The state of D3 guides

[solitha 84]

I've become disillusioned with Icy Veins' D3 guides. The noted author has no content on Twitch or Youtube in over two years; his Twitter is just retweets since. If he's still a professional player, I can't see how.

The comment forums for each guide seem largely ignored. I had a question about something on support barbs, went to the comments, and found out my question was asked by someone 6 months ago with never an answer. Along the way, I found even more questions in other posts, a minority answered by other users, and the guide still showing what appears to be wrong information (like why are attack speed and crit on a zdps support build).

I've posted myself for help and clarifications, often with no result.

Do you have any plans to bring these guides back to life beyond what feels like phoned-in "updates"?

[Bubble181 14]

Sadly, the amount of replies to this topic should show how much they care. 

I really like Icy Veins and its guides, it's a very good, readable format and fairly reliable info... But it's slipping more and more. 

I understand pro players moving on, but you'd think they could get a team of class - specific freelancers to keep the guides up to date or renewed when necessary 

[Valks 2,373]

So, I’m hoping I can clear up a few points on this. Deadset no longer posts on his personal YouTube channel, but that by no means is an indicator of his inactivity in the community. He is still a vital part of it, as well as a respected one at that. He now focuses on the guides here on Icy Veins, rather than his own channels, and ensures that the guides are updated each season for any new changes that take place. 

We currently have two writers that help Deadset with the more general guides, myself and Impakt, but the class guides are still maintained and kept up to date by Deadset. We always try to make sure that we update any errors or misinformation in the guides, especially when we make changes for a new season. 

We actually brought Impakt on-board to help specifically because we felt it was better to allow Deadset to write the more intense, detailed class guides, rather than waste his talent on more general, easier-to-write guides. 

I apologise if you feel that you have been ignored or not properly answered, that is most definitely our fault - often, there are times when we will discuss and update a certain part of a guide to reflect a certain comment, but will then forget to relay to that user that the comment was fixed in the guide. That is my fault, and I apologise for that - we’ll definitely make sure that we respond to each comment in the future, even if it is just a quick fix on our end in the guide. 
 

We have some new ideas in place for this season and, hopefully, once we can reveal them, you will both feel in somewhat safer hands, both in terms of how we handle the feedback, as well as the quality of the guides.

[Deadset 108]

Hey - aside from Blainie's pretty thorough comment, I thought I should chime in as well.

As far as Twitch and Youtube go, myself and many theorycrafting-oriented content creators can confirm that both platforms don't really encourage the type of analytical content that theorycrafting usually produces. On one hand we have Twitch, which has been going more and more into an entertainment direction, where games - let alone their analysis - is in lesser and lesser demand; in their stead, the platform demands constant viewer engagement and in-your-face attitude, neither of which appeal to me or would produce better guides. On the other side we have Youtube, which pushes for constant content churn (bad for guide makers specifically, since it encourages rehashing older content and/or buries already existing good guides in favor of 'newer' ones), on top of Youtube's ever-sinking revenue rates and seemingly random devaluation of content creators' work.

Both these factors have lead me to focus on Icy Veins work exclusively for the past 2.5 years, although as Blainie said - there's a big upcoming discussion in the works with some of the most respected names in Diablo theorycrafting, which I'm sure you'll love to go through and engage with. On my side, I will make a conscious effort to engage with the forums more throughout this upcoming Season - I have been notably absent from forum discussions for a good while, and I accept full responsibility if readers feel neglected by it.

[solitha 84]

Well, it took a few weeks but I'm glad to get some response.

I haven't found any viable replacement to IV's guides, but it's been frustrating to try to second-guess where things are unclear or unanswered. I'm encouraged by your responses and am cautiously optimistic for improvements.

3 hours ago, Deadset said:

Both these factors have lead me to focus on Icy Veins work exclusively for the past 2.5 years, although as Blainie said - there's a big upcoming discussion in the works with some of the most respected names in Diablo theorycrafting, which I'm sure you'll love to go through and engage with. 

TBH it's likely to be over my head - which is why I rely so much on the guides. You're helping poor schlubs like me enjoy co-op time with my much better spouse, allowing me to contribute and pull my weight. But when I'm failing and can't figure out why, it's such a downer. I look forward to seeing more active response in the guide comments in particular.

Edited June 27, 2020 by solitha

[Bubble181 14]

Hi Blainie and Deadset, thanks for the answers ? happy to see there's still a response ?

I think I mainly got the idea there wasn't much movement anymore these days as some "small" issues mentioned in some guides haven't been getting fixed (e.g. mentions of legendaries that used to be part of a build that have been replaced still lingering on an overview page or in summary,...). 

Still love the builds and the page designs, Icy Veins definitely puts together good guides that offer more explanation and make it clear how to build and use a build (rotations, alternatives), more than just a list of skills & a YT video like other sites; it's why this page is my go-to for D3 builds and ideas ?

Looking forward to the new Necro builds made possible/viable with all the changes in 2.6.9, seems like some fun should be able to be had ?