Median XL News, May 2025

[magz_]

2. Retaliate is "supposed to" hit twice due to the stun/knock back so technically it's already more damage than earthquake if you consider the total % wdm of the 2 hits for both skills. How well that works in practice, especially when spamming the skill, I don't know.

Retaliate consistently hits 2-3 times, Earthquake actually usually hits 3-4.

I haven't played HMP in about 3 years but it was clearing Fauzt pretty well with just

Chober Chaber

Chober Chaber
Hand of God (Sacred)
Two-Hand Damage: 104 to 105
(Paladin Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 832
Item Level: 105
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
Amazing Grace
Level 30 Kraken Stance
Adds 150-375 Fire, Cold, and Lightning Damage
Kraken Stance: +3% Damage per Base Level in the Templar Tree
(100 to 150)% Attack Speed
Ignore Target's Defense
Adds 150-300 Fire Damage
Adds 150-300 Lightning Damage
Adds 150-300 Cold Damage
-(25 to 35)% to Enemy Elemental Resistances
Socketed (6)

and some basic runewords; pretty sure that was when it was 100% WDM and it's been buffed to 133% since then? Needed to gather up enough mobs to leech from, and I never actually geared it up for scos (would require a swap to either phys or true IED), but that was before druids so it wouldn't matter if I had.

yeah even tho the dev dummy for some reason doesn't show hits for it it does indeed appear to hit at least twice reliably in the field. Wonder if fast moving targets dont play well with it. Smells like ND issues.

I have a concept for how to improve dj against moving targets, and i like what you did to vessels re: massively improving the buff qol so maybe some of that could be done. Could see how much time is left before beta start and maybe attempt something

[magz_]

Will oskills be given some love?

That's roughly 70% of my focus rn. If you're in the discord I'm avail for feedback.

Your post is 3 years old and some of it was directly addressed (specifically avalanche), but a couple of the skills you mention are on my list (not necessarily for 2.11 but definitely for the future)

Hello, I am on Discord. How I can find you?

the median-xl discord, I'm in there as "magz"
we also have feedback threads on the forums

[momope]

How about a casual "MXL-classic realm", my dream something like this:

• no forum integration
• chars start level 100 in hell a1
• all normal and nightmare waypoints
• 15 arcane crystals
• free respecs

Experimentation encouraged. Casual and time friendly realm. Theory craft many types of builds. For fun, no racing or stat tracking. Online with a community to show your creations.

[Wertyx]

How about a casual "MXL-classic realm", my dream something like this:

• no forum integration
• chars start level 100 in hell a1
• all normal and nightmare waypoints
• 15 arcane crystals
• free respecs

Experimentation encouraged. Casual and time friendly realm. Theory craft many types of builds. For fun, no racing or stat tracking. Online with a community to show your creations.

These are literally my thoughts after many playthroughs. Some will say that the first difficulties are there to test your build, because if you can't handle them, you're already doing something wrong, but this is fundamentally the wrong approach. Some builds need a certain item or gain their main power too late, which ultimately forces you to play a completely different build just because it's faster. And why do these difficulties exist at all if they don't make any sense? Hasn't anyone who plays Diablo 2 mods played it before? It's just a run through quests you've already completed hundreds of times, without even a challenge. You could add open waypoints in the first two difficulties so that players don't waste a lot of time, but that's not a solution, it's a smoothing out. Right now, the first 2 difficulties are an imitation of character development. They're still in the game only because they were in the original, which is already very outdated. Why can't we have one difficulty where you reach level 105? What special role do the first 2 difficulties play? If the answer is that the progression rate will be too high, then why not make the level cap not 150, but 60-80? Then each level will feel like a significant jump. And it doesn't affect the current balance much, since it all easily breaks down into 2 skill points per level and 10 stat points per level. Or you could even make 1/5 levels 1-25, 2/10 levels 26-50 and 3/15 levels 51-75. It's all literally dividing or multiplying by 2. And the entire late game starts at level 50, where each level you get a new challenge. Like: "Oh, my level has increased! Now I can go to another location for a new challenge." And most importantly, you don't have time to get bored with the build while you're going through this tedious introduction before the main content.
I used machine translation, so I apologize for any inaccuracies.

[Visico]

Hello, i would say am average player made it to 150 2 season ago and like 145 last season and by far my biggest problem is playing together with my duo the way the world scales feels terrible in group play. when i play solo i feel close to a god, then my friend joins my world and all of the sudden the monster does 2000x times the damage. its boring and annoying in maps above 7 and its alot more efficent to play solo then having fun. Tldr i would like if group play was checked. i dont care/want more loot or experience and its fine that monsters are tankier, just the damage they do is just way to high.

