Who all is in for Diablo III at launch?

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Originally Posted by ImaNihilist

Diablo 2 didn't really have goals. They just didn't finish the game up to level 99, so people "created" goals. End game was a social construct, not a game construct.

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Right, that's my point. There were fun goals in D2 for players to set for themselves. That isn't the case long-term for D3.

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When I say the fans were an anomaly, I don't mean that in terms of numbers. What I mean is that they never expected the game to have a fan base that played for years on end, because they figured people would get bored. After the skill tree was complete they just pretty mush stop developing the game and then just scaled it all the way up to 99 because they could, not because there was any reason to do that.

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Have to disagree again - they did expect this because of the previous wild, lasting popularity of D1. They designed D2 with longevity in mind and overwhelming achieved it. This was evident with positive early tweaks and additions to "vanilla" D2 that bridged the gap on the way to releasing the LOD expansion. The skill tree was not complete - they added synergies. They added charms, so you could further customize and pump up even "useless" skills to be fun, viable builds.

There was a very simple reason to grind for level 99 - the rankings sheet. Anyone and everyone could easily pull this to see the top players for each class.

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The reason for replay ability IS PvP. If you remove PvP from D2, it's pretty much the same loot grind, and the problem is there is no reason or motivation to do it. Even if you didn't participate in PvP in D2, the fact that it existed is the reason you played to 99. It's the reason gear mattered.

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It's not the same loot grind because the loot in Diablo 3 blows. The legendary and set items might as well just be rares. There is nothing "legendary" about them. Examples of awesome loot from release-day Diablo 2 twelve years ago:
Iceblink - Unique armor that froze any monsters you hit when equipped. This was the only item in the game that could do this.
Magefist - Low level unique gauntlet that had fast cast rate on it. Even high level casters used this item because it was the only gauntlet in the game with affixes like fast cast and mana regen.

I could go on at some length, but you get the picture. Loot was truly epic in D2. That is not the case in D3... it just totally sucks. You're stuck looking for the same Primary Stat / Vitality / Resist All items as every other player in the game because there are zero items with unique and cool affixes to make up for any shortcomings your character has in hit points or resists.

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Diablo 2 was designed to be played to maybe level 50 or so. Beyond that the XP grind was severe. The only reason people kept going was because you were competing against each other, even if you weren't dueling. What Blizzard realized is that you could extend an RPG, without actually adding any content, simply by letting people compete against each other.

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This was part of the initial game design. Eventually, long after release, they decided to tone down the requirements to hit level 99 to draw in some new gamers and add some high-level pvp flavor into the mix.

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If they add PvP to D3 it will fundamentally change the game. It will either end up being exactly like D2, or end up being something else entirely if the PvP is more action based. End game in D3 may end up being like NOX, which I wouldn't be opposed to. Or it may end up being just like D2.

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PVP would be nothing more than a band-aid on the problem of bad game design. Like I said earlier, they did away with all of the proven mechanics that made Diablo 2 such a successful game. They killed systems from Alpha and Beta that they were receiving positive feedback on because they were "too difficult" to implement. Diablo 3 is a massively botched game that had huge potential. :(

You don't have to be a die-hard D2 fan to just feel that something is off with D3... that there's no real hook to keep you coming back for more.

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Originally Posted by Rush

You don't have to be a die-hard D2 fan to just feel that something is off with D3... that there's no real hook to keep you coming back for more.

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What is "off" about it is that it isn't Diablo 2. People said the same thing about StarCraft 2 when it came out. If you remember all the way back to the before time, people actually said the same thing about Diablo 2 because it was "too hard" and too much of a grind compared to Diablo.

I agree that there isn't really a hook to keep you playing past 60 with the same character. The game, as it shipped, was designed to give you an awesome experience with your friends from 1-60, then maybe try out a different class or two. And that's exactly what it does. That's why the Blacksmith, Jeweler and Stash carry over from character to character.

The motivation for the end game grind may come with the PvP patch. It may not. I tend to believe it will, because otherwise the RMAH is kind of silly. LA PvP system can easily make loot matter. The grind will seem worth it if there's a 1% chance you'll get an item that will let you dominate your opponent. People will grind for that, happily. We know that.

Personally, I'm not interested in an end game grind. That's what D2 was. That's what WoW is. If I want that experience, I'll go play WoW. I'd much rather have a NOX like experience that sits on top of Diablo 3 and lets me play with my own character. I'm probably in the minority here, but I freaking LOVED NOX and miss it so hard. A 4v4 CTF map for Diablo 3 would be awesome.

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Originally Posted by taggart6

I plan to beat nightmare and then call it a day. At least then I can say i got some use out of the game. I dunno...it might not just be worth it. I honestly feel nothing for this game and regret buying it.

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That's what you even said before you bought it IIRC. Hype train wins!

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Originally Posted by ImaNihilist

What is "off" about it is that it isn't Diablo 2. People said the same thing about StarCraft 2 when it came out. If you remember all the way back to the before time, people actually said the same thing about Diablo 2 because it was "too hard" and too much of a grind compared to Diablo.

