Title.
Up until this pt, this game looked very D3, whatever, that sucks, still D4 is worth playing and trying to have fun with it even if it’s inspired by D3 way more than D2. Still worth being excited about up to this point.
This though, this is totally insane.
According to Llama’s D4 Q&A Video, don’t know how to link in here, youtube it, Diablo 4 is removing hit recovery. About 5 min in the video.
What does this do / mean?
When you get hit you have “Flinch” and “Stun”.
Flinch does not interrupt your control of your character.
Stun is where you lose control over your character, like hit recovery in D2.
Apparently there’s “some” monsters that will have stun but that’s it.
There is no block recovery either.
I am not whining. This is constructive, on pt, criticism.
So, please keep the D3 sided “D2’s nostalgia” posts away, lets come together in 2021 and be on the same page respect-wise if point-wise there’s a disagreement.
This is really bad you guys.
MANY factors contribute to “combat” ok.
It’s not just “how does it look and feel” because “feeling smooth” is a stance.
Like, “feeling threatened” is the opposite stance.
As in if you can “smoothly” run through a monster pack, to some that’s great that’s what they want, to us older folk / D2 folk, that’s a misfire at the design phase. People like us want to be worried about running into a monster pack, because of things like hit recovery, among at least 20 other big variables that go into “is combat good?”.
Things like:
Do I care if I get hit?
Am I worried about running into a mob pack?
Can I get put in hit recovery? (See how quickly this comes to mind?)
How much faster hit recovery do I want?
Is faster hit recovery a better tradeoff than X, Y, or Z on another item?
Do block chance and faster block matter?
Resistances both mine and enemies?
How fast does my char move / run? Does it cost mana, or a free cooldown?
How does this change combat if movement is based off cooldown skills?
Doesn’t that make combat less risky than running fast into mobs?
How costly are my damage skills? How do I sustain them?
How fast can I attack?
What are my weapon and skill attack ranges?
Does my weapon have a replenishing quantity and how will I sustain that?
How tight is the map? Are there small doors with monsters than can open them?
How far can I see ahead / is there fog of war?
How informative is the minimap, is it telling me where to go, or leaving it to ME?
Do enemies have variable on death effects, frost nova, and are they threatening?
How zoomed in is the camera? Does it allow me to plan my path or not?
Does AI deal physical / melee attacks to me, or am I fighting affixes only?
Another 20:
What’s the risk to dying? Is there corspe fetch / exp loss and such?
Am I vulnerable after I respawn, or do I just click on a banner and that’s it?
Where do i respawn too? How do i get back to action?
Does it take communication to get back to action, or a non interactive way?
Does the game have mounts, are those mounts immune to monster packs?
Are there curses? Will I get hit with Decrepify Weaken Maiden AD?
Does each new difficulty lower my resistances so I am vulnerable?
How common are buff auras, like BO sticks? Should they be that cheap?
How fast do enemies move? How fast do their projectiles move?
Is there stamina and is it effective early levels ONLY, to set the vibe right away?
Is there faster block to gear for? If not, that’s one less tradeoff to factor in?
How long do my skill animations take and such?
Are skills fueled by cooldowns and rotations, or mana?
How long are my skill cooldowns, and are (>1 second) long cooldowns fun?
If mana, how do you get mana? Is a generator a fun way to play or lame?
Aren’t health potions great when they replenish over time, slowly?
Is my item eth and can it run out of durability and do I care if it does?
Is my AoE skill so powerful I just clear the screen w/o caring? (like many of D2’s endgame meta builds, and f/e D3’s UE when it reigned).
How common are shrines and does each new shrine effect cancel the last?
Do you want shrine hunting to be a thing if they stack, or not be a thing because they overlap?
Things like this, there’s more, I’m out of energy to think of more and type.
If I don’t get put in hit recovery upon engaging an enemy, do any of these things matter? Seriously. Unless their affixes are spell-like and that’s all I fight / dodge / kite. This is why hit recovery is king for “is combat good?”.
Without that, there’s no risk to jumping in the action w/o caring.
I would like to learn how this is not the case, because I can’t see it.
Why is D4 going this low risk approach to combat?
Why did the devs say “faster hit recovery did not feel right?”
Like, how? I am not trying to be dramatic, they should be making videos on Youtube TALKING TO THE WORLD about these gigantic thoughts they have regarding deving D4, the fact devs are not being transparent on their own initiative is absolutely redic!
Think about the (negative, simplifying) effect this has on pvp?!
I’d only pvp if it’s low level, bc simple is more strategic (than tele all over) pvp. So I’m in D4 gearing up / planning a pvp char, should I value faster hit recovery on this item, or is the next breakpoint of IAS better? Is overloaded resistance better than hit recovery? Is overloaded health better than faster hit recovery? This is what ANY diablo player BUT the brand new to the genre people will think about. It is NOT just this “1 percent” of playerbase, its like 90 percent. in the age of Youtube, it takes 2 seconds to learn this what affixes are valuable.
None of these self-questions (when valuing a new item that dropped) matter because faster hit recovery isn’t a part of pvp, because it’s not in the game! You are taking out a MAJOR affix from the gear-valuation part of Diablo, which is THE CORE of Diablo 2! Like D4 devs!! What are you doing!
In D2 world, mostly, the mattering affixes:
- skills, sockets, faster cast/ias, resistance, lowered resist, faster hit recovery, mana after kill mana/health, can’t be frozen, things like this. They just chucked one of the top 5 id say affixes from Diablo 2 out of the game. No reason, just a DL slip to Llama and didn’t even elaborate to him by the way.
If D4’s devs would make dev opinion videos they’d be accountable for their decisions, and have to stand up for them, instead of just telling a streamer something and then doing it to the game. Llamas awesome, yet why does just he get to know this, and not us non-streamers in the world? Sorry for sounding negative, I am being constructive, and am disappointed D4’s devs are not talking to us about these things forwardly on video, just streamers.
Maybe on the forums here we can come together and voice our opinion that we are being rejected for not being streamers? Blizz is not making videos talking depth like “faster hit didn’t feel right, this is why we removed it”. Why? “Flinch” doesn’t affect your control we know that, so it’s not hit recovery, and only “some” monsters have “stun”. This is just outright redic, tell a streamer that, and do it to the game, and we just take it? This is the opposite of being transparent Blizz…regardless if your choice is a good one or bad for the game. Without Llama telling us that, how would we know your stance on hit recovery? I thought in 2019 you promised change…and this is not the change we are hoping for.
So, what do you guys all think about D4 choosing “no” for hit recovery, replacing it with “stun” and only having “some” monsters have that ability? How are we supposed to be threatened by monster packs now? If you reply please put your Diablo political bias aside, it’s 2021, new year, lets be adults about it.
Thanks.
EDIT Please include an example if you click reply. Since humans are so reversely wired i almost feel like writing “don’t include examples” bc when told not to do something we all are tempted to do that. So, “do not’” include examples…lets see if that way works.
(and d3 and poe fail miserably in that regard)