Solo tanking tier 10 map whole room
Duo cant tank 5 monster

[Jackel6672]

How about a casual "MXL-classic realm", my dream something like this:

• no forum integration
• chars start level 100 in hell a1
• all normal and nightmare waypoints
• 15 arcane crystals
• free respecs

Experimentation encouraged. Casual and time friendly realm. Theory craft many types of builds. For fun, no racing or stat tracking. Online with a community to show your creations.

These are literally my thoughts after many playthroughs. Some will say that the first difficulties are there to test your build, because if you can't handle them, you're already doing something wrong, but this is fundamentally the wrong approach. Some builds need a certain item or gain their main power too late, which ultimately forces you to play a completely different build just because it's faster. And why do these difficulties exist at all if they don't make any sense? Hasn't anyone who plays Diablo 2 mods played it before? It's just a run through quests you've already completed hundreds of times, without even a challenge. You could add open waypoints in the first two difficulties so that players don't waste a lot of time, but that's not a solution, it's a smoothing out. Right now, the first 2 difficulties are an imitation of character development. They're still in the game only because they were in the original, which is already very outdated. Why can't we have one difficulty where you reach level 105? What special role do the first 2 difficulties play? If the answer is that the progression rate will be too high, then why not make the level cap not 150, but 60-80? Then each level will feel like a significant jump. And it doesn't affect the current balance much, since it all easily breaks down into 2 skill points per level and 10 stat points per level. Or you could even make 1/5 levels 1-25, 2/10 levels 26-50 and 3/15 levels 51-75. It's all literally dividing or multiplying by 2. And the entire late game starts at level 50, where each level you get a new challenge. Like: "Oh, my level has increased! Now I can go to another location for a new challenge." And most importantly, you don't have time to get bored with the build while you're going through this tedious introduction before the main content.
I used machine translation, so I apologize for any inaccuracies.

Well aside from being a crap ton of work. Reworking items, exp charts, area levels, treasure charts, etc etc

Crazily enough, people actually do enjoy playing the game. I level solely as the build I am attempting. Theres an aspect of learning how it functions that I can't replicate just jumping onto a 105. If you feel forced to play a faster build, that's on you. Can't be unique, and a meta slave at the same time.

I can't imagine the pain of trying to condense 150 levels into 60 or 80. You would either make leveling too fast, or it would feel absolutely horrible from 50-60 or 70-80.

[LeonelC]

A lot of people are talking about what is wrong with Median XL, but I want to talk about what is right from my many years playing this game,

If there is a character that always made MXL fun from start to finish is the Assassin, yea she is a glass cannon in most builds, but there's something about her early to late game that makes her builds so much fun, even during the "bumpy" points through her journey (which may differ depending on the build). But when I hit a roadblock I can always farm a certain area for Oils, Shrines, or Runes/Jewels to keep pushing the build further. Not sure if it is Perfect Being and Shadow Refuge carrying my sorry self through the levelling process, but I can feel her slow but steady progress, and I love that so much about the Assa, I think the only character that feels the same (not sure now since I haven't played it since the rework) is the bowazon.

The rest of the rooster also get bumpy roads, but at points where "going back" isn't good enough or feels "odd", unless you are willing to run Nightmare K3K multiple times just to get enough runes for those RWs with PR and ED.

I don't have any suggestions for what should be changed, MXL is a huge project to begin with, and I'm glad to see some serious work is being put on.

[Maidstone]

Shadowfang

Shadowfang
Bastard Sword (Sacred)
One-Hand Damage: 44 to 47
Two-Hand Damage: 70 to 72
(Necromancer Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 535
Item Level: 120
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
Pestilence: duration reduced by 50%
Pestilence: regenerates 4% of Maximum Life per Second
25% Chance to cast level 50 Veil King Plague Grasp on Melee Attack
200% Bonus to Attack Rating
+100% to Poison Spell Damage
+60 to Stormlord
Slow Target 25%
+200 Life after each Kill
2% Reanimate as: Veil Terror
Socketed (4)

Pestilence orange text doesn't work. I think this item misses - 50 poison pierce as well , because is very hard to hit enough pierce with rest of the items without shield/weapon. Also is there any change to add the missing stats from SL skill like Arrogance? For level 60 SL gives you only 80 stats. Another thing is that we don't have proper skill to use with this sword. There's nothing in melee tree skills with poison just Angel of death which is crap.

