Someone help me figure out my "problem" with D3...

[Venant]

The great thing about D3 vs WoW is that you can fully enjoy D3 solo or with a group. In WoW if you are a hardcore raider you will likely eventually find that you have nothing to do outside of raiding. During every tier that I raided I would eventually get to a point where there was simply no benefit to playing WoW outside of raid, and much of that was because I found the character mechanics/abilities of WoW boring.

[Deleted]

Well i have problems when i run 5 man dungeans just like diablo after 5th run i fall to sleep
Things get changed when i`m in TS and comunicate with other 3 ppl then i just lost any sence of time

[deven04]

The great thing about D3 vs WoW is that you can fully enjoy D3 solo or with a group. In WoW if you are a hardcore raider you will likely eventually find that you have nothing to do outside of raiding. During every tier that I raided I would eventually get to a point where there was simply no benefit to playing WoW outside of raid, and much of that was because I found the character mechanics/abilities of WoW boring.

I agree totally on this. My enjoyment for WOW was strictly hardcore raiding. Spend hours wiping, calcs, strategies, videos, etc., to beat an encounter with efficiency.

@OP Diablo is completely a different mindset than WOW. You cannot compare them. I enjoy playing D3 (ROS not Vanilla) for chance of getting better items (including item sets - pixels, pixels & more pixels) not through skill but through luck. In addition, the best joy of this game is I can do it on my own schedule or leisure without depending on friends/strangers to find loot.

I think this is one of the main reasons why I ended quitting WOW after 7 years of playing the game (great game still kind of miss it) and now why I enjoy ROS. I hope blizzard keeps up the good work with this game.

[Ferocity]

Then why is it still so much fun for me and literally millions of others?
The best games are simple at their core, and easy to get into. That's why they're popular.

Various facebook-like games are very popular. But they can't be really called as proper games. It is like: if thousands more people eat in McDonalds instead of some normal cafe/restaurant it doesn't mean that McDonalds' food is anywhere near good.

And sorry, D1 and D2 were already extremely simplified for the genre they came from, they won by graphics and "softcoreness". But D3 simply went too far with simplifications while still providing very short game. It discarded idea of starting from scratch with alts, playing offline, modding and coherent leveling. Playing just for the loot without any cohesive background is just boring.

Also if CRPG (including ARPGs) is very simple at its core, it usually means that it sucks. The whole "simplicity at core" is very awful argument, every game should have depth in whatever way she is defined by the genre. You can make fighting game with 3 characters, each of them can do only 1 combo by using combination of 2 buttons. Simplicity! But I hope you agree that such fighting game would be a complete failure.

[Fencers]

Various facebook-like games are very popular. But they can't be really called as proper games. It is like: if thousands more people eat in McDonalds instead of some normal cafe/restaurant it doesn't mean that McDonalds' food is anywhere near good.

It also doesn't imply that McDonald's is any worse.

This is all hugely subjective and based on personal value judgements.

And sorry, D1 and D2 were already extremely simplified for the genre they came from

D2 compared to what? Most ARPGs before D1 and D2 were just as simplistic or rudimentary. Both Diablo 1 and 2 were markedly more complex in their gameplay.

It discarded idea of starting from scratch with alts, playing offline, modding and coherent leveling.

So it discarded those things. So what? Is that supposed to be inherently bad or faulty? Becasue this also seems like a lot of personal bias.

Also what do you mean by "coherent leveling"? D3's leveling is just as straightforward as Diablo 1 and 2.

Playing just for the loot without any cohesive background is just boring.

To you, sure. Maybe for the OP as well. But I suspect the OP is playing for the loot from his wording here.

You can make fighting game with 3 characters, each of them can do only 1 combo by using combination of 2 buttons. Simplicity! But I hope you agree that such fighting game would be a complete failure.

They have made successful fighting games as such. One of the big hits in the fighting game genre and garnering critical coverage and acclaim was a two button fighting game called Dive Kick.

There is no such thing as a simple game that is bad because it is simple. Or a game that is good because it has a lot of depth.

There are just games which are either well or poorly made.

[Ferocity]

D2 compared to what? Most ARPGs before D1 and D2 were just as simplistic or rudimentary. Both Diablo 1 and 2 were markedly more complex in their gameplay.

