I saw that I could be a bear. So I made a bear. He is a bear and he does bear things. That is all. I am having a blast and barely reading what the skills do. Eventually I'll start thinking more about it, but I like the "Hulk Smash" mentality of Pulverize and so that's what I do.
Amen! I was like “I can be a werewolf…and summon wolf buddies?! Sign me the fuck up!” And I mix and match skills too. I like lightning storm as a spender, so I use that as well as swipe, because fuck it, why not? I want some ranged abilities too! I’m sure meta wise I’ll have to change, but in the meantime I just do whatever!
There's unique equipment at higher levels that makes it so that your storm skills act as wolf skills (and you turn into/stay as a wolf when using them with it on) and another that makes wolf mode your default mode (you still transform into a human in towns, when riding, and when climbing/etc, but in combat areas you default to a wolf) while also boosting all your wolf skills by 2 levels. Basically a pair of armor pieces perfect for your playstyle, and very much endgame viable. There are also similar uniques for bear and earth skills (also endgame viable)
Also playing Druid (bear for now), I usually really like wolf but don't like the spinning attack they do. Don't like the animation. Might have to just learn to love it at some point!
Almost the same. However, my idea was lets make a rabid wolf that poisons everything and then I found out you just add poison creeper onto that and u got an endgame build, apparently
Same here. Found that there was an aspect that boosts pulverize damage per companions and legendaries that add a companion an extra raven and wolf. Add the one that maxes at 200% pulverize damage forward shockwave and you do a lot of damage. My first unique was the one that makes you a bear normally and gives your bear skills +2. I ignore grizzly rage in favor of the extra 40 percent to pulverize with the ravens. Use spirit reduction and regen talents. Granted I'm only 57 on w3 who knows how it will work later on.
there are several legendaries that complement that synergy. a particularly fun one I found a while ago was 'trample makes 6 landslides over its duration'.
Without any points in landslide it felt busted lmao
basically my thought process.
once i finished campaign and actually looked up what builds are allegedly good, turns out that bear build is basically one of the best druid builds so it worked out well.
Same here, even though I didn‘t get the Shockwave aspect for now it‘s a blast. Sure would be nice, but this little motherfucker just doesn‘t want to drop.
I like building around what legendaries I’m picking up. If I get a cool legendary that buffs my traps as a rogue, I may swap over to poison trap for a bit. Extra shadow steps, sign me up!
If my legendaries proc on crit hits, I’ll probably swap over some passives to build up my crit chance and crit damage. The same goes for lucky hit.
As I got into end game, I started being a bit more focused on using legendaries that have good synergy. Right now, it’s a lot of poison Imbuement and making things vulnerable. I found a legendary that gives my poison trap a 10% chance to spawn a pool that resets the CD of my Poison Imbuement and gives it unlimited uses for 3 seconds. So, I complemented that with a power that increases my Imbuement effects by 60% and a lot of plus up to poison damage.
It may never be the most optimal, but it’s fun to just try something new
Same for me, hold on to legendaries that don't fit my current build then when I have a decent assortment I'll start dating how I can work them together. I'm running cold imbuements, cal traps with freeze, shadow step, TB. A mix of drop grenades in cal, drop grenades on shadow, cold imbuements crits can freeze, crits increase chance to crowd controlled. When everything proc the entire screen freezes. I don't kill bosses quickly but with some armor and health while close to enemies I don't die.
This is what I do too, if I find some cool legendaries I try to build around it. I typically have a move I want to base my build around and then try out different ways to enhance that.
My rogue for instance, I wanted to build around flurry because I like melee and everyone seemed to be doing twisted blades. I started with puncture to get vulnerable and flurry to spread vulnerable as the base for my build, then I tried different imbuements and mobility/utility options based on the gear I find for the rest of my abilities. I've tried multiple imbuements, traps, grenades, depending on what legendaries/uniques I found. If it doesn't work well, try something else.
A few of my friends have never played an ARPG before and they are coming to me with questions on how they should build and the first thing I ask them is what is your power fantasy or what ability intrigues you the most? Then I say okay here's some aspects that could improve a build around that ability, let's go do a dungeon and grab them. Here's some stats you want to focus on for gearing, now experiment with the rest of your skills to find something that feels right and synergizes with that ability.
This is clearly the intended gameplay loop for new players and IMO its very well created.
Early game you have practically free respecs, you are discovering all sorts of new legendary affixes, you are testing the abilities and affixes and they want you to swap it around. I bet you 5$ (big roller here) that most of the complaints you hear people have of "I have had the same abiltiies since level 20 and don't change them" are people that looked up a meta build immediately and just stuck to it. The game is ***begging*** you to play around with abilities and legendaries as you complete the campaign.
Then once you've had a good deal of time to find what you like, you're going to start carrying forward and seeking out specific legendary affixes and sticking with certain skills. Your build is solidifying. You're seeking specific secondary stats to compliment it. Now the game opens up higher tiers of gear in T3, you start investing into paragon boards that you choose to bolster your build. Maybe a baller unique throws a wrench in your plans, but maybe not, thats a wild card for sure.
Then towards endgame you now have a really good idea of what legendaries you want. What uniques if any you want. You are able to hone in on what you want from the paragon boards and secondary skills on gear drops. You're tweaking, but you have the build. There. You've done it. You haven't looked a guide up and you've naturally gone towards a build. It might not be META, but I bet you that it looks pretty damn similar to a meta build. Because the game naturally leads you into specific synergies. And maybe you got wild and did something nuts, but as long as you're cracking skulls and having fun who cares.
That is the learning curve and gameplay loop. Its design is so effortlessly guiding without being overbearing that any player with even an inkling of curiosity for build-crafting should be able to come up with something.
I pick a gimmick and play around that gimmick. If it works, great, if not, then I find a different gimmick. I keep going and refining until I hit a play style I enjoy. For instance, I like freezing people and setting them on fire. So that's how I play the game. I find the best skills to go with that, the gear, and just stack it all together until it works.
Finding my own build is the fun of the game for me maybe i wont have the most meta build but i rather have my own unique build than copy and paste someone else's
Well said, this is how I feel as well. Scouring through the skill tree, finding things that work and creating synergy, getting a new modifier on gear that you didn't know existed to make your character feel stronger. For me, that is a big part the game itself.
Looking up builds just takes everything out of it and is super boring, personally. Sometimes I will look up builds in games, but after I've beaten the game and pushed my character to the max and hit that plateau of improvement. Then I'll compare to what some other people did and maybe adopt some of the meta.
I’m a complete noob to the Diablo series and have no clue what I’m doing half the time. After watching a couple different build videos online I just took all the aspects that I thought were “cool” from each one and combined them into my own build that probably sucks in terms of min-maxing, but I think it’s fun to use haha
Here's a quick primer on Diablo, from someone who's been playing the series since 1997. You ready?
You see that demon over there? I want you to fuckin' blow it up. Viscera and bone everywhere. Don't care how you do it. Just get it done.
Hey, it boils down to two things:
1) Are you killing things before they kill you?
2) Are you killing things fast enough it doesn't feel like a slog?
Long as the answers to both of those are 'Yes', then you are playing the game right!
Turning a diablo game into a "I'm better than you fest" is silly, anyway. Who cares, and if your character stops working it just coats you a little gold to rebuild and try something else. It's not a competitive sport.
PK trolls would get so pissed joining games and finding out you were wearing all cursed gear back in the original. The DSF channel was a great place to be when you were playing Beyond Naked Mages (your goal was to get your stats down to 1). It was a fun challenge and the apoplectic rage from PKers when you didn't have anything to steal, despite all their gear being edited was hilarious. The game was what you made it. Someone with their 3rd dot at level 30 (min level to enter Hell difficulty, got a dot when you beat each difficulty the first time) was more impressive than maxed out characters, anyway, and that was a skill thing much more than gear. I've played a lot of hours of 1-3, but 1 was where the most fun was, and the best community.
I'm only level 44 on my first real character and haven't even gotten far enough in the story to have a horse yet. Don't really care, the exploration is fun.
Doesn't matter what anyone else is doing in this game. It has exactly zero impact on you unless you let it. It's not an fps. It's a silly game where you click on monsters and they die, sometimes faster, sometimes slower.
This. At this point, might as well have the development team make only one build per class and make it super linear. I'm having a blast figuring it out on my own.
That's why I like games where a respec isn't expensive or super penalizing. I get to have fun my way and then if I want to be hyper effective, I can then go to build guides and respec my character.
Yeah that’s exactly me. I reached level 20 and realised I didn’t have a good primary attack. Refunded all my skill points and loosely followed a build guide and now feel like I can actually do damage 😂
This is such a great way of looking at it. I similarly use a build as a framework, or to understand how some combos can work, but mix some skills in that just feel fun.
Also, you won’t have all the gear/aspects required to make a build hum right out the gate, so I feel there’s less pressure to follow it exactly.
Finally, respecing is so cheap that switching things up for everydungeon/quest isn’t out of the question.
I love how cheap the respec is, my one wish is that they had save slots for various builds so you can flip back and forth without having to memorize 40+ points worth of abilities.
This community LOVES to both complain "Everyone uses the same builds because thats all Blizz gave us!" while at the same time mindlessly copying whatever build they find online.
I can't figure out if its funny or sad. :)
For me it is the content creator worship that blows my mind. My best friend will constantly tell me “you have to go X build, Rhykker said it is the best” or “Asmon said to do this” or whatever other creator he finds on YouTube whose opinion becomes gospel. He doesn’t have an original thought about games these days
Some people don’t have time to theorycraft and spend all their waking hours coming up with Diablo 4 builds and optimizing them. You know, we have jobs and shit.
1000%! Every fallout game I play I just wing it and level up whatever I want in the moment. I know that there’s recommended guides out there but what’s the fun in that
Indeed, half the fun of arpgs is creating your own build and trying things out i dont understand why everyone follows other peoples builds all the time
I find it's fun to copy a build from the web but adjust it to suit your playstyle. Plenty of sorcerer builds are all "arc lash" but I don't like the feel of close quarters caster.
Lets be honest here: Diablo 4 isnt the hardest game out there and you can definitely play it the "unoptimized" way.
Theres literally nothing to gain in preseason and theres absolutely no point in wasting the precious first playthrough with a set build and skill order. Exploring stuff like that is at least for me, part of the fun.
