Grim Dawn is better than Diablo 2. I have no problem at this point proclaiming it the best ARPG (in the classic Diablo-sense) of all-time. And it's the result of well over 7 years of development and constant work to get to this point (decades if you count Titan Quest as the dry-run template). It's astonishingly good, and I don't really know how the genre can possibly get any better than this at the moment.
I disagree. Better than D3, sure, but what game is worse? But better than Diablo 2/1, i strongly disagree. I mean, GD is interesting, mainly with mods, but has problems, i honestly din't liked much the skills in the game nor the amount of skills with cooldowns. Throw an canister shell, now wait X seconds to throw another is an mechanic that i hate
Diablo 2 has arbitrary skill cooldowns as well as limits, like only one hydra at a time?
I agree with jjstraka34 (whom I saw on Steam and couldn't remember where I'd seen his name before) that it is actually better than D2. Right now I'm on my way to Fort Ikon with a sorceress created in 1.1.4 and partway through Arkovia with my tactician created the day before the patch dropped.
Diablo 2 has arbitrary skill cooldowns as well as limits, like only one hydra at a time?
I agree with jjstraka34 (whom I saw on Steam and couldn't remember where I'd seen his name before) that it is actually better than D2. Right now I'm on my way to Fort Ikon with a sorceress created in 1.1.4 and partway through Arkovia with my tactician created the day before the patch dropped.
Casting delay, in few CPU intensive skills, about arbitrary limitations like only one hydra at time, i agree that is an problem, but GD as much mroe of this stuff
Grim Dawn has more skills to buy, too. And you can easily build a character around skills that don't have cooldowns you need to keep track of. And spamming some of the skills that have cooldowns would actually be OP, because the skills are balanced around having that cooldown.
Take for instance, pets. Playing on Veteran, my Pyromancer initially had one-point in Hellhound. When I got to the Warden, this skill at my investment level was useless because he was killing it in 3 seconds. The cooldown is there to prevent me from only having to use a single point in a skill I can use as a spammable meat shield. I went back to town and refunded the point. That is just good design.
Grim Dawn has more skills to buy, too. And you can easily build a character around skills that don't have cooldowns you need to keep track of. And spamming some of the skills that have cooldowns would actually be OP, because the skills are balanced around having that cooldown.
You are assuming that
1 - Balance is somehow important in a SP games(when immersion, consistency and replayability are far more important)
2 - That there are no better way to balance skills
The best cRPG's like Pathfinder Kingmaker uses no cooldown, the best aRPG's(isometric or not) like dark souls, dragons dogma and diablo 1, uses no coodlown.
Looking to grenades for eg
"dan, i ran out of grenades" is a good way to be unable to throw grenades
"i trowed an grenade, now i need to wait "X" seconds to throw again" is an bad mechanic
Same with supernatural powers, be an warlock channeling hellfire and taking damage from his own hellfire, be an kineticist taking burn on PfK to use powerful abilities, is much more interesting than "spam the same rotation, spam the same rotation and spam the same rotation", i wanna see the game, not my "action bar".
About more skills to buy, i disagree. Necromancers on D2 has 30 skills(counting passives), 4 types of golems to choose and the Iron golem is the most customizable one. Can revive enemies, cam cast 10 different curses ranging from simple curses like amplify damage to "composite" curses like Decrepify...
Take for instance, pets. Playing on Veteran, my Pyromancer initially had one-point in Hellhound. When I got to the Warden, this skill at my investment level was useless because he was killing it in 3 seconds. The cooldown is there to prevent me from only having to use a single point in a skill I can use as a spammable meat shield. I went back to town and refunded the point. That is just good design.
You can make for eg >
Pets having an casting time
Requiring corpses or reagents
The user needing to sacrifice part of his own life to have an pet
<<<insert more options>>>
Or you can make the necromancers wasting an minute to re raise his undead army every time that he dies or start a new "session" by putting cooldown on animate dead(something that no other aRPG ever made)...
Grim Dawn has more skills to buy, too. And you can easily build a character around skills that don't have cooldowns you need to keep track of. And spamming some of the skills that have cooldowns would actually be OP, because the skills are balanced around having that cooldown.
You are assuming that
1 - Balance is somehow important in a SP games(when immersion, consistency and replayability are far more important)
2 - That there are no better way to balance skills
Your first point leads me to question if you understand how game development works? Balance is necessary for those things you listed as well as for a game experience that can be challenging and fun. You don't have to balance for PVP, but you still need to balance things so that each difficulty provides the challenge it advertises.
Also, I did not assume there are no better ways to balance skills. I said that they balanced the skills around cooldowns. Obviously there are other options, but cooldowns were part of their chosen design.
Also, I would appreciate it if in the future you would refrain from telling me what I assume, thanks.
Edit: Cooldown for every summonable pet I found in Grim Dawn is 18 seconds. Except the Oathkeeper pet, which is five seconds.
Grim Dawn has more skills to buy, too. And you can easily build a character around skills that don't have cooldowns you need to keep track of. And spamming some of the skills that have cooldowns would actually be OP, because the skills are balanced around having that cooldown.
You are assuming that
1 - Balance is somehow important in a SP games(when immersion, consistency and replayability are far more important)
2 - That there are no better way to balance skills
Your first point leads me to question if you understand how game development works? Balance is necessary for those things you listed as well as for a game experience that can be challenging and fun. You don't have to balance for PVP, but you still need to balance things so that each difficulty provides the challenge it advertises.
