DiabloFans

Well balancing them well is easier said than done. You'd have to take into account that its only one person getting all the loot, so that would mean that difficulty and loot would have to be fine tuned in order to make the effect of followers negligible, and if it sways either way they either become useless again or they are too good. So instead they just turned them into this incentive to play multiplayer and kept them in the part of the game where balance doesn't matter as much.

Theres also Threatening Shout: Shouts with great ferocity, reducing damage done by nearby enemies by a percentage for X seconds, along with a few 'singing' traits, not to mention rune possibilities. But last time we saw the Barb's skills there were only two shouts.

Ah, never mind, I was wrong about them being free. All the talk of easy customization threw me off, especially the video that shows their skills changing so quickly.

So it will at least be very cheap/easy to respec them.

You can change their skills at any time through their UI.

Quote from Lenks

Actually in Diablo III, with individual items drop system, who will make solo mf runs anymore...

Exactly. But if followers were useful in Hell there would be no better way to MF than solo with a follower. Obviously you could take MF away from the followers, but you're still left with balance issues. If they're useful, you have to balance Hell around their usefulness, because its not like Normal where you can have a range of difficulties; the game is supposed to be hard at that point.

So if they were usable in Hell, that means you'd have to balance around them, which makes Hell too hard without them. Which takes us all the way back to the outrage that happened when the video was leaked where everyone was worried they'd be essential. So the only way around that is to make them unusable in Hell.

Exactly. Considering the options I think they made the right choice. IMO they could've made them useful during early to mid Nightmare, but in Hell, if you want it to be constantly challenging, you'd have to balance the game around having followers or not having them. Theres no scenario where they're useful and don't factor into game balance.

That being said, even though obviously the vast majority of people here won't really use them, the majority of people who actually play D3 will. Most of my friends that I introduced to D2 only played through Normal once, maybe a few times. Most people see the end of the story as the end of the game, and if this system works as intended and makes people want to have a co-op partner by their side then it benefits everyone. The person who would've normally just played SP Normal and dropped the game gets more time for his money and we get a larger online community.

Obviously you can wish that followers were useful because you liked hirelings in D2, but keep in mind that the day the video was leaked all the rage was about followers being essential, and once they were announced as being non-essential all the rage was about them being useless. So obviously a compromise had to be made, and if you look at it from an objective point of view Blizzard clearly made a good decision.

Quote from Daemaro

It's not the exact bridge though. It's missing the flag from the top one, and the small shingled roof off the side at the bottom of the top one.

You're probably right though could be the new model, but I'd imagine rain has a big effect on the rainbow.

It has the exact same holes though. Even if they have that similar models at the same angle, its still pretty much reusing models if its not an update. It seems to me that its something of a new look for that area.

Well Bashiok has made it pretty clear multiple times that they won't be a factor in Hell and the endgame.

Even though its not about followers, immunities won't be in D3. There will probably still be high-resist monsters though. And without trees characters can be considerably more varied in terms of the kinds of damage they deal.

The fact of the matter is none of us have played the game as it currently is, and as a result we can't put into perspective what they mean by too much clutter. That being said, it isn't hard to believe that having 4 players with 4 followers is a bit much.

Yeah, they could have the best of both worlds if they did that. Surely the MF & GF skills aren't essential to making them good for new players in normal difficulty. I like how they wont be used on co-op but I dont see why they feel they have to make them crap in the late game on to make them useful early on? its not binary..

Well at least in the case of the Scoundrel theres really no use for him if you're a DH except for the MF/GF. In the end, no matter how they modify the skills the followers have, if you make them able to be used in the endgame they will be essential. Theres not any way around it. If they give you a benefit, you won't be operating at the peak of your game unless you have one. So the only way around that is to make them give you no benefit when balance between players really matters (aka Hell).

Even without bringing other players into the equation, if you were playing SP Hell, they would have to tune the game around you having a follower and make it challenging with them around. Its not like Normal where they can make it so its just easy with or without the follower. If they allowed them in Hell, that means they would have to make the game difficult with them in Hell, which means it would be nearly impossible without them in Hell. Unless they were useless, which is the current scenario. So they had to choose between making them useless or tuning the game around them, and they chose useless. Obviously you can have a problem with that, but its not like their rationale isn't legitimate.

If you think its gimmicky and useless sure. But its a tutorial that also has value in the story and quests it provides, while also potentially bringing more people into the online community. So no I don't think its bad at all.

Really? You make all those assumptions based on a follower system designed for new players? Of course you're not going to find it useful. Its essentially a tutorial. That doesn't mean it has no place in the game.

We're nowhere close to the majority of the people who will play D3. So while it might be 'wasted' on us, it will probably be a valuable multiplayer tutorial for most of the people who play the game, which will then lead to a bigger online community.

Oh. I thought it was 5 slots. So its even less choices.

Yea, but you can only choose 1 of 3 per slot. Thats not a wide range of choices.

I thought I had posted that before, but yea, its a pretty major difference. As for the weather effects, they could still be there, but screenshots are pretty bad for seeing those kinds of things.

Edit: Ah, it was on battle.net
http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=27807930741&sid=3000