Diablo Immortal has had its ups and downs, just as its big brother Diablo IV has, but I have to admit the team working on Immortal has constantly been adding things that pique my interest. The Blood Knight was the first new class added to the Diablo franchise in nine years and it was an interesting spin on what I’d imagine a Castlevania protagonist would play like in the Diablo world. The Tempest is next and after playing for a while, I’m happy to report that the class adds an interesting set of new abilities and moves that make it a compelling option for players. I couldn’t tell if it would land in the S-tier category during my playtime, but it’s certainly got a lot of style that sets it apart from the others.
The Tempest’s main ability is focused on duplicating your character to set up an attack from all angles, as each clone (aka Zephyr) will mimic your attacks, which makes for some great gameplay moments that make you feel like a powerful trickster running laps around the demons on the map. The waterblades your character wields gave me God of War vibes for a moment, but in practice, the Tempest is a bit more like a trickster, zipping around the map and making it hard for enemies to get a bead on you.
Using the power of wind and water, combined with your Zephyr’s, you’ll find that the initial Wave Edge and Mist-Touch combo will make great building blocks that help you get a feel for the playstyle. Some of the first skills like Squall and Crosswinds are wave and wind attacks that will propel you in a direction and spawn a Zephyr once cast. From there you can finish off that initial setup with an attack like Cascade which makes “you and your Zephyrs slam your edges into the ground, unleashing a crashing wave around you.”
In practice, with these abilities I found the early game had me quickly zipping around the map to spawn my Zephyrs before setting up this trap over and over again to take me through the first few missions. It was a lot of fun to figure out a good flow and watch enemies melt as you did so. Not only are the movements interesting, but the overall design style is something I really like. These dual dagger-wielding Tempests look sleek and stylish, with vibes from other games and classes in the mix. The Zephyr mechanic could be compared to a Necro minion build, but for the Tempest, the Zephyrs act on a cooldown as opposed to having a set health meter – meaning you’ll need to set them up with each encounter as opposed to simply having them follow you around. That said, on a late game build they provided us with the Samilian WIndbrush and a 5-Star Echoing Shade that added a 15% chance to "summon a shadow clone for 17 seconds that attacks nearby enemies with one of your Primary Attacks." This addition did give you closes that romed along side you for a short period of time. These touches mean it's definitely a class I could see myself having a lot of fun with. The Tempest has a short origin quest when starting out with the character too, giving you a bit more history about the Tempest origin.
The other notable part of this preview was the huge change to the Paragon system. Blizzard tells us that all progress made on the Paragons so far will be retained, and that the 15 Paragon trees have been reduced to five. The goal is to give more options to mix and match your skills and because your progress is retained it’ll be nice to keep building it out as you grind the endgame. The trees you could stat into now include Frenzy of Battle, Soul of Conquest, Grind Expedition, Invincibility, Stringed, and for the Tempest there was a Wind tree. Add the skills you want to use to your new skill tree and take them for a spin. I like this new system, as in the retail build it does feel like you get locked in a bit more, and now you can, at Paragon level 300, choose six skills to put into your build.
The main criticism I have so far, strangely, is that Immortal feels incredibly easy. I know I’m the target audience, but progression has been ratched up so much that in the span of about an hour I had hit level 20 while everything around me melted. I realize that Blizzard wants to get you to endgame faster when rolling a 2nd or 3rd character instead of using the Class Swap option introduced a year after launch, but it doesn’t really give you a chance to learn by failing. You’re thrown so much loot and information a bit fast. Even trying out a Blood Knight at home after the event, I took him past level 30 by playing a mission here and there passively with minimum time put in. The ease of which takes away from the rewarding feeling you get when conquering something challenging.
The main criticism I have so far, strangely, is that Immortal feels incredibly easy.
All that said, when I asked about the health of the player base for Diablo Immortal, Blizzard told us that it “has been very healthy the whole time” during our interview. And because player counts saw a huge spike with the Blood Knight release, I’d imagine that we see one again with the Tempest. They also let us know that they’re already working on another character class addition and that they’d love to bring back characters they used to have as well
While I’ve had my criticisms about some of the mechanics Diablo Immortal uses, I do admit that I am impressed with the sheer amount of additions made to it in two years. There’s so much to dive into that it’s almost overwhelming when you sign back in. But because they’ve added two classes that are entirely new to the franchise, it’s worth trying them out for a few levels to see how they feel. I know I’ll be taking a peek in between my Diablo IV time when the Tempest and Paragon changes come to Immortal on May 23rd.
