An honest review of the Diablo 3 Billionaire guide
You might have seen the ads for it around the web or you might not. A Chinese gentleman claiming he has made 1 billion gold on Diablo 3 legitimately. And he is willing to share his secrets with you….for a price.
I have seen the ads as well, and all the other Diablo 3 guide ads, and I have been wondering: what the heck is in, Diablo 3 billionaire, a 37$ guide? That amount buys you two tickets to a crappy 3D movie and some snacks, so should you go see a movie or should you invest in this guide?
What do you get in the Diablo 3 Billionaire package?
So what is in this package? Daniel Chan tries to do the impossible and do everything for everyone: he’s got leveling guides, farming while leveling, boss guides, class walkthroughs, AH strategies, MF farming. As you might have guessed, he does not succeed in his endeavor, but rather delivers something that is really good in some key areas and lackluster in others. Luckily his lackluster areas aren’t that critical to what we want to do: make money.
But first, a recap for the impatient among you:
- The leveling is not the main selling point, and you shouldn’t get the guide for this.
- The regular farming is decent, and if you haven’t followed the scene closely, you will discover useful routes. The good thing is that they are very easy to follow with maps and all.
- Get this guide for the AH strategies alone. You can spend a lot of time and gold on the AH through trial and error and getting this guide will save you those head aches. That alone should convince you to get the guide.
- If you want to turbocharge your AH strategies and find and dominate your niche, this guide is well worth the $37. If you enjoy playing the AH, get Diablo 3 billionaire.
My biggest gripe with the Diablo 3 Billionaire – sleazy upselling
Daniel Chan, if you have Google Alerts set up for your keywords, let me tell you this right now: if I have just plunked down 37$ for your guide, I don’t want to get upsold….I want my product!
Once I had paid the 37$ for the guide, I was taken to video which “only shown once, then never again, containing critical offers”. Basically this was a pretty hard upsell for monthly membership of his even more exclusive, platinum membership area. WTF? I just paid 37$ for half a product? I looked for a long time to see the “leave me alone and let me get my product”-button and finally found it on the bottom:
Sadly this Diablo 3 Billionaire review got off to a rocky start with sleazy upselling. This is not McDonald’s, Daniel!
I clicked the button and moved on to…..ANOTHER FUCKING UPSELL?! This time for his exclusive “Gold Vault module”, which you might not be awesome enough to handle:
I thought I bought a complete guide? This is like buying a menu at McDonald’s, not getting any fried and being told you can have fries, but they will cost you. The Diablo 3 Billionaire review goes further down the hill!
Well, my half product has apparently been reduced to a third of a product. I decided to decline his gracious offer, having now found that you could do this at the bottom of the page on the link written in tiny angry, red letters. Bringing me to…..you guessed it. More upselling for his super-awesome “Diamond Annihilation Package”:
“Diamond annihilation package”…I don’t even…whaaa….?! Let’s move on with the review of Diablo 3 Billionaire.
I don’t even know what that means, but I am guessing it is some sort of guide to awesome builds. I decide once again to decline his gracious offer, which gets me to……my product. Or rather a prompt to let me set up my Diablo 3 Billionaire login. Hurray! I discover that 37$ gets you access to a Diablo 3 Billionaire members area with50+ guides to leveling, farming and AH strategies.
Leveling in Diablo 3 Billionaire – the weak point
Let’s face it; leveling is not hard in Diablo 3: click things and level up. It is more a question of how fast can you level, not if you can level at all. Here is what I would have liked to see in this section:
- Semi-exploitable spots in the game
- +experience gear and gems and reduced level weapons
- Best acts and quests for leveling fast
- Suggested skill and gear builds in an awesome design and layout
That is something I would expect as a minimum and something that an expert Diablo 3 player should know and should want his readers to know. What do you get on the site? Suggested skill and gear builds….and videos of the boss fights and that is it.
Sure, some of the exploitable spots in the game are time-sensitive, and I know he can’t have those on the site, but something like not mentioning +experience gear or reduced level weapons in an otherwise gear-centric guide is a huge flaw. The leveling portion of the Diablo 3 Billionaire guide gets a 2/10 in my book: 1 point for showing up and 1 point for trying, but overall a hard fail….and I am still pissed about the upselling.
But to be fair, this is not a guide on leveling, so all is not lost.
