I usually just play ladder starts for a couple weeks or so. Then I’ll come back before the next ladder and reroll a new character to practice. Rinse and repeat. Every now and then I’ll do a hardcore character just for the fun of it.
But mostly, the main reason I play Diablo 2 these days is for trading ladder starts.
/players X is truly necessary for end-game as you said.
Its boring to plaY when you are unkillable and 1shot everything.
We can only hope that one day D2R gets some more improvements.
Nothing really changes though. You’re still unkillable and one shot everything on P8. 
Except now you get more loot faster.
Which let’s be real… is why so many forum trolls want P8. So they can go run Act 1-2 TZ’s on P8 then quit the game in 2 weeks because they weren’t smart enough to figure out there was nothing left to do AFTER you farm everything.
this is just wrong… botting in d2:R is infinitely worse than in lod with one exception.
despite what everyone seems to think, most people really dont care about people botting if said bot is being helpful, doing chaos runs, baal runs, being a trival bot in a chat channel.
its only when the bots to ANNOYING thing that make the game experience worse like spam… or PK that. a real percentage of the players actually care.
i am 100% fine with a botter running baal or chaos.
what im not fine with is spambots.
in lod we could block them… in d2:R we can’t
that’s literally the reason the game is dying… thats why im typing here on the forums and not playing right now… because i have played for 20 years. i havce 10k FG, i can fully gear and character ands build i want… what i want… is to play with other people… to talk to other d2 fans.
the the game is SOOO BAD at allowing communcation… that i enjoy the forum more than the game.
all blizzard would need to do give is an infinte blocklist we can share online, give us chat channels… give is the basic chat functionality we had in LOD. and people like myself would play again.
but when we cant communicate because its filled with spam bots. im not going to play.
the ONLY time botting was an issue outside of spambots… was the PK bots… that ruined dueling games. outside that the only bots i have an issue with are spam bots
You can meow all you want but we are now about 2 years into d2r and at least none of these spam bots can enter games which used to constantly cause full bug back in classic d2 which to me was really the only real upsetting thing. Walls of random text don’t bother me, I’ve been through a divorce and nasty child custody battle. From my personal experience, d2r is more enjoyable, I don’t care that chat/trade channels are non-existent, d2jsp/discord fill that for me.
You need to let go man. Nothing is going to be as fun as it was the first time. I have limitless hours logged into vanilla WoW and all following expansions, but nothing comes close to getting lost in the woods in Everquest as a young teenager.
Part of getting older is just accepting the familiar shine and luster of our past glories will begin to dim. I find that music is the best reminder of nostalgia. I have a 95 sorc, nearly fully decked out, is there much to do? No, not even remotely. All I need to do is put on OG Tristram soundtrack, you know, the hauntingly good one, and drink a few beers and I find all the escape and motivation I need.
The era where this game was relevant is bygone, to the extreme. Now I listen for the echoing oboes, to send me into a killing frenzy one more time. Maybe something good will drop, and maybe it won’t, but I’ll be in the world of Diablo, the timeless masterpiece and ultimately that’s all I really want out of 40 dollars.
what i’m not fine with Botters selling 20x ber / jah every week and being crazy… if you play hardcore and use jsp, you know exactly who i’m talking about rofl. there’s 1 guy in particular who is so blatant … i don’t know how he’s allowed to sell. stuff like that needs to be stopped…
he posts screenshots of his character names so banning him wouldn’t be hard but blizzard nor jsp seem to do it.
Ultimately though, it doesn’t amount to anything. Personally I don’t play with people that use JSP, or trade myself as frankly… it defeats the purpose of the game, and just shortens it’s play cycle.
I’d love to see Blizzard crack down on JSP, but realistically they won’t, as it, and the botters it promotes are their main source of income from D2R.
I know a guy with a mule full of Jah runes, 40 in inventory 80 in stash so 120 Jah runes.
He still plays everyday — why?
I used to know a guy that habitually chewed his toenails.
Who knows.
Ask I’d love to know his magic
I think we all know what his “magic” is.
“Expecto Mastercardum!”
Not at all. Very telling sbout you though.
You are out of your goddam mind.
Great rebuttal, bravo. It is still a hack & slash arpg about shredding stupid ai monsters and sifting through items with low drop rates for high end uniques or unlikely chances of getting right combo of mods for blues/yellows. You think it was different because enigma didn’t exist even though sorcs were still super popular and there were still tele charges? Think it was different because everyone used to farm cows non stop? Think it was different because spells didn’t have synergies? Sure meta has changed, builds have altered but the core is the exact f’ing game from what I remember being around 10 years old and beating norm Diablo with my trash summon nec…gtfo…