets (#1), you may immediately re-acquire target lock if your cursor is over a valid 2nd target.
Once you lose target lock, there are major differences in between left mouse, right mouse, and number key behavior.
The left mouse button is problematic. Once you lose target lock, holding down left mouse issues a "move" order. This causes your character to run around like an idiot until you let go of the LMB. This can be quite annoying when you are in melee combat. In fact, it's made me switch my primary and secondary attacks when playing Barbarian - I put secondary on left click and primary on right click.
The right mouse button works like Diablo 2. Once you lose target lock, holding down right mouse issues a non-target locking attack order. This means that you will continue attacking whatever is under your cursor. If you want to acquire a new target lock you have to let go of the RMB and click again.
The number keys have the "strongest" target lock behavior. After losing target lock, you remain fully capable of re-acquiring target lock just by selecting a valid target. It seems really strange that number keys would work differently from RMB.
=======
I think it is incredibly strange how the target lock mechanic works differently between different buttons. IMO the game would feel smoother if Blizzard picked a target lock mechanic and stuck with it.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Target Lock is back in Diablo 3 and is a little more complicated. I have been testing and here is what I've found:
==========
Target Lock Basics:
Some abilities like Firebats, Rapid Fire, Ray of Frost, and Electrocute are non-target locking. They will always aim at your mouse cursor and will never lock on to a specific target. It seems safe to say that channeled spells do not target-lock.
To initiate a target-locking attack, just mouse over an enemy and hold down the attack button. It doesn't matter if it is left mouse, right mouse, or a number. As long as you hold down the attack button you can move your mouse cursor away from the target, and the target can move away from your mouse. Your attacks will continue to be aimed at the target. In the case of melee or short-range attacks, you will chase the target if it moves out of range.
==========
Target Lock Quirks
If you are target-locked onto an enemy that is out of melee range, your character will attempt to chase them. However, if you collide with any other enemies while chasing the target lock, your character will melee attack the other enemies. Despite this, you do NOT lose target lock on the far-away foe, you will continue chasing it and attempting to hit it. This makes melee target lock quite "smart".
What happens if you run out of resources? It appears to depend on the character. Barbarians and Demon Hunters will autoattack, while the Wizard will stand in place waiting for her AP to regen.
Target lock works for Haunt, which is incredibly bad because multiple haunts on one target do not stack. They really should make it a non-target locking spell like Electrocute.
==========
Losing and Re-Acquiring Target Lock
There are four basic ways to break target lock:
1) The target dies
2) The target becomes unattackable (ie Grotesque death animation, Jondar)
3) The target moves excessively far away (ie teleporting enemies)
4) You go into hit recovery
In case of dying targets (#1), you may immediately re-acquire target lock if your cursor is over a valid 2nd target.
Once you lose target lock, there are major differences in between left mouse, right mouse, and number key behavior.
The left mouse button is problematic. Once you lose target lock, holding down left mouse issues a "move" order. This causes your character to run around like an idiot until you let go of the LMB. This can be quite annoying when you are in melee combat. In fact, it's made me switch my primary and secondary attacks when playing Barbarian - I put secondary on left click and primary on right click.
The right mouse button works like Diablo 2. Once you lose target lock, holding down right mouse issues a non-target locking attack order. This means that you will continue attacking whatever is under your cursor. If you want to acquire a new target lock you have to let go of the RMB and click again.
The number keys have the "strongest" target lock behavior. After losing target lock, you remain fully capable of re-acquiring target lock just by selecting a valid target. It seems really strange that number keys would work differently from RMB.
=======
I think it is incredibly strange how the target lock mechanic works differently between different buttons. IMO the game would feel smoother if Blizzard picked a target lock mechanic and stuck with it.