29 replies to this topic

[Punkskelm]

eldimmy, on 13 December 2012 - 03:58 AM, said:

I think blizzard is lost about what they really want for itemization.

1) First philosophy: blizzard want a character with blue rare and legendary at the same time. It worked at the beginning, a wizzard of method killed diablo inferno with a blue weapon mixed with rares. But then people complained "why a blue is better than a rare and legendary, etc" and make blizzard think again.

2) Second philosophy: "We agree legendaries are bad", buffed and happened what I'm afraid of: rares are nearly useless, and everybody looking the same gear, it feels like: if you don't drop this you're garbage. Legendaries have some fixed 50%+ god affixes, and comes to my question: is this good or bad? don't this devaluate rares too much? how many runs I see players leaving rares on the ground and just getting legendaries now?

3) Third philosophy: "MP and Paragon will give the game more end game". I agree with that, but we don't have ladder and the game don't even have a year. My point is: don't this devalue MF and GF too much as a long term? I mean it's another affix that sooner or later will be useless, and it was meant as an affix that worth your choice at cost of dps.

In short: Blizzard is confused about it's own philosophy, there are so many OP affixes that even if they buff life on kill or thorns it's still going to be useless, because characters reached a level of nearly perfection I'd say. Probably the only fix is some kind of nerf/adjustment on the trifecta, resist all etc.

Oh before I forget, they have to improve what they have now, the system right now, fixing some numbers, etc. Putting D2 idea into D3 it's nearly impossible. Is the same thing as saying: Guys we failed, we should've started that way from the start.

Everyone complained about Leggi items being horrible (which it was) now everyone just leaves rare on the floor(farming Leggies)  when they do runs because 99% of all rare items is absolute garbage, i mean a wichdoctor ceremonial knife that drops with 300 dex ? But then agian there is that 1 in 10000000000 chance that a rare can be godly and be a 1bil or 2bil item. and not to mention everyone has vile ward shoulders..there is no real custimization for each player. but the game will only get better not worse Blizzard is doing a good job trying to get to everyone's needs. 1 step at a time. i can assure you when pvp gets released it will be unbalanced as hell and with time it will get balanced but that is (when) pvp arrives

[wyllder]

Bagstone, on 12 December 2012 - 09:50 PM, said:

Blizzard will not nerf items. And they will not touch items that you already own. If they change specific items, they might introduce "legacy" as for the old sets. They will just buff everything else.

I used to have gloves with 20% Attack Speed.  I think that's enough to prove the precedent.

If they introduce a whole slew of new items that are as good or better than (or let you improve) existing items, this would have the effect of devaluing existing gear.

As I think about this I just try to view what the game would be like if the changes I suggested were implemented.  I'm not thinking about the shitstorm of complaining they would create.  As I'm fairly certain this will never come to pass I can comfortably theorize on this from a totally objective viewpoint.  Sadly, Blizzard doesn't have this luxury.  

Wyllder

[maliceubx]

Quote

Everyone complained about Leggi items being horrible (which it was) now everyone just leaves rare on the floor(farming Leggies)  when they do runs because 99% of all rare items is absolute garbage, i mean a wichdoctor ceremonial knife that drops with 300 dex ? But then agian there is that 1 in 10000000000 chance that a rare can be godly and be a 1bil or 2bil item. and not to mention everyone has vile ward shoulders..there is no real custimization for each player. but the game will only get better not worse Blizzard is doing a good job trying to get to everyone's needs. 1 step at a time. i can assure you when pvp gets released it will be unbalanced as hell and with time it will get balanced but that is (when) pvp arrives

That is one of the major problems of Diablo 3 at the moment, and was mentioned in the OP's video. Blizzard is treating Diablo 3 like an MMO, where they worry about completely balancing each class, and catering to each classes needs specifically. What they need to be doing (and for the most part what was done with D2) is to add systems, items and affixes into the game and let players decide what is useful to what. That is how we discovered such weird builds like WWsins and enchantresses. It isn't because Blizzard North catered to those builds, it was because they put out the options to create such a thing and worried about fixing game breaking issues. While Blizzard has also focused on fixing game breaking issues like the CM wizard, and the DH SS builds, for the most part they have heavily focused on trying to 'fix' the game through a massive amount of class and ability changes instead of just putting out items that might improve upon less used skills.

[maka]

egervari, on 12 December 2012 - 08:13 PM, said:

maka, on 12 December 2012 - 05:48 PM, said:

egervari, on 12 December 2012 - 05:35 PM, said:

Indimix, on 12 December 2012 - 02:40 AM, said:

Blizzard will never fix this game.. because everything that can be fixed, goes against the RMAH.

I hope I'm terribly wrong, but so far, it's not the case.

