Pylons in rifts are overrated, they have a trivial effect on GRift progress standings. Even if all things were made completely non-RNG they'd still have trivial effect.
Excuse me? A conduit pylon can be used to clear 20%+ of a rift in a matter of seconds. For some classes, it's the only way they can kill the Rift Guardian.
It's also the number one complaint about Grifts. If nearly everybody agrees that they're a problem, how can you argue that they're not?
Statistics. They're not actually significant for the standings in any long-term sense. You get a leg up in the short term, but without any real affect on what the standings will be by the end of the season.
It's like arguing because Furnace is so powerful if you luck it in the first few days of the season it should be removed. In reality it doesn't have all that significant an effect on your progress in the long term.
There is no long term. Leaderboards are going to be reset at some point. The people currently leading the leaderboards will almost certainly be leading the leaderboards when the season ends.
It's not a matter of statistics, like your Furnace argument. Pylons directly allow players to exceed the primary limit on Grift progression: Gear. At some point, you're going to have a "BiS" set of gear. It might not have absolutely perfect rolls, but it's essentially going to be as good as anyone can get. At that point, the only thing that can further your Grift progress is, you guessed it, pylons.
Now, here's the problem: We're already at this point. The people at the top of the leaderboard are among the most skilled, most geared players in the game. They've already capped their non-Pylon Grift potential. All they can do now is spend their time finding perfect rifts (with conduit pylons) and hope that they don't screw it up.
TL;DR: There is no long term. Many have already reached the gear limit and the skill limit. The only option for them to improve their Grift score is, yup, Pylons. It's a real problem.
Pylons in rifts are overrated, they have a trivial effect on GRift progress standings. Even if all things were made completely non-RNG they'd still have trivial effect.
Excuse me? A conduit pylon can be used to clear 20%+ of a rift in a matter of seconds. For some classes, it's the only way they can kill the Rift Guardian.
It's also the number one complaint about Grifts. If nearly everybody agrees that they're a problem, how can you argue that they're not?
true end game will only become available after all content is released, all patches and expansions, so you don't have to rethink your entire game strategy every time a major change comes in and makes your build look like a shopping bag picked up by the wind.
It doesn't HAVE to be that way, though. WoW has "true end game" and it gets updated with every major patch and every expansion. There's no real reason that Diablo 3 couldn't have a "true end game" as well, as long as they continued to balance it.
Of course, they'd have to come up with something that isn't random, for once (like the boss rush idea I posted above :P)...
I would actually like to switch the topic at this point if we can. We now know that there are people that do feel there is no "end game." Let's say that someone that could potentially could influence the direction of D3 sees this. I'd want them to see some ideas on what direction they could take this to fix the problem. I have an idea or two, but I'm sure plenty of people could give better input than myself as they've probably played way longer than I have. ...
edit: Sorry for the triple post.
I like the idea of multiple tiers of gear, but I'd want a pretty solid difficulty revamp if that's the direction they're going to go. I'd also like for there to be more source-specific legendaries. Like how some legendaries are restricted to caches -- have other legendaries restricted to other modes, or to bosses, or to chests, etc.
I came up with a mode that I'd like to see in Diablo 3. I'm going to copy and paste my reddit post.
One of the most common complaints I see about the Greater Rift system is how random it is. It's supposed to be competitive and, yet, no rift is the same... so, I was thinking... what kind of activity is easily measured and still competitive? BOSS RUSH!!!
What Is It?
Boss rush mode is a fairly common mode in action games where the player faces off against (most) every boss in the game, one after another, to see how many of them they can beat and how fast they can do so.
How Would It Work In Diablo?
Picture a large, specially designed room. Probably somewhat circular, though with little nubs along the edge. Plenty of room to move around in and pick strategic positions. Upon entering this room, you could click an object (or button) to start the Boss Rush mode. After a short countdown, the first boss appears and you kill it. Upon death, the next boss spawns. And so on until you finally kill Malthael. At this point, the bosses would start cycling through again, more powerful than the last time.
Okay, But Can't We Spice It Up a Bit?
Absolutely! You remember those little nubs around the edge of the room that I mentioned earlier? Well, let's put orbs there that will allow players to spawn the bosses early. That way, those of us that can kill each of the first wave's bosses in seconds can just spawn all the bosses right away and clear the first wave, bringing down our overall time.
Also, there could be specially placed buff shrines (non-random) that will recharge after a certain amount of bosses are killed, allowing for more potential strategies.
Let's Go Over Some Specifics
How would we start this mode? Well, people are starting to get bored of Greater Rifts already, so we could either add another drop to the final Greater Rift Guardian (meaning, you get it when you either choose not to upgrade your rift key or when you fail the timer). Alternatively, the Keystone of Trials could be used as the key.
