Poll:How many of you are with the "always online" policy for D3 and how many against?

[shortylickens]

Why so much drama and angst over such a shit game ?

I can't believe Blizzard actually released this piece of shit. First time I've seen them put out a crap game.

Ummm, sounds like you just answered your own question.

 

[KMFJD]

D3 is a MultiPlayerOnlineRolePlayingGame (MORPG) with a real money auction house, the AH is the only Massive part and if access to the AH allows it to be labeled a MassivelyMUltiplayerOnlineRolePlayingGame (MMORPG) than i guess we agree to disagree.

 

[zinfamous]

Invincimonks were popular for a while, but they can only farm specific areas. Anytime you run into an enchantment stripping mob your monk pretty much takes it up the butt. Elementalist/Monk has a lot of mana, but their heals are also a little less effective because they lack the divinie favor buffs. I suppose if you had some elite mana regen skills an Elementalist could be a pretty effective healer?

Also I find it very hard to believe that anyone beat the entire campaign using only henchmen lol, they were worthless after about level 10, I couldn't even do it with heroes. The only time I ever enjoyed the game was when I got lucky with a really competent group, probably cause I never cared to join a good Guild. Most of the random pick up groups I joined were pretty bad... but even the worst players I found were better than henchmen.

It's true, but eventually, heroes became far far better at healing than people. The AI is so good now, that they effeciently target the most necessary group member for the most relevant need. Nec/Rit is a great healer (Teamed with an MM), because soul reaping + constant minion death gives them constant mana, with little to no degen. Casting is fast, too, so it is constant heals.

Overall, Rit tends to have the best skill line for heals as it is. The important thing to accept (this was also true when monks were used, but people denied this)--is that the best healing was done through preventing damage--not repairing it. Rits pump out spirits that leave a persistent damage-reduction buff and debuff, as well as quick, constant group heals. Condition/curse removal as well.

One thing GW does very well is treat healing properly--it is not "make red bar go up;" it is "keep red bar from dropping." There are still some good monk healing builds that make "red bar go up" quite effectively (with NF elites), but they are out of favor, simply because no one plays monks to heal, and rit healing heroes add so much more than simple heals--they offer amazing crowd-control spirit shields with their rituals.

 

[thespyder]

D3 is a MultiPlayerOnlineRolePlayingGame (MORPG) with a real money auction house, the AH is the only Massive part and if access to the AH allows it to be labeled a MassivelyMUltiplayerOnlineRolePlayingGame (MMORPG) than i guess we agree to disagree.

Wait a minute. Since when was Diablo a Role playing game? It's a hack and slash loot fest.

 

[RPD]

Wait a minute. Since when was Diablo a Role playing game? It's a hack and slash loot fest.

Uh when you gain exp, level up and gain better skills, its an RPG, more specifically an action RPG.

 

[zinfamous]

Uh when you gain exp, level up and gain better skills, its an RPG, more specifically an action RPG.

:hmm:

 

[thespyder]

Uh when you gain exp, level up and gain better skills, its an RPG, more specifically an action RPG.

LOLOLOLOL... I was being sarcastic... I guess it is sometimes hard to tell on the internet. See, the best way to tell if I am being sarcastic is that my lips move.

 

[RPD]

:hmm:

 

[shortylickens]

Uh when you gain exp, level up and gain better skills, its an RPG, more specifically an action RPG.

No its not. Its just an action RPG, which isnt an RPG. But for some reason so many people are so incredibly ignorant we just keep calling it that.

 

[PrayForDeath]

No its not. Its just an action RPG, which isnt an RPG. But for some reason so many people are so incredibly ignorant we just keep calling it that.

Semantics

 

[shortylickens]

Semantics

THATS WHAT WERE ARGUING ABOUT!

 

[Aikouka]

THATS WHAT WERE ARGUING ABOUT!

D:

I forgot what we were arguing about pages ago!

 

[shortylickens]

D:

I forgot what we were arguing about pages ago!

We're nerds. We'll probably argue about the color of poo eventually.

 

[thejunglegod]

Wait Wait Wait! Never thought of this. So if because of some unmentioned catastrophe, Blizzard closes down, it means no more D3 servers which means no more Diablo3 in the future?

 

[zinfamous]

We're nerds. We'll probably argue about the color of poo eventually.

mine is green

 

[borisvodofsky]

ok boris, i want to sell you a car but i get to decide when you're able to use it. still want to buy?
if i don't let you use the car, you can just go do something else all day instead of going to work, visiting relatives or go shopping. who needs that anyway?

and may i remind you that you are in the PC Gaming forum? if you prefer doing something other than gaming go find a forum for that, and stay out of ours.

Yea, I'm quite ok with buying that car, if You get to tell me when to use it twice a year.

do the math. 52 week in a year, that's 100-120 holidays depending on if you're jewish.

