i just want a definitive start date announced
Beyond fact it is clunky no fun as hell and underperforming even below Ulliana’s? (ok the fun below Uliana’s is my opinion :P) It is by far the worst monk set and even worse at low paragon and I normally do not get beyond paragon 1200 anyway before leave season. 
Lod is more productive and fun to play even if not WoL to get up to viable T16 play and well rewards are way worse at T8 even as T16.
For some reason devs decided that primary skills should not be highly amplified by other items even if have a set dedicated to them for damage compared to other skills and as a consequence have relative low max damage from stacking damage. Now whether you agree or not with that idea of devs it left many builds being highly unrewarding to play especially if not really fun to play either. Raiment being one of those.
I would not make this inference. There are many items that buff primary skills in the game, they’re just out of date.
Lots of skills/items/sets in this game need updated but haven’t been due to the limited update schedule this game has been on for many years. They only address a small number of builds per season, and we are trending towards fewer seasons per year so lots of stuff is outdated.
Trust me or not it was on purpose, just look at damage limit on frenzy barb when was reworked (it was not made into a S tier build like some others) and same goes for every primary skill set and some even being reworked away from that or from general usage sets like Akhan that could at least amplify primary skills or have relative low amplification of damage compared to specialized sets. For some reason primary skills have not been allowed to be competitive as long as ROS has been around, now if that does not signal intention, what does?
Especially since devs had more as enough time to add new sets and items, legendarie powers added to items and buff/nerf cycle them to the ground season after season over those years. Where they put that time they had, does signal intent to limit primary skills.
It’s still 50% though, correct? The Witch Doctor has a 100% chance of getting a particular upgrade.
And while the DH and Necro have a 100% shot at getting power multipliers, they still require different approaches to leveling.
But as far as the Necro, they have an 86% shot of getting a great item in the gloves. And outside of a Bloodtide Blade, which is a 25% chance, the gloves are really what matter when it comes to leveling. With practice, there’s only about a 5 minute difference between getting a Bloodtide Blade, and just using the gloves.
But in terms of being realistic, excluding Season 22, due to the Shadow Clones being op, since Season 20, on EU & NA combined, fewer than 50 people have reached Level 70 in under an hour of the season start. And fewer than 10 players have done it more than once.
There’s a world of difference between practice runs and live seasons. And people often tend to vastly exaggerate their leveling time, which is one of the reasons I’ve started keeping stats about the season starts. And that’s how I try to approach the season. What actually works, vs what people say works, as they’re not the same.
Getting to paragon 1000 is what, 20 hours, including leveling the first char? So, 60 hours in all three regions assuming you actually play solo and don’t get any boosts.
60 hours over some 13 weeks is average of 40 mins per day. I would say that’s casual.
No, not really. There are only two spears for the Barbarian, so you are guaranteed to get either The Three Hundredth Spear (200% bonus) or the Arreat’s Law (200% bonus). You just don’t get Weapon Throw until lvl 17 is all. Ancient Spear- Boulder Toss comes much later but you can level up pretty fast with just Weapon Throw. If you can get a different spear, other than the two I mentioned, then that is news to me.
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So they’re both weapon throw. But how good are they realistically?
With the DH, Karlei’s gives a buff to Impale, but Impale is not a great leveling skill. And with something like the monk, Rivera Dancers give LTK, but that’s not the greatest leveling skill. With the Witch Doctor, Zombie Charger actually is a decent skill.
Like, if I had to rate leveling experiences, no other legendaries, nor rubies used, along with a Level 40 Level Reduce Weapon:
S (<1h):
Necro - Grasps of Essence
Necro - Bloodtide Blade
A (<1h15m):
Necro - Petrified Spike
Necro - Nayr’s
Necro - Reliana’s
Monk - The Crudest Boots
B (<1h30m):
Demon Hunter - Lord Greenstone’s
Wizard - Etched Sigil
Witch Doctor - Scrimshaw
C (<1h45m):
Monk - Rivera Dancers
D (<2h):
Demon Hunter - Karlei’s Point
Where would the weapons fall on that scale? Anything C Tier or lower is where I tend to find starting a Necro and switching over is a faster approach to the season. It’s why with Monk & DH, I still prefer to start the Necro. Because while, if you get lucky, you’ll save time, if you get the wrong upgrade, it will be worse. The Witch Doctor is the only consistent class I know where it’s not worth starting off as a Necro.
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It would be if they had decent AI and could not be blocked by a tuft of grass. Or stairs.
I’ll admit, that’s one of the areas that’s been tripping me up, and leading to some death’s I wasn’t expecting, wasting precious time, but even on my first ever attempt at it, it was 1h22m to go 1-70.
But every test run after that was faster. It takes about half an hour to level my second (i.e. real) character, so on average, I do find it faster to just start as a Witch Doctor, if going that route. But, I haven’t found any other class where that’s true.
Since the seasons usually start 17:00 or so here in the EU, my goal for the day is to get to 70 and be done with haedrigs gift, then the fun part starts when I wake up on Saturday 
You are moving the goal posts. Your argument was that it was not guaranteed to end with a viable weapon for cube on an upgrade, was it not? That is why scrimshaw was so attractive. I pointed out that Barbs also have a guaranteed upgrade with spear for dps. is it the best? No, but it is guaranteed to result in a dps bonus.
I’m not. My initial argument is about hitting 70 quickly. Otherwise the base is no cubed items for any class.
And while their power enhancement to throw is the same, the secondary enhancement could make one more preferable for leveling than the other. Witch Doctor with Scrimshot fills all the requirements I have though for a baseline. It’s guaranteed, it’s a decently fast leveling experience, and because there’s only one item that can be upgraded, there’s no time discrepency.
I will start with Barb, especially if the WW set is the freebie. Tho, I don’t know if I want to start with SC or HC. I guess there is plenty of time to think about it since S26 will still be around for most of this month.
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I agree that WoL is much more satisfying to play.
I don’t have a huge problem with Raiment’s playstyle though yes, it is a little clunky playing on console. I just wish there was something else besides Dashing Strike that triggered the primary buff like Cyclone Strike.
If we don’t have one by the end of today then we likely have our answer.
The 2 piece bonus is awesome. The 4 piece is extremely expensive during the start of the gearing process and will quickly drain you of Spirit. The 6 piece is powerful, but limited in it’s application. Fully geared and optimized, Raiment is not a weak set, but it is MUCH harder to play well than the other options.
Even if a person did not push it, and did lower rifts casually, by the end of he season they will still be somewhere between 1K-2K.
Pretty easy decision after trying out the PTR. Main will be Marauder Demon Hunter, then the Witch Doctor if they don’t nerf Bogadiles.
Tried Shadow Strafe with mostly Primal gear. It’s just another spin-type mechanic with a glass-cannon build. Found that GoD was still better. Impale is far too squishy at high level GRs.
Spin barb with the group pulling was a lot of fun but weak sauce on Rift Guardians. Might be a fun farming toon for T16s.
Edit: Most of this post is irrelevant due to finding out DMO and Primus won’t work like I thought they did but still might play around with the set.
Though I usually play DH, I’m thinking I might go wizard this season. The new DMO with teleport on demand through Primus looks like it will be a fun speed build. Don’t think I’m going to push the leaderboards but probably just see how high I can take DMO and where the speed grift maxes out. Will be pretty quick in bounty runs too and good for EN’s.
At any rate, it’ll be a nice change of pace.