Also, I did not assume there are no better ways to balance skills. I said that they balanced the skills around cooldowns. Obviously there are other options, but cooldowns were part of their chosen design.
Also, I would appreciate it if in the future you would refrain from telling me what I assume, thanks.
Edit: Cooldown for every summonable pet I found in Grim Dawn is 18 seconds. Except the Oathkeeper pet, which is five seconds.
Look to Vampire the Masquarede - Bloodlines(VtMB) play as Nosferatu will be much harder than with an Tremere for eg, have seduction capped at zero and be monstrous looking in a game very focused on investigation, dialog and social life and being unable to be seen in the city without breaking the masquarede is an hard challenge. While other clans can walk into an club and with high seduction, get free blood dolls, an nosferatu needs to eat rats. While other clans can get discount from prostitutes, prostitutes refuses the nosferatu, run, screams on fear and breaks the masquarede. Even getting firearms and ammo become much harder. And the main appeal of a Nosferatu clan is exactly the idea of being forced to roleplay as an deformed outcast.
Other example? Dark Souls. The difficulty of the game is heavily tied to your build. I din't have any difficulty in the game, because i played as an pyromancer/spearman on my first run. People who i saw complaining about difficulty generally picked no armor, an sword and of course had problems with the game, but for some people an swrod only, no shield, no sorcery, no miracles, no pyromancy, no trow able items, no armor run being harder than an paladin run is an example of "unbalance" but lets be honest. Swords are awful against larger creatures and armored enemies. Dark Souls is one of the best games in therms of consistency that i saw in my life. Unfortunately From Software sacrificed consistency by the "fast swinging blade fest" aka DkS 3.
And will not be a surprise if the next game comes with cooldowns and other mechanics that makes no sense...
Perhaps not surprisingly, Grim Dawn is neither Bloodlines nor Dark Souls, and the creators have a different vision for it. Even so, both games you mentioned were designed in such a way that you could ultimately finish the games even if you choose a harder path. The same is true of Grim Dawn, but this is not an argument that skills/abilities/gear/etc in single player or primarily PVE games don't need to be balanced.
Grim Dawn is fine, the cooldowns are fine. Grim Dawn is not trying to be Bloodlines or Dark Souls or Path of Exile or whatever. It's trying to be Grim Dawn, and it is doing very well at it.
Also, all the cool skills don't have "insanely long cooldowns."
I only mentioned two games where they put consistency and immersion above balance and the result was much more replay value and an better game. You can say that GD is ""fine"" with CD, but one of my favorite classes in many RPG's, Necromancer, is ruined on GD due cooldowns. Path of Exile, an F2P game has no cooldown on raise/summon skeletons/zombies
Cooldowns is a plague that started with mmos and now is spreading among other (sub)genres and evne mmo fans tends to use macros to minimize the impact of this bad boring mechanic. See what an mmo fan said at 4:30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svI4ngeu57A
Incidentally, one of the main COMPLAINTS against Path of Exile is that it is a one or two button spam-fest. My action bar in Grim Dawn is always eventually going to actually get used. You can't reasonably hope to succeed by picking two skills and maxing them. It won't work.
Moreover, while Grim Dawn HAS mana (called spirit), it only really comes into play as a mechanic if you are playing a dedicated caster. Thus, a barrier has to be in place that acts as mana does so the most powerful abilities can't be abused to trivialize difficulty. Cooldowns are the ONLY way to prevent this. In Diablo 2, there is absolutey NO limit to the amount of health of mana potions you can chug. It's infinite. The lack of a cooldown on skills AND potions (which Grim Dawn also has) effectively makes it so you can cast your most powerful spell ad infinitum. Mana cost is a totally meaninglessness stat in D2, as is mana itslef, because you can simply farm or buy your way to an infinite supply of it.
Incidentally, one of the main COMPLAINTS against Path of Exile is that it is a one or two button spam-fest. My action bar in Grim Dawn is always eventually going to actually get used. You can't reasonably hope to succeed by picking two skills and maxing them. It won't work.
Moreover, while Grim Dawn HAS mana (called spirit), it only really comes into play as a mechanic if you are playing a dedicated caster. Thus, a barrier has to be in place that acts as mana does so the most powerful abilities can't be abused to trivialize difficulty. Cooldowns are the ONLY way to prevent this. In Diablo 2, there is absolutey NO limit to the amount of health of mana potions you can chug. It's infinite. The lack of a cooldown on skills AND potions (which Grim Dawn also has) effectively makes it so you can cast your most powerful spell ad infinitum. Mana cost is a totally meaninglessness stat in D2, as is mana itslef, because you can simply farm or buy your way to an infinite supply of it.
PoE isn't an one/two button smash. In my last shadow build, i was using an curse, two buffs, one mobility skill, one skill that deals damage to a lot of enemies and other who is amazing against single target. In fact, you can set mod skill to for eg Cast when Damage Taken, cast when hit, Cast while Channelling , etc And even if is, you at least spend more time watching to the game, instead to an action bar.
About potions on D2, potions don't insta heal, they take time to recharge and honestly, Path of Exile did potions in a better way than cooldowns. Charges and re charging via killing... And even the game with coodlwons, can become an button smash with an SINGLE macro. Some builds use only one skill on PoE and some use an large combination of skills. Eg?
