Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Improved talent and skill balance

I think that the balance of the talents and skills should be improved:

Lone Wolf
Lone Wolf provides +2 Max AP, +2 Recovery AP, +30% Vitality, +30% Physical Armour, +30% Magic Armour, +1 attribute point at every odd numbered level (1, 3, ...) and +1 combat skill point at every even numbered level (2, 4, ...).

Warfare
The skill should reflect 5 % of the incoming physical damage per level as physical damage.

Retribution
The skill should be removed.

Perseverance
The skill should be removed. Every character should regenerate 25 % of his magical armor when he is frozen or stunned and 25 % of his physical armor when he is knocked down or petrified.

Dual Wielding
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the critical multiplier by 5 % per level when dual-wielding two one-handed weapons.

Ranged
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the damage from high ground by 5 % per level when using bows and crossbows.

Single-Handed
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the armor of a shield by 10 % per level when using a one-handed weapon with a shield.

Two-Handed
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the critical chance by 2 % per level when using a two-handed melee weapon.

Leadership
The skill should increase dodge and all resistances by 3 % per level.

Huntsman
The skill should increase the range of bows and crossbows by 0.5 per level.

Hydrosophist
The skill should increase the damage of water attacks by 5 % per level, the amount of vitality points healed by 5 % per level and the amount of magical armor points restored by 5 % per level.

Geomancer
The skill should increase the damage of earth attacks by 5 % per level and the amount of physical armor points restored by 5 % per level.

Aerotheurge
The skill should increase the damage of air attacks by 5 % per level.

Pyrokinetic
The skill should increase the damage of fire attacks by 5 % per level.

Scoundrel
The skill should increase the movement speed by 0.5 per level.

Polymorph
The skill should increase the number attribute points by 1 per level.

Summoning
The level 10 improvement should be removed and the skill should increase the damage, vitality, magical armor and physical armor of summoned creatures by 10 % per level.

Necromancer
The skill should transfer 10 % of the inflicted vitality damage per level to the vitality of the attacker.

I think these are all-around poor suggested changes. Except Perseverance. Everyone should have Perseverance or some equivalent. I agree so much, you don't even know.

I like most of the suggestions, except:

-Even though I like getting rid of warfare damage bonus, the new bonus you suggest is bad (it's like nerfed retribution which is bad itself)
-Hunter giving extra range might be used to cheese encounters shooting them from unreachable places
-I like uber incarnate to stay in the game, although it messes up summoner power scaling. Maybe keep it as a higher level skillbook (potentially source) instead? Also, summoning gives 10% already even if tooltip says 5%
-Scoundrel only giving movement feels bit weird to me, it can be powerful with the higher bonus for sure, but I'd rather have it give something useful for combat too than being a pretty niche and potentially OP skill for some uber kite builds
-I don't think LW nerf is enough, but that doesn't bother me too much cause you can avoid it pretty easily

Nobody's going to play Lone Wolf if it is vastly inferior to using 4 characters. It takes up an entire Talent slot, after all. With 4 characters you have more opportunity to apply infinite CC chain (for example 4x battle stomp) and more summons to distract the enemy. Please also note that Lone Wolf doesn't give you 2x max Source Points. Nerfing Lone Wolf will simply force me... <cough> I mean everyone to employ other OP tactics to beat Tactician difficulty.

For me Lone Wolf is reducing the micromanagement of my party, e.g. less gear to worry about, which I find to be frustrating with 4 players. Is there anything other than that which makes Lone Wolf OP?

Yes, it has crazy scaling, by the lategame a single LW character is probably stronger than a whole non LW party. 2x skill and attribute points are that strong.

So 1x thunderstorm and a couple of other aero spells that go on cooldown is more powerful than 4x thunderstorms and a whole arsenal of other aero spells from 4 players that can be chained together?

I defeated both bridge trolls in act 2 at level 10 with my Lone Wolfs and the only time I had any trouble was when my shock spells were on cooldown. If I had 4 chars with shock spells they wouldn't have had a chance to act at all. I could've used shock nades, but still... that's another thing, 2 extra characters to throw shock or charm nades.

You don't need to chain anything if you oneshot enemies. A moderately optimized LW character would easily do 3x damage of a non LW one. As well as more survivability in practice in many situations since more AP allow for much better positioning.

I think defensive skills would make more sense if they were a separate set of points. 1 point every 3 levels or so. Having them compete against the damage and skills is a losing battle. There's no way to make them competitive while still keeping them balanced if you go all-in on them.

Strongly disagree overall with OP but agree with CatR and Cronstintein's comments. Separating defensive skills - Such that we have offensive, defensive, and civil skills would be great.

So how is it balanced for Aero and Pyro to only get 5% increased damage when all the weapon skills and other elemental skill give the 5% and something else? Pretty sure mages have as much need for baked in high ground and/or crit benefits as physical damage dealers.

I believe most of the suggested changes in the OP is pretty balanced and can be justified.

To the person above:

Because it's multiplicative?
With the suggested changes in the OP, the ultra scaling melees currently have is pretty much removed, due to their multiplicative phys scaling (warfare) gets nerfed.

So spell casters gets a massive scaling advantage is comparison with these changes (which is obviously fine, since spell casters are not broken in the least). How can you not see this?

Oh you mean there is actually some challange left in lategame if you dont pick LW? Even with all them extra AP and abilitys and xtra source points?



2 LWs have much less AP then 4 regular, less coverage and much less spells. Also one less Talent. When u start one shotting mobs in this game u have already reached the point where strategy in combat is irrelevant long ago, and u just roll ur face on the keyboard. Wich is basically when u have killed the voidwoken deepdweller in fort joy around lvl 5-6 ish.

