Diablo III: Reaper of Souls - Preview @ Ausgamers

Couchpotato

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Ausgamers has started a new beta diary of their time spent playing Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls. The entry deals with the improved loot system, or better known as Loot 2.0.

Loot 2.0 is a big change to the core Diablo gameplay, as even the item stats have been overhauled (again) to take into account the more sought after higher level attributes like Life On Hit, Life On Kill, Critical Damage, and so forth. Item comparisons are now divided into three groups, damage, toughness, and healing which take into account a larger variety of attributes. These big changes made across the board work wonders into instilling new life into a game that was feeling more than a little stale of late, as well as probably winning over players who gave up on the game pretty early on. Even with improved item drops and legendary items that you’ll actually get to see and use, sometimes it’s even the little things that can make you take notice. Health potions are no longer tiered and now come in a single variety called just that, health potions, which heal your character for 60% of their life. You also no longer have to pick them up, as they’re now automatically acquired like gold.
More information.
 
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This man is not nearly jaded enough; but the new system sounds like a vast improvement, over the old.
 
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I wonder how many are going to stick to their "price too high for an expansion, wont buy" resolution...
 
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I can't be the only one that keeps misreading the title of these newsbits as POS.
 
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Dear Green Place
I can't be the only one that keeps misreading the title of these newsbits as POS.
The game title is to long in the news-bit on the frontage. I changed it back. You can now see what I'm talking about. I hate when titles are to long.:)
I wonder how many are going to stick to their "price too high for an expansion, wont buy" resolution…
I still haven't bought the original. So that should answer your question.
 
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I have not bought it either. Even 1.5+ years after release, its still cost £23 to buy in UK!!!! I guess only Blizzard can get away with such high prices for an "old" PC game? (this is the steam discounts talking lol)
 
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The only bad thing about the expansion/patch is the removal of the RMAH. I actually loved that aspect of the game - it was just stupid to force it on players.
 
At this point I'm waiting for Grim Dawn to release as the best candidate to possibly slate my thirst for diablo-style game-play. For me at least. almost anything they do to Diablo III is too little too late to recapture my interest.
 
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The game title is to long in the news-bit on the frontage. I changed it back. You can now see what I'm talking about. I hate when titles are to long.:)
Relax, Couch. I wasn't exactly complaining.
 
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Dear Green Place
The game title is to long in the news-bit on the frontage. I changed it back. You can now see what I'm talking about. I hate when titles are to long.:)
I didn't say you were.;) I just explained why I shortened the title.
At this point I'm waiting for Grim Dawn to release as the best candidate to possibly slate my thirst for diablo-style game-play. For me at least. almost anything they do to Diablo III is too little too late to recapture my interest.
I agree with you. I find it funny though. I hated Diablo 3 because you needed to be online to play Single-player. Yet I love playing Path of Exile, and it is a F2P MMO.
 
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That's not really funny - it's human nature :)
Maybe it is but at least I didn't have to pay a single dime to play one of them. That was the major reason why I enjoy Path of Exile.:]
 
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Maybe it is but at least I didn't have to pay a single dime to play one of them. That had something to do with it also.:]

Perhaps :)

Personally, I don't think games magically suck or play better depending on price. I like to seperate one from the other :)

That said, their value could potentially fail to justify the price - but that's another matter.

I believe I understand why Blizzard chose online-only and I both respect and support that choice. However, they made a lot of mistakes - and now they've chosen to compound those mistakes by removing the AH - which wasn't a bad concept at all, it was just poorly implemented.
 
I started D2 last night to see what all the raving is about and why D3 is so loathed. I found D2 remarkably similar but with an amazingly annoying inventory system. Other than the death penalty and bad graphics it is fundamentally the same game. There is some additional stats management but depending on what class you chose its fairly obvious what to pick. I may not agree with that decision but I can see why Bizzard dispensed with it.
 
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I started D2 last night to see what all the raving is about and why D3 is so loathed. I found D2 remarkably similar but with an amazingly annoying inventory system. Other than the death penalty and bad graphics it is fundamentally the same game. There is some additional stats management but depending on what class you chose its fairly obvious what to pick. I may not agree with that decision but I can see why Bizzard dispensed with it.

You can't judge a game that quickly.

The primary difference - that D2 fans have a problem with - is that the skill system in D2 doesn't allow free customization, which is a huge incentive for replaying the game with the same class. A lot of people like to replay the game using different build paths - which is a very significant strategic component that Diablo 3 doesn't have at all. You can test everything at will - which means it takes all of 5 minutes to test everything.

It would be like playing Civilization where you could cheat and change all your cities and your research around constantly - meaning you wouldn't really need to play more than once.

Sure, it saves a lot of time - but it also makes the experience very short term.

The "stat system" is not as obvious as you think, and there are several examples of builds focusing on stats you wouldn't expect - like vitality for certain caster builds and what not.

Beyond that, the item system is vastly different - where weapons aren't just "DPS sticks" that rely on the primary stat and are basically just skill facilitators - but behave differently and alter playstyle immensely.

Beyond those, there's more interesting PvP and runewords, both of which are glaring omissions in D3.

The people in charge of D3 simply didn't understand Diablo - but they were still talented developers. So, they made a very playable game with great production values - but it wasn't Diablo.

Now, with the upcoming changes, I think we'll get something approaching Diablo - though it's not at all what it could have been.

But I still think it's better than PoE, TL2, Grim Dawn, Van Helsing, and the other recent ones.
 
I'm about 4 hour in, level 9 I think. I'm finding the skill selections at lower levels pretty uninspiring. No cleave? The jump is fairly useless. It's a long road to get to useful skills and the ranged critters are a real hassle. Fun though. I didn't die until level 8 so imagine my shock when I respawned naked with no gear and no gold. Stupidly I saved and quit so while I have my main gear back I've lost 18k gold! Live and learn!
 
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I'm about 4 hour in, level 9 I think. I'm finding the skill selections at lower levels pretty uninspiring. No cleave? The jump is fairly useless. It's a long road to get to useful skills and the ranged critters are a real hassle. Fun though. I didn't die until level 8 so imagine my shock when I respawned naked with no gear and no gold. Stupidly I saved and quit so while I have my main gear back I've lost 18k gold! Live and learn!

The actual skills are much cooler in Diablo 3.

I'm talking about the skill system.

The best part of Diablo 3 is the sheer amount of satisfying skills - each with multiple variations that are all quite significant.

Definitely a HUGE step up in that particular way.
 
I'll give more impressions after a few more play sessions. It's an interesting comparison what you gain vs give up between the two. D3 can certainly use more detail so I'm looking forward to this expansion for sure.
 
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