It's rant time.  Don't read this if you have a weak constitution or enjoy complaining about how every change Blizzard is making will "ruin" your current Diablo II characters.  You're not going to like it.  Consider yourself warned!

Patch 1.46 for the Lord of Destruction has turned a lot of heads.  I'll list the details right here so you can peruse them as I continue my rant.

Skill Balance Changes

Druid

• Increased the delay between the times that Hurricane does damage.
• (Increased the radius for Armageddon's damage and increased the delay between missiles. Didn't make it into the Beta build.)

Assassin

• Dragon Tail does not cost mana or knockback when it misses.

Sorceress

• Made sure that Thunderstorm hits.
• Static Field is no longer affected by Conviction and Lower Resist. Also, it will not take a monster below 33% health in Nightmare (50% in Hell).
• Increased Frozen Orb damage.
• Cold Mastery will not affect cold immune monsters.

Amazon

• Fixed the bug that added javelin damage to Lightning Fury, and made the graphics simpler for the lightning.

Necromancer

• The hitpoints for a Revived monster no longer reflect the number of players in the game.

Barbarian

• Whirlwind will now alternate between two weapons when you use two weapons.
• Fixed the bug which would allow you to still have armorclass after using Berserk.

Modifications

• We now average the speed of your two weapons when you do two-handed attacks - Frenzy, Double Swing, Dragon Claw, etc...
• Dragon Tail now has an attack bonus.
• Lower Resist, Conviction and Amplify Damage don't affect immunities.

Okay, done reading?  What are you thinking?  Chances are, you're ticked off.  All those hours you spent building up those characters of yours are shot down the tubes now.  Good, because if you feel that way, you're the person I want to speak to.

Again, I stated above that you might not like this article.  Here's why: stop whining.  Every Diablo II forum in the scene is awash with players griping, complaining, moaning, and whining about these changes.  It's turned almost every forum into complete slop.  And it's all utterly caused by people having an incorrect notion of what the Expansion Pack is.  I'll sum it up right here:

The Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.

Now, stick that idea back in your head, and listen to what I have to say (if you're still reading, that is, instead of starting your flame mail to me which I'll ignore anyway).  Blizzard has allowed us to convert our current characters over to the Expansion Pack.  This was actually in debate some for a while, but the bottom line won out: not allowing players to convert their characters over would hurt sales of Lord of Destruction.  It's that simple.  That's the only reason why we can convert characters at all, even though there were many who would be happy if we couldn't.  Why?  Because the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.

It's not a whole new game in terms of graphics and sound, it's a whole new game in terms of gameplay.  The whole concept of how the game is played has changed.  Try to understand this.  In D2 classic, every character (well, any character that wanted to play the ladder or be "uberpowerful") concentrated their skill points in order to have high skill point values in a small number of skills.  Barbarians would max out their mastery and then go for Whirlwind, allowing support skills like Natural Resistance to round them out.  Sorceresses would use Static Field and one other attack.  Paladins would use one aura and one or two attack abilities.  Necromancers would stick one point into each Golem, get some revives, max Bone Spirit and use one or two curses max.  Finally, Amazons would get points into Critical Strike, Valkyrie, Penetrate, Pierce, and then dump points into attack skills (they were probably the most spread out of the original five).

Well guess what.  This strategy doesn't work anymore.  Why?  Because the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.  90% of high level characters which are currently decked out in classic Diablo II will convert over to the Expansion Pack and get a rude awakening.  But hey, we wanted to be able to convert, right?  We didn't want to lose our characters and items, even when those characters and items won't be so hot anymore.

All of the complaining going on in the forums is a result of players using the previous mindset brought on by a year of playing the old style.  The mindset is that if you deck yourself out well enough and stick with those few key skills, you can walk around in hell difficulty solo in an 8 player game and rule.  It's your right; you earned it.  Too bad that wasn't Blizzard's intention for you to be able to do that from the start.  They underestimated the ability of players to find loopholes (Blessed Hammer + Concentration as an example) and ways to finesse the system to be able to handle anything that comes along.  The end result was the experience gain nerf after level 75, and yet another one later, to try to stop people from getting to level 99.  The ability to gain levels so quickly was what was broken with D2 classic.  Got me?  Broken.  Blizzard was forced to make quick fixes to correct that mistake.

