DiabloFans

MTX are a necessary evil. If they're cosmetic only.

What I don't like about MTX is that I'd rather all that cool art / pets just be in the game as something very rare to find. However since they obviously need to continually make money to support the game, then sure do pets / mounts.

3/15/2022

They kind of had this in D2. For example the beds in the abandoned houses would drop loot if you click on them, but they didn't highlight or have a name, you just clicked them to move and pop, loot.

Runes and runewords provide a LOT of different, good things to the game.

End game chase items, some very very rare so something to look forward to dropping.

A form of trading currency, since some were so rare and they'd be taken out of the economy by being used.

Could have potentially been a form of mystery, with a new runeword being something to hunt for.

Had another use besides being used as a whole runeword - gave player options for adding small stat increases in their gear.

I'm personally pretty disappointed in how their systems are being developed so far. I think they got the art right, and I'm sure combat feels good, but that's about it. I don't want to get all hyperbolic, but I'm REALLY insulted they are choosing to call this system 'Runewords'. A trigger and effect system? Sure. But they chose to cannibalize such a beloved part of D2, and something people have been begging for?

For D4 I believe they've said cross play / platform would be nice but no plans, so I'm assuming no.

Not to be all negative but there are a couple worrisome things I've seen so far;

Minor things;

Not super stoked about 3 tiers of legendaries; Legendary, ancient and mythic or whatever they were. That's essentially the exact same system as what's in D3 currently, and while I didn't catch whether a legendary can drop in all 3 states or not, it still creates the same problem of 'a leg dropped, however it's not mythic or at least ancient so that sucks'. Also SOJ has been dropping as a regular legendary in the demo, so if it can't be mythic then that's just wasted potential.

More major things;

Very, very small amount of stats on items so far. Not a fan of an item just giving more 'attack' and 'defense', and hey it's got 3% attack speed. If that's really how it's going to be stat-wise, they've made it on par with D3, yet even more boring. Armors just have 'Attack' and 'defense', Weapons don't have damage ranges, or attack speeds, just a single 'weapon attack' rating. Didn't see anything about resistance stats on gear, let alone anything defense wise such as dodge / block / parry / resistance. Worrisome as a whole so far for actual items.

Runewords! God damnit I have to say this one just really irritates me. They ALLLMOST got it right, one of the funnest gear / drops from D2, because man when I saw runes drop in the demo I actually cheered. However they've said a couple times that 'runewords' exist, but really what they mean is you can socket a trigger and an effect. That is NOT runewords my dudes, and what's frustrating is you can have both this new rune system, while STILL creating hidden items found through using specific runes in a specific order. The existence of this system almost certainly means there wont' be extremely rare runes for chase drops either.

No character stat screen currently. I haven't found anything saying this is just a WOP which means that currently, D4 is the LEAST complicated game out D2 / 3 / 4 by miles. The 'stat screen' so far is literally 3 stats at the bottom of the character page, attack defense and life. I'm pretty there's mobile games with more then that.

The MMO aspect. It's one of those ideas that sounds cool at first, but doesn't hold up after you talk about it. Can you turn it off? What about any sort of community created challenges, which will be ruined by the rng of having random players just in your game world? Giant outdoor bosses are awesome, but HAVING to have a party / random players just personally sucks. Make the bosses super difficult, I'm for that 100%, but not mandatory party bosses.

Crafting. Unless I'm just 100% wrong about how stats will be at launch, I don't see crafting in D4 being good at all. Hell, as it stands now, D3's crafting is better simply because of more stats to choose from / balance.

Drop rate and rare gear. Again, if things stay the course we'll once more have a Diablo game where rare items are absolutely worthless in the end game, and serve only as gold / crafting mat fodder. With such few stats, there won't be any 'downsides' to wearing only legendaries, and with 3 tiers of legendaries plus sets, I just can't believe them when they say they won't be raining constantly.

No mimimap overlay, just a full map and a small corner one. Do I have to say more?

So I'm excited D4 finally got an announcement, but now I'm anxious to see how it turns out.

