DiabloFans

Oooohhh.... This patch I like.

So which is more efficient now for a person who has great gear? Act I with Warden and Butcher, or Act III with Cydaea and Azmodan? I have no problem with either, but Act III takes me longer due to the increased health pools.

Quote from Zavannah

Love the changes to the drop rapes and finally there is a reason to kill bosses too with the extra rare drop with 5 valor buffs!

qft!

The question is; is it better to go back to boss killing? I stopped killing SK/Spider Queen cuz it was a drag with only 1 rare drop. The story parts slow down the killing too.

I thought they were going to make A3/4 farming more viable since people were just farming A1 instead because they could clear faster, but they buffed ilvl 63 drop rates more for A1 than for A3/4...

I'm thinking Act II is gonna be the best place to farm, if you can't handle Act III. Act II and III got about the same reduction in 50-60 ilevel drops, whereas Act II got the highest increase of ilevel 63 items (New% divided by Old%) out of all three categories.

Act I has 2.4 times more, and Act II has 2.268 times more ilevel 63 drops, but Act I has 2.4% more chance to drop ilevel 50-60. Act III/IV only got a 2.0375 times increase in ilevel 63 gear, but it does have a very high chance now. It's actually very tempting regardless of it being the hardest to farm.

Quote from Skelly

I thought they were going to make A3/4 farming more viable since people were just farming A1 instead because they could clear faster, but they buffed ilvl 63 drop rates more for A1 than for A3/4...

This. Congrats blizzard, you made it EVEN MORE PROFITABLE to farm Act 1 over Act 2-4.

I'll enjoy filling my bags in 15 minutes on Act 1 unlike the hour+ it takes on Act 3, and I'll enjoy the fact that crafting is worth EVEN less!

So people are going back to boss farming again... Yay for more drops but you'll still see QQ on "OMG not all of these drops are awesome". The previous post is spot on as well, there is more incentive to farm lower acts, they should have JUST buffed the last two acts and not hell mode.

Quote from aldrek

I'm thinking Act II is gonna be the best place to farm, if you can't handle Act III. Act II and III got about the same reduction in 50-60 ilevel drops, whereas Act II got the highest increase of ilevel 63 items (New% divided by Old%) out of all three categories.

Act I has 2.4 times more, and Act II has 2.268 times more ilevel 63 drops, but Act I has 2.4% more chance to drop ilevel 50-60. Act III/IV only got a 2.0375 times increase in ilevel 63 gear, but it does have a very high chance now. It's actually very tempting regardless of it being the hardest to farm.

Act 2 however you have to go all over the place to find Elites, Act 1 I know exactly where each of them spawn and have an identifiable route. filling my bag in Act 2 is 40minutes, Act 1 is 15. double the percentages of Act 1. Yep, that's what I thought. Still miles and miles and miles better.

there's no reason to restrict yourself to one act or one specific route unless you don't have good gear

do them all. you don't always have to do what's most efficient. do some different areas even if it's a bit less loot.

Yeah. Act 2 simply isn't efficient. Rares are too random. Act 1 has lots of guaranteed places for rares.

In my experience although Act 2 takes a little longer and does not have as many "set" rare spawn locations I feel like I find packs of elite's everywhere in Act 2. I'll do Maghda runs and get to 5x NV within 10-15 minutes. Additionally and this is purely my own experience I have found many many more 62 and 63 items in these runs. My A1 farms ended in MAYBE 1 63 item out of the 50+ i'd each in the run.

I will have to test this further with the new drop rates, either way hopefully more 62 & 63's dropping will mean I'll get a much needed ring upgrade.

Quote from BaneAu

Quote from aldrek

I'm thinking Act II is gonna be the best place to farm, if you can't handle Act III. Act II and III got about the same reduction in 50-60 ilevel drops, whereas Act II got the highest increase of ilevel 63 items (New% divided by Old%) out of all three categories.

Act I has 2.4 times more, and Act II has 2.268 times more ilevel 63 drops, but Act I has 2.4% more chance to drop ilevel 50-60. Act III/IV only got a 2.0375 times increase in ilevel 63 gear, but it does have a very high chance now. It's actually very tempting regardless of it being the hardest to farm.