Guess what?  Blizzard has corrected that mistake, or at least they are attempting to.  So much is being reworked to prevent one-skill-wonders, characters designed to abuse one skill over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over so they can clear the River of Flame, solo, in an 8 player Hell-difficulty game.  And yet the masses complain.  They are used to doing this, and can't accept that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.  They want the exact same rules to apply as before.  It doesn't work like that.

Everything that allowed for solo mass killing of large numbers of enemies quickly is fast disappearing.  Static Field: nerfed.  Everyone complains.  Revive: nerfed.  Everyone complains.  Whirlwind: nerfed.  Everyone complains.  Blessed Hammer/Concentration: nerfed.  Everyone complains.  Multishot: nerfed.  Everyone complains.  They want to get up that ladder fast.  It's what we're all used to, after all, right?  Never mind the fact that after level 60 or so the game turns into boringly mindless run after run after run after run of a certain map in large player games.  We like that!  We don't want it to change in Lord of Destruction, because we're not considering the fact that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.

The ability to convert our characters is a privilege granted to us because Blizzard didn't want to lose sales.  The average gamer will walk into the store, see the Expansion Pack, think it's great that they don't have to "start over" again, and buy it.  It's because they aren't informed that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game, so they'll get rudely surprised when they try to take that character out for a spin immediately in Act V.  This is unfortunate.  I'd rather they just not allow conversion, but then I wouldn't want to ruin everyone's need to carry over those 22 Stones of Jordan they have saved up.  Never mind the fact that those Stones aren't so great anymore.  Those players think that they're great because they don't realize that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.  The items have been turned completely upside down.  If you haven't played the beta, you can't possibly imagine how many new items are waiting for you.  It'll take some time for players to sort through them all to find those killer combos in sets, uniques, crafted items, and the few rares that are still decent in the game (remember too that there are magical modifiers that show up on magical items only, not rares).  News flash: rare items aren't so hot anymore.  Surprise!  You can gamble for them, so they're very common and they don't have the best modifiers.

So Static Field's been nerfed so that it can only reduce a monster's hit points to 50% in Hell difficulty.  Well now, let's complain until we're blue in the face!  How dare they do this!  How dare they actually make Hell difficulty INCREDIBLY HARD (which was their original intention) so that winning the game in Hell difficulty actually MEANS something - so we can respect those hardcore players who have crushed Baal in Hell for having great skill and cunning instead of just a good Internet connection (yes, I'm exaggerating, don't kill me - I respect all high level hardcore players now anyhow).  Because believe me, defeating Baal (merely getting to him) is one incredible feat right now.  Maybe it won't stay that way - the loopholes and the system finesses may come out all over again - but right now, Hell is HELL.

"Wait a minute.  So you're saying that the Expansion Pack is pretty different from classic Diablo II, huh?  So maybe our attitudes about what's 'possible' and 'impossible' are way off because we haven't played the game yet to see all that's in there?"

Anyhow, if you're an annoyed webmaster or beta tester sick and tired of the endless whining and complaining from users unaware that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game, feel free to link to this rant.  I'll handle all the flame mail, it's no biggie to hit the delete button.  Myself, I'll be doing what I planned to do for a month or two now - as soon as I get my hands on the Expansion Pack, I'm deleting all of my characters, with all of their items, and starting fresh.  To enjoy the game the way it was meant to be played - as a challenge.  I'm not criticizing anyone for converting their characters - far from it.  What I AM doing is telling them that whining isn't helping any.  Find a way to adapt or start over.  Blizzard's letting you convert to keep you happy, and nobody said you HAD to convert your characters!  They'll still be there in standard, classic Diablo II, as powerful as ever, ready to be played for years to come as standard D2 characters.  But if you want to convert them, you do not have the right to complain about the nerfs because it has been explained to you that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.  DEAL WITH IT!

