There are a lot of possibilities for new minigames in GTA 6, given the creativity and variety that the franchise has demonstrated in the past. Here are some ideas:
Arcade games: Perhaps players could visit arcades in the game world and play classic arcade games like Pac-Man, Space Invaders, or Street Fighter. These could be fully playable games within the game, with leaderboards and prizes for high scores.
Casino games: GTA 5 already had a fully-realized casino, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more games like craps, roulette, or baccarat. These games could be played for in-game currency, with high-stakes games available for the most daring players.
Sports: GTA 5 had a few sports minigames like golf and tennis, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more sports like basketball, baseball, or football. These could be played against other players online, with prizes for the winners.
Board games: Players could visit coffee shops or bars in the game world and play board games like chess, checkers, or backgammon. These games could be fully interactive, with the pieces moving around the board in real-time.
Puzzle games: There are plenty of puzzle games that could be integrated into the world of GTA, like Sudoku, crossword puzzles, or jigsaw puzzles. These could be found in newspapers or magazines within the game world, and completed puzzles could unlock rewards like hidden vehicles or weapons.
Virtual reality games: With the recent release of VR headsets like the Oculus Quest, GTA 6 could incorporate virtual reality minigames like shooting galleries, puzzle rooms, or horror experiences. These would be fully immersive and could provide a break from the main game.
These are just a few ideas for new minigames in GTA 6, but the possibilities are endless. The franchise has always been known for its attention to detail and variety, so players can likely expect a wide range of activities to keep them occupied in the game world.

okay long story so skip to paragraph 3-4 for the recommendation:)
okay so everyone in my life is concerned and thinks i’m too skinny and sickly looking and need to gain blah blah blah, the works. love them and appreciate them but i do not want that. well, i saw a girl on tik tok (oh boy) and she was skinny, yes, but like still muscular sorta. like lean? but i wouldn’t say she was like muscular to describe her. skinny but fit as heck maybe? but not unhealthy. so i’ve decided to try my hardest to up my protein, still be in a pretty big deficit (i can’t stop the ana thoughts sadly so still am gonna restrict, rip). i’ve been doing more weight training than just cardio (still doing like the same amount of cardio) and eating slightly more than usual (it’s hard okay?).
eventually i think i’ll eat more but i still wanna be in a deficit so i can be skinny still but fit. when i was a lot heavier than i am now, it was a lot of muscle but i ate in a surplus (didn’t count back then but pretty sure i ate like more over my tdee on a daily basis so i wasn’t lean).
i’m scared of protein bars. lot of cals and they hurt my belly. i love birthday stuff. i love cookies. trying to get protein. so what did i do? i bought quest birthday cake cookies. they are SO good. they have glaze on top so they aren’t dry as heck like regular quest bars. and? THEYRE ONLY 90 CALS. they’re less protein than a bar obviously, they’re 5g but hey i mean🤷🏻‍♀️. idk y’all should try them. they’re so tasty. i was gonna eat more than one but it would wreak havoc on my belly so i found the will power to not do it.
also? vitamin water zero sugar flavors are great. i’ve had the açaí blueberry pomegranate, the strawberry lemonade, and the raspberry dark chocolate (my fave but i can barely find it anywhere) and i will be trying the orange later today. i tried the reg sugar açaí one (on accident) and actually liked the zero sugar better.

There are a lot of possibilities for new minigames in GTA 6, given the creativity and variety that the franchise has demonstrated in the past. Here are some ideas:
Arcade games: Perhaps players could visit arcades in the game world and play classic arcade games like Pac-Man, Space Invaders, or Street Fighter. These could be fully playable games within the game, with leaderboards and prizes for high scores.
Casino games: GTA 5 already had a fully-realized casino, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more games like craps, roulette, or baccarat. These games could be played for in-game currency, with high-stakes games available for the most daring players.
Sports: GTA 5 had a few sports minigames like golf and tennis, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more sports like basketball, baseball, or football. These could be played against other players online, with prizes for the winners.
Board games: Players could visit coffee shops or bars in the game world and play board games like chess, checkers, or backgammon. These games could be fully interactive, with the pieces moving around the board in real-time.
Puzzle games: There are plenty of puzzle games that could be integrated into the world of GTA, like Sudoku, crossword puzzles, or jigsaw puzzles. These could be found in newspapers or magazines within the game world, and completed puzzles could unlock rewards like hidden vehicles or weapons.
Virtual reality games: With the recent release of VR headsets like the Oculus Quest, GTA 6 could incorporate virtual reality minigames like shooting galleries, puzzle rooms, or horror experiences. These would be fully immersive and could provide a break from the main game.
These are just a few ideas for new minigames in GTA 6, but the possibilities are endless. The franchise has always been known for its attention to detail and variety, so players can likely expect a wide range of activities to keep them occupied in the game world.

So I (M/28) have been single for technically single for a decade, mainly a mix of trying to get stability in my own life first & not many women I was interested in. A year & a half ago, I moved to a new state for work. There was a woman I was (arguably) with just before I moved, but it never went anywhere. Now that I had stability in my own life, I thought I'd get back into dating. Then I realized some difficulties:

1. The area I live in is basically a small college town where not much happens. A lot of the women either already have their own families or are college kids (I'd feel uneasy dating someone more than 4-5 years younger than me). The biggest city closest to me are more than an hour & a half drive away from me.
2. I'm basically a decade behind in everything. I'm an introvert posing as an extrovert. Having conversations with people isn't the issue. Actually finding where to meet people is. I prefer meeting people in person, yet I'd never been the clubbing/drinking type & I feel like it was easier making friends & meeting new people while I was in college. I humored myself with dating apps as a month experiment (Always hated the idea of them) & that, unsurprisingly, went nowhere.

I'm basically doing a blind playthrough of the dating game with no quest markers. I tried doing things that were out of my element (a la going to bars & clubs), but a lot of the times I feel overwhelmed/out of my element being there. With this in mind, how does an introvert posing as an extrovert get back into dating when they'd been out of it for so long?

There are a lot of possibilities for new minigames in GTA 6, given the creativity and variety that the franchise has demonstrated in the past. Here are some ideas:
Arcade games: Perhaps players could visit arcades in the game world and play classic arcade games like Pac-Man, Space Invaders, or Street Fighter. These could be fully playable games within the game, with leaderboards and prizes for high scores.
Casino games: GTA 5 already had a fully-realized casino, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more games like craps, roulette, or baccarat. These games could be played for in-game currency, with high-stakes games available for the most daring players.
Sports: GTA 5 had a few sports minigames like golf and tennis, but GTA 6 could expand on this with more sports like basketball, baseball, or football. These could be played against other players online, with prizes for the winners.
Board games: Players could visit coffee shops or bars in the game world and play board games like chess, checkers, or backgammon. These games could be fully interactive, with the pieces moving around the board in real-time.
Puzzle games: There are plenty of puzzle games that could be integrated into the world of GTA, like Sudoku, crossword puzzles, or jigsaw puzzles. These could be found in newspapers or magazines within the game world, and completed puzzles could unlock rewards like hidden vehicles or weapons.
Virtual reality games: With the recent release of VR headsets like the Oculus Quest, GTA 6 could incorporate virtual reality minigames like shooting galleries, puzzle rooms, or horror experiences. These would be fully immersive and could provide a break from the main game.
These are just a few ideas for new minigames in GTA 6, but the possibilities are endless. The franchise has always been known for its attention to detail and variety, so players can likely expect a wide range of activities to keep them occupied in the game world.

I'm wondering if anyone else has noticed that name brand protein bars don't taste as good when ordered from Amazon. I got some classic Quest cookies and cream a little while ago. They weren't expired but definitely tasted stale and a little off. I also just ordered my other favorite, Fortifx, from Amazon, and I swear they don't taste as good as when I order directly from them. Has anyone else noticed this? Does anyone know what the heck is going on?! Maybe I'm just crazy. Thanks!!!

Hey :)
I’ve been playing wow on and off since Cata and have recently started playing Classic and I’m having an ABSOLUTE BLAST.
I’m level 30 and wondering if there’s anything I should keep in mind already for the late game. Like if there’s some mats I should stock up on, quest lines I should do or any rep farm on my way to 60? For example: I have like 200ish Silver Bars and I’m afraid to put them on AH if I for some reason would need them later.
Or is there anything else you’d recommend a noob to do? I’m aiming on raiding :)
Much love,

Lately, I have been doing better. I don’t rely on my mom much, I can leave the house alone, I can drive, I can go for walks, and much more that I was not able to last year.
My sister is sick right now. She was at a party on Friday, so my guess is that where she caught it. She is in her room most of the time, and I don’t see her often. We don’t share food or anything either. My mom had to bring her to the ER because she is so sick.
I am worried about her, but I can’t do anything. I gave her a Zofran before she went to the hospital. She is getting a CAT scan. I hope she will be okay.
For me, I am isolating myself in my room. Disinfectant wipes, gloves, and mask. I have 6 water bottles and protein bars. I have a door to outside in my room where I can leave the house or go pee in the bushes. I have not had a panic attack yet. As long as I do this, I will be okay.
I feel bad for thinking so much about me when my sister is so ill. There isn’t really anything I can do though. Thankfully I have kept up on my chores, so my mom will not have to worry about those while she cares for my sister.

