Hi,
This is not a build guide, more like a general tips/tricks or feedback based on my personal experience. I felt the need to write this to help others who would like to invest heavy ours into this game because some early decisions/missed opportunities cannot be changed later on and can have consequences.
I got D2R and D3 last XMAS on special, kids got an Xbox so I thought after 20 years of zero gaming, I start again. I have to emphasise again, I am extremely new to this game, definitely wrong about number of things but my experience is still more than I was able to find out in the wild in the last 2 months of my journey. I played sorceress because that was the most recommended character for new players so my comments/experience all based on that too.
Game type:
I was presented with a page to pick a game type. I had no clue about offline VS online, had no interest researching it just wanted to get on with the game fast and have fun… mistake right there. I picket OFFLINE because I did not want to deal with network/server issues and felt no desire to join teams with others without much experience. Even if you select offline character, you still presented the ladder option, which is online only so this is really confusing. To me in offline, the “non-ladder” and the “standard soft core” seems to be the same, this should be made more clear somewhere. Anyway, both online and offline has its pros and cons but offline has huge disadvantage later on because you will not be able to trade with others, join games for XP, farming, etc! You have to find everything by yourself and if you cannot, you end up on poor gear like myself and struggle when things get hard. The only advantage I found offline was that the maps do not change, once you discovered an area, you can go back for farming a bit easier since the layout is all there.
Gameplay, controller, etc
I went out to the Blood Moor and sort of did this and that, slowly got into the atmosphere of the game. It really gets addictive after a while and it really is a fantastic game! I found the controller mechanics sort of okay but sorting out the inventory, picking up stuff much clumsier compared to PC where you have mouse cursor. The number of control binds are also limited and more complex to my liking but it is what it is.
Since I did not know much about respec, some of the buzzwords I started to look for YouTube videos. After watching countless number of hours of build guides, I thought I was ready to move on. I watched various streamers, MrLlamaSC, Fextralife, Rhykker, Sweet Phil, Old School Game Snob, etc and they helped a lot, credit to all of them! I found Maxwell a bit too late unfortunately but more on that later. Not sure what it is, but the graphics and details of my console is not as sharp and nice looking as some of the PC footage I watched on YT. I play on a high end Sammy 4K tv, it may be the graphics card of the Xbox?! Not sure…
Build for Normal:
I settled on Fextralife’s Fireball sorceress, which was great. The YT video, the progression was well laid out, followed it blindly and got through Normal mode with relative ease. I only died few times, which was down to my stupidity. I finished Normal on level 42 as I took my time and enjoyed clearing all rooms, took on extra challenges, etc. I also collected lots of stuff I thought to be worthy and traded it for gold which made me quite rich. But… I learnt later on that it was not a good idea. I did not pay too much attention on MagicFind (MF) which was also a mistake because gold is only worth beginning in the game where you are pretty much naked, you rely on the town vendors to get some decent gear. Later on though, I thought the vendors really don’t sell anything useful and what they sell is also ridiculously overpriced. In Normal on low levels, a Low Resistance Wand was over 200K, in Nightmare a level 2 one was 56k?! I had LORE helm, STEALTH body armour and LEAF staff at this point with some resistance charms, etc but all low-level budget gear.
I did not do much farming in Normal, although I was trying to get INSIGHT polearm for my Mercenary and I was totally unable to find a 4 socketed white base even in Cows. Since I was hoarder, I rolled many amethysts and had number of them at my disposal so after my 3rd attempt, I managed to cube up a standard Voulge with 4 sockets. I also picket up a Crystal Sword from ACT5 and got Larzuk to put 4 sockets on it, got my SPIRIT and I felt ready for Nightmare.
Build for Nightmare:
Since the good experience of the previous build, I settled again on Fextralife’s ForzenOrb/ChainLightning build and respec-ed into that. Since my main damage type was FO cold, I was actually flying through Nightmare easily again, just adding some points to ColdMastery, etc but mostly building my second element of the Lightning tree, preparing for Hell. Just for the record, my power was coming from me gaining INSIGHT and SPIRIT early on, the game only started dropping me 4 socketed polearms in ACT3 but only a handful of times, I am sure it would have been slower or harder without it.
Finished Nightmare on level 72 and it is where it turned pretty rough and I had to go through a reality check. Everything I collected was sort of okay so far but it is useless in HELL. First, I realised that we start with negative resistances and vulnerable so much. The mobs are stronger, cause more damage and harder to kill even in the Blood Moor. But above all, this is where I faced first time cold immune mobs, cannot do damage to them and this is where I realised how weak ChainLightning was. I stopped immediately and started researching.
