Diablo iii - 4 players

Entropy

Entropy

Full Member
I'm looking forward to the release of D3, and have noted that during the beta, the number of players has been limited to 4.

This was quite an interesting article on the same:

http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/on-the-drawing-board-11-maximum-party-size/

It suggests that Blizzard could have set the number of players at any level. I don't agree with their reasoning for restricting the number of players in the same game to 4 on battlenet, but, notwithstanding that, it's even more inexplicable considering the fact that Diablo 3 is Battlenet only and cannot be run over a LAN. Consequently, as it stands, we're not even going to have a choice as to how many people we play with in closed games!

There's been some discussion that the consoles will not be able to handle more than 4 players, and Blizzard have artificially restricted the PC version to ensure homogeneity for when their console versions are released.

I wondered what everyone else thought...
 
S

StGeorge

Full Member
I thought this bit, in the rebuttal, was interesting:

Besides, runs are fun. Rushes are fun. Twinking is fun. Boss farming is fun. Players always have and always will seek out the greatest reward for the least time/risk, and the game designer who works hard to remove all the ways players prefer to play is putting their game design goals above and ahead of player fun. Why put in arbitrary limits and rules to force players to play how you want them to?

It seems to me a lot of 'fun' may be taken out of this game. Much of it seems to be dumbed down, for instance the health globe thing forces you to drink potions when the game thinks you need to, rather than letting you decide for yourself that you should have pressed the button a half-second earlier!

Likewise with the attribute system, you don't have any control over it at all. I played a lot of HC D2 and it always made sense to shove all of your points into VIT apart from what you absolutely need in other attribs to run your character properly. That's all gone now.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking the game - I've enjoyed what I've played of it so far. I'm just not sure that it will keep me interested for the ten years or so that I've been playing D2 (and still playing!!).
 
Zeus

Zeus

Full Member
re party size...
their argument is that they've tried it with more players, and its not good. the screens too crowded, theres too much going on, and its just not fun to play. and therefore, for the small number of people that would play it even though its not all that fun, its not worth the development time to make it work in a technical sense. we're not really in a position to say they're wrong as... well... theyve played it with more people, we havnt :p

re consoles...
dont really think its an issue, if they'd felt the game was better with 8 but consoles wouldnt handle it, they'd just put the hardcap in on consoles.

re removing options...
its a similar argument to one i've seen a lot in wow, and i agree with blizzards view on this - if they allow players to do something unfun, but which has good in-game rewards... people will do it. they'll then bitch and whine that they were forced to do it. (eg. grinding dailys in wow. you can get by without ever doing a single daily, but people who dont like them still do them and then complain that they did them.). the only way to not make people feel 'forced' to do unfun things is to not give them the option.

re healthglobes...
you dont get the healthglobe when the game thinks you need it, you get it when you pick it up after you kill a mob that the game thinks should drop one :p subtle difference i guess, but you can still choose when to pick it up. also, you still have health potions, you just cant spam them anymore.

re attributes...
exactly as you said. the ONLY sensible way to build your stats was to put them all into VIT (beyond bare minimums into the others.). how is that an interesting way to play? same with skills. all it meant was that you had everyone lookup the best build to have (and you can bet there'd be ones designed even before the game was out), and stick to that - and you wouldnt dare try anything else because if you did then you'd wasted all the hours you spent on your char.
 
Entropy

Entropy

Full Member
Zeus said:
re party size...
their argument is that they've tried it with more players, and its not good. the screens too crowded, theres too much going on, and its just not fun to play. and therefore, for the small number of people that would play it even though its not all that fun, its not worth the development time to make it work in a technical sense. we're not really in a position to say they're wrong as... well... theyve played it with more people, we havnt :p
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But there are other ways to achieve the same result.

1) Just apply the player limit to bnet games when you are playing with random people; allow closed games to have a player limit of more than 4; or

2) Limit the number of players to 4 in any one group, but 8 in a game. What I'm most bothered about is that there will be 6 people or so that I regularly play with, and everyone might want to do different bits of the game at the same time, but the point is, we'd all be able to meet up if we wanted to (e.g. a party in Act 1 asking someone in Act 4 for help). Now we're forced to play in entirely different games, and if someone wants to help out some mates, they need to leave the game they're in (potentially losing progress) to go and do it... and that's only assuming that there are fewer than 4 people in the other game... if there are more than that, then Blizzard has barred them from joining!

