Diablo IV SEASON 4: dads eatin good

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Diablo IV SEASON 4: dads eatin good

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(Thread IKs: harrygomm, Astryl)

Orange Crush Rush: May 7, 2009; You don't need thumbs for revenge

Hashy posted:

Unbelievably grim

To be honest, is this really that much different then what Diablo 2 was like

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:41

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# ? May 23, 2024 22:37

The Ol Spicy Keychain: Jan 17, 2013; I MEPHISTO MY OWN ASSHOLE

exquisite tea posted:

I'm at P73 and starting to feel myself drop off a little so I'll just post my thoughts now. This is me having played D2 and D3 for thousands of hours each over the course of my lifetime and having seen pretty much everything those games have to offer at the highest possible level (never found a Zod rune though ). I was pretty down on Diablo IV from the start, wasn't a huge fan of anything during the beta, and after having taken an Arclash Sorc through a few NM30s and experiencing most of the content with a proper endgame setup... well unsurprisingly I'm still pretty eh about the entire experience. It has some good ideas like the Paragon boards and legendary aspects, but for every potentially interesting system, it's bogged down by lethargic game design that feels like it belongs in an MMO instead of an ARPG. Which honestly shoudn't be surprising to anyone, since I believe most of the developers who ended up shipping D4 initially started on WoW. And this lethargy extends to absolutely everything from class design to spell effects to the slowness of movement in a way that just gradually wears on me. The mounts, the "live events," the world bosses and such do absolutely nothing for me and kind of ruin the whole distillation of ARPGs that I absolutely love, which is getting into a flow state of endlessly killing monsters at lightspeed for the eternal promise of phat loot. Here everything is so restrained, so calculated, and ultimately kinda dull. Having to slowly walk around town with no teleport and the vendors all spaced out with no consistency to their arrangement per zone, having to trudge to the instance for almost a minute just to start an NM dungeon, all these little things might seem unimportant (they are, really) but they seriously interrupt the way I like to play these games.

I think it doesn't help that I started with Sorc, who I'm sorry to say is a pale imitation of the D2 Sorc and especially the D3 Wizard, two of my favorite classes ever. I loved my Nova Sorc from D2, the bold class silhouette and galaxy-bending magic of the D3 Wiz, and right now that class fantasy is totally lacking at the higher levels of the game. Slam all four defensive skills on your bars and feebly cast Arc Lash while trying not to fall asleep in between Frost Novas. That kind of thing is fixable with patches, but the wisdom in making her go OOM after like 3 casts and all her Core Skills super sucking makes you wonder where Blizzard's heads are at. It's like they kept the Wizard's high resource costs from D3 but forgot to give her Arcane Power instead of mana. Sorc needs a lot of work in pretty much every aspect of her design.

I recognize that I play these games at a different frequency and intensity than most people who just want to make their way through the story and be done with it, and for those players, I think D4 is a good time. The story isn't too bad and the environments are very nice to look at -- Scosglen and Kehjistan in particular. But it quickly falls apart after the campaign and I don't really feel any intense desire to level up another character or try out a new build in the same way that kept me coming back to each new D3 season for over 10 years. Blizzard hardly needs my endorsement though, and it seems like most people are enjoying it, so I'm happy for them. It's just not working for me right now.

arent you the guy from last thread who spent years talking about how every aspect of d4 seemed bad to you cause it wasn't enough of a d3 reskin? and you were first in line to give activision a lot of money and are level 73 already? lol lmao

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:41

That Little Demon: Dec 3, 2020

SHISHKABOB posted:

I feel like in the year 2023 they should know how to make video games at this point. Ofc this is blizzard we're talking about, I can't imagine how much talent they've hemorrhaged over the years.

Uh huh. Lazy devs am I right!

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:42

isk: Oct 3, 2007; You don't want me owing you

Wouldn't be shocked if the current state of Sorc and Barb are related to Kripp's videos he made during Beta*. Which, you know, lol. lmao.

*tl;dr: he was bullish about Sorc and bearish about Barb. Personally I saw his analyses as reductive and shortsighted, so I stopped watching his stuff

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:43

That Little Demon: Dec 3, 2020

exquisite tea posted:

It's always possible but I don't think there's any super forbidden Sorc tech to be discovered. Frost Nova makes you do damage and none of her actual skills do, meanwhile she gets like 40 different ways to increase DPS with barriers on. So it doesn't take a genius to realize you can spam defensive skills to give yourself barriers all the time so that your abilities actually have a chance to kill monsters.

