Diablo 4 [XO, XBSX|S, PC, PS4, PS5, XGP]

[Malo]

Yup, it also removes power leveling as well. Everyone fights mobs at their own level, allowing players high level and low level to party up and have an fun experience.

There's still ways to power level as you can have someone help kill the capstone boss then stay teamed with them in WT3 for 200% xp bonus. Someone already managed to be level 3 in WT3, which was minimum possible from gaining XP from the capstone dungeon quest.

I really like the group scaling system though, it works fantastically.

 

[iroboto]

There's still ways to power level as you can have someone help kill the capstone boss then stay teamed with them in WT3 for 200% xp bonus. Someone already managed to be level 3 in WT3, which was minimum possible from gaining XP from the capstone dungeon quest.

I really like the group scaling system though, it works fantastically.

Good point, if you can avoid being one shotted lol, yea you can do so.

 

[Malo]

And well, as a tip, create your own legendaries in the occultist after completing your character's dungeon. It's a game by itself, and you can get decent legendaries, which are going to make a huge difference for a weak class. Ah, and don't sell any legendary nor transform them into junk, like I did.

Some tips on legendaries:

• Correct, never sell legendary items.
• You should scrap legendary items when they're completely useless to you as they provide valuable materials you can only mostly get by scrapping legendaries.
• You can extract the special affix from a legendary as an aspect and either upgrade a rare to legendary, adding that affix. Or you can replace the existing affix on a legendary. You can only do this once with that aspect you extracted. These become items you can carry with you in your Aspects tab and even store them in the bank.
• You can earn legendary aspects from dungeons which allows you to do the same thing as above, upgrading a rare to legendary or replacing an affix on a legendary, however, the variable numbers for that affix (eg. +5-10% damage) will always be the lowest value. These are added to your Codex you will find at the Occultist, they are not "items".
• Legendary aspects are restricted to specific equipment slots, you can't add them to simply any legendary. This is important but also flexible enough to allow you to sometimes move shift an aspect to a different item leaving room to equip a new legendary you found.
• Some aspect slots boost the effectiveness by 50% or 100%. For example, aspects in the Amulet slot that have variability are 100% more effective.

Compared to D3, this provides more opportunities to retain certain legendary affixes whilst upgrading your equipment, or choosing a more appropriate legendary to store the affix. The 3 or 4 stats on your equipment become extremely important for optimizing your build, needing to focus on certain stats, getting specific types of +skills etc. so the new aspect system allows you to retain those ideal pieces of equipment whilst using the occultist to upgrade your aspect, and vice versa.

Just remember, once you've extracted an affix from a legendary to make it an aspect, you can only apply it once to an item. It will show "Imprinted" before the text. You cannot extract it again. You can only overwrite it with an aspect from your codex (dungeon aspects), which is always a weaker version, or another aspect you extracted.

 

[Cyan]

thx for the tips. I need to improve my equipment and stuff. I got the whole pack in a sole dungeon. The Butcher appeared out of the blue, I lasted 30 seconds.

If that wasn't enough, the boss of that dungeon is that damn spider, the Broodguard. She beat me in 15 minutes, then I spent 45 minutes -I'm not exaggerating, longest boss fight ever for me- fighting her, she had some life left but not much, but I died.

 

[London Geezer]

Yah, there's something weird about having a level up system when the entire game world instantly scales to your new level. It does kind of make things better because you can do missions, dungeons in any order and they'll always give you an appropriate reward instead of doing a level 5 dungeon at a high level and getting trash.

Yes that's what I thought exactly. What's the point of levelling up when everyone is at your level anyway. Might as well leave the levelling out of it and just keep the weapon scaling/bonuses etc.

 

[orangpelupa]

IIRC on other game (uh.. Bungie with destiny), they explained that people love to have increasing numbers. It helps with sense of progress, bragging, etc

So that could also be the case with D4.

 

[Malo]

Yes that's what I thought exactly. What's the point of levelling up when everyone is at your level anyway. Might as well leave the levelling out of it and just keep the weapon scaling/bonuses etc.

It's definitely a noticeable difference between a scaled up player and a native player. And each level you get skill points and eventually paragon points. You have to earn those.

 

[Cyan]

Yes that's what I thought exactly. What's the point of levelling up when everyone is at your level anyway. Might as well leave the levelling out of it and just keep the weapon scaling/bonuses etc.

talking of stuff scaling, there are also breakpoints -like in Diablo 2, where you had IAS breakpoints for the werewolf or any other character, where if you passed certain increased attack speed, the animation took less frames, dealing more damage, but if you were say 1% below that IAS breakpoint, you did the same damage as before- in Diablo 4.

