I already pre-ordered Diablo 3, and I do not regret it. I like everything that has been done to Diablo III, and I find that its enough change between the two games the keep the good part of the core game play but as well make it into a "new game" rather then just adding content to a previous game (kind of like what Bethesda did with Fall Out: New Vegas from Fallout 3).
- I never enjoyed having to put stats into my character in a very specific manner to get the most out of the character. It added no range to my character or playing style. It was simply a time waster. Since it gave no variation to making my character, I say good riddance.
- Getting rid of skill tree's seems a little odd too me, and I will be honest, I am not sure of it 100% right now. What I do know is that I had one sorc which was an Orber, I had another sorc which only did blizzards, I had another sorc for magic finding. I then had another Sorc that did Meteorites, I had another sorc that did fire balls.... I could go on, but I hope you get the picture. I do think that the skill tree did allow players a nice and interesting way to path towards certain skills... but the way it was simply made it so you were forced to have multiple characters, with a high level of difficult of changing your play style on the go.
With Diablo 3, they are attempting to have it so you can focus on a single character at a time, and not several of the same class. I welcome this new change, even if I am iffy about them getting rid of talent tree's.
- The economy in Diablo 2 was driving by those who could run the most bots. The economy was driven by duping. These issues were so bad, that the economy was just flooded with items if you wanted to trade. Most times you were not sure if an item would simply disappear on your next log in. I hated this, it made the game less fun for me. I welcome having to be online all the time for online play if it prevents this.
- If anyone here actually watched the "Activision Blizzard Second Quarter Calendar 2011 Results Conference Call" you would of found something very interesting about it. In no way did they account for the money they would make from the trading fee's to be apart of their income they would make from the game. An income fee which would be a flat rate, which means that there would have to be a LARGE amount of items being traded for them to actually make any money from it. They are simply giving players an option to trade real money for items.
Also, since gold is going to be extremely useful in Diablo 3, its going to behalf you to trade for gold instead of money.