03-27-2014, 03:54 PM
(This post was last modified: 03-27-2014, 04:41 PM by FireIceTalon.)
Here is my full thoughts now.
Yea the game is definitely a reality check for those of us who were farming higher difficulties pre-launch. T5 was no problem for me pre-launch, but I knew monsters leveled up as you do so I lowered it to T3 before I even started. Turns out, even that wasn't enough and I had to lower it to T1 just to complete Act 5 reasonably. It was still challenging since I was fighting lvl 70 monsters (I hit lvl 70 in about 3 hrs) with lvl 60 gear on. I died plenty of times, but the rough patch was only temporary and I found upgrades quickly.
Now, I'm back in T2 and destroying it pretty efficiently, will probably try T3 soon. Adventure Mode is just incredible, I cannot explain how this feature alone makes the game so much better. I'll probably never play campaign mode again. So I've been running bounties (mostly in Act 5) just improving my char steadily. Nephalem Rifts are incredibly fun too - I love the new look, random levels (Highlands at night time is @_@) and the random monsters that generate, but it is better to do these with a friend cause they tend to be pretty lengthy.
One thing I am a little concerned about is the kind of gear that will be required to farm T5-6. I mean, right now my Wiz has like 850k dps with buffs, over 8 million toughness (10+ million when Unwavering Will procs), 300k life, 2500 all resist, over 8K LoH, and T2 feels comfortable @_@. I can't even imagine the numbers I will need to do higher torment levels, it must be insane. I'm guess all legendaries in every slot is pretty much required to survive in those difficulties. But no rush, I like being able to build my char now and find upgrades instead of having to play AH Tycoon. It is actually fun and REWARDING to play the game now.
The Mystic is another incredible new feature, I use her constantly. The character customization is really nice too, with transmogrification and the fact we can dye legs now....
Another great thing now is that boss fights are more challenging than in Vanilla. In D3V, most of the bosses u could just face tank and win as long as you had enough mitigation and healing. Azmodan is still too easy, and Belial and Diablo are only hard at certain points in the fight. The new bosses, especially Malthael, have a lot more interactive abilities that force you to move and think about how u use your skills. Malthael is probably harder than most elite packs - not in a cheezy way, but in a genuinely challenging way. This is a welcomed change for me, bosses should be harder than elites in my opinion.
The new Wizard skills are just fabulous. Black Hole is just so much fun to use, and has become my fav skill. The passives are really nice too - Elemental Exposure is nice if you are using a build that has multiple elements, and Unwavering Will boost your armor, resist, and dmg if you stand still for 1.5 seconds - this is neat for channeling skills or those tank more.
In general, I am overwhelmingly pleased. Still, there are few tweaks that need to be done, and there is still a couple major changes that it needs.
The most glaring one of course is the implementation of a REAL PvP system. What we have now is a joke, its not even worthy of being called PvP. PvP was a big reason why many people played D1 and D2 for so many years, its the ultimate end game feature. When you get perfect gear in every slot and can faceroll the highest difficulty, the only left to do really (with that char at least) is to now test your skill against others. They will need to put this in if RoS is to have the same longevity as its predecessors.
The new loot system is nice, but I still see some room for improvement. For instance, most weapons only roll with 3 primary stats, and a socket is pretty much a requirement or the weapon is useless. This only leaves us with 2 other stats if we have to enchant a socket on our weapon. They either need to make it so weapons have 4 primary stats like most other items, or make it so that weapons have a socket by default. I would also like to see some more interesting secondary affixes across items.
The drop rate of legendaries and set items could a little higher. In patch 2.0 in Vanilla I was finding lots of legs, but now not as much. They don't need to make the drop rate significantly higher, but a small-moderate increase would be in place I think, say maybe 25% better chance. Although last night I was very lucky and found two nice leg upgrades (source and bracers).
The drop rates of Death's Breath needs a substantial increase, probably should be doubled. We need this material to craft almost everything, and the drop rates right now are just too low for how much we need it.
Experience gains for paragon leveling have been nerfed too hard. In a system where we only have a soft cap (paragon 800) and essentially an infinite amount of levels we can get, the experience we get from monsters needs to be rather high, so it feels like we are progressing. Right now, paragon leveling is so slow it feels like a crawl
Last but not least, and this isn't so much an RoS issue as it is a D3 issue in general since its been here since day 1 - monster affixes. I think monsters can spam their abilities too much - this is especially true of cc traits like Frozen, Jailer, Waller, etc. Also, some traits shouldn't be able to spawn together. Especially true now that elite packs can spawn with up to 6 monsters instead of just 4. Being chain frozen and jailed is not fun, nor is it challenging - it is outright annoying. I like being challenged, I do NOT like being trolled.
Despite these negatives I've listed here, RoS is a great game and I never thought D3 would reach levels like this. Overall, as it is now, I would give the game a solid 9/10. It is superior to its predecessor, D3V, in every way, by a landslide. I'm one of Blizz's toughest critics, but I have to hand it to them here, they delivered an amazing expansion pack. If they implement a legitimate PvP system and do a few tweaks here and there, this game will become a classic.