You follow guides

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:43

Hashy: Nov 20, 2005

That Little Demon posted:

It is if you are a fextralife guide reader to be sure

You'll feel it once you get bored of the on-meta build you funneled into because the balance really is that bad don't worry

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:44

That Little Demon: Dec 3, 2020

Hashy posted:

You'll feel it once you get bored of the on-meta build you funneled into because the balance really is that bad don't worry

Homie I�m 78 and play 12 hours a day with imp zone. Games a blast and I don�t have to follow some streamers build lmdao. You are skill issued and coping.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:45

Unlucky7: Jul 11, 2006; Fallen Rib

I think this game is fun

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:46

isk: Oct 3, 2007; You don't want me owing you

Unlucky7 posted:

I think this game is fun

It's had some valleys but for the most part I'm happy with it

EVERY TIME GOING posted:

If I unironically decide to take up one of my armor slots with the single-affix Razorplate, is it a requirement to make porcupine noises the entire time things are skewering thenselves on me?

Never knew what they sounded like until I looked it up just now. Holy cats this rules

isk fucked around with this message at 01:52 on Jun 11, 2023

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:48

That Little Demon: Dec 3, 2020

Duck and Cover posted:

If isn't a big deal why is it in the game? I mean it couldn't possibly be because they know that to many people cosmetics are part of the experience, part of the enjoyment of the game. They are paying AAA price, and getting a worse experience. That's bad. You shouldn't be handwaving that poo poo away.

Cope and seethe

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:48

Orange Crush Rush: May 7, 2009; You don't need thumbs for revenge

isk posted:

Wouldn't be shocked if the current state of Sorc and Barb are related to Kripp's videos he made during Beta*. Which, you know, lol. lmao.

*tl;dr: he was bullish about Sorc and bearish about Barb. Personally I saw his analyses as reductive and shortsighted, so I stopped watching his stuff

The Barb stuff is really funny, because Barb is so obviously the "slow burn" class that starts weak and turns into a rocket once geared (which has honestly been the case with, most Melee only classes in Blizzard games now that I think about it)

And of course Kripp, along with a bunch of people, kept going on and on about how terrible Barb obviously is, while being stuck at level 25, unable to learn Techniques, and having a very limited access to aspects as if that was the perfect display of class power.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:50

Astryl: Feb 1, 2005; "15,000 hours of Diablo II isn't that much, dweeb."

Duck and Cover posted:

If isn't a big deal why is it in the game? I mean it couldn't possibly be because they know that to many people cosmetics are part of the experience, part of the enjoyment of the game. They are paying AAA price, and getting a worse experience. That's bad. You shouldn't be handwaving that poo poo away.

I bought cosmetics day one of early access and will continue to do so because I am a sucker for pretty princess games.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:52

Ytlaya: Nov 13, 2005

How! posted:

I feel so bad when I accidentally explode a deer.

The game should have a special legendary that you can only get if you never kill wildlife.

Or it has some ability that acts as a debuff based on the number of critters you've murdered.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:53

isk: Oct 3, 2007; You don't want me owing you

Orange Crush Rush posted:

The Barb stuff is really funny, because Barb is so obviously the "slow burn" class that starts weak and turns into a rocket once geared (which has honestly been the case with, most Melee only classes in Blizzard games now that I think about it)

And of course Kripp, along with a bunch of people, kept going on and on about how terrible Barb obviously is, while being stuck at level 25, unable to learn Techniques, and having a very limited access to aspects as if that was the perfect display of class power.

Yep! Wild thing is it only took, like, 2 Aspects in the non-endgame Beta for Barb to start looking amazing. And that wasn't even with Whirlwind or bleeds! Missing that was a real "turn on your monitor" situation

I do think there should be more legendaries in the 1-50 experience than there are now. As a start I'd like to see them drop at the same rate as in non-Torment D3

# ? Jun 11, 2023 01:56

unattended spaghetti: May 10, 2013

Ytlaya posted:

The game should have a special legendary that you can only get if you never kill wildlife.

Or it has some ability that acts as a debuff based on the number of critters you've murdered.

ADoM has something hilariously similar to this idea and its great.

Cats are a common and sometimes immediately hostile enemy in the case of the big cats. Much, much, much later in the game the player meets The Cat Lord, who'll give them a powerful ring.

