Diablo III --Impressions start on page 36 --

[Arclight]

 

Started a wizzy myself a few days ago. Mind sharing what the "trick" thing is?
 

[CeeKay]

Korean Government Raids Blizzard Offices Over Diablo 3 Launch:

Blizzard can add the Korean Fair Trade Commission to the list of people who were less than pleased about the way it handled the Diablo 3 launch. The FTC raided the game company’s Seoul office on Monday following reports that it denied refunds to eligible gamers, reports the Korea Times.

“We have received many complaints from Diablo 3 users,” FTC spokesman Kim Hyung-bae told the Times. The organization is launching an investigation

The twelve-year wait for the new Diablo game proved anticlimactic for users across the globe when a massive wave of traffic shut down Blizzard’s servers and subjected legions of would-be demon slayers to the unstoppable force of “error 37.” Since Diablo 3 is an online-only game, it meant that even people who only wanted to play single player still found themselves incapable of signing into Battle.net.

Blizzard apparently refused dissatisfied Korean gamers refunds based on sales contract agreements, and the FTC is looking into whether or not those contracts are unfairly keeping gamers from getting their money back after they discover problems with the game.

[Victoria Raverna]

Korean Government Raids Blizzard Offices Over Diablo 3 Launch:

Blizzard can add the Korean Fair Trade Commission to the list of people who were less than pleased about the way it handled the Diablo 3 launch. The FTC raided the game company’s Seoul office on Monday following reports that it denied refunds to eligible gamers, reports the Korea Times.

“We have received many complaints from Diablo 3 users,” FTC spokesman Kim Hyung-bae told the Times. The organization is launching an investigation

The twelve-year wait for the new Diablo game proved anticlimactic for users across the globe when a massive wave of traffic shut down Blizzard’s servers and subjected legions of would-be demon slayers to the unstoppable force of “error 37.” Since Diablo 3 is an online-only game, it meant that even people who only wanted to play single player still found themselves incapable of signing into Battle.net.

Blizzard apparently refused dissatisfied Korean gamers refunds based on sales contract agreements, and the FTC is looking into whether or not those contracts are unfairly keeping gamers from getting their money back after they discover problems with the game.

I hope Blizzard and other publishers learn the right lesson from this. They didn't learn from the Ubisoft's DRM backlash.

[Roman]

Happy to report that I beat Diablo last night after 25.5 hrs @ level 31 with my Barbarian @ 600dps. Yes I am a noodler who likes to explore/destroy everything on the map and I was in no rush.

Really enjoyed the game - struggling to decide if I should create a new character or continue into Nightmare with my barbarian.

[wonderpug]

I just beat the game last night as well, and I'm also struggling to decide whether or not to switch characters.  Aside from Nightmare combat being more interesting, it's just so much more fun having so many more skill & rune options opened up.

What I really want to do is switch classes but still be able to play with a level 30 character on the new difficulty level.  If Blizzard had character buying/selling implemented, I think I might actually be tempted to fork over real monies to be able to skip past easy mode on a few more classes.

[Clanwolfer]

I've beaten the game with my Witch Doctor - I started Nightmare a little bit, and it is fun, but I think I'm going to get my other four characters through Normal pretty quick too. It's more fun keeping a bunch of characters close, as I can use about any well-rolled rare drop on somebody.

[Harkonis]

Just finished Nightmare, and am halfway through Act 1 on Hell and it is even more fun now.  Playing this and Dragon's Dogma with both Mechwarriors on the horizon and I feel like I'm in gaming heaven

[Teggy]

Skeleton King on Hell took a BEATING. He wasn't that difficult to kill, but it just took a long time. The difference between Nightmare and Hell was pretty clear. Of course, I really haven't used the auction house at all - gearing up probably would have helped.

[leo8877]

I started Hell last night too and really got owned by packs of elites.  WTF invulnerable???

[Misguided]

Happy to report that I beat Diablo last night after 25.5 hrs @ level 31 with my Barbarian @ 600dps. Yes I am a noodler who likes to explore/destroy everything on the map and I was in no rush.

Really enjoyed the game - struggling to decide if I should create a new character or continue into Nightmare with my barbarian.

