What new do you want in Diablo 4

General Discussion
41

One of my favorite games of all time was Ragnarok Online. Sure, it’s an MMORPG as opposed to an ARPG. Yes, the base game was a Korean grindcore festival. But I feel like there were so many things about the game design philosophy that were incredible, and you just don’t see those things in most games these days. I’ll list some of my favorites in no particular order.

1. The End-Game Isn’t Tied to the Level Cap

This is sort of similar to Diablo 2 in the sense that, yes, there is a level cap, but there’s not really anything at the level cap that you can’t get at a lower level. If we were to set an arbitrary level cap of 99, end-game should start around say 70-80 depending on the experience curve. That is to say, all zones, gear, resources, etc should be available to the players at this point. The additional levels will allow you to fine-tune you character with attributes/talents/skill levels/etc, but by no means are you simply locked out of the end-game content by not being at max level. So you can start pushing end-game and perfecting your builds, and your character levels simply come as a product of playing the game. This leads into my next point…

2. There’s Something to Do at All Level Ranges

One of the most tedious things about MMOs and ARPGs alike is that the start of the game is basically just a rush to the level cap. This problem exacerbates itself with each new expansion to the point that a game like WoW is now considering a “squish” to basically the entire level and content system. Even in D3, we see this at the start of seasons where everyone is just power-leveling a character to 70 as fast as they can, or waiting for their friends to get to 70 so they can get a carry because nothing before 70 matters.

The question then becomes, how do you make early-game content stay relevant?

3. Everything Single Item Drop in the Game is Useful to Someone

Not necessary, just useful.

When you were a brand new player in Ragnarok Online, chances are the very first monster you killed was a pink little jelly blob called a Poring, and it drops something called Jellopy. Different kinds and levels of Porings appear throughout the game’s content, but they all drop this basic inconspicuous item. Players who like to hoard every item they could would end up with thousands of these things. And then someone finds an NPC who wants thousand of them and will give you a hat that looks like a Poring in exchange. A new class was introduced that could use Jellopy to craft certain resources for its abilities.

With the way that item enhancements and damage calculations worked, low-level weapons and armor were sometimes superior to high level weapons/armor. Low level equipment had more slots for enhancements, whereas high level equipment had less (or none). Additionally, equipment could be upgraded (+1-10) but upgrading past a certain amount had a failure rate, and if you failed the equipment would break and be lost. Meaning if you wanted to fish for that +10, you had to get a lot of that item and the necessary upgrade materials and sort of “leap frog” your upgrades so you’re always keeping your best one.

So even as new players were leveling through the early game areas and collecting these low level items and equipment, they could keep them knowing that someone, be it a player or NPC, would want it and they could sell or trade it later. So every single zone and monster in the game was always relevant.

4. PVP Wasn’t Balanced, but That’s OK

Balancing PVP is hard. It’s even harder to do it without effectively making each class a reflection of the other. But it should be OK that certain builds will be your antithesis. Sure there were places where 1v1 or small PVP skirmishes happened, but the game was largely “balanced” around Guild.vs.Guild warfare. I think a lot of games have tried to recreate this kind of PVP, but honestly none of them have felt as good as the War of Emperium did in Ragnarok. Literally some of the most fun I’ve ever had in PVP gaming.

5. Guilds/Clans are Useful, and They’re Useful for All Types of Players

The guild system is Ragnarok was so great. Players could choose to donate some of the experience they gain while leveling (0-100% and could be changed at any time), and some of the money they earn from drops and vendor sales, to help level up the guild for extra perks. This means that even a dedicated “PVP” guild would want to recruit casual PVE members, and those members are actually contributing to the guild in a meaningful way even if they don’t directly participate in the PVP events.

So for the seeming majority of the player-base in D3 who like to say “Well I have no friends so group play isn’t for me,” that’s still fine. They could be recruited to a clan and never say a word in clan chat or participate in any group activities, but if they have a way to passively donate some of their resources to the greater whole they could still have a sense of belonging. And once you’re at max level, you can just turn on 100% experience donations since it’s just not useful for you anymore.

