The MedianXL 2017 v1.3 SP Miniguides Compilation

Grasshopper
Azure Drake
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My comments on amazon were not in any way meant to be a criticism of the builds/guides here, just providing feedback based on my thoughts on playing the build (and I am not very experienced). As far as i can tell the builds seem near to optimal for how the game is at this time (which does not necessarily mean they are powerful relative to other classes/builds).

I was mainly thinking about the state of the class in this patch. If it can't work better than the builds in the guides here, then it could do with being adjusted (I am assuming that the developers don't actually want different classes to be weak at different times/patches as a deliberate policy).

As Fumbles said, Chuck cannot play all these builds untwinked so he will have to provide us with his view as to best skills/gear/playstyle based on his experience. And that is always valuable.
Kylrath
Bone Archer
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Well I am now on destruction act 5 with #Storm in T6 gear. I have to use paragon uber skill to survive. Dmg is still decent.
Only issue is this is a single player character, so i cant mule any charms or items to her. Farming is a pain at the moment, to get midgame gear. So unlucky on shrine drops.
Dest k3k hurts, Dest TA is a nogo at the moment , i have to get close to amazons to kill them and the arrowside proc in my face is real. If you play cheeky and lure them to megnetic field than it can be done , but really slow. Still it is a good build , but dest farming and Ubers (god..) are really hard.
Compare to casters or other melee chars i dont think kilspeed and survivability stats on this guide are valid. Low def, low laek.
Easily got stunlocked , maxed out fhr skill , but amazon is the first char i can see the lack of fhr, fbr in an instant.
But cmon most of the chars with this garbage gear i have would suffer, except barbs ofc.
I will go to pounce if i find sacred maiden spear for rw, farm more k3k and TA, than switch back to Storm if i have the desired equipments.
Still i enjoy this build. But the truth came out quickly : Barbarians > Others.
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Jampula
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Aerial should be banned, he made other classes look weak.
Grasshopper
Azure Drake
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Re barbarians > others.
Maybe in some ways but it depends on how you define "beating the game".

All the builds I have seen / tried so far have had problems. There are some ubers they cannot do without a respec - or by dying many times. There are parts of the levelling process that are difficult or worse. There are areas they cannot farm.

Is that how it is supposed to be?

When I start a character I play it with a view to how this would play in hardcore. In d2 hardcore there were always some builds that could survive all areas - and yes there were some problems such as melee builds could not survive in Chaos Sanctuary due to Iron Maiden curse (which they eventually removed) but you could build to survive )or work in a team and do well).

Although the end game is really good in Median, I worry about the fact that there is no build that can do it all in a sensible way in hardcore.
Even aerial's barbarian had places where the strategy involved dying over and over again. Totemancer is also quite good but also has a number of no-go areas. I would like to see the game design think about how to make it possible for at least some builds to do all of the game content. I realise that will not be easy.
I played hardcore almost exclusively in d2/LoD and I enjoyed it more. But in Median it would be suicide.

Other area I miss: PvP :)
Kylrath
Bone Archer
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Grasshopper wrote:Re barbarians > others.
Maybe in some ways but it depends on how you define "beating the game".

All the builds I have seen / tried so far have had problems. There are some ubers they cannot do without a respec - or by dying many times. There are parts of the levelling process that are difficult or worse. There are areas they cannot farm.

Is that how it is supposed to be?

When I start a character I play it with a view to how this would play in hardcore. In d2 hardcore there were always some builds that could survive all areas - and yes there were some problems such as melee builds could not survive in Chaos Sanctuary due to Iron Maiden curse (which they eventually removed) but you could build to survive )or work in a team and do well).

Although the end game is really good in Median, I worry about the fact that there is no build that can do it all in a sensible way in hardcore.
Even aerial's barbarian had places where the strategy involved dying over and over again. Totemancer is also quite good but also has a number of no-go areas. I would like to see the game design think about how to make it possible for at least some builds to do all of the game content. I realise that will not be easy.
I played hardcore almost exclusively in d2/LoD and I enjoyed it more. But in Median it would be suicide.

