07-14-2003, 07:24 PM
Hi,
First, the only thing I totally disagreed with: "Even diablo 1, with the extreme difficulty of single player, . . ." You did mean "extreme easiness", didn't you? With the exception of a couple of bosses, SP D1 is a cake walk.
Now, back to the D2 problems. The first issue is that there are NO difficulty levels in D1 or D2 multiplayer. Let me explain. In games with difficulty levels, you start out a brand new character with a new game. In "easy" difficulty, the character is actually overpowered so that any dweeb can "beat the game". In "normal" difficulty, the game is pretty well balanced for the average gamer. And so forth. What is important is that, while the character stays the same, the opposition gets tougher as the difficulty increases.
What D1 and D2 multiplayer have is just a cheap way to triple the dungeon levels without having to design new levels and monsters to populate them. Sure, the game gets relatively harder as you go on, but that is the case in most well designed games -- the difficulty grows faster than the character's ability to handle it -- the difference is made up by the increase (hopefully) of the player's skill.
Now, both D1 and D2 have a real "difficulty" system in single player, but both are broken. In D1, the difficulty system comes from the ability to start a single player character in nightmare or hell mode as a level one. It is broken in at least two ways. First, because it is a "loophole" and was not intended as part of the game. It takes advantage of the fact that single player games don't reset the difficulty flag to "normal". It is broken in a second way because of the lack of an experience point cap. So, for instance, the first kill for a level 1 character in hell mode pops him up to (IIRC) level 5.
Now, in D2, the "difficulty" system is the "/players x"command. However, as you pointed out, the ability to change it up and down at will makes it broken. Partially that is design failure. When most players can mow down the hordes of run of the mill monsters at "/players 8", that's a pretty good indication that the ROTM monsters might be too weak. But if the "/players x" option was set at character creation and stuck with the character for life, then it would be a fairly decent difficulty setting.
As for the multi-player game, I don't know what could reasonably be changed to give true difficulty levels. Many players looking for a challenge handicap themselves in various ways (variant scum :) ). But making the game harder or easier just makes it that way for all.
Many people have talked about "balance", usually either in terms of PvM or PvP. I'm thinking of a different "balance", that between entertainment and aggravation. D1 had a high degree of entertainment with a relatively low degree of aggravation and is still a great game six and a half years after release. Dungeon Siege was a game with fairly low entertainment and much higher aggravation -- it has pretty well disappeared from the mind and HD of most gamers. D2 is somewhere in between. The LoD expansion added some entertainment, but even more aggravation. So far as I've seen, 1.10 added a lot more aggravation while adding just a little more entertainment.
One of the problems seems to be the failure of Buzzard to understand the concept of scaling. If the monsters are made twice as hard at the same time that the top level gear is made twice as good, the net result is nothing in challenge and a big, boring addition to the item farming. But, enough of that -- I'm still working on my opinion of 1.10. When I've played a character through it (or given up in frustration), then I'll say more.
--Pete
First, the only thing I totally disagreed with: "Even diablo 1, with the extreme difficulty of single player, . . ." You did mean "extreme easiness", didn't you? With the exception of a couple of bosses, SP D1 is a cake walk.
Now, back to the D2 problems. The first issue is that there are NO difficulty levels in D1 or D2 multiplayer. Let me explain. In games with difficulty levels, you start out a brand new character with a new game. In "easy" difficulty, the character is actually overpowered so that any dweeb can "beat the game". In "normal" difficulty, the game is pretty well balanced for the average gamer. And so forth. What is important is that, while the character stays the same, the opposition gets tougher as the difficulty increases.
What D1 and D2 multiplayer have is just a cheap way to triple the dungeon levels without having to design new levels and monsters to populate them. Sure, the game gets relatively harder as you go on, but that is the case in most well designed games -- the difficulty grows faster than the character's ability to handle it -- the difference is made up by the increase (hopefully) of the player's skill.
Now, both D1 and D2 have a real "difficulty" system in single player, but both are broken. In D1, the difficulty system comes from the ability to start a single player character in nightmare or hell mode as a level one. It is broken in at least two ways. First, because it is a "loophole" and was not intended as part of the game. It takes advantage of the fact that single player games don't reset the difficulty flag to "normal". It is broken in a second way because of the lack of an experience point cap. So, for instance, the first kill for a level 1 character in hell mode pops him up to (IIRC) level 5.
Now, in D2, the "difficulty" system is the "/players x"command. However, as you pointed out, the ability to change it up and down at will makes it broken. Partially that is design failure. When most players can mow down the hordes of run of the mill monsters at "/players 8", that's a pretty good indication that the ROTM monsters might be too weak. But if the "/players x" option was set at character creation and stuck with the character for life, then it would be a fairly decent difficulty setting.
As for the multi-player game, I don't know what could reasonably be changed to give true difficulty levels. Many players looking for a challenge handicap themselves in various ways (variant scum :) ). But making the game harder or easier just makes it that way for all.
Many people have talked about "balance", usually either in terms of PvM or PvP. I'm thinking of a different "balance", that between entertainment and aggravation. D1 had a high degree of entertainment with a relatively low degree of aggravation and is still a great game six and a half years after release. Dungeon Siege was a game with fairly low entertainment and much higher aggravation -- it has pretty well disappeared from the mind and HD of most gamers. D2 is somewhere in between. The LoD expansion added some entertainment, but even more aggravation. So far as I've seen, 1.10 added a lot more aggravation while adding just a little more entertainment.
One of the problems seems to be the failure of Buzzard to understand the concept of scaling. If the monsters are made twice as hard at the same time that the top level gear is made twice as good, the net result is nothing in challenge and a big, boring addition to the item farming. But, enough of that -- I'm still working on my opinion of 1.10. When I've played a character through it (or given up in frustration), then I'll say more.
--Pete
How big was the aquarium in Noah's ark?