Facing reality:
It did not take long to realise I am not ready for Hell, period. I missed out on the opportunity of MagicFind and although I had maxed out all my gold storage (yes, +12M) it is useless. You cannot buy good gear for Hell, you have to find it yourself. The only use for gold later in the game is to pay for death penalty although it is not that expensive or resurrect my under geared Mercenary. I also gambled away like +2M only giving me 2 skiller amulets. I seemed to be getting always good stuff for other characters.
The other (bigger) mistake is my second build choice. The Fextralife Orb build used charms, stuff I thought I could buy but NO, you cannot and even getting them is not simple (Hellfire Torch, Annihilus, etc) Whenever you are watching a build guide, pay attention to the gear! It may feature stuff you will never get or, you have to get to Hell to be able to farm it, even worse: finish hell to be able to farm it.
You could say, well you still have 2 respecs just change… stop complaining. Sure, but it is not that simple as I lost confidence in most guides, they are from the PC user’s point of view and it won’t solve my poor gear / poor mercenary issues.
The other thing to note: most streamers have massive powers over us. They play on PC, they have access to developer switches which gives them unlimited respecs, they can experiment with any build, on console we don’t have that luxury. They also have access to HeroEditor, they can cheat their offline characters the way they want, we do not have that, we must play the game on console as designed. Since I’ve chosen offline, I cannot buy/trade some runes to pimp my gear even though I collected good bases and it sucks big time.
So I started farming Nightmare: Andy, Countess, Mephisto, Lower Kurast, Pit, usual suspects. I got a RHYME shield, some other MF gear reaching +200%… well, I often used player3 even player5 at times on chests, etc but I barely got anything useful. I understand that my 20 odd runs is not enough but if this game demands 100 or even 1000+ runs for Hell gear, it is not really for me. This is not in balance of the first 2 difficulty levels and offline+console players face other limitations as well. Before somebody jumps on me… no, D3 is not the answer in my opinion. I know, it is always RNG but I am beginning to not buying into this. I did like 20 Hell runs on Countess, still dropping me Shael, Amn, Ort runes, all I want is a Lem for my SMOKE, no cannot get it. Andy in NM dropped on me 2 amulets of the SAME affixes: +4 dexterity! I mean in NM… really? I got the same useless Sigon’s Glazier set boots dropped on me 3 times already not too much apart from each other with +200%MF. Wtf?
You could say I am unlucky but I am not sure if it is just that. I thought I start rolling runes since I got zillions of the same Amn, Sol, etc. But I don’t have chipped amethyst and ruby. Haha, no worries, start farming normal… I got everything but these. Like it knows what I need and does not give it. I created a second offline Sorceress to give me some extra storage and help farming chipped gems. Started ACT1 normal again and I almost finished it, only got 2 amethysts and 1 ruby, need like 5 each. But it dropped on me like 7 diamond, 6 sapphire, 6 topaz and all the others. I know… as soon as I stop looking for something, I will find it but this is all wrong, I cannot seek something else, just to get something I need.
I am not sure what to do, would like to finish hell but I am not sure about any build now and it is mainly because of the console experience. I still have 2 respecs but the build has to suit controller and I just recently learnt for instance that FrozenOrb/Firewall hybrid is nice but you cannot target where the firewall is created, same for Blizzard and Meteor and most recommended builds are based on these. The PC players who present these builds have the luxury of point the mouse cursor anywhere on the screen and cast the spell there, on the controller you don’t. They can sort out their belt, add/drink potions while running or fighting, you cannot on the controller which makes our gameplay not only slower but more difficult. Take this into account as well when you pick a build.
Where am I? I went back to NM and started Terror Zone farming for XP. I got to 81 but it has slowed now so went back to Hell. Added all the extra 9 points to CL/L, a bit better and finished ACT1 but it was a struggle, dying, etc. The CL is so weak and unreliable. The only good thing about it is that when hitting multiple mobs with it, they are in hit recovery and don’t move much/cannot hurt my surrounded Mercenary much and he can kill them eventually. But it is slow… need a better polearm at the very least.
I am not suggesting anything here, just pointed out number of things that I did not pay attention to and the streamers / guides also fail to address / highlight or just assume like PC play.