Farming strategies in Diablo 3 Billionaire
This is the meat and potatoes of making gold for many people: playing and farming the game to get items and gold. Which is great, because that is how the game is meant to be played!
The farming strategies in the guide are solid, but nothing new. He has mostly got the old stables, such as Butcher Runs, Siegebreaker runs and Dank Cellar and some more iffy runs like treasure goblin farming in old ruins, which has not worked at all for me. It could be bad luck or it could be hotfix, I don’t know. But all routes have a short description and requirement and they come with a map. There are some routes, which I have not seen before, but I honestly can’t tell if that is because they are “secret” or that there are just better routes out there.
I like the fact that he has the difficulty of the farming route, name of the quest you need to start and which classes are best. I would have liked to see gold per hour and more media, such as a video detailing the run or just more pictures beside a map.
All in all, I give the Farming portion of Diablo 3 Billionaire a 5/10.
However, the loot system is only one part of the game. We also have the AH for better or for worse, so onwards with the Diablo 3 Billionaire review
Diablo 3 Billionaire AH strategies
This is clearly where Daniel Chan has spent the majority of his time and it shows in the guide. Where leveling is maybe 10% of the guide, boss guides another 10%, farming is 30%, AH strategies are 50% of the guide. This is great news for those, that love playing the markets, but maybe less ideal for those that like farming. Personally I love playing the auction house, and it is where I spend the majority of my time in Diablo 3, so seeing how large this section was had me excited!
The AH strategy guides are very detailed, have loads of media and step-by-step instructions, so even rookie AH’ers can follow along. There is a long list of guides to the AH and it starts right at the basic level with a walkthrough of the AH functions and how to do great searches and then he progressively adds more and more advanced AH strategies.
The great thing is that he starts at a very low level, and gives you strategies for starting with only a few 100,000 gold, giving you strategies that allow you to build your fortune from the bottom. Then you build up to the more advanced things, finding your niche and finally he covers cross-selling between the RMAH and the GAH. He does a great job of covering how to find items that sell on the RMAH, how to get good deals on the GAH and how to re-sell on the RMAH. He also covers which items are good for selling on both auction houses and which stats to look for.
It is clear to see, that the Diablo 3 Billionare has put most of the effort in this section, and I give it a 9/10. Why not 10 out of 10? All the articles are listed on the sidebar and they don’t feel cohesive. I would have liked a better layout to the guide. If I am paying money for something, at least make it look good, please. So the last point is taken for design.
Diablo 3 Billionaire review conclusion
We started off in a rough spot: sleazy upselling. Writing this review of D3 Billionaire and writing the part about the upselling actually made me angry, and made me not want to recommend getting the guide. Then we got to the leveling portion, which is extremely weak and things didn’t get much better.
But this guide is about making money on Diablo 3 and things started picking up a bit with the farming section of the guide. The farming guides are short, to the point and do the job. I would have liked a bit more info like gold/hour at various levels, but they are decent enough as is. This section made me go from not wanting to recommend the guide to being so-so about it.
Then we got to the strong point of the guide: the AH strategies. The big bucks in Diablo 3 are made on the AH, not from farming. Farming requires you to get lucky drops and that requires you to put in the hours. Playing the AH takes a lot less time and time can be spent much more effectively here earning you millions per hour. The AH strategies are really good, start very basic and get pretty advanced along the way. Anyone can do it, since the guides are detailed, contain step-by-step instructions and screenshots.
There is a big focus on the RMAH and making money here, which is pretty awesome. Real money playing a game? YES PLEASE!
Would I recommend getting the guide? 37$ might seem like a lot of money for something like this. But let’s be real here: what are you going to use those 37$ on instead? Watch a crappy 3D movie? Nickelback CDs? Starbuck’s Lattes? If you take the 37$ out of your fun-“budget”, I recon they would give you more fun if you spent it on this guide, rather than wasting them on something else. So yes, if you have spare “fun”-money and want to get better at using and playing the auction house, then buy the guide. Click here to go the Diablo 3 billionaire site to get instant access to the guide! By buying it through this link, you help me out a bit with running the site. Hopefully you think it is worth it!
And keep in mind, that if you don’t enjoy the guide and don’t feel like you got anything out of it, then you have a 60 day money back guarantee. The money back guarantee is handled by Clickbank, who have been in the business for 14 years, so it is an ironclad money back-guarantee. So buy with confidence!
