Basic Math - The Failure of Diablo Melee

[Athenau]

Did you read the first post?

I described my experiences and conclusions in some detail.

I read your post. The only statement speaking to your expectations for viability was this:

Diablo 2 had zero melee classes, because melee itself was not viable. The mobs hit too hard, compared to the health recovery options. You could not stay in toe to toe.

That doesn't tell us whether you expect that to be the case for all difficulty levels or not, or whether you expect it to be the case for all (or most) builds, or twinked vs untwinked, etc.

You can stand toe to toe with enemies in hell difficulty, with sufficient healing and mitigation. You can play melee like its meant to be played in hell, properly geared and skilled. I don't know if revenge is the only option for barbs or not, someone with a high level barb can chime in there, but if it is that's a problem with barb class design.

I do agree that enemy damage is too high, potion cooldowns are too high, and increasing difficulty by just pumping up the numbers is not interesting. What melee needs, more than anything else, is a way to selectively engage a few enemies at a time. In D1 you accomplished this though terrain and advancing slowly. In D3 there are too many open areas and super-fast enemies for this to work.