Paragon Level 106, 107, and 108

Transmogrified!

Went ahead and jumped to ACT V, but damn, I had to dial back the difficulty down to EXPERT because I was dying left and right to elites in Torment, even Master. Yes, I'm so crap at this. I'm already up to Level 67 and I finally encountered the new artisan, the Mystic. It wasn't so expensive to train her up to her highest level so I maxed her out immediately.

One fun thing about the Mystic is that she can "transmogrify" your armor, meaning she can change the look of your armor according to what you want. Place your, for example, helmet in the transmogrify window and you will be given several choices as to how you want it to look. It's so cool. That's my old Barbarian up there, fully transmogrified!

Reaper of Souls First Impression

I noticed a vast improvement in latency on the Americas server so I decided to continue playing my Barbarian there.

There was a big patch a while back, Patch 2.0 which upgraded the game and has in fact changed the log in screen to "Reaper of Souls". It came with an adjusted loot system (which is awesome), additions to the game like "Pools of Reflection" which allowed you to level up faster. But it wasn't until March 25 did the expansion "Reaper of Souls" was finally activated.

It comes with a new act, Act V, raising the level cap to 70, allowing more powerful items into the game.

Before the launch, I made it to Act 1 of Torment 3, Paragon Level 74. Torment 1 didn't seem all that hard, and the only thing that made Torment 2 slightly more difficult was that it took such a long time to kill monsters.

I thought I'd start over the game on Torment 2 after the launch, and just level up my character from there. What I noticed was the game had suddenly become more difficult, much more difficult than Torment 2 was before the launch. That's probably because the monsters are now leveling up the same time as me. Now that I'm up to Level 65, the monsters have leveled up to 65 as well. In fact, it's become so difficult that I've lowered the difficulty to Torment 1 and the monsters...just mobs and not even elites are STILL KICKING MY ASS. Holy crap. They seem to have a much higher damage this time around.

The joy in all this is that I've started to get much more powerful items, although I've noticed I haven't gotten much legendaries as I used to. Leveling up from 60 to 65 I only got ONE legendary item, but it's a really good one and it's now my primary weapon:

Additionally, the default gem that drops now is the "Marquise" gem, which automatically made all my other gems that I've been keeping and upgrading quite useless. I don't mind though. It's levels higher than the previous default gem which was I think "Flawless". As long as it makes my items much more powerful, I won't complain!

I've yet to see Act V or encounter the new artisan. But I'll get there eventually!

Paragon Level 105

Akarat's Champion

Latency has improved dramatically today enabling me to play lag free for the first time in a week. YEAH! I've been leveling up my Crusader and upon reaching Level 25, I gained the "Akarat's Champion" skill, which enables me to literally go berserk for 20 seconds, very much like the Barbarian's "Berserker" skill. The character grows dramatically, looking more ferocious, which is awesome.

When I started this new character by the way, I didn't bother with Diablo 3's "Normal" setting and went straight to "Hard". It's actually not that hard and it's faster to level up.

Paragon Level 104

The 50% Bonus XP has been over for a day or so now (the guys at Blizzard even expanded the XP Bonus to 100% during the last day or so of the allotted time). Thankfully I've broken through the Paragon Level 100 milestone before it ended.

I'm now at Torment III but I haven't been getting interesting items thus far (I'm currently at The Fields of Misery). I'm thinking of ramping it up to Torment IV but I'm somewhat worried that my character is not yet up to it.

We'll see later.

Serious Latency Issues

I continue to have serious latency issues. In an earlier blog entry I posted about how it became virtually impossible to play properly on the Americas server, causing me to switch to the Asian server. I was able to play OK for a while, but very soon it too became plagued with really bad latency issues. My new Crusader above already died several times because of it.

Can you imagine how frustrating it is when encountering a pack of elites, and you engage them, and everything just stops? You keep on hacking and nothing's happening. 8 seconds later everything moves again but you're dead. I'm like WTF.

Hardcore playing is SO out of the question.

This is not just because of Launch Day because I've been experiencing latency issues for about a week now. It's really soured my playing of the game. It's too bad because my Monk has been kicking ass and this new Crusader holds a lot of promise. Diablo 3 seems like a new and revitalized game. I'm so stoked to play it. But well...

It's just not me though. Looking over the forums at Battle.net, you have an endless list of people having the same issues worldwide. And yes, that includes quite a number of complaints from the Philippines.

Perhaps it is because of the launch. People have started to play Diablo 3 again after a long time and lots of people are starting to log in. Notice how I'm on a queue in the graphic above. I mean, that hasn't happened since the game first launched a couple of years ago.

With a renewed interest in the game, Blizzard has to recognize the fact that they need to make people happy at this time. This time more than ever. Many of these people have already swore off Diablo 3 (including me) and are coming back right now.

You are being given another chance Blizzard...don't blow it.

Paragon Level 102 and 103

New Character, New Server!

Fed up by the frustrating lags on the Americas server, I switched to the Asian servers where I'm able to play without lags at all. Unfortunately, my Barbarian, along with all the contents of my chest, don't come with me. I have to create a new character and build up its own inventory.

That's just fine. I created a Monk, which was the very first character I ever played on D3. I found myself leveling up incredibly fast. I mean, I just started this character today and I'm already at Level 24! Something must be in the air, and it turns out I was right!

Apparently, Blizzard has further boosted the Experience bonus to 100% on the eve of the Reaper of Souls launch. YEAH!

I'm not sure how long I will be playing on the Asian server. I will check again upon the ROS launch how playing on the Americas server will be. If it still lags, I will be playing Reaper of Souls, with a brand new Crusader, on the Asian servers for the time being.