I think Torment is a totally different in that the difficulty scales with your character's power, i.e. dps * toughness. If you make paragon levels almost uncapped (max 9999) you can also make the difficulty (almost) uncapped. You can start Torment with any gear at any level and the difficulty will scale along with your increasing power.
This way you can go through all acts and reach max level or higher in one run through all acts.
This also solves the problem that characters with uber equip will have no challenge left.
It's much like the Mario Kart principle, where the competition will adapt to your skill.
Note: I like the original post and I really like the discussion. Very good thinking.
Thanks...that was really my goal, to get us all talking.
Well see, I'm not sure they could make a difficulty that scales to character power, or stats like Toughness or DPS. I think it'd have too much room for screwing up. Of course, on the opposite of that argument, if they were able to make that kind of a system perfect, you wouldn't really need Normal, Nightmare, Hell, or Inferno, as no matter how powerful you got, the monsters were always a few feet outside of your reach, and the game was constantly challenging. Which seems good, but I've played games like that, and while it kept battle engaging and dangerous...I never felt like I was making any ground in regard to character development, ya know? Like, I'd grind and grind and grind, I'd get better and better gear...but I'd never feel, even for a minute, like I was really totally kickass. The battles all felt pretty much as hard as each other no matter where I went, or what I fought. They all kinda followed the pacing, too.
That's why I figured my idea would be best. Five tiers of difficulty, each with Monster Power to fine-tune...or you could even have Torment be harder than Inferno MP10, and not allow Torment to have MP settings. But all in all, being able to control difficulty to that degree would be pretty fantastic. It would also make it so that each difficulty's areas were places players wanted to go, as opposed to requiring that time. There would be some pretty brave souls out there, trying to get far in Inferno MPs with Level 1 characters.
Two words: Too Human. That game demonstrated quite well why a system that increases the difficulty based solely on your character's stats does not work.
I know how you feel about Final Fantasy, I've been a fan from around FF7, but I've played most of them retroactively.
I don't think every single game had all three of those musical pieces perfectly intact, though...for instance, I don't think FFX had the opening prelude, it had a variation of the victory fanfare, though...FFXII might've had one or two removed as well...but you're right, those three things are pretty iconic to Final Fantasy, and if at least one or two isn't in there, it'll feel "less" like Final Fantasy. I completely agree.
First of all, FFX DOES have the prelude, it plays during the intro scene with Tidus coming out of his house and talking to his fans, and also during the sphere grid tutorial. FFXII has the victory fanfare but it only plays after boss fights.
/fanboy
Then again, when people bring up stuff that they deem as traditionally "Diablo," 1) they usually mention D2...and not even D2 Classic, but D2 LOD, which came out a year later...2) they mention stuff, like you said, that affects gameplay directly and deserves a critical eye to be put on it, since so much time has passed. Even at D3's launch, I saw a lot of really small things that were improvements from D2...but since they were rather inconsequential, they didn't help the gameplay or character progression, so they weren't focused on as much. Now that a lot of aspects of the gameplay, skills, progression, itemization, etc., are all being worked on and worked out...the game may not feel as "Diablo" as it did, for some people...but I like what Diablo is becoming better than what it could've been, had it just leaned on tradition alone.
And thank you, yeah I do agree, the specifics would need to be worked out, most assuredly. I never once thought this idea was perfect from inception. Like I said, it was just an idea and I only proposed it because it seemed to solve more issues than simply removing a difficulty would. :-D
You're right, people argue about different things when it comes to what they think of as the "core" of the game. Bottom line is, we really don't know what Torment means or how it will change the game, I just hope Blizzard doesn't start changing stuff that could be handled another way without "breaking" it. Either way, it doesn't hurt to speculate.
In all fairness...at this point, if you're worried about traditional systems going by the wayside, then maybe you'll want to play something else, if you aren't already. Skill Trees? Gone. 5 point stat allocation per level? Gone. Only 99 levels to acquire? Gone. Mana-potion spamming for near-infinite skill usage? Gone. These are things people considered "traditional" in D2, and are still being updated to be better.
Which is why I don't feel "tradition" needs to be held to so strongly. After all, "tradition" is something that gets wickedly misused and personally interpreted every day, by people who say, "well come on...that's just not 'Diablo.' Cooldowns aren't 'Diablo.'" In essence, many things that people think are tried-and-true traditions end up holding back progress. People say that all the time. "Shoulda just made D2HD." Right...they would've made D2HD, and people would've gotten bored at light speed...why? Because there would've been absolutely no progress from the predecessor. Just because certain traditions are leaned on and accepted as standard doesn't mean that ancient standard is the best and brightest way to go.
