DIV Improvements
QOL
- Bigger Stash/More Tabs
- Gem Tab
- Higher Resource limits
- Salvaging of items should be moved to the character to be able to do it in the field
- Horse Inventory
- Zoom out the mini-map so you can actually see where you are in the world for navigation.
SKILL SYSTEM
- Resources should be expanded to all classes to be able to be used
- Skills should be made to support those resources
- Less reliance on cooldowns and more geared towards resource costs
- Fix the resource generators/spender paradigm. Allow people to affect their resource pool easier.
- More options for each skill to branch out and be customized
- More levels for skills to be upgraded
- Continue to give a skill point for characters all the way to 100, and expand the skillboard to have more choices to grab.
PARAGON BOARD
- This really feels like a time-wasting system. Most of the time you are grabbing +5 to a stat nodes, and then you can grab a magic/glyph/legendary node every now and then.
- How about “building your own board(s)? You have to hunt for the board slots/nodes to install in them?
- Glyphs are way too monotonous to upgrade, and once they are upgraded, you are done. It is more of a chore you have to do, than something you want to do. Part of it is the majority of glyph levels do absolutely nothing. It would be far better if there were less levels, but far more impactful levels for them.
- There are far too few glyph options to choose from. What I mean is that once you have decided on your build, most of the glyphs are useless, and you only need to level the few that matter for your build. This is also a problem with the too limited choices for builds for each character.
DUNGEONS
- These need to be extremely expanded, in depth, breadth, randomness, a reason to explore them to the end. Unique Dungeon only events. Hidden rooms/treasure. Secret bosses.
- The unlock mechanics need to be expanded upon dramatically, or dropped entirely. Right now Dungeons are extremely repetitive and boring. Nightmare Dungeons do not change this up at all. Sure, they add a few minor effects to the mobs/dungeon, but the experience of running the dungeon remains the same.
- More “Butcher-like” experiences within dungeons are needed. And by that, I don’t mean extremely challenging fights that pop out of nowhere (those are good, but better used as a rare surprise, like the butcher is). Rather, I am referring to things that happen out of the norm that surprise you during a run.
- Dungeon affixes should not be the minimum roll all the time. It should be the minimum of what you have found currently. As well, every affix should have a dungeon for it. Maybe simply have multiple affixes per dungeon and you pick one upon completion? Trying to hunt for an affix on top of a better item as well just feels bad when you are trying to run a build.
- Leveling glyphs should be less directly tied to killing the dungeon boss. There should be bonuses for exploring the whole dungeon/killing all the mobs, so as to encourage this over just rushing the bosses.
Dungeons all feel the same. And I am going to lump Cellars in with these, as they have the same problems. These are instanced locations. Diablo is (was) known for being the game that had the maps randomized, to promote replayability. The dungeons were especially so, for the most part. Being instanced, these dungeons should have no problem being more randomized. In the size of each floor. In depth of floors. In corridor designs. In “traps” and other extras. In the mechanics/activities to “unlock” the next floors. As designed, the dungeons are repetitive slogs, and after you have experienced them once, you really don’t want to do them again, especially since the unlock mechanics are so unfun, and they are far too often repeated. And since dungeons are the #1 activity that everyone is going to do over and over, having them so repetitive is bad. What I would like to see is dungeons that are both more different from each other to begin with, and also get larger/deeper as the difficulty increases. And a significant increase in randomization within the dungeon layouts, and a huge increase in number of “unlocking” mechanics for progression and randomization differences so they aren’t so repetitive to run.
BOSSES
- Dungeon Bosses need to be expanded upon. From their rooms that you fight them in (more environmental effects are needed, like lava/quicksand/falling pillars/dropping pits/etc), but the environments themselves need to change from flat, featureless locked arenas. Having different actions that you need to take in order to combat the boss is a far better thing than facetanking it until it is dead, dodging every now and then. There is a reason why legion/fortification bosses or the story bosses are more desirable, and it is because many of these fights are somewhat unique or have neat effects to the fight itself. This can expand to the World Bosses as well as to a degree to the random bosses that spawn in the overworld as well. They are nothing but damage sponges with a few effects to watch out for and dodge. They are extremely boring to fight.
Bosses are not fun. This comes less from the designs of the bosses themselves, and more from the trappings around them (although some of the mechanics around them are just “meh”, and too repetitive). They are all in the same kind of small, enclosed arenas that you are trapped in. There are no real environmental concerns to watch out for, other than any skills the bosses themselves use. So every fight essentially revolves around dodging a couple of times, and then hitting as much as you can. There are no interesting challenges to overcome that make the boss fights memorable or even neat to play.
