Oh, the customization they've got in store...

Finally, a lengthy post by Bashiok!
He's been rather silent as of late, but all is forgiven...

In case nobody has seen this response by Bashiok yet, it's essentially giving us more info on the rune system, which, thus far, has been kept pretty tightly under wraps. What we do know, is that they will be applied to skills, and that they will have a multitude of different effects.

What we don't know, is everything else.

One of his responses in particular, while very short, stood out from the others for sheer potential for discussion.


Official Blizzard Quote:



The only difference with more rare runes is that they would have an increased effect on the stats.
Incorrect.


Now, this can be taken two different ways depending on how you interpret it.

First, he could be saying that rare versions of the same rune will not simply add to the effect, but will add more effects. So for instance, a low quality version of a rune that adds a multiple shot effect, may add a bouncing effect at higher qualities.

OR

He could be saying that runes as a whole, as you move up the rarity tree, will be doing more than just adding a flat power bonus to the skill they are applied to.


Then, we've got this next little gem of information..


Official Blizzard Quote:



Some of them are fairly significant modifications, but I suppose it depends on what you think of as slightly or significantly.

Basically, this means runes will be much, much more interesting and complex than simple "adds X damage" runes, such as with the power rune.

This fact is also confirmed by the runes that have been announced so far: Power, Energy, Lethality, Multistrike, and Striking.

The Power rune has not had it's purpose revealed, but by the name, we can safely assume that it simply adds more power. The same goes for the energy rune, which probably makes the spell itself more energy efficient.

Then, we have the Lethality, Striking, and Multistrike runes.

Multistrike is pretty self explanatory, it adds multiple strikes to spells. Basically, this allows you to turn skills into a "chain" skills, such as with the skull of flame, which bounces when this rune is inserted into it.

Lethality, is more open to interpretation. The only skill we've seen it with is Electrocute. When socketed with this rune, Electrocute makes the target monster explode when killed by this skill. From this, we can conclude that this rune adds to the overall killing power of the skill, without adding a flat damage bonus.

Then, we've got the Striking rune. This one, when inserted into Teleport, makes it deal area of effect damage upon teleportation. So far, we've been led to believe that this rune turns non-lethal skills, into lethal skills. This open up an incredible amount of customization options. Imagine adding this to a warcry, would it turn it into a skill that sends rippled of force to knock back any nearby enemies, as well as benefitting allies?

In any case, it seems that we're going to be getting near endless skill customization options. Build-experimenters rejoice, your time has come.

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