LadyCrimson

That's the debate. In WoW, as often as you can afford to..the first time is cheap, and it goes up from there, but with an eventual gold-cost cap. In MMO's, this seems reasonable because of the immense amount of time involved in getting a chr. to high levels, for the average player. In games like D3, it's not as extreme...which is why I think if Blizz allows respecs, that there should be some method of limitation. Either thru the difficulty idea, or number of times, or quests, or whatever.

The difference between games like Oblivion and Diablo/WoW is that changing the spec of which "talent/skill tree" you've invested in doesn't make your mage a warrior. The only thing that changes is whether your mage deals in fire, ice, or lightning, or some combo of two, or even all three...with a single-tree chr. being the most powerful in that specialization, of course. Respec in this case isn't talking about stat points or changing classes - it's about the points that decide what abilities you will possess and how effective those abilities are, within that class.

One of the biggest arguments for respec is pretty much what Spider said. Casual players - which includes those who can't play 30+ hours a week as well as players who aren't as...hardcore, perhaps? - don't like to have to replay the entire game 60 times in order to try out every possible talent build for every class, just to be able to find out if they even like playing that build/class. Those against it often say such players are just lazy and not willing to work for it. As usual, I fall somewhere in-between...I wouldn't mind some respec ability/feature, because eventually playing the beginning of a game yet again gets really old (Peragus anyone?) but I don't think it should be all-encompassing ala WoW.

Diablo1 responses: Sorceror items were: Thinking Cap (pain to raise the durabilty w/shrines), Wizardspike (dagger), Naj's Light Plate, and Dreamflange (mace). The plate wasn't very useful past Normal, imo...the main reason to use it was to up your spell levels. I always found the D1 sorc to be easy to play...Don't put many points in VIT, since once you get mana shield, that's points largely wasted. I found the Warrior fun, until you reached the Hell levels and to chase all over the place after those Succubi. The corner trick worked, but it was still tedious. Edit: @Deraldin - you need a lot of Magic resistance against the witches, as a Warrior, or it's very very painful. The only thing to do is to lure then around a corner and then try to get them in a corner. If you attack them from the right angle whilst they're in a corner, they cannot run away from you.

My avatars are almost always cats of some kind. Because I like cats. Also, I can never think of anything else that's humorous/cool/hip.

Today I noticed that The Big Green Dragon is not the same dragon anymore. Nifty new av. Other than that...I've done the usual big nothing-much. Oh, I did try to make my own BBQ Chinese pork last week. Which was hilarious because it came out extremely pink, instead of the desired BBQ pork reddish color. Looked bizarre and unappetizing, but actually tasted pretty good. heheh

Someone elsewhere made what I thought was a pretty good suggestion on the respec idea....to make it fit more into D3's kind of game...a kind of compromise for those who hate the respec thing and those who don't. To make it so you can respec in Normal difficulty, but not in the harder difficulties. That way, more casual players could respec during the early phase of learning what skills do and what build they might prefer to continue on with etc. but it couldn't be used as an end-game crutch, if that makes sense...you'd still have to make a new chr. if you wanted both a max lvl fire mage and a max lvl cold mage, for instance. Not that I or anyone else have any say in what Blizzard will actually do....

In D2, I don't recall too many areas that were all that demonic/warmish/reddish/brownish in color...there was a lot of blues and greens and beige tones as well. Some areas had that sort of "diablo look" and some didn't. Even in Diablo1, the catacomb levels were predominantly blue, for instance. I think there was a general sense of there being a brownish undertone to many things such as stonework and walls and such, but I guess I didn't see it as consistent enough to be an actual theme. I think, as Moat mentioned, it's hard to speak to atmosphere/environment w/out seeing the whole game.

I think it would depend on how it's done. Even in WoW, respeccing when the game first came out wasn't considered super-easy, since it cost gold that in the beginning, wasn't easy for everyone to spend every day so someone could run 2 different dungeons w/different specs every few hours. Course, by now everyone is overflowing w/gold, so that system of limitation is "broken". If it was quest or item based, it could be made somewhat challenging or take some time, but not nearly as long as building up a new character. So players would still have to "work" a little for it while still being the easier option.

Jumper - I liked the concept, and the film was a little less "flashy endless action" than I was expecting...but Hayden in the lead made me wince and they left too many things hanging for a sequel to be satisfying. But it was watchable...tho first half is better than the 2nd half. Kite Runner - I haven't read the book nor knew anything about the plot going in. Heck, I didn't even know it was a book, heh. I usually don't like "serious" dramas, but I loved this movie. It has some flaws, sure...most notably that the actor playing the lead chr. as an adult is pretty wooden/weak...and the ending coincidences strains all credulity...but it's a fine anti-hero/redemption film. The man playing the father/Baba is a real stand-out, too. And I loved the cinematography...not just the CGI kite scenes, but all of it...angles and framing of scenes etc.

