Monsters and Bugs, Oh My... Happy Holidays!

Thanks to the almost continuous stream of complaints from players, Blizzard finally fixed the Fire Enchanted monster bug causing instant deaths. Those with Open characters will have to wait, however, until the next patch is released to have this implemented as the solution was introduced to the Realms only. There's no indication, however, how long it will be until the next patch.

There's little question that the "Stones of Jordan Sold to Merchant" message is a random counter not actually based on players selling their duped or legit Stones alike. Everyone's just happy to slay the Diablo Clone and get their hands on the lovely Annihilus charm. The frequency of clones spawning remains a mystery.

For this Mailbag, we asked you about the most difficult and annoying monsters you've encountered since version 1.10 was released, and the various bugs you've experienced. Most responses came from the latter category, though there are plenty of outside complaints on other monsters, such as Vampires and their fire-based attacks.

May everyone have a safe and fun holiday.

Now, onto the feedback from this past week!

From: Mike
Subject: Tomb doors glitch

It seems the tomb doors in Act II don't really matter when it comes to the baddies. They'll just up and walk THROUGH them while they're still closed, yet, being the lowly human, I have to open them first. Not exactly the one hit FE bug, but quirky anyway.

I haven't seen this problem myself, but I suspect it's a lag-related issue. Tomb doors seem to have latency issues with players opening and closing them, as they can look closed when actually open. If this occured in single-player, it would certainly be something to report to Blizzard.

From: John Ellsworth
Subject: monsters

the stygian dolls must have been thought up by a 12 year old kid. they are just doomsday machines for a palladin.there is no incentive to kill something that is going to explode and take 4/5 of your health just so the next 1 can finish you off when he explodes.even sanctuary wont hold them far enough back. they are way out of line in their damage.besides i havent seen any item in the game that says it protects from bone explosion. like i said any 12 year old could come up with a monster that kills you if you kill it

Stygian Dolls do far less damage in death than many higher-level monsters do normally. They're also conveniently placed in the final areas of Act Three, and seem to serve as preparation for dealing with the next Act's Vile Child monsters (Flesh Beast, Stygian Dog, Grotesque Wyrm). I'm not so sure if 12 year olds generally come up with monsters like hyper pygmy skeletons whose sole purpose is to gut and devour you in the name of their shamans and the Lord of Hatred.

From: modem1
Subject: least favorite bug

I'm playing a paladin through single player, and my least favorite is definatly when I have the paladin skill "Zeal" equiped (always have it on left click now that I have the mana), and a enemy gets frozen (the cold enchanted hirelings from act III for example), your swing usually comes up short. He stops before reaching the enemy and just swings, swings, swings and swings some more, only swinging once and never hitting because he's too far away, making me to have to click behind the enemy to get close enough, then attacking when I'm basically on him.

More discussion on Zeal bugs and other Paladin bugs can be found in the forums.

From:
Subject:

Before I discuss the subject matter i would suggest an effective build for paladins.Fanatism and zeal made my paladin a killing machine,Duriel in nightmare died without me taking a single potion.however i found boss drops to be quite poor and hammer is extremely nerfed. salavation might be an excellent investment in terms of skill points.and gamble!i got tal rasha's ajudicaton (the amulet)when i gambled by alcor.

Anyhow,on to the bugs:first,fire bug as usual.lightinig does not do too much damage as well as poison.cold is unnaturally fierce.in terms of cherater bugs:barbarian sticks in mid air for leap attack,and during ww will stick.bash does little to nothing and concentrate is the way to go.frost novae are paricularly nasty.

bad uniqes?ancients are really nasty,even for my zealot.damn litlle midgets really do damage if your not careful.the tree creature after flayer forest is really strong.the council members are not too bad but don't rely on their drops.sometimes they leave nothing behind.alot more uniques creatures and a lot less experince.and wait for it.....i had a hell of alot of trouble getting into secret cow level.not too sure why.yes i am a patriach.

other than the few animated glitches....wait or there is one more,the ancients dropped items twice.i know that not suppose to happen,but anyone have clues how this happened?the game is more challenging and stuff drop better like sockets and magical,no luck with runes though.please blizzard,bring out diablo3

For future e-mails, please first learn to type.

From: Shock2k3
Subject: Thanks a lot

Thanks a lot for reminding me in last mail bag that items are Mule able I totally forgot that. Now that you reminded me I can mule my items that are better for the Paladin from my Necro to my Paladin. Note to those who are disrespecting the Paladin class, you say that Paladin is over powered I find that totally un true. I am on nightmare difficulty near level 45 or so. Last time I was playing on server with someone who played as an Assassin, even with my double speed and damage aura (no I don't remember what u call it, I don't play games that much I got a life and girlfriend whom I will marry soon) we both got killed 5 times or so and nearly lost every coin in the stash not to mention bunch of exoerience. Just looking for that stupid bird of Kuihleh on the monsters in jungle it caused me 5 deaths. I wouldn't call this over powered, look at the darn Amazons they are a power house compared to us poor lil Paladins. They can almost take care of anything without risk. (bowazons that is) Barbarians well they are very powerfull but what you expect it's a Barbarian for christ sake it's supposed to be an over powered tank. (I guess)

I am not submitting screenshot from my last mail because the only way I found to get the screenshot was print screening it and pasting it into word. It doesn't work with photoshop so the size of screenshot is way too large. Besides my items seem to get better and better, even so I will still get that damn thief.

