David Kim put out the first of what will be a bunch of blogs detailing some of their thought processes with D4.
https://us.diablo3.com/en/blog/23232022/system-design-in-diablo-iv-part-i-11-19-2019
tl;dr – even basic core aspects aren’t yet concrete (specifically they haven’t decided on something as basic as character level whether it be finite or “infinite” but are looking at the D3 style setup with soft level caps and an extended progression system ala Paragon).
I’m just going to be blunt (else this will rehash this entire blog pre-November 2015). The lack of game designers (and leads including the game director) lacking actual ARPG design experience, is not going to bold well for D4 in the ARPG aspects.
In simple fashion, classic RPG’s; your journey is one that is continuous as you play where your character level is meant as a personal gauge of your progression. Having an MMO style max level immediately renders character levels prior to that cap, as meaningless (because the objective is to hit max level so that you can start using max level gear with stats defined around that).
I contrast this simple aspect with old school RPG’s where you aren’t focused on hitting a level cap; your more cognizant of leveling up yes but as a means that increases your character power in small but also meaningful steps. Nor are item drops always defined by level ranges (which determine the roll ranges of properties). Like my Torchlight Frontiers example that I wrote about in this previous posting where my character is still using loot I found levels earlier. As I mentioned, Echtra hasn’t dialed in this entire system yet (which is good that they decided to delay the release) but it’s still important that they get the horizontal/vertical progression dialed in because everything else that is dependent on that (like items), will then fall into place.
Blizzard needs to make a critical decision here with how they will handle character levels. IMHO, sticking with the D3 setup would be a mistake. Also, any extended progression system needs to be designed as part of the primary setup (Paragon in D3 was tacked on in band-aid like fashion) AND also have far more meaningful choices. Blizzard (Team 3 to be exact) does have this delicate balancing act however given that all of their games need to continue appealing to a much broader demographic.
