- Part 31

June 18, 2012 By Jack Jones 18 Comments

Diablo 3 Inferno Massive Crits Build

I’m back from my National Guard duty and ready to rock with more content 🙂 Played around with stacking crit last night. It’s definitely one of the most fun builds I’ve played so far. Seeing crits pop up every other hit is really satisfying.

Theory-crafting

The idea is to stack your crit chance and +crit damage as high as you possibly can. This leads to a tremendous boost in DPS thus allowing you to forego some of the more defensive stats like life on hit because you’re able to kill mobs faster. +Crit is very synergistic with monk skills and gives you a wide variety of build options to choose from. Today we’ll just explore one of these build options.

Important Gear Slots

Weapon

Look for a weapon with a socket and + critical hit damage, dexterity, +attack speed, and lifesteal are all great stats as well but finding a weapon with all of those can get quite expensive. Socket the weapon with a high quality emerald for more +critical hit damage. Lifesteal can actually be useful with this build because you’ll start hitting crits for 60k+. A 60k crit will equal 324 life back to you(60k x 2.7% x 20%).

Shield

Why do you want a shield? Because shields have the highest +crit chance modifier in the game. My shield currently has +10% to crit. Look for +crit chance, dexterity, vitality, and all resist on your shield.

Gloves

Look for gloves with + crit chance, + crit damage, and optionally + attack speed. The best glove you could find would be +crit chance, + crit damage, + attack speed, +dex, + vitality, +all resist. But that’s probably a 30 mil glove so finding one with crit chance and crit damage will suffice.

Helm

Get a helm with +crit chance and a socket. Dexterity, vitality, all resist are secondary stats to look for on the helm. Gem it with a purple gem for the extra life.

Amulet

Ideally you’d want + attack speed, + critical hit chance, and + life on hit. But again, that’s REALLY expensive. I settled for a 104 dex, +190 life on hit, +11% life, +7.5% crit hit amulet. Still cost me a pretty penny but didn’t break the bank. Stats in order of importance on amulet: + crit hit chance, + attack speed, + life on hit, dex.

Rings

Like the amulet if you can get rings with crit hit chance, attack speed, and life on hit you’ll be golden. Mine only have crit chance and dexterity, but still work just fine.

Other slots

The above slots are the really important pieces for this build because those are the items that can have the +crit modifier on them. The rest of your slots can’t, so just stack them up with as much dex, resist, and vitality as you can.

My stats

25,887 unbuffed DPS, 1558 dex, 39k hp, 42% crit hit chance, 203% crit hit damage, 43% dodge unbuffed, 52% dodge with mantra of evasion, 59% with fists of lightning 16% buff, and 65% for three seconds after hitting mantra of evasion.

Armor mitigation is 71.67%, resists are at 50.94% resist all.

Build

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#aiYgXh!XUW!Zccaba

Fists of thunder is great for generating spirit and the +dodge rune is useful for keeping you alive. Sweeping wind with the cyclone rune does INCREDIBLE DPS with 42% crit. You’ll have 4-6 lightning tornados up at one time, each zapping enemies for 20% of your overall DPS. IMO producing much more DPS than just taking bladestorm. Blinding flash and blaze of heaven both work to increase your DPS nicely and help keep you alive. Sixth sense works really great here for increasing your dodge even more.

Strategy

Start off each fight by using flash and getting some big hits in right off the bat. Make sure to keep sweeping wind up as much as possible. Think of blaze of heaven not so much as a heal, but as a 15% damage buff that has a heal as a bonus, so start each fight off with blaze of heaven just for the buff even if you’re at full HP. The drawback of this crit build is that it can be a bit of a glass cannon so manage your cooldowns and run away immediately if your HP starts to drop. Use extra spirit on Mantra of Evasion to keep your dodge as high as possible.

Find more monk builds on this page. Monk level 30-45 guide here. Monk level 45-60 guide here.

June 15, 2012 By Jack Jones 5 Comments

New content coming again starting June 17th

Just wanted to write this quick post and update everyone. For those that didn’t know, I was gone on Army National Guard annual training. I’m back now and after a short break to relax will be uploading new videos everyday starting on the 17th. I appreciate everyone being patient! And if there’s specific vids you’d like to see post them here in the comments and I’ll do my best to accommodate.

June 1, 2012 By Jack Jones 1 Comment

4 Easy quick tips to getting a six pack this summer

1) Add a quick cardio session to the end of your workout

Going along with tip #2 this is another great way to burn some extra calories without adding too much mental anguish. A quick 10 minutes of HIIT(high intensity interval training) can burn 150 cals and it’s a real easy thing to incorporate into your workouts. You’re already at the gym. You’re already sweaty. You might as well do a little extra to reach your goals faster.