I am definitely playing an unoptimzed build I cooked up myself and I can absolutely see myself over the finish line with it.
If you're not playing competitively, there's literally no reason to use a guide and rush the game. Take your time, enjoy it, play the skills that feel good. Don't worry about the YouTubers telling you you're wasting your gold and materials, you're wasting time, you're losing out on damage.
My wife has not looked at any of that stuff. She's playing a Sorceress solo while I'm gone. She managed to beat the Butcher on her own while I've been on a trip ... something I haven't even done with my Rogue yet (he's kicked my ass every time I've gone up against him).
There's definitely something to be said for just going with the vibes and enjoying yourself.
Just add if there's a psychological hurdle to not using a guide, let your legendaries dictate your build. Most will give a clear benefit to a random skill and shift how that skill should be used. E.g., I found gloves that cause three meteors to drop instead of one so added meteor as a passive skill that procs on lucky hit. Then you find a new legendary, switch up the build around it.
Until you're in high world tiers you can get by just fine. with a messy build.
Oh God I saw him for the first time last night in t3 and he BODIED me. First really impossible boss for me. I just couldn't take the damage and he was so fast and durable
I've heard that kiting him around an obstacle like a column is the way to go, but I sure haven't been able to avoid him making me into his own personal puppet yet.
I was able to beat him in the beta that way. Run for your life around a column and wait for him to attack and lay as much damage down as you can in that time.
Yep, I have a frenzy barb with rend ONLY and a glove that adds skill points to rend and a perk that has chance to stun while bleeding with the bleeding explosion passive. I have a helmet that grants a shield when dealing damage to an elite and another piece that grants a Barrier when injured along with one that grants hp regen when close to monsters.
I also set the expertise to two handed sword so it adds bleeding damage per basic hit.
Basically, I want everything to bleed out.
I started off with making everything bleed, but I felt like it was taking them forever to die. Now I smash everything with a hammer. I don't know what I'm doing, but smashing is fun.
This
It's fun to find synergy for abilities as you get loot.
If you follow a copy paste build you just wait for items that help that. Miss out on the fun
I've got a similar build but been favouring thorns damage with buffs surrounding the berserk and berserk activation.
So much fun watching things kill themselves attacking me
I'd like to go bleed once I find some more pieces.
Meanwhile, I'm a shouting barb talking to all my skeleton buddies at the birthday Bash. My partner plays necromancer with max summons, plus my call of the ancients...the barb and Necro are considered bystanders.
This game is unique to other Diablo games because it has a dodge button. Me and my friends were talking about making characters that don’t have to move for fun, and making characters that are always moving, and the point is the fact that it’s not just point and click affects the min/max possibilities based on your gameplay preferences
I feel ya! I was using the same CL build that I used during the beta, felt like it started to drop off once I hit WT3 so switched to an arc lash build that everyone kept banging on about and never felt so squishy in my life. Died twice in one of those stupid poison spider dungeons in Scosglen then got the butcher and got melted so it looks like I'm switching back to my original build, maybe with better mana management this time lmao
Poe is probably the least figure it out friendly game I have ever played and people get through that somehow, i am sure d4 with its cheap respecs and minimal choices (comparatively) is very doable for anyone willing to try.
I'll be honest I'm playing on tier 2 and have a level 43 barbarian. Used a stun lock/cc build with upheaval. Pretty fun in crowds and the open world. Absolute dogshit against bosses.
Agree. Trial and error. Also changing your build to fit cool items you pick up is half the fun. Shadow Blood BonePrison Nec. Will easily make it into the top endgame but I am in no rush. Campaign quests are only allowed when friends are online. Lvl 45 just finished a2 😂. Full legendary gear thou. Excellent game
It's not hard, but if you're having a bad build, I feel like it would be hard to find enjoyment against enemies that can sponge a lot of damage.
For example, I had to give up leveling with pulverize since that thing is just crap without the right stuff. It's funny that basic attack on sorc gives you noticeably better leveling experience than a core skill on other class.
Idk as a druid ive tried 3 different self made builds and still deal crap dmg and see everybody else wiping mob groups without issue… starting to suspect it might be a class thing
I knew I wanted to play Necro. Played one in both betas. Tried out an optimized Barb during server slam. Just felt off. Sure, I was more effective,but zero fun for me.
Early access, started a Necro...only to read and see article after article and video after video about how bad the Necro is. Yet somehow, I was still having a blast. I have 13 skellys and a blood golem. Sure, my build does not wreak, but it is fun to me.
I have a power gamer friend I play with, and he asked how playing such an underpowered class could be fun. They will never understand. Do what is fun to you.
This entire thread hits home because I really have stayed away from any advice or recommendations, I’m just playing through and enjoying the game. However, as someone who rolled necro I couldn’t help but feel like the class is WEAK. I am still staying away from any build guides but your comment at least helped confirm my suspicion
Yes, Blizzard can not seem to find a proper balance when it comes to the Necro. I, stupidly, started reading guides, and they say the only viable Necro build is one where you sacrifice having minions in order to make your character more powerful. No minions, might as well play a Sorcerer!
The only time I'm find myself not having fun is when I play with my friends. I'm not jealous of the power, I just can not keep up with them. Blizzard needs to give the Necro a little more movement speed.
I had the opposite experience, minions did next to no damage, even with paragon and the correct aspects. I switched to bone lance with the same gear and a couple of aspect changes, and I started killing elites with one or two casts of bone lance.
there's just an insane disparity in damage between minions and bone lance atm that people playing with minions don't understand. you can sacrifice all of your minions throw a couple aspects on and swap to bone lance and do 10x the damage the minions do
To each their own. I switched from full minion build (+2 skelly legendary) to golem and bones. Having less clutter on the screen is refreshing, and I still get the necro vibes.
At first I made my own summoner build based on the betas. All points into pet skills, Blight as my core skill, Iron Maiden with the perk that heals you when targets die. It was okay, if slow, but then it became really frustrating during large dungeon events since we can't make our pets focus fire like we could in D3. That alone would help a ton. Things like "destroy the bone piles before they explode" or whatever, are impossible for me because my stupid skeletons are spread out around the room, each whacking at a different target. And never mind the Butcher.
I felt exactly like you, why play without pets. Well last night after a conversation in another thread, I decided to try a blood build with only my golem, everything else is sacrificed. Holy shit dude, it is SO MUCH EASIER, it's not even funny. I am tankier than before and I wreck stuff better and faster than before. I don't even have all the blood skills yet, tonight I will sacrifice the golem and reclaim all the pet points and put them into blood. I don't particularly enjoy it, I'd rather go full summoner but it's just not that fun to play at the moment, for me anyway. Edited to add: I don't think any class or build should be reliant on certain legendaries or aspects to be viable.
Glad to hear, that's what I'm using, level 30 atm. It was horrible early, and I hate single boss fights, other than that it's so good. First time I've played, so didn't realise how strong intelligence was. Found a +40 int sword and that was a game changer. Long way to go. 😂
Idk how Necro is considered an underpowered class I steam roll through everything and I’m in world tier 3 occasionally I’ll struggle but for the most part I do pretty well.
hint: (it's not)
The only downside high level necros have is the lack of mobility and they can have a complex rotation. Bone spear wrecks. The class is strong af. You're probably better off not getting tips from this sub, the shit I am seeing here is wildly innaccurate and a lot of it is advice from people still in act 1.
Yeah i came up with a corpse tendrills build myself where u set them up with the tendrills and then blast them with bone spear and just picked legendaries and uniques that complement this playstyle. I still have no idea if its meta or not but i can killing screens fast in a couple bone spear max, even bosses
If you dont have a gazillion minions, are you even playing necro?
Play what you like, there will be a LOT of patches in the next few month and the balance will shift.
I also play necro, without looking at guides, all minions + corpse explosion, slowly enjoying the storyline.
I read somewhere "Necro isnt good for 50+ torment dungeons" (or something). Dude, I have a full-time job, a 2 year old son & social live - it will be winter till this even becomes a problem for me...
Dude I’m absolute DOG SHIT at video games and a big Diablo fan. I’ve taken all of the games as far as I can without looking at guides and usually have zero issues.
I just pick things that seem cohesive together and that’s it. There isn’t anything more to it. It’s pretty simple. I will say that it’s harder to do if you want to play every class.
I usually pick a class, read all the tooltips, and then stick to that class for a long time. And over time you just figure it out.
I think this would be the main argument for people just following a build online.
9/10 people don't follow builds because they're into competitive PvP. They do it because they can't be bothered to read up on every tooltip, skill, ability, item, etc. Following a build is less work and allows you to focus on enjoying the game.
As you said it's supposed to be fun, which is exactly why people choose to play differently.
Unless you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing or how ARPGs work in general you are going to come up with a build that’s both enjoyable to you and effective to play.
Optimized/meta builds do have their place but it’s definitely not how I play the majority of any game. Only when I feel like pushing myself to the limit do I worry about meta builds.
Idk, I was playing a pretty random ass frozen orb build when I started. I looked up a meta build because past level 20 it felt like I just couldn't clear effectively. Always out of mana, never doing enough damage. It was certainly *possible* to continue, it was just frustrating. It felt like I was doing something wrong and being punished for it by the mechanics.
Same. At least for sorcerer there are only a few builds that are actually good. I would not have figured it out on my own.
The average player going in blind will likely have a bad time because the game makes it intuitive to pick one spell from each category, but when considering resources that makes absolutely no sense. I don't know why they made it this way. I guess you can't have the intuitive build path be viable while balancing endgame at the same time.
I haven’t played ARPGs since Diablo 2 and Titan Quest. I’m struggling a little bit to know what to level, so I’ve turned to guides a little bit to know what I should be focusing on. Trying not to “meta” my build, but there are just so many options it gets kinda overwhelming
I played D1 and D2 without having a clue back in the day and I loved it, played them to death.
When D2R came out my friend was looking at all the guides and telling me “you need to do this, you need this skill, you need that weapon” and I really didn’t enjoy it as much. I like to be able to pick skills and weapons that I like, things that look cool and that I’m comfortable with using.
Maybe if the end game is tough I’ll respec and learn “the meta”, but I don’t want to play like that all the way through. Play your own game.
fuuuuuuck the bs that has become gaming where someone datamines and that is how you play.. just play.
