Diablo III Options

[almost normal]

The memories you give me...

Last summer. Maybe the summer before. Worked at UPS. Girlfriend and I went to the beach. Sat out all day. Got insane sunburn. The blisters were so bad that if I rubbed my bicep, the blister-water would drip down my fingers like I was under the shower. To keep my mind off the intense pain I'd pop the little packs of water as I worked. By the time the skin started peeling, it was bad. She tore off full sheets of paper sized skin off my back.

I wouldn't wish that on a jerk. And thats what Blizzard is here. Greedy jerks. Not much we can do about it.

[Jhaiisiin]

I've not had the chance to play D3 because I don't own a system that will run it (my desktop just goes click when you try to turn it on, and yes I've troubleshot it, so don't ask).

I have however watched someone else play it.

And I have to say, it's not Diablo. Not *my* Diablo anyway. It just doesn't look right. It's too smooth. Historically, Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo all looked very different. Warcraft was cartoonish and exaggerated on proportions and everything. Starcraft was spacy and semi-real with some exaggeration, and Diablo went for the gritty, grimy, bloody gorefest type of realism. I *loved* that about it. Now it's the generic cell-shaded smoothness that Blizzard has settled on with some details added here and there. The interface is stupid-bright, compared to what I'd expect.

And that alone will keep me from playing it. It's sad, because I was looking forward to it. But after watching gameplay videos, I was worried. But I waited until I could see it in person before rendering judgement. It sucks that I'll miss out on what is likely a good game because I can't stomach how they decided to make it look this time around. It's one thing to change voices or other things. But if I'm going to sit playing something for hours, I'd best be able to enjoy what I'm looking at.

I do honestly hope those who chose to play it have fun. I've truly always enjoyed Blizzard games. It sucks that I'm choosing to bow out because of the art choice. Oh well.

Wow. How many times did I repeat my point in there? Jeez. Enjoy the game, guys.

[Yerameyahu]

Diablo went for the gritty, grimy, bloody gorefest type of realism

Realism? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
It's true that they finally added a little bit of color beyond red, black, white, and brown. Having playing hundreds of hours of D1 and D2, I don't find the slightest incompatibility, but clearly it's a personal thing. I do like that the skills are all spectacular now (instead of only for spellcasters).

[Jhaiisiin]

I'm hearing a lot of issue with D3 characters feeling more... one dimensional? than the D2 skill trees offered. As if there are far fewer choices available. The person speaking of it said it felt like you played the character how Blizzard says you play it, instead of having a few different options for advancement and development. How are your thoughts on that?

[Yerameyahu]

Hm. If anything, there are too many skills to choose from, and 'free respec' means you *can* choose them. In D2, you were stuck. In fact, you had to actually plan ahead for your perfect cookie-cutter build. I'd say D3 is significantly less constrained than D2.

I'm not sure it's possible to play the Demon Hunter as anything but an archer, though; AFAIK, there's no equivalent of a spear amazon option. Certain classes have certain weapons unavailable, but this seems minor (e.g., monk can have 2h staves, but not 2h swords). Not that it really happened in D2, but you can't really play non-DH classes as archers, either. You can equip bows, but your skills do what they do regardless.

One thing they could do better is be more explicit about 'Elective Mode' (like, that it exists!). By default, you have 4 skills per button (1-4, click, right-click); if you check Elective Mode, you can assign any skill to any button. This totally changes the game, even though the non-Elective Mode is a good tutorial.

[phlapjack77]

Servers are down

[CanRay]

Servers are down

BURN!!!

[phlapjack77]

BURN!!!

It's funny because we've all been there, amiright?
...
Right guys?
...
Anyone?

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

[almost normal]

I'm not sure it's possible to play the Demon Hunter as anything but an archer,

If you wanted to be a dick, you could use nothing but traps, knives, pets and grenades. I mean, everything is going to be a projectile, but theoretically, you could avoid using an arrow or a bolt. It's also theoretically possible to never equip a skill, and therefore use the default melee option that you get at level 1.

I love my DH though. I've never had as much fun with another Diablo class, and that's saying alot, I <3 my d2 druid.

