I agree with you in general but D3 is a character building game. You claim that it is a "loot finding action game" but that loot finding is only rewarding because it serves one purpose and that is, building your character up.
If the ladder only items will be moved to non ladder along with everything else, then it might not be so bad. Blizzard wants to create as many incentives as they can for people to actually decide to come back and start a new character in the new season. That's why they are coating it with new shiny, "powerful" legendaries and whatnot. I am worried by this design choice (which is evident already imo) because it will just mean that if you don't play the ladder you are screwed.
In d2 all the best items were actually non ladder simply because really old items existed in small quantities. Items that had overpowered / bugged stats and survived throughout the years in non ladder.
Even though i am not a big fan of the whole ladders / seasons idea, i will probably end up playing it.
But to be honest, let's face it, how hard is it going to be to gear up a character from scratch and farm t1 speed rifts for the new legendaries? I think it's not going to be too hard... Sure, you can't reroll and socket that much because you won't have gold but who really needs those features when all you need to do is be effecient on T1?
I think that in 1 week we will all have suffecient enough gear and just farm ladder for a while untill we get the new items and then quit / take a break untill the season ends... But then you are screwed again because another season is about to start so you'd have to start everything over again... Damn now that i think of it, it's the worst idea ever from a player's point of view but a really good one from a marketing point of view. I hate it but will still play it. I hate the people who pushed for this stupid idea to be implemented but still respect them for caring about the game and its future.
Even though i am not a big fan of the whole ladders / seasons idea, i will probably end up playing it.
Ultimately this is becoming a larger and larger problem with each bit that Josh works on.
I remember when the community and the devs talked about NOT forcing people into certain playstyles and such. Everything is obviously within reason which is why Mira runs get nerfed, and I do understand that. But since Josh has taken over with all the awesome new stuff he's added, he's done a very good job of removing choices from us. And the community's response is "Screw trading, if you trade you just want to cheat the game, deal with BoA." Instead of "Taking away choices is bad. I don't want to trade, but there has to be a better way."
We are seeing similar with ladder-exclusive items. Instead of advocating that all players get equal enjoyment potential from the game regardless of what game mode they're playing, the pro-ladder bloc uses the same jedi mind tricks that the anti-trading bloc used to justify removing that choice.
As it stands Blizzard has willingly pre-made the following gameplay choices for us:
Trading vs no trading
Solo vs multi-player
Adventure mode (even more specifically: rifts) vs Story mode
and if we let them they're going to make the ladders vs standard choice for us to. When are we, collectively, going to stand up for our ability to choose how to play this damned game regardless of our individual agendas? When are we going to demand that Josh stops defining one "correct" way to play and summarily leaves everything else in the lurch? It is in all of our interests to preserve our general freedom of choice. We're playing an ARPG here which implies there is a good bit of open-endedness in the game. It's high time we get (take) that back.
^^ so they have somehow taken away your ability to play solo? they've taken away your ability to play story mode? the only argument you even have that can stand on its own two legs is the trading versus no trading, which has solved far more problems than it has created. I don't see anyone at blizzard driving to your house to FORCE you to run rifts, or FORCE you to play with other players. I understand the always online ruins the solo experience for some people but you are in no way FORCED to interact with other human beings. So your major gripe just seems like an entitlement issue because you feel that you're entitled to a story experience that matches adventure mode in optimization of loot finding, which I thought was the whole point of the free lego off of malthael every single time you reset your quests?
I dont understand what the issue is. How about you just play the game instead of worrying about whether you're getting as many legendaries as mathematically possible and just play the game as an enjoyable piece of entertainment (which is exactly what it was created for)? If you're really so obsessed with getting more orange text items over every other person in the entire game then I guess you're just gonna have to sacrifice some of those other things because no matter how hard they try there will always be an optimal way to do things that is not necessarily the most fun.
who cares about seasons. Leaderboards gonna be filled to the brim of botters and streamers having a army of asslickers giving them items. Not hard getting fully geared when you play with 3 others of your class. all giving you their items. Regular people that play a lot doesnt stand a chance.
^^ so they have somehow taken away your ability to play solo? they've taken away your ability to play story mode? the only argument you even have that can stand on its own two legs is the trading versus no trading, which has solved far more problems than it has created. I don't see anyone at blizzard driving to your house to FORCE you to run rifts, or FORCE you to play with other players. I understand the always online ruins the solo experience for some people but you are in no way FORCED to interact with other human beings. So your major gripe just seems like an entitlement issue because you feel that you're entitled to a story experience that matches adventure mode in optimization of loot finding, which I thought was the whole point of the free lego off of malthael every single time you reset your quests?