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The Tempest’s main ability is focused on duplicating your character to set up an attack from all angles, as each clone (aka Zephyr) will mimic your attacks, which makes for some great gameplay moments that make you feel like a powerful trickster running laps around the demons on the map. The waterblades your character wields gave me God of War vibes for a moment, but in practice, the Tempest is a bit more like a trickster, zipping around the map and making it hard for enemies to get a bead on you.
Using the power of wind and water, combined with your Zephyr’s, you’ll find that the initial Wave Edge and Mist-Touch combo will make great building blocks that help you get a feel for the playstyle. Some of the first skills like Squall and Crosswinds are wave and wind attacks that will propel you in a direction and spawn a Zephyr once cast. From there you can finish off that initial setup with an attack like Cascade which makes “you and your Zephyrs slam your edges into the ground, unleashing a crashing wave around you.”
In practice, with these abilities I found the early game had me quickly zipping around the map to spawn my Zephyrs before setting up this trap over and over again to take me through the first few missions. It was a lot of fun to figure out a good flow and watch enemies melt as you did so. Not only are the movements interesting, but the overall design style is something I really like. These dual dagger-wielding Tempests look sleek and stylish, with vibes from other games and classes in the mix. The Zephyr mechanic could be compared to a Necro minion build, but for the Tempest, the Zephyrs act on a cooldown as opposed to having a set health meter – meaning you’ll need to set them up with each encounter as opposed to simply having them follow you around. That said, on a late game build they provided us with the Samilian WIndbrush and a 5-Star Echoing Shade that added a 15% chance to "summon a shadow clone for 17 seconds that attacks nearby enemies with one of your Primary Attacks." This addition did give you closes that romed along side you for a short period of time. These touches mean it's definitely a class I could see myself having a lot of fun with. The Tempest has a short origin quest when starting out with the character too, giving you a bit more history about the Tempest origin.
The other notable part of this preview was the huge change to the Paragon system. Blizzard tells us that all progress made on the Paragons so far will be retained, and that the 15 Paragon trees have been reduced to five. The goal is to give more options to mix and match your skills and because your progress is retained it’ll be nice to keep building it out as you grind the endgame. The trees you could stat into now include Frenzy of Battle, Soul of Conquest, Grind Expedition, Invincibility, Stringed, and for the Tempest there was a Wind tree. Add the skills you want to use to your new skill tree and take them for a spin. I like this new system, as in the retail build it does feel like you get locked in a bit more, and now you can, at Paragon level 300, choose six skills to put into your build.
The main criticism I have so far, strangely, is that Immortal feels incredibly easy. I know I’m the target audience, but progression has been ratched up so much that in the span of about an hour I had hit level 20 while everything around me melted. I realize that Blizzard wants to get you to endgame faster when rolling a 2nd or 3rd character instead of using the Class Swap option introduced a year after launch, but it doesn’t really give you a chance to learn by failing. You’re thrown so much loot and information a bit fast. Even trying out a Blood Knight at home after the event, I took him past level 30 by playing a mission here and there passively with minimum time put in. The ease of which takes away from the rewarding feeling you get when conquering something challenging.
The main criticism I have so far, strangely, is that Immortal feels incredibly easy.
All that said, when I asked about the health of the player base for Diablo Immortal, Blizzard told us that it “has been very healthy the whole time” during our interview. And because player counts saw a huge spike with the Blood Knight release, I’d imagine that we see one again with the Tempest. They also let us know that they’re already working on another character class addition and that they’d love to bring back characters they used to have as well
While I’ve had my criticisms about some of the mechanics Diablo Immortal uses, I do admit that I am impressed with the sheer amount of additions made to it in two years. There’s so much to dive into that it’s almost overwhelming when you sign back in. But because they’ve added two classes that are entirely new to the franchise, it’s worth trying them out for a few levels to see how they feel. I know I’ll be taking a peek in between my Diablo IV time when the Tempest and Paragon changes come to Immortal on May 23rd.
Continue reading...
