Post-BlizzCon Diablo 3 Thoughts

In this blog post, I want to cover the upcoming Diablo 3 changes.  There were a lot of news that are coming to Diablo and some that were not in the panels.  I want to give my thoughts as to what these changes will become once in the game. 

Diablo 1 in Diablo 3

At the opening ceremony, it was revealed that the original Diablo game will now be playable (just for January) in Diablo 3.  This Diablo version will have pixelated graphics and your character will only be able to move in 8 directions (just like the original version).  At first, the Diablo team was thinking of just putting in the soundtrack only but decided to put all 16 levels of the dungeon.  This has been in the PTR for a about a week and the players have mixed reviews about it.  There aren't any cool new items from this event (except for a new legendary gem for the helm) and the 16 levels doesn't seem like the original levels from Diablo 1.  Since this is a seasonal event, I don't think it is worth playing this event for more than a couple hours (much like the "cow" event for the 2 year anniversary for Reaper of Souls).  I think it will be cool just to feel nostalgic for a bit and get some cool rewards along the way.  I am excited to play this event in January since I haven't played it on PTR yet. 

Necromancer
I was real excited when the new Necromancer character was shown at the opening ceremony of BlizzCon 2016.  I got a chance to play the Necromancer at the Diablo test station and it feels really good to play it.  One of the skills that the Necromancer has is called corpse explosion, which triggers a big explosion once you target a dead corpse on the ground.  Another cool skill is called blood rush, which makes you teleport to an area 50 yards away (it has a very short cooldown).  The primary skill is called siphon soul, which drains the enemies' health and restores your resource.  The secondary skill is bone spirit, which is just a projectile skill that does a certain amount of damage.  The Necromancer also has the ability to summon skeletons for you (some which are melee and some that are ranged).  The Necromancer was really fun to play at BlizzCon and I especially like the design and artwork for this character.  I usually play a Witch Doctor so I am bit hesitant about playing another pet based class.  The Necromancer will be playable sometime in the second half of 2017 and will be able to be purchased, along with 2 character slots and 2 more stash space.  Some people feel like that the Necromancer should be free but since Diablo 3 doesn't have any payment model (except for the expansions), I think this is a good idea for Blizzard to monetize their game.  Who knows but if enough people pay for the Necromancer, this could lead to more classes in the future (maybe the Druid comes next?). 

Challenge Rifts
Another cool feature coming to Diablo 3 in the future is Challenge Rifts.  Challenge Rifts is a system that takes an existing player and copies his or her rift run for all players.  The purpose of this is to "challenge" the original players rift time using the exact same gear and stats.  So for example, I run a greater rift 60 in 8 minutes using the Helltooth set, the challenge is for all other players to run the exact the same rift as I did (including the same layout and monsters) with the exact same gear that I had on and try to beat the time of 8 minutes.  I think this will be a cool feature to the game since it will determine who will be the best player of Diablo 3.  The best player currently in Diablo 3 is mostly based on the amount of time a player has put into the game.  This feature will more focus on the "skill" aspect of Diablo 3.  I don't think this feature that is something that I will focus on a lot since it doesn't affect the current characters that you are playing.  I think it will be more focused on the higher skilled players of Diablo 3 (it may even lead to some kind of e-sport mechanism).  I think this feature will become like the "brawl" events in Hearthstone and Overwatch (it will be cool to try). 

Other changes (quality of life changes)
There were other changes coming to Diablo 3.  The first was that seasons were coming to the consoles (PS4 and XBox1).  I don't play on the console so this doesn't affect me.  Another change was that there is going to be a new crafting mats UI.  I think this is a real good change since you won't have all the crafting taking up space in your inventory.  It should make things like Kanai's Cube more manageable and easier to use.  Another change is the new armory system.  The armory system will let you save different builds for your character.  I really like this system because it is very difficult and time consuming to change your build in Diablo 3 right now.  Once you save your different builds, it will be easy to switch from (for example) a greater rift running build to a speed farming build. 

That was all the changes coming to Diablo 3 announced at BlizzCon.  I am sure there are many other changes that the devs at Diablo are thinking of putting into Diablo 3.  While none of these changes will affect the end-game of Diablo 3, I think these changes will bring about more ideas and future changes that can be made to the game.  The more events, classes, features and small quality of life changes there are, the better off the game will be.  One small story from BlizzCon that I wanted to share with you is that there is an easter egg hidden in one of the Diablo shirts.  

The hint that I was given was to use the letters in Caldeum, Stoney Field and Wortham.  I think it really surprised me when I found the easter egg (moo!!). 

