D2r Patch 2.4

[NorthDakota]

Plague for example was a perfect fit for an Assassin. Instead, they make it a sword only.

So sad. I tested this out on mercenaries because that seemed like a situation where maybe it'd have another use. It's hardly doing anything though. Having cleansing all the time on a CS runner is pretty nice, but the lower resist basically never triggers. If you put it on an act 3 merc, he avoids getting hit, so it never triggers. If you put it on an act 5 merc, he battle cries and overrides it (along with it not triggering reliably enough). I dream of it being "on striking" since a5 merc goes absolutely bananas striking so fast with 1h weapons. At least then it'd be sort of similar to infinity.

 

[Vang]

So sad. I tested this out on mercenaries because that seemed like a situation where maybe it'd have another use. It's hardly doing anything though. Having cleansing all the time on a CS runner is pretty nice, but the lower resist basically never triggers. If you put it on an act 3 merc, he avoids getting hit, so it never triggers. If you put it on an act 5 merc, he battle cries and overrides it (along with it not triggering reliably enough). I dream of it being "on striking" since a5 merc goes absolutely bananas striking so fast with 1h weapons. At least then it'd be sort of similar to infinity.

I forgot it cast lowered resist. That straight up screams: We made a Runeword for Martial Artist.

 

[NorthDakota]

I'm kind of spamming this thread I know but I'm just living my best life dreaming about these changes, so I've been reading about d2 while at work, playing nonstop while at home, dreaming of builds laying down at night.

I was most excited about the changes to paladin offensive auras, as you all know I'm quite attached to my character Magus, who uses dual dream, hand of justice, and dragon. He was sort of relegated to that /players 1 life before these changes. Now he's doing much better! Of course, everyone is buzzing about pure fire, so I really tested that first, but now I've come round and think that my version of auradin is the best one! Of course! What other conclusion can I draw!

I've tested and played quite a bit, the only questions I had given the changes weren't really about changes to my gear, instead it was about changes to merc gear. I ended up using nothing new and focusing more on boosting my physical damage since life leech/mana leech sucks given the low physical damage. I also decided that I was going to stop using an act 1 merc with faith, as fanaticism gives very low %ED and only improves my fpa by 1. An act 2 might merc with pride improves my physical damage enough to make my sustain much nicer.

I tested many options - the new plague runeword didn't trigger lower resist frequently enough to justify the loss of physical damage auras. I tinkered with an act 3 lightning merc, many versions. Triple dragon, dual dream/plague, these two merc builds are a waste. The extra damage from the merc's holy shock or holy fire don't hardly add anything. I also tinkered with a pure support build with plague/flickering flame. The cleansing arua is nice, but lower resist does next to nothing here, and the resist fire aura doesn't really add anything to this build which already has high fire resist. I also tried an act 5 merc out with plague (like I said in a previous post) but of course battle cry overrides curses and it doesn't trigger often enough. So I went with the good ol' act 2 might merc XD

Here's some gameplay of this. My most exciting result is doing pit runs on /players 8. /players 1 is just charging through and things dying.

Gear is not optimized for mfing, it's my all arounder gear.

I also have CS runs on /players 1 and /players 8 so you can see how those go. /players 1 is a laugh. /players 8 is rough but serviceable.

Spoiler: /players 1 CS

Spoiler: /players 8 CS

 

[AntiRush]

On the current PTR build, Find Item has a +1% synergy from Find Potion. A 58% find item barb can now get to 78% with maxed Find Potion. If this sticks pit zerkers will be even more the best possible MF character.

 

[snickersnack]

So @snickersnack - blessed hammer right click functions normally, while blessed hammer held left clicks function as described above. You'll cast till the target dies, when it dies, if you mouse over a new target blessed hammer will continue casting and you will remain stationary. If the target dies and you don't mouseover a new target, you will begin moving towards your cursor as though you clicked normally with left click. To me, it still feels worse than using the "quick cast" option for hammerdin, which to me feels like a million times better. Or even better, using a controller (except teleport is a little butts, but I think the benefit of doing my best jabba the hut impression slouched in a comfy chair outweighs that)

To me, these types of changes are the most exciting.

Huh, I've never played hammerdin that way. I keep my cursor where I want to teleport to next and just use shift-leftclick to attack I think that actually mousing over enemies would be too slow for me.

