DII vs. Titan Quest

[Fragbait]

Hi,

Now that I have a little bit more time, let me address the statements you made.

"Underpowered" things are a necessary function of progressing up the chain in a linear progression like the Diablo series. "Overpowered" things are not.

The 'function of progressing' in Diablo is in no way linear, be it the experience you get, the pace with which your char develops, the difficulty of the game or the distribution of item finding chances. I don't quite understand what you mean. In my eyes, the 'function of progressing' is logarithmic at best. Your "overpowered" things are exactly what helps you cope on the far far right "end" of the logarithm, where progression is slow and difficult. What real "overpowered" things would do is, in my opinion, break the function and paste a linear, quadratic or otherwise different function not necessarily continuously onto the logarithm. Maybe the skill Blessed Hammer in its current form does, and runewords that grant not only oskills (for they are beneficial for the variant building), but that grant aurae which obviously were balanced for the paladin only when the game was created maybe do, too.

Conviction, at the very least needs to be on your list. It is completely unfair. Essentially, it eliminates the need for a secondary element (on elemental characters, including, but not limited to, Sorceresses, Amazons, and Druids) AND attack rating.

I think this has been addressed already. Conviction on a paladin is not unfair in my eyes. It is great, yes. Unfair - no. Also understand that my list was not meant to be taken dead-serious. I don't consider most of the things I named to be "overpowered".

Holy Shield is the only skill I see as even close to Conviction in terms of raw power. At high levels, Holy Shield makes the caster nearly indestructable. Nothing else can make this claim. Not defiance. Not Shout. Not Ironskin. Not Energy Shield (although it comes close IF you set your gear right).

Ah, then 60% of the power builds out there are Conviction/HS builds? I don't think so. My impression is rather Hammerdin and Dual-Element Sorceress at the moment, maybe some Trapsins.
Holy Shield is very powerful. Since the patch that changed its defense bonus to be applied to your whole defense especially so. My lvl 91 fanatic zealot has maxed it, and uses it always. With high-end (well - achievable by playing in singleplayer, i.e. no high end runes) gear, he has 17xxx defense, a 75% ctb and 75% resist all. He is fairly easy to play in most areas, but in some, he is not, and I have to exercise caution, e.g. versus Blood Lords, Vipers, Succubi, Gloams, Dolls and the like. And this is after 5 years of playing and searching items for him. Holy Shield is not overpowered. Imagine if it would up your maximum block chance to a, say, 95% cap at lvl 30! That would be overpowered.
PS: Paladins cannot get the huge life balls that Druids and Barbarians can get. Thus they must be helped with means of damage preventing. Druids and Barbs can get 75% block, too. And Barbs can even get high defense. I don't know why you descend to Holy Shield so frustratedly.

Teleport is arguable. I'll grant you that one.

Teleport alone will never be the 'make or brake' of a build. It is a convenience skill, and while I found it better when the Sorc could still alone use it, it doesn't imbalance the game when others can use it, too, I think. Well, I'm speaking of PvM here, but I was meaning PvM the whole time, so... Can't really speak for PvP.

If you've never used War Cry, I don't expect understanding there. It's like the old Nova Sorceress, except you stun everything in a radius. For ~10 seconds. The enemies not only don't have a fighting chance; they cannot even move or attack, their two basic functions (aside from dropping items, I suppose).

I have never used War Cry. But it seems to me that its duration goes down with difficulty level, no? So if you have a 6.4 sec. duration with slvl 28, doesn't it go down to 3.2 sec. in nightmare and 1.6 sec. in hell? Well, I could very well be wrong here. But with a finite amount of skill points to distribute, this skill isn't overpowered. Great? Maybe, my barbs lived well without it. Unfair? It doesn't speed up the killing, but makes it safer. I don't think it's unfair. And to be a dedicated singer, you have to sacrifice quite a lot of gear for fcr and mana. It would be unfair if the cast speed was high with low amounts of fcr, if the damage was high (it isn't ), and if a Barb wasn't to economize his skill points between BO, the mastery of choice, Natural Resistance and the attack skill of choice (+possibly a synergy) already, I think. Maybe, just maybe, it would have made sense to not be able to stun physical immune monsters with it, since it already can't damage them. But that's about it.

I could, and should, list more, but I won't, as you're no doubt sick of this line of reasoning.

Hm. I think the point is not that I'm sick of it, but that I think it is wrong. Every patch brought with it a character class or build that sort of broke the balance between the classes a little. At some point, it was the WW-Barb. Last time, it was the Hammerdin. Unfortunately, they made auras available as an oskill (not only, but also Conviction), which is rather imbalanced, too. But in general, not all strong items and skills and things are "overpowered". Please understand my point of view.