I dont understand what the issue is. How about you just play the game instead of worrying about whether you're getting as many legendaries as mathematically possible and just play the game as an enjoyable piece of entertainment (which is exactly what it was created for)? If you're really so obsessed with getting more orange text items over every other person in the entire game then I guess you're just gonna have to sacrifice some of those other things because no matter how hard they try there will always be an optimal way to do things that is not necessarily the most fun.
I can't believe you are so blind to the NECESSITY to play these modes. Trading being taken away has solved 0 problems, so that was an awful design choice by them. Second YOU HAVE to play mp to be able to get a good amount of drops, if you don't you are severely gimped. Same goes with xp, you just rack it up so much faster in MP vs SP that there isn't even a contest. Not saying you can't play SP, but since you are so badly gimped why would you? What benefit do you get. There's too much incentivization in the way they want you to play. and it isn't even like the incentive is non-gamechanging. It's completely game changing. You gear up faster, level faster get to end game much faster. It's not that they come to your house and put a gun to your head, but they might as well be with the way they make MP stand out from SP. Same goes for Adventure mode or rather rifts vs story mode. In story mode you get shit items for a quest completion and a decent amount of XP, If you go into a rift, your leg drop rate gets increased by 100% and you get blood shards for completion, which you can then use to gamble which has a pretty decent rate of legendaries popping up. So as you can see story mode provides 0 benefits. It's just a normal playthrough, where as rifts are a playthrough with so much more bonus that there's no competition you do it or you don't gear up quickly.
Again they aren't putting a gun to your head, but they might as well be. There should be no bonus for playing in MP, Why is there a bonus? What made it so that there should be a bonus? I play with my friends so i deserve more? That's the end logic of it, which is completely because people felt entitled to it. What's the point in the 100% leg drop rate buff in rifts? They are "THE DEFINITIVE" end game so josh buffed their leg drop rate, instead of universally buffing the rate to make it equal across the board. This comes down to his decision as the leader of D3 that rifts are endgame, once you can you should be farming rifts. That's what it boils down to. Same thing will happen with seasons, if they keep season only legendaries in. You get forced into playing it if you want all the items. You can't get them if you don't so you have to go play. Again the logic here is " I play seasons, where my shit gets erased. I deserve special legendaries" What kind of bullshit is that? If they add legs, they need to be universally ACCESSIBLE, I don't want to have to build a char just to get a leg maybe somewhere down the road, so i can then use it on my non season character. that's not cool or fun imo. I don't like the idea of ladders in general. Doesn't mean I'm opposed to them being in the game, just don't make em the definitive way to play
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I dont understand what the issue is. How about you just play the game instead of worrying about whether you're getting as many legendaries as mathematically possible and just play the game as an enjoyable piece of entertainment
But that's exactly what people WANT to do. When you have a system where certain game modes are brutally inferior to others, though, it really takes the "just play how you want" aspect out of the game.
Sure in 1.x I could have been a Seismic Slam barbarian, I suppose. But really the chasmic difference between WW and every other barb spec really makes the actual choice non-existent.
Sure I could play story mode but it would be horribly inefficient. It's not that everything has to be balanced, because it doesn't. There will always be a "best." The issue is making the delta between "best" and "the rest" small enough that people feel they are being presented with a valid choice. As it stands, if you're not split-farming bounties and then doing RiF, you're not doing it right. How is that good for anyone? We have this whole huge game to play and we're stuck doing one thing because co-op is so ridiculously incentivized and because rifts are the best thing to farm for items.
Why have anything else in the game? When we log in why doesn't it just put us in a random party directly in a rift? Why don't we just skip all the other bullshit out there?
EDIT
The notion that nothing will be perfectly balanced, therefore they shouldn't try to give us options is completely asinine. We loved the monster density patch because we didn't have to keep doing Alkaizer runs. People hated CotA farming because it basically was the new Alkaizer run.
People want to feel like they have alternatives... VIABLE alternatives. They don't have to be 100% equal, but they need to be close enough that if you fire up story mode you don't feel you're at a massive disadvantage. Currently that's simply not the case. Anything that isn't a 4-player split bounty or rift is just not close to comparable.
That's not acceptable no matter how you try to argue it.
Have to say that if they really do add season-only legendaries then that's the last straw for me.
The incentive for seasons should be the competition aspect, not the shinies. As it is, if anyone wants those shinies they'll have to play seasons. That turns an apparent 'incentive' into almost a punishment for playing non-seasons.
ps. That's a perfect summation Bagstone.