Bosses should have a pool of attacks that they can draw from randomly. For example, they have 10 total special attacks, and they choose 3 separate ones from that group that they can use anytime they are faced, making each fight more unique. As well, each difficulty, they can get more attacks to use, so maybe on Nightmare they get 5 attacks, and on the highest they have 7, making the fights harder to having more attacks that you have to watch out for. Bosses having unique (and most importantly) playable mechanics to work through is interesting as well. It breaks up the fight to make it more than just about Dodge, Dodge, Wack, Run for a while until charges regain, repeat. Having different things you have to attack before you can hurt the boss to any realistic degree (not making them immune, however!), like killing the ritual performers before you can attack the boss, but instead, maybe having the ritual performers adding to damage or defense, making killing them a bonus for the fight.
Bosses should have a health bar that is not so predictable. Getting them through each “phase” of their bar drops the health globes, and makes them slightly “angrier”, so to speak, moving faster, having a new attack, hitting harder, etc. The problem is these phases are always the same length, and are always the same every time you face any particular boss, so once you know the patterns, you have nothing more to “learn” or watch out for when facing them.
If you are not going to have randomized dungeons, every dungeon should have a unique boss and environmental area to fight them in, so that every fight feels different. There should be quicksand, lava, wind that pushes you and makes it harder to travel in certain directions, etc. anything to make the fight more interesting to run.
MOBS
- There need to be more types of mobs, as well as more “personality” to them. Right now, they feel very “samey” no matter the type.
- Less crowd control, or far more affixes that the elites have access to.
- The effects of their flashy attacks need to be less “arcadey” feeling, and more like it should be a part of the world.
- I would like to see more differentiation between mobs for strengths and weaknesses. Having some mobs strong/immune to Vulnerable/Critical/Overpower/etc. Would make fights more interesting, as well as punish those builds with an over-reliance on 1 type of damage.
EVENTS
- Events are far too repetitive. There needs to be more randomness to them, from the length of time they run, to the different waves of monsters that appear, to the placement of the “fixtures” in the events.
- Remove the giant chest that pops at the end and the popup in the middle of the screen.
Events honestly suck. They were interesting the first time you run into them, almost like mini-sidequests, however they are far too repetitive. Although there are different ones you can find, and the monsters that spawn for them are random, everything about them is too predictable. From the numbers of monsters, to the order that they spawn, to when elites arrive to the “boss” of the event, to the time the event runs, to the placement of all the “pieces” of the event, it is all the same. And to top it off, the giant chest that spawns from mid-air with a giant flash, it is just too much of an “arcadey” feeling mini-game. It would be nice if these had something “more” to their makeup, from randomization of the numbers of mobs to the placement of the parts of them, just to make them more different from each other, and make them feel neat to run into, beyond the way to gain obols. There also needs to be far more of them.
Mastery should also mean something. I would have another level that actually involves a challenge to do, to make the event “Mastery” actually mean something.|
QUESTS
- Quests should be looked at. Remove the “farming” quests from the quest list, or at least expand them to feel less of a slog or an MMO fetch quest feel.
- Quests should be moved to after the story finishes. The campaign is a “we have to hurry to stop Lilith before bad stuff happens” and in the middle we have little Timmy asking us to pause to look for his grandfather or Jennifer asking us to hang an amulet on a tree. It just feels wrong. Having the quests occur after the story makes sense with the ending, as well as giving players something to do at the end.
- There needs to be better rewards to quests beyond items and experience. Where are the Charsi quests to imbue items? Where are the quests that unlock skills and stat points? Maybe quests to unlock additional carrying capacity or stash slots? Quests that allow you to further customize a skill in some way (permanently reducing resource costs, or cooldown or somesuch?). This gives you a reason to hang on to your build in some way. Quests to unlock paragon boards? Or alter paragon board nodes? Quests to add an affix to items? There is so much you could do with the quests beyond what was done.
STORY
- I would like to be able to replay the story with the same character. It was well done, but having the option to start a new world tier and running through the story (at a harder difficulty) would be great).
ITEMS
- More Gem Options and more gem effects when slotted
- Gems being slotted into more items/more sockets for gear
- More item types allowed for every class to be able to use
- Yellow items should have a 3-5 affixes to spawn, legendaries maybe 4-6
- Seeing Charms back, but with their own Charm slot(s) (so you can’t run with an inventory full of them, but having a reduced amound, maybe 1 of each size or some such) would be nice
- More affixes would be nice
- Maybe having quests to be able to put a second aspect on an item?
- There definitely needs to be some sort of fix to the affix system. With so many granular affixes, items just feel monotonous to look through. I honestly think that most of the specific ones should be moved to the paragon board exclusively, and have items with more open-ended affixes.
