Game feels gimped without Reaper of Souls

I kind of touched on this in another thread…

The systems patch when it comes to vanilla Diablo III, is not really meant for well geared level 60 characters (at least, not with the current tuning of Master).  Doesn’t help with dynamic difficulty that monsters also max out at level 60 (before, they’d be 63 with MP enabled).  Thus the current difficulty tuning at the high end represents a huge nerf for vanilla.  And yes, this is a preview of what’s to be expected.

The systems in the patch do shine though if you level from scratch (it provides that sense of continual progression as you level up; I’m doing this now on my other account that is in the closed beta – and it’s a huge perception difference in terms of finding/crafting/purchasing from vendor upgrades).  And once you hit the ceiling, it’s then about finding/crafting progressively better items so that one can eventual clear the next higher difficulties (the expansion of course has a huge selling point with enchanting via the Mystic).  For many of us though (if testing only within the PTR), that entire loop has already been short circuited (as most of our items are ilvl 63 – and thus there is very little that will drop in vanilla that will be even be sidegrades).

What the devs really need to re-think is adding more granular control for Master difficulty (like in the console and how Torment is) with incremental settings (like Master I through IV) for vanilla Diablo III.  Master IV for example would be tuned to represent the kind of difficulty one would expect when playing a level 67-69 character on Master difficulty in the expansion.  These incremental settings for Master would only apply to vanilla and would disappear in the expansion (since Torment has this sort of slider).  I believe some implementation like this would be a fair compromise such that there is some sembelance of challenge/difficulty afforded to vanilla players (since not everyone is planning to upgrade).

But yes, I also know there is the ulterior motive to upsell to the expansion.  What I didn’t expect though with the PTR, was just how stripped and vanilla, Diablo III vanilla would end up actually feeling (being redundant there on purpose because the term vanilla is fitting) compared to the expansion.  Note that while I’m upgrading regardless, I was also hoping they wouldn’t go down this route of implying that Diablo III vanilla is basically a gutted experience; that if you really want the full Diablo III experience, you need to buy the expansion.

I myself am also not very keen on how they are doing it.  The upgrade placard (like how it is with the Starter Edition) is just tacky looking if that is how they plan to keep it on the vanilla client once everything goes live.  Just from a visual standpoint, it gives that same impression that the vanilla version is now just a limited demo (and yes, I do realize that the execution of the details has resulted in the implementation of the expansion turning out to be just that).

There’s a nice “What’s New” icon below the switch hero button that contains everything that one needs to know about what the expansion offers (including yet another upgrade placard).  I’m just looking at this from the point of view with how the game originally shipped, and what has transpired over the last year and a half to address some of those problems; to where a more understated approach would probably be wiser/classier than this big ugly “UPGRADE NOW” mockery at the top right corner of the main screen (IMHO).