I finally managed to download the gameplay-vid so I could see it bigger/full screen. It looks even more awesome that way. I don't really see an over-cartoonish aspect either. I mean, let's face it, the gimpy walking druid in D2, Duriel, some of the colors in a couple of the Acts, and the tattooed, kilt wearing barb wasn't exactly non-cartoonish. Can't speak for the strategy-game Warcraft aspect, but it doesn't remind me of WoW at all. Different subject: I'm wondering what people think here about the possibility to re-spec your character in D3, ala WoW. That is, would you be for it or against it, and why. I wouldn't mind being able to respec, but it should be very difficult to do, either through a series of quests or rare items you have to collect etc...not gold-based as in WoW, which makes it way too easy. I doubt D3 would have a respec option, but I've seen some debate on the issue elsewhere and was curious what folk here would think.

Hahaha! That's hilarious. I must go share it with others now.

I was disappointed that their "official" wallpaper didn't have the splash image face and words on it. :/ So I grabbed a frame to make my own. And about the environments ... that worries me a little too, because they did look a little bland. Then again, this is Blizzard we're talking about. They've (so far) never been known for innovative visual settings...usually, if the gameplay is addictive enough, people forget to notice after a while. But it looks like it'd be as environmentally interesting as Titan Quest, which I found nice looking enough while marching around in it. At least you can interact a bit more with the environment beyond smashing barrels. Really? As in, the game "assigns" you your share of the loot and only you can see it, w/other players only seeing their share? Would certainly be nice to not have the greedy rush to the center etc. You can do that via your own videocard too, if you don't like the default. I kinda like over-saturated colors in games, myself.

Blizzard's page is working for me fine right now - the diablo3 game footage video looks great (they "talk" you through while demo-playing). It's definitely still Diablo, with spiffy updated graphics and some new features. I'm not sure the new class sounds too exciting to me - sounds like a combo of necro & nature-tree druid, but who knows. The map graphics remind me a bit of Titan Quest and certain aspects of Overlord combined together. But it's hard to say for sure, since the video screen is kinda small.

YESSSSS YESSSSS YESSSSS

I know I'm double-posting, you can spank me later, but a completely different line - don't know if this was mentioned already earlier, but it's been pointed out to me that this could just be leading to an announcement for a new battle.net...maybe in a steam-like style...with all the references to all their franchises rather than just one etc...and not a new game.

Yeah, I'm like that too. In WoW/BC I created my own Guild and had all my characters join it so I could purchase and use all 6 of the Guild Bank tabs, on top of each individual characters fairly large stash space. heheh I don't remember how much "stash" BG actually had, beyond it was more than Diablo games. I do remember always running out of room in BG, too, tho. Diablo1 was even worse...no town stash at all. The mod is called PlugY. Be aware it's considered a hack by most trading forums (w/good reason) so if you ever did want to play w/others to trade via "open" bnet, you'd be considered illegit. You can't use PlugY on closed bnet, however, so you're safe in that regard. I never did like ATMA's configuration, with all it's files and such. I much prefer it to be all in-game. It does look a bit more like Lich King eyes today - altho imo the brow between the eyes isn't quite right for it. Still, tomorrow it may look more like some other franchise character, or something completely new. They're just messing with us, as usual. If all this is for WotLK, I bet Blizzard is laughing at all the D3 furor that's arisen because of this.

The new splash image is making the face more apparent. In spite of myself, I'm finding this all kind of exciting. Genius marketing people.... That's bothered me in all action-RPG's. I want endless stashes...or at least several "pages" worth of stash. I mean, c'mon, BG it's not, don't give me pretentious excuses about having to make decisions on which almost-impossible-to-get per playthrough sets you want to try for at any one time. Just gimmie the room for the loot. In SP I'm using the mod that pretty much gives you endless storage and allows you share between all your characters - it also allows you to have that Super-Diablo or whatever he was appear in the SP game. :D Agreed. They're monster bashing and loot-based games, that's it. And personally, I don't mind if they change it some or give it a little more depth, but I think I'd prefer the Diablo series to stay in that general vein, at least.

I've been popping allergy meds like candy for the past few days because of the smoky skies from all the wildfires both north and south of us. And I'm hoping that Big Sur doesn't burn.

Most of these kind of movies show most of the potentially funny moments in the ads/previews...meaning I have no reason to pay to see the movie. :D The "stupid" humor I have no problem with - but it's like SNL skits - potentially hilarious for 3-5 minutes, torturous if extended into 90.

Edit: Bah, way too slow. If you played hardcore, your death was permanent, if that mattered to you. The only general difference I remember in D1 was if you couldn't reach your body in the same play session, you actually lost all your stuff. The enemies respawning was initially annoying in single-player but it made sense if you actually played on battle.net, which is where Blizz's D2 focus always seemed to be, vs. the SP game.

Actually, I think WoW fits that definition a lot better...mostly because it takes you 100 times longer to actually "achieve" anything via the grinding.

When I Die - Blood Sweat & Tears

Oh ugh. That's all. Just ugh.

Well, the new splash image has what looks like eyes in the center, with the mist forming what could be a...demonic face around it. It could be an optical illusion w/people seeing what they want to see, but ... I'm betting on D3 now too. That would be awesome. Or at least, potentially awesome... Edit: Blizzard also bought a diablo3 named domain, away from someone else, I think, a while back. Read about it somewhere. I think it's not a matter of if they're going to make D3, just a matter of when. I hope this is the when.