I only mentioned two games where they put consistency and immersion above balance and the result was much more replay value and an better game. You can say that GD is ""fine"" with CD, but one of my favorite classes in many RPG's, Necromancer, is ruined on GD due cooldowns. Path of Exile, an F2P game has no cooldown on raise/summon skeletons/zombies
Cooldowns is a plague that started with mmos and now is spreading among other (sub)genres and evne mmo fans tends to use macros to minimize the impact of this bad boring mechanic. See what an mmo fan said at 4:30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svI4ngeu57A
I mean there are people with hundreds and thousands of hours in Grim Dawn right now. One guy has close to 13,000 hours in the game, and you're saying to me it lacks replay value? Really?
Also, what I said about those games applies to any games - in an ideal world they're designed according to the designers' visions. Also, if you genuinely believe balance wasn't a serious concern in those games, I again question whether you get how games are designed.
In an earlier post, you said you liked Grim Dawn, but now that there are people who like it more than Diablo II you just can't resist trashing it? That's so weird.
As far as necromancers go, they're my favorite class too? My highest level character in Diablo 2 was a Skelemancer in 1.09. My most played character in Guild Wars was a necromancer that I most frequently played as a minionmancer. My most played Path of Exile character summons the undead. I'm fine with the necromancer profession in Grim Dawn, but it's more than just skeletons. Unfortunately, that's only one other pet. And the Occultist adds two more. And, to be honest, the skeletons not being viable for the entire game is exactly a balance issue, and one the devs should address.
Diablo 2 doesn't have the build variety, the length of gameplay through all five acts + Forgotten Gods, the sheer number of secrets, challenge dungeons, the roguelike challenge dungeons you can only attempt once in any game session, the sheer number of heroes and bosses, and the game has a fun fast pace.
I only mentioned two games where they put consistency and immersion above balance and the result was much more replay value and an better game. You can say that GD is ""fine"" with CD, but one of my favorite classes in many RPG's, Necromancer, is ruined on GD due cooldowns. Path of Exile, an F2P game has no cooldown on raise/summon skeletons/zombies
Cooldowns is a plague that started with mmos and now is spreading among other (sub)genres and evne mmo fans tends to use macros to minimize the impact of this bad boring mechanic. See what an mmo fan said at 4:30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svI4ngeu57A
I mean there are people with hundreds and thousands of hours in Grim Dawn right now. One guy has close to 13,000 hours in the game, and you're saying to me it lacks replay value? Really?
Also, what I said about those games applies to any games - in an ideal world they're designed according to the designers' visions. Also, if you genuinely believe balance wasn't a serious concern in those games, I again question whether you get how games are designed.
In an earlier post, you said you liked Grim Dawn, but now that there are people who like it more than Diablo II you just can't resist trashing it? That's so weird.
As far as necromancers go, they're my favorite class too? My highest level character in Diablo 2 was a Skelemancer in 1.09. My most played character in Guild Wars was a necromancer that I most frequently played as a minionmancer. My most played Path of Exile character summons the undead. I'm fine with the necromancer profession in Grim Dawn, but it's more than just skeletons. Unfortunately, that's only one other pet. And the Occultist adds two more. And, to be honest, the skeletons not being viable for the entire game is exactly a balance issue, and one the devs should address.
Diablo 2 doesn't have the build variety, the length of gameplay through all five acts + Forgotten Gods, the sheer number of secrets, challenge dungeons, the roguelike challenge dungeons you can only attempt once in any game session, the sheer number of heroes and bosses, and the game has a fun fast pace.
To say nothing of the best part of Grim Dawn, which is that it is wholly tailored as a solo-experience. Serious Diablo 2 players for years had to rely on unreliable and shitty options to trade gear. Gold was viewed as so worthless by the community that Stones of Jordan became the currency (which in turn is likely EXACTLY why Path of Exile has no actual currency). Both Diablo 2 (at least until WAY later patches when they massively increased the drop rate of high runes) and Path of Exile are designed around drop-rates that assume thousands of people are playing. Grim Dawn's drop rates are designed around you are your laptop, and if their isn't INFINITE space to store things, there is a hell of a alot of it.
Grim Dawn has 96 Legendary Quality Sets. Not items. Actual full sets to tailor your build around. There are nearly a THOUSAND Legendary items to find, to say nothing of the Rare (blue) items ALSO numbering near a thousand. Add to that the dual-class system which allows for dozens of classes to choose from, and the fact that it is likely that at least one or more of those sets will be specifically tailored to what your dual-class is good at, and the fact that since the expansion you can transmute set items into ones that are potentially more useful for you. In a genre where loot, skills, and class identity mean everything, Grim Dawn has so much volume that it's a wonder it can even be contained in one game.
Also, on the subject of macros and people who use them, coming from someone who has spent a couple of real-life YEARS playing WoW. People who use macros and complain about the game being ruined or too easy are laughable to me. They are DELIBERATELY entering commands into a one-button press that is playing the game for them. I understand why bleeding edge raiders have to use them, but for everyone else, they are just making the game easier for themselves on purpose, and then complaining about difficulty and having nothing to do. I have never once used a macro in WoW, and I've played the game for at least a decent period of time in every expansion since Wrath.
