So, Pirates are Playing Diablo 3

[Grey Day for Elcia]

This has nothing to do with hacks and cheats and everything to do with money.

Sorry, but you're wrong. The reason it's always online is -not- piracy, it's to add a layer of anti-hacking security, which is in turn necessary to make Blizzard money on the RMAH.

This is not a defense of that, by the way, I just want to see anger for the right reasons.

Wait, I think we sort of agree... Blizzard wants people to be unable to cheat and hack, as doing so would make their little auction house money grab useless.

The game is going to take up a shitload of server space.

Server space accrues costs.

Instead of having a monthly fee for a game of this magnitude, Blizzard released an streamlined method of real money item auctions (which people were doing on eBay anyway), and are taking a small amount of each transfer. They could potentially lose money off this idea, but it will help pay for the servers SOMEWHAT.

So stop bashing them for the freaking auction house.

Also, Diablo 3 is pretty sweet for anyone who has a stable internet connection (90% of you) and the ability to not get butthurt over silly little intricacies of games (apparently about 5% of you).

If you have a solution to somehow solve this dilemma, please, by all means, reveal it.

Separate online and offline characters. Still play online single player as you currently can where those can later be played with others and use RMAH but an offline mode as well for people who just want to play single player and not care for the online components, completely shut off from it making it still safe.

Immensely simple solution.

That's exactly what Diablo 2 was and it didn't work.

You should go ahead and watch the Jimquisition. Right now. Even if you hate Jim with every fiber of your being like me. Watch it and post this argument in the video's thread.

Gogogogo.

 

[Kahunaburger]

The solution would be to design the game such that P2W isn't an issue in the first place, not to make it a core pillar of gameplay (to the extent that they remove core features like modding and an offline mode).

They did that in WoW. They removed trade by making items BoP. It didn't help.
You have to remove progression completely to remove this. To even suggest this is asinine.

Yeah, you could make a very good case that this kind of grindy RPG slot-machine is inherently going to be poorly balanced. I mean, you have items that are inherently better than other items and mechanics that significantly limit the access to those items. If you wanted to eliminate P2W, you'd probably need to eliminate scarcity or eliminate progression based on finding better items. Blizzard, of course, would rather make hilarious amounts of money than make a balanced game.

 

[Athinira]

Why are we in a situation where people who stole Diablo 3 are able to launch the game and just... play, while people who purchased the game have to wait for servers to be fixed to play single player?

Steal the cracked game, play it.

Buy the game, don't get to play it.

That DRM sure did work >_>

Online only was never about the DRM or piracy. It was keeping the game less susceptible to cheating and hacks.

If they are worried about cheating and hacks, make an online mods and an offline mode, where a character made in the later cannot be used in the former and vice-versa.

This has nothing to do with hacks and cheats and everything to do with money.

Wrong.

While you are right in that this has something to do with money (Of course it does, since it's Activision-Blizzard now with Captain Kotick on bridge), you are wrong in that it doesn't have anything to do with cheats and hacks.

You see, even if they separate the offline and online components in the game, the offline-components will still have to reside on the players computer for there to be an offline-mode. Hackers can therefore use the information about how the game is run locally to create hacks that also work online. This is partially why Diablo 2 was so hack-infested. It had seperate online and offline-modes like by your suggestions, but since hackers had access to the offline mode, they could easily use that knowledge to craft hacks.

Unless Blizzard made some easily exploitable mistakes, the difficulty of creating a hack without access to the offline mode is increased massively.

 

[Baldr]

Why are we in a situation where people who stole Diablo 3 are able to launch the game and just... play, while people who purchased the game have to wait for servers to be fixed to play single player?

Steal the cracked game, play it.

Buy the game, don't get to play it.

That DRM sure did work >_>

Online only was never about the DRM or piracy. It was keeping the game less susceptible to cheating and hacks.

~If you truly believe that you are being incredibly naive. It's partly to promote the auction house, partly DLC. It doesn't stop hacking. WoW gets hacked and they are using the same system here. ~Not to mention, how does forcing you to be online stop hscks and cheating? If im playing offline, who cares?

Diablo 1&2 online dupes and item hacking came from offline aspects of those games. They tried to limit it in D2, by separating the offline and online aspects, but it didn't work.

 

[evilneko]

It is still an incredible amount of work to make both. If you have already made the model with a client server setup with battle.net integrated and have to make the whole thing again without. That is a lot of work.

And with the single player split comes a whole new host of issues that customer service will have to deal with. "why cant I play with my friends with my single player char". You know that is a bloody stupid question, how many do you think who bought the game and dont think that?
The popularity of the game it self and support becomes a new kind of issue. They are not making games just for you. They are making it for millions of users.

