Tips for lapsed players returning?

Last week's UPF and the vague knowledge I've had a for a few years that Diablo III had become this living thing through seasons and updates convinced me to jump back in. I finally finished Act V and got my main (and only PC) character, a barbarian, to Level 70 and have completed a three or four bounty series to earn the cubes/caches. I'm reading up on Paragon levels and Nephalem rifts, but I'm wondering what should I know that I don't know I need to look into? Endgame content for games like this always seems daunting, like there's ONE way to play "correctly," but I just want to kill some shit by clicking and get things with better numbers or craft things with better numbers so I can kill more things to get more things what got better numbers and so on and so on.

Who's kept up with D3 and has tips for enjoying the endgame?

i'm roughly in the same boat but from my understanding of it, once you hit the level cap, the idea is to run bounties, rifts, etc to gain paragon levels and keep bumping your difficulties up to get better gear. Seasons are a different beast where everyone starts a fresh character at the start of a season and there are season specific gear/achievements to earn. hope that helps a little. There's really no way to play wrong. The loot system is set in such a way that you'll constantly be getting new gear as long as you play. just the drop rate will change depending on the difficulty you play on.

The season stuff still never made it to console? I wish they would have added controller support to pc.

I've just recently returned to diablo 3 since they started doing seasons and I gotta say, it's pretty fun (I don't do the seasons). I hated how grindy it was, hours of play without a single legendary because I didn't want to use a wizard or a witchdoctor to do the farming. But now, you are practicaly swimming in legendary items (I got 4 different barbarian builds, mixing sets and legendaries) and the cube thingy that let's you equip an item's legendary effect on top of all of your equipment really helps with build variety.

If you don't know where to start with end game stuff I would suggest going to diablofans.com and look up some barbarian builds that might interest you so you at least have an idea of what you are aiming for. The meta is pretty set but there are some fun builds that don't require you to be a hardcore diablo player.

The game is still grindy, all of these games are, but you at least get some reward when you finish a regular or a greater rift. Killing things in this game is still fun.

If you want you can add me and we can play coop until you get comfortable with the new systems.

My name on battle net is Groposo#1703

I've played every season except for 2, and generally do 2 man greater rifting in the 60-80 range with friends. I'm not a super hardcore rift pusher like those who go into 90's, but I can give you some good advice.

Basically, here's what is important to pick up while you play:

• Get death's breath. Lots of it. It is used in basically every kanai's cube recipe.
• Speaking of the cube, go get the Kanai's Cube. You can find the cube in act three. Zolton will give you the quest for it in any act hub. You only have to acquire it once and you'll have it on every character. Unless you do seasons.
• Break down every white, blue, and yellow you find. You'll need the mats for enchanting your items and for the kanai's cube.
• Get forgotten souls. Again, you'll need a lot of these for enchanting and using kanai's cube.
• Get "Act Materials". You'll need them for the cube. You can use them for crafting items at the blacksmith too, but don't EVER waste them on that. No end game builds will use items from the blacksmith.
• Do not waste materials on enchanting items that aren't worth it. A bad legendary that gives you an improvement over your current gear is not worth enchanting or re-rolling when there is better stuff out there. Take it as an improvement and wait for a good legendary to spend resources on trying to perfect.

Now, how do you best go about getting these things most effectively?

• Death's Breath: Bounties and Regular Rifts. They will not drop in greater rifts. Don't make the mistake of only greater rifting and not building up a healthy supply of this item.
• White, Blue, and Yellow Mats: Same as death's breath. Again, don't neglect them.
• Forgotten souls: This one's a little more vague. It depends on the difficulty you can play at. Typically greater rifts and regular rifts are the best source for this though. Rifts have increased legendary drop rates which means more forgotten souls. You can get guaranteed souls from bounty cache's though once you hit Torment 6, and legendarys do drop outside of rifts of course. Stick with the former option rather than the latter if your goal is just souls.
• Act Materials: Pretty self explanatory. You can only get these from Bounty Cache's that Tyrael gives you for doing bounties. Each act drops a different mat, so you must do every act. You can't just spam Act 1 like everyone used to like doing. Only do the act that has the "Bonus!" indicated on it. You'll get an extra cache, and the bonus will move to another act after you complete the one it is currently on. Allowing you to get double the mats in one run.

