DiabloFans

Hopefully not, but we are not able to give an ETA yet though.

atleast can you tell us @ is it soon™ or not soon™ ?
If I have to pick one I would have to go with the classic soon™

Ehhh. While the advice "don't play in Hardcore public games" may be valid in a number of situations, we recognize that this is a legitimate issue for Hardcore players and want to address it ASAP -- ideally in a way that doesn't impact co-op play (or impacts it as minimally as possible).

Right now, we're looking to remove the 10-second movement lockout whenever a Vote Kick is passed from both Hardcore and Normal modes. While we realize this solution may allow players to exploit the Vote Kick function to avoid death, it's not a very reliable survival technique and we feel that it's a better alternative than players losing a character they've invested a lot of time into due to griefing. We'll definitely be keeping on an eye on this, though, and will consider other solutions if necessary.

I don't know yet if this is something that can be addressed via hotfix; it may be a fix that we need to implement with a client-side patch. We're still working out the details, and I'll provide an update once there's any more info to share.

Do you guys also think that those who have been using such an exploit should be banned immediately?
While we think these players are poor sportsman and secretly hope they don't get any cool presents for Christmas this year, we don't feel like we should seek any unilateral account action at this time. We're more concerned about correcting the issue and improving the gameplay experience for our Hardcore players -- something we which hope to accomplish with the removal of the 10-second movement lock out.

it seems people are not following what is happening,
they removed the stasis lock on characters when they get vote kicked.....
as in you still wait 10sec to get kicked you are just free to move and activate abilities.....
Correct.

If your solution is getting rid of the 10 second countdown and you are worried it might create ways for people to exploit it, why make such a drastic change when you can just finesse what you already have?
It's not a very drastic change overall, and we're happy to consider other solutions. This particular choice seemed the most logical for the situation because it allowed us to address the issue while minimally impacting players (in both Normal and Hardcore). It's also something we believe we can act on fairly quickly and get into the 1.0.7 patch.

Also, the hardcore disconnect issue is a severe one that needs to be addressed. Here are my (well reasoned I believe) thoughts on the matter:

Auto-pause, ala SC2, is the golden bullet here. The only thing that exploit can do, really, is just allow pausing in multiplayer, as far as I'm concerned, which is so much less of a drawback than the sheer unfairness of the current DC protocol.

If auto-pause is not possible, DC detection at least needs to be stepped up. Currently, a DC can take up to 50 seconds. The 10 second countdown is not even the problem. If it was just kept to a 10 second countdown (maybe with 10 seconds TOPS for DC detection), that is much more survivable. Up to 50 seconds is just prohibitive to gear against what with the possibility of multiple arcane beams and multiple desecrator stacks.
Thanks! And understood. I'll pass this on.

While you did act on it quickly once complaints started moving to the General Discussion forum this issue has been on the hardcore forum for a long time. Many Hardcore players feel that no blue's ever even look on the Hardcore forum, and they seem to be correct since the only way to get a response is to complain on the General Discussion forum.
Fair point, and noted. It's something I'll make sure our team works to improve on this year. I agree we could do better about communicating in other forums.

You heard it here from a blue! Exploiting parts of the game won't get you banned. Although bot discussion and the random "I should have botted" statement that people like to throw out (even in a comical context) warrants a ban from the forums. Awesome!
Clever, but not all situations are equal. We're still evaluating what's best and definitely reserve room for Customer Support to make judgment calls on a case-by-case basis, but at the moment we'd like to avoid dropping the banhammer across the board.

Thanks for taking the time to craft such a constructive and well-intentioned thread. We really do appreciate the passion of Diablo III players like yourself, and you have some very fair points and feedback, so /highfive for that!

And how an old game had systems inspired already to lead into multiple diversities and that game is full of skill trees and is immensively popular, so those telling me skill trees & stat points is outdated, tell that to a 12 year old game still surviving and is massively going on updates still. It's only outdated if your skill trees/stats don't actually offer any equality between power & variation.
While we enjoyed allocating stats and having intricate skill trees in Diablo II (as well as the benefits they provided), we ultimately feel the current stat and skill system is better for Diablo III. We heavily iterated on the skill trees and stat points in Diablo III for quite some time, but we felt that they simply didn’t fit the direction we wanted to go with the game. They added artificial complexity to the game, but didn’t actually add much in the way of customization. They also often rendered a remarkable penalty, in that if you mis-allocated a stat point or skill the wrong way, or simply wanted to change it at a later point in time, you were out of luck, as you were locked to your original choice.