One of the most iconic abilities in WoW is the Shaman skill Bloodlust, which increases the casting and attack speed of the entire party by 30% for 40 secs. Anyone who has ever been on a boss fight when Bloodlust gets popped knows EXACTLY why it is placed on a 10 minute cooldown, especially in a raid fight, or even to a lesser extent when doing a 5-man dungeon. It is meant to be strategically used ONCE per fight, or maybe 2 or 3 times per dungeon depending on how long/hard it is.
I also like that the gear seems to progressively look cooler, rather than simply recycling weaker gear types for higher gear levels in Elite and Ultimate difficulties. And I love transmuting gear. It made the difference between having one set item and three on my tactician.
I also appreciate the use of components on every piece of gear you can equip, many of which add additional skills. On my two ranged characters, devil-touched ammo is very nice, at least in normal difficulty. I also appreciate that many skills have one or more modifiers, including the branching ones that tend to change damage types or offer other situational bonuses.
The fact that my sorceress has been using the same attack since early levels, but now it's significantly more powerful. Fire Strike went from being a nice single target attack to an extremely effective aoe, and there's still one more skill that can boost it. This is better than having to drop one point into an early but weak skill to get access to a much better skill
And since my build will likely need to change as the difficulty increases, I can easily respec for elite and ultimate difficulties rather than get stuck in veteran or early elite because my build is too weak.
(...)
In an earlier post, you said you liked Grim Dawn, but now that there are people who like it more than Diablo II you just can't resist trashing it? That's so weird<...>
I an not "trashing", i an just saying that GD could be better if was more similar to other aRPG's in the therm of not artificially forcing you to watch action bars. I agree that GD is an amazing game. My point is that with class mods become much better. Sadly even "mods" like Diablo class mods put cooldown in the game, at least they are only short ones. But i can't create corpses and raise zombies in few seconds like i can do on path of exile.
Also, on the subject of macros and people who use them, coming from someone who has spent a couple of real-life YEARS playing WoW. People who use macros and complain about the game being ruined or too easy are laughable to me. They are DELIBERATELY entering commands into a one-button press that is playing the game for them.
So, the difficulty is not by taking decisions on how to build your character, what advantages and disadvantages you have. The difficulty is not making an strategy, is not coordinating an team(...), the difficulty is just "playing the action bar", why should i play wow instead of guitar hero?
That is my main critique towards mmorpg's and Diablo 3 in general. The game feels like an Barbie dressing game feat Guitar Hero, where the DNA of your character is on the gear(and if you unequipped the gear, everyone is a clone) and you spam the same couple of buttons over and over instead of an real RPG.
On DkS 2, pure RP builds using almost no gear are perfectly viable . I don't see "spamming the same attack" for casters or fighters on dks 2 > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-G0QJX4vzI
You won't hear me say anything bad about Dark Souls 2, it's one of my favorite games precisely because of the variety of builds. But if we're talking about Necromancers and skeletons, let's go right back to the source of the popularity of the class. Every time you load a game in Diablo 2, you don't just have to take the time to summon them, you have to go kill that number of enemies. Great for immerison I suppose, but when you have to go back to the Cold Fields and spend time raising a bunch of skeletons and mages with just a Golem or a Bone spell you aren't invested in, it gets beyond tedious, especially if you are doing something like farming Pindleskin.
You won't hear me say anything bad about Dark Souls 2, it's one of my favorite games precisely because of the variety of builds. But if we're talking about Necromancers and skeletons, let's go right back to the source of the popularity of the class. Every time you load a game in Diablo 2, you don't just have to take the time to summon them, you have to go kill that number of enemies. Great for immerison I suppose, but when you have to go back to the Cold Fields and spend time raising a bunch of skeletons and mages with just a Golem or a Bone spell you aren't invested in, it gets beyond tedious, especially if you are doing something like farming Pindleskin.
DkS 2 has two great problems. ADP stat and Soul Memory. This flaws don't prevent DkS 2 from being an amazing game. Other problem of Dark Souls is not exactly for the game, but for a small portion of the community that hates variety and wanna see everyone playing DkS 1/2 as they play Sekiro(no armor, no shield, no magic, no ranged weapons and only the most boring weapon - sword) when a lot of people don't like Sekiro exactly because cool stuff are restricted to your enemies.
About necromancer on d2, just trhow Irom maiden in a group of weaklings and attract in another group. You can generate an army pretty quickly and honestly, run to get corpses is much more fun than wait an skill on CD... Path of Exile allow you to create corpses with skills, but IMO D2 could be better if you can run with 5 fire golems and use 5 fire hydras. I don't like artificial limitations that makes no sense. No, it don't ruin d2, only make slight worse.
I never quite understand the motivation of person number 2 in this hypothetical conversation:
Person number 1: "I love this game. I think it's great. I'm enjoying it even more than I enjoyed this other similar game."
Person number 2: "What? How could you possibly think that? You are so wrong. The game you love is horrible compared to the other game, because a, b, c, x, y, and z.
Person number 1: "Umm. Okay. I don't agree that a, b, c, x, y, or z are problems with my game. I still like my new game better than that other one. But, okay, whatever.
Person number 2: (Refusing to let this go.) Your arguments are just ridiculous. Of course all the things I'm mentioning are serious problems with the game you love. You should stop loving that game and love my game (s) instead.
Person number 1: No thanks. I still love my new game the best.
Person number 2: Well, you shouldn't. Let me repeat all the reasons why you shouldn't. I won't even bother to come up with any new reasons, I'll just keep repeating the same reasons over and over until I have the last word here and you stop loving your new game.
Person number 1: Whatever, I still love my new game the best.
Person number 2: Well, you shouldn't. For the third time, let me repeat why.
**************************
This continues on and on in circles. Usually all participants eventually go away feeling angry and frustrated.
These discussions happen a lot in gaming forums, and they always leave me smiling, chuckling, and shaking my head, mostly at person number 2. If you think you might be person number 2 in the completely hypothetical discussion above, apologies if I've caused any offense, and allow me to add the disclaimer, "The discussion above is fictional. Any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental."
BelgarathMTH one more thing. Only because i critcized an aspect of an game, doesn't means that :
1 - I hate the game
2 - I wanna make people who liked the game dislike the game.
Grim Dawn still one of the best isometric aRPG's in the market. IMO Path of Exile is more fun? Yes, but is amazing that we have choice. Imagine if the unique game of the genre was D3...I love with passion DkS 2 but recognize problems on the game. Soul Memory and ADP to name few that even the most diehard fan would agree that are a problem. And as i've said, if you dislike cooldowns, you can mod the game and download tons of mods.
Things that i like on GD and don't see on other games
1 - The post apocalyptic steampunk theme
2 - The dual classing system
3 - The devotion system
4 - The moddable capability
5 - The drop rates of gear who are the right ones IMO
6 - The fast action phase
BelgarathMTH one more thing. Only because i critcized an aspect of an game, doesn't means that :
1 - I hate the game
2 - I wanna make people who liked the game dislike the game.
Grim Dawn still one of the best isometric aRPG's in the market. IMO Path of Exile is more fun? Yes, but is amazing that we have choice. Imagine if the unique game of the genre was D3...I love with passion DkS 2 but recognize problems on the game. Soul Memory and ADP to name few that even the most diehard fan would agree that are a problem. And as i've said, if you dislike cooldowns, you can mod the game and download tons of mods.
Things that i like on GD and don't see on other games
1 - The post apocalyptic steampunk theme
2 - The dual classing system
3 - The devotion system
4 - The moddable capability
5 - The drop rates of gear who are the right ones IMO
6 - The fast action phase
I also believe Path of Exile is a legitimately great game, and by far the best free-to-play model ever put into practice for a game, and it isn't even close. I was MORE than willing to lay down $20 for the unique collection stash-tab, because along with solo-self-found mode, they have catered the game exactly to my tastes in that regard even though I am in the minority that has no interest in the online-trading aspects. I only prefer Grim Dawn because it was built that way from the ground up. Path of Exile is a superb product and likely the best value in all of PC gaming.
I love Path of Exile, although I wish cosmetics weren't quite so expensive. At least extra stash space is fairly cheap.
Plus I got some cosmetics via Twitch prime.
I don't tend to buy the cosmetics, I have strictly stuck to the stash tabs. The thing is, there are specific tabs to store crafting components, cards, etc. But the one that really made me sit up in my chair when I learned it was out was the Unique Collection tab, which allows you to "collect" all the unique items in the game. What is even more special about it is the way it is implemented. There are items you just can't get anymore in Path of Exile. They are not included in the tab. If you happen to get one, it will unlock the space for it, but you will never be able to not complete your "collection" because of these items, because if you don't get one they simply stay hidden. What this tells me is that the people at Grinding Gear who offered this tab understand the exact nature of people like me who want to just get all the fun loot to drop. We don't like to have hypothetical "gaps" that can never be filled (maybe it's an OCD-type thing). They specifically went out of their way to make this tab cater to that. I was beyond impressed and immediately purchased one even though I hadn't had the game installed for months at that point.
One problem that i have with PoE cosmetics is lootbox. Ask me $100,00 for an skin that i want but NEVER try to charge me for the chance of getting an skin that i want. This is not fair...
Guys, i know that i ranted about cooldowns, but i an seriously can't enjoy GD necromancer due it. I an fine with reagents to raise skeletons, i an fine with casting time, but after each unique mob, i have to wait half of minute to have 10 skeletons due this boring artificial times and it ****. I've tested some mods which adds diablo 2 necro, but they still have cooldowns(Diablo 2 had no cooldowns in any necro skill). Anyone knows a mod which adds necromancer without boring cooldowns?
The main reason that i've stopped with Belzebub mod for D1 is also CDs. Skeleton already costs live, if you spam raise skeleton, you will gonna die. Why put a cooldown on it? Only to make me waste time?
I started playing this game again with the 1.1.7.0 patch, and I love the new monster infrequents that they have added. This is probably the best Diablo-esque game I've played! (Second in the list for me being Van Helsing.)
So I started with an Arcanist/Necromancer and am in Wightmire now. Levelled up Panetti's Replicating Missiles all the way upto 16 and I'm shredding things in blinks, and using those level 1 skeletal summons as meat shields (I'm really surprised by how tough they are even without upgrading them). Investing points in the Quill constellation because it seems really cool.
One thing I'm thinking about is enabling Veteran mode, but I'm not sure if it'll make the game too hard later on (I'm finding things very easy currently). Can someone who played the game more share their opinions about that mode? Should I turn it on?
Comments
I disagree. Better than D3, sure, but what game is worse? But better than Diablo 2/1, i strongly disagree. I mean, GD is interesting, mainly with mods, but has problems, i honestly din't liked much the skills in the game nor the amount of skills with cooldowns. Throw an canister shell, now wait X seconds to throw another is an mechanic that i hate
I agree with jjstraka34 (whom I saw on Steam and couldn't remember where I'd seen his name before) that it is actually better than D2. Right now I'm on my way to Fort Ikon with a sorceress created in 1.1.4 and partway through Arkovia with my tactician created the day before the patch dropped.
Casting delay, in few CPU intensive skills, about arbitrary limitations like only one hydra at time, i agree that is an problem, but GD as much mroe of this stuff
You are assuming that
1 - Balance is somehow important in a SP games(when immersion, consistency and replayability are far more important)
2 - That there are no better way to balance skills
The best cRPG's like Pathfinder Kingmaker uses no cooldown, the best aRPG's(isometric or not) like dark souls, dragons dogma and diablo 1, uses no coodlown.
Looking to grenades for eg
"dan, i ran out of grenades" is a good way to be unable to throw grenades
"i trowed an grenade, now i need to wait "X" seconds to throw again" is an bad mechanic
Same with supernatural powers, be an warlock channeling hellfire and taking damage from his own hellfire, be an kineticist taking burn on PfK to use powerful abilities, is much more interesting than "spam the same rotation, spam the same rotation and spam the same rotation", i wanna see the game, not my "action bar".
About more skills to buy, i disagree. Necromancers on D2 has 30 skills(counting passives), 4 types of golems to choose and the Iron golem is the most customizable one. Can revive enemies, cam cast 10 different curses ranging from simple curses like amplify damage to "composite" curses like Decrepify...
You can make for eg >
Or you can make the necromancers wasting an minute to re raise his undead army every time that he dies or start a new "session" by putting cooldown on animate dead(something that no other aRPG ever made)...
This is a necromancer >
Your first point leads me to question if you understand how game development works? Balance is necessary for those things you listed as well as for a game experience that can be challenging and fun. You don't have to balance for PVP, but you still need to balance things so that each difficulty provides the challenge it advertises.
Also, I did not assume there are no better ways to balance skills. I said that they balanced the skills around cooldowns. Obviously there are other options, but cooldowns were part of their chosen design.
Also, I would appreciate it if in the future you would refrain from telling me what I assume, thanks.
Edit: Cooldown for every summonable pet I found in Grim Dawn is 18 seconds. Except the Oathkeeper pet, which is five seconds.
Look to Vampire the Masquarede - Bloodlines(VtMB) play as Nosferatu will be much harder than with an Tremere for eg, have seduction capped at zero and be monstrous looking in a game very focused on investigation, dialog and social life and being unable to be seen in the city without breaking the masquarede is an hard challenge. While other clans can walk into an club and with high seduction, get free blood dolls, an nosferatu needs to eat rats. While other clans can get discount from prostitutes, prostitutes refuses the nosferatu, run, screams on fear and breaks the masquarede. Even getting firearms and ammo become much harder. And the main appeal of a Nosferatu clan is exactly the idea of being forced to roleplay as an deformed outcast.
Other example? Dark Souls. The difficulty of the game is heavily tied to your build. I din't have any difficulty in the game, because i played as an pyromancer/spearman on my first run. People who i saw complaining about difficulty generally picked no armor, an sword and of course had problems with the game, but for some people an swrod only, no shield, no sorcery, no miracles, no pyromancy, no trow able items, no armor run being harder than an paladin run is an example of "unbalance" but lets be honest. Swords are awful against larger creatures and armored enemies. Dark Souls is one of the best games in therms of consistency that i saw in my life. Unfortunately From Software sacrificed consistency by the "fast swinging blade fest" aka DkS 3.
And will not be a surprise if the next game comes with cooldowns and other mechanics that makes no sense...
Grim Dawn is fine, the cooldowns are fine. Grim Dawn is not trying to be Bloodlines or Dark Souls or Path of Exile or whatever. It's trying to be Grim Dawn, and it is doing very well at it.
Also, all the cool skills don't have "insanely long cooldowns."
Cooldowns is a plague that started with mmos and now is spreading among other (sub)genres and evne mmo fans tends to use macros to minimize the impact of this bad boring mechanic. See what an mmo fan said at 4:30
Moreover, while Grim Dawn HAS mana (called spirit), it only really comes into play as a mechanic if you are playing a dedicated caster. Thus, a barrier has to be in place that acts as mana does so the most powerful abilities can't be abused to trivialize difficulty. Cooldowns are the ONLY way to prevent this. In Diablo 2, there is absolutey NO limit to the amount of health of mana potions you can chug. It's infinite. The lack of a cooldown on skills AND potions (which Grim Dawn also has) effectively makes it so you can cast your most powerful spell ad infinitum. Mana cost is a totally meaninglessness stat in D2, as is mana itslef, because you can simply farm or buy your way to an infinite supply of it.
PoE isn't an one/two button smash. In my last shadow build, i was using an curse, two buffs, one mobility skill, one skill that deals damage to a lot of enemies and other who is amazing against single target. In fact, you can set mod skill to for eg Cast when Damage Taken, cast when hit, Cast while Channelling , etc And even if is, you at least spend more time watching to the game, instead to an action bar.
About potions on D2, potions don't insta heal, they take time to recharge and honestly, Path of Exile did potions in a better way than cooldowns. Charges and re charging via killing... And even the game with coodlwons, can become an button smash with an SINGLE macro. Some builds use only one skill on PoE and some use an large combination of skills. Eg?
I mean there are people with hundreds and thousands of hours in Grim Dawn right now. One guy has close to 13,000 hours in the game, and you're saying to me it lacks replay value? Really?
Also, what I said about those games applies to any games - in an ideal world they're designed according to the designers' visions. Also, if you genuinely believe balance wasn't a serious concern in those games, I again question whether you get how games are designed.
In an earlier post, you said you liked Grim Dawn, but now that there are people who like it more than Diablo II you just can't resist trashing it? That's so weird.
As far as necromancers go, they're my favorite class too? My highest level character in Diablo 2 was a Skelemancer in 1.09. My most played character in Guild Wars was a necromancer that I most frequently played as a minionmancer. My most played Path of Exile character summons the undead. I'm fine with the necromancer profession in Grim Dawn, but it's more than just skeletons. Unfortunately, that's only one other pet. And the Occultist adds two more. And, to be honest, the skeletons not being viable for the entire game is exactly a balance issue, and one the devs should address.
Diablo 2 doesn't have the build variety, the length of gameplay through all five acts + Forgotten Gods, the sheer number of secrets, challenge dungeons, the roguelike challenge dungeons you can only attempt once in any game session, the sheer number of heroes and bosses, and the game has a fun fast pace.
To say nothing of the best part of Grim Dawn, which is that it is wholly tailored as a solo-experience. Serious Diablo 2 players for years had to rely on unreliable and shitty options to trade gear. Gold was viewed as so worthless by the community that Stones of Jordan became the currency (which in turn is likely EXACTLY why Path of Exile has no actual currency). Both Diablo 2 (at least until WAY later patches when they massively increased the drop rate of high runes) and Path of Exile are designed around drop-rates that assume thousands of people are playing. Grim Dawn's drop rates are designed around you are your laptop, and if their isn't INFINITE space to store things, there is a hell of a alot of it.
Grim Dawn has 96 Legendary Quality Sets. Not items. Actual full sets to tailor your build around. There are nearly a THOUSAND Legendary items to find, to say nothing of the Rare (blue) items ALSO numbering near a thousand. Add to that the dual-class system which allows for dozens of classes to choose from, and the fact that it is likely that at least one or more of those sets will be specifically tailored to what your dual-class is good at, and the fact that since the expansion you can transmute set items into ones that are potentially more useful for you. In a genre where loot, skills, and class identity mean everything, Grim Dawn has so much volume that it's a wonder it can even be contained in one game.
Also, on the subject of macros and people who use them, coming from someone who has spent a couple of real-life YEARS playing WoW. People who use macros and complain about the game being ruined or too easy are laughable to me. They are DELIBERATELY entering commands into a one-button press that is playing the game for them. I understand why bleeding edge raiders have to use them, but for everyone else, they are just making the game easier for themselves on purpose, and then complaining about difficulty and having nothing to do. I have never once used a macro in WoW, and I've played the game for at least a decent period of time in every expansion since Wrath.
One of the most iconic abilities in WoW is the Shaman skill Bloodlust, which increases the casting and attack speed of the entire party by 30% for 40 secs. Anyone who has ever been on a boss fight when Bloodlust gets popped knows EXACTLY why it is placed on a 10 minute cooldown, especially in a raid fight, or even to a lesser extent when doing a 5-man dungeon. It is meant to be strategically used ONCE per fight, or maybe 2 or 3 times per dungeon depending on how long/hard it is.
I also appreciate the use of components on every piece of gear you can equip, many of which add additional skills. On my two ranged characters, devil-touched ammo is very nice, at least in normal difficulty. I also appreciate that many skills have one or more modifiers, including the branching ones that tend to change damage types or offer other situational bonuses.
The fact that my sorceress has been using the same attack since early levels, but now it's significantly more powerful. Fire Strike went from being a nice single target attack to an extremely effective aoe, and there's still one more skill that can boost it. This is better than having to drop one point into an early but weak skill to get access to a much better skill
And since my build will likely need to change as the difficulty increases, I can easily respec for elite and ultimate difficulties rather than get stuck in veteran or early elite because my build is too weak.
I an not "trashing", i an just saying that GD could be better if was more similar to other aRPG's in the therm of not artificially forcing you to watch action bars. I agree that GD is an amazing game. My point is that with class mods become much better. Sadly even "mods" like Diablo class mods put cooldown in the game, at least they are only short ones. But i can't create corpses and raise zombies in few seconds like i can do on path of exile.
So, the difficulty is not by taking decisions on how to build your character, what advantages and disadvantages you have. The difficulty is not making an strategy, is not coordinating an team(...), the difficulty is just "playing the action bar", why should i play wow instead of guitar hero?
That is my main critique towards mmorpg's and Diablo 3 in general. The game feels like an Barbie dressing game feat Guitar Hero, where the DNA of your character is on the gear(and if you unequipped the gear, everyone is a clone) and you spam the same couple of buttons over and over instead of an real RPG.
On DkS 2, pure RP builds using almost no gear are perfectly viable . I don't see "spamming the same attack" for casters or fighters on dks 2 >
DkS 2 has two great problems. ADP stat and Soul Memory. This flaws don't prevent DkS 2 from being an amazing game. Other problem of Dark Souls is not exactly for the game, but for a small portion of the community that hates variety and wanna see everyone playing DkS 1/2 as they play Sekiro(no armor, no shield, no magic, no ranged weapons and only the most boring weapon - sword) when a lot of people don't like Sekiro exactly because cool stuff are restricted to your enemies.
About necromancer on d2, just trhow Irom maiden in a group of weaklings and attract in another group. You can generate an army pretty quickly and honestly, run to get corpses is much more fun than wait an skill on CD... Path of Exile allow you to create corpses with skills, but IMO D2 could be better if you can run with 5 fire golems and use 5 fire hydras. I don't like artificial limitations that makes no sense. No, it don't ruin d2, only make slight worse.
Person number 1: "I love this game. I think it's great. I'm enjoying it even more than I enjoyed this other similar game."
Person number 2: "What? How could you possibly think that? You are so wrong. The game you love is horrible compared to the other game, because a, b, c, x, y, and z.
Person number 1: "Umm. Okay. I don't agree that a, b, c, x, y, or z are problems with my game. I still like my new game better than that other one. But, okay, whatever.
Person number 2: (Refusing to let this go.) Your arguments are just ridiculous. Of course all the things I'm mentioning are serious problems with the game you love. You should stop loving that game and love my game (s) instead.
Person number 1: No thanks. I still love my new game the best.
Person number 2: Well, you shouldn't. Let me repeat all the reasons why you shouldn't. I won't even bother to come up with any new reasons, I'll just keep repeating the same reasons over and over until I have the last word here and you stop loving your new game.
Person number 1: Whatever, I still love my new game the best.
Person number 2: Well, you shouldn't. For the third time, let me repeat why.
**************************
This continues on and on in circles. Usually all participants eventually go away feeling angry and frustrated.
These discussions happen a lot in gaming forums, and they always leave me smiling, chuckling, and shaking my head, mostly at person number 2. If you think you might be person number 2 in the completely hypothetical discussion above, apologies if I've caused any offense, and allow me to add the disclaimer, "The discussion above is fictional. Any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental."
Also, I don't spend all my time in Grim Dawn watching the action bars. I don't even watch them most of the time.
1 - I hate the game
2 - I wanna make people who liked the game dislike the game.
Grim Dawn still one of the best isometric aRPG's in the market. IMO Path of Exile is more fun? Yes, but is amazing that we have choice. Imagine if the unique game of the genre was D3...I love with passion DkS 2 but recognize problems on the game. Soul Memory and ADP to name few that even the most diehard fan would agree that are a problem. And as i've said, if you dislike cooldowns, you can mod the game and download tons of mods.
Things that i like on GD and don't see on other games
1 - The post apocalyptic steampunk theme
2 - The dual classing system
3 - The devotion system
4 - The moddable capability
5 - The drop rates of gear who are the right ones IMO
6 - The fast action phase
I also believe Path of Exile is a legitimately great game, and by far the best free-to-play model ever put into practice for a game, and it isn't even close. I was MORE than willing to lay down $20 for the unique collection stash-tab, because along with solo-self-found mode, they have catered the game exactly to my tastes in that regard even though I am in the minority that has no interest in the online-trading aspects. I only prefer Grim Dawn because it was built that way from the ground up. Path of Exile is a superb product and likely the best value in all of PC gaming.
Plus I got some cosmetics via Twitch prime.
I don't tend to buy the cosmetics, I have strictly stuck to the stash tabs. The thing is, there are specific tabs to store crafting components, cards, etc. But the one that really made me sit up in my chair when I learned it was out was the Unique Collection tab, which allows you to "collect" all the unique items in the game. What is even more special about it is the way it is implemented. There are items you just can't get anymore in Path of Exile. They are not included in the tab. If you happen to get one, it will unlock the space for it, but you will never be able to not complete your "collection" because of these items, because if you don't get one they simply stay hidden. What this tells me is that the people at Grinding Gear who offered this tab understand the exact nature of people like me who want to just get all the fun loot to drop. We don't like to have hypothetical "gaps" that can never be filled (maybe it's an OCD-type thing). They specifically went out of their way to make this tab cater to that. I was beyond impressed and immediately purchased one even though I hadn't had the game installed for months at that point.
I don't need them, necessarily. I've never used any cosmetics in Path of Exile, but I've also never played with anyone else, just solo.
The main reason that i've stopped with Belzebub mod for D1 is also CDs. Skeleton already costs live, if you spam raise skeleton, you will gonna die. Why put a cooldown on it? Only to make me waste time?
So I started with an Arcanist/Necromancer and am in Wightmire now. Levelled up Panetti's Replicating Missiles all the way upto 16 and I'm shredding things in blinks, and using those level 1 skeletal summons as meat shields (I'm really surprised by how tough they are even without upgrading them). Investing points in the Quill constellation because it seems really cool.
One thing I'm thinking about is enabling Veteran mode, but I'm not sure if it'll make the game too hard later on (I'm finding things very easy currently). Can someone who played the game more share their opinions about that mode? Should I turn it on?