Diablo 3 initial thoughts?

[One_Medic_Army]

Not to mention that dmg debuffs just don't work on certain things, to the point I've stopped using them entirely.
Plague, Firechains, Arcane Sentries, Desecrator pools, etc... don't seem to be affected.

[frostdillicus]

I honestly don't know if they work on those things or not. I try my best not to get hit by them.

If they don't though, that's silly. Those are the main source of damage from elites most of the time. Sure, their melee swings hurt, but those can be dodged/blocked. Their specials cannot be. (By dodged I mean the inherent dodge stat, not moving out of the way. You can move out of most specials obviously.)

You know, I just was thinking about something. I wonder how long after the RMAH goes up that we hear about some group using it as a transaction medium for illegal activities. Criminals seem to use everything else on the internet, why not start laundering money through the RMAH? 15% doesn't seem like that huge of a fee...lol

[Ignatius]

Duo is actually the hardest to play in MP. With 3-4 people you can actually have someone break off to rez someone. With a duo, once someone is down they are usually corpse running because there is no way the other person can break off to rez them.

I've actually found it to be quite the opposite in Inferno, I find duo to be far better than 3-4, but almost always solo trumping that. It's pretty easy to have one person gear pretty tankily and the other just go for pure damage, and have the tank never let mobs get to the glass cannon.

Whereas when you start adding players to 3 or 4 the ability for the one to actually tank the mobs really starts to nosedive.

Maybe if you're running 3 or 4 ranged dps though. But I can't really partake in that in Inferno yet, as the highest I have another class to is a 56 Wizard, and the difficulties below Inferno are just sort of a face roll.

[frostdillicus]

I've found the ability for one person to keep control of a 4 pack of inferno elites to be almost impossible. Without an effective taunt mechanic, I'm not sure if it is possible. Eventually the mobs get pissed at the range DPS and run after them, usually turning into a kite fest, or depending on the mob affixes, instant death for the glass cannon. :\

Any combination of Teleporter/Jailer/Vortex with Extra Health/Shielding and 1-2 damage abilities makes me cry as a range dps. Of course, when they naturally have teleport + 4 other abilities I just want to throw things.

[Ignatius]

Using the terrain is typically pretty vital to it. Really the only affix that gave us trouble with this strat was reflect damage, as the glass cannon just kinda blew himself up in a few shots. Fast or Teleporter can definitely occasionally be annoying though.

[frostdillicus]

Reflect damage really is a non issue. It reflects less than 1% of the damage. LPH or regen is usually enough to take care of it. The problem with kiting is that if the mobs get separated, all of a sudden you are kiting multiple packs instead of one pack. Teleporter is notorious for causing this. I use terrain a lot. Ask Medic. His usual response when I ask the question, "Guess what I am doing?" is "Kiting a mob around a tree?"

[Ignatius]

I feel like your glass cannon isn't glass cannon enough if you find it to not be an issue then. The DH I run with takes upwards of 8k damage from crits, that makes it an actual issue, and typically the fastest route is for him to just fire those tentacle things that take awhile to travel to the target, accept that he's going to die and respawn and port to me.

[frostdillicus]

I have never taken 8k from any reflect damage ever. Then again, none of my hits are large. They are mostly DoT abilities. I have killed myself from reflect, but never for any reason other than my own stupidity.

[One_Medic_Army]

My DH in act1 inferno throws out 60k+ damage crits on occasion, but since I also have over 40,000 life the damage reflected is a bit of a non-issue. Of course my armor/resists on that character is so low that it's still pretty fragile.

[Ignatius]

I believe he crits for over 300k, so that's probably where the issue is coming from.

[frostdillicus]

Yeah, if you are critting for 300k taking 8k reflect damage is still a 2.7% damage reflect which is still pretty small. I think it's more an issue with the fact that he crits for 300k than reflect reflects a large percentage of damage. lol

[Ignatius]

I'm not saying reflect damage is an amazingly hard to deal with affix for everyone, just that it's the only champ packs that have remotely been a challenge up through act 3.

[One_Medic_Army]

Well, after running into about 5 or so packs of Illusion+Reflect Damage I'm starting to dislike it. Throw a piercing AoE into that and you will feel it.

[BETTEH]

The only thing evil needs to prevail is for good men to Error 37.

[frostdillicus]

The only thing evil needs to prevail is for good men to Error 37.

Sounds about par for the course.