The information presented in these archived FotDs is now outdated, but that's often the most interesting thing about them, seeing how much the game has changed from then to now.
The original FotDs are indented and italicized. Explanatory comments below them were written by Flux at the time the FotDs were archived, usually a couple/few months after the original FotDs had been presented.
September 4, 2000
- There are a number of display errors with the Character window in Diablo II, mostly caused by the code that generates the numbers in the window differing from the code that actually determines the values in the game. The most notable is in the "% to be hit" value that you get by hovering on your Defense. This number is actually 1/4 the actual value, and has the effect of making your Defense look much more effective than it actually is, especially on NM and Hell diff levels.
The 1/4 monster AR display bug was a big deal at the time, and was widely disbelieved at the time, with people swearing they only got hit the 65% or whatever their window said. In a later patch Blizzard fixed the display error, which of course set off a huge round of, "why did Bliz nerf my defense!" when they didn't, they just fixed the display to show the correct value.
September 11, 2000
- The cottages you see in act one usually have a chest in them, but for a bit more gold or maybe an item, you can click on the bed. There is no hover text, you just have to know you can do it. The beds are just like another chest, kicking out gold or an item, and they can be trapped as well. Watching a zombie or skeleton appear out of the floor next to a bed is always interesting. Thanks to Barbacry for the suggestion.
The beds in the Harem in Act 2 can be clicked also, with the same result. Not the ones you see on the first level below the Palace, those can't be clicked. There are others, usually round, found on the lower levels, that can be. They are just glorified chests, don't expect anything great, but they are fun to click.
The link is live, it goes to a very high quality shot of a cottage, part of an interview we did with Blizzard North artist David Glenn. It's amazing how good the game looks in his screenshots, with his graphics card and super quality computer.
September 18, 2000
- Doomslinger and Ichorsting, both Unique Crossbows, are about to become extremely popular with Sorcs. Why? It has just been discovered that the Pierce they grant applies to her projectile skills, as well as any arrows she might fire with it. Piercing Glacial Spikes or Fireballs sound appealing? This one works with some other char skills as well, but not with Bone Spirit, since it is coded differently. So no pinball with Bone Spirit for the Necro. Thanks to The_Raven42 for first noticing this.
There had been rumors about this for a while, but it was finally confirmed, and set off a brief flurry of piercing xbow using Sorceresses. After a while people realized that piercing mid-damage spells were no comparison to non-piercing high damage spells, but it was fun to add some variety for a while. Blizzard fixed this bug in a later patch.
September 25, 2000
- Evade is a Clvl 24 skill from the Amazon's Passive and Magic Skill Tree. This skill allows the Amazon to dodge a % of attacks she would otherwise be hit by while she is walking or running. Such attacks are 95% likely to hit you, unless you have a shield equipped, but her avoiding them isn't always a good thing, since she'll sometimes she'll pause to to do the Evade motion, which lets pursuing monsters or projectiles catch her. This is most noticeable when running from Diablo's pink lightning attack.
The "Evadelock" problem is mostly fixed in D2X, and it was never that much of a problem for most in D2, but some people absolutely hated Evade since they got it all the time.
September 28, 2000
- Howl is a Clvl 1 skill from the Barbarian's Warcries Skill Tab. This defensive skill hits every monster in range with a Terror-like effect, causing them to flee for several seconds. This skill can be will work as long as Clvl + Howl Slvl + 1 > Mlvl. So your Clvl + the Slvl of Howl, +1, must be higher than the Mlvl of the monster for it to work.
This is why Howl becomes useless later in the game, unless your character is very high level. Nothing will run from it if you don't have a ton of points in Howl (which no one does) or your Barb is very high level. This formula is unchanged in D2X, as far as we know.