How about an endless dungeon where going down a level opens random dungeon levels from all acts with their appropriate monsters. Tower level 2, then Crypt level 1, Tal Rasha’s Tomb. Maybe with one of those rare mobs like Pindle and Nihlathak every 5-10 levels and an act boss every 25-50 levels xD I WOULD LOVE THAT SO MUCH
Also: I think one more difficulty level would not hurt the game at all. For the core fanbase that likes for nothing in D2 to ever change, you could even simply let the drop rates be the exact same as before, just scale up monster HP and DMG and maybe make every dungeon zone max level (or not, dunno).
But a challenge for all the gear farming to mean something would be BONKERS ^^
You wouldn’t have to play this new content now, would you?
You could still farm your original routes in your original Hell difficulty without any disadvantage whatsoever.
The game indeed needs a proper challenging endgame
But I doubt the solution is to go for more areas
But rather empower existing ones and have control over it and reward effort
Like making The monsters harder and harder the more cleared the game is
They gain mlvl up to 85
And also gain life, dmg, resistances, xp and no loot … not Mf
Then you can special areas that can be open through cube recipe but only at a certain %game cleared threshold
Ie:
cube something in harrogath corner at 75% to face Bul Kathos revived by nilatak
cube something near the tainted glasses of act 4 at 85% to turn it into a portal that leads to Diablo 1 hell architecture map filled with sucubus and doom knights
cube something in town with at least 95% game cleared to turn all remaining monsters into clones of bosses (boss mod)
——————
The first part of this endgame concept takes pretty much no dev effort… it’s just reusing an improved version of playercount mechanic
TBH I’d rather just see a “Hell+” unlocked after killing Hell Baal. Same quest completion as Hell, same -resist, ect. The only differences would be buffed mobs, all zones currently not 85 get increased to 85, and current 85 zones get increased to 86 just to make 98-99 possible off of something other than D/Nil/Baal.
Blockquote
the game indeed needs a proper challenging endgame
But I doubt the solution is to go for more areas
That is exactly why I suggested a “new” dungeon, that only consists of levels of every dungeon already in the game.
But I do also like your idea, honestly ANYTHING to give some reason for the end game gear and grind thereof. As it stands I play a character until I can finish Baal and then move on. I have never had any high end runewords or a maxed out build, because I could not get over the grind for nothing.
And I have played the game since its original release back in 2000 or 2001. Not every day and also not every single year, but enough xD
D2 has plenty of end game options already, it would be best to continue to request they improve these, vs asking for new, exuberant ideas that they 99% wont ever do for a remastered game.
So how is this “dungeon” different than going to each of those spots you mentioned and farming them separately? First run you go do the Tower, then go to the Crypt, then finish up in Tal Rasha’s tomb. Boom, end game.
i would like to see something like an ironman challenge. maybe you farm for something similar like the keys, open a portal and then get your endless dungeon thing. no town portals allowed, lets see how far you get. once you end the challenge you get a small token with the last level you finished for a sense of achievement/status.
That is actually something that i could be for. Doesnt affect the original game. You can still play in Hell and not go to the next level if you dont want.