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[ShadowgeistX]

1) nope! click away. or click the mouse on your target and hold. either way works, but more clicks = more fun.

lol, unless you have a razer or logitech mouse that has a left-clicking issue later in its lifetime. Then a game like Diablo will turn it into a ticking time bomb.

 

[aliencowz7]

See that's just it, I don't want to do the endless Baal runs again. That was so incredibly boring. Inferno sounded like a dream solution to that problem. I used to go around the different acts of hell and kill other bosses just for variety, even though I knew I would be vendoring all of the loot I'd find. Hell, my favorite thing to do in D2 was run the jungle in nightmare up to the council to find grand charms to reroll. Not really because I found it fun, but just because it was something different than Baal's throne room! I just wanted variety. But every multiplayer game I'd join was just another rush to the throne room and then after he died all seven players would instantly quit out and do it again. I really just don't want that again. And I truly hope that inferno does not become that again, even if Blizzard does tune it to that very effect.

That's what i meant though, just because the end boss no longer drops the best items doesn't mean there wont be a new "optimal grind area". It will just end up being some boring stretch that has the most optimal amount on monsters that are easy to kill in the fastest time. That kind of gameplay from the majority of the community is inevitable and there's nothing anyone can do about it really. Just take solace in knowing that at least it will be something a little more interesting / difficult then spamming a cave in act 1 because its the most loot per hour.

 

[Yoshichan]

Just got a mail from GAME (in Sweden) that they'll be doing midnight launch in the following cities:

Uppsala
Örebro
Lund
Umeå
Östersund
Göteborg

It's pretty weird that they're not going for midnight launch in Stockholm...

 

[Rentahamster]

Maybe they could add another difficulty level for the people that only find the last stages of Inferno challenging, to make sure people aren't running the same piece of Inferno over and over. Where the entire game is Inferno-level challenging all the way through. They could call it Inferno or some...oh wait.

lol I see what you did thar.

 

[Rentahamster]

You need to realize that the same exact issue of people running the same crap over and over would have still happened with the original inferno plan, all the while hampering alot of peoples enjoyment due to never having any increase in difficulty. It really was never a very good plan of action and the way they are steering it now makes far more sense.

People will ALWAYS find the easiest and most lucrative way of playing, it's inevitable. And quite frankly i would rather be forced to go back to doing constant baal runs then finding the easiest and quickest possible path between two points for item farming to its fullest.

Uh, this:

constant baal runs

is basically the same thing as this:

finding the easiest and quickest possible path between two points for item farming to its fullest.

 

[injurai]

Maybe they could add another difficulty level for the people that only find the last stages of Inferno challenging, to make sure people aren't running the same piece of Inferno over and over. Where the entire game is Inferno-level challenging all the way through. They could call it Inferno or some...oh wait.

A modular and infinite growing stacks of difficulty levels that are created on the fly as soon as more than 1 person is able to make it through the highest difficulty level.

 

[Mengy]

That's what i meant though, just because the end boss no longer drops the best items doesn't mean there wont be a new "optimal grind area". It will just end up being some boring stretch that has the most optimal amount on monsters that are easy to kill in the fastest time. That kind of gameplay from the majority of the community is inevitable and there's nothing anyone can do about it really. Just take solace in knowing that at least it will be something a little more interesting / difficult then spamming a cave in act 1 because its the most loot per hour.

The original concept for inferno was to actually have the rare champion packs have the best chances of dropping good loot. Every monster would use the same loot table with regard to what they can drop, but the random rare packs would have the highest chances of dropping the best loot. Even better than the act bosses. And all of inferno would be at the same monster and item level. This would:

1. have no fixed location set as the "place" to run
2. promote actually playing through the game, just running around all of the acts killing everything in sight hunting champion packs, be the best way to item hunt.
3. promote killing every singe creature, barrel, and boss, because they all could drop that item that you wanted.

It was an imaginative and thoughtful way of not forcing the players into any one area and preventing something like Baal's throne room from being the "mathematically best" location to grind loot. Now all we have is a fourth difficulty level past hell but virtually identical in design. Where the end of the difficulty level is still better than the beginning.

 

[aliencowz7]

It's still the same thing, people just swap baal runs with whatever has the highest density of mobs / champion packs in a small area. There is no way around there being a mathmatically best place to farm, there are simply to many factors that go into a place being good to farm. The old system just took away possible difficulty curve from the people that wanted it and added nothing else to the table that isn't possible in this new model.

Seriously, if every monster and breakable item could drop the same items in d2 would you run one of the sub caves packed with monsters and chests or the jungle area in act 3 if you wanted the optimal farming experience? There is still a vast difference in loot chance per hour between the two even with everything being the same.

