I'm pretty sure the point of the RMAH is to not spam it with junk items, which is why you have to pay a small fee. I suppose not being able to salvage items instantly makes things a bit more cumbersome, but I'm sure the salvaged materials aren't totally random so that only specific items are worth salvaging.
I wonder if it pays for certain builds to put points into other classes' stats instead of dumping everything into vitality. Armor and dodge seem useful. More health from globes, not so much.
New stats really don't seem like as big a deal as they should.
The old stats were super bland, but this way, with skills still being based on weapon damage and no way to manually add stats, it's the same shit with different numbers and formulas.
Well this more than likely shows that D3 will not release for Q1 or Q2 of this year. Giving a little hope for Q3 but if I were to re-vote for the release date pool? I'd say somewhere around Q4.
If you read the actual article and not just the list of main points, they go into how theyre putting a lot of focus on the affixes and stuff, so youre going to be going for thsoe more than the base stats.
I disagree with the removal of the cauldron and cube. They wanted players to be able to sell/salvage w/o having to go back to town... now they are flipping that on its head and forcing them to go back to town every couple of seconds (if you are an avid looter... which you are if you are playing a Diablo game). And that 10second "town portal" cast is going to get really annoying really fast.
In D2, eventually you get to the point where you don't even look at items unless they are unique/set items... I don't see that happening in D3, as the RMAH gives a REAL value to everything. If you aren't picking up every single shiny along the way you will feel like you are missing out on moneyz. They need a way to clean up your inventory on the fly still... or just add a TON of inventory space so you can pick up everything in between major quests (where you have to go back to town anyway).
"We want to make it clear that junk items aren’t worth picking up, and make it easy to identify other items as not for your character. We want to drop a ton of items..." This is not going to happen when real money is involved... if you can sell it or salvage it at all, it is worth something. Yes, not every player is going to be a loot whore and grab everything (which is what they want obviously), but a LOT are.
And that's not even getting into the fact that people will want to get gear for their alts and/or friends.
They could always just borrow some more elements from Torchlight and give your Hireling an inventory and the ability to go back to town for you while you smash things in the head. Heck, advance it a little and tell that Templar to pick you up some potions while he's at it. Or to dump all the items in your stash instead of selling them.
Hopefully they do at least give a person in town the Identify All ability, for the people who don't stop and ID each item as they get it and end up having an inventory full of them.
Also, some people have apparently convinced themselves that reworking the skills system means they're bringing back skill points. Mostly by combining the following quote with all the references about extensive customization and whatnot and then taking a leap of biased logic:
The item hunt has always been based on secondary stats and affixes, and we’re working hard to ensure build diversity is as large as possible by getting as many affixes into the game as possible (adding more item affixes is also something we’ve been working on). Simply including affixes that augment specific skills greatly expands the itemization pool and build possibilities.
Very much not liking the removal of the ability to break stuff down. That was one of the things that was going to help me keep pace with my super-insane Diablo fanboy friend who instinctively knows what items will and won't be good.
Especially annoying that we can't break white items down anymore. What the fuck is the point of them after level 10? Why do they need to drop if they're A. Useless and B. Sit in your inventory until you just sell them. Why waste our time with that shit? Just drop more gold so we can get back to the fun part of the game. :P
It really feels like they're placing artificial time wasters in here, rather than coming up with good mechanical concepts.
Scrolls of Identification are no longer in the game.
This is where I put on my huge smug face about the discussions we had about scrolls of ID like a year or more ago in a previous D3 thread.
Removed the Cauldron of Jordan and Nephalem Cube.
wat
Why? They simultaneously remove some inconveniences and then add in a new one? Not having to constantly travel back to town (or just leave a bunch of drops behind) was one of the improvements I was really looking forward to in D3. This seems like a big pacing hit to multiplayer games.
Stats redone:
"We're changing core character attributes to Strength, Dexterity, Intellect, and Vitality, and the benefits each stat provides is being broken down as:
We're dropping Defense, Attack, and Precision as attributes, Armor is taking over for what Defense used to provide, +Physical Resist will take over for Armor, and +Chance to Crit will fill in for Precision."
wat
This seems fucking huge. Like, back to the drawing board, time to rebalance our game more, longest-Blizzard-beta-ever huge. I guess the current stat system was really not working out for them? At the moment I'm having trouble figuring out how this is much better. The way I read this, it seems like people will want to stack nothing but their damage stat and vitality, since all the other stats will end up being balanced as gimpy half-stats for them. I guess maybe they'll put heavy diminishing returns on everything to encourage people to get a pretty even mix of stats? Hmmm...
