overneathe

well i found this weap, last week

NO! *swats with newspaper* NO!

As soon as I started to play the AH a few months ago, I started to lose interest in the game. I started with less than 10mill and within 2 days had over 100mill (no RMAH use, all on the gAH for very little work). I couldn't help but think that the game was very broken if you could hit 60 and then gear with top demon smashing MP10 gear without ever killing another demon.

So I bought a second copy of the game and made a new Battle Net account.

I'm sure some of you are crying, but it's the best thing I've done since D3 came out. I have on account for my 5 SC and 5 HC, one of each class and all use the AH. But now I have a second account, with 5 60s all using self found gear.

To me, the idea of self found is entirely items that I have found or crafted myself in this account. I do not and will not share between the two accounts. One of the things that's kept me clean from the AH is knowing the history is blank and always will be. The main one though is knowing the excitement for every orangey brown that shoots into the sky (more on that later).

I don't see a problem with passing items between other characters on that account, especially when there's a shared stash, but I won't pass items between my two accounts. The reason I wanted a separate account was to keep the artisans separate, the recipes learned and the gold amount. My other account has spent millions and earned it all back with no trouble, gold is worthless with only an hour a day.

Now I'm doing self found, I'm getting excited about the drops all over again. So far only two legendaries have dropped on Inferno, and I can't wait for the third. Pick and weapon that can drop there, with any stats, and I'll love it and use it at the moment! I've been farming the new 1.07 plans on Act 1 and have just built my barb up enough to WW farm on MP1 too (P9 so far, Monk at P13). However, this has brought a problem up.

The number of crafting mats and the gold cost don't lend themselves well to playing self-found. I'd love to make some of the new jewellery, a dexterity amulet was the first plan I found, but I still have no brimstones! With legendary items so rare, and also very useful to me right now, I won't salvage one for the chance of an amulet that might suck. I've been tempted to buy crafting mats from the AH, as the craft itself still fits under 'self found' but so far I've resisted. I'm having too much fun identifying every rare again and treasuring every half million gold I build up.

I love playing self found, but whenever I feel the urge to play the AH or trash some MP6+ with ease, I just load up my main account and get bored.

I'm keeping the other 5 char slots of my self found account free now too, with the hope that one day Blizzard will add a
no AH or self found option on the character creation screen. That way I can prove that I've not 'cheated' myself rather than people believing me. At the moment, I'm happy that I've not tainted my new account with the AH, and I'm loving every second of it!

PS: I'm not brave enough to try HC with no AH yet, but I'm very tempted with a new char that does only MP10 with self found and no crafting.

Been seeing a few similar topics pop up while we mark D3's first birthday.

Looking back on the year, I believe I made some progress.

Late May 2012:

Rocking that Blizz-Veno build.

May 24, 2012:

Discovered Whimsyshire for the first time.

June 18, 2012:

Killed Diablo after spending many days doing Siegebreaker runs. Pulled an all-nighter; see 7 a.m.

June 28, 2012:

Broke 100K DPS for the first time and was so proud, saved an image, sent it to all my friends, and saved it on my hard drive.

Late September 2012:

Hit top 10 wizard DPS in the Americas server.

Never looked back since—aside from cashing out once in late December 2012—now just striving for perfection as a hobby. Happy birthday, D3! Thanks for being the source of many headaches and also for providing me countless hours of entertainment.

izzigoin, on 11 May 2013 - 09:22 AM, said:

I think the most important fact is: The economy isnt ruined. Everything is back to normnal. And everyone can use the AH, and RMAH again,  with an amazing patch that people are hella enjoying it.
You WONT see a service like this from ANY other company.

This is literally the company you paid ur 40 bucks of game to, that has been giving you free updates and free fixes and free content ever since the game was released. They still care, they still make good games and top notch service.