- Items should have more differences between each other. Heavy vs. Light armor. Reach with weapons. Mobs that are strong vs. types of weapons.
- More abilities to upgrade/alter specific items
Exploration
- Lilith Shrines - Good idea, but having more different shrines to hunt for would be good as well. The issue is that there should have been far less shrines you “needed” to find larger rewards for each one, and then at random locations that they could spawn at. 20 would have been a far better number.
- Buff Shrines - fun but don’t last long enough, and the mob density isn’t high enough to make them feel fun. The Greed one is especially bad, in that the amount of gold you get is laughably small from the bonus.
- Other shrines - the “emote” shrines were interesting, and their bonuses do last for a decent time. Cursed shrines are very good, as they make the gameplay more interesting, especially if you need that health shrine, and instead it spawns a bunch of monsters instead…There should be other shrines to find that are more “temporary buffs that last for a playthrough” This is where the Elixirs should honestly have been dumped, as the Elixir mechanic itself is really lacking.
CLASSES
BARBARIAN
I am only speaking to the barb, as it is the only class I have played so far.
ARSENAL
Arsenal system should be opened up to allow any item that fits to go into the slot. Ie. Any Two-Handed Weapon can go in either Two-Handed slot. Allow people to carry 2 Two-Handed Swords, or Mauls or Pikes, or a Sword and an Axe. 1 Handers already allow this, why not Two-Handers. This could allow more interesting skill decisions, as some skills may require specific classes of weapons to use.
EXPERTISE
Expertise system needs to be expanded. Once it is maxed out at level 10 for each weapon, it is done, and there is no need to really touch it again. Having the option to further customize attacks via leveling up the weapons on use would be a great addition that allows for further non-experienced based leveling.
There is also the option to expand it to Bows/Staves/Scythes/Shields/Armor as well.
SKILLS
There needs to be far more done with skill options. Especially with skill choices that simply give a small percentage to damage/defense/life/resource. These skills feel wasteful, even if the game “requires” them for certain builds to feel viable.
Basic Skills really need something to make them more customizable for people to use. Right now the resource generator/spender system feels really bad. The skills people “want” to use are the spenders, but they “have” to use the generators in order to do it. And they are only able to do it in short bursts, before moving back to the generators which just feel bad to use, having no real utility, design, or damage. Their only function is to generate resource, and feel bad to do so.
I would be fine to see Shouts remain with cooldowns, as long as the other skills move more towards the resource management side of things.
How about a way to get both (or multiple if they get expanded) twig options to a skill? Maybe a special unlock? Or even item affixes that allow it? Or a paragon board slot that allows you to pick a skill for this to happen to?
Allow more skill options to be chosen for your hotkeys. Allow the option to have different attacks/abilities that you can use based on the situational need.
“Ultimate” abilities are currently bad. The cooldowns are so large, that they are relegated to being unused or charging for a majority of game time, only being used for a very short “burst damage” against bosses/elites. They feel real bad to have on your hotbar, as opposed to having a skill you can actively use more often.
Where is the option to let you have a wider targeting arc for Death Blow? Or how about upgrades to Whirlwind to allow you to hit farther enemies (or the aspect that lets you pull enemies to you?) How about a skill that lets you set a skill to retaliate for free upon a hit?
Replayability
There just isn’t enough. The game is full of different activities. But all the activities are the same as the activities you have already experienced as you leveled through the campaign. There just isn’t enough new or unique to work towards. For a simple comparison, I want to use Disgaea as an example. It is a turn-based strategy rpg. It has a “campaign”, a main story that you run through, and gameplay revolving around unlocking various aspects to grow your character(s), as well as item hunts, class unlocking, advancing your skills, leveling your items, and your characters. It has level scaling, so the monsters you face are always at your level, but the powers and abilities you gain end up putting you miles above the competition. The fun comes from “optimization” of your skills, items, group etc, as well as the constant unlocking and leveling of different things.
There is nothing of that in Diablo IV. For a deep endgame, Diablo IV needs far more things to do, beyond just hunting for the next minor upgrade. It needs more customization that you control, from transmogs to find, to items to upgrade through different activities, to customizing your skills and skill layout, to different, and deeper, socketing. Hopefully the game gets that over time, but right now, the game is extremely shallow, and very limited by the choices the devs made in their implementation. We are in the wading pool, and can see the deep end over there, but we aren’t allowed in. We can only make up our own “games” to play in the shallow end, to make it feel fun, but we really want to dive off the high board, or slide down the waterslide. I am hoping the devs remove the barriers for us to get over there.
There’s a start.
