Those of us who follow the news know that the rune & skill systems are being reworked. As a result, there's been a wild theory going around that runestones will be eliminated. ...Not the rune effects that alter your skills as you see fit, just the physical runes themselves.
Do you buy into the theory, or do you think it's absolutely crazy that it's even considered?
Personally, I can see it happening. The early iteration of runes pre-attunement could lead to "easily" acquiring every rune type you'd ever need thanks to trading via the auction houses. Attuning runes to skills, however, leads to massive inventory nightmares since there'd be thousands of individual runes of each rank & color devoted to each and every skill.
The negative aspects of both scenarios deal with the numbers of runes people need. So... if Blizzard was able to come up with a new iteration that kept runestone effects but eliminated the literal item from the game, the issues would be fixed... right?
Theorycraft away. ...Or troll. Your choice. But hurry up; speculation says that we might find out when the new patch is released in a day or three!
Hm, well with the open invitation to troll, it's hard to pass up, but I think I'll keep it constructive lol.
I had always thought of the attuned runestones to mean that when you place a runestone into a skill slot, it is then locked in, and can't be taken out and placed in another one. This would give people a reason to get more than one of each level, if they didn't lock them into skills when set into them, then everyone would only need one of each level as they progressed. They'd flood the AH's after that, and eventually you would start just vendoring them becase no one is buying them and they keep dropping.
I had heard though that they would drop with affixes, possibly increasing their use further than the base effect. I think this is what they are working on. If they found a way to work this out, it just means that we have to make choices as to which stones to keep and which to sell. I don't see them getting rid of them all together. It would mean that we could be getting new stuff past level 30 as we level up, meaning that after lvl 30 when you have all your skills, you then unlock different runestone versions of them until level sixty, that would make some people happy I think, but I don't think it's the direction they are heading though. Still, it's just speculation, we'll have to wait and see.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Tired of the same regurgitated blue posts? Want more in depth coverage of
the aspects of the game you want to know about? Check us out!
What if they just leave the system as is, but make the runes bind on pickup per character, thus forcing people to play a shit ton on each toon to get the proper runes? I understand that Diablo has historically never had bind on pickup items, but.... let's be honest here, Diablo 3 isn't exactly a "clone" of Diablo 2 with it's fancy new UI, ability to use hotkeys to cast spells, etc.
I had always thought of the attuned runestones to mean that when you place a runestone into a skill slot, it is then locked in, and can't be taken out and placed in another one. This would give people a reason to get more than one of each level... They'd flood the AH's after that, and eventually you would start just vendoring them becase no one is buying them and they keep dropping.
I had heard though that they would drop with affixes, possibly increasing their use further than the base effect... It would mean that we could be getting new stuff past level 30 as we level up, meaning that after lvl 30 when you have all your skills you then unlock different runestone versions of them until level sixty.
The issue attuned runes creates is how much potential inventory space it can eat up. And a lot of what you wrote, Damerflinn, illustrates that point.
As an example, let's say that a player decides they're going to play only Barbarians forever, but they're gonna take it seriously and play with intent. They'll get their Barb(s) up to clvl60 and use every single skill and it's variation at one point or another. Even if they use ONLY rank seven runes, that's 22 skills with five colors each for 110 individual runes. Realistically, as they're leveling their character(s) they'll be plonking in lower tiered runes as they become available and later, as you say, upgrading as they go along. So maybe that's an estimated 200 total used runes altogether.
...200 runes. For a single character class. Maybe later they decide they wanna get serious with a different class. Or two. Or all five. If the latter is the case, imagine the fact that a single person might have all five characters and want to have complete build diversity available at a moment's notice; even with only rank seven runes, that's ~500 runes or more that someone has to hold onto at all times. When Blizz reduced the stash size a couple weeks ago, he said that with the combined space of the stash & ten characters' inventory, they could hold some 400 swords. ...Or in other words, 800-ish runes.
THEN add to the fact that they're able to implement various randomized mods to the runes. Regardless of whether they attune runes or allow them to be swapped freely, as soon as you find a rank seven rune of something you already own, either your new rune or the old one becomes obsolete. Therefore, eventually for every rune you find, you're going to put it up for auction. Thing is, they said that rune drop odds would be balanced depending on what system they ended up with. So if attuned runes drop five times more often then unattuned runes, that's five times more runes going to the AH.
Again, 200 runes for a single class, but also for just one player. How many millions of people will be playing this game? I'm low-balling here, but if every player of a one million player base gets a total of 200 runes across ALL their characters... 200 million runes are in play. That's CRAZY high.
