I meant to post this over the weekend, but I was busy with some work-related stuff and also with leveling my second wizard to paragon 100.
But Sunday, September 15, 2013 was a special day. Exactly one year has passed since I originally joined Diablofans.com. The event sparked my original enthusiasm for the Diablo community, not just Diablo III (well, yes, my experiences in the original Diablo and Diablo II are limited, but I consider the entire franchise one entity). I posted sporadically on the official forum, but nothing ever really monumental.
Anyway, looking back, I think I came a long way. Here’s my introduction thread.
May 2012 to the end of 2012, I went from casual player rocking 30K DPS running Blizzard and Hydra to cynical-tinfoil-hat-wearing-entitled fool who wanted everything to drop for free to wizard enthusiast to Auction House tycoon to stereotypical I’m-disappointed-in-Blizzard-for-not-giving-us-end-game-content player.
I made really, really stupid decisions, such as buying a rare ring with no attack speed, no crit chance, and no crit damage on the RMAH for $6 and also a crit-less rare source for $50. I made some really awesome AH choices that resulted in huge profits (multiple $250 sales!). I got my multimillion gold drops. I crafted some amazing items. I flipped and flipped. I researched hacking tools and the culture of gold botters out of curiosity (I never took part in any of that, of course). I was nearly scammed dozens of times. I was actually impersonated before (but the guy backed off and disappeared eventually). I got cyber stalked O_O. I chased the DPS leaderboard on Diabloprogress. I chased the PvP score leaderboard as well. I eventually ran out of things to do and just stopped. If you’re not having fun, then why bother playing?
I quit the game once before and, man, it was a difficult decision (see “I’m-disappointed-in-Blizzard-for-not-giving-us-end-game-content”). But I came back. I think I quit for a whole day before I stormed back. I wanted to do more.
From the beginning of 2013 to today, I went from developing a new interest in the game to loving the game to loving the community that sustains the game. I started reaching out to the community way more than I ever had in the past. Had it not been for all the wonderful people and players that I’ve met, I would not be playing this game. Without the game, there’s no community. Without a community, there’s no point for the game to exist. I decided to do my best to juggle working with the community and continuing to play the game as it is. That meant being around pretty much at all times—while working, having lunch, or before turning off the lights to head to bed.
And even when I’m not posting, I’m lurking. Always lurking if not posting.
So after submerging myself in the Diablofans forum, churning out posts like no tomorrow on the official forum, creating a YouTube account here, booting up a Twitter account there, a few Reddit posts later, and taking part in a couple of fan podcasts in between, I still feel like I’m barely scratching the surface. Being a part of Blizzard’s MVP Program—which is still a surprise for me to this day—did help a lot in connecting with other community people, but I still feel like there’s more to be done. While I don’t have too many resources at hand, I’ll continue to do what I have been doing this past year.
With Reaper of Souls on its way, all the impending class changes, complete overhauls, and so much more, I’ll carry on and play my part in supporting Blizzard and their decisions to grant this game improved health and longevity. Simultaneously, of course, I will be supporting the players and all their wonderful endeavors.
I’ll be going to BlizzCon in November with a fellow wizard that I met on the official forum (funny story: we actually found out we live 10 minutes away from each other in real life and we actually share a mutual real-life friend). If anyone else is going, let me know
Thank you, Diablofans. Without this site, who knows where I’d be and what I’d be doing right now.
- EleSaturate
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Jaetch posted a message on Thank You, Diablofans.comPosted in: Diablo III General Discussion -
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Uldyssian posted a message on [SPOILERS] Reaper of Souls Beta Soundtrack (via reddit)https://www.youtube....6p2jS170yvZXewgPosted in: Diablo III General Discussion
http://www.reddit.co...eta_soundtrack/
Sounds awesome Kudos to the sources on this -
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LordBacon_2129 posted a message on Diablo III:RoS release date - Q4. Here is why.Found the release date:Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion
Valentines day 2014 ... -
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WarlockHolmez posted a message on Rewarding the Loot Hunt - Loot 2.0MrMonstrosity has me inspired after reading his post full of suggestions for Blizzard. I've decided to further investigate the issues with the "loot hunt" to discover solutions.Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion
I want to find really rare items and be able to use them! I want to see that orange glow on the ground and know I have something special, to save for specific builds that could take advantage of it, or for other characters.