Quote from Bagstone Season-only legendaries and the transferral of season-only legendaries to non-season forces people into playing a game mode that not everyone might enjoy. By neglecting this new game mode, you risk “falling behind”, miss out on potentially game-changing items, and might find yourself separated from your friends, clan, and communities. Overall, it might result in an unnecessary segregation of the playerbase.
I'm really excited about seasons, and even the Season-only-legendaries. But seriously, what are you gonna do about multi-boxers Blizzard?
I've heard multiple times that multiboxing "isn't against the rules". But if Blizzard isn't gonna do anything about multiboxers in Seasons, then they'll have an advantage gained trough additional 3rd party software.
I know, i'll probably won't reach the top 1000 in ladders or whatever, but i don't feel like playing in a competition "against" people who will already have an advantage. Especially with the season-only legendaries. If the loot-system stays the same as it is now, thus "tradeable with the party members within the first 2 hours", then multiboxers will probably get every Season-only legendary on the character they want, since they gain 3x more loot (by playing with 3 more characters).
IMO, streamers with bunch of mindless drones working for them are much bigger issue in this respect. There is no way 'normal' player would come even close to them, even with multiboxing.
I might have missed this since i'm not that into streaming, but what exactly do you mean with "drones". Diablo 3 is consists mostly out of getting legendaries, and you have to be in the game the moment the legendary drops to be a eligable trading partner right?
...what are you gonna do about multi-boxers Blizzard?
While I agree multiboxing is a problem - it is reasonably simple to fix with update to Warden. IMO, streamers with bunch of mindless drones working for them are much bigger issue in this respect. There is no way 'normal' player would come even close to them, even with multiboxing.
they will never ban multiboxing. instead of a person buying 1 unit a person buys 4 units. it's a win win for blizz.
...what are you gonna do about multi-boxers Blizzard?
While I agree multiboxing is a problem - it is reasonably simple to fix with update to Warden. IMO, streamers with bunch of mindless drones working for them are much bigger issue in this respect. There is no way 'normal' player would come even close to them, even with multiboxing.
they will never ban multiboxing. instead of a person buying 1 unit a person buys 4 units. it's a win win for blizz.
blizzard banned befor for multiboxing they couldnt care less if you buy even 100 coppies they wont let you use outside 3rd party programs to gain advantage over other players
Have to say that if they really do add season-only legendaries then that's the last straw for me.
The incentive for seasons should be the competition aspect, not the shinies. As it is, if anyone wants those shinies they'll have to play seasons. That turns an apparent 'incentive' into almost a punishment for playing non-seasons.
The inherent issue is; Competition in Ladders is an illusion by even the most optimistic view. Are people really going to drop their beloved SC chars in lieu of possibly earning #1,346 on Ladder?
"Competition" suggests somewhere along the line you stand a chance at winning. So to that end, I understand the need for further incentive for participation. You will not "win" ladders, but you may win some prized ladder-only items to abscond with to non-Lad.
Can anyone honestly say they don't see how Ladder (as well as lad-only items) provide a tremendous break from the monotony? It doesn't take long at all to level a char to 70 and start farming. It's not like we have to clear 4 game modes still to do this. I see that move directly synergizing with ladder play, as people have no real excuse to boycott/abstain from ladder play.
My hopes/predictions regarding Ladder parameters;
1) Ladder chars become relegated to a similar Hall of Honor as we see fallen HC chars displayed. They're effectively wiped at seasons end. There isn't enough "room" on an account for a constant stream of ex-lad chars piling on top of pre-existing non-lad chars.
2)The items (both lad and non-lad), gold, gems etc are added to your non-lad stash at seasons end.
3) Every season, new lad-only items are added.
4) Earned ladder paragon stays on ladder.
So what would you gain by playing ladder for the items? Why not just wait until they're available on non-lad? Well, those whom played ladder will have the builds down for said gear, as well as the adjoining gears to compliment the items immediately upon seasons end.
Uhm guys, please stay on topic ;-) This is not about multi-boxing.
Thanks for the discussion so far.
True, this topic isn't about multi-boxing, but the topic is about the concerns of Seasons. Imo, multi-boxing is one of my/the concerns. I really think multiboxers can ruin the fun for others in Seasons.
...what are you gonna do about multi-boxers Blizzard?
While I agree multiboxing is a problem - it is reasonably simple to fix with update to Warden. IMO, streamers with bunch of mindless drones working for them are much bigger issue in this respect. There is no way 'normal' player would come even close to them, even with multiboxing.
they will never ban multiboxing. instead of a person buying 1 unit a person buys 4 units. it's a win win for blizz.
blizzard banned befor for multiboxing they couldnt care less if you buy even 100 coppies they wont let you use outside 3rd party programs to gain advantage over other players
...what are you gonna do about multi-boxers Blizzard?
