Either Bashiok lost some sort of office Superbowl bet and was assigned impossible forum missions, or he’s been reading Dom Quixote and felt like tilting at windmills, since he’s taken on his second lost cause of the day. This time he’s written a small essay in defense of…. Blizzard’s notorious fetish for super-sized shoulder pads! (What’s next on his agenda, a post about how the Necromancer always sucked and the WD was a mercy killing?)

	Blizzard Quote:
	Re: shoulder armor I’ve seen people mentioning it here and there, wondering why a “light” fighter like a monk would have heavy gear or why it’s just so darn pointy. Essentially it’s a two part answer. 1. Your character should look bad ass toward the end of the game, and that’s what that armor is a concept of; a set later in the game. The concept within the artwork gallery is a lighter armor look. 2. The shoulders may look big in a concept like that, but (and I feel like it’s been two weeks of hearing a broken record about this but…) from the distance the game camera is at they’re going to look downright awesome [see part 1]. So the issue is really just an understanding of how we design characters to be seen from an angle that the concepts just don’t do. Now, maybe the smart thing is not to show concepts like that unless we have screenshots to go with it, but I also don’t know if holding off on releasing this stuff until we have the armor sets done in game is what people want either. Addressing maybe the most core issue is the weight of the armor and that’s simply a fact of wanting each stage in armor progression to feel like… progression. There’s only so much you can do to make robes look progressively more powerful, and especially from the game’s camera angle. But make no mistake, a monk’s “heavy” armor is going to look nowhere near as heavy as something like a barbarian’s heavy armor. We’re very aware of the look of each character, their style, how they fight, what their spells and feeling of the character mean, and go to great lengths to make sure that each class doesn’t just look like they’re wearing plate mail at the end of the game. Any realism concerns of “he’d impale himself on his belt!” or “she’d slice her ears off!” is a case of realism being shifted for the sake of fantasy. Which is what this game is based in. Also it looks cool.

So, there you have it. Since the shoulder pads in Diablo 2 weren’t inspired by the Kentucky Derby’s hats, fans have been somewhat taken aback by the giant size of them in some of the Diablo 3 concept art. And they are undeniably huge—but now that you’ve read Bashiok’s explanation, what do you think? Are they silly, or cool, or just necessary to show off your character’s improving armor?

On a related issue, did anyone feel that the armor changes/upgrades in Diablo 2 weren’t visual enough, and if so, would bigger shoulders pads would have made the crucial difference there?

Blizzard has released a preview of Battle.net 2.0 on the official StarCraft II site.

Blizzard has released a preview of Battle.net 2.0 on the official StarCraft II site.

	Blizzard Quote:
	Battle.net is about to undergo the greatest update in its long and storied history as one of the world’s most successful online gaming services.

The new page consists of an overview of the new Battle.net system.  We are given details regarding the three main pillars of the new multiplayer infrastructure:

Always being connected: Having a persistent character linked to your account online and in the campaign.  Showing off the portraits and decals you’ve unlocked through achievements.

A competetive arena for everyone: So that even beginner plays can have a level of competetion suitable for their skill level.

Connecting the Blizzard community: Being able to communicate with fellow gamers fluently and easily.  Including cross-game chat, in-game text chat, and voice chat.

We also get 8 new screenshots and a video interview with Greg Canessa, project director of Battle.net 2.0.  Hit the jump to see all the new screenshots showcasing the Battle.net 2.0 interface.

A fan asked whether the weapon switch hotkey is still not included in Diablo 3, and disapprovingly referenced Jay Wilson’s past remarks (archived on the wiki page) that it was removed from D3 since it was too complicated for noobs. Bashiok confirmed that yes, it’s still out, and explained why. I’ve added an illustration to editorialize my reaction to his comments.

	Blizzard Quote:
	At the moment it is. The confusion it creates for players is a good point really in my opinion. From my time in tech support it was a common enough issue that we had pre-written responses to send to people to help inform them of where their weapons went. BUT that said it’s not a problem that’s completely without a solution, so while it’s a decent argument it’s sort of weak because it could probably be addressed somehow. One good reason why it’s not a feature we like the idea of is that it adds a new type of play complexity that we don’t want to layer on top of those that we already have. We’re creating the game, the skills, the movement speed, kill rates, skill runes, and all other combat related mechanics and features to fit as tightly together as possible. Throwing in weapon swapping forces that tightening/balancing to take it into account. Only thing is that it’s not a clear cut feature. You either know how to game it - or you don’t. So it creates a separation of players that isn’t based on use of the character and skills but doing this weird little trick and swapping back and forth between weapons at specific times. It becomes a necessity to remain effective or as a strong opponent, and we believe the combat has enough going for it that it doesn’t need difficult to explain and understand features like weapon swapping. I know this is probably the wrong audience to try to make that argument to, because most of you are on the winning end. But trust us that there will be plenty of separation between you and the noobs to show how awesome you are without weapon swapping. You also have the issues of it just being used for storage, which feels super cheesy. Or as a means to game MF by swapping in weapons to get 0mgz uber dropz. Weapon swap will be there with or without a magic button. People will just get good at doing it manually. And then there will be a rift between those who can swap out fast manually, and those who don’t swap out fast enough, and those who don’t swap out at all. Bashiok: If that appears to be an advantageous way to play the game then we’ll break the ability to do so.

