Filed under: Diablo 3

The dedicated Diablo III fans at, uh, Diablofans.com have unearthed some files for the forthcoming patch 1.0.3 that reveal a few neat in-game bonuses, presumably intended for purchasers of the Mists of Pandaria Collector's Edition:

• A new Feat of Strength, Panda-monium, which is achieved by registering a copy of the MoP Collector's Edition.
• A new banner sigil and accent combo featuring a panda face and some pandaren-style linework.
• A pair of black demon wings, along with the string "SpecialGiftWingsBuff_name - Collectors Edition Buff." Unlike the banner options and the Feat of Strength, there's some speculation that this may not be a MoP CE reward, but the string at least raises that possibility.

If you're interested in extra items, you might want to consider buying the Collector's Edition. While the details haven't been announced yet, Wowhead recently found a quilen mount and pet that may be among the in-game CE bonuses.

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Evil has returned! 1.2 million WoW players are getting Diablo III for free thanks to the Annual Pass. You can get prepared for the evil with WoW Insider's launch coverage. From the lore of Diablo, to the important blue posts and the basics of Diablo gameplay, we'll get you on the inside track for the return of evil.

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Welcome back to our weekly recap featuring Panser of TradeChat, where we look back at the hottest news from the past week and whatever other kickin', rad things may have come our way. This week's topics include:

• Collector's edition mount and pet discovered
• Jaina Proudmoore's latest model update
• Legendaries for everyone!
• Diablo III bans being issued
• Diablo III's Real-Money Auction House now live
• New female pandaren customization options unveiled

If you enjoyed the show, make sure to subscribe to TradeChat, leave a comment, and come back next week for the next episode!

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Since the advent of gold sellers, players have discussed the ethics of buying gold with real currency, as well as what would if Blizzard started selling gold. Then came the Guardian Cub, and suddenly Blizzard was allowing gold buying and selling via a vanity pet.

Later, Blizzard hit us with the announcement that Diablo III would have an auction house that uses real money. Now that the Real-Money Auction House has been launched, the debates have heated up. This guide is to help you decide, debate, or deliberate about real money in Blizzard games.

Real-money transactions for WoW

• The implications of a real-dollar auction house
• What WoW can learn from other transaction models, part 1 and part 2
• Guardian Cub pros and cons
• WoW's immune system and the gold selling virus
• Blizzard responds to Guardian Cub controversy
• Guardian Cub pet available for purchase
• How much is a Guardian Cub worth?
• Guardian cub taking a bite out of third-party gold sales

The Real-Money Auction House is now accessible to the Americas via Battle.net balance or approved payment services for some currencies. The U.S. dollar, Australian dollar, and the Mexican peso are all supported, with the EU region and more currency from the Americas to be implemented soon.

The long-delayed RMAH will now allow players to purchase and sell in-game items using their region's currency. Your home game region will affect which RMAH you will have access to, so if you have created characters to play outside the country registered to your Battle.net account, you will not be able to use the RMAH for those characters.

Only equipment such as armor and weapons is available on the RMAH at this time. Commodities will be added at a later date. In some cases, items may be held for processing. Most items purchased will be available immediately, however.

Using the Battle.net Balance for your Real-Money Auction House transactions requires that you have an authenticator or mobile authenticator on your account. Furthermore, if you choose to use PayPal (not available in all regions), you must use the Battle.net SMS Protection feature.

To access the RMAH, go to your Campaign Screen in Diablo III and select Auction House. Then press the button that shows your region's currency. You can toggle back and forth between the gold AH and the Real-Money one.

The entire announcement from Blizzard is after the break.

You read that right: Several thousand suspensions and bans have gone out to Diablo III players using account hacks or bots or otherwise cheating at the game. Zarhym (he who often shows up in monster form while I'm playing Diablo III) posted to the official forums to announce the action.

Diablo® III Players Banned

We recently issued a round of account suspensions and bans to several thousand Diablo® III players who were in violation of the Battle.net® Terms of Use for cheating and/or using botting or hacking programs while playing. In addition to undermining the spirit of fair play that's essential to everyone's enjoyment of the game, botting, hacking, and other such exploitive behavior can contribute to stability and performance issues with the Battle.net service. As always, maintaining a stable, safe, and fun online-gaming experience for legitimate players is a top priority for us, and we'll be continuing to keep watch on Battle.net and take action as needed.

source

Seems fairly straightforward to me -- don't cheat, won't get banned. With the move to require an authenticator for the Real-Money Auction House and now this, it is pretty clear Blizzard is taking Battle.net very seriously moving forward.