Difficulty? Simply set the difficulty based on the game's difficulty level. Torment 6 players automatically start with Torment 6 bosses. Naturally, the only really interesting leaderboard for this would be the Torment 6 leaderboard, but other difficulties would still be present for those that can't handle Torment 6. Boss difficulty would obviously increase with new set of bosses.
Rewards
There would be three obvious sets of rewards for this mode...
Leaderboards: Fastest wave clears, most waves cleared. This way you could either choose to go for speed or for longevity.
Loot: Players would obviously expect some kind of loot reward, so why not add some more legendaries to be dropped specifically from this game mode? Utility items like Ramalandi's Gift could also be included. Perhaps the player would be guaranteed one item that would add a specific affix to a piece of gear for a specific slot. Say, you get an item that adds an All Resist roll to a ring, or an item that adds Cooldown Reduction to your helm. There are any number of potentially appealing items that could be made specifically to drop in this game mode.
Achievements: 'Nuff said.
Wouldn't This Just Get Boring, Eventually?
Much like everything else in Diablo 3, yes, repeated use of this game mode is bound to get boring after so long. But now that we've got this system in place, what's to stop Blizzard from updating it on a regular basis?
Tired of Boss Rush mode? We'll add a new challenge! New bosses! Bosses from Diablo 2! Famous Nephelem of legend to test yourself against! There could be the Set Item challenge, where you fight bosses based upon the set items in the game. Finally, you get to fight Bul-Kathos, Natalya, Roland, and everyone else! Danger mode, where you have to actively avoid non-random (or random, though I'm trying to avoid that with this idea) environmental affects that limit your ability to navigate the room while fighting bosses. Really, there's no end to the new challenges they could come up with.
Tell Me What YOU Think
I think that this could be a great addition to the game... how about you? Comments, concerns, critiques? Go for it!
One last thing:
This just occurred to me, but Diablo 3 could really use something like the Brawler's Guild from WoW. For those that don't know, Brawler's Guild is an Arena where you fight progressively more difficult and unique bosses.
Hows Gr100 for endgame? At least 50 at this point in the game (solo)
Greater Rits are more akin to scoreboards on an arcade game than leaderboards. They serve basically no purpose for improving your character, and are purely optional.
While challenge is an important part of endgame, I make the distinction that a proper endgame has to have interlocking systems of progression and challenge. If your "endgame" content offers the same drops as everywhere else, it's not much of an endgame. Likewise, an infinitely scaling statistical system is more of a curiosity and time-waster than a structured challenge.
Greater Rifts serve a direct purpose in improving your character -- Legendary Gems.
It's funny seeing people claim that "ARPGs don't have an endgame" and "That's just not what this game is about" when Diablo 3 DID have a very strictly defined endgame at one point. It was called Inferno, and it was exactly what you'd expect out of an endgame: brutally difficult for most people, with really good rewards if you could clear it efficiently. Then a bunch of people complained, and it got nerfed into the ground to the point where Blizzard felt comfortable removing it entirely, since it no longer served its original purpose (you know, actual challenge). Those same people now complain about how the game feels "empty" and "boring".
Moral of the story? Most people don't actually know what they want. I wish Blizzard would go back to doing their own thing without worrying about focus testing. It resulted in better games.
Inferno wasn't end-game. It was a higher difficulty level. That's all. People complained about it because it wasn't balanced in the slightest. I agree that it was a lot of fun, but it got old knowing that my Demon Hunter would never survive getting hit by a boss or elite. I played through the entire game in one-shot mode and it was fun until I had finally killed Diablo and now had to farm gear in one-shot mode.
End-game implies that you're doing something different now that you've reached the "end" of the game. Doing the exact same content on a higher difficulty is not end-game.
I agree with your post when it comes to Diablo 3. This game doesn't have an end-game that is even remotely different from the mid-game.
Your attitude, however, is something I have a problem with. I might be wrong, but I got the impression that you don't think this game needs an end-game (and, after seeing your edit, I was correct). Every game needs an end-game. Not having an end-game is the #1 problem I see in Diablo 3. Farming is extremely boring and the endless-farming style of this game is why only the "hardcore" remain outside of major patches.
Endless farming isn't fun. There needs to be an objective outside of "get better gear to do more of the same boring stuff."
It's not a matter of statistics, like your Furnace argument. Pylons directly allow players to exceed the primary limit on Grift progression: Gear. At some point, you're going to have a "BiS" set of gear. It might not have absolutely perfect rolls, but it's essentially going to be as good as anyone can get. At that point, the only thing that can further your Grift progress is, you guessed it, pylons.
Now, here's the problem: We're already at this point. The people at the top of the leaderboard are among the most skilled, most geared players in the game. They've already capped their non-Pylon Grift potential. All they can do now is spend their time finding perfect rifts (with conduit pylons) and hope that they don't screw it up.