So the twice a year has a 1/3 chance of landing on a holiday each, so a 1/9 chance of both being holidays.

The point I'm making is, Its effect is really NOT A BIG DEAL. You guys are not looking at the big picture.

 

[rchiu]

Yea, I'm quite ok with buying that car, if You get to tell me when to use it twice a year.

do the math. 52 week in a year, that's 100-120 holidays depending on if you're jewish.

So the twice a year has a 1/3 chance of landing on a holiday each, so a 1/9 chance of both being holidays.

The point I'm making is, Its effect is really NOT A BIG DEAL. You guys are not looking at the big picture.

Heh maybe you got some fetish and love to get screwed by companies, but the rest of us will certainly have problem with cars that could break down while I am on the road, may not start when I gotta use it to get to an interview or date with hot chic, or maybe a TV won't turn on when I want to watch my favorite show, or fridge that can decide to turn off couple of hours on any given day.

But yeah, of course to someone who love it up in where the sun dont shine wouldn't think it's a big deal.

 

[thespyder]

Wait Wait Wait! Never thought of this. So if because of some unmentioned catastrophe, Blizzard closes down, it means no more D3 servers which means no more Diablo3 in the future?

Absolutely. However it is worse than that. I anticipate that within five years (give or take) Blizzard will determine that primary sales have depleted and that the only sales being made are third party. They get to make the decision that they would then much rather support the next iteration of the franchise rather than continue to support Diablo 3 considering that their profit margin has dropped yet their cost outlay has not. So they shut it off. Why continue to finance servers and maintenance for a five year old game if they can grind out a new thing that they can "Fill the void" with and turn a profit again.

They get to control the market. They get to make money on micro-transactions. They get Fanbois trumpeting how great they are for providing an "Secure and Hack free" game. And they get to decided when the third party market is getting ahead of itself and pull the plug.

 

[darkewaffle]

Absolutely. However it is worse than that. I anticipate that within five years (give or take) Blizzard will determine that primary sales have depleted and that the only sales being made are third party. They get to make the decision that they would then much rather support the next iteration of the franchise rather than continue to support Diablo 3 considering that their profit margin has dropped yet their cost outlay has not. So they shut it off. Why continue to finance servers and maintenance for a five year old game if they can grind out a new thing that they can "Fill the void" with and turn a profit again.

They get to control the market. They get to make money on micro-transactions. They get Fanbois trumpeting how great they are for providing an "Secure and Hack free" game. And they get to decided when the third party market is getting ahead of itself and pull the plug.

Yea, Blizzard has such a terrible track record supporting their legacy products after all. I wish I could still play Diablo and Diablo 2 and Starcraft and Warcraft 2 and Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft online.

They're also just greedy profiteers. I mean they churn out a new Diablo game every, what, decade? What a bunch of assholes, clearly all they care about is money, just capitalizing on the Diablo name once every ten years.

 

[thespyder]

Yea, Blizzard has such a terrible track record supporting their legacy products after all. I wish I could still play Diablo and Diablo 2 and Starcraft and Warcraft 2 and Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft online.

They're also just greedy profiteers. I mean they churn out a new Diablo game every, what, decade? What a bunch of assholes, clearly all they care about is money, just capitalizing on the Diablo name once every ten years.

LOL. Man, do I love this guy.

So I am guessing that Diablo 1 and 2 require dedicated servers to play on the way Diablo 3 does? And the same for Starcraft and Warcraft 1-3? Oh wait. No. they don't.

And how many expansions has World of Warcraft had? Expansions that are purchasable? Not to mention the fact that WOW has an online monthly service fee, which none of the other games listed have. It's continuing to make money for the company, unlike the others mentioned.

Just curious, are you aware WHY Diablo 3 took so long to come out? It was in development in 2005 after all. Could it have something to do with it being pulled from Blizzard North? And the entire team finding other gainful employment? Ever heard of a game called Torchlight? In other words, the people who made Diablo 1 and 2 are not the same people who made 3.

And since Diablo 1 and 2 don't require online servers hosted by Blizzard, they have no control over the lifespan of the game. Not so with diablo 3.

And that doesn't even mention Activision.

So, different people making the game. An additional cost outlay in the form of server upkeep and maintenance which isn't present in the other non MMO games listed. A company that shows it has no problem being cutthroat with it's own employees just to make a buck. And absolutely no comparison between any of the games you are putting up as 'Examples' of Blizzard being altruistic towards it's gamers.

Would STRONGLY recommend that you get some facts before you spout off.

 

[JoPh]

there should be i dont care.

 

[gladiatorua]

Always-online would have been better if they had done it Guild Wars style.