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Evil has returned! 1.2 million WoW players are getting Diablo III for free thanks to the Annual Pass. You can get prepared for the evil with WoW Insider's launch coverage. From the lore of Diablo, to the important blue posts and the basics of Diablo gameplay, we'll get you on the inside track for the return of evil.

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There is a lot to like about SteelSeries' Diablo III headset, giving players a solidly built peripheral that sit snugly on the ears and provide strong sound. I'm the kind of gamer who never wants to take off his headset because of the activity going on around me -- it's one of the only ways to get any semblance of peace and quiet. In addition, voice chat and Mumble have become hangout tools rather than just gaming features, making a good, durable microphone that much more important.

This isn't the first time I've tried out this particular offering from SteelSeries. When I went to BlizzCon 2011 and stopped by the SteelSeries booth, the representatives wanted me to try it on immediately. Something about ear cups and weight displacement, I don't know. There was a lot going on. To be honest, the biggest factor in choosing a headset for me is whether or not I can wear the thing for, like, eight hours straight. So, that's what I did. For you.

It's not like it's a secret that I think the Diablo III barbarian class is chock full of ideas World of Warcraft should steal for warriors. For one thing, I just told you. That's not what you do with secrets. But it's hardly just the one class that I think has ideas worth appropriating. And better yet, when you steal from yourself, no one can complain.

Already, we're seeing in the Mists of Pandaria beta that some of these ideas are finding their way into the game. Warriors, for instance, are going to generate rage via attacks like Shield Slam or Mortal Strike or Bloodthirst rather than just via damage dealt, a change similar to the barbarian's fury gathering attacks like Cleave. Similarly, the new talent system for Mists is a lot closer to the D3 system than any of the previous ones used in World of Warcraft or Diablo II, for that matter. It's also no secret that the D2 system is written all over launch World of Warcraft, especially classes like the paladin.

So what do I think World of Warcraft should steal from Diablo III?

In order to use the Real-Money Auction House in Diablo III (which can be used to fuel your WoW subscription), you need to have a Battle.net balance set up for buying and selling items. Because Blizzard is understandably concerned about account security, an authenticator or mobile authenticator is now required in order to add to your Battle.net balance. Transferring proceeds from the RMAH to your B.Net balance will also require the use of an authenticator.

The RMAH has yet to be implemented in Diablo III, but some players have already added money to their balance in preparation for its launch. Those players will be still be able to use it to pay for eligible purchases or to use in the RMAH without the added security, but adding to the balance from now on will require adding an authenticator to their accounts.

I think that preparing beforehand for the inevitable attempted account incursions is a very responsible move on Blizzard's part. This move is good for the players, as well as good for their customer service department, I'm sure.

The full announcement is after the break.

Someone has had the audacity to hack Odin's account, and He is demanding that Blizzard restore His items immediately. In a post on the Diablo III general discussion forums, Odin insists that not only should His items and gold be returned immediately but also that a human sacrifice be performed. He blames Blizzard for giving his data away, since his system is completely secure, and therefore it must follow the rules, else be cursed.

Here's an excerpt of the All-Father's complaint:

So I'm Odin, the All-Father; I am Iron Grim, the One-Eyed. I'm the Longbeard, Lord of Ghosts, Wise One... you get the idea. My gaming rig is engraved with protective runes, and my firewall is a wall manned by Heimdell, who sees and hears any threat to the residents of Asgard. Every day at sunrise, my entire system is massaged with a poultice of angelica, burdock, comfrey, dill, and moss provided by Eir while a healing galdr is chanted over it. My ISP is two ravens that bring me news of all the happenings in the world and is always 100% stable and secure, personally watched over by the birds. Don't ask me how they do it; I'm not spending another day on that damn tree just to find out. It's powered by human sacrifice, although I have no idea how this could be relevant; I've just seen others with the same problem posting it.

Given that personal info has never been leaked by Blizzard before, it seems unlikely the hackers got the All-Father's info from anywhere but Him or one of his subjects on Asgard. He describes a seemingly impenetrable system, however, protected by magic, herbs and faithful creatures. Someone with access to His computer must have responded to a phishing email or was otherwise careless with His login info.