Well, ya, that's what I mean when I say it's subjective. Besides, of the things you mentioned, only mana-potion spamming was something that actually started in D1, so they are hardly traditions. Also, those are things that affect the gameplay in a very direct way, and deserve to be looked at with a critical eye. There are some things that are more about "flavor". If you change those things, the game just doesn't feel like it's in the same series.
I could talk about this for pages, but let me just give you one example of what I mean: Final Fantasy 13. The FF series has a lot of traditions in it, but each game changes a lot of the mechanics, sometimes in a very extreme way. In the case of FF, the music has a huge impact on the game feel. The music changed a lot over the course of the series, but there are 3 particular pieces of music that are absolutely traditional: the opening prelude, the main theme, and the victory fanfare. These 3 pieces have been in every single game since the first. And FF13 removed all 3 of them. I still liked the game, but that REALLY put a bad taste in my mouth, and I'm not the only one.
Would changing the N/NM/H progression ruin Diablo 3? No, of course not, and while I wouldn't like that change I would still keep playing the game. They don't even necessarily need to work exactly the same way. Example: Scrolls of Identify and Town Portal. We still have those functions in D3, they just aren't scrolls. I think that's an acceptable change. It keeps the basic function, but changes it enough so that it "plays" better.
So, I'm not opposed to the system you've come up with in principle, I just think the specifics need work. As for "Torment", I just hope they don't change the current naming convention. That would just be change for the sake of change.
Going back to 3 difficulties just seems like nostalgia to me. Like, "D1 and D2 had 3, why shouldn't D3?" Because 3 is some kind of neat and tidy number or something. I'm not against it, but like my original post pointed out, I keep going back to what the devs have been saying.
Nostalgia and Tradition are powerful forces in game franchises. There is a thin line between making enough changes to some of the core elements of a game to make a sequel feel 'new', and changing too many things, or changing the wrong things, to the point that the sequel feels disconnected from the original. It is very subjective, and like I said, I will trust Blizzard's judgement on this, but in my opinion, the Normal/Nightmare/Hell progression is not something that should, or needs to, be changed.
No offense drj, but I'm barely able to follow your post. You might want to go back to it when you have time and make it more readable.
I'll say this though: from a purely aesthetic viewpoint, it makes no sense for the first difficulty level to be anything other than "Normal", since that's the standard against which you compare everything else. I suppose you could call it "Easy", but that wouldn't be very Diablo-ish.
Yes, you can stop them. Just implement caps. If nobody can go over 40% crit and 250% crit dmg, for example, then they have a "max OP-ness at RoS launch" to work with. Very simple.
The point of the caps, as I understand them, is to prevent people from stacking as much as possible of a particular stat, to encourage build diversity. It has nothing to do with limiting overall player power. And even if someone was able to somehow hit ALL those stat caps, they would still have no trouble getting through act 5 very quickly at launch.
Honestly, here's my feeling, about as narrowed down as it goes...
I'm going along with "Torment" assuming, like many, that it means a new difficulty level. It may not. It might be an exclusive setting to a completely different section of the game being added later, that none of us know about. I'm merely combining a proposed change of a potential new difficulty level with the idea of removing the requirement to fully complete game playthroughs to unlock higher difficulties, into one singular idea that I feel would solve a lot of problems players have with the game.
Many think Torment is going to replace Nightmare, or Nightmare & Hell, and I'm mostly aiming this at them, with a counter idea that I haven't seen proposed by anyone, to hopefully inspire some debate, as I think messing with Nightmare and/or Hell is the wrong way for the devs to go.
With all due respect...the only solution I've seen you propose (at least in this thread) was a level requirement for a player or character to reach before moving on to the next difficulty. Which is nice in theory, but truthfully, it just seems like an arbitrary number to me.
In that case, I'll leave it to someone else to continue that particular argument. In short, I'm not proposing a solution because I don't see much of a problem with the way things are now.
Assuming 5 acts and 4 difficulties: N: 1-35, NM: 35-55, H: 55-70, I: 70. This is more or less how the leveling curve changed from D2 to LoD.
