Diablo 3: An Item Shop's Tale

[The great MPinke Torte das Pony.---]

My biggest gripe about the game has been the graphics not being up-to-par. "Witcher 2" or"Skyrim" have graphics I was expecting Blizzard to give us. They've had something like 10 years to work on this, why does it's engine feel like it's still 2008?

Then you don't know Blizzard. They don't do high-end graphics. They want their games to run on as many computers as possible, no matter how old-ass they are. That's why they favour stylized graphics over hardware-demanding stuff.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

Then you don't know Blizzard. They don't do high-end graphics. They want their games to run on as many computers as possible, no matter how old-ass they are. That's why they favour stylized graphics over hardware-demanding stuff.

The game looks the same as it did when the alpha first came up.

And I'm referring to the game's Ultra/Max graphic settings; the games max settings look mediocre. I don't care how lower end systems run the game or Blizzards' casual > all philosophy. I want a very impressive looking game; I want it to look like or better than World of Warcraft on Ultra settings. They ARE a gigantic company after all.

Like I said, it's just a gripe, I'm still going to play it.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

I want a very impressive looking game; I want it to look like or better than World of Warcraft on Ultra settings.

Personally, I want it to look unique.

And I'd like it to play on a computer that doesn't cost $900. I had to buy a new machine as it is.

[Rainbow Crash]

I'd rather have a little lower graphics in order to get 60 simultaneous enemies on the screen than cutting edge graphics. I don't think the game looks bad at all.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

It doesn't look bad. There's multiple graphic settings for a reason.

Without sounding snobby, and my rig isn't the latest $5000 rig, but I was hoping for more detail on the characters. I wanted to be able to see the characters eyes, etc.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

The problem with character detail is that everything is so zoomed out when you play, and there's always so much going on, that fine details will only get lost and do nothing but bog down the performance with textures that aren't really even visible outside of the character select screen. That's also why the characters have such exaggerated breathing animations and such ridiculous armor design.

And I like how this thread gets a bunch of posts when one person criticizes an aspect of the game. Excuse me while I trawl some other forums for complaints to make.

[AramekYour MRI results have shown total infection to now be approximately one fifth of the full mass of the tissue."So you're saying..."Your brain is about 20% tumor.]

Complaints are easier to respond to because thinking about stuff we hate brings out the best in us. It lets us understand ourselves/each other better than stuff we love.

[Damathacus]

It doesn't look bad. There's multiple graphic settings for a reason.

Without sounding snobby, and my rig isn't the latest $5000 rig, but I was hoping for more detail on the characters. I wanted to be able to see the characters eyes, etc.

Good graphics are nice, but when I'm surrounded by 100 skeletons and down to my last healing potion with my level 89 HC character, at that point seeing my character's eyes is probably last thing in my mind.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

Actually, when you put it like that, I kind of want to see the look on his/her face.

"XP!"
"I've killed more skeletons at this point than could possibly have been provided by the human dead in the whole history of the world."
"I knew that guy."
"Keep it coming, jerks. I can do this forever."

[ArtificerGoes well with All Natural Milk Naturally Flavored with Natural Flavors.]

Actually, when you put it like that, I kind of want to see the look on his/her face.

"XP!"
"I've killed more skeletons at this point than could possibly have been provided by the human dead in the whole history of the world."
"I knew that guy."
"Keep it coming, jerks. I can do this forever."

This makes me wish that there was a party system in place and we could customize our characters so we'd be the Mane 6 running around and saving the world.


AGAIN.

Though the above would mean there would literally be 3 wizards and 1 demon hunter. Not very....optimized.

[Damathacus]

"Keep it coming, jerks. I can do this forever."

Or at least until someone decides to cast iron maiden to mob just as you hit it. I still jump when I hear that sound effect from D2.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

Man iron maiden was bullshit. D2 melee was already gimped; why would they make an enemy that does... that? I was ecstatic when they took out that enemy in the last patch.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

Man iron maiden was bullshit. D2 melee was already gimped; why would they make an enemy that does... that? I was ecstatic when they took out that enemy in the last patch.

My friend and I would make gimmick characters all the time, one of his Necromancers had a level 46 Iron Maiden.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

I take it you handled the casters?

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

These were PK characters. He also made a Singing Barb that he could kill Hammer paladins.


Edit: I'm tempted to reinstall D2 and give it a once over before launch. Anyone interested?

[Dal]

My biggest gripe about the game has been the graphics not being up-to-par. "Witcher 2" or"Skyrim" have graphics I was expecting Blizzard to give us. They've had something like 10 years to work on this, why does it's engine feel like it's still 2008?