If you cant move on from a simple bug, and play again. well dood, you really need to find another hobby. its kind of sad.
cheers,

shaggy, on 08 May 2013 - 01:17 PM, said:

Aww, maaaan.........I really thought we had something.

overneathe, on 07 May 2013 - 04:22 PM, said:

This is what LoL has done to me. At least it dosnt effect my dataming skilzzz

Contest: Free Archon Set
↑ Click to see D3up stats ↑
Contest also here: http://us.battle.net...opic/8769577414

I decided to put together an Archon set with the following stats:

At paragon 0 (meaning fresh level 60 wizard):

216,564 unbuffed DPS
319,281 unbuffed EHP

294,197 DPS buffed with Force Weapon, Sparkflint, Pinpoint Armor
328,945 DPS buffed with the above and also Glass Cannon

715 unbuffed resistances to all elements (644 with Glass Cannon)
3,372 unbuffed armor (3,034 with Glass Cannon)

Fully buffed (including Glass Cannon) when in Archon form:

328,945 DPS
515,438 EHP (594,679 with dodge)

Other specifics:
HP: 47,132
Damage reduction: 85.24% (83.27% with Glass Cannon)
Life steal: 2.6%
Life per kill: 1,655
Movement speed: 24%

«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»

Now with all that out of the way, here are the items in question that provide those stats:



Mempo of Twilight, Vile Ward, Tal Rasha's Allegiance, Tal Rasha's Relentless Pursuit, rare bracers, rare gloves, rare ring, Zunimassa's Pox, Zunimassa's Trail, The Witching Hour, Inna's Temperance, rare sword, Triumvirate

So who's going to get all of these items (gems included), absolutely free?

Free.

Completely free.

Who?

Quote

I don't want to know what the Mempo is specifically worth, or the Triumvirate. Tell me collectively what everything is worth. This is a great way for newer players (or lazy players) to practice price-checking via the AH. What better way to progress than to do and learn things yourself?

I overpaid a little on some items, but managed great deals on others, so the number should be fairly "market level." Closest number wins. I have a screenshot of my AH history as proof when the time comes.

Leave your guess and your battletag.

To be eligible:

- No purchase necessary
- North American server
- One guess only, but you are free to edit your "guess" post.
- You must main a wizard, e.g. most of your play time should be logged on your wizard compared to the other four classes. This is not for people "converting" to a wizard solely for this contest. I will judge based on profile, kills, gear and paragon level, but you can argue against me/attempt to convince me if you wish and I'll look further.
- You must have a fresh wizard, not a paragon 100 one crawling around Inferno.
- You must have <40,000 elite kills in your total play history (I can adjust this number according to my own discretion).
- You must be an active wizard and not a loser
- You must use this set yourself (i.e. do not give the set to your needy friend).
- You must not sell this set for profit. I will keep track of your battletag and I will be watching you and the items via DiabloProgress and D3up. Don't mess with my generosity. When the time comes and you want to upgrade individual pieces, I will understand. Point is to use and learn from the gear set.

«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»

EXPIRES ON FRIDAY, MAY 10, 2013 - 10 p.m. EST (barring an unforeseen world catastrophe).

I reserve the right to change the rules of eligibility at any point in time. Sorry for inconveniences.

Also my friends list is hovering around 97, 98/100. So please don't add me unless it's unrelated to this event and you actually have something important to tell me. Sorry for inconveniences again.


«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»

Video demonstration of the gear set on MP8 (bear in mind I'm PL100), but MP6-7 will be super easy with this set.

«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»*****«»«»«»

CURRENT CONTESTANTS & ESTIMATES - Updated 5/10/13, 2:36 a.m. EST:

Google Docs

If you tried to participate and don't see yourself on this list, either you didn't qualify or you did not provide a valid guess. You're free to argue your point of eligibility though, and I'll see what I can do for you

Thanks for that, Enkeria.  It's quite helpful encouragement   Also thanks to everyone that's stopped by and joined the conversation, I think there's some good discussion here.  It's why I tend to post and read the forums here over the Blizzard ones.

As long as I can find something to be long winded about I'll continue to put out what I can.  honestly I'm really hoping for expansion news in the future.  I would love to be able to cover the beta for it if possible.  Fingers crossed.

http://imgur.com/aeIft53

I discovered this advertisement at Gamestop today. The preorder bonuses are a poster and an in-game helmet that provides bonus exp to the wearer.