How many times have you found a top tier item and kept it? Sometimes I find upgrades for Alts, but even then it's usually worth selling them knowing I can always buy a replacement later. We need a reason to keep items we find.
The intent of this post is to balance (Not defeat) Auction House use and Finding Usable Gear from Playing the game yourself.
Link to Diablo 3 General Forums Post:
http://us.battle.net...opic/9793090332
The core issues I feel are:- The AH takes all the fun out of finding useful items.
- Items found while "playing the game" are Auctioned 99.99% of the time to be able to purchase upgrades, via Auction House.
- Finding your own gear and progressing at the rate of the general community is impossible. While this shouldn't necessarily be as fast, the difference is too vast.
- Personally discovered items will be considered "Pristine".
- Pristine Items gain a % bonus to all affixes.
- Pristine Legendaries receive a bonus, special affix.
- When a Pristine item is traded to any other account, it becomes "Worn".
- Worn items contain the original stats of the item.
- A limited number of Pristine Items can be equipped at a time. (possibly)
(This example demonstrates a +20% increase to affixes. Yes, I didn't calculate the %damage change. It would be +58%, therefore the DPS would be even higher. I didn't feel like doing the extra math. :P)
Result:- The best items in the game can only be found by YOU.
- Finding a specific legendary you want will still be rare.
- Finding any legendary may be exciting enough to motivate trying new builds.
- The bonus, legendary affix should have a very unique impact on each item, strongly influencing unique builds. (Better affixes than the one that took me 10 seconds to come up with.)
- Just like in D2, the playtime required for the best legendaries (uniques), could be a very long time, but it WILL be special when YOU find them.
- Collecting gear you find and saving it for later/other builds/characters is possible again.
- Purchasing items off the Auction House will still be critical and convenient for quick upgrades and finding/trading gear required for your specific builds.
- The loot hunt becomes exciting again!
- This is the only solution I can see (or something similar) to having loot YOU find to occasionally be better than what you might be able to buy in the Auction House.
- High end gear will still be extremely expensive on the Auction House. It's not like a perfect item for each slot will drop for you right away, if ever.
- Possibly lowering the drop rate of Legendaries could make them feel more special, with this system in place.
- The items we find need to be stronger than traded/auctioned items, or the AH will win every time.
Criticism:
There has been lots of positive feedback so far as well as some good constructive criticism. I want to discuss some of the criticism and how it might not turn out how it sounds.
The main strongest criticism seems to be that luck will become an even stronger factor with this system in place. That players who find high-end legendaries will be pushed too far ahead. I believe an opposite effect would occur.
High-end drops will always be great (with Pristine or without). But all the low/average value drops won't be and are usually trashed. But with the Pristine system, those items have a chance. Those items also drop much more frequently than the rare, high-end items. Therefore, more lower-end players will be pushed closer to the high-end players because of the frequency of drops. This will actually help close the gap, not expand it, therefore reducing Luck as a factor.
Example:
For every one 1500 dps Skorn that drops, one-hundred 1300 dps Skorns drop (estimating, wouldn't be surprised if it's more). In the current system, the one player gets a great weapon OR great trade, the others get vendor trash. With Pristine, the one player gets a top of the line weapon OR a good trade, and the 100 others get useful items too, possibly many of them gaining decent upgrades, shortening the gap between high and low geared players.
Another very important point here is that lower geared players will be able to close the gap slightly on high-geared players through playing the game. It won't be an instant jump like if they upped general loot quality in a patch, because you won't be able to get the upgrades instantly through the Auction House, it will take time.
+1 if you like the general idea! I see a lot of positive responses, but not enough +1s! -
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overneathe posted a message on Nephalem TrialsHis charity thing is very legit and he's the number 1 donating streamer. He won a few hundred thousand, I believe, on poker and from what I remember donated everything, not 100% sure anymore. He also does science research and so on. Also spends the majority of his time theorycrafting so that he can then troll masterfully. To truly troll you first have to know something to perfection and he is the king of it.Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion -
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Edriel posted a message on Nephalem TrialsSo I was on the american forum when I saw this:Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion
As you can see there is a response from Grimiku.
