Punishable exploits involve getting a competitive advantage over the the design intent. Design intent is the key here. Mechanics have an intended designed behavior.
Let's consider the Blood Shard issue because this is a clear example of a punishable offense. The intended design of Blood Thief design is that at higher difficulties you are to be rewarded with higher quantities. So you can expect more in T6 than in T1. But if you use a game multiplier like a Greater Rift mechanic that is used strictly for XP to affect the blood shard drop rate the bug is clear. Blood Theives do not exist in Greater Rifts, therefore they should not be affected by this multiplier.
It is one thing to find the bug. This isn't punishable. You simply report it as a bug and the fix will get implemented. When you hide it and don't report it, well you are at the mercy of Blizzard's discretion. It is a judgment and they are the judge. Some got rolled back. Someone got banned because it was streamed and in their judgment the punishment was warranted.
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Regarding the likelihood of Goblin packs in a Rift, the odds are that they will be after the Rift Guardian.
Here is why I state this:
Density has improved so much that the RG trends to spawn somewhere around the end of the 2nd floor. With about 6 or 7 floors per Rift if the chance of Goblin Packs are the same for each floor, then the RG spawn event isn't the midpoint to determine how likely a different Random event will occur. Clearly the Goblin Pack will more likely occur on the floors that are greater in number. This in my estimation is the 4 to 5 floors after the RG is killed.
I can't back up this will any real data or numerical formulae. This is purely an empirical assessment. But I do call BS to anyone that states that you aren't missing Packs if you don't do full clears. About 2/3 of the floors are left on the table if the Rift ends immediately after the Boss kill.
I do think that shards per time spent in a rift is a valid strategy. However, the Blood Thief spawn clouds whether this is optimal.
I don't offer this as a reason for any one to change their Rift exit strategy. My intent is to give the OP a logical a
reason for people to continue until the exit obelisk spawns.
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I'm going to flat out state the DH isn't what you're looking for. If you doing anything but M6, it's probably weaker.
The only variation is pretty much Weapon and your choice of Resource Management. Passives are pretty much Awareness, Cull of the Weak, Steady Aim, Archery, Custom Engineering, Blood Vengeance, and Ballistics. Of those, for Higher Grifts, you need Awarenes, Custom Engineering and Ballistics. Cull of the Weak is too good not to use in combination the Bane of the Trapped Gem. So, the others are whatever your Hellfire Amulet allows you to use. With the overlapping bonuses with Passives and Gems, if there is a class that needs a 5th passive, it's DH. And crafting requires lots of luck or way too much time to gather the Keys and Forgotten Souls.
Legendary Gems provide the most diversity. Bane of the Trapped is pretty much required, as noted above. Zei's is best in combination with Steady Aim. And Enforcer is good with Sentries. Other than that, you can use Bane of the Powerful for most part, but when it takes more than 20 seconds to kill of an Elite, the gem's only real value is Elite Damage.
With weapons, the only thing that will drastically change your build is an ultra-rare Kridershot. It helps with resource management. The new Season weapon is good, but, you're still only doing primary damage. M6 does most of it's damage with either Cluster Arrow or Multi-Shot. Elemental Arrow with Lightning is an option, but, this is a very specific build with well rolled items. So good luck getting all the right gear to drop or allow required enchanting.
That being said, I think Crusader is the best for Multiple Builds. There are a number of Game defining Item Drops that will allow you vary your build. Ahkahn's Set is probably the best set, but there are a lot of items outside the set that can be swapped outside of the set. These are in Shield and Weapons. There is a Flail and a couple of Shields that affect Heaven Fury. Each is very powerful on it's own. There is also a Sword that triples the effects of Falling Sword. So, as you obtain items, you can vary your build. Considering Shields, there are a number of them that do different things, like allow you to use Hammer as well as do somethings when a Block occurs. The big thing is that the items you find will be usable to do different things. Most of these things are offensive, so your builds feel much different from the others. For most other Classes, they are very Set dependent for this kind of change in play styles. For Crusader, if you swap a shield, you can change your build from channeling Heaven's Fury or to an in your face Shield Bashing style.
Personally, I still like all the trouble I can get into playing DH, but, for now, this requires dropping sentries and managing resources. This is what you do regardless of any items you have in your slots.
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It drops, my DH got a drop a off a Rift Guardian in Strength with 48% Elite Damage. WTF?
I guess I'll have to wait until the season ends to use it on my Nonseasonal Crusader.
Then I had to spend Shards with 463 in the bank after the Rift.
I figure I'll just go and spam click some weapons since I just completed my M6 set.
Third item from Kadala is a Kridershot. 2 of the most rare drops in less than a minute.
