While I understand that if you despecialize a skill to specialize a new one you have to start from 10 points, I don’t understand why I cannot freely reallocate the points in a skill I specialized.
This practically stops me from trying to tune a skill on my gameplay and I end to just copy-paste builds from sites.
I would like to test my builds, modify and try things but if I have to start at 10 points every time it’s a pain…
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Just my personal take but this is only an issue at low level. When you’re higher level, you basically get ALL the skill points after one or two monolith echoes. The only time I recall this being an issue was trading out a skill when I was still low level.
Skill mastery point gain is SO super fast at higher level that I feel it is a non-issue.
-Acknowledge that you apparently feel it IS an issue, at whatever level you are at. Not sure what to say to that. I have never felt I HAVE to “copy paste” a build, etc.
-Well actually, that’s not true. I do feel I have to follow builds if I want to push past corruption 200.
While this is 100% true, it doesn’t fix the problem that at low levels it takes forever to re-level a skill and feels like loss of progression, which is a very nasty feeling.
Some data to back it up (since it annoyed me so much I measured it, lol):
At level 30, my Sorc had specced Fireball from level 4 and FB was level 10. I had got sick of it and wanted to try Lightning Bolt for a change. I respecced and noted the following:
Time to get LB to level 10: 2 hours (solid play)
I then decided to respec back to FB:
Time to get FB back to where it was: 1.5 hours
So 3.5 hours just to try a “quick” experiment with skill changes. I think that is unacceptable. Especially since the player wants to experiment a LOT during levelling and “find” his build. That’s the whole point.
The irony here is I believe the reason for this mechanic is the devs wanted to prevent players changing spec on the fly for the next encounter (e.g respec skills for echos, then respec for bosses etc). If so, it has completely failed, since at level 100 it takes 1 echo (or about 1 minute) to do a complete respec.
Only low level (and hence new) players are punished by this.
I think this respec mechanic adds nothing to the game but player annoyance.
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You have good points.
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They might tweak the numbers to help lower level players, I agree with that, but it feels completely right to me that there’s a cost to respeccing.
I’m not at endgame so, for the reasons I outline, I find that if it gets easier to respect, that’s really bad.
I gain mastery of certain skills and use them, like in real life, with writing, say. If I then want to become an artist, it’s also a creative skill, but I have to build up to becoming competent in that, practice, get the eye for it, improve it by using it.
It would feel weird to me to be a mage specialising in lightning, feeling that lightning, casting it, manipulating that element day in day out, then just as easily doing it with fire or ice.
It still works, by being too annoying to always respec, do 1-2 echoes, kill boss, respec, do 1-2 echoes, etc, but not being annoying enough to stop experimenting.
Also, it prevents doing that before a dungeon boss.
Though I think everyone agrees that earlier levels could use some loving. I have switched at early levels before as well and I didn’t have any problem in continuing the campaign even with lower level skills, but it does prevent experimentation and it also presents a negative first impact to new players which should be avoided.
At the very least, minimum levels could probably be higher early on.
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But when would a pattern like this occur? You only fight the boss every few dozen echoes. So in the final echo you re-spec, kill boss, then in the first echo of the next few dozen you re-spec back. Since you no longer lose stability for wiping on the boss, there is no need for the re-spec to be frequent.
Footnote: I actually find the devs’ dislike of people re-specing like this a farce since I can switch my gear at will, which is far more “abusive” than being able to re-spec on the fly. And by all accounts I will soon be able to swap blessings on the fly too? OP!!
I mean really, what the hell does it matter? I file this very firmly under NO FUN ALLOWED.
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Just want to add my complaint is not about character power while levelling. Campaign is so easy you could probably finish it with no skill points allocated at all. It’s all about stifling experimentation at the very point in the game it should be encouraged.
Much as I rate the game very poorly, this is one thing D4 got very very right. Easy re-spec, instant and free, to promote player experimentation and fun. [The fact there was little to re-spec to in D4 is irrelevant, :P]
For most players, having to respec before the boss quest, relevel in 1-2 echoes, doing the boss and then going back to the speed farm spec is annoying enough that only a few will try it for a significant time.
Not really. Respeccing skills means you switch from a speed farmer with AoE to a single target skill with high damage. You don’t achieve those by just changing gear or even blessings. You can scale your AoE, but it won’t become a high damage ST skill.
