First Hardcore Inferno Belial Kill (by a Barbarian, too)

[Roland]

So why do people ask to make the game super easy by essentially removing all danger from vortex rather than asking for fixes to DH utility and defensive abilities so they don't get one shot?

. . .

I completely agree that the defense gap between a DH and any other class is huge. Even Wizards and Witch Doctors get ~120 resist from gearing reasonably offensively, and they both have a few abilities to amplify resists and/or armor. The solution is not to remove all difficulty from vortex, the solution is to re-work the mechanics of the DH so one can actually survive. I mean, there are no DH mitigation skills outside of sentry with a 15% mitigation. Woo-hoo, that almost makes up for having no useful defensive value from your prime stat. This is where the problem lies... not in making the game EZ-mode.

Bingo.

[FireIceTalon]

That's just it though, Vortex is completely unavoidable for ranged classes, and when you are as fragile as the DH is and everything 2 shots you, it makes playing pretty pointless.

I stopped reading here. Vortex has a maximum range, as does Jailer.

Edit: Bolty, two quick points.
1) Why not rejudge when 1.0.3 hits? In the meantime, everything before Act 2 Inferno I find very fun.
2) Must get the gear to advance sounds astoundingly like ... WoW. Except it's not making me log in and do freaking daily quests every day to get a little token that says "here, buy this item from a vendor".

And what is the maximum range? A thousand yards?

[Elric of Grans]

As others have said, Vortex is probably the easiest to deal with. Just about anything between you and them breaks the effect. There is plenty of terrain (or whatever) you can place between you and them while still firing over. If they still get you, use your defensive skill (Smoke Screen, Vault, Shadow Power) and get out of there --- Blizzard added them for a reason. Compared to Invulnerable Minions, Vortex is a doddle. I sure as heck would not want it removed, as it makes the game interesting.

[Quark]

And what is the maximum range? A thousand yards?

Given this game's definition of a yard, probably . I don't know, all I know is on my Wizard I try to keep Vortex and Jailer mobs at the edge of my screen and they don't cast those when I'm successful.

[Kevin]

And what is the maximum range? A thousand yards?

Given this game's definition of a yard, probably . I don't know, all I know is on my Wizard I try to keep Vortex and Jailer mobs at the edge of my screen and they don't cast those when I'm successful.

http://diablo.incgamers.com/gallery/data...ce_Map.jpg

Based on that and my experience in multiplayer games where I've seen folks get pulled in when I wasn't, I'd say it's about 70-80 yards for Vortex. Which means if you aren't running a 16:9 aspect resolution you will have a very hard time with it.

[kandrathe]

... I'm quite dissatisfied with Diablo III because I feel the game design is poor.

And, I can really respect the way you have analyzed the game play. What I don't understand is the logic about D2 being more fun because of excessive treasure drops, especially from certain simple fast encounters. I think that was what Mav was reacting to.

I agree with the remorse on dumbing down on variety in builds ( also being done to WOW in MOP). I'm also a bit dubious of the forced pace resulting in a lack of strategy/tactic ergo -- MOB spam, "whoops there was an invulnerable/godlike Champ pack you couldn't react fast enough so you died".

I like games where it feels like I did something extraordinary and then won earned some cool lewt, and not the frenetic life or death crap shoot. It's not skill then, it's just luck.

[ViralSpiral]

Someone, somewhere, somewhen, there needs to be an article on game design called "One-shot kills are not clever." I can think of at least four companies who would need to scour that article for advice.

[Athenau]

I have to disagree that D3 involves less player skill than D2. In D2 you could brute force your way through almost any encounter with potion spam and/or ridiculous gear (mass life leech, CTC life tap). In D3 the gameplay is much more about judicious use of your cooldown skills and (to a lesser extent) abusing terrain. It's true that a lot of boss fights in inferno come down to a gear check, but that's mostly a problem with inferno, not with the fundamental game design.

The change to how melee hits are registered are annoying and unnecessary, but in practice if you're playing melee it doesn't change much, because wasting time ducking in and out of attacks cripples your dps too much. Shift-clicking to hit enemies before they come into range and minimizing frontage are still staples of (non-tank) melee play. The addition of telegraphed attacks to regular mobs (which you can avoid) add another element of skill not present in D2.