I think thats the takeaway point. I wonder why they think thats better than needing all 4 stats.
While working on Diablo III we've been called out for messing around with systems too much, that the game is good as-is and we should just release it. I think that's a fair argument to make, but I also think it's incorrect. Our job isn't just to put out a game, it's to release the next Diablo game. No one will remember if the game is late, only if it's great. We trust in our ability to put out a great game, but we're not quite there yet. In addition to finishing and polishing the content of the game we're continuing to iterate on some of the core game systems. So all that said, I'd like to provide everyone an update on some of the systems we're currently working on.
We’re changing some of the systems we’ve gotten the most feedback on both internally and from the beta test, including crafting, items, core attributes, and inventory. We’ll go over those changes and the reasons for them. In addition we’re working on major changes to the skill and rune systems that we’re not ready to talk about, but I promise you we can’t possibly ship without a finished skill and rune system.
Let’s start off small: Scrolls of Identification are no longer in the game. Unidentified items and the act of identifying them is still very much part of the game, but now when obtaining an unidentified item you'll simply right click it, a short cast timer will occur as your character examines the item, and it will become identified. We love the double-discovery of finding a present and then unwrapping it, but we don't think it requires a physical item you have to find and keep in your bags to get the same effect. From now on you'll just be able to inherently identify all your items, no need to carry scrolls. Your character in Diablo III is just that badass now.
We’re also moving the fifth quick slot button, which is becoming a dedicated potion button. A dedicated potion button is something we went back and forth on throughout development. Recently it became apparent that players need to be aware of their potions for emergency situations. Our combat model doesn’t promote or even allow chugging potions in rapid succession, but they’re certainly useful when you run into a string of bad luck with health globes, or if you just get in over your head. This is one of our newest changes, so the button and mechanics don’t actually function in beta Patch 10, but that’s our intent and you’ll be seeing it supported in future beta updates.
The design team is currently looking at systems and cleaning them up, removing any superfluous system objectives and those that are beyond fixing. Thus, we're removing the Mystic artisan. As we look at the big picture, the Mystic simply wasn’t adding anything to our customization system. Enhancement was really just the socket and gem system with a different name, and it would prolong the release of the game even further to go back to the drawing board and differentiate it, so we’ll revisit the Mystic and enhancements at a later time. Removing her from the game took some time, but it’s nowhere near the efforts that would be required to flesh out a better customization system. We hope she’ll be able to join your caravan in the future, but for now we’re going to focus on the extensive customization options the game already offers.
We're also looking at systems we’ve created and making sure that the rationale that brought us to these designs still makes sense. The Stone of Recall, for instance, has a short cast time and allows you to return to town. Early on we said we wouldn't have town portals, as they introduced too many combat exploits, but we were able to resolve them. Because we have the Stone of Recall, though, we began to evaluate systems that were originally implemented to deal with the exclusion of town portals.
So we've decided to remove the Cauldron of Jordan and Nephalem Cube. They were implemented to allow for salvaging and selling items when there was no quick and easy way to return to town. Now that the Stone of Recall exists, we found that keeping the Cauldron and Cube in the game detracted from the benefits of returning to town to sell items, salvage, craft, and interact with the townsfolk. It’s a good idea to break up combat so that players have a moment to evaluate their gear and crafting options before venturing back out. In addition, we've decided to just call it what it is and the Stone of Recall is now Town Portal, and is integrated directly onto the skill bar UI.
The Blacksmith artisan will now salvage items. With removal of the Cube we needed some mechanic in town that allowed you to salvage your items, and it just makes sense for the Blacksmith to offer it.
One other important change is that common (white) items will no longer be salvageable. We found that it caused a few itemization issues, but mostly this is due to a general philosophy shift on the importance of items. Previously, our thinking was that when an item dropped it should always be useful to you in some way, either the stats could be an improvement for you, or in the case of white items you could break it down and craft something better. Through a lot of play testing we have come full circle to the Diablo II methodology -- a lot of stuff that drops just isn’t worth picking up. Diablo II captured the loot piñata feel by dropping a lot of crap, mostly arrows and bolts, and we of course still very much want that feeling of item-explosions. To do that we need to be able to balance the value of items to how many we’re throwing at you.
