After taking a moment to peruse the latest set of Diablo III screenshots posted yesterday, I found myself contemplating the question that has been on every Diablo fan's lips since the last class was announced at BlizzCon '08 back in October - what are the remaining Diablo III player classes that are, as of yet, still unannounced? I have come to the conclusion that we may have enough clues already in our possession to piece together what the mystery classes are, or at the very least what roles they will fill. And for that, we need to review what we know and delve a little bit in to Diablo history.
Join me after the jump for a quick refresher course in Diablo classes and, once we are all on the same note, I will declare my predictions for the classes yet to come.
The Classes of Diablo
The first game in the Diablo franchise had rather simplistic roots; To be honest, I don't believe that the developers at Blizzard had any idea of the huge legacy they were getting themselves into at the time. Part of the tightness in game design revealed itself in it's limited character selection, three archtypical classes that strongly establish the tone and style of the rest of the franchise. While they were allowed a limited amount of cross-skill customization, they each had certain strengths they played well to, as follows:
- The Warrior - A master in all things close quarters, the Warrior was immediately established as the "Hack'n'Slash" expert of the originally game. Sure, you could give him a ranged weapon or teach him some spells, but by and large if you chose a Warrior you knew you were going to be up close and blood drenchingly personal.
- The Sorcerer - Establishing the "Magic User" archtype was the Sorcerer. Though physically weaker and more frail than the others, he could unleash great amounts of damage from a distance, and more often than not to a large number of targets.
- The Rogue - Like the Sorcerer, the Rogue dealt with her foes from way more than an arm's length away. She was an archer, and the majority of her class skills revolved around letting arrows fly with wild abandon.
Reviewing those three classes, we can see the defining play styles that are a large part of what makes a Diablo game what we expect: Close quarters hack 'n' slash, ranged combat and spell-based destruction.
A Note on Diablo: Hellfire
For the sake of this discussion, Im going to set aside the classes presented in Diablo: Hellfire, the expansion pack published by Sierra on Blizzard's behalf. Many people did not bother to play it, and it's story is considered by most to be non-canon. Hell, it isn't even listed on Blizzard's website and was not included in the Diablo Battlechest compilation, so I can only assume that the developers don't really acknowledge it either. The classes, for those that are curious, were a martial arts style Monk, as well as Bard and Barbarian classes that were unlockable by modifying a text file in the install folder.
The Classes of Diablo II
The next true installment of the franchise upped the character class ante to five playable classes, as follows:
- The Barbarian - The spiritual successor to the Warrior, the Barbarian was a full on "chop 'till you drop" melee class. For the first time in the series (not counting the previously mentioned Bard), characters could dual wield weapons, increasing damage output and turning the player into a human blender.
- The Sorceress - If I have to tell you what archtype this class replaced, we may as well end the discussion right here. Aside from a convenient gender change, her powers were now firmly based in three different fields: Fire, Ice, and Arcane magic, a similar setup to what was used in another of Blizzard's popular games.
- The Amazon - Successor to the Rogue (and looking quite similar, to be honest), the Amazon filled in the Ranged Attack archtype quite naturally, whether you equipped her with bows, crossbows or javalins.
- The Paladin - In order to create classes beyond the three basic archtypes, Blizzard followed the most logical course of action - mix and match them. The Paladin is the first of these hybrid classes, playing very similar to a mix between Warrior and Sorcerer, but with the addition of healing spells and holy damage added for extra flavor.
- The Necromancer - Last, but certainly not the least, of the D2 Five is the Necromancer, who at his core was a mix between a Rogue and a Sorcerer. The new trick he brought to the party, however, soon became his defining power set: The ability to raise the dead and have them fight for you. This "pet" system allowed a player to sit back and command his army of skeletons from a safe distance, while firing over their heads with spells or bows.
The Classes of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction
Lord of Destruction, the Diablo II expansion pack, brought with it two new character classes, as follows:
- The Druid - The Druid is by far the most convoluted of all the characters, pulling an equal amount of inspiration from all three of the main archetypes, as well as some pet class abilities similar to the Necromancer. In addition, the Druid gets the ability to shapeshift in to a werewolf and werebear forms for additional melee prowess.
- The Assassin - Much more straightforward, the Assassin takes the Warrior archtype and adds in a combo point system where specific attacks stack up points that are "spent" on a finishing move. This system is the direct inspiration for the Rogue class of World of Warcraft.
The Classes of Diablo III (so far)
Finally, lets take a look at the classes they have already announced for the next game.
- The Barbarian - The large, bald brute makes a come back, marking the first time in franchise that a class has carried over between iterations. He will carry on the Warrior tradition of up-close, brutally over-the-top combat.
- The Witchdoctor - With a skill set eerily similar to the Necromancer, the Witchdoctor fills a similar role of combining the Rogue and Sorcerer archtypes with a pet system.
- The Wizard - Once again we have our Sorcerer archtype represented, though this time the spheres of magic used shy away from elemental magics and lean more towards the higher arcane arts, such as arcane teleportation and time manipulation.
What else we know
While Blizzard has been their usual tight-lipped selves about the remaining classes, we do know the following things items as fact:
- There will only be five classes when the game ships.
- Other than the Barbarian, no other classes will be repeated from previous installments of the franchise within those five initial classes.
Putting it all together
We have established the fact that Diablo III already has a pure Warrior, pure Sorcerer, and hybrid Rogue/Sorcerer classes. Following this logic and looking at the previous games, we are still missing classes that fill the pure Rogue and hybrid Warrior/Sorcerer types of gameplay. With all the previous Diablo classes ruled out, that leaves me with the following suppositions:
- Filling the Rogue archtype: The Hunter - Here we have a great excuse for Blizzard to tap into some inspiration in its big money-making franchise, World of Warcraft. Hunters are predominantly ranged attack oriented marksman, who suppliment their firepower by taming powerful beasts as their protective pets. We have established how much Blizzard loves their pet systems with the Necromancer, Druid, and Witchdoctor, so this seems like a fairly straightforward conclusion.
- Filling the Warrior/Sorcerer archtype: The Bishop - Looking over the rest of the classes (including my guesswork hunter) it quickly becomes obvious what we are missing. We need a class that can fight and cast close-quarters, that fills in the missing element of self and intra-party healing, and can do both with a gothic flair. The Bishop would be a replacement for the Paladin, focusing more on healing and holy damage, but being able to handle his own when the battle comes close. Also, a good counterpoint to all the tribal-looking characters (Barbarian, Witchdoctor, possibly Hunter) is in order to give the game a more balanced class selection.
Well there you have it, my guess for the final two classes: Hunter and Bishop. While the names may be off (as much as I try, I can't seem to read minds as of yet) I have a very strong feeling that at least my character descriptions will hold true. Only time will tell how accurate my predictions are. Do you agree with my forecast? If not, what classes do you think are likely to be announced?
