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Diablo 3 Open Beta starting this weekend

Kalnos

Banned
The in game voice in both SC2 and WoW is garbage. I wouldn't look forward to it in D3, if they include it it'll be the same half-assed implementation. You're not going to get good voice chat outside of 3rd party solutions, but Skype is both free and pretty amazing if you don't want a permanent server set up.

I thought it was alright in SC2, nothing spectacular but it was good enough for pug games.
 

elfinke

Member
The in game voice in both SC2 and WoW is garbage. I wouldn't look forward to it in D3, if they include it it'll be the same half-assed implementation. You're not going to get good voice chat outside of 3rd party solutions, but Skype is both free and pretty amazing if you don't want a permanent server set up.

Oh ok, thanks. WoW didn't have in built speech during my time with it (beta - BC launch). I'm happy to deal with the usual suspects to get some shit talking coop business happening!

I'm glad that skills list was posted in its entirety too. I look at it and see an enormous horizon of possibilities. Best of all, the use of each of those abilities and runes is explained succinctly and neatly in-game. As Blizz-blue keep saying, there will be minimal need for alt-tabbing out of D3 to see what your new rune or skill provides.

I think they've struck fucking gold with the auto stats and new skill set. Just a weekend with the beta makes all other Diablo clones feel antiquated by comparison on that facet alone.
 

Fugu

Member
J
No. Shit. There are only a handful of 'viable' (as you say) builds in Hell in D2 - I would be absolutely shocked if there are only a few viable builds in D3. That is the difference. The amount of work that has gone into each skill in D3 is something that should be applauded. They've tried to make EVERY skill useful; obviously, this wont happen, but I think the attempt should be complimented, not criticised by people who don't even realise how the system works.
You don't think they tried to make every skill useful in Diablo 2? Why do you believe them now and not then?

List of builds that are hell viable in 1.13 (Hell viable means can solo hell, pvp builds not counted):
Sorceress: Blizzard, fireball, meteorb, firewall, about ten other fire/cold hybrids, lightning, enchant and enchant hybrids, nova. Single element builds are merc dependant for immunes.

Amazon: Jabazon (and other permutations of the 2h javazon), javazon, jav/bow hybrid, bowazon. Javazons struggle to solo hell without a mercenary and/or a good weapon.

Necromancer: Skellymancer, zoomancer, fishymancer, poison/fish hybrid, poison/skeleton hybrid, pure poison (poison + golem/CE) and dagger-oriented poison, bone necro. Skellymancers have historically played host to strange builds involving bows and stuff like that.

Assassin: Traps, kick, claw, traps/claw hybrid; kick hybrids may also be possible. Claw struggles to solo without good itemization, pure traps depends on mercenaries for immunes.

Paladin: Zealadin, smiter, vengeance, hammerdin. Zealadins are gear-dependant on hardcore and simply require patience on softcore.

Barbarian: Zerker/WW, throw baba. Throw barbs are heavily gear dependant.

Druid: Werewolf, werebear, elemental; all three can have a varying degree of summons. Melee builds are inherently gear-dependant.

You must have huge hands.
 

HenryHSH

Member
This is kind of off topic I guess, but to anyone who has prepurchased the game directly from the Blizzard's website and do they charge your card right then or the day the game comes out?

I kind of want a box copy, but honestly I don't want to go to Walmart and midnight and risk not being able to play it for a few hours when the servers launch. Can't get behind ya know?

We just had this discussion a few post above yours.

Anyway, I bought it off battle.net today and they do charge you right away. You get to download the installer early (Around 8GB), but can't install it until the game releases.

I decided to get it off their website for pretty much the same reason as you.
 

Ryan_

Member
Might as well ask here.
Is there going to be a community thread? Where you can see who plays, maybe form groups, trade... Stuff like that?

I'd make one myself but still being junior and all, I can't ;-)
 
Q

Queen of Hunting

Unconfirmed Member
there servers were killed by 300k players on open beta, i dread the launch......

Bashiok I think we peaked at around 300k concurrent. Total users? I don't know... a lot.
 

99%

Member
there servers were killed by 300k players on open beta, i dread the launch......

There were no eu/asian servers.

They were deliberately testing a small portion to see bottlenecks.

That said i expect servers to be down at launch anyway with millions logging in.
 

Fugu

Member
They mentioned somewhere that they were only using a small percentage of their servers. On top of that, there were only NA servers. I'm not really worried about stability at launch.
 

Sothpaw

Member
You don't think they tried to make every skill useful in Diablo 2? Why do you believe them now and not then?

List of builds that are hell viable in 1.13 (Hell viable means can solo hell, pvp builds not counted):
Sorceress: Blizzard, fireball, meteorb, firewall, about ten other fire/cold hybrids, lightning, enchant and enchant hybrids, nova. Single element builds are merc dependant for immunes.

Amazon: Jabazon (and other permutations of the 2h javazon), javazon, jav/bow hybrid, bowazon. Javazons struggle to solo hell without a mercenary and/or a good weapon.

Necromancer: Skellymancer, zoomancer, fishymancer, poison/fish hybrid, poison/skeleton hybrid, pure poison (poison + golem/CE) and dagger-oriented poison, bone necro. Skellymancers have historically played host to strange builds involving bows and stuff like that.

Assassination: Traps, kick, claw, traps/claw hybrid; kick hybrids may also be possible. Claw struggles to solo without good itemization, pure traps depends on mercenaries for immunes.