As expected, there is no release date yet.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am back! Wooo!  once again I am late to the table, but you can't blame me for wanting to put out a Neverwinter media blitz, can you?  Of course you can't, you can't stay mad at me.  Of course it didn't help that I got pretty sick between these episodes as well...

Well here it is, a round up of articles and opinions from the news taken from the headlines right here at Diablofans.  This project is a merger of my typical patch notes coverage as well as some thoughts on the Ask the Devs answers.  In the video you will also find side by side comparisons of some areas with the new monster density from live to 1.0.8

I hope you enjoy and please feel free to leave feedback here, on YouTube, or on the Email account listed.  If you do find it at all interesting or entertaining, please don't forget to give it a thumbs up to help it get noticed, that's always appreciated.

EDIT/Update:  I'm hoping this is well recieved and really want to stress I'll be looking at feedback.  This one took a very long time to produce due to the large amounts of video streams and editing that took place.  It even took my video software 4 hours to encode it.  It was a massive piece of work, but I think it paid off.

Here's the video description which indexes the entire video with time stamps:

Hey guys! For people that dont know me, I'm Rakunvar ;P

I did two new videos on 1.07 LIVE vs 1.08 PTR Split Screen Monster Density Changes! Probably will redo my main thread soon! If you like it all, please subscribe and stop by the stream sometime, Thanks!

I stream on Twitch.tv and am a Multiboxer(Cue the hate), me and Inigomontoya/DatModz/Rober/Cro etc, etc are always hanging out in Mumble and of course streaming. Feel free to visit all of us, as well as my threads or YouTube for more info on me. I do also try to stream from a different location each time

Videos of 1.07 LIVE VS 1.08 PTR Split Screen Monster Density

(END OF THE VIDEOS HAS THE MONSTERS KILLED COUNT!)

~ ACT 1 ~

Video#1~Act1: Fields of Misery: Festering Woods: Leoric's Hunting Grounds: Pony Land:

~ ACT 2 ~

Video#1~Act2: Black Canyon Mines: Dahlgur Oasis: Desolate Sands: Vile Cavern's:

(No I dont get any money from youtube or streaming atm. I am trying to eventually, due to my disabilities etc.{Cue Zilian remarks} Also, please don't just come on here to yell about Multiboxing etc.. Trying to help people here and I'm not botting..)

www.Twitch.tv/Rakunvar

Zero(pS), on 22 April 2013 - 03:51 AM, said:

Yes.

Zero(pS), on 22 April 2013 - 03:51 AM, said:

No, but I have a pretty good idea. It's a lot.

Zero(pS), on 22 April 2013 - 03:51 AM, said:

Yep.

Zero(pS), on 22 April 2013 - 03:51 AM, said:

Meetings.  So. Many.  Meetings.  So many.

Zero(pS), on 22 April 2013 - 03:51 AM, said:

Too many people.  Too many people with their hands on everything.


Based on my work experience, I can tell you that Zero(pS) is asking all the right questions.

If the team was unbridled, independent, small and agile, they could iterate over these issues rapidly and release them just as quickly.  This is not a small, agile team.  It is a department of a massive international software company.

When people refer to "the programmers", the group they are actually addressing are coders, analysts, testers, QA teams, managers, architects, web developers, and many more, just on the software side.  There are also technical writers, translators, community managers, customer service representatives, and many more just from a communication / documentation standpoint.  There are infrastructure managers, server administrators, network specialists, release managers, database administrators, and many many other on the hardware side.

Each person has an important moving part that must hit a moving target at the same time as all other members of all other teams for a release to happen successfully.

It's a miracle anything ever gets done at all.

overneathe, on 19 April 2013 - 01:00 AM, said:

Zero(pS), on 19 April 2013 - 12:17 AM, said:

I would like start out by thanking all the little.....
I'm so full of (you know what)

Really though, thanks!!! for posting my followers guide on the site! After you picked it up, Blizzard  posted my new followers guide on theirs. I'm sure it's what led them to checking out my channel for these videos, snowballs are funny like that.