Some other things to think about:

• The value in greater rifting while you're gearing up is that they will:
  • Generally give you a couple legendaries at the end. The higher you can go the more you will get. Once you start getting into the 40+ range they become amazing for farming legendaries. Don't try to farm a rift level that takes you longer than 6 minutes to finish if you care about efficiency. Around 5 minutes is efficient for a farming rate. As your gear gets better you'll be able to farm higher levels at the 5 minute mark.
  • They are the only place you can get legendary gems. These gems will power up your character in a way a lot of regular loot won't. Bane of the Powerful and Bane of the Trapped in particular are very good for damage bonuses. Ranged characters like the Demon Hunter can make good use of Zei's as well. Others depend on the build, so play around with it if you get any. ALWAYS HAVE A SOCKET ON YOUR JEWELRY. These gems are that good. If you aren't running three legendary gems then you're cutting down on your ability to kick ass.
• Bloodshards:
  • Both rift types will drop bloodshards that you can use to gamble at Kadala. The harder the difficulty the more you will get. This is the best way to get set pieces and legendaries that you need. It allows you to focus in on one item type and spam it until you get it. Never gamble for weapons or amulets. The cost far outweighs any benefit unless you have perfect versions of every other Best In Slot item your build uses. Rings are maybe kind of worth it at 50 per gamble, but I prefer using Kanai's Cube to generate legendary rings rather than spending bloodshards on them.
• Kanai's Cube:
  • Best ways to use the cube:
    • Cube 3 legendaries. This is kind of obvious, but its worth mentioning. You can have one weapon effect, one armor effect, and one jewelry effect at one time. Make sure these slots are used. It's free legendary slots for you, so no point in leaving it empty.
    • Upgrade rares into legendaries. This is what I was talking about when I said don't gamble at kadala for weapons and jewelry. You can do that here instead. For the measly price of white, blue, and yellow mats in addition to 25 death's breath you can turn one yellow item into a legendary. This is incredibly broken. Need a specific demon hunter 1 handed crossbow or a specific monk fist weapon? Well you can make it without any chance of getting any other type of item like a 2 handed crossbow or a sword. This feature alone makes farming for deaths breath a number one priority. You'll burn through it fast at 25 a pop.
    • Re-roll set items. If the set has more than two items in it, (ex: You can't use this on the Focus and Restraint set because it only has 2, focus and restraint), you can reroll one set item into another item within that same set. So lets say you have a duplicate of the Demon Hunter's Unhallowed Essence set. 2 helmets while you really just need the boots for example. You could take the 2nd helmet and keep rerolling it until you get the boots. This allows you to control the rng. Again, costs deaths breath and forgotten souls. So this is why we farm those items first and foremost.
    • Reroll a legendary: So what this does is it will allow you to completely reroll one legendary. It will come back with new stats as if a fresh version of the item just dropped for you. This can be used to change a crappy Yang's Recurve into an Ancient Yang's Recurve that even the best players would be jealous of. Only use this on legendaries that are hard to find through other methods and that you really NEED to be better. Weapons and amulets are the prime subjects here since they are harder to get and not efficient to gamble for. This is extremely expensive. It takes Act Materials and 50 forgotten souls. Don't do this right away. It'll bleed you dry of resources.
• Ancients:
  • Ancients are basically superior versions of legendaries. There is a slim chance that they will appear. The gold border means its ancient. Its basically just a flat increase in most stats for the item. Certain stats like percentages will not be affected by this however. Crit chance, crit damage, elemental % for example see no benefit from this. Ancients can also be further boosted by destroying a legendary gem to give it more of your base stat (str, dex, or int). This can be done with the cube, but don't worry about that while you're starting out. If you see an ancient right away, all that you really need to know is that its great and lucky. The end goal is to have all ancients, but this can take a long time.
• Paragon Levels:
  • You'll note that I haven't said a thing about these yet. That's because you'll get these by doing all of the above. Don't listen to people who insist you must farm paragon levels. Only people competing for spots on the leaderboard need to farm paragon levels. Farming paragon levels makes people hate the endgame and gets dry extremely fast. You can only farm paragon levels in greater rift 90+ 4 man groups, and people won't let you into a 4 man group if you aren't the right class with the right build with the right gear. Don't fall into that trap. Unless you want to be competitive in seasons. Again, I wouldn't recommend it though. Just take paragon levels as icing on the cake that you'll gain as you play every other aspect of the game.