Paladin: Zealadin, smiter, vengeance, hammerdin. Zealadins are gear-dependant on hardcore and simply require patience on softcore.

Barbarian: Zerker/WW, throw baba. Throw barbs are heavily gear dependant.

Druid: Werewolf, werebear, elemental; all three can have a varying degree of summons. Melee builds are inherently gear-dependant.

You must have huge hands.

Since you are including gear dependant builds, I bet will be able to make more hell viable builds on any one D3 character than all of the D2 hell viable builds you listed above. So in comparison, the viable D2 hell builds will seem only like a small handful.

Why do I believe that Blizzard is trying harder to make all skills in D3 viable than they did with D2? Well...

1. Blizzard has exponentially more recources now than they did in the late 1990's.
2. This game has been in development for at least 5 years.
3. The man hours put into D3 dwarf the hours put into D2.
4. D3 is made by a completely different team.
5. The D3 team tests all skills and systems exhaustively, and if a skill or system isn't up to their standards they rework/cut it.

Sure I could be totally wrong, but monkies could also fly out of my butt.
 

hitsugi

Member
Just another comment born out of not knowing exactly how things work - you can still have your high dex Sorc, the only difference is that it's now dependant on gear. In fact, you can have a much better high dex Sorc/Wiz than you'd ever have in D2.

lol.. I know plenty about how things work in D3. Please, don't twist things.
 
Since you are including gear dependant builds, I bet will be able to make more hell viable builds on any one D3 character than all of the D2 hell viable builds you listed above. So in comparison, the viable D2 hell builds will seem only like a small handful.

Why do I believe that Blizzard is trying harder to make all skills in D3 viable than they did with D2? Well...

1. Blizzard has exponentially more recources now than they did in the late 1990's.
2. This game has been in development for at least 5 years.
3. The man hours put into D3 dwarf the hours put into D2.
4. D3 is made by a completely different team.
5. The D3 team tests all skills and systems exhaustively, and if a skill or system isn't up to their standards they rework/cut it.

Sure I could be totally wrong, but monkies could also fly out of my butt.

The fact that skills are scaled to weapon damage now for all classes makes balancing stuff FAR FAR easier then it was in d2 as well on top of the fact that alot of the builds listed i wouldn't even say are actually hell viable
 

Tacitus_

Member
So someone over at reddit crunched some numbers:

The wizard has 25 skills, each with 5 rune combinations (assuming we don't allow unruned skills), and 15 passives. With 6 skill slots and 3 passive slots, that gives us:

1,259,070,313,000 (1 trillion, 259 billion, and change)

Similarly, the other classes have:

Barb: 22 primary / 16 passive =652,863,750,000 (652 billion and change) barbarian builds

DH: 23 primary / 15 passive = 717,670,078,100 (717 billion and change) demon hunter builds

Monk : 21 primary / 14 passive = 308,626,500,000 (308 billion and change) monk builds

WD: 22 primary / 15 passive = 520,451,796,900 (520 billion and change) witch doctor builds

That better be enough builds.

Bonus:
Guided Mode/Non-Elective Mode:

Barbarian: 20,160,000,000
Demon Hunter: 21,840,000,000
Monk: 9,828,000,000
Witch Doctor: 16,380,000,000
Wizard: 34,125,000,000
 

Fugu

Member
Since you are including gear dependant builds, I bet will be able to make more hell viable builds on any one D3 character than all of the D2 hell viable builds you listed above. So in comparison, the viable D2 hell builds will seem only like a small handful.

Why do I believe that Blizzard is trying harder to make all skills in D3 viable than they did with D2? Well...

1. Blizzard has exponentially more recources now than they did in the late 1990's.
2. This game has been in development for at least 5 years.
3. The man hours put into D3 dwarf the hours put into D2.
4. D3 is made by a completely different team.
5. The D3 team tests all skills and systems exhaustively, and if a skill or system isn't up to their standards they rework/cut it.

Sure I could be totally wrong, but monkies could also fly out of my butt.
I didn't include builds that require gear that they can't get on their own, with the exception of maybe the throw barb. If you are twinked, basically any skill in Diablo 2 can be effective except skills that are literally just weaker versions of other skills (firebolt, ice blast, etc.). I also didn't include builds that are more viable with support, or builds like the singing barb that can't solo anything but are very effective in parties.

1. I don't see how that's relevant. Fighting games today aren't any more balanced than fighting games from ten years ago.
2. We're only going to play the release version of the game.
3. Diablo 3 was developed by one team and restarted by another; the years that the game was developed by Blizzard North are essentially non-contributions.
4. Yeah, and I think the team that made Diablo 2 was a stronger team.
5. Their standards aren't my standards. As well, for this argument to be a valid one you would have to assume that Blizzard (North) didn't do this for Diablo 2.


The fact that skills are scaled to weapon damage now for all classes makes balancing stuff FAR FAR easier then it was in d2 as well on top of the fact that alot of the builds listed i wouldn't even say are actually hell viable
Like? I've beaten the game with at least half of them. Some of them have a harder time than others (melee classes are gimped in 1.13) but they can still do it.

I really, really can't believe they're tying skill damage to weapon damage for every class.

EDIT: These "number of builds" numbers are hilarious. Let's include every single possible combination of 110 skill points across 30 skills and 500 stat points per character and see what numbers we come up with.
 