Edit; Rhykker's video states that it sounds like max level will be 40 currently. That's just... I mean there's a proven formula that's worked for years; Max level 99 or 100, and the last 10 or so are for the hardcore people who play the most, because you end up in the end game around 70 +. Cmon Blizz, dont' 'leave room' for expansions, this isn't WoW and we don't need level increases for expansions.

I've had some major contention with the way loot works in D3 for years now. So, here's a quick wish list of things I want Blizzard to avoid in a D4;

1) Rares being useless. The philosophy that rares *can* be as good in a slot as a unique I originally hated before D3 launched. Having been 7 years, and having played poe for a couple years now, I realize it's actually a very smart idea. Getting that perfect stat-ed, perfect rolled rare can actually be in itself a chase item, leaving something to look forward to dropping.

2) Main stat + Vit on every unique. Why even have these stats exist if they're on EVERYTHING. There's a good way to balance uniques, and that is to make a unique item be rolled around it's unique effect, while missing stats that something like a rare item could offer. This chest is amazing because of XYZ unique effect, but it's missing vitality, or resistance, so now I have a choice and a trade off.

3) Uniques 'power' being an absolute mandatory buff to a skill. This actually creates SO many problems. Firstly, you now HAVE to have this unique if you want to use a certain skill. Oh you really like this skill? Well unless you've obtained the power bracelet of 900% damage to that skill, why even try to use it? Secondly, now you don't get a choice of anything else in that slot. Thirdly, this is actually one of the root problems of having uniques rain all day long in D3, because players NEED that item to even enjoy using a skill.

4) Set bonuses in general. Really just read #3 on why these have been badly implemented in D3, the issues are the same; mandatory items that eat up slots that you HAVE to have to be effective. While I'll only miss them if they aren't in D4 on a nostalgic level, there IS a way to balance their power. The amount of pieces would have to be lowered in my opinion, probably 3 in total such as jewelry / armor / weapon. But the real balancing would be the set bonus. Take Tal Rasha set. You *could* have the set bonus be something that players can form their own builds around, such as taking the convention of elements buff and putting that on the Tal Rasha set; "you gain 30% damage to an element until you use a skill that matches that element, and then it rotates to the next element. These elements are Fire, Cold, and Lightning." Doesn't lock you into a skill, doesn't force you to 'wait for a window'. Just a suggestion.

5) Current Crafting. D3's crafting is just... not engaging. It's far too simple. Honestly just copy + pasting the way POE handles crafting would work. That system, while complicated at first, works VERY well to balance the line between deterministic crafting and RNG. You could change the currency orb system to where you have the same options, but at the bench and they would just cost different amounts of dropped mats.

6) Stats. D3 uses main stats to tell players who gets to wear what items. Vitality is also on everything, making both of these just a shoulder shrug when you see them. There's also a huge problem with resistances. Why on earth it was decided to add complication to resistances is beyond me. Not only does it create something that's harder to balance since the max resistances can vary so wildly, it's also confusing without a good reason. Is 97 to all resis good? I don't know, I have 19,000 resis!

'Main' stats need to instead provide the same bonus to every class, which in turn makes them sought after depending on what build you're trying to make. Instead of 'oh I'm a Demon Hunter, I have to stack dex', the player could instead say 'I want to play my Demon Hunter differently, so I'll stack strength for armor', without wrecking their damage because they didn't use the stat they 'have to'.

7) Gold pieces as currency. D3's currency is gold, and that system just flat out does not work. First off, in an effort to balance the fact that the only currency drops from the very first act of the game in the same form as the end game, you start off with 1-3 gold pieces dropping, and end up with millions in the end game. Second problem, it's easily farmed by bots, because it always drops. It's also not 'taken out of the economy' with any great rate. People just accrue more and more.

