Is there a downside to throwing Greater Rift time trials?

Is there a downside to throwing Greater Rift time trials? - Man And Child Throwing Paper Airplanes

Greater Rifts only drop loot from the Rift Guardians, but that loot is quite good, and apparently even level 1 Rifts drop Torment-only loot.

Since the Rifts get progressively more difficult, and completing a Rift run results in choosing between increasing the difficulty of the next Rift, or trying to upgrade a Legendary Gem (and thereby ending your Rift run, necessitating finding another Keystone of Trials), what is the benefit of doing well in the Realm of Trials?

If I throw the Rift trial, and start at a level 1 Greater Rift, won't I wind up with more loot per Keystone of Trials I find?

Is there a benefit to advancing as far as possible in the Trial that I'm missing?



Best Answer

It depends on what your goal in running Greater Rifts is. For acquiring legendary gems or other loot, it's actually much better to start at level 1 and just keep upgrading your keystone rather than your gems, so for that goal, nope, no downside to throwing the trial.

Greater Rifts have two main goals:

  • A test of your character's capabilities
  • Upgrade legendary gems

They do offer some other advantages over regular rifting, in that all loot is contained in the Rift Guardian, and they are much quicker to complete than regular rifts (compared to equivalent levels).

The Keystone of Trials lets you speed up the process of getting to higher rift levels. Rather than having to run rift after rift after rift to get to the point you want, the trial lets you start generally where you fit.

If your goal is to upgrade gems, though, it all comes out to the same: One Keystone of Trials = three chances at gem upgrades. This is where the higher ranks of Greater Rifts come into play, as the higher your rank, the better the chance of upgrading your gems. Personally, I'm going for gem upgrades, so the higher the rift level, the better the chance I can upgrade my highest level gem.

And if your goal is to see how far you can get, the Trial speeds that up to the point of only needing one or two rift runs to test that capacity.




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What are the benefits of higher greater rifts?

What comes to mind:
  • Legendary gem upgrades. The upgrade chance for legendary gems is based on the level difference between gem and greater rift. ...
  • More legendary items. The cap for this is at greater rift level 90, at which you get 12 legendary items at the end.
  • More bloodshards + gold. ...
  • More xp.


Does torment affect greater rifts?

Even assuming that you want to exclusively run greater rifts, the new torment levels will help you continue to do so. Greater rifts require GR keys that drop from normal Nephalem rift bosses. At higher torment levels, these bosses will drop multiple keys.

How long should greater rifts take?

Fights, especially against elites and Rift Guardians, will usually last multiple minutes, in some cases even up to half of the total time (7.5 out of 15 minutes). It's very common to fight elites for minutes and eventually leave them behind at 10% HP because it would simply take too long to finish them off.

Are greater rifts harder?

There are two types of Rift: Standard Nephalem Rifts, which are locked to your Torment level, so the harder your Torment level is, the harder they are. Greater Rifts, which you pick a difficulty level for, based on the highest level GR you've finished in the past.



Diablo 3 - Greater Rift Tips \u0026 Tricks Seasonal/GR Non-Season Pushing




More answers regarding is there a downside to throwing Greater Rift time trials?

Answer 2

Especially if you can do T6 rifts, which drop Keystone of Trials 100% of the time, advantages of advancing as fast as possible:

  • More gem upgrades per hour (as Frank mentioned, 1 Keystone of Trials = 3 upgrades)
  • Likely: more/better legendaries, depending on how quickly you go through normal rifts, how often you get Keystone of Trials. Higher tiers appear to give more/better legendaries.
  • Maybe: more experience per hour (this may or may not be the case if you can't quickly clear T6 rifts)
  • Opinion: more fun (blowing through easy mobs gets boring fast)

Advantages of starting at a low tier:

  • More legendary gems per Keystone of Trials (usually 1-2 per Greater Rift)
  • Higher percentage of time in Greater Rifts
  • Unlikely: more legendaries, depending on how quickly you go through normal rifts, how often you get Keystone of Trials

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