I didn't include builds that require gear that they can't get on their own, with the exception of maybe the throw barb. If you are twinked, basically any skill in Diablo 2 can be effective except skills that are literally just weaker versions of other skills (firebolt, ice blast, etc.). I also didn't include builds that are more viable with support, or builds like the singing barb that can't solo anything but are very effective in parties.

1. I don't see how that's relevant. Fighting games today aren't any more balanced than fighting games from ten years ago.
2. We're only going to play the release version of the game.
3. Diablo 3 was developed by one team and restarted by another; the years that the game was developed by Blizzard North are essentially non-contributions.
4. Yeah, and I think the team that made Diablo 2 was a stronger team.
5. Their standards aren't my standards. As well, for this argument to be a valid one you would have to assume that Blizzard (North) didn't do this for Diablo 2.



Like? I've beaten the game with at least half of them. Some of them have a harder time than others (melee classes are gimped in 1.13) but they can still do it.

I really, really can't believe they're tying skill damage to weapon damage for every class.

As for blizzard north not doing that for diablo 2 I remember them coming out and saying a couple times that balance was never a focal point of the development of d2. I could be remembering wrong though.

As for the builds, any of the single element sorc builds, the poison builds for necro and javazon are all ones I wouldn't consider hell viable.

I wouldn't count any build that needs a item to reduce enemy resistance or a merc as hell viable to be honest. Made worse by the fact that alot of the resistance lowering items weren't even around for the majority of d2's life span
 

Fugu

Member
Single element sorc builds are made viable in a lot of different ways. Non-lightning are made viable by static, lr wands and mercs; lightning is made viable by mercs, lr wands and the ability of lightning to do so much damage that they can eliminate all of the non-immunes. Sorceresses can also teleport which eliminates a lot of the danger of immunes.

The poison necro doesn't struggle at all untwinked. In fact, it is one of the easiest builds to complete the game with because they get four damage types (poison, fire, physical, magical) by themselves. Poison nova damage gets up past 4k off of gear you would expect to find by hell (~5-10 plus skills) and the buff to CE means that the poison necro needs only to find one non-immune to make all of the immunes dead. The damage on poison dagger is simply ridiculous as well, and that route works similarly.

I've played through the game solo as a javazon on hardcore more times than I can count. Javazons with good weapon damage can use jab or strafe to kill lightning immunes. If they don't have good weapon damage, they also have poison javelin, one-point-wonder bow skills, valk + merc and/or lower resist wands at their disposal. D/E/A plus max block gives javazons almost obscene survivability so they have a lot of freedom when dealing with immunes.

EDIT: Resistance-lowering items don't affect immunes until their immunity is already broken, by the way. Only two things break immunity: Conviction (Fire/Cold/Lighting) and lower resist (Fire/Cold/Lightning/Poison).
 
Single element sorc builds are made viable in a lot of different ways. Non-lightning are made viable by static, lr wands and mercs; lightning is made viable by mercs, lr wands and the ability of lightning to do so much damage that they can eliminate all of the non-immunes. Sorceresses can also teleport which eliminates a lot of the danger of immunes.

The poison necro doesn't struggle at all untwinked. In fact, it is one of the easiest builds to complete the game with because they get four damage types (poison, fire, physical, magical) by themselves. Poison nova damage gets up past 4k off of gear you would expect to find by hell (~5-10 plus skills) and the buff to CE means that the poison necro needs only to find one non-immune to make all of the immunes dead. The damage on poison dagger is simply ridiculous as well, and that route works similarly.

I've played through the game solo as a javazon on hardcore more times than I can count. Javazons with good weapon damage can use jab or strafe to kill lightning immunes. If they don't have good weapon damage, they also have poison javelin, one-point-wonder bow skills, valk + merc and/or lower resist wands at their disposal. D/E/A plus max block gives javazons almost obscene survivability so they have a lot of freedom when dealing with immunes.

EDIT: Resistance-lowering items don't affect immunes until their immunity is already broken, by the way. Only two things break immunity: Conviction (Fire/Cold/Lighting) and lower resist (Fire/Cold/Lightning/Poison).

I was mostly thinking of conviction from the runeword item, I think we mostly have a different idea of hell viable though. For a build to be hell viable to me they need to be able to make there way through hell at a normal pace without any outside help including twinking. Being able to slowly whittle immune monsters down with a level 1 skill isn't something i would consider viable as part of a single element build.
 

TylerD

Member
Is this a Diablo 2 thread or a Diablo 3 thread?

Why are we comparing so many end game and mature builds to a game where we have yet to play past the first 1/3 of the 1st act on the 1st of 4 difficulties?

I understand the need to try to compare this stuff but we simply don't have the experience with Diablo 3 to say whether there will be so many more builds that are viable in endgame compared to Diablo 2.

We do know that there was a lot of care taken to ensure that there is not going to be a shortage of viable endgame builds, or at least that is what we have been told. It is time to sit back and relax a bit until we can reach those levels in Diablo 3.

There has been some suggestion to consolidate the D3 discussion into 1 thread.

Here is the closed beta thread and it won't be long until we have an official OT for one of our most anticipated games!

