Larian Banner: Baldur's Gate Patch 9
Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Page 1 of 2 1 2
#585550 15/09/16 05:57 AM
Joined: Sep 2016
K
stranger
OP Offline
stranger
K
Joined: Sep 2016
One of the exciting parts of Divinity: Original Sin was finding interesting ways to use obscure skills. While you had skill limits within the individual skill classes, you still had plenty of room to have less useful skills which would use occasionally.

Now we have an across the board limit with Memory. I can't say I know all the implications of this, but with 10 to start for 5 skills and 2 points in required per additional skill, it seems unlikely that you'll have a vast array of skills at your disposal anymore.

Looking at my characters from the end of the last game, I see a range from 14 to 28 non-special skills available. This would mean spending 18 to 46 points in Memory.

I'm not an expert in the balance of the game, but I know what I found fun. I enjoyed using lots of skills, and having the space to keep skills I only used occasionally. When I think of being able to use less skills, I see less fun.

Additionally, since the points I spend on Memory come from somewhere else, I'm losing abilities in other locations to get the slots I used to get from spending skill points. It's a bit of a drag, and I'll certainly be forced to spend sparingly to min/max my other powers, which means even less skill slots, which means only the biggest and best skills get the open slots.

The old system not only gave me more room for minor powers, but required me to use lower powered slots on lower power skills, so I always had some random interesting low level powers available. Now I simply can't afford to waste the slot unless I really need it.

I'm not sure why the designers decided we needed less abilities. Maybe it's a balance thing, but it doesn't feel fun.

Joined: Jun 2014
veteran
Offline
veteran
Joined: Jun 2014
Some skills however require 0 memory slots.

Joined: Apr 2011
veteran
Offline
veteran
Joined: Apr 2011
You can learn all skills, only memorise a few for combat though.

Think of ik like the 2nd ED&D rules, also used in Baldur's Gate for example... but without resting.

Joined: Jun 2014
veteran
Offline
veteran
Joined: Jun 2014
Originally Posted by Hassat Hunter
You can learn all skills, only memorise a few for combat though.

Think of ik like the 2nd ED&D rules, also used in Baldur's Gate for example... but without resting.


Hopefully this time the level cap is higher.

Joined: Feb 2015
enthusiast
Offline
enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2015
Yep.
I'm not that thrilled about that aspect either and voiced my concern back then.
I'll play like this and see whether or not this is actually bothersome.

Joined: Sep 2016
O
stranger
Offline
stranger
O
Joined: Sep 2016
Aye, this is the one gameplay aspect I'm really concerned about. I'm worried that situational utility skills will have to be left behind in favour of more relyable, non-gimmik combat abilities.

Do we know if Lone Wolves are gonna get a sizeable gain in memory?

Joined: Aug 2013
addict
Offline
addict
Joined: Aug 2013
as far as i understood you can learn all skills but only use them according to the number of slots you have simultaneously, ie in a fight/battle.

Ie: you have 30 skills learned, but only 5 slots = out of fight: swap as you please. in fight: stuck with 5 skills you have chosen before until fight is over.

also, more memory means more slots. but more memory also means less other stats which means less effective skills (less powerful, ie damge, duration etc.) but - as mentioned before - more of them (more variety of skills).
as far as i understood this is only a trade off between number of skills vs. power of skills. so you dont lose out elsewhere throughout character development.

i dont see the issue? less but more powerfulls skills (more damage, longer duration etc) vs. more skills which are less powerful. in its simplest form this translates to: use eg 1 fireball for 10 damge or use 1 fireball and 1 ice lance for 5 damage each. well balanced trade off imo

Last edited by 4verse; 15/09/16 01:19 PM.

"I don't make games to make money, I make money to make games". (Swen Vincke)
Joined: Feb 2015
enthusiast
Offline
enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2015
It's not that balanced actually.
Eventually to min max, the path will be pretty straightfoward : more powerfull spell rather than more spells, and some spells will be so situational than they'll find themselves always picked last (O ye Rain...).
And the thing is, for a fight, there WILL be a combination of useful spells, so either you decide to have a lot of spell not to bother, either you'll min max it, and spend a lot of time switching spells between fights. I find this aspect boring rather than really interesting. There was a way to induce less options without requiring such a drastic change.
And I kind of like the idea of schools of skills in D:OS, I was psyched by the new schools like necromancer, now it does not have the same taste.

