Lore question:Spoiler: show
Lore question:Spoiler: show
Smarky answer: Because Blizzard needs to sell more games.
Serious answer: That's a damned good question. Probably something about upsetting the balance and that would destroy Sanctuary or something. We'll have to find out if Blizzard finds away to recapture their previous storytelling.
I tend to forget Diablo even has a story, pretty much just farming lootz and leveling for me.
Leah getting shafted is half the reason I was pissed with D3. For them not to make any mention of her at all just irritates me even more.
They'll probably save it for another expansion, but to go an entire expansion just expecting the Nephalim to not even question anything about Adria or Leah would be incredibly saturday morning villains.
I'm assuming this is free for pc players to make up for the shitfest that is vd3
YUS!! Excitebike for Paladin 2.0
No necromancer, not interested. though with crusader i guess it's coming at some point.
I'm with the majority this time around. I got burned hard with this one, blizzard has lost my "buy their games blindly it'll be great!" mindset until they can correct this fuckup.
Press release;
The defeat of Diablo, Lord of Terror, should have given rise to an age of hope. Instead, it has drawn out a shadowy being of immense power, whose malevolent purpose is yet to be revealed. Announced today at gamescom, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, the upcoming expansion to Diablo III, opens a dark and terrifying new chapter in the ongoing conflict over the mortal realm of Sanctuary.
Malthael, the fallen Archangel of Wisdom, vanished after the events depicted at the end of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction. In Reaper of Souls, he returns as the Angel of Death and seizes the Black Soulstone, which contains the essence of the Prime Evil. It now falls to the players to track down Malthael and stop him before he unleashes irreversible havoc on the world.
Fortunately, a new hero is ready to join the cause and bring Malthael to justice—the Crusader. Driven by a centuries-long quest to cleanse the corruption blighting their beloved Zakarum faith, Crusaders are warriors of righteousness who have been hardened through relentless, brutal combat with the foul evils plaguing eastern Sanctuary. In addition to wearing immensely heavy armor and wielding a wide range of cruel and punishing weapons, this new playable class in Reaper of Souls uses battle magic to strengthen allies and weaken foes. A natural walking tank, the Crusader adds power and versatility to any party of adventurers.
“From the beginning, Diablo has always been about the struggle between good and evil, and Reaper of Souls explores the darker notes of that conflict,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “This expansion also represents a big milestone in the ongoing evolution of Diablo III, with key enhancements to the core gameplay, along with a new act to experience, a powerful new character class, tons of new loot, and even more end-game options. We think players will love playing Reaper of Souls, and we can’t wait to get it into their hands.”
In addition to taking the story of Diablo III from the legendary city of Westmarch to the unhallowed halls of the Pandemonium Fortress in Act V and introducing the incorruptible Crusader class, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls increases the game’s level cap to 70. Players continuing on with their existing Barbarian, Witch Doctor, Demon Hunter, Wizard, and Monk characters will benefit from an array of fearsome new spells and abilities as they advance in level.
The expansion also accentuates the key features of the Diablo franchise, with a greater emphasis on randomized environments to explore; epic new quests; horrific new monsters to defeat; and substantial updates to the loot experience, enabling players to further customize their characters with new and improved multilevel Legendary items, new Blacksmith and Jeweler item-crafting options, and more.
Diablo III’s Paragon progression system is also being majorly upgraded for the expansion, adding even more end-game character advancement and replayability. Two new game modes—Loot Runs and Nephalem Trials—are being added as well, providing fun and rewarding challenges for players to tackle when they’re not busy saving the world.
If you plan on subbing for XIV you have no business claiming D3X should be free. That's hilarious, go enjoy your generic MMO.
As for lore with Malthael, no clue. If you read the Book of Cain is explicitly notes that el'Druin is thought to not be able to harm creatures with righteous intent. It doesn't harm Malthael. It was a nice touch.
Tyrael just seems so.. dumb though. I mean seriously looking at the story from D3vanilla he either lost a bunch of braincells destroying the worldstone or he is teh demons. I hope they somehow patch that up.
diablo loreSpoiler: show
Side note. I was terribly sad when leah died/was turned. We still need to go hunt down her bitch mother. fuck that potion selling bitch from d1!
Tyrael needs to be dumb to maintain Blizzard's "Vision" for this franchise, it seems. They have him doing boneheaded things and spouting generic one-liners again and again. I miss the enigmatic Tyrael from D2, and that's not simply because "D2 did everything better because D2". This Tyrael has too much Mentzen in him. Too much campy writing and lack of foresight in just about everything he does.
You want my money, Blizzard? Find a way for us to resurrect and/or purify Leah. Someone deserves a happy ending in this tripe, especially since our characters never do (see D1: Warrior, Rogue, Wizard, D2: Barbarian).
I will be shocked if Leah's resolution isn't involved here, when the trailer explicitly shows the "reaper of souls" pulling souls out of things. On top of which, the plotting in Blizzard games has been so shallow lately (does D3 vanilla go ten minutes between mentions of Malthael and wondering what he's been up to?), that it's hard to believe they've been thinking up anything new and surprising plotwise when they've got these three big obvious hooks sitting there to use up in the most straightforward way possible. Adria's probably been working for Malthael the whole time, helping get the Prime Evils into the soulstone in the order he wants for his plan or whatever. The only question is how long it takes for that dick Imperius to side with Malthael in a sudden but inevitable betrayal.
They really are good at making cutscenes, though. I'm going to have to watch that one at least a few more times.
People are talking as if a Diablo or Metzen game in general has ever had a good plot.
Not much mention of the expansion coming for console,
Basically says it's only for PC at the moment, and they'll release it for console if it makes sense in the future, since it'll be 2014 sometime, maybe ps4 version will have reaper of souls included?
Lets say this, then. Less was certainly more back in the days of D2. I remember reading the manual and the lore on Druid and whatnot, and damn, the writing was very good. The backstory writing has always been good. The in-game writing and dialogue between NPCs was always good. Farnham the drunk was good. Alchor's hilarious lines were good.
Somewhere along the lines, that shit was lost. Lost completely.
I'm still on the fence about this, but definitely optimistic.
From the interview, I'm a little worried that the writer said they "found" Malthiel as their villain. That tells me they never fully thought out a continuation in mind when they penned the original story for D3. The continuation of the Leah/Adria situation seemed to be a slam dunk, and it better be the mid-act surprise. Wanting to find and rescue Leah's soul and needing to go through the reaper of souls seems obvious to me. So, story wise, not too impressed. But we'll see.
I like the ideas behind the raised level cap, paragon "merits", and the new crafting and drop systems. But I need to see more of what these improvements give before I get toooo excited. I'm worried that the paragon points wont give large enough stat boosts to really personalize classes, and I hope they're learning from the current craft system. Demonic Essences definitely represented a step in the right direction, but it's flawed and I think it still needs tweaking. The idea was to pull people away from the AH, but it doesn't do that. I could get 4-5 DE's on a good run, so every 2-3 runs I could do a crafting session, which is a reasonable expectation. But the high costs via tomes/other mats/gold meant I was still relying on the AH to craft.
Tangent over...basically I think they're on the right path, but they seem to keep messing up just enough that I want to see a bit more before I get as excited as I want to be.
This is a pretty good video to watch, so far anyway. Only half way in. The nephalem trials sound cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUSp_...ature=youtu.be
I'm not sure how to embed it so if someone could do that it would be great.