Thursday (17 May) - Diablo 3 Act I and More

Thursday (17 May) - Diablo 3 Act I and More

Note: My somewhat obsessive focus on Diablo 3 has outpaced all my attempts to write about it. So, the below is a somewhat rambling account of my progress prior to the weekend. I did have to slow down over the weekend because I wasn't home much on Saturday and will be away much of Sunday, as well. So, hopefully, I'll get caught up early next week. Here goes . . .

Diablo 3 really brings back memories of those old single player games. It was just me against the computer, and I played a lot of them. Diablo 1 and 2 were my favorites. A close second was Dungeon Siege I and II. Of course I played all three single player Warcraft games and completed the first Starcraft game, too. When I was in between releases of my favorites, I grabbed other games: Sacred, Beyond Divinity, Harbinger, Syberia, Throne of Darkness, and others. I still have all of those games, and they probably even still play on my XP computer.

Diablo 3 takes advantage of all the things Blizzard learned when they created World of Warcraft, while still giving the game the very same feel of the earlier Diablo games. I was stunned when I learned that the game still used Checkpoints instead of letting players save the game at whatever point we want. During actual game play, though, it really hasn't been a factor or even a minor irritant. There are a lot of checkpoints, so even in the worst case you don't lose too much if you quit the game in between checkpoints. My worst moment was when Blizzard shut down for maintenance. I was off in my own world and didn't know about it until I was booted out of the game. Even then, the game remembered everything right up to that second. The only thing that seems to be affected is exploring and clearing areas. Several times I would return to an area I had explored, only to find I had to go do it all over again.

Getting around in Diablo 3 is a lot easier than with the earlier games, too. Waypoints allow travelers to teleport to every major spot in the game, and single purpose waypoints are also used to move between areas, such as when following a quest chain. For example, when exploring a dungeon with two levels, players must pass through a portal to go back and forth between levels. The handiest feature in the game (which I can't recall whether earlier games had it or not) is that once players reach a certain level (like level 5 or something low like that) we get our own personal portal between our home town and where were are currently. That makes it really easy to portal to town, clear the junk in our bags, and then portal back right where we were. It's more convenient than even WoW's portal process.

When I started playing these games, a lot of those conveniences didn't exist. If you were killed, depending on the game, it could be a real pain. Imagine working and working to clear through a long chain of monsters, and then die right before the end with the game putting you back at the beginning to do it all over again. Maybe in part because of that, I really, really hate dying. It took several years playing WoW before dying was just another facet of the game. Just rez and go on.

With Diablo, I've fallen back into my barbarian opinion that dying is for wimps. Barbedwire's gear and ability decisions mirror that opinion. BW is heavily armored. He wears quite a bit of armor that adds additional health, or provides health regeneration. It's nothing as elaborate as WoW, but it's very similar. Everything else is designed for killing. All of BW's abilities give him more fury, or higher damage, or strike multiple targets, or stun/knockback the bad guys. As BW has leveled the game keeps presenting him with new abilities to try. From my perspective, though, they gave BW all of the good ones up front. All of BW's abilities come from the first or second rank, and he has access to four levels of abilities now.

BW still has his templar follower with him. The Templar levels right along with BW, although he is usually one level behind. Which is just like hunter pets in WoW. Bw was offered a Scoundrel (like a rogue), which BW turned down. So far BW has only been allowed one follower, so I'd have had to give up my templar. I like my templar. In truth, I wish templars were playable characters. Later on BW was offered a sorcerer type, but I stayed with the trusty templar. To be absolutely honest, the follower doesn't really help much (ie, a WoW hunter pet is much more powerful than a follower), but he does talk a lot, so I guess he's good company.

I've played enough to start seeing some patterns. Based on that, here is a description of a typical battle when going into an area for the first time.

BW and Templar teleport into a new area. We are in a small room. The map doesn't show anything but the immediate area around me. We'll have to move to start drawing in the map of the area. Templar immediately sets up a few yards in front of BW. The guy is earnest and sincere, and determined to protect BW by attacking anything and everything nearby, even if it's currently minding it's own business. No problem, because killing everything in our path is what's on the agenda.

Our first contact is with a group of mobs, including some really nasty ones. The game likes to get the adrenaline popping right at the beginning with a large pile of mobs which often hides a smaller group of elites. Templar gets the scent and he's off, BW on his heels. BW weighs into the fray, swiping multiple targets with single swings of his axe/sword/dagger/mace/whatever he's using at the time. If mobs are going down in two to three swipes, BW will keep massacring them, adding Stomps to stun groups before cutting them down. Left click swinging and right click stomping, BW piles up the carcasses. As long as health bulbs appear in the carnage, BW can keep plowing through mobs. When something meaner than the run of the mill mob starts taking chunks out of BW, BW targets the attacker for personal attention. If health starts to become a problem, BW has his special, practiced move. He retreats, forcing the mobs to follow, which also causes them to spread out and become easier prey.

Retreating is good strategy if part of the goal is not to die. There is no penalty for dying, though. Sure, dying damages gear that then have to be repaired. Gold is plentiful, though, and gear is easily repaired. Dying might also mean having to restart at a checkpoint that requires re-killing some mobs, but again that's a minor inconvenience. It's just fun for me to try to avoid being killed.

Ok, about the mobs. Mobs are stupid. Some mobs follow, some stay back, and they quickly get strung out if BW stays on the move. BW can saunter back, his health now back to full, and crush them in smaller groups. It works for the big bad elites, too. Just wear them out, get out of range when health is low, and they'll eventually go down. One ability of BW's is that mobs will literally explode when certain conditions are met. There's a certain finality to that blast of blood and flesh, particularly when it's an elite. BW will even save the health pots that randomly drop, leaving them available in his path of retreat so he can heal up faster.

BW is facing a lot of mobs recently that spread acid and other corrosive goop as an attack or when they die. Standing in that stuff does more damage than anything else. BW has to reposition often to stay out of that stuff, and retreat to heal when he can't help it.

Templar ignores all that. He jumps into every fight with genuine enthusiasm. He does pitiful damage, but he's just about indestructible. When BW first started using the back off and come back approach I figured Templar would die, because he just doesn't know how to quit. But I learned right away that Templar would immediately try to follow BW. If BW out ran him, which is easy to do, in a few seconds he'll still pop up out of nowhere next to BW, ready to go again.

For most battles, though, BW and Templar don't need to back off at all. The two of them leave piles of rotting corpses in their wake with the only pause being to port back to town to sell off the gear bulging in BW's bags.

Barbedwire is level 23 and has completed Act 1. BW is near the end of Act II, with just two more king-sized elites to deal with.