My Unofficial Hellfire 1.02 Mod

[Hammerskjold]

Sorry, long post again.

True, when you consider that most physical damage comes from character attributes, tacking another 10-20 on to the damage display at high levels seems like a small thing, but sometimes a few numbers make a big difference.

Quite. I used to try to remember some key numbers like min stun dmg needed for H\H regular monsters, to hit %, Dex number for block at what clvl etc.

IIRC the difference between 63 and 65 dmg was negligible. The difference between 60 and 63 dmg was sometimes, the difference of getting consistent stun dmg.

Anyway, lots of ways the oils could be used that are nice... and some sadly kind of exploitative.

Absolutely. It's a fine line between fun and this is too dang easy.

Yes. The Amazon's Multi-shot skill in Diablo II is aimed the same way; ...

Your text, my thoughts. We are in sync on this one.

As one more thought on Gnat Sting's performance, since it does 1-2 damage and has no elemental enchantments, it reaches its peak only with Max Str & Dex and at the highest character levels. Whereas most of the elemental bow's punch comes from the item itself, rendering them relatively potent as soon as you can obtain one (around Level 31, give or take, I believe), and only improving slightly with stats/levels. But it's an amazing bow if you find it really early, and definitely a worthy choice later on against some of Hellfire's fire and lightning immune monsters where physical damage is all you can do.

Yep. I don't use the 'Y' pattern shot much, because most of the time
it frankly sucks. There are rare occasions however I found the 'Y' pattern useful when shooting witches from a corner. But it's fairly rare and niche situation. It definitely favors, almost needs a maxed dex&str \ higher char levels to really shine.

I did use it on a middle clvl rogue once to cover her deficient dmg.

Nothing wrong with that. I think the visceral feel of the game, the nice sounds and visuals are an important part of the lasting appeal it offers. Compare this with some of Diablo II's (in my opinion) relatively underwhelming sound effects and graphics, say, the original Fireball with Diablo II's. Enough said.

We're in sync on this one as well. D1\HF is not perfect. But it still has one of the best feedback for control. It's hard to describe it, it's like a coupe with a tight turning radius vs a big town car.

D2 is a fine game, but to me there was always that slight bit of 'skating on ice' feel in the char controls and feedback.

TL2 is IMO very good with feedback on control, surprising considering AFAIK it doesn't use the grid system of D1, but it doesn't feel as 'slidey' (Not a real word, just the closest I can describe it.) as D2.

Like you, I immediately warmed up to Hellfire's Bard, because I'd become much too good with the Sorcerer. Since this mod I've been reluctant to play Sorcerers any more because without the concern of friendly fire, nothing about the game holds back his insane destructive potential besides running out of mana potions. The Bard will never have his massive mana pool, casts slower, and is tougher to get spells up to high levels.

The Bard was the second last char that I actually 'got', because when I first tried it I thought she was another Rogue. Due to the shared graphics. 'WTF? She's crap using a bow. NEXT!'

After reading and playing it some more, I finally understood she's the Jaquie of all trades Mistress of none type. Similar but different than the Rogue. But since she's pretty good\decent enough with Magic and Melee, it's not a big loss in my eyes. That and dual wielding. Decent Dex max limit for to hit and blocking, sweep dmg, arguably second strongest spell slinger. ID'ing as a native skill, possibly the best innate skill in the game.

I was admittedly reluctant to try the Barbarian until recently, but I found him enjoyable enough to finish Nightmare with. Not being able to hide behind a shield like the Warrior or Rogue definitely makes melee... interesting.

The Barb was the first one I tried when I bought my HF disc. And I grok-ed the char instantly. I thought, this is how the warrior should've been. We know Warriors are very, very good with Weapon\Shield melee. Barbs, are -excellent- with nearly all melee excepting staves iirc. Phenomenal with 2 handers. I had a high level Barb with Kings Axe of Vampire that was quite fun. And a mid-high level that cleared H\H with just a Bashing axe. He was a blast to play as well.

I'm set to play my first Monk soon. I'm hoping he'll surprise me because he seemed the least interesting of the Hellfire classes, like a confused Bard that can block but is slow with everything except staves and bare hands.

IMO, he suffers from not up to par artwork. Sierra probably was not given enough time, conflict\quibbling between bliz and sierra etc whatever the reason was.

Now I can overlook a lot of stuff if the gameplay is solid. As long as it's not too fugly, I can be generous. Monk, is too close to fugly IMO. The stance and walk cycle looks like he's doing a Ministry of Silly Walk. It's the bent angle at the knees I think.

It may not have been in the original model, maybe it was skewed. But on screen, it looks fugly, and out of place in comparison to the rest of the artwork\models. Monk's model\animation is the 'Hive' of HF char design to me. It sticks out, in a not so good way.

HF:F IMO at least made the monk playable. But a huge fix like a complete redraw of the artwork\re-model, especially with the sprites\individual frames system. Is likely too tall and big, time consuming, difficult and expensive for modders.

I'm guessing you probably know that Runic Games, the creators of Torchlight, are composed of some of the same team members that worked on the original Diablo. I met and played with some of them (including Max Schaefer, who was quite nice and insightful) during the Mythos alpha test,

That sounds awesome.

Agreed... sadly different entertainment products enjoy very different life spans before they are all but forgotten, and video games have by far the shortest life spans in that sense.

I like to think it just might need time. Maybe it just needs to gain some more years until 'old' rolls over into 'classic retro'.