Before, you said that people get to around level 30ish on one playthrough of Normal, and I agreed, because that's about right. Probably a little less, maybe 25-27 or so. But by your model, I'd need to get my new character to level 35 before moving onto Nightmare? Seriously, it would take at least three times as long, mindlessly grinding to 35 on Normal (with diminishing returns on XP might I add), than it would just speeding through and struggling to squeak by Diablo at level 22, which I might be able to do now! That's why I picked level 20 as a more reasonable requirement, but even that...if all you need is level 20 to advance to Nightmare, again I'll ask...why bother requiring a particular level at all?
I must have misunderstood you here because I was referring to a level progression (player level and monster level) for a 5-act structure, not level requirements for each difficulty. For practical reasons, the current level requirements would probably not change, and would certainly not get any higher. But again, the point is to provide players with a benchmark for how to progress through the game. Veteran players probably don't need that kind of handholding so I wouldn't be opposed to removing the level requirement for each difficulty on your account once you get to a certain point.
Here, practical example of that concept in action...have you ever played Champions of Norrath? That game had a level requirement to advance to the next difficulty level. But the level requirement was fairly low, and it should be. It basically said, "this is the literal MINIMUM you have to be in order to move on...you're allowed to move on to the next difficulty when your character hits X, but even if you're at the bare minimum, you're probably going to meet really serious adversity." Thus, if that's the case, why not allow players to try out harder difficulty levels? What's the point of the restriction? What's the worst that can happen if they try out harder difficulties? They die? Fail? Lose? Freeing that up encourages people to experiment, to see what they can make happen. it encourages players to try pushing themselves to the limits, and if it proves too much for them, they at least know what they're up against and can appropriately prepare. Much like RPGs that let you travel to lands with super powered monsters. You may die, but if you can somehow survive, you're going to be rewarded pretty heavily for your bravery.
Level 35 would actually put someone in a great spot going into Nightmare, likely too good, and that's not even taking into account Loot 2.0 probably guaranteeing this new character a bunch of legendaries on their trip. In addition, Paragon Points gained via Paragon 2.0 will also cause new characters' power levels to be thrust considerably forward, meaning Normal MP10 will be nothing short of a cakewalk.
So this isn't me just pining for a fifth difficulty level. It's me pining for people to get to the hardest content they can play on as fast as possible. They want to experience the story all the way through, they absolutely should. But once they beat Diablo once, they know what's going on, and more than likely, they want to zip around the game and explore, rather than have to go through the whole thing another 12-15 times.
My idea was trying to get people to a point where they can choose anywhere they want to go as fast as possible, and feel like the endgame has begun a lot sooner...your idea seems to hold that process up.
I don't mean to pick on you for one little aspect of your argument, but this is a key part of the restrictive problem the devs face...players are 1) bored at having to redo the entire game four times per new character in order to experience the full depth and breadth of endgame, 2) finding the existing difficulties fairly easy as they are, even when they crank up MP to 10...and will likely find them easier with better quality loot dropping earlier in the game when Loot 2.0 and Paragon Points go live.
Meanwhile, if a player uses a Witch Doctor, let's say, with enough effectiveness chipping away at mobs to safely handle Hell MP5 at only Level 12, then so be it. It means they're good enough to handle harder content, and they should have a chance at proving that. It's part of why the 3 difficulty system of yesteryear is so dated now, it gave players ZERO control over how hard or easy the game was, in addition to how much reward they got out of it.
And at this point, we're just going to have to agree to disagree because you're talking about the game from the point of view of people who essentially are past the point that they really need to worry much about leveling up, where I'm thinking of people who are new to the game. Those are very different perspectives, and I believe that everything pre-level cap should be balanced and designed with the latter in mind rather than the former. As I said before, if you want to create a new character to level up just for fun, why would you want to skip ahead in content?
Let me ask you something, to try and narrow this down: why are you arguing specifically for a 5th difficulty? Is it because you feel that is necessary for your proposed change to the way difficulties work? Or is it because a "Torment" difficulty has been mentioned in datamined patch notes and we really have no idea what it means? Because it seems to me that those are 2 separate issues.
1) You're right 100%. People will be storming through Act 5 regardless, :-) But aside from reaching level 70 and collecting new gear, and doing some of the new endgame stuff like Loot Runs and Bounties, what else is there to do? Most of that extra stuff is going to be awesome, no doubt...but at the end of the day, those things are really just there to provide alternate streams of XP and items. It's all for the same ultimate purpose of strengthening characters and offering different challenges.
But you could make that argument no matter what they do. This is an expansion, not a new game. They can't stop people who are already super-powerful from stomping through the new content and they can't balance the new content around those people without setting everyone else way back. And no matter how much new content they add, it will never be enough.
