WARNING: intensive wall text with a lot of ideas to make this mod more fun, balanced and unique.
All love to this mod, it just need some polish. I know, not everyone will like the ideas/changes, but please, put your commentaries in this post your opinion of all this ideas/changes with as much details as possible, just be friendly.
PS1: all in this are just a theorycraft, never tested and need be more "polished" too.
PS2: Sorry for bad english.
THE MINDSET TO GUIDE THE CHANGES ARE:
• Turn all classes more unique in their concept and playstyle, balanced (PvM/PvP), making the class kit the “core” of gameplay (and rewarding for this), turning all class skills more good and synergy and making the leveling more fun;
• Making some classes have more coop effect/synergy (almost every class, like is in Diablo 2;
• Balance gear things making all classes gear based or at least a little gear based, less gear = less power, more gear = more power, how must be;
• Balance the thing about Very Fast weapons are too strong when compared to Slow weapons;
• Balance the of spells and immunities (who make the game play frustating and make all Sorcerers use crafted –res staffs, disabling the use of other gears) – indirecly balancing the Sorcerer;
• Almost every class have a useless skill/spell or sub-used, replace them for new spells/skills to make the core of class more interesting and put the utility skills (ex.: repair) to be a 6 skill to all classes and not counting as 5 skills.
• Make the class kits more useful and balanced and played like the concept of class is;
• Changing of synergys: the effect of each synergy need to be rebalanced;
• Low the cooldowns, more than 1min for a cooldown in a hack'n'slash is very high IMO.
1. BALANCING UTILITY SKILLS
Utility skills like Repair Item, Staff Recharge and Trap Disarm counting as one of the 5 class skills is bad, since are only "utility" and let the class without one skill to use in a real combat, and some gold or telekinesis almost nullify the effect of them or can make the same thing with a little more effort (opening a Town Portal, just).
• Put utility skills to be a special skills of class, not counting as the 5, so the class kit spells/skills will be 1 Utility and 5 Combative skills/spells;
• Put one utility skill for each class, since some class don't have;
• Put the cooldown of utility skills be at maximum 1 min, more than this is bad;
• Sorcerer, Warrior and Rogue: maintain the utility skill, just create a new skill Combative to complete the 5 Combative skills of class kit;
• Barbarian: create the utility skill named Find Potion/Item, you use this skill at a corpse to try to find Potions or Items (affected by Magic Find), like is in Diablo 2 skill;
• Necromancer: create the utility skill named Drain Essences, what you use at a corpse and get X% of maximum Life/Mana;
• Assassin: create the utility skill named Identify Items, what can be used to identify items (I know, Bard have this in Hellfire, but if they think to put a Bard, I think Bargain, a utility skill for reduce a lot price of NPCs will be more interesting).
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
This is one of changes to make all 5 skill class kit to be the core of gameplay (except Sorcerer, what the Spell List is the core) and have 1 utility skill to help, in differents ways, every class.
2. BALANCING SPELL BASED CLASSES
2.1. BALANCE OF SPELLS (Balance of Sorcerer – INDIRECTLY)
• Make the character level a requesite to learn a spell (based in the Spell Level who will be learned), like are with Magic/Vitality;
• Down the Magic/Vitality need to learn spells with high level;
• Chain Lightning is the grand unbalanced skill, since others spells make your job without clearing all room with one press. Maybe make the Chain Lightning to become in the style of Chain Lightning of Diablo 2, was more “balanced” than the Diablo 1 version at least;
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
This changes will make the spell damage more balanced since a low level character won’t be possible to get a great Spell Level and the down of Magic/Vitality req will make the dream of lvl 15 not more “impossible”.
With all this changes, the monsters “full immunities” don’t need more exist to balance Sorcerer/Casters, since the character level will balance them like balance others classes, so the damage will be more balanced.
2.2. BALANCE MONSTERS IMMUNITY
• Drop the immunity to be 100% instead of 125% of resist;
• Don't let monsters be full immunity/resistences (enhanced);
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
With the spells balance writen in the start of this topic, the monsters don’t need be get a lot of immunities since the damage will be much more balanced based in level and the character don’t need a lot of "-% enemy resistances" to deal some damage, because the damage will be more balanced.
Don’t need a lot of "-% res" open the window to use a lot of more staffs, instead of using only crafted staffs "-% res" - another side effect of a lot of immunities.
2.3. SORCERER
Concept: the true caster of the game, use spell list to conjure powerfull spells, the core kit is about give supportive to this playstyle of Sorcerer.
Currently: Sorcerer are OP until Hell and in Hell/Torment are frustating, the changes at monsters immunity (100%) and Spellbooks (req more level and less magic – to learn) suggested in the start of topic are the start of balancing the Sorcerer, since the are the only class true based in Spell List. Different from other classes, the skills of Sorcerer are balanced only in attributes (magic), but need be based in level too to a good balance.
IMO, the Sorcerer, as a master of spells, need know some tricks, and with this, need have at least one spell/skill unique form to deal damage.
2.3.1. Staff Recharge (Utility Skill)
• Maintain this, just change to a slot reserved to Utility skills;
• Change the cooldown for: 1 min.
2.3.2. Desintegrate (will be avaible from start)
Description: a beam of energy who will deal damage per each 0.X seconds for what enemy touched. Like the Diablo 3, but much more next to the work of Inferno.
• Create Desintegrate and put to be avaible from start;
• Desintegrate will deal 33% damage as Magic, 33% as Fire and 33% as Physical – a skill to deal with a lot of monster, but aren’t too much strong when facing a monster will one of this immunities;
• Duration: until unhold the RMB/LMB button.
• Will be used every time need;
• Synergy: more level and magic will increase the damage.
• Costs mana/sec.
2.3.3. Elemental Drain (level 8 )
• Turn the cooldown to 45 secs;
• Synergy: Level will decrease the cooldown.
2.3.4. Mana Shield (level 16)
• Add Synergy: make the Resistences Penetration and Duration be affected by Magic and Level, instead of only Magic.
2.3.5. Etheralize (level 24)
• Add Synergy: All Resistences, Armor Class, Attacker Takes Damage and Duration be affected by Magic and Level, instead of only magic.
