Beating Inferno with Bad Gear

[Coriolis]

Can someone confirm that you get the full amount of your LoH for every monster you hit? I had heard that you basically only get the LoH amount once for each click of the mouse, so that it doesn't actually help to use it with an AoE spell.

Yes, you get healed for every mob you hit with LOH. But, how much you get per mob depends on the skill (and rune) you are using and your LoH. Someone worked out the numbers for all the generators but I don't have the link handy, but the basic idea is that the bigger the aoe of the spell, the less it heals for each individual mob you hit (to balance out the fact that you will hit more enemies).

The "problem" is that certain skills are seriously unbalanced right now, most notable FoF+thunderclap rune which counts both the normal attack and the aoe as separate "attacks" for the purpose of LoH, each with a coefficient of 75% (changes a bit for 3rd strike but that doesn't really matter). Meaning that if you have 1000 LoH and hit one mob with FoF+thunderclapyou heal for 1500 hp, and every additional mob for another 750. WotHF+ fists of fury has a similar "problem" with an even higher coefficient (1.75 total I think), but since it's naturally slower then FoF it's not actually better over time.

[kestegs]

Okay, that makes sense then. I was thinking it was divided in a different far less effective way.

[Such Violent Storms]

Is Crippling Wave worth it then? You get a little less LoH, I guess, but Concussion -20% and -20%ias surely makes up for it... right? I do enjoy Thnderclap though.

[Odegar]

I updated my guide with info on life per hit. It's an amazing stat, just outrageously expensive.

[Warrior of Light]

Nice guide! I am so impressed and going to try “zero LOH” approach!

--------------------------------------
15,165 Damage
1.95 Attacks per Second (extremely important)
111.4 Life per Spirit (extremely important)
914 All Resists
1,360 Life Regen
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Where did you found that gear for 7.5 millions?
Please show screenshots of your gear. At the moment I have to use deduction to find what you use.
Your key points of the guide are: life per spirit, life per second, cheap price.
15k DPS with 2 hits per second means you have 1k dps weapon and attack speed rings and amulet. Cheap rings don’t have all resist. So you should be using 15% AS + one resist + dex + vit.
That means 9 armor slots must have: 130+ life per second, 90-100% resists (all+one), dexterity.
30% dodge, 15k dps, and you say you stack dexterity. So it is about 1 – 1.3k total dexterity. More than 100 dex per item.
It means you use 9 armor items with those stats each:
100 dexterity
100 resists (all+one)
135+ life per second.
Some vita.
Helm also has 20 life per spirit.
Gloves probably have attack speed.
Boots has 10% run speed.
Demon hunters and monks are crowding EU servers at the moment. Items with such stat list going for 1-3 millions.

[Odegar]

I guess my question would be, how easily do you farm champ packs in a2, a3 and a4? You can slog through quests with a very defensive build and bypass champ mobs and get through the game, but that doesn't mean you can easily farm an act. If you farm, what do you farm and how long does it take you? I used to play with a build similar to yours and while I could kill things, the amount of time it took made it inefficient compared to a more balanced offensive/defensive build with LoH.

On my way through I killed probably 40% of packs in A3 and A4, but I wasn't entirely interested in spending tons of time on them. The #1 thing that held me back from killing packs was damage output. I would end up getting that debuff. The thing is, if I went to a LoH, fist of thunder build I wouldn't have survived a single hit.

150 life per spirit is equal to 900 life per hit (single target), but you have complete control. I just put up a vid of me killing diablo in the gear I first beat him with. You can easily see that my healing power is off the charts (and on the move!). And I have 1/3 the life regen I could have. Imagine 150 life per spirit, 1,200 life per hit and 3k life regen. Immortality. As far as packs of mobs and life on hit, large groups of enemies aren't a problem at all. Yea, if you're able to attack 4 elite mobs at once it'll help, but elite packs are messier than that and have spiky damage/things you must avoid.

If you farm, what do you farm and how long does it take you?

To get gear to beat inferno, I would just run through A1 when it was actually profitable, or do belial runs w/ 5 stacks if i got bored of that.

Now I do Inferno Whimsyshire. I upped my dmg to 22k by sacrificing survivability. If a pack is going to take me more than 5 minutes, I kite them away off the bat. I have a designated corner. I use blind/serenity to kill mobs super fast and clear out the place and put on MF gear to loot chests.