[Based]

My biggest issues in Median as a casual player are:

Theres so much content without much in terms of guides on what content to do when and specific build guides are hit and miss on if they can even do them or whats exactly required to realistically do them

Then its the issue of how important bosses are to progression so it feels like you HAVE to pick a build that can reliably boss for charms and farm regularly and it's hard to know what builds can even do that (and without needing massive gear). I always hit a complete brick wall when playing that i have zero idea how to get passed, and i'm assuming the players don't want to spread information like this out.

Just what items are good what sells what doesn't, so many dead and useless items that it's impossible to tell from a casual player standpoint which brings me to the next issue

Biggest issue of all is how shit trading is combined with TG persisting over seasons. I know the PD2 trade website probably took a lot of work, but without being in a circle of players or hoping you can find similar people posting in the trade channel on the discord its impossible to know what anything is worth at all. Probably at least half of the notes after completed trades are "ty" which i assume are people actively trying to muddy the market so no one knows what the value of anything is unless you're a seasoned and experienced player, or lazy as fuck. I've always detailed my notes on trades with exactly what they are so people know what the price for things are. All this does is create unnecessary barriers for non super experienced no lifers. Combining this with the fact that TG stays over seasons means that someone or a group with enough TG can completely manipulate the market on things if they try hard enough or at least can get stupid ahead of everyone else that doesn't have access where i think whats the point of season resets if the economy is warped by this?

I love so many things about Median but at the end of the day theres so many problems that feel like they gatekeep players that don't have years of experience or specifically taken under the wing of an experienced vet. I could be wrong about some of this but if i (someone who tries to research and figure out these games when i play them) am not able to figure them out reasonably without being guided by someone else then the average person trying Median is going to just nope the fuck out at like a few possible brick walls you may hit. I hate comparing this to PD2 (and for many reasons its an unfair comparison) but so many of these issues don't exist or are so lessened to the point where they mostly might not matter. All i did this season for a build and damage type i've never played is look at last seasons top players of the build and then ask a single question in the discord and everything else was found on the way. Not even a week into the PD2 season and i have a lot of really good gear and have some pretty high tier gear for my build. I'm not even a D2 hardcore/vet at all, i literally first played D2 in any incarnation ON MEDIAN the first SIgma season, and barely have played ARPGs outside of like 2 or 3 super casual PoE seasons prior to this.

[Taem]

My biggest issues in Median as a casual player are:

Theres so much content without much in terms of guides on what content to do when and specific build guides are hit and miss on if they can even do them or whats exactly required to realistically do them

Then its the issue of how important bosses are to progression so it feels like you HAVE to pick a build that can reliably boss for charms and farm regularly and it's hard to know what builds can even do that (and without needing massive gear). I always hit a complete brick wall when playing that i have zero idea how to get passed, and i'm assuming the players don't want to spread information like this out.

Just what items are good what sells what doesn't, so many dead and useless items that it's impossible to tell from a casual player standpoint which brings me to the next issue

Biggest issue of all is how shit trading is combined with TG persisting over seasons. I know the PD2 trade website probably took a lot of work, but without being in a circle of players or hoping you can find similar people posting in the trade channel on the discord its impossible to know what anything is worth at all. Probably at least half of the notes after completed trades are "ty" which i assume are people actively trying to muddy the market so no one knows what the value of anything is unless you're a seasoned and experienced player, or lazy as fuck. I've always detailed my notes on trades with exactly what they are so people know what the price for things are. All this does is create unnecessary barriers for non super experienced no lifers. Combining this with the fact that TG stays over seasons means that someone or a group with enough TG can completely manipulate the market on things if they try hard enough or at least can get stupid ahead of everyone else that doesn't have access where i think whats the point of season resets if the economy is warped by this?

I love so many things about Median but at the end of the day theres so many problems that feel like they gatekeep players that don't have years of experience or specifically taken under the wing of an experienced vet. I could be wrong about some of this but if i (someone who tries to research and figure out these games when i play them) am not able to figure them out reasonably without being guided by someone else then the average person trying Median is going to just nope the fuck out at like a few possible brick walls you may hit. I hate comparing this to PD2 (and for many reasons its an unfair comparison) but so many of these issues don't exist or are so lessened to the point where they mostly might not matter. All i did this season for a build and damage type i've never played is look at last seasons top players of the build and then ask a single question in the discord and everything else was found on the way. Not even a week into the PD2 season and i have a lot of really good gear and have some pretty high tier gear for my build. I'm not even a D2 hardcore/vet at all, i literally first played D2 in any incarnation ON MEDIAN the first SIgma season, and barely have played ARPGs outside of like 2 or 3 super casual PoE seasons prior to this.

You know, you don't have to Trade. And its alright to play on realms solo (most do) and/or without trading while playing on realms.