2.3.6. Temporal Slowdown (level 32)
• Add Synergy: Time Slowed and Slowdown Duration be affected by Magic and Level, instead of only magic.
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
Now 1 skill of Sorcerer (Staff Recharge) can be buyed with gold, 3 of 5 Sorcerer kit are pure defense, so the new skill Desintegrate will bring a UNIQUE spell damage to Sorcerer making the class more unique with damage too, Desintegrate will deal damage at every enemy (since the Physical damage) but in general aren’t a skill to use at all monsters, since vs a Fire Immunity or Magic Immunity it will deal only 66% vs a Chain Lightning will deal 100%, so will be a skill was need be used with wisdom;
Making the skills being sinergy with Magic and Level make the Sorcerer less unbalanced in Normal/NM and don’t be frustating playing with in Hell/Torment.
With balaced the things of damage and immunities, the Elemental Drain do not need a cooldown too high.
2.4. NECROMANCER
Concept: a class who play around the use of corpse mechanics and summon mechanics, gives support to the skeletons while they are piercing enemies. Good versus crowd.
Currently: the Necromancer is a weak/slow sorcerer with meat shields (until hell/torment) with one of the most useless skills named Raise Zombie, what make at character low levels painful and very slow.
Only vitality from gear change a little the gameplay now, making Necromancer being the less or one of the less class based in equips, but we can change this.
Necromancer cap at never giving support to him army, a curse replacing the Raise Zombie can be effective in this way, and helping a little vs Super Uniques, since Necromancer are weak vs Diablo.
In high difficulties necromancer become more balanced, but Raise Zombie still inviable and Revive are bad since you can’t teleport revives like in Diablo 2.
2.4.1. Drain Essences (Utility Skill)
• Create skill named Drain Essences and put as a Utility skill;
• How work: use at a corpse and get 100% of maximum Life/Mana;
• Cooldown: 1min.
2.4.2. Raise Skeleton (will be the avaible from start)
• Replace Raise Zombie with Raise Skeleton and delete Raise Zombie from Necromancer's kit;
• Change the gains of Skeletons starting from lvl 4 (was lvl 8 spell the skeletons starting being better after lvl 11) – this is a pure balance to when changeRaise Skeleton to being avaible from start;
• Synergy: Skeleton’s Health, Armor Class, Physical Damage, Chance to Hit and Elemental Resistences (Fire, Lightningn, Cold, Fire, Magic and POISON) will be increased by Level and Vitality of Necromancer instead only level (only Health is currently affected by Vitality);
• Turn the summons “immaterial” to players, turning them impossible to body block allies or make them open the way when (necromancer or parterner) clicks off the “ring” of skeletons, and to receive friendly fire with some spells, but still possible to body block enemies.
2.4.3. Decrepfy (will be the lvl 8 )
Description: a AoE curse who slow and weak enemies, work in every enemy and work in super uniques (bosses), very like in Diablo 2.
• Slow the enemies (10-20% or like chill, without the “blue effect”);
• Cursed enemies deal 10% less damage;
• Cursed enemies have reduced physical resistences or amplify damage received;
• Costs life;
• Cooldown: 30 secs;
• Duration: 10 secs;
• Synergy: Vitality and Level will increase the Duration of Decrepfy, maybe AoE too.
2.4.4. Blood Ritual (level 16)
• Balanced, have sinergy with level and indirecly have sinergy with Vitality (because are % of health). None to change here.
2.4.5 Corpse Explosion (level 24)
• Damage will be increased based in Level and Vitality, insted only in Level. Maybe let this skill like are, because this are making your job well at high difficulties;
• Corpse Explosion deal damage based in spawn monster, not base monster (D2 the spawned make difference in damage).
2.4.6. Revive (level 32)
• Revived’s Damage, Hit Chance and Lifespan will be increased based in Level and Vitality, instead of only Level;
• The monsters Revived will teleport/phasing/down/up with Necromancer (like happens when teleport in Diablo 2), turning this skill more good to use and more synergic with Teleport.
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
With this modifications, all 5 skills of Necromancer will be good and usable, skeleton at start will make the lvling with Necromancer become more fun and less painful. Decrepfy will be used to deal with great mobs/bosses and to “support” yours skeletons, making more the gameplay to be around of skeletons like Diablo 2. A curse make the multiplayer will more feel like a true coop, because curse will help, indirectly allies too. Decrepify will help the Necromancer to kill Diablo a little more easy, because Diablo just stomps skeletons. Balancing all spells to sinergy with Vitality make the Necromancer a class what the items will make the difference, turning Necromancer in a class little gear dependent (all will be, so this will balanced).
3. BALACING WEAPON BASED CLASSES
3.1. BALANCE OF SLOW WEAPONS (Balance of Weapon based classes: Warrior, Barbarian, Assassin and Rogue - INDIRECTLY)
Fast Weapons give more DPS and more stunlocks, because this almost none use slow weapons (slow bows and Two-Hands are bad when compared to fast bows and One-Hands), for balance this need:
• BUFF the base damage of Normal, Slow and Very Slow weapons until this have a more dps than Fast and Very Fast for make them more interesting” to use;
• Making almost every class skill to be weapon damage based (except casters: Sorcerer and Necromancer), so the slow weapons, what have more damage base, will have more used.
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
With more damage, and skills being more based in weapon damage, the Slow Weapons will be more useful.
The player will have think every time what he need. If need control: fast weapons for stunlock, if he need damage: slow weapons to deal more damage;
3.2. ROGUE
Concept: a ranged physical dps based in bow skills.
Currently: show the concept very well, but have only offensive options in your kit, lacking some strategy/defenses uniques of class. And have unbalance trough Fast x Slow weapons.
3.2.1. Trap Disarm (Utility Skill)
• Maintain as the utility skill of rogue.
3.2.2. Lay Trap (will be avaible from start)
Description: a defensive skill, when used you lay a trap in the mouse pointer, this root the affected monster por some seconds, works in every enemy.