That's all I can really think of right now. It's getting late or I'd try to add some more for you. Let me know if you have any specific questions or if anything confuses you on your journey. Just keep in mind that Bounties are for materials, Regular Rifts are for bloodshards, legendaries/souls, and deaths breath, and Greater Rifts are for bloodshards, legendary gems, and legendaries/souls. Spending these effectively can allow you to gear up a character for the hardest difficulties in just a couple days. Try not to neglect one over the other until you're well established. All 3 are important, and having a change of pace can help keep you from getting tired. There's no wrong way to play the endgame, because nothing will get locked out for you if you do something that other people don't. It may just take a bit longer to get cool stuff than it would for those who take a polished approach.

They key to enjoying Diablo's endgame is to use it as an excuse to talk to friends, listen to an endless amount of podcasts, or binge watch something on another monitor.

Damn Rorie for getting me back into this. I've already done the Diablo dungeon with a new level 1 hunter and got the two pets. holy shit why did I never play this class before. He is so awesome later on

I would say in terms of endgame content Diablo 3 is probably the most open when compared to other ARPGs (Grim Dawn, Path of Exile). There is no one right way to go about things though depending on your goals, some activities are more beneficial to you than others.

If you're interested in seeing and running endgame content I would check out Deadset's class guides on IcyVeins. There are high end builds for every class as well as builds meant to get you from 1-70 and even fresh 70 builds which can be used with any gear you've found or crafted. What I like about Deadset's guides that they do a very good job of explaining not just what to use but how to use it most effectively and why each piece was selected, this can really help newer players gain a better understanding of the game. For newer players or people returning after a long absence I would recommend against using DiabloFans build guides as those are typically written for veterans of the game. They tend to assume a lot of knowledge about the person reading using all sorts of acronyms, not really explaining how the build works or how it's meant to be played.

Finally I would seek out a clan. I believe there are multiple Giant Bomb clans you can join. While I'm not dedicated enough to compete on the North American leaderboards, it's nice to be able to see how I compare with the rest of the GB community.

Thanks everyon, especially @mezza. I'm Asmo917#1312 if you want to add me, as I'll probably be playing a bit this long weekend. I've run 8-9 bounty series to start collecting act mats but still feel like I have a shirt on to learn about builds and optimal gear. Also, I'm a filthy casual so please don't invite me to groups where people will care when I fuck up :)

@oursin_360: Seasons are coming to console later this year.

@asmo917: I've sent you a request. I'll usually be on fairly often. If you need help with builds at all or what items to look for feel free to ask. I mainly only play Demon Hunter and Monk anymore, but I've played every class and have a basic idea of what builds people are preferring in the current season/patch.

How are the other classes to play? I really like the witch doctor and demon hunter because they're fast and can get a bunch of companions which I think looks cool. The wizard was also pretty dope. How are the melee classes though?

@dudeglove: ooh, monk sounds cool. Will definitely try it out. Thanks

@_brojangles_: Nice! Will give me an excuse to jump back in on ps4.

Left click kills

Right click kills harder

Always play seasons. Playing and finishing a season ends you with better gear than you can farm for in the same time without doing the season.

If you're on console and can't play seasons, the game isn't as much fun.

Are you on PC or PS4? If you're on PC then just create seasonal characters and go from there. If you're on PS4/X1 then I would say finish what characters you don't have leveled to 70 or work on doing rifts and bounties. There's really no learning curve for jumping back into Diablo 3.