 

[snickersnack]

On the current PTR build, Find Item has a +1% synergy from Find Potion. A 58% find item barb can now get to 78% with maxed Find Potion. If this sticks pit zerkers will be even more the best possible MF character.

Time for me to level a barb in D2R then. (Or just be lazy and move one of my existing ones forward...)

 

[NorthDakota]

Huh, I've never played hammerdin that way. I keep my cursor where I want to teleport to next and just use shift-leftclick to attack I think that actually mousing over enemies would be too slow for me.

Yeah, I don't do that either. I was just describing the how the behavior has changed with regards to clicking. I use push to cast now but before that I used left click + Stand still keybind.


For you shapeshifters out there, PezRadar posted in a reddit thread stating that druid shapeshifting forms will receive updates during the PTR and won't go live as is.

 

[snickersnack]

Yeah, I don't do that either. I was just describing the how the behavior has changed with regards to clicking. I use push to cast now but before that I used left click + Stand still keybind.

I don't have a hammerdin in D2R, but I should try using quick cast to see how I like in on the builds I do have. Having all of your hotkeys displayed is pretty great, though.

 

[NorthDakota]

WOW nope, I made a post here saying valk sounds were fixed in the PTR but they are not XD She is screaming loud as ever. Sorry for the unnecessary bump. How are yall doing with the PTR? anyone done anything else cool yet? working on anything cool? I was thinking about trying out the MA sin

 

[Excalibur]

I am always excited for any changes companies usually bring to the game. It's quite refreshing!
Unfortunately, I haven't tried anything. I am still waiting for a regular release.

But I couldn't help but notice this Holy Fire Build.

 

[abridged]

that is pretty crazy lol

 

[lizard]

I am always excited for any changes companies usually bring to the game. It's quite refreshing!
Unfortunately, I haven't tried anything. I am still waiting for a regular release.

But I couldn't help but notice this Holy Fire Build.

Wasnt this P1? With Dual Dream, Dragon and Hand of Justice? That is not too crazy for that amount of runes. Javazon is basically oneshotting Cows on P1 too. "Normal" Holy Fire is not going to be that insane.

 

[Excalibur]

Perhaps it was p1 but I am pretty sure it could be the same for p3 and with a bit of better optimisation could go for p5 I believe.

Javavon can certainly be still more effective at p7 but running around without having to worry about anything else with mana and javelin quantity is definitely a massive advantage.

The build has hand of justice, x2 dragon and for helm the new rune word flickering flame. He swapped the gear with dual dream a bit later on cows and it wasn’t one hitting them anymore. Make sure to check the beginning of the cow level.

 

[Vang]

So a Cham, 3xSur, 3xLo. and a Vex. Mind you game isn't made for SP, they are doing it ladder.

What does the average player have in terms of runes in a season?

 

[snickersnack]

If you put it on an act 5 merc, he battle cries and overrides it (along with it not triggering reliably enough).

That sounds like a reason to have more than one type of barb merc, just like every other merc.

I've posted about this before... let me dig it up.

Edit: Here it is.

 

[snickersnack]

Since you make Obsession in a staff, you can potentially get +3 to your primary attack skill and +3 to a mastery on top of the +4 skills it gives you.

You could still top +7 to a skill when combining both hands, if you went with a magic orb with +3 to a tree and +3 to a skill combined with Spirit monarch, but then you'd lose you out on all of the other stats you get from Obsession.

Now that I think about this again, why didn't they tone it down a bit (e.g. +3 skills instead) and make it an orb recipe? Make it Zod-Lum, or limit it to the 3 socket orbs and make it Lem-Zod-Lum. Maybe that could be potentially too OP, but there currently aren't any orb runewords.

 

[TopHatCat64]

Now that I think about this again, why didn't they tone it down a bit (e.g. +3 skills instead) and make it an orb recipe? Make it Zod-Lum, or limit it to the 3 socket orbs and make it Lem-Zod-Lum. Maybe that could be potentially too OP, but there currently aren't any orb runewords.

Definitely an interesting thought. I think what Blizzard did with Insight (expanding the bases it can be made it to include bows) is a good direction for them to continue. Expanding armor/helm/shield runewords to weapons (and vice versa) would require some thought to balance, but expanding bases for a weapon runeword to include more weapon types (same thing for armor runewords) would be a piece of cake.

