So, I decided to try out a build idea on a new char. I wanted to not 1 shot things as I went so I could actually get a feel for the viability of the build as I leveled. Well, isn’t this the exact type of thing they made penitent for?
Level 1-15 was a serious grind (which I have no problem with). It felt good working at it to kill stuff. Having to actually dodge mechanics and pay attention to my CD’s was a nice change of pace. But it became clear by 20+ that they need to tune the scaling difficulty level up a bit. By 30 I was back to 1 shotting elites. Now at 44, doesn’t feel much different than hard or expert. The whole point of penitent was to actually have to play the game to level … not faceroll xp to max.
This makes me sad 
Maybe your just too good. 
I did the same thing, but when I was just easily killing everything I went to the next difficulty. Seems the highest I can go is T III, as long as I don’t get swarmed and keep moving…and attack from the Outside of mobs I’ll be all right…
Hell tide is a different story… but…lol yeah. I’ll just stay in T II.
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I honestly think Expert and Penitent are wasted difficulty levels.
Just go to Torment 1 from Hard.
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lol … idk about that. I can say I’m not ‘bad’.
It’s just sad that the “hard leveling mode” they made doesn’t scale well into later levels.
For max level … sure they are wasted. But they weren’t rly created for that. They were made for those that want a challenge while leveling.
I leveled on Expert from lvl10 or 11. I went to Penitent at 10. Felt like I needed to be a higer level so dropped to Expert.
Expert was not hard, what is was…was an excess of CC and attempts to kill you with Cheese like R Kelly or the Kamakzi bomber idiots while you cannot move. The whole process was a chore, AGAIN it was NOT harder just stupid. It was a “spam your heal button” simulator.
I am all for game mechanics and smarter enemies, this was not it. And Expert being that terrible made me forget about going back to penitent later…so maybe it is not that. I am playing a Melee Druid so this “remove player movement and cheese is not fun”
The reason I say they are wasted is I was hating this season…until I got to Torment which is supposed to be harder than both…this is why I think they are wasted levels.
If I am wrong about penitent and it is fun…apologies…but Expert is trash.
Yeah the mode is just “enemies do more damage and have more health”. It would be awesome if they scaled that back just a smidge and added the ‘smarter’ AI from higher torment difficulties to penitent. It would be easy for them to do and it could be a blast!
That’s the hard part for development. All the CC is there because most builds incorporate a decent amount of unstoppable into them. At early levels you just don’t have access to that stuff. So melee gets rolled hard until you get some. And they would have to develop a completely different scaling skill set for each mob based on your level. That’s an @$$ ton of work so they aren’t going to do that for a niche difficulty level. I wish they would … but it’s not going to happen
I mean … There is some slight objectiveness (I can’t believe that’s actually a word lol) to the word fun. But it’s mostly subjective. Don’t apologize for what you find fun or not 
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More apologzing that I did not go back and try it again and just assumed it was Expert extended edition…it is possible you experienced something different there.
I did not dislike Penitent on the PTR, but then you were level 50 there.
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Cool
Yeah you could have gone back at later levels with more skills and been fine. But it is just “Expert extended edition”, as you so eloquently put it. So, based on your previous comments, you weren’t likely to find it fun. And it doesn’t even feel all that ‘extended’ lol. That’s my whole gripe. At the very least it should be just that. But it really doesn’t feel like it. 1 shotting a mob with 1k hp feels the same as 1 shotting a mob with 100 hp. At best it could be scaled up mob dmg and hp with torment AI.
Worry not - you’ll hit similar combat sweet spots as you transition through torment levels.
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Yeah it’s the way Diablo has always worked. Things are hard, you get some gear, they get easier, you move up to the next difficulty, things are hard again. I have a different char doing T4 at that sweet spot right now. Just hard enough to be fun without being a slog.
I was hoping that the scaling content intended for penitent leveling would kind of hold instead of feeling like I can outgear it. Unfortunately that doesn’t seem to be the case.
I was thinking the same thing pre-launch but then it dawned on me - if the content continuously scales with you does that break the core ARPG gameplay loop?
I think they did a great job with the new DC content and Kurast Undercity. I’d love to see them add mechanics or costs to dying on the higher difficulty levels/torment levels that doesn’t involve added HP. For me, that’s what makes the most engaging content.
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Yes it does. You say that like they haven’t already done that. Every mob in every area scales to your level. The loop only starts to exist once you hit 60.
I would prefer they went back to the old way where the areas on the leveling difficulty(s) had their own mob levels and you could choose where to go based on your level and how hard you want the content to be. But they chose to scale mobs which completely brakes the ability to test your build while leveling.
And, honestly, I wish there wasn’t a point at which you hit cap to start the loop. The loops should exist throughout. Level cap should not be important. Like “Oh most builds fill out around ‘x’ level and should be usable in end-game.” Then they can just make end game modes after that don’t have a level restriction.
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