[D4] - Adding Depth w/o Sacrificing Accessibility

General Discussion
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The D4 developers are very capable of making a deep game, but often times I think they shy away from adding certain things to the game for fear of making the game less accessible. I think this is actually a good thing to strive for (if the game is PoE deep/complex too many people will not play it) but often times I feel they err too far on the side of accessibility. There are several things that would be easy wins for the developers that could add layers of depth to the game with minimal development time.

Armor Types: As of right now they’ve only added inherent modifiers to weapons. This is a great change in addition to the weapon speeds they introduced. Both of those were easy wins and the type of thing I’m talking about in this thread. My question is, why can’t we extend this to armor as well? They could easily have three types of armor: light, medium, and heavy. As a base each type has the same defense, but different inherent modifiers.

  • Light armor - +x% movement speed
  • Medium armor - +x% dodge
  • Heavy armor - +% increased defense

This would position light armor as having the least defensive capability, but the most freedom of movement. Medium armor would be viable for builds that focus on defense through dodge, while heavy armor should naturally have higher defense than the other options. This is very understandable to a new player, makes some realistic game sense, and would add depth to the game - you could see light armor, medium armor, or heavy armor versions of certain builds as a result. Better yet, there could be passive skill tree bonuses that reward players for only having a single armor type equipped.

Consistent Elemental Effects: It feels bad to have elemental damage effects on items (or skills) which offer no real distinction. To new players this is very confusing - they expect fire to burn, lightning to shock, and cold to chill. So far in D4 they’ve only shared plans for certain elements having stagger mechanics - +cold adds chill which eventually leads to freeze is a very understandable progression that is easily extendable to other damage types.

Every type of damage in the game should have a well understood stagger - ailment progression system and ways to scale stagger stacking speeds and ailment potency. Some easy examples:

  • +Fire - adds burning stagger - creates ignite ailment
  • +Lightning - adds shocking stagger - creates stun ailment
  • +Earth - adds crushing stagger - creates crushing blow ailment

So long as there are tooltips which clearly describe the keywords involved this system makes intuitive sense to a new player. In turn, this gives variation in builds based on the damage type you want to pursue in addition to the skills you choose. If a holy sword and a fire sword have absolutely no in-game difference what’s the point of having that distinction in the first place?

Skill DPS Clarity: Not being able to see the DPS of a particular offensive skill somewhere in the UI feels bad - even if the best way to play the game is not always increasing skill DPS its an important detail for players to have access to.

These are three immediate things that come to mind which would be easy wins for the D4 development team to cultivate depth while actually enhancing accessibility. I’m sure there are others - what are some easy wins you see?

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I agree that variety and depth is important, as you highlighted in some examples. This means having enemies feel and behave differently, elements have effects/matter (resistances and ailments), weapon types have differences, armor classes to have differences, etc. This is all important and adds to the build diversity, combat mechanics, and feeling of something more than a monotonous grind.

Obviously Path of Exile is deep, however I would not necessarily say it is too deep, it is just too complicated. I agree there is beauty in some simplicity. The choices should be mostly very clear, yet the variety and interest in how you make those choices (skills, gear, stats, etc.) should be thought provoking and allow for various builds and approaches. D3 had almost none of that and Path of Exile is so overwhelmingly nitty gritty that it feels like a massive riddle rather than a path of choices. D2 is comfortably between those two, though obviously D4 needs to carve its own path, adding more depth than D2 while maintaining a deep but not overly complex system.

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usually armors are split between heavy (defense), light/mid/leather (dodge) and light/robe (elemental/magic defense)
but i’d be open to any concept if they want to do something more with armor types

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I’d be completely fine with a breakdown like that also, I just find it very odd that the armor items they’ve shown us so far just say chest, pant, etc… . with no variations. It’s possible this is just pre-alpha being pre-alpha, but just in case I wanted to mention something about it.

Yeah, I think adding depth w/o increasing complexity might be a better way to say what I’m after here. I’ll add one other potential easy win for them to add.

Easily Understood Skill Categories
Skill categories like minor, major, mastery, ultimate feel bad (or maybe just weird) because they convey status among the skills as some being meaningful (or more important) while some are not. In my opinion, any offensive skill should be capable of being able to be built around. Perhaps better would be Primary (single target), AoE (multi target), Movement, Defense, Crowd Control type descriptions. This would also make itemization like +defensive skill duration, +crowd control skill duration, +aoe skill radius, more easily understandable if all the classes had the same categories.

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well, that’s how it’s always been in diablo and also other more simple arpgs
PoE went with the defense/dodge/magic shield

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This is basically what I have been saying regarding weapons. it seems to me that so far, a sword is a sword is a sword. In D2 and PoE, there are stats that change depending on the variation of the sword you are using. I am not saying D4 needs to copy D2 or PoE, but just having every sword be identical in base stats is pretty boring. Same damage, damage range (if ranges even exist), speed, implicit mod, durability, range (reach), etc.

