Too much of the good stuff?

[windstriker]

I really like most of the changes coming up in 1.0.4, but might this not be a little bit too much of the good stuff?

- Elite monster health reduced by 2,5%
- All monsters dmg reduced by 15%
- New more powerful legendaries and useful 61-62 weapons (will get easier to get a good weapon?)
- Classes getting skill buffes (even though some ppl wont even use them)
- Paragon system

Some people say that the extra stat bonuses you get from Paragon will be too low to matter, but that's just bull. 30 more dex for my monk is huge atm, and it seems like you will get at least 2 dex/lvl. And at the same time, more vita dex and str.
Farming act 3 in inferno should mean really fast leveling in the beginning.

I like these changes, except I believe the paragon buff may be too high, but wont all these things together make the game a lot easier? Ofc we have to wait and see, but Im a bit worried tbh! May have to switch to HC fulltime

[ShadoutMapes]

Yeah. Making the game too easy no doubt.

Though I'm glad they caved on the elite HP nerf, ending with a rather small nerf.

At least they still claim they want some harder endgame (in the future...)

Wilson was quick to clarify that the issue of difficulty wasn't off the table, just not something they're touching in 1.0.4. "That being said, moving forward that's one of the things we're going to be looking at next...How can we address it for both players?" [those who want difficulty and those who want it easy]

[Steven Hazani]

Paragon levels: MF and GF (except if you care, you already have it on gear and caps make it not stack), stats equal to level ups (which no one cares about, and these take longer to get) and that in bulk would amount to 300 prime 200 vit... aka one item. And not even the real power benefits of that item like ias and crit stuff... stuff that multiplies instead of adds.

If 30 Dex is huge for you I can only conclude you have about... 200... in which case you clearly have worse problems than needing 10 paragon levels (and good luck getting those without your gear on).

It's funny as hell.

Before 1.04: Hey, we really don't want to grind for hours just for minor incremental numerical upgrades. We want meaningful advancement with a purpose, not this boring stuff.
After 1.04: OMFG MINOR INCREMENTAL NUMERICAL UPGRADES ARE THE BEST THING EVER!!!!!!!!11111111111111

[sifuedition]

Paragon levels: MF and GF (except if you care, you already have it on gear and caps make it not stack), stats equal to level ups (which no one cares about, and these take longer to get) and that in bulk would amount to 300 prime 200 vit... aka one item. And not even the real power benefits of that item like ias and crit stuff... stuff that multiplies instead of adds.

If 30 Dex is huge for you I can only conclude you have about... 200... in which case you clearly have worse problems than needing 10 paragon levels (and good luck getting those without your gear on).

It's funny as hell.

Before 1.04: Hey, we really don't want to grind for hours just for minor incremental numerical upgrades. We want meaningful advancement with a purpose, not this boring stuff.
After 1.04: OMFG MINOR INCREMENTAL NUMERICAL UPGRADES ARE THE BEST THING EVER!!!!!!!!11111111111111

Lol. It's funny because this was the nagging feeling that I had about the idea ever since Kripp said it. I disliked it then and I have felt an aggrivating itch every time I heard someone basically repost the idea. I just hadn't thought to express it that way or I would have long ago. Nice one.

[ShadowMatrix]

With the monster nerfs and damage buffs they are freeing up a lot of the "must have" stats on items specifically All Resists. It helps with balancing gear out. It helps with build diversity.

[Steven Hazani]

Lol. It's funny because this was the nagging feeling that I had about the idea ever since Kripp said it. I disliked it then and I have felt an aggrivating itch every time I heard someone basically repost the idea. I just hadn't thought to express it that way or I would have long ago. Nice one.

The best part about all of this?

A few days ago Kripp actually said something to the effect of "Yeah, 1.04 might change some stuff but if I'm still farming Act3 forever I don't care."

Before:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIgnnDxjPlU

Skip to 2:45.

After:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDCOVJ1-hEM

The entire thing.

He has all the pieces, he just isn't putting them together. This isn't the first time that's happened either.

While he is a good player his analytical skills and connection making could still use some work.

[mr punk]

At least they still claim they want some harder endgame (in the future...)

i hope that's just PR happy talk. otherwise, he's out of his mind.

[Valeli]

Nah, harder endgame is nice and fine.

It would be nice it it was some sort of "event" though, that's not a necessary endgame. It's hard to explain exactly what I mean, but i think the ubers added late in the history of D2 are a pretty good example. No one's forced to run through them for the standard game experience, or for most item hunting, but it still provides a neat challenge for those who want it.

I'm not advocating a redoing of that or anything of course, but something along those lines could create a hard end-game that's not something you're required to experience in the course of just running through the game. So it's fairly satisfactory for everyone I think.

In re: too much of the good stuff, it does look like a lot of difficulty reduction. But the game 1-60 didn't need all that much difficulty anyways. The whole inferno idea was just unnecessary imo. It can't be removed for the traditional normal/nm/hell now, but this basically turns it into that. D2 was never challenging for the most part, but still provided lots of fun. Some of the fun did come from being overpowered in many situations.

This patch is sounding nice, and will probably get me to play with the game again. At least for a bit. If only they added an option for skipping the in-game cutscenes too, I'd be thrilled. But this is definitely good progress imo. A way to quick switch between two skill set ups would be pretty sexy too.

[Ivan E]

As far as I can tell, much of the "difficulty" was from being gibbed by crap anyway, provided you had decent enough stats for whatever you were doing. Even low-ish stats were fine if you wanted to kite a bit or get creative, but the stuff like fast+jailer+desecrator on a champion pack that would jail you on top of a burning pit three times in 12 seconds was what got you.

So I'm not too upset about them lowering some of the numbers, if it makes this stuff less annoying. Wading through trash was generally faceroll anyway and it was largely about fighting elites, and they just seem to be tuning that such that it has less tedium (both in terms of kiting forever and in terms of dying more than once due to being vortexed into 3 molten firetrail stacks). It would be better if they altered mechanics rather than numbers, but that's a lot harder, so I don't blame them for the shortcoming.

[ShadowMatrix]

Krip is right this patch isn't fundamentally adding content even with paragon levels we are still going to be farming Act 3 inferno all day. The legendaries do look awesome though. I can't judge for certain though because the monster nerfs and skill buffs and legendary buffs will add more skill build diversity so that may help add some depth to the game but PvP is still the big one - Blizzard needs some really good orignal ideas with the PvP patch - they need multiple modes for PvP, 1v1 2v2 3v3 5v5 random champ packs in arenas, ladder points etc.