The thread is this: http://us.battle.net...opic/9728912961
Luckly I was fast enough to read his post but not fast enough to get a screenshot of it, because it's now deleted.
I can assure everything I'm gonna say is what I've seen with my own eyes.
Basically Grimiku explained what Nephalem Trials are.
For the "lore side" they are places "guarded" by Ancestal Nephalems while for the "gameplay side" they are portals that the player can find around whole Sanctuary.
When the player gets in he has to do a trial and the rewards are based on the difficulty of the trial itself and on the "player's efficiency".
Does it reminds you something?
Well.. it reminds me of this: http://www.diablofan...-hells-portals/
Burning hells portals... oh yeah -
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shaggy posted a message on Loot 2.0 and AH predictionsPosted in: Diablo III General DiscussionQuote from Zero(pS)
Less items, better item quality = perfect for more AH usage, not less.
Enchanting will make use of the bad drops, but once you got average gear all those "Smart Drops" will go straight to the AH, and so will the improved Legendaries (maybe with the ridiculous guaranteed baseline stats all over again?).
And then the gear quality baseline will skyrocket again, and again we will be left with the feeling that what we find isn't "worth it" because there's thousands of items better than those for 50k gold on the AH. And anyone who isn't on the top-notch gear quality will resort to the AH to upgrade to the current "baseline quality". It's easier to spend 15 dollars and be at the average quality for farming MP 5-7 easily than manually farm the lower MPs for gold.
There is only one real way to fight that feeling. There is still some hope in Blizzcon, but I doubt they will focus on that. The current dev team doesn't seem able to see the root of the problem.
None of that matters if the self-found experience is rewarding.
I don't need/want 500k DPS and 12903821903821 million EHP.
What I need/want is to be able to find enough gear to move forward in the game on my own. I'm not in a race with anyone. I don't care if someone else uses the AH and "wins" the game faster. All I want is for the self-found experience to be good enough that I can immerse myself and truly feel like I can tackle the game on my own if I so choose.
As long as the self-found experience is rewarding many people will forget the AH exists and it won't matter what the AH kids are doing and they can keep having fun with what they find to be fun. -
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Zero(pS) posted a message on Reaper of Souls (Spoiler?)Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion -
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Bagstone posted a message on Loot 2.0, discovering its true potential.A few days of vacation, you come back, and this happens. Well, almost everything has been said. Some of the complaints are just about the numbers - but who cares, you can always tweak numbers. Also, just pictures don't make good suggestion threads. I wasn't too thrilled on the previous threads, for example. But this is great because:Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion
1) Having achievements that give an in-game advantage (and not just useless sigils) and that are only obtainable by playing the game for a long time (and not just buying items off the AH) is great. Achievements usually don't appeal to me because I get nothing out of them rather than a new banner design (and I couldn't care less about that).
2) The new idea for NV stacks for MF and removing MF from gear and paragon is brilliant. Yes, high DPS players could play MP10 really fast and get stacks faster and so on, but they can do now as well. Besides, it's also a question of number tweaking. High DPS players should always have an edge, because high DPS is what you aim for in this game, but right now it's just about getting to p100 (which is a long and boring grind of "efficiency" and the majority isn't there yet, probably isn't even interested) and then playing on high MP for the extra bonus item drop chance and killing really fast. But despite the fact that mob density made almost all areas rewarding to play through, we're still not quite there yet, and the 1.08 changes even lead to many people ignoring NV5 stacks altogether. Your NV/MF idea is the ultimate way to "force" everyone to do entire playthroughs. Start act 1 quest 1, play until you kill Diablo, rinse and repeat. And let Diablo drop an extra guaranteed legendary if you killed 90% of all elite packs along the way or so. Some exploration bonus, I don't know.
This thread just made my head explode of new ideas and was not only the usual boring "add Mystic enchant xy" stuff. -
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MrMonstrosity posted a message on Loot 2.0, discovering its true potential.Posted in: Diablo III General Discussion
Rarity
If you ask any veteran Diablo player what their most memorable moment was from a past Diablo game, more often than not it will involve a story about the time when a certain rare item dropped for them. Whether that drop was a legendary (unique) item which was statistically next to impossible to find, a high rune needed to craft an amazing runeword, or even just a legendary item with perfect stats, the feeling was pretty much all the same (alright.. finding something like a Windforce, Zod rune, or Tyrael’s Might was a little different haha). Players could probably even go as far as recalling the time of day, act, zone, or monster that dropped that particular item, it was that memorable. How can we give this same nostalgia feeling back to the items in Diablo III?