Closed Beta Thread
 

Fugu

Member
I was mostly thinking of conviction from the runeword item, I think we mostly have a different idea of hell viable though. For a build to be hell viable to me they need to be able to make there way through hell at a normal pace without any outside help including twinking. Being able to slowly whittle immune monsters down with a level 1 skill isn't something i would consider viable as part of a single element build.
My list is a list of builds that can clear 1-player hell with no outside help in the form of assistance or gear. I did not include builds that were dependant on a specific item. That's a pretty strict requirement, and yet there are several builds available.

There are very, very few builds that can kill immunes at full speed, but it's hardly "slowly whittling down"; mercenaries deal thousands of points of damage, as does CE, static field, strafe, and the other skills I described. Blizzard has oriented patches since 1.09 towards making it difficult for characters to clear hell by themselves. Your idea of hell viable doesn't fit in with how Blizzard has updated Diablo 2 as it describes literally two builds (meteorb and hammerdin), and those builds function because mastery skills don't require hard points and hammerdins ignore immunities on almost all of the game's monsters. Diablo 2 is a harder game to solo than ever before, but there are still many builds that can do it.

TylerD: I was responding to the claim that there are only a handful of builds that are hell viable in Diablo 2, which is not factual. I'm not discussing Diablo 3's balance because I'm fully aware that the game isn't out yet. As a result I am also arguing against the posting of these ridiculous NINE-HUNDRED SEVENTY-TWO TRILLION BUILDS statements because they quite blatantly don't mean anything as those numbers would be larger if the same methodology were applied to Diablo 2.

I am, in fact, very excited for Diablo 3. I would just be a whole lot happier if people stopped regurgitating bullshit about the game we already have and the game we've never played.
 
My list is a list of builds that can clear 1-player hell with no outside help in the form of assistance or gear. I did not include builds that were dependant on a specific item. That's a pretty strict requirement, and yet there are several builds available.

There are very, very few builds that can kill immunes at full speed, but it's hardly "slowly whittling down"; mercenaries deal thousands of points of damage, as does CE, static field, strafe, and the other skills I described. Blizzard has oriented patches since 1.09 towards making it difficult for characters to clear hell by themselves. Your idea of hell viable doesn't fit in with how Blizzard has updated Diablo 2 as it describes literally two builds (meteorb and hammerdin), and those builds function because mastery skills don't require hard points and hammerdins ignore immunities on almost all of the game's monsters. Diablo 2 is a harder game to solo than ever before, but there are still many builds that can do it.

TylerD: I was responding to the claim that there are only a handful of builds that are hell viable in Diablo 2, which is not factual. I'm not discussing Diablo 3's balance because I'm fully aware that the game isn't out yet. As a result I am also arguing against the posting of these ridiculous NINE-HUNDRED SEVENTY-TWO TRILLION BUILDS statements because they quite blatantly don't mean anything as those numbers would be larger if the same methodology were applied to Diablo 2.

I am, in fact, very excited for Diablo 3. I would just be a whole lot happier if people stopped regurgitating bullshit about the game we already have and the game we've never played.

Oh come on now, if you think the other side is regurgitating crap more often then the side constantly posting about how there's no customizition in d3 or how xxx being removed makes it worse then d2 you are crazy. It's called a discussion and its inevitable with a franchise so popular that is pretty much its own genre at this point.

While I agree there are plenty of builds in d2 capable of being hell viable I think the comments about d2 builds are more responding to the people claiming there was some vast amount of customization in d2 when there simply wasn't. How d3 turns out is yet to be seen but how d2 turned out is very much apparent.
 

Durante

Member
Fugu, thanks for your insightful posts in this thread. Some of the blatant untruths being spread about Diablo 2 were getting annoying.

I still maintain that completely removing any sort of (semi-)permanent character/stat customization is a very "Biowaresque" approach to "fixing" the problem. It's seeing that there was a subsystem that did not work out exactly as intended and solving it not by improving upon it, but by dropping it completely.
 

Lothars

Member
Fugu, thanks for your insightful posts in this thread. Some of the blatant untruths being spread about Diablo 2 were getting annoying.

I still maintain that completely removing any sort of (semi-)permanent character/stat customization is a very "Biowaresque" approach to "fixing" the problem. It's seeing that there was a subsystem that did not work out exactly as intended and solving it not by improving upon it, but by dropping it completely.
There's alot of truths being spread about Diablo 2 as well but It doesn't mean a biowaresque approach to changing something isn't a bad thing or will some how make the game worst or the costumization worst.

I don't see how it's a big deal at all that we can't put in stat points because I've played Diablo 2 for over 10 years and well yes there are some builds that stat points can benefit, the vast majority of builds were always the same stats used.

The Semi Permanent Skills also were a great thing back than but e haven't see the full range of Diablo 3 to know how it will affect the one off builds like a singing barb or melee Sorceress, It's possible builds like that are entirely possible.

I have hope and I think people will be surprised.
 

Fugu

Member
But there's plenty of customization. The only builds that I can think of that don't allow much degree of customization are the builds that use skills with a 100-point synergy (lightning and bone).

The negativity towards any complaints about Diablo 3 in this thread and all other threads about the game is intense. The game doesn't need any more defenders. Yes, there is bullshit on both sides -- as there usually is -- but only one of the sides has their bullshit arguments codified by blue posts.


There's alot of truths being spread about Diablo 2 as well but It doesn't mean a biowaresque approach to changing something isn't a bad thing or will some how make the game worst or the costumization worst.

