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  #1  
Old 08-03-2012, 10:41 PM
Cubsfan Cubsfan is online now
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Diablo 3 - 2.5 months later.

Well, I think I've reached the point where I'm going to uninstall the game. I got my moneys worth out of it but am highly disappointed in the pitiful end game. The only people playing it now are people who have been grinding since launch, so they are only buying the most perfect gear and anything that is "good" is left to rot on the AH. I've been lvl 60 since late May I think and only play a few hours a week now at most and it's just not enough time to try to win the lotto. Prices in the AH on useful gear have gone so high that the casual player just cannot earn enough gold to buy any improved gear anymore and the "good gear" that I do find may sell for 40-80k (which was good back in the first month after launch) but that doesn't even allow me to sniff the taint of a decent 1kdps+ 1h weapon, even though there are 1000's of them to choose from on the AH.

I did get my monies worth, but it was not satisfying at all and I'm definitely let down by the game, including the amazingly slow reaction time by Blizzard to patch the grossly damaged itemization in this game. I'm not on the Official Forums or Gamefaqs complaining about the game, but I wanted to say something somewhere because I'm just let down. I'll uninstall the game to keep myself from burning off an hour here, 30min there, doing a couple goblin runs even if it does only add up to 4-5hours total a week because it just doesn't get me anywhere.

Is anyone here even still playing? The fact that there is little to no traffic on this board regarding Diablo 3 when D2 had new threads every few months is telling.
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  #2  
Old 08-03-2012, 10:44 PM
Snowboarder Bo Snowboarder Bo is offline
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I stopped playing in June. I think I got to level 32 or something. The game was boring as hell.
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  #3  
Old 08-03-2012, 10:54 PM
Kinthalis Kinthalis is offline
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I really don't get the whole "end game" complaint.

It's an ACTION RPG. It's not an MMO. You got a guy up to level 60 and were still playing... that's how many hours? 20, 30, 40? More?

How the hell is that disappointing?

Please explain it to me. I've never personally been disappointed by a game that lasted me tens and tens of hours. I tend to stop playing a disappointing game a few hours in at most. The last call of duty: texture swap, THAT was disappointing.

This was an extensive game, with flaws, for sure, but the mechanics were solid, and it was FUN. Heck, it provided me with more fun than the last Dragon Age fiasco.

I really, really don't get it. It seems to be the same idiotic complain coming from everyone hating on this game.

"Diablo 3 sucks after 120 hours it gets a bit repetative, you know?"

What did you expect, exactly? Blizzard boothbabes to come to your house and blow you while you played the game?

Last edited by Kinthalis; 08-03-2012 at 10:56 PM.
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  #4  
Old 08-03-2012, 10:56 PM
Vicullum Vicullum is offline
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Stopped playing a couple weeks ago after I finished leveling my third lvl 60 character. I won't say I didn't get my money's worth, but as far as end game goes you're exactly right: this game doesn't have one. Grind mobs for gear just so you can grind mobs for gear faster? What moron thought that would make a satisfying game experience?

Maybe I wouldn't have stuck around longer if Blizzard had actually done a balance pass on the talents so that each class would have more than one or two viable builds in inferno. The fact that 2.5 months later they STILL haven't done it is a sad testament to how far their company has declined.
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  #5  
Old 08-03-2012, 10:59 PM
Kinthalis Kinthalis is offline
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You know what, you guys are right.

You know what else sucked?

Max Payne. What the hell is up with THAT end game? I mean, watching credits rolling is not MY idea of fun.

And what about the end game for Batman, Arkham City? Who the hell wants to spend their time searching for trophies all over the place?

Trash games, all of them. When are developers going to design an action game that lasts and remains fresh for 700 hours? What the hell is so hard about that?

Last edited by Kinthalis; 08-03-2012 at 11:00 PM.
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  #6  
Old 08-03-2012, 11:09 PM
Tarwater Tarwater is offline
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Originally Posted by Kinthalis View Post
You know what, you guys are right.

You know what else sucked?

Max Payne. What the hell is up with THAT end game? I mean, watching credits rolling is not MY idea of fun.

And what about the end game for Batman, Arkham City? Who the hell wants to spend their time searching for trophies all over the place?

Trash games, all of them. When are developers going to design an action game that lasts and remains fresh for 700 hours? What the hell is so hard about that?
Truly an impressive argument.
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  #7  
Old 08-03-2012, 11:15 PM
Cubsfan Cubsfan is online now
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D2 was built around, and thrived, on it's end game grind. It's what gave the game it's longevity. This is the direct sequel to that game. It's end game sucks and when that's what the main fan base wanted is a disappointment. I'd almost liken it to the thrashing Drgon Age 2 took because it wasn't the same as the first one.
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  #8  
Old 08-03-2012, 11:29 PM
Johnny Bravo Johnny Bravo is offline
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It's about expectations.

Diablo 3 was marketed as a game that was going to have an extensive end-game, driven by the Real Money Auction House. It didn't live up to that expectation.

There's nothing wrong with being disappointed in a game that didn't live up to its own hype.
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  #9  
Old 08-03-2012, 11:36 PM
Mosier Mosier is offline
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The auction house has only been fully functional for a short time. They finally released the patch that allowed commodities to sell on the RMAH, what, three weeks ago? I checked it out briefly, but wasn't impressed. I love the concept of people buying and selling game items, but the magic formula hasn't been nailed just yet.

I'll start playing again when the expansion comes out. I feel like I've "beaten" the vanilla game.
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  #10  
Old 08-03-2012, 11:46 PM
Sudden Kestrel Sudden Kestrel is offline
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I still play about an hour a week. I can't really define why I don't find it more compelling. It could be the crappy drops or the failure of crafting or a thousand different things. I just can't care about it, for some reason. Maybe I'm just aging out of gaming . There's also something from the first two games that's missing, some atmospheric element or story feature that seems out of whack.

I'm pinning my last gaming hopes on Guild Wars 2 and will probably uninstall D3 when that arrives.
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  #11  
Old 08-04-2012, 10:16 AM
Chronos Chronos is offline
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So, wait, the OP is disappointed on the one hand that gear that's anything less than perfect just rots away on the auction house for lack of anyone to buy it, and on the other hand that there's no good gear available on the auction house for him to buy? How can both of these be true simultaneously? Just go buy yourself some of this slightly-less-than-perfect gear that's sitting around rotting.
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  #12  
Old 08-04-2012, 10:29 AM
elninost0rm elninost0rm is offline
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Originally Posted by Kinthalis View Post
I really don't get the whole "end game" complaint.

It's an ACTION RPG. It's not an MMO. You got a guy up to level 60 and were still playing... that's how many hours? 20, 30, 40? More?

How the hell is that disappointing?

Please explain it to me. I've never personally been disappointed by a game that lasted me tens and tens of hours. I tend to stop playing a disappointing game a few hours in at most. The last call of duty: texture swap, THAT was disappointing.

This was an extensive game, with flaws, for sure, but the mechanics were solid, and it was FUN. Heck, it provided me with more fun than the last Dragon Age fiasco.

I really, really don't get it. It seems to be the same idiotic complain coming from everyone hating on this game.

"Diablo 3 sucks after 120 hours it gets a bit repetative, you know?"

What did you expect, exactly? Blizzard boothbabes to come to your house and blow you while you played the game?
As someone else touched on already, expectations.

I played D2 for 10 years and probably 1,000+ hours.

I played D3 for 1 month and maybe 50-60 hours before I could no longer stomach it.

So much that people loved about D2 was ripped out, beaten bloody, and then laid to rest 6 feet under.
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  #13  
Old 08-04-2012, 10:34 AM
markdash markdash is offline
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Originally Posted by elninost0rm View Post
As someone else touched on already, expectations.

I played D2 for 10 years and probably 1,000+ hours.

I played D3 for 1 month and maybe 50-60 hours before I could no longer stomach it.

So much that people loved about D2 was ripped out, beaten bloody, and then laid to rest 6 feet under.
Well, they do get to patch D3, don't they?
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  #14  
Old 08-04-2012, 10:51 AM
RickJay RickJay is offline
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I doubt I got 20 hours out of it.

I beat the game, and that was that. I have not once had any interest in playing it again.

20 hours isn't much by the standards of it PC game releases.
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  #15  
Old 08-04-2012, 05:11 PM
MJinks MJinks is offline
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I probably played it for over 100 hours and got a WD and Barb to inferno Act 4. I stopped playing weeks ago though and haven't gone back, partly because I've been working 60+ hour weeks but mostly because of the lack of a fun endgame. The wonderfully addictive grind of D2 is just not there and don't give me the 'rose tinted glasses' counter-argument because I was playing D2 right up to the day of D3's release.

Having said that I consider 50p/hour to be excellent value for money when it comes to games and even if I never touch it again I still consider it money well spent.

Last edited by MJinks; 08-04-2012 at 05:12 PM.
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  #16  
Old 08-04-2012, 07:06 PM
Kinthalis Kinthalis is offline
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So what exactly is so different form D2 and D3's "End game"?
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  #17  
Old 08-04-2012, 11:47 PM
Cubsfan Cubsfan is online now
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I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or serious K. If serious have you played a char to 60 and spent time in inferno? If not then, frankly, you don't have any real experience worth bringing to this conversation.

Last edited by Cubsfan; 08-04-2012 at 11:49 PM.
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  #18  
Old 08-05-2012, 02:22 AM
Jules Andre Jules Andre is offline
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I'm out, completely. I put in probably 150 hours between two characters, but I have zero desire to ever start the program again. The game just isn't tuned correctly.

Since entering Inferno, not one single upgrade has dropped for me. Every single item I have equipped has been purchased. And with the economy so broken, it would take roughly 20 hours to build up enough gold to buy an upgrade on the AH. Probably another 150 hours to get enough upgrades to notice a difference. I can't see any reason to invest the time into that when the reward is just some bigger numbers behind the scenes.
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  #19  
Old 08-05-2012, 06:12 AM
cckerberos cckerberos is offline
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Originally Posted by Chronos View Post
So, wait, the OP is disappointed on the one hand that gear that's anything less than perfect just rots away on the auction house for lack of anyone to buy it, and on the other hand that there's no good gear available on the auction house for him to buy? How can both of these be true simultaneously?
It can be true if the less than perfect gear is outrageously overpriced.
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  #20  
Old 08-05-2012, 08:53 AM
Cubsfan Cubsfan is online now
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Originally Posted by cckerberos View Post
It can be true if the less than perfect gear is outrageously overpriced.
This.

Everyone is pricing all gear at mega high prices in the hopes of catching up enough gold to be able to afford the gear they need. Problem is that very little of it sells so we are all stuck in the same cycle. This is why you see 100's or 1000's of nearly the exact same item sitting on the AH for millions and millions of gold. Nobody wants to pay M's of gold for 80% gear because they are looking for 100% gear that costs 10's or 100's of M gold to buy.

I don't even find things that I could sell on the AH at all to be honest, though I did sell some piece a month ago or so for 1M.

Last edited by Cubsfan; 08-05-2012 at 08:55 AM.
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  #21  
Old 08-05-2012, 08:54 AM
Kinthalis Kinthalis is offline
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Originally Posted by Cubsfan View Post
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or serious K. If serious have you played a char to 60 and spent time in inferno? If not then, frankly, you don't have any real experience worth bringing to this conversation.
I'm not being sarcastic, I'd like to know. I haven't made it to inferno yet though, so likely I might not understand some things, but I know enough about the game to get the gist of the difference, right?

For example, it looks like there is a difference in terms of the rewards. Is it a failure of interesting items popping up in inferno vs D2? Is it a fundamental flaw with the game, or is it something that a patch can easily fix?
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  #22  
Old 08-05-2012, 09:50 AM
Cubsfan Cubsfan is online now
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Originally Posted by Kinthalis View Post
I'm not being sarcastic, I'd like to know. I haven't made it to inferno yet though, so likely I might not understand some things, but I know enough about the game to get the gist of the difference, right?

For example, it looks like there is a difference in terms of the rewards. Is it a failure of interesting items popping up in inferno vs D2? Is it a fundamental flaw with the game, or is it something that a patch can easily fix?
Ok. Fair enough.

This has been discussed to death on the intertubes though so I'll give you the short version.

In D2 once you beat Diablo on the hardest difficulty you could (and did) continue to play and play and play trying to complete sets of gear and/or make your guy a little more powerful. Though you may not have gotten perfect gear to drop every time you played at least you regularly got incremental upgrades, however slight, to make you feel like you made progress with your character whenever you played. The items also had a very wide variety of affixes that boosted skills directly or added cold/fire/posion etc... to your weapon.

In D3 once you beat Diablo on Hell mode you are very limited in what you can actually accomplish. Item drops that help your toon improve are virtually non-existent in Inferno. Set items almost never drop and when they do they are about as worthless as the legendary items, which also almost never drop. Recipes to craft gems are as rare as winning the powerball so most of us are stuck with Flawless Square gems unless we want to pay massive gold prices for better gems on the AH. Items that drop in Inferno typically wouldn't even be useful in Hell let alone inferno difficulty an the affixes are all totally generic and roll horribly 99.9% of the time with things like 200INT on a Mighty Axe or a Wizard Hat with 200 STR etc...

There is nothing to keep a Diablo fan playing anymore in the end.
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  #23  
Old 08-05-2012, 10:16 AM
shijinn shijinn is offline
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imho, the problem is the lack of an item sink big enough to cover the ones caused by the auction house. you get exactly what you want without the intermediary upgrades. Diablo 2 kept you stringing along for a long, long time because it simply took a long, long time to get the equivalent item you might find in seconds on the AH for a mere 40-80k. if you're rich you could even get the perfect gear, something which would have taken a long, long while to collect in Diablo 2.

that is a difference between the endgame in Diablo 2 and 3 - the length of their grind.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Cubsfan View Post
... are only buying the most perfect gear and anything that is "good" is left to rot on the AH. ... casual player just cannot earn enough gold to buy any improved gear anymore and the "good gear" that I do find may sell for 40-80k ...
i'm quite sure a casual player can afford 80k.
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  #24  
Old 08-05-2012, 12:08 PM
Chronos Chronos is offline
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In high-level D2 play, drops that would directly help your character were quite rare, too. And to complete any but the lowest-level sets, your only realistic recourse was trading: I doubt that anyone ever completed any of D2's class-specific sets purely through their own drops, for instance. You never grinded to find items that would help you directly; you grinded to get items that you could trade for the ones that would help you directly. The only difference now is that trading is a heck of a lot easier than it used to be, since the auction house has moved the game economy beyond the inefficient barter system.

Quote:
Quoth Cubsfan:

Everyone is pricing all gear at mega high prices in the hopes of catching up enough gold to be able to afford the gear they need. Problem is that very little of it sells so we are all stuck in the same cycle. This is why you see 100's or 1000's of nearly the exact same item sitting on the AH for millions and millions of gold. Nobody wants to pay M's of gold for 80% gear because they are looking for 100% gear that costs 10's or 100's of M gold to buy.
This just means that people are setting their prices too high. Eventually, the market will figure that out, and start pricing things more sanely again. And guess what? You're part of the market, so you can do your part in that. If you want the items you find to sell, you need to price them at a point people are willing to pay. It's irrelevant that that price is so much less than what everyone else is charging, if everyone else isn't making any sales.
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  #25  
Old 08-05-2012, 01:00 PM
magnusblitz magnusblitz is offline
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Originally Posted by Kinthalis View Post
So what exactly is so different form D2 and D3's "End game"?
I myself stopped playing before reaching level 60, but based on my experience and what I've read:
- Inferno contains a lot of "enrage" timers - i.e., if you don't kill the enemy within a certain amount of time, it'll enrage, gain a ton of damage, and basically become unkillable. This means there isn't any slope of difficulty anymore, you can either beat a monster or you can't. Thus lots of people will get stuck in one Act of Inferno, unable to proceed until they finally get the gear they need.

- The overall question of "can you beat it or not" is almost entirely gear-dependent. There's no class that can proceed without awesome gear, like the Sorceress or Necromancer in D2.

- It's much more difficult to consistently find better gear because bosses don't have a good chance to drop uniques and sets as in D2. I know the design philosophy over having boss runs be useful or not has been contentious, but at the end of the day, I think most people would agree getting gear from boss runs is more fun than getting gear from the auction house.

I think there are some other problems that killed D3's longevity, such as:

- No reason to make more than one character of each class, due to the skill system. In D2, it was fun to roll a new character and start all over again, farming it up. Now you just switch your skills around on your level 60 character.
- General lack of interesting builds. Personally, I liked making non-cookie cutter builds, like Singer Barbarians or Poison Necros. The new skill system, where you get 6 skills no matter what (and you usually need at least 1 resource-generator) removes that. Obviously this isn't true for everyone, but it certainly turned me off the game.
- Likewise, the generally dull and boring items in the game ... though Blizzard says they're going to try and fix this in the next patch. (We'll see)

And lastly, as a quick answer to your sarcastic questioning about the complaints - D2 provided many (hundreds to thousands) hours of entertainment. Dungeon crawlers are intended to be like this - it's not about playing through once, it's about playing through over and over and over again, constantly finding more gear, etc. D3 fails miserably on that account, so while you can say "well I played it for 40 hours and had fun, that 's the same as the $60 I spent on this other different genre game" in terms of expectations of the person buying it, it failed miserably.

Last edited by magnusblitz; 08-05-2012 at 01:02 PM.
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  #26  
Old 08-05-2012, 02:18 PM
by-tor by-tor is offline
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I think PVP will be fun. However, in hell and inferno, the constant dying for shit drops is not worth it and an exercise in frustration to me.
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  #27  
Old 08-05-2012, 02:32 PM
Ethilrist Ethilrist is online now
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Originally Posted by Chronos View Post
This just means that people are setting their prices too high. Eventually, the market will figure that out, and start pricing things more sanely again. And guess what? You're part of the market, so you can do your part in that. If you want the items you find to sell, you need to price them at a point people are willing to pay. It's irrelevant that that price is so much less than what everyone else is charging, if everyone else isn't making any sales.
The problem is that there are a half-dozen games coming out in the next few months that are going to be a hell of a lot more fun than trying to manipulate AH prices in D3. I've got maybe 50-60 hours of play time in and I'm done with D3; I've got over 600 hours in Skyrim and I'm still playing. There just isn't that much to the game to make it consistently interesting to me.
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  #28  
Old 08-06-2012, 09:01 AM
CandidGamera CandidGamera is offline
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I gave it up about two months ago. I plan to go back and get each class through Normal, but everytime I think about picking it up again, I just go 'meh' and do something else.

The game's too tactically and strategically flat to sustain my interest on that side of things, so all it has to offer is the grind for goods - and while I haven't hit the endgame point where that becomes completely useless, upgrades are still pretty thin on the ground for me.
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  #29  
Old 08-06-2012, 09:04 AM
Anaamika Anaamika is offline
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I haven't played D3 (and probably don't intend to) but the fact remains that people are still playing D2. That's a big deal, how many years later? And I hear lots of complaints about D3.

I can't say for sure, but it certainly seems like a different kettle of fish.
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  #30  
Old 08-06-2012, 09:47 AM
Kiros Kiros is online now
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I stopped playing... wow, about a month and a half ago, now. I have a really addictive personality with this sort of stuff, but it got to the point where I was just getting really frustrated every time I logged in. I won't say that I regret the 100+ hours that I spent on the game, but I doubt I'll be back before it gets an expansion.

I was lucky enough to be ahead of the power/gear curve for most of the time I was playing - I had completed almost all of Inferno before the repair cost nerf, I have good enough gear to farm Act 2 and to be mostly secure playing in Act 3 - and it still felt like a chore. The fact that it takes 6+ hours to get a new character into Nightmare and to even start having fun is another big drawback, as someone who likes alts.

I don't think it's a bad game, but compared to the expectation level that D2 established, it was a massive disappointment.
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  #31  
Old 08-06-2012, 09:48 AM
Tom Scud Tom Scud is offline
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Personally, I'm still finding the actual Act I Inferno end area pretty fun on a purely tactical/twitch-game level. I've definitely hit the wall in terms of gear upgrades - at this point, seriously improving any of my gear will cost in the 5 to 10 million gold range, which is maybe a month or more of grinding. I can get some incremental improvements (as in +10 INT, +10 resist all) at a few slots for half a million or so, but why bother at this point?
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  #32  
Old 08-06-2012, 10:22 AM
Kinthalis Kinthalis is offline
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I do think that the skill system was a miscalculation on their part.

Yes, it means that it's easier to switch your character's abilities around and removes the penalty of a "bad build". But it completely guts one major replayability element that the hardcore really, really wanted.

And it was a miscalculation because it's the hardcore that drive the game past the first few months, and the casual Diablo players aren't going to continue to play anyway, so the impact of "bad builds" wouldn't be such an issue in the community.
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  #33  
Old 08-06-2012, 10:48 AM
DigitalC DigitalC is online now
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One big difference was that Diablo 2 was never actually hard. You could play the way you wanted, not just get forced into doing one specific way or get destroyed.
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  #34  
Old 08-06-2012, 03:55 PM
Chronos Chronos is offline
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I dunno... I definitely tried out some character concepts in D2 that just simply didn't work, and I play my D3 demon hunter completely differently than anyone else I've met. If anything, I'd say that D3 allows more flexibility in that regard, since all damage being based on your weapon means there's no such thing as "bad skills" any more.
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  #35  
Old 08-06-2012, 07:53 PM
Otara Otara is offline
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Id add in lag, as in I know Im playing a different game to someone closer to the servers, and loot variety.

Ive never even seen a set item before I gave the game away. Never saw a fun item either, like multi shot crossbows either - your attack is essentially identical regardless of the item.

They hardcored it to the point your average person will say screw it, and has. They may improve the game balance, but once people are disillusioned with a game, its pretty hard to get them to take a second go at it.

Particularly when your character has all red armour, and you cant be stuffed going to the work of getting the gold to fix it again which was my exit point.

As a way of ensuring people leave and dont come back, they cant do much better than that. Its almost like they didnt want people to return.

Otara
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  #36  
Old 08-09-2012, 03:59 PM
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I have played maybe 300 hours or so total with a barb in act 4 inferno and a wizard in act 3.

The main source of enjoyment for me is progressing the game, questing, etc. Finding items are great but only to the extent that they help me progress. I didn't use the AH until I couldn't progress any further. When I got to inferno, it was a massive gear check. Basically everything you need to do well in act 1 doesn't drop until act 1 so when you get there it's a death factory.

I farmed act 1 for some time and finally was able to do well enough to pass it. Then Act 2 was the same story all over again. No way in hell I could take a single boss pack. That meant I had to go back to act 1 and do runs there. Over and over. And over and over. Lots of them. I finally got to the point where act 1 was pretty easy. Repeat the same for act 2. Act 2 is now pretty easy and given I'm using the most overpowered build for barbs (double tornado), I find it not that hard. Act 3 however, I get killed by normal trash mobs. The game is setup so that as I move further and further, I feel weaker and weaker. I want to be stronger.

Most items are just crap. I dont even bother picking up rares that aren't lvl 60+ because they are a waste of time. I immediately salvage legendaries for the materials to save inventory space. And with the ridiculously low level cap, I can go 10 to 12 hours of game play with absolutely no progress. No new items, no new experience, no progress. Not quite sure why that's rewarding. At least in D2 there was experience towards a higher level. That's not that fun.

4 player max games. Really? You can't even have a game with 1 of each class. There are serious disincentives to playing in a group, even with 2 people. I want to play with my friends but it's more efficient to solo. D2 was a theorycrafting game to min/max your character. To min/max in D3, you play solo. That is a major fail.

Ultimately though, it's the gear check. To get the gear you need, you need to pass the point you're at. And even then, the gear will never drop. That overshadows the lack of build diversity and lack of incentive to replay. In D2, I had several builds of the same character to do different things. And past inferno act 1, everyone needs the exact same gear, mainstat, vit, all res. The only way to really boost your dmg is going to be crit chance and crit dmg as well. Anything that doesn't have that, is worthless. And you need life on hit because of some stupid 80% inferno penalty for life leech.

And yes, I still play most nights for about 2 hours because I still like the game, but if 1.04 doesn't fix some major issues I think that's it for me.
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  #37  
Old 08-09-2012, 04:33 PM
smiling bandit smiling bandit is offline
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I admit I was wondering why they didn't ad whole stages to each difficulty. That would really keep people coming back: add some specialty areas for each class, as well as new plot elements and which expand or alter, but don't contradict, the basic plot of the first runthrough.

This would greatly increase the variety available without really making the game that much more complicated to make. Blizz, however, seriously has a problem with the slows. There's perfectionism, and then there's insanity. When I look at D3, I start wondering how, exactly, this took so long to make. There's simply not enough there, there.
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  #38  
Old 08-09-2012, 08:28 PM
Autolycus Autolycus is offline
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I am a HC fiend and, as my characters aren't twinked out, I have been loving the roller-coaster thrill ride through the acts up to level 60 and Act4 Hell. However, now I have hit the wall. Rather, I should say I have hit the wall before the wall. I need to farm Hell just to be able to farm Inferno Act1.

Rather than repeat what everyone has already said, I'll just say that my playtime has waned significantly, and if some recent patches don't majorly liven things up, I don't know if I'll be able to find the motivation to play more. It's a shame too... I really wanted to finish Inferno HC, seeing as I beat D2 hardcore in high school... Kinda a nostalgia thing, you know?
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  #39  
Old 08-12-2012, 07:20 PM
Bone Bone is offline
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I was purely HC in D2 as well, though that game mechanic for my playstyle lent itself better to HC play than D3. I still have the urge to play HC, but after going through to Act 4 in Inferno, I dont think that will ever happen. I still play the same way, minimizing deaths and not pushing content I'm unable to handle, but the cheap deaths and spike damage to me are insurmountable. That and I dont have the time I once had to grind for gear.

I think I could safely complete Hell difficulty in HC, but beyond that I think it would be impossible given my time constraints.
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  #40  
Old 08-13-2012, 08:42 AM
Airk Airk is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kinthalis View Post
And it was a miscalculation because it's the hardcore that drive the game past the first few months, and the casual Diablo players aren't going to continue to play anyway, so the impact of "bad builds" wouldn't be such an issue in the community.
But the question is...why should they CARE? They've already sold you the game. At this point, unless you're spending money on the RMAH, you're a liability if you continue to play because you're using server power.

It's not in their best interest to have hardcore people "drive the game past the first few months". It's in their best interests to sell you another game or an expansion pack, or have you go back to playing WoW in September.

The only benefit they reap from you continuing to play their game is that MAYBE it will result in more hype for D4 in 2020. Maybe.
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  #41  
Old 08-13-2012, 10:06 AM
Munch Munch is offline
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Here's info on the 1.0.4 patch coming out next week. Big items: no more enrage timers on Champs and rares, no more "invulnerable minions", lower HP increase in multiplayer, lower repair costs for high level gear, and lots of buffs on skills.
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  #42  
Old 08-13-2012, 10:09 AM
Munch Munch is offline
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Originally Posted by Airk View Post
The only benefit they reap from you continuing to play their game is that MAYBE it will result in more hype for D4 in 2020. Maybe.
Right - Blizzard has never been known to push out expansion packs for their games. Or for cultivating a tremendous amount of goodwill for supporting their games far beyond what they need to. Or for wanting to perfect their product with continual tweaking over time.
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  #43  
Old 08-13-2012, 10:23 AM
Tom Scud Tom Scud is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Munch View Post
no more "invulnerable minions"
*cheer*

That's one that must have seemed like a good idea but is just so severely overpowered compared to the other affixes that it just doesn't work. Maybe if it counted as two or three affixes.
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  #44  
Old 08-13-2012, 10:30 AM
Airk Airk is offline
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Originally Posted by Munch View Post
Right - Blizzard has never been known to push out expansion packs for their games. Or for cultivating a tremendous amount of goodwill for supporting their games far beyond what they need to. Or for wanting to perfect their product with continual tweaking over time.
Sign here if you would not buy a D3 expansion pack that purported to "fix the endgame". If anything, making the endgame lacking makes it easier for them to sell expansions, not the reverse.

Just saying they're in no way obligated to cater to you folks. It's nice of them when they do, but seriously.

Also, how much of that "continual tweaking over time" goes into the single player side of their offerings?

There are certain advantages to maintaining a multiplayer community over time, but I don't see those for a single player title.
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  #45  
Old 08-13-2012, 10:35 AM
Munch Munch is offline
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Originally Posted by Airk View Post
There are certain advantages to maintaining a multiplayer community over time, but I don't see those for a single player title.
Diablo 3 is not a single player title.
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  #46  
Old 08-13-2012, 11:44 AM
CandidGamera CandidGamera is offline
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I love the implicit thesis statement of those patch notes :

"We were wrong."

It's dripping off of every paragraph.
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  #47  
Old 08-13-2012, 06:56 PM
Chronos Chronos is offline
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Y'know, every time there's a patch, I worry that they're going to remove the trick I use on my Demon Hunter, and every time so far, it seems like they've actually improved it. And if what they're saying about DoTs is true, it looks like that might just happen again.

And am I the only one who's never had a particular problem with Invulnerable Minions? Sure, it can be annoying, but so can any affix, and a slot that's taken up by IM is one that isn't taken up by one of the ones my character has a real problem with (Reflect or Fast for my DH, Arcane or Nightmarish for my monk, etc.).
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  #48  
Old 08-13-2012, 09:16 PM
Otara Otara is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Munch View Post
Diablo 3 is not a single player title.
Yes it is. The large majority of people were playing it single player, and always were.

They forgot that and it cost them, in reputation if nothing else.

Otara
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  #49  
Old 08-14-2012, 02:43 AM
magnusblitz magnusblitz is offline
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Not to mention that that the shared magic find and HP/damage scaling in multiplayer all but forced people to play alone.

I think the D3 expansions might be the first Blizzard games (besides WoW) that I don't buy. I just feel so burnt on D3.

Quote:
Originally Posted by CandidGamera View Post
I love the implicit thesis statement of those patch notes :

"We were wrong."

It's dripping off of every paragraph.
Whenever I see something just so terribly wrong, I always wonder how it made it through playtesting. Did they just hire a bunch of yes-men who only reported obvious bugs and never pointed out any obvious design flaws? Or were there QA testers who shared misgivings, only to be completely ignored by the dev team?
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  #50  
Old 08-14-2012, 02:05 PM
Bone Bone is offline
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I don't mind invulnerable after 1.03. 1.03 reduced the main guy's hp so invulnerable was manageable and I liked the change up occasionally. The items and skills are the problem.
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