Other area I miss: PvP :)


Indeed, charm farming is suicide in hardcore. d2/LoD was really easy even in hardcore. Get a blizzard sorc to farm , than make a hammerdin or javazon and you wont die ever (ofc watch out for burning souls :) )
Well PvP was retarded and unbalanced in D2 except "Melee duels" what was mainly 2 waraxe Grief, Beast baba vs Smiter.

If you miss Pvp, check weekly events.
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=19202
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ChuckNoRis
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Grasshopper wrote:Is that how it is supposed to be?
yes
Grasshopper wrote:hardcore
median was not intended for HC , there are insta-kills in many spots
Grasshopper wrote:But in Median it would be suicide.
indeed
Grasshopper wrote:I would like to see the game design think about how to make it possible for at least some builds to do all of the game content
all characters can get all charms , not all builds can get all charms . you must either change the gear or respec at some point . it's how Median has always been
Kylrath wrote:single player character, so i cant mule any charms or items to her
don't you use Plugy ?
Grasshopper
Azure Drake
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ChuckNoRis wrote:
Grasshopper wrote:Is that how it is supposed to be?
yes
Grasshopper wrote:hardcore
median was not intended for HC , there are insta-kills in many spots

That doesn't mean that this is intentional. It may be a problem as yet unsolved.


ChuckNoRis wrote:
Grasshopper wrote:I would like to see the game design think about how to make it possible for at least some builds to do all of the game content
all characters can get all charms , not all builds can get all charms . you must either change the gear or respec . it's how Median has always been

That doesn't mean it must always be that way. Re-speccing means changing everything: skills, stats, gear (assuming you have the gear for all specs) which is painful in my opinion.


ChuckNoRis wrote:
Kylrath wrote:single player character, so i cant mule any charms or items to her
don't you use Plugy ?

Yes I wondered that - is PlugY not built into Median now? So the shared stash is enabled whether you like it or not?
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ChuckNoRis
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Grasshopper wrote:
ChuckNoRis wrote:
Grasshopper wrote:Is that how it is supposed to be?
yes
Grasshopper wrote:hardcore
median was not intended for HC , there are insta-kills in many spots

That doesn't mean that this is intentional. It may be a problem as yet unsolved.
it is actualy not intended for HC , not a non-solved problem . get the death projector as example . if you don't dodge the ray , you die .
Grasshopper wrote:
ChuckNoRis wrote:
Grasshopper wrote:I would like to see the game design think about how to make it possible for at least some builds to do all of the game content
all characters can get all charms , not all builds can get all charms . you must either change the gear or respec . it's how Median has always been

That doesn't mean it must always be that way. Re-speccing means changing everything: skills, stats, gear (assuming you have the gear for all specs) which is painful in my opinion.
painful or not , if you want all charms you have to do it at some point
Grasshopper wrote:
ChuckNoRis wrote:
Kylrath wrote:single player character, so i cant mule any charms or items to her
don't you use Plugy ?

Yes I wondered that - is PlugY not built into Median now? So the shared stash is enabled whether you like it or not?
no, you must install it and it only works by using D2SE .
Kylrath
Bone Archer
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Kylrath wrote:single player character, so i cant mule any charms or items to her
don't you use Plugy ?

I usually play on realm. This is my first char in SP ofc with Plugy, but i dont have items to share.Yet.
Grasshopper
Azure Drake
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Kylrath wrote:Indeed, charm farming is suicide in hardcore. d2/LoD was really easy even in hardcore. Get a blizzard sorc to farm , than make a hammerdin or javazon and you wont die ever (ofc watch out for burning souls :) )
Well PvP was retarded and unbalanced in D2 except "Melee duels" what was mainly 2 waraxe Grief, Beast baba vs Smiter.

Yes there were the so-called 'cookie cutter' builds but the point is that hc was possible with almost any build. And if you wanted to get high magic-find on the cookie cutters you had to compromise and take a few more risks.

There were more risks than just burning souls. Extra-fast lightning enchanted springs to mind. Especially if playing a more risky build.
Farming on a sorceress was never 'easy' (as in guaranteed to stay alive) unless you worked with a partner such as a skeleton necromancer.

I found most of the fun in PvP was in the level 9 hardcore duels. Nobody had great gear, it was a test of skill. And you stay dead so you have to make another one when you lose and get more gear.

Perhaps Median could use hardcore mode to have a completely different set of rules to bring some of that to the game. Just a thought.