Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - Suggestions and Feedback New/Altered Skill Ideas

I've complained about Contamination and Ignition being awful skills, so I decided to help think up some others.

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I don't like the starting Earth skills. One is Contamination, which will turn a large chunk of the battlefield into toxic, flammable pools which are more likely to hurt you than the enemy.

Another is Magical Poison Dart. Okay, but not that great for the undead-infested second half of the island.

The only Earth-damage skill is Fossil Strike, which is earth damage, but also produces a huge oil slick which is flammable and has an slow effect which can't be resisted by armor. This contributes to the messy battlefields which can easily backfire on your own party or hamper their advances.

I think Contamination should be removed, and another Earth-damage skill should be added, one which doesn't spam oil everywhere. I have a few possible candidates:


Earth - Skipping Stone
A stone which bounces between enemies, doing Earth damage, but doing less damage with each hit. Maximum 4 hits. Produces NO SURFACE if ground-targeted. Larian will probably hate this because it's just a reskinned Ricochet.


Earth - Splitting Stone
An Earth damage spell which hits one enemy and splits off into two 45-degree angles in different directions with a wide hit cylinder for the split rocks. You can see the preview of the split lines and where the projectiles will go before casting.


Earth - Stalagmite
Impales a single enemy with a spike for heavy damage. No surface produced. 3 AP, 4-5 Turn cooldown.


Earth - Stalagmite Swarm
Select three targets, which are then impaled with spikes from the earth. Low-moderate damage, 2 AP, 2-3 Turn cooldown. D:OS 1's Firefly worked along similar lines, letting you target specific points before the spell was cast.

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Pyrokinetic - Fire Breath
This is the exact skill which used to be the Lizard's Racial, but was moved to Pyrokinetic because it was worse than a candle. This version is buffed up more and benefits from points into INT as well as Pyro.



Necromancy - Sacrificial Gift
AP: 1 // Duration: Instant. // Cooldown: 4 turns.

The caster sacrifices 50% of their maximum health to heal a targeted ally for half that amount. If the caster is under 50% health when casting it, they are reduced to 1 health.

• Possible additional rule: If the caster is under 50% health, the target is only healed to 50% of the caster's CURRENT HP.
• Possible variation: The caster sacrifices half of their current HP to heal the targeted ally for half that amount, which greatly simplifies how it works.

Example 1: A Necromancer has 552/552 health. They cast this spell on an ally, and the Necromancer loses 276 health, and the ally is healed for 138 heath. Both effects are instant.

Example 2: A Necromancer has 300/552 health. They cast this spell on an ally, and the Necromancer loses 276 health - reducing them to 24 health - and the ally is healed for 138 heath. Both effects are instant.

Example 3: A Necromancer has 140/400 health. They cast this spell on an ally. But because the Necromancer is under 200 health, the Necromancer loses 139 health - reducing them to 1 health - and the ally is healed for only 70 heath. Both effects are instant.


Necromancy - Shackles of Pain (Alteration)

Shackles of Pain is changed to allow targeting of any two combatants. Any damage received by one of them is split equally with the other. (Note: Something is done so that if both targets have Pain reflection, there is no infinite feedback loop of reflected pain)

This makes Shackles of pain more useful:
Enemy-Ally: Half the damage done to the ally is reduced and given to an enemy.
Ally-Ally: Allies spread the damage out between themselves, instead of one larger hit on one of them.
Enemy-Enemy: Damage two enemies at once, even though it's for less damage.

I like splitting stone. I also think there should be a geomancer spell that creates a high piece of terrain you can stand on for height advantage, assuming that's possible with the engine, or at least as a source of cover.

Sacrificial Gift sounds like a good way to make the other necromancy skills more useful since you can use your health for something else. Possibly it could grant some additional buff with the healing if you're really sacrificing 50% of your health.

I don't think Shackles of Pain needs to be changed. But there could be a whole separate skill that does what you suggest.

I understand your complaint and as someone whos loving to play meele chars I do feel likewise BUT this is how this gamplay mechanic is supposed to be. And it is working very well so far, even in multiplayer.
There are lots of options to prevent your meele chars from receiving damage or to recover health and armor.

Given that Magical Poison Dart is one of the most powerful spells in Earth's repertoire, I am not sure why we should get rid of it.

Much as I enjoy basic spells such as "poison dart" would imply, in the current iteration of balance, all poison spells are pretty much broken and the spell itself becomes anything but basic.

