Diablo IV Announcement Discussion

General Discussion
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My brother was also primarily interested in how Diablo and the prime evils in general will present themselves in the story. I’m sure they will be involved, but that I don’t think they are ready to talk about that yet. There are a few frames in the cinematic trailer which show a procession of people around the skull of Diablo. I think the people were the priests of Rathma, but can’t be sure… From this, I am sure Diablo will be involved in the story, just don’t know how yet.

Here is the part in the trailer, if you are interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xw6exAdQRr8&t=52m11s

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I guess will find out won’t we? Have you heard about Terminator: Dark Fate? I heard it didn’t work out to well, unless you think 10mill even covers the cost of that movie.You know what this “atmosphere” is all about don’t you? You know how this ends if they can’t satisfy what costumer base they have left. What few loyalist they have against Chinese money… Time will tell… But i’m not expecting much from communists.

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I’m not really into the whole D2(or PoE) vs D3/D4…but I just wanted to convey one issue I had with D3(and kind of worry about D4 from what we saw at Blizzcon…though admittedly it’s early on so we’ll see).

There needs to be a long term loot hunt plan.

If hitting the max Ilvl is a relatively easy(a 1 week goal), then it’s going to stagnate player retention. If this is going to be the case then Blizzard needs to genuinely consider adding a third type of loot to give the more “dedicated” people something to farm…but most importantly…

The loot needs to not undermine the casual player-base while giving the hardcore crowd something to work on.

Just because one grinds more doesn’t mean the other player should be holding them back when tackling the bosses in dungeons. There’s a sweet spot in power level and gear we need to find.

My suggestion is to add a third type of loot on par with legendaries/sets. The third type on average will be weaker than legendaries, but has the potential to eclipse them. This probably involves adding a lot more RNG on this type of gear.

Mythic items are cool in D4, but it’s limited to one slot so I don’t feel it’s enough.

Primal Ancients were made to also kind of tackle this issue in D3, but they didn’t offer enough power or customization to be worth it(nor did you effectively ever see them for you BiS build).

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When I saw the white highlighting on hit, I thought it was kind of awkward as well. However, I think it helped with making attacks feel impactful. The animations and sound designs were really well done, though, so maybe they could tone down the highlighting to make it more subtle or provide an option to turn it off in settings.

They did have some mechanics for bigger bosses that showed when you stagger them they can lose a claw or something, which also impacts fight mechanics. I think focusing on things like that is the right direction, as that is one of the big things that D3 did better than most of its competition. It would be a nice touch to lose a limb here and there for smaller mobs too, but I think it would ultimately make a better game to focus on mechanics. If they have the time, maybe?

Trust me. Without highlighting you will still feel the impact and will be more realistic. There is no way to not feel that your power grows when playing when you see how fast you kill mobs.

Hah, yeah - I laughed a bit when they showed that runewords were limited to combining two runes. Mechanic-wise, I think it still makes sense for adding something to items like that, but I think we understood rune words to be something different previously. It doesn’t sound like runewords as we remember them will come back. I am hopeful they will unveil more systems for customizing items as well.

Yea I actually wrote that before watching Q&A and did not knew that there are 2 runes runewords. It is not enough for me also.

D2 had four small tabs, if I remember correctly, that incorporated skills and talents. They weren’t very big, so I think number-wise it matches or is even more with D4 from what they showed. I think adding talent points alone is actually very useful, since it adds some much needed depth to more horizontal progression and variety around itemization if nothing else. Hoepfully it doesn’t boil down into being ‘essential’ on items, where if +skill doesn’t roll the item is worthless, but there are ways to fix that. From what I have seen so far, they are pretty clearly focusing on fixing some of the main problem areas of D3, while recognizing and building on some of the game’s strengths, which is a good sign.

I don’t know. Maybe…Definetly after Q&A I see more good signs.

Fallowing up after Q&A new information.
While everything I wrote unfortunetly stays and is valid but I’l add to it.

  1. Philosophy.
    Guys …really. Maybe it is because you are snowflakes so you have no clue how not to make a snowflake game?
    I don’t get it. You brought in darkness to implement mechanics to make people feel safe when playing and spot a light on were to go and what to do. Come on. That is the opposite of darkness. What was the point of it then?
    More details why I say it is a snowflake below

  2. items
    a) item philosophy
    You are allowed only one mytic item. Good call ! Everything else - the whole item system that you shows is crap.
    We do not want to strengh of our character or build to be defined by one item. We want multiple equal ways to achive strengh.
    (if I am reading your way of items properly.)
    You character should be strong because of:
    Your skills, your talents, your weapons, your armor in equal way.
    DO NOT LET ONE ITEM DICTATE BUILD BUT ALLOW IT TO HELP IN IT.
    Example:
    Wrong way:
    neck
    +2 to skill A.
    Skill A does skill B.
    Skill B is forever on CD.