I think it's bonkers personally.
 
Artanix

Artanix

Full Member
it makes us look cooler if we have to join clanuk4 game again :D

I don't mind the player limit personally, I kinda half agree, in diablo 2 on a full 8 player game, things got heptic, and it literally became a click anything before it dies sort of affair, any skill / difficulty was effectively removed. (for the most part).

As for choosing your own stats and stuff I'm a bit sad about that, as much as it allows you to effectively "break" your class, it also let you do fun things, like the titansorc :D

Tbh its just another thing making games "easier", kinda sick of it really, games are so bloody simple nowadays. Just compare stuff like doom/quake against BF3/CoD now, turn the wrong way for more than 15 seconds and it has flashing arrows and noises saying "turn around!". ugh :\
 
Zed

Zed

Rogue Chimp
id not played for a while but the last month of beta i found i couldnt put it down. Looking forward to this sooo much.
 
Jumani

Jumani

Evil Monkey
I purposefully stayed away from the Beta and am now utterly phsyched for Diablo 3. 15th cannot come fast enough.
 
Zed

Zed

Rogue Chimp
Ive got to spend the 15th in a hotel in poole. The buggers better deliver diablo 3 before i leave and the hotel better have a usable wifi connection!!!
 
Guy

Guy

Piper/Leonaedas
Zed said:
Ive got to spend the 15th in a hotel in poole. The buggers better deliver diablo 3 before i leave and the hotel better have a usable wifi connection!!!
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Digital purchase and pre-download?
 
Git

Git

Your opinion is worthless....
I have it on order, must admit i am really looking forward to playing this with others, been mainly playing single player rpg's lately along with a bit of left for dead 2 which is fun.. some human interaction is in order!
 
Artanix

Artanix

Full Member
yeah same for me, I've completely withdrawn from MMO's nowadays. We going to see the return of clanuk games and funky passwords? :D

I'm moving house on the 14th too :\ g/f isn't going to be too happy when I'm getting the internet sorted before getting a fridge/washing machine :D
 
Zed

Zed

Rogue Chimp
Artanix said:
yeah same for me, I've completely withdrawn from MMO's nowadays. We going to see the return of clanuk games and funky passwords? :D
:D
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No. you add all your friends to the Friends list and can simply join their games... the way public games work these days isnt like the old D1/D2 fayre.

I like this better though as you can see whos playing, how many are in their game and jump in if they are running at under the 4 member cap.
 
Git

Git

Your opinion is worthless....
Artanix said:
yeah same for me, I've completely withdrawn from MMO's nowadays. We going to see the return of clanuk games and funky passwords? :D

I'm moving house on the 14th too :\ g/f isn't going to be too happy when I'm getting the internet sorted before getting a fridge/washing machine :D
Click to expand...

i do still play DAoC, but the guild i am in i small and it's rare we have lots online, so even though the server is busy you end up solo 50% of the time, just not my style of play, on top of that i needed a change ;-)
 
Guy

Guy

Piper/Leonaedas
Git said:
i do still play DAoC, but the guild i am in i small and it's rare we have lots online, so even though the server is busy you end up solo 50% of the time, just not my style of play, on top of that i needed a change ;-)
Click to expand...

Blimeh, what's DAoC like these days? Is it fun?
 
Git

Git

Your opinion is worthless....
Guy said:
Blimeh, what's DAoC like these days? Is it fun?
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it's great fun, server has about 2500 active players and it's as busy as hell, they also updated the new player quests and all the bg's so you can actively level and buy armour as you play, which means you don't have to worry about big boy rvr until 50.

but when you have nearly 12 level 50's and 4 toons you mainly play it loses it's lustre as i can no longer play US hours haven't for years, and don't play late unless it's weekends, what with new baby I don't have much time for it at the mo :/
 
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