Hey all. I've never been a pro player. I see people nonchalantly referencing characters builds and items and talking about how they dominated T6 three days into the new season and...well, that's not me. I don't even play with others, strictly solo. In any RPG or MMO, I always go with what sounds fun, not with what works. Now it's Season 3, and I want those cosmetic rewards (for 400 Achievement Points), but there's no way in Hell I can get those points playing as I have been.
Don't know why, but I started with a HC Monk. Probably thought the full achievement list would be available as in previous Seasons and wanted to knock out the HC and SC ones in one go. My GR limit is Rank 11, the Champions/Rares of Torment 1 tend to make me go all-out to beat. I've put in some 10 hours in the last few days, but have hardly progressed at all--GR11 was my starting point, and several equipment changes later I'm still stuck there. I even looked at preferred Monk skills and changed much of my skills, to not much difference.
I guess my problem is...what do I do? Do I need to just accept I need allies? Should I stop worrying about Rifts and do runs of a preferred location in search of loot (though I don't think location changes potential drops, just the monsters)? Are there...ugh...specific Monk items I should be exclusively searching for and using?
Ahhhh....there we go. Now I have something to work with.
To start, the game is entirely predicated upon the use of full sets (fully assembled Legendary Set pieces) for any efficacy on Torment level difficulty. One of the most potent damage dealing 6 piece sets is the Raiment of a Thousand Storms set, which uses the Dashing Strike spirit spender as it's main attack amplifier.
You'll want to concentrate on gaining Blood Shards as quickly and efficiently as possible so you can go to Kadala and piece for piece, assemble the full set. The use of Ring of Royal Grandeur will allow you to use the full set bonuses with only 5 pieces. Once you get the set assembled, things will take off rather fast.
Being that we're talking HC, Dual Unity rings is also very much recommended, as it will cut all incoming damage by 50%.
It's hard to guide you much until you get a set assembled, but some basic advice;
Use the Passive skill Harmony. It will boost your Toughness greatly, especially if you concentrate on gear that has a single resist, as opposed to All Resistance. Monk is special in that, with the use of Harmony, we use a single secondary resistance over the primary All Resistance affix. You get max use from this Passive if you use the largest variety of resistance types as you can (lightening on 1 piece of gear, cold on another, and poison, arcane, physical, fire respectively).
Cooldowns. As with all classes, having as much cooldown reduction is typically a goal. The passive Beacon of Ytar is a huge first step toward getting your cooldowns in order. On your sheet, you're going to want AT LEAST 40% cooldown reduction. Aiming for 50% or more would be a later goal for you to focus on.
Drop Agility rune on Mantra of evasion and choose either Hard Target or Perseverance. You'll get far more functional toughness from these choices. If I think of more, I'll drop in and post it.
Feel free to keep asking questions, I'll try to help where I can.
Another example of a HC monk - of a different build setup. Not as efficient as ruksak's above (only GR30), but still fun to play. Unfortunately I can't help you directly since I play on a different server (EU).
Copying others aside what you need to do is:
Get a weapon and a helm with sockets (emerald and amethyst (for now; later can switch to diamond) respectively)
Maybe Pants with sockets too. Can't say what gems you should socket there.
Since your amulet has +%physical on it, maybe you should look into switching some skills around to capitalize on it for now - e.g. picking Fists of Thunder : Quickening as you generator. If you change the elemental damage bonus, try to find the skills that use that element to use this buff.
Look into some life-recovery stats - they will make your life much easier in combat. In my case, I rely on paragon points in passive regen and life-on-hit, as well as on the legendary gem.
Get a decent Ring of the Royal Grandeur from act 1 caches... And the one from act 3 - it usually rolls quite decent and can give you a boost. Otherwise, if you are lucky, get yourself Focus and Restraint - they give you 50% damage increase for using generators and another (multiplicative) 50% damage increase for using spenders.
Start working towards obtaining some class set, T1 might be a bit slow, but you definitely can do it there. Keep in mind that Inna is a support / defensive set and not really something that will make you a monster of a monk by just itself. Going beyond 4pc is not really necessary (but having all base mantras on you at all times is really helpful).
NHunter gives a great example of another approach to using sets. With Ring of Royal Grandeur, you can mix set bonuses from multiple sets. A typical example would be what is seen in his profile, Sunwuko pieces for damage and Inna's for defense. Another good set combo for HC is Sunwuko + Blackthornes.
Blackthornes has some incredible use in HC survivability.
As another point of advice, all jewelry slots should have a socket in them, to take full advantage of Legendary gems. Pop a diamond in your helm socket for the cooldown.
...and improved by 2 Grift tiers immediately. It really balances out the damage mitigation when taking physical damage. Right after plugging it in, I was able to stay upright much better in large mobs. Cleared tier 43 rather easily.