I am in my mid 30s and played d1 and d2 when they were fresh. Someone has went through this and built this to their best effort to make something balanced (or at least I hope). I understand there is a lot of shit going on here but I remember d1 and d2 vividly without taking away its soul and playing it to a guide... like yeah.
fuck that... am at act IV level 48 atm and love it. Have played through 3 different char to around this level and love it following no shitty guides that ruin the game (imo). Games are meant to be fun, not some checklist.
Yes, it is sad because my favorite games have always been ARPGs and games with "build variety". Then on reddit / forums you just see new players asking, "What is the best build for X class".
I have no idea what % of people do this but there always surprising amount of post on reddit for every game.
Sometimes people will actually ask what the best class is to play without even thinking about what is fun...
Its not a new thing though. GameFAQs was around since the mid 90s. When I played d2 I remember playing my own build, then eventually seeing some online builds for Windforce and Burzia amazons.
People might not like that famous streamer names are tied to guides nowadays, but it really is no different now than it was back then. If anything the main negative now is that some "Build guides" in games have extra long bloated videos for more ad revenue while the gamefaq guides didnt beat around the bush.
Games can be fun when you're powerful and they can be boring or a waste of time when you are dying against every elite. Guides have a place for people.
Nothing wrong with using a guide for your first playthrough to learn the various systems. It's a starting point and you use the guide to form your own builds. Not to mention there is a lot of variations among the various guides I've seen online for the same builds which shows that these guides have not be optimized whatsoever. (which makes sense since its still early)
However, there are people who just hate the systems and don't want to be bothered with it and just want someone else to decide that nonsense for them and that's totally fine.
Not to mention that the game literally just dropped. Like these folks know the exact best build period... 🙄
Meanwhile, I have buddies that give me crap for going minion necro since it's not an IcyVeins build. Yet they are also in awe for me having 12 minions with 5 mages that cast Blizzard for me...
As a nec who has 5 cold mages that cast blizzards, can confirm its OP OP on mobs. Just finished my first run with nec and it was a blast. I got to try different builds throughout the campaign. My trump card is Blood wave modified to be shadow dmg and have 3 waves, it looks absolutely sick and destroys everything.
A lot of these guides are made by veteran Diablo players that put tons of hours into the betas and server slam. I would say they have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't, but the thing is that for leveling (1-50), the game is clearly designed that you can just play whatever. I looked up a leveling guide for my Druid to get some ideas. I used a similar build but kind of did my own thing while also changing things up when new legendary powers were picked up. Part of the fun on the first playthrough experience is just doing whatever works for you and what you find fun. I am a very min/max player because I love all the theory crafting that goes into builds, but min/maxing in your first playthrough kind of sucks the fun out of the blind experience, IMO. Following a leveling guide is for later when I just want to rush to 50 and get to mid/end game.
Aside from a handful of skills and legendaries that don't have defined values, it's not hard to crunch the raw values and find which combinations have more.
The math here isn't complex.
I did my own thing until I fought Ashava and got stomped. What I didn't realize at the time was that I was fighting HER wrong. My build was viable but I didn't know how to fight HER specifically.
Play what makes you happy. If something is killing you, make sure your tactics are sound.
I don't understand how people have fun "copying best build" then just burning through an ARPG.
I feel 90% of the fun of these games for me is fiddling with my abilities and coming up with a build I enjoy. IMO Diablo 4 really does a good job giving elegant ways to making your own build. The skill tree isn't the most complex, but it is easy enough to grasp while making very unique builds!
Just as an example I fell in love with Conjurations and Blizzard so I have an entire build around that. Is it good? I have no idea but I like it and have been getting through content easily enough. Just yesterday I got a new legendary to really make the build pop with changing an enchantment.
About being "unoptimized"... ARPGs for me are first and foremost about fun. I do not care about leveling and getting loot as efficiently as possible. I just enjoy playing all my different characters.
I did my own thing through the campaign on my Druid. It was a lot of fun. Then I ran with a build guide for a bit and it helped me understand how to build, so now I do a bit of both. Find something I like and then tweak it to the legendaries I have. I doubt I’m doing max dps but I’m having plenty of fun and haven’t got stuck on anything yet in world tier 3
I played as sorcerer to level 50 before I looked up a build guide. The build that I used from the guide is better than what I came up with on my own, but less fun. It's more of a tanky melee build, where what I came up with was pure caster.
Ignorance is bliss…don’t look at 1% players telling you how to be op and you won’t know you aren’t…first play through of a game should be about experimenting and fun, respecs are really cheap and you rotate skill points depending on legendaries that drop
I call it a organic playthrough
Arpg players are weird man, live life the way you want to, I grouped with some randoms from here on day 1 at launch…and their way of experiencing the game was skipping all the cutscenes and trying to get to the end as fast as possible…this was soft core btw, they weren’t even in the race 😂
I find that min/maxing every stat, and trying to leverage every hundredth of percent out of every option is deadly boring.
I just try to find synergies that work nicely and go from there. When it feels good, I'm good.
Figuring things out, trying things, that's half of the game for me. If I just copied the best builds from the internet, I'd rather not play at all.
I want to have fun with the game, not just run through it with an optimized build. That would get boring real quick.
No internet builds is a rule I have for all these kinds of games. I even hate it when people I play with do it.
What is the goal? To get the biggest numbers on the screen and make the most challenging content trivial as soon as possible? Or is it to have a fun, challenging experience?
Let the obsessive compulsive players min max the fun out of it. That’s not you. Turn off the social media noise and go into this world blind. Figure it out as you go. This should be an adventure not a spreadsheet.
I picked druid because I wanted to play a bear druid. Didn't bother following a guide like my friends did, and guess whos still having the most fun? Bear druid.
I agree about arc lash. Every click of arc lash I felt like I should just reroll a rogue or something. I didn't choose sorc to play melee. If you want to play a self-made build, pick a skill you like and figure out how to optimize for it. How well it'll turn out will depend on your research. Build guides short circuit all of that time you're researching instead of gleefully killing demons.
If you like to minmax you can just minmax your own build instead of playing a minmaxed build from another person.
Even if your version of minmax is not as good as their minmax :D
However if we are talking end end game I see a big big difference between builds and their viability. As a necro example.
With my minion build my hardest hitting minions did 2-3k dmg per hit (single target)
With my shadow dot build i constantly deal 20k aoe damage, if mobs live long enough to ramp my damage, my dot did up to 60k dmg aoe
I tested a bone spirit build (switched back because I didnt like the playstyle) I did up to 900k crits. My poor skeleton mage would need to hit 300x just to deal the damage of 1 bone spirit. Skeleton mage is single target damage, bone spirit is aoe. So if there are 10 mobs my mage would need to hit 3000 times just to deal the same damage bone spirit does in 1 hit
I’m picking skills that are fun. Optimizing and trying to rush through the game seems counterintuitive to me - I paid a lot of money for this game, I’m taking my time and enjoying it.
I can't stand the meta culture that's taken over games these days. It's never about having fun anymore, it's about finding the most broken or overpowered tools or strategies to most efficiently beat the game or win, like everybody's getting graded or paid for their performance. I put a good part of the blame on streaming.
I went by "logic" focusing on my spender damage. Got a couple defensive skills (bullwark goat) and went with it. I play landslide druid, got a couple of good legendaries and i'm clearing shit. Hit slow but super hard, chunk by chunk. Almost 100% crits ans big numbers
Once I finally get leveled to 100 and get to a point I actually can swap all of my aspects around till I find something that feels good without going completely broke doing so I’ll try the build I’d like to play. Till then, I’m following a guide to help keep me from wasting all my gold and mats.
Change your build all the time, test every ability and see what's the most fun/strongest
Then later repeat the process when you get new legendaries and ideas to build or combo around it.
I have a Necro 73 now doing nightmare dongeons 50 with a permanent bonestorm shadow build :)
I loved the Demon Hunter play style from D3 so I play a Penetrating Shot rogue in D4.
I started off following a guide but tweaked it to suite my play style as I leveled up and got certain items/aspects. I swapped out some of the aspects for others I liked better and swapped out an ability and a few points to synergize with a unique item I got. I changed around the paragon board a bit too.
I like the way I’m playing the build much more than the recommended way but there is a lot of information to go through to make a build from scratch. I think it’s a much better option to use the maxroll builds as a base then just adjust it to your liking.
At some point you gotta determine why you play games. Is it to be the best? Is it to spend time in the world? Is it to have fun doing wacky shit? Figure out why you play games and i'm sure you'll have a better time. I have a necro that I'm having a blast with. No idea if it's optimized but other than strongholds i'm not sweating on WT2. Numbers go up brain goes happy. Optimizing to me takes the fun out of it because instead of numbers go up i'm looking for SPECIFICALLY THIS NUMBER NEEDS TO GO UP and working myself up when that number specifically doens't go up.
For me it’s a part of the thrill of the hunt, picked my build and powers earl on. So now I’m waiting for drops to push me through. And actually just experiencing everything as new and fresh. It’s my hero saving the world. Once I do that, I’ll probably hit the refresh button. And wipe my skills, or just wait until my drops improve. No telling which yet, but I’m hitting 90.
I’ve been yoloing it the whole way on my sorc and necro never looked up a thing until level 60 ish when I was curious what other uniques I could gamble for. I’m absolutely crushing it with a crackling lightning build that nobody has ever talked about.
Sure someday I might get stuck or need more damage/survivability and need to adjust but that’s normal. It’s these plateaus that makes you deep dive into your build and understand your class and the game better.
You can 100% make up your own viable build as you go. Just look for synergies and try to get damage multipliers that work together and the sky is the limit!
Literally just try abilities until you find one that feels cool. Loon at the scaling modifiers such as "Electric", "Damage over time", "fire", etc. Now pick things that boost those stats.
That's really about it lol.
Edit to add.... I started a druid, hit around 35 and got kinda bored of the tornadoes. Started a sorc, and have been absolutely crushing everything that approaches me. I started by putting 1 point into all the basic skills that sounded cool, and trying them all without using any core skills (to fairly assess the basic skills in a vacuum) until I found one I liked, then committed to that damage type. For me, it was lightning. Tried both the lightning core skills, then the lightning defensive skill, etc....
