Diablo III Wild Speculation and Rumor Mongering Abounds

[Paelos]

All I care about is them coming to their senses and going to great lengths to keep asians off American servers. I want The Great Wall of Geoblocking separating our markets.

I concur.

[cironian]

Won't do a bit of good against sweatshops farming for $$$. As soon as you are making real money off this, setting up an IP tunnel that comes out somewhere in the US is trivial.

[K9]

If only they could keep the Romanians off the EU servers.

[Ironwood]

They have cloaking devices.

[01101010]

They have cloaking devices.

[Paelos]

They have cloaking devices.

[Malakili]

Made a Hardcore character and did a few runs with random people.  Man, this game is going to eat my life.

[Stabs]

via Bashiok:

This is may be a good a time as any to REVEAL TEH SEKRITS! that Inferno monster levels aren't linear any longer. They get progressively more difficult. This was really a reaction to Inferno playtesting. Our original intent was to have a flat difficulty level where you could go wherever you want, farm for items, and it'd be no more or less difficult than any other area in Inferno. This caused a few inherent issues for us, though:

It just felt wrong. It didn't feel right to be progressing through the game and have it stay pretty much the same difficulty the whole time. It felt like a letdown to get to the final boss of the game and it be no more difficult than the first.There’s a wide variety of players out there and we wanted to make sure everybody had something to sink their teeth into. We expect that anybody with enough time and dedication will reach level 60.  But the jump in difficulty to Inferno needed to be different amounts for different people.  For the crazy people they need a HUGE ramp in difficulty, for a more “casual but still hardcore” audience you want an obvious but milder increase in difficulty.  So for the crazy people who play non-stop they’ll hit Act I and get a challenge, but 1 month later they’ll still have something to work on (Acts II, III and IV).  For the “hardcore-casual” they will reach level 60 later and not get brick walled when they reach Inferno.  They can experience some “small victories” working on Act I with the dream of maybe someday reaching the later acts.Longevity.  We know people really want goals to work towards and challenges to overcome.  We made Act III and Act IV really, really brutally hard, for the most elite players only.  It felt wrong to make ALL of Inferno that brutally hard.

Now, you may be saying “I thought you wanted us to be able to farm anywhere we wanted.  Now we only have half as much area in the game to farm in? What gives?” Our goal is to make the loot mathematically better in the later acts without making the earlier gear completely obsolete. We feel Diablo II actually did a very good job with this and we expect Diablo III to perform similarly.

Specifically, people in D2 did Diablo runs, Mephisto runs, Pindleskin runs, Pit runs, Baal runs, etc. because the loot in Diablo is extremely random. Even though the theoretical best items might come from the later Acts, well-rolled items from earlier acts will still be better. Internally we find sometimes after an intense session of brutally hard Inferno it can be really fun to cruise through Hell Act III or IV and it’s not too uncommon surprise when an upgrade drops. We expect this to carry through to Inferno difficulty where somebody who can theoretically farm Act IV will likely still enjoy romping through Act I simply because the drop potential is still there. It’s all because of the highly random items having lots of overlap in their power distribution curves.

[Malakili]

via Bashiok:

Saw that yesterday.  I think it sounds good.  Inferno was sounding iffy before for precisely the reasons he mentions, so I'm glad they changed that up.  Now, the faster May 15th gets here the better.

[Soulflame]

... so blizzard has learned nothing, and they're talking up how they're going to restrict the last portion of the game to 5% or less of the playerbase.

That is just fucking awesome.

[schild]

Guess it's not for you then!

[Soulflame]

You're completely wrong, but you go with that.

[Malakili]

... so blizzard has learned nothing, and they're talking up how they're going to restrict the last portion of the game to 5% or less of the playerbase.

That is just fucking awesome.

Shouldn't this NOT matter in, of all games, Diablo?  Inferno is the exact same content on the FOURTH difficulty level.  Why does it matter if only 5% of the playerbase does it?  Its not like they are hiding new content up there.

[Soulflame]

Yes, that's right!  It's okay if the vast majority of the playerbase can't play the endgame, because they should have enjoyed the ride on the way to You Can't Play Here Land!