Tough call, but I was playing in act I of NM last night with my barb and it was fantastic. New mob abilities (and in combo with old ones), a new event or two, gems from the start, rates, blacksmith and jeweler pages....

My first Waller desecrator pack was a blast.

[Nonnahob]

Roman you should continue on. You haven't seen all the effects of runes on your skills! The game gets to be a lot more fun as stuff opens up as you level.

[Blackjack]

I started Hell last night too and really got owned by packs of elites.  WTF invulnerable???

Diablo Inc Gamers had a post looking into that a bit:

Are Invulnerable Minions Challenging or Imba?
http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/are-invulnerable-minions-challenging-or-imba
*If like me, you're out of the loop on all this leet speak, "imba" generally means something in a game (usually online variety) is deemed "imbalanced" and probably needs adjusting.

Lylirra [Blizzard rep]:Speaking in general about monster affixes:

The intention is for there to be differences in the difficulties of the monster packs. Some are hard, some are easy — and some may seem impossible. When you are first beginning Inferno, you can pick off the easy ones without much challenge, but you may have to skip some of the harder ones. That’s okay. As you become more powerful, you can survive better, deal more damage, and take on some of the affix packs you previously chose to avoid. And after gearing up even further, eventually you can take them all on. It won’t be a cakewalk, but you won’t run in abject terror the next time you see that Invulnerable Minions combo pack sauntering your way (okay…you might run a little). Certain monster affixes will also punish certain skill builds more than others, as many of our affixes do.

We’ve been watching feedback closely about all the affix types and we’ve seen a lot of responses to concerns such as “I have no problem with them” or “use skill X instead and you’ll be fine” or “I used to have trouble but then I got some X gear and now I’m fine”. This is what we intend to happen over time.

Speaking of Invulnerable Minions specifically:

All that said, we definitely are paying attention to your feedback (as mentioned earlier), and we’ll make adjustments to monster affixes as we see necessary. We will always intend that some affixes are harder than others, and we’ll mostly be making adjustments to ensure some affixes aren’t radically out of line.

I'm not sure I've run into that. I do remember running into some groups where either the summoner or his minions seemed impervious to nearly everything my follower and I threw.

[Nonnahob]

I ran into invulnerable minions in act 1 of hell. Can't imagine if they were invulnerable mortar or something. It was not a fun 5 minutes of kiting.

[Orgull]

Just started INFERNO!!! Didn't seem so bad at first. Then a Risen in the first "Cellar" I encountered, one-shotted me. The loot drops are obscene. Everything has stats WAY higher than anything that dropped in Hell.

I'm a level 60 Wizard, with 54814 Life and dealing 9132.73 DPS. Just finished the fight against Captain Daltyn in Adria's Hidden Cellar. The fight took over two minutes and I was near death several times. Thank goodness for Teleport with Fracture.

There is  going to be some white-knuckle combat ahead!

[The Grue]

Had a weird thing happen where I was in the final section of Act 3 on Nightmare with some people in my game.  When I would teleport back to town it would bring me to New Tristram instead of the Keep.  Then, a bit later, I got this message with a countdown timer saying the Act was going to end.  Then suddenly I was in the second section of Act 4.  Anyone run into something like this?

[Arclight]

Back with the 41 Monk I have, in Act 2 of Nightmare. I'm not sure what I feel about the game at this point. The drops are a bit baffling at times. The armor will be more and a stat or two, but the life will be rediculously lower than the item I have equipped. It just doesn't make sense. Also the quality and class specific drops are, for the most part meh.
I know what makes these games tick. The combat and the drops. I'm loosing interest fast..even thinking of starting up SWToR while I have a few days left on my cancelled account.

I guess the attention for me now switches to Guild Wars 2.

At least with the Diablo games you can pretty much be confident they will continue to tweak the game. Unless the rumors of Mr. Blizzard and Mrs. EA becoming better than just good friends is true.(comparison wise)

[Mikagami]

New gear outta AH
13k hp
5287 armor
5450.15 dps
67% damage reduction
49-89 varying resistances.

Skilled for damage reduction, Tough as Nails + Nerves of Steel

...
......
.......... still dying to elites near the end of Act I:Hell.

Why am I still going with this barbarian...