Three Diablo III developers stopped onto Reddit tonight for an AMAA -- "Ask Me Almost Anything" -- where they answered questions from all over the internet. Most of the questions were gameplay-related, given that these guys are developers and not dudes involved in the creative aspects of the game (story, etc). There are a lot of great answers in here: fixes coming for common complaints, overall design goals for the future, and more. Check out the full transcript after the break, but here are a few interesting points:

• Non-trash white items like potions and pages will have different item colors in a later patch, and an option to filter out trash white items completely is also being considered.
• An "auto-skip cutscenes" option is being considered.
• Bosses will drop rares the first time you kill them on any difficulty, not just normal, in a future patch.
• Legendary items are getting a big buff to be more attractive and unique.
• Auctions can be canceled in patch 1.0.3.

Senior Technical Game Designer Wyatt Cheng took to the Diablo III site today and announced a series of design intentions for Diablo III's upcoming patch 1.0.3 They really hone in on some of the problems with the endgame, while correcting styles of play that Blizzard doesn't see as desirable.

Some of the highlights:

• Repair costs are going up four to six times their current cost, at level 60 (to combat graveyard zerging).
• Bonus monster damage per additional player in coop play is being removed.
• Five stacks of Nephalem Valor will guarantee only one rare now per boss (down from two).
• Five stacks of Nephalem Valor will guarantee all champion and elite packs give at least one rare drop.
• A legendary item buff is coming in a future patch.
• Drop rates are being increased for item level 61 through 63 gear in Hell Act III through Inferno Act IV.
• The damage and health of monsters in Inferno Act II, III, and IV is being reduced.

It shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone that Inferno is getting nerfed a little bit. As someone who's up against it right now, yeah, it's a bit steep. The damage nerf, combined with the item level drop rates, should make things significantly more obtainable without putting in 40 hours a week farming.

The full blue post, after the break.

The StarCraft II Arcade feature, a tool intended to help the community highlight quality custom maps and game modes created with the StarCraft modding tools, has recently gone into beta. Coinciding with that beta, Blizzard has launched a contest that requires you to play, rate, and review an Arcade game for a chance to win a Heart of the Swarm beta key.

One of the delightful custom game modes that has become an Arcade chart-topper is an incestuous mix of all of Blizzard's major franchises: It's the first Diablo game ported into StarCraft II using World of Warcraft art assets for the 3D models. The gameplay doesn't match the original Diablo click-for-click, but the core mechanics and all of the sound files have been carried from one game to the next, including Deckard Cain's signature stay awhile and listen.

StarCraft II shoutcaster Husky recently featured the game mode on his YouTube channel, and you can watch his 18+ minute preview/review embedded above.

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Bashiok recently responded to a well-written thread on the Diablo III forums. The Diablo forums are usually a wretched hive of scum and villainy (though not as bad as SWTOR), but in this case, player Matthest constructively posted a list of 35 small improvements he'd like to see implemented. Constructive criticism without histrionics is always more likely to get the attention of a blue poster.

Many of the improvements are ones that we take for granted in WoW, such as changing the font size in chat and locking the action bar. While those changes will be implemented, many other WoW features won't be due to design restrictions in the UI or a reluctance by Blizzard developers to give in to what they call "option bloat."

Personally, I would like general chat defaulted to off. I really don't want to log in and see how high Playerx is or what Lazyguy wants help with. But that's not addressed in this list.

Bashiok's full, item-by-item response is after the break.

In Diablo III's hardcore mode, when you die in the game, you die in real life. Wait, no, that's not right. When you die in the game, you lose your character forever. Kungen, another former World of Warcraft raider turned competitive Diablo player, was known for his ... exploits in the world of Azeroth for years. He recently retired from the game and, since the release of the new Diablo title, has been playing that game nearly as much as he once played WoW.

Kungen made it to level 60, began working his way through Inferno Hardcore, and met his untimely demise in the silliest possible way. His death screen states that he has spent a little over 175 hours on his hardcore barbarian, but how much of that was spent playing and how much was spent AFK or tabbed out while still logged in to the game, we don't really know. Judging by his death, maybe he should have spent a little less time tabbed out.

"The good thing," Kungen remarked, "is that I'm going to be back at the same spot in like 30 hours."

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