If you enjoyed this Diablo 3 Billionaire review, then please share it with your friends and don’t forget to swing by the Diablo 3 farming facebook group.
Do u think it helped YOU to earn more cash then you spent?
How long do you think does it take to get your money back?
Does he show things that are not spread over the internet and even smart ppl/expert players wouldnt usually figure out?
Do u learn how to value items?
Have you made any significant amount of gold/money, which you wouldnt made without the guide?
Is it applicable on EU servers?
Those are the thinks I would like to know in a review like this.
You can buy around 20 million gold for the price of the guide. How long does it take to make 20 million? Well, that depends on your starting capital, but if you have a million or more, it shouldn’t take you more than a week or two.
The thing is, that most strategies on forums are farming strategies, since most people would rather farm than play the AH. So there aren’t a lot of AH strategy tips and tricks in one place out there. So yes, he does show things that aren’t readily available on the net in this format. But seeing as everything is on the internet somewhere in some form, you could probably find most of the guide spread around the net in bits and pieces. But you would have to trawl forums, torrent sites and more seedy places. And in that case I would rather spend 37$ and save countless hours.
The stuff is applicable on both EU and NA (and asia), but there might be minor price differences. That doesn’t really matter, since the guide teaches principles as well as doing step-by-step. If you apply the principles and devote the time to playing the AH, you will make money. Especially when you get to know your niche better. And valueing stuff also becomes easier when you get to know your niche.
Paying for the out of game products? What’s next, paying for upcoming hotfix warnings before on the official site? “And keep in mind, that if you don’t enjoy the guide and don’t feel like you got anything out of it, then you have a 60 day money back guarantee.” What’s the point selling secrets then. You bought it so tell us what are these “secrets” who is stopping you?
The point in selling secrets, is that new secrets will come along.
And what is stopping me from telling you everything in the guide? Common decency……and copyright laws
Common decency……and copyright laws.
I can understand the second one but really common decency? Your site is all public and they shouldn’t sell something like that in the first place. What’s the decency with that? Or are you agree with them? Are you going to charge us too soon?
Why shouldn’t they sell something like that? He has spent time devising and collecting those strategies, so you don’t have to.
Do you have any idea how long it takes to write all that material? Let me tell you how long: 1-2 hours per 500 words on the low end. This article above you is 1700 words for reference. His site has maybe 50 articles of between 500-1000 words and some pushing 1500-2000 words, meaning he has spent 100-200+ hours writing alone. Then there is webdesign, media design, logistics and maintenance. It all adds up.
I respect the work the man has put in to this, I think he is entitled to charge for it and that is why I don’t want to give away his stuff for free. Common decency.
With regards to this site: No, it will never be subscription based or paid. That is not my style. This is a serious hobby project for me and not a business. I do it because I like certain aspects of Diablo 3, I like interacting with Diablo 3 fans and I like doing SEO and social media. Having this site be free, also gives me the possibility of just saying “fuck it” and walk away if I get fed up with it.
Great review man, really appriciate your honesty and the time you put into the review. I’m still not sure if the guide is right for me, I might buy it if I get some spare cash soon, i’ll make sure to use your link if I decide to go with this guide, have bookmarked this review. Thanks again.
Wow. I just came to this website via google and have read 2 articles so far. Mind blowing how you can make sucha good articles. I have been searching for a D3Bill review for some weeks cuz Im not sure if its worth the money but I might try it out now. The other reviews seem to be just copy paste material to get readers to buy to get them a piece of the profit.
Anyway, keep up the incredible work, you make awesome articles and guides. I’ll def come back and read whenever something is uploeaded.
Question: Do you think the guide is “uptodate” on the material. AH items and RMAH items can sometimes take a hit and go down pretty far, will he be prepared for that or will the guide just say “buy item with XYZ stats and resell” even tho that will sell like crap today?
PS. Sorry about my crappy english lol
I’ll ofc use your link if I buy the guide. Take care! // Niklas
Most of it can be used regardless of the markets, since you can distill the principles of it and apply it to the new markets. So he teaches you method, and then you can use that method on the new market.