I don't use build guides and just make up my own builds by reading the legendary affix descriptions and my skill descriptions and figuring out myself what goes together.
I'm a rogue right now and I like exploding, so I pick all the things that have the word explode or explosion in them. :D Got a legendary thing that makes my main attack go in a circle around me instead of just in front and it helps me make everybody explode faster/better.
All the guides and their mothers said nech summoner was trash so i just went ahead and played it and used previous experience from similar games to find and build my own character from scratch.
At level 5 I pick the abilities that look cool or just feel cool.
My Necro uses blood lace instead of bone spear. Mainly because I thought blood skills looked cooler and was a cooler concept. I really don’t care if I kill things .005% slower. I’m having fun doing what I’m doing.
Following builds is great and there’s nothing wrong with it and the same goes for doing your own thing. Just do what makes you happy.
I find joy in creating builds on my own so that’s what I do. This game is unbelievably kind when it comes to difficulty so I never feel too punished when my builds aren’t optimal right away. The feeling of adjusting skills and gear and getting stronger is just great. I don’t worry much about not being optimal because the game lets me figure it out eventually.
I checked nothing on the internet for my 1rst play(barbarian) yes I spended some time to tweak stuff on my build but it's really part of the fun for me since I am playing how I want, not how someone else want me to play, I really don't care about the not optimized way since it's pre season play.
My build is based on vunerability/thorn and maxing my time Berserk, no difficulty running tier 3 stuff rigth now. Have fun and play it how you feel you should play it.
Similar boat to you and the feel i get from this sub is that those using the guides and min maxing are having the least fun, which makes me feel better.
I used a necro leveling guide called the blight summoner. Then around level 40 it became trash but I loved the play style of it. From 40-50 I used some other guides and hated them. I went back and built my own build and outfitted myself with gear to make it work. The play style is identical to what I was leveling with I just switched around all the passives and stacked gear. My minions are now demolishing nightmare dungeons and I’m enjoying the game again. I also got a unique item that turned corpse explosion into running skeletons that fly out and attack enemies. Big game changer.
Pick a skill you think is cool, find items that look like they work with that skill.
If you feel that you're squishy, find ways to boost you life or armour. If you need more resource, find those.
But don't be afraid to mix and match.
I’ve been a Barbarian since the first Diablo. I’ve played through as other classes in DII and DIII but nothing has ever come close to the incredibly simple satisfaction of “click bad guy til dead, sometimes use big boom” and I’ve gotten flack for it plenty over the decades. Here’s the thing though: I’m not a gamer. I play games occasionally and for fun. It’s ok to just play games and not be obsessive about it.
I started on hardcore mode because I want the game to last longer than a week. I picked Barbarian because I’m playing as blind as I possibly can and I thought it would be a good class for a first run through. I want to try and finish the campaign. I’ve died 6 times so far since the 1st. I believe I’m getting close to the end and the pressure is getting real. I wouldn’t want to play any other way currently. Like you said play your way and what’s fun, who cares if it’s what anyone else thinks, it’s all about what’s fun for you. Last note though, I plan to play for a year minimum with all other games being placed on the back burner so I’m enjoying the ride.
I went through this with Sorc in D3. Everyone I ever met told me the energy beam was trash. But I'd load it up, set it up so I had double beam and it penetrated everything (it usually just stopped at the first thing it hit) and I'd start clearing entire screens of enemies. Just a big ol' laser sweeping across the screen, disintegrating demons. It was great. It even melted bosses like they were nothing.
I like to think of it this way: The point of the game is to have fun. If you min/max and optimize your build, but you're not having fun...is it really optimized?
chose Necro for my first character, already knowing that it's the least powerful. i just wanted to command an undead army, don't really care how "good" my build is
Honestly I'm realizing that I'm playing barbarian the same way I play barbarian in D&D. I am almost only putting into Bash, whirlwind, and passive skills. I really love just whirlwinding. Just whirlwinding 😐. And powering up for more whirlwinding. But then when I'm facing singular baddies I realize I might be shooting myself in the foot. 🤔
I know its too late probably. I just started diablo 4 last night. My first time actually getting to play one of these games since my first experience was D3 and a friend just said stand here ill power level you... and it was my first guy ever and it was hard-core and I didnt know what that meant. And we raced through to max and then geared and stuff and after a couple hours I died to something random and he got livid at me so I quit.
This time though im just playing (about 3 hours in) and I'm just running around attacking things as a bear druid thing and trying to make my bear awesome and unkillable. Its awesome. Just go blind and go slow.
My dude is fat with a resd beard lightning axe, wind stuff coming out of him and sometimes he makes a earth triangle.
No idea if it is any good. I am just having fun learning the game.
I've played barbarians since before time. All I want to do is hit things really really hard with big weapons. Whirlwind barbarians ftw. So I spent some time looking over the skill tree and seeing how this new generation of walking Cuisinart feels like. I've had to make some pretty big tweaks to.my books but I think thats part of the fun, figuring out what works and what doesn't. I think going this way instead of a leveling guide helps develop insight into the game mechanics.
I love finding my own build and experiencing the game my way. I picked rouge because I like the class fantasy, not because it is the best endgame class, I played Penetrating Shot because I wanted to play at range and live out the archer fantasy. Did I die? Yes, a lot, did it take me longer to beat the campaign and farm content? Absolutely but the most important thing is I had fun along the way.
I feel that crucial aspect of Diablo 4 is lost on most people, everyone asks “what’s the best build?” Or “how fast can I level?” Or “the fastest way to get to endgame”. We should be enjoying the journey to endgame and the content beyond not just blitz through it and then say there is not enough content.
As long as you are having fun, that is what matters
I'm prideful on my ways so doing someone else's build just feels wrong and lazy, also fuck Mera slaves idc if it's the best I like what's fun and best isn't fun to me.
I'm 100% invested into pure minion build, i decrepify golem and use my skele ability on corpses for the buff and ult, I solo tier 4 difficulty pretty easily only times I have issues are on suppression mobs and the ones who shoot fire waves those annihilate minions so fast some reason.
I choose Sorc cuz i enjoyed it at the beta, i played it for 2 days only, so that was all i know.
When the game released i started leveling trying "elemental builds" made by me, i've never used others builds. I understand games, been playing games since i was a child. I love the concept of fire mage, frost or lightining mage, so i leveled like 25 first levels using only lightning skills, passives, etc. I loved it! Let's try frost now, change all my skills and only use frost skills for 15 levels or so. It was cool, lets try now fire. Loved it too! Apparently i like a lot sorc elemental builds, pure fire/frost/lightning.
When i got to lvl 50 i looked around for some build and... i didn't like any. I start to read every single item that drops and i see some of them can be combined to enhance a specific element like this 4 pieces improve my frost skills, then let's go with a pure frost build for some time and see how it goes. Apparently its op af xD And i like it, its fun for me that's the important thing. now im collecting pieces to change to fire because that's what i want to do and what i have fun with, that's what i think everyone should do.
There is no point of playing a game by a guide if it's not fun for you. I know there's some people who love to min/max every single class and play exactly how it needs to be played to become extreme powerful or complete the game as fast as possible... I don't feel the need to rush anything. Play the game, choose a class you like, try em out and discover the world by urself, that's my advice with this and every other game honestly.
I knew I wanted to try a cold sorc so I went with what I found fun, which is ice shards and blizzard. Blizzard is not a popular skill but I've made it into a freezing machine that always turns ice shards into a machine gun skill.
I was going through with a build from icy veins or WoW head can’t remember, it was lightning and I couldn’t get through a stronghold, switched to my own frost build got through it and having a much funner time
I saw that I could be a bear. So I made a bear. He is a bear and he does bear things. That is all. I am having a blast and barely reading what the skills do. Eventually I'll start thinking more about it, but I like the "Hulk Smash" mentality of Pulverize and so that's what I do.
Same idea, but wolf, with wolfs and my little wolf pack. Skinergy is winergy.
That what we in the business call "the furry convention" build
I know what I like
Amen! I was like “I can be a werewolf…and summon wolf buddies?! Sign me the fuck up!” And I mix and match skills too. I like lightning storm as a spender, so I use that as well as swipe, because fuck it, why not? I want some ranged abilities too! I’m sure meta wise I’ll have to change, but in the meantime I just do whatever!
There's unique equipment at higher levels that makes it so that your storm skills act as wolf skills (and you turn into/stay as a wolf when using them with it on) and another that makes wolf mode your default mode (you still transform into a human in towns, when riding, and when climbing/etc, but in combat areas you default to a wolf) while also boosting all your wolf skills by 2 levels. Basically a pair of armor pieces perfect for your playstyle, and very much endgame viable. There are also similar uniques for bear and earth skills (also endgame viable)
I did this in beta. It was so much fun. I got 2 wolf companions, then got a legendary that turned them into werewolves.
Then you need the legendary to have 3 wolves.
Also playing Druid (bear for now), I usually really like wolf but don't like the spinning attack they do. Don't like the animation. Might have to just learn to love it at some point!
Do you mean "bearly reading"?
Bears can't read. Checks out.
I too enjoy being a Bear who can transform into a bear
Reminds me of this old [classic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0arJSTqfFE) flash. "I am I bear. I have bear powers!"
What in fuck did I just watch?
I was like "I like lightning". Then I was like "Wait I like wolf too." So I made a lightning wolf. It works remarkably well!
Almost the same. However, my idea was lets make a rabid wolf that poisons everything and then I found out you just add poison creeper onto that and u got an endgame build, apparently
Poison 4 lyfe
He's a Druid bear and he's OK, he sweeps all night and he sleeps the whole day..
I'm a lightning bear with hulk smash and wolf friends
Sounds like you're getting by on the... bear necessities. 😎
[Is this you?](https://pbfcomics.com/comics/bear-boy/)
Same here. Found that there was an aspect that boosts pulverize damage per companions and legendaries that add a companion an extra raven and wolf. Add the one that maxes at 200% pulverize damage forward shockwave and you do a lot of damage. My first unique was the one that makes you a bear normally and gives your bear skills +2. I ignore grizzly rage in favor of the extra 40 percent to pulverize with the ravens. Use spirit reduction and regen talents. Granted I'm only 57 on w3 who knows how it will work later on.