A quick suggestion would be to replace gold as it currently is, with a variety of single drop items that are fairly rare. A gold bar could drop (hypothetically a rare occurrence even at the end game) that would actually have value. It could have multiple uses; using it on an item could re-roll the stats. It could be used in crafting for the highest end crafts. It could be used to augment whatever rift / map style end game we get to make it more difficult / give better rewards. Anyone who's played POE might notice I just essentially suggested chaos orbs or exalted orbs, and for good reason; that system kicks ass. Not only would something like this be constantly pulled out of the economy because of it's multiple uses, it also introduces a very badly needed item in the form of a currency to trade with.

8) Dropped items that are just armor / weapons. There needs to be more then *just* armor and weapons to drop. The above mentioned currency item is a start. I'd also add even rarer types of the gold bar I suggested, such as say Crystal Orbs, Unobtainium Chunks, you name it.

We can actually take a look back at D2 for this category; Gems dropped, Runes, Charms, and Jewels. This all adds to the ever important part of a loot based ARPG; 'what could drop next'. POE has a dropped item, the divination card. They're essentially pieces to a whole item, with varying rarity. Sure the chances of that awesome giant 2 handed greatsword dropping are very low, but hey you've found 3/7 of the cards that'l turn into it. Maybe you could trade some players for the other cards? Adding a system of 'pieces' of an item could be another fun thing to add to this category.

9) D3's Gambling. A fun side mechanic from D2, but it's my opinion that it's FAR too prevalent in D3. That of course is just another symptom of D3 HAVING to drown you in uniques because otherwise builds won't work. It could be kept in D4 for sure, but I would make it pretty expensive to do so, so it's not spammable, keeping it leaning towards it's use from D2.

10) Ancient uniques. The idea that 'yay omg this awesome weapon dropped..... buuuuuut it's not its super mega rad elder void touched sun forged ancient version' just sucks. There's no good reason to carry this system over, because there shouldn't be a situation where we NEED to introduce power creep.

11) Not having Runewords. I, let it be known, LOVE runewords. It adds SO MUCH to the game! Hear me out. First, runes introduce chase items. Those highest end runes are what we dreamed of dropping back in D2 days. Secondly it's a pseudo deterministic system of getting an item since you get to choose which runeword to make, and what base item to use it in. Runes themselves are a form of trading currency. Runes also act on their own to augment gear, so there's a choice between gaining that stat or waiting for that 3 socket shield to drop so you can make that runeword, as an example. It also is an untapped potential for adding actual mystery to the game. Every season could see the introduction of say 1-3 runewords, but the players would have to find out what they are. And if runes cannot be unsocketed then it would be fun seeing if people are willing use their highest runes to try and find out the new runeword.

12) Uniques raining down. I honest to god forgot until this point that they're called legendaries in D3, it's been a quick minute for sure. Either way, I think it can be agreed upon that they need to drop far, far less. For a really, really bad example of what good drop rate would be, lets say it's Friday night and we sit down for a good 5 hours of playing some D4. I'd like to think somewhere in the realm of finding 4-5 during that time would be ideal. That's not accounting for people who will sit by their stash for 3 out of those 5 hours, and also not for the super speed clear people on the other end of that spectrum. I'm sure others would want double or triple that, it's just how I feel on that matter.

There's even more topics to cover, but this a good summery of what I'd personally like to see in that hypothetical D4.

Glad I didn't remove Dfans from my top bar, surprised to check back and it's actually alive

I forget how I found this site. According to my account that was 7 and a half years ago. Man, I checked this site multiple times a day, for YEARRRRSSSS. Getting drip-fed information was excruciating. I won a closed beta key from here, and I remember being absolutely stoked. I remember getting into some heated arguments as well haha. Hell, I defended stuff like the RMAH for awhile even.

I've said my thoughts on D3 awhile back, so no need to re-hash them here. Suffice it to say, my views on Blizzard as a whole have done a 180. It IS very sad to watch your favorite hobby, your favorite pastime wither. And I'm definitely surprised to see Diablofans going away.

I pretty much stopped frequenting this site about two years ago, when I picked up PoE. But it always held a spot in my chrome bar, and once every couple of months it felt like, I'd check in, only to see the latest threads have their last reply be days old.

