Do you consume health orbs when you click on them, or walk over them? It seems like you only need to walk over them (cause the red orb was never highlighted in the gameplay trailer when the barb picked it up). But this is kind of a problem when you're in a narrow bridge, like the beginning of the game play trailer. Cause in multi player, what stops players from consuming all the health orbs in a narrow bridge when there are other players in need of the orb even more. And this is assuming that no other character has a leap ability like Barb.
'WTF YOU NINJAED MY HELTH ORB I NEEDED IT MORE THAN YOU"
Do you consume health orbs when you click on them, or walk over them? It seems like you only need to walk over them (cause the red orb was never highlighted in the gameplay trailer when the barb picked it up). But this is kind of a problem when you're in a narrow bridge, like the beginning of the game play trailer. Cause in multi player, what stops players from consuming all the health orbs in a narrow bridge when there are other players in need of the orb even more. And this is assuming that no other character has a leap ability like Barb.
All characters will have a skill to use strategically to get to health orbs.
Sounds good, with one exception, the orbs themselves.
Just,... do away with them, they are silly, they make you turn your intelligence down to zero cause hey,... you know that a health orb is about to drop 50% of the time anyways, so why bother actually using tactics anyways, its mindless random auto health with only one purpose, making the player do nothing else then plow forward like a lawnmower cause gamers these days don't like to be bothered being distracted from dumbed down repetition.
How does that differ from 'plowing forward like a lawnmower' while repeatedly drinking potions?
If anything it makes the game more difficult and strategy based, since you are not always positive when the orbs will drop... Where as you always know if you have potions.
Some of you people are just looking to complain and try to call gamers now a days 'mindless'.
Potions were 'mindless health' as well, I don't really see why anyone would dislike the orb concept.
Where in my post did i say i wanted "plowing forward and repeatedly drinking potions"? Oh right, i didn't, making your post a straw man.
So what sort of health system should they use?
They can't use potions like the previous Diablo games since that concept for some reason sucks (Didn't Diablo 2 win game of the year... Or something?) and health orbs clearly are an awful idea...
So what is your brilliant plan for players regaining health in the game if not those two?
They can't use potions like the previous Diablo games since that concept for some reason sucks (Didn't Diablo 2 win game of the year... Or something?) and health orbs clearly are an awful idea...
So what is your brilliant plan for players regaining health in the game if not those two?
I think he would be happy with the Boba Fett editor where he can be invincible and auto kill us for all of our gold.
I like the idea of pots being more rare, and the idea of orbs is a little strange for me. I agree that the rarity of pots would make you think before you act and possibly weigh out your risk vs reward. A little more Hardcore never hurt anyone right?
Yep, and just think, if you then see someone plow through a group of monsters like a lawnmower then that person is either crazy as a bat or very skilled.
So what you are saying is that they should slow Diablo down and give it a more MMO type feel?
People would have to then start pulling monsters, fighting one or just small groups at a time and then wait 20-30 seconds between fights for their health to regenerate.
Making potions expensive is just foolish, people would just spend all of their money on potions and then just continue to plow through monsters because that is what makes the game fun... After all that is what you do in the first two games of the series after all. So if you don't like that style, I really don't see how you expect to like Diablo 3 at all.
And making them just rare drops that are really hard to find? Are you kidding me? Like I said, it would slow the game down and take away the aspect of Diablo that captivated the huge fan base that it has... The speed, killing groups of monsters and the ability to be active.
I suppose next you are going to suggest that they put food and water into the game so you have to sit down and consume it between fights.
Well first off, i didn't say anything about (slow) health regeneration, imo, its a useless feat if the game wouldn't be slow anyways, amirite?
Secondly, i think you're exaggerating quite a bit, it will make you play with your brains, not slow down time to a crawl. Its not as if you need to think more then a second before attacking a group of enemies, not unless you yourself are just very slow in the head or didn't even bother doing a bit before hand planning on what skills to use and whatnot. Also, i can hardly believe you have played Diablo 1 if you think speed is what captivated the huge fanbase. Just look at what the fanbase counts as the most memorable moment in the franchise, the Butcher, it wasn't exactly a fastpaced battle now was it? Why was it so memorable then? Because you knew that if you opened that door unprepared you were going to fail, hard. I really don't think slowing down the pace of DII down a bit would hurt the franchise at all, it would rather move it more into what it initially set out to do, hack & slashing instead of playing a lawnmower simulation.
