Further progression?

[Cairhiin]

If FoT is 75/75/75 by default and thunderclap adds more aoe, i wouldn't be surprised if it changed the scaling entirely. I do know that runes change how each ability scales with LoH.

75/75/75 is the scaling of the thunderclap rune; not of Fists of Thunder (which is 100/100/75).

http://i.imgur.com/rpqd2.jpg

[Riptide]

75/75/75 is the scaling of the thunderclap rune; not of Fists of Thunder (which is 100/100/75).

http://i.imgur.com/rpqd2.jpg

yea i found that with a bit of googling lol.

As I said though, I don't use thunderclap anyway. I'm enjoying the endless spirit with quickening.

[Deleted]

@ the op. Your stats are ok, but those people saying your damage is "good enough". Well think of it like this, sure it's doable to take a beating but once you're out of cool downs, you're kiting. If you had more damage you could burst most of those packs down in a blind flash + serenity. So don't think damage isn't a good survival tool, some things just hit way to hard to have a lengthy fight with.

I'm not going to argue about the the whole life steal issue. I'm sure there is a way to make it work and it's one way to gear, if the op so chooses. I do have two thoughts on this bit right here though. First of all, the OP will kiting mobs regardless of what he does+. The kind of damage you need to consistently kill elite packs within the duration of two CDs is insane. So kiting is going to occur anyway.

Secondly, the only reason to really kite are consecrate, plagued, and arcane enchanted affixes. For everything else, he just needs a little boost to resist, armor, and his LoH, and suddenly it's a tank and spank. It isn't that difficult to survive prolonged fights, even in act III. The only thing, that comes to mind, which hits really hard are the tremors but even then the real issue isn't really the damage but the knock backs, which prevent you from regenerating health. At that point CDs no longer become something you need to continually chain but you use them as you need them.

Gearing for survivability is also much cheaper than gearing for damage, and not just that but it will also increase your damage, after the fact. As your stats improve you can switch to a more damage oriented build. Blazing wrath alone gives you 15% damage increase and mantra of conviction gives you 24%/48% increase. That's all free damage, once your survival stats are high enough.

[Riptide]

I'm not going to argue about the the whole life steal issue. I'm sure there is a way to make it work and it's one way to gear, if the op so chooses. I do have two thoughts on this bit right here though. First of all, the OP will kiting mobs regardless of what he does+. The kind of damage you need to consistently kill elite packs within the duration of two CDs is insane. So kiting is going to occur anyway.

Secondly, the only reason to really kite are consecrate, plagued, and arcane enchanted affixes. For everything else, he just needs a little boost to resist, armor, and his LoH, and suddenly it's a tank and spank. It isn't that difficult to survive prolonged fights, even in act III. The only thing, that comes to mind, which hits really hard are the tremors but even then the real issue isn't really the damage but the knock backs, which prevent you from regenerating health. At that point CDs no longer become something you need to continually chain but you use them as you need them.

Gearing for survivability is also much cheaper than gearing for damage, and not just that but it will also increase your damage, after the fact. As your stats improve you can switch to a more damage oriented build. Blazing wrath alone gives you 15% damage increase and mantra of conviction gives you 24%/48% increase. That's all free damage, once your survival stats are high enough.

I never said I disagreed. But you do realize that 700 res is plenty right? you're already at 70% dmg reduction there. The amount of resists you need at that point to make a noticeable difference are quite large compared to the dps stats you could gain on say.. rings/neck/gloves.

Hell at that point, you're almost better off getting vitality over resists as far as the cost goes since the trade off isn't that big.
My current stats, feel free to use the spreadsheet as well. But as you can see resists aren't that much better than just straight vitality which is significantly cheaper allowing you to get more dmg.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...MaWdhVmc#gid=1

How much effective HP do you consider mandatory? I can burst down 1-3 elites in a single cd cycle. All I'm saying is I probably take less damage than the op because the fight is much much faster for me. It's not like I'm squishy. I'm critting for 150k(with a 1.4/1.5weapon)+ aoe.. it's not like mobs have that much hp I kill packs in act2 before taking any damage at all quite frequently.

I look at it this way, my demon hunter doesn't kite much if at all. I have less effective hp but I kill things pretty damn quick often a pack is dead in less than 2 seconds. My DH is at 600 res and only 130k dmg with sharpshooter but no steady aim (because I don't kite). My DH has significantly less ehp compared to my monk but it doesn't matter because I don't get hit near as often as I do on my monk. As a result my DH has more practical mitigation through damage.

