The problem is that the current system eliminates the need to actually put thought into your build and come up with a cohesive set of 6 skills + runes + 3 passives that defines your play-style. Without a limitation on when and how you can swap skills, the designers' intent to limit you to 6 skills is effectively meaningless.
Designers limiting us to 6 Active Skills, has more to do with not wanting every skill available on screen at once. So a choice has to be made.
Changing skills on the fly is mostly about changing 1-2 skills at most. Not all 6 skills at the same time, and it is to counter different mobs that you face. Additionally, runes cannot be changed in combat (at least not that we know of) so you're stuck with the runed skill you already have. That is thought into your build. For monster X, switch to skill A4, for monster Y, switch to skill C6.
As I mentioned, concepts of builds need to change. The main idea is to defeat monsters/bosses and get items. Why is a fluid build so anathema to some people?
PS. I'm way too lazy to switch skills on the fly, I'll be choosing a build and using it till it does not work or I find one more fun. I'm not opposed to switching out a few skills for bosses because, strategies are different, (its not cheating and if you think it is, to each his own). And I'm not opposed to people switching out their skills every 5 minutes although I might not want to play with someone why always has an hourglass over his head and is not pulling his weight.
Bashiok brought up some points today in the unattuned rune thread.
He already said the quote up above, but after people were discussing possible other systems besides only skill swapping in town, he made another comment. There is currently no system in place that checks a combat state. So unless they take time off other stuff, there likely won't be one. Meaning I think we can rule out any sort of system that works off checking for combat state.
Posted by Bashiok
As a follow up, there's no concept of 'in combat' or 'out of combat' in the game, so that's not something we can just hook in to. There could be. We could take programming time dedicated to other features and design and build out a 'combat state' system, but that's programming time away from something else.
Designers limiting us to 6 Active Skills, has more to do with not wanting every skill available on screen at once. So a choice has to be made.
D3 was originally to have skill trees just like in D2, but with easier respecs. The problem they found with that design was that the optimal strategy was to dump skill points into a tier 1 skill until tier 2 opened up. Then respec and put all those points into tier 2, etc. The new design is a great solution for early leveling and allowing the skills you use to evolve as new ones become available. The 6 skill limit (and lower limits earlier as you level) was supposed to preserve the feeling of having a build (like how in D2 you could only choose 4-5 skills to max).
Unfortunately, the ease of switching skills now means that you effectively have ALL skills maxed and just can't have them all hot-keyed at the same time. If this is truly how they want the game to function, they should just remove the tedium of having to swap out skill slots and let you hot-key as many of your skills as you want.
If, on the other hand, they want skill selection to mean something then they have to add some mechanism to make it easier to pick a build that can handle any situation and stick with it than it is to swap out skills for every different situation.
As I mentioned, concepts of builds need to change. The main idea is to defeat monsters/bosses and get items. Why is a fluid build so anathema to some people?
For many people the challenge of coming up with a clever or unique build is just as interesting as the thrill when that uber item drops. I realize that plenty of people aren't interested in theory-crafting different builds and/or aren't interested in the unique play-styles of variant builds, but for those who are interested in that sort of thing it will be a disappointment if the current system goes live without any tweaks and we lose that part of what made D2 such a great game.
For many people the challenge of coming up with a clever or unique build is just as interesting as the thrill when that uber item drops. I realize that plenty of people aren't interested in theory-crafting different builds and/or aren't interested in the unique play-styles of variant builds, but for those who are interested in that sort of thing it will be a disappointment if the current system goes live without any tweaks and we lose that part of what made D2 such a great game.
I enjoy theory-crafting as much as the next ARPG obsessed fan. The point I am trying to make is that your current definition of a "Build" really is based from the Diablo2 concept of a build.
Every game has its own system of leveling up. Sadly many games refuse to innovate, which is why MMO combat is kind of stale [Hoping TOR and GW2 will be different]. So when someone tries something new, why should we tie it down?
