Characters/Character Creation

[dabragan]

Originally Posted by Siberys

Yeah, and? Diablo 1 was far better than diablo 2 simply because of that reason.

yeah it was a better version. but im saying if we make it like d1 you can have any character with any spell at any level... i mean come on... frozen orb at level 1? or if its more like d1... level 20 frozen orb at level 1 with a palidan?..

but yeah. its a great idea. and i think that if they do it like d1.. it should be changed to be level specific.

[Caden]

If they do make it so that you can use any piece of armor or weapon, regardless of class, then they should make the effects of the armor or weapon be dependant on stats. There should be no reason that a mage recieves the same amount of armor as a warrior. Perhaps, the amount of armor you recieve from an item could be dependant on your agility and the amount of damage you do with wands or staves could be dependant on your intelligence. Heavier armor reduces your chance to dodge as well. This would make it less likely but not impossible for mages to use heavier armor and warriors to use wands. This would make it so that characters would have reason to build mages with heavy armor and without it, providing different approaches to fighting. As for the spell system being like D1, I don't think that is a good idea. As a warrior in D1, you hardly used any spells, except for heal and teleport. Thus, it made the option of learning any spell pretty pointless.

[Deadalready]

I'd like for more unique skills actually, too many of the skills in Diablo 2 were basically watered down/upgraded/differently animated replicas of others. For example the sorceress is a huge offender with her ice bolt, ice blast and glacial spike.

I'd also like to see the synergy system implemented again except with better ramps for "lower skills". So if I was inclined to use firebolt and put all my points into it it wouldn't be pitifully inferiour to equal points (or even 1 point) in a level 30 skill.

[Loot_Junkie]

I dread the thought of the classes will being watered down or mixed. Diablo is a roleplaying game!! The class you select is your role to play and you select it on the basis of your preference
All this talk of sub classing and race bonus and most abhorid of all emulating the WOW system makes me very concerned. I like Diablo because its not like WOW. Wow is an MMO which equals a giant mess of balancing out strenghts vs weakness so that you are forced to party up.
When I played WOW the feeling that was overwhelming was your classes weakness's because face it its not designed to be played alone. you cannot solo very far in that game and still get good gear.
Diablo is all about feeling effective based on you style of play any where anytime with or without friends as long as you make smart skill choices, stay alert and have some luck with loot drops.

I know everyone thinks they want unlimited customization options.
But!!! So much suffers if you do. IE storyline , balancing, incentives and worst of all is in multiplayer as malicous dishonourable types will always find loopholes or cheap tactics to exploit. Thus effectively destroying the roleplaying element
When I select a Pallidan I commit to it and play that out.
And when I see an assasin either for or against me I see a sneaky knife in the back on legs and that was a conscious choice by the player to make that leap.

If you let people sit on the fence as to there playing style and persona then the whole game suffers.

If think one thing that sets Diablo apart from all others was the very effective and compelling random generation system.

My suggestion as to adding to the system is that having unique class eveolution that are made availbale through the games random drop system.

This could kill two birds with one stone, adding new storyline, map and item and classes options. Here my take is that throughout the game you have a chance for a varirty of keys, maps or artifacts to drop. These when all collected let you visit a new instance area with a goal to achieve. The end result could change your apperance, title and open up new skill tree options.
Even give you access to different item types

So imagine you are playing through the normall game for 35-50+ levels and then you get the right chain of items, then open a portal in town to a nasty really challenging level that only you can go into. You struggle at it for a while, perhaps even have to flag it till your stronger then beat the boss and tada!!! you given the choice of new class evolution IE Pallidan Holy Avenger


Or a familiar or a class specific item, or perhaps the choice to forfeit immediate reward for a recipe to gain access to another class specific region.

Something else that could be better utilised is that if maps are randomly generated then extend that to the non main plot dungeon entrances. So you could run through the "Cloudy platuea" region once and find entrance to "festering lair" that has 2 levels and chest at bottom Yay! or you could come to map again next time and find locked gates to "hall of the hammer" That requires a randomly dropped key.

I firmly believe that Diablos longivity and loyalty is based on the random system and the speed of game play.

Let the power be in what you can possible get and then become not what you can choose from the start. There has to still be incentive all the way through. If I find out at level 40 that my class or sub class is redundent and no mater what items or choices I make, I will be very upset.

Either way I can't wait for it to come out

[Caden]

I can't speak for Hellgate: London with all its class specific armor, but I doubt D3 will be like it since Blizzard didn't make Hellgate.

Why is D1 better than D2 again, because the Warrior can pointlessly learn Fireball?

I can at least think of 7 completely different and still effective playing styles with the Barbarian in D2. I'm not refering to the low tier skills either, as those are ineffective, but 7 is more than with any class in D1.

[Loot_Junkie]

The whole D1 style of anything goes doesn't slide with me.
Why have classes if you are going to do that.
Imagine if a barbarian could freeze a whole mob then whirlwind them.

There should be a conscious decision to take all the pros and cons of a class when you choose it. Also one of the most compelling elements of D2 was that you could choose a another class and get a whole different playing experience.

