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DiabloII CommentsThis is my open letter to the Blizzard design team.
The current backstory is that the first set of player characters failed, so ... I dislike that sort of backstory. You start the game with "while you weren't looking, a deus ex machina killed off your prior character" -- a cheap shot combined with a downer. Better is some sort of disaster that others are responsible for <g> that impacts on your character, "norming" them to the current game. E.g. You awake in the middle of the night with a feeling of dread and despair. Evil power washes over the land. You have a vision of Theopolis, the Hierarch of the Monastic Dreads. You never trusted him and now you know the terrible truth -- as a result of his actions, Diablo is free again! You feel twistings of magic and curses warping through you. The world has changed and not for the better. Then, the imported character is reduced to level 1 and finds out that his/her character class has to change as a result of the curse. Worse, all of his/her equipment is missing -- but will show up later in the game as "special treasure" items with the character's name attached to them. Thus, one quest might reward you with "Michael's Helm" (if your character's name was Michael) and another with Michael's great sword of the zodiac. This sort of backstory allows new characters to be used or old ones imported without having any negative impact on flavor or gameplay, and with some added flavor. Think of the triumph and satisfaction of getting your own stuff back -- and having it with your name on it as well. The concept of hot keys should be expanded. The left hand key set should be linked to optional functions/abilities/spells. Thus [q][w][e][r][t] to [z][x][c][v][b] would provide up to fifteen spells or skills ready to go. Players would play with one hand on the left side of the keyboard and one on the mouse -- somewhat like the four function keys now work. See also Spells & Comments on Magic/Skills. That allows for a lot more flexibility and challenge in some issues. BTW, I don't see anything wrong with making some skills consume mana just like spells consume it. Makes for easier play balancing (and less of the need to fumble characters every-so-often. "Strong" fumbles are an indication of design failure. "Weak" fumbles add texture. E.g. "you can do this special move, but some disaster might happen" is an indication that play balance couldn't be achieved through good design. "You can do this special move, but it often comes at a price" is game design. For a magic user the "price" is mana/energy. There isn't any reason not to make all the special skills/etc. somewhat supramundane and costing in mana). At a "special" (skill or access to a spell) at about every level (either adding a new one or improving an old one at each level), every character class should have 15 to 20 special skills, abilities, spells, psionic disciplines, etc. available to them by level twenty. I'm assuming that each town should take the character through about four or five levels and each wilderness about one or two. By the end of the fifth town and four wilderness expeditions the character should be "finishing" the game at about level 25 to 30. Difficulty levels would take game play up through level 75 or so -- keeping the game a real challenge.
I know that the design team thinks that they can take those out and make
the game locations take over that function. However ... I think that
keeping difficulty levels is important.
It may seem strange for me to be one of the people espousing extended game play. I'm not a long term, repeat for hours sort of player. *But* I also have design and successful game credits back into the 1970s and know a lot of consumers <g>. This is just my two bits about what makes a better game and what is important commercially. Imagine if QuakeII did not have difficulty levels... Ok, I'm not the biggest fan of "real world" intrusions. But, I think that making equipment a little less durable (oh, say, about 50% or so more repairs needed) would make the game play more interesting without making it painful. Further, it would let the game penalize fumbles (e.g. the Amazon's impale move with the chance of a disaster) with "crack" noises rather than "break" noises (5-10 points of durability off the weapon rather than all of them). Some characters could still recharge/repair their own equipment, though the erosion off the maximums ought to be more constant *and* repaired or repairable by resort to the blacksmith/witch, etc. Paladin (healing/anti-undead/anti-demon), Amazon (fighting tricks), Bard /Harper (blended rogue/monk replacement), Necromancer (no healing spell, own dark skills and spells), Witch/Sorceress (infravision, healing, identify spells) are my guesses. Each has a universe of 20 possible spells/skills of which any character can have a max of fifteen of them (one for each key <g>) and up to twenty levels or so in each skill/spell. I should note that Blizzard decided against the Bard /Harper and in favor of the Barbarian. Might as well give all of them "spell books" or similar tokens -- and it wouldn't hurt to tie some of those into quests. (e.g. a character needs to go up a level and have the right book or certificate or some such and they can then learn the spell/skill). I'd be careful with the Necromancer's golem/elemental/bone spirit/blood star equivalents. Tailored in that fashion they should work well. What you are then doing is requiring the Necromancer to have rather common ingredients ready to use variations on "stock" spells. that can be kept within good play balance. I would like to see the Barbarian, Monk and Rogue return as well. Guess they'll be in an expansion pack. <g> [spells & comments] An important note for the "housekeeping" end of a game is that there are two tools that can make things work out very well. First, autopilot or the equivalent. When Origin produced WCIII, one real problem they had was that players had to search the darn ship over and over again. Many Diablo players give up visiting Wirt for the same reason. A "hot spot" map/autopilot really helps in situations like this. Whenever your game world gets large, that sort of thing really helps. Second, banks, houses, letters of credit, etc. are a real help. Rather than having the players dump everything on the ground <g> it helps if they can convert cash to jewelry, tokens, letters of credit, etc. While there should be a limit to character possessions, much of the fun of the game is in keeping souvenirs. The classic "bag of holding" (accessible only in the towns -- basically as a replacement device for throwing stuff on the ground) is a good example of such a technique in action. With access restrictions it protects inventory size control considerations while also allowing the characters access and storage (without the UO "safehouse" etc. approach). |
Heroquests (Chaosium/Runequest)
Shattered Norns
Runequest Scenarios
Wing Commander
King of the City
-- a proposal.
Ftp item directory,
Ftp1 item directory
Hellfire -- the Barbarian, Bard and Cow Quest
Diablo 1.5 -- Fallen Angels
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