• Create Lay Trap and put to be avaible from start;
• The trap deal the damage each second;
• Root the enemy who activate the trap for 3 seconds;
• Duration of trap: 10 seconds (on the ground);
• Cooldown: 10 seconds;
• Synergy: Dexterity and Level will increase the damage and Root Duration.
3.2.3. Multiple Shot (level 8 )
• Level will decrease the damage reduction of each arrows.
3.2.4. Piercing Shots (level 16)
• Cooldown reduction to 45 secs instead of 2min.
3.2.5 Guided Arrow (level 24)
• Damage will be increased be Level and Dexterity instead only Level;
• Make this damage by more based in weapon damage.
3.2.6. Sightless Eye (level 32)
• Damage will be increased be Level and Dexterity instead only Level;
• Make this damage by more based in weapon damage.
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
Rogue Trap Disarm is a good utility when compared to Repair Items/Staff Recharge, but still making Rogue use 4 or 5 skills of her kit almost time. Using this as a free skill don’t will unbalance the game, this will leave a space to create a new skill, a defensive skill, since 3 or 5 skills of Rogue’s Kit is for deal damage and one is a buff, so she need a rogue skill to defense, help allies and be more strategic.
Lay Trap comes to help with the lack of defenses of rogue and this skill is to be use with strategy to deal with a lot of monsters and bosses, will help with kitting (attack move tatics) too.
The changes of synergies make the Rogue use more the Dex items.
The changes to balance fast x slow weapons was explained previous in section “BALANCE ITEMS”.
3.3. WARRIOR
Concept: the Sword and Board (one hand weapon + shield) gameplay using mechanics with shield.
Currently: like Barbarian, stay running a lot and fighting less (until Teleport Skill learned (low level of this cost a lot of mana, Warrior don’t have much mana, or until get Charge (level 24, too late)). And like Sorcerer and Rogue, the Utility skill make Warrior use 4 or 5 skills almost every time.
3.3.1. Item Repair (Utility Skill)
• Maintain Item Repair how the utility skill of Warrior;
• Reduce cooldown to 1min.
3.3.2. Shield Bash (will be the avaible from start)
Description: Warrior deal medium damage with your shield causing the enemy to become stunned.
• Make Shield Bash avaible from start;
• Costs mana;
• Cooldown: 8 sec;
• Deal damage based in AC (Armor Class), Shield damage and deal more damage when Shield Wall is activated;
• When deal damage, stun for 3 secs;
• Only usable if a shield are equipped.
• Synergy: The Damage will be increased be Strenght and Level.
3.3.3. Cleave (level 8 )
• To Hit (Weapon) will be increased based in Strenght and Level instead only Level.
• Weapon Damage will increase damage.
3.3.4. Charge (lvl 16)
• Turn Charge the lvl 16 skill class;
•To Hit (Weapon) and Damage (per square) will be increased be Strenght and Level instead only Level.
3.3.5. Valiant Strike (lvl 24)
• Turn the Valiant Strike the lvl 24 skill class.
• Physical Resistance and Block Chance will be increased be Strenght and Level instead only Level;
• Weapon Damage will increase damage.
3.3.6. Shield Wall (lvl 32)
• Synergy: character level and strenght up: physical resistance, down damage taken from enemies, up attacker takes damage and up the block chance.
CHANGES COMENTARY:
Warrior, like other base game classes, have only 4 true used skills, Repair can be buyed with gold, so -1 skill for some gold?! Don’t make some sense at NM or more.
With this changes, warrior can be a more shield based class (2 of 5 skills of him kit), have 5 true used skills, can get mobility (Charge) more early, but no too early and the Warrior will stay more fighting than running.
Integrating Weapon Damage with damage skills will balance the thing of Fast Weapons beign much more strong than Slowt Weapons.
3.4. BARBARIAN
Concept: A Two Hand weapon user who sacrifices survival for deal more damage, a two-handed melee fighter.
Currently: Almost all Barbarian players use Shield, because of little buffs from using a Two Hand weapons and Shield provides a lot of survival. Same problem than the Warrior, is more running than fighting, without using Teleport Barbarian have poor mobility.
Designed to be a Two-Hander user, but fails because anyone need/want use Shields for block, AC and resistences, since Diablo 1 is all about minions/bosses exploding heroes and stunlocking mechanics. So all Barbarian need is more options to equip and more bonuses to don’t using a shield.
Make the Barbarian able to Dual 2-Hand weapons (reduce the damage, like in Diablo 2) and Dual 1-Hand weapons, and receive some bonuses when using one 2-Hand weapon, turning he in a more jack all trades of weapons, like was in Diablo 2.
So based in this we need make some class adjustments:
• Can Dual Weapon (dual One-Hand and dual Two-Hand, dual Two-Hand receive some penalties with each weapon, like in Diablo 2);
• Get more buffs when using dual weapons and one Two-Hand weapon, more damage or at least more speed;
• When dual Two-Hand the damage of weapons is reduced/half for balance things (like in Diablo 2);
• Get penalties when wielding a shield (?);
3.4.1. Find Potion/Item (Utility Skill)
• Create Find Potion/Item to be the Utility Skill of Barbarian;
• Description: Use in a corpse to search for potions and items;
• Cooldown: 1min.
3.4.2. Rage (avaible from start):
• Strenght and level increase the rage duration;
• Strenght and level reduces the lethargy duration.
3.4.3. Frenzy (will be level 8 ):
• Turn Frenzy into the level 8 skill;
• Strenght and level will increase the damage bonus;
3.4.4. Whrilwind (level 16):
• Will be the AoE damage skill of Barbarian;
• WW duration: until unhold the button. So if you wish you can hold the button for stay in WW, if not just unhold the button;
• WW give defensive bonuses to Barbarian if aren’t using Shields: chance to block, physical resistence, the duration of buff is based in Strenght and Level, base duration is 1.5 sec after WW is stopped;
• Apply life steal;
• WW damage will increase with Strenght, Level and Weapon Damage.
3.4.5. Leap (will be level 24):
Description: The Barbarian gap closer, deal some AoE damage.
