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veteran
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veteran
Joined: Jan 2009
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i see, so you expect that there are an exptremly usefull skill and also placeholder skills. so you expect that skills are unbalanced. that is sick mind my friend. You expect that skills are poorly done you you wnat to fix it a way you take a lot of them. I don't understand what you're trying to say, try saying it in a way which is comprehensible to humans.
Poor excuse. Proper answear is Yeas/No. Prety quick to write :-] You are wrong, you know it, but dont want to admit it.
To answer your question, I would have to look at all the skills and think about that, which I did not have time to do because some people have other things to do. Amazingly, some things can only be answered properly when you put some thought into them, although obviously that's something you are unfamiliar with. If you're arbitrarily going to declare victory and claim that "you know you're wrong" because I did not immediately answer your question, then I am not wasting any more time on you.
Last edited by Stabbey; 21/12/15 11:22 PM. Reason: ugyhfjgh
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journeyman
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journeyman
Joined: Dec 2015
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In D:OS, once we had the active skill abilities at level 5, we could learn an unlimited amount of them.
In D:OS EE, even at the max level the skill abilities had a limit to the number of skills we could learn.
The D:OS system was better, IMO. It was a middle ground between learning everything all the time and having only limited abilities:
* Someone who is just dabbling or using a few spare points in a given ability is limited.
* It requires a huge investment to master an ability, considering how the ones with active skills don't have any gear that increases them (in D:OS 1 at least)
* There is more freedom in making the skills if players can reach no limit. In D:OS EE, it's very silly that we are told we can learn 6 Novice water spells when the game has only 5 Novice water spells. Removing the limit at high levels would lessen this problem and give freedom for the designers to make as many or as few skills as they want.
* Many of the skills in D:OS EE are underwhelming, just like many of the highest level skills were in D:OS. In the original game, this wasn't much of an issue since you could just keep them around until the rare situation in which they would be useful, but in the Enhanced Edition this doesn't work - it's better to simply not ever learn the underwhelming skills, since they are going to take the space of something else. This becomes even worse, for the records, when a given ability doesn't have many useful skills in a given rank - rogues don't have two useful Master abilities, for example, but we can't use the Master slot to learn one more Disciple-level skill.
If this allowed characters to become too powerful in D:OS - which IMO it didn't, considering how this was something available to all roles (as opposed to, for example, only spells being unlimited) -, it could be balanced by tweaking the skills themselves.
But I think the skill system in the original version of D:OS was much, much better than in the EE. Well, I honestly dont see much of a problem with the EE system simply because there arent that many great mastery spells. In fact, aside from Man-at-Arms (which only has 2 master spells anyway), none of the other trees are worth maxing out to 5. I keep them all at 4 and even if we reverted to the old system, I would probably do the same. If you are a wizard: The final level of each tree was never worth the 5 skill points. You can easily get another tree up to 3 with just 6 points and that is much more powerful than having master spells in just 1 tree. In other words, even in the old game, you were much stronger as a wizard with 3 or 5 schools at 4-4-4 (30 skill points) or 3-3-3-3-3 (30 skill points) than two schools at 5-5 (30 skill points). If you are a warrior: You max out man-at-arms for its relationship with talents (they scale with man-at-arms level). If you are a dex character: You are better off as 5-0, 0-5 or 4-2 (archer), or 2-4 (tanky rogue). Regardless, the master level stuff isnt really going to change the character enough to matter. But the lower level stuff can. The next game will really depend on the skills. If they are also underwhelming at master level (which is not necessarily a bad thing... I kind of like it that way) then there is no point to changing it again.
Last edited by Marc54; 24/12/15 01:12 PM.
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member
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member
Joined: Nov 2014
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I don't even think the second master skill of Man at arms is good? Is it?
Hydro has many good master spells. The others int school have typically 1 (the big AOE ones, although in geo you might prefer the blob since it comes with the AOE too?).
Marksman master spells are good (spray and rain esp.). I wouldn't stop at 4.
I'd say the only schools worth maxing up to 5 are marksman and hydro (not man at arms).
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stranger
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OP
stranger
Joined: Aug 2014
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The next game will really depend on the skills. If they are also underwhelming at master level (which is not necessarily a bad thing... I kind of like it that way) then there is no point to changing it again.
I have the opposite opinion. If D:OS2 also has underwhelming skills at level 5... Then it should go back to the system in the original D:OS. Otherwise, there would be no point in ever getting an ability to level 5. With unlimited skills at level 5, even if the master skills aren't that great, we have a strong incentive to dedicated that many skill points to a single ability. Otherwise there would be no point to that ability level.
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addict
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addict
Joined: Feb 2015
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Reward in skills for level 5 is not worth it.
Eighter original or EE.
But there are some nice talents which are worth it. Stun imunity in original was greate for example. In EE this talent is not so greate, becouse imunityes are cheap to get.