Nevermind the facts that the lowest rank spell shouldn't be "the most powerful", or that poison related spells should just get a school of their own instead of being thrown into earth for vaguely thematic reasons.

Not in the early game, and the early game loves to throw in enemies which spew oil or poison everywhere. Oil is a guaranteed armor-bypassing slow, which reduces your AP and movement, which at best loses you a turn as you try to flee the oil surface.

Void-touched Turtles? Impalement, with a huge oil slick. Saltwater Crocodiles? Fossil Strike, huge oil slick. The Cultured One in the Arena? Searing Daggers followed by Fossil Strike. Magister Houndmaster? Fossil Strike, huge oil slick. Source Hounds? Poison Doggie Darts in confined quarters.

If nothing else, it's a bit tiresome seeing the exact same kind of enemy tactics from multiple different enemy types. It also restricts your own options quite a bit. Right now, playing as a fire mage is a recipe for frustration if not outright pointless.



I didn't say to get rid of Magical Poison Dart. Magical Poison Dart is fine - it's just not great for the second half of the island, because of all the undead.

I suggested getting rid of Contamination because that skill is worse for your team than it is for the enemy (thanks to the enemy having higher armor and HP). I thought that a replacement which does Earth-type damage without creating an Exxon Valdez oil slick like Fossil Strike might be helpful as a safe damage source which also will be useful against the undead.

Actually thats the point this is all about.
Your altered skills idea is based on a quite early alpha of the game. The first alpha verion after larian did a huge change on the combat system.

Now I do respect and admit that not everything is fine right now - but most of your suggestions ( as many other suggestions in this forum ) are based on an inbalancend alpha version of the game. ( balancing is actually a beta thingy)

Right now we don't even know what the next version will change , add or remove from the game. ( Thats why a roadmap would be really good btw. )

Therefore I'm not sure if such threads are very helpful right now at all. I've seen quite a few of suggestions and also rants about the current situation - and I don't really get it.

Sure criticism is very important and helpful but only if we consider that this game is currently far from finished and just a preview of what it is going to be.

And? Are you saying that I should shut up and not give feedback on how I feel about this current version of the game?

You're totally clueless. Of course it's important to give feedback on the way things are now. Of course feedback at ALL STAGES is important. How exactly is Larian supposed to decide what needs changing if no one says anything?

EDIT: I mean, if I was saying something like "I wish this game would have party dialogues," when clicking on a party member gives "Coming soon: Party Dialogues", or "The Polymorph skill school seems underdeveloped", then yes, that would be a case of asking for too much in early alpha.

But giving feedback on skills, skill balance, and combat balance is absolutely appropriate, because it can help Larian refine the balance for next patch. Refining the balance of a game is not something which happens overnight from nowhere. It's a process.

If i find one thing absurd then it is complaints and demands that no criticism or feedback is given during alpha or beta stages of games that ask for such feedback.

I like stabbeys ideas, for all that is worth.

What i would suggest in addition to all this is to slightly change how skills, especially those we get at the beginning develop. Which would also solve or minimize the problems with surfaces that are too large.

This is also one thing i was thinking of doing in my (given up on) mod for OS.

I was annoyed with how rain always has the exact same radius at first level and the last. So that led to a simple but effective idea of changing skills so at the first level we can only make a small rain, meaning rain in a small radius and then the radius would enlarge as we gain more levels or invest more in that skill.

I thought of maybe making several versions of the rain spell, each stronger than the previous one with a bigger radius and maybe some other effects, that would also increase as we level up and find - buy those stronger versions of the same spell or invest more points into that kind of magic.

This can be applied to a lot of early levels skills, including all the new ones Stabbey suggests.
Shackles of pain can be as they are at first level, but later they can be given these additional effects Stabbey came up with. And so on.

So, just for a quick example, your first level "Skipping stone" could bounce off one enemy and hit another, and at higher levels it would bounce off and hit more enemies, maybe with bigger damage too.

This can be done with relatively minor effort from the devs since it doesnt require making new spells or abilities with their own unique special effects and everything else that entails.
Yes, obviously Stabbeys new spells would need to be made from scratch but i think that effort would be well spent. And he is asking just for a few, relatively simple ones.

I would like to see more and more diverse Ice offensive type of spells too, because there is very few of those.