Some of it is very specific, so it will be outdated at some point. However, you can adjust it yourself as the game matures. He talks a bit about stats in the 100 range being good, while that is currently on the low end. But you can quickly do a quick tour of the AH and adjust it yourself.
This is only for the “basic” package. I can’t really talk about the upgrades, but they might be worth it for you. So if you have the cash for it, you might want to go all in and get the full package.
no offense, but this is clearly advertising for this guide. You should publicly state how much money you’re making off doing this, or simply admiting you are the game guide creator. Meh.. this post will get deleted, if it even passes the filter
Well, he spent the first half of the article bashing the services, delving into the pros and cons towards the end, then giving his honest, good opinion about the product. I doubt highly that the admin for this site is making one red cent off this guide, and doubt even further that he had (in any way, shape, or form) any hand in its creation. Is he advertising? No more than we are when we talk about Diablo 3 to our friends/family, co-workers, or other interested peoples.
Further, Mr. Trollface, starting an offensive post (full of wild accusations with little or no bearing or evidence) with the words “no offense” doesn’t really make a lot of sense, now does it?
Nice review of the guide… was just wondering if there was any chance you could put some video up? Maybe show visitors around the membership side of the site so we can see what it’s all about?
Just do a quick CamStudio video or similar.
Well, I might. It could be pushing what I can show people, since this is a member’s site. I know you can still just buy access and get a refund if you aren’t satisfied, but still……
Let me explain how this scam works. This site claims this is a review for a product. Gives the advertised product an excellent review. When a user realizes how awesome this guide is because this review is “honest” and convincing, they click on the link provided on this site that takes you to the site where you actually purchase and order the guide. What you don’t know is, when you click on the link on this “review” page, Daniel Chan (book writer) pays the scumbags on this site money for advertising his product and drawing in the customer which ultimately lands himself a sale. These marketing tactics have been going on for years and anyone with common sense can figure this out.
First off, yes, I make money if someone buys the guide by using the link. That is no secret. I use a lot of time on this site, and this is one of the ways I get “paid” for my effort. Everything here is free and no one is forcing you to buy the guide. Welcome to 2012, where almost everything on the net is ad-based, but free. If you think I am such a scumbag, then no one is forcing you to stay. If you don’t like the free content I provide….then don’t use it. The beauty of personal choice and freedom! Huzzah!
Anyway, the guide is great for AH strats and it saves you time figuring it out yourself. Some people have lots of time , but not a lot of money (people with part-time/no jobs and no family)….they have the time to figure it out for themselves. Great for them! Some people have no time, but lots of disposable income (full-time job, families)….they don’t have time to figure this out for themselves, but just want the juicy parts fast…and that is what this guide does. It is exactly the same on the RMAH: who the fuck pays $250 for a pair of virtual gloves?! The mid-thirties guy working 60 hour weeks with a new-born baby at home, who couldn’t be arsed to farm for 50 hours, because he has the money, but not the time. He can play 2 hours a week, and he wants to have fun when he does.
As I say in the review: if you have fun-money to blow on either going to see the new Twilight movie in 3D or buying this guide….I would buy the guide. If you don’t have $40 to spend on fun, then don’t spend it on this guide, just go play the game instead. You’ll figure it out eventually.
But thanks for the input.
“First off, yes, I make money if someone buys the guide by using the link. That is no secret. I use a lot of time on this site, and this is one of the ways I get “paid” for my effort. ”
Actually, you should have it clearly disclosed in the article if you are getting paid commission on people who buy the guide after reading your review. Otherwise, yeah, it is a secret and a sleazy thing to do.
I have now made specific mention of just this in the review. Thanks for pointing it out!
You’ve been kind to mention it, but I don’t see why it is required. Affiliate links and advertising is ubiquitous on the internet already, but besides that, why should you disclose how you make money? If I had a business why should I tell my secrets to everyone about how I make my money?
Haters gonna hate…
Can you do a quick check if the guide is updated for 1.0.4 and how active he is there? Like, how many % of the website that is 1.0.4, I feel like alot have changed, UI, item and economy wise. Took a break from Diablo and I figured I’d try the guide. Would be a waste of time to buy it and nothing is up to date then just refund.
Kind regards, Niklas.
Not yet updated completely, but Daniel chan is in the process of updating it. It does take a while for him to get around to everything, so you have to be patient if you only buy the guide for patch 1.0.4 stuff.