No, it's not really a lot of work. Code reuse is quite a time-saver.

As for the other thing, they've dealt with that before. Single and multiplayer characters have been separated since the very beginning. Classic Diablo had no mixing of SP and MP characters at all--you wanted to play multiplayer, you started a new character.

Why are we in a situation where people who stole Diablo 3 are able to launch the game and just... play, while people who purchased the game have to wait for servers to be fixed to play single player?

Steal the cracked game, play it.

Buy the game, don't get to play it.

That DRM sure did work >_>

Online only was never about the DRM or piracy. It was keeping the game less susceptible to cheating and hacks.

~If you truly believe that you are being incredibly naive. It's partly to promote the auction house, partly DLC. It doesn't stop hacking. WoW gets hacked and they are using the same system here. ~Not to mention, how does forcing you to be online stop hscks and cheating? If im playing offline, who cares?

Diablo 1&2 online dupes and item hacking came from offline aspects of those games. They tried to limit it in D2, by separating the offline and online aspects, but it didn't work.

The dupe bug in Classic Diablo stems from a lack of sanity checking in the code for picking up items. It really didn't have anything to do with online or offline. The creation and importing of hacked items was possible because the game had little protection from its memory being overwritten by an outside source. Again, not really anything to do with online or offline there. D2's problems similarly stem from a lack of sanity checking between server and clients.

The main issue with both is that the peers all trust each other to some degree. They likely had to, due to hardware limitations back then they simply may not have had the power to act otherwise. D3 however is different. The server now essentially acts as God, determining everything from player positioning (handled by clients previously) to loot drops. The server tells the clients what they have, what they get, what they're hitting, and doesn't take anything in return (or shouldn't, as it would be silly for the server to say, "a bronze ring of mana dropped" and then blithely accept a client telling it "I picked up an obsidian ring of the zodiac"). If Classic Diablo had had this model, the infamous Godly Plate of the Whale (impossible for the game code to generate on any level, and thus can only be imported with a trainer) would never have existed--at least in multiplayer, where the server could just up and say no. It'd work in single player, with no server to tell the game no, but big deal, if people want to cheat (and get a crappy armor, GPoW sucks, it was only popular because people are idiots) in single player let them.

 

[evilneko]

It is still an incredible amount of work to make both. If you have already made the model with a client server setup with battle.net integrated and have to make the whole thing again without. That is a lot of work.

And with the single player split comes a whole new host of issues that customer service will have to deal with. "why cant I play with my friends with my single player char". You know that is a bloody stupid question, how many do you think who bought the game and dont think that?
The popularity of the game it self and support becomes a new kind of issue. They are not making games just for you. They are making it for millions of users.

No, it's not really a lot of work. Code reuse is quite a time-saver.

As for the other thing, they've dealt with that before. Single and multiplayer characters have been separated since the very beginning. Classic Diablo had no mixing of SP and MP characters at all--you wanted to play multiplayer, you started a new character.

Now that is factually false. You would almost have to start from scratch when it comes to char creation and remake the system for how items register because there isn't an account overlap.

Of course, it wouldn't need to have any account overlap, it wouldn't need an account at all. Single player characters wouldn't be tied to an account [small]well unless you consider the user account on Windows[/small] as why would they need to be? They're local.

And classic Diablo 2 didn't have the Battle.net that we have to day. That is a bad comparison to say the least. Also you didn't have the level of service now. Totally different world.

I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. Yes, D2 worked differently. I think I pretty much covered that. I'm not pointing to it as a successful model (albeit moreso than Classic Diablo's peer to peer system), if that's what you're thinking.

 

[evilneko]

Of course, it wouldn't need to have any account overlap, it wouldn't need an account at all. Single player characters wouldn't be tied to an account [small]well unless you consider the user account on Windows[/small] as why would they need to be? They're local.

What you dont seem to understand how big a deal the account is. Where do your gold register? it registered at you Battle.net account before. You need to set up a completely different system to undertake this. Everything from items, to lvls needs to register somewhere. The Battle.net account was at the center of that and now just make a char?
Not that simple. the system it self need to be remade almost from the bottom up. You just removed the spine of the game.

No, I think it's you who doesn't understand. An account wouldn't be needed because instead of storing the character data in a file on a remote server, it's stored in a file on the local host. All the stuff you're worried about would actually be the same, only the destination for the output would be different. That's not very hard to change. The concepts needed to accomplish it are taught in basic and intermediate level programming courses.

 

[ZekeMcKillip]

I registered just to post this:

This has nothing to do with hacks and cheats and everything to do with money.

