DiabloFans

I know because I just got in! So go check your accounts!


Edit: A few posts down someone posted a screenshot of my beta-flagged post on the diablo forums for anyone who wants any sort of confirmation.


But I swear to you this is NOT a troll!

don't forget 20000 barbarian females named 'DeathBySnooSnoo'

If this is meant to be a comparison to the wow one, then it makes no sense because rift is not a blizzard product... if it's meant to be serious then why would you even ask such a silly question... and if it's just meant to be a troll it really lacks creativity...

Blizzard has said SEVERAL times now they're designing around the assumption that people will NOT be hotswapping. And they do NOT expect a lot of people to do it regularly. Okay? Can we get that out of the way now? Thank you. Quit assuming the game will be balanced around you swapping skills because it WON'T. Blizzard wants the game to be balanced assuming people DON'T do that.

Now that that is out of way, let's get on to the real points.

The runes are what determine how many charged bolts to use your skill, a level 7 rune does more than a leve l rune. So yes, you will see more scaling of effects beyond just damage through rune levels. And rune types.

I'm pretty sure Blizzard isn't planning to put macros in place to change your abilities. You have to stop killing, open your menu, find the skill, drag it to where you want it. Long process - doesn't seem very fun to me. So I won't.


What's better is MEANINGFUL customization. Skill points have NEVER proven themselves to be that. Remember, I am a game reviewer(admittedly fairly recently starting out as one), I play a ton of games. I've never seen a skill customization system that encouraged me to do anything other than max as many skills as I could to be as powerful as possible. Skills get increasingly more powerful the more points you put in them, not literally, but scalingly. So 1 point may do 1-2 damage, 5 will do 20-22, and 10 will do 100-102. There's no reason to only put 5 in, because I'll be really really weak. So you max out as many skills as the skill point system allows you to, then use whatever few skill points you have left to get utility abilities or in rare cases synergistic abilities. This is a fact. It was this way in D2, it was this way in Dungeon Siege 3, it was this way in dozens of other games which had skill trees. It is ALWAYS this way.

Stat points I will give you in some games HAVE been meaningful and well done. But usually they result in one person finding the optimum and 99.999% of people copying him. In d2 the optimum was as many vitality points as you could after getting youjr strength for items, for one example.

Meaningful customization will be in the choices you make, and I truly expect this game to end up with most people doing what I'll be doing: Designing their character to be a specific character. Ie. I'm going to have Venra the melee Wizardress. She will be that, and unless BLizzard makes it completely 100% useless, that is what she will be. It doesn't matter if I fight enemies that isn't ideal as, she will do what she needs to. Most gamers I've talked to play like that in games like this.

Sure there will be 'professional farmers' who do otherwise, but that's fine too - it's their choice. And that's the beauty of this system, it allows you the choice to play how you most want to. IF you want to build a character and make it a real character there is NOTHING stopping you from doing so. If you want to min max and swap abilities on the fly, there's also nothing stopping you from doing that. And that is truly a beautiful thing in a game - true choice.

If the companions are invisible to other players, I think an scv or a drone would be a cool bonus for people who buy the Collector's Edition of sc2:HotS.

... what is so odd about there being rabbits in Sanctuary? I still can't fathom why people are so shocked that there are rabbits...

When you see a cow grazing in town are you going to have a heart attack?

Normal animals exist... sheesh.....

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Quote from BrokenTomato

I think a lot of cool and not to mention HARD achievements will for me fulfill this role perfectly. I am sure you will need to use a lot of time in order to do the really cool achievments and get the banner icons that are awesome!

This is also something I have thought about. I think this might be the "new endgame thing". Try to get the really hard achivements.

I can't stand playing only for the sake of loot.

But that's what Diablo is. Playing for the sake of loot. That's ALL Diablo has ever been. People tried to superimpose other meaning onto it... but in the end it really is just playing for the sake of loot.

No, diablo has never had a guessing game. Nothing in it has EVER been a guessing game. There's a lot of randomness but never GUESSING. You always knew what you were getting before you equipped it - that was the point. The stats might vary somewhat after it drops, but you could tell what it was once you'd looked at it. You don't have to guess whether it's useful to you and then have it locked in where you put it, where it might be useless.

