The following is a synthesized account of my experience from the Open Beta Weekend (March 24-27); it is important to note that I have not previously participated in other Diablo 4 testing weekends and this was my first hands-on experience.
Throughout the test, I made three characters. A Druid, a necromancer, and a Barbarian. I played the Barbarian the most, reaching level 24.
Character Creation and Personalized Customization
Character creation seems limited and poorly implemented, with few options to distinguish from the other players of the same class and gender. While I would not have expected there to be many options, the character creation feels superficial - as though it does not matter.
- The only feature that is often distinguished from the others in ARPGs is the face (when using the ‘hide helmet’ function); in which the player can proudly display their characters face. However, with four head options per gender per class, there is not much creativity that can exist.
- There are not even the most minimal body sliders for height or weight, preventing players from customizing their ideal representation of their characters.
The title system is interesting, offering a unique spin on the classily earned titles by combining a Prefix with a Suffix.
- It would have be nice to have seen more options available; perhaps by incorporating more unlocks through achievements and challenges (as they are currently unlocked).
- A system where you could freely choose to place Prefix and Suffix adjectives in any order would allow for more possible creativity (i.e. instead of having Prefix and Suffix words, just have a number of words that a player can combine to create a title; this could include articles like ‘the’, ‘a’, ‘an’, etc. to increase the possible unique combinations).
UI and Map
The Health and Resource gauges should have an option to display their numeric values, including secondary and tertiary values such as Barrier and Fortify.
- It is currently impossible to determine how much Barrier a player has left just by looking at the gauge; some effects give higher amounts of Barrier than others, meaning that the gauge is never a reliable visual indicator.
The Map is well designed and offers some unique features. The ‘pin’ function, in particular, is incredibly well thought out; in that the pinned marker removes itself once you reach your destination, meaning that you do not have to manually disable it.
The ‘Renown’ system is fantastic; honestly one of the most appealing features of Diablo 4. It provides:
- Account-wide unlocks, meaning that the time invested on one character can have meaningful impact on another - rather than having to start from scratch.
- Incentive to explore, both by offering plentiful side quests and cellars.
- Significant rewards for exploring, such as impressive amounts of Gold, Attribute points, and Stat boosts.
World Tiers and Difficulty
Since the test only allowed players to reach character level 25, there was no ability to reach World Tier 3 (requiring completion of the campaign and level 50).
- Throughout the playtesting experience, being an ARPG veteran, I found World Tier 2 to not be challenging enough.
- One of the factors that caused the lack of difficulty was the absurd quantity of Health Potions that would constantly drop from enemies and bosses. It would consistently be to the point where multiple extra Health Potions lay abandoned on the ground.
- The sheer amount of Health Potions, especially when dropped throughout the phases of a boss fight, made it so that characters were effectively unkillable and could face-tank anything that came at them.
Having more access to higher difficulties earlier on would be appreciated.
Area Level Scaling With Player Level
I had initially disliked this system, as it gave the impression that the player’s character was not growing stronger - which felt true in the earlier game. After level 10, however, the character’s strengths begin to define themselves.
One of the greatest benefits of the Area level scaling with the Player’s is that it means that any player can play with another no matter the level differences. This is something that I can appreciate, as it means that friends who have less time to play do not feel as though they are dragging their other friends down to their level.
The scaling Area level also makes the time between levels feel relatively similar, in that the player is consistently leveling up at a moderate rate.
Player Leveling - Skill Trees and Attribute Points
In the current version of Diablo 4, a player is required to assign Attribute points into the earlier skill tree nodes until they meet a threshold to unlock the next node, in a pattern as follows:
- Basic Node requires 2 points assigned to unlock Core Node.
- Core Node requires 6 points assigned to it or the Basic Node to unlock the Defensive Node.
- Defensive Node Requires 11 points assigned to it or any of the previous nodes to unlock the next node.
- The next Node requires 16 points assigned to it or any of the previous nodes to unlock the next node.
- The next Node requires 23 points assigned to it or any of the previous nodes to unlock the next node.
- The final Node requires 33 points assigned to any of the previous nodes to use it.
An issue with this system, especially in early game, is that it demands the player to assign points, even if they are uninterested in or are not needing to assign more.