• Create a skill Leap put how level 16;
• Deal damage based in Strenght, Level and Weapon Damage;
• Can Leap over objects/obstacles;
• Cooldown: 15 secs.
3.4.6. Warcry (will be level 32):
Description: AoE Buff who give HP, MP and AC to yourself and all nearby allies when activated.
• Create Warcry put as the lvl 24 skill;
• Give +10% HP, +10% MP, +10% AC to yourself (not Mana Points) and all nearby allies when activated;
• Increase the HP, MP and AC bonuses based in Strenght and Level.
CHANGES COMMENTARY:
Freazy at level 8 will leave the Barbarian level up more cool/less boring and add some mobile early leveling.
Leap will make the Barbarian less sad about don’t using Teleport, Leap for Barbarian at lvl 24 and Charge for Warrior at lvl 16 will make the game more “mobile”, the actual problem of melees stay more running than fighting, this will solve this problem.
Warcry will bring the coop/multiplayer thing become more cool and sinergy.
The changes at WW will make the Barbarian less “defenseless” when not using Shields, same from HP and AC provided from Warcry, all to make Barbarian less using Shields.
WW will become the AoE damage skill for Barbarian, so taking this more early make the Barbarian dungeon clear maintain fast when compaired to Cleave at clvl 16.
Basicly all changes are to increase the defenses of Barbarian to don’t need use Shields, making the Barbarian and Warrior more uniques.
Making the skills more sinergy with Weapon Damage (Whrilwind and Leap) let the Barbarian to use Two-Hand weapons slows attack speed but with good damage, and the Frenzy still make dual one hands usable for Barbarians, being more fast.
3.5. ASSASSIN
Concept: a slippery high single target damage dealer.
Currently: I know, she is a assassin, the gameplay is very unique and cool, but she lacks some AoE damage, turning the clear time a eternity and little boring, put at least one skill of AoE damage in her kit, and she will be better since 3 of 5 skills are single target damage, 1 is CC with low damage AoE and one is a Supportive skill.
Adjustments of class:
• Dual Weapon (two One-Hand).
3.5.1. Identify (Utility Skill)
• Assassin can idenfity items;
• Cooldown: 1 min.
3.5.2. Stealth (avaible from start)
• Dexterity and Level will reduce the speed penalty when Stealthed.
3.5.3. Fan of Knives (will be the level 8 )
Description: A AoE point blank skill, the Assassin throw knives at every directions while is spinning.
• Deal good AoE physical damage;
• Cooldown: 4 secs;
• Duration of Spin: 0.5 secs;
• Synergy: Dexterity and Level decrease the Cooldown and increase the damage, weapon damage increase the damage.
3.5.4. Maleficient Strike/Fataticism (level 16)
• Maleficient will import some characteristics of Fanaticism, like: stacking (max. 4, duration 5 secs refreshing every new hit), Attack Speed Bonus (5%) and Hit Recovery Speed (5%), damage bonus of both are 10% so continue the 10%. Will be a fusion of the two skills.
• Synergy: Dexterity and Level will up the maximum of stacks and damage.
3.5.5. Narcosis (level 24)
• Synergy: Damage, Stun Duration and Cooldown Reduction will be based in Dexterity and Level.
3.5.6. Dragon Flight (level 32)
• Synergy: to Hit, Damage and Duration of buff will be based in Dexterity and Level.
4. ANOTHER IDEAS/BALANCES
4.1. ITEMS
4.1.1. ITEMS ADD
• Make the “+X Spell levels” to work on class skill/spells kit, just make them simulating more “X” levels in character level;
• Poison Resistence;
• Change some "mana steal" of 2hands and Barbarian sets and uniques, since Barbarian don't have mana now;
• Ignore Target Defenses (ITD) be possible to get to ANY item, to make any weapon good for use (any weapon without ITD is useless in Torment), so much weapons can be viable.
4.1.2. CHARACTER TABLE
• Make the “C” to show the total of Gold Find (next/bottom of Magic Find) numbers;
• Show the damage and dps of each weapon slot, for show correctly infos for dual weapons (Barb and Assassin);
• Show Poison Resistence;
4.1.3. ITEM NAMES COLORS
• Change the color of Rares and Uniques, the colors of them are much next to other, sometimes have confusion;
• Make Spellbooks to have Purple Name in the ground to be more easily to notice;
4.1.4. ITEMS INFORMATIONS
• Show the Quality Level (qlvl) in the informations of items in the game.
4.1.5. BASE ITEMS
• More one-hand crossbows;
• More one-hand wands;
• More one-hand Axes;
• More two-hand Maces;
• More two-hand Swords.
• Add Thrown Axes;
• Add Thrown Daggers.
4.2. ITEMS MANAGEMENT
• Make CTRL possible to transfer potions from Belt to Stash directly.
4.3. CRAFTING
• Make more easily to find recipes;
• Give more reagents from salvaging;
• Give the option of taking all reagents from salvage Anvil like in Belzebub.
4.4. AUTO LOOT GOLD
• Turn gold auto pick-up if you pass trough or next him.
4.5. POTION OF RESPEC
• A potion when drinked the character receive all spend points of atributes again, atributes points of quests too (spendeds), don't receive quest give/rewards points like +X all atributes;
•High cost of gold, increase costs based of character level.
4.6. SCROLLS
• If a Necromancer are at effect o Blood Ritual, make all unusable Scrolls in Red pallets/color.
4.7. MENU
• After choosen the character, pre-select the last difficulty played with character for more fast runs;
• A system for change the order of character list what the owner want;
4.8. CUSTOMIZE KEYBINDS
• Custom hotkeys, can put every key in every skill/spell and belt slots.
4.9. LMB x RMB
• Make all skills being able to LMB too.
4.10. NPCS
• Create HotKeys (what subscribes any key Keybinded in spells) for fast Repair All, Recharge All and Identify All, I think the "A" is a good hotkey for every NPC.
4.11. HUD
• Make the HUD to show HP and MP bars of allies (players, minions/golem);
4.12. PRINT SCREENS
• Put the screenshots at a paste named “Screenshots”, so will be more organizated the paste of D1;
• Maybe put to save as PNG than BMP, since BMP have much more weight.