 

[V_Arnold]

is basically the same thing as this:

Except that champions are always randomized, and you NEVER know what you will fight against. Baal fight is Baal fight, always.

 

[aliencowz7]

Except that champions are always randomized, and you NEVER know what you will fight against. Baal fight is Baal fight, always.

Randomized or not, if you would have been able to handle the baal fight the champions aren't going to be so unique to provide a challenge, it still comes down to how many items of what quality in what amount of time which is the same thing as doing baal runs.

 

[V_Arnold]

Randomized or not, if you would have been able to handle the baal fight the champions aren't going to be so unique to provide a challenge, it still comes down to how many items of what quality in what amount of time which is the same thing as doing baal runs.

Are you sure about this? In Diablo III, things will be quite different than in D2.

 

[aliencowz7]

As sure as someone can be either way at this point. they aren't going to make champions harder then bosses, its bad game design. Them rewarding better loot is simply to encourage exploration of the game not to try to say zomg rakinishu can totally beat up baal now. They don't even reward better loot by themselves anymore, Nephalem valor pretty much scrapped that idea for the better.

 

[V_Arnold]

Hm... you seem to have missed a lot of discussions about the game's difficulty and where high end is.

One thing that was pointed out is that you can prepare builds for a boss, making it easier and easier. You cannot do the same against packs that will require different tactic in each combination - and not all your skills prepared for a boss will be optimal against that.

That is why they decided to give the best loot* to champions - and that is why it is potentially more challenging as well, as there is no way to look for a cookie cutter build and abuse it
*ofc, Nephalem will make sure that you hit bosses at the end once you have all stacks readied, but that is not the point. They are both viable, but you NEED Nephalem for ideal boss runs, you do not need it for running some champion farm.

 

[aliencowz7]

That may apply to the journey, but this current discussion was about end game item farming. They are already likely to have very good gear and either looking for trade fodder or absolute optimal set up stuff. If all monsters are the same level and difficulty, the bosses will still be harder simply because they are given larger move sets and more unique effects. Champions will ALWAYS simply be pulling a certain amount of modifiers from a pool of said modifiers and that can become just as predictable to deal with as a boss. If the worst mods are freeze enchant and lightning enchanted for example, people are going to lean towards having gear that protect against that while alot of bosses moves cant be protected against with a resist or absorb.

 

[V_Arnold]

That may apply to the journey, but this current discussion was about end game item farming. They are already likely to have very good gear and either looking for trade fodder or absolute optimal set up stuff. If all monsters are the same level and difficulty, the bosses will still be harder simply because they are given larger move sets and more unique effects. Champions will ALWAYS simply be pulling a certain amount of modifiers from a pool of said modifiers and that can become just as predictable to deal with as a boss. If the worst mods are freeze enchant and lightning enchanted for example, people are going to lean towards having gear that protect against that while alot of bosses moves cant be protected against with a resist or absorb.

This is where you are totally wrong, by the way. Sorry I do not have enough time right now to hunt down the specifics, but it is not Diablo II - the potential modifiers are way scarier, way more diverse, and just because we say "yeah, a group will have 4 modifiers out of the potential 15" does not make them any more predictable.

 

[aliencowz7]

This is where you are totally wrong, by the way. Sorry I do not have enough time right now to hunt down the specifics, but it is not Diablo II - the potential modifiers are way scarier, way more diverse, and just because we say "yeah, a group will have 4 modifiers out of the potential 15" does not make them any more predictable.

Urgh, i'm not talking about predictable in the same way you are. Its predictable in the sense that you can prepare for the ones that hurt the most which lessens overall difficulty of those champion packs. Bosses always are treated as a totally different beast because they have to be, they are significant to the story and are meant to be perceived as super powerful. You seem to think that i have no idea what diablo 3 is all about and just come back with stuff like no your wrong cause "repeated argument used over and over" and that's that. I think everyone knows diablo 3 isn't diablo 2 at this point whether thats a good or bad thing in there own personal opinion.

 

[forrest]

All the monsters have the same loot table. Champions have a higher percentage chance to drop said loot than the bosses do. Killing the champions to stack valor makes the bosses worth doing as it increases the bosses drop percentage to a level that is probably along the lines of the champion packs.

 

[Yoshichan]

Wait, CHAMPIONS give the valor buff? I thought it was the bosses...

 

[forrest]

Wait, CHAMPIONS give the valor buff? I thought it was the bosses...

Are you being sarcastic or serious? I can't tell.

 

[Yoshichan]

Serious.

