The wizards familiar...

[Arbedark]

I hope it'll be a pet cub or so and that it'll grow with you as you level up.


NO I don't mean upgraded!

Familiar is a level 26 skill...bit pointless that when you're starting Act 4 and assaulting the Demons of Hell to have a baby animal help out...

[TheMythe]

Familiar is a level 26 skill...bit pointless that when you're starting Act 4 and assaulting the Demons of Hell to have a baby animal help out...

That solely depends on what that baby animal can do already, doesn't it...

I don't mind having a dragon whelp along

[Your Average WoW Player]

I think the familiar will be the rainbow of doom crapping unicorn.

In all seriousness, I think I'd like a little elemental type guy that's some damage type default (like, oh I dunno, Arcane) with runes that can change it to being ice, fire or whatever else we get.

[TheMythe]

I think the familiar will be the rainbow of doom crapping unicorn.

In all seriousness, I think I'd like a little elemental type guy that's some damage type default (like, oh I dunno, Arcane) with runes that can change it to being ice, fire or whatever else we get.

Sounds like a nice idea. An elemental which changes color/stats depending on what rune you put on it.

[Smash]

1) Alright, if I missed your "point" of talking about core spells, you say that the D3 development team is uninnovative and resorts to "copy/paste" from D&D for their skills. This just doesn't make any sense to me. D&D is a pen&paper rpg and also the universe used by dozens of fantasy games as basis for their own adaptions of it. There are 0 visuals for skills, especially concerning the example you referred to...the "familiar" is not even an invention of D&D, it's a part of european medieval history. Plus you don't know anything about the skill design yet, apart from attacking the player's enemies. Seems pretty farfetched to call it a copy if there's nothing known about it, yet .... o_0
Ofcourse DnD didn't invent familiars and other things, you can say this about everything but try to avoid Warhammer fanboys, their skull is to tough to understand this.
Problem is that Blizzard is even copy from itself and that is getting little boring for example did they really need bring back soreceress's meteor, blizzard for wizard, couldn't hey made him more refreshing?
2) How did D2 items ever alter the function and visuals of skills? And if there are any at all, how many of those items were there? Comparing this to D3's rune system is ridiculous.
They didn't, they altered stats as i wrote plus they were adding some alternative effects like knockback.
3) WoW's talents improve skills. They almost never change their function and if so, to a minimal extend. And after 5 years of WoW I can't think of any talent that ever changed a skill's visuals.
Both WoW's talents and glyps improve/altering skills but not as much as Diablo 3 will do, it has more to do with community balance whine and Blizzard fear, still you can look at WoW as testing ground for what you will have now in Diablo 3.
4) You've got a point concerning the resource reduction rune that many skills will most probably have. Let's say, 70% of the skills have one resource reduction rune and a pure +dmg/+number/+aoe rune. Out of the 4 examples we already know this seems to be a pretty good estimate. This still leaves ~500+ rune effects changing visuals and function. Try to copy/paste those somewhere o_0...

I do not know how did you calculate this number, We will see how it work and if it will be in final version i do not want to be pessimistic but i was with SC2 since first announce and before final version hit shelves they removed or dumb down nearly all skills and units they showed, i felt really cheated.

[konfeta]

or dumb down nearly all skills and units they showed, i felt really cheated.

They were removed because playtasting demonstrated them to be unfeasible in a competitive RTS. Could they have somehow balanced them and retained as they were originally? Perhaps, but Diablo 3 isn't going to have that problem as it doesn't need to sacrifice quirky abilities/monsters for sake of esport balnace.

[Arbedark]

That solely depends on what that baby animal can do already, doesn't it...

I don't mind having a dragon whelp along

Dragons are SO DnD. The Diablo universe has very few true "monsters" such as Dragons etc. And most of them are twisted by Demonic influences.

[Sass]

Actually, the only one single dragon is completely unknown to demons.

[Smash]

They were removed because playtasting demonstrated them to be unfeasible in a competitive RTS. Could they have somehow balanced them and retained as they were originally? Perhaps, but Diablo 3 isn't going to have that problem as it doesn't need to sacrifice quirky abilities/monsters for sake of esport balnace.

You may believe it i don't. Right now new units are terrible and straight minded in what they do, they are just used as counters a+move units.

For example.

Reavers >>> Colossi in terms of design and others.

Old Thor was so much better and more interesting that final one which is just oversizes Goliath 2.0

Old Reapers were more fun and more useful, new one no one even consider building (maybe one for scouting).

Old mothership had cool spells like planet cracker, new one is Arbiter 2.0
....

[konfeta]

Old Thor was "Tank 5.0," Reapers were hideously broken early game and simply the threat of their possible appearance nearly broke Zerg early game, old Mothership had an amount of power concentrated in it that is not workable in the SC2 game style, Reavers were only interesting because they had a large number of bugs associated with scarabs that made them quirky.

However, again, I reiterate - SC2 changes came to improve it as a competitive game (whenever you agree if the changes succeeded or not is completely irrelevant). D3 does not have that design goal, it will not have "crazy fun stuff" toned down for sake of competitive balance.