That's not necessarily true at all. Fixing most problems with the itemization would only improve the RMAH. Only minimizing the variances on items might actually hurt it. But adding more class-defining items, more variety in legendaries, a reason for white and blue items, improving crafting, etc. would only improve things for blizzard's bottom line. That is why it is so shocking that the itemization is so boring and lazy.

I disagree, not necessarily with what you say, but with the way you look at it.
With the current system, every new patch and expansion has the potential to bring more powerful items: they're just like the previous items, except with bigger numbers. Like WoW xpacs: when a new one hits, previous items are automatically crap. This creates a pressure for players (the ones that stuck with the game, as well as ones that came back and new players as well) to quickly acquire the new 'tiers' of items. That sometimes means using the RMAH.
WIth a (let's call it) 'D2-style' system, new items that are inserted into the game aren't necessarily 'the old ones but with bigger numbers', and they're not necessarily 'better'; they're just different. So, the xpac hits, and your stuff is still good, it's not suddenly useless. Sure, you want the new stuff, because it's, well, new, and it's different, and it's a breath of fresh air. But it's not flat-out 'better', so the pressure to acquire it isn't nearly as big. Which means, less RMAH usage.

That's how I see it, at least.

I don't see how adding things like better crafts, more class-defining items, etc. would remove rmah profits from items introduced into the economy via new patches or an expansion though. I think the ideas are totally separate. My point is that if there were more variety and more interesting items even now, the RMAH sales would have been greater and would have peeked for a much longer period of time before the next patch.

It depends. If the 'new' items are simply better than the old ones (à la WoW), then yes, adding new items will probably increase RMAH sales, at least for a while. But that's a crap system; that's a system where new items make your old items obsolete.
A good system will introduce new items, but they won't be better than your old ones; they'll just be different, with more variation. In a system like that, the pressure to acquire those new items is significantly lower, which should be reflected in RMAH sales.

In my opinion.


Also, they should increase the number of affixes a rare item can have. I'm tired of uninspiring rare items with 4, 5 or 6 properties. Bring back stuff like this:


This is just a random rare that I found in google in about 3 seconds.


EDIT: Oh, and they already nerfed items people owned - IAS. Why was it OK to do it then, but it's not OK to do it now?

eldimmy, on 13 December 2012 - 03:58 AM, said:

Is the same thing as saying: Guys we failed, we should've started that way from the start.

Why would this be so bad? It's the truth

Edited by maka, 13 December 2012 - 07:42 PM.

[egervari]

maka, on 13 December 2012 - 07:32 PM, said:

It depends. If the 'new' items are simply better than the old ones (à la WoW), then yes, adding new items will probably increase RMAH sales, at least for a while. But that's a crap system; that's a system where new items make your old items obsolete.
A good system will introduce new items, but they won't be better than your old ones; they'll just be different, with more variation. In a system like that, the pressure to acquire those new items is significantly lower, which should be reflected in RMAH sales.

I don't think you understand. Let's imagine that 1.0.5 introduced many more class-defining items, multiple level 62 and 63 legendaries per slot (instead of just 1), better crafting system, etc. This would have kept people playing for longer, and thus would have had more activity on the AH.

Now, if a patch or an expansion introduces new items, how does that invalidate my statements in this thread? It doesn't. We have to assume that this new patch or expansion would also bring about even more class-defining items, and better itemization in general if my suggestion were actually followed in 1.0.5, which would still lead to more economic activity.

My original claim is that the uninspired, poor itemization is hurting Blizzard's bottom line, and if they improved the itemization by adding things like more varied items, more uses for whites and blues, better crafting systems, etc, it would not only make the game more fun, but would have greatly increased activity on both the GAH and the RMAH, and would extend the length of this activity. This is obviously true.

While everyone has a right to an opinion, I just don't understand your point. The point I am making is mutually exclusive to Blizzard adding new items for a new patch or an expansion, because they could only add the same garbage-style of items with higher stats like they've added so far (what you seem to be suggesting), or they could actually create a rich itemization (which is what I'm suggesting).

You are partly right in that a new patch/expansion would increase economic activity too, but that's only a SHORT-TERM boost. The type of itemization I'm talking about would keep the economic activity blooming for much longer periods of time, whether blizzard released a new patch/expansion or not. And obviously the best of both worlds for blizzard is to both add new items AND improve the itemization.

This is why I don't understand your point. It doesn't contradict or disprove anything I've said. It is entirely mutually exclusive to my point, yet you insist twice now that it's not. Just because I am saying the itemization should be extended/improved does not mean I also do not welcome a patch/expansion to bring new items into the game every now and then as well. I don't know why you would have assumed this, as I never said this ever in my posts.

maka, on 13 December 2012 - 07:32 PM, said:

Also, they should increase the number of affixes a rare item can have. I'm tired of uninspiring rare items with 4, 5 or 6 properties. Bring back stuff like this:


This is just a random rare that I found in google in about 3 seconds.

