Lessons often learned after death. Maybe we could throw in some survival tips, whether they were learned through deaths or just being over paranoid.

Tip: Escape the intial lag

Before starting or resuming a game in hardcore, log on softcore and do battles for a few seconds. This helps me get pass the sudden lag which I always get in my first few seconds of encounter with the mobs. For me it involves a spin of the tower at softcore. Interestingly in my last two spins I got a leg from each. A Zuni pox and an EF. That doesn't stop me from moving immediately to hardcore after that spin though.

Tip: Positioning

I had close calls here.

First Picture - Act 1 Warrior Rest

While facing a seemingly harmless elite pack of skeletons, my WD was standing at where my barb is standing in the picture. The next thing I know is the skeletons teleported right beside me and I couldn't move due to them blocking my path. At that time I do not have the DPS to melt them fast and my HP was decreasing fast.

I actually used horrify then spirit walk away. BTW, I am not sure if spirit walk could enable me to walk pass the bodies of standing elites....

Second Picture - Act 3 Skycrown Battlement

While walking down the stairs, I noticed the Elite pack 1 is up there. So, I walked back up to kill them, not knowing that I have drawn the Elite pack 2 from downstairs. When I was at where the enchantress babe is standing in the picture, the next thing I know is the elites have waller, frozen, electrify, desecrator and etc and I have a hard time moving due to those natural blockage. I finally run backwards to the previous open space and killed them there.

* You can also use natural blockage to your advantage. When facing Vortex, I usually position myself behind the wall/ up the stairs, in a way that after I spam a few acid cloud, I can "hide" myself somewhere, especially when the mob also have molten (& one of them about to die and explode), or they have landed a few disco light lazers on the ground.

Spirit walk allows you to pass through everything. Including in my xp breakable barricades, so using both is wasting one cool down

Here is one I encountered.

If you post an equipped item in hopes it sells big. Fetch it from the ah before playing...btw my witching hour did not sell while I was at work for 99,999,999.

Tip: Wealth Management

If you looted a 100m item which you do not plan to use or equip, do not carry it around in your bag. Send it to stash or auction it. This is to avoid an unintended extra gear sink.

Tip: Know what you are dealing with

Read the affixes before you engage fully. I don't do this always, and I nearly paid for this yesterday when I just walked into a yellow pack of Hersld of the Pestilence with Fast, Waller, Frozen and something else. My position was bad for kiting and I only realised what I was dealing with when my Spirit Vessel was activated. I frantically tried to flee my WD amidst those walls, freeze balls and green worms on the ground. It was soooo close. It was 'only' MP1 btw. I am glad that I tune down the MP from 2 to 1.

Btw watch out for this Waller 'bug'. Bnet : Waller bug?

Douvinsky, have you ever tried self-found hardcore? I just started a character for doing self-found only and I'm definitely finding it more entertaining than outgearing myself for every level. I am, however, a little uncertain as to how often I should craft and how much I should craft.

Posted by arpger at 03/15/2013 08:35 AM

Douvinsky, have you ever tried self-found hardcore? I just started a character for doing self-found only and I'm definitely finding it more entertaining than outgearing myself for every level. I am, however, a little uncertain as to how often I should craft and how much I should craft.

Nope.

The temptation of buying uber gears and outgearing myself is too great lol. I would rather outgear myself and tried MP10, than letting my gold sit idle. Done this MP10 with my 1st belated WD up to lvl56 (DC killed him), and DH up to lvl41 (still surviving).

I also do not see any benefit of making the game harder by denying yourself options.

Posted by arpger at 03/15/2013 08:35 AM

Douvinsky, have you ever tried self-found hardcore? I just started a character for doing self-found only and I'm definitely finding it more entertaining than outgearing myself for every level. I am, however, a little uncertain as to how often I should craft and how much I should craft.

For the best experience, I believe you should only craft each item ONCE. I will work on this new project soon, details and rules will be out these few days. My rules would be harsh, if we wanna make it hard we might as well push it to the limit.

Alright, crafting each item once makes sense to avoid becoming entirely reliant on crafted gear. I do have to admit that I've already broken that rule so far, but it was only in crafting a few of the same shoulders in an attempt to get a vitality roll. From here on out, though, I will make sure to follow this crafting rule.

@zerokewl, the benefit of playing self-found is that it makes you interested in the items that you actually find/craft instead of only being concerned with what will sell in the auction house. It's definitely fun to breeze through hardcore levels with auction house gear, but it's also exciting to find your own upgrades.

I agree and in inferno I was finding something almost daily.