Now to OP. Your changes only work to further over powering the overpowered. Except maybe 2h warrior. As for ur LW changes it seems to be more in line with what they had in the previous game, im all for that suggestion. Anything to make it a little harder without delibertly gimping yourself.

How? Most physical classes would get a whole lot weaker with these changes, simply because of the damage nerf on warfare. Even rogues/dual wield warriors with 100% crit would get a lower overall damage with these changes, and they are hit the least by it.

Then again, just how much is the opinions of someone not understanding why LW is incredibly much stronger than a normal sized party.

Rogues would get crit dmg in dual weilding wich is also multiplicative. Since they always crit its not a big loss as they wouldnt have to divide points between warfare and scoundrel. Scoundrel would only have enough points for the skill requirement.

Huntsman + Scoundrel + Pawn + tactical retreat would be the ultimate cheese

Two handed warrior gets shafted as they cant get crit bonus OR multiplicative damage. Mages would put a few Points in two handed for more spell crits.

Everything i just said about LW vs 4 man is true, so whatever u tried to achieve by ur lazy comment there i dont know. Had a bad day?

Seriously, it only takes to play through the first act with LW and non LW party to see how broken LW is in comparison. And it only gets worse with each level.

Yes, rogues would get crit damage, which is indeed multiplicative. Point being is, what's more valuable, one or two multiplicatives?

2x * 2y < 2x * 1.5y *1.5z

^This is the main reason why lonewolf is so absurdly strong. No amount of mental gymnastics on your part can change that.

You are too hung up on the warfare change here. The changes suggested is a nerf to every class type not only physical. Mages loose height advantage since its now restricted to bows and crossbows and can only get Crit dmg if they dual wield, so I guess Shadowblade? Huntsman, again restricted to bow and crossbow. So they are left with INT*Pyro/Aero/etc.etc
Ranger has FIN+Ranged*highground and added range (hello ballistic shot)
Dual Wielders have FIN/STR+dual dmg*Crit dmg
Two handed warrior RIP

About LW, i never argued their dmg output wich obviously is higher. Having double the uses of certain abilitys have huge benefits. More overall AP is also useful. Math looks pretty and all i know, but it doesn't take everything into consideration. I guess i will just have to try it out for myself.

You are definitely right. I didn't take mages and two handed warriors losing the crit multiplier into account. Must've misread some of the suggested changes. That's absolutely my bad. Again though, I don't find all of his suggested changes to be smart, but I believe his focus on making weapon skills more attractive is a step in the right direction.

On LW though, you should definitely try it out. It gets stupid really fast. Fin/Str cap = 200% (lw 400%), warfare cap 50% (100% lw), crit cap 200% (250%).

That's a whopping 750% vs 2000%(LW) in terms of effectiveness when stuff are maxed. That's usually where the complains arises from. Now toss in LW's tendency to proc executioner and their 6 AP each. It's really silly, just to see for yourself, just full min/max on two crossbow rangers and you'll quickly see. :P

His focus to make weapon skills more attractive is good yes, as of now theres no point in investing in them really. Also agree with adjusting LW down to a more reasonable lvl. I play lonewolf because i find managing too many characters tedious but I find the game getting tedious when u get too powerful. When u sum it up like u just did it is kind of obvious and i never did that. LW in DoS1 was great up until lvl 15 when u got those OP abilitys.

Thank you very much for your feedback. I have tried to include your suggestions in the following update:

Damage
The damage of physical basic attacks and skills (scoundrel, huntsman, ...) should depend on the equipped dagger, bow, etc.
The damage of magical basic attacks and skills (hydrosophist, geomancer, ...) should depend on the equipped wand.

Lone Wolf
Lone Wolf provides +2 Max AP, +2 Recovery AP, +30% Vitality, +30% Physical Armour, +30% Magic Armour, +1 attribute point at every odd numbered level (1, 3, ...) and +1 combat skill point at every even numbered level (2, 4, ...).

Warfare
Every character within a 5 meter radius should regenerate 20 % + 3 % per level of his physical armor when he is knocked down or petrified.

Retribution
The skill should be removed.

Perseverance
The skill should be removed.

Dual Wielding
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the damage of attacks against blinded targets by 5 % per level when dual-wielding two one-handed weapons.

Ranged
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the damage from high ground by 5 % per level when using bows, crossbows and wands.

Single-Handed
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the armor of a shield by 10 % per level when using a one-handed weapon with a shield.

Two-Handed
The skill should increase the damage by 5 % per level and the damage of attacks of opportunity by 10 % per level when using a two-handed melee weapon.

Leadership
Every character within a 5 meter radius should regenerate 20 % + 3 % per level of his magical armor when he is frozen or stunned.

Huntsman
The skill should increase the damage of attacks against crippled and marked targets by 5 % per level.

Hydrosophist
The skill should increase the water resistance by 10 % per level.

Geomancer
The skill should increase the earth resistance by 10 % per level.

Aerotheurge
The skill should increase the air resistance by 10 % per level.

Pyrokinetic
The skill should increase the fire resistance by 10 % per level.

Scoundrel
The skill should increase the damage of attacks from stealth and invisibility by 5 % per level.

Polymorph
The skill should increase the number attribute points by 1 per level.

Summoning
The level 10 improvement should be removed and the skill should increase the damage, vitality, magical armor and physical armor of summoned creatures by 20 % per level. The level 10 incarnate should be available as new spell that requires 5 summoning, 3 ap and 2 source points.

Necromancer
The skill should transfer 10 % of the inflicted vitality damage per level to the vitality of the attacker.