Just like my monk has more practical or real-world (if you will) mitigation than all those monks at 20k. Their stats aren't much better than mine and their dmg is way lower. That's the point I'm trying to make. Just going all tank is pretty ineffective, just like going all dps is. You need a solid balance. If you can achieve 60-80k with 700 + resists and 5k armor. You would be much better off than with 30k with 1200 resists and 8k armor.

I need to get me a nice slow 1 hander for my mh + cyclones but I'm waiting to see 1.04 first.

[Deleted]

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculato...igk!ZXU!ZcbcYa

I use this 45% dmg reduce from mobs due to concussion and resolve its win <3

[Deleted]

Sure, 700 is plenty for act II but it isn't that much for acts III & IV. For all intends and purposes, act II is pretty tame compared to the later acts. It's also a bad idea to think of these stats as individuals. Many think that if they just get their resists really high they'll be golden, but that's not how it works. You could have 1k resist and still take a beating because a) your vitality is low and b) your armor is low. Resists and armor should be increased evenly because one makes the other stronger. The same goes to vitality; there's no point having 8k armor and 1k resist if your vitality is 15k.

As for high damage... the reason I don't hold it in a very high regard is that getting high damage is very expensive. You talk about rings and amulets, but they are the most expensive items in the entire game. Mine are still quite poor for the simple reason that I haven't had a lot of luck finding good ones for reasonable prices. High end weapons are also very expensive, which is your main source of damage, and in the end, having high damage isn't necessary, particularly for the first time you're progressing. Survival stats are arguably much cheaper and easier to get, particularly for a monk who can use secondary resists as if they are all resists.

Sure, if you can get high damage it's awesome but no matter how you hack it, it's very expensive. High damage also sacrifices survivability and I've seen the effects on live streams, where people boast having 50k-90k DPS. However, they still die and what I personally dislike is that by sacrificing survival stats you give up a lot of control. In your previous post you said "some things just hit way to hard to have a lengthy fight with."

That simply isn't true. I can stand in act III all day long and not be in any danger. The only time when you're in danger is when you are susceptible to bursts of damage from CC, hard hitting mobs, etc. With survival stats, you can negate that threat, and it is to that sort of thing that many high damage streamers keep dying. There are bad affix combos and mob types that are just naturally tougher on them, like shielded for instance. With my monk however, I don't really have any combos that are particularly bad anymore. That's the control that I personally like.

That's just me ofc. I've always enjoyed playing tank like characters so it works for me. Just saying that even high damage specs have weaknesses, while high survival specs have hardly any.

[Riptide]

Sure, 700 is plenty for act II but it isn't that much for acts III & IV. For all intends and purposes, act II is pretty tame compared to the later acts. It's also a bad idea to think of these stats as individuals. Many think that if they just get their resists really high they'll be golden, but that's not how it works. You could have 1k resist and still take a beating because a) your vitality is low and b) your armor is low. Resists and armor should be increased evenly because one makes the other stronger. The same goes to vitality; there's no point having 8k armor and 1k resist if your vitality is 15k.

As for high damage... the reason I don't hold it in a very high regard is that getting high damage is very expensive. You talk about rings and amulets, but they are the most expensive items in the entire game. Mine are still quite poor for the simple reason that I haven't had a lot of luck finding good items for reasonable prices. High end weapons are also very expensive, which is your main source of damage, and in the end, having high damage isn't necessary, particularly for the first time you're progressing. Survival stats are arguably much cheaper and easier to get, particularly for a monk who can use secondary resists as if they are all resists.

Sure, if you can get high damage it's awesome but no matter how you hack it, it's very expensive. High damage also sacrifices survivability and I've seen the effects on live streams, where people boast having 50k-90k DPS. However, they still die and what I personally dislike is that by sacrificing survival stats you give up a lot of control. In your previous post you said "some things just hit way to hard to have a lengthy fight with."

That simply isn't true. I can stand in act III all day long and not be in any danger. The only time when you're in danger is when you are susceptible to bursts of damage from CC, hard hitting mobs, etc. With survival stats, you can negate that threat, and it is to that sort of thing that many high damage streamers keep dying. There are bad affix combos and mob types that are just naturally tougher on them, like shielded for instance. With my monk however, I can don't really have any that are particularly bad anymore. That's the control that I personally like.

That's just me ofc. I've always enjoyed playing tank like characters so it works for me. Just saying that even high damage specs have weaknesses, while high survival specs have hardly any.

First, I specifically linked you a spreadsheet(with my stats) that not only covers dmg but also effective hp and asked you what an acceptable amount was.

"some things just hit way to hard to have a lengthy fight with."