Yeah, I remember killing the Butcher... I had to drink a lot of potions.
Since you are so 'skillful' did you just do it without them?
Um, lock him behind a door and shoot arrows through the iron bars, obviously.
Maybe that is what we should do in Diablo 3. Make a bunch of ways to trap monsters so they cannot hit you and you shoot them with a bow. That would make the game really exciting.
As for your previous post saying you would have to use 'strategy' and it wouldn't take that long to figure it all out when attacking a group of monsters... Do you just plan on setting up your skills somehow so you never lose life? Because eventually without potions or health orbs or whatever, your health is going to be low and then it is going to be impossible to get it back unless you 1.) Have something to eat or drink to bring your life total back. 2.) You have to go to town to get healed 3.) You have a skill that can heal yourself (Which in the end would just be similar to potions/orbs anyways)
I cannot believe you said that they are trying to 'dumb the game down' for this generation of gamers when the previous two games used a smash into a group of monsters and drink potions style that will be very similar to the health orb system.
Well it does because now you don't even need the most basic fingerfastness or any worry on how much potions you are actually carrying, it just depends on random orbs dropping all over the place auto healing you (when you're close enough), hell not even that if you're in a party with one very skilled player, its autolife for all, how much more dumbed down can it possibly get?
Wouldn't you think that the randomness of dropping and uncertainty of if one will drop would make it less dumbed down? You will be more careful going into combat because you know if an orb doesn't drop you have a higher chance of death.
I mean in the last game you always knew how many potions you had... And you knew when you were going to run out. So you could just teleport/run away, TP back to town, buy some more and then resume your fight immediately.
@ Phrayed: Then you're not really counting on your skills but instead simply plowing forward like always and just hoping orbs drop to bail you out each second, can't possibly be more mindless imo.
Just to make it clear, i'm not against fast paced action, not at all, but what i'm suggesting doesn't impede on being able to play just as fast as you always did or imagine to do in Diablo 3.
The difference is that currently with the orb system everyone is adviced to play as fast as possible, everyone benefits from it, making the satisfaction to play fast really nihil after you've played it once.
With my suggestion "being able to play fast" means you're confident in your own skills, rather then Blizzard telling you "playing fast is the only way", if you are able then you know you are good and if you do then being able to play fast will be that much more satisfactory, it will proof you really are epic. I don't see how you can be against dividing the truly skilled players from the n00bs that wouldn't last long when playing fast.
I mean, what is best? Blizzard telling you it is adviced to play slower rather then fast and then proving them wrong purely by your own skills, or Blizzard telling you it is adviced to play fast and you just following their orders because thats how you play the game wether you're skilled or not?
I still think the game will be skill based, just like Diablo 2 was.
I read posts that say it was 'easy' to die in Diablo 2 at times and I completely disagree. I played hardcore for as long as I remember and when I died I couldn't believe it. So I knew in the end that I was generally a more skill based player because I can play that mode and not worry about death.
I believe that it will be the same way in Diablo 3. Certain people will be worse at the game. They aren't just going to make the game so easy that you never die... People playing the demo said that they died multiple times and on the final boss they said you could die very easily if you didn't use strategy and get out of the way of his big attack.
@ Phrayed: Then you're not really counting on your skills but instead simply plowing forward like always and just hoping orbs drop to bail you out each second, can't possibly be more mindless imo.
Just to make it clear, i'm not against fast paced action, not at all, but what i'm suggesting doesn't impede on being able to play just as fast as you always did or imagine to do in Diablo 3.
The difference is that currently with the orb system everyone is adviced to play as fast as possible, everyone benefits from it, making the satisfaction to play fast really nihil after you've played it once.
With my suggestion "being able to play fast" means you're confident in your own skills, rather then Blizzard telling you "playing fast is the only way", if you are able then you know you are good and if you do then being able to play fast will be that much more satisfactory, it will proof you really are epic. I don't see how you can be against dividing the truly skilled players from the n00bs that wouldn't last long when playing fast.
I mean, what is best? Blizzard telling you it is adviced to play slower rather then fast and then proving them wrong purely by your own skills, or Blizzard telling you it is adviced to play fast and you just following their orders because thats how you play the game wether you're skilled or not?