They could keep it this way and counter this “issue” by having several more weapon types, but I doubt that will happen.

I think having classes of items, both weapons and armor, adds to the variety and immersion. Knowing that you found a bastard sword, falchion, scimitar, or war sword gives them flavor, then on top of that changes the stats and which one you may prefer.

If armors are all the same and the top tier is always the best, that is pretty boring as well. There does not seem to be any stat requirement on items, only level. So theoretically we will see sorceresses and barbarians wearing full plate mail, even if the barbarian is a full on up close melee build and the sorceress is a ranged magic AoE build. Of course, this could vary if you are wearing uniques, as those may have specific looks that enforce the theme of the item, such as “Robes of Lazarus” granting affixes that benefit a caster, while “Immortal King’s Platemail” might look and favor the build of the melee barb.

I want so badly to know more about item affixes/types/and so on, as well as enemy affixes and mob types. These are my two biggest concerns as of right now.

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Diablo 1 and 2 had movement speed penalties for heavier armor, as well as different armor ratings, durability, stat requirements, and socket potential. D3 and seemingly D4, remove all of that and add nothing new to offset the streamlined system.

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We have seen that the inherent modifier for swords is +all stats, but there is no difference between a Falchion and a Tulwar for example (to be fair there wasn’t any difference in D3 either other than ilvl which had no real variational effect which felt odd in that game also). So far they are just calling them swords and not even using the descriptive names - they could always be put in later I suppose, but I wouldn’t bother unless it means something.

This also hits on something that has befuddled me about Diablo 3 and I hope they don’t repeat in Diablo 4. What’s the point to having higher item level gear if that new tier of gear doesn’t introduce anything potentially new?

In theory, I should be excited to see when Berserker Axes start dropping instead of just regular Axes because I’d expect them to have higher base affix rolls possible, but I’d also like them to potentially roll new affixes not possible on the previous tier. In short, well-defined tiers of gear are far more immersive than flat item level affix progression design.

I think their intention so far (based on what we’ve seen) is to just have a chest be a chest regardless of which class equips it and let the art of the item make it suited to that class directly - caveat this could just be pre-alpha stuff and they haven’t gotten around to it. This system is very lacking in depth and is actually a bit off putting to a new player who expects there to be some difference in items within a single category. If this is truly their direction, I’d argue that what they think is increasing item accessibility is actually decreasing it and stunting build depth as a result.

I think that was true in Diablo III, but earlier in the franchise, there were meaningful variations in armor type within the same slot, i.e. boots, chest, etc… even if it was only stat requirements to equip them.

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i mean weapons already have different specific stats depending on overall weapon type
armors could have that too

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Yeah, D3 is truly the worst itemization I have seen in a game of this genre. Don’t get me wrong, I have put quite a few hours into the game and it is fun while it lasts, but the depth of the loot system is severely lacking, as are other parts.

I don’t think this is going to change much in D4, but I hope I am wrong. Just having ilvl and nothing really change with the leveling makes it feel like a monotonous treadmill, rather than fun progression with choice-driven builds.

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Yeah, that was what I proposed above. Expanding on the initial idea a bit, I do like the elemental armor category. These could be the 4 armor type categories.

  • Light armor - +x% movement speed
  • Medium armor - +x% dodge
  • Heavy armor - +% increased defense
  • Elemental armor - +% increased resistance to a single element

Then imagine every class has the following four nodes in their passive skill tree (just for an idea, subject to change/balancing of course).

  • Light Armor Mastery - If you are wearing all light armor pieces your attack rating is increased by your movement speed %.
  • Medium Armor Mastery - If you are wearing all medium armor pieces your critical strike damage is increased by dodge%.
  • Heavy Armor Mastery - If you are wearing all heavy armor pieces your chance for a crushing blow increases by your defense%.
  • Elemental Armor Mastery - If you are wearing all elemental armor pieces your elemental damages are increased by the lowest % of your elemental resistances.

This would create some tension if say as a sorc you really wanted to wear elemental armor, but a really good unique for your build was light armor. Do you forgo the armor mastery bonus to equip it or not. Tensions like this are really good for the game and everything about this system is immersive and easily accessible to new players. This even makes the legendary affix hunt on armor potentially more interesting since you would need to match the affix you want to the armor type you want in the slot you want.

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Yeah, strongly agreed on this.

That could be interesting for sure.
Although I would add one more; If you are wearing at least one of each armor type, gain X. So the “jack of all trades” option also exists. It should probably be weaker than the others of course, to compensate for it being offering more freedom.
Or make it somewhat harder to get, like “use at least 2 of each armor type” (well, I dont think there are 8 armor slots, but you get the idea :P)

Also, have different jewelry types too, as in rings and amulets, with their own inherent bonus.