After 6 days of complete mayhem and fun, most posts here seem like going into the direction of balance and content which is most definitely going to be changed by feedback. (Let's hope so)
But I didn't see enough of UI / UX and visual changes that could be made to the game, so I wanted to make one myself. I'll update this list if I see new stuff that I haven't realized yet, from this thread.
My main gripe is this: The game's UI is way too aligned for a gamepad and some allowances for mouse and keyboard would greatly benefit the game's PC version.
Action Bar & Gameplay
- I just played Diablo III and all the health/energy globes looks better at that game than Diablo IV. Is it just me?
- Action-bar needs some options such as move it higher or push it to the border.
- Requires an option to remove hotkey indicators.
- Requires an option to lock down: Town Portal, Evade and Health Potion via mouse click.
- Some new affixes are explained in some places and and other it does not. (What is a Lucky Hit? etc.)
- Needs options for larger minimap and minimap zoom.
- Minimap overlay! This is a staple Diablo feature! where. is. it?
- Minimap reveals entire subareas, this kills exploration sometimes or I sometimes intentionally wouldn't want to go someplace (and would return there later) but the game reveals it as if I "explored" it already. Why is this abandoned for a more casual approach is beyond me.
- The notifications for quests and vendors are sometimes easy to miss. Their placement can be better. (Bear in mind I'm using Ultrawide monitor and there are issues with that as well, but as a 0.8 beta, I won't go into detail here)
- A tutorial, quest or notification for new players to let them know the action wheel exist and could be used for Leaving Dungeons etc. would be great.
Character Screen
- When Character Screen is open, change viewport to show the character on the center.
- Materials & Stats are not correlated. Move Materials to the gold bar perhaps?
- Stats tab shows currencies, instead of materials area?
- Core stats are already on the character sheet, show them side by side?
A Case for A Left Panel UI for PC version of Diablo IV
For a PC game, the amount of full screen UI is staggering. It doesn't need to be this way, but somehow it did. In PC, where we cannot do co-op, we can totally use a left-hand side panel (think similar to vendor panels) to:
* Show a better layout version of Stats panel, that can fit on the screen without scrolling, so we can screenshot it properly to show off our builds better?
* Show social and clan tabs, so we can invite people & manage our parties without going out of the loop of the game.
* Show collections tab so we can track what we need seamlessly. At least give us the option to track them (ala WoW Achievement tracking) - Codex of Power already can be shown that way when opened in the Occultist vendor!
Map
- Ability to leave notes. (Perhaps not very essential as the game guides us a lot, but good to have for rares and such)
- Ability to share coordinates with other players.
- % of completion for the given sub area.
- Ability to open the Journal without opening the map.
- I'm sure some materials are locked in some areas, perhaps show where they are spawning in map when we learn possible renown for an area?
Inventory
- Equipped items on the inventory doesn't need to show the "Equipped" bar.
- Item tooltip and stats need a hierarchy - doesn't have consistency. Diablo III clearly showed Primary, Secondary and Utility stats - perhaps this could return. If this is not possible, as a suggestion use different bullets to show what it does; (i.e. benefits attacks (red), benefits defenses (green); benefits quality of life(blue) etc.) we already use it to show legendary stats and sockets.
- That being said, stat list bullets for stars and sockets are too small - looks bad.
- Inventory needs more space. If this is locked down, consider increasing inventory space for Aspects & Gems (and hopefully, in the future, runes too!)
- Sorting is too vague. What does it sort? Item type, item power, item rarity? In PC it can do all of them, but there is no option.
- Skull "gem" looks like the skull relics (offhand)
- Game should communicate better if the item is "special" - therefore salvaging or vendoring it wouldn't seem scary or wrong?
Skill Tree
Overall, I think Blizzard can do a way better job with this. This type of design reminds me of Path of Exile without all the bells and whistles. There is nothing in this skill tree that couldn't be done in the Diablo II or III design. My only hope for this skill tree is that there are things like "Cluster Jewels" from PoE in the game that expands or modify these skills based on that item.
Respecing even the smallest thing in the middle of the tree without "refunding all" is very cumbersome. Give us an ACCEPT/APPLY changes button, and let us freely try our builds in game, and don't let us close up the skill tree until all the requirements are met.
See the left panel for PC suggestions. The stats are being changed by passive nodes in the skill tree, but I cannot see what effect it had without fully respeccing, possibly lose lots of gold, then try again. This should be much easier to play with.
- Ability to share skill specs.
- Ability to save skill specs.
- Ability to modify the skill tree freely without any costs in town.
- Ability to zoom out more.
- Skills and their node icons seems too derivative of themselves. There is no differentiation between let's say a Fireball icon and its improvement nodes. This can look more clear - now with its very small node size and generic icons, I have to just memorize or read the tooltip.
- Sorcerer's class specific "Enchantments" - is too hidden and when you spec, if you are a new to the game, it is easily forgotten. It needs to be on prominent place on the skill tree or have its own tab like the others. I think Blizzard can chew up a classy artwork to put two skills on the tab? Right?
Profile Page
- Profile Page should show what skills the user is using and if possible, the whole skill tree. (and copy & save it)
- Profile Page shows lots of spaces that looks like clickable buttons. One and the biggest one can be given as an example is Titles, which is actually not. We have to go through "Edit" to do these. It may be needed for a gamepad, but not mouse+keyboard setups. There are lots of changes that can be made on this front.
Vendors
- Sell all buttons based on rarity.
- More item options for all vendors please!
Blacksmith:
- Repair shouldn't have its own tab! It should be on all tabs!
- Perhaps a separate character for Upgrading items would be better? Such an essential and probably forced part of the endgame is at the last tab of the vendor is... weird?
Occultist:
Again, too much power on one vendor. It can and in my opinion should be divided into two characters.
- Aspect modifications & enchants
- Sigils
As it stands Sigils is a such important part of endgame is "HIDDEN" in a vendor that deals with item improvements. Why?
- Imprint Aspect requires us to juggle two inventory tabs. Inventory itself, and aspect tab. There is also Codex of Power. I need to search whether I have the needed aspect in my inventory or codex of power? Why? Why cannot I have a one-use codex of power node where I can browse every legendary aspect IN ONE PAGE?
- Enchant item should show possibilities. If it is %100 random, just say so. If not, you should show them. Pretty challenging thing for console i presume. But It shouldn't be a problem for PC.
Ultrawide Improvements:
- In game cutscenes are 16:9, please fix :(
- Some in game cutscene text overlays - such as the carting out scene at the prologue, where the "prophecy" is written, is off screen.

Newbie lifter here. Went to the gym semi consistently for 2 months. Followed a Chloe Ting full body workout routine and for the first week it was doing me wonders. But the problem was that it was not good enough. I started losing patience and joined the sub to learn more about peds and steroids.
After 2 days I finally decided to hop on cycle and started blasting 2g of turkersterone a day for 2 weeks. Saw minimal results and was left disappointed so upped it to 3.5g.
Things actually started getting better and noticed significant increase in my sex drive, cognitive function, special awareness and lifts. I was feeling so good and decided to up the dose to 4g per day.
Things got even better, I noticed an abnormal increase to my mood, I stopped beating my wife and son, started talking to my parents again, found confidence in my self and got the courage to go to bars and hook up with people. Things were great.
After 1 month I had increased my pr from:
-40kg squat -25kg bench -45kg deadlift
To:
-300kg squat -285kg bench -305kg deadlift
I was feeling like I was a god amongst men, the chosen one, I was THE man. I thought about it a lot but decided to up my doses one last time, to see if I can break the human limit, unlock 100% of my brain, reach a new level, become the ultimate alpha. I upped the dose from 4g a day to 20g twice a day, 1 hour before and after my aerobic trainning.
And I'll tell you what, for a short period of time I had achieved my goals, I had reached levels of mental and physical growth beyond your puny imaginations, I had reached the top, I could see everything, I had finally done it, I had beaten life..
But all of this came crushing down rather quickly, after a few days I started noticing a weird bulge in my pelvis area. At first I brushed it off as an allergic reaction or a bite of some sort, but it quickly started growing and growing.
Then one night, I woke up to this immense pain, I started crying and feeling like I was being stabbed, I looked down on my panties and noticed that the weird bulge had grown rapidly, afraid of what to do, I took a big breath, removed my panties.... and then I saw it, I was so scared, confused and just speachless. Throughout all of this time, somehow, the turkesterone I was taking had been feeding my previously dead twin I had absorbed at birth.
And worst thing? It had been fueling itself through my weiner. Somehow, it managed to attach to my dick's vein system, and fuel itself quickly overtaking my big willy and taking it's place on my pants.
I panicked, and fearing the worst, ran downstairs, took a knife and... well, yeah... I... yeah it was just honestly...
After that traumatizing night I swore to myself to never allow such thing to happen again. I hopped off turk, cleaned my diet up, started lifting smartly with proper form and getting each set close to failure, started bettering myself and trying to become the best version of me I could be, and even started taking creatine and protein powder!
And after 2 weeks of this weird situation I can finally say with confidence that I am starting to become a person that I am proud of.
But yeah anyways I got really sidetracked here, I wanted to ask if this is a sideffect of turk and would it be safe for me to one day start again in the future with lower doses or are Sarms a better idea?

this is probably gonna sound really dumb so i apologize in advance lol
i’ve been doing CICO for 3 months now, loving it (except for my weight not changing in the last 16 days… grr)
now that i’ve gotten better at tracking calories, i decided i wanted to track or at least just be aware of my macros, particularly protein. i checked my lose it app and looked back on all my past logs to see where i average and as it turns out, my protein was average (i’m still planning to increase it for weight lifting purposes though) but my carbs were low! like, my daily average is under 100g of carbs. and from what i read online you need 200g+ or something. i’m wondering if that’s why i find myself tired so often? is under 100g of carbs bad? my dad did keto a few years ago and absolutely hated it, his breath stunk, and his weight barely changed. i’m worried i’m like, accidentally keto? is that a thing?
oh and does anyone have suggestions for foods with more carbs? i eat tortillas, bread, pasta, rice, etc and my favorite snack is peanut butter crackers so i’m not sure how i’m even eating such few carbs tbh
idk if this has any influence on my question but i’m female, 24, 5’2, 127lbs, cardio + pilates daily

Warning: Long, even for myself

Good morning, afternoon, evening or whatever.
First, REDDIT IS MORONIC TODAY! Is just not letting me save my post to edit carefully, and I really need that time since this has so many words it needed edits to fit. And because my computer has Alzheimer since mid 2021, I have to use the awful online word with a far worse editing. At least I can correct most of the orthography mistakes I do.
Second, it was my birthday. As a gift i got Bug Fables: The everlasting Sapling. I think I should give my opinion of that as someone who loved Paper Mario and wishes could play TTYD. First of all, it was incredibly janky with the Vimerang and ice blocks, with bad minigames, occasional obtuse layout, a surprisingly bad Spanish translation considering it was developed in Latinoamerica and definitely cannot replace the void Intelligent Systems left; I think they even admitted it via Kabbu on a post-credits scene. That being said and as a spiritual sequel/love letter, it excels at what made those RPGs cult games. It has heavier emphasis on the low number system and partners to the point most of your powerful attacks use 2 or 3 partners, they can give their turns to others, you stay at 2 base damage without an ultra-rare item, is quite taxing and suboptimal to have more than 20 HP, badges are overall less powerful, same for the expensive AoE, super guard only reducing damage, and even nerfed “multibounce” to only strike 4 times; in short, a game who is difficult to exploit, making it oddly deeper. The characters are also deeper overall, which is especially noticeable on the protagonists and their missions, the “Ship of Theseus” with Leif, Vi’s reconciliation with her Weevil sister, every Vi vs Mothiva... Have I mentioned Vi is an amazing character? Because she is. Overall, quite a good game for people who likes RPGs and specially Paper Mario, even though chapter 5 could go f*** itself for trapping me there for hours instead of letting me do fun side quests in between like every other chapter...
Oh wait, this is about champion design, sorry. This is a 4-part series of Champion design who now will cover all what was made in 2022, which involves the Gnar miniset and both parts of Series 6. As a reminder, those are informed opinions, personal stances with heavy justification behind you won't care anyways because reddit loves mob mentality and because CCG players. Also, those go to a value to be analyzed and compare in a productive way instead of pure subjective feelings and notice tendencies easier, which is especially important this year.