You lost me, are you saying orbs promote fast play because you should come out of battles with full life and jump right into the next one...or are you saying orbs promote slow play because you need to be more cautious in battle and cautious equals slower...I am split on the issue of orbs, but you honestly are not making good points. From what I can tell...you think orbs will be super abundant and make things easy or too rare and make things frustrating because you need to heal. Yet you cite them needing to balance, its what every game designer does...so isn't it possible they balance it such that orbs are neither too abundant nor too rare.
When i take into context what Blizzard is telling us, basically the game revolving around even faster gameplay and i link that to health orbs, well imo its undeniable, its an obvious mechanism to not make you do anything but plow through armies of monsters, thats what i basically read their "gamephilosophy" behind D3 to be.
Yes, they pretty much stated that outright as their design goal behind the orbs. No guesswork there.
Their "balance" won't be to neither make orbs abundant or rare, it will be OVERLY abundant just as you can see in the demo vids, and all the time, that is what they are set out to do.
Sounds about right. If they didn't drop enough orbs, you'd run out of life and have no way to replenish it since you cant buy healing potions, and that would take you out of combat for a longer period of time than going back to buy potions in the first place...so in order to maintain their philosophy of non-stop action, they pretty much have to give you a lot of orb drops.
Sure, you could make it work with orbs, but then just as i suggested for potions make them rare, then again you would probably be backtracking all the time to "pick up" that health orb you didn't need 10 minutes ago making it pretty pointless and very annoying. Plus letting the player decide for him/herself when to "heal" based on their own knowledge/risktaking/... of the game instead of giving them autolife, even when rare, is still vastly superior.
The health orb concept certainly isn't new, it seems more like a throwback to all the old games where you had...lets say, 4 life bars, and you could find a "heart" that gave you another life bar, but every time you get hit, you lose a life bar.
You are correct that this eliminates the strategy from using health resources. However, since you know you cannot replenish your health at will, it FORCES you to use a fighting strategy that is more defensive. You can no longer afford to receive damage while taking damage, unless you are killing large mobs of easy people.
If you are able to do enough DPS to kill hordes of monsters easily, then health orbs will not affect the difficulty compared to D2 -- the only difference is that, instead of rushing your gold back and forth to the merchant, you get health drops immediately.
If, on the other hand, you have ventured into an area thats a little over your head...so that it takes you a while to bring down each enemy, then you wont be able to afford the damage you take, and the health orb concept will make it HARDER than D2, and force you to use more strategy to take down the bad guys without receiving any damage. In D2, you could afford to fight monsters that were a little out of your league if you could put up with simply chugging a lot of potions.
Putting cool-down timers on potions will just lead to people running around in circles avoiding the enemy until the timer wears off, making the game-play slower and more tedious.
'WTF YOU NINJAED MY HELTH ORB I NEEDED IT MORE THAN YOU"
All characters will have a skill to use strategically to get to health orbs.
Also they will heal the whole party.
Here is all about them:
http://wiki.diabloiii.ca/index.php/Blizzard_Representative:_Bashiok#What.27s_the_deal_with_the_new_Health_Orbs.3F
Thanks for that link. I hadn't seen all that before. I was wondering where people were getting all those quotes from. Thanks again.
How does that differ from 'plowing forward like a lawnmower' while repeatedly drinking potions?
If anything it makes the game more difficult and strategy based, since you are not always positive when the orbs will drop... Where as you always know if you have potions.
Some of you people are just looking to complain and try to call gamers now a days 'mindless'.
Potions were 'mindless health' as well, I don't really see why anyone would dislike the orb concept.
So what sort of health system should they use?
They can't use potions like the previous Diablo games since that concept for some reason sucks (Didn't Diablo 2 win game of the year... Or something?) and health orbs clearly are an awful idea...
So what is your brilliant plan for players regaining health in the game if not those two?
So what you are saying is that they should slow Diablo down and give it a more MMO type feel?
People would have to then start pulling monsters, fighting one or just small groups at a time and then wait 20-30 seconds between fights for their health to regenerate.
