Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Beta Suggestion : Two skill categories

I feel like this seperation needs to be made, however this is only from playing the beta and reading comments from some topics, because we dont know what the level cap is and thus it might feel like these secundary skills might be ignored if we decide from the beta.

Primary and secondary skills should both have their own skillpoint pools

||--primary skill--||

--Warior--
Armor specialist
Body buildig
Shield specialist
Single-Handed
Two-Handed
Way of the warrior

--Wizard--
Air elementalist
Earth elementalist
Fire elementalist
Water elementalist
Willpower
Witchcraft

--Survivor--
Bow
Crossbow
Loremaster
Reflexes
Sneaking
Way of the ranger

||--Secondary skill--||

--Craft--
Repair
Telekinises
Crafting
Lockpicking
Pickpocketing

--Social--
Barter
Charisma
Charm
Intimidate
Leadership
Lucky Charm
Reason

That doesn't look like a bad idea. Unfortunately though, the game has entered Beta, so it's likely past the time when that kind of change can be done. they'll be willing to make a change like that.

You are right that in theory it does sound simple to do, and it would drastically improve the attractiveness of secondary abilities. I just don't think it's going to happen.

Tbh, from a programming point of view, I have no clue how they programmed it, but this shouldn't be all that hard if its only a xml file which they need to adjust.

That's true, but in theory, they've already balanced the game on only having 1 pool of ability points for everything. Separate points could possibly upset the balance.

I say "in theory", because several abilities are practically worthless and in serious need of reworking.

Well, most secondary abilities are boosted by traits. So it's not like you will never have them.

They only need to fix a bunch of stuff with traits (equal not missing out on bonus completely, some bonusses missing)...

Allegedly, the Trait system as is currently implemented is only a placeholder. It also only gives you a bonus with the first point, and no subsequent points do anything unless it cancels out the first bonus


(Trait) Bonuses for Conversation are Ambiguous


But since that was two months ago and there's been no news since, and the only change was now there's a shiny bar showing which Trait is dominant, maybe that was cut too.

Sounds good, the traits system as is kind of distract of roleplaying like boni to choices in Dragon Commander (as I also commented on in my report thread), forcing the player pretty much to forgo roleplaying and pick X always, powergame, or be gigantically nerfed if you play regular.

I can't wait to see the replacement in action soon enough

Now that the excitement of a fresh idea has died down, I'll take a more objective look at this.

You can get about 45 Ability points through leveling up. There are also apparently free Ability points you can get through questing/the main plot, and how would that work if there were two pools?

It takes 10 points to get an ability to Rank 4 and 15 to get one to Rank 5. So if you split them up in to two categories getting each... you could max out 3 Primary Abilities, or get four to Rank 4.

On the other side, the secondary Abilities, if you get the same 45 points, then that would certainly be too much, so you'd have to reduce the rate you gain these instead of matching the primary rate, and then...


... Yeah, this may just replace one balancing headache with another one.

Also, Reflexes should not be on that list, it has been deleted.

Not even taking into account bonusses from items and aforementioned traits (whatever the final will be).
There's pretty much never a need to actually get to lvl 5 with actual points as it looks like it now (and that's without even having rings, necklaces or belts), saving plenty of points for alternative needs.

If only the skillupdate system would be similar to gothic 3. Everything would be hell of alot easier



The thing is, I have no idea how the final version would be but at its current stage, it looks like those secondary skills will be missed out.

Even with all those bonusses and ect, again it depends how the final version will work...... I would really prefer a skill system closer to gothic 3, because it made more sense.

But I think Stabbey is right, The game already has alot of technical bugs making it unplayable for some people, which probably needs more attention than this Suggestion.

In the worst case they might fix it with a patch I guess if the final version doesn't do the job