[StealthSigma]

What do they need those servers for in the first place? The "online auction house" gimmick is not something absolutely necessary - they could have tweaked the drop rates ingame instead (I played the beta as a DH and finding decent one-handed crossbows was a pain). The only use of it is PR "added value" bullshit used to justify the retarded-ass DRM.
When will they understand that piracy is a service problem, and oppressive DRM only aggravates it? To say nothing of the insane price tag?

Seriously Mike? How much did you know about D2? It sounds like not very much. If you think the online auction house is a gimmick than you really don't understand the amount of trading that went on in D2. You wanted Azurewrath? Sit in a chat channel spamming WTB Azurewrath or wait for something to spam WTS Azurewrath. Then you join a game with the guy and hope he didn't skip out with whatever you were trading without dropping the Legendary. The online auction house provides a significant quality of life improvement over D2 by removing the active element of the seller and adding protections for both parties in the transaction. Granted, the trade function was implemented inside a game, however that has less protections than the AH such as that someone could quickly change the value of currency offered right before you hit accept in order to get away with paying significantly less or nothing at all.

--

I never understood why hacking was a problem that Blizzard needed to solve.

Competitive gaming. If you can't keep the environment reasonably hack free then it undermines the credibility of the competition.

--

Yes, that was the Realms/Ladder solution; apparently it was inadequate? I really don't know. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) I never cared about 'hacking', but I did use more polished mods (shared stash, skill respec, etc.), so I know what you mean.

They've made significant quality of life improvements over D2 and a lot of them are aided by having the battle.net online play.

--

First, hackers aren't everyone's problem. As the video said, they're Blizzard's problem. Possibly the problem of people who want to play with random people online or PvP, but that's hardly "everyone". Many players don't care about hackers. I sure don't.

Alright, so you won't mind when some chinese gold seller keylogs your account information, logs in, pilfers everything from all your characters and leaves it naked? You're right! Hackers are Blizzards problem, that's why this question....

Still trying to figure out how single-player requires online play...

...makes much more sense. Since it's Blizzard's problem, they store your account information on their servers. Information which they make backups of at intervals and are capable of restoring what you lost to you. That is their solution to hackers. That and providing authenticators to aid in preventing YOUR characters from being exploited and hacked.

--

If you're playing D3 you can communicate with your friend playing Starcraft 2 or World of Warcraft.

One can look at this multiple ways.

Your guild leader can see you're online playing SC2 or D3 instead of raiding in WoW. Or your friends in the other games can harass you to come help them in the other game.

--

AND the requirement to be online doesn't make much sense. The RAM requirement, the HD space requirement, the graphics card requirement, those are pretty visible in terms of why, in terms of how they help the game. They're within reason. But how does Diablo suffer at all if it is played offline? Previous versions worked great for offline mode. What good is online-only mode bringing this game?

It helps push towards a healthy economy.

D2 economy.

Get Rare. Rare is shitty. Sell Rare. Gamble. Sell most of what you just gambled for because they're shitty rares. Gamble some more.

In D3 there's an actual item economy with multiple paths. You get a shitty rare? Well, is it decent enough for another class? And you are benefited by that economy if you choose to use it. Otherwise, you can sit on your arse and farm crap all day long just like in D2 and end up with a bunch of worthless junk.

--

The Auction House is a very cool feature. The AH for actual cash is going to make Blizz millions. The only way Blizz can make sure the AH doesnt fill up with duped/hacked items is to allow nothing artificially valuable into the hands of the user.

It may. The real money AH will make Blizzard exactly $0 from Hardcore players.

--

Ironic. Those are the same people who have been hacked in D3, those joining open games with strangers. Either 7 something years of planning and coding hadn't accounted for a seemingly obviously flaw in their system (I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but the method used to spoof seems very obvious), or their main focus was on keeping the monetary AH hack-proof, with a nice side benefit of obtrusive anti-piracy measures.

Most people's battle.net account username is exactly identical to the display name they have for Diablo 3. This causes issues and enables a dictionary style attack against the account.

I'm also not inclined to believe that just "being in a game" with one of these hackers is sufficient to get hacked. I have an open mind so if you have some credible evidence showing how this supposed hack works and that it is not most likely a matter of a keylogger I would be interested in reading it.

--

I'm hearing a lot of issue with D3 characters feeling more... one dimensional? than the D2 skill trees offered. As if there are far fewer choices available. The person speaking of it said it felt like you played the character how Blizzard says you play it, instead of having a few different options for advancement and development. How are your thoughts on that?

