DiabloFans

we've been pushing for this internally for some time now and got the green light for the changes recently. We think these changes will improve the forums a lot and were very necessary for when Patch 2.1 comes. Hopefully you guys agree, and enjoy the changes.

Also, if you have any feedback on it or other changes to suggest, feel free to contact me or Bagstone even via PM.

I'm not sure if you're talking about news posts as well, but in case you are, thanks for the suggestion, I will make sure to add that in future posts.

I'm leaning more towards 3 months than 2. It's been a couple weeks already and they haven't even started implementing and testing Seasons/Ladders.

Let alone balance classes, sets/legendaries/items, new seasonal Legendaries (so they're actually useful), Greater Rifts.

There's SO much to be done before even talking about "live", and that can be seen by what's currently on the PTR - how short-sighted some of the changes were for classe and item balancing.

Update 26th June: moved all the "item changes" into their own category. Most changes to items are very similar. Kept the "miscellaneous" stuff on the first section. Added links to all items mentioned (for easier referencing), and added everything else I saw here and on reddit.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Let's put together a list with all the undocumented changes (aka not in the Patch Notes) for Patch 2.1.0 (PTR).

I've already added a few (from reddit), and I'm sure you guys will spot a few more.

• First and foremost (as this will be repeated a lot below): lots, lots, lots of items have had changes to their "base affixes", some had "meh" affixes removed from always rolling (like Blackthorne's Life%/attackspeed/LoH), and quite a few were changed to roll 5 Primary Affixes (up from 4 maximum).
  
  While this does make these items considerably more powerful, bear in mind the more difficult stages of Greater Rifts (lvls 40+) will probably require a lot more power than what end-game characters have right now.

Miscellaneous

• Malthael XP is fixed. You get the xp from kill only after his death animation now (no double kill xp anymore).
• Gold drops now show (the amount on the ground)
• Your last sum of your gold within ~5 second time frame now shows in the lower right hand corner
• Treasure Goblin Realm now exists after killing a goblin, random chance to spawn portal - Greed is the boss.
• Kadala now says her other lines, when getting rares and legs.
• Greater Rifts can roll Pandemonium Fortress maps (not a change per se, but still kind of unexpected)
• Icon for Reusable Parts and Forgotten Souls has changed.
• Not 100% on this, but I think Orlash spends less time invisible. He's still annoying, moreso when you're on a time limit.
• New Particle effect for Frozen Pulse. It's the same blue ice star, but now it spins and has a blizzard effect. It's larger and more noticeable.
• Area Damage now has a new icon in the utility section for Paragon levels
• New Cursor
• Meteor Shower's tooltip updated. Now it displays "Unleash a volley of 7 small Meteors that each strike 228% weapon damage as Fire".
• The goblin from the puzzle ring no longer glows.
• QOL change: Holding down a button will now recast that spell when off cool-down.
  

  1. The spell will not go off if you have another skill being 'permaclicked' when the cd ends (channeling spells or hold position+autoattack)
  2. The spell will not go off if you are running around by keeping left button clicked at all time (You have to release it slightly before the cd wears off)
  3. consequence from 1 you cannot have two cd spells kept clicked at the same time (only one of the two will go off & priority seems to be given to the one with shortest cd no matter which one you started channeling first)
  4. Also clicking your main skills too fast (if you have high AS for example or if you are a SC born clicker) while having a cd skill channeled might prevent it from triggering. Most likely every click trigger an extra internal cd to the skill like 0.3 sec so if you click faster than that you will permablock said skill.
     (mechanics tested by Masterswipe)

• Fixed a bug where crusaders wouldn't get nephalem glory buff from picking up an orb while using steed charge.
• The gas from Ghom rift guardian doesn't hurt after you kill him.
• Red Nephalem Globes are in Higher Rifts fill your completion bar.
• Screen shake has been deleted or added to certain skills
• New artisan that upgrades your gems found after killing a level 25 greater rift. Reported on level 23 as well.
• When you have Low FX checked in options, disco beams show the direction they will spawn (didn't before).
• Lootable objects (chests, corpses, etc.) do not spawn in Greater Rifts, making Harrington's Waistguard and Sebor's Nightmare practically useless.
• Female Crusader 'Inspect Hero" picture fixed!
• Horadric Cache Icon changed
• Fixed the Crusader's skill Slash (Guard rune) stacking more than 5 times as stated in the description (on live it stacks up to 10 times for a total of 50% armor)
• Enemies hexed by the Enchantress (into chickens) now properly show life bars above their heads.
• Earthquake fury cost is now 25 (down from 50)

