Been playing WoW on and off since its initial release. Whats different? Things are easier but content wise each expansion was an improvement (for its own mechanics and new features of course. Nothing will top classic wow for enjoyability because earning anything was enjoyable and a time sink).
What killed it for me was burn out, in the end it was the same thing... End game, farm rep, farm dailies, farm heroics, farm raids, and get so bored make an alt. Doing this for over six years on and off kinda killed it for me and I finally have quit for good... sadly maybe a bit to early since D3 isn't coming out quick enough.
1) new ideas + change = good for me = good for game = good for blizzard
2) end game redundancy * years = time for a new game
3) new features + expansion - mastering content very fast = equation #2
I quit WoW when I realized the game itself wasn't hard at all, it was actually a joke how easy all the boss fights in raids were. The challenge was a Social one, not an intellectual one. It was more a question of
"How many people can you find that can be on a lot and are actually smart enough to research a boss fight and know how to play their class?"
And with America's education system being so pathetic, it actually was extremely challenging. Even if you did get in one of the best raiding guilds in the server, they were full of abunch of greedy, egotistical a-holes and annoying nerds who turned the game you play for fun and a challenge into a game full of drama and annoying people you would never hang out with IRL.
Ok so i don't really have issues with everything new released cause I trust Blizzard to fix them and make sure they work.
Except they've already explained Loot and pretty much are locked into their decision.
The problem I see with Loot is greed.
If something drops and it's not for your class, instead of giving it to your friend, won't people just sell it on the real money auction house? Far as I've heard, your teammates won't be able to see the items you loot until you post them or drop them, so if people just pretend only bad loot dropped whose to say it didn't?
Example: You and 3 friends just killed Diablo and he drops an awesome item for the Demon Hunter in your group but you play a Barbarian.
Friends: "Eh, i got crap loot, how about you guys?"
*You loot +10 Crossbow of Uberness*
You: "Yea, what's with all this bad loot, I'm just gonna vendor it all"
*Sells it on RMAH*
Have none of you ever played guild wars? (Haven't seen anyone compare the way D3 skills are to GW)
The way the skill system is set up is pretty much exactly how guild wars set up their skill system. Except in GW you picked 2 classes a main class and a sub class then picked skills from each one in order to create your own hybrid character. You could swap skills in and out at the beginning of each instance. (And before you enter a pvp arena)But only of those of your 2 classes.
So if anyone is worried about the whole not adding to skills anymore, if you played GW you'd realize it's awesome and a great way to allow people to customize their character so everyone isn't just walking around with the same builds. The problem with D3 though is, there's no dual classes, so like someone said earlier, if you find a cool skill combo someone can easily just copy you granted they have the runes required to change the effect of whichever skills you've changed.
The only problem I see with it is the Rune+Skill System, if they do it right, it'll be a great way to make your character unique from everyone else, but if they do it wrong... everyone is just going to be a clone of one another just like in D2. (There was only like 3-5 builds max each class could even use to be viable for Hell difficulty)
As far as the RMAH (Zomg so much talk about it)
I personally played D2 as a single player and co-op game with friends. I didn't care less if people ran around with the best items in the game that they bought from some chinese farmer so I have no problem with it being used as a way to eliminate 3rd party distributors. If I want to PVP i play a game that is balanced for PVP, not Diablo 2 where my zon could just spam guided arrow off screen over and over with a piercing bow and know that noone could ever kill me. (I know this was eventually nerfed but still, it was extremely overpowered when it existed)
Just play a first person shooter or League of Legends/DoTa/etc if you want good pvp. I'm like 99% sure that PVP in Diablo 3 will be completely unbalanced so there'll be no point in it at all.
BUT
The problem I do see with RMAH is what other people have stated, EVERYONE, well like 90-95% of the population of the game is going to try to sell the best items for only cash. (I noticed this from a Browser game that also had a RMAH combined with an in-game gold AH) Basically forcing anyone who wants any of the good items to either farm it themselves or pay cash for it. While some might think "I got free time, I can just farm it myself" Loot tables are based on luck, so sure you could kill bhaal 100 times but he might never drop the item you want just due to really bad luck. Therefore, in order for hardcore players to get these extremely rare items they should be ready to drop some extra money into the game. I just hope blizzard has multiple items (lets say at least 3 for each class, for each armor/wpn slot) that are all best for certain builds that all have the same drop rate so you'll be able to at least trade/sell a different classes best gear in order to buy your own, because I'm pretty sure none of the best items are going to be sold for gold ever. Hopefully they'll have a diverse amount of rare but godly items and not just "1 Ring that rules them all"
If gold is ONLY used to "Gamble" (like in diablo 2) or only to get more stash slots it'll become an almost pointless in-game resource so cash will become the only thing to use to buy/trade rare items. (Why buy/use gold for only a small chance to get a good rare item when you can pay real money to get the exact item you want)
If the auction house works though, it's going to be a great way for hardcore gamers, even hardcore single-player/co-op only players to make some cash just for doing what they love to do. Gaming of course.