None of us know how a level 60 will play, how fesiable this skill changing will be, how runes will affect "builds". How players will truly react when playing D3. Its one thing to say that you have the ability to switch skills on the fly, but in Hell, Inferno, after 10's or 100's of playthroughs, will we still switch skills, is it even worth it?
Why can't builds for D3 now consist of a 2 builds. 1 for all mobs, 1 for bosses.
Bottomline is such things can be implemented once we have true experience with the game. I'm fine with people suggesting potential changes but there are so many posts here berating the D3 designers and sounding off that their method is the best method.
PS. I'll take the game as is if it means we can get it out by End of Jan 2012. I'm actually very disgusted that Blizzard didn't stick to their guns and are wasting precious time fiddling about with skill swapping when they could be spending it creating more legandary items, adding even more properties or even working on the expansion.
Designers limiting us to 6 Active Skills, has more to do with not wanting every skill available on screen at once. So a choice has to be made.
*snip*
Unfortunately, the ease of switching skills now means that you effectively have ALL skills maxed and just can't have them all hot-keyed at the same time. If this is truly how they want the game to function, they should just remove the tedium of having to swap out skill slots and let you hot-key as many of your skills as you want.
If, on the other hand, they want skill selection to mean something then they have to add some mechanism to make it easier to pick a build that can handle any situation and stick with it than it is to swap out skills for every different situation.
As I mentioned, concepts of builds need to change. The main idea is to defeat monsters/bosses and get items. Why is a fluid build so anathema to some people?
*snip*
I think this is right on the money - they've already implemented systems to insure you can't have every skill at your call at all times - I think their idea goes WAY beyond giving you a momentary annoyance to switch your skills ever 30 seconds as you meet new challenges.
As annoying as it can feel your character MUST be limited in some ways or they need to balance content against people who will macro the hell out of hotkeyed skills and be able to play an area like they have 20 maxed out skills instead of 6. - IMHO this falls into the exact same category as why you wont be able to pop runes in and out of your skills on the fly either - people would be using macros to automate that as well.
None of us know how a level 60 will play, how fesiable this skill changing will be, how runes will affect "builds". How players will truly react when playing D3. Its one thing to say that you have the ability to switch skills on the fly, but in Hell, Inferno, after 10's or 100's of playthroughs, will we still switch skills, is it even worth it?
Obviously this is still speculation right now, but I just can't imagine using one of my limited skill slots for a powerful, but niche, ability if I was able to just swap that ability in easily for the times when I needed it. If you can easily access a character's entire toolkit, why would you restrict yourself to just 6 skills?
After 10's or 100's of playthroughs, people will be looking for ways to automate the switching process (via keyboard or mouse macros if possible) so they can get around the annoying and archaic limitation of only being able to have 6 skills hot-keyed at a time. If this is really how they want the game, they should fully support it by allowing players to hot-key as many spells as they want.
Why can't builds for D3 now consist of a 2 builds. 1 for all mobs, 1 for bosses.
Similarly, if this is the design they want, they should support it with a spec switching mechanic (as they did in WoW).
Ultimately they can do what they want and can always change things later. I'll certainly play and enjoy whatever they end up shipping. However, there are plenty of players like myself that really enjoy working through the various trade-offs that restrictions within a game provide. Whenever those sorts of restrictions are removed and those trade-offs become irrelevant it makes the game a little less deep, enjoyable, and replayable for us.
Not having to worry about those sorts of things is obviously attractive to a different group of people and Blizzard ultimately has to pick the balance that will end up selling the most copies. Unfortunately for fans like me, removing trade-offs from the game won't stop many of us from buying it and since its not a subscription-based game it doesn't really matter if we get bored with it more quickly as long as they can get us interested again when the next expansion rolls around. This is frustrating, but really all we can do is try and suggest changes that would keep the game interesting for us without overly burdening the people who enjoy the game differently.