Q: Uptime and Patching
Plenty of games frankly suck when it comes to patching and uptime. While you guys have been awesome when it comes to the speeds for patch downloads, how do you guys see server downtime looking when updates come along?
For comparison, I'm looking at Rift (awesome with downtime) vs Blizzard (abysmal with downtime).


A: Guild Wars 2 should expect to have the same amount of down time that Guild Wars 1 has had (which is about 32 hours total give or take a few). We don't need to take our servers down to patch.
~z
Note: This doesn't count internet routing issues that interfere with gameplay.

Our downtime is extremely minimal between builds. You'll basically be out of the game long enough to restart the client and download the new data.
Multi-hour downtimes? Not in Guild Wars 2.
-Ferg

32 hours of downtime in 8 years. D3 achieved this number.... in a week?

 

[darkewaffle]

LOL. Man, do I love this guy.

So I am guessing that Diablo 1 and 2 require dedicated servers to play on the way Diablo 3 does? And the same for Starcraft and Warcraft 1-3?

And how many expansions has Warcraft? Expansions that are purchasable? Not to mention the fact that Warcraft has an online monthly service fee, which none of the other games listed have. It's continuing to make money for the company, unlike the others mentioned.

Just curious, are you aware WHY Diablo 3 took so long to come out? It was in development in 2005 after all. Could it have something to do with it being pulled from Blizzard North? And the entire team finding other gainful employment? In other words, the people who made Diablo 1 and 2 are not the same people who made 3.

And since Diablo 1 and 2 don't require online servers hosted by Blizzard, they have no control over the lifespan of the game. Not so with diablo 3.

So, different people making the game. An additional cost outlay in the form of server upkeep and maintenance. A company that shows it has no problem being cutthroat with it's own employees just to make a buck. And absolutely no comparison between any of the games you are putting up as 'Examples' of Blizzard being altruistic towards it's gamers.

Would STRONGLY recommend that you get some facts before you spout off.

Yes, yes they do. Diablo 2 battle.net games are hosted by Blizzard, that is beyond a shadow of a doubt. One only has to look at the methodology of hunting an Annihilus Charm for proof (SoJ counter is IP based, each IP is a server [rack/farm]). D2 did also offer p2p connections over TCP/IP but it wasn't 'true' online play as the drops/progression were still locally stored.

Diablo 1 I believe did use a p2p architecture for the actual games but the 'matchmaking' and data provided to the UI would still have been centralized at Blizzard; also I do not know whether multiplayer characters were stored locally or remotely. As for the RTS games, any sort of ladder play or matchmaking will require a central service from Blizzard in order to function/track, though off the top of my head I do not know whether the games themselves were hosted server side or client side.

Suffice to say as long as a game interacts with battle.net, it requires Blizzard resources.

In spite of Blizzard North employees leaving the Diablo project, Starcraft 2 also still took 12 years and WC3 took seven years without similar setbacks. So they appear to work in fairly long cycles regardless of circumstance. But if all they wanted was to just capitalize on their franchises, why would they kill titles like Starcraft Ghost or Warcraft: Lord of the Clans? Further, why not halfass the rest of the "original" D3 and release it so that they could put out D4 now?

When you use the word facts, you should probably put it in quotation marks.

 

[thespyder]

Suffice to say as long as a game interacts with battle.net, it requires Blizzard resources.

And these games Require battle.net to function in any capacity? Because I have played Diablo 1 and 2 for 12 years now and only recently obtained my Battlenet account for the first time. Never had a problem. (Ok, I might have had an account 10 years ago, but it certainly hasn't been active in the last 8 despite playing consistently on Diablo 2 in that time). And if Blizzard were to get hit by a meteorite tomorrow, i would still be able to play Diablo 1-2 and Warcraft 1-3 for the next ten years. Not so with Diablo 3, which would stop on impact.

 

[Wyndru]

And these games Require battle.net to function in any capacity? Because I have played Diablo 1 and 2 for 12 years now and only recently obtained my Battlenet account for the first time. Never had a problem. (Ok, I might have had an account 10 years ago, but it certainly hasn't been active in the last 8 despite playing consistently on Diablo 2 in that time). And if Blizzard were to get hit by a meteorite tomorrow, i would still be able to play Diablo 1-2 and Warcraft 1-3 for the next ten years. Not so with Diablo 3, which would stop on impact.

I think the point of his post was that you don't have to worry about Blizzard abandoning anyone, especially since they still keep the bnet servers running for d1 and d2 multiplayer after so many years. They even put out patches for D2 still.

A meteorite would have to hit a number of server farms around the world for it to cease.

I do understand what you are saying though, D3 is the first one to have a server only requirement, and if Blizz ever decided to pull the plug, it would essentially stop anyone from playing the game again. I wonder if it would be possible to allow a patch that would make it single player. I doubt it since most of the npc ai is done on the server side.