Changes to Items

• New Item - Spear with + Holy% Damage!
• Angel Hair Braid is rolling with +Block% Chance!
• The proc from Baleful Remnant now triggers with assists as well - huge buff!!!
• Halcyon's Ascent (amulet) no longer rolls guaranteed elite damage + elite damage reduction
• Doombringer no longer rolls Life % as one of its primary affixes, but *does* roll 5 primary stats.
• Stone of Jordan can roll 5 primaries
• The Compass Rose now has 5 primary affixes
• Heart Slaughter had the Critical Hit Damage Removed
• Moonlight Ward Arcane % damage buffed from here
• Litany of the Undaunted has had a lot of its stats changed
• The Grin Reaper has had CDR removed
• Mask of Jeram (Set) name changed to Helltooth Mask
• Stalgard's Decimator no longer rolls CHD% on it. In fact, I'm 2 for 2 on finding items that used to roll CHD that no longer roll it
• Nemesis Bracers no longer roll movement speed
• Sash of Knives (Legendary DH belt): +Fan of Knives damage roll range increased is 38-50% - up from 30–40% (change affects pre-2.1/PTR items).
• Justice Lantern can now roll OP
• The Traveler's Pledge buffed, can roll good stats
• Visuals on Genzaniku were changed from red glow to green/blue glow.
• Band of Untold Secrets rolls 5 primary
• Vigilante Belt now rolls %CDR
• Blackthorne's Duncraig Cross (Amulet) updated - no longer rolls life%/attackspeed/LoH as fixed affixes.
• Lacuni Prowlers now roll 5 primary stats
• Lidless Wall now has 5 primaries Also rolls different fixed affixes.
• Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac now [rolls different stats(http://imgur.com/w6CFlAB)
• Flavor of Time amulet also rolls 5 primary stats.
• Stormshield's elite damage reduction/melee damage reduction has been buffed
• Quivers can roll elemental % damage now (one of the 5 primaries). I got a quiver (one that doesn't have any special effects) that rolled 20% fire, and Kadala can reroll it to any element. could be a specific quiver that has been added to roll an elemental affix

• I believe the reasoning for this is for sockets to have some meaning in these slots, and for them to be a competing affix with things like Attack speed, CHC and CHD. I also think that's meant to "limit" how many legendary Gems you can have equipped at a time, so there's actually an interesting choice to be made at the end-game (which wouldn't be possible if you could equip them on Chests/Helms/Pants).

Table of Contents:

First, the effect has to be somewhat simple, easily described in a line or two, otherwise the mechanics and description become just too convoluted and cluttered. I've seen suggestions for legendaries on the forums that have 3-4 lines, or weird "charge" mechanics, and separate cooldowns for different effects - that's not what devs are looking for,imho.

Second, keep in mind these effects need to make someone wonder"ok, would I trade 'x affix' for this?", at the end-game. I believe the Ring of Royal Grandeur is a great example of this in general. Since getting a trifecta RoRG is so hard, people usually weight having just attack speed and either CHC/CHD, and giving up one of those affixes for its effect.

Third, I believe in general they want to implement ideas that make unused skills and unexplored areas/mechanics of the game more interesting. The "Fear" Gem proposed is an example of that. In general, people don't care too much about Fear effects. Frozen, on the other hand, is a theme/effect already heavily explored by items like Frostburn, Azurewrath, Winter Flurry and Light of Grace, so having more items for that would be somewhat redundant.

Quote from Venaliter »

They said "Summer." So expect it...next winter

Winter is coming... soon™

Place your bets. Who's gonna release it first? GRRM (next book) or Blizz's first RoS patch?

So the order of the day for this subject is fallacy-filled analogies? This thread seems to be full of them, despite the extensive explanations preceding them. Allow me to present mine as well.

Let's do the following experiment. Make a game mode that costs 50 dollars a day to play, and it will drop the best items in the game, new legendaries and sets. Or a more realistic scenario, let's make seasons have a 50 dollar monthly fee.

Suddenly these guys saying nobody is forced to play ladder have their pitchforks up against that idea. "Oh, it's not fair... why should I be excluded from a certain game mode or gameplay experience because I'm not a stupid rich guy who can waste that kind of money". What? You don't want to spend your money on that? Your problem, nobody is forcing you into anything. It's your "choice" as well. But hey, if it involves money then people who are worried with "pay to win" just go bonkers.

