Blizzard recently announced the quarterly update of the final episode of Diablo 4. Chief system designer Joe Piepiora will introduce the important content update items of the item system, including skill bonus items that re-emerged, the new interactive mechanism of legendary abilities, and the preliminary version of the drop lock. After this, we will further introduce Diablo 4 the new post-game character development system peak panel.
Next, the chief visual effects art designer Daniel Briggs will be responsible for explaining related design concepts, letting everyone know how the talented visual effects team can create amazing and eye-catching skill effects, and even if there are many players and monsters on the screen, the game content It is still clear and easy to distinguish.
In addition, he will also introduce the new game engine of Diablo 4 in depth. With the help of this engine, we have successfully created battle scenes with a meticulous level of every frame, and at the same time strengthened the special effects of the new lighting system. Finally, we will introduce the various skills of the four revealed professions, and let everyone take a look at the skill-oriented death system.
Diablo 4 Item System
Heroes of San Huári, hello! I am honored to have the opportunity to introduce the system status of Diablo 4 and the later content of the game to you again. I’m the chief system designer Joe Piepiora. Today I’m going to explain in detail the two main items of the “Diablo 4” item system update and the planning of the peak system.
Skill bonus level attributes
The skill bonus level attribute re-emerged in Diablo 4. Players can spend points to invest in skills to increase the strength of the game’s characters. If they find items with skill bonus levels, they can also speed up the speed of becoming stronger. Not only that, if the skill bonus level items that the player equips are related to a skill that the player has not learned, then the player can use that new skill.
With this type of item, players can try the power of new skills before they start investing in new skills. If the player’s luck in playing treasure is very good, maybe they can experience the skills required for a certain genre ten levels earlier, which can be said to be a great benefit to the player!
Legendary & Unique items
Joe Shely mentioned in the December 2020 update article that legendary items and unique items will also be an indispensable part of the item collection process in the new work of “Diablo”. We have made significant changes to the legendary items of Diablo 4, allowing legendary abilities to appear in multiple inventory slots. Now, if players want to find legendary abilities such as martial arts (which can strengthen the barbarian’s kicking skills) and have the opportunity to find rings, breastplates or helmets with this ability, players no longer need to collect certain types of items.
The new problem is that if the player finds that the item with the legendary ability is an axe, but what the player wants is actually a ring, what should be done? Or if the player finds a very powerful legendary amulet, but cannot use the related ability, then What should we do? At this time, we will introduce our new friend: the mysterious master.
Mysticists can extract legendary abilities from legendary items and turn this legendary ability into crystallized essence, but the price is that the original items will be destroyed. Then, the player can implant the essence into any legendary item, covering the original legendary ability of the item. In addition, players can also keep the essence for future use. Unique items cannot be modified in this way, this is to preserve the style and characteristics of unique items, but also the uniqueness of these items.
Collect Items
San Huárei is a vast world with bleak scenes, such as forests lurking with werewolves, withered wastelands full of man-eaters, and misty cemeteries where undead creatures wait for opportunities. There are hundreds of enemies and monsters that the hero can encounter. Each monster seems to have its own favorite types of items to collect, and the probability of dropping these types of items is also relatively high. For example, robbers like to use hammers, crossbows and boots, so if you want to collect a new pair of pants, I suggest you go hunting for sea corpses instead of dealing with robbers.
In the past few discussions, some players have responded to us, saying that collecting the equipment they have obtained for a long time does not have much influence on the strength of the game character. If the process of customization and character development has no significant impact on the actual strength and performance of the character in combat, then this process is naturally not so attractive.
However, we have heard the voices of the players, so in Diablo 4, we will further emphasize the changes in character strength, and every little thing players do in the process of upgrading and exploring the world of St. Huari Decisions will affect the strength of the character. We are currently unable to share detailed information about the character’s strength, but this time I will introduce one of the game mechanics, The Peak Panel.
Peak Panel
In Diablo 4, we particularly emphasized the genre customization system, so that players can master the process of developing heroes by themselves. Each profession can unlock the peak panel when reaching level 50, which is the specialization mechanism of each profession. In the peak system, your hero character will start from the start panel column in the middle of the initial panel of the occupation, and expand outward as the selection process.
When your hero character reaches the final panel field, you will select a connected new peak panel from that position. In the end, you will combine a set of bonus effects you like to strengthen your hero character, allowing you to pay off after spending time and effort to manage the character, and players can also adjust the combination method during the repeated challenge of the game content. Experience the fun.
The picture below has a huge amount of information, and I will introduce it to you on all levels. The peak panel is composed of many fixed panel fields. The barbarian will gain peak points in the process of accumulating experience points, and the barbarian can spend these points to unlock adjacent panel fields. There are several types of panel fields, which will be explained next.
