If you’ve ever played Diablo II, you know what a time-devouring bit of work that game was. At last year’s BlizzCon, I had some hands-on time with Diablo III, and let me tell you, it’s much, much more intense. Diablo III is so utterly addictive, it will suck your time away like a gigantic, demonic leech. Of course, I’m not the only gamer looking forward to the release of this amazing piece of digital crack action game, there are a lot of fanboys and fangurls dying for this one to drop. In fact, any and all information about Diablo III generally gets gamers foaming at the mouth with excitement.

I just got out of this year’s BlizzCon opening ceremonies, and they actually had quite a bit to say about Diablo III.  They even introduced the newest DIII class, the Monk. Chris Metzen of Blizzard made the announcement, indicating that it hearkened back to the monks from tabletop RPGs. I can only assume that he was referring to the old D&D monks. Got to be frank, the old D&D monks were ok, but they never really thrilled me; my emotions were mixed when he said monks were to be included in Diablo III.

Of course, Blizzard never does anything in a conventional way.  Their monks are distinctly different from anything else we’ve seen in a fantasy RPG before.  Sure, they’re super fast martial artists, but they’ve got a lot more going on.  Their weapons are huge and exciting, and they’ve got an over the top quality to them.  Their abilities range from sweeping area effect attacks, to lighting fast rapid strikes, to some self-healing abilities.  Prayerful warriors, they also have a nice array of class-appropriate spells available to them.  Check the video below (live from the show floor), as it gives a good overall feel for what the Monk is all about.

Monks, overall, are meant to be quick but somewhat fragile.  This is what sets them apart from other melee classes, like the Barbarian.  Their abilities are based largely on the idea of combinations, which grow in power with each successive attack.  For example, they have a skill called “Exploding Palm”.  EP does some damage on the first hit, then damage + a bleed on the second hit, then on the third hit, it causes the target to explode.  A lot of the Monk skills are set up this way; they are designed so that new players can simply spam one attack and still do quite well.

However, combinations of skills can be used in rapid succession, and players can still get the benefits of this 3-step power amplification.  Metzen gave an example of how a player can use step one of the ability “Way of the Hundred Fists”, which is essentially a rapid series of punches.  He then can use an AE debuff called Crippling Wave, but that skill will now be at step 2, its second level of effectiveness.  If the player then used Exploding Palm, it would be at its third level of effectiveness, causing explosive damage to enemies.  Here’s a clip of this discussion:

The idea behind the monk is that he is an unconventional melee class: quick, lightly armored, and vulnerable to damage.  However, his use of combinations give him huge damage spikes, and his debuffs and skills allow him increased survivability.  His overall feel is that he comes from an arcade style fighting game, not an RPG.

Below I’ve embedded two vids; the first is of the skill “impenetrable defense”; it’s akin to the Jedi skill of parrying incoming ranged attacks.  The second is a bit less visually stunning, but it’s an AE debuff that weakens enemies attacks called Crippling Wave.  Have a peek:

A bit of background to the Monk class:  they combine some traditional views of RPG monks (i.e., strongly based on Shaolin monks), with an ‘eastern European’ feel.  (This can be seen in the intro video – the monk has a bit of a Rasputin tinge to him.) They are both holy men, and incredible warriors, so they are both feared and revered by the populace.  They are very prayerful and meditative, and they are accountable to their patriarchs.

Overall, that’s a solid feel of the Monk.  There isn’t a lot more detailed information regarding the class (or the game overall) as yet; Blizz is still playing this quite close to the vest.  I’ll update this piece as more is revealed at BlizzCon. 

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