If they didn't kill any cats, that is. Otherwise, he'll try to kill you.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

Clocks: Oct 2, 2007

Astryl posted:

I bought cosmetics day one of early access and will continue to do so because I am a sucker for pretty princess games.

well go on, share with the class, which was it

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

acumen: Mar 17, 2005; Fun Shoe

That chart's gonna get thrown right out the window when s1 starts with a bunch of random changes and a seasonal modifier like "thorns does 10000% damage now lol"

I am not overly concerned that 90% of the people who have played 12hrs a day for the past two weeks are using the same build

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

The Ol Spicy Keychain: Jan 17, 2013; I MEPHISTO MY OWN ASSHOLE

isk posted:

Yep! Wild thing is it only took, like, 2 Aspects in the non-endgame Beta for Barb to start looking amazing. And that wasn't even with Whirlwind or bleeds! Missing that was a real "turn on your monitor" situation

I do think there should be more legendaries in the 1-50 experience than there are now. As a start I'd like to see them drop at the same rate as in non-Torment D3

They said they're going to be adding legos, uniques, paragon boards, etc with every season so it shouldn't be long before the range of items starts expanding.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

Astryl: Feb 1, 2005; "15,000 hours of Diablo II isn't that much, dweeb."

Clocks posted:

well go on, share with the class, which was it

One?

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

Horizon Burning: Oct 23, 2019

Have they re-enabled those aspects yet

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:00

Rageaholic: May 31, 2005; Old Town Road to EGOT

Unlucky7 posted:

I think this game is fun

I just hit 50. So wait, once you hit 50, you no longer receive skill points, only paragon points?

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:01

unattended spaghetti: May 10, 2013

acumen posted:

That chart's gonna get thrown right out the window when s1 starts with a bunch of random changes and a seasonal modifier like "thorns does 10000% damage now lol"

I am not overly concerned that 90% of the people who have played 12hrs a day for the past two weeks are using the same build

I'm not either, fwiw but based on my much more limited experience the concerns do have some merit. But like I said above, numbers tweaking and new aspects are pretty low impact in terms of workload. D3 hummed along on support of that scope and that scope alone for a very, very long time. There's nothing to worry about really.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:06

isk: Oct 3, 2007; You don't want me owing you

The Ol Spicy Keychain posted:

They said they're going to be adding legos, uniques, paragon boards, etc with every season so it shouldn't be long before the range of items starts expanding.

Oh sorry, I phrased that poorly (though this is welcome news). My issue rn is less with the range at 1-50 and more with the drop rate itself (at least before finishing the campaign). It's a bit anemic for my taste. Getting one legendary every 5-10 levels seems reasonable IMO

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:06

Astryl: Feb 1, 2005; "15,000 hours of Diablo II isn't that much, dweeb."

Orange Crush Rush posted:

To be honest, is this really that much different then what Diablo 2 was like

Not even a little. Even D3 suffered from this, it�s inherent in ARPGs where the name of the game is farm as fast a possible.

But Diablo 2 did have the ability to have other extremely powerful and viable builds that only the ultra rich could afford. (IE; auradin) and none of the uniques I�ve seen so far are so strong that you�d respec entirely around one item. I don�t know if that�s better or worse.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:09

Hashy: Nov 20, 2005

That Little Demon posted:

Homie I�m 78 and play 12 hours a day with imp zone. Games a blast and I don�t have to follow some streamers build lmdao. You are skill issued and coping.

What is imp zone

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:10

Orange Crush Rush: May 7, 2009; You don't need thumbs for revenge

Astryl posted:

Not even a little. Even D3 suffered from this, it�s inherent in ARPGs where the name of the game is farm as fast a possible.

But Diablo 2 did have the ability to have other extremely powerful and viable builds that only the ultra rich could afford. (IE; auradin) and none of the uniques I�ve seen so far are so strong that you�d respec entirely around one item. I don�t know if that�s better or worse.

Fields of Crimson makes Rend/Rupture a lot more fun, but still it can't really compete with a proper WW setup.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:11

That Little Demon: Dec 3, 2020

it's over for these noobs

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:11

The Fattest PI: Mar 4, 2008

Maybe I'm just old and don't enjoy things anymore but the D4 story seemed real dumb and pointless. The epilogue went on forever like I was attached to that one character but only met them like 10 minutes earlier, i don't even remember their name.