As I said, Blizzard has learned nothing.  They're still in the mindset of putting out content for a very small set of hardcore gamers, which will sit really well with everyone else, I'm sure.   

[01101010]

Yes, that's right!  It's okay if the vast majority of the playerbase can't play the endgame, because they should have enjoyed the ride on the way to You Can't Play Here Land!

As I said, Blizzard has learned nothing.  They're still in the mindset of putting out content for a very small set of hardcore gamers, which will sit really well with everyone else, I'm sure.   

More like "endgame lvl 4." Which is the same as lvl 1-3.

[MuffinMan]

Just play up to the third difficulty level and mentally add a zero to all of the numbers.

[Malakili]

Yes, that's right!  It's okay if the vast majority of the playerbase can't play the endgame, because they should have enjoyed the ride on the way to You Can't Play Here Land!

As I said, Blizzard has learned nothing.  They're still in the mindset of putting out content for a very small set of hardcore gamers, which will sit really well with everyone else, I'm sure.   

What are you talking about?  This isn't a logistics issue like a 40man raid, this isn't them locking you out of seeing content, this isn't preventing you from hitting max level.  Its just a very difficult version of the same stuff you've done in the first three difficulty levels.  The most casual player in the game has this accessible to them because they can spend as much time as they want or need farming Hell before going to Inferno, and let me be clear - that is NO DIFFERENT from farming Inferno itself aside from it being arbitrarily more difficult.

Seems like you're awful butthurt about WoW and bringing it over to this game when it makes absolutely no sense.

[Cadaverine]

Maybe there's a secret Act V that is only available in Inferno that only Soulflame knows about?

[01101010]

Maybe there's a secret Act V that is only available in Inferno that only Soulflame knows about?

...and it involves Bovine?

[Ingmar]

I'm normally with people on the 'rabble rabble don't lock me out of content' but SUPER DUPER HARD MODE SAME STUFF YOU ALREADY FOUGHT 3 TIMES is not content.

[SurfD]

Yes, that's right!  It's okay if the vast majority of the playerbase can't play the endgame, because they should have enjoyed the ride on the way to You Can't Play Here Land!

As I said, Blizzard has learned nothing.  They're still in the mindset of putting out content for a very small set of hardcore gamers, which will sit really well with everyone else, I'm sure.  

What endgame are you talking about?  I played Diablo 1, 2, and all the expantions associated with each one.  I never played ANY of those on the UBER INSANE CRUSH YOUR BALLS last difficulty level.  I still killed the end boss in every single one, and got to see the same cinematics and story as every other person who finished the games.  I just didnt have to finish the games 4 seperate times on 4 seperate difficulty levels to feel like I somehow actually, you know, finished the game.  Really, the game is Over after Final Act Normal.  Everything after that is just Bonus challenge difficulties with bigger numbers on the loot.

I would also argue that blizzard really does not care if the "Vast Majority" of the playerbase never gets to act 5 Inferno or whatever, because chances are the "Vast Majority" of the playerbase was never going to get there regardless, since the "Vast Majority" of the playerbase is probably people like me.

[Margalis]

Having a completely flat difficulty curve across the entire game for the highest difficulty sounds like a terrible idea and I'm surprised they even considered it.

[Soulflame]

The original idea was that you could wander anywhere and get the same reward level.  Now it sounds like they're planning to scale it, and I'm guessing (out of my ass) that it will require farming act I to move to act II, etc.  Again, guessing out of my ass, this will not prove to be fun to a sizable number of Diablo 3 players.

/shrug

Or I could be totally wrong.  I'm good with that.

[Yegolev]

I'm OK with loot farming in a Diablo game.

[Malakili]

Having a completely flat difficulty curve across the entire game for the highest difficulty sounds like a terrible idea and I'm surprised they even considered it.

I sort of understand what they were going for, but I'm happier with this decision.   It might have worked if Inferno didn't actually *have* the progression built in, like, you beat hell, and then you get ALL inferno at once and can farm anywhere you like in the game.  But given that they actually wanted you to go through the game it would've been pretty demoralizing to slog through it for effectively no reason.

[Ratman_tf]

I only ever made it through normal and then a bit into nightmare in D2, so this would impact me not at all, I think.