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Wait, seriously? Diablo 2 is harder than Diablo 1? It might have been due to the age at which I played Diablo 1, but I remember that game being a LOT harder.

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Originally Posted by Timman_24

That's what you even said before you bought it IIRC. Hype train wins!

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Pretty much.

I'm kinda bored with the game already, I ran a demon hunter up to lvl 60 and played to a2 inferno. I think it might be because I already played a lot of d2, and d3 is really just more of the same, just with better graphics. I know about the differences, when I say more of the same I mean the same basic gameplay

haha wow its terrible that we all knew it was going to be mostly hype and still bought into this game... same thing with the prometheus movie

i actually picked up COD:MW3 recently since i got it for cheap used and after playing all day yesterday, i regret that purchase too lol

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Originally Posted by kpxgq

haha wow its terrible that we all knew it was going to be mostly hype and still bought into this game... same thing with the prometheus movie

i actually picked up COD:MW3 recently since i got it for cheap used and after playing all day yesterday, i regret that purchase too lol

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Seriously, Blacklight Retribution is 100x better than MW3 and that game is free.

and tribes ascend (also free), just started getting into it

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Originally Posted by kpxgq

and tribes ascend (also free), just started getting into it

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Tribes Ascend is excellent.

Sign up under my referral link so I can get stuff!
https://account.hirezstudios.com/tri...referral=80954

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Originally Posted by Kamakazie

Tribes Ascend is excellent.

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I second this. I just bought the steam starter pack and dive into it yesterday. It runs great on my laptop and CTF is awesome.

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Originally Posted by ImaNihilist

What is "off" about it is that it isn't Diablo 2. People said the same thing about StarCraft 2 when it came out. If you remember all the way back to the before time, people actually said the same thing about Diablo 2 because it was "too hard" and too much of a grind compared to Diablo.

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I have had less fun with Diablo III than I have with any other game in the genre I've played since Diablo 2. I like Titan Quest more, I like Torchlight more, I even like Dungeon Siege 3 more. None of those are Diablo 2 either but nothing feels "off" about them.

Even before I finally delved into the auction house VERY close to the end of the game I just wasn't excited about the loot and the loot is a MASSIVE part of these games (health orb pickup radius bonuses? Give me a break). I made it through probably half the game just using skills I picked up by level 8 (bash, cleave, stomp, and leap) and only tried out others to try to break the monotony.

Something just feels not right about D3 to me. I'm probably going to try playing a bit more into Nightmare with my barb and probably try playing a bit with a different class to see if anything grabs me but as of right now when Torchlight 2 comes out I'm likely to just uninstall D3 forever and if Torchlight 2 sucks I'll just go back to Titan Quest for my clickfest fix.

I think part of the problem is you never really feel powerful in the game. Sure you kill tons of dudes, but the impact really isn't there. There aren't procs on weapons that do crazy damage, the cool down skills are pretty unimpressive, and new weapons up your numbers but don't really feel much more powerful than the old weapons. I want dudes flying off the map when I hit them with a crit and I want cleave to hew enemies into pieces. I also wish I could craft items with the modifiers that I want instead of going through a stack of mats only to get 5 helms with intellect, dex, and strength all on them at the same time.

I think the root of the problem is the progression doesn't feel like it is making me more powerful.

You can definitely do that in Titan Quest. My Battlemage launched people and gear everywhere.

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Originally Posted by Timman_24

I think part of the problem is you never really feel powerful in the game. Sure you kill tons of dudes, but the impact really isn't there. There aren't procs on weapons that do crazy damage, the cool down skills are pretty unimpressive, and new weapons up your numbers but don't really feel much more powerful than the old weapons. I want dudes flying off the map when I hit them with a crit and I want cleave to hew enemies into pieces. I also wish I could craft items with the modifiers that I want instead of going through a stack of mats only to get 5 helms with intellect, dex, and strength all on them at the same time.

I think the root of the problem is the progression doesn't feel like it is making me more powerful.

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I mostly just left cooldown skills off of my barb, other than the one damage soaking one. As you say, they all just seemed unimpressive enough that I'd rather have another weaker skill that I can use 20 times than use the one powerful one every once in a while.

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Originally Posted by monroeski

I mostly just left cooldown skills off of my barb, other than the one damage soaking one. As you say, they all just seemed unimpressive enough that I'd rather have another weaker skill that I can use 20 times than use the one powerful one every once in a while.

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I use the long cool downs all the time. In Nightmare, I use the ancestor call skill to bring down 3 other barbs when I run into blue and yellow mobs or when I'm overwhelmed. They not only soak up damage, but they add quite a bit of AOE damage that will clear out some of the lower level mobs.

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Originally Posted by monroeski

I mostly just left cooldown skills off of my barb, other than the one damage soaking one. As you say, they all just seemed unimpressive enough that I'd rather have another weaker skill that I can use 20 times than use the one powerful one every once in a while.

