Nasty Diablo! Is a fairy tale they say...

[Moatilliatta]

Blizzcon has been and there is new info!

 

A new Diablo 3 class has been announced.

 

Movie

 

Character page.

 

Wizard talent tree.

 

Article on Wizard class.

 

 

As well as info on dying (random forum post and unrelated to Blizzcon):

Before I get in to what we are doing let me go over some things we want to avoid with a death mechanic.

 

We want to separate being in town and being out on a quest/adventure/dungeon as much as possible. Leaving the safety of a town should not be a decision you take lightly. We don't want to remove the sense of suspense and danger by making town something you're always going back to pretty much whenever you like. The intent is to create a greater separation from being in town, and not, and to make your time away from town a lot more tense.

 

On that same note we also don't want to remove the player from the action. Throwing them back to town for every death really breaks up the action, and not in a fun, interesting, or necessary way.

 

So, with these things in mind we've found that a check point system works really well. Throughout your adventures, and generally at the ends of each "floor" of a dungeon your character is saved to a checkpoint. When you die you're dropped back at the last checkpoint with a small amount of health, and the rest regenerates slowly. It's obviously a very forgiving system as it is. It's just too early to put a ton of thought in to what penalties there should be, if any, added on top of it.

Regardless, potential penalties aside, this is the death mechanic we're currently using and it's working really well so far.

Edited October 11, 2008 by Moatilliatta

[Dark_Raven]

Thanks for the info.

[Lare Kikkeli]

It looks friggin awesome. I will be buying this the day it hits the stores. Witch Doctor all the way beyatch

[LostStraw]

Latest news is that multi-player games will have a 4 player limit

 

Although its unconfirmed right now, stat points may not be distributable -- based upon the demo at Blizzcon. The new skills/runes system does look interesting though.

 

Edit: Automatic stat assigning is confirmed (I miss-read the news post)

Edited October 11, 2008 by LostStraw

[Tigranes]

I was always a magic user lover in D2 and anywhere else, so the Wizard class info really does interest me. From the video they seem a lot more hands-on and involved in combat than the sorceress, which is even more awesome. I mean, this could turn out to be just aesthetics (and filthy lies, grah), but whereas the sorc interacted with the enemies by throwing area-based projectiles for the most part, you're looking at the wizard targeting them more individually, getting up and close, while also throwing around balls of explodey-stuff. Looks great.

 

I also like their intent behind that death mechanic. While the D2 TP system was really great in practice, I like this idea of making a dungeon trek a lengthy, campaign-like affair. Suits Diablo very well.

 

Latest news is that multi-player games will have a 4 player limit sad.gif

 

That would be amazingly suicidal, and very surprising. Do you think you could link us to that info? I'd love to read it myself.

[Maria Caliban]

*Is exercising her clicky finger in anticipation*

 

Anways, I'm more interested in the save system. I installed Diablo 2 when I first heard D3 was coming out. After clearing the area around the starting camp out five times, I shelved it.

Edited October 11, 2008 by Maria Caliban

[LostStraw]

All my information has come from http://www.diablofans.com/

 

Wilson's last direction was to only enable a maximum of 4 players on bnet games. This will encourage others to band together in completing quests and prevent servers from reaching over capacity and allow better connection quality...ridding lag.

[Tigranes]

Thanks LS.

 

Wilson's last direction was to only enable a maximum of 4 players on bnet games. This will encourage others to band together in completing quests and prevent servers from reaching over capacity and allow better connection quality...ridding lag.

 

Sounds poor: the only explanation I can think of is that D3 doesn't run as well contemporary computers as well as D2 did (even with my med-range comp at time of release, lag problem was never that bad). If you allow 8, people can CHOOSE to have 4 anyway. With five classes, I'd have thought 5 would be the minimum. That's really a blow.

 

For example, adding a Multistrike Rune to the Witch Doctor's Skull of Flame skill splits the lone fireball into multiple splashing attacks.

 

This has elicited my first fanboy drool in a long time.

[Darque]

Awesome.

[Maria Caliban]

Two classes left! What will they be?

 

I'm hoping for paladin type and assasin type.

[Morgoth]

Another Blizzard game, another must-have game. Moah please!

