i am glad so many got off the topic of the very first post.

As far as abby is concearned its definitely harder but soloable and groupable just takes a bit longer.

I also like your ideas on slowing down the exp as i also said do something more with the crypts.

Somebody else posted that when they got to 100 they werent able to solo abby. That is because you prolly spent 90% of your time in the crypts and never did hdol. Sure you prolly ran rasputin a few times but we all know how his gear is.

The people who have been lvl 100 for a while now laugh at the new lvl 100s who have crappy gear for abby. If you content on doing bosses then shadow queen is soloable by a mage.

I sort of agree. A little difficulty is good, but endlessly chugging potions to survive on the easiest difficulty level seems cheap. And, I mean, my friends and I, we like it hard, we tend to push the difficulty slider up until it hurts, but it only goes down so far...

Now, I've seen two "solutions" that invariably come up. 1) Group, 2) Grind. No thanks. If I really want to join a guild and farm the same boss over and over for loot, well... well I don't. So there!

I got my invite in February. Started play in bits and pieces. Moved in March, was with out internet for 3 weeks. Picked back up and made 100 with Bogey before the end of April.

Bogey did HDoL all the way down 3 times, 60 lvl in Demonic Crypts as a mage, countless Abby runs. And even the grind was FUN .

We've been without power since the ice storm in Oklahoma last Monday, just got it back Teusday at 4:30pm. I downloaded the new build and played as Steele for about 2 hours and I cantruthfully say it wasn't very fun . It's a good thing that we have pots that stack 10 high because I now use twice as many. I re-speced his build adding more end and losing a hefty chunk of int. It was a slight improvement but slight means using only 80 pots instead of 110. God forbid trying Bogey out he's still wearing .59 gear I think because I really don't keep anything he finds for him since I figured I didn't need it.


rambling of a really tired old man who is working way to frickin much:)

Gary

One day, Ripper McGee came to World #2 requesting questions for an upcoming interview with MarkT. This is one of the questions I suggested, "How do you balance adding new features with the current KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) game style that appeals to many of your subscribers." The question was modified slightly by Ripper, but this is the response from MarkT.

Quote:

---

Any time you add an extra ingredient to a pot of stew you have to taste it and see if it’s “right.” Sometimes getting it “right” can happen quickly, and at other times, if it’s an ingredient that has a strong flavor, well, it might take some time to get it where you want it to be. Adding new features to a live game is no different. Some can be easy, and others can be very time consuming and challenging to get “right.”

Each addition takes a lot of thought and consideration in terms of how the new thing will work within the existing game and what implications it will have on the rest of the game systems. Fortunately we have a great team of developers that are really good at working through these issues. In the end, it really is a case by case process.

When we add new things we try to engineer them in a way that makes it easy to tweak down the road. Essentially, every gameplay system we have in the game has been architected with this in mind. The easier the game is to tweak and balance, the more iterations we can make when testing out our ideas. Being able to iterate more quickly over a variety of ideas allows us to explore a lot of options when trying to come up with the “right” balance. This is always preferable when trying to get things right… you really don’t want any stone left unturned if possible.

---

I agree totally with everything Tristanne has said.

DarthNinja

Its like ive said from the beginning simply increasing HP of the enemies is not how you introduce difficulty into a game. Diablo 2 shows us laying waste to screens and screens of enemies is fun, the challenge comes from the variability of enemies and the fact that any second you could be swarmed and die, or get 2 shot by a conviction gloom, or accidently teleport into a crowd of enemies.

Its this "randomness" that made diablo 2 fun, and while it was generally an easy game "hardcore mode" was still a tough thing to do due to bad luck and one slip up.

Not to say there wasnt tough enemies but they definately were not frequent, and its not to say you didnt have to dodge and do mob control but it was a lot easier with smaller hitbox and nothing impedeing your control; not even 180 degree turns slowed you down. Ah and 2 enemies could not occupy the same space making it a lot easier to do mob control as well. But in the end it was an easy difficulty which spiked up to almost impossible in certain places, and sometimes not even a quick "save and exit" was enough to save you.

Edited by tappa (01/03/08 02:43 AM)