4.13. DUNGEON ENTERS
• Maybe put the “square“ of the enter of every dungeon being more large to prevent body block from allies and skeletons/minions;
• Level to enter in dungeons are sometimes too high (lvl 50 for LT in Torment? Lvl 45 for Terror’s Domain at Hell?), what make the first character very very slow progressive. Put the max level for enter in any thing 40 at least, or 50. 50 is possible to equip all items of the game, but not to go to all areas, this don't make sense.
4.14. COMBAT TEXT
• Put the floating text of damage like belzebub, but only show damage caused by the player and him minions, not show text of damage of other players (this will be a spam if show);
• Put the numbers of gained exp text floating like belzebub, to measure with precision exp gained.
4.15. DROPS
• Make the drops from Armor/Weapon Racks more better;
• Until don't have quests, allow the unique items of quests to drop to the respectives monsters (exemple; Andariel always drop the Amulet Unique as a BONUS (don't count to the max of items drop) drop in Normal difficulty), because much of the uniques are very useful and help to the leveling.
4.16. SAVE DIRECTORY
• Saves in game directory because crash on windows can make you lost saves, if you make 2 virtual disks from your HD, you can format the windows without losting your saves, if you instaill game in another part of hd of course, saving in "Documents" don't let you make this.
4.17. GAMBLING
• Make gamble refresh the items what you can buy everytime you click in gamble, like is in Diablo 2;
• Make gamble to get more better items;
• Make gamblable items a little more cheap.
4.18. MODES
• Mode Hardcore, using different stashs of Softcore, will be a new challenge for players.
4.19. COMMANDS
• Put the $X Player (1-10) like in belzebub, for when can't or don't want play MP, or when play MP write this command to bring a new challenge to game.
5. DIABLO 1 HD - SITE
• Make a site for D1HD Tchernobog, because almost everything in the actual is about Belzebub, or just upgrade;
6. DIABLO 1 HD FORUM
• Make subforums for every aspect of the Tchernobog like a subforum for each class (to discussion and guides-like), to farming, share items, like this.
Categorize forums Exemple:
General:
1. News/Announcements – “subforum” only for devs /webmaster post the News
2. Old Posts (all actually posts will be put in this session)
3. Tchernobog
3.1. General Discussion
3.2. Guides
3.2.1. General Guides
3.2.2. Assassin Guides
3.2.3. ...
3.3. Multiplayer
3.3.1. How Find Games/Rooms
3.3.2. Trades
3.3.3. PvP
3.3.4. ...
3.4. Off-Topic
__________________________
Well, sorry for this giant text wall, this was a theorycrafting to balance this game, I am not claiming I am right, but we need talk to how balance the game.
Let your opinion, and have fun!
__________________________
Edits:
02/04/17 - Added "4.16. SAVE DIRECTORY".
03/04/17 - Added "4.17. GAMBLING".
03/04/17 - Edited "4.1.1. ITEMS ADD", add a 3ª dot.
04/04/17 - Edited "4.1.1. ITEMS ADD", add a 4ª dot. Ugily idea, thanks for this.
04/04/17 - Edited "6. DIABLO 1 HD FORUM", added exemple for forums.
04/04/17 - Added "4.18. MODES".
04/04/17 - Added "4.19. COMMANDS".
04/04/17 - Edited "4.1.5. BASE ITEMS", add a 5ª/6ª dots.
ULTIMATE THEORYCRAFTING TO BALANCE
ULTIMATE THEORYCRAFTING TO BALANCE
Last edited by sarcrofs on 04 Apr, 2017 17:08, edited 9 times in total.
As @radicool said, in many cases BrightLord is tied up but...
1. Balancing utilities
Full agree, and he can do this. I'm preety sure.
2.1
Isn't mag req enough to learn a good spell? Imho it's good like it is now. CL is OP but it's mana draining too with less dmg on gigher diff/lvls. And remember. When you have lvl15 of some spell easily it's not gonna help you to rush your progress forward. It usually have low dmg, so...?
2.2
Yeah... some dropping in immunities would be nice. Especially light/poison enchanteds. You can't kill them ranged, you can't kill them melee. So dropping their res and killing them with mage would get whole team to a less frustrating situation.
2.3
Maybe put some wider range of mag req for Apocalypse spell but raise a little phys dmg too? Cause yes, mage (even in hell) is getting many full immune bosses with bad enchants. So maybe little tweak to Apo with same AI of bosses?
2.3.2
Impossible in D1 engine.
2.3.(3-6) it's ok i think...
Sorc need other thing. If not buff to Apocalypse phys damage then any other spell/skill that deal phys damage. Even low, but still need to deal anything.
2.4
Curse? Propably impossible.
2.4.1
Maybe not 100% but it should work as small HP potion. It would be nice afterall not giving Necro full stack of 'full potions' for him.
2.4.2
Raise Skeletons should be rebalanced and Zombies should be replaced. Full agree. at 50lvl of full vita Necro i have problems with killing Diablo on normal, but Diablo Hell is a piece of cake... that's weird... So yeah, Vita would be nice to consider dmg synergy if skeletons would me bore balanced. Sekeles 'immaterial'? I think it's impossible, that's why Bright have added 'unsummon' button.
2.4.4 Is the same as i told about curses but 2.4.5...
It would be nice to see Blood Ritual earlier in the game, same as Mana Shield is not on clvl32. Maybe clvl24, because Necro have some small advantages above Sorcerer, but not so heavy to give him BR at 32.
3.1
DPS is counted by more factions than just dmg of weapon multiplied by attacks per second. It would be really hard to balance, but... You can always play with slower weapons to makeyour Diablo experience harder. Usually faster weapons are better because they have better modifiers. As in real life. Do you want to have hard and heavy hammer and while you'll swingin it adversary will stab you with dagger 5 times in vital organs?
3.2.2
If you thnik about 1square fire/lightning wall or sth like that. it still should me much mana consuming and have cooldown. Especially if it would be a 'trap damage' that is incredibly high. Balance for traps should take difficulty of game lower... So...? I don't know how it's gonna take for balance...
