Today we’re going to explore a brand new addition to the Diablo universe; World bosses. These unique battles give a taste of what it’s like to play with a large group of players engaging with a monster of enormous scale, ferocity, and impact.
Basic philosophy
Each World Boss expands from four base player experience pillars. These pillars allow alignment to the type of gameplay that is our standard, even as we try to create wildly different monsters and challenges.
Everyone can contribute and be part of the solution
This is an activity for players of all classes, so no match-up feels favored towards one class and playstyle. There is no action required to bring down a boss, so the “fun” cannot be monopolized or prevented.
Players should be grateful to other players for joining them
This content is for all players, from those just learning the game to masters. The activity is designed so that each additional player means that the World Boss will be conquered a little faster. Don’t worry if you don’t know all the attacks; getting in and playing is the best way to learn.
Replayable
We put a heavy emphasis on mechanics that stay interesting every time and feel larger than life. Experiencing the same Boss with a different class will present different challenges.
Staggering should be interesting and useful but never mandatory
Players who stagger or break a boss’ guard are rewarded with a high-impact adjustment to combat flow. We spend a lot of time making these quirky moments meaningful without them having to be.
Unique experiences
World Bosses are high-intensity battles filled with new Diablo experiences, terrifying challenges, and joyous triumphs. It’s a lot of pressure to do them well!
From Ashava’s concept art, you can see that while we had a clear idea of the general shape and claws, her head and general texture went through multiple runs to find what told the most story. clear on who she was and worked best with our top. -camera down.
Once we’re aligned on what we think our new horror will look like at a high level, we move on to building it into the engine. At this stage, the monster is extremely basic because creating amazing character models takes a lot of time! The team can’t always wait for a finished model, so we’re starting with something a little rough around the edges.
The process now becomes playtest-playtest-playtest. The team is refining attack instructions, damage payloads, timings, and evaluating the effectiveness of attacks as a whole. Bespoke spawn animations are created to tell a story about who this monster is and where it came from. Staggering mechanics are overhauled to ensure the player has interesting choices and it’s a rewarding experience.
The deaths of patrons are often the subject of special attention; it’s an impactful moment that showcases a horrible monster’s last breath in Sanctuary and every World Boss wants to leave a lasting impression.
Multiplayer Focus
As you’ve probably noticed, these titanic fighters are meant to be hired as a group. Taking on one without a sizable collection of other players would be a mistake until you learned what’s in each World Boss’ bag of tricks.
Our first task was to make sure our World Bosses cover a lot of ground with each attack. To do this, we first built some of our biggest attacks; show abilities that clear huge spaces with massive damage.
We can’t just have giant attacks! Our teams work incredibly hard to challenge players who tend to move fast, adapt to attack patterns, and are always looking for the easiest way to finish a boss. We tackle this problem by mapping many different attacks, using dangerous locations, and making sure to create interesting challenges for all styles of players.
Our next step is to make large parts of the map dangerous and blocked off, preventing players from trying to stay very far away safely. Ashava accomplishes this by spreading her poison and making jump attacks. Other World Bosses will address this issue in different ways to keep players on their toes.
Challenge Ashava early
The team is extremely excited about releasing our World Bosses into Sanctuary, and I hope you now know more about the team’s dedication to bringing them to you. If you want to challenge Ashava yourself during the Open Beta and Early Access weekends, you can do so on March 18 and 25 at 10 a.m., 12 p.m., 10 p.m., and midnight PDT.
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