[mrmud]

I dont like automatic stat assigning... That is just going to make hardcore play more frustrating (without being able to dump loads of point into stamina to compenstate for lag)

[kirottu]

Thanks LS.

 

Wilson's last direction was to only enable a maximum of 4 players on bnet games. This will encourage others to band together in completing quests and prevent servers from reaching over capacity and allow better connection quality...ridding lag.

 

Sounds poor: the only explanation I can think of is that D3 doesn't run as well contemporary computers as well as D2 did (even with my med-range comp at time of release, lag problem was never that bad). If you allow 8, people can CHOOSE to have 4 anyway. With five classes, I'd have thought 5 would be the minimum. That's really a blow.

 

It

[Meshugger]

I do have to give it to Blizzard for creating wonderful spell-effects. Instead of the all usual pointy-hat-robe-cane, we have a malevolent girl that makes her enemies explode into a pulp of blood. I have to say, a part me really likes this direction.

[Dark_Raven]

we have a malevolent girl that makes her enemies explode into a pulp of blood.

I know I like it.

 

Magic casters FTW.

[H]

I love the trickster flavor the new spellcaster class has.

[Nick_i_am]

Yeah, D2 Sorc was pretty boring PvE.

[Darque]

[Nick_i_am]

Eh, compared to the other classes (save amazon, which I never played) I found the 'spam this spell over and over!' gameplay relatively boring, even for the clickfest that was D2. Some varience to spells depending on situation (ice with backup elec for bosses), but very little. Sure, most 'power' classes rely on a very limited skillset, but most of those take part in melee to make up for it.

 

I'd take the likes of a melee assassin over it any day of the week.

[Moatilliatta]

I agree with Nick about the general boringness of the sorcerer in PvE.

 

@4 player max

Is this really that much of a problem? I can't remember a single time that I played on a server with more than four people. I don't play on public servers in Diablo games as that is the road to a surefire headache and coop rarely exceeds more than four people.

 

Does sound like a strange decision. I highly doubt that it's a performance decision as even D2 ran pretty poorly at first if I remember correctly. And with Blizzards published numbers from WoW I doubt that they have money problems, so servers shouldn't be much of a problem.

[kirottu]

@4 player max

Is this really that much of a problem? I can't remember a single time that I played on a server with more than four people. I don't play on public servers in Diablo games as that is the road to a surefire headache and coop rarely exceeds more than four people.

 

Does sound like a strange decision. I highly doubt that it's a performance decision as even D2 ran pretty poorly at first if I remember correctly. And with Blizzards published numbers from WoW I doubt that they have money problems, so servers shouldn't be much of a problem.

 

D2 still ran poorly when I quit it and "migrated" to WoW. Every third game you

[Moatilliatta]

Somehow I doubt that they have troubles with servers even with regular D3 sales as D3 will sell like hotcakes, guaranteed.

[Tigranes]

Is this really that much of a problem? I can't remember a single time that I played on a server with more than four people.

 

Hey? You know better than to go down that logical landslide.

 

If you are asking, did most people ever play on bigger servers, then yes - definitely. Most 'runs' were/are 8-player, and some of my best D2 experiences is when a gathering of 6-8 strangers hit it off.

[kirottu]

Somehow I doubt that they have troubles with servers even with regular D3 sales as D3 will sell like hotcakes, guaranteed.

 

I

[LostStraw]

Well there's good news and (potentially) bad news.

 

 

 

The good news is that the 4 player limit may not be the cap: http://pc.ign.com/articles/919/919059p1.html

The game is playable for the first time at Blizzcon, and it's playable in co-op with up to four players. When asked about what the upper limit will be for co-op play, he said that the final number is up in the air but they're currently looking at eight.

Confusing conflicting statements coming out of Blizzcon

 

 

The (potentially) bad news is that there will be some sort of micro transactions: http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/55271

Diablo III director Jay Wilson said today that the company does not have a great desire to charge a subscription fee for the upcoming revision of its multiplayer client Battle.net. However, the developer did note that Blizzard will likely monetize unknown features of the game.

 

"We are going to monetize features so that we get to make them," said Wilson. "We kind of have to."

The article is much too vague to draw any useful conclusions so I'm leaving my panic hat off for now.