S tier

S+
Nothing. Again, I ask for masterpieces in this so is not necessarily a bad thing. I even gave A. Sol, the best designed champion overall, a S- just because of his champion spell.
S-
Annie: 1 mana 0 attack unit who on attack deals 2 damage to her blocker. She levels up via seeing you play 6 skills or fast/slow spells, making her skill deal 3 damage and stun that blocker, as well as creating a Tibbers on hand, a 6 mana fearsome who on summon stuns an enemy and deals 2 damage to all damaged or stunned enemies. I made a post a while ago on why I think she was the best designed card of the first worldwalker expansion, a perfect example on how Legends of Runaterra can fix champions, and my stance has not changed at all, if anything it got enforced as the best champion of 2022 by a longshot. If you remember that post, you might also remember my grievances on her champion spell being too good of a removal spell and having unintuitive gameplay patterns who were fixed thankfully, and while it still rubs me the wrong way, it's just a me thing. Overall, this is what 1 mana champions should aspire to be.

A tier

Nothing: No champion is worth the A tier in 2022, which is weird. It used to be one though.

B tier

B
Gwen: 4 mana quick attack hallowed who gains hallowed bonus of other units on attack and drains 2 from the enemy nexus. She levels up via her or her skill dealing 10 damage, where she now deals damage proportionally to the attack she has currently. This champion that I definitely don't feel lots of tenderness for, have not called her a princess and have definitely not acquired her guardian because it was cute, is one of the highlights of this year in terms of design, being a quite interesting way of using revenge kill in a way Kalista never was capable of and rewarding good positioning a lot. My biggest gripe is the buff she got, making her much less interactive and fair on level 2; it's a big attack and it should be interactable in some way, as shown by Taliyah, Annie and Ziggs, especially since it feels bugged and deals all the damage unconditionally bar frostbite. I prefer when champions have actual risk behind the reward, as do most of the player base I would assume.
B-
Udyr: 5 mana create on summon or strike a stance swap on hand and reduce its cost to 0 if you already have one; Stance swap are 3 mana slow spells who can either give you stats, health and regeneration, attack and overwhelm or be an ice shard outside the selected target. He levels up via playing stances, gaining Stats for each stance you've played. Originally F tier due to lacking cohesion between both parts and the record of fastest rework, now is a clear unit enhancer of a very interactive engine, but that still has a serious problem: He's still a 5 mana unit without Quick Attack who dies to flock + stun, and overall is in the same situation as Shen of being too fair of a champion; also his champion spell, while great, doesn’t have synergy with his plan.
Is also the perfect opportunity to mention something about design: 1°: to anyone who think "He's poorly designed due to being bad", Design =/= Performance, because sometimes the issue is indeed low numbers like with Taliyah. 2°: Udyr was a competent champion, not on UdyAkshan, but on UdyGalio when broadwing was even more busted, but as proven by Gwen/Sejuani using stances without Udyr, his numbers are just too low. 3°: Purpose is the most important thing of a design; Why making a thing you don't know where to use? Is not something I bring up often because most champions have a purpose, but OG Udyr was a contradiction, trying to be both a plunder payoff and a stance engine without an efficient connection in between since, making him just frustrating to use.
Illaoi: 4 mana overwhelm who spawns 1 tentacle on attack, then gains the tentacle's attack before attack striking. She levels up via seeing her or tentacles deal enough damage, making each spawn spawning 1 more, healing the tentacle after the spawn and gaining all its stats instead of just attack. Her issue is, once again, being too fair of a champion and also being a Bard victim, but most importantly, Tentacles just aren't going to stick and grow due to how Bilgewater works, but rather work the best as a free decently sized unit on the board as jostled value; honestly the tentacle archetype was doomed to fail once people realized how almost every deck became better with Eye of Nagakabourus. The strategy is quite cool and interactive, is just that she is not that fitting for Bilgewater’s design.
Aatrox: 6 mana who on summon will autoequip the darkin blade, a regeneration weapon, while also on strike or summon healing by 2 and creating a world ender in hand if you don’t have it. World ender is a 16 mana spell who cost 1 less each time you strike with an equipped ally that makes all units equipped with Darkin weapons those darkin units without losing the weapon. His level 2 is acquired upon playing that world ender, gaining overwhelm, +4+4 and making darkin units 5 mana cheaper, but can no longer create that world ender. He can be played with Darkin equipments, who will draw him if player 3 different equipments. Honestly, this has to be the most disappointing champion, and I say it because he could have been S TIER levels of amazing in design but is ruined by clear wheelchairs on the wheelchairs. I get he needs to be overtuned to make a suboptimal deck functional, but this is "Why?" the champion because of being so busted. Why does he grow by +4+4? Why does he discount darkins by 5? Why was he so easy to tutor? Why does he heal on summon? And for some reason they made the deck more dependent on Aatrox instead of nerfing him, causing lots of collateral damage in the process. I love a lot of his design, but those kinds of shoehorns are just unacceptable considering he’s only a 6 drop. That being said, is still the best runaterran champion overall, but he isn’t great.

C tier

C
Gnar: 4 mana Quick attack who generates a pokey stick on strike or makes it free if you already have one. He levels up on round end if you pinged the enemy nexus, gaining overwhelm, +2+2 in stats and making an enemy vulnerable, but leveling down after the turn you gained the attack token and will carry damage done to him. Is kind of a generic jack-of-all trades master of none with a very vanilla design who doesn't explore the theme of nexus poking or transformation enough, who showcases 3 things: 1°: They were pushing Bandle a bit too hard considering Udyr was terrible on account of Gnar carrying him. 2°: A singular point of attack can make a card much worse, especially quick attack ones. 3°: Reddit is AWFUL at balancing, considering they said he would still be busted with 3 attack but he wasn't.
Jhin: 4 mana 44 who, if beholden, will do 1 damage to the nexus via a skill for each 3 skills played, will stun the weakest enemy if on board, and on attack will deal 2 damage to all stunned enemies. He levels up via you playing 12 fast/slow spells or skills, gaining quick attack and his skill dealing 4 damage to stunned enemies instead as well as the nexus; he can also bring with himself any unit who can generate a skill in some way. He is the reason of 3.6 changes alongside Annie and is one of the few cases of overdesigning. Due to flavor obsession he's overly complicated, but also only good on burn Aggro because skills almost never damage enemy units outside battle or give you value. He's also prone to miss timing, in good part due to how messy the interface can become with so many skills running around, and is not like Sivir where you can do simple math to level her up in the best moment, because skill chains go backwards; finally, he gives free power just by behold, although is not as bad as other since is from hand instead of deck and aggro dries quickly. Aside from that I can't really say there's a lot of negatives, he’s as skill expressive as aggro decks can get and even his negative of miss timing could be seen as a positive by the FGC and YGO fans, but I digress, he’s more like a middling design due to glaring flaws.
Kayn: 5 mana challenger who heals himself by 2 when killing an enemy unit and autoequips the darkin scythe who gains +1 attack each time you... attack. He AND THE SCYTHE level up via striking twice, recalling and becoming 0 mana before transforming into either Shadow Assassin, a Yusari with actually good stats and a scythe gaining +2 attack, or Rhaast, a Raid boss with overwhelm that fully heals itself and heals the nexus by 2 each time it kills an enemy and a scythe that now grants +1+1 on attack. Finally, he can be played with his package, the Cultist, who will tutor him if play 4 cultist followers. The card just feels... off, as if it’s missing power; I think that’s due to how bland the champion is, from a bad equip to Shadow form who is just stats even though he works well, to him being a surprisingly bad play on curve. At least Rhaast actually feels powerful even though he isn’t necessarily, and he’s definitely someone who can be helped via QoL buffs, so is not all bad, just middle of the road.
Kayle: 5 mana who gains 1 attack for each time an ally with increased attack attacked and gains a keyword based on her current attack stat; at 6 she gains quick attack, at 11 she gains overwhelm and levels up on the next round start, and at level 16 she gains double attack. Finally, on summon she either grants +1 attack at level 1, or +1+1 at level 2, to other allies. One would think this would go to handbuff decks, a style that has not worked due to limited card draw and how they for the most part are careful with tempo; luckily, she works just fine with efficient board buffs. This also is to be the most flavor obsessed champion in the game besides Jhin, which is one of her flaws; just like LoL she’s overreliant on her allies not being removed to reach level 2 reliably, which causes a lot of polarization and makes her a bit of a win-more. What’s worse, she is one of the least inspired champions in game in terms of gameplay considering her level 1 is a weaker Garen on play, which isn’t bad but isn’t good either. She’s overall only fine.
Master Yi: 3 mana quick attack who on round start makes a random spell in your hand 1 mana cheaper and grants Yi everywhere +2 attack if flow was activated. He levels up via Yis striking for enough damage, giving him a burst speed strike on attack declaration. Honestly, I would face this over Lee Sin all day because is a flow engine with scaling board pressure instead of wincon, but even then, he has a problem who is being too easy to snowball and lack of interaction on his level 2 effect, but also being a 3 mana do nothing on play which can be an issue. Is a delicate card to balance and can become frustrating when rolling but is definitely in the decent side of things when it comes to Ionia.
Ornn: 7 mana tough duplicate a weapon on hand or board and equip it to himself, who forges himself twice on attack. He levels up via an allied strike dealing enough damage, summoning an ephemeral ram with his stats and overwhelm on attack after forging. TL; DR: He’s a beatstick who becomes huge on attack with some equip duplication and nothing else. Being mechanically as deep as a 3 mana level 1 champion from early 2020 is obviously a big problem to his appeal if that’s your level 2, and the level 1 is even worse being pure stats, something Dragons already did. Also, why only he gets forged? I say it because he can also forge for allies due to sheer passion. And don't get me started on Kindra handling Ornn’s turtle. That being said, forging an equip to make it better over time is cool and Ornn is definitely capable of pulling off those big number moments into an actual gameplan.
C-
Yuumi: A 3 mana unit speed spell who can't be used with spell mana, that grants an ally +22, "Round start: grant me +1+1" and "last breath: return Yuumi to hand (Doesn't count as recall)", activating summon and play effects in the process (Used to be only play ones). That spells levels up if the ally attacks 3 times, granting it spellshield both on level up and all round start... Wait, did you expect me to say that Yuumi has an F tier design? Nah, I think she's fine, and I think you're confusing her with Papercraft dragon creating degenerate OTKs without proper reaction alongside Fizz or Ruin Runner. Yuumi by herself is just a pump spell for go-tall strategies who can be replayed once the card dies, which sounds terrifying but it isn't considering she needs to pay regular mana to be used. Her issue is oddly enough the tied to why I don't think is an abomination. Why would you play her on board considering she's understatted and doesn't return to hand? YOU DON'T. She is only a spell with no dept on practice, which is especially bad considering Darkins are more dynamic and intriguing cards with more properties and clear opportunity cost, while summoning attach cards not attached is only cost who will likely cause a negative snowball to lose the game. Overall though, the reaction to her from the community seems unjustified considering the problem was not her, it was Pantheon and Papercraft Dragon. I know LoL Yuumi is an abomination of design Riot refuses to properly fix even though we’ve told them multiple times permanent invincibility is not fair, but that Yuumi IS NOT our Yuumi, ours is just a bland buff spell.
Varus: 4 mana quick attack which who autoequips a bow, a weapon who gains 1 attack each time you play a spell or equip an ally, until it strikes and up to +5 attack. Varus levels up via targeting allies in any way or shape, gaining overwhelm and doubling the weapon effect; he also can be played with his package, the Cultists, the same as Kayn and just like Kayn, you can tutor him, this time with spells played. First, I still dislike his new lore with passion for the same reason I consider Aatrox rework a disaster and is annoying they're using a quote who doesn't make sense for him now. Rant from me aside, his design is very reminiscent of Lee Sin, while on the other is just a beatstick without properties; is an uninteresting champion who can become your wincon lategame at best and very uninteractive OTK champion at worst. Just not a fan of... Him? Them? It? I just can’t deal with English pronouns in these contexts, but I feel is more how the controller changes between 3 individuals, being the only believable genderfluid case I'm aware of instead of a serious identity crisis... Oops?
Vayne: 3 mana backro who generates a tumble on summon or round start, a 4 mana slow spell who both equips a cheap weapon and starts a free attack, and if you have one, she discounts its cost by 1 instead. She levels up via seeing you attack, making all those Tumbles 0 mana. The design is fine despite what many would say, tumble is not an overpowered spell even on release, but there's a big issue: IS A 3 MANA CHAMPION. The kind of effect she has is clearly a bit too much to handle this early on because of how exploitable extra attacks can be. Worst yet, she’s a backro character who just by existing forces interaction due to the combos she enables in a region with good protection, which is only a problem due to how cheap she is, unlike a Lux who feels mostly fair due to the mana investment she demands. Also, she’s really reliant on good equipments, making her very vulnerable to indirect nerfs as we saw after the Aegis one. Overall is a good idea ruined by making her too cheap, which goes to show you how important mana cost is in card games.