Good way:
neck
+2 random skill.
+1 all skills.
+1 talent random talent point.
+2 random stats.(lets say bleed and + to stagger effect in this case or life or w/e)

Don’t make any item like above bad way.

b) rare/legendary/mytic etc
Also second wrong way is making a huge difference between rare/ legendary/ mytic/set.
Legendaries can be more specified. More stable. For example a mace that always give…ummm…+2 to maces skill? Thats cool. I get that. But who said that you won’t be able to find very rarely a rare mace that also has that stat?
Example:
Legendary mace:
+2 to maces skill.
+240-300% dmg.
-5-15% attack speed
-0-10% movement speed
+double stagger values.

Rare mace:
+4 random stats. In this case:
+2 mace skill
+200-250% dmg
+7-14% attack speed
+bleed effect

Who said that only legendaries must be the only good items? The only valid items to wear?
Rares should also have a very small chance to be epic.

Regarding sets.
Wrong way set:
(2) Increase skill A damage.
(4) Increase Skill B damage.
(6) When you use skill A gain buff to damage with frost.

Good way of set:
(2) + 30 to weapon damage
(4) add stagger effect to lighting damage.
(6) +1 all skills +30 weapon damage.

I don’t know why you cant see it. There are so many examples.
Wrong way set:
(2) gain 50% attack speed when using skill A
(4) Skill A has a chance to do additional damage

Good way:
(2) Gain 5% attack speed and 10% damage
(4) Gain 5% attack speed and 10% damage.
(6) Add attack speed % to damage %. (including attack speed from other items)

Now you might think that this good way set is the opposite of what I wrote:
“DO NOT LET ONE ITEM DICTATE BUILD BUT ALLOW IT TO HELP IN IT.”
Partially I admit. It changes the build and allows focusing on attack speed.
But it is nothing if you don’t have attack speed on all your items ! All your gear contributes to this and the set literally sucks. You gain 20% damage and 10% attack speed? Thats like one items stats and it does not dictate your build. You can use it with multiple skills and talents. Actually it gives more chances of making more builds.

  1. dungeons

I love the mechanic of dungeons appearing randomly. That was such a great Idea.
I see already mysalf and friends hunting some SPECIFIED area in order to find dungeons cause I have no clue were they spawn. Or hunting SPECIFIED area to check if there will be a event or world boss and have a small chance of droping …a legendary chest?. No clue what this world will give.

But when when I enter unknown area(dungeon) a cloud shows me what to do to get reward…come on. End with the snowflake pls. Weres the darkness in that?You are entering unknown area ! You don’t know a s**t. ITS A DUNGEON !
…how in world you can’t get that? How many 7 year olds you saw in blizzcon? That many !!! and even if you did. Why you are trying to hurt them by treating them cerfully and show were everything is and take by the hand. NO ! That is a terrible thing to do to child ! Children need the same thing as adults ! Difference is adults enjoy it realism and children NEED IT for their development. You are actually hurting them by making snowflake game. Don’t you get that?

We do not want to be carried. We want to explore and be amazed oursalfs ! We want to cheer when luck stroke !
Bad way:
Dungeon objective:

  1. Kill someone.

Dungeon objective:
2. Find something.

Dungeon objective:
3. Do whatever

Right way:
No dungeon objective. You go in and see what you luck will bring you !
You might find a legendary boss.
You might find a rare chest.
You might find rune chest.
You might find rare boss.
and so on and so on.

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312

New classes please

samurai
Combines demon hunter and Amazon skills.
Warrior priest
Combines paladin and crusader skills
Theurgist
a magician who supposedly summons gods

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Doctor
summons blue box.

How about something more diablo like and not a samurai or w/e.

Knight
Uses shield for offence and inspires allys.

Shadow Lurker
Uses shadow,evasion to charge power in to skills.

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I know it is very early verison of the game but here are my observations:

The Sorceress’ spell effects are looking really great.

Lighting, cold and fire are illuminating the dungeons’ walls, floor and puddles and pools of blood on the ground reflecting the lights and coloring the caves, this adds to the immersion. I like how some spells originate from / channeled through the staff. Also like the town portal effects while casting and its blue lighting flickering at town. Healing / life per hit shirne’s effect also good.

