My Take on Ironman (or, Maintenance got you down?)

[entranced]

Whenever Americas maintenance comes i don't know what to do with myself. Henceforth, i will use global play, log on Europe, and play ironman.

This should not be taken as a comprehensive or official set of rules. These are merely the rules i am personally starting with, by reading old ironman rules from various sources, as applied to D3. Mainly what sounds fun to me. I've surely forgotten a few things and will add them in time. As i playtest this i will likely change some when i realize where improvements/corrections can be made. I am also open to suggestions/ideas.


entranced ironman rules:

-hardcore

-no use of auction houses

-no grandfathering gold/items whatsoever. you start with nothing but the white weapon and use only what you find. if your account is shared with non-ironman characters, note your start of session and end of session gold balance to track how much is owned by your current ironman

-stashing is ok (when you are forced to go to town for quest forwarding) but you must pay the gold value* to unlock extra slots/tabs as though each ironman were on a fresh account [14 slots free, 10k per 14 slots thereafter, 100k for tab2, 200k(?) for tab3]

-no use of TP or WP ever, except for quest progression (the current zone and all subzones must be fully cleared first)

-upon entering a level or resuming a checkpoint, the character is locked in. it may not go backwards through the entrance door, it can only leave through the next exit stone/exit door after fully clearing

-no exiting the current game unless at a brand new checkpoint, and the previous area was fully cleared, and the new area is untouched

-only ever quit a session at a checkpoint (as above, previous area fully cleared and next area untouched)

-if disconnected in multiplayer, when rejoining you must not interact in town, go straight to click on a buddy's banner

-full clears of mobs & breakables

-no re-clearing anything anywhere. if possible, this also includes in a new session when a quest returns you to an old area that you already cleared at the time (e.g. Cathedral Garden)

-if known incoming maintenance, prepare to quit far in advance, at a checkpoint (you never know when you'll run into a pack that takes you 30 min to beat). if surprise maintenance, exit immediately

-if the game/server/connection crashes, continue forward from your current checkpoint, but do not reclear any named cleared subzones (e.g. if the same random side-dungeon spawns that you'd already cleared)

-followers are ok but mortal. when each dies, make a note and Dismiss it permanently. you cannot "loot its corpse". you cannot retrain a follower's skills. you can switch between living
followers (when you are forced to go to town for quest forwarding)

-cheat death skills are ok (Spirit Vessel and whatever the monk one is)

-no interaction with vendors aside from forwarding quest progress (no repairs/purchases/sales/healing, in-town nor out in the field). no forwarding quest progress unless the current zone and all sub-zones are clear


These last two are my personal flavor, and are probably not good to use in baseline ironman rules:

-skills variant: once a passive or skill is chosen, you cannot change it to a different one. once a rune is chosen for a skill, you cannot change it to a different rune. you may move skills around on different mouse/keys provided you end up with the exact same set of skill & rune combinations. whatever your starting skill is counts as being locked in, you're stuck with it. the "basic ranged attack" (or equivalent) does not count as a skill, but once you replace it, you cannot go back to it

-artisan gemming/salvaging/crafting is ok (when you are forced to go to town for quest forwarding), but you must pay the gold value* to level artisans up to the level of items you wish to use, as though each ironman were on a fresh account (this may make it non-ironman/too easy, but i want to make use of the blacksmith at least once in my life) [blacksmith, jeweler costs]


* if you've already leveled artisans or purchased tabs on the account: buy a bunch of stuff from vendors, drop it all on the ground and leave it behind (anyone have a better idea?)


Some interesting possible variants i saw elsewhere: "Things like only allowed to use skills from single group/category, no runes, have to use the newest rune, randomly roll the skills you use, only use items from crafting etc..." One i thought of would be to always use the 3 most recently gained passives and 6 most recent skill/skill-rune combinations.

And now off i go with demon hunter IronmanOne! If you add my battletag you can view my progress and i can check you out too.


Edit: didn't take long for me to find a new rule/addition

-town lore books are ok
-no pausing (ESC) the game in single player to regroup. basically if there are mobs around or chasing you, no pausing (aside RL emergencies of course)

[entranced]

Updated the OP with lots of little improvements/clarifications.


Session 1, when i first posted this, was uneventful. Level 7 (DH).

Just finished a 2nd session today. Highlights:

-at 7 met my first goblin, with an errant arrow aggroing it at the same time as i meet a knockback rare gravedigger. wow what a frustrating battle that turned out to be. eventually vanquished both at least!

-unfortunately i'm seeing that playing ironman optimally in D3 entails meticulous breakable comboing for extra xp. not exactly my preferred playstyle. :/ i guess avoiding that will just make it slightly harder, so not a big deal.

-at 8 i came across a teleporter rare 3-pack of the most dangerous low-level enemies, those big fat fast spikey guys (Unburied). was pretty sure i would die here, but pulled it off with a lot of running around. was at like 20% hp most of the fight!

-an interesting playstyle adjustment has been to immediately inspect every item i pick up to see if it's an upgrade. in non-ironman i only ever check items all at once when my inventory is full. also been using ctrl+hover a lot, which in standard play i never use.

Level 9 currently.

[AlexanderBarin]

Good stuff.

My personal style of ironman is:
-No AH
-No Vendors
-No Re-clears
-No re-choosing skills or runes except for the lvl 1 skill (because we are forced to use it, so its ok to switch it, but only once).

[entranced]

-No re-choosing skills or runes except for the lvl 1 skill (because we are forced to use it, so its ok to switch it, but only once).

Yeah that makes sense. It's kind of arbitrary to be stuck with it. I may change my rule to yours eventually. Though by then i'll probably be playing with a "random skills" variant or something.

[entranced]

The adventures continue.

@10 vs the skeleton king, doing everything to keep my templar alive was an unexpected priority.

Annnnnd RIP IronmanI. At the mouth of the Fields of Misery she faced a 3-pack of champion bulls. She met her end at the tender age of 10, her last thoughts grasping for a freshly dropped health globe. At least she reached the adolescent age of archiving!

I forgot to assign her first passive slot, because i dinged 10 with a frenzy shrine on the way to the skeleton king. Not that i necessarily want one of her first two passive options to be one of the final three anyway, hadn't decided in advance.

Deeds, skills & gear: http://imgur.com/a/hJNmi

[thehipone]

-no pausing (ESC) the game in single player to regroup. basically if there are mobs around or chasing you, no pausing (aside RL emergencies of course)

or you could go REAL hardcore-hardcore mode with no breaks
http://www.gocomics.com/foxtrot/2012/06/10

Anyways, keep up the posts, always good to have some interesting action in the HC forum.