D tier

D
Galio: A 7 mana spellshield formidable who grants allies +3 health. He levels up via allies having enough health on round end, making him rally if an ally gets damaged once per round... Honestly this design is like LeBlanc, very bland. As I said a while ago, "An underutilized Demacian identity is that of suppression, the one who FORCES a fair game. Things like silences and mana taxing are something the region doesn't use. So, the best idea is to make Galio, the statue created to absorb magic, die to a 3-mana combo spell... wait, what? That's right, Galio is one of the most vulnerable cards to removal and silences in the game, as well as another "level 2: Rally" champion who is just becoming tiring at this point." My stance on this has not changed bar the fact they finally nerfed quietus; in fact, it became even worse due to Darkin Aegis being released and therefore proving THEY CAN make fair, intriguing anti-spell cards, but they were too coward to use them when making Galio and decided to make boring demacian soup once again.
Kai'Sa: 5 mana quick attack evolve who creates a second skin on round start, a free slow speed spell who can clone keywords. She levels up with evolve, dealing spread damage on attack from lowest to highest health target, once per keyword she has. Honestly this card has 4 problems. 1°: SCOUT, which feels specially bad considering riot is aware on how busted that keyword can be when freely given, yet it was freely givable; luckily, she doesn’t seem to work with scout anymore. 2°: Rulebreaker. For the unaware, she's a champion who skill doesn't go through when stunned... but it shouldn't be the case, since the factor of that is because they recognized how OP she was, yet she was still released at 5 mana instead of 6. 3°: Bland design. Evolve is basically a much less interesting Deep, being also stats but with low deck building cost and less explosive. 4°: Toxic champion spell. While it wasn't busted even at 3 mana, the mere idea of granting a champion overwhelm and spellshield is THE OPPOSITE OF INTERACTIVE. Btw, second skin used to be FOCUS SPEED, making her even worse and a F tier design; is still bad but at least she's no longer horrible.
Jax: 2 mana auto-equip a quick attack weapon... that's it. He levels up via equipped units dealing enough damage on strike, granting himself and weapon overwhelm and gaining a +1+1 on for each equipped ally for; he can also bring with himself his package, the weaponmasters. First, I LOVE Jax's confident personality, but that's the only good thing I have to say about him. He is somehow less inspired THAN EVERY WEAPONMASTER, being just a French vanilla. Those improvisers also were constantly breaking the carefully crafted regional pie via giving scout and overwhelm needing multiple nerfs, but that's more of his package, not himself, he's just a LeBlanc/Galio in terms of dept.
Norra: A 2 mana elusive who creates a portal on the top 4 card of your deck. She levels up via you summoning created units, where the thing she summons from portals become better. While a creative design in both gameplay and visuals, creative =/= good (Ask Bandle Tree). My issue with her is not the randomness on what she will summon, since they almost never have synergy with her; is more about the mana cheating this implies and most importantly, the randomness of WHEN the card will be summoned. You just can't plan with Norra, just pray you'll get a unit fast enough or when you'll block; same for the enemy who just can't play around her. What's worse, the summon is at BURST SPEED, further diminishing both player's agency. The solution would be to make every single unit to proceed like the time you have a full board for free, forcing the player to use them from hand so everyone can play accordingly to the randomness.
Seraphine: 2 mana backro who creates a new spell (not played yet) who costs 2 or less in hand. She levels up via you playing new spells, now doubling any new spell you play. First, Congratulations to the art team to make Seraphine a real character instead of a marketing tool. Second, where it is the acorn guardian? Third, she's essentially a 2 mana Karma, and no, the new spell who cost 2 or less is not enough of a restriction because she's lacking the restrictions Jayce had, especially with Back alley bar existing. Speaking of Bar (Rant incoming), Fourth, WTF WERE YOU THINKING WHEN DESIGNING HER SUPPORT?! Cards like Back alley bar, Fanclub president and Drum solo are just atrocious designs because mana cheat SHOULD NOT be something easy to get; same goes for her ease of access to cards from other regions because that makes the game basically Hearthstone, something the developers promised not to be. Because of her I directly quit the game for weeks, DESPITE ME PLAYING AGGRO TO COUNTER HER, due to how obnoxious is to play against her and Ezreal. If I would rate package, I would give Seraphine a G tier design alongside Ryze (spoilers), but she by herself is a mini-Karma, aka a bad design but not atrocious.
D-
Evelynn: 4 mana 0 attack create a husk on summon, 01 tokens with keywords that can’t attack or block and translate their properties to the next unit you summon, dying without being slain. She levels up when she sees a husk die, gaining +5 attack, the keywords of all husks that die and summoning a husk on round end, but losing those keywords on round end and even leveling down if less than 6 allies have died. Can be played with her package, husk generators. I have 3 problems with this. 1°: You can’t determine when she will keep her level up, which makes her very difficult to play around for both sides. 2°: Husk Randomness. You see, husks are not made equal and there’s 3 who stand way above the others, those being spellshield, overwhelm and elusive... yes, they thought ELUSIVE, a despised keyword due to removing almost every board interaction, was a good idea to give at random; on the other hand, there’s Impact or fearsome, effectively candy keywords. Honestly this kind of gameplay just makes me think about the Lavos ragequit post (Btw, Lavos decided to play top level HEARTHSTONE afterwards, before quitting that as well). 3°: Bland design, because random keyword soup is not really that exciting of a prospect when only gaining up to 3 per round, nor it feels like you’re building to something due to those being lost on round end. Considering Xolaani did the whole token sacrifice much better, the husk idea is not something that should be acceptable. Not gonna lie, it was as frustrating as boring to write about her.

F tier or lower

F tier
Bard: 4 mana Garnet that passively creates 3 chimes on the deck randomly after turn 3, and applies chimes from hand to the board if leveled up with +20 on stats; you can add his package of boons for him, which also includes Norra's Package. (Rant incoming): As Rarran said "This is so toxic" and he is a guy who thinks SHUDDERWOCK, one of the most degenerate and toxic HS cards ever released, is well designed. There's a long list of reasons why he's just an awful design.