Some great quick cardio workouts:

HIIT like I said. Sprint for 30 seconds, walk for 30 seconds, repeat for 10 minutes
Walk at a 10-15 incline on a treadmill at 3-4 speed for 10 minutes.
Use an elliptical with a high level of resistance for 10 minutes.
Bike with a high level of resistance for 10 minutes.
Jog at a fairly high pace for 10 minutes. You’re only on for 10 minutes, so suck it up!

Over the period of a 90 day cut this can help you shed an extra 2-3% bodyfat. That’s the difference between lean and ripped out of your mind.

2) Chug a liter of water upon waking up in the morning

Staying hydrated is KEY to fat loss, and you’re never more dehydrated than you are upon waking. So if you can immediately hydrate you’ll kick your body’s metabolism into optimal gear that much faster and get a extra hour or so of optimal metabolic function going for you.

There’s a ton more benefits to chugging water in the morning as well. It helps you wake up. Helps flush out your digestive system. And overall just helps you start your day on a great note.

Along the same lines, it’s a no brainer, but keep drinking water throughout the day. A well hydrated person will lose noticeably more bodyfat than a chronically dehydrated individual.

If you’re not peein every half hour you’re not drinking enough water 🙂

The kleen kanteen is an AWESOME water bottle. I’ve had mine for YEARS and it’s seriously my most prized possession. I take it with me everywhere I go(ask my friends). It’s stainless steel. Holds a liter of water. You don’t get that nasty plastic taste and most of all you avoid all the BPAs. Click here to check them out on Amazon. These things are DURABLE too. And in a pinch they make for great weapons. Stainless steel, filled with a liter of water… might as well be a baseball bat 😉

3) Replace one carb heavy meal with a spinach salad, vegetable stir-fry, or other form of low density carbs

Abs are built in the kitchen, not the gym.

By replacing just ONE dense carb source(pasta, breads, etc) from a meal each day you can cut out as much as 300 calories and dramatically lower your intake of carbohydrates. This will greatly speed your cut and help you reach your goal of a six pack quicker. Over the period of 90 days following this one tip and changing nothing else about your diet you could see as much as 8.4lbs lost.

4) Take an early morning walk!

Not only will taking an early morning walk help you to your goal of a six pack, it will also start your days off on the right foot. 😉

If you took a 20 minute brisk stroll in the morning five days a week that can equal 500-700 calories burned per week. Over a 90 day period that’s 8400 extra calories or 2.8lbs. Over a year’s time that’s 11.2 pounds you’ve either taken off or kept from being put on your frame. All from a brisk morning walk.

I like morning walks because let’s be honest. It’s tough to wake up in the mornings knowing that you’re about to do some grueling workout or run five miles. Both of which are GREAT, but do what you can. It’s better to walk in the mornings then say you’re going to run and but never actually follow through. And a brisk walk is a great starting step to transitioning over to a morning run or morning workout.

June 1, 2012 By Jack Jones 2 Comments

Diablo 3 Monk Leveling Guide | Levels 45-60

This is part two of my leveling guide. You can find part 1 here giving a guide for levels 30-45.

Level 45

You’ll be in the later acts of Hell. Things should start getting more challenging. If you find you’re dying a lot start picking up more vitality on your gear and stacking a few pieces of +all resist gear.

Build

This build is focused around generating a ton of spirit so you can spam your Lashing Tail Kick and keep everything stunlocked.

Fists of thunder with the spirit gen rune is wonderful. You should have at least +15 crit chance to use this rune. If you don’t an alternative is to use crippling wave until level 48 where you’ll switch over to way of the hundred fists with the spirited salvo rune(15% chance of generating 15 spirit).

Lashing tail kick is your primary spirit dump. It does great damage and the PBAOE(point blank area of effect) stun will make it so most mobs never actually even hit you. Couple that with the fact that transcendence heals you everytime you use the skill and you should have no trouble surviving.

Activate sweeping wind at the beginning of each fight. It’s wonderful AOE DPS and you can forget about it after you hit that button once.

Serenity and breath of heaven are great for oh sh*t moments, but should also be used proactively. Use serenity whenever you’re about to get hit by a big attack or laser and to avoid/escape from freezing/movement impairing effects. Always keep the 15% damage increase buff up from breath of heaven. Pop it at the beginning of a fight even if you don’t need a heal right then, the DPS increase is worth it and the CD is short enough to allow you to do that safely.

Mantra of healing with the spirit regen rune is great for helping you crank out more lashing tail kicks. Hit this if serenity, breath of heaven, your potion are on CD and you still need a heal. The extra heal for 3 secs is pretty nice ontop of the heal from transcendence for spending 50 spirit and definitely more preferable to dying.

Passives are up to you to play around with depending on your weapon choices and gear set up.