Once a rune is socketed into a skill doesn't that effectively prevent the "change your skills all the time" gameplay people are afraid of?
Really this whole discussion feels like its missing the point to me because the focus should be on how skills interact with runes rather then how the base abilities can be moved them around. For example, its my understanding that once socketed runes can't be removed or reused, this creates demand for runes long after everyone has their level 7 runes banked due to needing more for respecs more or less. So if swapping a skill out for another erases the rune... you have both your respec cost and penalty right there, done and done, all while keeping maximum freedom.
Am I wrong in thinking this? It seems like this is implied in the design but people are forgetting about it due to the rune-less beta.
Once a rune is socketed into a skill doesn't that effectively prevent the "change your skills all the time" gameplay people are afraid of?
Really this whole discussion feels like its missing the point to me because the focus should be on how skills interact with runes rather then how the base abilities can be moved them around. For example, its my understanding that once socketed runes can't be removed or reused, this creates demand for runes long after everyone has their level 7 runes banked due to needing more for respecs more or less. So if swapping a skill out for another erases the rune... you have both your respec cost and penalty right there, done and done, all while keeping maximum freedom.
Am I wrong in thinking this? It seems like this is implied in the design but people are forgetting about it due to the rune-less beta.
Heh, according to the unattuned system, the runes are in no way erased, they're tied to a skill yes, but you can switch them around if you want.
And for the love of god, they better not make it as you say.
At first I was like "This dude's got a point" but then you proposed that runes be deleted upon switching skills and didn't know they aren't destroyed and are interchangeable... The problem with criticism is everyone thinks they can do it and I fall victim to this as well. Just as we're not professional movie critics because we've seen all 6 Star Wars, we're not game designers because we have played Diablo.
What is wrong with switching your skills on the field? What is wrong with being proactive and thinking about the best way to succeed? Isnt that what any logical person would do in real combat?
Players will still be able to switch skills in between combat, they will just have to go to town to do it. Its not really a deterrent, just a waste of time in a game that is supposed to be nonstop action
PS: Obviously you should not be able to change skills during combat.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
What is wrong with switching your skills on the field? What is wrong with being proactive and thinking about the best way to succeed? Isnt that what any logical person would do in real combat?
Players will still be able to switch skills in between combat, they will just have to go to town to do it. Its not really a deterrent, just a waste of time in a game that is supposed to be nonstop action
PS: Obviously you should not be able to change skills during combat.
2 Things:
1. If you make it burdensome, you remove any and all requirement or expectation of good players to do it constantly for progression's sake.
2. If you make it burdensome, player skill choice becomes at least quasi-permanent, allowing diversification of player characters, instead of letting every player of a class have access to every skill whenever they feel the need for it.
The only reason why this second issue is an issue is because they removed talent trees, synergies, stat points, and skill points - the RPG aspect of the game, where you choose how to diversify your character from the herd, was funneled down into what six active skills you use and how you rune them, if you are not even semi-glued to that decision, then there would be absolutely no meaningful personal decisions to be made about your character beyond class, gender, and name.
I do not understand at all....
Is it just a case of "I want to be a special snowflake" or something? As if cookie cutter builds are special?
There are BILLIONS of build choices....its kind of dumb to think you have to pick just one and stick with it. Especially when the system was designed to allow experimentation.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
I do not understand at all....
Is it just a case of "I want to be a special snowflake" or something? As if cookie cutter builds are special?
There are BILLIONS of build choices....its kind of dumb to think you have to pick just one and stick with it. Especially when the system was designed to allow experimentation.
I am not saying you have to stick with it, I am saying that you should have to pay a price to change it.
Experiment all you want, just don't swap out skills before every fight because, if you don't, you are a gimp loser who doesn't know how to play who should be boooo'd and /kicked out of the game.
Take Monk Mantras for example.
Monks only get six active skills, just like everyone else, but they get four mantras (auras) that do different things (and no monk will waste more than one slot for a mantra).