2) But see...in that case, if people get to move on when they hit certain XP milestones, it's basically the same as what I said, just with an arbitrary numeric determinant. Like, allowing players to move onto Nightmare quests (already completed in Normal, I assume) when they hit level 20, for instance. There's no guarantee they'll be able to handle Nightmare with a level 20 character, same as there's no guarantee they'll be able to handle Nightmare with a level 10 or a level 30 character, so if that's the case, what's the point of the level requirement? Especially since the "initial level cap" will only be 70 come the expansion. How do you divide 70 levels up among four difficulty tiers and require certain levels to ascend?
The level caps serve mainly as a benchmark for players to reach while working through Normal. As if to say "If you aren't at least this high, you're NOT ready yet." Without that kind of guideline, new players really have no idea when they should be able to move on. They could get to level 20 but unless they have amazing gear, they are NOT ready for Nightmare. I suppose you could argue that beating a difficulty once could unlock the next one account-wide, but we need some way of keeping players on a reasonable leveling path.
As for how you divide them up, that's actually pretty simple. Assuming 5 acts and 4 difficulties: N: 1-35, NM: 35-55, H: 55-70, I: 70. This is more or less how the leveling curve changed from D2 to LoD.
3) Again correct, creating characters in D2 was more common, for various reasons. Which is a great point. In D3, creating new characters isn't nearly as common, except for Hardcore players, so really...a player who is primarily Softcore, and has gotten five characters to Inferno, will not even see updated mid-range difficulty levels. A primarily Hardcore player might, as they may have to "reroll" new characters they've lost. But like I said, with Paragon 2.0 buffing new characters in big ways, they might take more care with their characters to protect them from death...but meanwhile, with a fifth difficulty tier, there's more danger and bigger rewards to lure them to die, and players who are already at the high end of endgame have further challenges to overcome.
You seem to be of the opinion that players need something beyond Inferno MP10 to keep them satisfied. And I would agree if the AH wasn't being removed. It will take MUCH longer for people to get to that point at level 70. Granted, paragon 2.0 being infinite means they can eventually do it through sheer playtime, but...that's kinda the point. And I think it goes without saying, but Blizzard absolutely should not balance the game around Hardcore. I don't think anybody would be happy with that.
4) Monster levels are indeed a major concern, you're very right about that. In fact, if I haven't said it yet, that's a major reason why I think adding a fifth difficulty tier is a better idea than changing two mid-range tiers. They change one or more mid-range difficulty tiers, they'll have to rework what those monster levels mean, which may bleed into affecting gear drops, gold acquisition, crafting, etc. Adding a fifth allows them to leave Nightmare and Hell as they are, but they can also add in additional hazards and abilities for Torment level mobs to throw at you specially. But the ability to change difficulties at a player's leisure means they can get a much bigger boost in difficulty than simply MP10 on Normal, if Normal MP10 isn't enough, or even Inferno MP10 if Inferno MP10 isn't enough.
As I said, I'm against merging NM and Hell, for various reasons. But there are many ways they can make monsters more challenging beyond increased numbers. I just don't see how adding a new difficulty mode is necessary for that when we already have 4 to balance them around.
Obviously, this idea and scenario isn't quite fleshed out, I'll admit, :-)
Meh, gotta start somewhere. I don't think it's necessarily a bad approach, but there are some kinks to work out, obviously.
I guess I just don't see simply merging two of the mid-range difficulty settings as a great solution to solving the overall issue of repetition players are having. Merging Nightmare and Hell only shortens the repetition, and adds more work for Blizzard to rework what each monster level entails. Plus, if Inferno has become manageable by TODAY'S limited gear standards, Loot 2.0 and Paragon 2.0 will put people so far above the curve that even Act 5 creates, that Reaper of Souls could bowled over within a week.
I'm against merging NM and Hell, simply because it would violate tradition. I said before in another thread that if Blizzard wants to do so because they genuinely think it will improve the game then whatever. But there are some things I feel they really -shouldn't- change, and I also think people are so eager for the game to be shortened in some way that they are grasping at straws.
To the second point, people who have been playing since release are going to storm through Act 5 regardless. But just finishing Act 5 is only the beginning. We still have to reach 70 and start collecting new gear, and who knows what else they have in store for us?
