The way ladder was released as a circle jerk for the top 2% of streamers was just another affront to the general player base of Diablo. Blizzard, please get your house in order.
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That’s the [current] design of the whole game. No wonder D2 and D2R flopped (compared to other Blizzard products) where D3 was a huge financial success.
Wake up Blizzard, player x command and ploot would be great start.
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I mean, the streamer strategy of using a pool of thousands of random people to support them to 99 is pretty stupid, yes. Not legitimate at all, and should be disregarded completely. But who cares about 99. Ladder isn’t actually about ranking on the ladder. They could get rid of it completely and I wouldn’t even notice. It’s about a fresh economy and everyone rerolling together in it.
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Agree with you, I don’t give a crap about the leader boards too and it always was about a fresh start and trying as many builds as I could.
But still, it shows fundamental design flaws of D2 and it IS a turn-off for many people. That’s why D3 appeals to way more people.
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Well, it is called, “Ladder”. For. A. Reason.
There are Leaderboards.
It is ALL about who comes on top of the Leaderboards. Who is first. World or Region firsts.
There is NO official game feature supporting an “Economy”, fresh or otherwise.
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I blame the internet.
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How would you have preferred they release it? Specifically: what changes are you wanting for next time?
I’m having trouble determining what it is that you are complaining about.
In a perfect world where no team spearheads you to no1 and no item donations are possible…or even P8 is possible for Ladder…
The ladder would STILL look similar.
It’s a convenient excuse, isn’t it, that you can say “meh, that person is fed EXP Shrines or good items or his teammates are creating Baal Runs for him to leech, blah blah”.
But the truth is, if it weren’t for that, you would’ve complained about bots or server instability or the fact that it’s a Thursday and “OMG it’s not fair that a streamer can do ladder as their work and you weren’t able to get a week off”.
Just check out Teo’s stream. Dude slept 11 hours since the ladder started. His team isn’t going for No1 - they are going for WR 99.
This takes planning and dedication way above and beyond your typical player is willing or able to do.
Would he be as fast as he is now? Surely not. Would he still be no1? Probably.
Also, they are tryharding so much because as streamers they are much more visible and they can’t get away with stuff people who lurk in the shadows can - like sharing an account for 100% upkeep.
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Sure buddy, let’s never improve anything because it will always have a flaws and people would complain about.
Let’s not progress, ever.
Will they still be #1? Maybe. But they will at least earn it, not let other people play the game for them and take credits aka Diablo II Communism.
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I think the word “communism” must be your favorite since you say it so much.
Also you must be certifiable insane if you think that even though they have help they don’t put up the work. They do and probably more than anyone around is capable to match. It’s an insane endurance marathon and people who complain are arguing on forums instead of grinding.
They are speedrunners as well, they would be finishing Hell Baal when your typical player would be doing Nightmare Trav at best.
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What they are complaining about is that Blizz’s little event just focuses on streamer teams. It would have been nice of them to do something for the WHOLE community for at least the first ladder. Not everyone watches that crap or cares about it. I mean, not “everyone” does a lot of things.
Basically, Blizz is still in the doodoo and they’re catering to the streamers to get the people to cater to them so that Blizz looks better 
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In fact, I trust more a streamer who puts up the work than some group of unknown dudes who share the same account in 4 shifts for 100% upkeep.
Yeah, the streamer only has 32423432 helpers getting him high runes and high-end items from FGs/$$$ (and exp shrines and teleporting and killing monsters for them and playing the whole game for them) but the 4 people taking “shifts” are obviously the issue.
Honestly, there are 32423432 people playing the game for the streamer, only he takes the credit.
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First of all, I don’t think Teo has that big of an audience. And he does it mostly with his speedrunning team.
Second of all, WTF do you mean play the game for him - they are playing as well. Reaching very unhealthy upkeep times but that’s what it takes to get no1.
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d3 only appeals to braindead zombies
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I have to agree with OP on this one. Since ladder-only content has largely been moved to non-ladder, about the only raison-d’etre for ladder was the race to the top.
However, Blizz organized groups of players to use extensive networks of players to boost a handful of streamers to see who would win that race. Then advertised this extensively to the entire player community.
So, the primary incentive to play ladder is to get to the top, but the company organized networks of select players who are guaranteed to win that race.
The entire concept is self-defeating, and disenfranchises that dramatically vast majority of players who play more or less SSF, with only some light trading.
This supramajority never stood a chance in the ladder race simply because someone at Blizz thought it would be a great idea to suck up to streamers, even at the expense of the normal player base who make their jobs possible…
Nice work, Blizz. Well done, you…
EDIT: just a clarification, I know that interacting with a fresh economy/larger player base are also reasons to play ladder, but looking over Blizz’ adverts on ladder don’t mention this at all. So, it’s a secondary, passive motivation to play ladder, and not something Blizz puts much/any effort into.
I also know that most people don’t expect to take the top spot. But, most of my motivation in playing ladder was to make it to the top 999 and appear in the ladder board. Back then, Blizz only displayed the top 999 players on ladder. To me, that was the race, and I usually made it with at least one character. The new ladder display is a click-fest that takes forever to scroll down, but at least it does display everyone on the ladder - or will when it works properly.
So, my bottom line is that there are many good reasons to play ladder. However, Blizz was only talking/advertising about the race to the top. Then they undermined that race by organizing vast networks of streamers and their toadies to fix that race. Bad planning, bad design, bad execution…
And don’t get me started about allowing bots to occupy 800 of the top 1000 spots on the ladder. Not instituting a massive ban wave the first days before/after ladder launch really makes most of the leader board utterly meaningless…
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I just smoked some narlant weed with gheed, and even I’m not dumb enough to think D3 was more successful than D2. D3 flopped after a few years of contantly updating the game for anti-group play. D3 pvp is the most unbalanced nonsense in the entire history of gaming, which is hillariously sad. D1 had one of the most balanced systems in the entire history of gaming, which speaks volumes for simplicity. D1 had no trade system to speak of, which sucked. D2 is fairly balanced, just a small few tweaks to be made here n there(like change cold damage of spirit wolf into 50/50 split of magic and cold damage, or completely change to magic damage), so dont go spreading nonsense.
the entire reason any Dev gives streamers a headstart, is to promote their game as a whole for free. This hurts the game and helps it in equal measures, 1 step forward and 1 step back. They should make sure that Streamers dont get a headstart, to encourage the community as a whole to play together.
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Large corporations measure success with $$$
I suspect D3 made more $ than D2 and D2:LoD even when accounting for inflation.
Hahahaha suuuure.
D3 is not even a shadow of D2 LoD.
And nice try with players8 again. No.
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Gheed forgot to tell you denial and delusions were side effects:
Nice try but still zero logical counter-argument. Proof D3 was more successful is above.
Facts don’t care about feelings.