I guess I should have read this thread BEFORE my previous DH was killed. The skycrown battlement pic is where I was killed. I ran through the area, dropped down the stairs and saw a pack I missed, so ran back up the stairs. They were walling and arcane, so I tought I'd run back down the stairs as they had me cornered. The other pack was coming up the stairs and were frozen and something else. I had a lot of leach, but the walls prevented me from hitting any monsters, when I wasn't frozen and I couldn't leave the stairs. Now I make sure to check the corner of that top area and kill the elites if any are there before progressing.

Tip: Fallen Maniacs are bad. Kite elites, not chasing after.

Nearly lost my WD............while fighting an elite pack in Keep 2. What happened: I was chasing after the elite pack (got feared by Echoing Fury). A few Fallen Maniacs were charging from the other room, then the elite pull me in with Vortex...........freeze me with Frozen.........and kaboom........Spirit Vessel activated. I ran my little girl back to the entrance and to town!

Tip: Wait for your important cooldown

Spirit Vessel / NDE activated?

Wait for the cooldown to finish, before you zoom into battle again. You might need them soon again!

Tip: Consider to keep yourself mobile/ capable of doing Crowd Control

E.g.
Monk: Dashing Strike (with Quick Silver, = 10 spirit free jail break. Also a fast repositioning good against fire and poison pools on the ground)
Barb: Leap
DH: Vault
WD: Spirit Walk
Wizard: Teleport

Official Bnet: 3m EHP barb die in 5 seconds

Posted by douvinsky at 03/15/2013 02:57 AM

Btw watch out for this Waller 'bug'. Bnet : Waller bug?

Yip. That's how I lost my first lvl 60 DH. Only... you can't really watch out for it. If it happens you are screwed.
I had wall on me, and poison pool below me.



Tip: Don't get overconfident.
This is obvious, but I lost my second DH on lvl 59. I was like 5% away from lvl 60. Probably another 15 minutes. So I was having such a smooth time and already planning my lvl 60 gear in my head, I missed that I should be running away from the Act2 invisible snakes with fast and frozen.


Tip2: Leave place to run.
Unlike SC you really should kill all the mobs on your way. There is nothing as terrible as running away only to find your way cluttered with tiny mobs you felt weren't worth fighting.


Tip3: Know when to turn and fight.
Ok, this is a weird one, but it really helped me.
I was playing act4 inferno. Silver Spire 2, on my way to Inferno Diablo for the very first time with my Monk.
Like we all know, act 4 is just full of activity. Large blast areas from the Morlu, bad visibly with all the spirits, etc.
I hit an elite mob with some range attack. Can't remember which mob it was. If it was Mortar or some other ranged attack. The point is... I look at my situation and realise: I have no spirit, every healing thing and my pot is on cooldown, and I'm running out of life. The more I try to kite, the more I get hit by ranged attacks and I just see myself dying. My life/s gain is just not enough to keep up with the damage.
So I resign myself to my fate, and I turn and fight.
BUT... I survive because of my LOH.
So if I had kept running I would have been dead, but turning and actually fighting and relying on my LOH / lifesteal to keep me alive saved me.

Tip3: Know when to turn and fight.

This is a hard one, tough call, especially for melees. For range, e.g. my WD, I can at least spam a few Acid Cloud for LoH while running away.

Most of the time I just run away like a little girl..........just need to look which way you are running to! Some life regen would be nice too.

Tip: Smoking kills... hardcore characters.

Had a couple of near-death experiences while taking a quick cigarette break. Even tho I thought I was alone a pack decided to zoom in on me. Got back just in time.


Tip #2: Don't forget you're playing in hardcore.

Every now and then I'll get a little too comfortable exploring...

Tip3: Know when to turn and fight.

My DH is not a tank, but kiting is very dangerous when facing fast mobs that can stun you when they hit (can you say demonic tremors?). If I stop shooting against them, my life goes down quickly. Usually, my LOH and steal keep my health full even with reflect packs. The only real problem I have is being walled in where I can't hit any monsters and arcane sentries are hitting me (only happens in tight areas such as stairs/chokepoints).

Survival Tip: Key Binding for move

The default is the left-click on your mouse, same as the attack left-click.

The problem, as I have experienced it a lot of times, is sometimes you need to move out of sticky situation. So, you click on the direction which you want to move, but you discover that you are not moving, because there is just a swarm of low HP monsters at where you were clicking. Hence, instead of moving and running away, you are still at the same spot shooting poison darts (or whatever is your primary left-click attack skill).

I will be using "5" for move, need some practice on this.

I made my "move" button middle mouse since it's really easy to switch to from left-click in sticky situations.

I move with mouse button 4. Middle button is health pots.

Posted by arpger at 03/26/2013 07:33 AM

I made my "move" button middle mouse since it's really easy to switch to from left-click in sticky situations.

Sounds good let mr try it. I didn't like my 5 button