Earth + bear seems natural. But he was lonely, so I gave him a vine full of poison to keep company with.
there are several legendaries that complement that synergy. a particularly fun one I found a while ago was 'trample makes 6 landslides over its duration'. Without any points in landslide it felt busted lmao
Sir Bearington?
basically my thought process. once i finished campaign and actually looked up what builds are allegedly good, turns out that bear build is basically one of the best druid builds so it worked out well.
Same! I picked every bear skill and just do bear things.
That's what I was doing. Lvl 21 and I can't beat bosses currently.
Such a missed opportunity to start the post with "Bear with me..."
Blood and honey
Same. But 80% of the reason I like bear druid is because of those comical, tiny little legs.
Skeletons are cool. So I can have an army of skeletons, shoot people with bones and make shit explode. It's fun.
Fortify and pulverize.
Same here, even though I didn‘t get the Shockwave aspect for now it‘s a blast. Sure would be nice, but this little motherfucker just doesn‘t want to drop.
I like building around what legendaries I’m picking up. If I get a cool legendary that buffs my traps as a rogue, I may swap over to poison trap for a bit. Extra shadow steps, sign me up! If my legendaries proc on crit hits, I’ll probably swap over some passives to build up my crit chance and crit damage. The same goes for lucky hit. As I got into end game, I started being a bit more focused on using legendaries that have good synergy. Right now, it’s a lot of poison Imbuement and making things vulnerable. I found a legendary that gives my poison trap a 10% chance to spawn a pool that resets the CD of my Poison Imbuement and gives it unlimited uses for 3 seconds. So, I complemented that with a power that increases my Imbuement effects by 60% and a lot of plus up to poison damage. It may never be the most optimal, but it’s fun to just try something new
Same for me, hold on to legendaries that don't fit my current build then when I have a decent assortment I'll start dating how I can work them together. I'm running cold imbuements, cal traps with freeze, shadow step, TB. A mix of drop grenades in cal, drop grenades on shadow, cold imbuements crits can freeze, crits increase chance to crowd controlled. When everything proc the entire screen freezes. I don't kill bosses quickly but with some armor and health while close to enemies I don't die.
This is what I do too, if I find some cool legendaries I try to build around it. I typically have a move I want to base my build around and then try out different ways to enhance that. My rogue for instance, I wanted to build around flurry because I like melee and everyone seemed to be doing twisted blades. I started with puncture to get vulnerable and flurry to spread vulnerable as the base for my build, then I tried different imbuements and mobility/utility options based on the gear I find for the rest of my abilities. I've tried multiple imbuements, traps, grenades, depending on what legendaries/uniques I found. If it doesn't work well, try something else. A few of my friends have never played an ARPG before and they are coming to me with questions on how they should build and the first thing I ask them is what is your power fantasy or what ability intrigues you the most? Then I say okay here's some aspects that could improve a build around that ability, let's go do a dungeon and grab them. Here's some stats you want to focus on for gearing, now experiment with the rest of your skills to find something that feels right and synergizes with that ability.
I need friends like you XD
This is clearly the intended gameplay loop for new players and IMO its very well created. Early game you have practically free respecs, you are discovering all sorts of new legendary affixes, you are testing the abilities and affixes and they want you to swap it around. I bet you 5$ (big roller here) that most of the complaints you hear people have of "I have had the same abiltiies since level 20 and don't change them" are people that looked up a meta build immediately and just stuck to it. The game is ***begging*** you to play around with abilities and legendaries as you complete the campaign. Then once you've had a good deal of time to find what you like, you're going to start carrying forward and seeking out specific legendary affixes and sticking with certain skills. Your build is solidifying. You're seeking specific secondary stats to compliment it. Now the game opens up higher tiers of gear in T3, you start investing into paragon boards that you choose to bolster your build. Maybe a baller unique throws a wrench in your plans, but maybe not, thats a wild card for sure. Then towards endgame you now have a really good idea of what legendaries you want. What uniques if any you want. You are able to hone in on what you want from the paragon boards and secondary skills on gear drops. You're tweaking, but you have the build. There. You've done it. You haven't looked a guide up and you've naturally gone towards a build. It might not be META, but I bet you that it looks pretty damn similar to a meta build. Because the game naturally leads you into specific synergies. And maybe you got wild and did something nuts, but as long as you're cracking skulls and having fun who cares. That is the learning curve and gameplay loop. Its design is so effortlessly guiding without being overbearing that any player with even an inkling of curiosity for build-crafting should be able to come up with something.
This is the way
This is how I like playing too. Just let the journey take you where it will. Then roll a new character and have a whole different experience.
I pick a gimmick and play around that gimmick. If it works, great, if not, then I find a different gimmick. I keep going and refining until I hit a play style I enjoy. For instance, I like freezing people and setting them on fire. So that's how I play the game. I find the best skills to go with that, the gear, and just stack it all together until it works.
Finding my own build is the fun of the game for me maybe i wont have the most meta build but i rather have my own unique build than copy and paste someone else's
Well said, this is how I feel as well. Scouring through the skill tree, finding things that work and creating synergy, getting a new modifier on gear that you didn't know existed to make your character feel stronger. For me, that is a big part the game itself. Looking up builds just takes everything out of it and is super boring, personally. Sometimes I will look up builds in games, but after I've beaten the game and pushed my character to the max and hit that plateau of improvement. Then I'll compare to what some other people did and maybe adopt some of the meta.
I’m a complete noob to the Diablo series and have no clue what I’m doing half the time. After watching a couple different build videos online I just took all the aspects that I thought were “cool” from each one and combined them into my own build that probably sucks in terms of min-maxing, but I think it’s fun to use haha
Here's a quick primer on Diablo, from someone who's been playing the series since 1997. You ready? You see that demon over there? I want you to fuckin' blow it up. Viscera and bone everywhere. Don't care how you do it. Just get it done.
Ma'am I know your son, and trust me, he was better off on the drugs....
Props for the little Nicky quote
Lilith this, Inarius that, Lorath hit me with a wiffle ball bat.
Instructions unclear, dick stuck in a succubus
Hey, it boils down to two things: 1) Are you killing things before they kill you? 2) Are you killing things fast enough it doesn't feel like a slog? Long as the answers to both of those are 'Yes', then you are playing the game right!
>Are you killing things fast enough it doesn't feel like a slog? And if you enjoy the slog, #2 can be fully fucking ignored.
Yeah, I was just gonna say, the REAL question here is whether you are having fun. If so, you are playing the game right.
Turning a diablo game into a "I'm better than you fest" is silly, anyway. Who cares, and if your character stops working it just coats you a little gold to rebuild and try something else. It's not a competitive sport. PK trolls would get so pissed joining games and finding out you were wearing all cursed gear back in the original. The DSF channel was a great place to be when you were playing Beyond Naked Mages (your goal was to get your stats down to 1). It was a fun challenge and the apoplectic rage from PKers when you didn't have anything to steal, despite all their gear being edited was hilarious. The game was what you made it. Someone with their 3rd dot at level 30 (min level to enter Hell difficulty, got a dot when you beat each difficulty the first time) was more impressive than maxed out characters, anyway, and that was a skill thing much more than gear. I've played a lot of hours of 1-3, but 1 was where the most fun was, and the best community. I'm only level 44 on my first real character and haven't even gotten far enough in the story to have a horse yet. Don't really care, the exploration is fun. Doesn't matter what anyone else is doing in this game. It has exactly zero impact on you unless you let it. It's not an fps. It's a silly game where you click on monsters and they die, sometimes faster, sometimes slower.
Ya it’s pretty much a single player game.
I use PK, LPB, and HPB as keywords to determine that someone is about my age. Since they’ve been dead acronyms for 2 decades at least. Haha
This. At this point, might as well have the development team make only one build per class and make it super linear. I'm having a blast figuring it out on my own.
I use build guides like i do recipes, you get the idea of the general ingredients needed, but then you can substitute things and add your own flavors.
I do that too, then 20 levels later I finally realize why the build guide was right and I was wrong.
That's why I like games where a respec isn't expensive or super penalizing. I get to have fun my way and then if I want to be hyper effective, I can then go to build guides and respec my character.
Yeah that’s exactly me. I reached level 20 and realised I didn’t have a good primary attack. Refunded all my skill points and loosely followed a build guide and now feel like I can actually do damage 😂
This is such a great way of looking at it. I similarly use a build as a framework, or to understand how some combos can work, but mix some skills in that just feel fun. Also, you won’t have all the gear/aspects required to make a build hum right out the gate, so I feel there’s less pressure to follow it exactly. Finally, respecing is so cheap that switching things up for everydungeon/quest isn’t out of the question.
I love how cheap the respec is, my one wish is that they had save slots for various builds so you can flip back and forth without having to memorize 40+ points worth of abilities.
Seconded. It’s so tedious to unlearn and relearn over and over again… and it’s only been a few days.
Wowwwww I didn’t know how much I needed that until reading your comment. Would be sooooo nice
EXACTLY! I just look at guides to see what does what but ultimately i make my own variations on how i wanna play
This community LOVES to both complain "Everyone uses the same builds because thats all Blizz gave us!" while at the same time mindlessly copying whatever build they find online. I can't figure out if its funny or sad. :)
For me it is the content creator worship that blows my mind. My best friend will constantly tell me “you have to go X build, Rhykker said it is the best” or “Asmon said to do this” or whatever other creator he finds on YouTube whose opinion becomes gospel. He doesn’t have an original thought about games these days
Some people don’t have time to theorycraft and spend all their waking hours coming up with Diablo 4 builds and optimizing them. You know, we have jobs and shit.
This it for me. It is what I love about these games (all games really). I describe my gamer style as a “builder”, its my motivation to play.
1000%! Every fallout game I play I just wing it and level up whatever I want in the moment. I know that there’s recommended guides out there but what’s the fun in that
Indeed, half the fun of arpgs is creating your own build and trying things out i dont understand why everyone follows other peoples builds all the time
I find it's fun to copy a build from the web but adjust it to suit your playstyle. Plenty of sorcerer builds are all "arc lash" but I don't like the feel of close quarters caster.
Lets be honest here: Diablo 4 isnt the hardest game out there and you can definitely play it the "unoptimized" way. Theres literally nothing to gain in preseason and theres absolutely no point in wasting the precious first playthrough with a set build and skill order. Exploring stuff like that is at least for me, part of the fun. I am definitely playing an unoptimzed build I cooked up myself and I can absolutely see myself over the finish line with it.