One dimensional? The D2 skill trees were one dimensional. D2 was idiotically one dimensional for character. The trees were fluffy. Stat allocation was fluffy. What did D2 boil down to? Figure out which ability you use to try to roflstomp everything, put 20 points in that, put 20 points in every skill that synergized it, put points enough to meet those requirements. That ate up about 86 of your 105 (?) skill points. Attribute points? Even simpler. Enough strength, dex, and int to meet equipment requirements and then you stack vitality.

[Yerameyahu]

There are a few little changes I think would be more fun. I'm avoiding the big issues here (difficulty balance, item drops/item composition, AH issues), but it would be nice if health potions had a purpose (for example, #1). The main thing is the insane 30sec cooldown on using them. I don't understand. Not only are they not enough to fill (even half-fill) your life, but you literally find them faster than you can drink them (1 per 30sec). So, once per 2 fights, you can partially refill your life. :/ They even sell the potions in the the shops, as if you weren't finding more than you could ever use. So… why not make this cooldown much shorter? It used to be 0, and I don't see a big problem with that (you're tearing through your resources quite quickly in that case). But let's say we do want a cooldown: what's wrong with 5 or 10 sec? That's letting you use this partial heal a few times per fight (random packs, not bosses), and you're using up your resources (potentially gold, if you had to buy them).

#2: So, after going through the game on Normal, NM, and Hell, times 5 characters, I've found a grand total of 1 Legendary, 0 Set, 0 Plans, etc. This also seems like a huge problem with the game. Surely you should be able to find a few Legendary, Set, and so on, in *at least* one full run through the plot? It's not like the Legendaries are even any good (at all), so why not let us find a *couple*? This is a huge departure from D2.

#3: While D2 used to have stat requirements to use your armor and weapons, D3 is just level. Which means you have exactly 2 stats to dump everything on: (primary) and Vitality. Strength gives a minor bonus to armor, Int gives a minor bonus to Resists, and Dex gives a minor bonus to dodge, but these are all much to small to bother with while you try to maintain armor, resists, DPS, and HP in a balance that keeps you alive. It seems like a simple tweak could make these other stats more useful when they're 'non-primary': increase that minor bonus a small amount. Make it 1.5% instead of 1%, I dunno (that's why playtesting exists), and only do this for non-primary stats of a given character. I'm sick of finding Monk-only items that have big Strength bonuses, or DH-onlies with tons if Int, etc. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) It feels like a giant waste.

[StealthSigma]

There are a few little changes I think would be more fun. I'm avoiding the big issues here (difficulty balance, item drops/item composition, AH issues), but it would be nice if health potions had a purpose (for example, #1). The main thing is the insane 30sec cooldown on using them. I don't understand. Not only are they not enough to fill (even half-fill) your life, but you literally find them faster than you can drink them (1 per 30sec). So, once per 2 fights, you can partially refill your life. :/ They even sell the potions in the the shops, as if you weren't finding more than you could ever use. So… why not make this cooldown much shorter? It used to be 0, and I don't see a big problem with that (you're tearing through your resources quite quickly in that case). But let's say we do want a cooldown: what's wrong with 5 or 10 sec? That's letting you use this partial heal a few times per fight (random packs, not bosses), and you're using up your resources (potentially gold, if you had to buy them).

I agree, the potions bit is quite dumb. I see most people in Inferno running around 20-30k hp though I have seen a ridiculous resist barbarian with 14k hp. The best potions are pretty much useless in Hell if you're doing some Inferno. There's also the ridiculous difficulty gap between Act I and Act II of Inferno. The potions are one thing and there is at least a justifiable reason for the fact that they restore a fixed amount. D2 had Rejuevenation potions that were, IIRC, 30% or 100% of your HP healed. No, the ridiculousness of healing is best represented by monk. They have a fixed value heal that only rises with level. In a world where basically every skill's potency is based off weapon damage you have a skill that quickly falls behind in effectiveness.

#2: So, after going through the game on Normal, NM, and Hell, times 5 characters, I've found a grand total of 1 Legendary, 0 Set, 0 Plans, etc. This also seems like a huge problem with the game. Surely you should be able to find a few Legendary, Set, and so on, in *at least* one full run through the plot? It's not like the Legendaries are even any good (at all), so why not let us find a *couple*? This is a huge departure from D2.

