DiabloFans

Imagine going into a casino with a handful of monopoly money. Obviously you have no fear of charging up to the big stakes tables and throwing down all in because if you lose who cares.

Now imagine the fear and anticipation if you go into the same casino with your life savings. How do you approach those same tables now?

Some people can't live or game with substantial risk, but many of us can't get the same rush without it.


Games like UO, (arguably old eq), Eve online, darkfall, and D2 HC, all follow severe death penalty rules.

They also happen to be all my old favourites.

The one thing that may define hardcore experiences are the boss events.

Currently you can not town recall out of the skeleton king event (and I don't think you can zone out either but forgot to check )

I can just imagine doing a do or die boss encounter with 4 people and 3 die and don't leave the game forcing you to solo down a boss with 3.5x hps or die!

Will see if they allow event zone outs, if not they will be crux points again much like earlier duriel kills when low level in diablo 2

I never used this method in d2 unless I lagged out, and even thenci recall using alt f4 instead.

When you use esc to leave a game when outside Tristan in the beta however, I believe the countdown is 10 seconds. There is an actual timer on your screen, would be painful to watch that count down hoping to get out in time hahahah

Town recall is still around 6 seconds and channeled, if hit you are interrupted.

Potions are on a 20 or 30 second timer, not exactly sure what it is.

Best to have way way more of a back up plan then esc!

using a regular 1 hand bow main hand and off
1.8 and 1.8 with 15% gives us 2.07 attacks per second

using a regular 1 hand bow main hand and 3% increased attack speed off
1.8 and 1.85 with 15% still gives us 2.07 attacks per second

using a 3% increased attack 1 hand bow main hand and regular 1 hand off
1.85 and 1.80 with 15% still gives us 2.13 attacks per second

using 1 hand bow main hand and shield off
1.8 and shield = 1.8 attacks per second

so use your fastest bow in main hand for bonus. (not sure if this is a bug in ui since dps does not change at all, will report it and see.)

Quote from nemesis2252

what im wondering is if you have a 1.80 APS crossbow in one hand, and a 2.00 APS crossbow in the other, if you will be getting the maximum amount of shots out. the slower weapon takes more frames to shoot, which after a period of time would slightly delay the faster one. yes, no?

I pulled some actual numbers from beta here for 2 handed xbows vs single weapons if you are interested.

http://www.diablofans.com/topic/30178-can-demon-hunter-use-a-1h-xbow-and-shield/page__view__findpost__p__694630

I haven't run math on overall dps but I am sure that the double amount of hate regeneration being dumped into hate spenders has to help over time for added damage and more importantly way way more added spell effects and procs.

my bad on this, just checked character sheet on beta, adding a 2nd 1 hand bow changes attacks per second from 1.8 up to 2.07

Adding a low level shield adds usually either around 60 hps (i have 320 total at level 13) or around 11-15 defense (adding 15% total damage mitigation at that level) and obviously including ac mitigation of 7% on melee and 14% chance to block 14-20 damage.

regular 2 hand bow is 1.47 attacks per second. with 3% attack speed bonus quiver its up to 1.5 attacks per second


15% attack speed is going to be hard to pass up even for that added mitigation in hardcore, especially if you get some decent stats off the 2nd 1 hander.

tppk and mods like autochicken killed all open pvp for hardcore in diablo 2, not lag. This is why everyone just leveled in private games.

I could see diablo 3 being slightly better platform for some version of it, but going hostile in game and chasing someone down who is farming mobs in MF gear was fairly lame in my eyes. While I enjoyed forcing people to leave games that were pissing me off, it just easier to find another game.

I used to duel a fair amount when I was number 1 (highest level) amazon on USWEST server on the first ladder run hardcore mode and took several ears, but the thrill wore off when people just spammed bonespirit/guided arrow/frost nova/leap and run around until they would get stun locked and died or pussed into town with an instant gate. I even retired that character alive.

just confirmed that currently in beta there is no exp increase when mobs scale in hps when you add more players in game.

soloing in a 4 man game will just waste your time.

Killing skeletons net me 63 total exp at level 10 with +31 bonus exp items solo (32 exp naked), with 2 people in game, 3 people in game and 4 people.

If you want to solo, its going to be in private games I guess.

beta already has a nifty feature that remembers what players you were gaming with in your most recent games and shows if they are online.

do yourself a favor, remember the good ones and invite them to the next game.

newbie fest over.

I don't see much reason not to group up anymore, especially in hardcore. Most of the issues involved in grouping in diablo 2 involved loot competition and town killers.

Now that loot is not shared at all, shrine buffs are shared within a certain range, and the only form of griefing I can forsee would be to set up some kind of monster killing trap with a summoning banner which can be completely avoidable, why wouldn't you pug it up for faster, safer loots?

One thing I have not tested is exp change based on number of players. The + experience items don't seem to get x4 when there are four people in game though. (lowbie mobs still only give 2 or 3 exp + your item total) Will look into this.

I play hardcore exclusively back on Diablo 2, and now beta testing diablo 3, I can honestly say there is almost no reason not to use a shield with a one hander on all classes. The added ac mitigation bonus alone is huge.

Your attack speed and damage remains the same (you just cycle two 1 handers if you have them equipped) and the armor and block bonus can more then make up for some class specific bonus's that you may get on a quiver or 1hand xbow.

The only reason I could see you would want to run two 1 handed bows would be to cycle on hit affects like life steal and snare on two different weapons, or make use of a set bonus.

my razer naga may be overkill for diablo 3, however the ideal of playing solely with a mouse when grinding is appealing, especially when confined to a laptop keyboard.

the g15 is still my mainstay for a desktop keyboard, and the idea of macroing in a sequence of skills for an " oh Sh!t " hardcore character to a single button may be a possibility.

razer sidewinder was nice (although i seem to burn through these fast) but i preferred the logitech g400 feel for hand grip and height.

both had dpi adjustments, but Razer has a really nice gui to adjust a mouse to make it feel just right regardless of game.