But how should i say it, it is not dark enough, i mean sometimes there is too much light in the underground caves and dungeons even without light sources. Also noticed that maybe the gamma was up in the streams / videos because instead of black / dark shadows there was a lot of greyish ones.

Watched D2 videos again and there the dungeons were more eerie, with fewer light sources and more dark spaces between them, with smaller light radius. Enemies attacked from the dark, fallen shamans fireballs lit up from nowhere.

i don’t mind if i can see normaly at day, but at night and in dungeons vision should be more limited. If enemies are behind object sight should be blocked or they should be hidden somehow.
Also if rooms’ doors are closed sight sould be also blocked into the next room and/or its content needs to be blackened and its enemies hidden. But at least there is some striving for it at Garan Hold and i like it how opening a door light shines through it after where it can but also leaving some shadows in the room.

Sometimes the camera was too zoomed at the character not in a good way like there is a feeling that there isn’t enough space for fighting or don’t know how to put it, though sometimes it is good because i can see the details of the world, that the devs put together.

I like the feeling of enemies need more than just one slash to kill them (even from barbarian), like they are not made from paper. Also like how some skills have more weight behind them then others, but even basic attacks and spells seems punchy in a good way.

I hope for the return of the original fonts to everywhere.
Also hope for the PC version to get a regular/classic GUI for the bottom of the screen instead of the bottom left corner (or an option to choose where to put it).
Inventory is not to my liking, but, well it’s not that bad.

I don’t like to idea of the instantanious shapeshifting of the Druid, but if there will be enough skills or skill combinations to keep it in constant Werewolf or in constant Werebear form for different builds and suppliment it with talents and legendaries, or get bonus to keep it in said form then i’m okay with it. I really like the Werewolf/bear movement and attack animations. Though other animations are also good.

Additional to the current characters one ranged and one summoning class is a must.

Good ides are: upgradeable skills, talent trees, rune words.

It would be good if the early D3 idea of charms would make a comaback, a pouch with a limited number of charms in them. I also liked (and still do) the early D3 version of skill runes, where they could be found as loot and had more levels which chaged skills at least that was the idea.

Hope they/you won’t go overboard with damage numbers. Also hoping for an option to hide / filter out other players in towns/hub areas, because i like the idea that the game what i start is my own, but don’t mind seeing them at non soloable world boss events.

Dungeon “Objective: Slay all enemies in the Domhainne Tunnels” is like Den of Evil. After clearing it light immediately starts to shine through, though no skill point reward. Also hoping for more varied rewards for completing quests, it was quite forgettable/boring in D3.

One drowned design is almost like Pyramid Head from Silent Hill 2 :smiley:

So far it looks like quality work!

And of course can’t wait for release!! :fire:

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I liked Archon when I first tried it - it’s visually and thematically appealing and the smash of the punch is visceral, but the luster of it was short-lived. Using Archon became mandatory to push the character’s strength and Archon forces you to only use a punch and a beam skill - on a wizard. The new 60-second cooldown ‘ultimate’ ability for the sorceress that was showcased in the Diablo IV demo is called “Conduit”. It transforms your character into a ball of lightning and damages nearby enemies with lightning damage over time. While it is active, all you can do is move around and dash, and dashing deals additional damage. Like Archon, Conduit seems visually and thematically appealing, but it’s just as hollow as Archon was, because you can’t use any other skills while it is active. Since it is an ‘ultimate’ skill (and has to be crazy strong to be worth using at all), finding a way to make it permanently up or nearly permanently up will be a goal (just as every other class will be trying to do with their ‘ultimate’ skills, and just as Archon was), it will be just as dull to play as Archon was.

Moreover, having Conduit in the game allows the devs to say sorceresses are good on mobility, they have Conduit, as opposed to actually giving sorceresses real teleport - Diablo 2 teleport. Diablo 3 teleport sucked. You had to use Aether Walker just to remove the cooldown that did not need to be there and still the wizard was struggling to keep up with groups. One of the pieces of information that came out already is that the devs plan to have a cooldown on teleport and offer a unique item that removes that cooldown (like Aether Walker), but even worse than Aether Walker, because it then makes you teleport RANDOMLY (ie- you cast teleport and you teleport to a random location within range). I am just floored by the boneheaded decision-making that thought that would be great. It must have been suggested by the same numbskull that thought Death Blossom would be a good idea, but this is even worse because your character is moved. So what if there’s another unique you can combine it with to unleash a nova every time you teleport (ie- Calamity rune in D3)? You can’t select where you teleport to, so you can’t control it and will likely miss many times (like Death Blossom) and will also likely re-position yourself right into bosses’ one-shot mechanics.