To compare the randomness of the gear with the new rune system...


Imagine if in stead of a "Rare Great Axe" dropping you'd in stead get a "Rare Item" - it's stats are already assigned but you can't see them. Once you equip it to a slot, those stats appear and it LOCKS to that slot. So you could be a wizard and this "Rare item" drops. So you equip it to your offhand slot and it becomes a "Rare bloody orb" which has all sorts of barbarian stats like healing on fury use and increased fury regeneration but it's locked to being an orb so barbarians can't use it and it's completely useless to you.



With the new rune system you don't KNOW where you want to PUT the rune until you put it somewhere. With Diablo gear you always know WHERE it should go and what you wnat to use it as, but it still has a ton of randomness associated with it. So until you put it somewhere and make a huge mistake, you don't know where you really wanted to put it.

Let's take a real world example. Say 'Golden rune of magic missile' sucks. It's completely useless - no builds use it(and you know as well as I do there WILL be some rune/skill combos that will be like this - with 110 of them per class, it's impossible to make them ALL good). But you REALLY need a crimson rune of magic missile. And say you use Arcane Orb and the rune you want most of all for your current build for Arcane orb is Golden.

You get 5 level 7 runes, and you socket them one after another into your Magic Missile. They all turn out golden by fluke. You've now COMPLETELY wasted 5 LEGENDARY quality drops(ie. 5 one in ten thousand drops) and they're completely useless. So you now quit playing becuase you're so frustrated at having five really rare drops and none of them were even the SLIGHTEST bit good for you even in terms of selling them because the rune itself is undesirable for all builds.

Under the system I'm hoping for(runes drop coloured, attune when you put them into a skill, and roll random affixes). You get 5 runes, and by fluke they all roll Golden. You can now put one into your arcane orb, roll your random affixes, and now you have 4 level 7 golden runes you can either use to try to get a better affix on your Arcane orb, try rolling them into other skills that golden runes are good for to try to get an elusive 'perfect' rune to sell for a ton on the AH, or you can sell them as unattuned golden runes so people can buy them for the skill they need.

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Quote from Leeodin

I really take issue with this... I have said in other posts; I just don't get why you feel like you derserve your items more than someone that just buys them?

Lets say player A wants a particular legendary item. He has to figure out where it drops, how to kill the mobs / boss, and also figure out an effective way to farm there. He will also probably fine tune his build and change his skill/passive/runes setup to be extra-efficent in that area. For example he might use a spell he does not normally use because it deal extra damage to the mobs there. He might also equip lots of +MF to help him in his quest. Player A is very dedicated, and it takes him a few weeks to drop his legendary. He his then very happy. Yay, good for you, Player A.

Player B goes on the RMAH and pay 80$ for the legendary.

You think both player deserve the item equally?

No I think the person who is willing to pay 80 bucks for it deserves it more, because he valued it on the same level as FOOD for him. He used the same currency he'd use to buy food, clothing, to pay for his house. He didn't just spend his free time, he actually WORKED for that item.

As I said in another thread - as long as they don't make me play a guessing game about which skill I want to attune my rune to, I'm fine with it. Tell me the rune is a crimson rune before I attune it to my skill and I'll be happy with the attunement and the random stats.

Text wall incoming!

Quote from Kodachii

I don't like this "the players are stupid, suck it up cause blizzard is smarter" stuff. I agree that people shouldn't be complaining about this particular issue but in the end blizzard is a company that depends on us to buy their junk to make money, if enough people requested something they'd almost certainly include it in their game.

But not liking it doesn't make it untrue.

Playing games, however extensively, does not make you a designer. It's barely even related. Just like eating doesn't make you a chef, watching movies doesn't make you a filmmaker, etc.

And from the Designer's perspective, sometimes you have to pretend you're the player's mum and make them try something they think they won't like. Otherwise the medium would never move forward. Creators don't ask permission for what they create if they want to make something new.

Even if Blizz would actually listen to a large portion of the fanbase disliking something,even though that's absolutely not the case here, it would be detrimental to the game as a whole.

Quote from hoboman27

Hi Panda, I am assuming you are asian?

