what to upgrade?

http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Hexpheros-2741/hero/1202910

beside gems

This post was edited by Magic_Hammer on Sep 22 2012 07:12am

helm with a socket for ruby

how do you think would the new patch change things ? with the weakening of resolve and STI ?

Doesn't matter since the mobs are getting nerfed more.

And the high end guys will be able to play a Difficult game now that there's monster lvls.

will skorn still be worthing on monk in 1.0.5? or shield will be necessarly?

This post was edited by hpn on Sep 22 2012 04:13pm

Two hander is slow and boring.

Shield is not needed.

I just gotta say. having a shield speeds up my runs SO much. Of course, this has everything to do with the tier of gear I'm at right now, but frankly, I found a really good offhand for less than 3 mil (a great bargain) and it gives me about...200 dps more than my shield. Unless I use my LoH ammy, then I LOSE about 400 dps. With the 900 dps offhand with 70% CHD. Plus with the shield, I get about 2k armor, 110 res all, block, etc etc...the only thing I gain from an offhand is the LoH on mine, and a lot of attack speed. Which is nice for cyclones, teleporting around faster, and maybe if I had 1k+ LoH, but for the most part it just nerfs my survivability so much.

So anyways, for me at least, at 48k dps buffed, a shield is definitely the better choice. Maybe when I get up to 70k dps, and have more than 650 res without my shield, I'll be able to switch up to dual wielding. But despite the DW craze and people in this thread telling me how much better it is...it's not. It just isn't. And frankly, it plays exactly the same with or without a shield in terms of playstyle...just a bit slower attack speed.

In the meantime, here's my shield monk, still taking suggestions on what I should upgrade next. I found a Blackthorn belt the other day (!!! first set drop ever!) and sold it for 16.5m...over doubled my life savings, hah. So I have about 30m right now. I want to get rid of the shield but I can't afford to run without it right now. I switch it out sometimes when I'm not seeing elemental affixes up the ass (basically 100% of my deaths are from fucking molten + horde, which is 70% of the champ packs I face it seems. MOLTEN IS OP AS FUCK. INVULNERABLE MINIONS WAS FINE), and it speeds things up a little bit, but other than that the shield helps.

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Kylezo-1560/hero/933168

This post was edited by kylezo on Sep 22 2012 05:02pm

It works for you. That's all fine and dandy.

But I have 70k unbuffed dmg with 670res. I I have like 250loh only and never really die. 2.2aps is addicting to me and that's why I always preach all the monks to go dual wield.

If u like ur shield set up, that's fine too.

And a little tip for dealing with molten packs is 24% movement speed. With it, you jump in to burst out huge dmg and go in and out of the fight without really stepping on the fire.

I think I can spend my saved up gold to boost my dmg up to 100k but trying to wait til the patch hits. Gotta try the monster lvl games and decide what to do.

This post was edited by jinshin85 on Sep 22 2012 06:33pm

Hey man, like I said, I'd love to get rid of it, but I can't. I die. I don't have 24%ms, I dont' have 70k unbuffed DPS...roll with no shield on MY monk and tell me "Yeah well it works for you", lol. 2.2 aps is totally addicting, I know. But dying every 5 seconds is NOT, haha.

Thanks for the molten tip, never thought how much ms would help with that. I'll probably continue farming with a shield until I save up enough gold to get off the training wheels and dual wield. I probably could do it pretty well with just a couple new pieces, but they are gonna be COSTLY. I'd need a LoH ammy with lots of vit, res, and at least crit and hopefully APS, new APS gloves, and higher res on all my gears. That's gonna take more than 30m probably.

LOH is a crappy thing to pay for :/ any decent amount basically doubles the price of the item, but it is no longer needed when you hit 80k dps because that's when you can finish off a mob before serenity runs out... With 30 mil I'd probably up my defenses and try to go for life regen as it works just as well (300 life regen = 150 LOH@ 2 attacks/s) Youre looking to upgrade a few pieces anyway, so look for regen on them. Meanwhile, try to go for crit chance. Ideally, you want to be able to hit 80k dps just by switching your shield out. This is very much possible with a skorn, which is something to consider because it's price is coming down.

I use a shield as well and I've seen some crazy shield builds... It's possible to break 100k dps with a shield, but that build will cost just as much as one with dual wield