LEARN HOW TO GEAR YOUR CHARACTER EARLY. Again, this is much much different than Diablo 2. Gone are the days where you wanted to stack as many +skill levels as possible. There AREN’T any skill levels! Your character’s prime stat is what upgrades your damage and is generally what you want to be focusing on. This means strength for Barbarians, dexterity for Demon Hunters and Monks and intelligence for Witch Doctors and Wizards. Also WEAPON DAMAGE ACTUALLY MATTERS FOR CASTERS. Thats right Witch Doctors and Wizards, many of your spells do a percentage of your weapon damage so you want to be rocking the highest DPS weapon you can- even if that means a two-handed axe. Keep in mind attack speed affects cast speed as well though.

BOSS FARMING FOR LOOT DOESN’T WORK. The more elites/uniques/bosses you kill in a single game increases your chances of finding better loot. This means joining a new game and right as they kill diablo will probably only net you a few blue items and thats it. Sorry Mephisto and Pindleskin, looks like your record for number of times killed by loot hungry adventurers won’t be broken anytime soon. In fact once you hit level 60 you get a buff that stacks up to 5 times that reflects this.

ZOMBIE BEARS IS THE MOST METAL SKILL IN THE HISTORY OF GAMES. 

Don’t sell your magic items, just break them down. This goes hand-in-hand with number 1. The randomness of the crafting magic means that I created plenty of items with stats that were of little use to me. My monk didn’t need strength or intelligence. So I had to craft several of the same item before I got one with stats that were useful. The more crafting materials you have, the better.

Make sure all of your followers are properly equipped. They have slots for two weapons (one if two handed), a necklace, two rings and a focus. Although the damage they do is considerably less what I did, the little pokes and stabs they do means less damage you have to do. Giving them gear that increases their damage or healing could be the difference in a kill or a long walk back. Your followers also never die, they just rest and won’t fight for a time before rejoining your side.

Watch for visual cues in boss fights or when exploring. As in World of Warcraft, certain fights will offer visual cues before special attacks. Later in the game, environmental obstacles that can damage you will do the same thing. An area of the floor will glow or swirl, an item will drop on the ground that appear innocuous at first but will explode a second or two later. If you played WoW, you may recognize a few boss fights in Diablo 3. That is not a bad thing for survivability.

Utilize checkpoints as often as possible. There is no save in the game. The game is saved on Blizzard servers at checkpoints, when entering a new level or using a way point. An unexpected disconnect could lose your progress and force a regeneration of the random map or dungeon.

Don’t assume Nightmare difficulty is just Normal mode with harder hitting mobs that have more hit points. My entry into Nightmare has shown Elite and Champion mobs with new attacks and AoE, forcing me to move more or run around a bit to wait for an ability on cool down. These fights can be tougher than the boss fights. Also, I find that I am utilizing the environment to put obstacles in between myself and certain types of mobs. Nightmare has its name for a reason, so be warned.

I am just beyond the Skeleton King and working toward the Act I conclusion. That last boss will be a true test of just how ramped up Nightmare level is. Hopefully, these tips will help you get there so we try some co-op together. 

Darkartiste has slain the beast. It only took 27 hours, but I’ve completed the four-act epic of Diablo 3 with my monk and am wiser for the experience. Already eight hours into the Nightmare level, I’m finding the difficulty level lives up to its name. How can you survive? Here are 10 tips to help you succeed alone.

Destroy every barrel, search every body and explore every inch of the map. I said there is no shortage of gold, but the more you explore, the more monsters you kill. Every dead body rifled and every barrel, vase or bookshelf toppled means more gold or items to sell. Utilize your town portal to get back to town quickly to empty your bags so you can get back to the action.

Stick and move when fighting the yellow or blue mobs. Elite monsters (named individuals ringed in yellow) or Champion monsters (groups of three or four ringed in blue) are tougher to take down and often have special abilities that can wall you off or freeze you in place. Especially as melee, standing in one place is usually a bad idea as flames, poison or ferocious blows can drop your health to zero in a few seconds. Constantly move, grab health globes, and pick your spots to use your special attacks. Certain mobs will drop health globes as they drop in health. Use only what you need and save others for later in longer fights.

Get extra experience by reading lore or fighting well. The journals found in satchels or bookcases will give you some good back story as well as limited XP. Also, having a big killing spree where you massacre a large number of monsters will yield extra XP. As an extra tip, listen to the lore (or read it later) when it is offered as it can give you tips on a new monster and how it attacks.

