Hey guys, new member.
So, I am on team Blizzard with this entire update, and I shall now discourse on why every single thing they did was genius.
First, some Economy 101, since plenty of posters here seem to have acquired the HURR-odric scroll after bumping their head on the Tree of Idiots. The RMAH is ingenious for a few very specific reasons, a few of which have been touched on by previous posters. First, since you can sell gold, you can acquire money to spend in the RMAH, which means you just spent gold to get something on the RMAH. Second, those of you who think the RMAH is not ethical will (according to your ethics) put anything you want to sell in the AH on the Gold AH, which means that there will be plenty of good items on the Gold AH. If your ethics are so strong that you don't like the RMAH, then I'm sure we can trust you to not try and sell there. Third, this puts a value on Gold, so you know what you have. Sweet, finally.
Further, you guys need to understand economics on a deeper scale if you're going to attack Blizzard for bringing real world economy and grafting it into this virtual universe. In particular, you need to understand the ebb and flow of money coming in, the money sitting around, and the money going out. Let's say that out of one million players, fifty thousand buy SOMETHING in the RMAH, whether it be 50 cents for basic gloves, or 50 dollars for a sweet-axe axe. That's fifty thousand multiplied by the average expense that was just put into the D3 economy. Some went into the real-world pockets of the sellers, and some went into Blizzard e-balance. Now, assuming that another four-hundred and fifty thousand players are okay with selling gold for e-balance and buying on the RMAH with e-balance, they're just recycling the money put in the economy already. What does this mean? If there's a total e-balance amongst the five-hundred thousand players of $5000 (obviously low, but just for example, let's roll with that amount) then people are just shifting that $5000 around to acquire things that they want/need. So eventually, our collective e-balance will begin to move into real-world pockets, but more e-balance will come in from more cash expense into the game. What this means is that our Diablo economy will function much like the real-world economy. The more cash there is in the system, the less it's worth. Conversely, the less cash there is, the more it's worth. What this means for Diablo economy is that if everyone is buying into the RMAH with cash, we have more cash in the system, which means each e-balance dollar is worth just a little less because it's easier to come by. This is a GOOD THING. It's a good thing because we also have Gold that has a comparable exchange rate to our e-balance cash. If cash is valuable, gold is valuable, and if you can acquire gold, you can acquire cash, assuming you sell. What I'm getting at here is simply this: for every ONE player that spends their real money (buying power, as ragers call it) we get a stronger gold economy for all of us, and fewer of us will get scammed out of our transactions because we know what gold is even worth.
Long story short, people, the RMAH is not going to beat out the Gold AH. It's going to become the supplementary force that makes people like the AH altogether. I don't even think it makes sense to think of it as RMAH and Gold AH so much as a single AH with two ways to pay. Your gold can be spent in the RMAH just as your cash can be spent in the Gold AH, thanks to the possibility of currency exchange and e-balance.
*whew*
As for PVP, who cares if people buy godly armor and go PVP? You'll never play against them unless your armor compares, so what does it even matter? "Oh, but I spent time, and they spent 5 minutes." Well good, then you should be able to beat them on the pure merit of knowing how to play, and they'll see what all their godly spends were worth them.
As for skill points, awesome. Brilliant even. So what, you're sad that you won't feel different from other players with Whirlwind? How is this better than D2 when you were fighting other Barbarians who beefed out Whirlwind there? At least this time around, you can be a whirlwind/leap barb while they're a whirlwind/berserker barb. You're different from every other barb because you have 6 ways to play! In PVP, I bet we'll see a never-ending ebb and flow where you are Barb 1 and you get beat by Barb 2, so you shift to have his skillset, and now you get beat by Barb 3, so you switch to that skillset, and suddenly, you get beat by someone who's playing Barb 1's skillset again. And people are honestly crying about the ability to switch out often? So what? Are YOU going to switch out often? If you are, then it was a good move. If you're not, good on you, you found a playstyle that works for you, and that is GOLDEN. That's Blizzard's goal anyway. They don't intend for every player to switch skills between each scenario. People are going to use what they want to use. People want identity, and if they can have the freedom to perfect that on the fly, they'll do it, but they'll still lock into what works for them best. This is aided even further by the new (possible) rune system. And speaking of the rune system...
The Rune system is awesome! So what if you don't know what you're getting? You certainly didn't hate unidentified items, did you? That's all this is. If you try it and don't like it, well, better luck next time. That's how good item finding has always worked in Diablo. And if you have to think carefully about what skill you're going to toss a rune into, well then you're not going to be switch out your skills that often are you? You gotta know what you're going to use so you know what skill is worth throwing that oh so precious level 7 rune into. This reinforces identity, it reinforces the treasure hunting we've always enjoyed in Diablo, and it reinforces the idea that just because that Barb has the same skillset as you, it doesn't mean you're identical, because his Whirldwind is alabaster while your whirlwind is something else entirely. Trust me, there's no such thing as "better" or "worse" runes for each skill, because when you compare any change you get from runes to the changes OTHER skills get with whatever runes they get may make what you currently THINK is a bad change into the perfect fit for your build. Essentially, everyone will have different preferences for runes, and I think this random method is going to help us all explore that a little better, which will have us playing different styles for months -- nay, years -- to come.
THANK YOU BLIZZARD! I can't wait to get my hands on this and ruin my life by only ever playing it!
- sicyo
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Aug 2, 2011theSkaBoss posted a message on Diablo 3 Press Event VisitPosted in: News & Announcements
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VladDracul posted a message on Diablo 3 Press Event Visit"Now, skill and trait points were also removed."Posted in: News & Announcements
...Why? Who cares if people hoard up points for a later skill, if they could make skills that were actually useful like they said they could then there wouldn't be a reason to hoard. So now every barbarian is exactly the same beside gear till high level when Meta gear is found and bam everyone is the same, fantastic.
Also why the hell would I use Bash or whatever low tier skill once I unlock the high tier skill? Obviously they can't make the skill worth 2 shits with points put into it, why on earth would it be a better choice going off my weapon damage when the top tier skill will have an equal booster?
Please don't tell me "Oh but there is more then 1 type of best gear" or "But but but runes in skills" all that shit will be figured out within a few months and top tier builds and gear will be known. Looks like Jay and the crew again are showing their inexperience with Diablo 1 and 2 when creating this game.
Diablo 2 was bad enough when you smashed kids they wanted to know all your gear and build, now you limit it even more so there is no thinking involved ha.
Way to make a series with a ton of re playability look stale for the first time, why the hell would I continue to play when 1 Barb or Monk is all in one and there is literally no customization.
Why not just remove Mana and cool downs while we are at it? Lets remove ALL thinking required please!!!! -
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Vadoff posted a message on Diablo 3 Press Event VisitPeople are getting way too carried away with the whole RMT Auction House thing, and I think the reason why is that they’re misinformed or ignorant about certain key points.Posted in: News & Announcements
1) The critical point that you have to realize is: RMT would have occurred anyways! There are hundreds of $ for gold sites for WoW, there were hundreds of $ for item sites for D2, and there would have been hundreds for D3… had it not been for Blizzard stepping in with their RMT AH. All that’s changing now is that RMT will be handled officially and provide players with a legit way to sell their hard work. This will also most likely cause the death of every gold site out there for D3 (still won’t stop the farmers, but at least it’ll put an end to the middle-men).
2) “But D3 was supposed to be about EARNING loot!”. It still is, NOTHING is different than before. All you have to do is not pull out your wallet, and play like you’ve always had. It’s actually the same exact decision process that had always been present since when you played WoW or D2. Only the players who are willing to spend money on games in the first place will buy gear from the RMT AH, but these are the same folks who had bought WoW gold or D2 HR’s/SOJ’s and would have bought gold for D3 anyways, regardless of who’s offering the service. It might as well be Blizzard since they’ll do a better job mediating and making sure no one gets ripped off. Plus, the market for buying/selling your items will be huge (even bigger than when ebay allowed virtual items to be sold on its marketplace), guaranteeing a good market for you to sell quickly.
3) “I’m going to sell my items for cash, whoo! But, I ONLY want to buy items with gold. There’s no way I’d PAY for an item” This statement doesn’t really make much sense. The fact that the RMT AH will be established means that gold and cash will have a direct observable correlation with each other. One is the other as much as the other is it.
Imagine that the hypothetical exchange rate for cash to gold in D3 is $1 = 100g at the time. Let’s say you had 100g to start with, sold an item for $5, then bought an item for 100g. You now have your new item, $5, and 0g.
Now let’s say you had the same to start with as the above situation, sold an item for $5, then bought an item for $1. You now have your new item, $4, and 100g. Different results than before? Just sell your 100g for $1. Same end results.
Gold and $ will be essentially the same for the purposes of buying items. Having some weird ethical stance against buying with RMT, but not when it comes to selling with RMT doesn’t make any sense. If you’re still against RMT at least don’t be a hypocrite and use the system to sell your items, just don’t use it at all.
4) I think a lot of what people are getting confused with is what the RMT AH is, and what it isn’t. To clarify, it’s not a Blizzard store by any means – it’s simply a tool for us, the players, to use. Blizzard is NOT selling uber high-end gear through the RMT AH, nor ANY items for that matter. It’s strictly a marketplace, one that would have existed anyways, just in another form and off of the battle.net interface. - To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
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