Blizzard keeps doubling down on bad ideas. The release of Season 14 does not disappoint here in any way.
Yesterday my wife and I jumped in when it was released. Not bothering to create a seasonal character as we decided not to play seasons three seasons ago. Each season is nothing more than build from zero, get nothing when the season ends. Clearly seasons are for other players and not the way we choose to play.
Billed as Mythic Unique 3.0 with all the fanfare of how great this change will be; hit hard and flat for the eternal realm and just as hard in seasonal play.
Seasonal you can use the cube to convert anything to a mythic item. However, you can wear only one crafted mythic unique item on any character. During the PTR for season 14 you could put gloves in the cube to convert to mythic then be returned pants. This they say was fixed before release. Limited to one crafted mythic you can wear others you find but only one crafted.
Eternal, well you can select the item type for the mythic you create. Now with increased cost in resplendent sparks, from 1 per mythic to 3 per mythic. However, they did reduce runes needed to craft by 1/2. Results are 100% random what mythic item you get back. If you picked a helm, you will get a helm but no clue what helm you are going to get. Odds are greatly it will not be one you need for your build.
Three resplendent sparks to create a mythic. No increase in resplendent sparks and how to get them. No change in rune drops, especially the legendary runes where each mythic will cost you 3 legendary runes of various types. Blizzard here introduced another time slog, dragging out even longer the time you spend in game to create a build.
Celebrations started as finally they would have party war plans. Stop, celebration on release. First thing you must do is spend 2 special currency to select “New Party War Plan”. Two and you only have three so you must path the first plan you get. You never have more than three of that special currency to change a war plan. If this wasn’t bad enough, well hold on.
War plan progress wasn’t the same for a two person party. One completed a plan before the other. Really, it is a party plan and done is done no matter who in the party completes it. But not in Blizzard’s world.
War plans don’t sync between party members. This is a must for them to work properly and it appears everyone knows this except those in Blizzard.
If that wasn’t bad enough, how about escalation nightmare dungeon keys that would not trigger the next level. Two times that happened. Wasted escalation keys and never was able to complete that shared war plan as a result.
Mythic 3.0 removed the last bastion we could call had a targeted path to improve your build. Now random just like every other aspect of crafting in the game. Cube to add an affix, random results. Cube to remove an affix random results. Cube to replace an affix random results that could even strip you of the great affix it had.
Loot that drops in massive amounts one cannot ever use. But even that is random. Level 70 character with 300 paragon can find a magic item more powerful than the ancestral legendary they have with a greater affix on it. So we already have no path to know visually what item is better than another. Clearly they want you crafting and chasing materials more than they want you playing the game.
Diablo 4 is no longer a game, it is a fun killing slot machine.