Blizzard has never made graphic intensive games. That being said, I really wish they would've added more options added options to take advantage of higher end graphics cards for people who have them. You can't really fault Blizzard for trying to appeal to a broad-spectrum of players like they always have.

[Scuderia FerrarityThe Corndogs Of Today are the Tacos of Tomorrow]

My biggest gripe about the game has been the graphics not being up-to-par. "Witcher 2" or"Skyrim" have graphics I was expecting Blizzard to give us. They've had something like 10 years to work on this, why does it's engine feel like it's still 2008?

Excuse me, those are FPS's and Diablo is a game with a top down perspective.
Apples to Apples.

The concept of "up-to-par" is kind of slippery - How much is good enough? Everything about two centimeters high on screen and is zipping around all over the place.

Everything is a design decision with cost benefits. If you add distracting reflections or interesting lighting, how is that going to affect a twitch based crowd control game like Diablo 2/3?
Heck, Starcraft 2 isn't the most elaborate thing either, but it's designed in a way that you can pick out your characters from the rest of the background with no problem.

Blizzard has never made graphic intensive games. That being said, I really wish they would've added more options added options to take advantage of higher end graphics cards for people who have them. You can't really fault Blizzard for trying to appeal to a broad-spectrum of players like they always have.

There's also that - emerging markets cyber cafes in Korea, China. People with business laptops like me who have pretty good CPUs but limited graphics hardware.
I mean, this is a company lets you download their game and makes it playable after about 20% of it is downloaded. They're all about lowering barriers to entry.



Design is 99% invisible.

They've gone a long way to eliminating a lot of the nonsense in D2. Identify scrolls, town portals, basic communication to the other users as to where the door to the next level is located, the ever present monitoring of your health and hoarding of health and mana potions. In your inventory you've got "Right Click to Swap highlighted armor with your current one". Run over gold to pick it up.
The whole item auction thing is lessons learned from WoW that would have NEEEEEEVER existed in Diablo 2, from 2000.
All of this is meant to reduce player fatigue.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

Aren't you going to complain about something too?
What? ...I just want the graphics to look cool.
Do you not like the gameplay?
The gameplay is fiiine.
Do you not like the number of creeps on screen?
The creeps are fine, I just want the graphics to look cooler.
Do you not like the features?
The features are fine, just make the whole thing look, y'know, cooler....It needs to be about 20% cooler.


Like I said, it's just a gripe. I'm still going to play the hell out of it.

[AramekYour MRI results have shown total infection to now be approximately one fifth of the full mass of the tissue."So you're saying..."Your brain is about 20% tumor.]

I'm excited! I look forward to NEVER paying real money for in-game equipment!
I look forward to selling a lot of shit, however.

Imma play a Monk!

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

http://dailydiablo.tumblr.com/
This is great.

e: Damn, those sketches make me want to play female monk.

[Vulin]

What's wrong with D2 with prettier graphics?

It makes it a greedy money grab, that relies on the nostalgia of people instead of actually providing new and interesting content.
I don't think the game would get even a third of the sales if it didn't have Diablo in the name, even with the rest being the same.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

I don't think the game would get even a third of the sales if it didn't have Diablo in the name, even with the rest being the same.

Really? Personally I think it'd end up being the darling of critics everywhere when it came out, and they'd all say the same thing: clearly inspired by Diablo 2, but improving on it in every way. Or almost every way, depending on the critic. They'd praise it for its skill system that rewards experimentation instead of punishing it, its general polish, the RMAH, and the addictive gameplay. A number of forums would complain about game companies continuing to cater to the casual player, since it seems to remove certain options that D2 pretended to offer and you don't have to read online guides to understand the workings of the game, and then they'd ignore it. Then the game would actually come out and some people would try it. Then more people would try it. Then the game would explode (unless it explodes from day one from sufficient media exposure) and whatever company released Biadlo 3 would never have to worry about budget constraints ever again.
Because this game is really good.

[Vulin]

Yes, because all it needs for a game to be succesfull are good reviews.

This thread clearly shows, that the main interest for Diablo 3 of most people seems to come from the fond memories about Diablo 2 and not the actual quality of the game in the context of its genre.
I don't see how Diablo 3 is anything more than a dumbed down version of Diablo 2.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

Yes, because all it needs for a game to be succesfull are good reviews.

This thread clearly shows, that the main interest for Diablo 3 of most people seems to come from the fond memories about Diablo 2 and not the actual quality of the game in the context of its genre.
I don't see how Diablo 3 is anything more than a dumbed down version of Diablo 2.