If a party has two Monks in it, and they both chose the same mantra, and if it were easy and costless to switch, one will have to switch, and if they don't, something is wrong with them.
If it costs gold to switch auras, it would not be worth it for a monk to switch, and no one would ask them to just for the convenience of a single game.
Now, the aura each monk chose, based on how they want to play, is somewhat locked into their character, at least to a point where they are not changing it willy-nilly.
Your half-articulated argument about everyone is just going to choose the cookie cutter build anyways is bologna, we all know it, and you can prove it by looking at the talents of players in the WoW-Armory and of the talents of players on rated arena teams / progression guilds.
First of all, the problem is everyone is looking at this from the D3 beta stand point where you can stand in a pack of mobs and change all your skills without a care in the world. Please do this in Nightmare and Inferno and see how successful you are. I'll bet you can change 1 skill before you die a horrible death.
Out of all the beta streams I've seen, I don't see people constantly changing skills while in combat.
The people who will follow the cookie cutter builds will be that small % of min/maxers who are the people most likely to be ridiculous about this and swap skills every fight, it will not affect everyone. Most people will settle into the 6 skills they enjoy using and works for them and rune them and stick to them.
Also, in your example above, you just prove why the current system is better. Two monks with the same Mantra's. Hell with running to town to swap them at a cost or whatever asinine idea you guys come up with to make this a hassle for players. They can just coordinate and swap to 2 different mantra's on the spot and keep on questing.
First of all, the problem is everyone is looking at this from the D3 beta stand point where you can stand in a pack of mobs and change all your skills without a care in the world. Please do this in Nightmare and Inferno and see how successful you are. I'll bet you can change 1 skill before you die a horrible death.
Out of all the beta streams I've seen, I don't see people constantly changing skills while in combat.
The people who will follow the cookie cutter builds will be that small % of min/maxers who are the people most likely to be ridiculous about this and swap skills every fight, it will not affect everyone. Most people will settle into the 6 skills they enjoy using and works for them and rune them and stick to them.
Also, in your example above, you just prove why the current system is better. Two monks with the same Mantra's. Hell with running to town to swap them at a cost or whatever asinine idea you guys come up with to make this a hassle for players. They can just coordinate and swap to 2 different mantra's on the spot and keep on questing.
The real risk as I see it is swapping in and out long cooldown spells while they are on cooldown. If there is no restriction, there is a benefit to gain by swapping those spells out while they are on cooldown (possibly with another long cooldown spell). Imagine a barb rotating through the 3x 120 second cooldown skills in their 6th slot. They swap them between groups of mobs when its safe.
I expect when you socket a rune to a skill, it binds to that skill until you socket another one. I expect that you can swap a skill out and the rune is swapped out with it, and if you swap that skill back in the rune is swapped back in with it. It seems tedious to do it any other way. I don't think socketing a rune is going to lock that skill into your skill slot. I don't imagine that you will have to remove the rune before you can swap out the skill.
I think some people on this site are going to have to come to terms with the fact that the game has changed. Selecting one build for the life of a character is no longer the intended way to play the game. The new way to play is to swap your skills around as you go and just have fun. I'm personally looking forward to seeing how to make non-standard skill selections work (particularly battlemage with shield). Nothing is stopping you personally from picking 6 skills for the life of the character, but the game does not make that the only way to play. And I think its for the better. Chances are you'll need different gear stats for different selections of builds (ie. crit build vs a defensive build) so chances are you will not be dramatically changing your skills as you reach endgame. But you can if you want to.
I am not saying you have to stick with it, I am saying that you should have to pay a price to change it.
Experiment all you want, just don't swap out skills before every fight because, if you don't, you are a gimp loser who doesn't know how to play who should be boooo'd and /kicked out of the game.
Take Monk Mantras for example.
Monks only get six active skills, just like everyone else, but they get four mantras (auras) that do different things (and no monk will waste more than one slot for a mantra).