Yea the game is definitely a reality check for those of us who were farming higher difficulties pre-launch. T5 was no problem for me pre-launch, but I knew monsters leveled up as you do so I lowered it to T3 before I even started. Turns out, even that wasn't enough and I had to lower it to T1 just to complete Act 5 reasonably. It was still challenging since I was fighting lvl 70 monsters (I hit lvl 70 in about 3 hrs) with lvl 60 gear on. I died plenty of times, but the rough patch was only temporary and I found upgrades quickly.
Now, I'm back in T2 and destroying it pretty efficiently, will probably try T3 soon. Adventure Mode is just incredible, I cannot explain how this feature alone makes the game so much better. I'll probably never play campaign mode again. So I've been running bounties (mostly in Act 5) just improving my char steadily. Nephalem Rifts are incredibly fun too - I love the new look, random levels (Highlands at night time is @_@) and the random monsters that generate, but it is better to do these with a friend cause they tend to be pretty lengthy.
One thing I am a little concerned about is the kind of gear that will be required to farm T5-6. I mean, right now my Wiz has like 850k dps with buffs, over 8 million toughness (10+ million when Unwavering Will procs), 300k life, 2500 all resist, over 8K LoH, and T2 feels comfortable @_@. I can't even imagine the numbers I will need to do higher torment levels, it must be insane. I'm guess all legendaries in every slot is pretty much required to survive in those difficulties. But no rush, I like being able to build my char now and find upgrades instead of having to play AH Tycoon. It is actually fun and REWARDING to play the game now.
The Mystic is another incredible new feature, I use her constantly. The character customization is really nice too, with transmogrification and the fact we can dye legs now....
Another great thing now is that boss fights are more challenging than in Vanilla. In D3V, most of the bosses u could just face tank and win as long as you had enough mitigation and healing. Azmodan is still too easy, and Belial and Diablo are only hard at certain points in the fight. The new bosses, especially Malthael, have a lot more interactive abilities that force you to move and think about how u use your skills. Malthael is probably harder than most elite packs - not in a cheezy way, but in a genuinely challenging way. This is a welcomed change for me, bosses should be harder than elites in my opinion.
The new Wizard skills are just fabulous. Black Hole is just so much fun to use, and has become my fav skill. The passives are really nice too - Elemental Exposure is nice if you are using a build that has multiple elements, and Unwavering Will boost your armor, resist, and dmg if you stand still for 1.5 seconds - this is neat for channeling skills or those tank more.
In general, I am overwhelmingly pleased. Still, there are few tweaks that need to be done, and there is still a couple major changes that it needs.
The most glaring one of course is the implementation of a REAL PvP system. What we have now is a joke, its not even worthy of being called PvP. PvP was a big reason why many people played D1 and D2 for so many years, its the ultimate end game feature. When you get perfect gear in every slot and can faceroll the highest difficulty, the only left to do really (with that char at least) is to now test your skill against others. They will need to put this in if RoS is to have the same longevity as its predecessors.
The new loot system is nice, but I still see some room for improvement. For instance, most weapons only roll with 3 primary stats, and a socket is pretty much a requirement or the weapon is useless. This only leaves us with 2 other stats if we have to enchant a socket on our weapon. They either need to make it so weapons have 4 primary stats like most other items, or make it so that weapons have a socket by default. I would also like to see some more interesting secondary affixes across items.
The drop rate of legendaries and set items could a little higher. In patch 2.0 in Vanilla I was finding lots of legs, but now not as much. They don't need to make the drop rate significantly higher, but a small-moderate increase would be in place I think, say maybe 25% better chance. Although last night I was very lucky and found two nice leg upgrades (source and bracers).
The drop rates of Death's Breath needs a substantial increase, probably should be doubled. We need this material to craft almost everything, and the drop rates right now are just too low for how much we need it.
Experience gains for paragon leveling have been nerfed too hard. In a system where we only have a soft cap (paragon 800) and essentially an infinite amount of levels we can get, the experience we get from monsters needs to be rather high, so it feels like we are progressing. Right now, paragon leveling is so slow it feels like a crawl
Last but not least, and this isn't so much an RoS issue as it is a D3 issue in general since its been here since day 1 - monster affixes. I think monsters can spam their abilities too much - this is especially true of cc traits like Frozen, Jailer, Waller, etc. Also, some traits shouldn't be able to spawn together. Especially true now that elite packs can spawn with up to 6 monsters instead of just 4. Being chain frozen and jailed is not fun, nor is it challenging - it is outright annoying. I like being challenged, I do NOT like being trolled.
Despite these negatives I've listed here, RoS is a great game and I never thought D3 would reach levels like this. Overall, as it is now, I would give the game a solid 9/10. It is superior to its predecessor, D3V, in every way, by a landslide. I'm one of Blizz's toughest critics, but I have to hand it to them here, they delivered an amazing expansion pack. If they implement a legitimate PvP system and do a few tweaks here and there, this game will become a classic.
https://www.youtube.com/user/FireIceTalon
"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)
"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)