This leads us to the last change I'll be detailing today:
We're changing core character attributes to Strength, Dexterity, Intellect, and Vitality, and the benefits each stat provides is being broken down as:
Strength
+Barbarian damage
+Armor
Dexterity
+Demon Hunter damage
+Monk damage
+Dodge
Intellect
+Wizard damage
+Witch Doctor damage
+Health from globes
Vitality
+Health
We're dropping Defense, Attack, and Precision as attributes, Armor is taking over for what Defense used to provide, +Physical Resist will take over for Armor, and +Chance to Crit will fill in for Precision. Obviously these stat changes are one of the bigger systems changes we're currently working on as they have far reaching requirements to re-itemize and balance the game.
This change makes the stats more intuitive and fixes some of the itemization issues we were running into. We want to make it clear that junk items aren’t worth picking up, and make it easy to identify other items as not for your character. We want to drop a ton of items, but to really pull off a sense of excitement when finding a great item, there needs to be non-optimal items, both for your class, and in general. By specifically targeting stats at classes, we can reduce the amount of item overlap, diversify our item pool, and create a cleaner, more exciting itemization system.
By and large these changes have little impact on which items you’re going to want. The item hunt has always been based on secondary stats and affixes, and we’re working hard to ensure build diversity is as large as possible by getting as many affixes into the game as possible (adding more item affixes is also something we’ve been working on). Simply including affixes that augment specific skills greatly expands the itemization pool and build possibilities.
Moving on, with the removal of the Cauldron of Jordan, Nephalem Cube, and by moving Town Portal to the skill panel, we're now displaying character stats directly on the inventory UI. Now you can see your stats go up and down as you try on different items. All the same info is available; we’re just streamlining the UI, making it more useful. It might seem insignificant but we're pleased with the results.
All of these are changes that will in one way or another be seen in the latest beta patch, and so we hope that those of you with access please try them out and let us know what you think in the Beta Feedback forum.
There’s a lot of work left to be done, though. We’re constantly tuning and making balance changes; it’s a massive task. Some of these changes can be seen in the beta, like changes to item rarity, the levels at which we introduce affixes, and how many affixes enemies can roll up. Some you can’t see in the beta, like balancing the difficulty of the entire game for four different difficulty levels, adding tons of new affixes, creating legendary items, filling out crafting recipes and itemization, working on achievements, and implementing Battle.net features. We’re also working on a number of other large systems changes -- specifically with the skill and rune systems. We're not quite ready to share what those are just yet, but we look forward to being able to do so in the near future.
We want Diablo III to be the best game it can be when it launches. To get there, we're going to be iterating on designs we've had in place for a long time, making changes to systems you've spent a lot of time theorycrafting, and removing features you may have come to associate with the core of the experience. Our hope is that by embracing our iterative design process in which we question ourselves and our decisions, Diablo III won't just live up to our expectations, but will continue to do so a decade after it's released.
Jay Wilson is game director for Diablo III and the Inventor of Meat. He believes that Kate Beckinsale is the greatest actress that’s ever lived.
*Scrolls of Identity are gone, just right click the unidentified item and after a short cast time your character will figure out what it is for free.
Just caught this post. Err, a cast time? That just sounds like a pointless annoyance. Why isn't it instant? Why isn't identifying items trivial? It's not at all an interesting part of the experience. It's just extra meaningless clicking and waiting.
*Scrolls of Identity are gone, just right click the unidentified item and after a short cast time your character will figure out what it is for free.
Just caught this post. Err, a cast time? That just sounds like a pointless annoyance. Why isn't it instant? Why isn't identifying items trivial? It's not at all an interesting part of the experience. It's just extra meaningless clicking and waiting.
I feel like they have no fucking idea what they're doing and just fumbling with their arms open in a dark basement.
And I usually trust Blizzard's judgement VERY MUCH. I was OK with everything they did up until now. But this kind of ultra major system complete redesign at this point is extremely disheartening and completely drained me of any faith I had in the D3 system team.
The stat change sounds good to me. In the previous system, an item with like 30 attack 15 precision would be good for anyone. A 1h sword with those stats could be a wiz/doc weapon just as easily as a barb/monk weapon.
If you were lucky enough to have some amazing +Attack 1h sword, way better than anything else you had, you'd have good reason to pass it around to whichever character you happened to be on at the moment. Instead, Str/Dex/Int will more clearly define who gets the best use out of the item. I imagine there would still be Int swords, etc.
