, i guess the answer is easy the game use to be abandoned and the game feel dead , player just leave and lost hope , i dont think back them the game have a full team of dev working on the game , maybe 1 guy sometime work a little bit on d2 and is more easy to throw a few runeword trying to fix some issue compare working on all character synergie and working on class skill , not sure how your test is going but for barbarian option are very limited
my barb did use grief for soloing chaos before wave 3 of baal runs, so I can say for barb zerk it is definitely the go to if you needing to teleport around
I think for general pvm if I did not need to tele on my own I would rather use something like a big eth thunder maul botd. I have not tried that out before so its just speculation though.
when it comes to zealots i can prove 100% beyond a doubt that grief is the ok budget option if you have someone to tele for you. there are far better weapons than grief for pvm.
For pvp i really dont see the problem. its balancing the melee and creating fun not op builds. why do we need to have 100 different flavor of icecream at the cost of killing chocolate u know what im saying?
i also have a eth great pole axe on my barb is look kool and is good
but 2 grief in my opinion is the way to go
anyway going to eat now and farm gear later , and one day i will call you for a ww barb duels after the leader end the only rule . i will hold grief and you not 
will see the result ok later going to eat 
1 Like
haha ok, that would be fun. I would probably use like edc or beast but probably lose. I am aware that grief cb is probably the best bvb weapon.
afterwards i would challenge u to a zeal vs zeal, only rule is u are not allowed to use edc, etotd, or fools weapon but u get to use grief.
1 Like
This is why I said nerf Grief and buff melee at same time. There’s nothing wrong with doing this.
2 Likes
how would u account for the nerf to hammerdins or foh paladins in pvp? buff holy sheild to get extra +400 damage to smite and buff charge to get +400 base damage? but then how would u balance being able to do that kind of dps with a hoto on now? this is a big can of worms where u are going to kill builds or make them insane. already at a fine balance level overall so why???
1 Like
Phase blade is also fast. People would still use pb and repair it constantly if it wasn’t indestructible, simply because it’s speed helps get to the best breakpoints.
1 Like
Not everyone hates Grief, some actually loves it. Nerfing Grief leaves those people unhappy. If you hate Grief, then don’t use it, Blizzard just needs to provide alternatives to Grief, so you can use a viable alternative, then everyone can be happy.
“Guys. I have a Grief for my Barbarian. What should he’s second weapon be? Last Wish? Ethereal Breath of the Dying?”
“Another Greif.”
2 Likes
for bvc it should be a beast
for bvb and pvm it should be stormshield (assuming u doin some serious pvm such as soloing chaos sanc in baal runs)
actual pvm bis is ondals lol
ah so the real reason comes out. You just don’t want your shiny toy nerfed.
Nerf Grief and refund the Lo rune to the users if they choose to “disassemble” once.
I want it nerfed so that item diversity can increase. Unless you provide alternative that are just as OP as Grief, people will just continue to ignore all options and use Grief instead.
if u want item diversity it already exists. nerfing grief just kills build diversity and options for hybrid characters.
main thing to nerf would actually be ignorance and sheeplike behavior
I have the option to use grief on every melee build I have, but I don’t. I use other runewords purposefully like death and oath which can clear monsters just as fast.
This mentality of having to use the best possible things simply because they are there and the best didn’t really appear until after D2. It’s aspects of play like achievements that force a certain path of playing, and a mob mentality amongst the fanboys of having to use the best possible gear to be viable like in D3.
It comes down to this; if you don’t like an OP runeword, don’t use it. Why does the other guy using it affect you in this game?
Agreed 100% with this
1 Like
not gonna read all post see if someone else corrected you but
Dream Paladin…NOT GRIEF…
Dream Paladin has multi weap choice but not grief
Crescent Moon(-35% Light resist for Radial support)
Shael Shael Ber Ber Ber Ber Phase Blade(high melee attack speed and high CB for bosses)
Rabies Druid NOT GRIEF
its Plague Bearer(+5 to Rabies to power to power up the poison dmg)
WW Barb Grief + Lawbringer…likely use Frenzy to proc Lawbringer then use WW…more suit for Ubers
other option…Grief + Bul-Kathos(C-Blade) (Shael rune for ias BP) …BK+Gore+Steelrend+Guillaume = 95% CB
Grief for Barb if using BK sword prob better made in CB…or Zweihander for lower repair cost but 6 less average dmg than one made in a PB
why not Last Wish over BK ? you loose 20% dps since cant reach best ias BP with Last Wish
other option 3: Grief + Azurewrath(ignore Undeads with Physical Immunes)
Zweihander and BK have weap range of 2 which is prob more favorable for a WW Barb…Phase Blade has weap range of 1
also want to note…a Rare Zweihander with 2 socket and 30-40 ias can outdo BK Sword
Eth rare Zweihander
Prefixes
Mechanic: 2 Sockets(2X Ber)
Cruel(300% ED)
Master 150% ED + 250 AR OR Fool for 1500+ ish Attack Rating + Max dmg)
Suffixes
30-40 ias(either work for ias BP)
Auto-repair
OR
Eth rare Colossus Blade(206 - 536 dmg(master mod choice instead of fool))
Prefixes
Mechanic: 2 Sockets(2X Ber for 40% CB)
Cruel: 300% ED
Master: 150% ED + 250 AR OR Fool for 1500+ ish Attack Rating + Max dmg)
Suffixes
Quickness: 40 ias( for ias BP)(cant have less than 40% on a Colossus Blade to
get the IAS BP
Transcendence(+20 Min dmg) or Amp proc if gonna use some frenzy b4 ww
OR Knockback
Auto-repair
as usual…rare weapons that can pop with busted mods are ignored//not even known about XD…but ya those are like near impossible to find though to be fair 
That’s what I said multiple times in my posts.
Yeah, honestly they might have to gut grief at some point especially if they add more content or new monsters because it really is that good. Nothing else even comes close to it.
1 Like
Because all the original developers quit or shifted teams before the horrible 1.10 patch even went live.
The game went into “maintenance” mode after that, with the classic teams taking over just to make sure the servers are running.
1.10 was an awful patch that ruined the game.
The addition of synergies made characters and builds 1 dimensional. No more hybrids.
1.10 made the game harder, rendering most uniques obsolete as they did not receive any updates.
Instead, we were given OP runewords like Enigma and Grief to compensate. Like band-aids on top of a horrible mistake.
So basically, they released 1.10 which radically changed the game, then abandoned it because of their drama with ActiBlizz.
1 Like
You are wrong. Main guy who worked on 1.10 was from original d2 team. He wanteds to left with others but stayed.
It elevated game and made it so much better.
1 Like
Ya that’s why I left it at seeing what 2.4 has. All the weapons would need to be tweaked to add purpose for each type beyond almost meaningless Stat differences that weed out 95% of the base items anyways.
Tweaking one or two items doesn’t alter much in the end.