Early roguelikes had things like food, drinks, nasty curse effects, more elaborated on-use items and bigger dungeons, usually a number of races and classes, often featured things like permadeath. They were mostly ASCII and turn-based (D1 was planned to be turned-based at first too, some ASCII were also happening in real time, I still remember Kingdom of Kroz), so D1 got big upper hand here. Loot systems were also more elaborated in earlier games like Might and Magic III (prefixes, affixes, on use), so nothing new here too.

So it discarded those things. So what? Is that supposed to be inherently bad or faulty? Becasue this also seems like a lot of personal bias.

Also what do you mean by "coherent leveling"? D3's leveling is just as straightforward as Diablo 1 and 2.

Roguelikes were about making a toon, trying to see how far can you get (especially if permadeath was a threat) and how powerful can you become. D1 and D2 continued it. D3 discarded it and make incoherent by enforcing level-scaling. With level-scaling you simply can't say how much more powerful you have become, because with each level up monsters level up too, thus removing the sense of levels. It leads to disastrous results like, e.g. lv70 who never finished Act I or extremely low level finishing game, thus showing that levels are stripped of their purpose as indicator of power and progress and in D3 they serve as a filler before "endgame".

Even more so, you know that you completely waste your time leveling in D3 after beating game once and probably scared to waste your good luck early on by getting something like lv53 Thunderfury (level-scaled legendaries is just another dubious idea). As a game which revolves around loot, you might be actually scared to get good legendaries early on just because of how probability in math works.

Achievements and professions were account-wide from start too, but at least this could be somewhat ignored. But Achievements themselves also existed in earlier CRPGs just under different names, like from "Awards" in Might and Magic (starting from 3 onwards), when you could check what your party has achieved so far. Not the player. Party/characters. It was system of milestones while progressing through game, it is completely counter-intuitive to have it "account-wide". Same about profs.

Speaking of achievements, I wonder how people do complete achievement Bashanishu nowadays, as Rakanishu drops specific blade quite rarely and only at specific level range.

To you, sure. Maybe for the OP as well. But I suspect the OP is playing for the loot from his wording here.

I wrote it in absolute sense. Even more so I am big lootwh**e in games which involve loot. But background decides a lot too. Maybe for others it is different, but for me it isn't interesting to hunt for loot which drops from completely random dungeons from completely random mobs (rifts) without any proper and serious system behind that.

They have made successful fighting games as such. One of the big hits in the fighting game genre and garnering critical coverage and acclaim was a two button fighting game called Dive Kick.

Didn't know that. I just wonder, was it accepted for the same reason as black square of Malevich, or was it actually ingenious game? MK was my favorite among MK, Tekken and Killer Instinct. UMK3 was most favorite as it featured most of the characters from earlier MKs and had double difficulty system. But I am not much into fighting games now.

There is no such thing as a simple game that is bad because it is simple. Or a game that is good because it has a lot of depth.

There are just games which are either well or poorly made.

I agree, but "simplicity" (being taken in completely wrong sense) is often used as excuse to very poor design decisions.

[miffy23]

Simple, functioning game design is always preferable to complex theories that fall apart on launch.

You also sound like you simply don't enjoy the ARPG genre much. That doesn't make Diablo a bad game, or unsuccessful. It's actually highly profitable, and wildly popular.

Leveling is not the focus of the game in Diablo, my friend. The game begins at 70, more so than in an MMORPG. And power upgrades are exactly as noticable as you want them then.

I'm really not sure what your issue with the game is.

[Nivena]

I stopped playing completely when I got a legendary in every equipment slot. I didn't even reinstall it when they introduced +100% drop chance.

In WoW I know the chance that I get an upgrade from a boss exists and is quite high. I can plan in advance which items I like to have (love it), in D3 it's completely random and you can't really plan ahead. I don't enjoy grinding when I can't see the end of the tunnel so to speak. When I farm reputation in WoW I know when I will have finished and when I get my rewards like Shado-Pan mounts and such.

[miffy23]

I stopped playing completely when I got a legendary in every equipment slot. I didn't even reinstall it when they introduced +100% drop chance.

In WoW I know the chance that I get an upgrade from a boss exists and is quite high. I can plan in advance which items I like to have (love it), in D3 it's completely random and you can't really plan ahead. I don't enjoy grinding when I can't see the end of the tunnel so to speak. When I farm reputation in WoW I know when I will have finished and when I get my rewards like Shado-Pan mounts and such.

