Diablo 4 [PS4, PS5, XO, XBSX|S, PC, XGP]

I posted a gameplay video, labeled as gameplay, and introduced by me as gameplay... ;) They don't show any meat, meaning it's just a guy whacking monsters with various particle effects.

I reckon I clicked the second linked video - the cinematic trailer. The gameplay trailer is hard to analyse. It does look slower and more deliberate than DIII, even when you're beginning as a new character at level 1, but the lack of any UI it makes it difficult to tell how similar or different it'll be. I only just got into DIII again on Switch so I'm not craving another full-priced game of the same type at the moment and if I am, if anything, I'll probably grab Torchlight II to scratch that itch.

What have they been doing the past seven years then? I guess as long as D3 kept selling, they weren't interested in working full-steam on a sequel.
In addition to World of Warcraft updates and re-balancing, which really never ends, they've been doing a bit of fan service with the Starcraft remaster and Warcraft 3 Reforged due out.. umm.. at some point when it's ready. New seasons and tweaks to DIII. It's Blizzard, they do nothing quickly. :nope:
 
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It did suck at launch. And it did improve a lot with the removal of the auction house and the Reaper of Souls expansion.
Thing is, the game was fixed after launch after a huge public backlash. If that was the case back then, what monetization tricks will the new masters implement, how deeply will they be embedded in the game and will they ever be removed?

No hype until the product is out. We’ve got good reason to be hesitant.
Seems like a good fit for drop-rate boosters given how time-intensive the genre is by nature, and maybe early resetting of certain high reward portal dungeons (or to that effect).

I couldn’t help but feel that the mobile game was meant to be the place to test the waters with various schemes.

I’m sure they’ve already got a plan for skins, armour, horse, pets etc.
 
What I mostly dislike about D3 is the absolute need for Set bonuses to be able to compete. It would be nice to get something a bit more dynamic so more items are viable and we don’t see the same builds over and over.
 
Love how they went back to the roots with a dark, gritty and gory look, the monster designs and environment are so much better now which oozes out that demonic atmosphere.
I guess I'll be getting it on PS5 then for that maximum settings at 4k.
 
It's Blizzard, they do nothing quickly. :nope:
Fortunately, they've had pretty good sales on quality products, although that may or may not correlate with investors where some might look at outliers from Bethesda releasing certain janky messes but still selling exceedingly well.

What have they been doing the past seven years then? I guess as long as D3 kept selling, they weren't interested in working full-steam on a sequel.
I do wonder what they'll do differently in terms of gameplay. A stronger focus on the co-operative side might lead back to some age-old concepts as combo attacks (between player classes/abilities). :p

At the same time, I'd like to see a more dynamic environment (more elaborate dungeon traps, destructible things that can fall on the enemy and so on.)
 
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So, it appears that Blizzard is out to copy Korean ARPGs like Lost Ark.

It'll be open world with instanced dungeons. There will be world bosses in the open world portion. Up to 100 players per server instance. And PvP might feature heavily in the open world.

If there aren't PvE only servers, I definitely won't be playing this.

Regards,
SB
 
So, it appears that Blizzard is out to copy Korean ARPGs like Lost Ark.

It'll be open world with instanced dungeons. There will be world bosses in the open world portion. Up to 100 players per server instance. And PvP might feature heavily in the open world.

If there aren't PvE only servers, I definitely won't be playing this.

Regards,
SB
hm... It's been a while since I've played Path of Exile, but it'll be nothing like that then? (that said, POE has an extremely aggravating co-op setup, something which the console folks at Blizzard nailed for the most part, exploits aside)
 
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What I mostly dislike about D3 is the absolute need for Set bonuses to be able to compete. It would be nice to get something a bit more dynamic so more items are viable and we don’t see the same builds over and over.

Even if there were no sets, one build is always going to rise to the top.

Legacy of dreams addition gives you builds without set items that are all the same. Because there are only so many items that work with each skill.

The funny part is that plenty of builds are viable at the levels the vast majority of people play at. If you only want to clear GR 75 (Same as Torment 16) you can cobble together anything and clear it. The set you are gifted for completing the season tasks will certainly let you achieve that. It's only if you want to compete for the leaderboard (GR 105+) that you really need to narrow your focus to the top one or two builds for your class. However, most people go straight for that perceived top build even though it actually might be impairing their advancement at lower levels by being slower.
 
Even if there were no sets, one build is always going to rise to the top.

Legacy of dreams addition gives you builds without set items that are all the same. Because there are only so many items that work with each skill.

The funny part is that plenty of builds are viable at the levels the vast majority of people play at. If you only want to clear GR 75 (Same as Torment 16) you can cobble together anything and clear it. The set you are gifted for completing the season tasks will certainly let you achieve that. It's only if you want to compete for the leaderboard (GR 105+) that you really need to narrow your focus to the top one or two builds for your class. However, most people go straight for that perceived top build even though it actually might be impairing their advancement at lower levels by being slower.