Now, I'd like to ask one more thing: if you're spending all of your time on the Lounge forum or various scene forums complaining and whining about every nerf and change coming along in the game, move on.  Get off the Lounge forums in particular.  If you have NOTHING constructive to say, get out.  There is a HUGE difference between whining and offering constructive criticism.

An example of whining (not taken from any forum, just theoretical):

"This friggin sucks. What was Blizzard THINKING with Static Field? Do they know how IMPOSSIBLE it is to kill ANYTHING with Meteor or Frozen Orb in Hell Difficulty? These jerks must be completely brain dead. I'm totally not going to buy this game until I hear if a Sorceress can do anything solo in Hell Difficulty."

Now, an example of constructive criticism, something that's been sorely lacking as of late:

"This new revelation about the Static Field change has me worried, I'll admit. If we crunch numbers, we can see that after a 50% hit point reduction, a Hell difficulty Urdar has 1,400 hit points. With level 20 Frozen Orb and level 15 Cold Mastery, that'll take 10 Orbs to kill the creature. Granted, any mercenary the Sorceress has along will probably do half that damage himself, reducing the strain on the Sorceress. Still, with spell timers, it could get pretty difficult."

All of the numbers up there are just made up by me without checking, of course.  It's just an example of someone THINKING about the change with their HEADS; analyzing that there may be new strategies to use here (so many non-testers forget what mercenaries are doing for the Sorceress; it's a whole new game for her - wait, haven't I said that before?).  The fact is that a Sorceress has more to her arsenal than Frozen Orb and Static.  Maybe she could actually diversify her skills to include a now-beefed-up-by-a-beefed-up-Fire-Mastery-Hydra skill to support her while she takes down that Urdar, while flinging a now-beefed-up-Chain-Lightning skill to bounce around other creatures and do some quick mass damage before unleashing another Frozen Orb.  Hmm.  Gee.

Stop analyzing the game in terms of 8-player solo, and you'll finally get the drift.  You are NOT SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO SURVIVE PLAYING SOLO IN AN 8 PLAYER GAME.  That was NOT the original design of Diablo II!  Blizzard just screwed that up and they're now fixing it.

In short, if you're more like the first poster than the second, consider the fact that I (and many others) are sick and tired of your attitude.  Not just on the Lounge forums, but scene-wide.  Either remember that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game, or stop posting.  Period.  Perhaps you've forgotten the days when poster #2 was the norm, not the exception.  When intelligent discourse was made continuously and well-thought-out suggestions were made instead of outright bashes for Blizzard to "fix this now or I won't buy it."  Yes, poster type #2 WAS the norm back before this site exploded in popularity.  If you can't see why that's better than a forum filled with poster type #1, then there's no hope for you.

We all get emotional about changes to our favorite game.  It's natural.  Especially if you're not a beta tester and you're not fully informed as to what's really going on.  When you feel like making a post that contributes absolutely NOTHING to a forum, that's echoed in 100 other posts in the same THREAD, stop and THINK.  Count to 10.  And take a break.  Come back when you have a more level head.  There's no point whatsoever in poster #1 - you do nothing but waste everyone else's time so you can blow off some steam.  Instead, think.  Think for half an hour, and come up with a suggestion as to how to improve something you don't like.  If you can't think of a way, admit that maybe Blizzard has a good idea on their hands.  If you CAN think of a way, post it in the appropriate thread - don't start yet another thread about something if it's already there for you to add your thoughts to.  Remember that this IS a beta, and things ARE still up for changes.  Even after the release, too.  A well-constructed idea will go a lot farther than "Blizzard sux, fix it."

I'm out.  If you disagree with what I said, fine.  I understand.  If you disagree with what I said and still plan on spamming up every forum you can with whining, get lost, for you are no longer wanted here.  Try not to take it personally.

Those of you who know me know how rare this kind of outburst is.  Perhaps that tells you how much it means to me.  And, since it bears repeating, remember that the Expansion Pack for Diablo II is a whole new game.  Thank you for reading this far.