Simple compromises for solo play

General Discussion
21

I find random group play to not be that much fun unless everyone is on a pretty even keel. It’s very easy for folks to be left behind when others are rocketing through the rift.

For example, on the GoD DH, if you’re behind, and not shooting at mobs, you more readily lose Hatred and momentum and then you’re stuck – which is No Fun™.

I still do it, I’ll take the extra drops and extra XP, but it’s not fun.

Bounties are different as each one takes a map and we all catch up on the last one, so it works much better for less than balanced groups.

I’d like to try group play with roles and such (zDPS, etc.), but don’t have anyone to work/play with and learn all that.

22

Got to really disagree here. People should not feel like they have to solo to lvl gems, and group to get xp, that is not solving an issue. Just making two issues instead of one.

Different choices leading to different benefits in-game is great, like which type of build you are using.
But the same should not be used for “out of game” choices, like who you play with. Those choices should just feel like they are as equal as possible, so it never feels like you have to make a choice about it.

That is another thing too. While I play with friends in Diablo 3, I have never, and will never, play with randoms. That is as far away you can get from fun as I can imagine.

1 Like
23

This is another topic that comes up somewhat regularly. The followers feel boring and lackluster (other than talking a lot which is good/bad depending on preference). They don’t really seem to offer much benefit, despite having some nice Leg items.

Reworking them a bit would be great, on it’s own, but if it can also be done to shorten the solo vs group gap that would be win win.

Good addition to the thread.

4 Likes
24

Solo Bounty Solution:

Assuming you have all 3 followers hired (See Above Post on details) when entering a new game the total bounties required per act for the solo player is 2 each for a total of 10 to complete.

How to do this. Of the 5 bounties 1 will be locked by each follower hired randomly, assuming all 3 are hired then 2 remain unlocked and needing completion. The solo player only has to complete 2 to get the cache.

If a desired bounty is locked by a follower then start it and the lock will switch places with an unlocked one. Once a bounty is started you cannot un-start it.

If you dismiss a follower the “lock” will be removed on each act. Rehiring will not re-lock. Only on the start of a new game will the locks be placed.

Adding other players into the game automatically removes all followers and all the bounty locks and resetting completed Tyreal status.

Remember having all three followers = Same difficulty/xp as 4 normal players.

Anyway that’s my suggestion

Cheers

1 Like
25

Heck, this happens with friends too. The speed of the rift is mostly dependent on the most powerful characters. My friend are running 90 and 100, and I’m doing 80s. So when I join with them, I can “keep up”, and stay alive, but I don’t contribute that much. The speed is still coming from them.

26

I’ve had more fun getting a root canal. I gave up on public games many, many, many moons ago. Never once found a random group that actually worked together as a group. Always got stuck with the following types:

The Olympic hopeful - the DH who wants to show that they can vault 7 screens away from everybody. Same with Monks and dashing strike.
The Paper Tank - The Wiz who wants to be in the middle of melee
The Chicken with Head Cut Off - WD who stays in chicken form and never kills anything. I know they are capable of it, but I never saw one do it.
The Globe Grabber - So you’ve killed an elite pack and you see the impending explosion counting down to detonation. A smart player stays out of the blast radius. There’s always that one player who runs into the middle of it to grab the progress globes (before they disappear, I guess?), gets blown up and then wonders 'WTF?"

Other examples out there, but you get the idea. I stick with solo. Yeah, don’t reap the benefits but don’t have to deal with the aggravation either.

6 Likes
27

I’ll admit, this had my laughing.

28

It’s good point regarding to the solo bounties and gem upgrade.

If playing solo, doesn’t require push too high level just for upgrade gem, friendly and encourage casual players to play more.

29

Do you happen to have any proof of this?

1 Like
30

Man, how much i would love to play solo and gain an EQUAL amount of xp like group play does. or the bounty thing you mentioned would be a godsend considering how many people just afk or play the SLOWEST build possible.

2 Likes
31

I understand their philosophy of group > solo. But as someone who only plays solo except for bounties and occasional PLs, I would really like to see:

  1. More exp pots for solo. Those yellow pools that give us +25% XP? Yea, more for solo peeps.

  2. Make the follower a bit more useful for us. Not doing a ton of damage, but their gear should help benefit us a bit (like the occulus ring does). A synergy that would make the follower ALMOST as good as having a second player in game. And for Petes sake (whoever Pete is), make them immortal at lvl 70 or combine the immortal follower token with one of the other ones!

2 Likes
32

As already said, playing solo feels punishing. You should not feel bad when you’re playing a game. On the other way arround the group meta is way more effective but (at least I am) feel burned out after doing a bunch of speedy greater rifts in a four man party.
So I have to choose between two bad choices. And think what, I often just close the game after I just opened it.
Another problem is not only playing solo vs four man parties. It is also about playing with only one or two other people. It is also far less effective then four man meta groups.

