Yeah, I'm fine with attack and defense stats existing, and even being the most important stats on gear, but being essentially the only 2 meaningful stats in the game isn't great.
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Diablo IV announced
- Thread starter NotLiquid
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Yeah, I'm fine with attack and defense stats existing, and even being the most important stats on gear, but being essentially the only 2 meaningful stats in the game isn't great.
Those stats were never meaningful though. You took the minimum you needed to equip your gear sets, and then dropped the rest into defensive stats. 92 strength to wear astral plate being the common threshold.
Its the same in PoE as well - unless you are using a particular unique item that cares about a specific stat, it's still the case that base attributes are there to meet equipment thresholds.
Its the same in PoE as well - unless you are using a particular unique item that cares about a specific stat, it's still the case that base attributes are there to meet equipment thresholds.
Fair enough, but they were more meaningful in D2 than they were in D3. I'm not sure how they should tackle that issue, I just know that I don't want my damage scaling stat to be called "Attack" or my damage reduction to be called "Defense"; there must be a more appealing way to deal with it.
Dex/Strength/Intelligence is usually about equipment/skill restrictions in these games. Some builds can build around having high enough stat based around certain items. PoE does this well enough, it's also a balancing thing. Something like Cospri's Malice is an insanely powerful weapon but requires high intelligence and dexterity to wield. And then there are items that convert stats to other attributes. Stack strength then convert to armor, Dexterity into movement speed etc.
There is a lot of stuff you can do with it. Where as there is nothing you can do with a generic "Attack" mod.
There is a lot of stuff you can do with it. Where as there is nothing you can do with a generic "Attack" mod.
One thing I really like about the new system is how we can put points into skills. In D3 the skills are all "does X% of weapon damage" where as in D4 it will be "does 32-45 damage" for rank 1 and "does 37-50 damage" for rank 2 and so on. Having every skill tied to weapon damage was boring and nonsensical. Having individual ranks with damage values will make for more interesting builds and itemization. There will be items that put points into individual skills so a player can have say level 22 Frozen Orb (soft cap 15) where Frost Nova may be be maxed out at 15. This is why I don't think it's a big deal that all skills can be maxed, there will still be choices to be made, they will just be made with gear.
Everything that was in the demo from the icy-veins link a couple pages back:
I'm not a fan of +critical strike damage and the various types of damage coming back as a percent increase. From what I remember of D3 they were overpowered and dominated gear choices.
Everything that was in the demo from the icy-veins link a couple pages back:
I'm not a fan of +critical strike damage and the various types of damage coming back as a percent increase. From what I remember of D3 they were overpowered and dominated gear choices.
Probably an unpopular opinion but i prefer the more colorfull D3. This looks so grey and dull, but can understand why it would be popular given the IPs history.
Diablo 3 on console was a travesty with the amounts of hacking and item duping going on. Going always online is the best call with a game that's all about the loot.
I only play Diablo 3 offline in local co-op or single player. That option should remain in Diablo 4. If it's not then that's cool, but Blizzard shouldn't expect me to but a copy.
Yeah I'd be fine with the option to have offline only characters but personally for me if it's between what D3 on consoles did or always online, I'll choose the latter in a heartbeat.
If some of the rumors are true and Paladin is back, I hope to hell they bring back Zeal in Diablo 2 form.
Also, attack rating needs to come back. Damn I miss that stat.
Also, attack rating needs to come back. Damn I miss that stat.
I mean, hopefully not the original form of Zeal, which added an extra attack for every level and could therefor lock you in place until you had completed all 20+ swings...
You must be one of the few people in the world to enjoy it. It's been removed from games across all genres because most players dislike missing in that respect. Developers tend to tune balanced using damage numbers and defences rather than hit chances nowadays.
(PoE excepting of course!)
I always loved the Charge pally more than the Zeal pally (but Hammerdins were my bae). I just loved the sound and visual effect of Charge. My brother and I still do the sound from time to time lol.
50/50 on that lead dev addressing player concerns will turn into another "You think you do, but you don't".
I think the bigger problem is that Blizzard isn't innovating big, they're innovating small with D4. They're changing certain systems in small'ish ways and change how certain numbers work, etc., but they I think they'd need to radically re-think how Top Down ARPGs should work. Click and Point combat systems don't really make sense in todays time, a lot of the cool conceptual ideas they had for D3 were never realized and also apparently aren't on the table for D4 and I think the world state event stuff (which is one of the bigger innovations) isn't really all that exciting for Diablo fans.
I think Mosqueira got it, he understood that in order for this thing to keep going, some big changes needed to happen... and he got whacked for thinking outside the box.
As far as communication goes, it really couldn't get better than this, so glad they're taking feedback seriously (seemingly).
Totally agree. One thing I've learned with the recent increased visibility of PoE and Diablo's fanbases is that the ARPG die-hards are super conservative in their tastes.
Don't see the appeal. PoE fills the traditional Loot ARPG segment while Nioh is actually the Loot ARPG evolution that the folks behind Hellgate London failed to realize. If a Nioh 3 ever goes the way of class systems it's basically full Diablo mode.
D4 looks uninspired but I guess Blizzard will always have die hard fan points sticking to them because they're blizzard and not because of the quality of their games.
D4 looks uninspired but I guess Blizzard will always have die hard fan points sticking to them because they're blizzard and not because of the quality of their games.
It's loading in a low resolution for me too. If I view it directly from the site it looks better (on mobile).
Now if skills are no longer tied to weapon % damage, THAT is the most important step in the right direction.
I am not kidding myself: This game will pale in comparison to current PoE, let alone its next form, but at least it will be a viable alternative.
I am not kidding myself: This game will pale in comparison to current PoE, let alone its next form, but at least it will be a viable alternative.
D3 sold a ton of copies and brought in a lot of new players by releasing on consoles. I see no reason to get away from the gameplay that has worked so well for the franchise up to this point. If they want to try something new I wouldn't mind seeing a spin-off Diablo title in addition to the traditional gameplay in the numbered sequels, but I'm not ready to lose my point/click.
Well the good news is that Llama has a direct line of contact to the D4 team (as do the other streamers invited to BlizzCon). So Blizz will hear the feedback for sure. It remains to be seen if they decide to use any of it or not.
While poe seems miles ahead in mechanics and content, D4s artstyle and general polish just speaks to me much more.
That's a very, very dangerous line of thinking, especially since Blizzard has some serious competition this time around. When D3 came out, a ton of people bought the game blindly just because of D2 and because there wasn't that much else around and people wanted their ARPG kick. Back then, people didn't take PoE seriously yet compared to Diablo. We're looking at a very different landscape now... Will the game sell if it stays the way it is? Of course. But it doesn't look super exciting yet, it doesn't look like it'd blow my mind and make my jaw drop. There's a huge difference between 'Here's a darker Diablo 3 with some adjusted systems!' and 'Here's our next-gen Diablo experience!'. Blizzard has unlimited resources, so you'd definitely expect the latter.
They don't have the right devs, that's all there is to it
You should really have a look at that Path of Exile 2 announcement stream.
Start at 1:42:00 and thank me later.
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It's still not on par with what was shown of D4. I also believe that D4 will have a lot more unique asset's. In a GDC dev talk the poe guy showcased how they heavily rely on reusing assets (desert areas being color corrected ice areas etc) and everything being randomly generated and was of firm believe this to be the only viable approach if you do free2play. Blizzard has , I would assume , more artists doing textures then the whole GGG Dev team. So I expect D4 to look a lot better, from art, assets and general polish.
If I'm staring 500 hours on the same animations they tend to become an important part of the experience.
From the fair bit of PoE I have played I would say it excels in some areas and not in others. The core combat just doesn't feel anywhere near as good and crunchy as Diablo for me. I could not even find anyway to lock-on in PoE (maybe I missed that). The story and lore in PoE seemed utterly nonsensical. The story in D3 wasn't the best but I thought it was still better than PoE campaign story and had the lore from the previous game's stories (which were great) to carry it. PoE has the customisation and character build stuff down though.
All that said, for me I would still give the edge to Diablo for the combat, the world and I guess powerful nostalgia. Also PoE is a full on GAAS game that's constantly improving and adding whereas I don't think D3 was ever planned to be that. So, it's natural that it would have way more content.
I watched the reveal live and a bunch of gameplay afterwards, and I completely agree with them. I've played PoE before and it didn't hold my attention for very long, I don't see why this would.
For comparison:
With seamless dungeons now, Diablo 4 will hopefully have some verticality.
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I'll try both obviously, but the "mmo-lite" setting for D4 was the right way to move the series along.
I can't stand the seasonal reset thing much anymore.
I can't stand the seasonal reset thing much anymore.
Lock on? Diablo doesn't have lock on either. Maybe in the console version? Never played that.
POE actually has a pretty interesting and very dark lore, but it's very easy to just skip everything. The Diablo 3 story was, in m opinion utter garbage, after the story of D2 (but the same happened to SC2 after Brood War). But yes, the combat in Diablo is miles better, but in terms of content, mechanics, itemization and build diversity, POE is king. At least as I see it from the few hundred hours I played of both.
Aside from the atmosphere, this is what makes me much more excited for D4, I'm not going to play for thousands of hours, maybe a few hundred, but not long enough for any of that depth to make much of a difference.
Poe of course, actually has lock on. Once you start auto-attacking on something, "namelocking" occurs and until you release your mouse, your character will "cling" to it with attacks and even movement. It is one of the first things that you learn to avoid by hitting stop+attack and replacing attack button with move button.
Blizzard seems to be presenting D4 as a throwback to the earlier games in the series due to all the backlash from D3. The negativity I saw wasn't about the genre being stagnant or a lack of innovation but rather for departing too much from what existing fans expected. The auction house, itemization (skills scaling too much off weapon damage), the change in tone and art style, the story and cartoonish dialog are what I remember people complaining about along with the hacks on the console side. I understand where you're coming from but as a long time fan of the series a throwback Diablo game is exactly what I want. I suppose we'll have to see where everyone else falls but I think there is enough space in the genre for PoE, Diablo, and others to all do well. I suspect Diablo will capture more of the casual players with the bigger budget and refined D3 combat while PoE will certainly appeal to the segment that wants the extreme customization systems.
FWIW I did think the leaks about the canceled Josh Mosqueira game sounded great, I would want to play that game, just not if it meant no more traditional Diablo.
I get that and there's definitely some truth to that. When D3 came out, people expected a game on the quality level of D2 and the sad fact is that it just wasn't. Not even close. The Auction House made no sense at all for a game like D3, it was just shoehorned into the game half a year or so before release and it just completely ran counter to D3's core gameplay loop. But that wasn't the only issue, the D3 design team just fundamentally didn't understand some of the core aspects that made D2 tick. I usually never throw other designers under the bus, but Jay Wilson was just the wrong person to put in charge of D3. He was responsible for some core changes that just put the game into a state where it wasn't really 'fixable' even with expansions and so on (don't get me started on the Paragon system... a horribly grindy design patch on top of a fundamentally flawed system... terrible). There was no skill system anymore, they didn't like the fact that people were able to look up optimal build stats on a Wiki, so their response was to just completely remove the skill system, to remove player choice and weigh everything insanely towards itemization, which made the game incredibly shallow... and it also killed the fantasy. Playing a mage and running around with a heavy Barb two-hander completely broke the class fantasy, but that's what you had to do to gain an edge due to shallow systems.
I get that people would basically be happy if they'd 'just get another Diablo 2', but you're not getting that by just creating a carbon copy of a thing you already made. D2, when it came out, was pretty revolutionary. It improved upon every aspect of Diablo 1 and successfully so. It still had some silly systems in it (what in the world was the stamina / run shit for? I don't understand that to this day), but it was a damn fine game and the systems made the game almost infinitely replayable - D3 due to its shallow almost arcade-like quality just didn't have that. If you want to create the next big thing in a franchise, sometimes you have to innovate and take the next step, even if that step is a bit radical and might offend your old school fans for a bit (Until they 'get' that it's the right step forward). The proper sequel to 2d Mario at some point had to be Super Mario 64. If they would've gone 3d by doing what New Super Mario Bros did, nobody would have cared. Again, Point and Click Combat is a relic of the past. There's tons of games out there that show how the combat system in those games should work, but Blizzard at this point is just trying to do the same old, same old and that'll bite them in the butt, cause somebody is gonna come in and do it right.
Stamina is dumb but running/walking had a gameplay factor behind it. When you're running, the game ignores the chance to hit formula (meaning attacks will always hit) and blocking is reduced to 1/3 effectiveness. Therefore walking is the safer way to traverse dungeons, especially if you're playing hardcore which is a throwback to roguelikes. Think of successfully hitting/missing as rolling a dice in D&D.
Just from what they've shown, it seems pretty far along for something that's four years away.