Instead, I'll offer up a definition of overpowered.

Any skill/item/"thing" which is universally used when able to be, and universally good when used. Example: Teleport, Holy Shield, Stone Curse

Any skill/item/"thing" which, even though specific to a build, is so far above the power curve that it makes the game trivially easy (Perhaps "Bottably easy" is a good term here). Example: Blessed Hammer, Conviction

Any skill/item/"thing" which makes monsters incapable of (damaging, hitting, moving, living, etc.) without completely crippling the player using it. Example: Teleport, Holy Shield, Stone Curse, Conviction, Blessed Hammer
"Of Haste" might fit the bill. "Archangels" does not. Level 20 spells are not significantly more powerful than level 15 spells.

I answered that in my last post, I think.

So, for your list...
Zodiac--Maaaaybe. Does it grant you a *significant* advantage over Giant's/Sorcery/Precision? Not really. They're just nice.
Emerald--Not really, but would be very much so if available on more than Weapons and Shields. Especially weapons. Look at the mods one must give up for use.
No resistance penalty--Would this even be an issue if Diablo II didn't have one? Advocate fireballs still do plenty of damage to full resistances.
No Physical resistance on monster--Must be why Warriors are nearly universally considered the most difficult class to play.
Armor dependance--I wouldn't say that. Items that provide ridiculous armor (IE, Awesome Full Plate Mail of the Suffix) maybe. Armor dependance...bull. Else Naked Mages, Low-Armor-Warriors, and such would not exist. It isn't a dependance. It's a weight factor. Diablo II offers different means to go about it, but still shares the same polarization if any of those factors is at high levels.
Instantaneous potions--perhaps, but again, would this be an issue without Diablo II saying different?

Zodiac (Heavens): Yes, the advantages, especially for a fighter and not a caster, are significant. Are you referring to casters again?
Emerald and Obsidian: While Emerald is not available on Armor and Jewelry, Obsidian is. It should not, in my opinion, especially not on one item with Zodiac or Heavens.
Resistance penalty: This is somewhat balanced because there is no way to get above 75% resist, and Advocate fireballs and Soul Burner blood stars still hit hard. I'll think about it a little more.
Monster physical resists: Warriors are difficult because they can't hit ranged, like the two other classes. They have to chase Advocates and Soul Burners instead of just shooting them. That is why they are more difficult (in hell difficulty) in my opinion. And a physical resistance would also make life a bit more diffcult for the Rogue. Of course, Fireball and Chain Lightning would have to be nerfed a little bit in exchange. That would make for a really challenging hell difficulty.
Armor dependance: I would say that. Rogues and Warriors and even (Battle-)Mages all seek the highest AC available to them, because it is possible for all of them and because it does have a major impact on the surviveability. This is done better in DII, where defense has some effect, but it is set at a rather broad, nonlinear range: In hell, 4000 Defense can net you 50% less hits. 8000 defense may net you 70% less hits, and 16000 may net you 80% less hits. It's diminishing returns - DI doesn't have it. The more, the better - if it is the "Awesome" prefix on plates or something else. Why do you think an item that sets your res to 0 like Gotterdamerung is so good?
Instantaneous potions: Perhaps it is necessary in a game like DI where you can't run or tactically outmaneuver (hireling, minion) your opponents. But again: take everything that I said with a grain of salt, for I was trying to mock you a tiny bit by enumerating several "overpowered" things you didn't name.

In short, things (aside from superior tactics) that give players an unfair advantage over enemies are what I consider overpowered. Teleporting over walls is pretty dumb. Static Field, Crushing Blow are pretty dumb. Turning on Holy Shield and not being hit for the rest of the session is outright idiocy. It's not even a game anymore.

You have to admit that except carefully advancing step by step, there was no such thing as "superior tactics" in DI, I think. Also I have commented on this in my last post. You seem to exaggerate things a little - maybe it's you mocking me, and I can't see it. Static field and Crushing blow is a way to balance the hilariously high hps some monsters have since I don't know which patch. Holy Shield does not grant the user that he isn't hit anymore. By the way, while you could achieve 100% block in DI, you cannot in DII.
They both are great games, and I still think that because of its innovation-grade and its tight atmosphere, DI goes for the win if both games compete for the best action-rpg ever. But I don't think for more than some meager percent points, e.g. DI: 96 out of 100 points, DII: 92 out of 100 points.

It's nice to discuss something I like very much - the two games DI and DII and their individual pros and cons. I think it's time for me to apologize, for I have nothing to contribute to Titan Quest. Could turn into a thread hijack if none of the Titan Quest lovers reclaims it!:o

Greetings, Fragbait