We strongly feel that in general, players will know whether or not they like a particular skill or play style only after they’ve had a chance to try it out for themselves. And while there definitely is some intrigue and fun to permanently committing yourself to a particular character design, it’s not what we envision for Diablo III. We want players to be able to experiment and find a combination of skills and runes that they enjoy and that fit them the best. We also don’t believe that the current skill system would really benefit from a free allocation of stats, either. We think that players can achieve a sizable level of customization through runes, and that this system fits in much better with the overall design of the game.

You speak of rares or magics and you'll just get laughed at, all everyone talks about is Legendary this that, mempo skorn, manticore blah blah, I haven't played and read enough to know that's all is being mentioned mainly for items and things, which still isn't even fully viable on the new Monster Power...? And one last thing I know Rares are still somewhat useful just as cheap trash gear now until you find your first Legendary and such, but past that you never look back really
If you haven’t played in a few months, you might have missed out on some of the item improvements we’ve made along the way. In terms of patch 1.0.4, you might want to check out the blog we did regarding Legendary Item Improvements as well as the various overall item improvements we made in patch 1.0.5.

Regarding the death timer: The incrementing death timer is actually being removed in 1.0.7.

Paragon Levelling - This is just an extension of your grind, I wouldn't call it an improvement as well, it's just an "illusion" of accomplishment past level 60 which grants nothing but extra "auto-allocated" stats. At first when I saw it being put in I was tempted to re-login and play, but to find out it's just more automated stats even, made it pointless. But after having the thought of just main stat & vit, why doesn't my Paragon levels just tunnel all those stats gained directly into main stat?
It is just a weaker form of levelling from 1-60, just without skills being unlocked. sigh...
The Paragon system was designed as a way to help address Magic Find/gear-swapping and the Magic Find stat in general along with offering an end-game character progression grind. The Diablo III end-game is fundamentally for people who enjoy making their character feel more powerful, investing time into slaughtering hordes of enemies, and hunting for loot. The Paragon system provides players with a predictable reward they can work towards. But for us, grinding alone is not enough. We like that there are still random item drops, you can change your build if you get bored, and it's all designed to complement a fluid combat system.

Infernal Machine - Serves like an event in any MMO it's a scavenger hunt and doesn't seem to thrilling just watching videos and streamers do it. I'm being honest here, it really feels lik an event being held in an MMO, except those FREE MMO's give these kinds of things seasonally and at a higher rate Diablo 3 will ever gain.
In terms of free additional content, we’d love to add more events similar to Infernal Machine to the Diablo universe, but whatever we add needs to fit within the scope of the game and needs to be weighed against other design costs. D3 isn’t an MMO, so it’s not going to receive regular content additions like an MMO (in terms of frequency and reward structures), but we’re definitely keeping our options open for the future, so don’t hesitate to let us know what interests you!

FFXIV:ARR For example the DIRECTOR even said to take WoW as a base test and improve on that and make it into their own style, and to study market trends to see what worked and get player feedback and ENGAGE IN CONVERSATION WITH PLAYERS in a LARGE scale not just a few random select individuals, through FORUMS, SOCIAL MEDIA, BLOGS & FREQUENT POSTS.
Pertaining to engaging in conversations with the players: we aim to do just that, and we’re dedicated to improving on this further. I for one am extremely active on our official social media channels (especially Twitter and Facebook), and have recently started branching out to other communities to try and connect a bit more there as well (including Reddit and DeviantArt). One of the things I think that it’s key to realize, however, is that while part of our job is indeed to be a presence on the forums and communicate with all of you, part of that job also entails stepping away from the forums so that we can gather feedback, communicate with the developers, attend meetings, moderate, draft up social media, write blogs: the whole shebang. The behind-the-scenes portion of our job isn’t easy to see, but hopefully the numerous improvements that have been made over the passing months shows that we’ve been listening and passing along feedback, and we plan to continue doing just that.

"Regarding the death timer: The incrementing death timer is actually being removed in 1.0.7."
could we please pick a direction and stick with it? sorry to complain but i had to get it out.
We feel that as the game has evolved and stands now, there are sufficient penalties associated with character death, so the incrementing death timer it doesn’t feel necessary anymore.