Sad to see you go Dfans, you will be missed. (Bleu42 on poe / steam).

Quote from Ferret_»

Quote from Magistrate»

Quote from Foensh»

What a load of BS...

This corroborates a lot of developments over the last several years, as well as other independent statements over the last couple months. Anyone that didn't think they were working on 4 were pretty wonky in the head as the writing has been on the wall for some time. That's what made the fact it wasn't announced even more frustrating.

Anyone who thinks a major corporation isn't making a sequel to a franchise that has an install base with nearly 50 million units sold is delusional.

And if Blizzard thinks that scraping a game multiple times and taking 10 years to produce a sequel is "exciting news" for the fans, they're also delusional. The Blizzard Soon meme isn't a sign of quality anymore. Its an indication of "we don't know what we're doing".

Hi Magistrate

I'm curious where you're getting the 50 million units sold number? The most I can find is 30 million, and that's D3 and RoS combined.

Either way I agree with you, Blizzard has no idea what it's doing anymore. They quite literally pulled their top guys from all their games to start working on mobile. So, get ready to not see anything great for the PC for years and years to come.

And here I am just reading through the next POE expansion announcement that'l come out in 3 weeks. The 3rd this year =D

I think you're absolutely right OP. Forgetting a D4 for a second, if Blizzard is for some ungodly reason trying to only stay with D3 for the future, they need to let it's players mod it.

Unfortunately, Blizzard views you all as children; gigantic babies who need their hands held, and there's no freakin way they'd let you add any sort of actual modding.

(side argument, I wouldn't call poe's personal leagues modding. I get what you're saying, but modding is still very very different then choosing some additional difficulty options when making your own league.

"We've been working on something incredible for quite some time that we've all been dying (pun mostly intended) to share with you all." - Nevalistis, blizzcon 2016

See this is why most of us get pissed off. It's like we're in the twilight zone where 'the forges are hot here at blizzard' equals a phone game, and working on 'something incredible for QUITE SOME TIME' equals a 15$ class.

Quote from Skelos_bg»

"The forges here at Blizzard are burning hot, and we have multiple Diablo projects in the works. Some of them are going to take longer than others, but we may have some things to show you later this year."

Rofl, how can some people interpret the bolded text above as not related to D4? What are you hyping with such a video? D2HD and new D3 hero? Why release a video at ALL then? I am starting to think in the direction something came up suddenly and the D4 reveal at Blizzcon 2018 was canceled, but why not announce this BEFORE the Blizzcon map release where Diablo is next to the big stage? Really nothing makes sense atm. And when nothing makes sense in general - there has to be a LIE somewhere. Maybe the last blog post is created to mislead us? But this then would be an awful marketing. What a puzzle this guys made. I am completely lost. It's good the answer will come soonNOTM.

They needed to sell them blizzcon tickets. They know FULL WELL what they were doing. You can't say shit like "The forges here at Blizzard are burning hot, and we have multiple Diablo projects in the works. Some of them are going to take longer than others, but we may have some things to show you later this year." With a smile, and then be confused when people are like 'oh freaking FINALLY a reveal!'.

Their line in the newest post "We know what many of you are hoping for and we can only say that “good things come to those who wait...” could very well be talking about D4. What made my eye twitch though is that it's paiiiiinfully obvious they COULD do a D4 reveal, but they're choosing to play with D3 on the switch instead.

Edit; And if Blizzard rolls out a mobile game, then they've completely lost touch. Might as well make a BR mode while they're at it.

The fact that Blizzard is so god damned scared to talk about ANYTHING related to a 'diablo 4' is fucking frustrating. Wow Blizz, yea D3 on switch so god forbid you talk about anything else otherwise zomg less sales right? If they've been working on a D4 for years, as has been speculated, then they absolutely COULD have done an announcement this Blizzcon.

Brevik is right, Blizzard is being consumed by activision. They're more worried about some god damned switch sales of D3 then they are letting us know diablo isn't dead.

I'm so done being disappointed in Blizzard.