Any game’s community is like 75-80% casuals and 20-25% hardcore players. All company aim for that 75% casual players for profit, and make game depth for the hardcores. Blizzard is a profit oriental company, and also aim at the casuals with each of his games. So they won’t make a hardcore, Darksouls like game like ever.
Those companies who decide to focus more on hardcore players like PoE and Darksouls/Elder ring, just won’t be able to grow, from their limited size/playerbase. It doesn’t mean that any of these games are bad.
D1 and D2 at their time were basically the only options in the genre. This is why all those ppl who got to like this genre played it. Now that we have more options, finally everyone can choose what they prefer in ARPG-s. This also means, we don’t have to force our preferences on all the ARPG-s coming out, as we can just choose to play those we like.
So about D4 balance issues on lvling and how hard the games feels. Unlocking class quest on all classes will definitely help. Also drop rate will be like 1/3 of what was in beta, so getting game changing items will be a lot less through lvling. It will make all classes feel less powerfull. World Tier choice had little meaning, as there was basically no difference between the two in difficulty. I hope they’ll separate difficulty lvls more, so everyone can choose a lvl they like. Both casual and hardcore.
Individual balance:
Sorc: Over all a good balance. The class has a few skills that are more powerful then the others, making them almost mandatory in any builds. Those need to be toned down, to the other skill’s lvl, so it’s not mandatory anymore.
Barb: Giving it a better base hp and armor/lvl bonus will solve all it’s tanky problems. As basically any of it’s skills works on additional hp etc, the base value won’t casue problems in balance.
Rogue: Over all i felt, it had the most balanced lvling. It’s traps were a bit underwhelming on their own, if i have to say something.
Druid: As the class is designed around big cd, costy, heavy hitter skills, these skills need to feel more impactful. Also most of it’s skill’s AoE effect area is just too small. Lastly, the spirit generation base skill options are poor. Storm Strike is just far better then any of the other options.
Necro: Starting with 4 meat shields on lvl 1 for free is just too much. Minions should be a build up thing. Even starting with only 1 would feel good and strong enough, but probaly halfing it and having 2 would be a good enough change. The other thing is is the same as Sorc. There are some mandatory skills, that should be toned down to the power of the other skills.
Conclusion. I would both nerf and buff at the same time. Scaling everythign down to druid as of now would be too hardcore, and game would loose a lot of ppl plaiyng it. Buffing everthing up to necro as of now, would do the same, but the other way around.