If a party has two Monks in it, and they both chose the same mantra, and if it were easy and costless to switch, one will have to switch, and if they don't, something is wrong with them.
If it costs gold to switch auras, it would not be worth it for a monk to switch, and no one would ask them to just for the convenience of a single game.
Now, the aura each monk chose, based on how they want to play, is somewhat locked into their character, at least to a point where they are not changing it willy-nilly.
If this is the best example you can come up with in defense of punishing players for being able to switch skills, it is a terrible one.
Your argument is the same one as when a player dies there should be a cost. Eg. All equipment left behind, or loss of XP etc. I'm sorry but if that is your stance, I find that my impressions of your need to "pay a price" is completely based of your ego.
You example tells me you're not interested in making the game more fun, or gameplay mechanics more fun. It sounds like you're all about prestige and ego. You want people who make bad choices to be punished even if they are new to the game. You want only the elite to be in Inferno mode.
And worse of all you are really stuck in a Diablo 2 mindset. 2 Monks with the same aura should be forced to use whatever build they have chosen? Seriously?!?
Its a very narrow mindset, and is aimed only at benefiting players who have poured a ton of research into creating the BEST build. I've got news for you, its not an e-sport, and the basis of the game is to make all builds viable. I think Diablo 3 is about fun and luck of the draw (for items).
I find it more fun to kill bosses and get loot, I really don't care to compare that your build can complete the specific boss run 10 mins faster than mine. I like my builds to be fun or theme centric and as long as its viable, I'm good.
Eg. All equipment left behind, or loss of XP etc. I'm sorry but if that is your stance, I find that my impressions of your need to "pay a price" is completely based of your ego.
And it is your "ego" that is saying that no matter what you do, you want to never be punished for making a mistake in a video game, ever.
That you should just zip through without dying, and if you do die, it shouldn't really matter.
That there should be no way for you to screw up.
It is a very entitled mindset you have, I am not sure you really want to play a game so much as watch a movie unfold before you at the pace of your mouse-clicks.
In games there are rules, and you can lose, you can make mistakes.
You want invincibility mode, probably because games were too hard for you growing up and your elder brother put the cheats in for ya.
Well I am your older brother, I am the dungeon master, and I have to tell you that you need rules and the possibility of failure to make a game interesting.
We already have people in the beta complaining about the difficulty of some mobs because they explode when they die, and if you don't move away in time you will die as well.
This isn't Dora the Explorer for the PC, it is Diablo 3.
You should be fallible.
I completely agree. What kind of game would it be with can't lose mechanics, the last thing I want is Diablo to turn into a square game, I might as well watch a movie or read a book). I'm pretty annoyed at the insane amount of way points in D3 as is(there's so many, what's the ******* point of town portals, especially since you can't use them to get out of battle anyway, have one or the other, not both. atleast in D2 the way points were few, and far between, not to mention the maps were much bigger on top of that).
I would like to see him play a Rogue-like or the "old" Wizardry games, then he'll know what hard really is, which unless you play a hardcore char, Diablo doesn't even come close to the difficulty of actual hard games to begin with.
Lol@ people complaining about difficulty over monsters exploding, give me a ******* break, um It's called put some actual thought into how you fight it(from what I can see, It's not hard to avoid even if you're melee, as there is a delay before they explode. Move in, and move out, that's all you have to do).
Companies need to stop using these crappy accessibility tactics, you want the game to be accessible, add a in game tutorer(which there is), screw all this crap to make things easier(no skill trees, no stat relocation, infinite TPs, massive amount of WPs, exc).
They could've easily balanced skill trees, and point use if they made each skill only require 1 point(It's only when skills can be upgraded through puting more points into it, that it becomes hard to balance skills, in the skill trees. If only equipment/stats can make skills more powerful, there's no problem).
I think a good way to do it is to leave it how it is in normal, nightmare and hell but in inferno you have to leave the game to respec. I think there is a problem if you never have to choose which skills you want to use, but I also think that while leveling you often want to change skills to get a feel for what skills go well with what gear etc.