I don't see how it's a big deal at all that we can't put in stat points because I've played Diablo 2 for over 10 years and well yes there are some builds that stat points can benefit, the vast majority of builds were always the same stats used.

The Semi Permanent Skills also were a great thing back than but e haven't see the full range of Diablo 3 to know how it will affect the one off builds like a singing barb or melee Sorceress, It's possible builds like that are entirely possible.

I have hope and I think people will be surprised.
My argument against the stats isn't that the removal of player-distributed stats will cause customization to no longer be an element of Diablo 3. Rather, I disagree with Blizzard's assertion that stats cannot contribute to customization meaningfully because it's counter-factual; that Diablo 2 currently does not offer much variety in stats does not mean that all stat implementations must necessarily be poor. As I've mentioned previously in this thread, Diablo 2's stats were relevant before the expansion came out and still remain relevant to some degree in hardcore. As well, there are games within the genre (like Sacred and Divine Divinity) that offer meaningful decisions through stat distribution. In that regard, the change, in isolation, is a negative one.

I am skeptical, not pessimistic. Really, I enjoyed the beta a lot, and what shatters my confidence is every single time I hear one of the major developers of the game speak about it, because it's like they've never really played Diablo 2. Eight players was not chaotic and constituted the vast majority of Diablo 2 games on the internet. Stat distribution hasn't always been broken. Not everyone uses the (black market) cash shop and they could have put a stop to this with CAPTCHAs on login and game creation, so no, this was not a never-ending problem. Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac is from Diablo, not Diablo 2. These are things that Jay Wilson should know, not me.
 
It seems that you think theres some kind of agenda among people defending the game though, and while I can't speak for everyone I know I certainly don't have one.

I love diablo 2 and have spent more time with it than any one person should, but alot of the complaints levied on diablo 3 have been completely baffling to me, exspecially coming from anyone that has experience with diablo 2.

There are changes I think could be better in diablo 3 and there are changes I think made the game vastly better then its predecessor. It simply gets hard not to speak out with the amount of weird complaints that come up comparing it to d2 in ways that make no sense.
 

Sothpaw

Member
I didn't include builds that require gear that they can't get on their own, with the exception of maybe the throw barb. If you are twinked, basically any skill in Diablo 2 can be effective except skills that are literally just weaker versions of other skills (firebolt, ice blast, etc.). I also didn't include builds that are more viable with support, or builds like the singing barb that can't solo anything but are very effective in parties.

1. I don't see how that's relevant. Fighting games today aren't any more balanced than fighting games from ten years ago.
2. We're only going to play the release version of the game.
3. Diablo 3 was developed by one team and restarted by another; the years that the game was developed by Blizzard North are essentially non-contributions.
4. Yeah, and I think the team that made Diablo 2 was a stronger team.
5. Their standards aren't my standards. As well, for this argument to be a valid one you would have to assume that Blizzard (North) didn't do this for Diablo 2.

1. The big ones are. Super Street Fighter 4 AE 2012 is more balanced that SFIII Third Strike. UVMC3 is more balanced than Marvel 2. 10 years ago we got the Third Strike update to SFIII. Chun all day every day. Maybe a little Yun and Ken splashed in. Diablo 2 got 1.10. Hellooooooo Hammerdin! Compare those to the AE 2012 and UMVC updates. You know as well as everyone else here that Blizz will update D3 as well if there are major balance issues.

2. I don't understand what you mean by that.

3. The man hours by the current Diablo 3 team dwarfs the man hours spent developing Diablo 2.

4. That's nice.

5. What are your standards? Diablo 2? Torchlight? What you have seen of Torchlight 2? I know Blizzard North didn't test Diablo 2 to the extent that the Diablo 3 team is testing D3 because Blizzard North didn't have the time/resouces to do so. Also, the proof is right there for you, D2 has no balance whatsoever.

I don't want to go too far away from my main point: I believe that every class in Diablo 3 will have more hell viable builds than all of the hell viable builds in Diablo 2 put together. This is based on playing D2 since launch, following D3 very closely since 2008 and spending quite a bit of time with the D3 skill calculator.
 

neoism

Member
So someone over at reddit crunched some numbers:



That better be enough builds.

Bonus:
Guided Mode/Non-Elective Mode:
9ve4g7.gif
 

Fugu

Member
It seems that you think theres some kind of agenda among people defending the game though, and while I can't speak for everyone I know I certainly don't have one.

I love diablo 2 and have spent more time with it than any one person should, but alot of the complaints levied on diablo 3 have been completely baffling to me, exspecially coming from anyone that has experience with diablo 2.

There are changes I think could be better in diablo 3 and there are changes I think made the game vastly better then its predecessor. It simply gets hard not to speak out with the amount of weird complaints that come up comparing it to d2 in ways that make no sense.
I don't think there's an agenda. I think that the Blizzard devs often say things that make it look like they don't know what they're talking about, and then people repeat these inaccurate statements. Can't people defend the game without parroting this bullshit about stats always being useless forever? Because Diablo 3 has plenty of great things going for it that are actually TRUE.

1. The big ones are. Super Street Fighter 4 AE 2012 is more balanced that SFIII Third Strike. UVMC3 is more balanced than Marvel 2. 10 years ago we got the Third Strike update to SFIII. Chun all day every day. Maybe a little Yun and Ken splashed in. Diablo 2 got 1.10. Hellooooooo Hammerdin! Compare those to the AE 2012 and UMVC updates. You know as well as everyone else here that Blizz will update D3 as well if there are major balance issues.

