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'Diablo III' Designer Explains Why Necromancer Was Cut, Hints At Return

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MTV Multiplayer reports:

"Although many "Diablo" fans have expressed fondness for the Necromancer from "Diablo II," lead "Diablo III" designer Jay Wilson confirmed to MTV Multiplayer that the character class will not appear in the initial release of the game.

When the team was choosing which classes to include in the long-awaited sequel for Blizzard's best-selling action-RPG series, they decided to create a brand-new one - the Witch Doctor. And with only five classes in the game, "Diablo III" just didn't have room for two curse-dealing, pet-wielding classes.

Here's Blizzard's explanation for why the Witch Doctor replaced the Necromancer..."
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multiplayerblog.mtv.com
SUP3R - contributor
Published: 511 days 20 hours ago | News | PC
 
 

Showing: 1 - 12 of 12 Comments
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Daxx - 511 days 20 hours ago
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If there's enough demand for the necromancer Blizzard will just put that class in the Diablo 3 expansion. But I'm not complaining. The witch doctor looks very awesome. It's pretty much the new necromancer only with Voodoo spells and what not.
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Diugu - 511 days 20 hours ago
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2 - Is it just me...
Or the Necromancer in the picture looks better than the witch doctor. I mean... as if the game with the Necro was the new game. hehehehe

Oh well... I played Diablo 2 with my Necromancer for a long time and the Witch Doctor looks weird and gay. I hope I am wrong. I always used the Assassin, the Barbarian or the Necromancer... but mostly the Necro.
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Altered_Soul - 511 days 18 hours ago
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The Witch Doctor is an extreme closeup of in game graphics, while the necro pics are from the prerendered artistic character selection screen of Diablo II. Thats why one looks a lot better than the other in that shot.

I am nostalgic for the Necro, but if they bring him back in a certain capacity in an expansion, that would be very cool. D2 didn't bring back any of the first ones characters in any way, since the gameplay mechanic was different. I am looking forward to new ways of using characters in D3 (I hope).

I drool over the possibility of mixing classes somehow, not as broad as D1, but not as restrictive as D2.
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PikkonX - 511 days 20 hours ago
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Aw man, that's my favorite class too. I hope they at least put in the Sorcerer then.
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ThanatosDMC - 511 days 17 hours ago
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That sucks... i like building up a skeleton army plus revives plus golem...
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Charlie2688 - 511 days 20 hours ago
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I <3 the Necromancer :P

So far the Witch Doctor seems to be a mix between the Necro and the Druid O.o

Hopefully they will bring the Necro back in the expansion with even more cool stuff :D
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Wizeguy21 - 511 days 20 hours ago
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This sounds disappointing but its Blizzard were talking about Every Pc game they have made has been AWESOME!
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Daver - 511 days 19 hours ago
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Its good that they are trying to put new classes, personnaly i would not even brought back the barbarian
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Tyrael - 511 days 18 hours ago
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Witch doctor is sort of a druid/necro hybrid so it makes sense that they wouldn't bring him back initially. There's also obviously going to be some spellcaster of sorts and a ranged attacker.
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mariusmal - 511 days 17 hours ago
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when i saw the witch doctor i guessed the necro was cut.
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thor - 511 days 16 hours ago
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Necromancer was very imbalanced towards the higher levels. In fact, diablo 2 was imbalanced from nightmare mode and up; it wasn't just more difficult, it was just a pain because you would die very very quickly indeed and couldn't do anything about it. Many of the spells/skills were useless when you leveled them up, and you very rarely found any decent items. I completed hell difficulty with a amazon because then you can just stand back, dodge attacks and fire a lot of arrows for a long time until the enemies die. I probably died 30 times on baal at the end of hell difficulty.

If they can make the levels beyond 30 balanced this time, and even up the skills so that it's not sometimes a waste putting more skill points on a skill, and make the reward for leveling up at high levels more, well, rewarding (1 skill point doesn't do much when your skill is > level 10 already), then diablo III could just trump its predecessor.
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KarateExplosion - 511 days 14 hours ago
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10 - Please oh Please
Gimme back my Paladin.
BTW the necro was the first character I created on D2. These people made no sense. The witch doctor does damage with pets (that you get from a corpse)? and you use those pets to explode. They just added an extra step. As for the wall of flesh... it looks nice but bone wall plus iron maiden = damage too. That just took out the extra step.... oh well I am sure the servers will be flooded with witch doctors.
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