3.2.3
It's OP even right now, so no, don't need decrease of dmg red.
3.2.(4-6)
It's ok now - look at youtube and things that some Rouge's are doing on Terror Domain players10...
3.3.1
2,5min? I think it's enough. 1min is too short to go to Gris, 5min is too long to fight. But afterall... you have so much money on nightmare that you can always repair at Griswold. As you said in your commentary.
3.3.2
Stuns? I don't think they're possible.
Ideas to make Warrior more shield dependent (even when i hate Smiter in d2) is really nice. It's some things to consider for BrightLord. I hope he will read that.
3.4
So... Bright said multiple times that dualweild is not possible, but in other hand, i think that using a 2hand weapon should have some advances for Barb. ie faster block/higher chance to block/more AC/higher arc of dmg (instead of cleave). This had been implemented in many other mods, higher arch was even in Hellfire when played monk/barb. I think it's the only thing that should be changed in Baba.
3.4.1
+1 you have my full support.
3.4.3
I would like to see some bug fix, that when you make a swing at 0.5sec timer it won't count it as a new swing but reset the timer to 5sec with all your stacks. Or maybe just make it 6sec. Dmg bonus isn't such needed.
3.4.4(+6)
Don't think it's possible.
4.1.1
Poison is Magic afair. So you can have resistance for Poison. The problem is that higher difficulties mobs (especially pois ench bosses) have riddiculously high pois/magic dmg.
4.1.2
-no need, srsly. Gold find is marginal thing
-like i said before - no duals, no tab...
-like i said before - poison = magic...
4.1.3
-change your colour pallette... I have less problem to see the difference here than in Diablo 2. It IS significant difference.
-books are dropped quite often... You always have more than you can read...
4.1.4
No need for this for one reason... You don't have any guides about what mlvl drops which ilvl and which ilvl can be some specific rare/set. Jarulf didn't predict this mod, and this mod is made from scratch. It would be nice but it wouldn't be useful at all.
4.1.5
Throwing weapons are propably impossible. Otherways you would see Quivers with magic/rare arrows...
4.2
Did you tried shift+click? :v I would like to see something like in D2. Scrolls never going to belt at picking up and with potions...when you have mana potion in the belt and you have there any free place in column, and in other spaces full health pots, then picking up health potion would transfer it to backpack instead of free space in the 'mana row'. That's irritating both with different kinds of pots but with scrolls (especially cannot be used) too...
4.4
Cannot be done, because it's multiplayer with shared loot. It's not D3 when you have separate loots for every game client. It can't be done.
4.5
For over a 10 years people in D2 didn't have problem with this... They've must to spend some extra 2hrs to make new high level char. It isn't really so important and... Still don;t know if it's possible on Bright's engine...
4.7
-player should make the decission...
-nice idea... but after few days you can get used to alphabetical order
4.8
-not doable afair
4.9
Yeah... I still can't figure out how some skills can be on LMB and some can't...
4.15
So then every player would farm bosses on normal to get some uniques... Seem legit...
4.17
It's in Belzebub for sure but... I've spend many hours last few days in gambling in d2. When someone near you is gambling, gambler is not refreshing, so... You still want it like in D2?
6
'Search' button? :v
1. Balancing utilities
Full agree, and he can do this. I'm preety sure.
2.1
Isn't mag req enough to learn a good spell? Imho it's good like it is now. CL is OP but it's mana draining too with less dmg on gigher diff/lvls. And remember. When you have lvl15 of some spell easily it's not gonna help you to rush your progress forward. It usually have low dmg, so...?
2.2
Yeah... some dropping in immunities would be nice. Especially light/poison enchanteds. You can't kill them ranged, you can't kill them melee. So dropping their res and killing them with mage would get whole team to a less frustrating situation.
2.3
Maybe put some wider range of mag req for Apocalypse spell but raise a little phys dmg too? Cause yes, mage (even in hell) is getting many full immune bosses with bad enchants. So maybe little tweak to Apo with same AI of bosses?
2.3.2
Impossible in D1 engine.
2.3.(3-6) it's ok i think...
Sorc need other thing. If not buff to Apocalypse phys damage then any other spell/skill that deal phys damage. Even low, but still need to deal anything.
2.4
Curse? Propably impossible.
2.4.1
Maybe not 100% but it should work as small HP potion. It would be nice afterall not giving Necro full stack of 'full potions' for him.
2.4.2
Raise Skeletons should be rebalanced and Zombies should be replaced. Full agree. at 50lvl of full vita Necro i have problems with killing Diablo on normal, but Diablo Hell is a piece of cake... that's weird... So yeah, Vita would be nice to consider dmg synergy if skeletons would me bore balanced. Sekeles 'immaterial'? I think it's impossible, that's why Bright have added 'unsummon' button.
2.4.4 Is the same as i told about curses but 2.4.5...
It would be nice to see Blood Ritual earlier in the game, same as Mana Shield is not on clvl32. Maybe clvl24, because Necro have some small advantages above Sorcerer, but not so heavy to give him BR at 32.
3.1
DPS is counted by more factions than just dmg of weapon multiplied by attacks per second. It would be really hard to balance, but... You can always play with slower weapons to makeyour Diablo experience harder. Usually faster weapons are better because they have better modifiers. As in real life. Do you want to have hard and heavy hammer and while you'll swingin it adversary will stab you with dagger 5 times in vital organs?
3.2.2
If you thnik about 1square fire/lightning wall or sth like that. it still should me much mana consuming and have cooldown. Especially if it would be a 'trap damage' that is incredibly high. Balance for traps should take difficulty of game lower... So...? I don't know how it's gonna take for balance...
3.2.3
It's OP even right now, so no, don't need decrease of dmg red.
3.2.(4-6)
It's ok now - look at youtube and things that some Rouge's are doing on Terror Domain players10...
3.3.1
2,5min? I think it's enough. 1min is too short to go to Gris, 5min is too long to fight. But afterall... you have so much money on nightmare that you can always repair at Griswold. As you said in your commentary.
3.3.2
Stuns? I don't think they're possible.