The cube/cauldron change is upsetting. Unless they up the sell value on Commons, picking them up may be more trouble than it's worth.
I tried telling everyone they were overly optimistic.
People never learn when it comes to blizzard and releases.
Heh, I even said in my PM that I was being overly optimistic. It's sad when expecting a beta to last half a year is living in magical, fantasy, fairy-tale land. For a moment, I had a lapse and forgot that Blizzard is constantly one-upping itself in terms of taking forever.
*Scrolls of Identity are gone, just right click the unidentified item and after a short cast time your character will figure out what it is for free.
Just caught this post. Err, a cast time? That just sounds like a pointless annoyance. Why isn't it instant? Why isn't identifying items trivial? It's not at all an interesting part of the experience. It's just extra meaningless clicking and waiting.
Edit: Valiance, my knight in shining GPotW.
Shit, why even have the need to identify stuff? The "Unwrapping your present" analogy only works when you like the present. As is, finding an item, going "oh, is this worth something to me?" and then having to go through a small cast time to have probably greater than not chance of going "Nope" just seems like archaic design: kept only because it's a series "staple." Slay that sacred cow, I say!
EDIT: I won't be surprised when they go back on going back on the idea of selling/breaking down from outside of town.
Agreed, I mean, if they are concerned that we will never go back to town, we have plenty of incentive. In the early game, we will be headed back for quests and to swap skills out.
I'm canceling my preorder, not because I don't intend to get the game, but it's obviously moving into fall release, and that's $65 I could use on another game in the meantime. Not like there will be a shortage anyway.
Not shocked in the slightest about this. I wasn't expecting it until summer despite the promises of an early 2012 release. Beta was moving at a glacial pace. I am not expecting it until end of 2012 now. Disappointing but not unexpected.
From what I understand Precision was garbage so it makes sense that it's gone. And giving different damage stats to different classes means you won't just be stacking +Attack on every character you build, which will be nice for variety.
The town portal changes make sense when you take them with the salvage changes. Before you would vacuum up every item that dropped and salvage it. The cube was important because of the volume of material that was coming in. Now there's less salvageable material incoming so trips to town will be less frequent. And I do think it's nice to have breaks in the combat where you can take stock of the loot situation. I don't know whether on the balance which system is right but I do see advantages to the removal of the cube/cauldron.
Profile -> Signature Settings -> Hide signatures always. Then you don't have to read this worthless text anymore.
I was reeling from all of those and thinking, "OK, OK, makes sense, sounds good...WTF changing all the stats?"
This is the one change I would challenge because it raises the issue of stat requirements for things like armor and weapons. The other way was much more simplified. He says this is more intuitive; perhaps, but it's also more complicated. It also means they're going to have to create more class-specific items (which includes art work, modeling, and animations).
There is no way in Hell this game is getting released before the Summer.
I always thought the Mystic was superfluous, but it's a shame we'll be losing a rather colorful and interesting NPC.
Their solution to ID scrolls is almost funny. It's like they said, "Both sides are right."
EDIT: I won't be surprised when they go back on going back on the idea of selling/breaking down from outside of town.
Agreed, I mean, if they are concerned that we will never go back to town, we have plenty of incentive. In the early game, we will be headed back for quests and to swap skills out.
Lategame, we will need to be craftin' stuff.
Yeah I found myself going back to town plenty. At the ends of quests certainly, but also just to swap skills. I don't think that was a problem at all.
I'm glad Blizz is willing to do this kind of radial rework, but it scares me that they need to at this stage. And the stuff they are marking as problems is not stuff I saw at all.
Oh well. 2013 here we come! (actually I'm guessing Q3 or Q4 of 2012... I still have hope!)
---
I think the identify mechanic is important actually. Maybe not for uniques (legendaries I guess... no idea what was wrong with the term uniques....), since eventually you'll know them all by heart anyway, but for rares and magic items it makes sense. It raises your hopes slightly before crushing them. It's a little gamble step that enhances the addictiveness of the game. "Ooh a blue, it might be good! awww." is better than "oh great another ring of the lion. salvage." That way turns blues into whites. I think there's an important fun factor in that ID step.
I think the cube/cauldron change may also have been intended to reduce the rate of gold inflation. It just seemed too easy to hoover up everything and get some return off of it when you could instantly sell or salvage, but with the change, most people will either leave things on the ground like in D2, or will spend a bunch of time portalling to town, which will slow their kill-rate. Seems like a sensible change, even if it would have been nice for players who don't like inventory management... which is all of them.
