So let’s ask the question, for those of us that don’t know the answer (maybe that’s just me).
Why is the re-leveling skills in the game? It seems to entirely be about guiding player behavior, but I’m honestly not sure.
And, for reference, leveling skills makes sense to me, it’s part of the character (and, the first time, player) journey. It’s just re-leveling that leaves me wondering why. It feels like pointless busy work.
Re-leveling skills are in the game so you can experiment with different skills but you can’t just switch skills on the fly because you’re about to fight a boss.
In early game your skill level doesn’t matter much and almost any skill can carry you. You can respec all but one skill so you’re not hampered or you can even respec them all and quickly enough catch up. I’ve done that a few times and still had no issues doing the campaign.
In late game just a few monos will bring your skills back to level 20, so it’s not an issue either.
So the sole reason to do this is to stop players from cheesing boss fights by tailoring their skill selection to a particular boss.
Does this even make sense given the game design? It seems to me that, to an incredibly large extent, skills (and skill enhancements), items and item attributes all play together so tightly that changing skills on the fly is just not something that the developer should actually be worrying about (because the player would have to put together multiple item sets to support switching on the fly and train themselves to play multiple configurations and I can’t really think of a boss fight where it would be worth it).
Players farming particular bosses seems like a late game activity. If cheesing those fights is actually possible via skill-change then, to your point, this mechanic won’t be stopping those players that are actually willing to put the time in to do this activity. So this mechanic makes some casual players unhappy enough to come post about it, but won’t actually prevent the behavior in late game that this mechanic is supposed to discourage.
I just don’t see this as being something that actually needs to exist in the game. Unless there is something else I’m not getting.
What for? All you need is to switch one less used skill (or an AoE/clear skill) for a skill specced for single target. If you switch at level 20 for a level 20, it takes less than a minute to cheese fights.
That is actually the point. If you want to change your skills to cheese a boss fight, it shouldn’t be immediate. You switch it, do a few monos and a few minutes later you can go do the boss fight. And once you’re done with the boss, you switch again, do a few more monos and you have your old setup back a few minutes later.
Basically, switching skills is discouraged for cheesing because the time you save by speccing into boss killing is nullified by the time you have to wait. It’s much easier to just use your regular build for the bosses.
It does, however, allow you to experiment with different skills with little inconvenience.
There will always be someone how doesn’t like where the line is drawn untill the minimum skill lvl is 24.
I know.
Because otherwise the optimal strategy is swapping skills before the boss / or any other echo depending on modifiers. This will become super tedious and boring very quickly. Not all players are minmaxers, but the game should not have optimal way of playing that is tedious and unfun.
Please educate me, what character/build can swap one skill and no equipment to go from being AoE focused to being single target focused so much that it cheeses a boss fight. Sure, it’s easy to say, I’m just not thinking of a single build where that is actually possible.
I think two things; 1) the game’s skill, equipment and attribute design already make this not an actual problem, and/or 2) the goal could be achieved in other ways (without actually putting any thought into how).
Why do I care? I think this design is needlessly punitive to new players trying out new things.
This is such a a bad argument against increasing the minimum skill level curve to be more generous earlier. Personally I think that’s the best solution, because as everyone has stated 1-3 points doesn’t really matter that much so having a skill that’s level 4 respec to another skill that starts at level 4 isn’t that impactful. The same thing with have a skill that’s level 12 respec to one that’s level 7.
I’m fine with making the skill level continue to cap out at 10, but it’s solely beneficial to the leveling experience to increase minimum skill level early on.
Also to provide context to the current system:
Level 10 : 2
Level 15 : 3
Level 20 : 4
Level 30 : 5
Level 40 : 6
Level 50 : 7
Level 60 : 8
Level 70 : 9
Level 80 : 10
I think something like the following would feel better:
Level 8 : 2
Level 12 : 3
Level 16 : 4
Level 20 : 5
Level 28 : 6
Level 36 : 7
Level 48 : 8
Level 60 : 9
Level 72 : 10
This is just from my memory, but it should be close to 1:1 with skill level and minimum skill level until about level 30-32 then it starts to lag behind.
Except it’s basically what’s happened over the past few years since I’ve been here. Originally there were no minimum skill points & no accelerated xp gain. Since then those two things were added making respeccing significantly less punishing & the xp threasholds have been tweaked over the last few years (such that you no longer get to the point where your lvl 16+ skills sit at 0 xp for a good few character levels then all level up at once from a handful of mobs once you pass the next character level threshold.
