Critical hit chance

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Critical hit chance (abbreviated as CC or ChC) is one of the most powerful and popular item modifiers in the game. Items and skills that grand Critical hit Chance increase a character's chance to score a critical hit, which causes an attack to deal bonus damage. Not only does this greatly increase the damage output, but many procs trigger off Critical Hits, making a substantial value in this stat essential for many of the more popular builds in the game.

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Critical Chance and Damage basicsEdit

Critical Hit Chance and Damage are displayed atop the Character window.

Brand new characters of any class deal 5% critical hit chance at 50% critical hit damage. This figure can be raised by various skills and items, and boosting these values is one of the best ways to improve a character's damage in Diablo 3. Characters geared for success in the end game look for at least 30% ChC, and well-geared characters generally exceed 40-50%. Much higher values are possible.

A balance should be sought between the figures; high CD without much CC is a wasted opportunity, as is very high CC with little CD (though high CC can be useful simply to keep the procs clicking, aside from dealing damage.) The basic guideline is 40% / 400%, though well-geared characters usually exceed 500% CD.

Critical Hit Chance from ItemsEdit

Critical hit chance can be obtained from numerous item types, and the modifier is among the most sought in he game. The following item types can roll CC on Magical, Rare, or as the random affix on Legendary/Set items:

• Amulets: 1-10% CC
• Gloves: 1-10% CC
• Rings: 1-6% CC x2
• Helms: 1-6% CC
• Bracers: 1-6% CC
• Off-hand (shields, quivers, mojos, and sources): 1-10% CC

Total: 54% from these items, if all were perfect seeds.

A number of legendary items provide CC from other item slots, or from partial item set bonuses, allowing characters to accumulate higher totals.

A number of legendary items of the above types have some inherent value of CC that will always appear on that item. Such items can not roll additional CC from their random modifiers, so the values will never stack higher than the above figures.

Paragon Points can also be spent to add additional critical hit chance, at the rate of .1% per point, for a maximum of 5% from 50 points.

Critical hit Chance by ClassEdit

The classes vary in their maximum ChC due to differences in equipment and skills. The swings between classes aren't as large in RoS as they were in D3v, since fewer skills boost ChC than in the old days.

In terms of strategy, it's not ideal to chase the highest possible values in any stat. Players who achieve the highest values generally do so by specializing their gear in just that value purely to try to achieve the highest score for third party ranking sites. That said, here are the highest ChC values by class, as of June 2014, via the sorting charts on DiabloProgress.com.[1]

• Barbarian: Softcore 76%, Hardcore 60.5%.
• Crusader: Softcore 76%, Hardcore 66%.
• Demon Hunter: Softcore 66%, Hardcore 62.5%.
• Monk: Softcore 67%, Hardcore 60%.
• Witch Doctor: Softcore 67%, Hardcore 62.5%.
• Wizard: Softcore 64.5%, Hardcore 59%.

Diablo 3 Vanilla Max ChCEdit

Different maximum ChC values (often higher) could be obtained in Diablo 3 vanilla due to differences in the ChC found on top level items, and which skills boosted ChC. For instance, while there were no Paragon Points in D3v, Barbarians could add 5% from Ruthless and 15% from Weapons Master.

As of January 9, 2013, the highest CC figures for skills + equipment (verified by Diablo3Ladders.com) were:

• Barbarians: 86.5%
• Demon Hunter: 100% (Via the Sharpshooter passive.)
  • 77.0% seems to be the highest Demon Hunter without Sharpshooter.
• Monk: 61.0%
• Witch Doctors: 58.5%
• Wizards: 69.0%