While I agree multiboxing is a problem - it is reasonably simple to fix with update to Warden. IMO, streamers with bunch of mindless drones working for them are much bigger issue in this respect. There is no way 'normal' player would come even close to them, even with multiboxing.
they will never ban multiboxing. instead of a person buying 1 unit a person buys 4 units. it's a win win for blizz.
blizzard banned befor for multiboxing they couldnt care less if you buy even 100 coppies they wont let you use outside 3rd party programs to gain advantage over other players
they do not ban for this and never have.
show me where blizzard states that multiboxing is ok to use and ill agree with you
I agree with you in general but D3 is a character building game. You claim that it is a "loot finding action game" but that loot finding is only rewarding because it serves one purpose and that is, building your character up.
If the ladder only items will be moved to non ladder along with everything else, then it might not be so bad. Blizzard wants to create as many incentives as they can for people to actually decide to come back and start a new character in the new season. That's why they are coating it with new shiny, "powerful" legendaries and whatnot. I am worried by this design choice (which is evident already imo) because it will just mean that if you don't play the ladder you are screwed.
In d2 all the best items were actually non ladder simply because really old items existed in small quantities. Items that had overpowered / bugged stats and survived throughout the years in non ladder.
Even though i am not a big fan of the whole ladders / seasons idea, i will probably end up playing it.
But to be honest, let's face it, how hard is it going to be to gear up a character from scratch and farm t1 speed rifts for the new legendaries? I think it's not going to be too hard... Sure, you can't reroll and socket that much because you won't have gold but who really needs those features when all you need to do is be effecient on T1?
I think that in 1 week we will all have suffecient enough gear and just farm ladder for a while untill we get the new items and then quit / take a break untill the season ends... But then you are screwed again because another season is about to start so you'd have to start everything over again... Damn now that i think of it, it's the worst idea ever from a player's point of view but a really good one from a marketing point of view. I hate it but will still play it. I hate the people who pushed for this stupid idea to be implemented but still respect them for caring about the game and its future.
I remember when the community and the devs talked about NOT forcing people into certain playstyles and such. Everything is obviously within reason which is why Mira runs get nerfed, and I do understand that. But since Josh has taken over with all the awesome new stuff he's added, he's done a very good job of removing choices from us. And the community's response is "Screw trading, if you trade you just want to cheat the game, deal with BoA." Instead of "Taking away choices is bad. I don't want to trade, but there has to be a better way."
We are seeing similar with ladder-exclusive items. Instead of advocating that all players get equal enjoyment potential from the game regardless of what game mode they're playing, the pro-ladder bloc uses the same jedi mind tricks that the anti-trading bloc used to justify removing that choice.
As it stands Blizzard has willingly pre-made the following gameplay choices for us:
Trading vs no trading
Solo vs multi-player
Adventure mode (even more specifically: rifts) vs Story mode
and if we let them they're going to make the ladders vs standard choice for us to. When are we, collectively, going to stand up for our ability to choose how to play this damned game regardless of our individual agendas? When are we going to demand that Josh stops defining one "correct" way to play and summarily leaves everything else in the lurch? It is in all of our interests to preserve our general freedom of choice. We're playing an ARPG here which implies there is a good bit of open-endedness in the game. It's high time we get (take) that back.
I dont understand what the issue is. How about you just play the game instead of worrying about whether you're getting as many legendaries as mathematically possible and just play the game as an enjoyable piece of entertainment (which is exactly what it was created for)? If you're really so obsessed with getting more orange text items over every other person in the entire game then I guess you're just gonna have to sacrifice some of those other things because no matter how hard they try there will always be an optimal way to do things that is not necessarily the most fun.
Again they aren't putting a gun to your head, but they might as well be. There should be no bonus for playing in MP, Why is there a bonus? What made it so that there should be a bonus? I play with my friends so i deserve more? That's the end logic of it, which is completely because people felt entitled to it. What's the point in the 100% leg drop rate buff in rifts? They are "THE DEFINITIVE" end game so josh buffed their leg drop rate, instead of universally buffing the rate to make it equal across the board. This comes down to his decision as the leader of D3 that rifts are endgame, once you can you should be farming rifts. That's what it boils down to. Same thing will happen with seasons, if they keep season only legendaries in. You get forced into playing it if you want all the items. You can't get them if you don't so you have to go play. Again the logic here is " I play seasons, where my shit gets erased. I deserve special legendaries" What kind of bullshit is that? If they add legs, they need to be universally ACCESSIBLE, I don't want to have to build a char just to get a leg maybe somewhere down the road, so i can then use it on my non season character. that's not cool or fun imo. I don't like the idea of ladders in general. Doesn't mean I'm opposed to them being in the game, just don't make em the definitive way to play
Sure in 1.x I could have been a Seismic Slam barbarian, I suppose. But really the chasmic difference between WW and every other barb spec really makes the actual choice non-existent.