Hey all. I've never been a pro player. I see people nonchalantly referencing characters builds and items and talking about how they dominated T6 three days into the new season and...well, that's not me. I don't even play with others, strictly solo. In any RPG or MMO, I always go with what sounds fun, not with what works. Now it's Season 3, and I want those cosmetic rewards (for 400 Achievement Points), but there's no way in Hell I can get those points playing as I have been.
Don't know why, but I started with a HC Monk. Probably thought the full achievement list would be available as in previous Seasons and wanted to knock out the HC and SC ones in one go. My GR limit is Rank 11, the Champions/Rares of Torment 1 tend to make me go all-out to beat. I've put in some 10 hours in the last few days, but have hardly progressed at all--GR11 was my starting point, and several equipment changes later I'm still stuck there. I even looked at preferred Monk skills and changed much of my skills, to not much difference.
I guess my problem is...what do I do? Do I need to just accept I need allies? Should I stop worrying about Rifts and do runs of a preferred location in search of loot (though I don't think location changes potential drops, just the monsters)? Are there...ugh...specific Monk items I should be exclusively searching for and using?
Thanks in advance.
If you could link me to your character profile via Bnet, I could certainly help you.
I'm currently trying to get by Grift tier 42, but I keep coming up a minute short.
Question; Are you playing season or non-season?
You can view my HC Monk and perhaps get some ideas;
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/BurningRope-1322/hero/53333948
((Currently set up for 40+ Grifts. I use a slightly different set of skill choices for speed-t6 runs))
BurningRope#1322 (US~HC) Request an invite to the official (NA) <dfans> Clan
Sure, here you go. I just quit, so it may not be updated.
And yes, he's seasonal. I managed to make it to GR14, and won thanks to a Conduit shrine (just took the gems, no reason to try a GR15).
Ahhhh....there we go. Now I have something to work with.
To start, the game is entirely predicated upon the use of full sets (fully assembled Legendary Set pieces) for any efficacy on Torment level difficulty. One of the most potent damage dealing 6 piece sets is the Raiment of a Thousand Storms set, which uses the Dashing Strike spirit spender as it's main attack amplifier.
You'll want to concentrate on gaining Blood Shards as quickly and efficiently as possible so you can go to Kadala and piece for piece, assemble the full set. The use of Ring of Royal Grandeur will allow you to use the full set bonuses with only 5 pieces. Once you get the set assembled, things will take off rather fast.
Being that we're talking HC, Dual Unity rings is also very much recommended, as it will cut all incoming damage by 50%.
It's hard to guide you much until you get a set assembled, but some basic advice;
Use the Passive skill Harmony. It will boost your Toughness greatly, especially if you concentrate on gear that has a single resist, as opposed to All Resistance. Monk is special in that, with the use of Harmony, we use a single secondary resistance over the primary All Resistance affix. You get max use from this Passive if you use the largest variety of resistance types as you can (lightening on 1 piece of gear, cold on another, and poison, arcane, physical, fire respectively).
Cooldowns. As with all classes, having as much cooldown reduction is typically a goal. The passive Beacon of Ytar is a huge first step toward getting your cooldowns in order. On your sheet, you're going to want AT LEAST 40% cooldown reduction. Aiming for 50% or more would be a later goal for you to focus on.
Drop Agility rune on Mantra of evasion and choose either Hard Target or Perseverance. You'll get far more functional toughness from these choices. If I think of more, I'll drop in and post it.
Feel free to keep asking questions, I'll try to help where I can.
BurningRope#1322 (US~HC) Request an invite to the official (NA) <dfans> Clan
Another example of a HC monk - of a different build setup. Not as efficient as ruksak's above (only GR30), but still fun to play. Unfortunately I can't help you directly since I play on a different server (EU).
Copying others aside what you need to do is:
NHunter gives a great example of another approach to using sets. With Ring of Royal Grandeur, you can mix set bonuses from multiple sets. A typical example would be what is seen in his profile, Sunwuko pieces for damage and Inna's for defense. Another good set combo for HC is Sunwuko + Blackthornes.
Blackthornes has some incredible use in HC survivability.
As another point of advice, all jewelry slots should have a socket in them, to take full advantage of Legendary gems. Pop a diamond in your helm socket for the cooldown.
BurningRope#1322 (US~HC) Request an invite to the official (NA) <dfans> Clan
Diablofans has dedicated forums for Monk, as well as Hardcore.
I would browse them and see what you may learn.
Monk forum
Hardcore Forum
Just a bit more as you go along;
I added this belt.....
...and improved by 2 Grift tiers immediately. It really balances out the damage mitigation when taking physical damage. Right after plugging it in, I was able to stay upright much better in large mobs. Cleared tier 43 rather easily.
BurningRope#1322 (US~HC) Request an invite to the official (NA) <dfans> Clan