IIRC the non-linearity was criticized by some gamers in Div... Skill/spell system in BD is more complicated - correct - but allows a wider variety - and the ability of a gamer to choose/decide instead of powering himself up with all sorts of skills.
As you played Div pretty late => a lot of bugs were already erased/fixed. BD is very complex - so not all bugs are naturally fixed in 3-4 patches - specially not the random generated BF.
Did you know how many hotfixes patches Div had until it became what it is now? Guess not - because the EV was 1.029 from the start.
Do you know how many bugs were fixed from the German version 1.00 until now? Guess, not really, hm? Your English version is already 1.2 without the last patch..
So, please, don't compare apples and pears. I understand, you like Div - me, too <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" /> - but I don't think the skill/spell system in BD is crap => just involves a bit more thinking/deciding - and giving it a chance to get accustomed to. I don't think it's lame to unlearn a skill if I don't like it. I'm glad, I can instead. Kiya
Addendum: I'd appreciate it, if you wouldn't call me a fan girl. I simply have a different approach => taking each game as unique instead of comparing. The Larians decided to take another approach instead of using the rinse-and-repeat one many companies prefer. I think, I would've been disappointed if they had simply made another typical Div. I like to try out new stuff.
Actually, the skill system and the battlefield system are basically nonsensical fixes for design flaws. Unlearn is completely silly. Battlefield is just to take care of balance issues, and really makes no sense in the scope of the game. At level 30 in BD you get what...35 skill pts? I don't know the exact # but you could easily dump all of those skill pts into ONE SINGLE SKILL OR SPELL. This is a major design flaw. There are a ton of options yes, but you have to choose a very small number of them for each skill or spell to be useful after a short time. Unlearn is simply a quick fix due to the design flaw of the skill system. It makes absolutely no sense. Even with all this I'll still like the game overall of course. I just think they made some serious mistakes with the skill system, and were trying to cover it with the unlearn ability.
There is no thinking involved in the skill system. You are pretty much forced to start out with one-handed combat and choose slashing/or something. If you ever want to do anything different, you have to do the ridiculous and unlearn it so you can go another route. This is silly. You can compare enjoyment factor of games. If you can't compare games against each other, what can you do? What it boils down to is, Divine Divinity is a good bit better product than Beyond. This scares me greatly for Divinity 2.