I bought it purely because my friends are going to be playing it.

Friends that all bought it because of how much they loved D2.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

This thread clearly shows, that the main interest for Diablo 3 of most people seems to come from the fond memories about Diablo 2 and not the actual quality of the game in the context of its genre.
I don't see how Diablo 3 is anything more than a dumbed down version of Diablo 2.

Oops, why did I even bring reviews up? Good point.
This thread is a poor example because every third post is me, and it's all of two pages long.
Dumbed down? How so?

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

The skill system in D2 was less user-friendly. You screwed up and your character would have to be redone. Which isn't a better model, clearly. The synergy system that 1.10 put in was more difficult to use correctly for people already not used to the game. From what I've seen, it feels like there's significantly less "custom character" building. My favorite character was a Lightning Strike Javelin-spec'd Amazon with Guided Arrow.

In D3 everything is pretty straight forward, less room for quirky characters and/or dual spec'd. There's tons of health globules in the field and plays easier. I'm hoping Hell difficulty is actually really hard, which from what I hear, should live up to that.

Dumbing down can be good and bad. The game is still going to be really fun.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

I don't know about hell difficulty, but inferno is supposed to be effectively impossible for most people. Average players are expected to go to inferno, hit brick wall after brick wall, and then be proud of themselves when they accomplish little things like finishing a mission. I'm paraphrasing a Bashiok quote, which I can go find if anyone wants to see.
Personally I thought the synergy system was pretty simple; you pick a skill, and then you max it and the synergies. Many skills were strictly inferior to other skills higher up on the tree, so most skills weren't a viable focus for a build. Combined with the fact that that there were exactly two right ways to assign stat points regardless of character or build choice, this meant that most decisions were vastly inferior. It was a punishing system--but it was pretty simple, since there were so few realistic options available if you wanted to get past nightmare.
As for quirky characters, I'm not sure what you mean by quirky; I mean, personally I always thought the hammerdin was pretty goofy. If you mean something like "unique and relatively weak", then I'm sure there are going to be some unpopular skills for every class, and I'm sure some of those skills are going to be less potent than some of the more popular choices. The reason I'm sure of this is because herd instinct is a major factor in who uses which builds, and, since there don't seem to be many skills that are mathematically inferior to other skills like in Diablo 3, and since a D2 character had 30 skills and the D3 wizard (for example) has 135 including passives, I think finding and executing clever ideas won't be hard.

But seriously, can I get a definition for "dumbing down"? For all I know, I agree completely.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

I meant Inferno difficulty, whoops.

Dumbing down just means making things simplier. Here's an example with math:

10 * |5| + 25(2) = X

10 * 10 = X


They both equal 100, but one has a few loops in it.



Quirky means characters that out of the norm/intended purposes of their class. For example, I had a Poison Dagger Necromancer and a Fire Sword Sorceress. I had them stacked with some much gear/damage charms that I was able to wipe the floor with Diablo and Baal on Hell Difficulty with them. And I PK'd lots of players with them. It's what kept the game interesting for us. Finding stupid abilities and smushing foes beneath our heels with them.

Seriously, nothing is funnier than a Barbarian with a level 52 Battle Shout (+600% HP give or take) and two Wizardspikes using their damage shout to lock and murder anyone stupid enough to get close.

If I remember right, their weapons were:
Cruel Phase Blade of Quickness (Sorc) / Cruel Mithril Point of Transcendence (Necro)


Edit: Yeah, that's a better example VVVV

[The great MPinke Torte das Pony.---]

Dumbing down just means making things simplier. Here's an example with math:

10 * |5| + 25(2) = X

10 * 10 = X


They both equal 100, but one has a few loops in it.

That's what I'd call streamlining. Dumbing down is more like taking away choices that actually would matter. It's hard to say if D3 will be dumbed down or not, gonna need to see more of it first.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

Fire Sword Sorceress.

With enchant and energy shield? I tried that for a bit, after looking at numbers and finding out that sorcs swung 2H axes really fast for some reason. I gave up when I reached enchant and saw the animation for it. I forget what it was. Anyway, I always figured that could do really well. How fragile was she? Did you have any room in your build for AoE skills?

Oh, and: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/w ... afb!.cYcaZ
You can get auto-attack by turning on elective mode and then dragging your left-click skill out of the skill bar. You could also just use spectral blade, but I remember reading that spectral blade doesn't hitstun, which sounds suicidal.

But I don't see an equivalent to poison necro, and the above build doesn't prove anything.