Yeah, it was just added to the game. A bit late one might say.
 
Yeah, it was just added to the game. A bit late one might say.
There was also an existing ring set which gave very similar bonuses for not using any other sets though. This just opens up the options a bit more.
 
Even if there were no sets, one build is always going to rise to the top.

This is always a problem in build-based RPGs but you can reduce it by having a variety of encounters which advantage different builds of a class. I don't know what WoW is like now but there was plenty of re-balancing over the 7or 8 years I played to promote diversity in the different tank, dps and healer classes but you do need to offer multiple builds on individual characters without heavily penalising switching, after all those may already have to be accumulating multiple sets of weapons and armour for different stat or unique bonuses.

But this is what Blizzard should be good at by now.
 
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There was also an existing ring set which gave very similar bonuses for not using any other sets though. This just opens up the options a bit more.
Those rings are fun and you can do some cool stuff with them but other sets are way more effective in my experience, especially given the amount of time it takes to find Ancient versions of all the stuff you need (the bonuses on those rings only work if the legendaries are Ancient).
 
This is always a problem in build-based RPGs but you can reduce it by having a variety of encounters which advantage different builds of a class. I don't know what WoW is like now but there was plenty of re-balancing over the 7or 8 years I played to promote diversity in the different tank, dps and healer classes but you do need to offer multiple builds on individual characters without heavily penalising switching, after all those may already have to be accumulating multiple sets of weapons and armour for different stat or unique bonuses.

But this is what Blizzard should be good at by now.

Considering the time and effort required to build one elite set, I don't think people want to have multiple gear set ups and constantly switch. I have a monk clearing GR 106+ at paragon 1100 atm and I am still missing ideal pieces for that one particular build.

In WoW you are not switching gear unless you are switching roles. The best gear is the almost always whatever the current raid set is with the exception of pvp where you will want resilience from pvp gear. There are a few encounters where you stack a resist, but those aren't that many and often is just filling in a crafted piece.

Diablo classes may also change builds and gear for a few different reasons, gold or key farming, (although there wouldn't be much effort put into farming this, you just craft some ) or running high level rift groups is not the same setup as soloing rifts.

Also you can't keep the randomness of diablo and have encounters that require build changes, no one wants to be running back to town to change gear because they ran into a certain mob. And the rift system doesn't allow gear changes.
 
Those rings are fun and you can do some cool stuff with them but other sets are way more effective in my experience, especially given the amount of time it takes to find Ancient versions of all the stuff you need (the bonuses on those rings only work if the legendaries are Ancient).

Several classes current top solo build uses the legacy of dreams gem. At max level it winds up being better than the ring set because you are only losing one gem bonus for the effect instead of losing 2 item bonuses for the rings.

If you get the LoD ring set early it can kick start your advancement because just using any ancient is a large buff it doesn't need to fit a particular build. I started my monk doing GR70 using mostly crusader gear which I had already found and an LoD ring set (with STR).

Every item found doesn't need to be part of endgame progression. It doesn't mean it's useless but the reality is at the endgame 9 out of 10 items are useless for any class. Is the solution to that to make the burden on leveling slower/harder? I doubt that would go over well.
 
It's not all about leaderboards either, in fact it has never been for me. I would never put in the time for that anyway but I have never experienced a need to rank, rather I find it fun trying out different combinations, whether I can achieve high GR or not.
 
hm... It's been a while since I've played Path of Exile, but it'll be nothing like that then? (that said, POE has an extremely aggravating co-op setup, something which the console folks at Blizzard nailed for the most part, exploits aside)

Yeah, nothing like PoE.

PoE is basically more of a successor to Diablo 2 than D3 ever was WRT game systems.

So, it's still based around a hub for each Act. The hubs are the only place you can randomly run into other players.

Diablo 4 is planning to have an open world with world bosses where you can randomly run into other players. And then you'll also have instanced dungeons like previous Diablo games or PoE.

I have to say, after playing some more PoE, I definitely like it significantly more than D3. As I mentioned above it's more D2 like with your skills and your skill build being more important than your gear.

D3 is more about the gear, and then picking skills that synergize with your gear.

D2 and PoE is more about your skill builds and then picking gear that works well with your build. Some builds in PoE that can do all seasonal content at the highest levels don't even require special gear.

Another benefit is that gear is tradeable. So if you can't find the gear yourself when farming, you can just farm in game currency items to trade with other people for the gear. But if someone doesn't want to do that, there are entire builds that are SSF (solo, self found) friendly. These are usually builds that don't require any really exotic or rare gear to do all the content at the highest level, but can be enhanced by exotic or rare gear.

And in game currency in PoE is rather novel as well. All of the currency items have uses other than as currency (for example, rerolling stats on items or socket colors or a whole host of things). Specific currency items do specific things. That's what makes them so valuable and desirable.

I still install D2 to play every now and then. I haven't even touched D3 in like 3 or 4 years now?

Regards,
SB
 
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