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I think my main concern is the restricted ability for cross-skills that was easily available in DD, but not in BD. For example, I wanted a warrior that could pick locks and make poison. Easily don in DD... but in BD I'd have to find a way to open the lockpick skill and open the alchemy skill BEFORE I could even put puts into them. Also, my characters started DD with two valuable skills. BD characters start with no skills at all.

I wouldn't worry too much about that. In the demo, you only started with two skill trees available. The skills you could learn in the demo had no relation to your initial class, so one can assume that all three classes will develop equally through the game.

There may be times when you can only select one of a few skill trees to learn. Example:
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You have done well. I will teach you one thing.
  1. Magical Damage level 5.
  2. Elemental Sphere level 5.
  3. Avoid Damage level 5.
  4. Cross-stich level 5.

This would make skill development more interesting.