Meanwhile, adding a fifth difficulty tier, and opening up the entire game for choice farming and grinding after the first playthrough, means a player can feel like they've reached "endgame" a lot faster, while still feeling like there's more to do with their character. Right now, people HAVE TO get a new character through Normal, Nightmare, and Hell to reach Inferno. This way, if their new character can handle Torment MP6 sooner than later, why should they be deprived of it?
I think the easiest solution to that particular problem would be allowing players to move ahead to NM/Hell/Inferno once they have reached the right experience level, rather than needing to go through all the quests. Then they can change MP to whatever they want to level at their own pace and move through the game on their own terms.
After all, look at D2. People power-leveled each other and "rushed" each other all the time. Newly created characters were technically required to go through Normal, Nightmare and Hell, but power-leveling and rushing was an easy work around. The D3 devs seem to be effectively taking those D2 exploits into account with many of their updates for D3, and my idea here takes that into account as well.
Except that in D2, creating new characters was much more common, for various reasons. In D3, you have 10 character slots (soon 12) and that's really generous considering that 5 (6) is really all you need. The ability to rush through the game really shouldn't be an issue since people don't actually need to make new characters that often. Sure, you CAN create a new character if you want, just for fun, but in that case why would you want to get rushed?
Ultimately...if D2's design made it insanely easy for players to help drag each other to endgame within an hour, and D3's current design means it takes a solo player a week or more of hour after hour of speeding through content just to make it to endgame, why not split the difference somehow and give the players more control?
For the reason I mentioned above, and also because monster levels are a major concern with how players progress, especially once the AH goes away and gearing is going to be a bit more difficult. MP is there to let them adjust the game according to their own preferences; I see no reason to completely reformat the way players get to max level when the focus really should be on what they do once they get there.
So in this proposed system, would leveling from 1-60 in Normal MP0 even be viable? Or would you still come out around 30 after killing Diablo? In which case, what reference does a player have to how they should increase the difficulty in order to continue leveling?
Also, how do you handle the explicit purpose of inferno, which is to have an 'end-game' arena for players at the level cap? Remember that monster level is an issue separate from how much their damage/health etc is scaled. Whether it's 60/63/70/73, how do you handle the idea of having a mode (whatever you want to call it) where players can go anywhere in the game world they want and still have a consistent challenge?
Maybe I'm just missing something here, but I don't see how this suggestion is fundamentally different from the current MP system. How is this any different from just letting MP scale up to 50 instead of just 10?
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Two words: Too Human. That game demonstrated quite well why a system that increases the difficulty based solely on your character's stats does not work.
/fanboy
You're right, people argue about different things when it comes to what they think of as the "core" of the game. Bottom line is, we really don't know what Torment means or how it will change the game, I just hope Blizzard doesn't start changing stuff that could be handled another way without "breaking" it. Either way, it doesn't hurt to speculate.
Well, ya, that's what I mean when I say it's subjective. Besides, of the things you mentioned, only mana-potion spamming was something that actually started in D1, so they are hardly traditions. Also, those are things that affect the gameplay in a very direct way, and deserve to be looked at with a critical eye. There are some things that are more about "flavor". If you change those things, the game just doesn't feel like it's in the same series.
I could talk about this for pages, but let me just give you one example of what I mean: Final Fantasy 13. The FF series has a lot of traditions in it, but each game changes a lot of the mechanics, sometimes in a very extreme way. In the case of FF, the music has a huge impact on the game feel. The music changed a lot over the course of the series, but there are 3 particular pieces of music that are absolutely traditional: the opening prelude, the main theme, and the victory fanfare. These 3 pieces have been in every single game since the first. And FF13 removed all 3 of them. I still liked the game, but that REALLY put a bad taste in my mouth, and I'm not the only one.
Would changing the N/NM/H progression ruin Diablo 3? No, of course not, and while I wouldn't like that change I would still keep playing the game. They don't even necessarily need to work exactly the same way. Example: Scrolls of Identify and Town Portal. We still have those functions in D3, they just aren't scrolls. I think that's an acceptable change. It keeps the basic function, but changes it enough so that it "plays" better.
So, I'm not opposed to the system you've come up with in principle, I just think the specifics need work. As for "Torment", I just hope they don't change the current naming convention. That would just be change for the sake of change.
Nostalgia and Tradition are powerful forces in game franchises. There is a thin line between making enough changes to some of the core elements of a game to make a sequel feel 'new', and changing too many things, or changing the wrong things, to the point that the sequel feels disconnected from the original. It is very subjective, and like I said, I will trust Blizzard's judgement on this, but in my opinion, the Normal/Nightmare/Hell progression is not something that should, or needs to, be changed.