I mean one of the most exciting and frustrating points is that you could get a great drop but 9 out of 10 times it wouldn't be for your class. So after the initial disapointment of bum drop you would Tp out sell your junk and do the run again or continue through with more hunger than before. This could go on for ages and by the time you finally got something good (which sometimes came from the strangest places) the level of joy experienced would be worth it all.

A broad spectrum suedo class would weaken the fabric of the diablo experience. There is a good reason that unlike thousands of other games Diablo 2 is still selling in stores years after it should have faded into obscurity under the weight of progress. it had hooks in all the right places, change those and its just another inffective and disapointing fishing lure sold on an infomercial and endorsed by a celebrity(blizzard).

[Vidar]

I think for D3 Blizzard needs to "look around" and see what is working for other industry RPG games.

If you want to see how you can cross over 2 classes successfully to build a character all you need do is look at TQ....

If you want to see how to make character generation have an insane amount of choice then look at NWN...

Personally the list could go on however I think it might be time to develop a character building system that is instead of gender limiting or class limiting or race limiting a system that is very open.

What I am meaning is have a very large pool of skills/spells that characters can chose from when ever they level up. Maybe something where as to meet certain requirements for each spell or skill you need to have say 50 intelligence to be able to chose the Lightning spell tree or 50 strength to chose the 2 weapon skill tree or 50 dexterity to be able to chose the Rapid shot tree etc.

Each spell/skill should be upgradeable depending on one of 2 factors maybe an attribute requirement and/or level requirement (not class/race/gender req.).

You would have skill points along with attribute points at each level still but ultimately an open type of character that may be e.g. skilled in the bow but also cast a limited range of spells and handy with the dagger. A level cap would still be required in this sense but I would imagine you could go pretty high.

Another idea would be to have maybe the skills/spells written on ancient learning scrolls or the like so basically you actually have to kill creatures (potentially with simple weaponry or limited combat ability at first) before you get the opportunity to find a drop that gives you that skill/spell to learn? Obviously these skills/spells would enable people to learn and level

Then you may find people trading ancient scrolls with skills/spells also.

Gender could possibly be chosen at the start or race could be chosen at the start - maybe give a little bit of variation in base attributes dependent on race and gender but no limitation on what skills/spells gender or race type can learn.

All and all it would make for a much more open character type.

Thats my thoughts anyways.

[Salidin54]

I mean insurance by making sure that my character will be available until I delete it. I lost 2 characters in D2 1 was a lvl 49 paly and the other was a lvl 29 barb. That just ticked me off and i stopped playing for a year and lost all my item storage characters (which I didn't care about accept for the fact they were holding most of my set items). Blizzard needs to make sure this doesn't happen again.

[TalonKarrde]

I know what you mean I lost a few characters as well, but my main problem with D2 is that after you be normal and nightmare what point is there in playing, I have a level 71 soceress on hell and really since the game is the same just harder what is the point? On D3 i would like to see the storyline change between normal, nightmare and hell.

[Siberys]

Originally Posted by TalonKarrde

I know what you mean I lost a few characters as well, but my main problem with D2 is that after you be normal and nightmare what point is there in playing, I have a level 71 soceress on hell and really since the game is the same just harder what is the point? On D3 i would like to see the storyline change between normal, nightmare and hell.

There isn't much of one other than the challenge of harder enemies and bosses. But some people find this fun nonetheless.

Either way, we should get back on topic guys. This is about Diablo 3 character creations, a comparison to diablo 2 is fine, but ranting about why you hate diablo 2's character system and gameplay is completely off topic.

[Insideout]

I would like to see special class quest, as it was in Diablo 2, most of the classes found a place where they would somehow be respected. (Barbarian returns to harrogath, Amazon amongst the rogues, paladin in kurast, you know the drill). These quests would somehow give the character some sort of advantage, like a new skill or some Item. maybe these quests will be triggered at a certain level and you will be redirected to a place where you possibly would have been before. Let's say that you are a Barbarian, and when you turn level 30, whoever it might be, will redirect you to a certain act city (if there will be one area/act) where you will aquire a quest, either with an objective in a special otherwise unaccsessable place in that "act" or somewhere in the usual area you are in when you turn lvl 30.

[Siberys]

@Insideout

I think they are doing something like that, which is pretty cool.

But...wouldn't paladins be better suited to Lut Gholein, considering Fara, Greiz, all the mercenaries, Jheryn, and Atma are all paladins?

[Salidin54]

I think a lot of post so far have tried to connect D2 with the elder scrolls. The unique system of the diablo series is what sets it apart from others. While cross-classes would be cool, it would just open the door for an uber-kill-everything class that would be used by 1/2 the player community. The current system allows for a balance. While certain combinations of characters in online play are still kick-butt, it encourages cooperation, which is a main goal of the Blizzard games team. The ability to do something over and over again and still have fun is another goal which is encouraged by the fixed class system. For example: Paladin with Thorns + Necro with skeletons/summons makes for an awesome team that is proven to work. This stimulates the idea of 2 friends getting on to have some fun and maybe getting some other people that will add to the strength of their team.

[Scarlet_r0se]

Dead Dekard Cain, one that shuts his mouth.
He talks way too much.