Anyone who picks up an item off monster that I killed and I believe I deserved that item are in danger of me PK'ing them later for revenge. Already 3 people experienced that feeling and I am not willing to stop unless they stop stealing the items.

PS. Duriel and Baal are the most hated bosses by me.

Actually, if you're playing version 1.10, Bowazons have really been nerfed. It may not be as apparent in Normal difficulty, but certainly will be in Hell. Thanks for actually responding to the Mailbag topic!

From: Jaxx
Subject: Leap Attack Bug?

Every now and then I find the leap attack stops working, I have to leave the current game and rejoin or go to a different one for it to work again. Very annoying esp when you are relying on it to escape death!

We haven't heard about this problem before, so if other readers have experienced it, please write in and describe the situation in detail.

From:
Subject:

WOOT thanx so much for 1.10 patch Blizzard! [Finally.] Now then before I get into detail let me just say that the patch could have been better. Now on to my comments.

Thanks to 1.10 patch, my old, horribly weak lvl 81 druid who did 300 damage with lvl 28 Hurricane now does about 4000 damage.

On a similar note, in normal and hell difficulty, I kill a quill rat in one hit. In hell however... Well it takes me about 10 hits with hurricane to kill it. [You never knew how resistant Quill Rats are to unnaturally occuring natural disasters.] Now I dont know if its because the quill rat has res. or high def. or something but honestly. I have high defense and about 1700 life. ONE FREAKING HIT FROM THE STUPID QUILL RAT DOES ABOUT 1500 DAMAGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I like the difficulty increase a little. It's kinda way too hard though. It would be nice if you increased the difficulty a little bit by increasing the characters abilities but increasing the monsters abilities more. Well anyhow, I was doing a NM meph run the other day and one of the blood lords meteors did about 300 damage... whereas my hurricane did like 7000 MWAHAHAHA.

My God That Diablo Clone is awesome. Me and my buds were trying to kill him one day in NM and I got an ANNIHILUS CHARM BABY WOOT!!!

Cows are overlooked. It's okay Kingy. I still love you. [Moooooo!]

This is weird. I killed NM Corpsefire in 3 hits with hurricane. All of his zombie minions took me about 10 hits to kill. What's up with THAT? [His protective loincloth was being washed at the time?]

WIERDLY ENOUGH THERE SEEMS TO BE SEVERAL BUGS IN THIS GAME HUH? For crying out loud That rust storm thing didn't do anything right. I dueled A level 33 assn the other day and she killed me over and over again. It's sick. She had 2 Bartucs CutThroats (lvl 33s cant even use those can they?) With 3 sockets each!!!! She had 3 jewels (suspiciously they were all looked the same DUPES) in each of them. The added about 5000 damage to each claw and added like 300 Increased Attack Speed. AND WHAT IS UP WITH ELDRITCH THE RECTIFYIER IN NM HAVING STONE SKIN IMMUNE TO FIRE AND PHYSICAL SPECTRAL HIT TELEPORT AND LIT ENCHANT!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!!! Did I mention I was lvl 81 and the assn was lvl 33?

Well those are my thoughts. Oh and one more thing. You peoples at blizzard... you tried to balance out the weaker classes and made them too strong. NOW YOU HAVE TO BALANCE OUT AL THE ORIGINALLY OVER-POWERFUL CLASSES. real smart move huh? on a scale from 1-10...

See a problem here? Yeah... Me too. Oh and... Originally overall strength of all classes was 49 and now the overall strength is 44. Do the math at Blizzard with your fancy calculators. 49-44=5 That means that basically the strength of a party of 7 with one of every class is about 5 out of 10. A Hell Quill Rat is hmmm say ELEVEN OUT OF TEN!!!! DiabloClone on NM is like 17 out of 10 or something. But thats with a full party. A Quill Rat in hell vs a party of 7 all lvl 40 with one of each class. over all its 5 out of 10 vs. 19 out of 10. Yeah. Big Mistake Blizzard.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe that Jewels are among the items that, like Gems and Runes, cannot be detected as dupes. Those claws should certainly not have had three sockets, though. I'd advise playing Ladder characters.

Sorceresses are actually quite powerful now. They're even more powerful than before, and I've seen a number of Fire Ball sorceresses out there now that its an overpowered skill. Paladins, despite the bugs they're enduring at the moment, are probably more powerful than Necromancers. Javazons and Spearazons are not having too tough a time, though Bowazons have severely been weakened.

From: michael hernandez
Subject: dammed minions!!!