They need someone who actually understands spellcasters to design their spellcasters. I’m underwhelmed so far by what they’ve revealed (and hinted at) about the sorceress from a gameplay perspective - and I want it to be amazing.

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Hope they don’t try to balance all chars to do everything. What was great about d2 was each character had a purpose. Zealer, smiter for ubers. Hammerdin for rushing and baal runs. Sorceress for mf. Javazon for cows. I had some chars specifically for pvp. Barbs to buff other chars. Each character had a purpose.

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They say skills will be permanent. This won’t work if they do patches and changes regularly. They will have to offer a free reset after each patch or even offer a way to change skill points but at some cost.

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They confirmed that there will be an item that completely removes the “cooldown” of teleport skill. The same for other skills, more build variations and customization options. It is intended design.

Check out this thread:

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I’m sure you’re right man. I just think it’s weird that no one is really talking about this haha

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The Barbarian is able to equip 4 weapons at any given time

Well i guess Amazon will be able to equip more jewelry than other classes :slightly_smiling_face: and I hope you will not be creating a male version of Amazon

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This is exactly what I thought when I first saw gameplay.

Other thing I disliked was the talent system, it is way too simple, I would like a more complex system, especially knowing that it could be resseted anytime.

Everything else is utterly perfect… for a Blizzcon Demo xD, you still have a lot of work ahead guys!

Keep on this way please!! :smiley:

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Definitely the biggest departure we’ve ever seen from traditional Diablo. That’s not inherently a bad thing - we already have the existing games so ideally we want something new - but the direction is not what I’d choose.

Sure, we have D2 aesthetics, D2 classes (Druid looks cool and it has been a while but I hope the Sorceress is more than a retread).

But the game is different in being far more an MMO than D2 or D3. Always online - but where’s the evidence Blizzard has fixed its server and connection issues? Bosses you can’t solo. Likely no ability to pause. And microtransactions in a full price game!

I want to get on the hype train. I want to play a new Diablo game, for the first time in a long game - especially I want to try out the Druid. But so far, the more I think about what has been revealed so far, the more skeptical I am.

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So as a lifelong Diablo 1 and 2 player, I LOVE the aesthetics, mood, characters, skills, and day night cycle. I would love to see harsh weather like storms and rain make it a little hard to see monsters in some areas/affect gameplay :wink: but other than that everything on the surface looks good. Unfortunately under the surface reveals that they’re taking straight from WoW/Diablo 3 once again :frowning:.

So from what I’ve heard from dev interviews and online, they want to have a max level (40) with eNdGaMe content behind it, making gear found throughout your journey through sanctuary, once again, useless and forgettable. They keep talking about endgame. Well the D2 “endgame” was IN the leveling progression and the meat of the game was during those levels NOT at a magical single max level that rendered everything before it moot.

In D2 rarely are you ever in a game with people the same level. Level 99 was just a trophy that was damn near impossible to attain, it existed only as a number cap, it didn’t hold all of the fun content behind it like WoW and Diablo 3. This worked great because it always felt like your character wasn’t finished AND like you COULD get high enough to be able to use every level item in the game if desired. Very, very few people got past 94 (I’ve played hardcore since 2000 and my highest ever was a 92 sorc and i have probably a million hours in that damn game).

If you give players another paragon-like leveling system instead of proper character levels and building after the mountainous feedback and hate Diablo 3’s botched leveling system received, you’ll see the same falloff as D3. People still play D2 because of the systems, not the 800x600 graphics. PLEASE have levels stand out by making items tied to levels. If I’m level 50 and i find bunch of amazing items that are viable for 50+ but requirements hover around the level 30 range, I can’t wait to make a new character to see how powerful I can make level 30 become. Can I use this level 30 to defeat this hard boss i needed my level 50 to kill? LET’S TRY. Can I complete the game on this level 30 with these amazing items I’ve collected with my other high level characters? This also relates to the low level dueling scene in d2.

I can see D4 already, everyone’s going to be max level 40 and doing everything they can to skip characters to that level because it’s where the carrots lie. The carrots should be scattered through the game/journey and leveling because balance and proper rpg elements. The fun in life is the fleshed out journey and NOT focused on the end of it. Diablo 2 devs understood this simple concept. Diablo 4 can have FAR more replayability than D2ever had they just need to not go to extremes like Diablo 3 with one level being connected to every item

Next D2 point: MAKE QUESTS COMPLIMENT CHARACTER BUILDING. We need SOLID reasons to do side quests (and even main quests). Diablo 2 players had skill points (izual q), stats (a3 book q), remove identify cost (save cain), cut shop costs (radament q), huge xp boost/level (ancients), imbue item (smith q) item customization (a5 socket q), and a lot more fun things like the cube and item personalization. Hell, take those ideas but come up with new ones too. Quests should serve for more than just story progression or gold. I want certain quests to feel like they’re involved in my character development, or simply stand out for the special reward. It feels great to backtrack through the world to complete quests that add permanent power or utility.

