This doesn't work on Battle.net, did you really think that such an exploit would have gone unnoticed? ;)

I can't speak for my personal experience (passed on D3), but I can try to explain my understanding of the situation from reading others comments on it. The core of the issue is that the auction house did not exist in a vacuum, but that other game design decisions were made with the auction house in mind, most notably the gear drop rates. In order to prevent the auction house from being absolutely flooded with gear the drop rates were set at a level where trying to reasonably gear up a character for end-game content with just self-found loot wasn't something that could be done in a reasonable amount of time. As a result, many players had the options of either grinding and grinding and grinding until they got enough lucky drops to progress, or hitting up the auction house. This is what bothered many people- the auction house wasn't something that could just simply be ignored, because the loot system was designed with it in mind. This point is reinforced heavily by the fact that the removal of the auction house is being accompanied by a revamp of the loot system. If the auction house truly were just something that existed on its own and could be ignored then it could have been removed without needing to redesign other gameplay elements.

Exactly, this concept of illegal markets seems to be really really hard to understand for many people (might explain modern prohibition,though). And what the other guy said, that this "enables" them to improve the game in other ways is just ridiculous. If they want to improve the loot system just improve the loot system. How does moving trades to ebay help with this.
It's probably very simple, the auction house system maintenance now costs more than the real money trade fees yielded.

As I said above - "I don't own D3 and only played D1/D2 using SP or LAN". We mostly had LAN parties with someone having a "speed run" server where we buffed up and went for maximum fun. For this server the items were required. We all tried Battle.net at one time or another but it just didn't compare to the fun of a LAN party =)

Edit: the maximum number of servers I recall at a LAN party was five IIRC, add steaks, whiskey, wine, women, loud music etc etc . . battle.net didn't stand a chance with our group ; P

Actually, owning several copies of D1 / D2 / SC, the reasons I don't own D3 / SC2 is no LAN, AH, always on =(

But just what is "the grind" in this case? A common complaint I heard is that people felt like the end-game content required them to grind the auction house rather than the game itself. How many people who completed Inferno do you think did so with just self-found gear? And what is the time investment for something like that compared to getting one's gear from the auction house? From what I've read it doesn't seem that people are all that annoyed about a steep difficulty curve towards the end of the game, but rather that overcoming this difficulty curve just about requires that one gear up through the auction house. Again, it all casts serious, serious doubt on the claim that the auction house is an entirely optional part of the game and that people can just ignore it if they don't like it.

This.

Diablo 3 loot comparison - PC vs Console on Gamespot. Pretty funny.
Yeah, the "casualisation" claims will come up, no doubt about it - which remains to be seen how much truth they hold. But really, adjusting drop rates to make the AH viable in the first place, contradicts the "optional" part rather firmly.

Wasn't your avatar just a head at some point? Does she slowly back away from the camera or is it just me? I'd say I would remember boobs. I tend to remember boobs.

Yikes.

Had I been given that console experience back when I first got D3 I might still be interested in it. As it stands I've ended up playing more D2 than D3 since I bought D3.

Who doesn't? :)
You're right. Just the head is a rather common avatar, but I finally managed to care enough and had a bit time spare to search for the original artwork in a decent size / resolution.

Oh I have plenty to complain about it, it is a braindead action game with stupid gameplay. The only reason I bought and played it was due to peer pressure from real world friends. The only interesting thing about the game was the auction house.
At least I managed to sell the the game for more than it cost me. Thanks to people who apparently don't even want to play the only part of the gameplay that was mildly amusing.

When the game was first released, Blizzard said that they expected people to take months to progress through Inferno to kill Diablo (took about 3 days I think). You feel like you should grind the game? Go ahead and sink in those months as intended.

What does this video say? Absolutely nothing? And ok, let's admit that drops were adjusted to make up for the fact that there is no AH? No shit? Isn't that fucking obvious?

You spent 100+h playing a game that you don't like, but nevertheless managed to recoup 'the investment'? Well done, your mother must be proud of you!

Someone pointed this out to me earlier today: http://www.diablowiki.net/Diablo_3_console

That kind of makes the console version the superior version right now, at least to me (I know preferences will differ), couch co-op makes it even better.

To be clear, consoles have loads of dual analog stick ARPGs, many for 10 bucks or less. Diablo 3 it may be but what I have seen in the demo makes me feel it's not particularly more special than most of the generic ARPGs you could get for a fraction of the cost. I'd have to buy it and play it for awhile to see if my feelings held over the long term or if the social aspect of co-op made me feel differently.

I wish I could mod Torchlight 2 for the same, less loot but when it' drops it's better mechanic they put into the console version of D3. I tend to find this to be more fun, the inventory puzzle minigame was NEVER a fun part of Diablo games.
Hey man, at least I've managed to play the demo at this point;)

And really, as far as I can tell, D3 isn't bad at all, so much as it's not as special as I wish it was. All in all, that's not the doomsday pronouncement of suck some people are making it out to be.

However, it seems that many people don't find it particularly fun to grind for three months just to gear up enough to beat the game, and also don't find grinding the auction house to be much fun, so ultimately they just stop playing. It seems Blizzard prefers that they keep playing (and get their friends playing, and buy the upcoming expansion), so they're changing the mechanics to what they think will entice more people to play the game. Look, I get that you're angry that a mechanic you liked is being changed, but at this point you're not making any kind of rational argument that Blizzard made the wrong call, you're just venting your own personal frustration.

Not really, I hated myself for playing that crap so much. Ever know how you have a warm and fuzzy feeling AFTER playing a great game like Fallout 2 for example? Well this was quite the opposite. But it's ok, I can blame my friends.