My BlizzCon 2016 Review

Just got back from Anaheim, California attending BlizzCon 2016.  It was my fourth time attending BlizzCon and I had a ton of fun there.  I didn't think I would have this much fun since I already went to 3 BlizzCons before but there was a lot of stuff that you could do there.  My original plan was to leave on Wednesday November 2nd but my flight got cancelled on Wednesday so I had to leave on the Tuesday beforehand.  This meant that I had one extra day in Anaheim.  So on Wednesday, I decided to spend the majority of the day at Disneyland.  I went to Disneyland before (I think when I went to my first BlizzCon, which was 4 years ago).  I ended up going on most of the rides since I had a lot of time there.  Unfortunately, some of the rides were closed (like It's a Small World and Splash Mountain).  The coolest rides were the Indiana Jones Adventure, the Matterhorn Bobsleds and the Star Wars Tours.  I bought a Star Wars 3" vinyl figure plus a Funko Pop Stormtrooper.  After Disneyland, I went to dinner at Red Robin and then watched the World Series final game 7 back at my hotel. 

On Thursday, it was time to pick up my BlizzCon badge.  I knew this might take a bit of time so I went to lineup pretty early on Thursday.  I think I lined up at around 8:00 am, the lineup wasn't too long at that time.  I managed to pick up my badge fairly quickly and lined up for the BlizzCon store.  They were selling lots of cool stuff (most of which I bought beforehand like the Murloc slippers, and the Diablo desk mat).  I bought two t-shirts (one of Diablo and one of Overwatch), a BlizzCon magnet and a Funko Pop golden Soldier 76.  By the time I was finished with the badge pickup and the BlizzCon store, it was around 10:30 am so it wasn't as bad as last year when I ended up finishing around noon time.  Once I dropped off my stuff at my hotel, I had lots of free time so I went to Outlets at Orange, which was big outlet mall with many different outlet shops.  There lots of cheap stuff that the stores were selling.  I went to the Asics sporting goods store and picked up a t-shirt for $12 (wow!).  I also bought some soap for my mom at Bath & Body Works for $3.  One of the stores that I was really interested in was the Nike store.  They were selling lots of cheap shoes there.  I really wanted to buy a pair of running shoes but I knew if I did, it wouldn't fit in my luggage.  I came back to my hotel at like 4pm and ate dinner at Clancy's. 

Friday was the start of BlizzCon and I wanted to arrive there early to get a good seat for the opening ceremonies.  I lined up for BlizzCon at around 7:30 am and the lineup seemed pretty long already.  Usually when I lineup of the start of BlizzCon, I can get to the base of the fountain that is located outside the convention center.  This time when I arrived, I was already several feet further away from the fountain.  At the time, it seemed as though the lineup was super long already but what I didn't know was that the event center was doing something different this year.  Normally, the bag checks would be just inside the convention center leading up to the second set of doors to the convention.  This time around, the bag checks were outside the convention center, meaning that the lineup was being pushed farther than it had been previously.  I think this was a better change but at the time, I was worried that I wouldn't get a good seat for the opening ceremony.  I managed to get a good seat, it was about 2 sections back from the main stage, real close to the center of the stage.  It was hard to see the main stage but fortunately I had a real good view of the video monitors.  The opening ceremony was really cool this year.  There weren't lots of news concerning WoW or StarCraft.  Overwatch announced Sombra with a cool animation, some new maps and the Overwatch e-sports league.  Hearthstone announced it's next card expansion and Heroes of the Storm announced 2 new heroes (Varian Wrynn and Ragnoros).  The best announcement by far was for Diablo 3.  They announced their 20 year anniversary event, which features going back to original Diablo game, the armory, which will help you switch to different builds more easily and the new character, the Necromancer! 

After the opening ceremony, I wanted to play Diablo with new Necromancer but there was already a big lineup there.  So instead I went around the convention getting signatures and some cool posters.  Diablo 3 had lightning talks at 1:30pm so I went to that.  It was really cool hearing about various tools and development strategies the Diablo dev team were using to make their game.  After that I played Diablo 3 Necromancer, played Hearthstone (beat a little kid - sorry!) and also played Overwatch.  At 5:00pm, Diablo 3 had their main presentation in Hall D.  There were showing lots of cool new features coming to the game.  One of the most exciting things were the new crafting materials page.  They also showed a bit more of the Necromancer and how it might be played.  After the Diablo panel, BlizzPro was meeting up so I went to that.  I got to meet Neinball and Leviathan from the Westmarch Workshop again (I also met with Dreadsythe, Miss Cheetah and Lala).  After that, I ate dinner at one of the food trucks outside.  I didn't want to spend my time outside for Blizzard's anniversary event so I went to get my picture taken at the Gif booth and bought some toy capsules at the toy capsule depot.   