Ideas to make Warrior more shield dependent (even when i hate Smiter in d2) is really nice. It's some things to consider for BrightLord. I hope he will read that.
3.4
So... Bright said multiple times that dualweild is not possible, but in other hand, i think that using a 2hand weapon should have some advances for Barb. ie faster block/higher chance to block/more AC/higher arc of dmg (instead of cleave). This had been implemented in many other mods, higher arch was even in Hellfire when played monk/barb. I think it's the only thing that should be changed in Baba.
3.4.1
+1 you have my full support.
3.4.3
I would like to see some bug fix, that when you make a swing at 0.5sec timer it won't count it as a new swing but reset the timer to 5sec with all your stacks. Or maybe just make it 6sec. Dmg bonus isn't such needed.
3.4.4(+6)
Don't think it's possible.
4.1.1
Poison is Magic afair. So you can have resistance for Poison. The problem is that higher difficulties mobs (especially pois ench bosses) have riddiculously high pois/magic dmg.
4.1.2
-no need, srsly. Gold find is marginal thing
-like i said before - no duals, no tab...
-like i said before - poison = magic...
4.1.3
-change your colour pallette... I have less problem to see the difference here than in Diablo 2. It IS significant difference.
-books are dropped quite often... You always have more than you can read...
4.1.4
No need for this for one reason... You don't have any guides about what mlvl drops which ilvl and which ilvl can be some specific rare/set. Jarulf didn't predict this mod, and this mod is made from scratch. It would be nice but it wouldn't be useful at all.
4.1.5
Throwing weapons are propably impossible. Otherways you would see Quivers with magic/rare arrows...
4.2
Did you tried shift+click? :v I would like to see something like in D2. Scrolls never going to belt at picking up and with potions...when you have mana potion in the belt and you have there any free place in column, and in other spaces full health pots, then picking up health potion would transfer it to backpack instead of free space in the 'mana row'. That's irritating both with different kinds of pots but with scrolls (especially cannot be used) too...
4.4
Cannot be done, because it's multiplayer with shared loot. It's not D3 when you have separate loots for every game client. It can't be done.
4.5
For over a 10 years people in D2 didn't have problem with this... They've must to spend some extra 2hrs to make new high level char. It isn't really so important and... Still don;t know if it's possible on Bright's engine...
4.7
-player should make the decission...
-nice idea... but after few days you can get used to alphabetical order
4.8
-not doable afair
4.9
Yeah... I still can't figure out how some skills can be on LMB and some can't...
4.15
So then every player would farm bosses on normal to get some uniques... Seem legit...
4.17
It's in Belzebub for sure but... I've spend many hours last few days in gambling in d2. When someone near you is gambling, gambler is not refreshing, so... You still want it like in D2?
6
'Search' button? :v
Why, lemme put my 5 cents in here too!
Overall thoughts: game in itself has good base to work with, so I believe not a lot of things really need overhaul. Let's look at the concept and then into particular cases.
There's a plenty of not-so-useful things right now and way-too-good things. And there's 4 difficulties as well. Yeah leveling as melee character sucks, mages are OpieOP, rogue despite being ranged, falls off real quickly when ranged enemies start doing damage, and so on. But all in all, I feel like the game as it is now is balanced around the final versions of character builds on final difficulty, and all of them might be (and most likely are) okay when fully-geared. The only problem here is that leveling process is actually taking most part of the game, while the "endgame" is non-existent or maybe 4th difficulty is deemed to be one. When making a thing, developer, which would be Bright in our case, usually looks at how these things are doing at different stages of the game, but it is impossible to balance all at once - it is known that current game is in alpha state.
Balancing something here or there usually means balancing the leveling process - making it either easier or harder depending on what is being balanced. Let's take a look at "not-so-useful-while-leveling" things which are utility skills (Recharge, Repair and Trap Disarm), Vitality attribute (and to a lesser extent - Strength), and melee classes in general.
The utility skills tht are bad aren't necessarily bad because of poor design. Saving money on recharges and repairs would be useful and cool if gold wasn't too redundant to be saved => not the problem of skills themselves. Actually, not having to go to Griswold every now and then is cool. Recharge isn't as cool because most of the time you literally don't use staff charges anywhere after level 1. Trap Disarm also has no excuse from me. Replacing them with something would be cool but having them is about to be fine. We have other things to use so it is whatever.
Speaking of melee characters, they are bad because they don't have their power spikes caused by mechanics used in the endgame. It is life and mana leech and critical strikes. In early levels it is impossible to sustain since your damage too low, while as the character grows stronger, viability of self-sustain grows as well. As an example, I didn't notice much difference when I got some mana leech early on for my Warrior, but at level ~35 having 8% mana leech on my equipment made me free 2/5 of my belt slots which were blue potions.
Critical strikes, meanwhile, aren't as easy. They are the very reason because of which I stated that STR is quite useless while leveling. If I could, I'd throw all my points into DEX despite Warrior's skills scaling off STR. The scaling is just not big enough for STR being preferred over DEX. The former attribute gives damage bonus, crit damage bonus and scales our innate abilities. DEX gives Armour, Accuracy (or rather Chance to hit, as it is called in this game), ALSO gives damage bonus and crit chance as well. Now remember what I said about STR being bad because of crits? The thing is, we should put points into STR in order to be able to equip some pieces of gear, instead of putting them into DEX which would have made it easier to progress because of all these additional things that it gives!
And well, Vitality just doesn't do anything different that flat HP for life-based (sorry for PoE terminology) characters. It is no difference if you roll +VIT on your item or +flat HP. UNLESS you are a Necro, which probably was designed to save VIT from being completely irrelevant in whole game.
That brings us to the point where we take a look at "things-that-are-too-strong-while-leveling", which are casters. The thing that makes them strong in leveling process isn't even them being ranged: remember how rogue isn't as easy despite having a bow? This is because of Mana Shield and Blood Ritual. SOR and NEC use their primary attribute to get damage and main battle resource. Attack characters, which are WAR, ROG, BAR and ASS (xD) don't maximise Vitality to scale their attack damage. That is the main issue with caster classes. While Assassin has quite good cast time so could be possibly built into a caster herself, she won't be as good as Sorcerer or Necromancer because she will use two resources while they use only one. This AND having ability to stay safer than melee attack characters makes them as strong.