6. Rewards for Participating in World Events

Ragnarok had an “MVP” system where the player who dealt the most damage to a world boss would get bonus experience and an extra item. The extra item was never anything amazing, but that wasn’t the point.

While I think the idea of just rewarding one player is a little too narrow, I do like the idea of rewarding players for meeting certain conditions in a world encounter. What could be done instead is providing challenge conditions like beating the world boss within a certain time limit, beating it without causing a stagger, beating it while making sure a certain ability was always interrupted, etc. etc. If the players meet the condition, they get an additional loot drop either from the entire boss’s loot table or a fixed loot table. Hopefully challenges like this would deter players from just tagging the boss and AFKing, which I think is a concern for many players.

7. Hidden Quests and Entrances into New Areas

I know they’ve already mentioned a non-linear storyline for D4. But it would be even cooler if you could also just randomly find NPCs in a sub-basement of some decrepit shelter in the dark corner of an abandoned map that set you on a questline that would actually end up opening a whole new area. And most importantly, don’t tell the players that these things are in the game.

Don’t ever just show the players your game. Leave some of it to be discovered. People would lose their collective minds if they found out that there was an entire part of the game they never knew existed simply because no one had found out how to unlock it yet, and it’s those kinds of things that can make a game really memorable. I mean, once people know that these sort of easter eggs exist, there would be a huge shift in community paradigm and people would really start exploring every nook and cranny looking to see if they missed anything else. Furthermore, it helps the players feel like they’re in a living, breathing world rather than just base camp/sanctuaries surrounded by monsters. Perhaps dataminers make keeping secrets like this a little difficult, but I think it’s worth considering.

That’s about all I can think of right know. Even though Ragnarok was an MMO, I feel like a lot of these lessons and philosophies can be easily carried over into an ARPG.

3 Likes
42

It could be an interesting thing since we will have an open world for D4. Then why end-level places? One should be able to reach the whole game from the start (ofc, some things could be locked with quests). We should be able to get all the items and also get the key dungeons: ofc, enemies could be very hard but can try if you want.

Now, to do something like this there should be some changes to the items. Items shouldn’t give power in the way of scaling attack and defense. The items wouldn’t have levels and could be equiped at any level but at the same time there wouldn’t be items a lot more poweful than others (for example, a 1h sword could have between 100 and 300 damage but not much more). What would make the difference between the different items would be mostly the affixes.

The monster wouldn’t scale anymore but have their own power, and some would be a lot more powerful than others.

Level would have a meaning bcs would make the character more powerful: get extra stats (there shound’t be a huge difference between the start and the end) and extra skill points.

Nox (game) did it 20 years ago, so they coul do it for D4. Be able to move rocks and other objects, destroy walls, branches and other things to discover secret pasages.

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i don’t want the game to revolve around rushing through everything as fast as possible. i want the game to revolve around proper arpg elements. i want the game to have depth and replayability that doesn’t stem from monotonous, infinite incremental power. i want the game to feel like the first two games and not at all like the third. i want it to be its own evolution of the the first two games, something brand new with the deep customization and freedom of the first two in mind. give us diablo back, we’ve played enough wow.

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Right, level systems aren’t completely useless. They’re an effective vehicle for distributing static power increases like attributes, talent points, skills points, etc. But you should get to a point in the game where the most significant character progression is going to come from getting the right gear and enhancements, and progressing your character this way is what allows you to push into more and more difficult areas. There’s no real reason to lock any content behind character level.

2 Likes
45

I agree, that is the part in which i don’t fully agree with the video i linked above. But it is also true they could give those points in other ways, but at the same time i think leveling can also give a meaning to kill things.

Btw, if was something i make, what i would do is to level the atributes and not the character. For example, if kill with a melee weapon, you rise your str and dex instead of level the whole character. Hit with magic and your int increse. If apart from that want to spend points in an atribute, then they could add other ways to get points.

The idea would be to become stronger depending on what you use.

As an additional thing i would add the posiblility to unlock other classes skills with books. The books would have a very low chance of drop and would be bound to the character (not the account).

