Most likely not.
You will however, have to pay for the game itself, as well as your connection to the internet. 😉
Blizzard has stated many times that they intend to keep Battle.net a no-paid-subscription-required-service. After all, Diablo 3 will not be an MMORPG, so it’s not like there will be loads of overhead required to maintain stability and to continue with future development.
Of course, this plan could change at any time, but that is unlikely.
Here are few official posts on the subject, taken from a Battle.net forum topic concerning the likelihood of Diablo 3 or Battle.net requiring a paid subscription…
Quote from Bashiok
Mike mentioned it in an Activision Blizzard investor meeting [paraphrased] “A player that buys Starcraft 2 at retail will have the ability to play on Battle.net with no additional fee.”
I’ll point out that this is a very carefully worded statement. (Source)
Quote from Bashiok
Q u o t e:So you mean you have to subscribe to the online fee in order to find the high level weapons and use all of battle.nets features right?
No. (Source)
Quote from Bashiok
One pay-for idea that specifically relates to Diablo that I thought was kind of interesting was the chance to resurrect a fallen hardcore character.
I think this was mentioned by a fan, as far as I know we’re not even thinking about these types of pay-for options yet. But, I think it’s kind of interesting. I’m not sure if I like the idea or not, which is probably why I like thinking about it. There are some obvious pros and some obvious cons, but I’m not sure there’s a clear cut answer as to whether it would work well or not. (Source)
Interesting idea about hardcore character resurrection, but I’m not so sure I agree with it. After all… “hard core” is supposed to be just that — HARDCORE, not turgid-core. Knowing you can pay a nominal fee to resurrect your character would take a lot of the excitement and risk out of PvP. But… I suppose if the fee were great enough — oh, I dunno… say twenty bucks — I suppose that could be enough of a hit to the wallet in order to retain the HC aspect of play.
Hmmm… maybe that isn’t such a bad idea after all. I mean twenty bucks isn’t a lot of money, but it’d be sort of like making an unofficial wager on a duel. The victor wouldn’t get any richer, but they’d at least know the other guy was going to be out twenty bucks. 😉
Maybe add a probationary period to the resurrection process as well… making the process require 3-5 days might not be a bad idea either.
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