 

[forrest]

Yes Champion packs award Nephalim Valor. Originally Champion packs just had a higher drop rate than bosses to encourage farming the whole act instead of doing boss runs. This however meant no one would ever be killing bosses when they got to the endgame. So as a means to encourage exploring and boss killing, but not one over the other, they implemented Nephalim Valor as a stacking buff that you get whenever you kill a Champion pack.

Edit* - Apparently Rare packs will also raise you Nephalim Valor buff, not just Champion packs.

 

[aliencowz7]

All the monsters have the same loot table. Champions have a higher percentage chance to drop said loot than the bosses do. Killing the champions to stack valor makes the bosses worth doing as it increases the bosses drop percentage to a level that is probably along the lines of the champion packs.

Not entirely true anymore, now that inferno isn't a static difficulty. If act 1 inferno monsters are level 61 they can only drop items up to a item drop level of 61, but now act 4 inferno goes up to 65 so they can drop items 62-65 item drop level while act 1 wont be able to. The nephalem valor buff only increases chance of drop and not quality so act 1 will still be unable to drop a few items even with it stacked.

 

[forrest]

Not entirely true anymore, now that inferno isn't a static difficulty. If act 1 inferno monsters are level 61 they can only drop items up to a item drop level of 61, but now act 4 inferno goes up to 65 so they can drop items 62-65 item drop level while act 1 wont be able to. The nephalem valor buff only increases chance of drop and not quality so act 1 will still be unable to drop a few items even with it stacked.

Sorry I should have said "of same monster level" I agree people will solely farm Act IV once they can. But people won't just be killing the boss.

 

[aliencowz7]

Sorry I should have said "of same monster level" I agree people will solely farm Act IV once they can. But people won't just be killing the boss.

Yeah, I think the point of contention was people thinking that the old static inferno was different from the new one in that there was no set place to farm. I don't know where or what the farming place will be, but nowadays in games like this there is no way around people finding one. The poking and prodding into games workings these days is really at an all time high on the net and its even worse for blizzard games. Seriously it wouldn't surprise me in the least if all of the most optimal item setups and farming places are figured out within a month or two of launch.

 

[forrest]

Pulling some quotes from Diablo Fans regarding Nephalem Valor Buff. Sorry for the spam, but I thought this might help clarify.

Nephalem Valor Buff
Blizzard just posted an article describing the mechanics and the goal of the new Nephalem Valor buff!
Blizzquote
We’re working hard on balancing and testing Diablo III, and one of the major components is making sure that the end game experience is fun and exciting. We’d like to share a few of our goals for end game:

We have an enormous number of skill build combinations, and we want a lot of those skill builds to be viable and interesting
While there are millions of skill builds available to players, we don’t want players swapping skills regularly to beat specific encounters as they come up
We don’t want repeatedly running specific three-minute chunks of the game to be the most efficient way to acquire gear for your character
While a three-minute run shouldn’t be the most efficient, we also don’t want you to feel like it’s a two-hour commitment every time you sit down to play
Bosses should still feel worth killing

Nephalem Valor is one of the major new systems in Diablo III and it kicks in at level 60. Keep in mind that this is still in testing and we’re still working out the details. Here’s how it currently works internally: Rare and Champion packs already have great loot on them. By killing a Rare or Champion pack, not only do you get their loot, but you’ll also receive a buff granting you increased magic find and gold find. However, if you change a skill, skill rune, passive, or leave the game, the buff disappears. As an extra reward, if you kill a boss while this buff is active, you’ll receive extra loot drops from that boss.

The exact amount of magic find and gold find provided by the buff is still being reviewed, as is the amount of extra loot you get from a boss while the buff is active. We’re also playing around with whether or not the buff stacks, what the duration should be, and whether or not it should persist through death. We want to make sure the buff is strong enough to make staying in your current game more rewarding than creating a new game. At the same time, if the buff is too strong, it risks making shorter play sessions feel not worthwhile.

We expect this system will encourage players to stick with a skill build of their choice, select an area of the game they enjoy, and sweep it for rare and champion packs on their way to a boss, finishing off a run with a boss that’ll be worth killing. If you wanted a shorter play session you could be done at that point, but if you have more time, the path of least resistance would ideally be to stay in the same game and make your way towards the next boss.

Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Nephalem Valor Only For Inferno?

No, it kicks in at 60. Once you hit 60 you have access to this buff regardless of difficulty. You can use it and go back to Hell to help you gear up for Inferno, absolutely.

A Few Questions Answered
Bashiok took the time to answer a few questions, however please keep in mind This system is a work in progress, this information can easily change while the system is being worked on!

