• Fan of Knives – similar to a rogue’s fan of knives from WoW. Knives fly out in 360 degrees around the demon  hunter.
• Molten Arrow – flaming arrow, deals extra fire damage, penetrates several targets. Leaves a flaming trail on the ground, presumably dealing damage to targets that stand in or near it.
• Grenade- throws several grenades spreading out in a short line, deals small AoE damage.
• Bola – fires an arrow with a timed explosive, after a few seconds the bomb goes off and it deals a mid-range AoE.
• Entangling Shot – roots the target in place

At this point it’s still early and we just don’t know what we don’t know, but what we can say is things are looking pretty amazing for the Diablo 3 class line up. If you haven’t checked it out already you’ll want to take a look at the Demon Hunter’s cinematic.

Spirit of Diablo
Make it replayable more than just randomness (items, maps, etc.)
Large scale boss battles.
Focus on cooperative play, making it easy for people to jmup in and out.

Replayability
Random Environments.
Random Monster Encounters.
Randomly Generated Items.
Higher Difficulty Levels (Nightmare, Hell, and more?)
New Feature: Random Adventures.

Epics Heroes
Large scale combat putting as many monsters on the screen as possible that you can pile into the dirt.
All classes will be incredibly powerful, unique, and approached in a new way.

Approachable
Easy to play (If you can click a mouse)
Easy to learn, but difficult to master.

Cooperative Play
Battle.NET – New version that should make it easier to play together.
It should be easier to hop in a game with your friends at any time.

Improved Controls
Less Spam, More Depth.
New Type of Monster (Not specified)

New Hotbar
Removed potions as primary health mechanic.
Replaced potions with a skill hotbar.
Better gameplay, less mouse clicking wrist pain.

New Health System
Goal is to remove things from D2 that made it too easy (potion spamming).
Very little downtime.
Monsters drop globes of health that you run over to restore health.
Health globes automatically heal nearby teammates.

Monsters – Force Players to Make Choices
Berserker – Aggressive Creature, Massive Charge up Attack, Vulnerable on a Miss.
Skeletal Shieldbearer – Slow and methodical but tough, Accompanies ranged units, Acts as a health wall for more threatening units, Shield can be destroyed or circumvented.

Better RPG
Improve story without losing the ability to hop into a game easily.
Remove the generic feeling from random dungeons.
Bring the world to life through events, better quests, and npc interactions.

New Adventure System
Solution to the fact that scripted events don’t work with random environments.
Smaller scale encounters that randomly occur.
Each play through can feel different as you won’t always get the same adventures.

Question and Answers

Q:Will there be a hardcore mode?
A: Yes, definitely.

Q: Will there be talent respecs?
A: Yeah, we definitely want to have talent respecs this time around. Details have not been worked out yet.

Q: How will the economy work in Diablo 3?
A: I think the D2 (SoJs) economy turned out the way it did because of the gold cap and how much gold the mods dropped. We want the gold you have to be meaningful. We want players to be able to use gold as a trade currency, but no details at the moment.

Q: What kind of PvP system will be in place?
A: Diablo II system didn’t work. They don’t have a solution yet but plan to come up with that satisfies both PvE and PvP focused players.

Q: Are you going to removed the complete immunity system?
A: Class builds are going to have much more variety so that immunity will no longer be a problem. This means immunity will most likely still be in the game to incentivize you to build a more diverse character.

Q: How will the scramble for loot work?
A: Loot is per person specific. If you can see it, only you can loot it. Something drops for everyone. Items can still be traded per characters. Loot dropped can be seen by everyone.

Q: Will we need to stack magic find and run bosses over and over to get loot?
A: Magic find will continue to exist. We want to make it so you can still get good loot without running the same boss over and over.

Q: Will there be special achievements by your name to show you have beaten the game on hell mode?
A: Yes, we will do something.

Q: Will all classes have as much environmental interaction as the wizard?
A: I think the answer is yes. Every class is different, but the wizard does feel a bit more destruction. Later on all classes start getting something for interacting with the environment.

Q: How many players for coop?
A: We are finding that 4 is about the perfect number to prevent the gameplay from becoming too chaotic. Still up in the air though.

Q: Is there going to be a ranger or something?
A: Wirt and the Cow King are the other two classes.

Q: Any way to customize the appearance of your character?
A: We tried hair changes, skin tone, etc. You can’t really tell because the character is so small. We don’t really have an incentive to keep those systems in. We want to create more permutations in the looks as we aren’t really happy with the level of customization in the game.

Q: Diablo I felt more fragile than Diablo II. What will Diablo III feel like?
A: We see Diablo III as a blend of both games as there are things from both that we like. We changed several things such as the health system to help give the “I’m trapped in a dungeon with a lot of monsters around” feeling.

Q: How will Diablo III multiplayer differ from single player?
A: We’re not focusing on persistence as a primary goal. It makes the drop in and out coop play harder to achieve. We do want to make the world feel like it is transitioning. There will be big milestone events where the world changes.

Q: Is there a crafting system similar to the Horadric Cube?
A: I’m not going to say yes or no. We are exploring an item creation mechanic. The Horadric Cube was actually kind of annoying of a mechanic. We want to make a mechanic that is better. More space in the inventory and ways to upgrade it.