Legendaries are getting buffed, so be glad you haven't found any. All the ones that have already spawned are staying as they are. Blizzard has admitted that their too weak. There are lower than level 60 legendaries (I have three) and those are really the ones you're most likely to find on Normal-Hell. I'm not sure if there's any set pieces that require a level lower than 60. That means you need to get iLvl 60-63 drops to get set pieces and the latter three are only available in Inferno. I think iLvl 60 items can be gotten in Act IV Hell.

It's also not a huge departure from D2. The frequency, perhaps can be considered a departure, but that's about it. Overall, rares can be a lot better than most set or unique items. The problem, of course, was getting one that was better. Top end rares should be better than legendaries only because they're much hard to obtain than to get a legendary that generally has the same stats, but with ranges.

#3: While D2 used to have stat requirements to use your armor and weapons, D3 is just level. Which means you have exactly 2 stats to dump everything on: (primary) and Vitality. Strength gives a minor bonus to armor, Int gives a minor bonus to Resists, and Dex gives a minor bonus to dodge, but these are all much to small to bother with while you try to maintain armor, resists, DPS, and HP in a balance that keeps you alive. It seems like a simple tweak could make these other stats more useful when they're 'non-primary': increase that minor bonus a small amount. Make it 1.5% instead of 1%, I dunno (that's why playtesting exists), and only do this for non-primary stats of a given character. I'm sick of finding Monk-only items that have big Strength bonuses, or DH-onlies with tons if Int, etc. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) It feels like a giant waste.

I just want to make sure you're on the same level. Attributes in D2 had one purpose. Meet equipment requirements. Once those were met, for all intents and purposes there was really just one attribute. Vitality. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Yerameyahu]

Not, 'just frequency' really is a gigantic departure from D2 if I haven't found any Unique or Set items in something like 15 first-run plays through the entire game. In D2, you'd find a few per Act, on every difficulty rating. If the game is only meant to be played on Inferno/Level 60, that's bad. I'm not talking about 'legendaries should be better than rares', I'm talking about 'legendaries should *exist*'. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) That goes double for Set items… are they seriously Level 60 only? That's just shocking.

Right, but they don't have that purpose in D3, and it was a *huge* deal in D2. Meeting reqs was half the reason to do anything.

[phlapjack77]

Alright, so you won't mind when some chinese gold seller keylogs your account information, logs in, pilfers everything from all your characters and leaves it naked? You're right! Hackers are Blizzards problem, that's why this question....

2 things. One, no I won't mind, because I don't have anything in my online account with Blizzard, the same as other people here. We don't care about online, that's the point. The hackers aren't our problem. Two, oh noes, the horror, a Chinese haxx0rrzed my account with "keylogs". Seriously?

[Yerameyahu]

… You have to have things on your account; he specifically said 'pilfers everything from your characters'. Diablo characters have things.

[phlapjack77]

… You have to have things on your account; he specifically said 'pilfers everything from your characters'. Diablo characters have things.

This seems circular. "You must have an online character. But what if scary Chinese!!1! hackers steal your stuff? Then you want things secure, right? Hackers are your problem!"

Maybe I'm misunderstanding his point...in D2, you could totally have an offline experience.

[Yerameyahu]

Oops, I didn't realize we were talking about counterfactuals. The fact is that you do have online characters in Diablo 3, so they have to be secured. The argument for having online characters is for the integrity of the whole game (which apparently many D2 players wanted), not the individual characters. So, it's everyone's problem, because everyone's online. You might wish for a non-online D3, but you might also wish for unicorns.

[phlapjack77]

Oops, I didn't realize we were talking about counterfactuals. The fact is that you do have online characters in Diablo 3, so they have to be secured. The argument for having online characters is for the integrity of the whole game (which apparently many D2 players wanted), not the individual characters. So, it's everyone's problem, because everyone's online. You might wish for a non-online D3, but you might also wish for unicorns.

I think the original idea was that it was said "Hackers are everyone's problem". But they weren't everyone's problem in D2. Yes, I guess hackers ARE everyone's problem now in D3, but only because Blizzard chose to make them everyone's problem.

That's a little silly, to equate wishing for what we already had in D2, to wishing for unicorns. There's a latin expression for that kind of argument...