1. Uncontrollable RNG; As a reminder, they declared that kind of RNG WOULD NOT be released to the game, yet here it is, and is applied in a way of winning or losing depending where and when the chimes land.
2. Bland RNG. Played optimally is just random +1+1 handbuff, nothing crazy or exciting; no, the thousands of stats is not Bard, is Maduli, a better designed meme card. Real Bard is just bland beatstick, and that comes from a M5 Poppy that loves Demacia's beatstick plan, but I want that big board to be earned, like a "FOR DEMACIA!" or acceleration portal in a wide board, Protecting Poppy so she can level up, coordinating hallowed attacks with a Gwen to overwhelm the opponent, putting barrier on my best units or reversing the tempo lost with Deep, not a passive outcome like chimes.
3. Passive bonus. They are busted unless it has a very hefty cost, like being forced to only have shadow spells and a 5 mana 56 if you want shadow form as hero power, or... honestly, it's the only one I can think of as remotely balanced, because the other ones were definitely overcentralizing or not passive. Bard does not demand a lot, just that you must use its and a second region in a game where most regions are surprisingly self-sufficient and 2 of the cards of his region are amazing anyways... that could improve with rotation though.
4. Patches the pirate syndrome, also known as Garnets. Those are cards which frustrates you when drawing but have to play in order to win; Bard is definitely a garnet in that sense, you don't want to draw it and even at level 2 it's not amazing. The issue is that those kind of cards makes you dredge the bad luck that will inevitably happen, which is an anxiety-inducing experience who goes against the spirit of this genre of wishing the perfect draw in a clutch moment, the opposite of drawing Bard.

Overall, Bard is a bad as a meme and a bad competitive card because is random and it doesn’t go crazy (again, that’s Maduli). “Tip 15°: Design the component for the audience is intent for”. You can’t just be on an awkward middle point when doing something crazy because otherwise you will please next to no one, you either embrace random to its fullest or reject it, not doing a modern Disney.
G Tier
Ryze: 4 mana Champion who creates on game start, summon or round start 2 Delve to the past, a 2 mana burst spell who can search rune fragments, 2 mana landmarks who each do their unique thing to help to stabilize on play, when you play another rune fragment or when you attack with Ryze, whether is an on-demand stun, mana refill, an unit removal, a heal or card draw; Ryze gains spellshield if you managed to play 3 runes due to level 2, and if all 5 are in the board and Ryze attacks, he wins. He can also put non-targeting burst or focus spells on the deck.
(Rant incoming) Sigh... Where do I even begin? This is the worst designed card IN THE ENTIRE GAME, and I say it knowing that Ezreal, Irelia, Convergent timelines, OG Bandle Tree and Back alley Bar exist. Why? Because it's the singular most polarizing champion because his deck designed to be the LEAST INTERACTIVE POSSIBLE. It just does next to nothing to stop aggro since it lacks actual interaction due to the champion origin, and the secondary region he usually goes with is Ionia of all places (No, deny IS NOT INTERACTIVE, is literally denying opposing interaction so you can play solitaire), and it can't be really interacted on to stop it if you play most control or slow midrange lists because it has a clear timer and landmark removal is very limited, basically creating scenarios where unless is the mirror or another combo deck, one of the two players can surrender if you see him and save time because the outcome is incredibly predictable. And for some reason THEY BUFF HIM TO BE VIABLE. I just can’t endure his mere existence and how they though it was good idea to make him good, because he is to Legends of Runaterra what Companion is to Magic, what Yuumi is to LoL, a massive disaster.

A lurking problem

Because I need this to prove a point
Average: A numeric representation of the average quality of the set. The scores are looked like X/5, which might make them see them very low, but is just me being demanding of the A and especially S tiers.
Median: The quality of the normal champion. It's not very reliable on polarized data, although neither is average on small data.
Variance: How varied the quality is. It usually represents how risky their design philosophy at the time was.

Set	Average	Median	Variance; V/A	Best	Worst
Foundations/Beta	1.875	1.750	1.276; 0.681	Elise (S-)	Ezreal (F)
Rising Tides	2.636	2.500	2.504; 0.950	Gangplank (S)	Lee Sin (F)
Call of the Mountain	2.643	2.583	1.079; 0.408	Aurelion Sol (S-)	Tahm Kench (D-)
Post-beta 2020	2.625	2.500	1.734; 0.660	*	*
Empire of the ascended	2.000	1.833	1.529; 0.763	Taliyah /Kindred (A+)	Irelia (F)
Beyond the Bandlewood	2.139	2.125	1.578; 0.738	Jayce (S)	Nami (F)
2021	2.141	2.083	1.676; 0.783	*	*
Worldwalker	1.929	2.000	2.102; 1.090	Annie (S-)	Bard (F)
Darkin Saga	1.500	1.667	0.455; 0.303	Aatrox (B-)	Ryze (G)
Darkins	2.400	2.500	0.940; 0.392	Joraal (A+)	Naganeka/ Ibaaros (D)
2022	1.682	1.750	1.050; 0.608	*	*

Here we can see a lot, even though is from my perspective. Call of the Mountain and Rising tides have the overall highest quality, how the latter plays significantly riskier, how the quality varies so much on the worldwalker set and how the worst darkins are not terrible, just bad but fixable. Then there’s Darkin Saga has the lowest champion quality in multiple senses, alongside the lowest variance; those are honestly TERRIBLE numbers for the longevity of a game because being mediocre and uninspired is a gaming sin.
Foundations, for your reminder, has an average of 1.875 with a variance of 1.276, which I said it was mediocre but justified developers needing time to reach its full potential. I often say "You know things are bad when a game is worse than its original release”; I would say the darkin Saga is worse than 3 years ago in every single parameter and not by a small margin. Do you remember the LoR exodus? While they said it wouldn't affect PvP, I honestly think that's just to calm down the community, because is clear the lack of personal caused some damage to the design... Although that's more of an optimistic scenario, because if it was not then is clear there's a huge misunderstanding of what made LoR great back in 2020. Either way, the result is this, the darkin set fails due to overly safe designs and wheelchairs in a game who is supposed to make plays naturally risky due to the interaction dance, in an old YGO anime fashion where you know when is won because someone activated the opponent's mother, and when it's not overly safe or bland is something like Ryze.

Conclusion

I have been thinking about that video made by the Ukrainian bots, and although they're prone to create biased data to impose their vision of the game, they also explained with numbers and everything that two card games were destined to die if the situation didn't change: Gwent and LEGENDS OF RUNATERRA. The former has already entered maintenance mode due to bad management, low real market and being too generous; the latter is still receiving content but has a rentability problem for very similar reasons to Gwent. I sadly have to agree with them: The LoR project is no longer self-sustainable, lots of LoR related websites are collapsing, the subreddit is a third of the size when I joined and with the mixed (and selfish) reaction of rotation, the next set might be the nail in the coffin, the first real failure of Riot after hits in League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, Valorant and kinda Wild Rift (Pokémon Unite exists). Doing these champions reviews also made me realize how BAD AND AVOIDABLE a lot of the design choices are, and how amazing design in the Rising Tides and Call of the Mountain is by comparison.
Is just... frustrating, specially knowing what they did with Annie due to coordinated teamwork, and honestly that has been my relationship with Riot since pre-S8 with the runes, "reworks", overloaded champions, Varus erase... I could be here for hours about how terrible that year was bar Odyssey and Nunu&Willump, and it was just constant frustration until my rage collapsed on pre S10 due to Aphelios, removal of winter rift, Yuumi, etc. Give them a chance for some reason but then the ruination event. I wish they knew about the importance of soft numbers. Back to topic, I though LoR would get safe from their influence, and admittedly it was, but I was naive, because as a League of Legends spin-off of course you will be hurt by LoL mismanagement...
This was supposed to be released in January, yet here we are in March, days before the rotation. You know why? Because All this time instead of ending this post I kept going back to complete Shovel Knight or Bug Fables. Almost everything in Shovel Knight is compelling in a retro way where almost all of those issues that come from that simplicity are intentional to sell the late 80's vibes; Bug Fables on the other hand is a love letter who aims to capture and expand the strongest points of Paper Mario and TTYD, even though it's not without faults. What I'm going is that those games have a huge heart behind and were a passion project, like Hollow Knight, Paper Mario, Hades, Cuphead, Kirby, Stardew Valley or Link's Awakening. How does LoR stand there? Well, it also has lot of traces of a passion project, but sadly LoR's hearth is right now feels captive by decisions of Riot, which is a shame, because I KNOW there’s a lot of care, but it seems that is also not reaching where it could.
Sadly, making this series of posts about this year in specific made me realize something: I NO LONGER LIKE LEGENDS OF RUNATERRA, despite me wanting to. This is honestly a first time for me, since normally when I analyze games I either understand why I felt in certain way about the game or found a big appreciation about its design. Even in my previous worst case, Skyward sword, I still like that game because of genuine strengths, even though I now recognize the game makes a lot of questionable choices. In Legends of Runaterra though I think my gripes are a mix of stale gameplay, deterioration of the game I found comparing champions of Rising Tides and Call of the Mountain to the Darkin saga, and just how the lore this game heavily relies on is being mishandled. It's what happened with League of Legends all over again of a game being slowly ruined by poor decisions, and makes sense, both are from Riot. I’ll wait until the rotating cards get announced to determine if I will stay or not, because stale gameplay is a complain of mine, but what I want the most is know WHAT THE GAME WANTS TO BE, because again, if you try to please everyone you will please no one.
Farewell, because I don't think I'm going back. Sadly, I guess my time has come... Also, I was quite meme-y; I guess it was to alleviate the sadness and rage this post made me feel.