I like sacrifical gift.
I would change it like:
Life sacrificed is 1/3 only but life gained is 130% of the loss. e.g. for 10 blood of Necro life warrior gets 13hp.

stripping 50% of HP is quite dangerous. It would work only you add other spell witch migh keep Necro caster live or better in a non dead state.
Generaly I thing necromancer should focus play with low healt. His dmg spells should be boosted as his hp goes down. However something is needed to help live on the edge.
Add Spell Jesus it can keep Necroplayer close to dead :
"Jesus" its a buff spell which lasts 6 rounds. Cooldown 1 per combat. It does nothing until caster dies. Then it resurrects himself after 3 turns. Together with auto ress it gets levitate effect, aura of radiance,50% Physical and Elementall reduction for 3 runds and high pain reflection for 3 rounds. It might sound like a lot, but get noticed that 3 rounds character didnt help in combat.
Maby jesus is not enoough political correctness so be it "DarkPropeth"

Shackles sounds fun. I like it. Althou, make it little less powerfull and more tactical - first target needs to be touched. Second target is close range - 8m from caster.

Earth skills are wierd. Earth goes slow. Most dmg skills should be damage over time. 6 rounds. Also I would like to see a Stone wall. Basicaly its Ice wall spell wich cant be melted by fire.

Generaly, idea of a superb skill lack context. Any school right know has no specific. No flavour. No special.
I mean general specification which ALL skill of a tree falows
- archer - special for dmg, longest range in game, most skills are for ONE target. Few for 2 e.g. Ricochet -> 2 targets. Non AOE !!!
- necro - touch to mid range skills, plays with dark art, suffering, twist reality, live on the edge. Voddoo/Curse/Possesion/AncientCruelNature. Strong one target skills, AOE debufs, No AOE dmg.
etc.
Such specification of each class tree should be the very basic. Such specification should be accessible for betatesters maby even in the game as description. With this general definition Then create details. Creating skills as piece by piece has current result of messy skills tree with not specific flavor. All is mixed and loud. I see loudness war effect in every aspect of this Larian project. Dynamic is needed badly.

Sure, numbers can be tweaked, I just wanted to suggest the idea of adding a healing skill to Necromancer which came at a cost of their life force.




The idea of a skill which resurrects the caster after death with buffs is interesting, but even though that's a lot of buffs the dead guy will get, it still requires three turns before going off, and 3 rounds is a long time in this game.

If your team can handle being a member down for three turns, the combat probably wasn't that threatening in the first place. By the time it goes off, (A) the fight will already be over because you won, or (B) your team is in serious trouble because they were a man down for three rounds, or (C) both sides are still holding their own, in which case your side probably could have wrapped up the combat faster if they weren't a man down.

Also there's no Jesus in Rivellon as it is a completely separate fantasy realm with its own different deities, so it might be called "Death Contingency" or "Death Pact". I dunno.




Hmm. Well, one reason why I'm suggesting a change to the existing version of Shackles of Pain is because it connects the caster to an enemy. A caster character probably shouldn't be getting hit all that much in the first place.

A change which requires walking up to an enemy to activate it defeats a large part of the reason why I wanted it changed in the first place.




Sorry, I'm having a little difficulty understanding what you mean by loud and "loudness war effect". I guess you mean that the skill sets have too much diversity, and there isn't a solid theme?

"Sorry, I'm having a little difficulty understanding what you mean by loud and "loudness war effect". I guess you mean that the skill sets have too much diversity, and there isn't a solid theme?"

Yes.
loudness war effect
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
Long story short - greed for load lead to a point where everything is so load that is distorted and low quality by design.

Something like : DOS2 is like more of everything in every aspect. Resulting in a great mishmash of nothingness. White noise.

Floor effects overload
Bleeding overload
Grenades overload
Archer is Area of Effect master overload
Basicaly any skill has Area of Effect overload
Combat is Russian roulette because of unpredictable chain reactions overload
Schools trees are no specific. They are just collection of AoE spells. Overload
From game-play perspective DOS 2 is a victim of loudness war.

What about one man army? What about use Invis and Sneak to wait in combat untill DarkProphet rise again?

I ment touch+self for first target. (caster should be able to use any spell with touch target on self) For second target give a Necro long range spell is against a Necro Theme
Copied from previous post:
- necro - touch to mid range skills, plays with dark art, suffering, twist reality, live on the edge. Voddoo/Curse/Possesion/AncientCruelNature. Strong one target skills, AOE debufs, No AOE dmg.