This is an exception to the rule though. If you know how D2 items work, you'd know that class-specific items could roll skills seperate from the random properties. This item only has 6 properties. The socket was added by larzuk, and the +1 fury, +2 tornado and +1 solar creeper are special mods that only appear on pelts for free. If this were a normal helmet, they would never have spawned and you'd only see the 6 properties with the socket.

Instead, you should be using this as an example of how much better d2 was since you could add sockets, and that skill points actually mattering was a good design. This is the real lesson from d2. The number of properties on the rare hasn't changed at all.

Edited by egervari, 14 December 2012 - 12:57 AM.

[Belzebuss]

Very nice discussions guys im waiting for the next video.
Cya.

[Hans]

egervari, on 14 December 2012 - 12:46 AM, said:

maka, on 13 December 2012 - 07:32 PM, said:

Also, they should increase the number of affixes a rare item can have. I'm tired of uninspiring rare items with 4, 5 or 6 properties. Bring back stuff like this:


This is just a random rare that I found in google in about 3 seconds.

This is an exception to the rule though. If you know how D2 items work, you'd know that class-specific items could roll skills seperate from the random properties. This item only has 6 properties. The socket was added by larzuk, and the +1 fury, +2 tornado and +1 solar creeper are special mods that only appear on pelts for free. If this were a normal helmet, they would never have spawned and you'd only see the 6 properties with the socket.

Instead, you should be using this as an example of how much better d2 was since you could add sockets, and that skill points actually mattering was a good design. This is the real lesson from d2. The number of properties on the rare hasn't changed at all.

I think Maka was more pointing to the the first three affixes on the item. The plus 2 to druid skills, The chance for charged bolt to be proceesed on being hit, and the faster hit recovery. D2 had more options for gear that might only suited a particular build of a class or that might only work on an odd build that also depended on some skills or from other items that had a particular affix on it. For D3 for the most part every build is looking for the same thing a stat stick.

[egervari]

Hans, on 14 December 2012 - 04:38 PM, said:

egervari, on 14 December 2012 - 12:46 AM, said:

maka, on 13 December 2012 - 07:32 PM, said:

Also, they should increase the number of affixes a rare item can have. I'm tired of uninspiring rare items with 4, 5 or 6 properties. Bring back stuff like this:


This is just a random rare that I found in google in about 3 seconds.

This is an exception to the rule though. If you know how D2 items work, you'd know that class-specific items could roll skills seperate from the random properties. This item only has 6 properties. The socket was added by larzuk, and the +1 fury, +2 tornado and +1 solar creeper are special mods that only appear on pelts for free. If this were a normal helmet, they would never have spawned and you'd only see the 6 properties with the socket.

Instead, you should be using this as an example of how much better d2 was since you could add sockets, and that skill points actually mattering was a good design. This is the real lesson from d2. The number of properties on the rare hasn't changed at all.

I think Maka was more pointing to the the first three affixes on the item. The plus 2 to druid skills, The chance for charged bolt to be proceesed on being hit, and the faster hit recovery. D2 had more options for gear that might only suited a particular build of a class or that might only work on an odd build that also depended on some skills or from other items that had a particular affix on it. For D3 for the most part every build is looking for the same thing a stat stick.

That's precisely the point I'm trying to make - not Maka - and the point (I think) he's arguing against. I have said repeatedly that it would be great to have items that are class/build-specific, and have a lot more variety within the itemization. This would in turn actually help Blizzard by getting more AH activity. Then Maka comes out and basically says I'm wrong?

I didn't get, from his post, that he was referring to the type of mods - only the number of affixes. I don't try to infer what I think he means - I just take him at his word.

Edited by egervari, 14 December 2012 - 07:04 PM.

[AudioCG]

I could certainly get behind more +skills affixes with more potent and desirable effects!

I use a belt with +6% CC on Revenge, and I do in fact use Revenge in part because of this, more items like this with more potent effects would certainly encourage more "off the wall" skill combinations, much like in D2.

[eldimmy]

AudioCG, on 14 December 2012 - 07:12 PM, said:

I could certainly get behind more +skills affixes with more potent and desirable effects!

I use a belt with +6% CC on Revenge, and I do in fact use Revenge in part because of this, more items like this with more potent effects would certainly encourage more "off the wall" skill combinations, much like in D2.

I concur. I have a demon hunter friend that have a natalya chest with evasive fire damage bonus (a high one) and started using evasive fire because of that, instead of the cookie cutter hungering arrow. I just don't use the rend cost reduction on my belt because I have a bunch of crit hit that go wasted on dot's because they can't crit.

But let's face it, what's flawed is a spirit barrage bonus on a manticore.