TLDR: So far I will be waiting until after launch to see what state the game is in before I purchase, especially since they want top dollar for a game I feel is not ready for release as is. It just doesn't feel "fun" to play, beyond wanting to experience the storyline of Diablo. The character building and item hunt so far feels weak, and the lack of randomization in dungeons really hurts for replayability.
These are my notes that I took while playing the game, which I then expanded upon after the Beta closed. I played as a Druid, up to Level 25. I only went through the main questline up to the first major town, only so that I can experience the story if and when I pick up the game later. I was looking at the gameplay aspects, rather than story critiques. The story, while great to experience, is not something that the average person who picks up the game is going to play through more than once or twice, and it is not likely to change at all. The gameplay is what is going to keep the person playing once they have finished the story.
​
Opening, Story and General notes:
It would have been nice to pause the opening cinematic, as I got a phone call in the middle, and couldn't pay attention to it fully.
Campfire screen excellent, the character creation screen is excellent. Both of these are vast improvements over Diablo 3, and bring nostalgia towards D2.
The larger Stash size is great. I would like to see stackable Gems, or a separate tab for gems, much like the ingredients tab would be nice.
The only thing I will say about the story presentation is there is a lot of pausing of gameplay to listen to what is happening. I am hoping that on repeated playthroughs with new characters, There is a way to bypass this completely if you do not want to listen to the story again and again.
Potions/gems are a little out of place, size and coloring. Just feel disjointed from the rest of the vibe the game is giving off.
Boss fights locking you into an “arena” was very “gamey” feeling, and took away from the atmosphere quite a bit.
The potion play felt okay, but gimmicky and arcadey, rather than being fun and adding to gameplay much. Potions would actually feel better if they were on a timer and unlimited, rather than the current system of when you run out, you're screwed, so to speak.
I like the “New Stock Delivery” timer for merchants.
There did seem to be a lot of new merchant options, which was both good and bad. It meant there was a lot more variety in what to do (as well as splitting up other players within the town, so everyone wasn’t grouped there), but it also meant a lot of running around within town doing downtime activities after battles. As well, keeping players ungrouped around different vendors really was dismissed when it came to the Wardrobe and Stash.
“Zzzzz” above afk characters is a nice touch, petting the dog, little things like this help add to the gameplay experience.
Tabbing to larger map was annoying to find where I was going. I would like to see a transparent overlay toggle for the map, so it doesn’t interrupt the flow of the game.
Having “Locked Door” feels silly, when you bust other doors down. It removes you from the immersiveness of the game. This goes for the fetch quests in the dungeons as well.
If you grabbed the Chapel Key before speaking to the priest, it would have been nice to see the dialogue change. “This Key?” Just having some dialogue relating to events that your character has completed shows that the game acknowledges your character there. This would be a nice touch.
Having your character speak some dialogue to NPCs, but not other dialogue makes for a very disjointed feel, especially when there are such pains taken to make your character feel central to the story, and involved in it.
Secret Doors, or secret things in general? If there were, great, but it would have been nice to see some if there weren’t. I did not find any such secrets in the game as I played. Hopefully there are in the finished version.
The UI in the game is very clumsy, and overall ugly, from the button tips underneath your hotbar, to the Map not being toggleable or having an overlay option, to the general layout of your character screen, and multiple font styles used in the game. Hopefully this is fixed in the future. I do miss the original Diablo Font as well.
The Shrines seemed to where off too quickly for my liking. It would have been nice if they were longer effects. Maybe a tweak that you could keep them going as long as you satisfied some requirement? You could even change up the requirements depending on the skill. The Gold Shrine? As long as you keep picking up gold, it would last longer. Increased Damage? The more monsters you kill, the longer it lasts. Etc. Anything to changeup the gameplay a bit would be nice, and temporary effects that change how you interact with the game for short bursts really are excellent. The Treasure Goblins are one such feature that really helps this, and I think Shrines could very well do the same thing. The keys are making sure to emphasize the core of the game: killing monsters, and being in short bursts that you control, so you can choose whether to interact with them or not.
​
Overworld
The overworld map looks nice. The one thing I didn’t really care for was the blue location circles that would show up to direct you to a quest location. I think it would be better served to simply highlight the whole region the quest was located, rather than the much smaller circle within that region. This would give more emphasis to exploring. You could even have the target location change randomly for some quests within that region as a result, so things aren’t always in the same spot, helping for replayability.
Being a “forced-mmo feel” didn’t sit right with me. I would rather it adopt the Guild Wars approach, where the cities were where people were, and the overworld was more instanced for you/your party/clan, but that ship has sailed long ago. I will say, having randoms show up as I was playing did not add anything to the play experience, and more often than not detracted, as I would run through areas without any monsters to kill as there were people killing them before I got there. This could also work with the Stash and Wardrobe areas which just felt glutted up with people. Have a separate loaded area where you can go to get to these quickly that isn’t accessed by the world at large.
The level scaling as a result really detracted from the experience as you never felt like you were gaining power when you leveled up. One small change that could help a bit is to not show a player’s level above their head, so you don’t know if it is a level 3 character beside you or a level 25 character. It would just have their name, and would lead to less immersion-breaking thoughts such as “Why is this low level character killing the mobs just as fast as me?”
The many different loot containers was nice to see, but also very annoying, in that you had to click on them in order to get what was inside. I would have liked to see more of them be affected by attacks going on around you, so that being destroyed by accident would still yield what you were looking for. This way people can concentrate on monster killing, instead of also having to run around and farm resources/open barrels as separate actions.
I would have liked to see more exploration rewards, whether that be secret dungeons not on the map, or more treasure chests in odd corners. The Altars of Lilith are nice, but once you have found them, there’s no reason to hunt more.
I was disappointed to see only 5 classes in this game, and all 5 being "old" classes. I would have liked to see all of the previous old classes represented as options, or else seeing a couple of new classes. I know that we will be getting new ones in the future, however it was still disappointing to see how few there were to choose from at launch.
​
Monsters
I liked the shielded skeletons/tough monsters having a blue bar rather than glowing shields.
The return of the Fallen, and other such mobs, was nice, especially with the new Fiery Fallen showing up to spice things up. Maybe have Shamans turn normal fallen into Fiery Fallen? Just an example of having old mobs appearing, but having different gameplay elements to them.
Tougher boss mobs were a little hard to differentiate from regular monsters. I would regularly run into a pack of monsters and then go “Oh, these are a bit tougher than normal, there must be a tough one here” Rather than be able to see ahead of time that there was a tough monster with minions to watch out for.
I think the circular patterns of soon to happen effects (like bombs/explosions) would be nicer if they weren’t so exact and regular. It feels too “gamey” for the world. Again, a disconnect. And again, the out of place “spinning laser” of D3 makes an appearance here (amongst other gamey effects). It just feels so wrong.
I loved the return of Treasure Goblins. They are one of the few new inclusions from D3 that I really like to see return. Chasing and killing these really adds to the gameplay, along with giving you a reward for doing so. Everything in the game should “feel” like this, an action you want to take despite the danger it may get you into, and a reward for doing so.
First boss was “alright”, if underwhelming; the pattern of attacks was far too predictable. It would have been nice to see a little changeup in attacks. And the dropping of health potions was a bit too predictable as well.
The overall density I did not have a problem with, as long as if you go to higher difficulties, the density grows with it, and not just mob damage/health.
​
Things that I would like to see changed
Being locked to only 4 hotbar skills, and not being able to use the scrollwheel to set different attacks on my mouse click felt bad. I would have liked to have more options with which to attack with, especially since the generate spirit/spend spirit combo felt so bland after a short time. It would have been nice to swap to Rabies, or even the ultimate for a quick shot in between attacks, but since using the keyboard for using attacks feels so clumsy, and I don't want to have so many timer skills on the bar, I simply never used them, opting for the pets there to give a slight buff while playing. I cannot stress enough how terrible the action economy felt while playing, and the 4 skill hotbar was a big part of it.
Having your core skill be your only option for attack that never really changes, and you use it for the entire game really feels lackluster. Imagine a world where you can either change your “resource generator” while playing the game (via a hotkey or something) on the fly and a way to customize said skill to do different things. That would make it a bit more interesting.
Skills bonuses themselves were fine, but really didn't feel impactful, simply being slight buffs to the main skill, same as the passives. Those incremental bonuses don't feel good at all to have to choose. And having only a couple of options to choose from for any given build really didn't add anything. I would like my Werewolf to be able to play differently from someone else's Werewolf, but the way the skills are, it just doesn't feel like they will.
The arcadey trapped in a small round/square arena got real old, really fast. My melee oriented Druid felt particularly bad. The boss fights, while some moment-to-moment gameplay felt interesting, overall just felt bad in the end, also because all of them are the same. There was no real variety in the arenas themselves, whether that be environmental concerns, size, shape, verticality, solve-this-puzzle-before-you-can-do-damage-style arenas, they were all just a closed box, kite the monster. Rinse and repeat.
Items are too over-engineered. Whites are useless, Blues are useless, Yellows become useless quickly. All that matters is Legendaries. This is poor game design. Not to mention the way the “wall of text” really makes you zone out on some items. Items should all have “some” use in the game, not just be a placeholder until you get a better item. An aside is regarding upcoming “set” items. I hope there is an option to “build-your-own” set, rather than collect premade ones. An example would be to collect blueprints for a set, put items of your choice into the blueprints, and then you get to create and name a set of your design. I would like to run around using a set that I build, “Jaroh’s Vestments” rather than hunt down the pieces for “Tal-Rasha’s Vestments” for example. The same could be used with a Legendary item that you have built to have the option to turn it into a Unique based on your character.
Another issue I have with items is how character-tied the items are. One thing I really liked about the older games is you could have off the wall builds for playing the game. You wanted a Scythe Wielding Sorceress? Sure. A Barbarian that uses a Bow? Why not? Leaning into unique items for character classes is a bad decision, in my opinion. What if those class specific items gave other classes access to abilities they couldn’t use? Running around with a Rogue that has a point in Wolf Companions because she is carrying a Druid totem in her off hand? Hell, this could be expanded to normal items as well for the Aspect hunting, a way to get you skills that you otherwise wouldn’t have, to open up build variety.
I think the current timer system of many skills just leads to feel-bad play. This is where expanding a stamina system would be much better instead, and feel less “gamey”. Imagine where you could use your skills based on how much stamina you had, and you had to wait for a stamina bar to recharge to use them again. Then you could hunt for items that affected your stamina pool/recharge rate/skill use percentage instead. This could allow you to have builds that rely on using your higher cooldown skills more often, or even as your main skill, depending on your Stamina stat, rather than having to push a button once and then rely on your main attack until it recharges. One thing that really felt bad for me in particular was the Companion Skills having to be on my hotbar. What if the skills gave you the companions as a Passive, and if you had them on your hotbar they could do something else? This way I can choose to have companions if I want, but also use other attacks I might be more interested in. This was just part of being so limited in the skills I was allowed to use for the game, and made me less interested in using the ones with larger timers at all.
This is also an issue of not having choose-able stats to some degree. Not being able to play a Throwing/Ranged Barbarian or a Shout Barbarian, or a Melee Sorcerer, or any other such “odd” build on a class is thrown out the window. Even with the skills we are given access to, not being able to choose my stats doesn’t let me help out my gameplay issues with Spirit spenders/Regenerators for example. If I was able to put points into my Spirit stat, I would be able to use that skill more often, if that was the skill I wanted to focus on.
The lack of randomization in the game is staggeringly bad. From every Cellar being a one floor dungeon with the same basic layout, to every Dungeon being pretty much identical as well, to every event that you find having the exact same layout and play progression every time you run into them, to every boss battle taking place in a small, locked in arena...all of it is bad. Sure, the “look pretty”, but that will get old quickly. Where are the randomized dungeon layouts? Secret doorways? How about randomized amounts of floors? How about having events have different triggers or even just basic layouts for some of them? (An example of this is the Blood Pillars, where you have to stand on a glowing circle for X time and then move to the next one, until they are all done, then kill the monsters. Why are they always with the same orientation? It would be nice to get some variation in these events so that when you run into these little events, they all feel a bit different from each other?). When the endgame is “running dungeons”, why are they all the same, with a few minor variations?
I think leaning into the randomization more would help a lot with the game. Have a “pool of attacks” that a boss can draw from randomly, so when you run into a boss, you have to identify his play pattern and formulate your attack/defense style would be nice. This way you aren’t looking for the exact same attacks every time. This is important when you fight the same boss monsters multiple times. This can be expanded upon as you fight higher difficulties, the bosses get more attacks to choose from each time. For an easy to understand example, let’s say a boss on “normal difficulty” has 9 attacks to draw from, and the game randomly sets 3 of them as the ones it will use for a given fight. Then on each progressive difficulty, they can add 1 or 2 attacks, making the fight more difficult to read. This can be helped by attacks that have similar “tells”, but different outcomes, and only careful observation will tell you which one the boss is about to take. This would allow for more interesting boss fights, where potion management as well as when to use your dodge will actually matter. It would also help if melee characters had some sort of “interrupt” or “parry/block” so they can mitigate some attacks that a boss may do, rather than have to rely on a dodge roll that has a timer on it (which could be relegated again into a stamina system instead) to dodge one attack, but have to face-tank the rest until the timer recharges.
​
The Little Things I miss that I would love to see return:
In D1, the thing I really enjoyed about the monsters were the little bits of extra information that you would get as you killed more of them. This was a nice touch that I would love to see return in some capacity.
I loved the notes you would pick up while playing D3 that were about the monsters. Listening while playing was the best part, as I did not need to stop killing monsters to hear the lore.
Any sort of stat screen showing what you have done in the world would be nice to see, from individual monsters killed (how many Fallen have died by my hand), to how many Legendaries you have found, to how many Dungeons you have cleared, etc. More stats are great to see.
The ability for any class to use any item. This to me is a pretty big loss, and I hope to see it return.
I am hoping to see the return of certain items in some capacity in the future, or expansion of some items. Gems are a big one. No new ones with fancy new effects? Jewels were a nice inclusion. I both liked and disliked Charms. I hope they come back, but I also hope they have either a dedicated set of slots in the bag, or even a limitation of you can have 1 Big, 1 Medium and 1 Small for example, and just have a much larger effect on the game than the originals did. They got out of hand fast with being in your inventory, and they detracted from the gameplay experience because of it.
Runes, only changed so that they don't create "must run" items. I would honestly be fine with Runes without Runewords, or if there are Runewords, have them not create such important Uniques from them. A Runeword on top of whatever Legendary you have would be better, rather than it replacing it.
I miss the randomized dungeon layouts.
​
The things I expect them to actually fix:
The Subtitles weren’t lining up with the opening cinematic and stayed on the screen for too long after the words were spoken.
Respawned after a death, and was invisible for a time, until I interacted with a wall to climb down.
Random glitch during gameplay cutscenes where the NPC would finish a sentence, and nothing would happen until I clicked to skip ahead, then it would continue as normal.
Randomly when zoning or coming out of a cutscene, the screen would zoom into my character, as if I had used the scroll wheel.
Sometimes when killing enemies, they would get frozen in an upright attack or standing animation instead of falling to the ground.
Some stuttering with sound and music during play, freezing on the animations; expect it to be server load issues.