I'll say this though: from a purely aesthetic viewpoint, it makes no sense for the first difficulty level to be anything other than "Normal", since that's the standard against which you compare everything else. I suppose you could call it "Easy", but that wouldn't be very Diablo-ish.
The point of the caps, as I understand them, is to prevent people from stacking as much as possible of a particular stat, to encourage build diversity. It has nothing to do with limiting overall player power. And even if someone was able to somehow hit ALL those stat caps, they would still have no trouble getting through act 5 very quickly at launch.
In that case, I'll leave it to someone else to continue that particular argument. In short, I'm not proposing a solution because I don't see much of a problem with the way things are now.
I must have misunderstood you here because I was referring to a level progression (player level and monster level) for a 5-act structure, not level requirements for each difficulty. For practical reasons, the current level requirements would probably not change, and would certainly not get any higher. But again, the point is to provide players with a benchmark for how to progress through the game. Veteran players probably don't need that kind of handholding so I wouldn't be opposed to removing the level requirement for each difficulty on your account once you get to a certain point.
And at this point, we're just going to have to agree to disagree because you're talking about the game from the point of view of people who essentially are past the point that they really need to worry much about leveling up, where I'm thinking of people who are new to the game. Those are very different perspectives, and I believe that everything pre-level cap should be balanced and designed with the latter in mind rather than the former. As I said before, if you want to create a new character to level up just for fun, why would you want to skip ahead in content?
The level caps serve mainly as a benchmark for players to reach while working through Normal. As if to say "If you aren't at least this high, you're NOT ready yet." Without that kind of guideline, new players really have no idea when they should be able to move on. They could get to level 20 but unless they have amazing gear, they are NOT ready for Nightmare. I suppose you could argue that beating a difficulty once could unlock the next one account-wide, but we need some way of keeping players on a reasonable leveling path.
As for how you divide them up, that's actually pretty simple. Assuming 5 acts and 4 difficulties: N: 1-35, NM: 35-55, H: 55-70, I: 70. This is more or less how the leveling curve changed from D2 to LoD.
You seem to be of the opinion that players need something beyond Inferno MP10 to keep them satisfied. And I would agree if the AH wasn't being removed. It will take MUCH longer for people to get to that point at level 70. Granted, paragon 2.0 being infinite means they can eventually do it through sheer playtime, but...that's kinda the point. And I think it goes without saying, but Blizzard absolutely should not balance the game around Hardcore. I don't think anybody would be happy with that.
As I said, I'm against merging NM and Hell, for various reasons. But there are many ways they can make monsters more challenging beyond increased numbers. I just don't see how adding a new difficulty mode is necessary for that when we already have 4 to balance them around.
Meh, gotta start somewhere. I don't think it's necessarily a bad approach, but there are some kinks to work out, obviously.
I'm against merging NM and Hell, simply because it would violate tradition. I said before in another thread that if Blizzard wants to do so because they genuinely think it will improve the game then whatever. But there are some things I feel they really -shouldn't- change, and I also think people are so eager for the game to be shortened in some way that they are grasping at straws.
To the second point, people who have been playing since release are going to storm through Act 5 regardless. But just finishing Act 5 is only the beginning. We still have to reach 70 and start collecting new gear, and who knows what else they have in store for us?
I think the easiest solution to that particular problem would be allowing players to move ahead to NM/Hell/Inferno once they have reached the right experience level, rather than needing to go through all the quests. Then they can change MP to whatever they want to level at their own pace and move through the game on their own terms.
Except that in D2, creating new characters was much more common, for various reasons. In D3, you have 10 character slots (soon 12) and that's really generous considering that 5 (6) is really all you need. The ability to rush through the game really shouldn't be an issue since people don't actually need to make new characters that often. Sure, you CAN create a new character if you want, just for fun, but in that case why would you want to get rushed?
For the reason I mentioned above, and also because monster levels are a major concern with how players progress, especially once the AH goes away and gearing is going to be a bit more difficult. MP is there to let them adjust the game according to their own preferences; I see no reason to completely reformat the way players get to max level when the focus really should be on what they do once they get there.
Also, how do you handle the explicit purpose of inferno, which is to have an 'end-game' arena for players at the level cap? Remember that monster level is an issue separate from how much their damage/health etc is scaled. Whether it's 60/63/70/73, how do you handle the idea of having a mode (whatever you want to call it) where players can go anywhere in the game world they want and still have a consistent challenge?