[Ashock]

It seems like the people who most enjoyed the endless Pindle/Baal runs, versus building characters and actually playing the game, are the ones most dissatisfied with D3.

Erm, no. What a strange generalization. As a player who never performed Pindle/Baal runs, or took a character to level 99, I'm quite dissatisfied with Diablo III because I feel the game design is poor.

I enjoyed the Diablo series because it was practically sandbox in its design. The game wasn't particularly hard to "beat" - what made Diablo 1 and 2 interesting was the analysis of the game mechanics, trying out new and different builds/ideas, and so on. The entire rise of variant play was based upon the fact that the game allowed for it - with enough knowledge and skill, you could pull off amazing stuff that would surprise your average player.

Diablo III's inferno difficulty forces me into a Pindle/Baal run kind of player. The only way to advance is not through skilled play, but gear farming. Until you experience firsthand the silliness of being able to clear Inferno Act 1 without breaking even a sweat, followed by getting killed by a white mob in Act II (no, not a wasp, a standard melee mob), you will not quite grasp what the playerbase is complaining about.

It's too easy to dismiss such complaints as "they just want the game handed to them," or "they don't like it because it's hard." There's nothing hard about being 2-shot by a champion mob as a melee player. Blizzard has created a game design with an artificial difficulty level designed to force players to farm for hundreds of hours to advance (or play the Auction House). There are some players that won't mind this at all, and consider it fine. 12 years ago, I also wouldn't have had a problem with it - I think I would have rather enjoyed the challenge just as something to do.

Nowadays? I recognize a silly game mechanic when I see it. And a game series that (around these parts) is all about finding joy in esoteric gameplay has been cut off by Diablo III's Inferno difficulty. There's no more "I wonder what happens if I create a character based around X abilities," because you can just take your level 60 character and change the skills around on the fly - and rapidly see how they don't work anyway. Replayability has gone down the tubes. In creating a difficulty level based on cheesy mechanics and plenty of 1 or 2-shot death structures, they've ruined the series for me.

Feel free to dismiss the statements of a guy who's been running a Diablo fansite for 13 years lightly as "that's your hardcore raider mentality" all you like. I find that line ironic. Diablo III's Inferno difficulty is extremely hardcore in terms of time and dedication to clear, so I should like it, right? So why don't I?

There's no more "sandbox." There's no more exchange of ideas or interesting concepts. It's get your five characters to 60, farm for +resist all, +main stat, +vitality, +health regen gear for hundreds of hours, and that's about it. It's...boring, like the soul has been sucked away from the games that I loved. Either that, or 12 years have gone by and I've just moved on from this style of game...but I don't think that's it.

I do realize it's kind of silly as well for me to hang around this forum to complain about how this game's just lacking, so I'll move on. I hope you all find the joy in it that you're looking for.

Add to it, the artificial char lvl cap, implemented so that the only way to progress in Inferno is through getting better items and not through getting higher in clvl. The game is funneled into the AH, whether we like it or not.

Anyway, excellent post, Bolty.

[ViralSpiral]

I have to disagree that D3 involves less player skill than D2. In D2 you could brute force your way through almost any encounter with potion spam and/or ridiculous gear (mass life leech, CTC life tap). In D3 the gameplay is much more about judicious use of your cooldown skills and (to a lesser extent) abusing terrain. It's true that a lot of boss fights in inferno come down to a gear check, but that's mostly a problem with inferno, not with the fundamental game design.

The change to how melee hits are registered are annoying and unnecessary, but in practice if you're playing melee it doesn't change much, because wasting time ducking in and out of attacks cripples your dps too much. Shift-clicking to hit enemies before they come into range and minimizing frontage are still staples of (non-tank) melee play. The addition of telegraphed attacks to regular mobs (which you can avoid) add another element of skill not present in D2.

D2 had plenty of telegraphed attacks you could avoid. It was called Tempting Fate. There's an interesting scale in D3 though. It seems like prior to Inferno, just about any build is viable (excepting maybe one that goes out of its way to have no synergy at all, but I don't think anyone could manage that by accident), but then when you get to Inferno, half or more of the skills fall by the wayside and suddenly become fodder. I've seen so many posts now that were "I switched off the skills that got me to Inferno to what person S said to use, and now my life is ten times easier."