Well that is just a sample of how to create or not create Theme related skills. Make an Theme for School. Define range, targets, AoE, style, dmg type. Then fit all the skills in the Theme.

I originally brought up the loudness analogy to illustrate the point (perhaps poorly) of predominantly nerfing but also occasionally buffing every skill and ability to have the same power: it felt to me that there was a risk of an unyielding wall of skills that had no discernible difference between them and that gameplay might suffer in the same way that recordings often do with the sort of unyielding music equalisation where any interest offered by variously louder and quieter parts is removed.

Possibly not the greatest analogy ever, but it seems my wont to go on somewhat erratic and whimsical tangents.

Impalement skills are nice, as well as the alteration to Shackles of Pain. Sacrificial Gift seems nice, but does it fit the theme of Necromancy?

I've always wanted to have skills that create high ground for your rangers and casters. So I was thinking, why not add a Geomancer skill that raises a moderate-sized ledge from the ground, tossing away enemies and dealing light damage at the same time?

It might mess with the "use your environment" thing in DOS, true... though I can't help but to think that there's a way to circumvent that. Perhaps it can only be cast on rocky surface or something, if that's possible.

I'm new and I've only done one run of DOS2 so far with a friend, but I definitely feel like contamination was a very underwhelming skill that seemed to be a bigger threat to my melee allies than my enemies.

As far as Geomancer skills go, I don't have any particular issue with all of the current ones spreading oil, but I do think it could use some more spells that focus on modifying the environment as opposed to dealing damage. Specifically I'm talking about spells that do things like denying line of sight, creating terrain that enemies have to maneuver around, or incapacitating them in ways that are not purely beneficial.

Earth Wall: Create a wall of impassable terrain for X number of turns (using wall targeting from DOS1)

Entomb: Selected target becomes encased in earth causing them to be unable to move or attack, as well preventing all damage done to them for X number of turns

Sand Trap/Unstable Ground: Place a hidden rune on the ground, when stepped on by an enemy the rune causes the ground to way, dealing X amount of damage and crippling the enemy for 1 turn. Enemies on elevated ground will be dropped below it if possible.

(I have the) High Ground: Create elevated ground at targeted location lasting for X number of turns.


Also, I like the idea of a Shackles of Pain that can be applied to someone other than the caster. In the run my friend and I did I picked Necromancy and ended up grabbing Shackles of Pain, but rarely found it useful. Granted, I was a backline mage and therefore wasn't getting hit a ton, but even when I found ways to use proc the damage - primarily through elemental effects - it was hardly as useful as I would've liked. Having the ability to link other combatants to each other to redirect or split damage would have been quite useful, and I fully support the idea.

Seriously :P give shackles of pain to a scoundrel or Warrior.

You sillies :P

Right now the game has damage over time effects which don't do anything as long as the target has armour. What if some skills were added which apply damage over time effects on magic or physical armour? There is Acid (Cursed poison), but what if you could apply acid status to a target directly?

And what about dual-effect skills - Let's say we alter Magical Poison Arrow to become "Magical Acid Arrow" - it applies the acid status and eats away at physical armor for a few turns, and if the target has no physical armor when the spell is cast on them, it applies poison. That does sound like it might be a bit powerful, but is the idea at least good?




Okay, but most other skills in Necromancy scale in effectiveness with points into INT. I'm not sure putting points into one school only for only one or two skills you're able to use well is the best way to build your warrior.

If you want to cast a skill for the effect and not the damage, you do not care about your intelligence. Putting one point in to learn a skill, will ruin the 'classic' warrior style but give a lot more flexibility. This was always one of my favorite possiblity of those offered by the classless D:OS-System.

DoT effect against armor sounds nice, but not sure, if they can make it, that magic damage can cause an effect, even if there is still magic armor left to protect from magic damage. Or making a magic skill afflict physical damage against armor.

Type of Damage and type of Resistance Check are both separate from the actual effects applied.

Slowness is a good example of this, where if applied by an Oil surface, it ignores any checks, while the cursed Boots of Braccus will make an armor one(the effect is identical and doesn't stack).

Same thing applies to scaling and damage types, it's only the way it is because they made it so, but there is nothing stopping them, or a modder in the future, to make it otherwise.