Sure I could play story mode but it would be horribly inefficient. It's not that everything has to be balanced, because it doesn't. There will always be a "best." The issue is making the delta between "best" and "the rest" small enough that people feel they are being presented with a valid choice. As it stands, if you're not split-farming bounties and then doing RiF, you're not doing it right. How is that good for anyone? We have this whole huge game to play and we're stuck doing one thing because co-op is so ridiculously incentivized and because rifts are the best thing to farm for items.
Why have anything else in the game? When we log in why doesn't it just put us in a random party directly in a rift? Why don't we just skip all the other bullshit out there?
EDIT
The notion that nothing will be perfectly balanced, therefore they shouldn't try to give us options is completely asinine. We loved the monster density patch because we didn't have to keep doing Alkaizer runs. People hated CotA farming because it basically was the new Alkaizer run.
People want to feel like they have alternatives... VIABLE alternatives. They don't have to be 100% equal, but they need to be close enough that if you fire up story mode you don't feel you're at a massive disadvantage. Currently that's simply not the case. Anything that isn't a 4-player split bounty or rift is just not close to comparable.
That's not acceptable no matter how you try to argue it.
Well written post, those were my very concerns as well, hope they find a way to alleviate this policy like this:
The incentive for seasons should be the competition aspect, not the shinies. As it is, if anyone wants those shinies they'll have to play seasons. That turns an apparent 'incentive' into almost a punishment for playing non-seasons.
ps. That's a perfect summation Bagstone.
And may the odds be ever in your favour.
Emmo#2406
I've heard multiple times that multiboxing "isn't against the rules". But if Blizzard isn't gonna do anything about multiboxers in Seasons, then they'll have an advantage gained trough additional 3rd party software.
I know, i'll probably won't reach the top 1000 in ladders or whatever, but i don't feel like playing in a competition "against" people who will already have an advantage. Especially with the season-only legendaries. If the loot-system stays the same as it is now, thus "tradeable with the party members within the first 2 hours", then multiboxers will probably get every Season-only legendary on the character they want, since they gain 3x more loot (by playing with 3 more characters).
http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Time2Kill-1230/hero/23330792
"Competition" suggests somewhere along the line you stand a chance at winning. So to that end, I understand the need for further incentive for participation. You will not "win" ladders, but you may win some prized ladder-only items to abscond with to non-Lad.
Can anyone honestly say they don't see how Ladder (as well as lad-only items) provide a tremendous break from the monotony? It doesn't take long at all to level a char to 70 and start farming. It's not like we have to clear 4 game modes still to do this. I see that move directly synergizing with ladder play, as people have no real excuse to boycott/abstain from ladder play.
My hopes/predictions regarding Ladder parameters;
1) Ladder chars become relegated to a similar Hall of Honor as we see fallen HC chars displayed. They're effectively wiped at seasons end. There isn't enough "room" on an account for a constant stream of ex-lad chars piling on top of pre-existing non-lad chars.
2)The items (both lad and non-lad), gold, gems etc are added to your non-lad stash at seasons end.
3) Every season, new lad-only items are added.
4) Earned ladder paragon stays on ladder.
So what would you gain by playing ladder for the items? Why not just wait until they're available on non-lad? Well, those whom played ladder will have the builds down for said gear, as well as the adjoining gears to compliment the items immediately upon seasons end.
BurningRope#1322 (US~HC) Request an invite to the official (NA) <dfans> Clan
Thanks for the discussion so far.
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Seasons
http://www.diablofans.com/
Off the main page.
WD Season 8 https://www.diabloprogress.com/hero/finiar-1655/Kildare/84509816
Monk season 7 http://www.diabloprogress.com/hero/finiar-1655/MojoJoJo/42225505
DH season 6 http://www.diabloprogress.com/hero/finiar-1655/DeadShot/75655606
Angry Chicken http://www.diabloprogress.com/hero/finiar-1655/WhoDoVooDoo/68187610
What? Me worry?
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http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Time2Kill-1230/hero/23330792