
Some things to consider might be how it graded players. Was experience alone the best determinate? What else might have been good to consider alongside it? Some other conditions that it may have been prudent to save and reuse for grading players could be as follows:
- Total number of other players you have beaten.
- Total number of monsters you've killed.
- Total gold value of all items on your character- this may have made non-set and non-unique items more worth saving, since magic, rare, and crafted gear sold for higher gold prices than other gear.
What do you agree with, or conversely, what do you think could be better? Have any other ideas?
How far have you come on the ladder in Diablo II, or do you even bother participating? How have third-party programs affected the ladder system? Would you be more enthusiastic about the ladder if third-party programs weren't as prevalent?
I agree, I think the ladder system was destroyed by the creation of bots.
HOW CAN YOU COMPETE AGAINST A MACHINE???
The best thing would be to measure a persons total contribution, but that is extremely hard to balance. It will most likely become one build that is better than the others. It would also have to be reset fairly often or you will be unable to catch up with other players.
What about tank builds?
Which equals character contribution (death deducts from score)
I have to say that I doubt even Blizzard can pull off a balance like that. Every build of equal power (total effect of damage, defence or support) should have the same point gaining efficiency if played correctly, or otherwise there will be a specific ladder-climb build. It is even harder to balance when you consider multiplayer and several people working together. A Wizard wouldn't want to play with another Wizard because they deal the highest damage and would steal from eachother.
Other than that, I'm fine with the Ladder system just to see who's better. I really hope that D3 won't disappoint me with the Ladder system like in D2.
I will stick to Ladder only options for D3, thats for sure.
The whole ranking by experience system was never important to me be. Obviously, bots kinda killed any fun factor for legit people. You waste a day getting your first character to 80, then wake up the next day and see some bots already run up to 93. The other reason I never really cared for it is simply becuase I never planned to go to 99. Pretty much every character could be "completed" by 95 for 1/100th of the time investment.
The achievement factor for me, has always been in joining a pub baal/chaos run and being strong enough to slaughter everyone, or joining a duel game with a friend and owning the game 2v6, or even a 4v4 with another organized team. I would rather enjoy the satisfaction that my game knowledge, trading abilities, time spent farming/leveling/tweaking builds, and skill at the game allows me to killed the toughest things in the realms, other players. Being part of a game where the ground is littered in ears, but not any of mine, is much more enjoyable then seeing my name on a list, that the only reason I'm there is because I've invested enough time.
What it boils down to for me is, so what if you get a special icon for killing baal 1000x or saving up some amount of gold, any of this grind type stuff to me, just indicates that your willing to put your time in, not that you are actually good at the game. Even as far as pvp tracking, D2 is pretty much build A pwns build B, build B pwns build C, build C pwns build A in 1v1 duels with skilled, well geared players. This would obviously just be heavily taken advantage of, making pretty much every elemental based build worthless for duel ranking.
Achievement is running a fast string of runs and having people ask you for advice after they've seen what you can do. Achievement is pwning someone elses baal run for a good laugh. Achievement is knowing I litter the ground with 30 ears for every 1 of mine I drop. Achievement is finding other players I have a good to playing with, or against. Achievement is enjoying a game where I can be the nicest guy around, or the biggest jerk around, whichever I feel like being that day. Achievement is not my name on a list.
A Little off Topic:
I do think it'd be really sweet if there was some type of arena that would have limitless levels and just continually get harder. Perhaps they could just increase the monsters hp/dmg/immunities/etc...every couple of levels. I see it as a Diablo version of GoW's Horde. Also don't make it stop at lvl 50. Just have it go on forever. Then people are always trying to get farther. It should also keep track of what level you've reached on the arena. As some indication of each players skill/equipment/etc. This would also add to the amount of playing time. I could see myself trying to get as high as possible, then maybe going and doing 'adventures' to level up/find better gear. Then going back to the arena to try and get higher.
Or perhaps it could be some endless dungeon, that just goes farther and farther underground. And enemies get more challenging the farther you go down. But I'd really like to see it be endless because then people would always have something to try and do. "Gotta get to the next dungeon level. Or maybe make it 100 levels but you can only get to level 100 when your character is level 100....I dunno just throwin ideas out there. Sorry for the rant.