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and you must know that to compare someone to a dog is very very very demeaning... sigh...

Unless you work in the industry, your design knowledge and my dog's are pretty comparable. Also, don't hate on Captain Buggles please

Quote from hoboman27

But you can not disagree with me about the impact of hacks?

Is that a question?

Quote from hoboman27

Would you be kind enough to give me the links? you said "see below" on the actual expert views, but probably forgot to link those interviews. It would be great to read those, more official information is what the community need.

I assumed you'd actually read any press releases about the game for the past... ever.

This could take a while.

Diablo Beta Press Event

This, honestly, has just about everything though. I will refer to it repeatedly.

OP:

Here are my problems with the current skill system...


No skill trees
Access to all skills
Skill swapping with no penalty

All of these are answered in one QA question:


For those of you with short attention spans:

-Skill points = mass dump into minimum number of skills. Most powerful skills, least fun gameplay due to lack of variety and interesting combos and synergies.
-Skill trees aren't really that different, except you are forced to spend single points in prerequisites first. Interest and fun added: 0.
-Respecs aren't nailed down yet, it's possible (and indeed looking likely) that after a certain level respeccing will require a regeant of some sort. But especially for low levels, free swaps are ideal for experimentation, which is fun with this many skill/passive/rune combos!

Lack of connection with your character

This is one of the most important aspects for me. You hardly look at your character screen because you don't really need to from what I've seen from all the D3 footage. Why would you? Stats are chosen for you, skills are unlocked for you. There doesn't seem to be a real DRAW to pull yourself toward your character. These factors are preventing IMMERSION, which is what video games are all about. A small analogy for you...Resident Evil. 1 and 2 specifically were survival horrors. They were scary. They were difficult, and you could get so screwed that you wasted your goddamned ink ribbons and couldn't save (thus heightening the tension and making you mad, both good things). Resident Evil 4 and 5 were great games, but they weren't quite the same. They took the "horror" out of survival horror by making it a shooting action game. Diablo 3 is doing the same thing to the origins of the series by making it less RPG, more action. No doubt it will be fun, but in the RPG world, this is absolutely unacceptable. You NEED to be tied to your character and not feel like you're playing Gauntlet at an arcade machine.

This is all bullshit. I've watched plenty of these streams, people obsess over stats/gear/skills and switch things out and figure out numbers all the time. Just because you can't add points to things doesn't mean they aren't important. Gear modifies everything, skill choices are imperative, and everyone pays attention to this still.

Some common rebuttals to these complaints of the new skill system:

"If I screwed up in Diablo II, I had to make a new character."

While this was true until respecs arrived, it isn't like it was difficult or "unfun" to make a new character. If you didn't know how to build a character (which is NO different from ANY other game with optimal builds), then you most likely wouldn't care if your blizzard did 80% the damage compared to the guy next to you.

Character attachment, the thing the OP is so obsessed with, is the reason for respeccing. D2 characters were throwaway. Some people were OK with that significant of a time investment being tossed in the bin because of a misclick. The majority were not.

"Runes will provide the customization and differentiation, as well as the setback to swapping skills."

I don't buy into this. I've seen from the datamines, various panels, videos, so forth the general idea behind runes. While this will provide customization, it doesn't seem at this point that it would provide enough to have someone say "Yes, I'm a Hydra Wiz" or "Yes, I'm an Archon Wiz". Why is it so difficult to let the player decide what skills he wants to be powerful?

This doesn't make sense. With skillpoints, you pick 2 abilities you want to be powerful. With the current system, you pick 6. Same deal, more versatility. Your skill loadout is very important, and does indeed distinguish you as a hydra wiz/whatever. Because you picked that skill, and skills that compliment it.

It makes me think they don't know enough about the series to be able to make these kind of judgment calls. Note: In Diablo II, you have a powerful Charged Boltress or Teeth Necro. You are cool and unique. In Diablo 3, you have a Magic Missile Wizard. You're an outcast and should be ashamed.

There are so many things wrong with this.

1.) The creator knows more about the series than the player. This is not up for debate.
2.) In D2 if you played those kind of classes you were playing a suboptimal build that wasn't really viable because of the nature of skill trees. Low tier skills are flat out worse.
3.) What the hell are you basing your D3 comparison on? At least in D3 those kinds of weird builds are numerically viable because of proper scaling. The rest is smoke blown out of your ass.

