The way stats are placed on items in D4 somewhat reminds me off Diablo 2 and not in a good way. In D2 it was always a pain to actually decide what item to use and what to sell. The reason was that there was such a “wild” variety of stats on items.
Diablo 3 (at least with RoS) in my opinion made a giant step in the right direction as it was much easier to identify useful items in terms of stats on the equipment. Why did the devs decide to basically make a step backwards in terms of this system?
I’m not saying “make it like Diablo 3”. What I am saying though is => don’t make it like Diablo 2. See what worked and think what could be improved on the stats. Right now looking at the items I already started doing what I did in D2 20 years ago. I simply put an item in a slot and check if damage and resist numbers go up or down which doesn’t make it a good system…
Also the stuff with berserk, overcharge or whatever else there is makes this system more convoluted and unnecessarily complicated as you cannot just look at the basic numbers but also have to consider certein synergies which makes it with this wild stat randomization a much bigger annoyance.
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The Synergies are there to give the game some kind of depth at the end of the day. If there was simply attributes, dmg related stuff and legy mods the game would’ve been blunt and boring like… mhhh… Diablo 3 ^^.
“Don’t make like Diablo 2”?
Well. There are two camps regarding D4. Those who want it more like D2 and those who want it more like D3. Ok, maybe a third camp who wants it like PoE…
Blizzard, besides having hell cleaning out their dirty closet the last couple of years, has also had to walk a thin line between these groups. People who want depth and intricate systems they can numbercrunch and theorycraft around til the end of time, and those who wish for a more lighhearted action game they can jump into right away.
What we see here is that compromise. An UI designed for console play with only six bindable skills and full respec options to please the D3 fans. And a darker, more gritty world with more systems and stats to please the D2 fans.
And…as always with a compromise…no one is pleased.
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The item as well as talent systems in PoE are the most convoluted, messy and unnecessarily complicated systems I’ve ever seen in an ARPG. No dev should EVER even remotely consider to use that as a guideline on how to design items or talents.
Personally I prefer systems where important information is easy to identify and utilize. The challenge should always be how you utilize something not in actually identifying relevant information in the first place. This is a reason why I liked the itemization in D3 because was pretty straight forward in most aspects.
You usually have the basic stats (Int, Str,…) and resistance values on most items. Then you had some additional bonuses which still gave clear indication on what they’d do (reduce CC effects on you, increase movement speed for example).
A lot of stat descriptions in D4 are rather vague.
Having something like “increases damage to close enemies” already gives me a headache because where does “close” start and stop? In addition it’s not even clear how or even if as a rogue for example the range weapon stats affect the melee damage. I put a new bow on my rogue which had better stats than the previous weapon (also dex and all stats for example). However my melee damage didn’t change based on my character screen. So that already creates considerable questions regarding items and their use.
In addition in D3 it was quite clear that basic attributes like dexterity had a pretty big impact on the damage of a character. In D4 I’m not even sure how much impact it has at all and whether % based damage bonuses provide better results. I had similar issues in D2 (and extreme problems in PoE).
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I think D4 does a good job having lots of concepts but it does not a good job explaining them to you. Maybe a glossary is needed where you can read descriptions about this kind of concepts.
For the record, Close enemies means melee range. I also had some doubts about wounded enemies (i dont know the exact word they use in the english client, i played on spanish) but on a loading screen tip i could read that wounded means less than 35% of max life. I thought it was some kind of DoT or something.
Once you start getting to know all this wording, items became easier to understand.
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Somewhat easier to understand yes. Easier to identify what to use and what to skip? not so much.
The problem is that it is very difficult to grasp the idea behind quite a few of the stat bonuses. Also the extreme randomness of the stats on the items makes finding useful items even more difficult.
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There is a difference between “Don’t make like Diablo 2” and “Do the contrary of Diablo 2”.
There are more things that must be repeated from Diablo 2, than things that you can add or change from it, as Diablo 2 had the correct approach for making an addicting game in many aspects.
The thing that is possible, though, is to ADD and VARY some stuff. But not REMOVE or do the contrary. This is what Blizzard did not get completely.
According to you. Like I said, Blizzard has a lot of different wishes and wants to please.
For those who liked D3 you can say the same thing. Neither one of us have the knowledge of “the perfect game” and shouldn’t pretend we do either. It’s just a matter of personal preference.
As you can see in OP’s post, he/she wants it to be contrary to D2 because he/she didn’t like the convoluted stats in that game. Whether or not it was convoluted can be discussed but we can’t disregard that the majority of background information around the systems came from unofficial sites with fans testing and calculating the perfect amount of…for example IAS based on the fact that D2 used frames.
There are several stats and effects here in D4 that could be explained better for the average player as well. Right now, when comparing two items, the only thing showing up with a green “+” text is armor or pure dps based on weapon damage/attack speed.
This is my biggest complaint. When trying to reroll a stat you have no idea what the options are, compare this to d3 where it tells you and it’s obvious the devs either intentionally hid the info or neglected to add it. Allegedly they’re going to bring this back in a later season, a lot of players have already complained about it.
It just seems like a very scummy thing to do, considering how expensive re-rolls are how hard getting a perfect rolled loot drop is and then you ruin it because you chose to reroll a stat line that may or may not have what your looking for in it.