Leonard Boyarsky: We're really excited to talk about the followers today, they really add a lot to gameplay, not only strategically, but also in really fleshing out the world as a living breathing place.

There are many aspects to them that really enliven the gameplay experience. There's a templar that's going to take a lot of damage for you, but if you're a barbarian you can choose to have him healing because you don't need someone up-front taking a lot of damage for you. If you're playing more of a ranged class, a wizard or somebody like that, you're going to use him more up-front.

We also have a scoundrel, which is the classic rogue archetype. Very humorous, very scoundrelly in his personality! He's a ranged character, and does a lot of damage such as poison multi-shots, things like that.

And we have the enchantress, she's kind of a buffing follower: she'll amplify your damage, lower enemies’ resistance and charm your enemies so they fight on your side for a while.

 

Leonard Boyarsky, Lead World Desinger on Diablo III

But basically the main thing we're getting across here is that you can pick and choose their skills as you level up and that changes their gameplay mechanics to sit better with your game style, how you're playing your character.

So there's that aspect of them but they also really bring the game world to life. When you're running around the world they comment on what's going on and comment on places in the world, and really give you a lot of background. That way you don't have to sit down and read lore books or things like that if you're not inclined to do so.

Gameplanet: Can you tell us about each follower’s background?

Boyarsky: The scoundrel, Lyndon, is a member of the Thieves’ Guild and he’s fallen into disgrace. He’s charming and cynical in equal parts, and always looking for his next bit of treasure.

Kormac, the Templar, is a member of the Order, and they’re searching for Tomes and Archbishop Lazarus stole before the events of the original Diablo.

 

Eirena the enchantress

Eirena the enchantress, her background is really shrouded in mystery. She follows this guy named The Prophet who you really don’t know much about and she really doesn’t tell you at the beginning where she’s from or what she’s doing. It’s a mystery that unfolds over the course of the game.

Gameplanet: How many skills do the followers have?

Boyarsky: They have at total of 12 skills, you get to pick at level five, level 10, level 15 and level 20, you get to pick a skill out of a set of three at each of those levels, so at the end you'll end up having four skills.

Gameplanet: So at what stage of the game do you adopt these followers?

Boyarsky: As you’re running through the main story arc, you’ll encounter them doing similar things to you. They’re adventurers fighting the good fight. You’ll interact with them in their story and then they have reason to follow you and to help you in your quest. These happen in the first third of the game, they’re spread out a little bit.

Once you’ve unlocked them you can keep them with you or send them back to town and choose which one you want.

 

Kormac the Templar

Gameplanet: Do they each have their own inventory, can you assign them weapons and so on?

Boyarsky: They don’t each have their own inventory as such [but] they have two weapon slots that you can use for a two-handed weapon, dual weapons, or a shield and a weapon. They have two ranged slots, an amulet slot, and they also have a special inventory slot for a special inventory item that is unique to them.

Gameplanet: How does their health system work, will you have to manually heal them?

Boyarsky: No, when you pick up health globes, they’re automatically healed.

Gameplanet: At no penalty to your own health?

Boyarsky: No, we really wanted to get that cooperative feel into singleplayer. It’s the same as when you’re playing multiplayer: if I pick up a health globe it heals everybody in my party equally.

Gameplanet: In Diablo II, mercenaries or hirelings would get wiped out almost straight away going into a boss fight. Have you changed that at all with these followers?