And if you're like me, I won't have just one of each class; being a fan of D2, I can't allow myself to respec a clvl60 character and create an entirely new build from it. I'm going to be constantly leveling new characters so I get the full experience of a build from normal up through... as far into the game as the build can take me. In an attuned rune system, if I wanted to be able to have every rune available, that's maybe 3,500 different runes that I'd have to keep. That's an impossibility.
Physically, runes are going to be a logistical clusterfu.... uh, mess. If you plan on saving any, plan on them eating up a good amount of your stash space. There will be thousands of runes available on the AH in a short period of time. Even if they're given random attributes, the majority of them will lose nearly all their potential value.
However, eliminating runes will alleviate all of these issues. It saves player hassle, it saves AH flooding, it saves space on the servers... as unbelievable as it may seem, getting rid of runes would really be the best play. Again, I don't know what they could change to inject rune effects into the game without the physical runes, but I can imagine how desperate they may be to get it done.
What if they just leave the system as is, but make the runes bind on pickup per character?
Understandable. Agreed that this isn't our D2 of old, but I don't think BoE items are on the table. My judgment is based entirely upon how someone from Blizz stated flatly that they'd NEVER do BoE in this game (citation needed). That said, two years ago they also said there'd be an offline single player mode. Look how THAT turned out. ...No, I'm NOT still bitter about it...
God I hope not, I've been so excited since they announced the runestone system as we know it now, until we're told otherwise. It seems like a much deeper evolution of skill trees. I'm sure a lot of people might not agree with me here either, but I also like that as far as we know, they're item drops just like crossbows or pants, it adds a challenging and random aspect of fleshing out our builds. If it stays this way, imagine how excited you will be when you find your first rank 7 runestone and its the one you needed for your most used skill.
I must learn to read entire posts before I begin typing for once in my life, as I just deleted an entire post about why the rune system couldn't possibly disappear. /facepalm
In actual response to the thread, I like the runestones, but as long as the system stays the same I am someone indifferent on what special items modify my abilities.
personally, it would not surprise me if the runes got eliminated. the rune effects will probably all stay but they will be added somehow with a npc, gold, or some item. blizzard has removed quite a few systems already so it could happen just to speed the release of the game.
It's hard to know what they are about to do. I do think they will shift towards something more akin to attuning skills, or having something easier to check in and out of, much like the skills. It will be interesting to see how affixes are incorporated into this, but I'm pretty excited the direction they will take.
The only concern is making it too customizable or adding too many options that might start to unbalance things. Oh well. We'll see.
Rune Tomes. "Right click to learn a level 1 Skill Rune effect on X skill."
Throughout the game, you will get them all.
35 rune effects for each skill.
Customize.
I like this. Implementing rune effects via books would be a serious throwback to D1.
There's something to be said about random drops in runes, but in a scenario where "you will get them all" it alleviates AH flooding and useless drops. I still find it hard to think about a world without random runes that you may or may not find... but I don't think I'd be angry if the quest line or side quests were to give you these Rune Tomes.
Reguardless of how the runes work I think that they are going to keep them around. The idea of having a drop that you can pop into a spell, and then give that spell a "legendary" (rank 7) feel. They probably do need to do something to keep them from inflation, possibly soul bind them as like crimsom rune of leap permanently ect. But, I do still definately like the idea of finding those "legendary" abilties.
I wonder if the removal of the Mystic was in any way related to the Runestone changes? All of the enchanting patterns required different types of "Rune Dust" which came from salvaging runestones. (She also has some patterns to combine dust into the next higher rune). I wonder if the changes to the rune system mean that there aren't runestone items anymore to salvage and when they realized they had to change the Mystic's patterns as well they said "you know what, she's kinda doing the same thing as the jeweler...lets just scrap her for now".
I like the idea of having a tome or something that can teach you the different rune effects instead--kinda like how glyphs work now in WoW. They could still have a cost to switch them out if they wanted, but once you learn it you know it forever and don't have to worry about the inventory space issue.
I have a feeling we'll all find out tomorrow, and I'm sincerly afraid of the changes they made. I personally do subscribe to the runestones are disappearing theory.
I think what needed is a significant penalty for taking the runestone outta the slot.
Maybe like shattering the rune for lower lvls runes or making the rune degrade wanna take it out for high lvls ones.
But i still prefer a one for one swap. Shatter another same lvl rune to take the existing out. (using a NPCs )
But all this will kill the prefix and suffix on rune system.
