What Difficulty Should I Be On in Diablo 3?

As an experienced monk main with over 1000 paragon levels, I‘ve played across the spectrum of difficulties in Diablo 3. When just starting out, I recommend Normal or Hard to learn. Experienced ARPG players can jump into Expert. But the most important thing is finding the optimal difficulty that provides engaging challenge without slowing down your progression.

In this guide, structured across early, mid and end game sections, I‘ll share the insights I‘ve gained pushing solo Greater Rifts up to 105 and playing meta group compositions that dominate the seasons leaderboards.

Early Game (Levels 1-70)

When first starting Diablo 3, play on Normal or Hard difficulty to get accustomed to your class abilities and game mechanics while still making leveling progress.

According to maxroll.gg Monk leveling guide, brand new players should spend levels 1-30 on Normal learning the ropes. Meanwhile, veteran ARPG gamers can start off on Hard for a moderate step up in challenge and rewards.

Around level 30-40, the guides recommend stepping up at least to Hard. The incoming damage shouldn‘t be too punishing, allowing you to learn to integrate primary attacks, skills and runes into smooth combat rotations.

By level 50-70, shifting to Expert becomes viable to take advantage of increased legendary drop rates while gearing up toward endgame. Expert provides substantial XP/gold bonuses without excessively bolstering enemy HP/damage to the point of slowing kill speed.

When assessing if your character build is ready for the next difficulty tier, consider how quickly you can defeat elite packs – the main source of progressing your character via gear, gems and paragon levels. Based on the r/Diablo community recommendations, you want to be beating elites in under 30 seconds for efficient runs. If it takes over a minute to take an elite pack down, dropping the difficulty will provide faster overall gains.

You may hit level 70 before completing the full story campaign – don‘t worry about staying to finish quests on lower difficulties! Once you gain access to Adventure Mode and Nephalem Rifts through completing Act V once, you can enable elective mode and leverage your class sets and legendary effects to accelerate into dominating the various endgame systems.

Mid Game (Level 70+)

Upon hitting the max level cap, you‘ll gain access to Torment difficulty levels 1 through 13. Torment unlocks the possibility for many powerful legendaries and set gear providing multiplicative damage bonuses tailored to enable specific playstyles and skill combinations.

Your goal is now itemization – acquiring well-rolled set and legendary pieces to empower your chosen build. Based on r/Diablo3Monks, farming Newhalem Rifts on Hard provides an excellent drop rate balance for freshly dinged level 70s.

Also, spending your early Blood Shards on rings and amulets can help round out your build defining Focus/Restraint or Bastions of Will combos. At this stage, rate of gear acquisition matters far more than small XP differences across Torment tiers.

Once your supporting legendaries and 2-piece class sets are in place, you can start steadily climbing the Torment ladder as your damage escalates exponentially. From my experience pushing solo Greater Rifts, incrementing just 1-2 Torment levels at a time ensures you don‘t hitdamage/survivability ceilings prematurely.

Pushing too high too fast can brick progress if not keeping up with necessary Toughness and Healing to counterbalance incoming elite affixes and attack patterns. Optimizing your gear‘s primary attributes andSocket rolls with Diamonds and Emeralds appropriately will help smooth out Difficulty transitions.

End Game Push (GR70+)

In the final Diablo 3 end game, the goalpost shifts to advancing your Legendary Gem ranks through completing ever-higher tier Greater Rifts within the 15 minute limit. Top pushes require fully Augmenting ancients with high level gems for thousands of main stat points.

Based on the Era leaderboards, the current highest 4-man meta clearing GR150 utilizes zBarb for buffs/debuffs, zMonk for grouping/healing and zNecro for damage rotations amplified by the zDemon Hunter‘s meticulously positioned area attacks.

But before diving straight into such hardcore optimization, I‘d recommend starting to Solo GR push around Torment 16 / GR75 to better gear out your build. Learn nuances like tightly grouping trash packs, skipping elite affix combinations that counter your skills, and optimizing your Cooldowns and resource management through the Rift Guardian fight.

Once able to speedfarm GR90s under 5 minutes, you can start leveling Augments and experimenting with zRoles. Staying in the 3-5 minute range means kills are still fast enough for Gem upgrades while providing the XP and drops to incrementally advance character power.

Key Takeaways

1. Start Normal/Hard to learn mechanics, then increase difficulty gradually
2. Prioritize kill speed over highest difficulty early on
3. Farm Torment tiers for quick legendary acquisition at 70
4. Solo push mid-tier GRs before specializing into group roles
5. Optimize around 3-5 minute GR clear times for augments/gem levels

Hopefully these tips help you slaughter demons more efficiently on your Slayer‘s journey to greatness! Let me know if you have any other questions.