2. I don't understand what you mean by that.

3. The man hours by the current Diablo 3 team dwarfs the man hours spent developing Diablo 2.

4. That's nice.

5. What are your standards? Diablo 2? Torchlight? What you have seen of Torchlight 2? I know Blizzard North didn't test Diablo 2 to the extent that the Diablo 3 team is testing D3 because Blizzard North didn't have the time/resouces to do so. Also, the proof is right there for you, D2 has no balance whatsoever.

I don't want to go too far away from my main point: I believe that every class in Diablo 3 will have more hell viable builds than all of the hell viable builds in Diablo 2 put together. This is based on playing D2 since launch, following D3 very closely since 2008 and spending quite a bit of time with the D3 skill calculator.
1. AE2012 isn't more balanced than 3S. UMVC3 isn't old enough for this argument to be made. This could be a thread so I'm not going to discuss it any further here, but the existence (and persistence) of a legion of complaints in high-level play about basically every major fighting game is evidence enough that balance problems don't just go away because the game is newer.
2. Every time they change something, they risk imbalancing another element of the game. That's what makes balancing so hard. It's not a cumulative process.
3. [Citation needed]
4. Right. It's about as useful of a point as the one you made about it being developed by a different team.

It's nice that you believe that, but seeing as you still haven't played the game, you don't actually have anything to base that on. And that's what makes this debate pointless.
 
I think both sides could dial down the exageration, but at the same time everything that we know about d3 has been discussed to death so far so at least it keeps discussion fresh while we wait.

I do think alot of the comparisons and stuff will die down post launch once everything settles but until then I actually kind of enjoy the back and forth discussions.
 
Are they going to disallow skill changes during combat?

Because being able to change skills and runes pretty much makes "builds" a dead point.

As has been noted before, after max level, switching skills becomes extremely disadvantageous as it resets the Nephalem Valor (magic find) buff. Additionally, past Normal the cool down for a skill switch increases and makes it not usable in the middle of combat. You can't really hot swap skills in the middle of a fight.
 

Sothpaw

Member
I don't think there's an agenda. I think that the Blizzard devs often say things that make it look like they don't know what they're talking about, and then people repeat these inaccurate statements. Can't people defend the game without parroting this bullshit about stats always being useless forever? Because Diablo 3 has plenty of great things going for it that are actually TRUE.


1. AE2012 isn't more balanced than 3S. UMVC3 isn't old enough for this argument to be made. This could be a thread so I'm not going to discuss it any further here, but the existence (and persistence) of a legion of complaints in high-level play about basically every major fighting game is evidence enough that balance problems don't just go away because the game is newer.
2. Every time they change something, they risk imbalancing another element of the game. That's what makes balancing so hard. It's not a cumulative process.
3. [Citation needed]
4. Right. It's about as useful of a point as the one you made about it being developed by a different team.

It's nice that you believe that, but seeing as you still haven't played the game, you don't actually have anything to base that on. And that's what makes this debate pointless.

1. Disagree but you're right there's no point in taking that argument further.

2. I never stated balancing would be easy. Blizzard has far more recources than they did in the late 1990's to take on that challenging task.

3. Do you even think there's a 1% chance that D3 didn't receive far more man hours of work than D2 did? Are you just trying to be difficult or are you unaware of Blizzard's explosive growth over the past 10 years? And yes I mean by the current D3 team, not including the work done by the disbanded Blizz North.

4. I used a useless comment to mock your useless comment that you think the D2 development team is superior. My original comment that the game was developed by a different team is not useless taken in the context of my original list.

As I said, I am basing my belief on many years of playing D2, following D3 as closely as anyone since 2008, and playing with the skill calculator. That is proper basis for my belief that there will be more hell viable builds in D3 than D2. Come June, my belief will either be proven correct or incorrect.
 

Fugu

Member
If you take North's contribution out of the equation then they were developed for a similar amount of time. I'm sure there's a lot more time spent on Diablo 3's art assets and other areas related to the expansion of computing technology in the past ten years but other than that, no.

There are no "resources" to take on the challenging task of balancing other than extensive playtesting by the kind of players who are likely to imbalance the game and look at it in ways that Blizzard didn't. These people are, inherently, not employed by Blizzard.
 
If you take North's contribution out of the equation then they were developed for a similar amount of time. I'm sure there's a lot more time spent on Diablo 3's art assets and other areas related to the expansion of computing technology in the past ten years but other than that, no.

There are no "resources" to take on the challenging task of balancing other than extensive playtesting by the kind of players who are likely to imbalance the game and look at it in ways that Blizzard didn't. These people are, inherently, not employed by Blizzard.

Time is a resource, and you have to pay developers that have to code all the stuff being balanced and stuff like that. Not to mention I think you are underestimating how much easier having all skills damage be scaled to weapon dps makes balancing the game.

Current day blizzard is also much more likely to be far more active patching for balance then they did in d2.
 
Comparing a mod to a full retail project isn't really fair. A mod has no time or monetary constraints. Fact of the matter is, I still can't think of a single retail game that did it well and I wont be surprised if there isn't a loot game in the future that does either.

Uhh....