To provide more player agency, this system should be changed in one of two ways, all while maintaining the same amount of attribute points:
- First, and arguably the easiest method, the attribute requirement could be changed to a level requirement, so that the player unlocks the Core Node at level 3, Defensive Node at level 12, the next at level 17, the next at level 24, and the final node at level 34. This method would ultimately allow players to properly invest in only the nodes they want to, enabling them to have better agency over the builds they create.
- Second, the attribute requirements would remain the same, but would account for the total number of points applied to the tree. For example, a player with 14 points applied to their skill tree, no matter where they were, could refund 3 points from earlier in the tree (lets say, Core Node), and reallocate them to another node (Defensive Node) without going lower than 11 points (the requirement to assign points to Defensive Node).
From each of the class skill trees, it appears that the active skills can have 5 points applied to them, and most passives can have 3. In the future, I would like to see the ability to apply more skill points into a single skill, similar to Diablo 1 and 2, where players could assign 15 points to a single skill.
- While I understand Diablo 4 is aiming for a different direction, I believe that having the ability to specialize into a certain skill would allow for more dedicated playstyles.
Itemization and Gear
Please add a loot filter. Beyond the first couple of levels common items have no value and become visual clutter.
- The loot filter does not even need to be complex, simply allow the filtering of rarities.
Default ‘Alt’ key is used to display item names on the ground, but this feature should also be extended to other environmental items such as Chests, Doors, etc.
Quest rewards are currently unsellable and cannot be salvaged; they should at least be salvageable for comparable salvage items.
When Upgrading an item, the player should be given the option of which stats they wish to increase, rather than only allowing a minimal upgrade of all stats across the item (i.e. on an item with Strength, Health, and Armour affixes, the player should be able to choose to assign +3 to Strength, rather than +1 to Strength, Health, and Armour).
Gems should have their own location in the Material Slot, and should therefore be automatically picked up when within range (similar to other Materials and Gold).
- Gems would then be socketed or upgraded from a Jeweler, rather that directly from the inventory.
Main Complaints
Outside of the expectedly poor server performance, towns and other areas populated by players caused major lag - something I expect will likely remain unresolved come the launch of the game. I am unsure if I agree with the ‘Online only’ model, in that it lends itself to more negative consequences than positive ones.
- Having access to private instances where a player could invite friends should be the default, with server ‘hubs’ available for those who want to participate in socialization and trade.
It was a shame not to even be able to peak at the Paragon Board. It is one of my most anticipated features of Diablo 4; a very big improvement from the simplicity of Diablo 3 and many other games that simply offer stat increases. Having the ability to effectively infinitely level a character pleases me very much; I look forward to spending many hundreds of hours playing in the future.
Despite having a strong focus on being ‘Massively Multiplayer’, there seems to be few actual interactions between the characters; few abilities exist across each of the classes that offer supportive engagement with other players.
- Outside of the Barbarian (ironically), no other class in the game has the capacity to heal other players.
- The Barbarian, Druid, and Necromancer seem to be the only other classes that can even remotely interact with other characters, offering superficial and arbitrary buffs.
With investment into World Events and World Bosses, I would expect more ways for a player to engage with those around them; that is not to suggest that there should be a dedicated support class (despite desperately wishing there would be), but there should be more care provided in order to avoid negative situations.
- With the main focus being damage, and only a minor focus in crowd-control, each character ultimately feels as though it is competing with the others for kills.
- If everyone is merely competing for kills, it is unlikely that party play (outside of the World Events and World Bosses) will exist.
- More supportive/utility abilities could provide better incentive for players to engage with one another.
TLDR;
- Character creation should be more in-depth, featuring, at the minimum, height and weight sliders.
- Title system is fantastic; more Adjectives and Articles should be added.
- Add an option that shows the numeric values of theHealth and Resource Gauges.
- Players should have access to higher World Tiers earlier; the game feels too easy.
- Health Potions spawn to frequently; trivializing the difficulty of bosses and large mobs.
- Skill Tree nodes should unlock based on Character level, not points invested (allowing the player to invest points into skills they actually care about).
- Skills should allow for more than 5 points to be assigned; passives should allow for more than 3 points to be assigned.
- Add a loot filter.
- Allow quest items to be Salvaged.
- Gems should be auto-looted and stored in the Material pouch.
- World should be privately instanced with invites to friends/other players to reduce the amount of lag in towns and other populated areas.
- Classes should have more support/utility skills that engage with other players.