Equipment

This is the point where you want to start picking up pieces of gear with dex, vitality, and all resist. You’ll need it in Hell mode difficulty. Keep an eye out for cheap rings/amulets with +attack speed %. Buy whatever weapons have the highest DPS. Secondary stats on weapons you should look for are attack speed increase, life steal, and + life on hit. Secondary stats to try to find on gear is +crit hit chance, + life on hit.

Still I’d recommend not buying much from the auction house until you hit 60. Just get enough to comfortably kill things.

Tips

If you’re getting stuck on any quests/bosses ask a friend to help! If you can’t find friends, ask someone on a forum. Dj2sp and diablo incgamers are both great D3 communities.

Level 50

Welcome to hell *evil laugh*

Build

This is the same build I’ve used successfully at 60 to clear out Act 1 Inferno in a breeze. Here’s the video I made for it, explaining everything, the only change is that instead of dashing strike the build I linked calls for a mystical ally. That mystical ally will be better for you leveling as it will help your DPS. You’re not trying to really skip trash mobs at 50. If you want a more detailed writeup of the build click here, and then here’s the video explaining the build.

Equipment

Hell is when you need to start stacking your vitality and resists. I recommend getting enough vitality so that you’re not getting 1-shot by mobs, and then focusing on all resist gear, or even better pick a resist(fire/arcane/whatever) and find gear with all resist PLUS that specific resist, and run the one with everything passive. This can help you get some ridiculously high levels of resist and make Hell mode feel like easy mode.

Weapons same goes as before, find the highest DPS, look for life steal, +life on hit, attack speed.

Find attack speed rings and amulets. Have I said that enough times now? 😉

Secondary stats to look for on equipment, +crit hit chance, +life on hit, +attack speed increase.

Tips

You’ll die a lot more in Hell. It’s just part of the game. Try to learn from it and not get too frustrated. Kiting becomes really important starting in Hell. If all your defensive abilities are on cooldown you want to run away until they’re up again before re-engaging. Also kiting with shift click(hold to attack) is vital. Move away, hold down shift, hit them 1-2 times, run away again.

Level 55

You’re almost there! You can do it. You’ll probably run into Belial somewhere in your mid 50’s. Here’s a video tutorial I made showing you the best ways to beat this challenging encounter(in my opinion the most challenging in the game by far).

Build

Honestly I’d just stick with the same build I linked last time. Here it is again: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/monk#WijgXk!YdX!ZZbaba

If you want to try something different here’s one of the first videos I made. This is at 58. Looking back probably not the most efficient build but it’s fun and something different to try. Gives you some good gameplay footage of what I mean when I say “kiting” as well.

Equipment

Resists, resists, resists! Surviving Act IV Hell and Act 1 Inferno(and beyond) are all about your resists and damage mitigation as a monk. At this level I ran a 1h/shield build for extra armor and block and to free up a passive slot, but this is up to you. The important thing is to find a playstyle that you like and make a build around your playstyle, not try to force your playstyle to fit some sort of equipment build. If you don’t like shields, don’t use shields! Plenty of monks are super successful dual wielding or using 2 handers. That’s one of the best parts about D3 is that you’re not FORCED to do anything. Choices are good 🙂

Tips

You’re probably getting pretty good at the game now, so let me give you a farming tip. This is what I did to accumulate gold to gear up for Act 1 Inferno.

I have a TON of level 60 builds for Act 1 Inferno up on this page. Peruse at your leisure and good luck in Inferno 🙂 If you found this guide helpful it would help me out a lot if you would share via the social media buttons to the left side of the screen and post this guide to your favorite D3 forums/websites.

June 1, 2012 By Jack Jones 4 Comments

Diablo 3 Monk Leveling Guide: Levels 30 – 45

This is something that a lot of people have been asking for. I figured I’d start with level 30, because normal mode is quite easy and it’s really a time for you to learn your character and try new things. Which I would still advocate continuing on, but thought I’d put together some nice builds and tips to help you get through nightmare and hell modes on your monk.

Level 30

You’re just starting off in nightmare and things should still be fairly easy. This is the part of the game where kiting starts becoming necessary. Don’t hesitate to pop potions and cooldowns, and run away often to let your cooldowns and potions recharge.

Build

The build is designed to let you spam lashing tail kick, which does great damage and also interrupts/knocks back enemies. Way of the hundred fists also performs a knockback, so between the two mobs shouldn’t hit you very often. Use dashing strike to close in with enemies, chase down runners, close in with casters, and keep up with treasure demons.

The mantra and passives are up to you really. If you have trouble surviving take mantra of healing. Passives transcendence is pretty necessary but other then that play around with your other two. Now is the time to play around and see what skills work best for you.

Equipment

Weapons – just get the highest DPS weapon you can find. Get lifesteal or attack speed if you can find it on a weapon for a decent price.