Use your shift key for certain battles. Movement in the game has your character following the mouse cursor. Targeting can be a bit troublesome on monsters that move quickly and you could literally find your character running in circles. Holding the shift key down will allows you to stand in place and let the mobs come to you. This strategy is not as good for the elite and champion mobs as mentioned above, but for large groups, or that last one or two mobs eluding you, it helps quite a bit. Also, holding a mouse button down automatically repeats an attack. You don’t need to keep clicking for each attack.

Use your gold to max out your jeweler and blacksmith crafting skills. Once they are maxed out, you will only be able to increase them through gathering blacksmith pages (five pages plus 15,000 gold for each Grand Master skill up) or jeweler pages (10 pages and 10,000 gold for each skill up in Master). There is no shortage of gold in the game, and crafting rare items (and even some exceptional magic items) will make adventuring and killing easier. 

Items are a big deal in Diablo III, especially as all spell damage is now based on weapon damage. The random drop chances can leave you with a pile of equipment you don’t need while you’re still stuck using an old weapon. Diablo III has solved this problem with a realm-wide auction house and crafted items that are competitive with dropped items. Break down any unwanted magic armour you find into crafting materials and use them to level up the Blacksmith artisan. The items he produces get random stats, so a lucky roll could produce items perfectly suited to a particular build.

Rather than break down any good weapons you find for materials, list them on the realm-wide auction house. People are sure to pay some serious gold for rare or high-damage weapons, as all skill damage is now based on weapon damage. Since everyone is starting out with no gold, there initially won’t be a market for twinking characters. In the first few days, you should aim for realistic prices based on the amount of gold that someone of the item’s level will have found. There’s no sense asking for 100,000 gold for an awesome 10 weapon if most level 10 characters will have a fraction of that amount and the weapon will be obsolete by the time they can afford it.

Items are a big deal in Diablo III, especially as all spell damage is now based on weapon damage. The random drop chances can leave you with a pile of equipment you don’t need while you’re still stuck using an old weapon. Diablo III has solved this problem with a realm-wide auction house and crafted items that are competitive with dropped items. Break down any unwanted magic armour you find into crafting materials and use them to level up the Blacksmith artisan. The items he produces get random stats, so a lucky roll could produce items perfectly suited to a particular build. 

In fact, make one character of every class. If you’ve been following Diablo III’s development over the past few months, you’ve probably watched all the gameplay videos and have already decided which class you’ll play first. You’ve probably also written off one or more classes as uninteresting based on the videos or ability details, but you might end up regretting your decision later. I had originally written off the Monk and the Demon Hunter based on their gameplay videos, but after playing them in the open beta weekend, I found my dismissal of them to be profoundly mistaken.

Feedback from the open beta weekend seems to agree, with a lot of players finding classes they had no interest in surprisingly fun to play despite earlier reservations. Blizzard spent a long time polishing all of the skills, so every class seems to be ridiculously fun to play. While it makes sense to concentrate on one character until you’ve explored the entire game, I highly recommend creating one character of each class and playing each for up to an hour before deciding which one to focus on.

In fact, make one character of every class. If you’ve been following Diablo III’s development over the past few months, you’ve probably watched all the gameplay videos and have already decided which class you’ll play first. You’ve probably also written off one or more classes as uninteresting based on the videos or ability details, but you might end up regretting your decision later. I had originally written off the Monk and the Demon Hunter based on their gameplay videos, but after playing them in the open beta weekend, I found my dismissal of them to be profoundly mistaken. 

It seems like a bit of a no-brainer to initially focus on one character, but in Diablo III’s case, there’s a special reason to do it. You’ll likely finish normal mode around level 20-30, and until then, you’ll get a new skill almost every level. It’s only when you’ve completed normal mode and moved on to nightmare that the challenge really starts and you will have picked out an effective set of skills. Your last active skill unlocks at level 30, and from then on you’ll gain a combination of two to three runes or passive skills every level until you hit the level cap at 60.

Diablo III officially launched at midnight last night, opening the floodgates on what is possibly the most pre-ordered PC game in history. It’s been almost 12 years since the previous game in the series launched, and it’s still going to this day. Whether you’ve played previous games, have taken part in the Diablo III beta or are taking your first steps into Sanctuary today, everyone starts with a clean slate. In this article, I give my top five tips for spending your first few days wisely in Diablo III.

It seems like a bit of a no-brainer to initially focus on one character, but in Diablo III’s case, there’s a special reason to do it. You’ll likely finish normal mode around level 20-30, and until then, you’ll get a new skill almost every level. It’s only when you’ve completed normal mode and moved on to nightmare that the challenge really starts and you will have picked out an effective set of skills. Your last active skill unlocks at level 30, and from then on you’ll gain a combination of two to three runes or passive skills every level until you hit the level cap at 60.