Sorry, but you're wrong. The reason it's always online is -not- piracy, it's to add a layer of anti-hacking security, which is in turn necessary to make Blizzard money on the RMAH.

This is not a defense of that, by the way, I just want to see anger for the right reasons.

Wait, I think we sort of agree... Blizzard wants people to be unable to cheat and hack, as doing so would make their little auction house money grab useless.

The game is going to take up a shitload of server space.

Server space accrues costs.

Instead of having a monthly fee for a game of this magnitude, Blizzard released an streamlined method of real money item auctions (which people were doing on eBay anyway), and are taking a small amount of each transfer. They could potentially lose money off this idea, but it will help pay for the servers SOMEWHAT.

So stop bashing them for the freaking auction house.

Also, Diablo 3 is pretty sweet for anyone who has a stable internet connection (90% of you) and the ability to not get butthurt over silly little intricacies of games (apparently about 5% of you).

If you have a solution to somehow solve this dilemma, please, by all means, reveal it.

Separate online and offline characters. Still play online single player as you currently can where those can later be played with others and use RMAH but an offline mode as well for people who just want to play single player and not care for the online components, completely shut off from it making it still safe.

Immensely simple solution.

That's exactly what Diablo 2 was and it didn't work.

THAT IS NOT WHAT DIABLO 2 WAS! I guess no one here ever actually played Diablo 2 other than as a circle jerk with their friends, but for those of us who have participated in ladder matches, and topped the charts, D2 had Single-player(offline), and then OPEN Battle.net and CLOSED Battle.net(Online), and they even had officially tracked and Blizzard sponsored Ladder rankings, which often times had vastly different loot table from the current single-player and open battle.net version of the game. Usually the next patch would allow access to these items single-player and in open battle.net, but in the CLOSED battle.net online competitive environment there was no way to get these items, or dupe these items, as they were stored server side, and were not available otherwise, and your characters on the closed servers were stored server side.

What this means is that you are right, it is IMMENSELY complicated to design this system, and I doubt anyone here could do it... BUT BLIZZARD ALREADY HAS!!! They just decided to shit on their fan base, because the pre-orders alone more than covered all the costs that D3 has and likely will accrue.

God... Really, no one else here has played D2 competitively on the closed battle.net servers? Really? You guys don't deserve to discuss whether or not D3 is a disappointment to the fans if you've never played the previous games, clearly you aren't a fan...

EDIT: Proofoes the ladder offer anything beyond a more stable economy?
Yes there are some items that can only be obtained with a ladder character such as some class specific and elite uniques. There are also some ladder-only rune words as well as cube recipes that can only be created by a ladder character. While these items can eventually make their way to non-ladder after a ladder reset, they can only be initially found or created by using a ladder character.(http://classic.battle.net/diablo2exp/basics/charactertypes.shtml)

 

[ZekeMcKillip]

God... Really, no one else here has played D2 competitively on the closed battle.net servers? Really? You guys don't deserve to discuss whether or not D3 is a disappointment to the fans if you've never played the previous games, clearly you aren't a fan...

That paragraph makes it hard to take you seriously with your "true-fan" attitude that you have going there.

How? Can you argue with anything at all that I said? No, except for my unrelated opinion that people who quote how broken D2 was need to actually play the game if they are going to say stupid crap... And I never said I was a true-fan... I'm not really I never played Diablo, and while I got into D2 alot, I haven't bought D3 either... all the release of D3 did for me was make me create a new ladder character on may 2nd when they reset the D2 ladders... If you think I have a "true-fan" attitude, then it just goes to show how little knowledge anyone else has displayed about what is and is not possible in both a Diablo game, and in programming in general.

 

[ZekeMcKillip]

How? Can you argue with anything at all that I said? No, except for my unrelated opinion that people who quote how broken D2 was need to actually play the game if they are going to say stupid crap... And I never said I was a true-fan... I'm not really I never played Diablo, and while I got into D2 alot, I haven't bought D3 either... all the release of D3 did for me was make me create a new ladder character on may 2nd when they reset the D2 ladders...

I am still confused to what extra layer of security this closed added. As far as I know what you described as closed is what I assumed they did on Open. The whole the whole difference between is open and closed is kinda blurred to me.

What didn't they do on Open, and why didn't they do that?

As far as I've ever seen and know(again far beyond my abilities and knowledge on how this is done) the items, exclusive to ladder characters and the closed servers they were on, were stored server side, as well as the characters themselves. So like any MMO you couldn't load your character save into an editor and add items... You couldn't dupe items because you didn't have a back up, and as you can see on the site, ladder matches didn't start until 1.11, by which time servers were far too fast to allow you to "trick" them into thinking that you still had an item in your inventory that you dropped... Unless you can provide proof that a ladder match was ever compromised, I've NEVER seen or heard of it, and they just started a new round on may 2nd, so people are still participating in them...

