Diablo 4 is a live-service ARPG which requires a constant internet connection to play the game. Although you can tackle most of the game all by yourself, there are a few activities where it’s better if you group up, because grinding is just better when you’re doing it in a party.
However, the current Diablo 4 design goes against that and somewhat punishes you for being in a group or playing a few activities along with your friends.
Introduced in Season of Loot Reborn, Diablo 4’s mechanics for a few activities like the Artificer’s Pit or the Accursed Ritual gives more rewards to the player who contributes the materials required to start the activity.
While you’ll have to give the same amount of effort to defeat the bosses or complete the activities, if you’re not the one contributing to the starting materials, you’ll get 50% of the rewards, which players feel is “multiplayer unfriendly.”
As seen on Reddit, PlutolSaPlanet shared their experience about how the initiator of the of the Pit gets most of the rewards because they made a “trivial contribution” of 3 runeshards. Players rallied on the post, and shared opinions of their own.
One player added, “Diablo is a solo game with the illusion of multiplayer,” while another said, “This game needs matchmaking.”
As players have shared, the process of inviting another player to your party from a whisper is also very convoluted. You’ll have to add them as a friend first, before you can send them a party request. You’ll be able to avoid this process if they’ve replied in the Global Chat, but not many people do that.
Overall, if Diablo 4 has to succeed at this point, the developers will have to introduce some form of matchmaking to the game, or remove the penalties for playing in a group.
And it’s not like this is a novel concept, because as players have pointed out, the previous Diablo games have had matchmaking systems, so they believe it might not be difficult to implement the same for the current ARPG.