All of you guys freaking out about when the game is coming out need to realize that these changes are already in, not on their to do list.
With the except, of course, of whatever is going on with runes and skills. We simply dont have enough info on those right now.
I'm still saying March, and you can all thank me when I'm right.
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ZarathustraEckUbermenschnow with stripes!Registered Userregular
I love Blizzard... but they've lost my attention.
I was all gung ho and chomping at the bit to get into the beta of D3 over the summer. I happily feasted upon their site updates like the talent builder and lauded their appointing GFraizer/Nebu as the man at the helm...
...but this is so drawn out that the game has fallen off my radar, save a few cases like the Azmodan trailer. Even then, it warrants a quick viewing and then the idea of the game is pushed aside. I haven't even checked my Battle.net account in a month and a half, despite the Facebook contest that promised a new batch of beta invites every week (with 1 in 4 getting an extra key for a friend, woohoo!)
It's going to take a lot to reignite my interest, I'm sorry to say.
See you in Town,
-Z
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BethrynUnhappiness is MandatoryRegistered Userregular
Removing the Neph cube is one of the dumbest changes yet.
The town portal changes make sense when you take them with the salvage changes. Before you would vacuum up every item that dropped and salvage it. The cube was important because of the volume of material that was coming in. Now there's less salvageable material incoming so trips to town will be less frequent.
The non-salvageable material is still sellable, and gold is extremely important in D3.
Removing the Neph cube is one of the dumbest changes yet.
yeah as much as I like that blizz wants to iterate and polish till the game is perfect, it scares me that they're still figuring this out, and are ending up moving backwards towards diablo 2 mechanics. I liked the cube a lot! but I guess we still get to use it, just only on blues and up. whites just get sold now.
Also, if they want to recapture that diablo 2 feel, keep the item categories the same. uniques 4 life yo. fuck legendaries.
Man, I came into this thread looking to see if there had been any release date rumblings, but apparently they're still trying to nail down how core systems in the game work. They really should have waited until they had a release date to open this game up to pre orders.
I was all gung ho and chomping at the bit to get into the beta of D3 over the summer. I happily feasted upon their site updates like the talent builder and lauded their appointing GFraizer/Nebu as the man at the helm...
...but this is so drawn out that the game has fallen off my radar, save a few cases like the Azmodan trailer. Even then, it warrants a quick viewing and then the idea of the game is pushed aside. I haven't even checked my Battle.net account in a month and a half, despite the Facebook contest that promised a new batch of beta invites every week (with 1 in 4 getting an extra key for a friend, woohoo!)
It's going to take a lot to reignite my interest, I'm sorry to say.
I'm in the exact same boat and for me it'll be either a release date announcement or maybe beta access
I tried telling everyone they were overly optimistic.
People never learn when it comes to blizzard and releases.
Heh, I even said in my PM that I was being overly optimistic. It's sad when expecting a beta to last half a year is living in magical, fantasy, fairy-tale land. For a moment, I had a lapse and forgot that Blizzard is constantly one-upping itself in terms of taking forever.
And I was aware that my late june prediction was most probably optimistic.
I disagree with the removal of the cauldron and cube. They wanted players to be able to sell/salvage w/o having to go back to town... now they are flipping that on its head and forcing them to go back to town every couple of seconds (if you are an avid looter... which you are if you are playing a Diablo game). And that 10second "town portal" cast is going to get really annoying really fast.
In D2, eventually you get to the point where you don't even look at items unless they are unique/set items... I don't see that happening in D3, as the RMAH gives a REAL value to everything. If you aren't picking up every single shiny along the way you will feel like you are missing out on moneyz. They need a way to clean up your inventory on the fly still... or just add a TON of inventory space so you can pick up everything in between major quests (where you have to go back to town anyway).
"We want to make it clear that junk items aren’t worth picking up, and make it easy to identify other items as not for your character. We want to drop a ton of items..." This is not going to happen when real money is involved... if you can sell it or salvage it at all, it is worth something. Yes, not every player is going to be a loot whore and grab everything (which is what they want obviously), but a LOT are.
I'm just really not liking that change at all. If they want there to be "an explosion of items" whenever you kill something, just make it graphical with non-pick-up-able items... that is what they are going for anyway.