RNG is RNG. I quit playing for the night.I was too shocked and it was getting late.
Next morning I play a Nephalim Rifts and Ramaladni's Gift drop on my second rift.
They did just improve the drop rate on the Furnace.
They did this because New Seasonal items would have further diluted the drop chance.
But, it's probably just offset to keep the drop rate over time about the same.
I will state that this is the first Furnace I've seen and I've played hundred of hours as non-DH classes.
This is my 4th Kridershot. 1st was level 67. 2nd one was a 3 Hatred generator. 3rd was a 4 Hatred Seasonal.
This one is a Seasonal 3 Hatred generator. Again just saying RNG is RNG.
I have never seen that Cow Rift. I think it's supposed to be a 1 in 10,000 chance of the spawn.
Just something ridiculous. My guess, is more like a 1 in 1 Million. I don't know anybody that's done it.
I did see a VOD of it, looks cool. It basically spawns as an event with quest.
There's a mini-story where quest objective are given to you by NPCs that have to be met. Something like 17 levels.
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You need it but Paragon in the Late Game provides more than than enough. So on a throwaway weapon it will help a lot. But later when you have nothing else to spend Paragon on you will have plenty. So maybe roll AD then later roll it off for Vit.
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Moving the affix doesn't help the DH class. Running M6 you only get to swap out 1 item right? With the change from Attack Speed to Resource Management we swapped Tasker and Theo for Cindercoat. Changing to gems makes us have to drop Bane of the Powerful or Zei's. You can't drop Enforcer or Bane of the Trapped.
There is no ring to use other than SoJ. And BoP is the best trade for elite damage.
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@shadyw
What? As of 2.1 DH & Monks are Armor classes. What math are you doing? Adding Dex, Armor and Resist All will always increase toughness. It's the combination of how much to each Stat that dictates the gains in improvement.
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Frozen has been getting me lately. I have kulle aid and smoke screen to deal with wallers and jailers. But can't use Ice Climbers with M6. When you're frozen and see frozen orbs stacking next to your character. It's time to just wait for your death.
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I actually like playing the campaign. You get the dumbest XP bonuses. Open a lore book, get XP. Every mission you get an XP bonus. Beside, it usually works out that you are leveled past 11 at the Skeleton King and you get a free legendary helm. Also slow moving zombies and skeletons in early act 1. You do have to watch out for elite quill demons. Stupid things are ranged and have about a 50 movement speed.
As far a weapons go, a two hander will probably crafted until I get an ancient. I'll replace after I get something that synergizes with a full build. Until I can get a couple pieces of a set, I don't think, I'll be looking too hard for an RRoG. Possibly though. Legendary Jewelry seem to be hard to get early and cost too much from Kadala. There are a couple of rings that drop off Horadric Caches, so it might be a place to go if nothing drops early. I don't know how many times I've cursed getting Squirt's amulet, but, if rolls with a socket, I'd be very happy early in the season. Until then, I'm rolling with socketed 6 stat yellows.
When Grift become readily available (it's going to be hard not having trial keys drop like they do in T6), I'll start upgrading gems. This is probably the quickest way to a useful affix on jewelry.
This is my plan upfront. Start at T6 and die a lot. Since the DH is all about kiting and using your range, (I'll be setting traps and rapid firing) this is workable. The bonus on Gold is helpful to get started, as you have to upgrade your crafters. I'll avoid elite mobs until I can craft a socketed weapon. Once I have a weapon with the biggest red gem I can afford, I'll back it down to something a bit more reasonable to be able to kill off elites. Gold is going to a problem. So I'm chasing down every goblin until I get into the vault to get a Boon of the Horder. After that, roll with the drops and craft Ashera's set once I get enough souls. I tend to think the set is cheap and has the best bonuses while you are struggling to stay alive without Paragon bonuses. You get 20% life on a 3-piece. Something that I notice while helping out a noob level up from scratch. SK's (broken) crown is now dropping early with the new Affix, so if this holds, this will be helpful with acquiring gems. So if you see a Level 70 DH on Sunday wearing Ashera's Vestments and a Level 13 crown in a T1 game, that'll be me. Fully upgraded gems on a chest and pants is 405 Marquis Gems, plus another 81 for your weapon. And Marquis don't start dropping until Level 61. With all the upgrades, I really want that Boon of the Hoarder early. Like all good plans, this will never work out perfectly. But it is a strategy.
GLHF everyone with Season 2.
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This is probably the only reason to re-roll to a specific element. I will state that this probably isn't the best stat to re-roll unless, everything else rolled near max. I tend to roll for a 10% damage boost out of a healing stat. With Vit rolling really high on ancient weapons, I prefer to keep it and roll it off on a couple of other slots.