I think that the inventory argument is pretty valid, but I like the idea of having class/spell specific items enhance your skills. Also, striving for the top rank rune for each of their spells gives end-game players something to work toward, especially if they're as rare as we've been told they'll be. Also, runes were revealed over two and a half years ago and have been consistently talked about by the blues, I'm not entirely sure they'd pull them out of the game so close to release and feel okay about it. (But who knows, they've taken out other seemingly important game mechanics.)
I think runes no longer being items in the sense of taking up inventory space is certainly plausible, given some of the reasons detailed here. I think one of two systems would work best:
-Keep runes as item drops, and items in your inventory, and have them be destroyed when taken out. And have them stackable.
-Keep runes as item drops, and once placed in a skill, you get sort of a drop down window for selecting that rune color. Sort of similiar to the current WoW glyph system where you can use a rune once you've learned it, and don't have to re-learn it, but it's also not sitting in your inventory somewhere. Add a cost to this i.e. dissapearing dust if desired.
If you take a look at how they're changing talents, glyphs, and general customisation in the new WoW expansion I think you can see how Blizzard are starting to think. They want the average shmo to pick up his character and be able to play it how he wants, when he wants. By this I mean you won't have to reroll a new character just so that you can try out a new skill.
I'm not saying it's generally a good thing but they'll probably make it so that (if the current system stays) the cheaper runes will be easily replacable and won't be such a hassle so that you can easily and cheaply swap around your skill set.
I don't see how you can have an item that everyone needs, without the market being flooded with it in hours. I mean, if someone can pick up every rune for some small amount right when they start, it eliminates the whole point of runes.
I think they either need to be consumable, which is really just annoying, or they just need to be given to you automatically.
My solution would be:
Every 2-3 levels after you learn a skill you get to chose an effect you would like, until you get them all.
It's gated, not an AH nightmare, still gives players choice as they level and the feeling of their skills getting stronger with them. The "rune levels" would have to be changed to be based on player level though.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Do you buy into the theory, or do you think it's absolutely crazy that it's even considered?
Personally, I can see it happening. The early iteration of runes pre-attunement could lead to "easily" acquiring every rune type you'd ever need thanks to trading via the auction houses. Attuning runes to skills, however, leads to massive inventory nightmares since there'd be thousands of individual runes of each rank & color devoted to each and every skill.
The negative aspects of both scenarios deal with the numbers of runes people need. So... if Blizzard was able to come up with a new iteration that kept runestone effects but eliminated the literal item from the game, the issues would be fixed... right?
Theorycraft away. ...Or troll. Your choice. But hurry up; speculation says that we might find out when the new patch is released in a day or three!
-TRM
I had always thought of the attuned runestones to mean that when you place a runestone into a skill slot, it is then locked in, and can't be taken out and placed in another one. This would give people a reason to get more than one of each level, if they didn't lock them into skills when set into them, then everyone would only need one of each level as they progressed. They'd flood the AH's after that, and eventually you would start just vendoring them becase no one is buying them and they keep dropping.
I had heard though that they would drop with affixes, possibly increasing their use further than the base effect. I think this is what they are working on. If they found a way to work this out, it just means that we have to make choices as to which stones to keep and which to sell. I don't see them getting rid of them all together. It would mean that we could be getting new stuff past level 30 as we level up, meaning that after lvl 30 when you have all your skills, you then unlock different runestone versions of them until level sixty, that would make some people happy I think, but I don't think it's the direction they are heading though. Still, it's just speculation, we'll have to wait and see.
Tired of the same regurgitated blue posts? Want more in depth coverage of
the aspects of the game you want to know about? Check us out!
The issue attuned runes creates is how much potential inventory space it can eat up. And a lot of what you wrote, Damerflinn, illustrates that point.
As an example, let's say that a player decides they're going to play only Barbarians forever, but they're gonna take it seriously and play with intent. They'll get their Barb(s) up to clvl60 and use every single skill and it's variation at one point or another. Even if they use ONLY rank seven runes, that's 22 skills with five colors each for 110 individual runes. Realistically, as they're leveling their character(s) they'll be plonking in lower tiered runes as they become available and later, as you say, upgrading as they go along. So maybe that's an estimated 200 total used runes altogether.
...200 runes. For a single character class. Maybe later they decide they wanna get serious with a different class. Or two. Or all five. If the latter is the case, imagine the fact that a single person might have all five characters and want to have complete build diversity available at a moment's notice; even with only rank seven runes, that's ~500 runes or more that someone has to hold onto at all times. When Blizz reduced the stash size a couple weeks ago, he said that with the combined space of the stash & ten characters' inventory, they could hold some 400 swords. ...Or in other words, 800-ish runes.
