...I doubt there was priority issue, the development team was probably LAN gaming the whole time.

I reckon there’s still the beta period to take into consideration. So I’m assuming, when he says “it is nearing”, he’s of course talking about the start of the beta stage.

I thought the team that’s making 1.13 only deals with Blizzard’s old games.

That’s a myth.  When Blizzard has a game that needs to go in crunch-mode (is approaching beta or release date) they move developers from other games to help in different areas to speed-up development.

I give you as an example that it was revealed StarCraft II was put on hold (a few years before its official announcement) to help launch World of Warcraft on November 2004.

I interviewed Mike Huang (ex-Diablo II developer) back on 2003. He acknowledged working on StarCraft, and World of Warcraft. If he was Blizzard North (exclusive) developer, why was he helping on those two games?

In the interview Huang said he gave the programmer the idea of protoss pylons powering their structures.

I thought the same thing…I remember when people were wondering if work on the 1.13 patch would in any way delay / slow things down with D3, and someone (probably Bashiok) clarified the teams were separate.

I wonder if these higher-priority issues were something of a crisis that necessitated pulling this separate team on board to help.

It is speculation, but it does sound like they were moved to work on something important. There are two immediate things we know are almost upon us: SC2 beta and BlizzCon.

If Diablo III demo is showcased again, it has to have the new bells and whistles, specially if they announce the fourth new class.

I am starting to get fed up with 1.13,

I understand it can be hard to predict release dates with software patches and other changes.  But really?  The estimate of two weeks in April is moving closer and closer to being two months.

If in April they just given the standard Valve / Blizzard “it will be done when its done” that would be better than making crappy estimates.

Don’t get me all riled up for a night with Diablo 2 1.13 and then not deliver!

>> Don’t get me all riled up for a night with Diablo 2 1.13 and then not deliver!<<

Yeah it seriously sucks. They not just make us wait for D3, no, now we’re also waiting for 1.13 to get released… they should’ve just kept quiet about it and then announced it 1-2 weeks before the actual realase. When the date is not just vaguely foreseeable and likely to be postponed. This happens far too often with Blizzard. How long was the release of D2 delayed? Years? All I can remember of this time is waiting and waiting and waiting…I’d be better off not caring for stuff like that and just keep playing, but its sort of hard when no one else really does because “soon” they will start over anyways.

”[...]a reset could occur as early as the end of April.” - yeah right. That may be December 2015.

“announcement just in case” pfft. i’d prefer they wait until they’re sure and then artificially delay the patch 2 weeks to give us a warning.

I can understand some frustration by some players but the thing we have to remember is that we are lucky to still be getting support for a game this old.

I agree with talrasha. 

That is basically the intensity of the patch “team” for D2.

there is no other way to understand it besides apathy. 

I feel bad for Bashiok, they left him to do a PR campaign for the most neglected big budget game in history.

And to The Lord of Darkness: Lucky?? Lucky someone isnt screwing you over and neglecting you?  Hm. I guess that is lucky.  It is like someone saying, “Kid you are lucky i dont put a wrench to your head!”

That sort of “lucky”.

yay.