[Yerameyahu]

Presumably, there's a Latin phrase for literally everything. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

It goes like this: apparently D2 players asked for a secure system with no hacked/duped items, which included an in-game auction house that you could actually use safely. To do that, you can't have offline play. Done. You can argue that you don't agree with the premise, but it's hardly a fallacy.

Again, I didn't realize anyone argued that hackers were everyone's problem in D2; I thought we were talking about how things actually are in D3. If I'm misreading everything, sorry for the trouble. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) The fact is that D3 is online, period. A non-online D3 is a unicorn, regardless of what D2 was. Someday, they might release an offline mode (like they eventually released NOCD patches), but given that all monsters and everything are processed server-side… it seems unlikely.

[phlapjack77]

Yeah, there's probably a latin phrase for almost everything. Probably not for ideas like computers and current day tech? I thought it was interesting, in a language like Sinhala, they just take the English word ("television") and add an ending sound ("televisionecka"). Anywho...

Well, I thought the idea was "Hackers are everyone's problem, that's why D3 needs to be always online". Implying that hackers were a problem for everyone before D3, and that D3 solves this problem. If not, then I'll apologize for the trouble (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Yerameyahu]

Ha! Well I'm glad we got that straight: one or both of us was confused. Oh well.

Another interesting thing about D3 is that they seem to have invested all of their plot-and-dialogue effort into the hirelings (leaving none for *anyone* else). Those 3 actually have personalities and backstories, and their voice acting is actually *acting*. I can't imagine why they made all the bosses, Cain, Adria, etc. say such wooden, boring, and stupid things. Surely it wasn't their intention to make the Lords of Hell sound like whiny children? :/

[nezumi]

It goes like this: apparently D2 players asked for a secure system with no hacked/duped items, which included an in-game auction house that you could actually use safely. To do that, you can't have offline play. Done. You can argue that you don't agree with the premise, but it's hardly a fallacy.

You could fix it. Just separate online and offline characters. Online characters are 'hack-proof', but require you be online constantly to use them. Offline characters ... don't.

Diablo 3 sounds fun, but I'm going to wait until the hacked version that permits offline play. I really don't have a choice.

[Yerameyahu]

But you can't do that. First, the *premise* is that you want a secure system including an AH. That's the premise; again, you can disagree with it, but you can't say it's not there. They already did the half-and-half method with Ladder/Realms, and (apparently) it wasn't acceptable. (I played 100% Open chars, so I'm not talking about myself here.)

Second, you'd have to not only remove the AH and all the online features (which, like it or not, are core components of the game), but apparently also basically run a D3 server at home. It seems a huge part of the game is run server-side, as I said. At best, this notional hacked version will be more like a private server than D2-style offline.

I'm not saying 'it's impossible for a game like D3 to be offline'. I'm saying that D3, as designed, is fundamentally online. Today in reality, they can't just flip a switch and give you Open characters. The new VW Beetle comes with different color paint and interiors, and you cannot get the blue paint with the beige interior; *that* is an arbitrary limitation (and I think it'd look good, hehe).

[phlapjack77]

But you can't do that. First, the *premise* is that you want a secure system including an AH. That's the premise; again, you can disagree with it, but you can't say it's not there. They already did the half-and-half method with Ladder/Realms, and (apparently) it wasn't acceptable. (I played 100% Open chars, so I'm not talking about myself here.

I'm not doubting you, but do you have any references to the gamers that were asking for a secure online-only game? I'm seeing the move by Blizzard as purely aimed at maximizing profit through the AH, and not really in any response to player requests.

[Yerameyahu]

No, I'm just taking it as given for the discussion. Like I said, I only played Open (and 95% offline) myself. Their motivation really doesn't matter, though. Whoever wanted it, the system is fundamentally designed around a secure system w/ AH, which includes major server-side processing and requires online play. Given that fact, a) you can't just 'enable' offline-only play, and b) hackers are everyone's problem. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) I'm saying you can argue that these are *bad* motivations and bad decisions, and/or that it's all Blizzard's *fault*, but A and B are still true.

Regarding D3, what's the deal with Thorns? Why do they keep including this wholly worthless power? Even in D2, it was still wholly worthless, and there were a lot more ways to leverage the effect (auras and things). I can only assume there's one dev who just loves it and they're afraid to sadden him.