Some ideas for improvement...

Re-introduce skill points at the very least, and give the option to allocate your stats manually.

Allow the option for respecs.

Allow skills to be powered past max level, as in Diablo II.

Reconsider synergies

1.) Terrible idea, for all the reasons everywhere.
2.) There are probably going to be respecs of some sort, this isn't nailed down regardless, please actually read articles and releases.
3.) That would require skill points, which are terrible.
4.) Numerical synergies are boring. Actual skill synergies caused by the skills being good in combination with eachother are present and interesting.

Quote from kontankarite

So there's no actual manual control over stats?

Gear, but in a traditional diablo sense, no.

Quote from kontankarite

I understand that Diablo 3 is based more on what you find in loot. That loot is the key factor in character customization.

See above.

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Does this mean that MOST of the character customization process is inherently luck of the draw?

In the sense that loot is random, sure, but given the fact that you're going to ultimately tailor your gear to your chosen active and passive skill choices: I think not.

Quote from kontankarite

What's this I read about traits? Is that like Feats in Fallout 3?

Achievements?

Quote from kontankarite

If I actually want to make a glass cannon wizard, I have to find the appropriate gear and if I can't find that gear, then I'm just going to have to do with what I find as far as a build goes? Let's assume that I'm not interested in trading at all for now.

You'd gear for damage, use nothing but damage active and passive skills, yeah.

Quote from kontankarite

If that's the case, you COULD theoretically be playing an entire game of chance and not any real and carefully planned build ideas?

If you refuse to acknowledge skill choice and how you utilize the gear you have, sure.

Quote from kontankarite

I'm asking because what I've heard about character customization is pretty much nothing resembling what I am familiar with as far as Diablo goes and I guess I'm just looking for some clarity.

You're right, it's a significant departure from D1-2 in some ways. That being said, Jay (the lead dev) has made some really compelling arguments to the effect that choice is still very much in the game and that the major losses we're incurring here are not in fun/choice/customization but tedium from the old system(s) that are being phased out.

Hope this helps.

Sounds like he wants to turn Diablo into Highlander.

First of all, a gap between levels 30-60 where "nothing changes except incremental increases in power," exists either way. All you're doing is choosing WHICH skills feel incrementally powerful. This fixes nothing.
Current System: You unlock final skills at level 30, and you just note that they get stronger until level 60.
Your System: You unlock final skills at level 30, and you just note that they get stronger until level 60.

Second of all, we have a problem here. At level 30, you can afford maybe that one powerful level 30 skill, and almost nothing else. So what you're doing is creating vacuums at each major level benchmark as far as skills go. A clearer way to say that might be to say "at level X, you can only use one strong skill and all your previous skills are nerfed by pure merit of not having enough points to devote." You can only exist as a "whole" character at level 60. That's a problem, since you won't hit 60 until you're near the end of Hell difficulty.
Current System: You progressively feel more useful until level 30 and then you proceed to feel stronger until level 60.
Your System: You progressively unlock skills until level 30, but if you get a level 30 skill at level 30, you will not be able to use all your other skills effectively, meaning you have to rely on that one strong skill, or admit the fact that you can't use that level 30 skill until you're maybe level 40-45, making that level 30 skill into really a level 40-45 skill, which will frustrate the pace of character development.

Third, it seems that you want these same points to also apply to our passives/attributes. This means that people must further dedicate fewer points to low-level skills. Why apply points to magic missile when you've got that one big skill and you can just toss points into the traits that complement that big skill perfectly?
Current System: Allows the use of low-level skills, high level skills, and passives; all in one big sexy bundle.
Your System: Affords people the use of skills OR the use of passives, which will result in people psychologically erring toward high-level skills and complementary passives.