What's she's really saying is "Be glad we did anything for you. Regardless of what you may think, the changes were great and the game is big fun. Item choices are interesting, stat allocation is spot on, and if you can't see that then.. well, you're just not doing it right."
Yeah it’s… not really cool to try and paraphrase my words in order to twist the sentiment of my post. :-/

Design decisions are made with a lot in mind, and it’s an ongoing development process that often involves a lot of people. While I can try to offer insight into why we’ve made or are considering certain design decisions, at the end of the day, people’s opinions on it will undoubtedly vary from person-to-person, and since the folks here at Blizzard are gamers just like you, you can bet this passionate bunch has some varied opinions about all sorts of things relating to Diablo III.

While there are aspects of the game you’re bound to jive with, there are undoubtedly others that simply might not be your cup of tea (or blood, since we’re talking about slaying demons here). If you’ve noticed something that you think could be improved, we truly do want to hear about it, but bear in mind that while a lot of feedback we receive sounds really neat (and believe me, I’ve seen some incredibly awesome ideas floating around here), that doesn’t mean we have the bandwidth to do it all, nor that we necessarily believe that certain ideas are best for Diablo III. But as I’ve said before, we’re down to continue to improve it and make it the best game we possibly can.

Regarding that last part I'm glad to hear you're socially active among the venues that most people check and see, but the forums here are equally as important, if not even more. It's quite disheartening to see these threads & many other things go without any response for pretty much half a month each time.

I know you all have to attend meetings conferences design shakedowns and whatnot, I'm not oblivious to that for sure, but it'd nice to get a check-in from you and the other CMs maybe once a week, daily is just asking too much. I've seen Blizzard's studio and HQ(pretty bold statement I guess), seen development teams and gone through development cycles, game design classes & studios and I know that job is extremely demanding from customers(i.e the players) and highly stressful with crazy crunch time and OT during certain phases of milestones and the like. But a simple drop-in weekly would be nice rather than silence for half a month to something else.

Maybe even just rumor debunking would be nice, or small tidbits of why the blog posts are delayed or something. Not asking for miracles or lies here just some communication.
With the exception of our holiday break and whatever time each of us take off for events or vacations throughout the year, we’re here, and we’re busy. Each week we have numerous blogs that go up concerning a variety of topics, and pretty much every weekday one or more of us are actively posting updates to our social media sites as and posting here on the forums. While what we post on might not always be the issue that concerns you most, I can assure you we don’t go months without posting (I’ve posted about a half a dozen times here today, and Lylirra is very active as well). But when time and schedule allows, I’m personally trying to squeeze in more time to post here and elsewhere on the “interwebs.”

As I said though, we’re definitely interested on continuing to improve communication with the community. One of the things we’re looking into is a better method to make sure that important “Blue” posts are highlighted, since I suspect many inadvertently are overlooked (which explains some of the repeat questions I see so often).

Reading Older Topics
We do. Keep in mind, though, that it takes time for us to respond (sometimes minutes, sometimes hours, sometimes even days), and we can't respond to every thread. This forum also moves rather quickly, so threads undoubtedly move around to different pages over time.

Many players are also inclined to reply to threads where a Blue poster has already posted a reply, which is why those particular threads often linger on the first page longer than others. (Blue Tracker / Official Tracker)

We are of course interested in reading constructive feedback on why you do not like Diablo III, but threads like this one are far from constructive.... this thread does absolutely nothing to change or improve things, and although it did get you some attention from us, I am sure is is not the kind of attention you want!

stop acting like everything is alright with this product
This I think constitutes a sweeping statement, and this is exactly the kind of post that doesn't benefit anyone except perhaps those who are looking for someone else to highfive on how much they do not like the game.

And just for the record, nowhere are we acting or pretending Diablo III is the perfect game, in fact we have previously acknowledged more than once that Diablo III needs more things to keep people engaged and having fun.

Just a few weeks from now will see the official release of The Art of Blizzard book, published by Insight Editions. The Art of Blizzard is a superbly high-quality tome dedicated to presenting and preserving the visual history of Blizzard and our Warcraft, StarCraft, and Diablo franchises. With over 350 pages and nearly 800 individual pieces, including a never-before-seen look into some of our unpublished projects, this will certainly be a must-have collector's item to adorn even the most discerning of bookshelves and coffee tables.


For those of you in the Southern California area, Gallery Nucleus will be home to a gallery show celebrating the release of The Art of Blizzard. The opening reception will be held on Saturday, January 12, 2013 from 7:00 p.m.–11:00 p.m. Nucleus will be displaying over 60 pieces of artwork from some of your favorite Blizzard games, and the exhibition will run until February 3. Additional details to be announced at www.gallerynucleus.com. A $5 entrance fee will be collected at the door, but costumed guests get in for FREE!


In addition, Nucleus will be among the first to offer advanced copies of The Art of Blizzard book for sale. Supplies will be limited, so guests should come early to secure their copy. Several of our artists will be in attendance giving painting demos, signing books, and meeting with attendees.

If you have the means, we hope to see you there, and if not we'll let you know as soon as the book officially launches and where you can order or pick up your own copy.

Over the past few months we’ve enjoyed exploring the community’s creative side by asking questions such as “What do you think your hero’s favorite song is?” and “Where would you go on vacation in Sanctuary?” on Facebook and Twitter. We know that not everyone may have a Facebook or Twitter account, though, so we’re going to start opening those questions to all of you here.

“What item from Diablo III would you want to have in real life?”

So far our Diablo Facebook and Diablo Twitter accounts have been lighting up with responses such as:

@Radditzgt – “I want the "Cluckeye". It would provide an unlimited source of entertainment. And food.”
@NateTheRed – “Easy. The Collector's Edition Wings ”
@BinaryMuse – “Definitely the Town Portal! Would make getting to work and back every day oh so easy!”
@Denis Bohnsack – “goldskin ^^”

But what say you? What single item from the world of Diablo III would you want to covet as your own in real life? Leave a comment below to let us know!

This week's community spotlight takes a look back at the fan art we've featured over the past year. Feast your eyes on all the gorgeous digital paintings, masterfully-crafted costumes, catchy melodies, and more from 2012 below.

Fan Art


Songs, Lyrics, and Covers



Cosplay and Replicas



Don't forget to check out our official Fan Art gallery as well as the winners of the "Darkness Falls, Heroes Rise" Portrait of Champion art contest for even more amazing Diablo III fan creations.

This week's Community Commentary shout-out goes out to Ogeishere and the Paragon leveling routes he posted over on the DiabloFans forum.

Ogeishere recently offered up two video walkthroughs which he believes provide a 20% and 30% improvement over the popular Alkazier run. He also included some stats in his latest video, and would enjoy finding out what others think of his XP-efficient Paragon leveling routes.


SkyHigh also posted a very similar route he called The Big 6, which you can check out below.


So, have you tried out Ogeishere’s or SkyHigh’s routes? Are they faster than the routes you’ve been using to work your way towards Paragon 100, or is there another route you prefer? Leave a comment below with your answers, or simply head on over to the original thread on the DiabloFans forum!

Vaneras, I have reported one guy, Ernes, for gold trade spamming 3 times during the last ½ day - nothing is being done?!
If you have reported it we will get to it. :-)

The speed of which we handle reports does vary though, as it depends on how many reports we have in the queue at any give time.

It's funny how I once tried to sell an item in the trade section and I bumped it only twice with an interval of more than an hour and i got suspended within 5-6 hours for a week or so. Meanwhile all sorts of spammers get their posts in the top 10 section for more than a day.
Again, the actual time it takes to deal with such things depends on a number of factors as we talked about before.

We are very keen to stamp out bumping here in trade, but it generally only results in a suspension (unless you already have a number of previous suspensions), whereas trying to sell items or gold outside of the RMAH will result in a permanent forum ban, for sure.

Only fools and those who fancy themselves “brave" face their enemies alone. Who will stand beside you in the war for Sanctuary?

There are three heroic followers who will aide you in your fight against the Burning Hells:

Kormac, the Templar Eirena, the Enchantress Lyndon, the Scoundrel

Kormac's devotion is unshakable, as is his skill in melee combat. Eirena's mastery of enchantments and steely bravery in battle belie her youth. And Lyndon…well, he's both a rogue and a rake, but you couldn't ask for a more cunning marksman.

Each of these allies offer a range of unique abilities to help you defeat Diablo and his minions, from slowing and weakening nearby enemies to healing you on the battlefield. But which follower do you prefer to serve at your side? And most importantly...why?

While this is not true for everybody, we totally acknowledge that a lot of people feel this way. Because PvP is so extremely important to quite a few people, it is important to us that the PvP systems we will implement actually work well and are fun to play, and we did not feel this was the case for Team Deathmatch mode for the reasons explained in the blog.

In regards to Diablo II, that game was never really designed as a PvP game, but over time a PvP culture developed around the duelling system that resulted in a lot of people putting a lot of effort of that game into creating and gearing duelling characters. This should hopefully become possible in Diablo III as well come patch 1.0.7.

Again, it is important to emphasise that PvP in Diablo III hasn't been scrapped. While Team Deathmatch mode might not happen in the format that was shown at BlizzCon, something else will.

As someone who’s been browsing these forums daily since their inception, I not only understand your eagerness to check up on the buzz surrounding the Diablo III community, but also the frustration you feel whenever you see complaints from players who are sometimes being less than constructive.

Here’s the thing: there are lots of people out there that enjoy Diablo III, and I’d wager that the majority of players posting here are doing so because they are passionate about the game and want to offer insight to make it even better. But there are also some players that simply like to stir the pot. My best suggestion for the latter is to down-vote their posts and take advantage of the “Ignore” feature if you feel they are being detrimental to the community -- and to use the “Report” function if they are outright breaching the forum’s Code of Conduct or Posting Guidelines. Using inappropriate language or harassing other players or employees is never okay, and we do our best to weed out such behavior from our forums.

As we’ve said many times before, we do appreciate feedback and constructive discussions, and we try our best to cultivate an environment where players feel comfortable discussing all things Diablo III. We realize the forums aren’t always going to be overflowing with rainbow unicorns and fluffy teddy bears, but that’s to be expected, and we truly do appreciate the continued passion of the Diablo III community.

Only idiots and egoists disregard good advice or feedback because their pride was hurt.
I wanted to jump in really quickly to say that this is the sort of exchange can lead to account actions. While players are welcome to disagree with each other, it is never acceptable on our forums to name-call or harass other players. It only hinders constructive conversation and makes those of us on this end ready our ban-hammers. Remember that discussing the game or one’s opinions of the game is okay, but attacking or belittling other players for their opinions isn’t.

Just like the botters you mentioned, we take reports concerning gold spam very seriously and are continuing to take steps to combat it. As long as you are taking the time to report and block these users, then you are helping us ensure that we’re aware of which players are attempting to abuse the friend request system so that we can investigate them and take action against them.

We’re always looking to improve your online experience, and that includes the reporting system. Thanks for taking the time to give us feedback!

Happy New Year to you and yours! It's truly been a pleasure for us to represent Blizzard and the Diablo III community this past year, and we want to thank each and every one of you for your support, your reports, and (most importantly) your passion.

Have a fantastic 2013, everyone... and may all your loot be legendary!

I can totally understand how frustrating it must be to find out that the very feature you were anticipating the most has been postponed, and that it might not even be released in the same format as was previewed earlier, but we hope that people understand that we truly want the best for Diablo III... we want to give you guys the best content possible, and the truth is that Team Deathmatch mode in its current form simply didn't deliver the kind of experience that we want it to.

The only way we can make Diablo III a better game is to release new features and content that is as great as possible. If we release content that is mediocre or rushed, then we might make some people happy for a little while, but after a couple of hours they will no longer feel it is fun to do and that will not be good for the game in the long run.

It is important to emphasise that PvP hasn't been scrapped, it is still being worked on.

Set up ptrs keep people's interest and keep them involved, you know more like it used to be. It's all so damned closed nowadays.
Are we to trust these testers?
First of all, you should never expect to see PTRs and other forms of player testing for all new features and announced content, but nobody has said that there will not be PTRs or other forms of public testing for something as massive as PvP content.

It is commonplace for most game developers (including Blizzard) when planning an external player test, to do internal testing first to see if the new content live up to the design goal. If it does not, then the content must be reworked. But as soon as the internal tests shows that things look to be working as they are supposed to, that is when we make the content available for external player testing to see if the content is truly working as intended.

The Team Deathmatch mode did not live up to the design goal during internal tests, and it must therefore be reworked. Does that mean PvP in Diablo III has been scrapped? No, but PvP may need to take a different form than a Team Deathmatch mode, and that was what the PvP blog was about.

i've spent a lot of time on feedback how Diablo 3 can be a better game, please - could you at least look and see whether it's worth to pass that feedback to developers?
Please trust me when I say that we are forwarding player feedback to the developers all the time, and especially constructive feedback from excellent threads such as the ones you have linked to :-)

It is hard to say what kind of PvP modes they are looking into, as there isn't any information available on that right now :-(

This is an interesting idea though, and although am not sure how PvP battlegrounds would work in Diablo III, you guys are of course free to speculate on that and share your ideas :-)

It shouldn't be that long. I am sorry I cannot be more concrete than this, but it should be ready before the new year... hopefully that is :-)

This is unfortunately one of those questions that there is no answer to at this point in time, which means that I cannot say yes and I cannot say no :-(

It is not an impossibility that we will get to see a ladder system in Diablo III in the future, but if we were ever to introduce this into the game, we would have to be very careful with the design as well as the implementation.

Lessons learned I guess?
Perhaps, but: http://i.imgur.com/N6Z44.jpg

:-)

Before we head off to join friends and loved ones in time-honored traditions of the season (e.g. catching up on the latest video games and eating our weight's worth in freshly-baked cookies), we wanted to wish all of you a very merry holiday!

'Tis the Season
As a small gift from our team, we've created a few festive Facebook cover photos and Twitter banners so you can deck the halls of your social media pages with some epic yuletide flare:








And speaking of presents, don't forget to be on the lookout for some heroic holiday giveaways, courtesy of Diablo III fansites!)


See You Next Year!
Just as a heads-up, the community team will have a reduced presence on the forums, Twitter, and Facebook over the holidays as we get ready to unwrap our very own Treasure Goblins and ring in a new year with family and friends. We're eager to hit the ground running in January, though, and look forward to discussing the delicate art of demon slaughter with you in 2013.

In the meantime, whether in Sanctuary, Azeroth, Mar Sara, or beyond, we hope that you and yours share in the warmth of the season. It's truly been a pleasure for us to represent Blizzard and the Diablo III community this past year, and we want to thank each and every one of you for your support, your reports, and (most importantly) your passion.

Have a fantastic holiday, everyone...and may all your loot be legendary!


Love,
Your friendly neighborhood North American Diablo III Community Team, featuring...

This week's community spotlight shines brightly on fan artist ChaoyuanXu and his breathtaking rendition of Leah and her Uncle Deckard, titled "Searching for Truth".

If you loved ChaoyuanXu's interpretation of two of Diablo III's most critical characters, then you'll be sure to enjoy his other Diablo-inspired pieces, including "Unstoppable Monk," "Wizard Unleashed," and "Enter Demon Hunter" (all featured below).

To see more work by this talented artist, head on over to ChaoyuanXu's gallery on Deviant Art or check out his blog at http://blog.sina.com.cn/u/132705606.

The December edition of ImagineFX magazine is now on sale and packed with a little something extra for Blizzard art enthusiasts, including tutorials and how-to information from some of the artists that help bring World of Warcraft to life. You'll also get to take a look into Blizzard Entertainment's Fine Arts Project; a unique gathering of some of the world’s greatest contemporary fantasy artists creating their own visions of the Blizzard universe. Legends including Alex Ross, Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell, Craig Mullins, Alex Horley, Todd Lockwood, and Syd Mead share their experiences and showcase the incredible pieces of art they produced for the project.

Blizzard's artists are featured throughout this memorable issue. Their contributions begin with new cover art for the magazine from Glenn Rane, featuring Alliance heroine Jaina Proudmoore. Inside you'll find Samwise Didier explaining how to depict an epic fight between two heroes, and Laurel D. Austin sharing her approach to creating dynamic groups of characters in the workshop section.

Whether you're an artist or just someone who appreciates fantasy art, this issue would make a worthy addition to your collection.

Learn more about this issue here.
Buy ImagineFX issue 90 now.

This week's Community Commentary shout-out goes to Diablo Stats, which is an interactive hero progression site created by Rek currently in beta testing.

The goal of Diablo Stats is to track hero progression over time and make item comparisons easier with built-in damage and effective hit point (EHP) calculators. It's a great way to see how your heroes' stats change and progress over time, and Rek would really enjoy if other players jumped in and offered feedback so that he can further refine his project.

You can get started by visiting Diablo Stats and typing in your BattleTag into the "Add or Search" box on the top right. From there, it should generate a page for your account for you to dive into and compare with other players.

So make sure to check out Rek's great new site, and take a few moments to leave feedback so that he can take it to the next level. You can do this by leaving a comment in his original thread over on Reddit, the thread he created on our forums, or you can drop a comment below!

Captcha System for Bot Prevention?
This is indeed a concern we have with CAPTCHA systems, which is that they can feel very intrusive and annoying for legitimate players.

If CAPTCHA means no boters the then im fine with it even there is every 30 minutes some checkpoint.
Yep, I know many would not mind this at all (chosing the lesser evil and all that), but there are people who would be very annoyed by a CAPTCHA system like the one suggested here.

Bear in mind Vaneras the CAPTCHA only need appear at all if the client/servers detect activity that may be botting. And a legitimate player detected in this way, that has answered the CAPTCHA a few times, will have the time between CAPTCHA's massively increased.

So once running it will be something like, excluding the botters:
90% of players will never see a CAPTCHA
10% of players, who trigger the bot match pattern, will very quickly have it reduced down to say once every 2 days or even more.

Thanks for the feedback though.
Sure, a CAPTCHA system combined with other detection systems would be an improvement, in that legitimate players would be less likely to be bothered by it. If we were ever to implement a CAPTCHA system, this type of approach would likely be considered :-) (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

What More Does a Community Manager Do?
This is rather off-topic, but I will answer it anyway as this is a question I get fairly often.

As a CM I am often privy to information regarding the development of the game, but I do not know everything of course as I am not a developer. Some of the things I know I am unable to share right now as said things are still eligible to change.

The developers get player questions and feedback from us all the time, but it is not always that they are able to answer said questions and feedback because they have not yet decided on the best way of doing so. The processes for everything the developers do are all very iterative, and this means that things can change dramatically before they reach certainty. Once the developers have made their decision on something though, that is when we can give you information and be sure that it is the correct information.

Basically what I am trying to say is that the right answer to a question one day may be wrong answer the day after, so we prefer not to give answers until we are certain that they are the right ones. I can assure you that when I do have info to "answer advanced stuff concerning the game", I will share that info with you right away. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Don't Report Bots as a Real Life Threat
I don’t know the details around this particular situation, but this information is a little incomplete, so I will provide some more info to help clarify.

Reporting a player for any infraction (including botting) is fine, but it should be done through proper channels. The best place to report a player for botting or other exploitative behavior is through our online web form, and you can find more information about that here: http://us.battle.net...pic/6246615165. However, reporting players in a public place should be avoided since it can result in a forum suspension. Similarly, the Report > Real-Life Threat in-game option should only be used for situations in which another player has threatened violence or harm that is not directly related to the game world, or if he/she has released real life information about other players or Blizzard employees. Abusing this report system can lead to an account action, so we strongly suggest that you please use it appropriately. You might want to review our online harassment for more details: https://us.battle.ne...assment-policy. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Fa la la la la, mwah HA HA HA...

Every year around this time, just as the holiday season reaches its zenith, the community team begins its annual tradition of preparing for the road ahead (pending apocalypses be damned). But as we began to schedule our meetings for brainstorming what kind of cool projects and promotions we wanted to do for 2013, we realized...we had absolutely no where to hold department gatherings anymore. We'd run out of meeting rooms!

Our mission became clear. The primary objective? Empty out the office we'd been using as storage space and turn it into the finest meetin' room this side of Sanctuary. The bonus objective? Discover what treasure lurked in its depths and present the bounty to as many worthy companions as possible.


So, under the pallid glare of fluorescents (and to the tune of The A Team theme song), we destroyed that office's defenses, looting everything its box-ridden corpse had to offer. To our delight, after carefully cataloguing our spoils -- and checking the lists twice -- we identified the following rare items:

• Signed Diablo III Collector's Editions (over 30!)
• Mini Tyrael statues (over 40!)
• Books of Cain
• Diablo III pins
• Diablo II action figures
• Some Battle.net Authenticators featuring everyone's favorite Prime Evil
• And a bunch of World of Warcraft swag

We decided the best recipients of all this sweet stuff would be you, our mighty community, and picked a few awesome allies to help us distribute the goods:

• Diablo Fans
• /r/Diablo
• Diablo IncGamers
• D3DB
• D3Sanc
• Diablo Expressions
• Diablo Sanctuary
• Kripparrian

We're letting these sites set the terms for how and when everything's given away, so be sure to tune in to their front pages (or video streams) for possible holiday swag sightings. We can't wait to see what kind of epic contests, challenges, or raffles they might have in store!


Good luck to everyone who participates in the giveaways, and a big thank you to our Diablo III fan sites who've not only helped us reclaim precious meeting space, but also provided a wealth of support, coverage, and cause for conversation in this year of our Lord (of Terror), 2012.

P.S. Here's a sweet digital painting of a barbarian in a Santa suit. Why? Because beards.