TLDR: So far I will be waiting until after launch to see what state the game is in before I purchase, especially since they want top dollar for a game I feel is not ready for release as is. It just doesn't feel "fun" to play, beyond wanting to experience the storyline of Diablo. The character building and item hunt so far feels weak, and the lack of randomization in dungeons really hurts for replayability.
These are my notes that I took while playing the game, which I then expanded upon after the Beta closed. I played as a Druid, up to Level 25. I only went through the main questline up to the first major town, only so that I can experience the story if and when I pick up the game later. I was looking at the gameplay aspects, rather than story critiques. The story, while great to experience, is not something that the average person who picks up the game is going to play through more than once or twice, and it is not likely to change at all. The gameplay is what is going to keep the person playing once they have finished the story.
​
Opening, Story and General notes:
It would have been nice to pause the opening cinematic, as I got a phone call in the middle, and couldn't pay attention to it fully.
Campfire screen excellent, the character creation screen is excellent. Both of these are vast improvements over Diablo 3, and bring nostalgia towards D2.
The larger Stash size is great. I would like to see stackable Gems, or a separate tab for gems, much like the ingredients tab would be nice.
The only thing I will say about the story presentation is there is a lot of pausing of gameplay to listen to what is happening. I am hoping that on repeated playthroughs with new characters, There is a way to bypass this completely if you do not want to listen to the story again and again.
Potions/gems are a little out of place, size and coloring. Just feel disjointed from the rest of the vibe the game is giving off.
Boss fights locking you into an “arena” was very “gamey” feeling, and took away from the atmosphere quite a bit.
The potion play felt okay, but gimmicky and arcadey, rather than being fun and adding to gameplay much. Potions would actually feel better if they were on a timer and unlimited, rather than the current system of when you run out, you're screwed, so to speak.
I like the “New Stock Delivery” timer for merchants.
There did seem to be a lot of new merchant options, which was both good and bad. It meant there was a lot more variety in what to do (as well as splitting up other players within the town, so everyone wasn’t grouped there), but it also meant a lot of running around within town doing downtime activities after battles. As well, keeping players ungrouped around different vendors really was dismissed when it came to the Wardrobe and Stash.
“Zzzzz” above afk characters is a nice touch, petting the dog, little things like this help add to the gameplay experience.
Tabbing to larger map was annoying to find where I was going. I would like to see a transparent overlay toggle for the map, so it doesn’t interrupt the flow of the game.
Having “Locked Door” feels silly, when you bust other doors down. It removes you from the immersiveness of the game. This goes for the fetch quests in the dungeons as well.
If you grabbed the Chapel Key before speaking to the priest, it would have been nice to see the dialogue change. “This Key?” Just having some dialogue relating to events that your character has completed shows that the game acknowledges your character there. This would be a nice touch.
Having your character speak some dialogue to NPCs, but not other dialogue makes for a very disjointed feel, especially when there are such pains taken to make your character feel central to the story, and involved in it.
Secret Doors, or secret things in general? If there were, great, but it would have been nice to see some if there weren’t. I did not find any such secrets in the game as I played. Hopefully there are in the finished version.
The UI in the game is very clumsy, and overall ugly, from the button tips underneath your hotbar, to the Map not being toggleable or having an overlay option, to the general layout of your character screen, and multiple font styles used in the game. Hopefully this is fixed in the future. I do miss the original Diablo Font as well.
The Shrines seemed to where off too quickly for my liking. It would have been nice if they were longer effects. Maybe a tweak that you could keep them going as long as you satisfied some requirement? You could even change up the requirements depending on the skill. The Gold Shrine? As long as you keep picking up gold, it would last longer. Increased Damage? The more monsters you kill, the longer it lasts. Etc. Anything to changeup the gameplay a bit would be nice, and temporary effects that change how you interact with the game for short bursts really are excellent. The Treasure Goblins are one such feature that really helps this, and I think Shrines could very well do the same thing. The keys are making sure to emphasize the core of the game: killing monsters, and being in short bursts that you control, so you can choose whether to interact with them or not.
​
Overworld
The overworld map looks nice. The one thing I didn’t really care for was the blue location circles that would show up to direct you to a quest location. I think it would be better served to simply highlight the whole region the quest was located, rather than the much smaller circle within that region. This would give more emphasis to exploring. You could even have the target location change randomly for some quests within that region as a result, so things aren’t always in the same spot, helping for replayability.
Being a “forced-mmo feel” didn’t sit right with me. I would rather it adopt the Guild Wars approach, where the cities were where people were, and the overworld was more instanced for you/your party/clan, but that ship has sailed long ago. I will say, having randoms show up as I was playing did not add anything to the play experience, and more often than not detracted, as I would run through areas without any monsters to kill as there were people killing them before I got there. This could also work with the Stash and Wardrobe areas which just felt glutted up with people. Have a separate loaded area where you can go to get to these quickly that isn’t accessed by the world at large.
The level scaling as a result really detracted from the experience as you never felt like you were gaining power when you leveled up. One small change that could help a bit is to not show a player’s level above their head, so you don’t know if it is a level 3 character beside you or a level 25 character. It would just have their name, and would lead to less immersion-breaking thoughts such as “Why is this low level character killing the mobs just as fast as me?”
The many different loot containers was nice to see, but also very annoying, in that you had to click on them in order to get what was inside. I would have liked to see more of them be affected by attacks going on around you, so that being destroyed by accident would still yield what you were looking for. This way people can concentrate on monster killing, instead of also having to run around and farm resources/open barrels as separate actions.
I would have liked to see more exploration rewards, whether that be secret dungeons not on the map, or more treasure chests in odd corners. The Altars of Lilith are nice, but once you have found them, there’s no reason to hunt more.
I was disappointed to see only 5 classes in this game, and all 5 being "old" classes. I would have liked to see all of the previous old classes represented as options, or else seeing a couple of new classes. I know that we will be getting new ones in the future, however it was still disappointing to see how few there were to choose from at launch.
​
Monsters
I liked the shielded skeletons/tough monsters having a blue bar rather than glowing shields.
The return of the Fallen, and other such mobs, was nice, especially with the new Fiery Fallen showing up to spice things up. Maybe have Shamans turn normal fallen into Fiery Fallen? Just an example of having old mobs appearing, but having different gameplay elements to them.
Tougher boss mobs were a little hard to differentiate from regular monsters. I would regularly run into a pack of monsters and then go “Oh, these are a bit tougher than normal, there must be a tough one here” Rather than be able to see ahead of time that there was a tough monster with minions to watch out for.
I think the circular patterns of soon to happen effects (like bombs/explosions) would be nicer if they weren’t so exact and regular. It feels too “gamey” for the world. Again, a disconnect. And again, the out of place “spinning laser” of D3 makes an appearance here (amongst other gamey effects). It just feels so wrong.
I loved the return of Treasure Goblins. They are one of the few new inclusions from D3 that I really like to see return. Chasing and killing these really adds to the gameplay, along with giving you a reward for doing so. Everything in the game should “feel” like this, an action you want to take despite the danger it may get you into, and a reward for doing so.
First boss was “alright”, if underwhelming; the pattern of attacks was far too predictable. It would have been nice to see a little changeup in attacks. And the dropping of health potions was a bit too predictable as well.
The overall density I did not have a problem with, as long as if you go to higher difficulties, the density grows with it, and not just mob damage/health.
​
Things that I would like to see changed
Being locked to only 4 hotbar skills, and not being able to use the scrollwheel to set different attacks on my mouse click felt bad. I would have liked to have more options with which to attack with, especially since the generate spirit/spend spirit combo felt so bland after a short time. It would have been nice to swap to Rabies, or even the ultimate for a quick shot in between attacks, but since using the keyboard for using attacks feels so clumsy, and I don't want to have so many timer skills on the bar, I simply never used them, opting for the pets there to give a slight buff while playing. I cannot stress enough how terrible the action economy felt while playing, and the 4 skill hotbar was a big part of it.
Having your core skill be your only option for attack that never really changes, and you use it for the entire game really feels lackluster. Imagine a world where you can either change your “resource generator” while playing the game (via a hotkey or something) on the fly and a way to customize said skill to do different things. That would make it a bit more interesting.