Last point:
They want to scale legendaries again Eg: a level 22 soj, 23 soj, 24 soj, 33 soj, 70 soj etc. Instead of properly having soj a level 29 equippable item, for example. We want some lower level items to have special stats in order to be viable at higher levels Eg: soj, bloodfists, hotspurs, 2 piece angelic set, vipermagi, magefists, rattlecage, etc.

See how even magic items in D2 could rival or exceed some legendaries for specific purposes? This is the Diablo 2 system that keeps us hooked. [Jeweler’s Duskshroud of the Whale]

don’t forget about the raw dungeon music, give us memorable horrifying experiences. :wink:

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I agree that cinematic was amazing can’t wait to play Diablo IV :smile:

Always remember Sanctuary needs heroes

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Why we would we buy a game that isn’t for us?

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No Cooldowns. Make skills more focused on Resource Management.
Bring in Resource Potions as well. Take Potion cooldown away and reduce the amount of potions you can carry in a quick slot. or Reduce the amount you can carry slightly and reduce the Cooldown to like 5-10 seconds.

Ultimate Skill
Now I do like the idea of having an “Ultimate Skill” I think what you should do is make it a choice between 3-4 Ultimate skills that have a build up overtime before you can use them. Also having talents and items that increase the charge rate or what grants you charge toward that skill. This skill would be separate from your other hotbar skills.

Character
People should be able to choose how to play their character. Wanna be a werewolf druid, do it. Wanna be mostly pet druid, do it. But from what I’ve seen it seems like we are bound to different skill categories that are forced to be in a specific keybind (even if you can change keybinds). If I’m wrong please someone let me know. But I noticed for druid all the pets under one section and binds didn’t seem to indicate that you could have a Wolf in one slot and a Raven on another. These type of specialized builds should be allowed, while still making someone wanting to dip into multiple categories can be effective as well. That makes build diversity much better.

Some ideas on Itemization.

Should have more focus on stats. I like legendary powers don’t get me wrong but I also don’t want those to be the only factors to determine the “Ultimate” build.

Runewords - Tweak them to work for D4 even dumbing them down to like 4 sockets would be cool. But overall I think Runewords should be a means of adding more stats into an item which would help with people talking about Rare items not being good enough. Could add things like 10% chance to use meteor on hit. Things like this could make you choose between this and a legendary giving players more overall choice.

Charms - Add 2 Charm Slots. Charms take the place of the current D4 model of Runes. Have Activation Charms and Condition Charms. These Charms can roll 1-2 random stats. This would keep the Activation/Condition choices meaningful. Add in a legendary version of each one that has boosted stats/3-4 stat rolls or something. This would also fix Charm clutter taking up inventory space from D2.
( they mentioned a system of being able to improve the rune versions in some way, but they could just do that for the charm idea as well. )

Jewels - Jewels add another way to just add more stats to items which would give players more choices for rares over a legendary or something like that. Jewels could vary and even come in Legendary forms for more stat rolls.

Gems - Make them useful beyond Crit and Main Stat. An interesting Idea would make them conditional in some ways. So for weapons make a topaz give chance to stun and progress these for higher quality gems. Maybe a perfect or whatever has a chance to electrify a small area when you hit an enemy. But make the add something new to them gameplay.

Unique Rarity - A way to fix some issues with rares or improve upon them. Since I’ve seen quite a few people complain about rares not being important enough. Make a player crafted rarity “Unique” like unique somewhat from D2. You could find these recipes or get them some other way. But you would take (Rare Item) + (Crafting Materials) = Unique item of Rare item used. These could even be class specific like Sorc staves and so on. These could even scale to levels based on the Rare Item used to make them a little more balanced. But they would give Rares more usefulness, and give people leveling up more choices in gear. Even could have some Unique items useful for endgame. Another thing is unique crafting materials that you can only get from specific dungeon bosses and world bosses. Would make farming those bosses useful and a reason to go back to specific places in the world.

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The item they hinted at has two components to its effect: (1) removes teleport cooldown, and (2) makes teleport destination random.

I mentioned that yet unrevealed item (and ridiculed it) in the second paragraph of my post you quoted from, among the rest of what I was saying.

Of course, someone could have misspoke… The item(s) have not been shown, so we do not have the actual item(s) to look at and analyze.