Once you are level 60 I feel like you should no longer be able to change skills like this, but I don't think there should be a gold or number of respec restriction. Going to town is still too easy though and makes it pretty much no different to how it is currently. I think that your skill bar/passives should be locked to the game as soon as you join in inferno (or maybe you can change skills until you first leave town), so if you want to change skills you have to leave the game, respec in some sort of character skill screen (or a lower difficulty game), then join/create a completely new game. This way people will actually have to think about a spec that will work if they want to get anywhere in inferno, instead of just relying on the ability to change skills whenever they want (going to town to respec is included in this statement).
And it is your "ego" that is saying that no matter what you do, you want to never be punished for making a mistake in a video game, ever.
That you should just zip through without dying, and if you do die, it shouldn't really matter.
That there should be no way for you to screw up.
It is a very entitled mindset you have, I am not sure you really want to play a game so much as watch a movie unfold before you at the pace of your mouse-clicks.
In games there are rules, and you can lose, you can make mistakes.
Excuse me but I am not entitled. I fully expect to get my behind handled to me in Hell mode and definitely in Inferno. I like challenging games as much as anyone else.
VIABLE BUILDS does not been god mode. It means with the right equipment and gameplay experience you can complete the game even if you have to die a few times or a lot of times, changing your tactics and approach.
I expect the enemies and their AI to be challenging, not some ridiculous trumped up restrictions designed to penalize people for their playstyle and feed some egos. You expect to find this awesome build that will deal with every single situation and triumph over everyone else, like the hammerdin did in D2. Let's discuss this God Build that you intend to unearth, talk about entitled.
Additionally, you brought up the concept of a DM. Do you think a DM's job is to cause a total party kill (TPK)? If so that explains a lot. A DM's job is to create memorable stories for both himself and his players. That does not mean TPK's are ruled out, if a level 1 party sees an Ancient Red Great Wyrm attacking villages and wants to be heroic and rush into battle, then I think TPK is completely justified. But that's not memorable for anyone except the DM who expects at least one party death per combat. In fact its the hallmark of a lazy, inexperienced and unimaginative DM. Which is just how I feel about putting artificial restrictions on skills in D3.
I would like to see him play a Rogue-like or the "old" Wizardry games, then he'll know what hard really is, which unless you play a hardcore char, Diablo doesn't even come close to the difficulty of actual hard games to begin with.
I did play Wizardry and the Bard's Tale series, and I enjoyed them very much. There is progressing is such games and I love RPG's. I completed all the Bard Tales and the early Wizardry (1-3), but didn't care for the later titles.
I do not however like Rogue-like gameplay. I find it very dumb to play a game that if you die you start back at level 0 with no items. But Rogue-like games delight in causing surprise and spike damage all so some folks can bellow out I reached level 100 on my 985th playthrough. Again EGO. the gameplay usually isn't fun and the whole game is built around killing the player (more so than diablo).
PS. I do intend to do hardcode, will I reach lvl 60 on a character? Maybe. But I see absolutely no point in doing inferno on hardcode. I would prefer to login on my character occasionally and have something to show for my hundreds of hours of play rather than just a tombstone.
They could've easily balanced skill trees, and point use if they made each skill only require 1 point(It's only when skills can be upgraded through puting more points into it, that it becomes hard to balance skills, in the skill trees. If only equipment/stats can make skills more powerful, there's no problem).
And by this statement, you don't get it. All the class skills in D3 are in 1 skill tree instead of creating 3 separate skill trees with lots of filler abilities. Go check the previous incarnations of the class skills. They essentially cherry picked all the skills people would naturally grvitate towards and removed the ones people were not so hot on and made some of those passives.
They have instead opted at great time & expense to introduce runes into the game for build creation, even giving every single rune skill a different animation and you're referring back to skill trees?