On Saturday, one of the first things that I did was visit the Jinx booth.  The Jinx booth was really cool this year.  They had set up two games you could do (2 versus 2).  One was where you had to push a button that had the same name that was on the screen.  Another game was you had to throw bean bags into a hole.  I ended up winning twice, got some Jinx logo pins and some lanyards.  After that I got some signatures for my Book of Cain (people like Nevalistas and Christie Golden).  At 12:30pm, there were some more Diablo lightning talks.  After that, I ate lunch at the Porko Rico food truck (they had a very good pulled pork burger).  Once I ate lunch, I played Hearthstone again where I ended up winning again.  At 4:00pm, the Diablo 3 dev talk and Q&A was in Hall A.  They went through challenge rifts and took questions from the fans.  After the Diablo 3 panel, I went to eat dinner and came back to the convention center.  I played another round of Overwatch and then went to play some Diablo 2.  After that, I met with Neinball and Leviathan again.  They were talking to some of Diablo 3 developers and I just listened in.  I ended up following the Westmarch Workshops guys and listened in on Wyatt's story time (I also ended up meeting Rhykker there as well).  That was pretty much it for BlizzCon 2016. 

BlizzCon 2016 was really fun.  I ended up doing most of things that I wanted to do there.  I was real worried that there weren't going to be any news for Diablo 3 but I was really pleasantly surprised.  I will cover more of my thoughts about the Diablo news in a different blog post.  One of the things that I kind of missed at BlizzCon this year was all the e-sport events.  I normally like to watch the e-sport events but I really didn't have the time to watch any of it.  I only managed to watch the final game of the StarCraft 2 tournament.  I was more concerned about Diablo and any news concerning that game.  Maybe next time, there will be a better chance I can catch some e-sport action.  I also missed watching the costume contest and the closing ceremony but hopefully with the virtual ticket, I can watch those events later.  That is it for now, see you later. 

Diablo 3 Season 7 Review

Well Diablo 3 Season 7 just finished and I wanted to update as to what I accomplished this season.  My original goal for the season was to hit Conqueror in the seasonal journey and hit paragon 800.  I managed to do both of those goals but not without some hiccups.  I lost a level 70 witch doctor pretty early on in the season but after that, I managed to get into a very good rhythm.  I was really pushing hard at the end of the season, trying to hit greater rift 75.  But that is when I lost my final character.  I tried to do a greater rift 75 and I had plenty of time to finish the rift but then I had Perdition as the rift guardian boss.  I almost killed Perdition but not before he leap attacked me and I died. 

Nevertheless, I ended up the season at paragon 812 (which put me at rank 850 in the America server) and my greater rift level 74 put me in rank 448 of all US witch doctors.  I think I could have done better this season but this season felt way shorter than past seasons.  I only managed to play 120 hours of this season, which is the fewest amount of hours played in a season since season 1 (where I barely played that season at all).  Also, this season there was so much unstable connection between my computer and Blizzard's sever that it limited my overall play time.  Another reason why I didn't do as well was because of the loot drops.  I was having lots of difficult time just trying to find ancient items for my build.  The second character that I lost didn't even have any ancient pants.  Hopefully next season will have better drops for me. 

Overall, my non-season paragon level is at 1105 now, which I am very happy about.  For the upcoming season 8 (which starts this Friday October 21st), I want to set the same goals that I had for season 7.  I will probably play a Helltooth witch doctor again because I am so familiar with it.  Blizzard just announced its schedule for BlizzCon and there is a bit of news to report there.  First of all, I don't think Blizzard is ready to announce a new Diablo game just yet.  There were no panels scheduled for any talk about a new Diablo game.  There is however some information that Diablo 3 might still have new patches coming out in the future.  Most people speculated that Diablo 3 is now in maintenance mode since for season 8, there was no patch associated with it.  I am hopeful that Diablo 3 will continue to receive some updates to its game since this is the reason why people will continue to play this game.  I look forward to see what kind of changes are coming when I visit BlizzCon in November.  On to season 8 for Diablo ...

New Computer

I recently got a new computer.  My old computer was having lots of problems.  Sometimes the computer would freeze at random times and it would run very slow at other times.  The worst was when I tried to restart my computer, Windows 7 wouldn't load for me.  I tried to run a disk scan to try to repair the Windows but that didn't work.  I even tried to start the Windows from an earlier check point but that didn't work either.  I had to dig out my very, very old computer, which I am very surprised that it even works still.  I ended up buying a computer from Cyberpower PC (details on the spec later).  My last ditch effort to repairing my old computer was to install Windows 7 all over again.  This time it managed to fix itself.  I didn't lose any of my previous files but I ended up losing all my programs.  Right now I am just running the barest amount of programs to run my games and my internet.  I don't know how long this computer will last but right now it seems to be working just fine.  I am having no hiccups, no freezing so everything seems to be good. 