"That simply isn't true. I can stand in act III all day long and not be in any danger. The only time when you're in danger is when you are susceptible to bursts of damage from CC, hard hitting mobs, etc. "

Those things are exactly what I'm referring to.. vortex skull cleavers with any other cc are AWESOME. My cooldowns prevent me for being cc'd for a short period the longer a fight goes the more chance I have to be caught in a bad cc that I can't recover from. I do clear act3 with my stats just fine (in mf gear no less). In fact I solo'd the game with less dmg (around 22k) and mitigation with 280ish loh and 5.7% life steal. Everything was fine, the whole process from level 1- act 4 inferno cleared took about 30 hours of game time . Most of the pieces I bought for under 100k, the only thing that I spent more than 500k was a weapon which was 4mil.

My gear is obviously much better now, but I think I'm still wearing the gloves I had waiting for me at 60 that were like 50k.

[Deleted]

That's just me ofc. I've always enjoyed playing tank like characters so it works for me. Just saying that even high damage specs have weaknesses, while high survival specs have hardly any.

Well the biggest weakness is that farming with them is terribly slow in comparison.

[Cairhiin]

I need to get me a nice slow 1 hander for my mh + cyclones but I'm waiting to see 1.04 first.

Just a question, why would you want a slow one-hander? Almost all Monk skills synergize better with a fast weapon.

[Libretto]

I sit at 70k buffed (enchantress / foresight / blazing wrath, if I counted overawe as part of that I would be at 103k) and the reality is higher damage saves your life more often than high defense.

The reason for this is that elites come in packs of 3-4, generally. Versus most elites, you cannot facetank all 4 without eventually dying unless you have very high defensive stats, such as 800-900 resist all / 6500+ armor / mantra of evasion / shield etc. Monks can't stand in desecrator and arcane beams in A3 the way some classes can, to do so would require 1500+ LoH and the aforementioned resists.

To have such stats costs you a lot of DPS. A LOT. Unless you have several billion gold / thousand dollars lying around to blow, you won't be able to have those kinds of stats along with extremely high DPS. For a monk, "extremely high DPS" is 50K+.

So the goal for a monk, and the goal I see most 50K+ streamers aiming for, is to burst down half the pack of elites in the duration of serenity. This is quite easy. With overawe and 3-stack cyclone already up I have no trouble blowing up 2-3 elites with 1m+ health in 4 seconds. I can frequently kill an entire health link pack of 3 champions in 4 seconds if it's certain mob types like fallen hound / demon trooper. Most elites with desecrator / arcane / frozen won't use them instantly on being encountered, so my goal with them is killing at least half the pack before they use the abilities for the first time, at which point I -then- use serenity to finish the rest off or tunnel more damage in before having to run out and reposition.

Sure, the downside is that if everything isn't dead at that point, I may have to kite or reposition. Oh no, it'll take me 15 seconds to finish a champ pack with certain affixes like shielding or extra health off instead of 5. No big deal. I still don't die. I am rewarded for actually moving out of fire and not standing there spamming a spirit generator futilely while standing in desecrator/plagued/arcane waiting for a mob's shield to drop. This is also why I prefer deadly reach/foresight over blinding flash. The blind does work very well when you have even more extreme DPS than I, such as having 100K+ unbuffed as some streamers do, and the reason for that is that they can kill virtually any pack in the duration of serenity / blind. I prefer having deadly reach so that if I do have to move away from fire or go around a corner to LOS vortex so I don't get sucked into 3 arcane beams, I can still do damage and keep cyclone stacked.

Playing this way I can quite literally clear an entire A3 farm route that covers everything except tower of the damned / arreat crater, in about 45 minutes. Tower / crater I skip because there's too many hulking phasebeast elites in tower, bloated malachor in crater still hits for pre-1.03 amounts (nonelite hits for 30K through 736 resist / 6100 armor) and the elite density in crater is horrid resulting in too much time wasted running around. I may occasionally die to running unprepared into goofy things like fallen overlord / horde arcane fast extra health, but you'll die to them too even with a shield and 1k resist/7k armor. The difference being that I could die and run back to them and kill them faster than you could kill them start to finish without dying.

Life steal does have considerable value when AOEing trash. Versus elites it's not quite as good, but I'm around the breakpoint where the next weapon I get I'll want to have it on top of the other stats I seek. However, I very rarely die when facetanking AOE trash despite having 0 lifesteal and only 960 LoH, mostly because said trash drops health globes that I munch and am always full health from, and dies long before any of it can kill me. I don't see the value in life steal over LoH yet for the purpose of farming A3. I can clear entire rooms of keep depths 2 trash without being randomly gibbed and if life steal isn't necessary now, it won't be if I added 30k more DPS either.