Ok first of kudos 2 blizzard on patch1.10 , despite its glitches its an ok patchup job. But if one complaint need be made it concerns the SPREADING OF THE UNIQUE EFFECTS TO THE MINIONS!!! The dam minions nearly owned high lvl hc chars o mine....... in solo games!!!!! they r more dangerous than the actual unique. and damned if they can be revived!!!

Yep, that's a bug that needs to be fixed. There's a few major bugs Blizzard didn't fix that seem so obvious to players...

From: Michael Lorenzo
Subject: Simulating Players

Dear PlanetDiablo

before v1.10, i was able to simulate players and give myself a noticable increase in the experience gained. However, after i loaded v1.10, ive tried simulating players and it doesnt seem to work anymore....am i doing something wrong? is there something else i have to do or has Blizzard taken away this ability completely. if they have its very disappointing....prolly not just to me either!!

From the v1.10 Patch Changes List: Chat commands (e.g. 'fps') are now preceded by a slash (e.g. '/fps').

Previously you would use "players x" substituting a number from 1 to 8 for x to simulate the increased difficulty of x players, but now you need an extra frontslash to get it to work. Use "/players x" instead.

From: Nick Wolff
Subject: Smitadin Guide

1st your Smiteadin description/bio is excellent and very informative. One of the reply's mention a level 30 Smite, The skill tree list on the site only goes to level 20, Am I missing something here(I am new to the game). Are you allowed to put more then 20 points into each skill? If not would you only allocate 15-17 skill points to a skill, allowing item bonuses to raise it to max level of 20?

If I was on the forum I might say something like "RTFM." But this time I'll be kind. You can put skill points into a skill until it is up to level 20 without magic bonuses, but thanks to bonuses from items (for instance, +1 to All Skills), you are able to achieve skill levels over 20. Get it? With all the +Skills items out there, it's often you see characters with skill levels above 30.

From: Brian Oswold
Subject: ESUD Guide

Does this guide apply to characters created from version 1.10? I've heard rumors that the new patch increases skill limits to clvl 99. If this is true, should I invest a few extra points to each of the skills you've listed?

From: Top Gun
Subject: To Much

I have been playing Diablo since its beginning, as I'm sure many more have; however this latest patch is a little too much. It needs to be tone downed a little. The kill rate for the computer is way off balance to the player. A lot of people like my self enjoy playing alone, and now that is next to impossible. Also what is the big deal about finding complete sets? Trading is good, but the reward is what you find on your own. Also what good is a weapon with six sockets, if the damage is 7 to 20? People hack because there is no balance. I know you think Blizzard bread and butter is Warcraft. but it is Diablo. Look at the Battlenet attendance after all these years. Also take a look at what they are doing with Civilization; they simple put it out there, let the fans improve on it, then take the improvements, make a add-on expansion, and then make a bundle giving the fans what they wanted to start with. Anyway, thought you would like to know.

You're certainly making a lot of points there, and not the kind you score. Version 1.10 certainly is geared towards party players, as the new experience systems and strengthened monsters are best dealt with by adventuring with seven other characters. The increased difficulty causes the game play to be more enjoyable when you have the extra help, too. It seems that Blizzard has left single-players out of the loop here.

Gaining complete item sets can take some time, and it feels all the more rewarding to find all the items yourself, but when other players can just trade over the remaining item or two you're looking for, it's also a relief.

From: Mats Johansson, Sweden
Subject:

Been caught in a ripoff, not very much, had two viper skins, not very much storage room, joined a trading channel. Since it was ladder game I didn't think to much about dupes. Well stupid me, got a nice ring, and that's when my bells should have turn on a big alarm, next look at the ring and it was not the same.

But the reason for writing is WHY. If you want to use your talents for ripoffs, why not politics or banking or something that pay's off? This is a game. I think it's a fun game otherwise I woulnd't play, but such ripoff's is just cheap.

A little collateral twist, items in D2 D2X sells for money, do Blizzard get's any royalty. Since they keep Battlenet up I belive they are worth it.

Blizzard has never condoned the sale of items over services like eBay or the various questionable Diablo II-specific item "retailers" and auction sites. It would certainly be a big controversy to see a game developer or publisher put a statement in the EULA of their software stating that players who sell game objects are required to pay royalties, but it's very unlikely that this would work unless the trade system was incorporated into the game itself.

Sorry to hear about losing your Skins of the Vipermagi. The Ladder Character system was a strange idea, as it's really not different than the Normal Character system; it just gave players a very brief time where everyone had to start with nothing. It generally doesn't take the cheaters long to find new exploits, though, and that was certainly case here.

On another tangent, players generally like keeping their characters, so Blizzard isn't going to "reset" the Ladder Characters and erase everyone's avatars. Are we going to end up with Ladder II?

Ahhh... fresh meat!

That's a wrap for this week, folks! Be sure to send in your comments, questions, and other notes of interest regarding next week's topic. Feel free to ask or comment about other topics, too!