Making potions expensive is just foolish, people would just spend all of their money on potions and then just continue to plow through monsters because that is what makes the game fun... After all that is what you do in the first two games of the series after all. So if you don't like that style, I really don't see how you expect to like Diablo 3 at all.
And making them just rare drops that are really hard to find? Are you kidding me? Like I said, it would slow the game down and take away the aspect of Diablo that captivated the huge fan base that it has... The speed, killing groups of monsters and the ability to be active.
I suppose next you are going to suggest that they put food and water into the game so you have to sit down and consume it between fights.
Yeah, I remember killing the Butcher... I had to drink a lot of potions.
Since you are so 'skillful' did you just do it without them?
Maybe that is what we should do in Diablo 3. Make a bunch of ways to trap monsters so they cannot hit you and you shoot them with a bow. That would make the game really exciting.
As for your previous post saying you would have to use 'strategy' and it wouldn't take that long to figure it all out when attacking a group of monsters... Do you just plan on setting up your skills somehow so you never lose life? Because eventually without potions or health orbs or whatever, your health is going to be low and then it is going to be impossible to get it back unless you 1.) Have something to eat or drink to bring your life total back. 2.) You have to go to town to get healed 3.) You have a skill that can heal yourself (Which in the end would just be similar to potions/orbs anyways)
I cannot believe you said that they are trying to 'dumb the game down' for this generation of gamers when the previous two games used a smash into a group of monsters and drink potions style that will be very similar to the health orb system.
Wouldn't you think that the randomness of dropping and uncertainty of if one will drop would make it less dumbed down? You will be more careful going into combat because you know if an orb doesn't drop you have a higher chance of death.
I mean in the last game you always knew how many potions you had... And you knew when you were going to run out. So you could just teleport/run away, TP back to town, buy some more and then resume your fight immediately.
You sure about that?
I still think the game will be skill based, just like Diablo 2 was.
I read posts that say it was 'easy' to die in Diablo 2 at times and I completely disagree. I played hardcore for as long as I remember and when I died I couldn't believe it. So I knew in the end that I was generally a more skill based player because I can play that mode and not worry about death.
I believe that it will be the same way in Diablo 3. Certain people will be worse at the game. They aren't just going to make the game so easy that you never die... People playing the demo said that they died multiple times and on the final boss they said you could die very easily if you didn't use strategy and get out of the way of his big attack.
You lost me, are you saying orbs promote fast play because you should come out of battles with full life and jump right into the next one...or are you saying orbs promote slow play because you need to be more cautious in battle and cautious equals slower...I am split on the issue of orbs, but you honestly are not making good points. From what I can tell...you think orbs will be super abundant and make things easy or too rare and make things frustrating because you need to heal. Yet you cite them needing to balance, its what every game designer does...so isn't it possible they balance it such that orbs are neither too abundant nor too rare.
Yes, they pretty much stated that outright as their design goal behind the orbs. No guesswork there.
Sounds about right. If they didn't drop enough orbs, you'd run out of life and have no way to replenish it since you cant buy healing potions, and that would take you out of combat for a longer period of time than going back to buy potions in the first place...so in order to maintain their philosophy of non-stop action, they pretty much have to give you a lot of orb drops.
The health orb concept certainly isn't new, it seems more like a throwback to all the old games where you had...lets say, 4 life bars, and you could find a "heart" that gave you another life bar, but every time you get hit, you lose a life bar.
You are correct that this eliminates the strategy from using health resources. However, since you know you cannot replenish your health at will, it FORCES you to use a fighting strategy that is more defensive. You can no longer afford to receive damage while taking damage, unless you are killing large mobs of easy people.
If you are able to do enough DPS to kill hordes of monsters easily, then health orbs will not affect the difficulty compared to D2 -- the only difference is that, instead of rushing your gold back and forth to the merchant, you get health drops immediately.
If, on the other hand, you have ventured into an area thats a little over your head...so that it takes you a while to bring down each enemy, then you wont be able to afford the damage you take, and the health orb concept will make it HARDER than D2, and force you to use more strategy to take down the bad guys without receiving any damage. In D2, you could afford to fight monsters that were a little out of your league if you could put up with simply chugging a lot of potions.
Especially in boss fights.
A great answer to the problem that is swigging potions like mad (I think it's a problem anyway).
whether or not there are actually health and mana pots idk
but potions of some kind exist.