[Deleted]

Just a question, why would you want a slow one-hander? Almost all Monk skills synergize better with a fast weapon.

Sweeping Winds Cyclone takes the damage of the weapon that is active at the time of the activation of the skill, a slower weapon has a higher weapondamage than a faster weapon with the same dps.

But to be honest, always checking which weapon is active before activating SW is to big of a hassle for me while farming, but some people do it.

[Riptide]

Just a question, why would you want a slow one-hander? Almost all Monk skills synergize better with a fast weapon.

Cyclones much like a barbs tornadoes spawn based on mainhand weapon dmg, however their tick speed alternates between active weapons.

Barbs are even more retarded because they can just run around and never attack with their sprint/ww build (in this case you wouldn't want to ww) you can get like a billion dmg 1.2 weapon and then use a 1.5 dagger(regardless of dps) with max ias and retarded stats on it which would double your actual dmg output(which is way higher than char sheet).

[Libretto]

Also, FWIW, with 2 x 1.4 weapons and 15% AS from gear (9% gloves 6% neck) I can keep 100% uptime on overawe without neeeding FoT quickening. Azmodan generally dies just as he spawns his second pool.

[Deleted]

Cyclones much like a barbs tornadoes spawn based on mainhand weapon dmg, however their tick speed alternates between active weapons.

That's not true, just look what I posted above your post.

[Riptide]

That's not true, just look what I posted above your post.

It is true. The cyclone itself spawns off your mainhand ONLY. Sweeping winds and tornadoes tickrate update on active weapon. Sweeping winds damage is based on the active weapon when it was casted.

Also, FWIW, with 2 x 1.4 weapons and 15% AS from gear (9% gloves 6% neck) I can keep 100% uptime on overawe without neeeding FoT quickening. Azmodan generally dies just as he spawns his second pool.

Yea, I have 0 IAS atm. In the market for some gloves and an ias skull grasp. I'll check it out later.

[Cairhiin]

It is true. The cyclone itself spawns off your mainhand ONLY. Sweeping winds and tornadoes tickrate update on active weapon. Sweeping winds damage is based on the active weapon when it was casted.

This might be true but you also have to take into account, that less crits means less tornado spawns since you hit less often with a slower weapon or am I missing something?

[Riptide]

This might be true but you also have to take into account, that less crits means less tornado spawns since you hit less often with a slower weapon or am I missing something?

You are correct. I'd still like to try it though since I'd always benefit from the increased sweeping winds dmg.

I usually don't like slow weapons though makes me feel like IAS is mandatory then. I won't even look at xbows for my DH.

[Deleted]

It is true. The cyclone itself spawns off your mainhand ONLY. Sweeping winds and tornadoes tickrate update on active weapon. Sweeping winds damage is based on the active weapon when it was casted.

Any sources for that?

[Deleted]

First, I specifically linked you a spreadsheet(with my stats) that not only covers dmg but also effective hp and asked you what an acceptable amount was.

I didn't miss the spreadsheet or your question. I just didn't answer it because any EH number I'd make is entirely subjective. Some run with less and some run with more. There's is no way to pin point one empirical threshold and say it's the be-all-you-can-be, particularly since you can reach that point with variable gear.

Those things are exactly what I'm referring to.. vortex skull cleavers with any other cc are AWESOME. My cooldowns prevent me for being cc'd for a short period the longer a fight goes the more chance I have to be caught in a bad cc that I can't recover from. I do clear act3 with my stats just fine (in mf gear no less).

That's all fine and good. The point I was making that for me, in survival gear, it makes no difference whether it is a longer or shorter fight because there aren't circumstances that I can't recover from. In fact, the only real threat for me is if I'm just playing stupidly. I don't need to chain CDs to survive and in fact half the time when using breath of life I do it just to refresh my blazing wrath buff.

I'm not saying everybody needs to gear the way I do but it works for me and it definitely has advantages that going with really high damage does not have. That was my main point.

Well the biggest weakness is that farming with them is terribly slow in comparison.

Define "terribly slow" for me? Is it slower than 60k damage? Ofc it is but it doesn't mean it's reeeeeally slow. That's if you run with 10-15k damage. My damage, with my survival gear, is roughly 30k and that gives me a very reasonable pace.

[Riptide]

Any sources for that?

Yes try it yourself in game. Go buy a cheap weapon with no dps and a slow attack speed and compare. I honestly haven't tried it myself but I was following a thread and it came to people doing just that an logging the info. I think it was on diablofans in the monk or barb forums.