Don’t waste money crafting till 60. You can find much better stuff for way cheaper on the auction house. Buy rings and amulets with attack speed %. Look for items with mostly dexterity. Get a few pieces with vitality if you’re dying a lot. Look for lifesteal on weapons. +life on hit is also a good stat. +crit chance on gloves and weapons are great. Don’t worry about resists at this level.

Tips

Your goal is just to blaze through the quests/acts as fast as you can. Don’t worry about exploring the whole map or every little cave you come across. You’ll get more xp by finishing the main story quests than anything else. But remember this is a game and you’re trying to have FUN! So don’t lose sight of having fun when you’re trying to power through the levels 🙂

Don’t be afraid to blow those CDs(cooldowns). Coming from a WoW background I thought CDs were meant to be saved for emergencies and thus hardly ever used my defensive ones. Get that outta your head! D3 is all about blowing CDs and managing CD timers. Use CDs proactively, pop your serenity when you’re about to get hit by a laser beam or when you’re standing in fire.

Level 35

Things are probably getting a little tougher. Just keep at it and hammering the levels out.

Build

This build is designed to let you spam wave of light, which is a great DPS spirit skill. Activate sweeping wind at the beginning of each fight, it is AMAZING dps. Again use dashing strike to close in with runners, casters, treasure demons, you can also use it to stun enemies that are charging up for a big attack. Mantra of healing mixed with transcendence should be plenty of keep you alive during fights.

Passives again are up to you. The guardian’s path is really good if you’re dual wielding or using a 2hander.

Equipment

Weapons – again get the highest DPS weapons you can find. Attack speed, lifesteal, and life on hit are all great stats.

Stack all dex again unless you’re having difficulty surviving. Then get a few pieces of gear with vitality. Rings/amulets with %attack speed are great and the easiest/fastest way to massively up your DPS. 15% increase to your attack speed is a flat 15% increase to your DPS(makes sense, if you’re attacking 15% faster, you’re doing 15% more DPS). +life on hit, +crit are still both good secondary stats.

I wouldn’t spend anymore than 10k on an item in the auction house. Save your money. Only upgrade the pieces of gear that REALLY need upgrading. You’ll go through the levels so quickly it’s not really worth paying much for stuff in the auction house right now. Vendor all the items you find that aren’t worth selling rather than melting them at the blacksmith, the mats you get at this level are worthless because the things you craft are pretty worthless, so it’s better to get gold from the vendor.

Tips

Again just blaze through the quests ASAP, don’t worry too much about exploring everything.

Start learning to kite. Run away, hold stand to attack(shift) hit the mobs a few times, run away again. This skillset will become invaluable to surviving Inferno.

Level 40

Keep at it, you’re 2/3rds of the way there!

Build

This build is designed to help you maximize your DPS while at the same time giving you enough survivability to make it through the harder difficulty levels of nightmare.

Crippling wave is a really great offensive/defensive ability rolled together. If you find you’re dying often switch out the rune to the one that reduces enemy damage by 20%. Otherwise the increased DPS is great, especially since crippling wave is a real quick AOE attack. Lashing tail kick with the stun rune is AMAZING for surviving large packs. This is your spirit dump and during a fight most of your spirit should be spent spamming lashing tail kick. Between the heals from transcendence and the stun portion of the kick you really should have no trouble staying alive.

Sweeping wind is a staple of my builds just because it’s such great passive set it and forget it AOE DPS. Serenity and breath of heaven are both great to help keep you alive, as you get into harder acts in nightmare having two defensive abilities might be necessary. If not I’d recommend switching out one for a more offensively oriented ability. 7 sided strike or your mystic ally are both great choices.

Mantra of conviction is an AMAZING boost to DPS, and if you find you have extra spirit just hit it a few times. 48% increased damage for 3 seconds after you cast it can make you melt through mobs.

Passives again are more up to you. Pick and choose to see what you like the best.

Equipment

Same ole same ole. Pick the highest DPS weapon be it 1hand or 2hand. Look for items with primarily dex. Pick up vitality where you can but at 40 you can still get away with mostly stacking dex. +attack speed, lifesteal, +life per hit are all great stats for weapons. +critical hit chance, +attack speed % are awesome on your gloves, rings, and amulets.

Again remember don’t spend too much gold on the auction house. You should be slowly saving up so that when you hit 60 you can pick up a few really nice pieces of gear to help you progress through Act 1 Inferno. I would only buy upgrades off the AH if I find I’m struggling through portions of acts. If you’re blazing through no problems don’t even worry about buying upgrades.

Tips

Again just want to reiterate the importance of not wasting money. You can spend 100k now to get a 150dps weapon or save that 100k and buy a 700 DPS weapon when you hit 60. Choice is up to you, but, I’d recommend saving money.

Not much to write here. Pretty straight forward. Do quests. Level up. Enjoy the scenery 🙂

You can find more high level builds here in my monk builds section.