I hope to keep make Diablo videos in the future, and what you did was a great help!

So THANKS again!

I do have one issue with Diablofans.... lol that sounds very out of context. I can't use my Enter key when posting on the forums. I have to copy Enter key strokes from other posts and paste them. That's how I'm able to space my sentences/paragraphs, Is there anything I can do to fix this.

Patch 1.0.9 Preview

Well, we just recently launched patch 1.0.8 but we're already well into development on 1.0.9, and while it's still weeks away we're going to start hitting you fast and furious with blogs aimed at explaining the upcoming changes. The next patch is going to be the biggest patch we’ve developed to date and most certainly provide the most features and systems changes. To kick things off, I wanted to provide an overview of some of the larger features, systems changes and game improvements.

Introducing the Trading Post

When we first started working on the Auction House the initial idea was to make a system that was easy to use and as efficient as possible for players to buy and sell gear. The end result was a system that was almost too efficient at what it did and removed all player interaction completely from the process.

We want to get back to the roots of what made Diablo II trading so popular over the years, but at the same time also improve it by taking what works rather well with Diablo III's Auction House to enhance it. In patch 1.0.9 we'll be removing the Auction House and introducing the Trading Post. The Trading Post works in a similar fashion to the Auction House in terms of its search functions and interface but with some key differences. Gold will no longer be used as the currency when it comes to buying items, instead you'll be trading the items you collect through your adventures with other players. You'll be able to use an interface to select which items you have for trade and also search for items other players across your region have for trade.



The Trading Post will offer an easy to use interface to make the trade process simple:

• Choose the items you wish to trade.
  
• Search what others have to offer or the offers you receive.
  
• Accept offers through the interface without needing to be in game.
  
• Ability to barter back and forth with other players.

We think this system will give back the player interaction Diablo III was missing and at the same time improve on Diablo II's trading system by making the items you're looking for easy to find, removing the potential of scams, removing the need to be in game with the other player, and also letting trades happen at literally any time of day even when the other player isn't logged on.

Here's an example of how a trade might work:

Quote

The removal of the AH also means the removal of the Real Money Auction House. Many players refer to the RMAH as a “Pay to Win” feature, that wasn’t our original intent but in reality it does hold true in many scenarios and we feel it really is removing the enjoyment out of actually playing the game for a majority of our players. It will no longer be possible to purchase items using real currency, however we still have plans to offer the option to buy and sell gold. Gold will still remain as the main currency in the game but instead  of being the sole currency will be used in combination with other in game items.

We’re also exploring the idea of drastically reducing the amount of gold dropped from normal monsters. We’d like the main source of gold to be from killing bosses, elites and champions, opening chests, and completing side dungeons. This should result in the value of gold to increase as we add in new features that rely on gold and also act as an extra step to combat gold sellers and bots. We'll provide some more details on this further down in our blog entry and will also be sharing more information in the near future.

Crafting

To salvage, or not to salvage…

We’ve introduced 7 new Brimstones to the game, each corresponding to one of the 7 types of available weapon damage. Salvaging a weapon with a specific type of weapon damage whether it be Holy Damage, Cold Damage, Fire Damage, Lightning Damage, Arcane Damage, or Poison Damage will have a chance to produce one of the new Brimstones. Salvaging a legendary Physical Damage weapon or a legendary armor piece will also produce a new type of Brimstone. Salvaging jewelry will provide a chance to receive any of the new Brimstones.



Salvaging legendary Lightning Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce a Charged Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Poison Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce a Toxic Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Cold Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce an Icy Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Fire Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce a Fiery Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Arcane Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce an Arcanic Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Holy Damage weapons and jewelry will sometimes produce an Angelic Brimstone.


Salvaging legendary Physical Damage weapons and armor will sometimes produce a Somatic Brimstone.


These new Brimstones are not a 100% guaranteed when salvaging legendary items, but rather will only a small 5-10% chance to be produced. While you may not receive a Brimstone every time you salvage an item, we’ll also be making a type of “consolation” item which can be sold to a vendor for a significant amount of gold. This should create a market not only for the Brimstone’s themselves, but the legendary items that produce them. We want you to be faced with a difficult choice when you find a legendary item, do you keep the item, trade the item away, or salvage the item for hopes of a Brimstone?