Any other small nasty things (like base attack weapons damage progression or underwhelming spells) could be fixed with just tinkering some numbers.
On the topic of Character Identity, it is almost there, to be honest. Arguably, BAR and ASS are in a bad spot because of how this game works - BAR is worse version of a WAR because of weapon preference, and ASS while being kind of a hybrid class that you can build into anything, ends up being WAR as well because the only casters are NEC and SOR.
________________________________________________________
So that would be good list of major balance changes from my perspective:
Overall thoughts: game in itself has good base to work with, so I believe not a lot of things really need overhaul. Let's look at the concept and then into particular cases.
There's a plenty of not-so-useful things right now and way-too-good things. And there's 4 difficulties as well. Yeah leveling as melee character sucks, mages are OpieOP, rogue despite being ranged, falls off real quickly when ranged enemies start doing damage, and so on. But all in all, I feel like the game as it is now is balanced around the final versions of character builds on final difficulty, and all of them might be (and most likely are) okay when fully-geared. The only problem here is that leveling process is actually taking most part of the game, while the "endgame" is non-existent or maybe 4th difficulty is deemed to be one. When making a thing, developer, which would be Bright in our case, usually looks at how these things are doing at different stages of the game, but it is impossible to balance all at once - it is known that current game is in alpha state.
Balancing something here or there usually means balancing the leveling process - making it either easier or harder depending on what is being balanced. Let's take a look at "not-so-useful-while-leveling" things which are utility skills (Recharge, Repair and Trap Disarm), Vitality attribute (and to a lesser extent - Strength), and melee classes in general.
The utility skills tht are bad aren't necessarily bad because of poor design. Saving money on recharges and repairs would be useful and cool if gold wasn't too redundant to be saved => not the problem of skills themselves. Actually, not having to go to Griswold every now and then is cool. Recharge isn't as cool because most of the time you literally don't use staff charges anywhere after level 1. Trap Disarm also has no excuse from me. Replacing them with something would be cool but having them is about to be fine. We have other things to use so it is whatever.
Speaking of melee characters, they are bad because they don't have their power spikes caused by mechanics used in the endgame. It is life and mana leech and critical strikes. In early levels it is impossible to sustain since your damage too low, while as the character grows stronger, viability of self-sustain grows as well. As an example, I didn't notice much difference when I got some mana leech early on for my Warrior, but at level ~35 having 8% mana leech on my equipment made me free 2/5 of my belt slots which were blue potions.
Critical strikes, meanwhile, aren't as easy. They are the very reason because of which I stated that STR is quite useless while leveling. If I could, I'd throw all my points into DEX despite Warrior's skills scaling off STR. The scaling is just not big enough for STR being preferred over DEX. The former attribute gives damage bonus, crit damage bonus and scales our innate abilities. DEX gives Armour, Accuracy (or rather Chance to hit, as it is called in this game), ALSO gives damage bonus and crit chance as well. Now remember what I said about STR being bad because of crits? The thing is, we should put points into STR in order to be able to equip some pieces of gear, instead of putting them into DEX which would have made it easier to progress because of all these additional things that it gives!
And well, Vitality just doesn't do anything different that flat HP for life-based (sorry for PoE terminology) characters. It is no difference if you roll +VIT on your item or +flat HP. UNLESS you are a Necro, which probably was designed to save VIT from being completely irrelevant in whole game.
That brings us to the point where we take a look at "things-that-are-too-strong-while-leveling", which are casters. The thing that makes them strong in leveling process isn't even them being ranged: remember how rogue isn't as easy despite having a bow? This is because of Mana Shield and Blood Ritual. SOR and NEC use their primary attribute to get damage and main battle resource. Attack characters, which are WAR, ROG, BAR and ASS (xD) don't maximise Vitality to scale their attack damage. That is the main issue with caster classes. While Assassin has quite good cast time so could be possibly built into a caster herself, she won't be as good as Sorcerer or Necromancer because she will use two resources while they use only one. This AND having ability to stay safer than melee attack characters makes them as strong.
Any other small nasty things (like base attack weapons damage progression or underwhelming spells) could be fixed with just tinkering some numbers.
On the topic of Character Identity, it is almost there, to be honest. Arguably, BAR and ASS are in a bad spot because of how this game works - BAR is worse version of a WAR because of weapon preference, and ASS while being kind of a hybrid class that you can build into anything, ends up being WAR as well because the only casters are NEC and SOR.
________________________________________________________
So that would be good list of major balance changes from my perspective:
- Give STR bonus to HP (not as big as from VIT though, maybe half or one-third of it) and buff VIT so it gives Armour Class for same amount as DEX does so it would actually worth something when rolled on items. Probably would lower added damage bonus from DEX.
- Make Mana Shield and Blood Ritual into scroll-only spells which would always sell at Adria for 50g and give 30 min buff. Activating one would prevent you from using the other to avoid the loop - using MS scroll replaces BR and the other way around.
- Revisit "weapon preferences". Make staves possible to roll attack mods for lulz and make them preferable weapon for one of classes, for example, Assassin.
Make all weapons within one class have the same attack speed and make dagger class, make daggers possible to roll both attack and cast mods and make them preferable weapon for ASS and WAR.
Make some serious survivavility buff to all 2-handed melee weapons. Maybe giving Armour Class or/and Block Chance/Faster Hit Recovery? Shields too stronk because of shitload extra lines of text in your build which won't fit into 2-hander. It's not an issue to ranged archetypes but definitely is for melee.
- Make spells scale more with Magic/Vitality and less with character level: that would make casters invest into their main attribute so you won't faceroll content while throwing your points into STR while having just some +MAG pieces of gear equipped. Make more spells scale with Vitality so NEC would have a bit more options while making it no difference to SOR who don't use a lot of VIT. Make VIT give a bit more addition of HP to NEC and MAG addition of mana to SOR, while also making those attributes give a bit less to other characters so true casters will keep their indentity.
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