Very well said, and worth repeating.
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He said the patch was mostly coded by Hu, who was the last person at Blizzard North, and left in 2004. While most of Blizzard North was busy coding D3 at that point, all of those changes were not approved and thought up by Hu. I’d imagine that they still had meetings to discuss what needed to be done, just that Hu was charged with the primary coding process. But yet, it was still a Blizzard North patch. 1.11 may have been the final Blizzard North patch, as it was released in August 2005, the same month Blizzard North shut down.
Patch 1.10 , released October 28, 2003
Brevik and the Schaefer brothers left Blizzard North in late June 2003, roughly 3+ months prior to patch 1.10 release. When the leadership of Blizzard North left, 30 additional employees quickly followed. Therefore, although the original leadership contributed to patch 1.10, the final version obviously did not have their approval and most likely had additional changes since they left the company 3+ months earlier.
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Could have been final changes made afterwards, but the initial vision of the patch is probably still there: Ladder mode, skill changes softcoded (oSkills easier, easier to rebalance), Dclone, bigger focus towards the runewords, etc. Some of the specifics could have changed. I think the patch was stuck in development for awhile, since I remember the announcement “Hell has frozen over. The 1.10 patch is here!”
nvm already was posted i missed it first time through
respec options, tokens and quest given. and some of the later runewords.
even if Devs are open for drastic changes, that doesnt necessary make it a good thing.
Doesn’t necessarily means bad too
With the lawsuit delaying D4 and Diablo immortal
With Wc3 reforge destroying remaster trust
With Diablo community being far more “conservatively vocal”
We have everything on our side to prevent a botched attempt at providing changes to improve the game
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What is not so well known, is that they still worked as consultants. You can’t know everything, simply because they left… Let’s see some actual quotes, that say they had nothing to do with Blizzard after that. Most had families that missed them.
I recall in interview that they were all against respec. The whole point of synergies was that you couldn’t respec. wysiwyg.
Initially, you could not respec at all in D2. The playerbase complained and it was changed.
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My point, exactly. The original team wouldn’t have allowed so many changes, knowing how it would disrupt game balance, and skill trees. I thought it was a terrible idea! I used it, but I knew it was cheating. I try not to respec at all, to this day. If I do, I somehow feel, I’ve corrupted the game.
Ironically, the one you didn’t list. 1.0 
But yeah, the best patches are 1.06 and 1.09.
Now, I’m confused. XD
1.10 is the worst hands down