This so much. All the other changes I am fine with, but when I went back and played D2 again a few months ago, it was clear the CONSTANT need to travel back to town was the most unfun, annoying thing about that game. I don't see how giving you a free TP "fixes this." How the fuck is that different from D2? TP scrolls were NOT HARD to find. I never ran out ever. The only difference now is that D3 has a cast time on the thing. So it's *worse.*
I really hope they reverse this change. I'll be sure to bitch on the beta forums at least.
Very much not liking the removal of the ability to break stuff down. That was one of the things that was going to help me keep pace with my super-insane Diablo fanboy friend who instinctively knows what items will and won't be good.
Especially annoying that we can't break white items down anymore. What the fuck is the point of them after level 10? Why do they need to drop if they're A. Useless and B. Sit in your inventory until you just sell them. Why waste our time with that shit? Just drop more gold so we can get back to the fun part of the game. :P
It really feels like they're placing artificial time wasters in here, rather than coming up with good mechanical concepts.
All of you guys freaking out about when the game is coming out need to realize that these changes are already in, not on their to do list.
With the except, of course, of whatever is going on with runes and skills. We simply dont have enough info on those right now.
I'm still saying March, and you can all thank me when I'm right.
If it weren't for the whole retooling of the entire skill/rune system, which Jay very specifically says they can't ship without, I would agree with you.
I will all too happily wear egg on my face, along with other breakfast foodstuffs, if this is out in March.
This is the one change I would challenge because it raises the issue of stat requirements for things like armor and weapons.
I don't think it raises that issue at all. Unless I missed it, he doesn't mention stat requirements. Instead of restricting what you can put on, it restricts what benefits you. Feel free to use that dex weapon on the barb if it's still actually better, etc.
On the plus side (for me), it's looking more and more likely that I will have moved to a different state with my fiance and have great internet before Diablo III ever comes out, so I might actually be able to get it at release.
I haven't decided if I will get it at release or not, though.
They are removing the whole Mystic Artisan from the game for now(which was taking up a lot of their time) so that will speed up the release... maybe.
They are reworking the stat system, but as pointed out, it is already done and just testing now. So probably only a little extra time added to the release date.
They are reworking the skill/rune system(have been for awhile now actually)... no telling how long that will take and/or if it was already factored into their release date(probably).
So overall, the release date is probably not changing too much from their original... although Q2+ is more likely than Q1 of this year.
Onto the whole items/selling/salvage changes(again).
I can see that they want players to choose between fast-paced fast-leveling OR (maybe) faster money making. The problem is that they didn't NEED to make this change. I made a list of reasons to go to town vs staying out in the field:
Why to go to town:
1. Quests
2. Selling
3. Salvaging
4. Skill swapping
5. Crafting
6. AFKing
7. Buying
8. Griefing(spamming/causing mobs to be tougher w/o participating in the fighting).
Why to stay in the field:
1. FUN
This pretty much sums it up for me... why force players to go back to town if there is any way possible to avoid it? If they don't want players to "mess up" the economy or whatever, just redo drop rates, make it so item quality goes up with level so eventually you just wont see white, then blues, etc. as you level so you are not tempted to pick them up.
The worst part of D2 was having to town portal 4-5x per zone to sell crap because your inventory was full to the point that eventually you just didn't even look at items that dropped... The items became WORTHLESS, which is what will happen in D3. Eventually there will be one set of gear that everyone will want because it is the best for their class and not pick up ANYTHING else.
All of you guys freaking out about when the game is coming out need to realize that these changes are already in, not on their to do list.
With the except, of course, of whatever is going on with runes and skills. We simply dont have enough info on those right now.
I'm still saying March, and you can all thank me when I'm right.
If it weren't for the whole retooling of the entire skill/rune system, which Jay very specifically says they can't ship without, I would agree with you.
I will all too happily wear egg on my face, along with other breakfast foodstuffs, if this is out in March.
Yeah it's really this mainly, I think. All those other changes will be live in the upcoming beta release; except for the one they said isn't fully finished but I don't feel like looking up which change that was.
Anyway, the rune/skill stuff they keep talking about, and have been talking about (particularly runes) for so long but still aren't showing anything, which is the biggest concern.
My initial reaction of not seeing the game till summer (and I still won't be surprised if we don't) wasn't so much the changes listed specifically, but more to the fact that they're, at this point in development, willing to totally scrap and vastly change long built in systems, seemingly (which it obviously isn't internally to them) on a whim. That sort of fleeting design, let alone being very worrying for various reasons, isn't a sign of a near release game.