As for my new computer, I haven't really used it yet.  I ended up paying lots for my computer but I think it was time to buy a new one anyways.  The following is the specs of my new computer:

• CPU - Intel Core I5-6600K 3.5Ghz 6MB Intel Smart Cache
• Hard Drive - 1TB HDD 3.5 SATAIII
• Video Card - AMD Radeon RX 460 2GB
• Power Supply - 600 Watt Power Supply
•  Motherboard - Gigabyte G1 Sniper Z170 SLI
• Memory - 4GB DDR4-3000 memory 

The new computer also came with a mechanical keyboard (my first mechanical keyboard) and an optical mouse.  The computer has Windows 10 and a very nice computer case.  My old computer also happens to be a Cyberpower computer and I am pretty sure this new computer will end up working well for me as well.  I bought my old computer around 5 years ago (I think) before Diablo 3 came out.  I wanted to be able to play Diablo 3 when I bought my old computer and it is good that I bought a new computer since there might be a new Diablo game coming out soon.

Diablo 3 Season 7 is ending next week so hopefully there will a blog post next week as to what I accomplished during Season 7.  BlizzCon is less than a month away and I am really excited about what Blizzard will be doing for BlizzCon.  There hasn't been much news about BlizzCon yet but the early BlizzCon online sale has lots of nice items up for sale. 

BlizzCon 2016 Predictions

BlizzCon 2016 is less than 2 months away and I am very excited about going to BlizzCon this year.  I am sure there are going to be lots of announcements and e-sport events going on this year.  In this blog post, I want to try and predict what may happen at BlizzCon this year.  World of Warcraft just released their newest expansion "Legion" so I don't think WoW will announce the next expansion at BlizzCon this year.  They will probably focus more on whats coming in the next series of patches for the Legion expansion.  Hearthstone just released their newest adventure expansion so they will probably announce another card expansion at BlizzCon this year.  Heroes of the Storm will probably continue push out new characters and maps plus they might finally get around to making an "arena" mode possible in the game.  The arena mode made its debut last BlizzCon but isn't in the game yet.  Starcraft 2 will probably have new heroes for their co-op mode (much like they announced Alarak at GamesCon this year). 

Overwatch might announce the arrival of its 23rd character in Sombra (which has been hinted at for a very long time).  Overwatch will probably come out with a new animated short at BlizzCon (don't know which character story they will focus on - maybe Sombra?).  At GamesCon, Overwatch did come out with the new animated short called "The Last Bastion" (it is very, very well done) and stated that there will be new sets of animated shorts in the future.  Diablo 3 will be at an interesting point at BlizzCon this year.  I don't think they will do much with Diablo 3 anymore because they might introduce the new Diablo game at BlizzCon this year.  Even if they do announce something for Diablo 3, all of the new things for that game won't come out until season 8 is done (which would be around February 2017).  I expect the PTR for season 8 will start sometime in October with season 7 ending sometime near the BlizzCon date (November 4 or so).   

I am going to expect something big for the new Diablo game.  The reason why I think Blizzard will announce something for Diablo is that the time is right to announce something big.  Like I said, if they just announce a little bit of news for Diablo 3 and nothing else, a lot of people will be very disappointed.  This will be 2 years in a row that Diablo won't have anything to announce at the opening ceremonies if Blizzard doesn't announce a new Diablo game.  A lot of fans of Diablo will feel left out if they don't announce something big for Diablo, especially since there were no major news for Diablo in the past BlizzCon and even GamesCon.  It might be that Blizzard isn't ready to announce the new Diablo game (since it is still in development) yet, much like how they dealt with new MMO game "Titan".  Which I think is fair, but if they don't announce the new Diablo game at BlizzCon, when will they announce it? 

Also, I am expecting lots of cosplaying at BlizzCon this year.  I expect to see lots of cosplays of Overwatch characters and even WoW demon hunters.  I don't know who might host the costume contest this year (maybe Wil Wheaton again?, Chris Hardwick? Jay Mohr? - there are lots of good candidates).  The closing ceremony band will also be interesting to see, although Blizzard usually picks a heavy metal band.  I am hoping that Blizzard does something different this year.  Since the movie "Warcraft" came out this year, why can't they show this movie at the closing ceremony this year?  (in fact there is little fanfare surrounding this movie for some odd reason  - poor ticket sales maybe?).  It would be neat if Blizzard fans could watch a "Director's cut" version of "Warcraft" (or even have Duncan Jones come in and do a "live" director's commentary for the movie).  E-sport tournaments for Starcraft, Heroes of the Storm and Hearthstone are going to be epic this year again.  I know Overwatch will have an all-star format, which I don't think will do well (people want to see the best teams play against one another).  That's it for now, hopefully all my predictions come true when I attend BlizzCon for the 4th time.