Originally Posted by Blizzard
When you say extra loot, do you mean, extra loot. Or do you mean extra loot that is on par with what elite/champs drop. I remember from the article before, bosses do not drop gear that is as good as champs/elites.
They will drop gear as good as champions and elites with this buff (because you have to kill champions and elites to get it, which was the point). With the buff active you’re guaranteed one extra item drop from the boss, and it’s likely that it’ll be 1 item per stack of the buff. Up to X stacks. We don’t know how many it’ll be, probably a handful.

How many stacks will there be if any?
We're not totally sure but probably a number you can count on one hand.

Do you lose the buff when you die?
It lasts through death currently, and we like it. I know some people will also want it to be a punishment for death, but repair costs are already extremely impactful.

Does the buff split between players?
Like someone joins after you've been killing and they have less stacks? It's a direct increase to your MF/GF, so it uses the same mechanics.

Do you lose it on disconnect?
There's a small grace period, similar to WoW where you can get back into the game before your character is actually logged out (ie a timeout), but yes if your character times out you would lose the buff.

What is the Time limit on the stack, if any?
We're messing with times from about 15 minutes to an hour. We don't know yet.

Do Stacks get removed after a boss?
We don't really think it needs to. Your focus is still going to be seeking out champions and rares. If you want to get full stacks, kill a boss, and then try to rush to kill another boss before the buff falls off... have fun? It's not going to be the most lucrative way to play, so it's likely a non-issue hypothetical.

 

[ZombieSupaStar]

havent tried in the latest beta, but has anyone else had an issue where the click to hold attack turns off and u have to reclick to keep attacking? sometimes you can click to hold and just mouse over a bunch of enemies, but sometimes it wont work after a bit and u have to reclick because your guy just rubs themselves all over the enemy instead of attacking, its a bit annyoing.

 

[TylerD]

I have a feeling that we are underestimating the difficulty of late inferno at this point and that people will not be doing act 3-4 farming runs for a LONG time.

I don't see how any build is going to be well equipped to very effectively handle what will be thrown at us.

Correct me if i'm wrong but I recall hearing that monsters will be inherently faster in the later difficulties so you might have every champion/boss pack in inferno be a Diablo 2 Hell extra fast by default then add say (Jailer, Mortar, Waller, Arcane Enchanted (if possible))...

That sounds like a recipe for brutal difficulty.

 

[FrontalMonk]

Not entirely true anymore, now that inferno isn't a static difficulty. If act 1 inferno monsters are level 61 they can only drop items up to a item drop level of 61, but now act 4 inferno goes up to 65 so they can drop items 62-65 item drop level while act 1 wont be able to. The nephalem valor buff only increases chance of drop and not quality so act 1 will still be unable to drop a few items even with it stacked.

I seem to remember them saying that you could get the best loot across Inferno and even in Act IV Hell? It sounded a lot like they were saying that your chances might be a little better in Act IV Inferno than in Act I Inferno, but that the loot wouldn't necessarily be like a higher ilvl (to borrow the wow terminology for a sec).

 

[Corky]

Just got a mail from GAME (in Sweden) that they'll be doing midnight launch in the following cities:

Uppsala
Örebro
Lund
Umeå
Östersund
Göteborg

It's pretty weird that they're not going for midnight launch in Stockholm...

the fuck...

Örebro and not Karlstad? SHAM! SHAAAAAAAM!

 

[Yoshichan]

Bwhahahahaha!

 

[forrest]

I seem to remember them saying that you could get the best loot across Inferno and even in Act IV Hell? It sounded a lot like they were saying that your chances might be a little better in Act IV Inferno than in Act I Inferno, but that the loot wouldn't necessarily be like a higher ilvl (to borrow the wow terminology for a sec).

Again quoting Blizzard via Diablo Fans

Our goal is to make the loot mathematically better in the later acts without making the earlier gear completely obsolete.

Even though the theoretical best items might come from the later Acts, well-rolled items from earlier acts will still be better. Internally we find sometimes after an intense session of brutally hard Inferno it can be really fun to cruise through Hell Act III or IV and it’s not too uncommon surprise when an upgrade drops. We expect this to carry through to Inferno difficulty where somebody who can theoretically farm Act IV will likely still enjoy romping through Act I simply because the drop potential is still there. It’s all because of the highly random items having lots of overlap in their power distribution curves.

 

[TheNamelessOne]

the fuck...

Örebro and not Karlstad? SHAM! SHAAAAAAAM!

Örebro GAF gets all the good stuff.

