DiabloFans

I don't really agree with the pets theory though, he's quite different from the standard summoning necro. For one, you start with a decent ranged skill. Also, the spiders etc aren't really pets, more like an AOE spell. I actually found him to be one of the more diverse characters, even in the first levels. The pets keep monsters at a distance while you use spells on them.

In the poll on the official forums, the Witch Doctor came out as a clear loser. What's the reason for this? When I played him in the beta, it was actually one of the two characters I enjoyed the most. Would this just be an impression by people who haven't played the beta yet?

The only HC character I ever had was a lvl 97 javazon. Didn't get to 99 because I got tired of the game (this was around patch 1.10).

My best defence was resist + run speed + cow runs with friends. Never really got into much trouble. In 99% of the games I was even the one to get wirt's leg because I was so damn fast nothing could hit me. Just in and out. But I'm always a sucker for run speed. I even used to prefer this armor with run speed on it wich was mostly useless, I don't remember the name.

Also, when playing softcore, avoid dying at all costs. I don't remember any of my sc characters dying apart from in duels (= intentionally) and the occasional boss trouble. I don't think you can become a good HC player if you allow yourself to be careless in SC at the same time.

I would, with a dedicated character of course, not with my pvm ones.

But just think of the adrenaline rush!
Think of the sweet sense of victory!
Think of the anger when you lost your char because of noob team mates!
Isn't this what great memories are made of?
This is what we will tell later to our grandchildren! How we owned noobs in the arena and (hopefully) looted their stuff!

One reason, as mentioned, is to guide new players.

Another reason is to create more clarity in the skill pool. By having each button correspond to a set of skills with the same role, the interface becomes a lot more user friendly. It makes the skills easier to read.

I have also noticed, at least in the beta, there's not the least need to use elective mode. This will only be for late game or special builds.

What does a critical hit actually do?

Thsi reminds me a lot of LoD. Can't wait!

Quote from ScyberDragon

You can dye an item back to its original color.

As for the super rare only one dye. The problem is everyone will just horde them instead of using them because of the frequency of upgrading gear. Nobody wants to use the only one chance on anything because you know you will swap out that gear anyway.

This may be true in the beginning, when we don't know the items' relative usefulness yet. But after a while you should be able to at least select some items you'll keep using on some character, I think.

Oh okay, I just got in in 13 so I didn't know, I'll get rid of that one

Have you noticed some things (not necessarily bugs) which annoy you and could be fixed relatively easily? Maybe we could compile the ones we agree on here and someone can post them on the official forum? (I don't have an account there). Only small things, we don't want to delay release too much. I'll edit this list based on your replies:

• The blacksmith ignores crafting materials in the stash. If blacksmith is shared across characters, it would also be convenient to have a shared pool of materials. Having to run over to the stash all the time is a bit inconvenient.
• When there's a pillar between you and a zombie, the barbarian will still take swings at the zombie without actually hitting it. This is probably not a bug, since you shouldn't be able to hit it, but it's annoying that he'll still attempt to.
• When you are holding down shift to attack, you stop attacking after killing something, and have to re-click to start combat again

Things removed from the list:

• The "you have unused item slots" message comes up all the time and it's annoying.

Quote from KageKaze

The beautiful thing about blizzard is they think long term. They aren't short sighted like EA or even Bobby "Take the fun out of making games" Kotick... and trust me I'm super glad Blizz is still autonomous from Activision. The goal here is player retention.

It's exactly this. For us it's hard to imagine, because we grew up with D1, D2 ad whatnot. We got eased into finding our way quickly around these games. But I have friends who never played any kind of rpg before and are planning to play D3. I can imagine that some extra pointer here and there would just improve their playing experience. Heck, I remember watching a let's play of the D3 demo by the guys from the Yogscast, experienced players. One of them hadn't played Diablo before, and he sucked It was horrible to watch. If they made atc 1 normal harder, or the interface less simple, these players would be discouraged right away, and that's not what the company wants.

The same goes for the "play normal before you can access HC". Do you really think that all players who have never played Diablo before fully realize right from the start what "hardcore mode" entails? That this is a game where you spend a lot of time building your character and that's all gone if you die just once? Those players will never play again if somehow they ended up thinking hardcore mode would be a good idea for a first character. We may think "good riddance", but that's not something a company wants to put its customers through.

This whole thread just shows how wrong D2 was. The point of low lvl uniques should be that you find them and use them right away, not that you will use them on another character. Maybe in D3 we'll finally be able to play the game instead of rushing all the time.

Quote from Brightsiide

So, give a vendor in ACT 1 or something the ability to wash of dyes to the original color making the armorpiece tradeable again.

Thoughts?

Actually this isn't even necessary, you could just redye it with a cheap dye in that case. But actually it would be nice to give the blacksmith the ability to 'wash' items. Just in case you want to revert an item to its original color.

Quote from Eggtchup

Hm, your avatar, what are you two doing?

In cats, this behavior is called 'grooming'.

My take on the filter stuff: on a screenshot it definitely looks better with the filter, but while playing the game, it gets boring after a while if all colors are so dull. I think it's a bad idea to just darken the whole game because you're also ruining atmospheric lighting and places that are supposed to be bright. In the end it just comes down to personal preference though.

Blocking trade would bring other problems though. Imagine you obtained the extremely rare PLUM color. You got it as a reward for beating inferno with a character. Pretty epic, right. So you want to save that for your best piece of armor, the one you want to wear. But that would also make that armor untradable, i.e. economically worthless. So what if you find a better armor? You won't even be able to trade away your Plum Magic Tunic. And if they won't block items in this color, they may as well not block the dye itself.

The advantage is though, that a Plum Magic Tunic would be infinitely more valuable than a violet one. Someone who's already got Plum Magic Boots may pay a lot to complet his set. So that would add economic value to your vanity reward.