DiabloFans

I thought they said that the items, skill pages, etc. pulled from the things currently in the game. Does anyone know why the Diablo3.com skill calculators and such do not reflect the changes?

I'm also kind of shocked people are worried about the difficulty of a game that is a sequel to a game that wasn't extremely difficult in the first place.

For all of you who are acting like you are easily going to beat this game, did you find Diablo 2 incredibly challenging?

A group of three friends and I just ran through normal, nightmare and hell together without farming loot or really doing any runs at all... we just went from A1 normal to A5 hell. One person ended up dying in A5 to gloams and the other two lived.

Diablo isn't meant to be some super challenging game. Sure, it's nice to have things that are very difficult in the game and I'm sure there will be. But Diablo 1 and Diablo 2 both weren't super challenging video games. You guys act like they are dumbing something down that comes from a long line of super challenging games or something.

I hope the difficulty level is right around where Diablo 2 was. I thought that was great.

Quote from Magistrate

Nope. But the point isn't that he could be beaten so easily so much as it is the details surrounding it. It's that a third of the way through act one, when you're supposed to be level 11-13, you can beat a major plot boss at level one. I think that screams broken. That's a boss that you shouldn't be facing until you've achieved 18% to 21% of your total experience in the game at 0% experience. And this isn't limited to one case. You can see countless examples of players beating him at all sorts of low levels.

When I play through the beta I have almost always fought him at level 7-8.

Regardless. These characters killing him are:

1. Obviously using gear that does not have level restrictions.
2. Have farmed health potions on them.
3. Due to these things, they have enhanced stats.

It's like saying World of Warcraft PvP is broken and then citing the reason: "This level 29 character that has spent thousands of gold on specific items for his character can kill my level 39 who has terrible gear! HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN?"

Yeah, he can kill them at level one. I think I'd rather fight him at level one with gear that I spend two/three weeks gathering up than fight him at level 7-8 with just the gear that I pick up along the way. That doesn't mean "THE GAME IS BROKEN!" though... it just means that some dude farmed a bunch of items and spent time so he could kill the boss at the end of a freaking beta at level one.

I'd like you to go try to kill Leoric when first entering the game at level one. No extra loot, no extra potions. Just log on, go to the WP, go to Leoric and then just fight him. My guess is you can probably kill him, but it'd take (like some of these videos) 3-5 minutes. Mainly because Leoric is slow and his mechanics are made easier for the easy difficulty. It won't continue like that through the rest of the game.

I honestly don't know why I come to this site anymore. All you see is people bitching. I remember when people had reasonable conversations about things that mattered in the game... that was awesome. But I guess everyone is getting bored, so that is understandable.

Being upset that the first hour or two of a video game is easy just points directly to:

"I am bored. I need something to complain about. Oh, I can complain about this even though it doesn't make much sense."

Quote from Magistrate

Quote from Hiselius

I'm very tempted to beat the countess in D2 with a tweaked level 1 character just to prove how silly this "OMG the game is easy in the first 10 minutes" - debate is..

I don't think that's quite a fair comparison. The Countess has less health, weaker attacks, and no real strategic skills. She also isn't really a major part of the lore. She's a side quest with little back story, and the story of the game doesn't really flow through her plot point.

With Leoric, we have an entire game's worth of lore to back him up, he has a variety of interesting skills and mechanics, much more health, and he is absolutely a plot point, not a side quest.

I think there's something to be said for all that. Someone of Leoric's importance simply should not be able to be beaten so quickly--if at all--by level one characters.

And this isn't the first ten minutes of the game. Leoric is placed a couple hours into the game, if you're playing it at the rate it was designed to be played.

So who would you compare Leoric to then? The only boss you really have to go through in Act 1 of Diablo 2 is Andarial.

Do you think a boss 1/3 of the way through an act should be as difficult as the end boss then, just because there is lore behind him?

venom1stas...

I have beat normal difficulty in Diablo 2 several times without dying and without any sort of special gear. I just think it's a matter of some people find certain things more challenging.

Diablo 3 isn't without difficulty. The arcane enchanted rare guys are a pretty big challenge. I think Leoric is harder than Blood Raven if you look at the comparison of the two.

We are also looking at it (most of us) from the standpoint of we have watched a lot of gameplay footage, played a similar game (Diablo 2) a ton, studied the skills, etc.