[Harkonis]

random drops are random.  not sure why everything feels that every single drop should be good, an upgrade, or even decent.  Crap happens, and so do amazing drops.

[leo8877]

46 monk and 55 wd and I still haven't see a legendary or a recipe drop.  Anyone else finding recipes?  Are they only in Inferno or something?

[Misguided]

I got a recipe for a crappy white staff off diablo in normal. That's the only one I've seen so far (in act I NM).

[leo8877]

46 monk and 55 wd and I still haven't see a legendary or a recipe drop.  Anyone else finding recipes?  Are they only in Inferno or something?

And just like that I got a legendary to drop.

EDIT:  But it's no good for my class.  Woo.

[Harkonis]

I got a recipe for a crappy white staff off diablo in normal. That's the only one I've seen so far (in act I NM).

That 'crappy' staff is the secret level key.

[The Grue]

Rolled up a Hardcore Monk last night and played with a couple of friends.  Definitely fun knowing that if you die, it's for good.  We played long enough to beat the Skeleton King and it will be a weekly Friday night get-together kind of thing.  Will be cool to see how far we can make it before one of us dies.

[Toe]

New gear outta AH
13k hp
5287 armor
5450.15 dps
67% damage reduction
49-89 varying resistances.

Skilled for damage reduction, Tough as Nails + Nerves of Steel

...
......
.......... still dying to elites near the end of Act I:Hell.

Why am I still going with this barbarian...

Not sure what level you are but at nightmare diablo i switched to a build similar to this

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#WeYVPR!bed!aaZcZZ

I use a shield and focus on vitality+strength stuff and life on hit is also nice. Some elites are very very easy. Basically the strat is to get 5 stacks of frenzy going then pop your wrath of berzerker. The goal is to take out 1-2 of a pack before wrath expires.

[Misguided]

I got a recipe for a crappy white staff off diablo in normal. That's the only one I've seen so far (in act I NM).

That 'crappy' staff is the secret level key.

Hahaha, I had no idea! I should have clicked on the staff in the list after I learned the recipe.

[Crusis]

Well crap. I guess I got hacked. My level 30 Witch Doctor was missing all of his gear, money, and my game was reset to the beginning when I logged in this morning. Lame. I added the authenticator thingy to my account.

[Dunamis]

I had a weird thing happen to me.  I had just killed Diablo in normal mode and played far enough in nightmare mode to kill the blacksmith's wife.  Logged off last night.  When I logged on this morning, I was back at the very beginning of nightmare where you first go into town, meet Leah, etc.  It's like my account was rolled back.  None of my stuff was missing though.  Weird.

Also, I had yet to see any recipe drops at all until this morning where I had about 12 blacksmith and 10+ jeweler recipe drops in about 90 minutes of playing.

[ericb]

I had a weird thing happen to me.  I had just killed Diablo in normal mode and played far enough in nightmare mode to kill the blacksmith's wife.  Logged off last night.  When I logged on this morning, I was back at the very beginning of nightmare where you first go into town, meet Leah, etc.  It's like my account was rolled back.  None of my stuff was missing though.  Weird.

Also, I had yet to see any recipe drops at all until this morning where I had about 12 blacksmith and 10+ jeweler recipe drops in about 90 minutes of playing.

Did you play a multiplayer game or join another's game (even if they dropped) when you were doing this?  If so then your "saved" game was completely separate from the game you were playing.  It would have actually reset for you when you finished normal and started at the beginning of nightmare the next day.

[Dunamis]

Did you play a multiplayer game or join another's game (even if they dropped) when you were doing this?  If so then your "saved" game was completely separate from the game you were playing.  It would have actually reset for you when you finished normal and started at the beginning of nightmare the next day.

Good thought but no, I was playing solo.  Oh well, I played some more this afternoon and everything seems fine.

[Harpua3]

Oh boy here we go again. Sitting down to play for a few hrs starting at around 1 am. I'm telling myself I'll be off by 3.. NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

[leo8877]

Oh boy here we go again. Sitting down to play for a few hrs starting at around 1 am. I'm telling myself I'll be off by 3.. NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

lol

[Misguided]

Also, I had yet to see any recipe drops at all until this morning where I had about 12 blacksmith and 10+ jeweler recipe drops in about 90 minutes of playing.