These new Brimstones will be the key ingredients used to craft the newly updated Blacksmith and Jeweler items which are also being introduced with patch 1.0.9.

A New Ally

Patch 1.0.9. not only updates the current crafting system for the Blacksmith and Jeweler but will also introduce a third type of craft. We’re introducing the Mystic, Myriam Jahzia, who was first introduced during beta. The Mystic’s primary purpose will be enchanting items which will include the upgrading of existing stats on items and also the re-rolling of the randomly generated properties found on an items.



The Mystic will require significant amounts of gold and combinations of the newly introduced Brimstones in order to purchase her services, further strengthening the market value of legendary items and gold.

The point of the mystic is to offer players a new way to improve their characters in terms of item progression as they play the game instead of relying solely on finding drops. Now all legendary drops, no matter if the item is an upgrade or not, can potentially be used to upgrade your character.  We think this system offers players fantastic item progression and will allow all players including some of the top geared players in the world to continue upgrading their gear for a very long time.

We haven’t decided on the costs associated with upgrading each of the many different stats yet but we do know they will vary from stat to stat. We expect stats such as Increased Attack speed, Critical Hit Chance, and Critical Hit Damage to fall into one category, primary stats in another, and so on. We don’t expect unique procs or unique properties found on legendary items to be included with this feature. Expect this to broken down into a different blog post all together in the coming weeks.



We would also like to point out that by using the Mystic to enchant items the item itself will also become Account Bound. This will ensure items are constantly being removed from the economy as they’re upgraded and still allow non-enchanted items with desirable properties or highly rolled stats to have a high trade value and continue to be sought after as they will help players skip some of the steps necessary to eventually upgrade to a “perfect item”. We don’t expect players to ever be able to fully upgrade every item on their character or even be required to, but it’s something the min/maxing type players can strive for over time.

The Mystic will also offer unique potions and elixirs that can’t be purchased or found anywhere else in the game. These items can be purchased with gold and brimstones and when used will give the player bonuses to stats such as Magic Find, Experience Gained, and Movement Speed, for a limited amount of time. Think of them as a Shrine that persists through death and lasts much longer.



Truly Legendary Items 1.0.9 and Beyond

We want to make “game-changing” legendary items the norm going forward. Our philosophy for legendary items has always been the same, to be powerful and promote build diversity. We know we haven’t been able to deliver on this fully up to this point, but with patch 1.0.9  we think we’ve finally been able to make this reality. When a player finds a legendary or set item the first thing they should be thinking is how can they use this item on one of their characters or how it might fit into a specific build.

Class specific items

We feel the one of the best ways make legendary items truly game changing is to allow certain items to alter the way specific class skills and passives work.  While we can’t obviously give every single legendary item the ability to alter skills and runes we chose to focus only on class-specific items and set bonuses. This made the most sense in terms of design, we could take an item that was already exclusive to one class and use it to provide new and interesting ways of playing that class.

Patch 1.0.9 introduces revamped class-specific items and set bonuses that provide unique alterations to already existing skills and passives. The most intriguing idea behind this concept is going forward we’ll be able to constantly open up new and exciting builds for each class as new items are introduced to the game. With the introduction of one new item or even mixing different items an entire build could be born. This will  truly allow new builds to be built around items.



Legendary status

We're not just updating class specific items in patch 1.0.9. We're going to revisit all legendary items to make sure they live up to their legendary status by not only providing great stats but also providing unique properties that will change a players game experience. While class-specific items will change the way skills and runes work for classes, we still want to make sure non-class specific legendary items also have an impact on build diversity. We decided to go a little bit of a different route with non-class specific items. Rather than focusing on individual class skills and passives, these items will introduce new unique properties that might change a players gameplay or change the way specific stats interact with a character. By doing this we can take a non desirable stat and change it into something a specific build highly values when using one new item. We plan on releasing a entire blog post dedicated to this topic in the next few days but here's a taste of the type of things we'll be talking about.



