Diablo III

Bump. I never realized the sad part of Eirena's personal quest. The rest of her sisters were happy to see her, but Lysa wasn't. :(

So the new season started yesterday. I did a rebirth of my original D3 character, my Witch Doctor, and have him up to 28 already. I also got to visit Whimsyshire for the first time.

This season they're also trying something new: Themed Seasons, with the first theme being the Season of Greed, in which there's double the Treasure Goblins.

I think the double Treasure Goblins might carry over to non-seasonal characters as well; I finally got around to pushing some of my non-seasonal characters past Greater Rift 75 last night (I've never really made much effort to push until I reach a level I can only just clear in 15 minutes, I've mostly stuck to levels I can speed clear) and it wasn't until I ran into a double Gem Hoarder in a normal rift that I noticed the "community buff" icon in the top right of the screen. If that's deliberate, I don't know if it's just for the first few days of the season or for the whole three months.

Playing a Wizard this time, after having played a Monk in Season 11, a Demon Hunter in Season 12, and a Crusader in Season 13. If I can get right the way up to Conqueror again, I'll have the maximum number of stash tabs. (Inevitably, the contents of my stash are like gases; they expand to fill the available space.)

I did wizard last season. This time around I Rebirthed my Witch Doctor. I always hav ea Witch Doctor when they're an option because my screen name on Steam and Battle.net (Zeidoktor) is a play on the Warcraft 3 Troll Witch Doctor ("Someone call for the doctor!"), but with me remembering the line with more accent than was actually there.

Forbes leaks Nintendo switch port with exclisive content for $60, then pulls article, Switch subreddit has pictures.

Not a leak anymore.

Edited by tclittle on Aug 15th 2018 at 3:46:00 AM

Double post:

Diablo III Switch port announcement trailer featuring Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Amie and Blizzard CEO Mike Morhamie

EDIT: Switched out for a version of the announcement with an actual trailer (starts at 1:54).

More info from Eurogamer:

Ganondorf transmog set, Cucco pet, Triforce portrait frame, and a set of wings.

Adventure mode unlocked from the start.

Single Joy Cons can be used, 4-player local co-op wirelessly.

Will require Nintendo Switch Online, but will use Blizzard's cloud service for game saving instead of Nintendo's, even single player as long as you connect to the internet.

Can transfer character's between Switches, but not to and from other platforms.

Cross-play not avalible, but is being considered.

60 fps, 960p docked, 720p handheld.

Edited by tclittle on Aug 16th 2018 at 11:26:52 AM

So a few updates: the Switch port of Diablo III hits the market in both Europe and the Americas on 2 November (cf. Nintendo's page for the game), and probably in Asia (and AUS/NZ?) at around the same time. This happens to be BlizzCon weekend, and Blizzard are teasing that they'll be unveiling other Diablo projects that weekend as well (cf. this video by Blizzard community manager Brandy "Nevalistis" Camel). Speculation is rampant as to what those projects are - Diablo IV seems a likely candidate, unless they're engaging in misdirection (Blizzard? Misdirecting? The very idea!) regarding a Diablo II remaster. But who knows. (Besides a subset of Blizzard staff.)

Season 14 ends on Sunday; I'll miss the double Goblin buff. But then again, Season 15 begins next Friday and will feature a double Horadric Cache buff; all money, materials, Legendary items, and presumably Blood Shards from Horadric Caches will be doubled. (Which will take some of the sting out of farming for an Ancient Ring of Royal Grandeur or Avarice Band, and make reforging Legendaries easier.) I've reached the maximum number of stash tabs, but the Guardian portraits are pretty sharp, so I'll probably still try to get them before season's end (estimated to be around 16 December).

Never played Diablo 3 before. Picked up the Switch version this week.

It's devoured every single minute of my free time. Please send help.

Right now I'm starting off with a Crusader. Started off a bit slow, but now I'm sending death from above while bashing in my enemies' skulls . The gameplay loops is just so addictive. It scratches a similar itch to Monster Hunter I find, where you're compelled to push yourself farther and farther for better loot until you're just hunting/dungeon crawling for the thrill of it.

Yep, that's Diablo for you. D3 used to be pretty bad but has been polished over the years to a mirror shine.

This is before my time, but I think I figured it out. (and "Instant Death" Radius is still funny)

After a crazy amount of grinding, helped along by some group Rift diving earlier today, I managed to complete the first 4 chapters of Season 15's Journey to secure the Roland's Legacy armor set for my Crusader as well as the season exclusive cosmetics.