It's a similar situation, just from a different perspective - people who are against exclusive items for seasons have limited time and patience when it comes to "starting fresh". They don't care about competing, or don't want to log-in to see a level 1 character and spend 100+ hours just getting that character to a point where the gameplay gets more interesting. To these, being given the middle finger for not wanting to waste their whole free time playing one game redoing everything they've done before, is a big issue - and will kill the game for them.

The more I read the arguments in favor of such idea, the more I feel exclusive legs/sets are about e-peen and showing off. People just want something to make them feel like a special snowflake for choosing to play the game instead of doing other things, either in gaming or in real life. And that's such a fucked up mentality from modern gamers (which you usually see from streamers and "hardcore" players).

Quote from noladrew »

That's different with seasons. And that's the whole thing.[/quote]
Nothing forces you into playing seasons either. Like I said, incentive and force are two completely different things.

in·cen·tive
inˈsentiv/
noun a thing that motivates or encourages one to do something.

force
fôrs/
noun coercion or compulsion, especially with the use or threat of violence. verb make (someone) do something against their will.

NO ONE is forced to do anything in this game as far as choosing which game mode they want to play, they CHOOSE which game mode to play.

That's just sheer hypocrisy. If seasons or ladders didn't give you a "very strong" incentive, almost nobody would play it. A lot like "banner rewards" and achievements, very few people care about those since they're meaningless to the gameplay experience.

Let's have it like this. The reward for playing ladder and doing well on it is a "black potion". It does nothing, it's only black. Or a "pink wing". Let's see how many of these so called "competitive players" will play ladder then. Exclusive legs show a very clear intent on the devs into pulling people into a game mode that would absolutely fail without that kind of incentive, because people don't really want what they say they do. 

And by having things like "exclusive legendaries", that for all we know won't be able to drop afterwards, they are flat out forcing people who want to enjoy those gameplay experiences into playing ladder. If the next big thing for Wizards is ladder-exclusive, I absolutely FEEL forced to play it.

This whole argument of "nobody is holding a gun to your head" that people have been using since the game came out is just retarded. In an online-only game environment, where the dev cares about what people are doing with their end-game, that argument simply doesn't apply. Nobody is forcing you to do Mira runs, but if that yields 100x more legendaries than anything else in the game with no downsides, everybody's gonna do it. There's obviously an issue there, and only hypocrite players fool themselves into thinking there isn't.

Quote from ruksak »

This is the elephant in the room, the big 'ol negative that I doubt anyone could successfully argue against. Ladders are divisive. Given the implement of ladders, here's the split;

1) Ladder Softcore

2) Ladder Hardcore

3) Non-Lad Softcore

4) Non-Lad Hardcore

That means your Friends List and your Clanmates will be split into as many as 4 camps. So....you could play all four modes, or, more than 1 to try and keep up. This breaks your playtime down into as many as four modes, relegating people whom have more time to play at even more of an advantage.

Nobody hand me that shit about "Why do you care what other people....". We all know it's not much fun to play with friends that out-gear you by a wide margin, and vice-versa.

My personal opinion is that Ladders are a mistake, a death-nail to many social avenues. As well, I feel we'd all be better off if they'd spend time dev'ing complex (all-inclusive) modes like Tiered Rifts, Uber Events and other challenges which could bring competition to Diablo 3. Ladders are an antiquated and borrowed idea, rife with issues that I believe will create a schism in the player base and likely be seen as a mistake, a waste of time and development resources.

Also, this ^ I had to quote it.

Because it is probably the ultimate reason they decided in favor of "season exclusive legendaries" after discussing it to death. (and boy, I promise you those items will be very powerful or interesting).

It is the only way they can do it without splitting the community so much, and without having an entire game mode (that took months of design, implementation, iteration and Q&A) fail miserably in its first couple months.

Still needs to farm hours upon hours to get enough shards (2.5k+) for a set item from her...

Then you need a couple dozen hours farming bounties (preferably split) to get a RoRG that actually makes the sets viable for T4+...

Then you need to get a dozen+ set items until you get lucky and have no repeated rolls (3 Vyr's Pants, yay \o/), so that you can get the set bonuses...

Then you need to get those same items to drop at least a few more times (5-6) until they actually roll gg-endgame affixes that suit your personal build (CDR, bonus to health globes or life-on-kill, CC/CHC or trifecta, allres or armor, etc)...

All of that to get one character to T5+.. there's 5 classes in the game, and hardcore mode, and ladders/seasons incoming.

Yeah, game's ruined now.. 110% casual fest... needs moar hardcore... much drama, such qq, wow...