The way I see it, if you are comparing Diablo 2 to Diablo 3 difficulty wise it seems like it is going to go like this:

Normal = Tutorial
NM = About on par with Normal from Diablo 2 (Maybe slightly easier since you will have good gear at this point)
Hell = Somewhere between the difficulty of NM and Hell in Diablo 2.
Inferno = Far above the difficulty of Hell from Diablo 2.

All of the monsters being level 61 or above should be pretty brutal. I have no doubts that the game will be challenging as you get to the later stages.

Quote from Dolaiim

So you can keep WoW subscribers by slutting D3 out as a WoW promotion.

OH SHNAP.

I assume you are joking.

I wish the American RMAH was locked out. I don't want to deal with any of your crazy foreigners buying up my items.

Quote from Gheed2010

And speaking of not making sense - your comment on concept art (clearly signed by a guy still on the team) is more than a little bizarre.

Concept art is drawn in 2004.
They put that concept into the initial game in 2004.

That doesn't mean that it is locked into just that version of the game. So in 2005 Blizzard North goes down, Blizzard doesn't like what they see from the game itself. They scrap the original version of the game.

They start to develop a completely new and different version of the game in 2006.
They put the concept art into the new game in 2007.

That doesn't mean that new version of Diablo 3 started production in 2004. It means it started production in 2006/2007 and the old version of the game that had nothing to do with it besides a piece of artwork had already been scrapped.

Quote from Gheed2010

As a matter of courtesy, try to use actual quotes when putting words in my mouth.

Try to read a little more closely, and feel free to look at much earlier posts. I've been saying that the game was delayed since '08 (don't know if was on this site then, maybe). The typical response from the deluded was ('09 at the latest). Three years later - and about five billion in wow revenue later - you think I was right? And I wouldn't say that deciding to market it as a WoW sub freebie hurts my argument in the slightest.

Try to direct your energy in a less flaming direction, phlayed, and answer my riddle about who that RTS designer was on the last page.

I do think you are wrong. You still cannot answer the question:

Why develop Diablo 3 in the first place?

Quote from Gheed2010

Quote from Phrayed

You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."

I'm sure I could show you 100% overlit shots with absolutely no action occurring from background areas that were thrown out in the most recent version, and you would say the same thing.

But, yeah, an overlit (creditless) demo shot of a background with a single static character in the middle is what makes a game in its early phases, right? Not the kind of engine work clearly referenced in the interview link, or the concept stuff clearly labeled from '04 - both of which reference current members on the team.

Now we know, thanks.

I am tempted to draw a stick figure in Paint and put it next to an image from Diablo 3. Something tells me you'd have some ridiculous excuse as to how it could possibly be related. Just because 'concept stuff' is labeled 2004 doesn't mean that 'concept stuff' was being produced in 2004. I also don't consider drawings part of major production.

Everything from the health/mana globe, the look of the UI, potions being where skills are now and the art direction indicate that it was completely different. Just because they say "We used that sketch concept in 2004 and we are using it now in 2011." doesn't mean it was the same game.

However, like I said, your argument is flawed from the beginning. It's something you continue to avoid.

You believe Blizzard is stalling and prolonging development because they are afraid Diablo 3 is going to expedite the 'death' of WoW. The question was already proposed... why develop the game in the first place then? They could have easily developed something that wasn't a threat to World of Warcraft like you claim Starcraft 2 isn't.

Your basis is that "Blizzard's worst fear is releasing Diablo 3 because it will hurt World of Warcraft!"... so then why the hell would they develop it in the first place?

Again... "You do not make sense".

Quote from Gheed2010

right, as if showing the still demo shots from kotaku in sequence is a 'video'.

try showing an actual animation. just one. you won't and can't.

and, yes, I try to stick to the substance of discussions rather than wall of text. sorry.

Sure man. I said video because it was on Youtube, but they are still photos. You caught me in the biggest lie ever, apparently.

Do those photos look anything like ANY setting or content that we have seen in the current version of Diablo 3? They are absolutely nothing alike. The Diablo 3 that we see now is a completely different game.

You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."

I also like how you select small segments of the discussion to talk about rather than addressing issues as a whole.

Quote from Gheed2010

Quote from Phrayed

There are videos out of the Diablo 3 that Blizzard North was developing.

Hilarious. I produced a link to back up my statement. You won't find a link for that. You may find the "heaven" stuff from Kotaku a few months ago - which was isolated demo stuff that tells you exactly nothing, but you won't find a video. I won't flame, but who needs to, when people make stuff up they can never document.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nmE5t1EvM8