It is not only about less experience and blood shards, it is also about the inability to upgrade your gems up to a certain level.

I am totally fine that I’m way behind in paragon levels, have less primal items and I’m not be able to clear GR content on level X within the same time as players who just play the meta (plus the new S21 5minutes GT150 abusing meta I don’t to be part of), but at least let me be able to finish the D3 content (for me, reaching GR150 and/or upgrade gems to 150 is part of the content) with also being able to play it solo.

3 Likes
33

Maybe we also need to add why we feel the need to choose solo over group…

In my case, I feel the time is more value, when playing solo over groups.
One thing is the disruption from family life, and having to pause the game, but also not waiting for other players to keep up, stay active or contibute ingame, when I want to play.
I also feel, that diablo 3 is grown old and split the base in 2 half. Season and Non-season. I love both, but feel force to play Season more, because of better drop rate, better stash management and more players at equal levels when doing bounties.
I tried clan to find like-minded players, but most clan are inactive or limit in other areas, so I end up playing solo, even its gets boring at times…
I actually think, there need to be different between solo and groups, as we’ll all end playing solo, this late in Diablo 3, if equals…

2 Likes
34

I honestly don’t really see why so many convoluted “fixes” are needed regarding followers. Many of us don’t even like having to have them around as they seldom feel useful outside of niche tactics.

For bounties, there is a very simple solution that greatly narrows, but does not entirely close the game between players. Simply multiply the bounty materials by a factor of three (so 16 bounty materials on T13 becomes 48 bounty materials) and increase the number of death’s breaths provided by the cache significantly. The scalar nature of how many materials you get takes care of itself after that with regard to difficulty.

For general overworld play, including bounties, bump the legendary drop rate up to that of the rate found in rifts. It isn’t like we can avoid doing rifts anyway since they are required to obtain keys for doing greater rifts, which are then required for obtaining and leveling legendary gems. As there is plenty of “incentive” (requirement) to do rifts, there no longer needs to be a lower drop rate everywhere else in the game. Have the drop rate in Nephalem Rifts and the overworld always be equal by doubling the overworld drop rates. The reward schedule for doing bounties just royally sucks, and adds to why players hate them.

The trigger for the tripled bounty rewards is much easier to code than the one that has to do with followers. Simply make it so that a game must be started as a solo game, and the bounty rewards are tripled so long as only one player is in the game. The moment anyone else joins, the solo flag is permanently removed from that game and it reverts to how things work now - scaling with group members instead. Once you’ve played in a group, you’ll need to make a new solo game to return to getting increased rewards from bounties.

It wouldn’t hurt to have the EXP boost found on the PTR also given to solo games. It won’t be as good as you can obtain in groups due to the nature of how groups can clear faster at equivalent levels, but we’re not aiming to be “as good”, just “closer to groups”. We need a boost, not a 100% gap filler, which I don’t think anyone’s asking for anyway.

The best rule of thumb when it comes to coding in enhancements and/or fixes is to follow the K.I.S.S. rule: keep it simple.

2 Likes
35

Don’t forget that even if you buff solo or nerf group play, this would directly support botting. Well, that’s not kind of an argument but a noticable issue that we have to keep in mind.

But lets ignore the bot issue for a while and focus on the solo vs. group thing. At least, yes, I agree, sometimes it might feel handicapped playing solo. The game supports group play in a special way. We all know that, but some of us made a decision for playing the game alone.

It is true that this might be fun. For the majority of all players it is fun and they don’t care about comparisions with other players, no matter if they play solo or in group. So the described problem with the “weak” solo progress only hits a very few amount of players compared to the whole community.

The next question that has to be asked is, why the people decided to not play in group to enjoy the advantages. If you know that solo play might be a handicap, why focussing on that instead of playing together with others? Doesn’t make that much sense or lead to the question if this game is really the right on for you!?

But as mentioned above, playing D3 solo might be funny as well. The point when it turns into some frustration comes along with the comparision with other players who might play in groups. Now the question is, why should I compare myself with them?

The Ranking! Source of all evil or something like this. Yes it could be nice, if at least solo players would marked as solo players in that ladder. Yes, a completely seperated ladder for solo players might also be a “solution”. But at least such a solo flag would be enough, I think.

Some players don’t see the advantage of playing in groups. The social interacting is a great thing - most times. As such perspective it is a plus point for the D3 game at all.

What sould happen, if you equal solo and group play? The answer is easy. OVerall there might be almost no difference, b/c most of the players don’t care about the differences. A very few players would enjoy the “new world” but maybe realizing really quick that the change don’t increase their fun. Another relative small part of the community would switch away from playing in group to playing solo, b/c it would become way more efficient than group play:

  • less planning effort
  • less lag spikes
  • less dependencies to others

In this world group play would be dead. Only to get main gems and maybe augments to a usefull level would require group play. To achieve the group advantages like higher gems would be way more complex than it is today. At least - not a good deal.