You cannot compare an ARPG with a MMORPG at all. They are different game philosophies.
While WoW has a certain element of RNG in it, and they are actually fleshing that out in WoD, it is absolutely nothing to ARPG systems.

The randomness and feeling of "anything can happen" is what makes an ARPG fun, at least for me and most people I know that play Diablo regularly, back in D2 as well as now in D3. You play for that "tching" - oooh an orange beam! That's what you play for.

[Kelimbror]

I stopped playing completely when I got a legendary in every equipment slot. I didn't even reinstall it when they introduced +100% drop chance.

Then you've missed out on the largest portion of the game.

In WoW I know the chance that I get an upgrade from a boss exists and is quite high. I can plan in advance which items I like to have (love it), in D3 it's completely random and you can't really plan ahead. I don't enjoy grinding when I can't see the end of the tunnel so to speak. When I farm reputation in WoW I know when I will have finished and when I get my rewards like Shado-Pan mounts and such.

1) People need to stop comparing MMOs, especially WoW, to ARPGs, especially Diablo 3. Not.the.same.genre. 2) You actually can plan out your gearing strategy and do research to determine the best methods to acquire what you are looking for. Items can have specific drop areas and also require fine tuning to perfect.

[Fencers]

Early roguelikes had things like food, drinks, nasty curse effects, more elaborated on-use items and bigger dungeons, usually a number of races and classes, often featured things like permadeath. They were mostly ASCII and turn-based (D1 was planned to be turned-based at first too, some ASCII were also happening in real time, I still remember Kingdom of Kroz), so D1 got big upper hand here. Loot systems were also more elaborated in earlier games like Might and Magic III (prefixes, affixes, on use), so nothing new here too.

Those are Rogue-likes. Not the same genre as ARPG or Action RPGs. All three are distinct.

M&M3 was neither a Rogue-like or ARPG.

You might be talking about game systems. In which you would be correct. But you first said, genre. And that is now very specific in identity.

D1 and D2 continued it. D3 discarded it and make incoherent by enforcing level-scaling. With level-scaling you simply can't say how much more powerful you have become, because with each level up monsters level up too, thus removing the sense of levels.

That's not what incoherent means... I am confused by your choice of wording.

Though you would be objectively incorrect. Diablo 3's leveling scheme is aggressively linear. One can only level in one direction and it is never regressive. There is nothing "disastrous" in a low level character finishing the campaign because that is not a measure of completion Diablo recognizes in relation to level. How could the scenario be a disaster if it's a non-factor in the game design?

Also there is a difficulty progression system that is tied to both level and power. The latter only being obtainable by leveling. You can never be weaker by leveling in D3. The game has like 10 tiered scales of progression.

The only thing nonlinear in Diablo 3 is the option to select your own difficulty setting relative to power threshold. Even "adventure" mode is highly structured and linear.

The adjustable difficulty settings in D3 might be the most nonlinear aspect of game design in all of Blizzard's catalog. To my knowledge the company's designers do not practice non linearity as part of their DD/Ts.

As I said on page one, there is fundamentally a different set of design criteria and intention in a randomized ARPG (which is essentially a fancy spreadsheet) and the the directed design of World of Warcraft, a CRPG and so forth.

Even more so, you know that you completely waste your time leveling in D3 after beating game once and probably scared to waste your good luck early on by getting something like lv53 Thunderfury (level-scaled legendaries is just another dubious idea).

This would be illogical. If one were so frightened under the scenario you describe, they would be so for their own psychological reasons.

One never de-powers in D3 by leveling up. A Thunderfury at level 53 is inferior to a level 70 item wielded by a level 70 character. No matter the glamor of the level 53 Thunderfury.

Achievements and professions were account-wide from start too

This is not gameplay. No relevance.

I agree, but "simplicity" (being taken in completely wrong sense) is often used as excuse to very poor design decisions.

"Depth" can be used as a poor excuse for arcane or obtuse game design as well.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that can not be done in design. All design is valid provided the rules and operation of the game are not contradictory. This exception is only due to one simple reason; the Artistry of video games (game design) is bound by the practical logic of programming (gameplay).

That is literally the only reason video games are created as they are. Design, principally, is unable to be "wrong", "bad" or "disastrous". It only needs to not be in conflict with the rules of operation (gameplay). Design can fall short of the gameplay goals, or hinder those goals. Sure. But that is a measure that is apart from the audience's attitude toward that design.