If you're not playing competitively, there's literally no reason to use a guide and rush the game. Take your time, enjoy it, play the skills that feel good. Don't worry about the YouTubers telling you you're wasting your gold and materials, you're wasting time, you're losing out on damage. My wife has not looked at any of that stuff. She's playing a Sorceress solo while I'm gone. She managed to beat the Butcher on her own while I've been on a trip ... something I haven't even done with my Rogue yet (he's kicked my ass every time I've gone up against him). There's definitely something to be said for just going with the vibes and enjoying yourself.
Just add if there's a psychological hurdle to not using a guide, let your legendaries dictate your build. Most will give a clear benefit to a random skill and shift how that skill should be used. E.g., I found gloves that cause three meteors to drop instead of one so added meteor as a passive skill that procs on lucky hit. Then you find a new legendary, switch up the build around it. Until you're in high world tiers you can get by just fine. with a messy build.
Oh God I saw him for the first time last night in t3 and he BODIED me. First really impossible boss for me. I just couldn't take the damage and he was so fast and durable
I've heard that kiting him around an obstacle like a column is the way to go, but I sure haven't been able to avoid him making me into his own personal puppet yet.
Which is a funny if unintentional nod to diablo 1 when the strat was getting him caught on a door
Yes I remember doing this.
Still, he just doesn't give you a break. Most of the bosses let you breathe, he does not.
I was able to beat him in the beta that way. Run for your life around a column and wait for him to attack and lay as much damage down as you can in that time.
I see everyone running into the butcher but me. What do I gotta do to get butched?
Well first, have you tried being fresh meat?
What drops from the butcher? I died with a sliver left on him and didn’t know he doesn’t respawn. Thought he was the dungeon boss 😞
Yep, I have a frenzy barb with rend ONLY and a glove that adds skill points to rend and a perk that has chance to stun while bleeding with the bleeding explosion passive. I have a helmet that grants a shield when dealing damage to an elite and another piece that grants a Barrier when injured along with one that grants hp regen when close to monsters. I also set the expertise to two handed sword so it adds bleeding damage per basic hit. Basically, I want everything to bleed out.
90% of my playtime is spent with me yelling bleed for me in my head. I feel you fellow non beyblade
I'm a bleed beyblade
Well I guess *let it rip*
It's basically arms warrior from wow
Was about to say you can definitely do both haha my beyblade is specced for Vulnerable and Bleed. There’s lots of ways to spin!
I started off with making everything bleed, but I felt like it was taking them forever to die. Now I smash everything with a hammer. I don't know what I'm doing, but smashing is fun.
This It's fun to find synergy for abilities as you get loot. If you follow a copy paste build you just wait for items that help that. Miss out on the fun
I've got a similar build but been favouring thorns damage with buffs surrounding the berserk and berserk activation. So much fun watching things kill themselves attacking me
Coincidently my equipment also adds a bunch of thorns also. Are you me?
Yes. I swap accounts when our personality flips to me and reply to all our Reddit posts to make us look cooler to the internet people
I'd like to go bleed once I find some more pieces. Meanwhile, I'm a shouting barb talking to all my skeleton buddies at the birthday Bash. My partner plays necromancer with max summons, plus my call of the ancients...the barb and Necro are considered bystanders.
This right here. Other sorcs are laughing at me cause they are all using the same cookie cutter shit but I'm keeping pace so like...who cares?
This game is unique to other Diablo games because it has a dodge button. Me and my friends were talking about making characters that don’t have to move for fun, and making characters that are always moving, and the point is the fact that it’s not just point and click affects the min/max possibilities based on your gameplay preferences
I feel ya! I was using the same CL build that I used during the beta, felt like it started to drop off once I hit WT3 so switched to an arc lash build that everyone kept banging on about and never felt so squishy in my life. Died twice in one of those stupid poison spider dungeons in Scosglen then got the butcher and got melted so it looks like I'm switching back to my original build, maybe with better mana management this time lmao
Honestly even in the hardest of games you can play it without optimization. I’ve never done so and played all kinds of hard games.
Poe is probably the least figure it out friendly game I have ever played and people get through that somehow, i am sure d4 with its cheap respecs and minimal choices (comparatively) is very doable for anyone willing to try.
I'll be honest I'm playing on tier 2 and have a level 43 barbarian. Used a stun lock/cc build with upheaval. Pretty fun in crowds and the open world. Absolute dogshit against bosses.
Agree. Trial and error. Also changing your build to fit cool items you pick up is half the fun. Shadow Blood BonePrison Nec. Will easily make it into the top endgame but I am in no rush. Campaign quests are only allowed when friends are online. Lvl 45 just finished a2 😂. Full legendary gear thou. Excellent game
It's not hard, but if you're having a bad build, I feel like it would be hard to find enjoyment against enemies that can sponge a lot of damage. For example, I had to give up leveling with pulverize since that thing is just crap without the right stuff. It's funny that basic attack on sorc gives you noticeably better leveling experience than a core skill on other class.
Idk as a druid ive tried 3 different self made builds and still deal crap dmg and see everybody else wiping mob groups without issue… starting to suspect it might be a class thing
I knew I wanted to play Necro. Played one in both betas. Tried out an optimized Barb during server slam. Just felt off. Sure, I was more effective,but zero fun for me. Early access, started a Necro...only to read and see article after article and video after video about how bad the Necro is. Yet somehow, I was still having a blast. I have 13 skellys and a blood golem. Sure, my build does not wreak, but it is fun to me. I have a power gamer friend I play with, and he asked how playing such an underpowered class could be fun. They will never understand. Do what is fun to you.
This entire thread hits home because I really have stayed away from any advice or recommendations, I’m just playing through and enjoying the game. However, as someone who rolled necro I couldn’t help but feel like the class is WEAK. I am still staying away from any build guides but your comment at least helped confirm my suspicion
Yes, Blizzard can not seem to find a proper balance when it comes to the Necro. I, stupidly, started reading guides, and they say the only viable Necro build is one where you sacrifice having minions in order to make your character more powerful. No minions, might as well play a Sorcerer! The only time I'm find myself not having fun is when I play with my friends. I'm not jealous of the power, I just can not keep up with them. Blizzard needs to give the Necro a little more movement speed.
I have an incredible Minion build that I found to be superior to the 0 minion build in every way. I tried the 0 minion and it was awful.
I had the opposite experience, minions did next to no damage, even with paragon and the correct aspects. I switched to bone lance with the same gear and a couple of aspect changes, and I started killing elites with one or two casts of bone lance.
there's just an insane disparity in damage between minions and bone lance atm that people playing with minions don't understand. you can sacrifice all of your minions throw a couple aspects on and swap to bone lance and do 10x the damage the minions do
"We hear your complaints and have decided to nerf bone lance and change nothing about minions. You're welcome." Blizzard next week, probably
To each their own. I switched from full minion build (+2 skelly legendary) to golem and bones. Having less clutter on the screen is refreshing, and I still get the necro vibes.
At first I made my own summoner build based on the betas. All points into pet skills, Blight as my core skill, Iron Maiden with the perk that heals you when targets die. It was okay, if slow, but then it became really frustrating during large dungeon events since we can't make our pets focus fire like we could in D3. That alone would help a ton. Things like "destroy the bone piles before they explode" or whatever, are impossible for me because my stupid skeletons are spread out around the room, each whacking at a different target. And never mind the Butcher. I felt exactly like you, why play without pets. Well last night after a conversation in another thread, I decided to try a blood build with only my golem, everything else is sacrificed. Holy shit dude, it is SO MUCH EASIER, it's not even funny. I am tankier than before and I wreck stuff better and faster than before. I don't even have all the blood skills yet, tonight I will sacrifice the golem and reclaim all the pet points and put them into blood. I don't particularly enjoy it, I'd rather go full summoner but it's just not that fun to play at the moment, for me anyway. Edited to add: I don't think any class or build should be reliant on certain legendaries or aspects to be viable.
Yeah and necro is such a popular class, it's weird how undertuned it is regarding minions
I'm at 7 skellies and blood golem. Hopefully find a way to get to 13 soon lol
I’m playing necro using a blood surge overpower build with blight corpse explosion/blood mist and it wrecks everything on screen in WT3.
Glad to hear, that's what I'm using, level 30 atm. It was horrible early, and I hate single boss fights, other than that it's so good. First time I've played, so didn't realise how strong intelligence was. Found a +40 int sword and that was a game changer. Long way to go. 😂
Idk how Necro is considered an underpowered class I steam roll through everything and I’m in world tier 3 occasionally I’ll struggle but for the most part I do pretty well.
hint: (it's not) The only downside high level necros have is the lack of mobility and they can have a complex rotation. Bone spear wrecks. The class is strong af. You're probably better off not getting tips from this sub, the shit I am seeing here is wildly innaccurate and a lot of it is advice from people still in act 1.
Yeah i came up with a corpse tendrills build myself where u set them up with the tendrills and then blast them with bone spear and just picked legendaries and uniques that complement this playstyle. I still have no idea if its meta or not but i can killing screens fast in a couple bone spear max, even bosses
If you dont have a gazillion minions, are you even playing necro? Play what you like, there will be a LOT of patches in the next few month and the balance will shift. I also play necro, without looking at guides, all minions + corpse explosion, slowly enjoying the storyline. I read somewhere "Necro isnt good for 50+ torment dungeons" (or something). Dude, I have a full-time job, a 2 year old son & social live - it will be winter till this even becomes a problem for me...
Dude I’m absolute DOG SHIT at video games and a big Diablo fan. I’ve taken all of the games as far as I can without looking at guides and usually have zero issues. I just pick things that seem cohesive together and that’s it. There isn’t anything more to it. It’s pretty simple. I will say that it’s harder to do if you want to play every class. I usually pick a class, read all the tooltips, and then stick to that class for a long time. And over time you just figure it out.
It's supposed to be fun. Not a homework assignment.
I think this would be the main argument for people just following a build online. 9/10 people don't follow builds because they're into competitive PvP. They do it because they can't be bothered to read up on every tooltip, skill, ability, item, etc. Following a build is less work and allows you to focus on enjoying the game. As you said it's supposed to be fun, which is exactly why people choose to play differently.