Well, the point is. Offer a reward for 5th skill in talent. Ice king or a Deamon talents are great examples. Something which highlights high level skill, the dedicated person. The master of the art.
In DOS2 there will be more classes e.g. more talents. It would be more confusing for user to realized what is conected to what.
I am proposing: make a free talent for level 5. This talent is not in the list of talents. This talent is in the School description. It has several effects.
- reasonable reward for skill 5
- more readable talent list
- easier to get for new players
- do not close opportunities for enthusiast character builders
- interesting consequences like you cant get level 5 Fire skill if you Ice King already.
What you think ?
Last edited by gGeo; 26/12/15 10:56 AM.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Oct 2015
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My general rule of suggestions: Never suggest "Do it better", it just isn't helpful - reasonable reward for skill 5
- more readable talent list
- easier to get for new players All of these for example are just "do it better" - do not close opportunities for enthusiast character builders
- interesting consequences like you cant get level 5 Fire skill if you Ice King already. Ignoring the contradiction my thoughts on this are three fold 1) Players will ALWAYS denounce anything that limits their choices even when it is to the benefit of the game. 2) It is kind of arbitrary to lock out skills due to thematic similarities when they aren't binary opposites in game. 3) Contradiction much? :P --- Don't get me wrong, good attempt.
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addict
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addict
Joined: Feb 2015
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Give a reward of full skill tree or other form of skill explosion is simply wrong. It nullifies requirement of handling resource.
In a system of cumulative price skill you need some reward for the final.
Maby a free talent is not great. Any other idea which do not break the game?
BTW what is contradiction to get a free stuff or readable builds?
Last edited by gGeo; 28/12/15 09:46 PM.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Jan 2011
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Use Cheats if the game doesn't allow what you want. Each of us, think of ourselves as a game designer, you want to release a well balanced game, in general that is what most will want to. If you want some type of get everything type game, cheats. I can't fault a designer for trying to design a balanced game and systems, it's what you do.
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apprentice
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apprentice
Joined: Sep 2015
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It isn't really about cheating or godmode. It is about implementing situational spells.
Cleansing fire simply isn't as appealing if you have the opportunity of using it every 3 or 4 fights and even then you think about using it because... it is not better than throwing a fireball. Skills are supposed to be "balanced". Now you might say "hey cleansing fire should be stronger. that would be balanced".
Yes, you could make it stronger until people would start picking it, but this can be really contrived (like it now cleanses everything, which was not intended, and increases resistances because pyro should not have heals for reasons but it needs to do more because we cannot buff resistances by more than 30% and so on...). You might end up at a point where this spell is both so strong and so situational that it is more like a necessity; you need to take it for the rare occasions where you would be at heavy disadvantage without it and play the game with basically 1 skill less.
If you instead give unlimited skills to the player this problem disappears. You can either change the skill - the way you imagined - or change the specific encounter where it might be too useful. At the very least, you can leave it as is without doing much wrong.
Possibly the best example of competition victim might be Witchcraft: Resurrection. Why choose it/invest 5 points if scrolls are so fundamental and overly accessible?
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addict
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addict
Joined: Oct 2015
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I think that in general, there is a problem with the mechanics: - You have a limit to skills within a specific school.
- You have no limit the the number of overall skills or skill schools in the game.
- You have a cool-down for individual skills.
- All other skills are unaffected.
This encourages multiskilling, but I don't feel that this achieves that in an organic way. Multiskilling just to get extra skill slots feels kind of broken. It's fine that they've decided to avoid the mana mechanic, but the benefit of mana is that it's fairly easy to balance regardless of how many spells a character has. By relying on cool-downs as this mechanic, it's much more important to manage the number of skills available to the character at any time. (There's no point having a cool-down on one overpowered skill, if you've got 10 others ready to use.) This would be why they've gone with the new limitations on the number of skills in the Enhanced Edition. But as I said, this feels like an imperfect solution. I think that they are planning to review the cost mechanic for spells. It sounds like they're planning to greatly expand the number of available skills/spells in D:OS2, so unless they severely limit the number of skills we can have at one time (which would not be fun), they will have to find different strategies for balancing this. The plan to reduce the amount of AP in D:OS2 may be part of this balancing act. ***Resurrection Speaking of resurrection -- I think there are some mistakes they made with that specific skill: The standard resurrection mechanic should be non-combat. Like, maybe you have to carry your KO'd companion back to a temple for healing. Or otherwise, it just relies on you performing an action you can only do outside of combat. The witchcraft spell should be unique in that you're able to use it during combat, so there is a distinct advantage to using it over the normal mechanic.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Oct 2015
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What makes limited skills a rather big issue is that the game has these four skill types
1) Useless over time
2) Useless within builds
3) Useless once you got better
4) Useless except in one situation
-Fortify starts off useful (less so in EE) but ends up being a waste of a slot (and honestly THERE IS NO reason it should be useless... Why doesn't this scale?)