Drop Rates
Drop rates have changed dramatically since release. I remember when the game was first launched I had almost leveled up two characters to max level before seeing my first legendary drop. I didn't really mind the low drop rates (even though the items were usually worse than rares), but it was a huge change compared to Diablo II where you couldn't finish the first Act on normal without seeing one drop. Where Diablo II had all items available in the hardest difficulty, Diablo III did things differently by splitting them up between four difficulties. This severely limited the amount of legendary items which could be found.
The good news is there is a change coming in loot 2.0 which which will make all legendary items available in every difficulty. I don't need to dive into all the details regarding this as many people are already aware of them, but what I want to talk about is the new possibilities this opens up. Possibilities in regards to drop rates. What I'd love to see now is the shift back to different drop rates inside each item type. I wouldn't mind the statistically impossible drops if it was offset by the fact that there were other, more common items available.
For example, let's take a look at legendary two-handed swords. Currently in patch 1.0.8 if we were to find a legendary two-handed sword in Inferno difficulty it would could only be one of 4 possibilities. With the new change that number will now increase to a possible 9, more than double the previous amount. We now have enough items in the same item type to afford to have substantially different drop rates.
(numbers are just for show)
The difficult part is balancing drop rates alongside the Auction House. In Diablo II the rarest item of them all, Tyrael's Might, had the highest chance to drop from the last boss in the game. Do you know what that drop rate was? A staggering 1:409,739 (0 Magic Find / 1 player game). Considering there was no Auction House available in Diablo II, even seeing one on another player was a feat of it's own. If Blizzard tried to make an item equivalent to that in Diablo III the drop rate would probably need to increase to something in the millions due to the Auction House.
Something could also be added to increase the excitement and also help people recognize the rarity of the item visually. Something as subtle as a different particle effect in the legendary's beam of light would go a long way to recognize when something truly special dropped. I don't know about you but if I saw an unidentified two-handed sword on the ground with a sparkling beam like The Grandfather's below I'd be jumping out of my seat in excitement.
How cool would that be, especially for new players or the less informed to know how rare their drop was without running to the Auction House to check the prices. What do you think the order in rarity is of the legendary helms below?
In one of the recent developer interviews Travis day is heard saying that he wants to create items that will be remembered. He even goes on to compare the impact of the items he hopes to create to that of World of Warcraft's Legendary sword, Thunderfury. I just pray that the reason he's using Thunderfury as an example isn't just for the sole reason it was powerful but also that not everyone had one and that it took not just a lot of hard work to get but even just plain luck. It wouldn't have had near as much impact if everyone on the server was running around with it, people knew of you and your guild if you were lucky enough to receive one, that's the reason it was remembered.
While I'm on this topic I'm going to also going to mention my own opinion in regards to the transmogrification system which might be making it's way into Diablo III. Don't include legendary items. The unique models are just as much of the reason as the unique properties as to why they can be labeled as a legendary. Do what you want with rares, but please leave legendary items out of it. If you absolutely think legendary items need to be included than at least connect the ability to do so with only the items your character has personally identified, at least that would help keep the integrity of the rarest items.
So please Blizzard, I beg, move away from the only thing rare about an item being the combination of random properties to the actual item itself.
Rewarding the Hunt
At the heart of the Diablo series lies the single most important aspect of the game, the hunt for items. It's the search for rare items which makes us stay up all hours of the night killing demon after demon, hoping for that one special drop.
Since the introduction of the Auction House the hunt for items has changed, instead of hunting for items in the game world we're now instead supposed to hunt for deals on the Auction House. Players are rewarded more for sitting outside the game than actually killing monsters. The Auction House isn't going away, so how can we give incentive to those that actually play the game?