 

[FrontalMonk]

Again quoting Blizzard via Diablo Fans

ah, thanks for the quote, that makes a lot of sense, a nicely rolled Rare in Act IV Hell would certainly do better than a poorly rolled Rare in Inferno.

 

[Mr Swine]

the fuck...

Örebro and not Karlstad? SHAM! SHAAAAAAAM!

Where in the world is Karlstad in Sweden? Iv'e been to örebro once, nice city

 

[IceMarker]

 

[hobart]

Never did this:

Hobart#1152

Kinda slipped my mind. Anyone hit me up. Never really played coop.

 

[Svafnir]

Just for curiosity what do people want from a Diablo 3 website? I am currently in the middle of making one and am looking for feedback on features/content people want that maybe isn't available on other websites or perhaps suggestions on how to do it better.

Of course I won't post the link on Neogaf (I am not trying to advertise it just get some feedback) Maybe if you are interested in taking a look you could PM me - but I am 99% sure it's against the rules for me to post my own website.

Anyways on topic I have been farming Den of the Fallen all day trying to get a ring -.- No luck yet....

 

[LordCanti]

Just for curiosity what do people want from a Diablo 3 website? I am currently in the middle of making one and am looking for feedback on features/content people want that maybe isn't available on other websites or perhaps suggestions on how to do it better.

Of course I won't post the link on Neogaf (I am not trying to advertise it just get some feedback) Maybe if you are interested in taking a look you could PM me - but I am 99% sure it's against the rules for me to post my own website.

Anyways on topic I have been farming Den of the Fallen all day trying to get a ring -.- No luck yet....

I was lucky enough to get a ring about five minutes after starting the beta. I went to the auction house to find out what it was worth, and realized that I'd landed on probably the most valuable thing in the beta.

The only bad news is that there is absolutely nothing I'd want to buy with any gold/beta bucks gained from selling it off.

As for the website thing; That's a tall order. There are huge sites out there that will have everything (builds, build videos, DPS charts, forums for buying and selling, clans, etc,). You'd need a niche if you want to stand out from them, and I'm not sure what that niche would be.

 

[Svafnir]

I already have a few ideas for "niche". But again I don't want to be advertising myself. I am just looking for people generally interested who want the url to help me out with feedback.

Also damn you... I have never got a ring in any beta patch.

 

[LordCanti]

Also damn you... I have never got a ring in any beta patch.

For what it's worth, it's completely pointless. I mean, yeah, it ups my DPS a bit, but I already mow the only boss in the beta down in about ten seconds.

The only way it would have value is if I could turn it into a full set of higher end loot. The only problem is that there is no higher end gear than what I have right now.

 

[Orgun]

Six weeks, only six weeks until release. So far i've managed to remain in the dark about pretty much everything! Can't wait!

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

Of course Battle.net goes down in the middle of a hardcore run >_>

People are gonna be pissed if

Spoiler

when

they lose a character due to a random outage like that.

 

[IceMarker]

Of course Battle.net goes down in the middle of a hardcore run >_>

People are gonna be pissed if

Spoiler

when

they lose a character due to a random outage like that.

Ah so that's what that was... well hope to play HC with you again, I won't play with my HC Barb until I run into your HC Wizard again!

 

[Yoshichan]

Hmm... did they lower the drop rate on rings or something? 10+ Skeleton King runs and no rings...

 

[Valnen]

Hmm... did they lower the drop rate on rings or something? 10+ Skeleton King runs and no rings...

They're a higher level item now.

 

[Yoshichan]

They're a higher level item now.

Oh, that's good, I guess.

 

[Artadius]

Oh the price Blizzard pays for being so open during their development process and non NDA'd betas. Tons of butthurt armchair developers everywhere.

 

[TylerD]

Hmm... did they lower the drop rate on rings or something? 10+ Skeleton King runs and no rings...

They will still drop from the Returned in the skeleton king chamber too. I have found 2 since the last wipe.

 

[Yoshichan]

They will still drop from the Returned in the skeleton king chamber too. I have found 2 since the last wipe.

Yup, I just got one from them! Does that mean those enemies are the highest lvl in the beta?

edit: also, I hate the fact that you can start right at Catacombs floor 3 now No more Jondar...

 

[injurai]

Oh the price Blizzard pays for being so open during their development process and non NDA'd betas. Tons of butthurt armchair developers everywhere.

Nah it helps them in the long run. I love companies that hide details to release, but It only works if they make something amazing. Blizzard more or less can guarantee that broken systems are refined. Typically only those with nostalgia glasses are still bitching. Although now that WoW is declining I think Blizzcon is as well. Atleast until titan.