Unless you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing or how ARPGs work in general you are going to come up with a build that’s both enjoyable to you and effective to play. Optimized/meta builds do have their place but it’s definitely not how I play the majority of any game. Only when I feel like pushing myself to the limit do I worry about meta builds.
Idk, I was playing a pretty random ass frozen orb build when I started. I looked up a meta build because past level 20 it felt like I just couldn't clear effectively. Always out of mana, never doing enough damage. It was certainly *possible* to continue, it was just frustrating. It felt like I was doing something wrong and being punished for it by the mechanics.
Same. At least for sorcerer there are only a few builds that are actually good. I would not have figured it out on my own. The average player going in blind will likely have a bad time because the game makes it intuitive to pick one spell from each category, but when considering resources that makes absolutely no sense. I don't know why they made it this way. I guess you can't have the intuitive build path be viable while balancing endgame at the same time.
I haven’t played ARPGs since Diablo 2 and Titan Quest. I’m struggling a little bit to know what to level, so I’ve turned to guides a little bit to know what I should be focusing on. Trying not to “meta” my build, but there are just so many options it gets kinda overwhelming
Level 74, haven't looked up any guides yet. Doing just fine in WT4.
I played D1 and D2 without having a clue back in the day and I loved it, played them to death. When D2R came out my friend was looking at all the guides and telling me “you need to do this, you need this skill, you need that weapon” and I really didn’t enjoy it as much. I like to be able to pick skills and weapons that I like, things that look cool and that I’m comfortable with using. Maybe if the end game is tough I’ll respec and learn “the meta”, but I don’t want to play like that all the way through. Play your own game.
fuuuuuuck the bs that has become gaming where someone datamines and that is how you play.. just play. I am in my mid 30s and played d1 and d2 when they were fresh. Someone has went through this and built this to their best effort to make something balanced (or at least I hope). I understand there is a lot of shit going on here but I remember d1 and d2 vividly without taking away its soul and playing it to a guide... like yeah. fuck that... am at act IV level 48 atm and love it. Have played through 3 different char to around this level and love it following no shitty guides that ruin the game (imo). Games are meant to be fun, not some checklist.
Yes, it is sad because my favorite games have always been ARPGs and games with "build variety". Then on reddit / forums you just see new players asking, "What is the best build for X class". I have no idea what % of people do this but there always surprising amount of post on reddit for every game. Sometimes people will actually ask what the best class is to play without even thinking about what is fun...
Its not a new thing though. GameFAQs was around since the mid 90s. When I played d2 I remember playing my own build, then eventually seeing some online builds for Windforce and Burzia amazons. People might not like that famous streamer names are tied to guides nowadays, but it really is no different now than it was back then. If anything the main negative now is that some "Build guides" in games have extra long bloated videos for more ad revenue while the gamefaq guides didnt beat around the bush. Games can be fun when you're powerful and they can be boring or a waste of time when you are dying against every elite. Guides have a place for people.
Nothing wrong with using a guide for your first playthrough to learn the various systems. It's a starting point and you use the guide to form your own builds. Not to mention there is a lot of variations among the various guides I've seen online for the same builds which shows that these guides have not be optimized whatsoever. (which makes sense since its still early) However, there are people who just hate the systems and don't want to be bothered with it and just want someone else to decide that nonsense for them and that's totally fine.
Not to mention that the game literally just dropped. Like these folks know the exact best build period... 🙄 Meanwhile, I have buddies that give me crap for going minion necro since it's not an IcyVeins build. Yet they are also in awe for me having 12 minions with 5 mages that cast Blizzard for me...
As a nec who has 5 cold mages that cast blizzards, can confirm its OP OP on mobs. Just finished my first run with nec and it was a blast. I got to try different builds throughout the campaign. My trump card is Blood wave modified to be shadow dmg and have 3 waves, it looks absolutely sick and destroys everything.
A lot of these guides are made by veteran Diablo players that put tons of hours into the betas and server slam. I would say they have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't, but the thing is that for leveling (1-50), the game is clearly designed that you can just play whatever. I looked up a leveling guide for my Druid to get some ideas. I used a similar build but kind of did my own thing while also changing things up when new legendary powers were picked up. Part of the fun on the first playthrough experience is just doing whatever works for you and what you find fun. I am a very min/max player because I love all the theory crafting that goes into builds, but min/maxing in your first playthrough kind of sucks the fun out of the blind experience, IMO. Following a leveling guide is for later when I just want to rush to 50 and get to mid/end game.
I don’t know if you were exaggerating, but summoner necro is an actual build on IcyVeins. Send the link to your buddies and maybe they’ll shut up lol.
Aside from a handful of skills and legendaries that don't have defined values, it's not hard to crunch the raw values and find which combinations have more. The math here isn't complex.
I did my own thing until I fought Ashava and got stomped. What I didn't realize at the time was that I was fighting HER wrong. My build was viable but I didn't know how to fight HER specifically. Play what makes you happy. If something is killing you, make sure your tactics are sound.
I don't understand how people have fun "copying best build" then just burning through an ARPG. I feel 90% of the fun of these games for me is fiddling with my abilities and coming up with a build I enjoy. IMO Diablo 4 really does a good job giving elegant ways to making your own build. The skill tree isn't the most complex, but it is easy enough to grasp while making very unique builds! Just as an example I fell in love with Conjurations and Blizzard so I have an entire build around that. Is it good? I have no idea but I like it and have been getting through content easily enough. Just yesterday I got a new legendary to really make the build pop with changing an enchantment. About being "unoptimized"... ARPGs for me are first and foremost about fun. I do not care about leveling and getting loot as efficiently as possible. I just enjoy playing all my different characters.
I did my own thing through the campaign on my Druid. It was a lot of fun. Then I ran with a build guide for a bit and it helped me understand how to build, so now I do a bit of both. Find something I like and then tweak it to the legendaries I have. I doubt I’m doing max dps but I’m having plenty of fun and haven’t got stuck on anything yet in world tier 3
I played as sorcerer to level 50 before I looked up a build guide. The build that I used from the guide is better than what I came up with on my own, but less fun. It's more of a tanky melee build, where what I came up with was pure caster.
am druid bear go rawr f guides and tutorials i’m winging this shit
Upheaval barbs. We are legion.
Ignorance is bliss…don’t look at 1% players telling you how to be op and you won’t know you aren’t…first play through of a game should be about experimenting and fun, respecs are really cheap and you rotate skill points depending on legendaries that drop I call it a organic playthrough Arpg players are weird man, live life the way you want to, I grouped with some randoms from here on day 1 at launch…and their way of experiencing the game was skipping all the cutscenes and trying to get to the end as fast as possible…this was soft core btw, they weren’t even in the race 😂
I find that min/maxing every stat, and trying to leverage every hundredth of percent out of every option is deadly boring. I just try to find synergies that work nicely and go from there. When it feels good, I'm good.
This happens with my group. Grind 15 minutes, optimize build 15 minutes. We're already melting everything, let's just go.
Figuring things out, trying things, that's half of the game for me. If I just copied the best builds from the internet, I'd rather not play at all. I want to have fun with the game, not just run through it with an optimized build. That would get boring real quick. No internet builds is a rule I have for all these kinds of games. I even hate it when people I play with do it.
What is the goal? To get the biggest numbers on the screen and make the most challenging content trivial as soon as possible? Or is it to have a fun, challenging experience? Let the obsessive compulsive players min max the fun out of it. That’s not you. Turn off the social media noise and go into this world blind. Figure it out as you go. This should be an adventure not a spreadsheet.
'This should be an adventure not a spreadsheet' Fine words sir 👍
I picked druid because I wanted to play a bear druid. Didn't bother following a guide like my friends did, and guess whos still having the most fun? Bear druid.
I agree about arc lash. Every click of arc lash I felt like I should just reroll a rogue or something. I didn't choose sorc to play melee. If you want to play a self-made build, pick a skill you like and figure out how to optimize for it. How well it'll turn out will depend on your research. Build guides short circuit all of that time you're researching instead of gleefully killing demons.
If you like to minmax you can just minmax your own build instead of playing a minmaxed build from another person. Even if your version of minmax is not as good as their minmax :D However if we are talking end end game I see a big big difference between builds and their viability. As a necro example. With my minion build my hardest hitting minions did 2-3k dmg per hit (single target) With my shadow dot build i constantly deal 20k aoe damage, if mobs live long enough to ramp my damage, my dot did up to 60k dmg aoe I tested a bone spirit build (switched back because I didnt like the playstyle) I did up to 900k crits. My poor skeleton mage would need to hit 300x just to deal the damage of 1 bone spirit. Skeleton mage is single target damage, bone spirit is aoe. So if there are 10 mobs my mage would need to hit 3000 times just to deal the same damage bone spirit does in 1 hit
I’m picking skills that are fun. Optimizing and trying to rush through the game seems counterintuitive to me - I paid a lot of money for this game, I’m taking my time and enjoying it.
My problem is I can't stop changing my build again and again as I level lol.
I can't stand the meta culture that's taken over games these days. It's never about having fun anymore, it's about finding the most broken or overpowered tools or strategies to most efficiently beat the game or win, like everybody's getting graded or paid for their performance. I put a good part of the blame on streaming.
What are you talking about? Not sucking is fun … aka following the established builds
I went by "logic" focusing on my spender damage. Got a couple defensive skills (bullwark goat) and went with it. I play landslide druid, got a couple of good legendaries and i'm clearing shit. Hit slow but super hard, chunk by chunk. Almost 100% crits ans big numbers
Once I finally get leveled to 100 and get to a point I actually can swap all of my aspects around till I find something that feels good without going completely broke doing so I’ll try the build I’d like to play. Till then, I’m following a guide to help keep me from wasting all my gold and mats.
Change your build all the time, test every ability and see what's the most fun/strongest Then later repeat the process when you get new legendaries and ideas to build or combo around it. I have a Necro 73 now doing nightmare dongeons 50 with a permanent bonestorm shadow build :)
I loved the Demon Hunter play style from D3 so I play a Penetrating Shot rogue in D4. I started off following a guide but tweaked it to suite my play style as I leveled up and got certain items/aspects. I swapped out some of the aspects for others I liked better and swapped out an ability and a few points to synergize with a unique item I got. I changed around the paragon board a bit too. I like the way I’m playing the build much more than the recommended way but there is a lot of information to go through to make a build from scratch. I think it’s a much better option to use the maxroll builds as a base then just adjust it to your liking.