Yes, people stay in the games community way way longer if there is a social binding. So group play is some kind of anti-aging for the community.

In my opinion there is no need to put focus on solo play, b/c most of the time it is a individual decision knowing the upcoming disadvantages. There are other aRPG’s around that don’t support group play in that way. Why not enjoying those? Well, easy dodge of the problem, but a legitimate question. I don’t really expect answers here, b/c i know them already … :slight_smile:

At least some solo players consider the disadvantages of solo play as a problem. Ok. But to punish group players only to become even in progress might not be the right way to handle the problem. Turn around the situation. Focus the game on solo play and put the disadvantages to the group play. Then the group players would think similar to you now: “Nerf solo play so we might close the gap…”

At the end the question is, what exactly you want? Playing solo with the same progression as players in groups? Not the best solution, b/c it would cause more problems then solving them. An alternative is to split the community into single player and multi player. That would solve a lot of the problems decribed in this thread, but a splitting of the community never is a good idea …

So I recommend the “visible solo flag” again as possible solution. Maybe D4 will come up with similar things. Maybe D4 will show us a significant different game, there solo play doesn’t make any sense…

Finally: The Bounty Issue. I really agree with that. Solo Bounties should be calculated different from “Group Bounties”. A T16 Bounty will reward us with two items, 22 Bounty-Mats and a few other stuff. It doesn’t matter if we play alone or in a 4man group. The 4man group averages the bounty runs 3-4 times faster than a solo player.

Why not scaling the rewards when turning in the quests at Tyrael depending on the amount of players receiving the caches? Doing Bounties with 4man group might result in 2 items and 22 Mats as it is currently. Now, the scaling takes place:

  • 3man: 3 items, 33 Mats
  • duo: 4 items, 44 Mats
  • solo: 7 items, 77 Mats
36

See above. I’m not the only one, either.

2 Likes
37

Because dealing with the general public is not something I enjoy doing in my limited spare time.

I actually couldn’t care less what groups do or get. What solo players mostly hate, is that to be competitive on a solo ladder, one need to progress their character in a group.

That, and the fact 99% of the people in pub games are either bots, leaches, afk or just plain clueless in high level games.

Much like the general public in real life I guess.

I don’t know about that, but it’s definitely close. Certainly gives the old root canal a lot more appeal.

5 Likes
38

Deal with the public long enough, you learn to love cats and dogs. :cat: :dog:

4 Likes
39

There are a lot of great suggestions here!

I am not even sure why D3 has extra/added benefits for group play… the basic, built in, benefits already make group play far superior!

  1. GRs: If I can speed run GR100 in 2-3 minutes solo, in a group I can easily speed run GR105-GR110 in 2-3 minutes, which translates to far more XP per hour, paragon, gem upgrades, etc., and that is before the added group XP bonus! If anything, solo players should get an XP bonus. The XP bonus of being able to run 5-10 GR levels higher than solo is significant!
  2. Bounties: It takes 1/4 the time to get all 5 bounties in a group!!! That’s 4 times more efficient! Without any bonuses added on top for group play! This translates to FAR more primals and better gear for group play as they can reroll 4 times as many legendaries!!! (I like the OPs suggestion to make single players only need to complete 2 bounties per act to get the cache, but even that is still slower that group play; 10 bounties vs 6.25 bounties. Maybe also give solo players 30% more in the bounties.)

Even if they were to remove the added group play bonuses and add them to solo players, group players would still have a significant advantage…

My suggestion: Double (or quadruple) the primal % find chance in single player games. You can then choose to either get the far superior XP, gem leveling and Bounties, legendary rerolls, etc. in group play OR get a better chance at primals in solo play. This would not compensate the solo player even close to enough but it would make solo play feel a little less crippled compared to group play, and everyone loves to see primal drops, so it should help keep solo players happy!

40

I like playing at my own pace and not watch every other players zoom right into the next map while I’m still looting, or trying to kill what’s left of the mobs that were tickled by them on their way to god knows where.

So yes, solo players need a lot of love (which explains why my Paragon is crap even in non-Season).

As for the OP:

I’m fine with the 30 second rift for now as I’ve accommodated to that. I’d usually teleport right back to town after killing the RG and speak to Orek. And in that remaining 30 seconds, I just pick up whatever leftover loot that was left.

Followers getting the same EXP as you do would still be moot seeing the bonus is reduced to 10% at level 70. Fundamentally, if they were to only reduce EXP gain applied to group play and not solo play would help close the gap just a little bit.

As for Gem successes, it’s still debatable. But I understand moving from group play to solo play gives them a large advantage at which their current level of gems would be higher than the solo rift that they are capable of doing, so I’ll leave no further comment on that.

I like the idea that completing any bounties would reward it 4x for a solo player. This has been suggested before but I highly doubt it’s easy for them to implement without seeing people exploit it (e.g. a player solos everything, then gets 3 people to join before collecting it from Tyrael in each town).