I've played D4 up to level 20 and it is in no way shape or form anywhere near as shit as D3 up to that point. I can't comment on anything past that as frankly I found D3 so fucking shit that I lost all interest quite rapidly, but it is a HUGE improvement on that game in all the ways that are immediately obvious for the first 10 hours or whatever.
Graphics, atmosphere, story, presentation, music, sfx, etc, that kind of thing.
You're basically at the point right before the bottom falls out. By level 25 you've seen 99% of what the game has to offer. After level 25, how your character plays doesn't change whatsoever, end-game and all content after level 25 is just repeating what you've already seen over and over, etc. I could go on, but that's the gist of it.
At around lvl 25-30 your build will effectively be the same for the rest of the game. Same skill rotation etc.
No diss at you Yosharian, but it's really telling when people keep saying it's an improvement over D3. It's such a meaningless comparison. Anything is better than D3.
I disagree there, but I am apparently able to better separate the game mechanics of D3 from its "aesthetic presentation" or whatever you want to call what filtered most people.
D3's biggest issue was how it didn't "feel like Diablo" in terms of worldbuilding and aesthetics. The gameplay wasn't that bad. And it had way more end-game on launch than D4 has, better itemization, etc. The character builds were also way, way more varied, without even bringing items into the mix.
I get that it's always been tricky making that argument when you'd have idiots like gaudost on here insisting that no, everything about D3 is amazing! Even the butterfly Disney villain woman!
I understand what you mean but I guess we just don't appreciate the same types of mechanics. I found almost all changes D3 made were bad in terms of itemisation (which D4 clearly is copying here) and skill 'loadouts' destroying class identity and having to make some sort of commitment to your build. The latter D4 tried to move away from but the barebones customisation of the skill "tree" and budget PoE paragon board made a joke out of build diversity.
I actually agree on that point compared to D2. But as its own thing, it was fine. And D4 does not bring back D2 or Path of Exile or Grim Dawn style builds, it just removes the build variety of runes/loadouts. I always said as far back as D3 beta/release that they should have kept the original design for runes, which would have been largely the same mechanics wise as runes were in D3, but they'd have to drop, and the best version of a rune would be an ultra-rare drop. That would have fed the item game into it, instead of making it feel like completely disposable loadouts.
I also don't think it's true they were genuinely trying to return to D2 with the D4 skilltree. I agree that's how it was
marketed, but like almost everything said about D4 before release, it was intentionally misleading. You can respec your entire skilltree in D4 on a whim, it is not expensive at all. The only thing added compared to loadouts is tedium, since you can't "save" a setup.
I'm not someone who cares too much about form, though. My issue with D4 is that there are
no good options. If they threw rune effects into legendaries (something they implied would be the case before release), or it was in the paragon board, or ANYWHERE, I would forgive them, but nope. They just don't exist. A single rune on a single skill in D3 adds more variety to a skill than your entire skill tree & legendary slots in D4. For example, Monk's Fist of Thunder. Teleports you to the target, chains lightning, and knocks up enemies. There are entire classes in D4 that never get anything this good, or this dramatic of a change, stacking every single skill and legendary they have. That really shows you how boring and bland the skill tree & paragon boards in D4 are, on top of legendaries. On the class I'm playing, I've seen a total of ONE aspect that is remotely as interesting as D3 legendaries. That's out of a list of dozens. Most of them are minor stat boosts or conditional buffs, not major changes to how skills work.