 

[TomLikesGuitar]

"I'm the only REAL Diablo 2 fan here! No one else knows anything about this game! Everyone shut-up and listen to me!"

Grow up and learn how to argue. Real men discuss the point at hand instead of attacking the legitimacy of the opposition's opinions. Not only that but you are attacking me for your subjective definition of what a fan of the game is.

Like Matthew94 said, your semantic bullshit makes it VERY "hard to take you seriously".

I played Diablo AND Diablo 2 a shitload. I played in both open and closed battle.net, and a "real fan" would know that closed battle.net had a shit-ton of duped items. That is a good reason why I didn't continue to play the game for as long as possible, because I knew that if I was trading for something, it was most likely a hacked or duped item.

To argue that duping was NOT a problem in Diablo 2 is naive at best.

In short, fuck your elitist attitude. I'm a fan of the game, and I'll discuss my opinion of the game as I see fit.


Learn to have a conversation like an adult and maybe we can have a mature discussion about this, but otherwise "you really don't deserve to discuss..." well... anything.

 

[ZekeMcKillip]

"I'm the only REAL Diablo 2 fan here! No one else knows anything about this game! Everyone shut-up and listen to me!"

Grow up and learn how to argue. Real men discuss the point at hand instead of attacking the legitimacy of the opposition's opinions. Not only that but you are attacking me for your subjective definition of what a fan of the game is.

Like Matthew94 said, your semantic bullshit makes it VERY "hard to take you seriously".

I played Diablo AND Diablo 2 a shitload. I played in both open and closed battle.net, and a "real fan" would know that closed battle.net had a shit-ton of duped items. That is a good reason why I didn't continue to play the game for as long as possible, because I knew that if I was trading for something, it was most likely a hacked or duped item.

To argue that duping was NOT a problem in Diablo 2 is naive at best.

In short, fuck your elitist attitude. I'm a fan of the game, and I'll discuss my opinion of the game as I see fit.


Learn to have a conversation like an adult and maybe we can have a mature discussion about this, but otherwise "you really don't deserve to discuss..." well... anything.

Funny... Unlike this quote, I don't think I actually ever said that...

 

[ZekeMcKillip]

How? Can you argue with anything at all that I said? No, except for my unrelated opinion that people who quote how broken D2 was need to actually play the game if they are going to say stupid crap... And I never said I was a true-fan... I'm not really I never played Diablo, and while I got into D2 alot, I haven't bought D3 either... all the release of D3 did for me was make me create a new ladder character on may 2nd when they reset the D2 ladders...

I am still confused to what extra layer of security this closed added. As far as I know what you described as closed is what I assumed they did on Open. The whole the whole difference between is open and closed is kinda blurred to me.

What didn't they do on Open, and why didn't they do that?

As far as I've ever seen and know(again far beyond my abilities and knowledge on how this is done) the items, exclusive to ladder characters and the closed servers they were on, were stored server side, as well as the characters themselves. So like any MMO you couldn't load your character save into an editor and add items... You couldn't dupe items because you didn't have a back up, and as you can see on the site, ladder matches didn't start until 1.11, by which time servers were far too fast to allow you to "trick" them into thinking that you still had an item in your inventory that you dropped... Unless you can provide proof that a ladder match was ever compromised, I've NEVER seen or heard of it, and they just started a new round on may 2nd, so people are still participating in them...

Yeah I just checked up on your terminology.

What you call closed battlenet is what the rest of us call.... battlenet... and open battlenet... had nothing to do with battlenet at all. Was just locally hosted games.
What you want is no different than what everyone else who was against the always online mode and wanted the standard D2 model.

I would like to point out thou that what you call "closed battle" was no where near as safe and hack free as you might believe. Duping happened. Like anyone here will tell you.

As I understand it, the ladder matches had a system in place where if the same item with the same UID existed on the same server(a duped item) one of them would disappear.

As to my terminology, you're right, I apologize, I for whatever reason thought that the ladder characters were on seperate servers from the other online only characters... I think I confused an open multiplayer game with a battle.net multiplayer game... As I've said, I don't claim to be the world's biggest diablo fan, or even diablo 2 fan, but Blizzard has a system that could atleast be improved that would eliminate duping, that doesn't involve removing singleplayer as singleplayer has diablo 2 has nothing at all to do with atleast a few diablo 2 items, runes, and runewords...