Weekend (10 Jun) - Falling Back to Diablo 3

Weekend (10 Jun) - Falling Back to Diablo 3

Wild, Silver, and DB made loose plans to try to get together for some group level Diablo 3 over the weekend. I have two characters at very different points and level in the game. They have even more characters, and we weren't sure which characters we should be grouping with. On Friday night Wild popped into Diablo 3, still wondering if I had any interest left in this game. As much as I liked my level 13 "machine gun" demon hunter, I just couldn't bring myself to dial her up to play. Instead, I grabbed my barbarian. He's level 34 and has completed the first level of the game. I had barely touched the surface of Nightmare, which is the next level of difficulty. I started doing quests, and was blowing through them at a pretty steady rate with little to no serious opposition. I knew my way around now, having done all of this before, but it was actually fun so I kept at it.

About an hour into the run Wild's friends started popping in around him. The portal system is one of the coolest I've seen, and Blizz should implement it in WoW. Silver and DB were in group with another player I didn't know. Wild was now in the group, as well. I guess that's what is meant by a "ninja invite." That was cool, though, we were all together. Silver was also a barbarian, at level 33, and DB was running his level 42 (I think) monk. The other player was a max level 60 and could pretty much destroy anything and everything around him without slowing down. So of course we moved pretty fast, blasting and destroying everything our path.

When I played the first level of the game, I would keep all of the "blue" level gear I would get to help improve my gear, or to sell for gold. In Nightmare level, the blue level gear is little more than trash, and the only gear of worth picking up is the yellow/gold gear, which is relatively rare. Wild also picked up the "letters" that are used to level up the jewel crafter. Silver gave Wild some truly awesome gems to use in his weapon sockets. I want to be able to make those!

Later, our level 60 friend had to leave, and the battles got a little more challenging. We picked up a level 30 player not long after that. That is how groupings seem to work. Players can come and go, with groups of 2-5 changing all the time. Where in the game the group is seems to be depends largely on the lower level players, who have to complete required quests to catch up with the higher levels in the group, which means the higher level players are repeating things they've already done. Nobody seems to mind.

Toward the end of the evening DB had to leave and our group consisted of now level 36 Wild, level 34/35 Silver, and the level 30. Despite Wild's gear and higher level, Silver easily out DPSed Wild and rarely came even close to dying, while Wild almost died several times. Almost. That would have been embarrassing. Silver took a look at Wild's gear, gave him some better gems, and suggested that my one hand weapon/shield combo was what was holding me back. I liked my shield. It made me feel safer. I took the advice seriously, though. The shield may be nice in the first level of the game, but in Nightmare high DPS and fast kills are the way to avoid dying, not heavy armor.

When we broke up for the evening, I checked the Auction House, thinking I would buy another even more awesome weapon than the one I'd bought some time back. I was a little surprised that Wild's weapon still rated among the highest of any weapon for sale. I couldn't decide, then, whether to buy a second one hand and dual wield the two weapons, or go with a two-hander. I'm going to make that call before I roll Wild in again. I'd really like to see how much that changes both his DPS and his chances for staying alive.

Weekend - On Saturday night Wild hit up Diablo 3 again, and I again grouped up with Silver and DB (and others) over the course of about three hours of fast and furious play. In between Friday and Saturday's runs, Wild made a pretty major shift in his gear, spending about half of his 200,000 or so gold on upgrades. Wild changed out eight pieces of gear and found a two-hand polearm that he liked. It was tough to turn in his shield, but the gear and weapon changes made quite a difference. Before the changes, Wild's Damage rating was 492. Now it's at 784.

The Saturday run was awesome. We had a level 60 and/or a level 54 in the group for most of night. Wild helped where he could, but things died so fast ... Somehow, Silver's level 60 demon hunter managed to "die from something I never saw" according to her. That in itself was something of an event on the night. As the evening pushed past midnight and group composition fluctuated, Wild and DB were the last standing. That made for more challenging battles, but DB's level 48 monk was a pretty devastating one-man wrecking crew all on his own. All of that made for some extremely fast leveling, and Wild advanced from level 37 to level 42.

Sunday - Wild did some solo hunting in Diablo 3 on Sunday, and found it very difficult going. I've had to return to my "attack and then run strategy" to keep from dying when encountering large groups of mobs. In Nightmare difficulty, every group of mobs are large - and more dangerous. I still have little feel for what gear stat levels I should have. A comparison with DB's monk really highlighted the difference. The monk had a DPS rating of around 1500 when he was Wild's level, while I sported a 900 DPS rating. That is a very large difference. In Nightmare, healing pots do not drop as often, and healing regen is quite slow, at least on my character. So the attack and run strategy becomes an "attack, run, and wait for health to regen" strategy. Which, frankly, quickly gets pretty boring. I've tried the Auction House, and made improvements, but obviously the gear is still very lacking. Gear drops are very chintzy in Nightmare, as well. Usually I can fill my inventory with magic items for use or sale several times in an hour of play. Now, I can finish entire segments and come away with more than half my inventory still unused. Bad luck with rare drops hasn't helped, as all Wild seems to see are bows and quivers, instead of the barbarian items he needs.

Right now Wild seems a bit over-matched, and for the first time I've had to quit the game more than once in between checkpoints, meaning I've had to go back and start over at an earlier checkpoint, redoing what I'd already cleared. Gear drops are even worse when doing content that has already been done before. Wild is currently in a cavern that he will be trying to clear for the third time. I sure hope I can get by this rough spot soon.