From https://us.diablo3.com/en/blog/23232022:
“We haven’t decided whether the character leveling and experience system should be finite or infinite. We’ve been discussing the pros and cons of both and would love to hear your thoughts.”
Please no infinite scaling in D4. It makes you feel like running on a hamster wheel and it encourages bots. It reduces the feeling of chasing a goal and the accomplishment of getting near it.
In my opinion a level system with attribute point upgrades is great, but if you insist on adding paragons make them a finite number and preferably individual for every character. It would be nice if the number is not huge and reachable by, let’s say not less than 10% of playerbase.
The flaws in the infinite paragons in D3 are :
The huge numbers and unrealistic requirements
When we look at the leaderboards we see 10k paragon and meanwhile a half of it - 5k is unattainable by 99% of us, so we settle for 1-2k at most. Being 80 lvl with a lvl cap of 100 feels way better than being 1k paragon compared to the 10k leaders in the endless grind.
The underwhelming rewards
This is connected to the huge numbers and the infinite scaling. In result the paragon rewards have to be scaled down and feel very underwhelming. No one said “Woohoo! I finally got that 0.10% critical chance upgrade”
The lack of clear goal
What are the goals of Diablo 3? Reach the 70 level cap in 1-2 hours, get full set gear in a few more and then grind for hundreds of hours for better rolls on the same gear and using the same spells, so you can get to the next GR and get more and more endless miniature upgrades in the form of paragons. Rinse and repeat until ~10k paragon and 150 GR which takes insane amounts of time. It’s not a clear, defined and reachable goal. You are chasing endless numbers.
Diablo 2 goals were well defined. You have to go trough all the difficulties, reach ~lvl 90 and get the most important items for your build. This usually took a few days where you find and equip new items and slowly shape your build. Then you can go for the full min maxing of the character and the end goal of 99 or start a new one. Talking about starting a new character :
Shared paragons don’t encourage the player to start a new character
Being able to farm paragons efficiently at the thousands with your main Barb feels more compelling than starting a new Crusader to lvl up to 70 in 2 hours and then get paragons very slowly.
TL;DR : No infinite scaling please and if you add paragons make them character exclusive, a finite amount that isn’t in the thousands and make them feel more rewarding and serve a bigger purpose than adding a miniature stat number.
I would like a max level to reach in-game, and then a paragon level system that kicks in after hitting max level, I also think it should increase power, but only to a point.
If I use D3’s paragon system as an example, I would have the stat bonuses stop at paragon 800 and instead just have cosmetic rewards after that.
However I also like the idea of paragons continuing to grant power after that, but at a much reduced rate, so say after paragon 800 you would get 5 stats per level up to 900, then 5 stats every 5 levels to 1000, and after that 5 stats every 10 levels up to 1100, and so on.
But I do think it would be easiest to maintain balance by simply having the power increase from paragons stop at a certain point and then just have prestigious cosmetic rewards to hunt for afterwards.
Yeah, I also agreed with not allowing post-leveling. One of D3’s largest design problems was the fact that it was nothing but a power creep from start to finish from gear as opposed to character design/build implementation.
Adding post-leveling just brings back some of that aspect.
I believe they said before that they were going to balance with PvP in the forefront, which means that they shouldn’t use a power creep design.
guys before you judge a system like that research what various devs say about it “not just blizzard” and how it could be adjusted… still possible to screw up both and then it does not matter…
The keyword in endgame is END lmao, you do reach an end at some point and that usually begins a new ladder season at that time, with Paragon it’s just a cheap carrot on the stick that adds little value to the gaming experience.
I rather see an infinite scaling system. Nothing sucks more then when your at max level, your farming for gear for 6 hours and find NO UPGRADES meaning you wasted 6 hours for no reason.
Stop judging all endgame advancements on the paragon system thats currently in D3. The paragon system was poorly implemented and had far more potential. D3’s paragon does suck and provides too much power but you shouldn’t base all advancement options on it.
A balanced AA system where the post max level gains are MINOR and the options to choose from are more diverse are far more superior.
The difference between a Fresh Max Level Player vs a 1000 AA Level Player with the same gear should be extremely minor (say no more then a 25% difference) and the difference between a 1000AA and a 3000AA level player should be less then that (say 10% additional power). Right now the gains from paragon after 800 are pretty big and are too much due to 5 main stat each level. I’m talking differences where if it was say 1 main stat per level difference, then the gap between 1000 to 3000 to 6000 wouldn’t be as wide as it is today.
