Irdalth Delrar wrote:All in all, I found that the melee classes were not only more fun, they were generally much stronger then the ranged classes. I never felt the raw power with the hunter or witch doctor that the monk provided (let alone the survivability). All in all, they'd better work on balancing, because I don't think its balanced at all...
I kind of disagree about the witch doctor. It felt the most powerful, mostly because of soul harvest. The bonus to intelligence is huge because the other classes can't compensate bad gear even nearly as good as that - and I didn't really want to spend the time to grind up good gear this weekend. But I still didn't
feel the strength, because the most powerful skills are those that are visually complex and/or do damage over time. You don't clearly see yourself doing damage, but if you pay attention, damage gets done real fast. In groups I was usually the one the others couldn't keep up with if I was the only witch doctor, that gtaoe grabby hands thing is deadly with 5 stacks of soul harvest up, stuff died faster than the melee classes could get in range. Even teleporting monks had trouble applying their damage fast enough. And when I ended up in a group with three witch doctors, the skeleton king pretty much just fell over in a matter of seconds.
The wizard on the other hand really didn't feel very powerful, but being near invulnerable half the time is a huge deal. The most fun I had with the wizard was when I played mine as a melee sorceror, using diamond skin and making mobs in front of me explode. Kind of the same playing style I used with the barbarian (with cleave) but taking much less damage due to diamond skin. That ice death ray feels really weak in comparison. I wonder how that'll change later on, hoping that the Archon form will be useful since I kinda like the idea behind it.
The demon hunter was kind of odd. It seems that with good gear you can do very solid damage against single enemies, but how often does that happen? Sure, being able to kill bosses and elites fast is nice, but if getting there takes ages... well. And unfortunately, dual crossbows didn't really seem to pay off, the higher attack speed was partially negated by skill cooldowns.
I did like the monk best too, I agree about it feeling the strongest. No huge damage on demand on long cooldowns but pretty solid consistent damage output. Survivability is great as well - solid damage, skills that heal you, teleporting,
and ignoring collisions with mobs? Sold. I'm planning to play hardcore only once I unlock it, and the monk seems like a great choice for that. The barbarian felt really week in comparison, damage output was okay, but it could do little else other than damage.
2012.03.17 03:00 
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