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Wait until higher difficulties.

Has anyone from here beaten the game on inferno? I made it to act 3, but can't kill the elite mobs consistently enough to try to progress. I don't want my strategy to be to kite the elite mobs out of the way so I can die and clear the path to the next objective.

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I mostly just left cooldown skills off of my barb, other than the one damage soaking one. As you say, they all just seemed unimpressive enough that I'd rather have another weaker skill that I can use 20 times than use the one powerful one every once in a while.

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I'm running call of the ancients, earth quake and berserk in A4 Hell A1 Inferno and it's handy. I can pretty much clear out an elite mob pretty quick using those kills.

After that I have leap (for it's armor effects) then Bash and then revenge.

Earthquake is great for doing a lot of AOE damage, Call of the Ancients provides that extra back up, and Berserk gives me life (I find I take a lot less damage) also increases my damage and then leap with the armor buff results in like 400% armor buff.

I also am doing like 700 LOH.

Example if I'm hurting in a fight and I see revenge is available I'll pop a leap (armor goes up 400%), use revenge and boom I'm good.If I need too I'll use a potion.

Right now I'm going slowly progress A1 Inferno/Farm Act Hell I need to get better gear. Found a sick Helm (50 Res, 30 Arance resist 135 Vit and 65 stregth) guy wants 1.5 mill however I'm bidding at 550k hope I snag it.

O yes and 22% GF

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Originally Posted by Snakespy

Wait until higher difficulties.

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Having to wait until after I go all the way through a game at least once to see the usefulness of over half of my skills (including a lot of other stuff in addition to the cooldown skills in that) is not good design, just like people saying you have to get 20 hours into Final Fantasy XIII before the game got good wasn't good design.

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Originally Posted by monroeski

Having to wait until after I go all the way through a game at least once to see the usefulness of over half of my skills (including a lot of other stuff in addition to the cooldown skills in that) is not good design, just like people saying you have to get 20 hours into Final Fantasy XIII before the game got good wasn't good design.

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Eh, I don't know. I didn't feel deprived of play styles during my first play through. I used earthquake a lot. The game was pretty easy on normal, but I constantly changed up my play style to try new things. If you are the type that gets set into a groove and doesn't change until you start dying a bunch then I could see it getting boring. The game doesn't actively force you to try new things until higher difficulties, but there's nothing stopping you from checking new stuff out.

Blizzard has said they wanted the first play through to be casual as to appeal to the widest audience. I think it was too casual, but most of us are far past normal now so it doesn't really matter.

My DH is still in Normal mode but I'm on late Act with 3 and half hrs in game. I'm sure within 4-5 hrs of game time I'll be in nightmare. I just don't want to progress faster then my level. I don't want to be lvl 28 doing tons of D runs to hit Lvl 30.

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Originally Posted by Timman_24

Eh, I don't know. I didn't feel deprived of play styles during my first play through. I used earthquake a lot. The game was pretty easy on normal, but I constantly changed up my play style to try new things. If you are the type that gets set into a groove and doesn't change until you start dying a bunch then I could see it getting boring. The game doesn't actively force you to try new things until higher difficulties, but there's nothing stopping you from checking new stuff out.

Blizzard has said they wanted the first play through to be casual as to appeal to the widest audience. I think it was too casual, but most of us are far past normal now so it doesn't really matter.

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I'm only past normal with one of my characters. I don't currently have any desire to dive back in with another.

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Originally Posted by monroeski

I'm only past normal with one of my characters. I don't currently have any desire to dive back in with another.

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:confused: I didn't mean change characters, but change your skill sets around. There are tons of combinations. My point was, sure you can roll through the game with basic skills, but theres nothing stopping you from changing it up. That's what I did several times just to try new things out. You could do leap/slam/cleave the entire game, but that's no fun. Its really what you make it.

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Originally Posted by Timman_24

:confused: I didn't mean change characters, but change your skill sets around. There are tons of combinations. My point was, sure you can roll through the game with basic skills, but theres nothing stopping you from changing it up. That's what I did several times just to try new things out. You could do leap/slam/cleave the entire game, but that's no fun. Its really what you make it.

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I know what you meant, and I mentioned earlier that I did swap in new skills to try to break up the monotony. It didn't really work. I was saying that I only have one character even close to any kind of point where I start being forced to use different skills so if I ever want to play another character I'll have to slog all the way through boring normal mode just to get to the difficulty where I can tell if I even like the character or not.

The cooldown skills in particular just made everything more boring IMO. Use the skill once and then you can't use it again for two or three more mobs and meanwhile you're down a skill slot. Particularly saw this issue against bosses because I would use the big skills once and before they recharged either I or the boss would be dead. I found myself equipping a bunch of different skills but then forgetting they were there because leap/stomp/cleave or frenzy killed everything so easily while waiting for recharges and all the other non-long cooldown skills just felt terribly inefficient.