TLDR: How well they balance the game so no class/build/item is extremely overpowered will decide how good this game will be.
0
I quit WoW when I realized the game itself wasn't hard at all, it was actually a joke how easy all the boss fights in raids were. The challenge was a Social one, not an intellectual one. It was more a question of
"How many people can you find that can be on a lot and are actually smart enough to research a boss fight and know how to play their class?"
And with America's education system being so pathetic, it actually was extremely challenging. Even if you did get in one of the best raiding guilds in the server, they were full of abunch of greedy, egotistical a-holes and annoying nerds who turned the game you play for fun and a challenge into a game full of drama and annoying people you would never hang out with IRL.
0
Except they've already explained Loot and pretty much are locked into their decision.
The problem I see with Loot is greed.
If something drops and it's not for your class, instead of giving it to your friend, won't people just sell it on the real money auction house? Far as I've heard, your teammates won't be able to see the items you loot until you post them or drop them, so if people just pretend only bad loot dropped whose to say it didn't?
Example: You and 3 friends just killed Diablo and he drops an awesome item for the Demon Hunter in your group but you play a Barbarian.
Friends: "Eh, i got crap loot, how about you guys?"
*You loot +10 Crossbow of Uberness*
You: "Yea, what's with all this bad loot, I'm just gonna vendor it all"
*Sells it on RMAH*
0
The way the skill system is set up is pretty much exactly how guild wars set up their skill system. Except in GW you picked 2 classes a main class and a sub class then picked skills from each one in order to create your own hybrid character. You could swap skills in and out at the beginning of each instance. (And before you enter a pvp arena)But only of those of your 2 classes.
So if anyone is worried about the whole not adding to skills anymore, if you played GW you'd realize it's awesome and a great way to allow people to customize their character so everyone isn't just walking around with the same builds. The problem with D3 though is, there's no dual classes, so like someone said earlier, if you find a cool skill combo someone can easily just copy you granted they have the runes required to change the effect of whichever skills you've changed.
The only problem I see with it is the Rune+Skill System, if they do it right, it'll be a great way to make your character unique from everyone else, but if they do it wrong... everyone is just going to be a clone of one another just like in D2. (There was only like 3-5 builds max each class could even use to be viable for Hell difficulty)
As far as the RMAH (Zomg so much talk about it)
I personally played D2 as a single player and co-op game with friends. I didn't care less if people ran around with the best items in the game that they bought from some chinese farmer so I have no problem with it being used as a way to eliminate 3rd party distributors. If I want to PVP i play a game that is balanced for PVP, not Diablo 2 where my zon could just spam guided arrow off screen over and over with a piercing bow and know that noone could ever kill me. (I know this was eventually nerfed but still, it was extremely overpowered when it existed)
Just play a first person shooter or League of Legends/DoTa/etc if you want good pvp. I'm like 99% sure that PVP in Diablo 3 will be completely unbalanced so there'll be no point in it at all.
BUT
The problem I do see with RMAH is what other people have stated, EVERYONE, well like 90-95% of the population of the game is going to try to sell the best items for only cash. (I noticed this from a Browser game that also had a RMAH combined with an in-game gold AH) Basically forcing anyone who wants any of the good items to either farm it themselves or pay cash for it. While some might think "I got free time, I can just farm it myself" Loot tables are based on luck, so sure you could kill bhaal 100 times but he might never drop the item you want just due to really bad luck. Therefore, in order for hardcore players to get these extremely rare items they should be ready to drop some extra money into the game. I just hope blizzard has multiple items (lets say at least 3 for each class, for each armor/wpn slot) that are all best for certain builds that all have the same drop rate so you'll be able to at least trade/sell a different classes best gear in order to buy your own, because I'm pretty sure none of the best items are going to be sold for gold ever. Hopefully they'll have a diverse amount of rare but godly items and not just "1 Ring that rules them all"
If gold is ONLY used to "Gamble" (like in diablo 2) or only to get more stash slots it'll become an almost pointless in-game resource so cash will become the only thing to use to buy/trade rare items. (Why buy/use gold for only a small chance to get a good rare item when you can pay real money to get the exact item you want)
If the auction house works though, it's going to be a great way for hardcore gamers, even hardcore single-player/co-op only players to make some cash just for doing what they love to do. Gaming of course.
TLDR: How well they balance the game so no class/build/item is extremely overpowered will decide how good this game will be.