TL;DR: There is no long term. Many have already reached the gear limit and the skill limit. The only option for them to improve their Grift score is, yup, Pylons. It's a real problem.
It's also the number one complaint about Grifts. If nearly everybody agrees that they're a problem, how can you argue that they're not?
Of course, they'd have to come up with something that isn't random, for once (like the boss rush idea I posted above :P)...
edit: Sorry for the triple post.
I like the idea of multiple tiers of gear, but I'd want a pretty solid difficulty revamp if that's the direction they're going to go. I'd also like for there to be more source-specific legendaries. Like how some legendaries are restricted to caches -- have other legendaries restricted to other modes, or to bosses, or to chests, etc.
I came up with a mode that I'd like to see in Diablo 3. I'm going to copy and paste my reddit post.
One of the most common complaints I see about the Greater Rift system is how random it is. It's supposed to be competitive and, yet, no rift is the same... so, I was thinking... what kind of activity is easily measured and still competitive? BOSS RUSH!!!
What Is It?
Boss rush mode is a fairly common mode in action games where the player faces off against (most) every boss in the game, one after another, to see how many of them they can beat and how fast they can do so.
How Would It Work In Diablo?
Picture a large, specially designed room. Probably somewhat circular, though with little nubs along the edge. Plenty of room to move around in and pick strategic positions. Upon entering this room, you could click an object (or button) to start the Boss Rush mode. After a short countdown, the first boss appears and you kill it. Upon death, the next boss spawns. And so on until you finally kill Malthael. At this point, the bosses would start cycling through again, more powerful than the last time.
Okay, But Can't We Spice It Up a Bit?
Absolutely! You remember those little nubs around the edge of the room that I mentioned earlier? Well, let's put orbs there that will allow players to spawn the bosses early. That way, those of us that can kill each of the first wave's bosses in seconds can just spawn all the bosses right away and clear the first wave, bringing down our overall time.
Also, there could be specially placed buff shrines (non-random) that will recharge after a certain amount of bosses are killed, allowing for more potential strategies.
Let's Go Over Some Specifics
How would we start this mode? Well, people are starting to get bored of Greater Rifts already, so we could either add another drop to the final Greater Rift Guardian (meaning, you get it when you either choose not to upgrade your rift key or when you fail the timer). Alternatively, the Keystone of Trials could be used as the key.
Difficulty? Simply set the difficulty based on the game's difficulty level. Torment 6 players automatically start with Torment 6 bosses. Naturally, the only really interesting leaderboard for this would be the Torment 6 leaderboard, but other difficulties would still be present for those that can't handle Torment 6. Boss difficulty would obviously increase with new set of bosses.
Rewards
There would be three obvious sets of rewards for this mode...
Leaderboards: Fastest wave clears, most waves cleared. This way you could either choose to go for speed or for longevity.
Wouldn't This Just Get Boring, Eventually?Loot: Players would obviously expect some kind of loot reward, so why not add some more legendaries to be dropped specifically from this game mode? Utility items like Ramalandi's Gift could also be included. Perhaps the player would be guaranteed one item that would add a specific affix to a piece of gear for a specific slot. Say, you get an item that adds an All Resist roll to a ring, or an item that adds Cooldown Reduction to your helm. There are any number of potentially appealing items that could be made specifically to drop in this game mode.
Achievements: 'Nuff said.
Much like everything else in Diablo 3, yes, repeated use of this game mode is bound to get boring after so long. But now that we've got this system in place, what's to stop Blizzard from updating it on a regular basis?
Tired of Boss Rush mode? We'll add a new challenge! New bosses! Bosses from Diablo 2! Famous Nephelem of legend to test yourself against! There could be the Set Item challenge, where you fight bosses based upon the set items in the game. Finally, you get to fight Bul-Kathos, Natalya, Roland, and everyone else! Danger mode, where you have to actively avoid non-random (or random, though I'm trying to avoid that with this idea) environmental affects that limit your ability to navigate the room while fighting bosses. Really, there's no end to the new challenges they could come up with.
Tell Me What YOU Think
I think that this could be a great addition to the game... how about you? Comments, concerns, critiques? Go for it!
One last thing:
This just occurred to me, but Diablo 3 could really use something like the Brawler's Guild from WoW. For those that don't know, Brawler's Guild is an Arena where you fight progressively more difficult and unique bosses.
End-game implies that you're doing something different now that you've reached the "end" of the game. Doing the exact same content on a higher difficulty is not end-game.
Your attitude, however, is something I have a problem with. I might be wrong, but I got the impression that you don't think this game needs an end-game (and, after seeing your edit, I was correct). Every game needs an end-game. Not having an end-game is the #1 problem I see in Diablo 3. Farming is extremely boring and the endless-farming style of this game is why only the "hardcore" remain outside of major patches.
Endless farming isn't fun. There needs to be an objective outside of "get better gear to do more of the same boring stuff."