Diablo 3 has had a lot of criticism lately, primarily due to the fact that a lot of people plowed through the game to get to Inferno difficulty, only to find that Act 2 and up are crazy hard.
Because of this, a lot of the changes in the 1.0.3 patch coming later this month are geared toward end game Inferno players.
Here is a hi-light of changes to come:
Inferno Level Items Being Spread Out
The way the game is setup currently, Inferno Act 1 drops item level 61 (item level is not the same as required level), Inferno Act 2 drops item level 62, and Inferno Act 3 and 4 drop item level 63. Since Act 2 and up are way harder than Act 1, a lot of people have been forced to rely on the Auction House for their items after long hours of gold farming, which Blizzard doesn’t want. They’re making changes that will spread out these items across more Acts, making the drop chance higher in the later Acts.
Here is an example of the changes that will take place:
Hell Acts 3 & 4: 9% chance for iLvl 61, 2% chance for iLvl 62, 0% chance for iLvl 63
Inferno Act 1: 18% chance for iLvl 61, 8% chance for iLvl 62, 2% chance for iLvl 63
Inferno Act 2: 19% chance for iLvl 61, 12% chance for iLvl 62, 4% chance for iLvl 63
Inferno Act 3 & 4: 24% chance for iLvl 61, 16% chance for iLvl 62, 8% chance for iLvl 63
As you can see, not only will there now be some chance to get higher level items at the end of Hell difficulty, but there will also be small chances to get much better gear in Inferno Act 1 and 2, with higher chances for people brave enough to try Acts 3 and 4.
Inferno Difficulty Changes
Right now, Inferno Act 1 isn’t too crazy, but Act 2 on the other hand is another story, which is why so many end gamers have to rely on the Auction House for their upgrades.
Blizzard has heard the outcry apparently, and they’re taking steps to smooth out the transition between the Acts and make them scale better. This change coupled with the item changes listed above, it should make the progression in Inferno much better.
Changes to Mob Damage in Multiplayer
Currently, when more and more people join a game, the damage any mob does goes up a bit, with no real extra reward. They are getting rid of this monster buff.
At first I wasn’t sure about this one, but then I realized that the damage is going down but the health buff will likely stay the same.
After all, it does make sense that with 4 players a mob should take more damage to kill, however it doesn’t make sense that a normal mob can one shot you in a 4 player environment.
Gem Prices Dropping Considerably
Currently, it can cost an arm and a leg to combine gems. In the patch you’re going to see a huge drop, not only in gold price, but in gem price as well.
Instead of requiring 3 gems across the board, tier 2 to 8 gems will only require 2 gems to combine. Gold prices have also been dropped considerably, down to around 2% to 3% of current gold cost, or as low as .5% of the current gold price. No that’s not a drop of a few percent, I’m saying they are just a few percent of their current total gold cost.
For example, combining a Flawed Gem currently costs 3 chipped gems and 500 gold, and this is being reduced to 2 chipped gems and 10 gold, which is 2% of the current gold cost. A Flawless Square gem currently costs 3 Square gems, 20,000 gold, and 2 tomes, and this is being reduced to 2 square gems, 100 gold, and 2 tomes, which is .5% of the current gold cost.
The recipes for Perfect Square gems and above will remain unchanged.
Repair Costs Going Up
Repair costs at level 60 right now aren’t really that bad compared to the gold you can make comparatively, so they’re going to be increased by a lot, apparently by around 4 to 6 times their current values. All they’re trying to do here is to keep people from graveyard zerging to beat bosses and such.
Personally though, with the other changes listed above, it shouldn’t be as big of a deal. With the difficulty scaling down a bit, wipes should be less frequent, and I think this will force players to refine their strategies a lot more than they do now.
Legendary Items Being Buffed
Legendary items so far have been much less than Legendary. At the end game, even a lot of magic items are better overall, making Legendary items nearly worthless. The statement is that they will be better than magic items when the patch rolls out, but most likely not better than rares in most cases.
At least the word Legendary will mean something closer to what it should mean. To quote one of my favorite movies ever.. “That word, I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Changes to Nephalem Valor Buff
Currently, when you kill a boss with a full stack of five Nephalem Valor, you are guaranteed two rares. This will be nerfed to just one guaranteed rare, though you still have a chance at more. Now before you star QQ’ing, they are buffing Champions and Elite packs to drop an extra rare instead.
Basically what they are trying to do is make it more worthwhile to keep playing in a group once a boss is killed. Personally I think it’s a good change that will make groups last longer, and will provide more overall drops in the long run.
Attack Speed Changes
Attack Speed is important, but a lot of players feel that it’s way too important and can’t be sacrificed in most instances.
Basically what they’re doing to try to fix this is to reduce Attack Speed values game wide, to make it less dominant.
I’m not 100% sure if that’s the right way to do it or not, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
That’s All For Now..
That’s all for major changes. There will also be some minor upgrades made to the Auction House, but I can’t find any specifics listed anywhere yet, so I’ll post those once I find them.
There aren’t going to be any major class overhauls yet, so you’ll have to wait until a later date for those. I think a lot of these changes will make progression in Inferno much more viable, and reduce the need to farm equipment from the Auction House after countless hours of gold farming from breaking vases.