[Scuderia FerrarityThe Corndogs Of Today are the Tacos of Tomorrow]

Is automatic skill point allocation for levels dumbing down or streamlining?
Unless you knew beforehand what to allocate where, you simply wouldn't make it anywhere in Hell difficulty.

I remember playing a necromancer that was built around raising an army of skeletons. Turns out when I got to Act 1 in Hell I couldn't kill a single monster to even begin my skeleton army. I was stuck, the game wasn't fun any more.
It's my fault for getting stuck, but it's the game's fault for not giving me a way to get unstuck.

Yes, because all it needs for a game to be succesfull are good reviews.

Marketing and distribution and maintaining a fan base is a whoooole other issue that makes life hard for studios who don't have Blizzard's resources.
The stress test Beta was also a marketing tool for building buzz.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

Skelemancer is actually a hell-viable build now, and it's the safest one I know of. Ever more than my old conc barb, which annoys me to this day. I got a skelly to hell den of evil, ran out of worthwhile skills to fill, and got bored. I found two homunculuses while grinding with him, which is funny since this was in single player.
They also put in respecs, so you can go fix your guy right now if you really want

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

With enchant and energy shield? I tried that for a bit, after looking at numbers and finding out that sorcs swung 2H axes really fast for some reason. I gave up when I reached enchant and saw the animation for it. I forget what it was. Anyway, I always figured that could do really well. How fragile was she? Did you have any room in your build for AoE skills?

This sorceress was only strong because of all the gear I had on her. She was basically a titan. She had full max damage reduction % (Vampire Gaze, Shaftstop, and Stormshield) and I used a Lightsabre Phaseblade not a CPBQ and her inventory was nothing but +posion/fire/cold/etc damage. She was pretty durable if I remember right.

No AoE skills, her build was very much a melee character with the skills you mentioned, Enchant and Energy shield.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

This sorceress was only strong because of all the gear I had on her. She was basically a titan. She had full max damage reduction % (Vampire Gaze, Shaftstop, and Stormshield) and I used a Lightsabre Phaseblade not a CPBQ and her inventory was nothing but +posion/fire/cold/etc damage. She was pretty durable if I remember right.

Well, she's melee, so it's not like you'd have gotten far without all that regardless of your class. I couldn't get past those skeleton pygmies with a zealot because of gear, and zealots were supposed to be pretty good. What's CPBQ?

No AoE skills, her build was very much a melee character with the skills you mentioned, Enchant and Energy shield.

Yeah, I think I remember planning the same thing. Something about necessary synergies taking up all the skill points, and the fact that most of her larger spells would overshadow basic attack.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

CPBQ is Cruel Phase Blade of Quickness. was something like +290% damage / +40% increased attack speed.



I had to do really loopy stuff on her, I had to use the Angelic neck and two Angelic rings (or whatever the set was) for the attack rating boost since her normal chance to hit (attack rating) was garbage, I might have only used one angelic ring and something that had life or mana steal on it. I don't remember how I fixed the mana problem, but Enchant and Energy Shield sucked up a lot of mana. A huge chunk of her damage was from the added damage effects from the Lightsabre and all her high tier damage charms.

But this is how we had fun with the game.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

I actually found two angelic rings and the necklace early on as drops, and promptly discovered that those are secretly pretty great. I've heard of people using them right through hell, for characters that have no better place to get AR from. I think fury druids tended to use them?

I don't remember how I fixed the mana problem, but Enchant and Energy Shield sucked up a lot of mana.

"Damage taken goes to mana" effects? It'd be funny to hear of a viable use for that after all these years.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

Currently installing Diablo 2:LoD, feel free to PM me or post here if you want to play together. I'm starting off completely from scratch.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

Can't find my LoD disc, have fun.

[Crow.Why, of course!I'm clearly insane! .]

If you do end up finding it, you can enter the CD key into your battle.net account so it will save your CD Key forever and you can then digitally download the client.

You could probably buy a CD key for cheap on craigslist or ebay I bet.

[RagnarWhat's older? Unicorns, or stars?]

So it turns out that I won't be getting D3 until July 23, since my sister wants to give it to me for my birthday (which is a month later, because I did a bit of polite bargaining). I'll still maintain the list and thread (hahahahahahaha) but I won't be playing for a bit. I guess I'll just go out and buy the D2 battlechest and figure out the wrapper thing that lets people play the game on Windows 7.

On the plus side, my copy is going to have been rubbed on a hellfire missile when I do finally get it. Yes, that's proper tense construction. It's called future past perfect tense. Not even kidding.

Anyone who wants to confirm that D3's bandwidth usage is negligible (or tell me that it vacuums the megs like a hoover) will have my eternal gratitude.