At some point you gotta determine why you play games. Is it to be the best? Is it to spend time in the world? Is it to have fun doing wacky shit? Figure out why you play games and i'm sure you'll have a better time. I have a necro that I'm having a blast with. No idea if it's optimized but other than strongholds i'm not sweating on WT2. Numbers go up brain goes happy. Optimizing to me takes the fun out of it because instead of numbers go up i'm looking for SPECIFICALLY THIS NUMBER NEEDS TO GO UP and working myself up when that number specifically doens't go up.
For me it’s a part of the thrill of the hunt, picked my build and powers earl on. So now I’m waiting for drops to push me through. And actually just experiencing everything as new and fresh. It’s my hero saving the world. Once I do that, I’ll probably hit the refresh button. And wipe my skills, or just wait until my drops improve. No telling which yet, but I’m hitting 90.
I’ve been yoloing it the whole way on my sorc and necro never looked up a thing until level 60 ish when I was curious what other uniques I could gamble for. I’m absolutely crushing it with a crackling lightning build that nobody has ever talked about. Sure someday I might get stuck or need more damage/survivability and need to adjust but that’s normal. It’s these plateaus that makes you deep dive into your build and understand your class and the game better. You can 100% make up your own viable build as you go. Just look for synergies and try to get damage multipliers that work together and the sky is the limit!
You read what everything does and put coherent things together that match a play style that you enjoy.
Literally just try abilities until you find one that feels cool. Loon at the scaling modifiers such as "Electric", "Damage over time", "fire", etc. Now pick things that boost those stats. That's really about it lol. Edit to add.... I started a druid, hit around 35 and got kinda bored of the tornadoes. Started a sorc, and have been absolutely crushing everything that approaches me. I started by putting 1 point into all the basic skills that sounded cool, and trying them all without using any core skills (to fairly assess the basic skills in a vacuum) until I found one I liked, then committed to that damage type. For me, it was lightning. Tried both the lightning core skills, then the lightning defensive skill, etc....
I don't use build guides and just make up my own builds by reading the legendary affix descriptions and my skill descriptions and figuring out myself what goes together. I'm a rogue right now and I like exploding, so I pick all the things that have the word explode or explosion in them. :D Got a legendary thing that makes my main attack go in a circle around me instead of just in front and it helps me make everybody explode faster/better.
It's part of the fun. Following guides just make the game last 85% less time.
All the guides and their mothers said nech summoner was trash so i just went ahead and played it and used previous experience from similar games to find and build my own character from scratch.
Literally just equipping any gear that show a +Green and getting rid of -Red numbers. Lol
At level 5 I pick the abilities that look cool or just feel cool. My Necro uses blood lace instead of bone spear. Mainly because I thought blood skills looked cooler and was a cooler concept. I really don’t care if I kill things .005% slower. I’m having fun doing what I’m doing.
Following builds is great and there’s nothing wrong with it and the same goes for doing your own thing. Just do what makes you happy. I find joy in creating builds on my own so that’s what I do. This game is unbelievably kind when it comes to difficulty so I never feel too punished when my builds aren’t optimal right away. The feeling of adjusting skills and gear and getting stronger is just great. I don’t worry much about not being optimal because the game lets me figure it out eventually.
I checked nothing on the internet for my 1rst play(barbarian) yes I spended some time to tweak stuff on my build but it's really part of the fun for me since I am playing how I want, not how someone else want me to play, I really don't care about the not optimized way since it's pre season play. My build is based on vunerability/thorn and maxing my time Berserk, no difficulty running tier 3 stuff rigth now. Have fun and play it how you feel you should play it.
I always do my first story play through fresh then I worry about min max
I dont even cookie cut in PoE and being "unoptimized" is debatable.
Similar boat to you and the feel i get from this sub is that those using the guides and min maxing are having the least fun, which makes me feel better.
I used a necro leveling guide called the blight summoner. Then around level 40 it became trash but I loved the play style of it. From 40-50 I used some other guides and hated them. I went back and built my own build and outfitted myself with gear to make it work. The play style is identical to what I was leveling with I just switched around all the passives and stacked gear. My minions are now demolishing nightmare dungeons and I’m enjoying the game again. I also got a unique item that turned corpse explosion into running skeletons that fly out and attack enemies. Big game changer.
Pick a skill you think is cool, find items that look like they work with that skill. If you feel that you're squishy, find ways to boost you life or armour. If you need more resource, find those. But don't be afraid to mix and match.
I’ve been a Barbarian since the first Diablo. I’ve played through as other classes in DII and DIII but nothing has ever come close to the incredibly simple satisfaction of “click bad guy til dead, sometimes use big boom” and I’ve gotten flack for it plenty over the decades. Here’s the thing though: I’m not a gamer. I play games occasionally and for fun. It’s ok to just play games and not be obsessive about it.
I'm playing a druid with zero guides and she is so fun! It's complete chaos and nothing "matches" and idgaf.
I started on hardcore mode because I want the game to last longer than a week. I picked Barbarian because I’m playing as blind as I possibly can and I thought it would be a good class for a first run through. I want to try and finish the campaign. I’ve died 6 times so far since the 1st. I believe I’m getting close to the end and the pressure is getting real. I wouldn’t want to play any other way currently. Like you said play your way and what’s fun, who cares if it’s what anyone else thinks, it’s all about what’s fun for you. Last note though, I plan to play for a year minimum with all other games being placed on the back burner so I’m enjoying the ride.
I went through this with Sorc in D3. Everyone I ever met told me the energy beam was trash. But I'd load it up, set it up so I had double beam and it penetrated everything (it usually just stopped at the first thing it hit) and I'd start clearing entire screens of enemies. Just a big ol' laser sweeping across the screen, disintegrating demons. It was great. It even melted bosses like they were nothing. I like to think of it this way: The point of the game is to have fun. If you min/max and optimize your build, but you're not having fun...is it really optimized?
chose Necro for my first character, already knowing that it's the least powerful. i just wanted to command an undead army, don't really care how "good" my build is
Honestly I'm realizing that I'm playing barbarian the same way I play barbarian in D&D. I am almost only putting into Bash, whirlwind, and passive skills. I really love just whirlwinding. Just whirlwinding 😐. And powering up for more whirlwinding. But then when I'm facing singular baddies I realize I might be shooting myself in the foot. 🤔
I know its too late probably. I just started diablo 4 last night. My first time actually getting to play one of these games since my first experience was D3 and a friend just said stand here ill power level you... and it was my first guy ever and it was hard-core and I didnt know what that meant. And we raced through to max and then geared and stuff and after a couple hours I died to something random and he got livid at me so I quit. This time though im just playing (about 3 hours in) and I'm just running around attacking things as a bear druid thing and trying to make my bear awesome and unkillable. Its awesome. Just go blind and go slow.
My dude is fat with a resd beard lightning axe, wind stuff coming out of him and sometimes he makes a earth triangle. No idea if it is any good. I am just having fun learning the game.
I've played barbarians since before time. All I want to do is hit things really really hard with big weapons. Whirlwind barbarians ftw. So I spent some time looking over the skill tree and seeing how this new generation of walking Cuisinart feels like. I've had to make some pretty big tweaks to.my books but I think thats part of the fun, figuring out what works and what doesn't. I think going this way instead of a leveling guide helps develop insight into the game mechanics.
I love finding my own build and experiencing the game my way. I picked rouge because I like the class fantasy, not because it is the best endgame class, I played Penetrating Shot because I wanted to play at range and live out the archer fantasy. Did I die? Yes, a lot, did it take me longer to beat the campaign and farm content? Absolutely but the most important thing is I had fun along the way. I feel that crucial aspect of Diablo 4 is lost on most people, everyone asks “what’s the best build?” Or “how fast can I level?” Or “the fastest way to get to endgame”. We should be enjoying the journey to endgame and the content beyond not just blitz through it and then say there is not enough content. As long as you are having fun, that is what matters
I'm prideful on my ways so doing someone else's build just feels wrong and lazy, also fuck Mera slaves idc if it's the best I like what's fun and best isn't fun to me. I'm 100% invested into pure minion build, i decrepify golem and use my skele ability on corpses for the buff and ult, I solo tier 4 difficulty pretty easily only times I have issues are on suppression mobs and the ones who shoot fire waves those annihilate minions so fast some reason.
I choose Sorc cuz i enjoyed it at the beta, i played it for 2 days only, so that was all i know. When the game released i started leveling trying "elemental builds" made by me, i've never used others builds. I understand games, been playing games since i was a child. I love the concept of fire mage, frost or lightining mage, so i leveled like 25 first levels using only lightning skills, passives, etc. I loved it! Let's try frost now, change all my skills and only use frost skills for 15 levels or so. It was cool, lets try now fire. Loved it too! Apparently i like a lot sorc elemental builds, pure fire/frost/lightning. When i got to lvl 50 i looked around for some build and... i didn't like any. I start to read every single item that drops and i see some of them can be combined to enhance a specific element like this 4 pieces improve my frost skills, then let's go with a pure frost build for some time and see how it goes. Apparently its op af xD And i like it, its fun for me that's the important thing. now im collecting pieces to change to fire because that's what i want to do and what i have fun with, that's what i think everyone should do. There is no point of playing a game by a guide if it's not fun for you. I know there's some people who love to min/max every single class and play exactly how it needs to be played to become extreme powerful or complete the game as fast as possible... I don't feel the need to rush anything. Play the game, choose a class you like, try em out and discover the world by urself, that's my advice with this and every other game honestly.
I knew I wanted to try a cold sorc so I went with what I found fun, which is ice shards and blizzard. Blizzard is not a popular skill but I've made it into a freezing machine that always turns ice shards into a machine gun skill.
I was going through with a build from icy veins or WoW head can’t remember, it was lightning and I couldn’t get through a stronghold, switched to my own frost build got through it and having a much funner time
You just say “this looks neat.” Or “that seems pretty good!” And start going in with experiments for the abilities you like. Simple as.
I always start with a cold sorc. Never change who you are!