Joined: Jan 2009
veteran
Offline
veteran
Joined: Jan 2009
I reached level 2 and got 2 attribute points. 1 skill slot = 2 Memory points. I don't know if there is such a thing as equipment with +Memory, but I would bet against that. I don't know if the amount of attribute points per level increases, but I don't expect that either.

Seems like Mages will need to alternate their attribute points each level between INT/Whatever and Memory. And we haven't reached a point where some spells cost multiple memory slots.

I'll have to play a mage for some time to decide how well this works.

Joined: Nov 2009
member
Offline
member
Joined: Nov 2009
It's probably a balancing thing

I imagine it's a lot easier to balance a set of 5 skills for combat than it is a set of 25 (or however many more).

I understand where you're coming from, @OP, but I seriously doubt this will change.

Joined: Sep 2016
K
stranger
OP Offline
stranger
K
Joined: Sep 2016
I was thinking about this, and as a counter to my previous comment on this issue, maybe our characters just carry around piles of scrolls for all the oddball things we might want to do. I have no idea how economically viable this will be, but if it's only something you cast once in a blue moon, this might be ok.

Last edited by Kyle Olson; 15/09/16 07:38 PM. Reason: typos
Joined: Jun 2014
Location: DeepSpace8
P
apprentice
Offline
apprentice
P
Joined: Jun 2014
Location: DeepSpace8
There is a lot of skills tied to equipment that are free to use and require no memory slot.
I am level 6 now and i only used 4 points on each char to get a total of 6 slots, this is enough since 3/4 do not even know enough skills to fill the slots up. But i also got about 2-4 extra "free" skills that are equipment or racial skillls and they are among the best.


Amberstar
Joined: Sep 2016
K
stranger
OP Offline
stranger
K
Joined: Sep 2016
The thing to remember isn't about whether or not your the game is allowing your character is powerful enough. I'm certain your characters will be powerful as the game goes on. It's whether you're losing some fun value by not having less important skills available.

If my skill slots are very precious, it's hard to imagine keeping a skill like "Rain" equipped in the mid to late game for those times when it's minor benefit becomes very strong, when it's competing with a "Winterblast" and "Fireball".

It's fun to find combat solutions where "Rain" is the right choice, but if I'm min/maxing my character, I have to put a spell which is highly likely to effect the outcome of combat.

Additionally, there's even less incentive to sample a new skill tree for fun because you don't get any new skill slots for doing so.

That said, I still think Scrolls are probably the answer for this.

Joined: Sep 2016
T
journeyman
Offline
journeyman
T
Joined: Sep 2016
Its actually better this way.

It prevents you from building a "Total annihilation getthatwaterelectrolyzedoilthatguythensethimonfire" type of characters.

I like it. Now we will be more tactical with our choices with spells and abilities.

Joined: Aug 2016
M
stranger
Offline
stranger
M
Joined: Aug 2016
I think Memory is going to be a very LOVE IT or HATE IT topic of discussion here...

Personally I like the idea and the implementation of it very much. Actually DOS2 in general I'm finding I like a lot of; it reminds me of Ultima FOR SURE! But I digress.

My only real issue with the memory system at the moment is the balance of it, which Larian can change as they gather more data. I like that I'm restricted to a limited number of spells/abilities but I feel that it's currently a little too limiting. Some abilities feel like they could be 0 memory cost abilities or it may make more sense to tweak the formula for memory around. Instead of 2 points per 1 slot, maybe some other distribution makes more sense (fibonacci? 1st point = 1 slot; 2nd point = 2nd slot; 3rd point = 3rd and 4th slot? etc just an example; this blows up too quickly but it gets my point across)

Another thing to keep in mind is that Larian can also play with the frequency of skills being attached to equipment (as well as memory stat). It was EXTREMELY rare to find a piece of equipment that gave you a skill attached to in DOS1 whereas in the alpha they're ALMOST common occurrence. They're still expensive and rare, but you see them frequently enough that I'm almost okay with how few memory slots I have. Plus my main gripe with wands in DOS1 was that skills could only be used 3 times whereas in DOS2 it seems they're always (at least now) unlimited uses which is WAY better.