As such it's really just different people liking different things as our OP here. Of which we (game players) probably bring a lot of our own baggage in expectation to a process that is either indifferent or irrelevant those preformed conceptions.

[melodramocracy]

The idea of playing the game for many hours simply isn't for everyone. For me personally, the game in small doses here and there (a single play session for me is generally 1 rift or bounty run, unless I'm leveling a new character), otherwise I get extremely bored with it.

The good thing about it is that it's a great game to simply pick back up where you left off last time, even if weeks / months go by. Take whatever entertainment you derive from it, there's no need to ask why you don't like it more.

[deven04]

I stopped playing completely when I got a legendary in every equipment slot. I didn't even reinstall it when they introduced +100% drop chance.

In WoW I know the chance that I get an upgrade from a boss exists and is quite high. I can plan in advance which items I like to have (love it), in D3 it's completely random and you can't really plan ahead. I don't enjoy grinding when I can't see the end of the tunnel so to speak. When I farm reputation in WoW I know when I will have finished and when I get my rewards like Shado-Pan mounts and such.

Diablo does not equal WOW. They are completely different games.

In order to achieve high end loot in WOW, it takes coordination amongst other people with a set schedule and a sense of efficiency to complete. There are a few exceptions to that such as reputation grinding. But in general that is the WOW.

Diablo can be played with others or by yourself without a set schedule or with skill set (in comparison to WOW).

If people do not like hack n slash with RNG and continuous grind then this game is not for them. It is not that complicated.

[zephid]

Eh? Traditional raiding MMOs are running the same raid, killing the same bosses over and over in the hopes of getting an upgrade, until the next raid comes out which in Diablo's case would be an expansion. Sure, the actual loot in traditional MMORPGs is static, but how is it somehow different?

That is true, but the BIG and important difference, at least for me, is that you can only clear a raid once per week in WoW. That means that I won't get bored of the content as fast as I will get bored of D3.

[oddmole]

I also poured hour upon hours into raiding wow over the last 3-4 expansions. I also played D1 and D2, The difference between elites and normals doesnt compare between even a normal or raidfinder boss and trash. Diablo is more like endless trash packs. so unless you loved grinding firelands trash forever for epics, the comparison will not hold. If you liked leveling toons over and over then diablo will most likely be more comparable.

Personally after years of coordinated raids with 10+ peoples schedules and fighting everyones lag boss, wife agro, holdiays, ect. I enjoy the hours of mindless slaughter for very little reward. Then again I had 3 servers and 20 ish toons in wow so i know i am abnormal.

[Ferocity]

Those are Rogue-likes. Not the same genre as ARPG or Action RPGs. All three are distinct.

M&M3 was neither a Rogue-like or ARPG.

You might be talking about game systems. In which you would be correct. But you first said, genre. And that is now very specific in identity.

From what I know D1 was heavily influented by roguelikes, but it didn't fit many of roguelikes principles (by being way too "softcore", not sure about proper word here). MM3 was brought as example, because back in time D1 was praised for its elaborated loot system, which tbh, paled in comparison to some other older games like MM3 (though it is a bit different genre).

Also there is a difficulty progression system that is tied to both level and power. The latter only being obtainable by leveling. You can never be weaker by leveling in D3. The game has like 10 tiered scales of progression.

I mentioned it somewhere. When i was gifted RoS, I was going through Act V, starting on Torment II because it was very easy for the gear I had. But I had to gradually decrease difficulty closer to 70, because each level up mobs were becoming like 20-40% more powerful than me relatively. Exactly same mobs. On top of that, a lot of gear didn't have middle tiers for 62-70, so at lv68-69 mobs kept dropping lv61 and in some cases - 64 gear. So yes, with level-scaling you always lose relative power.

This would be illogical. If one were so frightened under the scenario you describe, they would be so for their own psychological reasons.

Let's say Thunderfury has 1% chance to drop from legendary pool. Legendary pool works in a "smart" way, so some legendaries will be hard to find second time (it fully applies on receipts). Even if to ignore smart drop system, you are at the point where statistically you will never ever have a chance to see Thunderfury until you will get around 100 legendaries again, and then only for 50% chance at seeing it again, or 200 Legendaries for 50% chance to see it if you take already existing drop into count. Level-scaled legendaries actually have potential to statistically rob you of ever seeing good ones again.

