3501

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that D2’s skill trees were anything other than awful. I don’t think “Providing choice in how you customize your character” is the problem though, the problem was shitty design of the trees and the abilities. Having an ice spell you get at L1 which is replaced by the one at L6 which is replaced by the one at L18 or whatever was just stupid.

For me, I don’t want to necessarily have to completely re-roll, I just want more customization options than what I choose to put on the hotbar. D3’s going a different route and that’s fine, but for me it’s a little disappointing after waiting all this time. :)

3502

Here’s a respec system I’d like to see: I think the concept of respec’ing makes sense – but it needs to have a serious price. If you feel like undoing your choices over the last X skills, that’s fine, but pay for it – and not with money. Money is too easy to hoard in ARPGs. You should pay for it with time. You’d get 2-3 points to respec for free, and then anything more than that should be a process of time-travel: you’d get taken back to previous areas and lose levels to match. It’d be pretending as if the skill you’re removing was the last skill you added, and would let you redo that choice. It’s better than playing the whole game again, but it’s painful nonetheless.

3503

I don’t want any aspect of playing Diablo 3 to be “painful.” Except maybe finger cramps.

3504

That’s one way of looking at things. The correct way is that people have way less patience for dealing with game design decisions that add frustration than they used to. People still love dinking around with builds - they just won’t put up with it taking 20 hours per dink anymore. If you want to see how a particular build works at any particular point in the game there’s still nothing stopping you in Diablo 3.

3505

It’s really funny that you’re saying this to idris, of all people.

3506

Haha, I missed that.

3507

I am willing to invest what it takes to be good at a computer game. I played D2 for years, played Starcraft 1 at 140 APM on ICCUP and got to C level, played BG2 with all the hard-mode mods, and so on (looking up builds ain’t nothing compared to looking up how to install overlapping mods and in what order).

But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten lazier. With SC2, I was lazier than I was with SC1. And I expect the same to be true for D3.

I also don’t think that “look up a build online” constitutes any amazing skill. I’m willing to do it, I still do it for WoW and I don’t mind it, and I’m sure there are aspects of D3 that I will end up looking into online. But it’s not a great addition to the game to have your very basic builds be bad and suboptimal unless you go look at Build X on Website Y before you even start playing the game.

3508

I don’t know if I can agree. Well, let me rephrase that… yes, you can lay out your skill selection (modified by runes) and yes, that’s actually quite cool (I love the amount of abilities and variation). But say there’s 2-3 particular abilities that I really find I can use effectively when combo’d with a particular groupmate. There’s not a way that I can specialize myself to be more effective at those, even if it’s at the cost of something else. I can choose my hotbar layout, but beyond that I don’t have any control.

Does that make sense at all? It’s perfectly valid not to give two shits about that, but those are the kinds of things I really enjoy in RPGs and it’s the lack of those kind of decisions that leave me a bit disappointed. I don’t feel there’s any variation/specialization in character that isn’t redone by sorting your hotbar.

Anyway, I’m not trying to convince anyone, those are just some of the reasons for myself that I find the D3 approach a little bit lacking.

3509

This reminds me of how people (myself included) didn’t like the ability to swap out modules in Deus Ex 2. It took away any notion of building yourself up, making choices, and considering the opportunity cost. It wasn’t much of an RPG anymore, and I don’t think D3 can be called an RPG either. It’s now an action game with a rapidly growing set of powers.

3510

These games (Diablo, Torchlight, TQ, etc.) are not RPGs and have never been RPGs. They have ever been action games with the RPG character development mechanics (or what you called a growing set of powers).

3511

Can I just register the fact that I am still disappointed with the fact that every single character of a given class will follow an identical skill unlock path to every other character of that class now?

At least in the previous iteration of this Godforsaken design, you could still “pick” which sub-skills you got by deciding where to dump your runestones. Now, literally everyone gets the exact same skillset at the exact same time, in the exact same order. If I want to build a build around, oh, I don’t know, Fiery Magic Weapon, but the Fiery rune for Magic Weapon doesn’t unlock till level 59, then I have to wait till. . . level 59.

If the idea is free and open respecs, the notion of only giving you new options at a slow, arduous pace strikes me as a bit counterintuitive. I dunno, maybe I’m just talking out of my Diablo 3-hating ass :)

3512

This is something I can agree with. Getting ‘run unlock points’ at the appropriate levels would be sweet (not least because then I could try all sorts of runes in the beta!)

3513

That is also something I agree with. I liked it when runes were drops.

That said I’m not in the beta and haven’t tried the new system, or whatever they have planned for the final game.

3514

Haven’t played the Beta yet, but I kind of like the option to switch builds. In D2, I played a character through Nightmare to get stuck in Hell, then start up another one to get stuck in Hell again etc. While I didn’t mind that at all (I liked the lvling) I wouldn’t mind reaching the end and defeat the game on the highest difficulty either. And if this new system of swapping builds until you find the right one lets me do that, I’ll like that.

Then again: I think I’ll like D3 anyway… ;-)

3515

Well, he kinda said it himself - didn’t he :)

3516

Of course you’re right. Though I don’t think it’s “pointless” - but that’s because I’m a great believer in communication - as long as it’s about mutual understanding.

As you know yourself, it seems that a lot of people think we enjoy “punishment” or that we consider ourselves “hardcore” - because we enjoy this particular aspect of gameplay.

I’m not saying I’m right about this new direction being worse (though it could still be pretty good for reasons other than customization) - but it would be nice to be met with understanding, rather than knee-jerk responses about having no life and wanting to whip myself until I bleed.

But but, at this point - I think I’ve “contributed” enough of the same arguments in different ways.

The game is so close to release, anyway :)

Regardless of its replay value, there’s little doubt I’ll enjoy the game more than once - for each of the 2-3 characters I’m looking at.

I’d LOVE a Paladin implemented!

3517

No, he didn’t :)

3518

My bad, then. I’m not familiar with his gamey ways!

3519

Pointless wasn’t the right word. What I meant was that if people didn’t get what you’ve been saying by now it probably ain’t gonna happen. :) It seems to come down to a few responses:

-you want a game to punish you, I just want to have fun (when it’s the strategy and decisions that you find fun).
-skill trees suck! Firebolt sucked, remember? (I think everyone agrees Diablo 2 sucked really bad in this area)
-I don’t have unlimited time! (as if you do)

And of course there’s a big group who just finds the thought of the new system more fun because they don’t care about the same things we do. :)

3520

We should coin a new genre, like “Action RPG”