Someone posted a thread today on the battle.net forums asking if there were going to be items in Diablo 3, such as the runeword items in Diablo 2, that would grant characters other classes’ abilities. This has been a concern of many Diablo fans due to the imbalance that such items can create.
No one likes having to challenge a teleporting Bone Necro. 🙁
OK SO…
Anyone who plays D2 will know what I’m talking about and hopefully agrees.
Anyone else find that items like “ENIGMA” giving Barbs or whoever teleport kind of ruins the game? Like seriously, characters are unique because of their skills and I find that having items like enigma giving other toons those abilities just ruins the point. I’m sure there has to be better solutions to overpowered chars than that.
The general consensus on this mechanic was that it should be avoided in Diablo 3. It was a fun element of Diablo 2, just so long as you were the one with the godly items. Giving a powerful melee class, such as a Barbarian, an ability like Teleport is pretty overpowered.
It’s also argued that the rune words containing other class abilities were introduced to add some spice to an aging game. I see the merit in this argument as well. Diablo 2 was growing somewhat old and needed a shot in the arm. Adding items to the game that could expand a character’s available skills created all sorts of new possibilities for builds, game play and strategy.
Here’s what Bashiok had to say in response to the discussion:
Quote from Bashiok
Q u o t e:
The only reason these were implemented was to change things up, and add more playability to the already stagnant system that D2 had going.
That being said the only reason it was stagnant was because the game was what 6 years old at the time?
3 1/2?
Still, that’s quite a long time in game-years. I mean, it *IS* an exciting feature. Build items that give you other class abilities? Hell yes I’m going to start playing again, that sounds AWESOME. But which abilities were given determined the long-term effects. Also, in their defense, they’re generally very difficult runewords to create under normal circumstances. It’s fairly easy to justify creating some of these things with the idea that only a few people will be running around with these powers.
As it relates to Diablo III, I wouldn’t say “never”, but providing a way to gain access to other class abilities is not something we’re looking to or planning on implementing in the foreseeable future. I think if at some point years after the game is released we need some way to spice things up, honestly it’s one fairly easy way to do it. I also think we have enough knowledge and know how and experience to be able to intelligently control such things. But I would also hope that those smarts could maybe help us find better ways to keep things interesting. (Source)
At this point, it sounds as if these types of special items will not be in the game upon its release. However, he did indicate that they weren’t ruling out the possibility of adding them down the line.
This makes perfect sense to me. Once Diablo 3 has released its final expansion and run its course, the continued implementation of new and exciting rune word items could certainly serve to maintain players’ interest for a few more years. This would be especially true if Blizzard has any intentions of ramping up the PvP system in Diablo 3.
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