In conclusion, if this is truly an attempt at recovering customization in some way, I'm afraid to say that this is not the solution. In my personal opinion, there's no problem present, and the current system doesn't even NEED a solution. But opinions aside, the reality is that every system I've seen or read about that involves skill points in ANY WAY AT ALL will inevitably result in what some people call "optimal" builds, which almost always revolve around one or two high level skills, and a few complementary skills or passives thrown in as an afterthought. Oh, those other things might be used plenty, sure, but not in any significantly meaningful way. They just fill the cracks of a build that is really built on that one big skill.
Current System: Forces growth on all six skills present, so the only "optimal" way to play is to choose 6 that you can actually use. Customization high.
Your System, or any other skill-point based system: "Optimal" immediately falls on that skill that has the highest amount of points dumped into it. Customization limited to number of skills worth optimizing.

Sorry, brother, but my vote is "nay."

Quote from SentouTsurugi

Lol this is getting long. But the way you're explaining it, i have to disagree with, because at least in theSkaBoss's argument he acknowledged that there will be builds using max and underleveled builds, he just said that we're more prone to forget our underleveled skills. I got 15 from a thread in bnet which is probably buried away long ago. they were hinting in JW's interview on skill pts that they tried to limit the "respec to higher skills" by limiting how many points you can have in one skill per difficulty. i think the numbers were 5=normal, 10=nightmare, 15=hell. Apparently that system didn't work out all too well, so they removed it completely.

He was referring to psychology and I'm referring to the benefits of different designs, but mine is invalid? Oookay. You're making it sound like there is one valid explanation.
My argument is that a point system inherently favors focused builds, while with D3 they are going for a more loose fitting build system. And this will make for a tighter late game, I might add.
In the end they removed the skill points because even the escalating caps didn't work out, and that has to tell you something.

Yes, i suppose something that is absolute about skill system is that if you want to use more skills, you must sacrifice some points somewhere else. ie not be given everything to the max. It's highly subjective, i tend to like that model more because it allows for more tougher choices..like "hmm where will i take out points and if i wanted to increase this skill". It's already clear to me that you prefer the other one where you get all skills. where as in the current system, the only real analogous situation is. hm i have a lv 7 rune, which skill shall i put it in. Do note that the lv 7 rune situation also will exist in both my system and the current one.

Alright, again with the level 7 rune. What you are forgetting is that there are at least 22 skills and 5 different runes, which means there are effectively 110 skill choices open to you. Yeah, runes change it that much.

Perhaps that's where we disagree the most. I think they will complement each other. If they do, it just means that blizzard made a really good game. If you don't think my example with temporal flux (with arcane skills) and slow time is not complementing then i'm not sure how i can convince you otherwise. Complementing skills do not equate to pure damage.

No, because let's say you are fighting a boss with 12'000 HP, for your level 7 MM it would take at least 42 shots to take him down, while a level 15 MM would take at least 20. That is the huge difference. Your character will be damn frustrating to play, because his output will lag behind. Let's say a group of skeletons with 1'000 HP attack you, with level 15 MM you will kill them in 2 shots while level 7 will take 4 shots, meaning you will keep running out of arcane power way too fast. And MM is supposed to be your crowd control skill, but 4 shots would require way too much firing against say 15 skeletons. With a level 7 MM by the time you kill 6, you'd be out of arcane power.

Even with just a few points, a skill will be lacking. In your example, you said you put 1 point in hydra, alright, but let's say level 1 hydra does 8-12 damage. How effective will that be against enemies with 10'000+ HP. Yes, it's to slow, but it will still be an arcane power cost sink, which you will feel when you cast it. And that is what it suffered from, some skills you maxed (MM and Torrent), while others weren't useful to max like teleport. Doesn't that tell you something, what's even the point of giving such skills levels if they aren't viable later on. Options only go so far, if they aren't useful beyond a point.
And you know you only used to get 1 skill point every second level, which meant a max of 30 skill points, right?

Oh, and I doubt slow will be stacking, it would probably boil down to a 33% flat movement speed.

not sure what you mean by squeeze between builds.

See my comment above. Most people don't enjoy struggling like that. People will try to force the maximum efficiency out of their builds to get it 100% right. Many people don't even like to do that, which is why they go to guides to look at what builds work, and then spend the allotted amount of points where needed.

Okay, they brought in some new ideas, and I agree with you. But it doesn't change the fact that diablo = item reliant series, therefore if D3 is item reliant, it makes it truly a successor to d2 in my eyes. Which, i'll reiterate is not necessarily a completely bad thing. That was the only thing i was saying, and if you agree with my statement here, then you agree with my previous statement.

