I don’t recall off the top of my head what weapons wizards can equip, but you “could” do a basic shit attack with any of them. But there’s no reason to since the basic skills that regain resources are simply better versions of that.
Kind of an odd complaint to me, but ok.
Edit- Just tested it for funzies since it takes all of 2 mins. If you delete whatever skill you want, you can in fact just swing your weapon around (and wizards can use staffs and swords which are melee). But you could instead use spectral blades which are melee and give you so much more benefit. /shrug
Ok, fair. It would never have occurred to me to remember that. If I had, I would probably have tucked it into the category of annoying nonsense. Like call me crazy, but if I’m playing an insanely powerful spell caster the last thing I want to do after I get some skills leveled is literally wack things with a sword like some peasant.
Yeah…there is never a reason to use the basic non-class ability attack in Diablo 3. By design. That’s the difference.
In Diablo 1 & 2 you do. Especially early level even as a sorceress/mage. You hit enemies with your staff because your mana pool starts out very low. The basic attack never really is replaced until at much higher levels when you have enough mana to just spam ice orb or whatever.
As @TheWombat also mentioned they are stat holders. You won’t actually be hitting anything with a sword as a Wizard in Diablo 3 even though you can equip them.
So, from that video, they say it gets much more expensive as you level to respec, enough that you will get to a point where it will make more sense to start a new character. Color me skeptical, but intrigued. It sounds like it could be a happy medium between the complete permanence of D2 and the complete fluidity of D3
The cost of tweaking vs full respec is something I’ve always enjoyed in Grim Dawn. I don’t feel like I’m building up an actual unique character if I can just swap out all their skills and whatever at will. Being able to buy back individual skill points is a nice middle ground.
I feel exactly the same. Games are about interesting decisions for me and Diablo 3’s rune system never felt like I was making a decision. It felt like in a Civ game if I could disassemble my World Wonder and instantly have an army, then be able to convert the army back to a Wonder when I’m done with the war. Sure, it’s convenient, but it also robs the decisions of any importance. It just doesn’t matter what I pick, so don’t care and my brain isn’t engaged anymore.
There’s a balance to be had for sure. I wouldn’t want a character to take a year to come together and only discover on month number 10 that the build sucks and be stuck with it, so I get the other viewpoint on the matter as well. :) Diablo 3 was just way too far to one end of the spectrum for my tastes.
Respec is another aspect that never grabbed me. Whatever decisions I made, I made for a reason and stuck with them, and it became part of the roleplay aspect of any game. If the game was balanced right, and it almost always was for my style of play, there was no reason to respec unless you were one of those min/maxing, best-build, types. Well, not no reason; I get when people want to try out skills but don’t want to bother starting a new character to level through to that particular skill. For me, I leave that to another character/playthrough.
I’m more likely to want to change my character’s cosmetic attributes than anything to do with skills/stats. You know, because hairstyles change.
Maybe. It certainly is in Grim Dawn because of the way it is designed. And it was in D2. Haven’t seen enough of how skills work here to say, but happily, it won’t matter too much, from the sound of it.
On a different note, it looks like the Paragon system is borrowing a page from Gordian Quest with rotating panels that will connect to new ones in the future.
I’d take D2 over D3 any day as far as respec goes. Yes, the initial levelling of a new character can get boring after a (long) while. But usually, the anticipation of finally getting to use one of those weapons I had stored for ages because it was suited to another playstyle, was plenty to keep me going in D2. No anticipation whatsoever in D3. Which, despite the better gameplay, killed the game for me.
Sure, put some respec in. But do it like D2: 1 for each difficulty, 3 in total. So if you screw up, you can use one, but not just for fun.
I like being able to try out an ability before committing to it. especially since games often launch with things either broken or not worded well. hate picking an ability then finding out it doesn’t do what you thought or is just a waste. oh well, trash the character and start over. not sure how anyone would enjoy that tbh.
I also don’t want to have to research outside the game to find out what does what and what works. I want to organically experiment and figure it out. I think GD does this the best. Hated D2 for the lack of it since you would lose a large time investment on one choice. Sitting there debating if you should take something given the info you have on the sheet and then grabbing it and using it and just knowing you lost your character with a click. If I wanted that I would play hardcore mode.
I think being able to fine tune the class you choose by trying different abilities anytime makes Grim Dawn more engaging. Sure, it lessens difficulty a tiny bit since you’re not forced to stick with your choices, then again in a game that restricts respeccing, if you don’t like where you’re going you can always start over.
I like that I can respec as many times as I want. The cost does go up each time in GD but I admit the starting cost is too low. They should make it higher so the player has to sacrifice something in return.
Well, partly that sounds to me like game issues. There shouldn’t be trap abilities and other things that are trash. If an ability is so bad it ruins the character, the ability needs to be redesigned or otherwise fixed. I don’t know if anyone is expressing enjoyment for anything like that. And I do think limited respecing is good to have for exactly this sort of thing, I just like there being a cost or barrier associated with it so my choices are at least something I want to consider.
The other part might just be mindset, though. I play a lot of lengthy strategy games where I’m making various decisions throughout a campaign and inevitably some of them just won’t pan out. If it leads to defeat then I don’t mind, it’s an opportunity to think about a new approach for the next game.
ARPGs are like that to me, but with builds. I don’t think there should be trash abilities, that’s not an interesting decision or a valid choice/option. Boring. But I’m constantly thinking “oh, chain lighting sure is cool. And I’m really feeling like I want more AOE abilities in these areas, maybe I’ll focus on that” and then it’s either adjusting my current plans for my character or an invitation to indulge my altitis.
Do you typically play through ARPGs just once or do you like to make various “alts”?
:-) fair enough, I should have phrased that differently.
What I meant was that it shouldn’t be limitless and free (as in D3). So if the cost gets higher and higher (as in Grim Dawn) that could also work.
Alternatively, people could of course decide for themselves that they don’t want to respec and just stick with a build. However, respeccing was such a key element in D3 that that wasn’t a realistic option…
So, maybe a good compromise would be the skill trees of D2, but with limitless respec for those who want it?
D3 is still one of the best selling games of all time and it’s not 2001 anymore.
But given that seasonal content is likely to be the focus after playing the campaign, and starting a new character comes with that. So it might be ok to have a real cost to respec as long as it’s not super punishing to do.