You may not agree with the slippery slope argument, but that’s what has actually been happening for the past 3 or 4 years or so. And people are still complaining that it’s too punishing at lower levels/new players. I’m not saying that they’re saying that in bad faith, I just don’t necessarily agree with it.
I don’t think a slippery slope is something that should even come into the equation. That slope is made up of many player feedbacks, and dev design discussions about how to actively affect things in a way that makes the game more accessible/meaningful. Those changes were made for a reason and over a long period of time.
Any change made to the game should be something that’s evaluated on what the developers design goals are and how the change impacts the players. I would just rather allow people to express their opinions in the forums without so many people being outright dismissive without a reason to be.
For example, right now I have a Forge Guard retaliation build. It’s very slow. If I could swap in smite instantly for bosses, it would help me cheese them.
Any big AoE-mana expensive skill like meteor could be changed for a faster-less expensive skill. Especially considering that many skills have damage conversions in their tree, so your damage type multipliers on gear still apply.
Right now it’s not a big issue because pretty much any build can pretty much do any boss. But once difficulty is balanced and pinnacle bosses arrive, this would be an issue.
Why not? If players say “respeccing skills feels super bad 'cause it’s so slow”, devs add minimum levels & accelerated xp gain, players still say “respeccing feels super bad because I’m being punished by respeccing & going down from a lvl 12 skill to a lvl 5 skill (or whatever), I want higher minimum levels or no respec cost”, how is that not a slippery slope?
Just because it’s not a steep slope doesn’t make it not a slope. but yes, the “feels bad” moments do need to be constantly reviewed by the devs & this feedback is necessary.
You’re mostly correct. All am saying is there’s a reason it’s called the Slippery Slope Fallacy, because using it as the basis of an argument provides an argument in bad faith.
You’re correct in saying that by providing an easier option players will want even easier options. And I’m expressly stating that’s fine. Changes made to the game should be evaluated at the time of the change and with respect to the changes that were made before.
You wouldn’t just stop making changes to a class because it’s been changed 5 times before, you would want it to be in a good state. The current system potentially is, but just dismissing the argument by saying it’s been harder and now it’s easier so it shouldn’t be changed again isn’t giving the argument a chance to be considered.
That is a fair point. But just because players want easier options doesn’t mean the game has to have them. It also doesn’t mean they don’t. In the end, it’s up to the devs to see what they want their game to feel like between quick and easy respec to appease one crowd or a system where you can’t just make changes on the fly without some sort of penalty.
Between one end of the spectrum (D3 where you just have loadout to change all skills/gear with one click) and the other (PoE where if you want to change skills you have to relevel your gems, or buy them already leveled, although maybe other ARPGs have even less forgiving systems) there is a lot of space and it’s up to EHG to know where they want to land.
One thing is a fact: no matter where they land, there will always be players complaining.
I agree. Personally I haven’t had too many issues with respec penalties early, since I know my skills will catch up soonish to what I’m looking forward to, but new players would not have that same experience. They’ll see the punishment before the reward.
I definitely prefer this system over PoE’s approach as that game very much demands I have a game-plan going into the character, or plenty of regret orbs to lean on.
That’s kinda where I was trying to get to with the slippery slope bit.
True, but if they don’t change they will complain anyway. And if you change back they will as well. No matter if it’s a slippery slope or a hard climb.
And new players are not cheesing bosses. And ‘new players’ include players playing a new character type who have not/do not go online to sniff everyone else’s ass to see what they are building. They are experimenters who value experimentation as part of the enjoyment of the game and cheesing bosses simply isn’t something they would think to do.
So I’m feeling foolish that I didn’t realize that I am very biased in this conversation because I’ve just described me, and I hate this mechanic. Amusingly enough (to me) is that this wasn’t something that bothered me the first time through because I didn’t even understand the skill system. Seemed more like, ‘wow, that’s a nice-to-have’, rather than a, ‘your build isn’t going to actually work or be worth anything prior to understanding how this system works and how to make your skills work together’.
So now it’s every play though the lower levels where I don’t actually have a plan for a character in advance, I’m just trying different things to see what I like.
Bothers me quite a bit, actually.
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