Itemization

In addition to the upcoming legendary items we're going to be reworking the way elemental damage and physical damage work with weapons. Weapon damage including the base damage of the item will roll either as Holy, Cold, Poison, Fire, Arcane, Lightning, or Physical weapon. By doing this we can use the "adds % elemental damage" affix found on many of the legendary items in the game to provide a direct damage boost to weapons that also have the corresponding damage type.

For example, if you have a sword that has a damage range of 700-1000 Fire Damage and you equip an item with the property "Adds 5% Fire Damage", the new damage range of the sword will be 735-1050 Fire Damage. This not only provides a simple way of calculating damage but also provides an interesting way to combine weapons and armor.

We'll also be including more information in the next coming days in addition to the blog post regarding legendary items.

Promoting Exploration and Adding Excitement

You call that a dungeon? This is a dungeon!

Many ideas have been discussed by our developers in terms of how we can constantly add exploration back to game after the initial play through for our players. There’s nothing that saddens us more than seeing 90% population running the same act or in many cases the same zone over and over knowing that if they do anything different they’re hindering efficiency in both terms of items and experience gained. While repetition has always been part of the Diablo series we feel this can be cut down substantially. You’ve already seen improvements when it comes to giving players options in regards to this when we adjusted the monster density in patch 1.0.8, we’d like to go a bit further.

In 1.0.9 we’ll be improving on the randomly generated side dungeons found in all acts across the game in Inferno difficulty. We’ve created new tiles for almost every zone across all 4 Acts which will allow spawn locations to be found in every part of the game. An entrance in the wall found in the Cathedral, a burrow found the in Dahlgur Oasis, many different possibilities exist. We’ll also be taking a look at every aspect of them to truly make them a random experience. Things such as:

• Increasing the amount of spawn locations substantially in terms of both Acts and where they can spawn in each zone.
  
• The difficulty, dungeons can be found with additional monster power levels above the current game.
  
• Dungeon size, number of levels, the layout, and tile sets.
  
• The type of monsters
  
• The “end boss(s)”, which includes a random elite/champion pack which is buffed considerably

Of course there needs to be an incentive to search out for these improved dungeons, which is why we’ve created them to provide a fairly substantial buff in terms of experience gained from the monsters inside and also completing the entire dungeon. We’ve also decided to add a new type of chest found exclusively inside these randomly spawned dungeons which not only provides a much higher than average chance to drop legendary items but also provides a small chance to find items of immense power that can’t be found anywhere else.

We think by adding these new features it will promote exploration across all acts and provide a much needed type of end game experience for our players which doesn’t take away from Diablo III’s storyline.

Beam me up...

One of the most exciting events in regular play session is hearing that special “clang” legendary items make and seeing that beam of light coming from the pile of corpses at your feet. Over the past patches we’ve increased the chance of finding these items and we really think they are in a very good place in terms of drop rates. While RNG is still a huge factor when it comes to the amount of legendary items you see drop in a play session we still wanted a way to add to the excitement without actually increasing the drop rates any further. We think we’ve found an artificial solution that does just that.
Now when playing with your friends or other players in public games you’ll be able to see and hear all legendary and set items that drop in game, even if they aren’t yours for the taking.



We’ve received very positive feedback on the elite/champion and goblin announcement introduced in patch 1.0.8, so much that we’ve decided to extend it to also include an announcement when players identify legendary items. Now through your chat window you’ll be able to see and view the items your friends and party find during their play session. Obviously this won’t be taken positively by all players so we’ve also added the option to hide or display these messages from chat.

In Conclusion

We’re very excited to share this new patch with you and gather your feedback. This patch will be our biggest one to date and we think it adds to Diablo III immensely in terms of fun game play and longevity. We defiantly aren’t done yet when it comes to improving the game and we’ll work hard to provide our player base with many features to come.

Be sure to check out the new information on Dungeons, which can be found here: http://www.diablofan...ngeons-a-dream/




And then I woke up from my dream and came to the realization that we were still only in Patch 1.0.7...