I’d rant about this decision, and Bashiok’s final kick in the balls of, “If people figure out a way to skillfully use the controls, we’ll nerf that too.” (and ban players who use the inevitable “weapon switch hack”) but um…. been there, done that. I’ll just state that I think it’s a foolish decision to remove such a useful feature largely because some players couldn’t figure out the game controls. I’m sure that plenty of D3 players will never quite comprehend skill runes, or crafting recipes, or item upgrades, or other stuff we’re going to see in Diablo 3, and I certainly hope those remain in the game!

Lastly, I’d like to point out the irony of Diablo 3 finally not taking influence from WoW (full equipment switching is enabled in that game)... and it’s on this!

Last time we went to the center lobby of The Dark Library for some poetry. This time around with the delays due to our gallery wing collapsing we had to wait a week. Sorry about that. Go grab a torch and follow us. Please watch your step as we pass by there on the way to the very dark and not so well kept wing that contains books on long forgotten cultures, people, and creatures. Here’s our first book. Hold the light up for me I can barely read what the book is. The cover says “The Black Hand Magi”. Here I’ll read the beginning paragraph. Black Hand Magi - the members of the Black Hand order. Information about them among common people is only rumors. The church of Zakarum and the Vizjerean mages know about them and they both claim their order and their methods as completely forbidden. They don't like even talking about them. But they have a detailed description of the Black Hand Order in their secret books. Pretty interesting I must say. Let’s find another book here. Ah here we go a book on long lost creatures. The first chapter is on the Brutal Beast. Here have a look as I read. These creatures roam the planes of hell, consuming smaller demons and various minor monsters. Greater demons, like Diablo, will poke out their eyes and place spikes in their tails and tongues. This causes the beasts to be in constant pain but enables the greater demons to control them. Brual Beasts are immune to illusions since they rely on smell and hearing. Small pterodactyl-like imps called Harrier Imps live in symbiosis with these great monsters. Let’s get out of here for now and come back again in the future when we get some more books in. I’ll show you the second chapter of this book on Harrier Imp’s later as well. Don’t forget to put out your torches when you leave the wing. Next week we will bring you more from the fan fiction community in the same conveniently posted bitesize format as well as some works from fan monster creators. If you have made fan fiction that has not yet been posted in the Diablo fan fiction forum, or just got inspired to do so, head over there and post your material, or ask questions to other fan writers regarding lore, writing style or other input. See you next week!

Giving us a break from the non-stop FeMonk coverage, on Monday Bashiok answered some forum questions on other matters.

In reply to a fan who asked if we might see some Paladins and Necromancers in Diablo 3, Bashiok all but confirmed something that’s been more than hinted at in the past.

	Blizzard Quote:
	The Knights of Westmarch and cult of Rathma still exist, so the chances of coming across a paladin and/or necromancer through your travels are pretty good.

I was just joking in the intro to this post—of course there’s more FeMonk discussion! In reply to various comments and complaints about how the character looks, especially in her animation on the official site, Bashiok made a common sense rebuttal.

	Blizzard Quote:
	We decided that it wasn’t worth holding up the update to fix the artifacting on her hand. Essentially it’s just that the green screen process used isn’t quite sharp enough to keep details like her dainty fingers. Probably something we’ll correct but it’s not going to stop the show. OR! You can explain it away by saying that she’s actually punching so fast it looks like she’s mostly standing still, but her fingers have broken the time barrier and exist in multiple dimensions. Regarding clipping: the geometry and animation isn’t final so there’s bound to be some clipping. It would take time cleaning something up for a web capture to then throw away the clean up and keep working on it. So yeah, little things we just have to live with. You too. Aside from that as was said some amount of clipping is fine, because having an animation that looks good from the camera distance is more important than a clipping artifact you won’t even see.

Bashiok also confirmed that they were planning to include the M/F selector on the other character pages (as they did on the Monk page) to allow us to see the resting animation for all the characters. So there’s something to look forward to.

