Group experience bonus. Why?

PC General Discussion
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I just learned that there is a group experience bonus like there is in diablo 3. One reason I have been longing for Diablo 4 is that I heard that they regretted that in Diablo 3 because it undermines the solo experience.

Many people including myself want to play optimally but we don’t want to find a group with the right comp to farm with. There are many reasons for this.

First of all my friends don’t play diablo, so I have to spend time looking for a support barb and the other meta picks. Then we run two dungeons and someone has to leave so now we have to spend more time looking for a replacement and the cycle never ends.

So to counteract this we ideally want to find people to farm a minimum number of hours or runs in a specific dungeon/activity. This locks us in to run this dungeon/activity for a minimum number of hours even if we find what we were looking for. Or the circumstances change for some reason and we now want to do something else.

If I want to run 100 different dungeons and maybe some other activity it’s basically impossible to find a group that wants to do the same dungeons and in the same order as I want.

If I don’t play the meta build it’s harder to find a group. And the other way around. If I want supports in my group those builds are probably much higher in demand than they are in supply. Because few people enjoy playing as a support and everyone wants one or maybe even more in their group.

Even if my friends did play diablo we would have to agree to play X amount of hours this specific time, on this specific day to make it so we have a full group.

There are no communities or other good tools to find people with similar goals and interests in game.

A group needs to be very fast at salvaging gear and picking up loot because if one person is slower than the others he/she is holding the entire group back.

On top of this we need to take breaks at the same time to be efficient. I can’t go make tea, have a smoke, cuddle with my cat, be distracted by something or someone irl or go to the toilet whenever because then I’m holding my entire group back. Imagine if all 4 people constantly were taking mini breaks at different times, it just wouldnt work.

I as a solo player am simply much more versatile. I can decide what to do, when to do it, in what order, I can go take mini breaks when I want, I dont have to search for a group or replacements all the time and I can look at items however long I want.

Group play will most likely be easier and faster to clear hard content with anyways. So why punish us even more with this XP buff for group play? I beg you, please remove it.

EDIT: I’m adding this edit because some people seem to think I’m against multiplayer or the open world. I am very much in favor of this and I like playing with others. My problem is the experience buff because groups will most likely be atleast be 100% more efficent to level in a 4 man group even without a buff. Due to party buffs and debuffs on enemies. Plus the general scaling of monster hp and dmg in groups.

Also the argument that it’s selfish to want to get rid of the xp buff is very strange to me. Reverse the argument and ask yourself why is it not selfish to want to keep it, or even increase it? If it’s already double as effective to level in a 4 man group due to synergies, why do groups also need to gain even more xp? It just makes the gap between the two playstyles bigger than it needs to be. I enjoy doing both but even without the buff it’s way more effecient to play with a group.

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I really like group play, we are planning on running world tour dungeons to powerlevel with my friends at launch, the group bonus xp is neat.

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Here’s the thing… it doesn’t really matter whether there is group experience or not because most people that play solo do so for reasons that group experience bonuses will not affect.

The general idea of having a group experience bonus is to encourage cooperation, so there’s no scenario in which this will be detrimental to a multiplayer game. This is the first Diablo title that has a true open world environment which will promote a smoother experience playing cooperatively. Without the bonus, I likely wouldn’t even consider playing in a group as I just don’t like dealing with random people that may not match my speed of play.

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So because you don’t like it/Can’t use it; YOU are being punished?
Prosecution complex right here.

Ah, since YOU can’t use it, no one should have it. Because only YOU matter?

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I mean I don’t want to remove group play. I think it’s great that you can play together. It’s nixe to hear that you have plans with your friends. But with this buff it will be much more efficient to play in a group and for all the above reasons I dont want to be forced to do it because it’s better. Or feel like I’m getting behind because I’m playing solo.

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Then don’t. I’m playing solo unless I’m with the one other person in my friend group who bought the game.

THEN DON’T FEEL THAT WAY.
Again; I’m playing solo unless I’m with the one other person in my friend group who bought the game.

Just because I’m playing solo does not mean I’m being ‘punished’ or a party mechanic should be removed to make me happy.

So freaking selfish.

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Why are you so worried about efficiency? the game is not going anywhere. Why do you care so much about the xp while group up? it’s not race or something that will give you an edge vs other people.

Play the game at your own pace, don’t worry so much about a game man.

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You seem confused. You listed a bunch of reasons why playing as a group is incredibly inefficient, then act like a small experience buff will make group play more efficient.

If anything, that xp buff will help off-set a little bit of that inefficiency that comes with playing as a group. But it will likely still be more efficient to blast through the content by yourself without other people constantly holding up the show.

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As long as it doesn’t affect my solo experience then I don’t care too much. If they start hard enforcing group play every 2 seconds then I’ll be a bit more iffy about it.

But as long as it doesn’t affect my gameplay then it’s all the same what they have. I don’t care about min-max, I don’t care about peak efficiency and all that. Some players do, that’s their game. I’m playing my game.

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Yeah you get 10% more experience. You also get 5% more in the world whenever you are around anyone else and killing things.

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Playing in a group has always been and will always be more efficient even without a buff to it

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For extemely coordinated friends that actually setup a routine like the OP was talking about.

For an average party of friends just playing the game, it always slower playing in a group due to constant slow downs.

I’ve leveled characters in WoW with friends, it takes significantly longer than doing it solo.

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Diablo II had a /players command for offline mode, where you could up the difficulty without adding players. Maybe they could add that for solo play, but I could see it being an issue with monster scaling. Maybe it wouldn’t be a huge issue. I honestly don’t know enough to say one way or the other.

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An interesting part of this Feature

Is that in the world, if you happen to have people nearby, for anything you’re doing solo IE: Events , or whatever, you still get a proximity bonus :smiley:

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Pretty sure youll be able to group with anyone and do very well. No rigid group composition - im sure 4 sorcs or 4 of anything will slay.

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You’re high on copium my friend

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Dont think so - this isnt an old school MMO. I dont think we’re going to need a tank, dps, support, dps or whatever. Every class can dps, four sorcs would just annihilate everything faster. Theyd feel different than four barbs or a mixed group, but I dont think any particular group comp will be gimped. Why do you think otherwise?

I didnt play D3, but any group combo was fine in D2.

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“Undermines the solo experience”.

Music to my ears! I have no sympathy for solo players who cry for the exact same benefits as players who are willing to elevate the multiplayer experience.

You might as well be AI, your existance is nothing but a selfish attitude that looks to confine than to help and improve.

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Says the person whining that people grouping is unfair to them.

Oh! It’s so unfair that people can play while I am at work!
I formally request that Blizzard shut down the servers until I want to log in! Because people playing when I’m not get EXP I’m not getting!

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its in diablo 2 and was since launch. You get a bonus for more people in the game AND more in the same area in your party. not sure why you think this is new.

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