I get 5 neph stacks by going to the festering woods, entering the 2 caves, kill the 1-2 named packs in teh zone, then doing the quest on the hill for the last pack. If that only gives me 4 stacks, I go somewhere else for final pack. I don't care about principle when I farm. I just do what's fast and convenient.

[Odegar]

Where did you found that gear for 7.5 millions?
Please show screenshots of your gear. At the moment I have to use deduction to find what you use.
Your key points of the guide are: life per spirit, life per second, cheap price.
15k DPS with 2 hits per second means you have 1k dps weapon and attack speed rings and amulet. Cheap rings don’t have all resist. So you should be using 15% AS + one resist + dex + vit.
That means 9 armor slots must have: 130+ life per second, 90-100% resists (all+one), dexterity.
30% dodge, 15k dps, and you say you stack dexterity. So it is about 1 – 1.3k total dexterity. More than 100 dex per item.
It means you use 9 armor items with those stats each:
100 dexterity
100 resists (all+one)
135+ life per second.
Some vita.
Helm also has 20 life per spirit.
Gloves probably have attack speed.
Boots has 10% run speed.
Demon hunters and monks are crowding EU servers at the moment. Items with such stat list going for 1-3 millions

Sorry for the late reply. I posted a video of me killing Diablo in which I mouse over all of my gear. Very nice deductive skills, lol. You hit the nail on the head. I actually had haste on my helm instead of gloves though.

The reason my gear was so cheap was that I had very low haste, and the items which did have haste had poor stats. From what I've heard, the American market is much different, but if things cost more, you can make more selling them. Things have a way of working out. Unless you're a barb, then items cost 1/4 the amount. Way to make strength gear just as common as int and dex...

Here's the vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nS847bK4n3w&feature=plcp

[Enso]

Hey Odegar, I just wanted to let you know that I've been trying this build out and am having massive success with it so far. I had already been using these skills, but never considered purposefully lowering my health pool to increase the potency of heals, potions, LpSS, and life regen. This has made a huge difference, and I have gone from being stuck at the beginning of act 2 to progressing smoothly through act 3. My health recovery has become insanely fast and I can survive almost anything if I'm quick to react and heal properly. Thanks for the advice, it's made Inferno manageable and fun!

[Kinmaul]

Hey Odegar, I just wanted to let you know that I've been trying this build out and am having massive success with it so far. I had already been using these skills, but never considered purposefully lowering my health pool to increase the potency of heals, potions, LpSS, and life regen. This has made a huge difference, and I have gone from being stuck at the beginning of act 2 to progressing smoothly through act 3. My health recovery has become insanely fast and I can survive almost anything if I'm quick to react and heal properly. Thanks for the advice, it's made Inferno manageable and fun!

A 7k heal is a 7k heal, doesn't matter if you have 20k life or 40k life and lowering your health does not change that. Vitality is a buffer, but as long as you are not dying and can react to the damage with the appropriate skills then you can get by with less. It also takes up some of the item budget, so if you can get by with less vit then you can stack more of other stats which is what the the OP is suggesting with his guide. I'm sure if Odegar was offered 50k bonus life he would not turn it down because "it would make my heals look smaller on my health globe."

[Yggdrasil]

A 7k heal is a 7k heal, doesn't matter if you have 20k life or 40k life and lowering your health does not change that. Vitality is a buffer, but as long as you are not dying and can react to the damage with the appropriate skills then you can get by with less. It also takes up some of the item budget, so if you can get by with less vit then you can stack more of other stats which is what the the OP is suggesting with his guide. I'm sure if Odegar was offered 50k bonus life he would not turn it down because "it would make my heals look smaller on my health globe."

I can understand what they say : Lower life = higher resistances (at same budget).
Let's compare a 40klife/50%damage reduce with a 20klife/75%damage reduce build (I know it seems basic but it is just to illustrate what they are saying). Both loose exactly the same life% from a 10k hit (12.5%life less). Now lets say that with some +Life on Spirit spent, you have an exactly 5k heal spell... It will be more effective in the second case, getting life from 2hits back, than in the first build, recovering only 1hit life.

I know it seems to be to caricatured, but it is just to illustrate that in some sense, if you reduce you life but increase your damage mitigations, heals become more powerfull... You just need to find the right equilibrium in this.