Diablo 4: Item Level Breakpoints Explained

Most armor stats are readily visible, but some of them are hidden. Find out what item level Breakpoints are in Diablo 4.

primagames.com

All Item Power Breakpoint Levels in Diablo 4:​

• Level 1: 1 – 149
• Level 2: 150 – 339
• Level 3: 340 – 459
• Level 4: 460 – 624
• Level 5: 625 – 724
• Level 6: 725+

 

[Cyan]

have finally beaten the Broodguard thing

29 minutes of one of the cheapest fight I've ever played
1) run around the place
2) let the dozens of spiders follow you
3) leave poison trap
4) rinse and repeat
5) pray for died enemies to drop a health potion in the meanwhile
6) when Concealment is available go for the boss knowing you can escape anything she throws at you
7) during Concealment cooldown, repeat steps 1 to 6 for eternity-.

Much to my dismay I am getting rid of Poison Imbuement so I am going to use Poison Trap only, 'cos I want to have Death Trap too, it's the only ultimate skill I find truly useful and kick-ass. Also sometimes its cooldown is really low.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Where are you in the campaign atm? a2?

Yup, A2 at the moment. It's a bit of a slog. The one nice thing is that it's easy enough that you can treat it as a totally mobile game like casual experience in WT2.

While the game may not be challenging enough to keep my attention for more than a few minutes at a time now, it's still good enough to hop in for like 5-15 minutes to finish a dungeon or do the next part of the storyline.

So, it's entirely possible that it might take me more than a year to get through WT2.

OTOH, the casualness of the game certainly makes it really easy for first time ARPG players to pick it up. There's only a few small learning curves they need to get through. Like, not holding onto gear just because of its rarity because the item level of the gear is generally more important than whether or not it's legendary (there are some exceptions).

Regards,
SB

 

[Cyan]

so this is my definitive Rogue build with which I am going to beat the game:

- Forceful Arrow (1 point, and also 1 point for each of the 2 upgrades to get Knockback, useful at times)
- Concealment (combined with Mending Obscurity of course)
- Dash
- Barrage
- Death Trap
- Poison Trap
- Skills that reduce damage taken, damage done by enemies -related to venom-, attack speed increased by every poisoned enemy, etc. Huge potential for the Rogue there, but later in the game 'cos using them now detracts from other necessary skills. As of now it's a relatively weak character.

@Silent_Buddha you might have built an op build, 'cos it's amazing how good you are at the game. I spend a LOT of time clear any dungeon, WT2 here too, but the experience has been painful.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

so this is my definitive Rogue build with which I am going to beat the game:

- Forceful Arrow (1 point, and also 1 point for each of the 2 upgrades to get Knockback, useful at times)
- Concealment (combined with Mending Obscurity of course)
- Dash
- Barrage
- Death Trap
- Poison Trap
- Skills that reduce damage taken, damage done by enemies -related to venom-, attack speed increased by every poisoned enemy, etc. Huge potential for the Rogue there, but later in the game 'cos using them now detracts from other necessary skills. As of now it's a relatively weak character.

@Silent_Buddha you might have built an op build, 'cos it's amazing how good you are at the game. I spend a LOT of time clear any dungeon, WT2 here too, but the experience has been painful.

It's nothing special. Just survivability with a little bit of damage. So, damage reduction (flat from skills and fortification) and healing (blood orbs). Skills are a resource generator skill and a resource spender skill (that has a chance to spawn blood orbs) and one control skill (for survivability) and then minion skills. I have Army of the Dead as an ultimate (didn't originally want to use any ultimates) purely to spawn minions when a boss wipes them out.

I'd rather have an escape skill than the ultimate, but the ridiculously limited skill slots and inability to change skills in combat like you could with D2 or POE means as a minion necro you don't have many slots that you can use for active skills. So, no escape skill. Survivability takes a hit, but bosses that easily wipe out the minions become slightly less tedious.

Minions are stupid as hell. So, using minions oddly makes combat more deadly since you can't focus down the important mobs, but survivability offsets that. Minions are also easily killed by certain hard hitting mobs (elites and bosses mostly but there are some normal mobs that will kill them really fast).

So far I haven't seen the ability to build a really effective pure minion build like you can in POE (requires a lot of skill investment and using very specific passive skills). But that's fine with me on a casual difficulty like WT2.

On the flip side certain minions make single targets (like bosses that don't spawn minions) slightly easier as you can spec. your mages to stun or freeze them. But then bosses also have control immunity for a time after being controlled (stun, freeze, etc.). But bosses that spawn mobs throughout a fight tend to be really long fights if you are relying on minions for DPS.

Doing a necromancer without minions would be significantly more powerful. Spec'ing no minions allows for 3 extra passive "skills" and you aren't reliant on incredibly dumb minion AI.

Regards,
SB

 

[Cyan]

It's nothing special. Just survivability with a little bit of damage. So, damage reduction (flat from skills and fortification) and healing (blood orbs). Skills are a resource generator skill and a resource spender skill (that has a chance to spawn blood orbs) and one control skill (for survivability) and then minion skills. I have Army of the Dead as an ultimate (didn't originally want to use any ultimates) purely to spawn minions when a boss wipes them out.

I'd rather have an escape skill than the ultimate, but the ridiculously limited skill slots and inability to change skills in combat like you could with D2 or POE means as a minion necro you don't have many slots that you can use for active skills. So, no escape skill. Survivability takes a hit, but bosses that easily wipe out the minions become slightly less tedious.