1 Like
46

Single/solo players are punished in D3.

Can we change this in D4 and make it even.

9 Likes
47

That needs to happen and i am a party player.

What i didn’t like of D3 vanilla was that the monster became too hard, which makes little sence, if there are more people, the monster should be easier to kill.

Now, there are other ways to balance it. I think the balance should be between killing speed and reward. A party can kill faster but should get less loot (the loot could be divided between them) and get less xp.

1 Like
48

This would be really controversial and quite possibly impossible to pull off but I’ve always imagined an ARPG-strategy-survival-single player MOBA hybrid game.

The ultimate goal would be to kill Diablo but you start out and you can go anywhere on the map instead of proceeding linearly through act 1 to act 2 to act 3 etc. There would be a bunch of optional side quests that have time limits on them and you have to complete them in time to receive a significant benefit that will ensure the survival of the town. You save the town, you might unlock mercenaries, or craftsmen, or women who can cook that you can recruit to help save/defend other towns and ultimately help in a massive battle like D3 act 3 first part but more epic, Helm’s deep epic. Towns would be periodically attacked by enemies once you completed the initial “save” quests. You don’t necessarily participate in those battles but the towns survival depends on how much help you provided and you can send some of the mercenaries there to help defend, nurses and cooks to heal and restore moral, to ensure the town doesn’t fall to the next attack so that you can continue with the benefits that town grants you.

The idea is that you have to save several towns and doing so is crucial to success in the main story line, but you can’t save all the towns.

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  1. Haunted/cursed dungeons as a special weekly challenge. Yes there are keys to unlock late game dungeons with affixes but consider this as a “this week’s mutation mission”
Some ideas might be one of these
  • Non elite melee monsters hit prevent your lifesteal and regen procs (not your potion) for X
  • Each X consecutive hit (say 2nd or 3rd) by the same monster does X% more damage, Elites not affected by this
  • Standing still for X (2 - 3) seconds summons a champion monster of a duelist type at your face (think of Phase beast from D3 kind of thing)
  • Each non-elite mob resses back after X seconds automatically (say could be between 20 and 30)
  • Each casting mob does X% increased damage based on distance
  • Each mob of type X in the dungeon has unlimited leash range
  • Elites have double spell cast and leash range
  • Ranged mobs have doubled vision, their projectiles pierce through non-terrain and have unlimited range
  • Each non-elite melee monster gains frenzy (increased movement and attack speed)
  • Your vision radius is reduced by 50%, but have X torches in your inventory to put at some places to grant you certain-area vision increased
  1. Alchemist as a class
Something like this

D4 class suggestion [Alchemist]

OR at least let us have back a Rogue/Assassin/DH kind of class to play with

  1. Skill Tree… Make every skill have it’s own mini tree, nothing too significant, just to make abilities have a “couple of branches” where players can commit to for each ability
Few examples

Whirlwind, one might prefer to gain movement speed and slash faster, other might just want to add a knockback instead of more damage or speed

Frostbolt, one might prefer having higher damage and slow, others might prefer the frostbolt pierce or reduce CDs of other abilities

Cataclysm (Druid ulti), one might prefer to summon more lightnings per cast, others might want to use the winds to lift up opponents in the air or something

Boulder (Druid ability), one might prefer having 2 charges of the ability or have higher width, other might just want to stun opponent’s hit by having the rock go over the monster/s affected during the pushing phase… Or maybe even some might prefer having 2 charges of the ability or have it knockback bigger distance/s

  1. Arena runs, (not necessarily PvP only even though that would be super cool like others noted above)
Have something like this

Defeat some monster/s each round to get next/specific challenge (or a subset of specific challenges). Each 3rd round vs Elites, each 5th round vs either multiple elites or a mini boss mbe

At the end of the run you can choose 1 of 2 choices for crafting materials and rune/s. The Arena requires a good/solid entrance fee though so people wouldn’t just spam these

Another cool feature might be like if you have a white weapon you could “forge it” in the arena, i.e. each round you get a specific reagent/socket that empowers it further

These wouldn’t necessarily be stronger than loot dropped from monsters, but these can be used to craft your own stuff by having each round selected something specific or simply increasing the weapon’s EXP

2 Likes
50

Nothing, keep it same as Diablo 2, besides being able able to gank better.