Take Monk Mantras for example.
Monks only get six active skills, just like everyone else, but they get four mantras (auras) that do different things (and no monk will waste more than one slot for a mantra).
If a party has two Monks in it, and they both chose the same mantra, and if it were easy and costless to switch, one will have to switch, and if they don't, something is wrong with them.
If it costs gold to switch auras, it would not be worth it for a monk to switch, and no one would ask them to just for the convenience of a single game.
Now, the aura each monk chose, based on how they want to play, is somewhat locked into their character, at least to a point where they are not changing it willy-nilly.
This is a terrible example IMHO. This is exactly the sort of situation where people are perfectly justified in wanting to switch up their skills. If you join a game with another monk that's using the same mantra, go ahead and switch to something else--that's a once-per-game kind of switch--just don't be switching every other boss fight.
During the leveling process I think the current system is a great way for people to experiment and figure out how they want to play their character in the end-game, but at level 60 in Inferno difficulty people shouldn't be changing their skills more often than the party that they are playing with changes. I'm not sure if a gold cost or repeatable quest or cooldown or some sort of rune mechanic is the best way to enforce this, but something needs to be put in place.
People should be able to match their build to the strengths and weaknesses of the rest of their party. They just shouldn't be matching their build to the strengths and weaknesses of each boss as they come to them.
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Designers limiting us to 6 Active Skills, has more to do with not wanting every skill available on screen at once. So a choice has to be made.
Changing skills on the fly is mostly about changing 1-2 skills at most. Not all 6 skills at the same time, and it is to counter different mobs that you face. Additionally, runes cannot be changed in combat (at least not that we know of) so you're stuck with the runed skill you already have. That is thought into your build. For monster X, switch to skill A4, for monster Y, switch to skill C6.
As I mentioned, concepts of builds need to change. The main idea is to defeat monsters/bosses and get items. Why is a fluid build so anathema to some people?
PS. I'm way too lazy to switch skills on the fly, I'll be choosing a build and using it till it does not work or I find one more fun. I'm not opposed to switching out a few skills for bosses because, strategies are different, (its not cheating and if you think it is, to each his own). And I'm not opposed to people switching out their skills every 5 minutes although I might not want to play with someone why always has an hourglass over his head and is not pulling his weight.
He already said the quote up above, but after people were discussing possible other systems besides only skill swapping in town, he made another comment. There is currently no system in place that checks a combat state. So unless they take time off other stuff, there likely won't be one. Meaning I think we can rule out any sort of system that works off checking for combat state.
D3 was originally to have skill trees just like in D2, but with easier respecs. The problem they found with that design was that the optimal strategy was to dump skill points into a tier 1 skill until tier 2 opened up. Then respec and put all those points into tier 2, etc. The new design is a great solution for early leveling and allowing the skills you use to evolve as new ones become available. The 6 skill limit (and lower limits earlier as you level) was supposed to preserve the feeling of having a build (like how in D2 you could only choose 4-5 skills to max).
Unfortunately, the ease of switching skills now means that you effectively have ALL skills maxed and just can't have them all hot-keyed at the same time. If this is truly how they want the game to function, they should just remove the tedium of having to swap out skill slots and let you hot-key as many of your skills as you want.
If, on the other hand, they want skill selection to mean something then they have to add some mechanism to make it easier to pick a build that can handle any situation and stick with it than it is to swap out skills for every different situation.
For many people the challenge of coming up with a clever or unique build is just as interesting as the thrill when that uber item drops. I realize that plenty of people aren't interested in theory-crafting different builds and/or aren't interested in the unique play-styles of variant builds, but for those who are interested in that sort of thing it will be a disappointment if the current system goes live without any tweaks and we lose that part of what made D2 such a great game.
Every game has its own system of leveling up. Sadly many games refuse to innovate, which is why MMO combat is kind of stale [Hoping TOR and GW2 will be different]. So when someone tries something new, why should we tie it down?