-Lightning Jump can be outright detrimental for certain builds
-Skeleton Warrior is an inferior version of a later summon that far outclasses it
-Wolf is a summon for Hyberium and is completely useless as soon as your done
Now... With limit skills these are an issue. With the potential for unlimited learning it isn't. You shouldn't need to memorize what skills are useful later to be competent with the game.
I agree with the idea that mastery should give unlimited skills to be learned but should have to be slotted to be used BETWEEN battles or checkpoints or some other manner.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Aug 2014
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It isn't really about cheating or godmode. It is about implementing situational spells.
Cleansing fire simply isn't as appealing if you have the opportunity of using it every 3 or 4 fights and even then you think about using it because... it is not better than throwing a fireball. Skills are supposed to be "balanced". Now you might say "hey cleansing fire should be stronger. that would be balanced".
Yes, you could make it stronger until people would start picking it, but this can be really contrived (like it now cleanses everything, which was not intended, and increases resistances because pyro should not have heals for reasons but it needs to do more because we cannot buff resistances by more than 30% and so on...). You might end up at a point where this spell is both so strong and so situational that it is more like a necessity; you need to take it for the rare occasions where you would be at heavy disadvantage without it and play the game with basically 1 skill less.
If you instead give unlimited skills to the player this problem disappears. You can either change the skill - the way you imagined - or change the specific encounter where it might be too useful. At the very least, you can leave it as is without doing much wrong.
Possibly the best example of competition victim might be Witchcraft: Resurrection. Why choose it/invest 5 points if scrolls are so fundamental and overly accessible? It's true that situational skills are hard to balance, but I think purifying fire (the pyro cleanse spell I think you mean) is actually quite versatile. Cure burning, frozen, stunned, charm, or healing on shields on enemies? Probably most fights have a chance for one of those statuses. Most of the cleanse skills seems pretty versatile. But to your main point, unlimited skills might sort of solve the problem of situational skills, but it creates as many problems as it solves. I'd say it's easier to make skills versatile enough that they don't feel ultra situational than to balance having unlimited skills. Resurrect wasn't quite balanced right, but a 60% health rez is way better than a 20% health one for the scroll. Probably would make the scroll cost 8 AP and the witchcraft one 6, too, so there's a definite advantage to the witchcraft one. Morning Person is probably more to blame for making the spell useless, since scrolls are then just as good.
Last edited by Baardvark; 31/12/15 11:18 PM.
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addict
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addict
Joined: Feb 2015
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But to your main point, unlimited skills might sort of solve the problem of situational skills, but it creates as many problems as it solves. I'd say it's easier to make skills versatile enough that they don't feel ultra situational than to balance having unlimited skills. Exactly. Flood a player by the one time per game use skill is way to hell. Poison antidote was pure crap in original release. EE make it useful. What makes me bad feeling is, with reduced AP there is less option how to tune a skill. Poison Antidote is cheap, that is one of advantage. When all the spell costs the same, there is no space to tune up. Issue with Purifing Fire is similar, it is good counter spell. But it costs more then target spell and has longer cooldown! So basicaly it is better to cast same spell on self then strip enemy. Purifying fire should cost one AP less and act smart e.g. do not strip Shields, Healing/Fire (depends resistances) on friendly targets. that would make it competitive. Anyway, Larian needs quite invest to the battle AI. More clever skills requires more clever usage. Whenever I see a simple skeleton happily jogging over fire field to the dead, or Braxus Rex carefuly cast Fireball to avoid hit himself, or a teramage casts Bless on self, or goblins trying poison to death Nick, or ... that is the BIG space for improvement. Smart and versatile skills the together with battle AI who can use them properly makes the game. There are couple of skill mechanics experts on the forum who could help to tune up current skills. But AI would happily ignore them or misuse.
Last edited by gGeo; 01/01/16 03:55 AM.
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addict
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addict
Joined: Feb 2015
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there is a problem with the mechanics: - You have a limit to skills within a specific school.
- You have no limit the the number of overall skills or skill schools in the game.
This encourages multiskilling, I was thinking about this. Curent system promote huge multiskilling. In fact most usefull class is Mage with one point in each mage school. There is no penalty for opening another school ---> introduce one Set it so, For first skill tree opening - first point costs 1 for second skill tree opening - first point costs 2 for thirth skill tree opening - first point costs 3 for fourth skill tree opening - first point costs 4 and so on Get noticed that second point in any school costs 2, always. What is new is the starting barrier to get cheap new skills for one point. With even more mage/Int dependant clases requested by KickStarter this is good soft cap to number of skills. However, with a similar system, its crucial to tune up higher level skills. In curent status, rogue tree would be opened by masochist only, becouse of most skills are crap.
Last edited by gGeo; 18/01/16 01:04 PM.
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