I don’t feel the same at all.
This tells me that the best items will be class-oriented drops, and this is a good thing. It potentially means I can get rewarded for playing my Druid at endgame and getting endgame Druid drops rather than playing my Druid at endgame and getting endgame Barbarian drops that I then have to tediously trade for endgame Druid drops.
It potentially means trading can be a bridge like it should be rather than something you must do in the endgame.
Okay, first off, there’s a heck of a lot more than “no open trade” that causes D3 to be a massive let down - story, itemization, leveling process, skill system, etc. Acting as if the trade thing is the sole cause makes you look shallow, not to mention incredibly selfish.
Secondly, if only “the best items” are bind on pickup, that isn’t like D3 at all.
And WoW was massively successful, so… meh?
Sarcasm aside, the accuracy of your statement varies depending on which era of WoW you’re talking about.
Ok, look. You started your post the right way speaking from an “I” perspective. Now you’re trying to speak for everyone, and you should stop it. Especially when you don’t bother to define what “Diablo 3.5” would be.
D2 veterans can answer this rather easily.
All you have to do is ask this question: Was there trades done that didn’t involve endgame items? If the answer is yes, then yes, trading can be useful and meaningful without endgame items.
This is going to be even more true if Blizzard expands the systems as I expect them to with things like factions, crafting, tradeskills, secondary advancement systems, and item enhancement methods. Then you’ll have much more to trade for than the items themselves.
So simply removing the absolute best items from the trade system is gutting it? Do you really believe that, or are you just being overly hyperbolic?
Botting is rampant, but use of botting for the purpose of 3rd party selling is not.
I hardly ever saw bots in original WoW, doesn’t mean they weren’t there. And since retail is still going, they probably figure there’s more profit to be made there than in classic.
Well, they better.
But the amount of effort they put into it will depend on what D4 can bring them financially, especially after release. That in turn means limiting 3rd party selling as much as possible… and that probably some reinterpretations of trading, since trading is the system 3rd parties are most easily able to exploit for profit.