I can't believe Blizzard admitted that they didn't do any testing after doubling the difficulty in Inferno. Although it shows in any case. Be interesting to see what kind of HC solo/group eventually pastes Inferno Diablo. Of course I imagine their next question will be "what now?"

I wonder if Blizzard wouldn't have been better served including Normal-Hell + another feature - say, PvP, and having added Inferno in an expansion, when it could have been balanced more thoroughly along with an additional act or something. Of course I suspect they'll probably add a fifth difficulty in an expansion anyhow, along with a raised level cap. I'm guessing they're planning two expansions, one to raise Lcap to 80 and another for 99/100. It's just too easy of a sell. Who wants to have a maxlvl 20/39/40 lower than their friends?

[Athenau]

D2 had plenty of telegraphed attacks you could avoid. It was called Tempting Fate.

You could "tempt fate" on regular melee hits, but it wasn't worth it if you were playing a melee character (ranged characters had no need to tempt fate because they had range). It was far more efficient (as in diablo 3) to position yourself so that only a few enemies could hit you at once and shift click as enemies came into your range.

There were no berserk style telegraphed attacks that were painful enough to give you an incentive to dodge (act bosses aside).

There's an interesting scale in D3 though. It seems like prior to Inferno, just about any build is viable (excepting maybe one that goes out of its way to have no synergy at all, but I don't think anyone could manage that by accident), but then when you get to Inferno, half or more of the skills fall by the wayside and suddenly become fodder. I've seen so many posts now that were "I switched off the skills that got me to Inferno to what person S said to use, and now my life is ten times easier."

Inferno is just poorly balanced. They clearly didn't have time to do the job properly before release, and they underestimated how quickly it would take for people to reach their endgame content, so now they're scrambling to fix it. D2C wasn't in such great shape at release either, so it's to be expected.

[MongoJerry]

Inferno is just poorly balanced. They clearly didn't have time to do the job properly before release, and they underestimated how quickly it would take for people to reach their endgame content, so now they're scrambling to fix it. D2C wasn't in such great shape at release either, so it's to be expected.

The only way to do it properly would be to release the game to thousands of hardcore players and have them test it out and try to find out all iterations of skills, bugs, and exploits. But those very gamers are the ones Blizzard wants to sell the game to and even they probably wouldn't find everything that millions of players around the world would find. Despite the problems that have been discovered, I'm surprised about how few issues with exploits the game has had compared to D2 or especially LoD on their releases.

There aren't any issues with Inferno that won't be solved with better gear. My theory is still that Blizzard is holding back on sets of gear until they're comfortable that most of the farming (and now duping?) exploits have been found and patched. Then, they'll allow the gear they held back to be released and the RMAH to go online.

[swirly]

I can't believe Blizzard admitted that they didn't do any testing after doubling the difficulty in Inferno.

Meanwhile I laud them for it. Blizzard may not always test things as much as they need to nor have the correct reaction to issues; they do however communicate openly and honestly. I can not overstate how much more I trust what Blizzard says when it comes to non-opinion based information purely because they do admit such things. There is a lot of Blizzard bashing that goes on. Some of it deserved and some not. So I feel like one should also praise them for what they do well too. It may be bad that they didn't test after doubling the difficulty (though I understand why they didn't.) It is very laudable, in my mind, that they admit to it though.

[Occhidiangela]

You expect first kills of inferno HC fights to come from joe blow with a wife and three kids playing 10 hours a week?

I don't.

I only get to play now and again, since I have a job, kids in college, and a wife. I really enjoy the few hours per week I get to play D III, on my son's machine when he doesn't need it for class.

I don't know if D III will allow any of us to do a variant game, like we did in D II, where we knocked off HC Baal Hell using only clvl 1 skills. I suspect we'll end up trying something like that in a year or two as we figure this game out.

I tip my cap to this gent, Belial dead in HC Inferno.

It seems from a few of the comments I've seen that, like in D II HC, in HC DIII even a small mistake or connection problem can kill you.

Well, he managed to avoid that, or perhaps avoid it until Act III.

I wish I had enough time to try and get that far.

Will check back in a few months to see what people are kvetching about then. I am having a good time, when I get the time.

Until then, good hunting to you all.

[MongoJerry]

I don't know if D III will allow any of us to do a variant game, like we did in D II, where we knocked off HC Baal Hell using only clvl 1 skills. I suspect we'll end up trying something like that in a year or two as we figure this game out.