Those aren't recipes. You use those to level up the crafters and also to make the higher end items/gems.

[Arclight]

I think I'm gonna go into farming mode for a few levels. I see now that the AH is meant to be the focal point of acquiring the best items. I find the drops of any significance are few and far between.

I've been reading that on nightmare, which is what I'll be farming, the crypts are a good spot. You are basically farming the ashes that are very numerous in the crypts.
I started buying gear yesterday with high "find gold" stats on them. I'm only at about 70% at the moment but as the money starts flowing in I want to get around 150 - 200%.

I don't mind farming in diablo, you never know you just might get that.."Barrack bomba bastard sword of democratic vengeance" with very high stats of, "huge envy of the Canadian health care system"

Ok, putting on my farming clothes and heading for the fields.

[Misguided]

As far as finding the best gear on the AH, that makes sense, doesn't it? I mean millions of people are playing, and tens of thousands are posting items. There's a good chance that there are better items than what I have among those tens of thousands of people posting stuff. That's the nature of the random loot system.

Diablo is a slot machine where the domination of the currency varies. You've won 500 (a rare dropped) but is it Pounds or Pesos?

[Harpua3]

Oh boy here we go again. Sitting down to play for a few hrs starting at around 1 am. I'm telling myself I'll be off by 3.. NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

lol

I was correct... Played until 530 am.. This is not even getting remotely boring yet..

[Dunamis]

Also, I had yet to see any recipe drops at all until this morning where I had about 12 blacksmith and 10+ jeweler recipe drops in about 90 minutes of playing.

Those aren't recipes. You use those to level up the crafters and also to make the higher end items/gems.

Yes, thanks, I finally figured it out when I tried to level my Jeweler.  Makes sense now...

[Arclight]

As far as finding the best gear on the AH, that makes sense, doesn't it? I mean millions of people are playing, and tens of thousands are posting items. There's a good chance that there are better items than what I have among those tens of thousands of people posting stuff. That's the nature of the random loot system.

Diablo is a slot machine where the domination of the currency varies. You've won 500 (a rare dropped) but is it Pounds or Pesos?

Yeah, looking at it like that makes sense. Its just that a big part of the fun for me in these types of games, is the anticipation of the next drop. If I've pretty much resigned myself to just farming the "cash" to buy what I want. I'm sure things will get tweaked and re-tweak for a few years to come. No panic here, yet. 

[JCC]

Finally finished Normal last night after a few hour marathon gaming session. I have only been playing one character (a barbarian). I finished at level 32 with 27 hours and 27 minutes time played.

Overall, I think the game is great. I think it is in nearly every way a great improvement over Diablo 2. All the little streamlining they did from the UI, inventory, skills, frequent checkpoints and waypoints, etc. has made my overall experience much better. I wasn't overly impressed with the graphics when I first played the game on open beta weekend, but they definitely grew on me.

I thought Act 3 in particular was a blast. Thank god they didn't make me go through that damned jungle again.

The big complaint for me is the way it's so deeply tied to a server like a MMO. Forgetting about issues about DRM or crappy launch issues, my main complaint is that of performance. Being shackled to the whims of a server creates real problems when playing the game. I experienced lots of rubber banding and issues with phantom enemies that I am swinging at and missing because they aren't there any more but I haven't caught up with that yet. These things really break immersion and irritate me. I really hope they can clean up the performance of their server(s) and these issues are temporary.

Anyway, thumbs way up. I think I'll dip my toe in Nightmare before starting an alt...

Edit: Forgot to mention my chief complaint about the game. I really wish this had come out 5-7 years ago. I would have been delirious over this game back then. I just don't understand why they had to wait 12 years to get this out. My interest in this genre has waned since 2000, and I know that while this game is far, far better than its predecessor, I will never come anywhere near to playing it as much.

[Teggy]

Fast molten invulnerable minions - first time I decided to quit out rather than try and beat the monsters. F that.

[rshetts2]

Fast molten invulnerable minions - first time I decided to quit out rather than try and beat the monsters. F that.

lol.  Yeah some of those combinations can get down right nasty.  I had some molten, jailer, buffed health mobs that were damned near impossible.