THEN add to the fact that they're able to implement various randomized mods to the runes. Regardless of whether they attune runes or allow them to be swapped freely, as soon as you find a rank seven rune of something you already own, either your new rune or the old one becomes obsolete. Therefore, eventually for every rune you find, you're going to put it up for auction. Thing is, they said that rune drop odds would be balanced depending on what system they ended up with. So if attuned runes drop five times more often then unattuned runes, that's five times more runes going to the AH.
Again, 200 runes for a single class, but also for just one player. How many millions of people will be playing this game? I'm low-balling here, but if every player of a one million player base gets a total of 200 runes across ALL their characters... 200 million runes are in play. That's CRAZY high.
And if you're like me, I won't have just one of each class; being a fan of D2, I can't allow myself to respec a clvl60 character and create an entirely new build from it. I'm going to be constantly leveling new characters so I get the full experience of a build from normal up through... as far into the game as the build can take me. In an attuned rune system, if I wanted to be able to have every rune available, that's maybe 3,500 different runes that I'd have to keep. That's an impossibility.
Physically, runes are going to be a logistical clusterfu.... uh, mess. If you plan on saving any, plan on them eating up a good amount of your stash space. There will be thousands of runes available on the AH in a short period of time. Even if they're given random attributes, the majority of them will lose nearly all their potential value.
However, eliminating runes will alleviate all of these issues. It saves player hassle, it saves AH flooding, it saves space on the servers... as unbelievable as it may seem, getting rid of runes would really be the best play. Again, I don't know what they could change to inject rune effects into the game without the physical runes, but I can imagine how desperate they may be to get it done.
Understandable. Agreed that this isn't our D2 of old, but I don't think BoE items are on the table. My judgment is based entirely upon how someone from Blizz stated flatly that they'd NEVER do BoE in this game (citation needed). That said, two years ago they also said there'd be an offline single player mode. Look how THAT turned out. ...No, I'm NOT still bitter about it...
Throughout the game, you will get them all.
35 rune effects for each skill.
Customize.
In actual response to the thread, I like the runestones, but as long as the system stays the same I am someone indifferent on what special items modify my abilities.
1-you find a rune.
2-you put a rune in a skill
3-you remove/change the rune, the old one get destroyed.
pros
runes will keep there value
take a small inventory space
help identify your character/build uniqueness
cons
you lose affixes which adds to customization
The only concern is making it too customizable or adding too many options that might start to unbalance things. Oh well. We'll see.
Director, Writer, Producer @
http://outofthevoidp...ns.blogspot.com
I like this. Implementing rune effects via books would be a serious throwback to D1.
There's something to be said about random drops in runes, but in a scenario where "you will get them all" it alleviates AH flooding and useless drops. I still find it hard to think about a world without random runes that you may or may not find... but I don't think I'd be angry if the quest line or side quests were to give you these Rune Tomes.
D3 Channel: OnetwoD3
I like the idea of having a tome or something that can teach you the different rune effects instead--kinda like how glyphs work now in WoW. They could still have a cost to switch them out if they wanted, but once you learn it you know it forever and don't have to worry about the inventory space issue.
Maybe like shattering the rune for lower lvls runes or making the rune degrade wanna take it out for high lvls ones.
But i still prefer a one for one swap. Shatter another same lvl rune to take the existing out. (using a NPCs )
But all this will kill the prefix and suffix on rune system.
-Keep runes as item drops, and items in your inventory, and have them be destroyed when taken out. And have them stackable.
-Keep runes as item drops, and once placed in a skill, you get sort of a drop down window for selecting that rune color. Sort of similiar to the current WoW glyph system where you can use a rune once you've learned it, and don't have to re-learn it, but it's also not sitting in your inventory somewhere. Add a cost to this i.e. dissapearing dust if desired.
I'm not saying it's generally a good thing but they'll probably make it so that (if the current system stays) the cheaper runes will be easily replacable and won't be such a hassle so that you can easily and cheaply swap around your skill set.
I think they either need to be consumable, which is really just annoying, or they just need to be given to you automatically.
My solution would be:
Every 2-3 levels after you learn a skill you get to chose an effect you would like, until you get them all.
It's gated, not an AH nightmare, still gives players choice as they level and the feeling of their skills getting stronger with them. The "rune levels" would have to be changed to be based on player level though.