Diablo III Bestiary Update: Fallen!

The official Diablo 3 site has a new update (the first in a while):

It's a Bestiary page on everyone's favorite classic little buggers, the Fallen! :D

It's a really juicy page, too. The Fallen's history as servants of Azmodan (a likely major player and act boss in Diablo 3) is revealed, and five different types of Fallen (plus a rumored, unnamed two more) are detailed with both artwork and a neat video. Loving the 'lunatic' :)

Check out the message boards thread for Bashiok's thoughts on our adorable imp friends.

That artwork linked above has an interesting connection to the initial cinematic, which briefly shows a similar army marching out of what appears to be Arreat Crater...a concrete nod towards that being specifically Azmodan's army?

Blizzcon Tickets Update: 10am Pacific

An update on when Blizzcon tickets are going on sale:

The exact time is 10am Pacific (as confirmed on the boards).

See you in the queue... ;)

Reminder: Blizzcon Tickets on Sale This Saturday!

It's that magical time of year again---Blizzcon tickets are going on sale again :)

There is a new queue system for purchasing the tickets (essentially, a line to wait in with nifty status information on your spot), and they'll be available in two batches; one on May 16th (this Saturday) and one on May 30th, for $125.

There is not an exact on-sale time listed yet (e.g., if at midnight or during the day), but as DIII.net notes: "...it is on a weekend—so that everyone has a chance to be online at the moment they go on sale"...so it'll probably be sometime in the morning Pacific Coast Time---big concert events often go on sale around 11am, if that's any indication.

Check out the Ticket Info and FAQ for all the details, and also check out the Diablo III panels they have lined up already. I'd expect logicallyat least a new D3 class announcement, as well as playable D3 in some form and possibly new info regarding that Warcraft movie that's been in development a while now.

I attended the first two (missed last year's only because of $$$), and what a wonderful overall experience a Blizzcon is. It's not nearly as flamingly-nerdy a crowd as you'd imagine, so that in and of itself can be an eye-opener, and being able to play the games ahead of time and/or even games that are never released (Starcraft:Ghost, one of most fun games I've ever played) is just invaluable. It's a cool experience all-around, and this year's is even bigger than the previous ones. And of course, that beta key in the goodie bag is always nice ;) $125 is a steal given all the events, opportunities, comraderie, and gifts.

Hopefully, I'll see you there... ;)

Bashiok on New Skill Trees Design---Universal Tiers

In an interesting development, Bashiok over at the D3 Forums has detailed a new system for the skill trees, different than anything seen yet in Diablo or WoW, where all three 'trees' share universal tiers:

"Taking the barbarian trees for instance (berserker, battlemaster, juggernaut) they're not tabbed now, but instead all viewable at the same time. Side by side. T his is important due to how they are now a unified tier progression. Instead of spending 5 points in the berserker tree to then begin spending points in the second tier of the berserker tree, the new design allows you to spend wherever you like. As long as your points in the first tier of skills adds up to five, the next tier for all trees is unlocked. " -Bashiok, "re:Skill Trees"

As Bashiok goes on to explain, this is to open up skill design and remove redundant skills from each tree. Technically, this overrides the concept of 'trees', as it's now essentially one giant tree with three 'themes' per class.

This allows for both more skills (replacing old redundant abilities with cool new stuff), and theoretically more builds (through a greater number of potential combinations). Seems harder to balance, as obsessive tinkerers like myself are sure to find some obscure match that makes your Barbarian immortal or something ( :D ), so I'm not sure how long we'll see this setup last.

Still, seems like it could be pretty fun, and can't wait for the first calculators to surface so we can try it out :) (for a really neat calculator of the old designs, check out Diablo Source's gorgeous setup).

Bashiok on Synergies; Respecs! :)

Responding to a question on the forums about synergies being dead and gone, Bashiok emphatically confirmed that they are, and cited a number of reasons why, including respecs.

Good to hear about respecs from the horse's mouth; an endless tinkerer, I was a severe respec addict in my WoW days, and love trying obscure builds and strategies of all sorts. The existence of respecs also logically confirms that the problems of Hell difficulty in D2---e.g., running into monsters immune to your specialties---won't be an issue in D3, if a system like that is included at all. Tons of physical immunes on your Belial run? Just pop a respec and kill away :)

New Diablo 2 Patch Coming, with Test Realms--Precursor to Fresh D3 PR Campaign?

On Friday, Bashiok over at the official forums posted a nugget about the upcoming Diablo II Patch 1.13:

"Some exciting news - and it also may be some comfort - due to the types of changes we're making we will be offering the Diablo II 1.13 patch for testing and feedback on a test realm before its release. We'll have more information about how you'll be able to help test it in the coming weeks." -Bashiok

Bashiok and Blizzard had created a thread requesting everyone's #1 'dream' patch note they'd love to see with 1.13. This is going to be the first content patch since 1.11, which added the endgame "Pandemonium" event throwing you into a questline culminating in a battle against Uber Diablo, Uber Mephisto, and Uber Baal at the same time in Tristram.

Whatever the content they're adding now is (~3 and a half years later), if it's enough to require a test realm before releasing it...it's probably going to be pretty extensive :)

This works as good Diablo III PR for them---get lots of people back into actually playing Diablo and excited about the universe again, which would then be a great time to draw them into the daily D3 news by making a big announcement (the 4th of the 5 classes, perhaps?). So I could see this patch, which could be out within a month or so by the look of it, being a precursor to lots of goodies on the way; the first shot of a big PR onslaught :)

Another thought: could the new content for D2 include some early D3 story/setup?

"Ahhh...Fresh Meat!"

Welcome to Tyrael is Evil! :)

Here at Tyrael is Evil (the name being inspired by a plethora of hints that Tyrael has become corrupt---more on that soon :) ), expect daily delvings into everything Diablo. I plan to serve as a sort of Pandemonium Fortress (or is it a Chaos Sanctuary? ;) ) into all the online community goings-on: link-a-riffic roundups on the best goodies from all the fansites and official locales. I'll toss in features on a regular basis, as well---looks at Act design, character skill trees, lore, and everything else under the High Heavens that I feel like I can contribute quality thoughts on.

Expect posts that are just right: not short copy-and-paste deals, but not friggin' novels either :) I've been blogging about moon colonization for a year now (http://luna-ci.com/), and I'm excited to unleash my blogging skills on the game series I love so much.

Stay tuned... :)