Minions are stupid as hell. So, using minions oddly makes combat more deadly since you can't focus down the important mobs, but survivability offsets that. Minions are also easily killed by certain hard hitting mobs (elites and bosses mostly but there are some normal mobs that will kill them really fast).

So far I haven't seen the ability to build a really effective pure minion build like you can in POE (requires a lot of skill investment and using very specific passive skills). But that's fine with me on a casual difficulty like WT2.

On the flip side certain minions make single targets (like bosses that don't spawn minions) slightly easier as you can spec. your mages to stun or freeze them. But then bosses also have control immunity for a time after being controlled (stun, freeze, etc.). But bosses that spawn mobs throughout a fight tend to be really long fights if you are relying on minions for DPS.

Doing a necromancer without minions would be significantly more powerful. Spec'ing no minions allows for 3 extra passive "skills" and you aren't reliant on incredibly dumb minion AI.

Regards,
SB

you sound very casual about it, but I've seen some people that left the necromancer for a different class 'cos they kinda died, though they didn't give up on the necro, it's a very good class.

I am about to give up on the Rogue though. The only thing keeping me playing the Rogue is the hours I spent in the game, and don't feel like starting the campaign all over again -not that it'd matter much though, I am in the very early stages of Act 2-.

The Rogue isn't very effective, at least for my play style. Every boss in a dungeon is a pita, I end up dying even after a few tries, and the battles can last for 10 minutes or more. Another example is the Forbidden City dungeon's boss. I am spending a lot of time and energy running around, avoiding missiles and doing damage from time to time, chipping some of its health, very very slowly.

 

[Cyan]

been experimenting more with the Rogue, this looks like the real deal, at least for me:

- Forceful Arrow (1 point, and also 1 point for each of the 2 upgrades to get Knockback, useful at times)
- Concealment (combined with Mending Obscurity of course)
- Shadow Step -awesome skill, thanks for the idea @Scott_Arm -
- Barrage
- Death Trap
- Caltrops (romans used caltrops to combat the enemy and I almost hadn't noticed it, it's super fun and useful)
- Skills that reduce damage taken, crit damage, lucky hit (very important, in fact I used the very last bonus with Lucky Hit), etc. Huge potential for the Rogue there, for later.

 

[Cyan]

lvl 41, still in Act 1 -thought I was in early act 2, but no-. These two rings have been essential for my build.

 

[Malo]

lvl 41, still in Act 1 -thought I was in early act 2, but no-. These two rings have been essential for my build

• None of your equipment is upgraded. You should upgrade everything at least level 2 if not 3
• You're still wearing a rare, at least upgrade it with an aspect
• None of your gem slots are filled

These are all things that could significantly increase your power.

 

[Scott_Arm]

• None of your equipment is upgraded. You should upgrade everything at least level 2 if not 3
• You're still wearing a rare, at least upgrade it with an aspect
• None of your gem slots are filled

These are all things that could significantly increase your power.

I haven’t upgraded anything either. Trying to save materials. Haven’t socketed any gems either mostly because I don’t want to deal with inventory management.

 

[Malo]

I haven’t upgraded anything either. Trying to save materials. Haven’t socketed any gems either mostly because I don’t want to deal with inventory management.

Materials aren't really a problem, just make sure you're collecting drops and salvaging them. You end up with more than enough for regular upgrades up to level 3 items.

 

[iroboto]

I haven’t upgraded anything either. Trying to save materials. Haven’t socketed any gems either mostly because I don’t want to deal with inventory management.

Just burn em. You won’t need this gear if you keep progressing. Burn it all

 

[Cyan]

• None of your equipment is upgraded. You should upgrade everything at least level 2 if not 3
• You're still wearing a rare, at least upgrade it with an aspect
• None of your gem slots are filled

These are all things that could significantly increase your power.

thanks @Malo this is the next step, 'cos I'm happy with the build. I want to get my items to the Level 4 power breakpoint (460 til 624) and re-read some other tips you shared here when I start doing that.

The Rogue, imho, might be one of the most balanced characters in the game -nor op nor up, more like weak-. But most of the efficient skills aren't exciting to use, you are constantly moving, and in the brink of death many times, it's a perfect character to play with a gamepad.

12 years ago I cut my left finger's thumb so deep at the junction that I lost most of the sensibility there and at rare times I dont push the left stick strongly enough to move at full speed. This is not an issue with a mouse, but the twitchy play style of the Rogue isn't ideal, imho, for a mouse.

I have a MMO like mouse, the Logitech G604 Lighspeed but it's getting defective. My 12 buttons Drakonia Sharkoon is okay though, but I like the typical MMO mouse with a lot of buttons to the side.

This one looks interesting to me, the Utechsmart Venus:

UtechSmart VENUS Review

The UtechSmart VENUS is an excellent wired MMO mouse with a fairly standard 12-button layout on the left side. Its right-handed ergonomic slant makes it quite co...

www.rtings.com