Just spitballing here but...

• Treachery in a helm?
• Brand in body armor?
• Chains of Honor in a weapon?
• Duress in a helm?
• Chaos in any kind of weapon? (Now every class can whirlwind!)
• Exile in body armor?
• Rhyme in body armor?

 

[Swamigoon]

I would love to have Rhyme as a weapon runeword. Its runes, Shael and Eth, give two of my favorite modifiers to weapons (increased speed and reduced enemy defense, respectively). To those intrinsic rune bonuses, if we add Rhyme's other properties (resists, MF, GF, CBF) then this would be a coveted low-to-medium-level weapon, particularly for a caster.

 

[snickersnack]

Definitely an interesting thought. I think what Blizzard did with Insight (expanding the bases it can be made it to include bows) is a good direction for them to continue. Expanding armor/helm/shield runewords to weapons (and vice versa) would require some thought to balance, but expanding bases for a weapon runeword to include more weapon types (same thing for armor runewords) would be a piece of cake.

Just spitballing here but...

• Treachery in a helm?
• Brand in body armor?
• Chains of Honor in a weapon?
• Duress in a helm?
• Chaos in any kind of weapon? (Now every class can whirlwind!)
• Exile in body armor?
• Rhyme in body armor?

Dream in a chest armor?
Honor in a Bow/xBow
Wealth in a Helm/Shield
White in a shrunken head
1.11 armor available in helms/shields (which would make prebuffing with Fade much faster)
Crescent Moon shield

The more I think about this, the more I like it.

Edit: Here's another idea to help balancing: you're limited to 2 of any runeword, so you can make Dream in a chest armor, but you can't equip 3 (helm, shield, and chest), you have to pick 2.

More edit: Passion chest armor or shield would be very exciting. I have a zeal barb in 1.14d that uses a Grief BA and a Passion BA, and it's crazy good. Imagine having any class being able to zeal/berserk with any weapon instead of limiting that to pallies and barbs only. I think a berserksin would be at the top of my list.

 

[TopHatCat64]

I would love to have Rhyme as a weapon runeword. Its runes, Shael and Eth, give two of my favorite modifiers to weapons (increased speed and reduced enemy defense, respectively). To those intrinsic rune bonuses, if we add Rhyme's other properties (resists, MF, GF, CBF) then this would be a coveted low-to-medium-level weapon, particularly for a caster.

Dream in a chest armor?
Honor in a Bow/xBow
Wealth in a Helm/Shield
White in a shrunken head
1.11 armor available in helms/shields (which would make prebuffing with Fade much faster)
Crescent Moon shield

The more I think about this, the more I like it.

Edit: Here's another idea to help balancing: you're limited to 2 of any runeword, so you can make Dream in a chest armor, but you can't equip 3 (helm, shield, and chest), you have to pick 2.

More edit: Passion chest armor or shield would be very exciting. I have a zeal barb in 1.14d that uses a Grief BA and a Passion BA, and it's crazy good. Imagine having any class being able to zeal/berserk with any weapon instead of limiting that to pallies and barbs only. I think a berserksin would be at the top of my list.

Yes! Exactly, stuff like this. Expanding bases gives us new ways to gear and added flexibility that could bring items that never get used back into normal rotation.

I do agree @snickersnack that there would need to be some limits, otherwise everyone would just equip more of the meta runewords, instead of looking at different options. I want more of the runeword list to be end-game viable without dramatically changing their stats. This could be a way to do that.

In particular, we need more good helm runewords and as many different ways to equip CBF as possible. I get really tired sometimes of always equipping Raven Frost and looking longingly at all the great rare rings that I never wear.

Speaking of CBF, now that Blizz is digging through the archives and pulling out previously de-activated gear like Plague and Pattern...how about activating Merman's Sprocket?

Merman's Sprocket
Wyrmhide Boots

+410-420 Defense
+310 Defense Vs. Missile
+65% Faster Run/Walk
Replenish Life +5
Regenerate Mana 8%
+60-75 Magic Absorb
+55 Cold Absorb
Cannot Be Frozen
+ (0.75 Per Character Level) +0.75-74.24 To Mana (Based On Character Level)
+ (0.75 Per Character Level) Poison Resist +0.75-74.24% (Based On Character Level)