Quote

That said, I still think Scrolls are probably the answer for this. - Kyle Olson


Much like my points above; this is another option. Scrolls felt a little more precious in DOS1. Yes I used them but I often found myself hoarding them JUST IN CASE I NEEDED THEM. But even when I would die in combat, I'd just reload and try again and STILL hold onto the scroll because the NEXT fight is when I'd need the scroll, obviously. If they were a little more plentiful or it were a little more simple to craft the lower level basic scrolls (like say a Rain scroll, and SPECIFICALLY the scroll you wanted) then again, the memory "problem" begins to be mitigated (which again it isn't a problem and I don't like that word given the connotation but for lack of a better term it is a "problem" currently).

Last edited by mbcev; 16/09/16 01:00 AM.
Joined: Nov 2015
T
member
Offline
member
T
Joined: Nov 2015
I am quite okay with memory system. It deals with biggest balance issue in DOS1 - for cost of just 1 or 2 skill points, your (for example) aoe fire/geo mage with wand and shield, maxed willpower and loremaster can suddenly get ENORMOUS power boost, thanks to really easy to obtain and not very restricted usage of level 1 spells like regeneration, battery ram, bitter cold, rain, thunder jump or oath of desecration. We all know, that these "one point wonders" turned your specialized character in allmighty godlike machine of war and for extremely small cost, and absolutely no disadvantage (as 1 skill point is nothing on later levels) - suddenly instead of classical slow and fragile mage, you could have selfhealing aoe ball of destruction zipping around battlefield with low cost spells like no tommorow. So yeah, memory is indeed needed to balance things out.


BUT I strongly suggest one of two tweaks for this:
1) automatically expand memory slots with leveling up. The way it currently is, you can have lvl 20 character, but if you spend no points on memory, you will still have only 5 slots... which is quite meh and seriously no fun whatsoever. I would suggest, that characters get atleast 1 memory slot every 4-5 levels, this way you can have 8-10 slots at high level+few extra depending on your stat distribution (15 max with 20 memory?) This in my opinion sounds much better, as you can have no memory character, which must choose his main spells wisely, but is not too limited by this. Or you can have little more "hybrid" character, which gets much more spells in his skillbar, but has lower main stats as int and strength.
It keeps the basic idea intact, but won´t be so restricting that it might not even be fun anymore.

2) after reaching certain skill level (lets say level 4 pyromancer), your low level fire skills could have 0 memory cost. This makes sense, because it would be really weird, that my allmighty fire mage who is capable of bringing down meteor from sky is not able to shoot small fire projectile at enemy.
So with massive investments into your chosen skill tree, you can become real master of that type of warfare, enabling you to use much more skills, but only from that tree. Which perfectly solves the above descripted problem of all mighty hybrid builds. If this restriction isn´t enought, we can introduce specialized talent (lets say "Fire attunement"?) to enable this.

Ideas?

Last edited by TsunAmik; 16/09/16 07:32 AM.
Joined: Jun 2014
veteran
Offline
veteran
Joined: Jun 2014
Originally Posted by TsunAmik
I am quite okay with memory system. It deals with biggest balance issue in DOS1 - for cost of just 1 or 2 skill points, your (for example) aoe fire/geo mage with wand and shield, maxed willpower and loremaster can suddenly get ENORMOUS power boost, thanks to really easy to obtain and not very restricted usage of level 1 spells like regeneration, battery ram, bitter cold, rain, thunder jump or oath of desecration. We all know, that these "one point wonders" turned your specialized character in allmighty godlike machine of war and for extremely small cost, and absolutely no disadvantage (as 1 skill point is nothing on later levels) - suddenly instead of classical slow and fragile mage, you could have selfhealing aoe ball of destruction zipping around battlefield with low cost spells like no tommorow. So yeah, memory is indeed needed to balance things out.