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Yeah, I was thinking about this too and I thought that maybe once the player has a chance to learn the item system a bit in endgame you start to get angelic, demonic, and ancestral versions of all items in the game - so you have angelic light armor, or demonic heavy armor, or ancestral amulet, angelic ring etc…

Angelic, ancestral, and demonic versions of armor/weapons would roll as a secondary inherent a certain amount of the corresponding angelic, ancestral or demonic power. So an endgame item might look like:

Dawn Breakers
Legendary Angelic Heavy Boots
+1500 defense
+5% enhanced defense
+22 angelic power
“-----------------------------------------------”
Rolls 3-4 additional affixes and a legendary affix.

Then they could use the angelic, ancestral, and demonic power totals to activate bonuses within their endgame progression system (whatever form that may take). To me a system like this is easy to learn initially because light/medium/heavy/elemental and what they are is easily recognizable by the player, but the system has great depth and is hard to master because you have tensions coming from balancing ancestral/demonic/angelic powers against the armor types the roll on and whether you want the bonuses from the item or the item type more. Would be really interesting to me.

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They could just add Real Money to the game. And they could follow more simple game design. I dont get it, why Variety and Depth is so important. All you need is a hook.

I think players should be able to sell their items once they leave, also something like 50k per Season for players to collect.

YouTuber Communities might work as somekind of hook too.

Ive always thought Blizzard is all about making a few thing perfectly, so “hook” stuff is kinda their alley.

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I would add to this, skills like Wrath of the Berserker / Archon / Akarat’s Champion (or now Conduit in D4) in D3 are very problematic for game design. They present issues on multiple fronts:

  • They overwrite the look of your character which kills identity for some players - especially if you have near permanent uptime on these skills.
  • They have long cool-downs. Long cool-down skills are problematic since either they are super impactful and you feel weak without them or they are relatively unimpactful in which case they don’t deserve the name ultimate.
  • The buffs they provide work universally well for their class and usually these are powerful effects so you feel obligated to try to put them into every build and use CDR to break the cooldown they are designed around in the first place.
  • In addition, buff skills feel really bad as active skill choices in a Diablo game because they aren’t really active in any sense. Skills like Magic Weapon, Battle Rage for example are almost always afterthought fillers in builds for the buffs they provide - or worse they are active, on use resource generators in addition to passive buffs which makes resources an afterthought.

If they want to keep these types of buffs in the game consider making a skill category that is party buffs - i.e. shouts, auras from DII for example and steer clear of solo only buffing - it doesn’t feel good and is often mandatory.

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well, go sit in your corner and think about it

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It’s hard to see the basis for that claim, given that D3 is about an inch deep (and can’t even compensate for that with being a mile wide).

I’d love it if D4 proves me wrong, but if D4 is made by the same company-mentality that made D3, then where is this hoped for depth of gameplay going to come from?

Will D4 have interesting items to find? Will it have odd ways of combining items to make new character types that are “outside the box”? Will such potential combinations be embraced or nerfed into a bland, everything-is-equal footing? Will there be ways of not just having signature skills for each class, but odd ways of using, or even modifying those skills? Will there be ways for one class to make use of other classes skills through equipment for even more potential combinations of builds?

I’d be amazed if D4 answers even one of these questions positively - but, should this be read in some hypothetical future where it did - then I’ll happily eat my words, and enjoy a D4 that was vastly better than the bland as all get out D3.

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Variety and depth IS the hook.

No thanks.

Like no. 1 in leaderboards get 50k? That sure will do wonders for botting and cheating.

Yeah, that is the main flaw imo.

Yeah, Blizzard even solved this, in what is pretty much a first for the genre. All buff skills should have an active component, like the auras and mantras in D3. No fire and forget buffs.
(And of course no way to reduce resource costs or cooldowns so much that you can just spam them)

Now this I strongly disagree with. Make all buffs (and also heals) in the game only affect the player (including any pets, merc etc you might have). Part of the balancing issue (including zDPS disaster) in D3 comes from all those party buffs.

Group synergy and power should come from teamwork in combat. Like positioning well for offensive and defensive tactics, focusing the right targets, coordinated use of CC etc. Not by passively boosting each others builds.

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That’s an interresting idea. I wouldn’t “close” it in all eq but would give small bonus for every piece of armor, e.g.:

  • Light Armor Mastery - Each light armor piece of your gear increases attack rating for x% of your movement speed. etc.

This wouldn’t force us to wear something unwanted just to keep bonus but we could manage our gear. Ofc every class should have different nodes/bonuses.

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People will only bother about that if the ms is uncapped in D4. Even so, it will only be used for speed farming/build and won’t be using in the real content like pushing GR or Raid Boss or PVP.

LOL. D3 Dex used to give dodge % and it got scrapped because it was an unreliable stat for defense or against a magical attack/elite attack that has 100% hit rate. Now D3 Dex gave armor and everyone is happy.

During the time I was still playing Ragnarok Online. the dodge is the weakest defensive stat for all classes whether in PVM or PVP.

Even in D2, the damage reduction stat is still the favorable stat over defense rating for a good reason.

Everyone will wear this if their class allowed it (or it doesn’t have insane requirement) to wear it because damage reduction is always welcomed. :sunglasses:

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