Skills bonuses themselves were fine, but really didn't feel impactful, simply being slight buffs to the main skill, same as the passives. Those incremental bonuses don't feel good at all to have to choose. And having only a couple of options to choose from for any given build really didn't add anything. I would like my Werewolf to be able to play differently from someone else's Werewolf, but the way the skills are, it just doesn't feel like they will.
The arcadey trapped in a small round/square arena got real old, really fast. My melee oriented Druid felt particularly bad. The boss fights, while some moment-to-moment gameplay felt interesting, overall just felt bad in the end, also because all of them are the same. There was no real variety in the arenas themselves, whether that be environmental concerns, size, shape, verticality, solve-this-puzzle-before-you-can-do-damage-style arenas, they were all just a closed box, kite the monster. Rinse and repeat.
Items are too over-engineered. Whites are useless, Blues are useless, Yellows become useless quickly. All that matters is Legendaries. This is poor game design. Not to mention the way the “wall of text” really makes you zone out on some items. Items should all have “some” use in the game, not just be a placeholder until you get a better item. An aside is regarding upcoming “set” items. I hope there is an option to “build-your-own” set, rather than collect premade ones. An example would be to collect blueprints for a set, put items of your choice into the blueprints, and then you get to create and name a set of your design. I would like to run around using a set that I build, “Jaroh’s Vestments” rather than hunt down the pieces for “Tal-Rasha’s Vestments” for example. The same could be used with a Legendary item that you have built to have the option to turn it into a Unique based on your character.
Another issue I have with items is how character-tied the items are. One thing I really liked about the older games is you could have off the wall builds for playing the game. You wanted a Scythe Wielding Sorceress? Sure. A Barbarian that uses a Bow? Why not? Leaning into unique items for character classes is a bad decision, in my opinion. What if those class specific items gave other classes access to abilities they couldn’t use? Running around with a Rogue that has a point in Wolf Companions because she is carrying a Druid totem in her off hand? Hell, this could be expanded to normal items as well for the Aspect hunting, a way to get you skills that you otherwise wouldn’t have, to open up build variety.
I think the current timer system of many skills just leads to feel-bad play. This is where expanding a stamina system would be much better instead, and feel less “gamey”. Imagine where you could use your skills based on how much stamina you had, and you had to wait for a stamina bar to recharge to use them again. Then you could hunt for items that affected your stamina pool/recharge rate/skill use percentage instead. This could allow you to have builds that rely on using your higher cooldown skills more often, or even as your main skill, depending on your Stamina stat, rather than having to push a button once and then rely on your main attack until it recharges. One thing that really felt bad for me in particular was the Companion Skills having to be on my hotbar. What if the skills gave you the companions as a Passive, and if you had them on your hotbar they could do something else? This way I can choose to have companions if I want, but also use other attacks I might be more interested in. This was just part of being so limited in the skills I was allowed to use for the game, and made me less interested in using the ones with larger timers at all.
This is also an issue of not having choose-able stats to some degree. Not being able to play a Throwing/Ranged Barbarian or a Shout Barbarian, or a Melee Sorcerer, or any other such “odd” build on a class is thrown out the window. Even with the skills we are given access to, not being able to choose my stats doesn’t let me help out my gameplay issues with Spirit spenders/Regenerators for example. If I was able to put points into my Spirit stat, I would be able to use that skill more often, if that was the skill I wanted to focus on.
The lack of randomization in the game is staggeringly bad. From every Cellar being a one floor dungeon with the same basic layout, to every Dungeon being pretty much identical as well, to every event that you find having the exact same layout and play progression every time you run into them, to every boss battle taking place in a small, locked in arena...all of it is bad. Sure, the “look pretty”, but that will get old quickly. Where are the randomized dungeon layouts? Secret doorways? How about randomized amounts of floors? How about having events have different triggers or even just basic layouts for some of them? (An example of this is the Blood Pillars, where you have to stand on a glowing circle for X time and then move to the next one, until they are all done, then kill the monsters. Why are they always with the same orientation? It would be nice to get some variation in these events so that when you run into these little events, they all feel a bit different from each other?). When the endgame is “running dungeons”, why are they all the same, with a few minor variations?
I think leaning into the randomization more would help a lot with the game. Have a “pool of attacks” that a boss can draw from randomly, so when you run into a boss, you have to identify his play pattern and formulate your attack/defense style would be nice. This way you aren’t looking for the exact same attacks every time. This is important when you fight the same boss monsters multiple times. This can be expanded upon as you fight higher difficulties, the bosses get more attacks to choose from each time. For an easy to understand example, let’s say a boss on “normal difficulty” has 9 attacks to draw from, and the game randomly sets 3 of them as the ones it will use for a given fight. Then on each progressive difficulty, they can add 1 or 2 attacks, making the fight more difficult to read. This can be helped by attacks that have similar “tells”, but different outcomes, and only careful observation will tell you which one the boss is about to take. This would allow for more interesting boss fights, where potion management as well as when to use your dodge will actually matter. It would also help if melee characters had some sort of “interrupt” or “parry/block” so they can mitigate some attacks that a boss may do, rather than have to rely on a dodge roll that has a timer on it (which could be relegated again into a stamina system instead) to dodge one attack, but have to face-tank the rest until the timer recharges.
​
The Little Things I miss that I would love to see return:
In D1, the thing I really enjoyed about the monsters were the little bits of extra information that you would get as you killed more of them. This was a nice touch that I would love to see return in some capacity.
I loved the notes you would pick up while playing D3 that were about the monsters. Listening while playing was the best part, as I did not need to stop killing monsters to hear the lore.
Any sort of stat screen showing what you have done in the world would be nice to see, from individual monsters killed (how many Fallen have died by my hand), to how many Legendaries you have found, to how many Dungeons you have cleared, etc. More stats are great to see.
The ability for any class to use any item. This to me is a pretty big loss, and I hope to see it return.
I am hoping to see the return of certain items in some capacity in the future, or expansion of some items. Gems are a big one. No new ones with fancy new effects? Jewels were a nice inclusion. I both liked and disliked Charms. I hope they come back, but I also hope they have either a dedicated set of slots in the bag, or even a limitation of you can have 1 Big, 1 Medium and 1 Small for example, and just have a much larger effect on the game than the originals did. They got out of hand fast with being in your inventory, and they detracted from the gameplay experience because of it.
Runes, only changed so that they don't create "must run" items. I would honestly be fine with Runes without Runewords, or if there are Runewords, have them not create such important Uniques from them. A Runeword on top of whatever Legendary you have would be better, rather than it replacing it.
I miss the randomized dungeon layouts.
​
The things I expect them to actually fix:
The Subtitles weren’t lining up with the opening cinematic and stayed on the screen for too long after the words were spoken.
Respawned after a death, and was invisible for a time, until I interacted with a wall to climb down.
Random glitch during gameplay cutscenes where the NPC would finish a sentence, and nothing would happen until I clicked to skip ahead, then it would continue as normal.
Randomly when zoning or coming out of a cutscene, the screen would zoom into my character, as if I had used the scroll wheel.
Sometimes when killing enemies, they would get frozen in an upright attack or standing animation instead of falling to the ground.
Some stuttering with sound and music during play, freezing on the animations; expect it to be server load issues.

I mean NOTABLE worth, like some unique gear that's really good for example. I have access to all the towns now and I'm pretty much in endgame so anything barring the final boss is fine to spoil. I would very much like to know HOW to do the quest too, especially Partitio's scent of commerce ones. (those are the ones I want to do the most)

There are throw up puddles from where they tried to eat some airhead/peep gummies, so luckily I know that they did throw up a little. I just don’t know what to do, they’ve never escaped from their kennel before so we really didn’t expect this. The chocolate was consumed from eating kitkats, and one nature valley peanut buttedark chocolate protein bar. Some of the kitkats were thrown up, so These are estimates. Please help!

I found a fun way to use Quest Chips!
Make ground beef, turkey, or chicken with your favorite taco seasoning (We LOVE Mateos)
Portion out your protein, put it into a bowl, and add cauliflower rice if you like it, if not, skip to toppings
Add some sour cream, taco sauce (love Mateo’s) or salsa, little bit of cheese
Crush up a half bag to a whole bag of Quest Protein Chips (love Chili Lime)
Eat and enjoy!