Finally, Bashiok leapt into a long and rambling thread about everyone’s favorite joke from Blizzcon 2009, i.e. “Isn’t a female monk called a nun?” with some semi-philosophical musings about why aliens always look basically humanoid in every movie, and how things in fiction need to be different, but not so different that we can’t still identify with them. Click through to read those quotes, cause they’re long and not exactly game-related.

As promised the official unveiling, (somewhat dampened by the unofficial unveiling a few days ago), of the female monk has gone live on Blizzard’s Diablo 3 site tonight.  There is the caeser-esk concept art on the monk page we revealed in our collage news item from Sunday but of course it’s much better quality.  What is new however is the cool animation of her at the top of the page.

The female monk has received mixed reviews since the snapshots taken from the Jace Hall show first appeared, the massive pauldrons and the peroxide blonde hair being two minor gripes but now that you have seen her in a her full regalia in a high definition full body shot what do you think?  Does she epitomize Sanctuary’s martial arts warrior?

• Official Monk Page
• Monk at DiabloWiki.Net
• Monk Gallery
• Monk Forum

Update: A second, more action-y piece of female monk concept art was added to the official site. Click it for a much larger view.

 

Thanks to the reveal of the female monk, we’ve got a nice new Diablo 3 wallpaper. It’s by HolyKnight3000 of course, and features the FeMonk in his patented fiery runes, where so many of the Diablo 3 characters have gone before. He’s done a very nice job cleaning up the image; even at the large size it looks okay, and that’s no small feat given the limitations of the source image. More cool wallpapers will follow when/if Blizzard releases some HQ concept art, but we can certainly enjoy this one for now..

Click through to get the full size image, in various dimensions to fit your particular screen.

With the revealing of the female monk i used screen caps to build her up and compile. I saw the one on the site and thought it looked a little smashed.

This one looks a little off still but i think it was best suited for the fiery runes series. I will make a better version when the artwork is officially thrown on the website.

You should also notice the fiery runes. Its the dim runes as a runecircle. I’ve been meaning to do this lately and they look so different from the old runes. But they don’t overwhelm the image from the target that the wallpaper is about.

See Leord, Elly and Rushster Die. Literally.

I had the pleasure to play some Global Agenda beta together with Elly, Rushster and Maticus (who actually lurks around here but she mostly does MMO news for our parent site, IncGamers.com). We thought it would be fun to record some of these gun-slinging adventures, and discuss the gameplay. After long time of playing, and putting together the video, and giving it a voice-over; this is the result.

Well worth a look, if nothing else then to see myself, Elly, Rushster and Maticus die repeatedly (sorry, no Flux here), and/or to hear how me and Maticus sound IRL! What are you waiting for, check it out here:

• Global Agenda Co-op Video

Since we’re now all FeMonk, all the time, here are couple of more useful images. We just created a new D3 Team folder in the image gallery, and besides a bunch of photos of the various key individuals on the D3 Team, it’s got quite a few high quality images of the team and their giant conference table, as seen on the Jace Hall Show. Thanks to MD for all of the screencaps.

One of those shots featured a better look at her heavy armor look, so I cut it out and posted it separately. It can be seen below on the left; click it for the full size. Not only is the armor worthy of study (comically high shoulder pads and all) but check out her half-profile view. The different angle shows off her hair to nice effect, and I like her face a lot in this one. The expression gives her a thoughtful, contemplative look that’s more in keeping with the Male monk’s expressions and lore.

Elsewhere, Inkarnus put together a nice collage of images that explore various aspects of the Female Monk’s look, features, and personality. Click it on the right for a much larger view.

 

Everyone’s got an opinion on the newly-revealed Female Monk, but not everyone used Photoshop and modified their original artwork to make their point. I don’t much agree with it,but it’s worth debating. Here’s the quote from Sentioch.

If you want a battle hardened warrior feel, you usually go with the male class.

If you want a sexy looking body, you go with the female class.

But the female monk is really not sexy in any way…it really defeats the purpose of having a female version at all. Most guys who want to play women (which compromise the majority of the people that would play her) really just want to look at a hot avatar.

Most girls who want to play her…will also want their avatar to be hot. Nobody wants to play a butch girl.

Bashiok tried to dismiss this with sarcasm, saying only, “Nice story bro.” but I think there’s more to say than that. Personally, I’m not sold on Blizzard’s view; this coed blonde beauty is a battle-hardened warrior? But Sentioch’s changes make her look like one of those pretty, pouting, fashion model characters from Guild Wars. Furthermore, his description of why people pick their characters seems absurdly simplistic. Does everyone pick their game avatar for hotness? That might have some validity in a game with a trailing-camera-FPS style view, but Diablo 3 is isometric, and the characters are always in heavy armor and helmets anyway!

Other arguments, pro or con, are welcomed in the comments.