Started EQ barb into GT barb this season. Both builds suffer from same issue - lack of decent single taget damage vs mobile targets. The former one is exeptionally strong up to lvl 125 as usual, hits the wall past 125 again as usual, with no real way to fix it. GT farms much better and does bossing a little bit better by the vertue of being range+cast and forget type of skill (still suffers a lot vs mobile targets and even SoR+disco inferno addition does not help it) . It clears somewhat ok in labs but every miniboss is a major pain in the ass, especially assasin. On top of that layouts with doorways (like tal rasha tomb) are very hard due to delayed nature of dealing damage of guard tower.
After Gt barb i tried stormzon, while being amazing at bossing all the way through i had major issues with sustain and survivabilty. Bonus defense from Thundermaiden is not enough to reach adequate defence levels through the game, enemies always had at least 30% chance to hit me. The block from passive while being handy in some areas was absolutely detrimental in most of them - you just cant realistically reach decent block speed frames, Resistance gives you 30% baseline and it does not increases with soft OR hard points. Damage from Stormcall while being very good during whole game falls off in labs HARD. In lab 3 or higher you have to rely on conductivity proc or straight up use Askari Lightning to kill mobs. I'd buff the damage of Stormcall on later levels while nerfing the damage of Askari Lighting (keeping the latter same in the end, otherwise stormzon would be another dead build).
I found it hard to itemize Stormzon due to lack of form of sustain so i ended up with
Golden Chariot
Golden Chariot
Setzschild (Sacred)
Defense: (11002 - 13867) to (14557 - 17982)
Chance to Block: 4%
(Amazon Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 770
Item Level: 105
Gematria
(Bonus for each Socketed Great/Elemental Rune)
+250 to Life
+0.5% to Maximum Elemental Resistances
15% Chance to cast level 1 Mythal on Melee Attack
+(2 to 3) to Amazon Skill Levels
+(120 to 180)% Enhanced Defense
+(500 to 2000) Defense
Physical Resist 10%
+(25 to 100) Life after each Kill
Socketed (6)
, while being very powerfull shield i did not liked the fact that i had to sacrifice whole item slot for pure survivability (note that i never tried the
Rakkis' Benediction
Rakkis' Benediction
Morion (Sacred)
Defense: 854 to 864
(Amazon Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 500
Item Level: 120
Hammer Path: -30% Enemy Lightning Resistance
Thunder Path: 150 Life after Each Kill
+(1 to 2) to Amazon Skill Levels
-1% Base Block Chance
+40% to Lightning Spell Damage
(15 to 20)% to Dexterity
+500 to Life
Physical Resist 10%
50% Bonus to Defense
30% Magic Find
Socketed (4)
, could not land my hands on one and desided to use Indigo instead, so i guess this one is biased).
Overall Stormzon felt like REALLY good boss killing build, lacking in every other aspect though. It got the block, but no way to reach decent block speed. It got clear, but not enough to clear later labs. It got itemization, but with heavy sacrifices (this one is especially biased on my exp).
So far im pretty salty about class balance in general - paladin, sorc and assasin dominate the late game for quite a while (multiple seasons even before sigma), while other classes got 1 or 2 viable builds at most (totem necro, java and maybe stormzon in some cases). I really appritiate the buff to underdog builds like old java or stormzon (they really needed them) but i do not understand the treatment druid got (pretty much every build was shat upon).
I understand that it is a process to bring character balance in line, let alone build balance, but i cant be helped by wanting it sooner. So far playing any non meta build feels like playing non meta build in Diablo 3, when everyone who does play meta deals 300000% more damage and have 3000% more survivabiliy than you.
Overall (i used it again, yes) i like where the balance change is going, i just want it be faster and more inclusive i guess (more classes knocked up a notch and some of them turned down).
Just playing mostly ssf with non-meta builds