Ordinary panel field
These panel fields are very simple and easy to understand. They can provide numerical bonuses. Although this bonus is not large, it has a substantial impact on gameplay. Ordinary panel fields are very common on the panel and are responsible for connecting other different types of panel fields.
Magic panel field
The magic panel column will appear on the panel in a concentrated manner, which can provide a powerful and rich and diverse series of bonus effects. As you may have guessed, the number of such panel fields is less than that of ordinary panel fields, but it is quite common.
Rare panel field
Rare panel fields can greatly enhance the strength of the character. When unlocking the Peak Panel for the first time, this type of panel column will be a major goal pursued by the player, especially when the player locks in on the development of a certain genre. After the hero’s character attributes are increased to a certain level, these rare panel fields can also provide additional abilities, so players need to think and make choices when choosing a panel development route.
Legend panel field
After opening the first peak panel, there is a legend panel column in the middle of each new panel. After the character unlocks the legend panel field, he can obtain new legendary abilities.
Glyphs & Slots
Slots are special panel fields and may contain a glyph. Glyphs can be found in various places in San Huerui. After being inlaid on the summit panel, the glyphs can provide various bonus effects according to the number of active panel slots in the designated area nearby. In addition, if players bravely venture into some dangerous dungeons, they also have the opportunity to upgrade these glyphs. After the glyph is upgraded, its effect determination range will be enlarged, allowing players to activate or strengthen more panel fields.
Final panel field and panel selection
There is a final panel field at the very edge of each peak panel. As the player accumulates the game progress of the peak panel, they can finally come to the final panel field, after unlocking, they can choose a new peak panel to continue development. Each panel has a unique arrangement of panel fields, new magic panel fields and rare panel fields, and a new legendary panel field in the middle.
The peak panel will continue to extend outward through the final field. After selecting the top panel from the list, the new panel will take effect and connect to the final panel field just unlocked. In addition, the player can also choose to rotate the newly placed panel.
Diablo 4 Visual Effects
Thank you for taking the time to read this article! I am Daniel Briggs, the chief visual effects designer of Diablo 4. The visual effects design team is responsible for creating much different content for each function of this game, but today we mainly introduce the visual effects related to the battle scene. The visual effects art designer cooperates with game designers and other art team members to create distinctive themed features and styles for the hero profession, and inject life into the monsters, thereby presenting the bloody and refreshing scenes that players expect.
Visual effects are an indispensable part of the combat experience of the previous works of Diablo. For the part of Diablo 4, we hope to design more realistic visual effects through physical rendering (PBR) technology, and further support the core main axis of gameplay, that is, the deeper hero customization system and item system And combat clarity.
Visual Effects-Design Concept
Each visual effect plays an important role in the final version of the game. We must understand the operating principles and mechanisms of each visual effect so that we can create the best gaming experience. One of Blizzard Entertainment’s core concepts is Gameplay First. This concept has a major impact on our decision-making in art design when we develop the visual effects of the game.
The fast-changing battle process of Diablo 4 is the focus of this game, and it should also be able to attract the player’s attention. In order to achieve this goal, we must consider various factors, such as the player’s technical strength, monster information, traps, damage range, and character status. The visual effects of these elements must be clear and easy to distinguish under any area and light conditions so that players can quickly grasp the current progress of the game and use relevant information to make judgments and decisions.
In the chaotic battle process, players must think and use their brains. You may have seen a legendary item on the ground. You really want to pick it up as soon as possible, but the most important thing is to respond to the monster’s attack as soon as possible so that the character will not be killed in the expert mode. Our goal is to balance the first, second and third most important game content and help players keep abreast of the game situation.
For this reason, we allow powerful skills such as tricks to maintain brilliant and conspicuous visual effects. As for the less powerful skills, their visual effects will blend into the background. Each profession has many skills, from low to high with different consumption, cooling time and intensity. Therefore, the major professions also have visual effects of different strengths, and the more powerful the skills, the more conspicuous the effects.
Combat Improvement
In order to enhance the combat game experience, we have improved the in-game damage application mechanism for several aspects. In the previous revisions and adjustments of Diablo, the area effect (AoE) and melee skills will be judged as single area damage in a single frame. With the help of game engineers, we are now able to activate the target area (which we call the carrier) into several frames, so that the visual effects of the animation played out can be combined with the dynamic target area.
For example, The image of Whirlwind in Diablo 3 is a cylindrical pattern surrounding a barbarian, and damage is applied every few frames according to the attack speed. In Diablo 4, Whirlwind is a dynamic pie-shaped graphic that will become alive with your character. The scope effect will spread out over time, and the movement of the melee swing will also match the movement of the weapon.
The dynamic target area can improve the accuracy of the damage applied by the Diablo 4 game system, and can also make the process of battle more powerful, and the process of hacking and killing monsters more bloody and violent. The dynamic carrier will also add a small-time point mechanism for a variety of different skills.
