Focus on making a fun game, not on holding players desperately hoping they buy your cosmetics. That’s very lame, Blizzard. Add a canonical ending to every season with a cool cinematic at the end and a conclusion of the seasonal story. Add more stuff that is cool/fun, not just busy-work.
The way to have people enjoy a game is not by introducing 1% drop rates and mat grinds. Have them actually focus on the gameplay, not only on what item they need to farm. Shift the focus to actually thinking about and exploring dungeons, not just farming them mindlessly. Tie way more rewards to leaderboards, etc. That’s way more interesting than infinitely grinding. Introduce more Uber Bosses, that are actually interesting, and not just oneshot grinds for giga rare loot. Also, why so stingy with earned cosmetics? Add achievements with cosmetic rewards to battle passes, that are not just point stages. I played season 3 until level 100 and a few sessions of farming, but there is no satisfactory ending. I really liked exploring and seeing all the areas/bosses. I’m not interested in s4, regardless of quality of life improvements, if the whole seasonal game is just about extreme rare item drops though.
Not since target farming and Duriel. And now with Sparks, it’s quite easy to get what you desire - just requires time and dedication sprinkled with a bit of luck.
It’s not really FOMO, at least I don’t think it is. When people are saying there’s extremely rare items it’s because they don’t actually play much. The relation of their time versus time to acquire.
Personally I think someone who barely plays shouldn’t be too concerned with whatever they aren’t getting. It’s not like they’re putting in any effort.
From my perspective there is no reasonable point I can reach after level 100, where I feel happy with the game. There is no goal, no finish line. Only rare drops to get bis gear, and then do this vault leaderboard thing. It’s not something that I think is fun in the slightest. I did enjoy diablo 4 though, until I came to that spot, but I wouldn’t repeat it.
The whole seasonal game for the players is about blasting to 100 asap and being the first to do the hardest content. For the developers the seasonal game is about beta testing new content that they may add to the core game in some form at some point in the future.
While I like some of the things that you are suggesting, the blasters will dislike anything that slows down their race and the devs need the testers to test future content. Changes will come eventually but, in most cases, it will be slow and methodical because that is how the seasonal dynamic works. Case in point: The changes coming May 14th will change the game drastically. It all seems like a huge and sudden change. But it has taken a year to get to this point. Maybe by the time the expansion releases in another 6-7 months, you will get something like what you are hoping for.
There’s no easy solution. Whenever there’s no time consuming content, people blow through everything so fast then complain that there’s nothing to do until the next batch of content hits. They can’t develop content as fast as players run through it. People get bored of content they’ve already gone through quickly.
This has been a problem in WoW forever, which seems to be better now that they have seasons and all those temporary events.
I’m not against the blasting and leaderboard content at all. I think that’s fine with me, and I’m happy that people can enjoy their statistical builds/experiments, but that’s not competing with my suggestion either way. I’m only against the monster grinds, and the focus on retention over the fun player experience.
Season 3 at level 100 feels like a pure grinding experience with no gameplay and nothing of interest to me sadly…
I made a decision not to chase any items in S3. I did in S2. I did Duriel both solo and group, just using the mats I happened upon. Never went out of my way to farm them specifically.
What I discovered is that the game is made for not having Ubers. They are nice, a power bump, and there to be had if you desire - but you don’t need them for any content. I’ve got 4 lv 100s in S3 (all but Rogue), and have cleared all content on each. I’m far happier in S3 as a player than S2 (despite S2 having better Season mechanics).
That’s kind of how these type of games work. Even everyone’s most lauded D2 and PoE. Once the main stories are finished there isn’t much to do besides run the same stuff over and over. They’re more self directed than your average non-Diablo style ARPG, you have to find the thing you want to do. Set your own goals. As it stands the seasonal content does have a storyline and a clear end to it but that’s just like the main story, to get your feet wet.
So in the above context, things are only as rare as you make them out to be. If you get bored and don’t self direct, which is fine of course, you can’t really be mad that you didn’t get Evernight or whatever it’s called. I don’t think it’s even possible to get into the vault where it drops until after the seasonal quest ends.
There has to be some balance between your expectations and the games reality. By 8 days after seasonal 3 launch lots of people had already gotten the best of the best and signed off until they got word of the gauntlet release. I’m not even talking about streamers either, just people playing because they wanted to get “that thing”.