It’s all about the type of player you are. Some players like the D3 system where you can switch builds instantly and you only need 1 character per class because that character is every single build at once. Some players don’t like that because because they would rather have to create a build that can handle all the content they want.
Switching builds on the fly just means that you make the highest ST build possible, then you make the fastest AoE possible and you switch between them depending on the mobs you face. That isn’t fun for many players. So far, EHG prefers the latter type of players than the former.
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Translation: You are a skilled player who understands the game mechanics fully. You should be rewarded.
And are you saying there are no passive points I could shuffle that would also do this?
Hang on if I can freely switch between 75% Void resist from Black Sun OR a massive HP boost from the Black Sun, l how is that not OP? I only need Void resist EVER, if fighting Rahyeh, or maybe doing a beacon at high corruption.
Anyways, either way I also believe that players actually bothering to switch skill points like this, even if it were 100% free and instant, is a myth. Or at most 0.001% of players would actually care or bother to do it. The only competitive aspect to this game is Arena-based where you will never switch skills anyway. So again for non-competitive among us, no fun allowed. Why would anyone care how I play a non-competitive (and essentially single player) game?
I did agree with that. I think early respec could use some love.
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It’s all about the game identity. These are 2 irreconcilable player types:
-There are players that will leave the game if there are no instant respecs.
-There are players that will leave the game if there are instant respecs.
-Many players will stay around no matter which.
EHG just has to decide which players they want around.
So make it an option when you create your character.
Not that I believe people would actually quit a game over how hard or easy a respec was. Even Blizzard, 25 years after D2, said their biggest design mistake for that game was making re-specs so difficult.
An option doesn’t solve anything. If you have an option that gives you a clear advantage, it’s not really an option.
And yes, some players would leave with instant switch. I would, for one. It’s one of the things I liked least in D3.
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But again, why would anyone care about how I play a non-competitive game? That’s the type of player that as a dev I would not want to be encouraging. They will spend all year calling for nerfs for skills they personally do not use.
Again, it’s not how you play the game. It’s how the game is presented. Its identity.
If you added an option where you do 1 trillion damage per hit and are immortal, you wouldn’t have to choose it. If someone did, who would care how they play the game?
However, the simple fact that the game had that option would drive a lot of players away from the game.
Saying things can be optional if you don’t want to is dishonest when the option gives you a clear advantage.
How is re-speccing being free when I am levelling giving me a clear advantage?
(I do not give a crap about re-spec costing a WHOLE MINUTE when I am level 100, keep that in the game if you like, if it is so vitally important for “balance”, it doesn’t affect me at all. Same way it doesn’t remotely affect anyone who actually would bother to re-spec for a ST fight. NOT AT ALL.)
It’s the punishing low level players that I loathe.
You would quit over something you do not even need to take part in? That’s mind-blowing.
No one argues that low level respec needs to be looked at. It does. At the very least because it leaves new players with a negative impression. So it should be changed so that early respec isn’t more inconvenient than late respec.
But that is different from instant build swap.
Yes, I would. One of the things I like the most about LE is that I have to make a build work for all the content I want to do. I can’t go all in on ST, otherwise doing echoes is a chore, nor can I go all out on speed farming, otherwise I can’t do bosses. So I need to create a solution that allows me to do all of that in a single build.
In D3, I just had to collect all the sets and switch if I wanted to push, speed farm, etc. There was no choice other than which of the builds I would switch to.
Some players like the challenge of making a build work for all their purposes. If a game gives you instant free respecs, then what’s the point of doing that?
So yes, I would leave if free instant respecs were implemented in LE. I might play a week every year or so, like I did with D3, but I wouldn’t play regularly.
Would be nice if there were some kinda data behind those statements. Because for me it seems like it’s a very minor % of players who feel this way.
There’s at least one post about it each other day… If it was really that big of a problem, people would be endorsing those posts way more, but no, they just fall into the void with 10+ max. It’s not even a problem of people not using search function, because these posts just pop on the latest every time, so…
I used to be guide follower since PoE, but LE taught me to have fun while doing my own builds, and I never really had any problems at any stage of the game trying to experiment several, different combinations of skills/nodes. It never bothered me even when I was starting in EA.
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