Q: How do we make sure players diversify what stats they use?
A: I don’t think it is possible to make sure every class wants every stats. We want to make sure every stat is useful across all classes.

Q: Are there still super rare items?
A: Yes. Randomly generated items are still at the core of the game.

Q: Will security be ramped up?
A: We will have much better security.

Q: Will there be raid encounters?
A: Goes against what we want. Maybe we could see end game content, but we won’t have WoW style raiding where character classes have roles. Raid system really doesn’t fit the Diablo style of having all dps classes.

Q: Will there be an auction house?
A: Auction houses are cool, but might make items too accessible. We do want a trading system that is appropriate for Diablo.

Q: Will Battle.NET remain free?
A: We don’t have a strong desire to make Battle.NET be a subscription service. We do plan to monetize it somehow. It shouldn’t feel like a bad thing to the players.

Q: Will items become soulbound?
A: No there will not be a bind system. We want players to be able to trade items freely. There might be quest items that bind, but we really don’t want to.

Q: Are there ways to do damage once you run out of mana?
A: We want the game to be fast paced so that you don’t sit around with no mana a lot. We want to have skill based ways to actively get mana back. If you have to step back for mana it is for a couple of seconds, not minutes.

Q: Will there be synergy between spells or combos?
A: We want to make sure no one spell dominates. We want to have a mix between buffs and actives. Example: Witch doctor summons creatures and he can cast plague on them.

What’s the Diablo 3 Wizard like?

“A wielder of the elements and a master manipulator of time, the wizard can hurl environment-shattering lightning bolts, channel explosive arcane energies, and create pockets of space outside the normal temporal flow…” Generally speaking, your standard mage archetype present in all RPGs since day one.

Diablo 3 Wizard Game Play Video

Other Diablo 3 Classes

• Witch Doctor
• Barbarian

Looking for more awesome media? Check out these new Diablo 3 Screenshots.

Diablo 3 Demo: Barbarian

Diablo 3 Demo: Witch Doctor

For starters, Diablo 3 is NOT an MMO. The game is being developed very similar in play style to the original Diablo 2. While it will have much more polishing, details, and complexity in character development, the simplicity of the game will still allow any type of player (casual or hardcore to enjoy it).

Diablo 3 will not have a monthly free. With the announcement of the game, Blizzard also revealed that the game will be on Blizzard’s legendary network, battle.net. This means the game will be entirely free to play, simply plug and play till your heart’s content.

And now, a few rapid fire comments on what we already know.

1. There will be 5 Diablo 3 Character Classes, 2 of which have already been announced, Witch Doctor and Barbarian.
2. Diabo 3 will retain it’s old random environments and map generation.
3. Players will be able to choose their classes gender, unlike Diablo 2 which forced a gender upon a class.
4. Old friends and foes alike will make an appearance in the game, Deckard Cain has already been announced.
5. While the new world is called “Sanctuary”, players will still venture back to old world locations like Tristam.
6. The game is structured in such a way that you could level up solo, or with a group of friends.

and the big one…when will diablo 3 be released?

Officially, Blizzard is saying nothing, but in my personal opinion (and the backing of multiple insider sources), the game should release sometime between Q2 and Q3 of 2009.

This type of launch date for the beta is very reassuring, as it further reinforces the estimated diablo 3 release date of summer / fall of 2009. As in all Blizzard games the beta will go through a variety of phases. First, the family and friends of Blizzard beta (cross fingers that I get one!), second closed beta…now this is where timing on your part will be crucial if you’d like to get in.

Closed beta accounts will be given by invitation only. How do you get this closed beta invitation? Once blizzard finally announces the closed beta sign ups you may only have a week, or two at max to get your name and information sent to blizzard. In these applications make sure you extol your vast gaming experience, the fact that you are a player and do not represent any type of media organization (if you’re associated with another company or media outlet Blizzard will immediately deny your app).

As always make sure to stop back by on occasion, as soon as official announcements are made on beta sign ups I’ll have the full story on how to get yourself one.

Either way, if you haven’t seen the official Diablo 3 cinematic trailer make sure you check it out. If this doesn’t pump you up then I don’t know what else will. Also, check out the newest Diablo 3 game play videos here.

Diablo 3 Character Video – Barbarian
Diablo 3 Character Video – Witch Doctor

In addition to showcasing some of the basics associated with the class this video also reveals our first look into party and grouping mechanics of the game. Towards the end of the video a group of 4 (2 barbarians and 2 wtich doctors) engages in a real battle…and I’ve got to say, it looks pretty bad ass.

I really hope this game comes out well ahead of schedule!

Note: Make sure you check out part 1 of this video, Diablo 3 Video – Barbarian (this video starts with a few seconds of Barbarian footage from the end of part one)

Check out these 29 awesome shots from closed alpha testing.

The video showcases many of the barbarian’s skills and attacks, as well as the destroyable environment, interactive aspects of environment, quests, NPC interaction, gear, use of skills, character movement, as well as a pretty good look at the Diablo III user interface.

More on the interface…while it looks similar to the interface in diablo 2 it’s clear there have been vast improvements in the fluidity and customization of the action bars. You can now seamlessly change what abilities are located in each hotkey, which is presumably bound to a desired key.