Act 2 however you have to go all over the place to find Elites, Act 1 I know exactly where each of them spawn and have an identifiable route. filling my bag in Act 2 is 40minutes, Act 1 is 15. double the percentages of Act 1. Yep, that's what I thought. Still miles and miles and miles better.

True, I didn't take into account the fact that Act I is much more densely packed with elites. I thought about that after I posted. From a pure numbers perspective Act II may be better, but Act I is much more predictable and has shorter farm routes.

Quote from lorien1973

Yeah. Act 2 simply isn't efficient. Rares are too random. Act 1 has lots of guaranteed places for rares.

I disagree. Load up The Black Soulstone. Take the waypoint to Zultan and hit up his chambers. You can usually get 5 stacks between the 2 chambers unless you get the rare pack of baneling guys. Kill Zultan after the 5-stack, tp back to town and start the quest for Belial (go to the bazaar to start the event) and then tp back to town again.

From here you can take any waypoint you choose. Ancient paths has a chance to get a goblin, road to alcarnas, sewers, all have rare packs in them. Farm packs until you're blue in the face and tp back to town to kill Belial. He always has a rare pack right before his entrance too.

I would like Act 1 slightly better if you were given Halls of Agony level 3 but I guess that would be too easy. However, the drops are simply better in Act 2 if you have the gear.

Quote from Greenjoke

there's no reason to restrict yourself to one act or one specific route unless you don't have good gear

do them all. you don't always have to do what's most efficient. do some different areas even if it's a bit less loot.

I wish that were true, but for those of us who love playing the AH game, the most efficient route is always best.

I hope this makes things less reliant on the auction house, I hate what its made the game. I farm a lot, but still every piece of gear I am wearing is bought on the auction house. It pissed me off so much I haven't played for 2 weeks, I want to be able to find sweet loot and equip it. But it looks like its time to give it another try.

By making it easier to get loot it would make me play way more. Getting good gear in D2 definitely didnt take anywhere close to this long - when I spend 150 hours on a character to get him not even close to BiS it takes away motivation to play other classes. I liked the constantly building new characters in d2, trying funky builds and gearing them up. You can't really do that unless you have unlimited free time.

Unfortunately it will take a lot of work to make act 2 a viable place to farm...even if they made the drop rate really high compared to act 2 the spawns just aren't static enough. I might be baiting flame here but perhaps they need to remove guaranteed elite spawns from the game and just keep their locations random. It may be the only way to keep people from only farming certain acts.

Personally I want my infinite replay value to come from gearing up unique builds, not trying to perfectly gear up one. This requires drop rate buffs and simply better ways to farm loot. Sure they could add more static spawns in other acts but then it makes certain areas a wasteland instead of the unique exploration aspect. Make everything spawn in random places (except story mobs/bosses obv) but buff drop rates until people are much less reliant on the AH. Sure lots more gear floods the AH but perfect gear will still be extremely rare. Gear that isn't anywhere near perfect still goes for $250 right now which is just stupid so drops need to flood in to bring costs down to more reasonable levels.

Quote from Pherce

Quote from lorien1973

Yeah. Act 2 simply isn't efficient. Rares are too random. Act 1 has lots of guaranteed places for rares.

I disagree. Load up The Black Soulstone. Take the waypoint to Zultan and hit up his chambers. You can usually get 5 stacks between the 2 chambers unless you get the rare pack of baneling guys. Kill Zultan after the 5-stack, tp back to town and start the quest for Belial (go to the bazaar to start the event) and then tp back to town again.

From here you can take any waypoint you choose. Ancient paths has a chance to get a goblin, road to alcarnas, sewers, all have rare packs in them. Farm packs until you're blue in the face and tp back to town to kill Belial. He always has a rare pack right before his entrance too.

I would like Act 1 slightly better if you were given Halls of Agony level 3 but I guess that would be too easy. However, the drops are simply better in Act 2 if you have the gear.

this is what ill be doing now. A2 all the way. used to mess with a3 and bite the repair costs but a2 seems like it'll be better and faster.

I would like Act 1 slightly better if you were given Halls of Agony level 3 but I guess that would be too easy. However, the drops are simply better in Act 2 if you have the gear.

Why would you want a HoA3 way point? You lose the warden (and up to 3 rares on his level, plus a goblin). And 2 rares in HoA3. Plus all the rares/goblins in 1 and 2. HoA levels are very small and have a good number of rares.