Anyone figured how monsters scale in multiplayer?

[galzohar]

Was wondering that, since in Diablo 2 the scaling was pretty bad. With 8 players you would have 8 times the HP and 8 times the damage on your side, plus any team-bonuses like auras, shouts and debuffs, but the monsters only got a few times the HP and a rather measly boost to their damage.

Now *maybe* in normal difficulty a full game shouldn't give monsters both 4X HP and 4X damage, but in higher difficulties (especially inferno) I'd definitely like to see it like that. That way you'll have to actually play together to make a 4-player-game beneficial over playing alone. If you play with a bunch of noobs that run off and do their own thing, you *should* have a hard time! Again, at least in the higher difficulties...

So, anyone knows how it currently works in the beta?

[HARD]

i heard that there was no scaling in d3. playing in groups just allows you to clean up faster.

[HardRock]

i heard that there was no scaling in d3. playing in groups just allows you to clean up faster.

Not true. According to Bashiok, monsters will scale (at least in HP), but only so much, that playing with more people will still result in faster area clears.

[galzohar]

So basically it is official that more players = much easier? :(

I really wish at least the higher difficulties will force you to not just bring a group, but to bring a good one where players complement eachother, or else you should be better off to go alone. That is, it should be good group > solo > bad group > terrible group, and not good group > bad group > solo > terrible group. Wishful thinking?

[HardRock]

So basically it is official that more players = much easier? :(

I really wish at least the higher difficulties will force you to not just bring a group, but to bring a good one where players complement eachother, or else you should be better off to go alone. That is, it should be good group > solo > bad group > terrible group, and not good group > bad group > solo > terrible group. Wishful thinking?

Given that they really want to encourage group play, I think the answer is yes. Do note however, that we don't know exactly how much faster we we will be able to kill monsters in a group, compared to solo, only that it will be faster with a good group. There's a lot of variables involved (item drops and a group's willingness to share them being two major ones) in deciding if playing with a specific group will worth your time or not.

[galzohar]

Well I'm mostly talking about the time when you reach that part of the game where it's not so much about how fast you clear it, and more about whether you clear it at all. I really hope we end up actually getting there rather than mindlessly farming easy content over and over. Long-term challenge is one of the biggest improvements I was hoping to be in Diablo 3. And I don't mean challenge caused by self-imposed restrictions, but actual inherent in-game challenge.

[Steven Catogen]

Only thing about that: Most groups suck. So if only good groups are better than soloing, then people will just solo, as the odds are against them otherwise.

[galzohar]

Well, if people suck as bad as their group, then they might be better off in a group. Besides, people who actually play in inferno should be expected to not suck (and if they do they should die repeatedly), so at least scaling in inferno should be appropriate to provide proper challenge.

Think about it - 4 players have 4 times the damage and 4 times the HP. In D2 at least, mobs didn't get anywhere nearly as much (they had quite a lot less than 4 times the HP and a lot lot less than 4 times the damage). And that is without any teamwork whatsoever, just by fighting side by side. Once you start using team-oriented abilities or even use the fact that some classes/builds can tank damage than others while others can deal damage better, you get even better than just "4X damage and 4X HP for your party", giving the group an advantage even if monsters scale the full 4X damage and 4X HP as well.

So again, maybe not in normal difficulty, but definitely something I'd like to see in inferno.

[HARD]

Not true. According to Bashiok, monsters will scale (at least in HP), but only so much, that playing with more people will still result in faster area clears.

Well atleast your certain. Im not, i dont trust Bashiok

[Steven Catogen]

Well, if people suck as bad as their group, then they might be better off in a group. Besides, people who actually play in inferno should be expected to not suck (and if they do they should die repeatedly), so at least scaling in inferno should be appropriate to provide proper challenge.

At which point it becomes only bad players need groups... which reflects poorly upon groups.


Think about it - 4 players have 4 times the damage and 4 times the HP. In D2 at least, mobs didn't get anywhere nearly as much (they had quite a lot less than 4 times the HP and a lot lot less than 4 times the damage). And that is without any teamwork whatsoever, just by fighting side by side. Once you start using team-oriented abilities or even use the fact that some classes/builds can tank damage than others while others can deal damage better, you get even better than just "4X damage and 4X HP for your party", giving the group an advantage even if monsters scale the full 4X damage and 4X HP as well.

D3 doesn't have nearly as many force multipliers as D2. Flux even called this out as a bad thing, even though it's actually the opposite. With that said 4x damage would just mean a lot of random OHKOs, and aside from that... Getting a group together takes time. Soloing does not take time to organize. You just go. If the two progress at the same speed, then the one with no prep time always wins, which means everyone solos.

[Godzillaz]

I remember hearing that going off and trying to solo content yourself in a 4-player game wouldn't be feasible at all, so the encounters must scale to some extent. It would really be a shame if this game ended up being a complete cake-walk for groups.

[galzohar]

At which point it becomes only bad players need groups... which reflects poorly upon groups.

No, it means only bad players will be willing to go in a bad group to clear faster, and good players will prefer to solo than joining bad groups. If stuff don't scale enough, then even good players would be better off joining bad groups, but we all know joining bad groups is less fun than soloing, so it's a bad design decision if it ends up like that.



D3 doesn't have nearly as many force multipliers as D2. Flux even called this out as a bad thing, even though it's actually the opposite. With that said 4x damage would just mean a lot of random OHKOs, and aside from that... Getting a group together takes time. Soloing does not take time to organize. You just go. If the two progress at the same speed, then the one with no prep time always wins, which means everyone solos.
First, they said D3 will not have OHKOs - They're making it so healing is much harder, and thus monsters don't have to deal so much damage to be balanced. If they keep it that way and balance it correctly, they can get 4X damage 4X HP scaling and still have everything work just great, and good team-playing-groups will have an advantage over solo players, while groups of randoms will not.

I think it's perfectly fine and even preferable that groups of randoms will not have advantages over solid solo players - At least not while playing the high difficulties. In the high difficulties for a group to have advantage over the solo player it should be required to actually have the group organized and play together well. If playing like 4 solo players running around in the same game will be preferable than just 1 solo player playing alone it will dumb down the game too much IMO.

Again I'm not saying groups should not have advantage over solo - They should, and they will, even with 4X damage 4X HP scaling, as long as they play as a team, and as long as the game is balanced properly with no OHKOs.