BUT I strongly suggest one of two tweaks for this:
1) automatically expand memory slots with leveling up. The way it currently is, you can have lvl 20 character, but if you spend no points on memory, you will still have only 5 slots... which is quite meh and seriously no fun whatsoever. I would suggest, that characters get atleast 1 memory slot every 4-5 levels, this way you can have 8-10 slots at high level+few extra depending on your stat distribution (15 max with 20 memory?) This in my opinion sounds much better, as you can have no memory character, which must choose his main spells wisely, but is not too limited by this. Or you can have little more "hybrid" character, which gets much more spells in his skillbar, but has lower main stats as int and strength.
It keeps the basic idea intact, but won´t be so restricting that it might not even be fun anymore.

2) after reaching certain skill level (lets say level 4 pyromancer), your low level fire skills could have 0 memory cost. This makes sense, because it would be really weird, that my allmighty fire mage who is capable of bringing down meteor from sky is not able to shoot small fire projectile at enemy.
So with massive investments into your chosen skill tree, you can become real master of that type of warfare, enabling you to use much more skills, but only from that tree. Which perfectly solves the above descripted problem of all mighty hybrid builds. If this restriction isn´t enought, we can introduce specialized talent (lets say "Fire attunement"?) to enable this.

Ideas?


Point 2 makes a lot of sense. Again, hopefully there will be no level or attribute cap this time, so it WILL be possible to do it.

Joined: Oct 2015
addict
Offline
addict
Joined: Oct 2015
Originally Posted by TsunAmik

2) after reaching certain skill level (lets say level 4 pyromancer), your low level fire skills could have 0 memory cost. This makes sense, because it would be really weird, that my allmighty fire mage who is capable of bringing down meteor from sky is not able to shoot small fire projectile at enemy.
So with massive investments into your chosen skill tree, you can become real master of that type of warfare, enabling you to use much more skills, but only from that tree. Which perfectly solves the above descripted problem of all mighty hybrid builds. If this restriction isn´t enought, we can introduce specialized talent (lets say "Fire attunement"?) to enable this.

Ideas?


This is an idea I really like, but not exactly as you've suggested it.

Potentially all skills could start out having an expensive memory cost. As you invest in the relevant skill, the memory costs reduce. This sounds much better than the current system, where investing points in a skill only provides a trivial benefit. They might as well get rid of them from what I've seen so far. But I would much rather see them beef this up.

The problem I expect to see is that Mages will be limited by their memory slots, but they will still have a smorgasbord of skills to choose from. There should be incentives for them to specialise.

Joined: Feb 2015
enthusiast
Offline
enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2015
I like how people are for the system but still want the system to give more slots...

I'll try and play and see how the system turns out.
I for one admit I'm not please by it, again for this kind of reason :

Quote
If my skill slots are very precious, it's hard to imagine keeping a skill like "Rain" equipped in the mid to late game for those times when it's minor benefit becomes very strong, when it's competing with a "Winterblast" and "Fireball".


I really don't see how this system actually manages to nerf mages. It just casts out (no pun intended) minor spells from combat, which is kind of lame.

Joined: Nov 2015
T
member
Offline
member
T
Joined: Nov 2015
Yeah, its my main issue - I will still want to use most of my skills like rain, but instead of just casting it, i will have to open skill screen, relearn it, cast it and relearn it again...

Same with tough encounters. Just press F5 every 10 sec, and when you get into fight, look what spells you will need, reload, assign them, win the fight and assign back your previous skills.

Tedious, not fun, and balancing could still suffer, as you will always have all the skills you need in that fight ready after reload.

Page 1 of 2 1 2

Moderated by  gbnf, Kurnster, Monodon, Stephen_Larian 

Link Copied to Clipboard
Powered by UBB.threads™ PHP Forum Software 7.7.5