Diablo III: Runestones.

[Atomic]

and also tastefully done rape ?

 

[Topher]

Go start a new character and face Andariel again. Reaching her in normal play is basically instant death.

Is that the Act 1 boss? If so I've recently played through D2 again (as a druid) and I wiped her without needing so much as a health potion... I was flabbergasted because I remember her being very difficult back in the day. Maybe the druid is overpowered but I wasn't using an optimal/power build by any means nor am I'm particularly familiar with the game; having only played it once back at release. In fact I quit playing in Act 2 because the game was so painfully easy and my version wouldn't work with the /players 8 cheat.

 

[Needles]

I haven't read this thread and I haven't read anything about Diablo III's character customisation system, but I just wanted to chime in by saying that Diablo II's skill tree system was absolutely fucking shit.

Why have a skill trees where you can put 20 points into each skill? That's just under 20% of the total skills you'll ever get in the game (110 if I remember correctly) to max out a skill. Now, it might not suck if you could actually comfortably play as a "jack of all trades, master of none" type character, but Diablo II is all about maxing out the few skills you want to use then spamming them like mad. Therefore its skill tree system was just completely retarded. You end up with 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 20, 20 in a tree. It's never advantageous to put anything between 1 and 20 in a skill. Retarded.

So basically, how's Diablo III looking, guys?

Not completely true. Some abilities are worth putting a few points in, but 20 would be a waste.

Examples from just the Necromancer:
-Amplify Damage
-Decrepify
-Revive

Static Shield, Teleport as well.

These are exceptions to the rule however.

Did I read people putting points into energy? What..?

Cold Mastery was the only skill I remember in which you'd put about 7-8, and that was specifically for a meteorb sorc.

About the whole metagame issue: I am pretty certain that the prefix "meta" applies to games (and means the same) as it does to -linguistics or -ethics. It concerns the structure, results, foundations etc. of the given subject. As such, anything that is not written down in the manual or evident from the game itself qualifies as metaknowledge.
In DotA, the metagame changes a bit after each major patch, when players figure out (themselves) what the currently most effective strategies and tactics are, which heroes work well together and so on.
But figuring out any derived stat, which you don't see in the game itself, also qualifies as metaknowledge.
Going from the village straight to Navarro requires metaknowledge and so does late-game character-building in Diablo 1/2.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Close but not quite. Meta knowledge in DotA isn't about the tweaks to the characters, it's reacting to people's reactions to those tweaks. If a patch comes out that makes melee characters more powerful, playing such a character isn't metagame knowledge. Playing a character effective against melee characters because you know they'll be picked more often is. And the purest metagame knowledge effect is when someone simply plays a particular hero well and makes him popular. Nothing in game was changed; but everyone plays differently because of hype surrounding that particular match.

What this boils down to is that guides on where to put stat points aren't metagame knowledge. You can learn all that shit through tedious in game experimentation, sharing that knowledge doesn't make it meta. Running around with a specific set of unique boots in your inventory because you play on a PvP server and know that those boots will let you beat very common sorceress builds would be. Or going back to town to heal up before entering the ominous looking portal because every other game you've played had dangerous shit past portals like that, even though you've never seen one before in this game or had any hint about it.

 

[Needles]

And the purest metagame knowledge effect is when someone simply plays a particular hero well and makes him popular. Nothing in game was changed; but everyone plays differently because of hype surrounding that particular match.

So what's the difference between that and this:

What this boils down to is that guides on where to put stat points aren't metagame knowledge. You can learn all that shit through tedious in game experimentation, sharing that knowledge doesn't make it meta.

No changes were made either, someone just made something popular (obviously by discovering some previously unknown synergy or whatever).

Running around with a specific set of unique boots in your inventory because you play on a PvP server and know that those boots will let you beat very common sorceress builds would be. Or going back to town to heal up before entering the ominous looking portal because every other game you've played had dangerous shit past portals like that, even though you've never seen one before in this game or had any hint about it.

So why exactly is planning ahead in a game that doesn't provide you with the necessary information not metagaming?
Everyone keeps talking about "PvP", I just don't see what the difference is.