One never de-powers in D3 by leveling up. A Thunderfury at level 53 is inferior to a level 70 item wielded by a level 70 character. No matter the glamor of the level 53 Thunderfury.

Look above. On level up you gain +few stats, while mobs are adjusted in a way as if they got few gear upgrades. Roughly just to illustrate, you gain 10 dps, they gain 50, you gain 10 defense, they gain 50 dps. This is very evident for higher difficulties.

This is not gameplay. No relevance.

Achievements (awards, trophies, etc.) are showing the character progress throughout the game, what he achieved so far. Definitely lv1 fresh character didn't kill Legendary Black Dragon and didn't complete Super Final Dungeon. Same for profs. My lv1 character doesn't know how to use hammer probably, and he already has access to some Magma Dragonforged Claymore +104 (name is purely for example) receipt together with all the means of crafting it. It just so happened that D3 (and also WoW and maybe all Steam) achievements serve mostly milestone purpose (at which they fail being account-wide); in other games, like EQ or FF XII (trophies unlock access to extremely powerful items for low levels), you get some actual rewards for completing them, and it serves as perfect example why more thought-out achievements' system simply won't work on account-wide basis. Add on top of that robbing the people from choice to start from scratch (and many people actually enjoy that in all CRPGs subgenres, including ARPG).

All that is left is just kill millions of mobs to make it to 70. All these additional systems (professions, achievements, quests, etc.) are usually used for adding more depth to leveling and giving more objectives (let's hunt for that one receipt or let's complete that one dungeon for achievement), than simply kill just for the sake of killing.

That is literally the only reason video games are created as they are. Design, principally, is unable to be "wrong", "bad" or "disastrous". It only needs to not be in conflict with the rules of operation (gameplay).

Sure, it is developers who dictate gameplay, and there might be those who like it or not. But consistency and coherence of gameplay are based on stability of rule system. Some people like Skyrim or Sacred for level-scaling (I am not sure who can love such dreadful idea though) and would hate it if it was turned off with expansion, some people like some other game because it has no level scaling and would drop it as soon as it would be implemented. Switching from one design paradigm to another in the very same game is wrong and bad. Going from RMAH (one of the only reasons why I played D3 back in time, and only reason why I could forgive nasty online-DRM, I can see why people can hate RMAH ofc) to global No-Trade is also wrong.

If they could find middle ground. Level-scaling? If it is really needed, sure, put it in Adventure Mode, leaving Campaign intact. No RMAH? Sure, but keep it possible to trade with others by standard face-to-face trading and do not implement No-Trade on Gold and most of the actually worthy items). They simply killed everything that actually gave any kind of longevity to the game. And:

- I stopped playing completely when I got a legendary in every equipment slot. I didn't even reinstall it when they introduced +100% drop chance.
- Then you've missed out on the largest portion of the game.

100% increased drop chance isn't game content and doesn't practically adds to longevity. Yes, ARPGs are usually heavily loot-based and involve tons of clicking mobs to death. But they have it in some kind of context. Rfits is "ok" concept but it serves as a very poor context to be a major drive of the game. Gathering gear to kill newly met challenging mob or beat new dungeon (NG+ content might count, slider easy-normal-hard-impossible doesn't count) is a good motivation. Seeing gear name, and knowing what stats it might have also adds to consistency. But gathering gear with completely random names just to kill completely random mobs in completely random dungeon is just no...

Sorry for long post, but I still wanted to add - why D3 couldn't have vast overworld (quests too) like in Sacred 1 with elaborated dungeons like in Dungeon Siege 1 with solid item naming system, so you could truly adjudge item by name (like in Dungeon Siege 2 (DS2)) with various optional things like Rifts and so on? Make super high level cap, add additional progression systems in some kind of FF X/EQ2/PoE mix. With really decent journal like in DS 2 (in D3 it is pure voice over and carries absolute zero actual in-game information).

Game didn't evolve in any direction, it became more primitive. Even Rift-like things were implemented better in Torchlight II, when each map had its own prefixes, you could buy them, and they had system behind them (such and such map usually has such and such denizens, etc.), who didn't like maps for their randomness - they could do NG+.

They could make dream ARPG for many, but most of D3 aspects are submediocre (graphics and art are nice, no arguing here). Better things and game aspects can be made and they already exist in other games. No wonder people like OP are asking such questions, other games have surpassed D3 in various aspects. I hope you agree with me on this too.