[Ingmar]

The original idea was that you could wander anywhere and get the same reward level.  Now it sounds like they're planning to scale it, and I'm guessing (out of my ass) that it will require farming act I to move to act II, etc.  Again, guessing out of my ass, this will not prove to be fun to a sizable number of Diablo 3 players.

/shrug

Or I could be totally wrong.  I'm good with that.

If it is anything like D2, the vast, vast majority of players will never even try Nightmare.

[Malakili]

  Again, guessing out of my ass, this will not prove to be fun to a sizable number of Diablo 3 players.

If farming isn't fun for a sizable number of Diablo 3 players the chances they are even going to make it to inferno before quitting regardless. 

[Fabricated]

Getting brutalized at the highest difficulty levels is part of Diablo really.

[Paelos]

Getting brutalized at the highest difficulty levels is part of Diablo really.

With the added benefit of loot distribution going on the RMT AH.

[Soulflame]

That was a fine idea 12 years ago, but my thinking is more or less:
- How many people will find being brutalized fun gameplay?
- Has more casual style play, including Blizzard's own WoW, trained players to walk away once they feel something isn't fun anymore?

I'm not saying "I know people are going to play to difficulty 3 and walk away in disgust!"  I'm just wondering if that'll be the case.  I guess I'm not communicating very well.  

Personally, I'm looking forward to it.  Then again, I think Etrian Odyssey games are great fun, and wish I had a PS3 so I could play Demon's/Dark Souls.

[Xanthippe]

I was outraged! until I realized that Inferno is the hardest level (chosen by players) after Hell level.

I played D2 on normal. I don't even think I played on nightmare much. I doubt I'll ever even see Hell level.

I don't care what they do to make hardcore people happy as long as it doesn't impact me. I don't see how this impacts me.

[Malakili]

That was a fine idea 12 years ago, but my thinking is more or less:
- How many people will find being brutalized fun gameplay?
- Has more casual style play, including Blizzard's own WoW, trained players to walk away once they feel something isn't fun anymore?

I'm not saying "I know people are going to play to difficulty 3 and walk away in disgust!"  I'm just wondering if that'll be the case.  I guess I'm not communicating very well.  

Personally, I'm looking forward to it.  Then again, I think Etrian Odyssey games are great fun, and wish I had a PS3 so I could play Demon's/Dark Souls.

Thinking about the game that way is treating the game like  a WoW expansion.

 Blizzard already knows the huge majority of their playerbase will never play past normal anyway.  The difference between Inferno being a flat difficulty and Inferno ramping up in difficulty as it goes is effectively irrelevant to these people.  You got all up in arms over this announcement, but for the people who would quit because of difficulty this announcement is about a part of the game which is already beyond where they would ever go anyway.

[schild]

Chinese farmers will not be good at the highest level of difficulty due to Sleep Deprivation.

Neither here nor there, but I imagine the best loot WILL be from the people most catassy in the game, as such, with the way the auction house is set up they basically HAD to do things this way.

[Fabricated]

That was a fine idea 12 years ago, but my thinking is more or less:
- How many people will find being brutalized fun gameplay?
- Has more casual style play, including Blizzard's own WoW, trained players to walk away once they feel something isn't fun anymore?

I'm not saying "I know people are going to play to difficulty 3 and walk away in disgust!"  I'm just wondering if that'll be the case.  I guess I'm not communicating very well.  

Personally, I'm looking forward to it.  Then again, I think Etrian Odyssey games are great fun, and wish I had a PS3 so I could play Demon's/Dark Souls.

I think the kind of people who would have trouble past normal/nightmare difficulties will long be turned off when they get to Hell difficulty much less Inferno. The whole D2 replayability mechanic was the game getting increasingly punishing on each difficulty level while requiring more creative/specific gearing/speccing to survive.

The audience of people you're talking about would've punched out after running all of the classes they liked through normal mode, and possibly dabbling with the cow level once or twice with a harder-core friend. The part of the D2 playerbase that would've been like, "Rune-what?" when having nightmare/hell level play described to them will likely be perfectly happy fucking about on normal with the various classes until they get bored and shelve it for a while.