What? I don't really know how to respond to this. A retail game has infinitely more resources and effective man hours to work on it, as well as not being horribly, terribly shackled by an engine that was never designed to support modding. Time and monetary constraints, not to mention the willpower it takes to work on and create something like this without any promise of return on investment... these things don't help a modder make a better game.

What does help Brother Laz make MedianXL better than Diablo 2 is the fact that he's not constrained by beep-boop robot committee gameplay design standards. He can make systems that are unintuitive and complex, systems that require significant effort on the player's part to learn and utilize to their fullest. It's rewarding to the player, but not to the bottom line if your target market is casual gamers.

At the end of the day, that's where this argument inevitably leads. Are you making a game with creative, complex and deep mechanics that are difficult (and rewarding) to figure out, or are you making a game according to Blizzard's gut-wrenching motto of "concentrated coolness"? MedianXL has been worked on by the same guy (Brother Laz) for like 10 years. It still has an active community playing it in a game/engine very unfriendly to this type of modding. It's got such richness and depth, things that just wouldn't sell well to Blizzard's target market.

And as a disclaimer, I'm not faulting Blizzard for doing what a good business should do. At the end of the day, whether or not I agree with that is irrelevant, but I'm pretty sure I won't still be playing D3 in 10 years (like D2) unless some amazing things wait in the full game that weren't in the beta.
 
As has been noted before, after max level, switching skills becomes extremely disadvantageous as it resets the Nephalem Valor (magic find) buff. Additionally, past Normal the cool down for a skill switch increases and makes it not usable in the middle of combat. You can't really hot swap skills in the middle of a fight.

Well you can't hot swap skills because the UI is shit.

The whole idea of restricting skills that you have is terrible for the hardcore. I bet you that high-level PVP will just be whoever can hot swap skills the fastest.
 

Fugu

Member
If you take North's contribution out of the equation then they were developed for a similar amount of time. I'm sure there's a lot more time spent on Diablo 3's art assets and other areas related to the expansion of computing technology in the past ten years but other than that, no.

There are no "resources" to take on the challenging task of balancing other than extensive playtesting by the kind of players who are likely to imbalance the game and look at it in ways that Blizzard didn't. These people are, inherently, not employed by Blizzard.
 
Well you can't hot swap skills because the UI is shit.

The whole idea of restricting skills that you have is terrible for the hardcore. I bet you that high-level PVP will just be whoever can hot swap skills the fastest.

Skills have a significant cooldown when swapped in and can't be swapped out when on cooldown themselves, so... I really doubt that.
 

Cipherr

Member
List of builds that are hell viable in 1.13 (Hell viable means can solo hell, pvp builds not counted):
Sorceress: Blizzard, fireball, meteorb, firewall, about ten other fire/cold hybrids, lightning, enchant and enchant hybrids, nova. Single element builds are merc dependant for immunes.

Amazon: Jabazon (and other permutations of the 2h javazon), javazon, jav/bow hybrid, bowazon. Javazons struggle to solo hell without a mercenary and/or a good weapon.

Necromancer: Skellymancer, zoomancer, fishymancer, poison/fish hybrid, poison/skeleton hybrid, pure poison (poison + golem/CE) and dagger-oriented poison, bone necro. Skellymancers have historically played host to strange builds involving bows and stuff like that.

Assassin: Traps, kick, claw, traps/claw hybrid; kick hybrids may also be possible. Claw struggles to solo without good itemization, pure traps depends on mercenaries for immunes.

Paladin: Zealadin, smiter, vengeance, hammerdin. Zealadins are gear-dependant on hardcore and simply require patience on softcore.

Barbarian: Zerker/WW, throw baba. Throw barbs are heavily gear dependant.

Druid: Werewolf, werebear, elemental; all three can have a varying degree of summons. Melee builds are inherently gear-dependant.


Ugh, I really hope they do a LOT LOT LOT better than this in D3. There had better be more builds viable than this, especially for my DH (in comparison to the Amazon) or they failed bad.

Skills have a significant cooldown when swapped in and can't be swapped out when on cooldown themselves, so... I really doubt that.

Yeah, in fact, I thought the cooldown was put into place partially to PREVENT the fastest swappers from dominating something like PvP.

Edit: Wut..... Oh lord, merge the D3 threads, Im losing track and getting confused and whatnot. Lock this one, OB is over, lets move over to the other one.
 
Uhh....

What? I don't really know how to respond to this. A retail game has infinitely more resources and effective man hours to work on it, as well as not being horribly, terribly shackled by an engine that was never designed to support modding. Time and monetary constraints, not to mention the willpower it takes to work on and create something like this without any promise of return on investment... these things don't help a modder make a better game.

What does help Brother Laz make MedianXL better than Diablo 2 is the fact that he's not constrained by beep-boop robot committee gameplay design standards. He can make systems that are unintuitive and complex, systems that require significant effort on the player's part to learn and utilize to their fullest. It's rewarding to the player, but not to the bottom line if your target market is casual gamers.

At the end of the day, that's where this argument inevitably leads. Are you making a game with creative, complex and deep mechanics that are difficult (and rewarding) to figure out, or are you making a game according to Blizzard's gut-wrenching motto of "concentrated coolness"? MedianXL has been worked on by the same guy (Brother Laz) for like 10 years. It still has an active community playing it in a game/engine very unfriendly to this type of modding. It's got such richness and depth, things that just wouldn't sell well to Blizzard's target market.