51

A functional game at launch, that would be nice.

3 Likes
52

In which ways do you want to gank better? :smiley:

53

Ganking in town, would be a welcomed addition.

54

I want “Error 74” because we took “Error 37” and doubled it!

2 Likes
55

I posted this type of thing a few days a go.

Even to the point that this type of Dungeon will never be seen in the same place by other people, say when a character is created a code number is linked to it " RND Code " so that you cannot just search for a post " I just found a map that no-one else has and this is where you find it "

But also with weather being a new thing maybe even take advantage of that for one of the hidden dungeons maybe cannot be found unless you are near it after a rain storm or you would never have seen the odd shaped foot prints.

Maybe it could be that a monster only feeds during a set of conditions like Moon Phase and again if you are not there at that time you can never find the entrance.

Wild Goose chase types where it starts as a rumor as you are leveling and you find-out more and more as you progress, so power leveled chars would never get all the hints and you have to get them all to unlock the opening. Give people a reason to search all of the zones.

1 Like
56

I’d like the Alchemist class!

As for “new” ideas I’d like something like this:
PlayerX is playing with his hardcore character “notEvenBlizzardSoon” but it dies.
PlayerX get the message “your character soul has been caught” meaning the character has been selected to be reborn as evil in a very rare randomly generated dedicated dungeon.

Later on PlayerY spots a very rare and special dungeon named “Tomb of a fallen hero”
PlayerY enter the dungeon and fight his way to the final chamber.
Upon entering the final room two things happens:

  • “notEvenBlizzardSoon” is spawned as evil;
  • PlayerX gets a message about his character being spawn;

What follow is a (death?)match against the now evil “notEvenBlizzardSoon”.

If the evil “notEvenBlizzardSoon” is defeated three things happen:

  • it drops one of the items of his gear with the title “of notEvenBlizzardSoon” (i.e. the grandfather of notEvenBlizzardSoon or even “common magic sword of uselessness of notEvenBlizzardSoon”, no guaranteed “good” drop);

  • PlayerX get a message about his previous character being respawn and defeated.

  • “notEvenBlizzardSoon” can now rest in peace forever.

If PlayerY is defeated three things happen:

  • PlayerY is sent back to the last waypoint (or dies if it was hardcore);
  • the dungeon close and"notEvenBlizzardSoon" goes back to Hell waiting to be resurrected once again.
  • PlayerX get a message about his previous character being respawn and victorius and still alive somewhere in Hell.

It’s going to be tricky to implement ( should the character spawned be the same class of the one who enters the dungeon (barbarian vs barbarian, etc) so to guarantee a useful drop? the drop should be bound on account? what about multiplayer? should it be a deathmatch from which you cannot flee?) and balance, but I think it could be fun.

3 Likes
57

An idea related to that:

What if when we kill one of the great demons (Duriel, for example, we know he will be in the game) it drops a soulstone, now a player pick the stone and use it. Now they turn into a stronger version of Duriel which would become a world boss. A message would be sent to warn all that a world boss is up and the fight will start in x amount of time.

If the player wins, they get a good reward, and ofc if the other players win they also get a reward.

I like this, a weekly activity could be nice. I could add to that weekly world bosses.

We could also have events in which big bosses gather armies and attack towns and stuff like that.

58

i want 2 1-handers beamweapons for my wizard called ChiNWO:

1st is for a perma-blinding light.
2nd is for a DOT-killler and it shows all on the map.

it looks like this:


59

A base-game with everything included. High replay-value, expansions included. Solo play that can unlock everything without microtransactions. Offline.

4 Likes
60
  • offline mode
  • mod support
  • level/ map editor
  • item editor
  • Bloodmage as Vitality class
  • Necromancer as Vitality class
  • Town Defense mode
2 Likes