Exactly this. I don’t put in the time to warrant even really seeing an Uber Unique myself and I have no issues with it what so ever. I don’t need these items and don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything because I don’t have an Uber unique.
Must be my old gamer mentality I don’t know, I just never feel bad if I don’t receive a winning lottery ticket during a season because I never personally spent enough time to get one. Plenty of items I’ve never gotten in various games I’ve played, if I worried about even a fraction of them I’d have ulcers and more grey hairs.
I still haven’t gotten an Uber but I haven’t put much time into getting one. I don’t enjoy the tedium of a boss ladder. Not just this one but any of them. I prefer the organic drop more than just saying “now I gotta do this over and over”. I think since the boss ladder game out I’ve fought Duriel 215 times(solo and party combined) so like a few hours of gameplay total invested into farming an Uber. Payoff was about what I expected.
Same. But to be fair, I’ve been on a Factorio and Enshrouded kick since like a week into S3 anyway.
Genuinely expanding on the story in each season, instead of whatever the forgettable quests are aiming to do currently, would be great for sure.
Dear lord no.
Yep, exactly what happens.
When you train people to expect that they should get X, they will complain when it does not happen instantly.
It is much better when you are not necessarily going to see any specific items during a season. BUT that also means those items should not be needed for making your build work. In general, the rarest items should not be the strongest items, they should just be different, something you might chase to create a unique build (but again not stronger build) than what you could otherwise.
In my opinion, gear should not really be the end goal of the season, that’s why I suggested that. I think the end goal should be something like an Uber Seasonal Boss that triggers a cut scene with credits. Just something flavourful, that makes me feel nice about having played a season.
Also, I’m not even interested in competing for leaderboards myself. I just think that making gearing faster, not less complex, will be better for the casuals and also better for the leaderboard people, who can then focus on competing against eachother instead of grinding constantly for uber uniques. Meanwhile the casual players, who need half the season to level, have a more reachable and enjoyable experience to gear up without this endless stagnation.
Either way, I think Blizzard should change their mindset. They should let or even encourage players to quit with a good feeling, and come back fueled up with joy every season about experiencing it again.
Completely agree. I’ve also maybe killed Duriel 200 times since he was introduced in S2? Probably less? I don’t keep track, but I did get one Uber Unique, the Starless ring, which I didn’t realize it was an Uber Unique at the time, I wasn’t planning on using it on the Rogue build I had, so it was worthless to me regardless.
I’ll join friends when they go, or invite people when I have enough mats, but I’m going for 925’s and specific uniques, not uber uniques. Once I have what I want, I pretty much stop going. More power to people that like grinding him out, I just don’t have the time for that, not to mention I’ve done this song and dance for years in other video games for even worse drop rates lol.
@RobotNinja - That is copyright infringement, you will be hearing from my lawyer, soon as I reanimate him from the graveyard.
I would rather make gearing slower, but also less impactful. So it simply doesn’t matter that much for your progress if you don’t do the extreme grind to find the rarest items.
So many of Diablo 4s (and 3s) problems imo, comes down the the insane scaling, where you deal 10, 100, 1000 times more dmg, if you grind some more items.
There should be a substantial gear progression of course, but it doesn’t have to be completely absurd.
This I definitely agree with.
Crazy gear farming should feel like something you can do if you want to. For most players, the game (and seasons) should have well-defined journeys and end points. And an cut scene would certainly be a fine reward at the end of it.
I imagine the season journey was thought of as such a thing, but seeing a checklist get filled, as much as it tickles my personal Spreadsheet fetish, is not as interesting as seeing a story unfold, and a boss fight + cutscene at the end.
That’s more up to the players rather then Blizzard though. I leave a season with a good feeling. I complete the tasks I set out to complete, I have my fun, then I enjoy a nice break as I wait for the next season to come out. My goal definitely isn’t item oriented though, seems like a rather fruitless endeavor in this game when there’s almost always an upgrade to find with all the RNG involved on items (even with the new patch coming).
Granted if your goal is to have the best items in the game and you’re willing to grind for them more power to you, but I just don’t play that way or have that mindset. I also don’t think Blizzards intention was to lead players to the ultimate items in the game for a goal to actually accomplish on the seasonal realm. They offer multiple options and various objectives to complete of course, but it’s up to us to decide what our goal will be and when we want to stop.