I expect that our definitions of variants may change. It may be using very underutilized skills like Energy Twister and Explosive Blast and seeing how far we can go. Some varients may be considered successful for just finishing nightmare or hell. Also, as Inferno is tuned down and as more powerful gear is released, I think a greater variety of builds will become viable.

[Trevan]

There's a simpler solution for dealing with vortex...it's called vault. I can't understand why people undervalue vault as it's a good escape skill. The only thing that would make it better is make it so you are invulnerable while the vault is in effect (this is the only real problem with the skill IMO).

I have to comment on this. The delay on vault is long enough that quite a few monsters can kill you before vault goes off.

But I do have to note, vortex is not a big problem to my DH in act 2 inferno atm. Assuming, of course, I have kite space; vortex is a problem in enclosed areas. But I find shooting at vortex champions from across chasms/around corners works wonders because their vortex makes you collide with impassible terrain preventing you from actually moving to them.

Jailer is a huge problem though, because despite prep + smoke screen break, packs can spam that enough I run out of discipline. I might need to pack max discipline gear.

EDIT: Knew there would be posts about terrain and vortex by the time I finished the thread. Oh well, i'll leave this up anyways.

[Elric of Grans]

I have found Smoke Screen/Vault an interesting combo. Using Acrobatics, Vault uses no Discipline, saving it all for Smoke Screen. Use Smoke Screen in situations like Jailer and Frozen, then Vault for Vortex or Waller enemies. Odds are, every Elite group will provide situations where each is more beneficial. Since doing this, I have always had enough Discipline for Smoke Screen. That said, every time I have died with this strategy, it was when using Vault. The delay at the start and end, along with the lack of invulnerability during the animation, make it absurdly risky for what should be a `crap, get me out of here' button. I find it works most of the time, but around 25% of Elite groups have something that makes Vault a bad idea (either an attribute or a natural ability).

Most players hate Vault because it is poorly balanced and can fail to serve its only purpose, thereby preferring the reliability of Smoke Screen/Preparation to do the same thing without any risk.

[Kurosu]

Well, he managed to avoid that, or perhaps avoid it until Act III.

The person in the video died when he set foot in act 3 to a pack of the tongue lashing monsters, pretty much the first challenge he ran into in act 3.
Not surprising though, while going from act 1 (which is still reasonably manageable) to act 2 is a significant difficulty spike, I read that from act 3 onwards, the average damage of a monster rises from 10k (in act 2) to 50k or something ridiculous like that.

Personally I'm somewhat surprised that people are making the effort to play HC with the game in its current state, considering there are just so many things that are out of control from the player that makes staying alive impossible at times.
To me, that is like knowingly playing a shell game that is rigged.

[MongoJerry]

Personally I'm somewhat surprised that people are making the effort to play HC with the game in its current state, considering there are just so many things that are out of control from the player that makes staying alive impossible at times.
To me, that is like knowingly playing a shell game that is rigged.

The challenge just makes it more fun. It also allows us to look down snobbishly on softcore players who say they're getting one shotted in hell difficulty because those players choose not to equip themselves well. As for Inferno, once I get there (I was soooo close), I'll probably farm up Act 1 for a long time until I both get equipment and the difficulty gets changed in 1.0.3 before trying out Act 2.

By the way, there's nothing wrong with monster mechanics (well, maybe except invulnerable minions). The problems are simply a matter of gear and perhaps a tweak on the health and damage of mobs.

[BellaStrega]

Personally I'm somewhat surprised that people are making the effort to play HC with the game in its current state, considering there are just so many things that are out of control from the player that makes staying alive impossible at times.
To me, that is like knowingly playing a shell game that is rigged.

The challenge just makes it more fun. It also allows us to look down snobbishly on softcore players who say they're getting one shotted in hell difficulty because those players choose not to equip themselves well. As for Inferno, once I get there (I was soooo close), I'll probably farm up Act 1 for a long time until I both get equipment and the difficulty gets changed in 1.0.3 before trying out Act 2.

By the way, there's nothing wrong with monster mechanics (well, maybe except invulnerable minions). The problems are simply a matter of gear and perhaps a tweak on the health and damage of mobs.

This seems as good a place as any to ask: Do you find that the somewhat routine lag spikes cause many hardcore deaths?