I'm not sure which statement, but yeah, D3 (any Diablo for that matter) is item based. They've even changed it that most skills now rely on your weapons for their damage.

I'm not fighting that hard. i'm just saying your argument with respec is silly. There is no monetary slap on the wrist even with the current system (as far as we know) and it's easily true for skill system.

I gave you a silly example because you gave me a silly example with your character having to run all the way back to town just to pay 1 gold then respec....

I guess I like limits, skill points limits you, and forces you to choose what to max, what to not max and still have it be useful. It doesn't mean that it's a system that forces you to use 2 skills only, it just means that if you make a 2 skill build, that works, then good for you.

It's not really a silly example. When you wanted to respec, you needed to go to an NPC in the town. That was a huge time waster, just to see if you like a new skill or not. And I'm glad there is no monetary restraint on the current system. I don't like being punished by a game, it's not fun, that's why the monsters are there. I'd rather feel challenged and struggle with a boss than struggle with the game mechanics, and respec and points feels like restraints. It punishes you for mistakes and hinders your speed and progress.
I wont lie to you, I've enjoyed skill point systems, but times go on and to be honest, I like Sacred's skill system a lot more than Diablo or Titan Quest's skill system.

And you're wrong; that is not what i'm proposing. I understand very well that current system = auto-skill. It doesn't have a focus, there isn't something that tells a person "hey i made a blizzard wizard (lol.)" where this wizard utilizes blizzard like a boss, and HOW they use it like a boss is determined by their OTHER skills that complement this combination. Like I said earlier, if you disagree that underleveled and max leveled skills cannot complement each other, like my slow time + temporal flux (with arcane skills) combo, it would be very difficult to even see eye to eye. By definition a combination is something that works well together, complements each other.

I don't really care for the fee, but the fee would make it less casual and a little more challenging imo. I don't care for the unlocking much, i'm lenient and it works both ways for me. what i dislike greatly is auto-skill: your skill levels with you. (and auto-stat but i can let that one slide so lets not discuss about stats)

Oh, thought I understood you for a second, my bad.
Just want to know. Have you played Guild Wars, or a card game called Magic the Gathering. Well, the current skill system is a lot like that. You now have a hand of 6 cards and a side board of 16 skills (cards if you will), and your potential deck size is 110 skills (cards) with which you can optimize your build.
The old skill system was more of a racing game (for numbers), while the new one is more of a card game.

Once again, removing a fee makes it casual? How exaclty? Hmmm, funny how skills are lately associated with difficulty and not the damn hard monsters. Like I said, I'd rather have a flowing system and struggle against difficult enemies than struggle with the skill system that's fight back against me every step of the way.

Except your examples don't make sense to me. I addressed this in the earlier part of this post so just scroll up if you forgot. To me, this is your argument:

-respecing is lame, a punishing feature
-we're going to have plenty of combinations with runes and other new d3 features anyway
-people are forced to use 3-4 skill builds, always, period, otherwise they will be gimped
-character builds will be balanced now that skills will be balanced and level with you. By balanced you also mean, not one skill spammy as well because they're forced to take 6 skills at lv 30+

To reiterate for the 3rd time. I think that min skills/max skills will complement each other, you will have to find the right skill point amount in each skill to maximize this complement and your build. If we cannot agree here, then I don't think we can agree anywhere pertaining to skill pt removal.

I don't know how to help you there, I'm growing more verbose by the second, and I'm feeling long winded to explain how it logically fits together.
-No, respec work under certain context's, but in the system of D3 it feels redundant.
-We will have more options with only runes and escalating skills. People have gone over these points before. No limitations=more opportunities.
-That's the gist of it. Like my above examples with the skeletons, maxed skills=better efficiency, while with other skills more points becomes redundant. And that is not options it is carrot on a stick play. Carrot or stick?
-Actually all skills are now spammy. And that's better, because the more skills you try out, the more options you have.

To reiterate my point. min skills become obscure and inefficient. And skill point system allow for only so many good builds, it's not a design flaw, that is just the strength of the system and how it works.