I was playing the game last night, and one of the things the Wizard likes to say became painfully ironic: "I am unstoppable!" And I mean the "painfully" part literally. It seemed and especially felt like my resistance to fire suddenly became insultingly low. So I could dish it out, but I couldn't take it. x_x

Bump with some good news. I got to the secret pony level for the first time, and it is glorious! XD

Of course you had an appropriate avatar.

Whoever had the idea of giving the primordial scavengers Illusionist powers should be punched in the face, and be forced to watch the movie Bridesmaids. x_x >.<

I'm playing the game again thanks to some of the patch changes. The boost to the Legacy of Nightmares set has really pumped my Lighting Wizard up, although finding ancient legendaries that have synergy with my build is difficult. I took my Leapquake Barbarian up to GR 74 and there's lots of room for her to go farther. This many years later, Diablo III is great in small doses but gets boring after increasingly short periods of time.

I'm lukewarm on the possibility of a Diablo IV, but Blizzard will earn the benefit of the doubt as long as they put in enough effort to show that they are trying to craft an interesting ongoing narrative. And not trying to pollute the game with microtransactions!

One of my friends once said there might be another expansion for Diablo III, and it would take place in the Wizard's homeland. :) It doesn't look like anything's coming from it, though. :(

Fairly sure that Blizzard have quashed the notion of any further expansion packs for Diablo III; there was one in the pipeline, but it was cancelled and the developers assigned to other projects.

And yet, even as the game slides to the bottom of Blizzard's priority list along with Heroes of the Storm, I still enjoy it. I'm only a few hours into Season 16, but I like the possibilities offered by the free Ring of Royal Grandeur bonus all season. I'm playing a Barbarian for the first time ever in a season (after having played Crusader, Demon Hunter, Monk, Witch Doctor, and Wizard twice each), and I've finished Chapter IV (and Slayer, in fact) already so I have the full Immortal King set; I'm still deciding whether to stick with the Hammer of the Ancients build or get some pieces of the Raekor set for a Charge build. (I'm not the most skilled player at the latter build; my charges of Furious Charge keep running out at the worst possible times thanks to poor density management.)

On the one hand, I'm enjoying the shot in the arm the latest patch has given many builds (outside Necromancer builds). Finally, Inna's Mantra can crack the upper echelons of the leaderboards (the Legacy of Nightmares buff has also caused a Wave of Light build using said rings to emerge as a top tier build), and the same for the Leapquake build for Barbarian, and every Crusader set that isn't Armour of Akkhan (as much as I enjoy the Condemn build, or "Vacuum Cleaner of Death" as my groupmates and I know it, it's nice to see some variety).

On the other hand, apparently the collective Demon Hunter community has decided variety just isn't their cup of tea again and has gone back to only ever using the Shadow Impale (AKA "ninja") build - apart from the odd Natalya/Marauder hybrid player and the very occasional Unhallowed Essence player. Pity.

There's a good chance I could push Greater Rifts into the mid-90s at least with six character classes (I can't keep my Necromancers alive for long enough to make a serious push with them; if they die once, they'll keep dying over and over until I abandon the Greater Rift), although so far I'm concentrating on speed clearing mid-80s rifts to level legendary gems for augments, as many of my builds have few, if any, pieces of augmented gear.

Edited by mlsmithca on Jan 22nd 2019 at 3:55:29 PM

From Diablofans: Lore Loose Ends: Imperius, Archangel of Valor

The dubious grammar of this piece aside (the mixing of tenses makes me unmixably tense), it does point out plenty of loose ends that could develop into a story for Diablo IV.

Speaking of Diablo 4...

Looks like it got leaked thanks to an advertisement for a Diablo art book.

Edited by TargetmasterJoe on Oct 21st 2019 at 12:36:13 PM

-talks like Neo- Whoa.

I'd prefer that you not use a URL shortener when posting. It makes it hard to tell if the link is legit.

Anyway, I'd love to see D4 happen, as long as they don't turn it into a microtransaction-infested grind.

Fixed the URL.

After the Hong Kong hating fiasco going on, I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes exactly that.

Why would that have anything to do with Diablo IV's monetization model, if any? They aren't going to add microtransactions to punish gamers who dared to speak up against the Chinese government. They'll add them because Activision is calling the shots and Activision is greedy.

I meant how Blizzard is actively doing things the Internet hate, like banning people exercising their freedom of speech or make their content a load of micropaying BS.

I mean, did anyone up there think anyone would look forward to a Diablo game for smartphones?