In addition, we have also reworked the monster’s hit effect so that the impact force will vary with the direction of the spell or melee attack. We will use the data defined by the animation and the dynamic target area to find the most accurate location to hit the monster and determine the direction of the physical force of the monster after it is impacted. To put it simply, if you hit the knee of the Sheephead Shaman, there will be blood splatter effects on the knee. The physical force applied to the goat’s head’s knee will cause the goat’s head’s character model to fly out like a knee being kicked.
Visual effects-cast and receive light
In “Diablo 4”, we use the physical rendering (PBR) light module, which means that the appearance of the material and the response to the light are very realistic. This approach can greatly improve the rendering results, but its operating mechanism may violate the player’s intuitive experience of professional skills and monster skills.
For example: Just imagine what a campfire looks like in broad daylight. It should be boring, right? Next, imagine the appearance of dust or smoke in the middle of the night. It should be almost invisible, right? In order to solve this situation, we specially build a game engine and a graphics database to help us refine the details in a more aesthetic way. The ruleset of PBR. This approach can ensure that important gameplay content is presented as clearly as possible, while maintaining the PBR integrity of immersive elements, allowing them to truly react to light.
Previous adjustments to Diablo mainly used non-bright particles, that is, not affected by ambient light. These particles can help control the appearance of the art picture, and the painted work is the final result. The disadvantage of non-bright particles is that the art picture may look too bright in a dark dungeon, or the color configuration of the visual effect may not be able to blend into all the background environment.
In Diablo 4, we use bright visual effects to blend into the light of the background environment to create a more immersive gaming experience. Take Whirlwind as an example (see the video above): In broad daylight, the blade will reflect sunlight. In a dark dungeon, the blade will reflect a weaker light source, such as a torch. The dust raised by skills will also be lit by the environment, so it can be integrated into the art atmosphere of the game world.
If we rely solely on the operation of ambient light and fully comply with the original rules of PBR, then the gameplay will become fuzzy and difficult to distinguish, especially in a dim environment, it is basically difficult to see the process of waving a weapon. In order to balance this, many visual effects can emit light on their own and cast light on the environment. And many tricks in the game now can even change the climate and light of the surrounding environment within a period of time. Our goal is to strike a good balance between the clarity of the game and the immersiveness of the theme.
Dynamic player skills
No matter how good the art design is, if the gameplay itself is not interesting enough, it will just leave everything behind. When we are designing player skills, one of the goals is to give the system design team a variety of gains and losses, so that they can design skill trees, career mechanics, legendary items and peak panels with substantial influence.
The choice made by the player should not only affect the value of the character. After designing the ideal professional skills, the visual effects team will take over, allowing developers to dynamically adjust the size, intensity, and duration of the skills. As you accumulate upgrades and items that can strengthen the power of the skills, the vision of the skills will become more and more conspicuous and gorgeous.
In addition to the gains and losses of these skills, we also design different versions of skills, which can completely change the operation mechanism of the skills or the type of damage caused by the skills. The size, intensity and duration of these revised skills can also be changed. In this way, various versions of skills can be affected by more different combinations of legendary gains and losses. Your skill tree/peak selection and the items you equip can distinguish your character’s appearance and gameplay from other characters of the same class.
The relevant game content is personally created by the art designer to ensure that the art map can support all sizes and strengths. When changing the size and intensity, we will not adjust each visual effect in a standardized way. What we adjust is the generation rate, speed, luminosity and color, etc., to ensure that the art picture can fully integrate into the game world of Diablo.
We hope that the player’s character looks amazing! The items in the game are specially designed to help us apply weapon buffs to any weapon. Your legendary items not only have powerful effects, but they can also make your character look great. The following examples illustrate how we can apply the same fire buff and toxin buff to different weapons.
Skill-oriented death
San Huári is a dark Gothic world, with terrifying monsters doing terrible things everywhere. Players must not show mercy to the enemy so that they can survive in this barren land. We are going to relaunch the well-known feature of Diablo 3: skill-oriented death. With this system, the player can decapitate, slash, smash or dismember the enemy, and freeze or burn the enemy.
After introducing the new PBR operation mechanism, we can design the bloody and violent game content more realistically, so that these special effects can react more accurately to the ambient light. The structure of each monster is composed of bones and muscles, which is convenient for players to slaughter monsters in a brutal way. If your character is in a fierce battle, his body will be stained with blood from nearby monsters splashing blood. Over time, the character’s armor will gradually transform back to its original, clean appearance.
The magician specializes in the mystery of elemental magic. They will slow the enemy through the cold, and eventually make the enemy completely freeze and crush. In addition, the magician can also launch lightning strikes to attack the enemy, causing the opponent’s corpse to burst and make a squeaking sound. The flames summoned by the magician will devour the enemy, causing the enemy to fall to the ground and turn into coke.