And as a disclaimer, I'm not faulting Blizzard for doing what a good business should do. At the end of the day, whether or not I agree with that is irrelevant, but I'm pretty sure I won't still be playing D3 in 10 years (like D2) unless some amazing things wait in the full game that weren't in the beta.

That comment was in regards to a mod being able to be improved on bit by bit over time without needing to build a full game from the ground up. They get to focus purely on the stuff they want to focus on which leads to a more targeted development cycle.

They also don't have pressure to get the mod out at a certain date or constant whining from a giant fanbase that no matter what you do will have a ton of unhappy people.

Making a mod and making a full retail game are very different from each other and i'm not sure how you can try to compare the two.
 
Uhh....

What? I don't really know how to respond to this. A retail game has infinitely more resources and effective man hours to work on it, as well as not being horribly, terribly shackled by an engine that was never designed to support modding. Time and monetary constraints, not to mention the willpower it takes to work on and create something like this without any promise of return on investment... these things don't help a modder make a better game.

What does help Brother Laz make MedianXL better than Diablo 2 is the fact that he's not constrained by beep-boop robot committee gameplay design standards. He can make systems that are unintuitive and complex, systems that require significant effort on the player's part to learn and utilize to their fullest. It's rewarding to the player, but not to the bottom line if your target market is casual gamers.

At the end of the day, that's where this argument inevitably leads. Are you making a game with creative, complex and deep mechanics that are difficult (and rewarding) to figure out, or are you making a game according to Blizzard's gut-wrenching motto of "concentrated coolness"? MedianXL has been worked on by the same guy (Brother Laz) for like 10 years. It still has an active community playing it in a game/engine very unfriendly to this type of modding. It's got such richness and depth, things that just wouldn't sell well to Blizzard's target market.

False dichotomy.

Accessibility does not remove richness and depth. WoW and SC2 (and War3, D2, and BW before them) are some of the deepest and most thoroughly analyzed games ever made, yet also accessible. Probably millions of man hours have gone into, and will continue to go into, these games. Right now, I will wait to make a judgment on D3, but I see no reason why it should break the trend.

None of their games have ever been the sole provenance of simpletons and complete casual play. Like, say, Bejeweled, or Farmville, or what have you.
 

TylerD

Member
False dichotomy.

Accessibility does not remove richness and depth. WoW and SC2 (and War3, D2, and BW before them) are some of the deepest and most thoroughly analyzed games ever made, yet also accessible. Probably millions of man hours have gone into, and will continue to go into, these games. Right now, I will wait to make a judgment on D3, but I see no reason why it should break the trend.

None of their games have ever been the sole provenance of simpletons and complete casual play. Like, say, Bejeweled, or Farmville, or what have you.

This has nothing to do with that whole "Easy to pickup, difficult to master." Philosophy that Blizzard is still championing does it?

:)
 

Sothpaw

Member
There are no "resources" to take on the challenging task of balancing other than extensive playtesting by the kind of players who are likely to imbalance the game and look at it in ways that Blizzard didn't. These people are, inherently, not employed by Blizzard.

You might want to think about that statement a little longer.
 

erragal

Member
You don't think they tried to make every skill useful in Diablo 2? Why do you believe them now and not then?

List of builds that are hell viable in 1.13 (Hell viable means can solo hell, pvp builds not counted):
Sorceress: Blizzard, fireball, meteorb, firewall, about ten other fire/cold hybrids, lightning, enchant and enchant hybrids, nova. Single element builds are merc dependant for immunes.

Amazon: Jabazon (and other permutations of the 2h javazon), javazon, jav/bow hybrid, bowazon. Javazons struggle to solo hell without a mercenary and/or a good weapon.

Necromancer: Skellymancer, zoomancer, fishymancer, poison/fish hybrid, poison/skeleton hybrid, pure poison (poison + golem/CE) and dagger-oriented poison, bone necro. Skellymancers have historically played host to strange builds involving bows and stuff like that.

Assassin: Traps, kick, claw, traps/claw hybrid; kick hybrids may also be possible. Claw struggles to solo without good itemization, pure traps depends on mercenaries for immunes.

Paladin: Zealadin, smiter, vengeance, hammerdin. Zealadins are gear-dependant on hardcore and simply require patience on softcore.

Barbarian: Zerker/WW, throw baba. Throw barbs are heavily gear dependant.

Druid: Werewolf, werebear, elemental; all three can have a varying degree of summons. Melee builds are inherently gear-dependant.

You must have huge hands.

Conviction Pally is viable if you get the right weapon (Not hard as there are hell-functional weapons available with very modest runewords).

That said D2's build variety will be completely eclipsed by D3. The amount of variety in actual skill functionality due to the rune effects is astronomical for this style of game. You'll have builds focused around using the full gamut of 6 attacks and builds that spam one heavy resource attack with 5 defensive abilities.

Most importantly the incorporation of actual resource management will add a layer of depth to every class that makes it an inherently more enjoyable and complex game. D2's lack of resource management past the very early parts of the game is its' most massive flaw.
 
Skills have a significant cooldown when swapped in and can't be swapped out when on cooldown themselves, so... I really doubt that.

Still not significant enough. You have 6 skills to deal with. You can live without one skill for that tiny amount of cooldown.

I will definitely be swapping my DH's Vault for the other skills when necessary.
 
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