None of us know how a level 60 will play, how fesiable this skill changing will be, how runes will affect "builds". How players will truly react when playing D3. Its one thing to say that you have the ability to switch skills on the fly, but in Hell, Inferno, after 10's or 100's of playthroughs, will we still switch skills, is it even worth it?
Why can't builds for D3 now consist of a 2 builds. 1 for all mobs, 1 for bosses.
Bottomline is such things can be implemented once we have true experience with the game. I'm fine with people suggesting potential changes but there are so many posts here berating the D3 designers and sounding off that their method is the best method.
PS. I'll take the game as is if it means we can get it out by End of Jan 2012. I'm actually very disgusted that Blizzard didn't stick to their guns and are wasting precious time fiddling about with skill swapping when they could be spending it creating more legandary items, adding even more properties or even working on the expansion.
1) Cost gold
2) In town only
3) Timer
That makes it as unabusable as possible. Also, respeccing is a free gold sink in terms of design. Why not take it?
I think this is right on the money - they've already implemented systems to insure you can't have every skill at your call at all times - I think their idea goes WAY beyond giving you a momentary annoyance to switch your skills ever 30 seconds as you meet new challenges.
As annoying as it can feel your character MUST be limited in some ways or they need to balance content against people who will macro the hell out of hotkeyed skills and be able to play an area like they have 20 maxed out skills instead of 6. - IMHO this falls into the exact same category as why you wont be able to pop runes in and out of your skills on the fly either - people would be using macros to automate that as well.
Obviously this is still speculation right now, but I just can't imagine using one of my limited skill slots for a powerful, but niche, ability if I was able to just swap that ability in easily for the times when I needed it. If you can easily access a character's entire toolkit, why would you restrict yourself to just 6 skills?
After 10's or 100's of playthroughs, people will be looking for ways to automate the switching process (via keyboard or mouse macros if possible) so they can get around the annoying and archaic limitation of only being able to have 6 skills hot-keyed at a time. If this is really how they want the game, they should fully support it by allowing players to hot-key as many spells as they want.
Similarly, if this is the design they want, they should support it with a spec switching mechanic (as they did in WoW).
Ultimately they can do what they want and can always change things later. I'll certainly play and enjoy whatever they end up shipping. However, there are plenty of players like myself that really enjoy working through the various trade-offs that restrictions within a game provide. Whenever those sorts of restrictions are removed and those trade-offs become irrelevant it makes the game a little less deep, enjoyable, and replayable for us.
Not having to worry about those sorts of things is obviously attractive to a different group of people and Blizzard ultimately has to pick the balance that will end up selling the most copies. Unfortunately for fans like me, removing trade-offs from the game won't stop many of us from buying it and since its not a subscription-based game it doesn't really matter if we get bored with it more quickly as long as they can get us interested again when the next expansion rolls around. This is frustrating, but really all we can do is try and suggest changes that would keep the game interesting for us without overly burdening the people who enjoy the game differently.
Really this whole discussion feels like its missing the point to me because the focus should be on how skills interact with runes rather then how the base abilities can be moved them around. For example, its my understanding that once socketed runes can't be removed or reused, this creates demand for runes long after everyone has their level 7 runes banked due to needing more for respecs more or less. So if swapping a skill out for another erases the rune... you have both your respec cost and penalty right there, done and done, all while keeping maximum freedom.
Am I wrong in thinking this? It seems like this is implied in the design but people are forgetting about it due to the rune-less beta.
And for the love of god, they better not make it as you say.
Players will still be able to switch skills in between combat, they will just have to go to town to do it. Its not really a deterrent, just a waste of time in a game that is supposed to be nonstop action
PS: Obviously you should not be able to change skills during combat.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
I do not understand at all....
Is it just a case of "I want to be a special snowflake" or something? As if cookie cutter builds are special?
There are BILLIONS of build choices....its kind of dumb to think you have to pick just one and stick with it. