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Forgive me (and nuke this thread) if this thread already exists. I really expected it to, but I couldn't find it anywhere searching for it.

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to play Diablo 3 for the first time. I drove 750 miles round trip to Austin, TX, to play the demo at the Warcraft 3 and WoW North American finals. Yes, it was the Blizzcon 2009 build, but it was still quite awesome to actually play with my own hands and eyes. The Barb and Wizard seem very similar to the barb and sorc of D2, but the monk and witch doctor are very different. (Yes, the witch doctor is a necro replacement, but most of the skills are drastically different.)

After seeing it look beautiful and play smoothly at 1920 x 1200, I asked one of the Blizzard guys what hardware the demo was running on. He told me an i7 (didn't specify what type) and a GTX 275. Of course, they greyed out the video options, and disabled alt-tab and every other way to get to the desktop so I don't know what exact settings and hardware utilization D3 was using, but it was interesting to me nonetheless.

I know this is probably old news and not interesting to most of you, but I just got to play it yesterday and am more pumped than ever. I can't wait for Blizzcon this year.

Thanks for posting your impressions! ANY new tidbits about D3 are interesting and worthwhile when we have to wait months for something official from Blizzard. I hope someone got some gameplay videos... and I'm very jealous that you actually got to play it!

I've been dying for this game almost as much as I was Starcraft II. Sounds like it'll have all the Blizzard trimmings, meaning it'll look great even on moderately-old hardware, and probably scale down to look DX8-ish on integrated graphics and still run well.

The Barb in D2 was my favorite class so I'm glad to hear that the D3 Barb plays at least somewhat similarly. If it follows similarly to the SC2 development cycle, we'll expect it next summer, maybe? It was announced 1 year after Starcraft II so here's hoping release is 1 year later too.

From what I've read elsewhere, it sounds like crafting will help the diversity of ph4t l3wt like the gems and runewords did in D2. *fingers crossed*

I'll definitely have to get this one. It drives me crazy how long it takes Blizzard to come up with release dates for things.

yeah, but the games are good. I'd rather wait a year or two and get a good game than have them rush out a mediocre one.
I'm salivating at D3.

Ooh, if I'd had any idea there was a playable demo somewhere, I might have seriously considered a "vacation" to Austin (over 1,000 miles one way for me).

Can you give any details that aren't apparent from the videos on Blizzard's site? Like, any specific spells you remember (thoughts on their effectiveness, etc)? I'm a huge fan of D2, and I recently re-entered one of my D2 "phases" that I go through about every 6 months. So I'm jonesing pretty heavily for D3.

Sorry, I somehow forgot about this thread. Been busy with school and the like. I couldn't really tell you much about stategies or builds or anything. Only got to play for 15 minutes to a half hour at a time, so I didn't get to get very far. On top of that (especially for the monk), some of the skills weren't implemented.

It wasn't hard to get killed if you got too cocky. Also, they had some dungeons which collapsed after a timer reached 0, but yielded an XP bonus for making it through. (Collapsing dungeon will instantly kill you).

For the most part, I used just pretty straightforward, generic RPG stategies. With melee classes (barb and monk), just spam your attack skills, and back off to cooldown to avoid excess damage, since pots aren't nearly as abundant. Neat thing is though, health pots restore health instantly (but have a cooldown), so they can take you out of a jam that a D2 health pot would fall short in. Of course, that cooldown can be quite a hendrance if you really need health and are in a fight. I just summoned a bunch of stuff with the witch doctor, and used that to tank while I shot from afar. I do like how witch doctor weapons have a ranged attack, rather than in D2 where the necro's weapon was purely for bonuses. Wizard was pretty much what you'd expect: lots of spells used from a range. Spam attack spells.

derFunkenstein wrote:

I've been dying for this game almost as much as I was Starcraft II. Sounds like it'll have all the Blizzard trimmings, meaning it'll look great even on moderately-old hardware, and probably scale down to look DX8-ish on integrated graphics and still run well.

The Barb in D2 was my favorite class so I'm glad to hear that the D3 Barb plays at least somewhat similarly. If it follows similarly to the SC2 development cycle, we'll expect it next summer, maybe? It was announced 1 year after Starcraft II so here's hoping release is 1 year later too.

From what I've read elsewhere, it sounds like crafting will help the diversity of ph4t l3wt like the gems and runewords did in D2. *fingers crossed*

The Barbarian was also my favorite character in Diablo 2!

I got my hand on a beta key and I tried the Barbarian in Diablo 3. The character really feels like the Barb in D2. The barbarian skills are great and kick ass! ^^

Any one else at TechReport were lucky enough to get in the Beta?

No, not in the beta. I am set up for it on my B.net account and my hardware profile is up to date, but so far no invite. Envious.

I got into beta for last week right after I cancelled my WoW account. LOL But from talking to others I have seen that if you have access to a Mac use that for your hardware profile as they are inviting Mac users really quickly.

So far my favorite class is Monk, my least favorite as of right now is Demon hunter only because they start slow. I havent played the mage yet and I am only level 5 on my Barbarian. The Witchdoctor is very interesting in that it has pets that are cool.

I like the companion pets that go around looting gold. I wish they picked up other items too. I also wish they had more professions available as I would like to see the Jewelcrafter or what I think is a scribe or alchemist.

I did get a rare item from a disenchant but I have yet to figure out what its used for.

Does anyone know if players will be able to buy/sell stuff on ebay like as in D2?

I can't wait for this to come out. I'm going to buy a laptop within a few weeks before its launched so I can b.net lan it with friends. I'm thinking of going with a sorcerer to start. I always love spell caster damage!

Been keeping an eye on new hardware developments here, but it seems I might not need a major upgrade to run this:

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6337821/diablo-iii-beta-how-low-can-it-go/index.html?tag=newsfeatures%3Btitle%3B1

As for question about buying and selling on Ebay, the game has an auction house that allows for trading for gold or real money.

If only I could get a beta key...

A buddy of mine got into the beta, and according to the pact we formed years ago, he let me play it.

It's awesome. I still have my reserves about the modifications to the skills. Given that you can freely swap out your skills, and that you can swap out the runestones in the skills, and you can't spec your own attribute points...there really isn't any sort of thing one would call a "build."

To me, having a build in a character in an rpg is, well, a large part of what defines an rpg. Sure, you still have your own gear, but even the gear is so dumbed down that basically you just put whatever has the biggest number (they do all the calculations for you) on.

So there's no build, you can pay a few bucks (in real money) and get the most leet gear in the game, and I can't imagine it being that hard to reach level cap. That leaves virtually no characterization.

That being said, I'm such a huge fan on the Diablo series I'll still play it. Despite all I've said, the beta is really fun.

tanker27 wrote:

I got into beta for last week right after I cancelled my WoW account. LOL But from talking to others I have seen that if you have access to a Mac use that for your hardware profile as they are inviting Mac users really quickly.

If (hypothetically speaking) I had temporary access to a Mac and used that for my profile, do you think they would catch on if I were then using a PC for the beta? Just curious. No particular reason...

/straw grasping

Buzzard44 wrote:

It's awesome. I still have my reserves about the modifications to the skills. Given that you can freely swap out your skills, and that you can swap out the runestones in the skills, and you can't spec your own attribute points...there really isn't any sort of thing one would call a "build."

To me, having a build in a character in an rpg is, well, a large part of what defines an rpg. Sure, you still have your own gear, but even the gear is so dumbed down that basically you just put whatever has the biggest number (they do all the calculations for you) on.

ugh.... looks like wow and swap out skills and runes? I'm liking this less and less.

Anarchist wrote:

Does anyone know if players will be able to buy/sell stuff on ebay like as in D2?

On the d3 site I remember seeing that blizzard was going to officially support paypal for trading in game to real world currency. Another con.

MidnightFrost1701 wrote:

tanker27 wrote:

I got into beta for last week right after I cancelled my WoW account. LOL But from talking to others I have seen that if you have access to a Mac use that for your hardware profile as they are inviting Mac users really quickly.

If (hypothetically speaking) I had temporary access to a Mac and used that for my profile, do you think they would catch on if I were then using a PC for the beta? Just curious. No particular reason...

/straw grasping

I put my Hackintosh online last night long enough to run the hardware profile app, I'll let you know if I get in.

Buzzard44 wrote:

It's awesome. I still have my reserves about the modifications to the skills. Given that you can freely swap out your skills, and that you can swap out the runestones in the skills, and you can't spec your own attribute points...there really isn't any sort of thing one would call a "build."

To me, having a build in a character in an rpg is, well, a large part of what defines an rpg. Sure, you still have your own gear, but even the gear is so dumbed down that basically you just put whatever has the biggest number (they do all the calculations for you) on.

This easy re-speccing of a character sort of killed the replayability of Titan Quest for me. There was no challenge anymore in trying to manage the lower levels of game with a hard limitation on the skills you could use, because you could just choose the best skillset anyway and swap it out later if you didn't like it.

MidnightFrost1701 wrote:

tanker27 wrote:

I got into beta for last week right after I cancelled my WoW account. LOL But from talking to others I have seen that if you have access to a Mac use that for your hardware profile as they are inviting Mac users really quickly.

If (hypothetically speaking) I had temporary access to a Mac and used that for my profile, do you think they would catch on if I were then using a PC for the beta? Just curious. No particular reason...

/straw grasping

Not really. Once you get a beta invite it serves up both installs.

Anarchist wrote:

Does anyone know if players will be able to buy/sell stuff on ebay like as in D2?

I'm more than sure they will

LostHand wrote:

Anarchist wrote:

Does anyone know if players will be able to buy/sell stuff on ebay like as in D2?

I'm more than sure they will

No, hence the inclusion of the real money Auction houses that Blizzard will include in game.

derFunkenstein wrote:

I put my Hackintosh online last night long enough to run the hardware profile app, I'll let you know if I get in.

I never did get an invite. The Mac/PC divide has probably closed sufficiently for Mac favoritism on beta invites.

I'm really bummed about the max of 4 players in a party. I like playing with 7 other people. I'm throwing a D3 party at my house the weekend after release, and we're going to have to split up into 2 or 3 games.

Also, I don't like the real money auction house and the complete lack of character builds. The gameplay is great, but they've pretty much circumvented all the fun of it...

That being said, I've been anticipating this game for so long I'll get it no matter what.

P.S. This is the "official" D3 thread, started long ago in a galaxy far, far away.

What really? A max of 4 people in a party? So you can't have one guy of each class in a party and the monsters will no scale near as much as they did with 8 players on D2.

Seems so odd to drop it from the 8 they had on D2, maybe with the first expansion...

A lot of stuff is blocked for me at work so I can't read Blizzard's FAQ on the auction house. Are you saying this auction house is micro transactions? I.e. Blizzard will sell you x gold for $5?

I believe you can also sell stuff in the game for real money as well.

This way they can enable and get a cut of the money that they Chinese gold farmers are making.

But it's not like an Auction house where you can trade game gold for game items? Is there always a real dollar part of the transaction?

I think there is both a cash part of the auction house and a "gold" part but I have only read a little on it.

tfp wrote:

I think there is both a cash part of the auction house and a "gold" part but I have only read a little on it.

Yes there are two AHs, one for Real money and the other for gold.