Posts
I wonder if it pays for certain builds to put points into other classes' stats instead of dumping everything into vitality. Armor and dodge seem useful. More health from globes, not so much.
The old stats were super bland, but this way, with skills still being based on weapon damage and no way to manually add stats, it's the same shit with different numbers and formulas.
Anyone want to beta read a paranormal mystery novella? Here's your chance.
stream
Hopefully they do at least give a person in town the Identify All ability, for the people who don't stop and ID each item as they get it and end up having an inventory full of them.
Also, some people have apparently convinced themselves that reworking the skills system means they're bringing back skill points. Mostly by combining the following quote with all the references about extensive customization and whatnot and then taking a leap of biased logic:
Especially annoying that we can't break white items down anymore. What the fuck is the point of them after level 10? Why do they need to drop if they're A. Useless and B. Sit in your inventory until you just sell them. Why waste our time with that shit? Just drop more gold so we can get back to the fun part of the game. :P
It really feels like they're placing artificial time wasters in here, rather than coming up with good mechanical concepts.
I think thats the takeaway point. I wonder why they think thats better than needing all 4 stats.
whole article quoted in spoiler:
Systems Changes
by Jay Wilson
Jan 19, 2012 9:00 AM PST
Edit: Valiance, my knight in shining GPotW.
People never learn when it comes to blizzard and releases.
I suspect it is for the antic...
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...ip...
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ation...?
And I usually trust Blizzard's judgement VERY MUCH. I was OK with everything they did up until now. But this kind of ultra major system complete redesign at this point is extremely disheartening and completely drained me of any faith I had in the D3 system team.
If you were lucky enough to have some amazing +Attack 1h sword, way better than anything else you had, you'd have good reason to pass it around to whichever character you happened to be on at the moment. Instead, Str/Dex/Int will more clearly define who gets the best use out of the item. I imagine there would still be Int swords, etc.
The cube/cauldron change is upsetting. Unless they up the sell value on Commons, picking them up may be more trouble than it's worth.
We're not going to see this game till summer, at the earliest, are we?
EDIT: I won't be surprised when they go back on going back on the idea of selling/breaking down from outside of town.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Shit, why even have the need to identify stuff? The "Unwrapping your present" analogy only works when you like the present. As is, finding an item, going "oh, is this worth something to me?" and then having to go through a small cast time to have probably greater than not chance of going "Nope" just seems like archaic design: kept only because it's a series "staple." Slay that sacred cow, I say!
That's what the expansion is for!
Agreed, I mean, if they are concerned that we will never go back to town, we have plenty of incentive. In the early game, we will be headed back for quests and to swap skills out.
Lategame, we will need to be craftin' stuff.
The town portal changes make sense when you take them with the salvage changes. Before you would vacuum up every item that dropped and salvage it. The cube was important because of the volume of material that was coming in. Now there's less salvageable material incoming so trips to town will be less frequent. And I do think it's nice to have breaks in the combat where you can take stock of the loot situation. I don't know whether on the balance which system is right but I do see advantages to the removal of the cube/cauldron.
I was reeling from all of those and thinking, "OK, OK, makes sense, sounds good...WTF changing all the stats?"
This is the one change I would challenge because it raises the issue of stat requirements for things like armor and weapons. The other way was much more simplified. He says this is more intuitive; perhaps, but it's also more complicated. It also means they're going to have to create more class-specific items (which includes art work, modeling, and animations).
There is no way in Hell this game is getting released before the Summer.
I always thought the Mystic was superfluous, but it's a shame we'll be losing a rather colorful and interesting NPC.
Their solution to ID scrolls is almost funny. It's like they said, "Both sides are right."
Let the nerd rage commence!
Yeah I found myself going back to town plenty. At the ends of quests certainly, but also just to swap skills. I don't think that was a problem at all.
I'm glad Blizz is willing to do this kind of radial rework, but it scares me that they need to at this stage. And the stuff they are marking as problems is not stuff I saw at all.
Oh well. 2013 here we come! (actually I'm guessing Q3 or Q4 of 2012... I still have hope!)
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I think the identify mechanic is important actually. Maybe not for uniques (legendaries I guess... no idea what was wrong with the term uniques....), since eventually you'll know them all by heart anyway, but for rares and magic items it makes sense. It raises your hopes slightly before crushing them. It's a little gamble step that enhances the addictiveness of the game. "Ooh a blue, it might be good! awww." is better than "oh great another ring of the lion. salvage." That way turns blues into whites. I think there's an important fun factor in that ID step.
With the except, of course, of whatever is going on with runes and skills. We simply dont have enough info on those right now.
I'm still saying March, and you can all thank me when I'm right.
I was all gung ho and chomping at the bit to get into the beta of D3 over the summer. I happily feasted upon their site updates like the talent builder and lauded their appointing GFraizer/Nebu as the man at the helm...
...but this is so drawn out that the game has fallen off my radar, save a few cases like the Azmodan trailer. Even then, it warrants a quick viewing and then the idea of the game is pushed aside. I haven't even checked my Battle.net account in a month and a half, despite the Facebook contest that promised a new batch of beta invites every week (with 1 in 4 getting an extra key for a friend, woohoo!)
It's going to take a lot to reignite my interest, I'm sorry to say.
-Z
yeah as much as I like that blizz wants to iterate and polish till the game is perfect, it scares me that they're still figuring this out, and are ending up moving backwards towards diablo 2 mechanics. I liked the cube a lot! but I guess we still get to use it, just only on blues and up. whites just get sold now.
Also, if they want to recapture that diablo 2 feel, keep the item categories the same. uniques 4 life yo. fuck legendaries.
Hooray?
Coran Attack!
I'm in the exact same boat and for me it'll be either a release date announcement or maybe beta access
This so much. All the other changes I am fine with, but when I went back and played D2 again a few months ago, it was clear the CONSTANT need to travel back to town was the most unfun, annoying thing about that game. I don't see how giving you a free TP "fixes this." How the fuck is that different from D2? TP scrolls were NOT HARD to find. I never ran out ever. The only difference now is that D3 has a cast time on the thing. So it's *worse.*
I really hope they reverse this change. I'll be sure to bitch on the beta forums at least.
Edit:
Also this, so much. Why even drop white items?
If it weren't for the whole retooling of the entire skill/rune system, which Jay very specifically says they can't ship without, I would agree with you.
I will all too happily wear egg on my face, along with other breakfast foodstuffs, if this is out in March.
I don't think it raises that issue at all. Unless I missed it, he doesn't mention stat requirements. Instead of restricting what you can put on, it restricts what benefits you. Feel free to use that dex weapon on the barb if it's still actually better, etc.
I haven't decided if I will get it at release or not, though.
They are reworking the stat system, but as pointed out, it is already done and just testing now. So probably only a little extra time added to the release date.
They are reworking the skill/rune system(have been for awhile now actually)... no telling how long that will take and/or if it was already factored into their release date(probably).
So overall, the release date is probably not changing too much from their original... although Q2+ is more likely than Q1 of this year.
Onto the whole items/selling/salvage changes(again).
I can see that they want players to choose between fast-paced fast-leveling OR (maybe) faster money making. The problem is that they didn't NEED to make this change. I made a list of reasons to go to town vs staying out in the field:
Why to go to town:
1. Quests
2. Selling
3. Salvaging
4. Skill swapping
5. Crafting
6. AFKing
7. Buying
8. Griefing(spamming/causing mobs to be tougher w/o participating in the fighting).
Why to stay in the field:
1. FUN
This pretty much sums it up for me... why force players to go back to town if there is any way possible to avoid it? If they don't want players to "mess up" the economy or whatever, just redo drop rates, make it so item quality goes up with level so eventually you just wont see white, then blues, etc. as you level so you are not tempted to pick them up.
The worst part of D2 was having to town portal 4-5x per zone to sell crap because your inventory was full to the point that eventually you just didn't even look at items that dropped... The items became WORTHLESS, which is what will happen in D3. Eventually there will be one set of gear that everyone will want because it is the best for their class and not pick up ANYTHING else.
Yeah it's really this mainly, I think. All those other changes will be live in the upcoming beta release; except for the one they said isn't fully finished but I don't feel like looking up which change that was.
Anyway, the rune/skill stuff they keep talking about, and have been talking about (particularly runes) for so long but still aren't showing anything, which is the biggest concern.
My initial reaction of not seeing the game till summer (and I still won't be surprised if we don't) wasn't so much the changes listed specifically, but more to the fact that they're, at this point in development, willing to totally scrap and vastly change long built in systems, seemingly (which it obviously isn't internally to them) on a whim. That sort of fleeting design, let alone being very worrying for various reasons, isn't a sign of a near release game.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand