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[Thrakier]

The question is who Diablo 3 should cater to primarily, who the game should be focused and balanced around, and so forth.

Again, tuning Diablo 3 around people who mostly solo or play in small groups and don't trade is going to make the game trivially easy for those who do trade with any seriounessness. Obviously if you can beat the game fairly quickly just using drops you got from your own adventuring, then it will be extremely easy if you can trade for much better gear.

By contrast, if you balance around traders, then solo/small friend group players are going to find the game extremely difficult. The game might take months or even years to complete without trading.

And so the question is: who do you balance around? Because one of the two groups is going to lose out. Either its too easy for people who can trade, or too hard for people who can't.

I am suggesting that it is far more sensible to balance around the traders, because they are simply a more important and more substantial part of the Diablo community, and are the most important part of keeping Diablo alive for so long. Of course, this is precisely what Blizzard has done, and so I don't think there is a problem. Blizzard is correct focus more on people interested in the AH/trading and less on people who simply want to loot whore/solo play, because the former group is the primary driver behind the persistent success of Diablo 2.

I do think Blizz balanced around making profit on the RMAH. The drop rate in this game is abysmal. If you go for 10 to 20 boss run rounds with 5 stacks of NV and all you get is shit that you can't even sell on the inflated AH which is overflowing with mediocre items then it's not fun but just frustrating.

 

[balddemon]

since apparently i am godlike for act 1 inferno. it must be my skills. suggestions? http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#WVRSkP!VbS!acZccZ

 

[vaelic]

Why wouldn't I?

because price is outrageous

 

[Macmanus]

since apparently i am godlike for act 1 inferno. it must be my skills. suggestions? http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#WVRSkP!VbS!acZccZ

Personally I'd trade out Boon for Superstition - but that isn't really going to make things a lot easier.

because price is outrageous

You're incorrect. That's a very good price for arguably one of the best shields in the game.

 

[Rufus]

I am suggesting that it is far more sensible to balance around the traders, because they are simply a more important and more substantial part of the Diablo community, and are the most important part of keeping Diablo alive for so long.

I'd argue that the game is already (or close to) balanced for both groups. I don't think we can assume that everyone playing will want to exhaust the content the way the traders are.
Nobody is forcing people to complete every difficulty level, only the last of which will be impossible for non-traders if they don't want to farm or trade for the necessary gear.

 

[Opiate]

I do think Blizz balanced around making profit on the RMAH. The drop rate in this game is abysmal. If you go for 10 to 20 boss run rounds with 5 stacks of NV and all you get is shit that you can't even sell on the inflated AH which is overflowing with mediocre items then it's not fun but just frustrating.

Not necessarily the RMAH, but certainly around people who want to trade, yes. I am arguing that this was the correct choice, yes. I enjoy the AH, trading and think it's very fun.

 

[la_briola]

because price is outrageous

31% chance to block on SS. gg.

 

[Technosteve]

I am just going to buy gold, I don't care enough to farm gold. But care enough about good loot ={

 

[inky]

since apparently i am godlike for act 1 inferno. it must be my skills. suggestions? http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#WVRSkP!VbS!acZccZ

Drop boon of Bul-Kathos and get Superstition. Maybe dropping ignore pain for threatening shout would help, mainly due to the lower cooldown, because I'm thinking it takes you more than 5-7 seconds being in there to do any significant damage. I know that 65% off sounds like a lot in comparison, but in a lot of circumstances it won't save you. You could also try a disable like stomp or something, but your build is fine. You need more DPS/Armor I think (thus vitality). Try to get a helmet with a socket if you don't have one already.

 

[Opiate]

I'd argue that the game is already (or close to) balanced for both groups. I don't think we can assume that everyone playing will want to exhaust the content the way the traders are.
Nobody is forcing people to complete every difficulty level, only the last of which will be impossible for non-traders if they don't want to farm or trade for the necessary gear.

I was actually just thinking that the only group that really "loses" here are those who essentially fit GAF's primary demographic: "hardcore" players who are primarily old school single player/small community type gamers.

If you are a big community trader / seller person who views Diablo 3 almost as an MMO, you're probably mostly happy with the general design choices. AH is fun and good.

If you are a casual player who plays through Normal, Nightmare and maybe Hell, but then move on and are satisfied with your purchase, then I don't think you lose much either. The base game and its combat is quite satisfying relative to Diablo 2.

The people who might be frustrated, though, are those who do want to push the end game but don't want to take part in the larger trading/PvP community. The people who just liked to start a character every few years, push through hell, maybe gear him a bit more, and were done. Those people are getting squeezed, I feel.

 

[Fenderputty]

I do think Blizz balanced around making profit on the RMAH. The drop rate in this game is abysmal. If you go for 10 to 20 boss run rounds with 5 stacks of NV and all you get is shit that you can't even sell on the inflated AH which is overflowing with mediocre items then it's not fun but just frustrating.

It really is. I've not seen one set piece. I've only seen two Legendaries (both horrid and one from act 1 normal). By Nightmare in D2 I was seeing sets drop.

IMO ... Blizz doesn't have to make the drop rates abysmal for the RMAH to work. I think a solid PVP player base will also help in that regard. Someone out there will always take the easy way. Especially if there's insentive. EPEEN is a wonderful source of that.

 

[TheExodu5]

Diablo 2 was similar. You often only got a decent unique for every few hours of farming. I'd consider myself lucky if I got a single Shako after 2 hours of Andariel. Maybe 50 runs for one drop.

The main difference was that you'd get somewhat viable end game loot in early Hell or late NM, not gear that would instantly be passed by drops in subsequent acts.

 

[Thrakier]

Not necessarily the RMAH, but certainly around people who want to trade, yes. I am arguing that this was the correct choice, yes. I enjoy the AH, trading and think it's very fun.

I say RMAH. They want to earn money. They could've balanced the game around trading without the abysmal drop rate. Even with a drop rate twice as good there would be much room left for trading. They could've also gone for a bigger character cast or a higher max level. More content. But they went for a drop rate which leaves you basically two choices, either quit the game out of frustration or go to the AH. And since grinding for gold takes a lot of time, well, it's quite easy to spend 5 or 10 dollars on a weapon. I mean, it's just 5 or 10 dollars, could save you so much time searching for yourself and...my god what a twisted logic. They programmed a flaw so deeply in their system, all out of greed. That may sound pathetic, I know, but I'm angry. Because I like the game, I want to play it, but I probably won't anymore because it feels like it's a waste of time.

 

[SnakeswithLasers]

The question is who Diablo 3 should cater to primarily, who the game should be focused and balanced around, and so forth.

Again, tuning Diablo 3 around people who mostly solo or play in small groups and don't trade is going to make the game trivially easy for those who do trade with any seriounessness. Obviously if you can beat the game fairly quickly just using drops you got from your own adventuring, then it will be extremely easy if you can trade for much better gear.

By contrast, if you balance around traders, then solo/small friend group players are going to find the game extremely difficult. The game might take months or even years to complete without trading.

And so the question is: who do you balance around? Because one of the two groups is going to lose out. Either its too easy for people who can trade, or too hard for people who can't.

I am suggesting that it is far more sensible to balance around the traders, because they are simply a more important and more substantial part of the Diablo community, and are the most important part of keeping Diablo alive for so long.

Of the six(?) million copies they've sold, you think they should balance progressions around a few hundred thousand. That doesn't make sense.

At this stage in its life, it makes more sense to balance around everyone who is playing the game to enjoy it and then recommending it to people.

Later on, through patches, as the base contracts due to people leaving, Blizzard can add content that caters to those who are still around (Ubers).

You're acting as though the only thing they can do is tune it NOW to be super hard (and lose 90% of the players and get bad word of mouth because it's too hard) or make it easy and drive away 10% of the players who might stick around for years (those players who consequently didn't leave D2 after 10 years despite it being easy). There are other alternatives than the binary solution you're presenting which alienates either population.

 

[balddemon]

Drop boon of Bul-Kathos and get Superstition. Maybe dropping ignore pain for threatening shout would help, mainly due to the lower cooldown, because I'm thinking it takes you more than 5-7 seconds being in there to do any significant damage. I know that 65% off sounds like a lot in comparison, but in a lot of circumstances it won't save you. You could also try a disable like stomp or something, but your build is fine. You need more DPS/Armor I think (thus vitality). Try to get a helmet with a socket if you don't have one already.

i'll give those a try thanks. i think my biggest problem is lack of healing while fighting. as long as revenge procs i am generally fine (except 1on1) or if there are a lot of enemies i run through them with dreadnought. threatening shout tho..never tried it, thank.s

wow just trucked a champion with threatening shout. that makes life a lot easier when u can spam it every 15 seconds. also got a chance for more drops, lol.

 

[inky]

It really is. I've not seen one set piece. I've only seen two Legendaries (both horrid and one from act 1 normal). By Nightmare in D2 I was seeing sets drop.

I've seen 6 legendaries and 2 sets and only 1 could be considered not crap. I did manage to sell my other set item for 2 million, which was weird because others with much better stats (including sockets) were selling for 500k or even less, so that helped me a little. But that was an anomaly/someone taking pity on me.

 

[Revoh]

Is that SS in fact 38% Block or is it just 31% overall (31-7 = base 24)

 

[Opiate]

Of the six(?) million copies they've sold, you think they should balance progressions around a few hundred thousand. That doesn't make sense.

At this stage in its life, it makes more sense to balance around everyone who is playing the game to enjoy it and then recommending it to people.

Later on, through patches, as the base contracts due to people leaving, Blizzard can add content that caters to those who are still around (Ubers).

You're acting as though the only thing they can do is tune it NOW to be super hard (and lose 90% of the players and get bad word of mouth because it's too hard) or make it easy and drive away 10% of the players who might stick around for years (those players who consequently didn't leave D2 after 10 years despite it being easy). There are other alternatives than the binary solution you're presenting which alienates either population.

Essentially ramp up the difficulty over time to cater to the continuing contraction of the user base; that's a good idea, but would of course require continued and consistent tuning from Blizzard.

Not impossible, just hard. It was my understanding that Inferno was supposed to be the non-casual difficulty level anyway. As I just said in another post, the people getting squeezed aren't the casuals, who are probably happy playing through it a couple times with a few different characters and calling it a day (this is likely 50%+ of all purchasers). It's not the traders, either. It's the old school "hardcore" gamers who tend to prefer single player, small group play but still want to push content hard. This group happens to be disproportionately represented on GAF, I feel.

 

[Shouta]

I guess commodities are back?

 

[balddemon]

I guess commodities are back?

yep.





also, i guess i was just crying about act 1 inferno. it's really not that hard, yet.

 

[Brashnir]

Diablo 2 was similar. You often only got a decent unique for every few hours of farming. I'd consider myself lucky if I got a single Shako after 2 hours of Andariel. Maybe 50 runs for one drop.

The main difference was that you'd get somewhat viable end game loot in early Hell or late NM, not gear that would instantly be passed by drops in subsequent acts.

I've played 124 hours.

I've seen one Legendary item drop.

 

[HenryHSH]

Okay... So there are these gloves on the AH that have really nice stats (17% AS, 10% crit, 75AR, 95VIT, 70STR, 50DEX, 250Life/s) RMAH worthy. Starting bid was 200M with no buyout. I jokingly pressed bid and saw that no one had bid on them. Saw them again today and someone finally did with 2 hours left.

People have 200M to spend on a single item... :|

 

[yacobod]

I've played 124 hours.

I've seen one Legendary item drop.

if it makes you feel better i've had 4 and they all sucked so far.

 

[Brashnir]

if it makes you feel better i've had 4 and they all sucked so far.

oh, mine sucked too.

 

[joesmokey]

I've played longer than 124 hours and have yet to see a set item or legendary drop. That's life though .

 

[Houston3000]

With 1h/shield (710.5 DPS)
32k life, 6.6k armor, 429 all resist.

With 2h (1114.6 DPS)
29k life, 5.2k armor, 332 all resist

yeah US. that would be great, i'll pm you battletag

ya with the 2h i do 11.2k damage and the 1h/shield i do 7.2k damage. i'll go try inferno again. i made it to just before the skele king with a friend earlier but he was doing all the killing

since apparently i am godlike for act 1 inferno. it must be my skills. suggestions?

Eh... I don't know, I'm playing a Witch Doctor, not a Barbarian so maybe I'm confused. The damage on your weapon (710.5 DPS) is really high for Act 1 Inferno but your overall damage (7.2k or 11k) seems abysmal. I'm on the first act in Inferno and my Witch Doctor does about 22k damage and has the same amount of health as you do. Granted, my resists are only around 300 but that's perfectly good for Act 1.

 

[joesmokey]

Alright I think I'm done with crafting.

I got the Exalted Grand Striker Wand recipe to drop and after crafting 3 of them, the highest dps was 490.

The gold cost associated with crafting is way too expensive for me right now.

 

[Blue Geezer]

i'll give those a try thanks. i think my biggest problem is lack of healing while fighting. as long as revenge procs i am generally fine (except 1on1) or if there are a lot of enemies i run through them with dreadnought. threatening shout tho..never tried it, thank.s

wow just trucked a champion with threatening shout. that makes life a lot easier when u can spam it every 15 seconds. also got a chance for more drops, lol.

as a barb who can do act 1 inf with no problems now the one skill that really helps when you need it is ground stomp with wrenching smash. it is amazing.

find mobs jump in with ground stomp bash away either continue to kill if they are close to death revenging when you can or line up a furious charge when taking some damage to get life back up now that they are clustered together....

also in multiplayer dps characters will LOVE you for it.

in your build drop ignore pain as I also dont find it to be the most inspiring skill imo. also I having got a fancy for ruthless right now so i would take that for your boon of bulkathos.

 

[Fenderputty]

I've seen 6 legendaries and 2 sets and only 1 could be considered not crap. I did manage to sell my other set item for 2 million, which was weird because others with much better stats (including sockets) were selling for 500k or even less, so that helped me a little. But that was an anomaly/someone taking pity on me.

The fact that they're terrible most of the time makes it even worse. I play this game so that I can get a worthwile set or legendary item to drop. It's why we all play the game. I don't know how many hours I've logged on this game yet, but one would think after playing to 60 and farming act 1 for a while, I would have at leat 1 piece I would be proud of. I don't have that piece yet.

I'm OK with the AH too. I like finding smaller pieces to sell. Thta's also fun. It's just not the reason I play.

 

[Ferny]

I guess commodities are back?

Really? Woo

 

[nowai]

5 hours trying to kill inferno diablo with no success.

Part 1 is pretty straight forward, but part 2, the friggin clones keep killing me. I've managed to kill 2 and got shadow diablo down to 1/4 health. But I ain't got anywhere close to that again.

DH shadow clones 1 shot me with arrows and most of their abilities, sometime I get lucky and they fire something slow or vault or spike trap.

Bloody frustrating.

WD Hex works great for them if you have a WD friend.

Nothing better than sheeping the clone and watching them helplessly die.

 

[Vodh]

I was actually just thinking that the only group that really "loses" here are those who essentially fit GAF's primary demographic: "hardcore" players who are primarily old school single player/small community type gamers.

If you are a big community trader / seller person who views Diablo 3 almost as an MMO, you're probably mostly happy with the general design choices. AH is fun and good.

If you are a casual player who plays through Normal, Nightmare and maybe Hell, but then move on and are satisfied with your purchase, then I don't think you lose much either. The base game and its combat is quite satisfying relative to Diablo 2.

The people who might be frustrated, though, are those who do want to push the end game but don't want to take part in the larger trading/PvP community. The people who just liked to start a character every few years, push through hell, maybe gear him a bit more, and were done. Those people are getting squeezed, I feel.

I feel like I fit this third group quite well. I'm definitely not satisfied with finishing nightmare, and what you wrote about D2 is exactly what I did - come back every few years, sometimes more often, get through Hell, quit at the level where constant runs were becoming a drag and a way to progress without some support of a trading forum was becoming less and less probable.

Yet I'm really satisfied with my D3 experience so far. By now I got 3 characters to level 60, two others are sitting on ~55, and it's been awesome all the way. Currently I'm focusing on my Monk which I think I'm gonna take for a ride in Inferno.

What's even better is that the changes that are coming in 1.0.3 fix most of the issues I might have had with inferno as it is now, mainly allowing for ilvl63 loot to drop in Act 1 and ironing out of the difficulty on later acts. And the changes from 1.0.3 are even more awesome in the way how they show that Blizzard does screw things up on occasion, but overall they really do make good games and they support them. And the direction they're taking with the support so far is exactly what I feel the game needs.

As it is, the game would not have outlasted Diablo 2, I agree. But the game will not be as it is even 6 months from now. Hell, even the few changes from 1.0.3 make it a better and potentially more lasting game. And I've already sunk in more than 200 hours of play.

On a side note yes, there are flaws, but there's so many people focusing on those that I really don't think I need to do that too. But because I don't write about them, doesn't mean I don't notice.

 

[zlatko]

Okay... So there are these gloves on the AH that have really nice stats (17% AS, 10% crit, 75AR, 95VIT, 70STR, 50DEX, 250Life/s) RMAH worthy. Starting bid was 200M with no buyout. I jokingly pressed bid and saw that no one had bid on them. Saw them again today and someone finally did with 2 hours left.

People have 200M to spend on a single item... :|

It's not easy...being greasy.

 

[SnakeswithLasers]

Essentially ramp up the difficulty over time to cater to the continuing contraction of the user base; that's a good idea, but would of course require continued and consistent tuning from Blizzard.

Not impossible, just hard. It was my understanding that Inferno was supposed to be the non-casual difficulty level anyway. As I just said in another post, the people getting squeezed aren't the casuals, who are probably happy playing through it a couple times with a few different characters and calling it a day (this is likely 50%+ of all purchasers). It's not the traders, either. It's the old school "hardcore" gamers who tend to prefer single player, small group play but still want to push content hard. This group happens to be disproportionately represented on GAF, I feel.

While I agree with that understanding--I don't think it is truly represented within the game as such. If you were a ravenous consumer of D3 news, you knew that Inferno was going to be a hate fuck.

However, based on the progression loop within the game, it organically is the natural next step once you've hit 60 and beaten Hell. The D3 Hell killscreen may even say, "Congratulations! Move on to Inferno" (but I can't remember).

I'd imagine a lot of D3 players are WoW players who are used to that "once you hit 60, the game starts" mentality. Yet D3 doesn't have any Tiered content model. No gear levels. It just literally flips the game on its head once you hit 60 and Inferno. It's jarring and people are reacting.

At core: I'm not saying Inferno should be EASY, I just believe it should be a balanced progression. I think that the changes they've announced in 1.03 will provide needed balance and a great incentive to keep playing at 60 if you enjoyed the game up until then. I think the current game does not offer an ease or introduction into the next wave of content.

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

AMAA is up: http://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo/comments/uoooj/i_am_we_are_wyatt_cheng_andrew_chambers_and_jay/

 

[Shouta]

Grand Sovereign Helm gambling is fun but expensive. Spent 2 mil-ish and I might be able to make it back if I'm lucky. More fun than just sitting on the AH and waiting for good gear to show up.

 

[Drkirby]

I swear, some enemies must just ignore Resistance.

 

[Wedge7]

Okay... So there are these gloves on the AH that have really nice stats (17% AS, 10% crit, 75AR, 95VIT, 70STR, 50DEX, 250Life/s) RMAH worthy. Starting bid was 200M with no buyout. I jokingly pressed bid and saw that no one had bid on them. Saw them again today and someone finally did with 2 hours left.

People have 200M to spend on a single item... :|

I...What...These guys with more than 100 million gold to throw around has sorta desensitised me to the vast amounts that they actually have. Damn.

 

[Narag]

I swear, some enemies must just ignore Resistance.

Resistance figures are damage reduced for a monster equal to your level iirc. Elites and whatnot are higher level so resist has a lessened effect or so I was told.

 

[zlatko]

Grand Sovereign Helm gambling is fun but expensive. Spent 2 mil-ish and I might be able to make it back if I'm lucky. More fun than just sitting on the AH and waiting for good gear to show up.

Is Exalted one above that? Like you have to get the recipe for it as a drop? I got that version since I found the recipe. If I wasn't a broke as a joke dude I'd try to craft it. I also have the body piece recipe too.

 

[scy]

I swear, some enemies must just ignore Resistance.

Well, for one, the Damage Reduction the game tells you is actually a lie :x It's based off a Level 60 enemy and I think all Inferno enemies are at least Level 61.

 

[Shouta]

Is Exalted one above that? Like you have to get the recipe for it as a drop? I got that version since I found the recipe. If I wasn't a broke as a joke dude I'd try to craft it. I also have the body piece recipe too.

The one I have is +6 Property. Exalted I think is 4 and Exalted Fine 5, I believe.

 

[zlatko]

The one I have is +6 Property. Exalted I think is 4 and Exalted Fine 5, I believe.

God damn. What's the cost $ wise to do just one of those crafted?

 

[m31]

Inferno HC Butcher down... Hands are shaking still. Anyone who could give me Road to Alcarnus WP by the way?

 

[Macmanus]

Andrew Chambers on monster Affix changes:

We are making some changes to these in 103. The shielding will cast less often to start with, and for the invul minions, the health of the monster you can actually damage is being lowered. Hopefully that helps get them to the tasty melty stage sooner!

http://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo/comm...eng_andrew_chambers_and_jay/c4x71j2?context=3

Jay Wilson on Auction Cancellations:

Allowing the cancelling of auctions is in patch 1.0.3 (OK, I'm 99% sure of that). We don't currently have plans to let you change times.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo/comments/uoooj/i_am_we_are_wyatt_cheng_andrew_chambers_and_jay/c4x72di?context=3

 

[Drkirby]

And everything below flawless square is worthless, lawl.

 

[Hazaro]

God damn. What's the cost $ wise to do just one of those crafted?

75k-175k
Like 70 materials

 

[fizzelopeguss]

i looted an exalted grand orbit stone plan, worth upgrading my blacksmith for?

 

[LordCanti]

And everything below flawless square is worthless, lawl.

The stuff above it doesn't go for any more than the materials to make them. Meaning, it's pretty useless to upgrade your artisan right now =/

Maybe at the high end it becomes worth it, but I doubt it.

 

[joesmokey]

65-150k
Like 50 materials

More than that, unless it depends on the item type for Exalted Grand.

Both the Exalted Grand Staff and Wand were each 171k gold crafting fee, plus ~50 Exquisite Essences (1k gold per) + 11 Iridescent Tears (2k gold per) + however many Tomes of Secrets.

More around 250k each craft.

You've been quoted as saying that Diablo III loot is balanced around the existence of the Auction House. Could you clarify what you mean by that?

I'm sorry, I don't remember saying that and if I did then I was drunk and/or wrong. We tuned and balanced the game without the auction house, as there weren't enough people internally using it to test it against gameplay, so we didn't design anything for it.

Nice try on that one.