Oh well, I'm gonna grind to 50 and put together a cool werebear build

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:14

I said come in!: Jun 22, 2004

Rageaholic posted:

I just hit 50. So wait, once you hit 50, you no longer receive skill points, only paragon points?

Yes, your goal at that point is building up your paragon board and making it stronger by running nightmare dungeons. This part of the game is a massive long term grind.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:15

Nyan Bread: Mar 17, 2006

Rageaholic posted:

I just hit 50. So wait, once you hit 50, you no longer receive skill points, only paragon points?

Yes and if you gently caress up your Paragon boards, youre going to be doing a fraction of the damage or be needlessly squishy at higher lvls.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:21

coelomate: Oct 21, 2020

Rageaholic posted:

I just hit 50. So wait, once you hit 50, you no longer receive skill points, only paragon points?

Correct, but you get 4 paragon points per level (at intervals as you go, not all at once with each level up). It's neat!

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:26

SHISHKABOB: Nov 30, 2012; Fun Shoe

Unlucky7 posted:

I think this game is fun

I got two cool corpse explosion uniques, one that makes them into crazy little guys who run at the enemies, and another one takes like 4 corpses at once and makes a super corpse explosion.

EVERY TIME GOING posted:

Yes and if you gently caress up your Paragon boards, youre going to be doing a fraction of the damage or be needlessly squishy at higher lvls.

What does gently caress up the paragon board mean? Only take white nodes? Just take stuff that does the same thing so you don't spread your damage, it's not that complicated. Like I took the minion necro board first and beelined for all those rare nodes.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:28

Rageaholic: May 31, 2005; Old Town Road to EGOT

EVERY TIME GOING posted:

Yes and if you gently caress up your Paragon boards, youre going to be doing a fraction of the damage or be needlessly squishy at higher lvls.

Well poo poo :negative:

lol

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:28

DaveKap: Feb 5, 2006; Pickle: Inspected.

I think Diablo 4 might be my favorite of them all at this point but one thing, one really awful thing is a sticking point for me right now.

https://i.imgur.com/T7LSciU.mp4

The aggro as a necromancer is completely hosed. If you want to prevent snipes like this from happening, you have to let your skeles fight offscreen, which is lame. Call me crazy but minion builds should only be this deadly (for the player) if you position yourself poorly or your minions get melted from poor defenses or simply too-powerful enemies. Instead it's deadly if I happen to face an elite who decides minions don't exist and I'm the only dude in the room worth killing. That enemy wouldn't be wrong but that doesn't make for a fun experience.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:33

mbt: Aug 13, 2012

The Fattest PI posted:

Maybe I'm just old and don't enjoy things anymore but the D4 story seemed real dumb and pointless. The epilogue went on forever like I was attached to that one character but only met them like 10 minutes earlier, i don't even remember their name.

Oh well, I'm gonna grind to 50 and put together a cool werebear build

Confirmed you are old and don't enjoy things

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:33

I said come in!: Jun 22, 2004

coelomate posted:

Correct, but you get 4 paragon points per level (at intervals as you go, not all at once with each level up). It's neat!

This is great because it makes the ultra slow leveling a lot more bearable.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:36

BULBASAUR: Apr 6, 2009; Soiled Meat

looks like skelly necro not HC viable!

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:36

I said come in!: Jun 22, 2004

DaveKap posted:

I think Diablo 4 might be my favorite of them all at this point but one thing, one really awful thing is a sticking point for me right now.

https://i.imgur.com/T7LSciU.mp4

The aggro as a necromancer is completely hosed. If you want to prevent snipes like this from happening, you have to let your skeles fight offscreen, which is lame. Call me crazy but minion builds should only be this deadly (for the player) if you position yourself poorly or your minions get melted from poor defenses or simply too-powerful enemies. Instead it's deadly if I happen to face an elite who decides minions don't exist and I'm the only dude in the room worth killing. That enemy wouldn't be wrong but that doesn't make for a fun experience.

Just getting one shot like this is an issue right now regardless of builds. What is silly about this is that it happens from just normal mobs, not even bosses do it. it�s something blizzard needs to fix because it�s not intentional.

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:37

Potassium Problems: Sep 28, 2001

Hashy posted:

What is imp zone

the treasure behind the waterfall

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:41

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# ? May 23, 2024 22:37

euphronius: Feb 18, 2009

If the campaign didn�t please you then yeah idk if you are going to like this game

# ? Jun 11, 2023 02:41

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