Recognition for Discovery
This idea I haven't seen pop up anywhere and I've had stuck in my head since my days of playing Diablo II and I think has a lot of merit as a feature in terms of both game play longevity and progression. The idea first came to me doing Act 3 Mephisto runs one night playing Diablo II a long time ago. As cheesy as it might be I used to keep a pen and paper at my desk to write down what unique items I'd find during my play session, something that I could not only use to brag about to my younger brother but also something I could use to record my own collection of items (pen and paper achievements...lol).
The idea would be to connect a bonus, most likely in the form of small stat increases, to the discovery of items. It's such a simple idea and one I feel would change the game for the better. In the example below I used the achievement layout to showcase the idea.
Notice how I used the word "identify"? This would be such a simple way to ensure that people couldn't just buy every single item off the AH to reap all of the benefits, players would now rewarded for playing the game not the Auction House. The bonus wouldn't have to be huge, just a little something to be recognized for the effort (or luck) put in to obtaining items. Sure someone could buy or trade for unidentified items outside the AH but it would be much harder to do, especially if they adjusted the drop rates accordingly.
So maybe you're rocking a Maximus and you find a Warmonger, wouldn't it be cool if by just finding a weapon of the same type you just increased your two-handed sword damage by 1%. Better yet, if the bonuses were account wide similar to achievements, you could find something on your Barbarian that could potentially give a small boost to another class. I think this idea is great in terms of progressing your character as you play the game. As another added bonus for identifying an item, and if the transmogrification feature existed (which I hope it never does) would be to allow that item's model to be applied to another item of the same type.
This next addition is for all you lore junkies and collectors out there. With being a game designed completely around cool items why don't we know more about the history of them? There's an entire in-game journal which for the most part is completely ignored. Why not make a section for all the cool items we find?
I don't know about you but there's so many items like the Grandfather that I'd like to know more about. I'm sure the writers at Blizzard could throw us a bone, the Diablo story is rich with lore.
Magic Find
Ah, the stat everyone loves and hates at the same time. Just like it was in Diablo II, Magic Find is a very valuable stat. So much that people were actually switching to an entirely different gear set just to boost it as high as possible before landing the killing blow on elites and champions. Blizzard's fix, the addition of Paragon levels to slowly make the need for Magic Find on items obsolete as a player progressed to level 100. Sure this was a great bonus to have and fixed the need to swap gear but it also created an entirely new problem, punishment to play anything other than your character with the highest Paragon.
Something that struck me by surprise is a recent quote taken from the recent Blizzard Developer Interview with Diablofans:
Originally Posted by Travis Day (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
We've definitely talked about things like taking Paragon and decoupling it from your character specifically and making it something that is more account-over working. So that any time you invest in the game is rewarded and you don’t feel like we’re taking anything away from you if you want to try new characters or try out different play styles within the game.
I used to think the same way as Travis, I've always wanted to try out some other classes other than my barbarian but there was something always holding me back, something called Paragon levels. Was it the slight boost in primary stats stopping me from switching to a different character? Nope, it was the thought of all the loot I would be missing out on if I didn't have my valuable Magic Find which Paragon levels granted me. I would easily trade 300 of my primary stat to jump on a different character for a night, but when it came down to missing out on the potential for loot, nope not a chance.
I think it would be completely wrong of Blizzard to make Paragon levels account wide. Paragon is meant to provide players who've reached level 60 an extended progression system, don't shorten that to 1/5th of the time needed by requiring only one character to reach Paragon 100. Instead, bare with me on this one, why don't we remove Magic Find from items and Paragon levels. Wow, do you feel that? That's called freedom, the freedom to play any character you want now and not have to sacrifice loot.
So, if we no longer get our beloved Magic Find from either items nor Paragon levels where do we get it now? Well, what if we moved it all into Nephalem Valor and tried something like this:- Remove the NV cap size of 5
- Cap Magic Find at 500% for every character
- Award different values of Magic Find per stack of NV depending on the Monster Power
- Earn NV at any level, not just at level 60
- Lose a stack of NV for every death
- De-emphasize the need for Magic Find in general
Simple changes right? But lets look at what issues we may have just solved:- Rewards players for playing at a higher Monster Power (reach MF cap faster)
- Rewards players for staying in one game and playing through all acts
- Lower level characters have the same chance at finding legendary items
- No longer punished for playing low Paragon characters (No MF)
- Stops high MP leachers (if they keep dying it's not worth it)
- Might help somewhat to combat bots
- Players shouldn't need to get to max MF to find good items, sure it should help but not as much as it does currently.
(the new "Magic Find"?)
Crafting
Crafting has such huge potential to be one of the most interesting parts of Diablo III. Not only that but it might be the only way to fix the economy in it's current state. A little over a year into the game and we can already see the hyper inflation resulting from a game with no proper item or gold sinks. So, what can be done to crafting to get and keep a healthy economy?
Salvaging
Something absolutely needs to be done to make salvaging items more desirable. Yeah there's Brimstones, but I'm not sure why Blizzard decided to make them have a 100% chance of being salvaged from legendary items. I guess It probably made sense back when legendary items were actually hard to find at release, but when they increased the drop rates they should have also removed the 100% salvage chance.
I've already suggested this idea before regarding new types of Brimestone's but I'd like to mention it again. The idea is that by salvaging legendary items they'd have a small chance to produce a type of Brimstone depending on the elemental type of the item that's being salvaged. Maybe even tie in the rarity of the legendary item being salvaged to the chance of producing one.
Make these also be part of crafting recipes for all of the artisans. Obviously crafting recipes as a whole need help before this could even be implemented but I'm sure we'll see that happen along with loot 2.0. It would definitely increase the amount of legendary items being removed from the economy.
Legendary Crafting Materials
In Diablo II we had Runes which were the primary crafting reagent. Runes ranged from the very commonly found to the near impossible to find. Blizzard really needs to introduce similar crafting reagents in loot 2.0. They obviously can't be called runes, as those already exist in the form of Skill Runes, but they need to exist in some other form. They need to be something that we can find out in the game world by killing things and more importantly be highly valued in the crafting system.
I think I've found the perfect place for them to drop.
You may recall coming across monsters with purple name plates and unique names during your play sessions. What are they you ask? Your answer is as good as mine, the only thing they're linked to right now is an achievement. Sure some of them are obviously in the game for a laugh, Jay Wilson comes to mind, but for the most part they just exist for no reason at all. Why don't we give them a reason to exist? Blizzard could toss those rare crafting materials on their loot table with a very tiny drop rare and put them to good use. Beef them up a bit in terms of health and damage similar to Keywardens and they'd be perfect. Give them a little bit more randomness in their spawn locations so they can't be easily farmed and you'd have a very nice feature.
There's 82 named unique monsters as part of the acheivement "A Unique Collection", giving them all a chance to drop a unique crafting reagent would be an amazing way to spice up crafting. Throw on a Bind to Account similar to Demonic Essence and you'd really have people out in the world playing the game like it was meant to be played.
If you're anything like me your stash and bags are already really full of items that you couldn't possibly fathom the idea of more crafting materials. This next idea is to help all of us hoarders get a little breathing room.
This would be so welcome, having separate inventories for weapons and armor, crafting materials, gems, and the upcoming mystic artisan. Make picking up items automatically place them in the right inventory and you would have probably one of the most welcome features to many people alike.
While we're at it let's go ahead and clean up something I wish was never implemented in the first place... 15 gem versions. Blizzard should reduce the number of types found in the first 3 difficulties to one each, there's not really any point in having more.
Removing these steps in gem progression could be countered by just decreasing the drop rates accordingly. While we're talking about gem drop rates I don't see why we can't just have all gem grades be drop-able, but with increasingly low drop rates. At least that would give self-found players a chance at getting to the higher versions. It's not like upgrading gems is good gold sink anyways, we can definitely find a better one.
The Mystic
Everybody knows she's coming in the expansion but just how she'll work is still a mystery. The mystic might have features like crafting elixirs or potions, but she'll most definitely be involved in some type of item upgrading or enhancement feature. I tried my best to come up with a solution that not only works in terms of item progression, but also something to become the main item and gold sink for the game.
It was very hard trying to come up with an idea on just how her features should work. You obviously want to avoid making it so players only have to find one item and then just keep upgrading it until it's the best item in the game. That's why I didn't include a way to reroll item properties in my version of the mystic. I think by not allowing the re-roll of item properties it should at least still give reason for players to seek out upgrades. Instead my version focuses on only upgrading the originally rolled stats on an item. These stats could be upgraded to it's max potential value, but only for an increasingly amount of gold as it gets near max value. Take a look at the example below to see how upgrading this helm's Critical Hit Chance would work.
If you noticed above by placing the item you wish to upgrade in the mystic's menu you are shown the max value of the properties which already exist on the item. By clicking on each property you'd be presented with the required materials and cost to upgrade the stat. The idea is for different stats to be upgraded using different crafted materials, materials being a combination of both Bind on Account and tradable materials. This would ensure someone couldn't just buy all the crafting materials off the AH and upgrade to a perfect item, they'd be forced to play the game in order to collect the BOA items similar to Demonic Essence.
The next thing you may have noticed is the cost associated with upgrading the Critical Hit Chance on the helm by .5%. The number is meant to be big, this cost will be the main gold sink in the game and most likely a cost most min/maxers would be willing to pay to upgrade an item. The most interesting concept however is one that you can't see in the picture above. The concept being as you gradually upgrade your stats on an item the monetary costs associated with the upgrades also increases.
In the example above you can see how the closer the value moves to it's maximum potential, the higher the cost associated with the upgrade. This in some way mimics how the current gem progression system works that we all use Diablo III.
Legendary Items
This is the biggie and one of the additions I'm most excited for from loot 2.0. The developers, more specifically Travis Day, have already stated that they want to make game changing legendary items. Game changing in terms of the way items interact with skills, passives, and gearing choices.There probably will be a couple different types of items that will make up the this whole concept, lets explore some.
Class specific legendary items and set bonuses have the most potential when it comes to items that change the way skills and passives work. Really, it's the only option since putting skill changing properties on an item type available to all classes would be pointless seeing how skills are unique to each class.
In the expansion I can't see any classes getting any additional Skill Runes. What I could see though is a new empty rune slot being added.
What rune belongs to this slot you may ask? Well the answer is, it depends on the items you're using!
When I was originally trying to determine just how adding new Skill Rune effects on items should work I didn't have the empty rune slot. The problematic scenario I kept running into was, what if someone didn't want to use the new Rune Skill being offered by the item? Would they have to just shun that item out of their possible gear choices and find something else? That's where the idea of an empty Skill Rune slot came from, now when equipping an item with a new rune variation they wouldn't be forced to use it anymore, they'd have the choice of turning it off/on just like any other Skill Rune.
The beauty of a system like this is that it offers a huge depth in game play compared to the current system. Currently in the game once you hit level 60 you're done discovering your skills. With a system like this even at level 60 you could keep discovering new builds depending on what items you've found. Remember the idea of super rare items I talked about above? Imagine playing the game for a year and finally getting your hands on one of those super rare items with a sweet new Rune Skill, your entire play style or build could change to something completely different. It would make the game feel so fresh, people wouldn't be able to just run to the forums, look up the best build, and be done with swapping skills forever. Instead new builds would constantly be discovered that not everyone would have access to right away. This idea could even go further, what if a new build needed not only 1 but even 2 or 3 new Rune Skills only available on items. Combining gear to make new builds, who'd have thought? If Blizzard added even one new item to the game at a later point it could have the potential to create entirely new builds.
The next type of item I'll touch on is the also made to be for class specific items.
These could directly add new bonuses to passive skills or skills themselves. In the example above I gave a direct bonus to the Barbarian passive skill, Brawler. That seems pretty simple on it's own but what I hope you all noticed is the twist at the end which reads "within Pickup Radius". Hmm did I just make a once useless stat potentially sought after by the Barbarian class?
What I hope you all take away from this example is that we don't need to be so focused on making every single affix as good as one another. Lets make items do the work in making this happen. Imagine if there was a shield that changed the way Thorns damage worked and allowed stacking it to be viable, or a mace that made stacking as much armor as possible increase the damage of one of your skills. The possibilities are endless here and I really hope these are the type of ideas Travis Day is working on.
The next, and final type of legendary item that we could see wouldn't really have anything to do with Runes or skills at all. Instead these items would focus on providing unique new ways to play and gear your character. Imagine if you found the Girdle of Giants below.
Pretty cool eh? Some might think it doesn't change much because of the reduced damage, and really it might not do much in terms of directly increasing your overall damage. It might not even look like it would be better than today's Witching Hour which has amazing damage stats. It instead does something else, it opens up how many choices the Barbarian has in possible weapon choices. This one item added hundreds of different combinations of weapons. Maybe some of these combinations have the potential to create a new build, the possibilities could be endless. This is just the result of one new belt, imagine if other similar type items existed.
[saving this area for showcasing my legendary item thoughts]
In Conclusion
If you made it this far in my crazy long post I salute you and thank you very much for taking the time to look over my ideas. As you can see I'm very passionate when it comes to Diablo in general, especially when it comes to the hunt for items. I think by working together, the Diablo community and Blizzard, we'll finally get to the point where we can call Diablo III the greatest ARPG every created.
Thank you.
If you haven't checked out my other posts please feel free to look them over and let me know what you think.
http://www.diablofan...review-a-dream/ (old ideas, but still an interesting read)
http://www.diablofan...-dream-fanmade/ (pretty cool idea for a variation of the classic ladder system)
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There's more of us out there.
/brofist
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That said, I must say I am intrigued by the things coming in the next few months. If the team keeps working hard and stays on the right course, we just might get an awesome product and a worthy Diablo sequel by the end of this year. Yay.
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I believe that Blizzard should focus most of their time solely on Inferno, and I'm more in favor of the infinite wave-like events. Let's say Jar of Souls, but not nearly as boring, and much more challenging. Diablo 3 really lacks good meaningful quests and fun events. Everything they did was bland and as simple as it gets. People were right to expect more from Blizzard, at least in that part of the game design.
We'll most probably get to see a lot more of the goblin lore in the next expansion, perhaps even venture into their domain, but I hardly think they'll add anything drastic before that.
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Agreed. Charms were kind of terribly implemented, mostly useless and occupying so much of the already small inventory space. Reducing the soft cap is a more logical and faster way to approach the ressistance issue than creating a whole new game mechanic which would deal with the charms in the correct way.
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But you wrote it in direct response to me when I said that the hate is indeed extremely over exaggerated, didn't you? In that context it could have easily been read as your own view, because you don't actually need to write 'my hate' to make it appear so.
I admit I haven't read your other posts before that one, and given the circumstances I can't see how I could have interpreted your post in this thread any differently. Because I also have a lot of issues with Diablo 3, but I haven't been seen writing how brainwashed people are for loving the game as it is right now.
Either way, you are wrong. Hate is not valid if no valid reasons are presented for it's existence. A person has a right to feel that way about basically anything, sure, but that alone doesn't make it valid to the rest of the people around him.
If I say to the whole world that I simply loathe dandelions and bees, and present no logical, sane arguments to support my claim, while running around the streets with yellow flowers in my hair and honey dripping from my lips for days on end, people would just call me batshit crazy and move along with their lives.
The same goes for D3. Yes, we all waited a long time for it, and it arrived pretty unfinished. Yes, the itemization is semi-broken, lack of PvP is very much felt, and the cheap prices on the AH hurt the overall feel of accomplishment when you finally find a great item for yourself. No one denies that. The flaws are very much present and obvious, and will hopefully be taken care of in the near future.
But if you spend dozens or hundreds of hours on a game in it's first month from release (which vast majority of the people have already), how can you call it bad/mediocre and expect not to be exposed to ridicule?
You've already played it longer than most of all those amazing games that you've experienced in your life, ever. That alone makes it great, and proves that both gameplay and replayability, the two most important aspects in gaming, are spot on.
Diablo 3 is a freaking dungeon crawler. I don't know what else people expected from it. There is just so much that you can do with the formula without breaking it, and they clearly improved upon the franchise from the previous installments. It certainly is not a vast, open world MMO, and no, it is not made to be played 24/7 without getting bored. Practically no game in history can claim that kind of immersion.
But if Diablo 3 can indeed be classified as just mediocre, than I don't know what kinds of mind-blowing games you've been playing all these years.
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And reviews aren't subjective at all... riiight.
D3 also got 9.5 on IGN, but you don't care mentioning that. The game IS flawed but it really is not nearly as bad as some people are claiming it to be. It is better than D2 and D1 combined, and is yet to receive it's first major patch.
All the hate is extremely over exaggerated.