If you're still waiting for PvP Deathmatch to make its way into Diablo 3, then sadly, your wait has been for naught. Blizzard has posted an update on the official Battle.net blog to confirm that the mode won't be making its way out at all.
In the post by game director Jay Wilson, he admits that while Deathmatch was their goal, its current state didn't have enough depth and how it's "not good enough."
For us it comes to a few issues, one of which is depth. Simply fighting each other with no other objectives or choices to make gets old relatively quickly. We've brought a lot of people in to try out Team Deathmatch and, while some found it entertaining, most of our testers didn't feel like it was something they'd want to do beyond a few hours. Without more varied objectives, or very lucrative rewards, few saw our current iteration as something they'd want spend a lot of time in.
Wilson adds that another reason is class balance and how it might not work as well as they would have liked in Team Deathmatch. For now, the mode is "shelved," but he adds that they are "exploring other options."
However, all is not lost as dueling will be added to the game soon. In the same post, Wilson reveals dueling is scheduled to be implemented in DIablo 3's upcoming patch.
You’ve been asking us for dueling for a while, so we're going to add it to the game soon. Dueling is currently scheduled to release with patch 1.0.7, which is set to hit sometime after the new year. (We'll be providing details about that feature very soon, so stay tuned.)
So, there you have it. Don't expect Team Deathmatch in Diablo 3 anytime soon, but some of the things they've learned from it might crop up in some form in another mode.
Are you pining for Deatmatch to make its way into Diablo 3 or should dueling be enough? What kind of competitive multiplayer mode should Blizzard implement in Diablo 3 if TDM can't work as good as they would have liked?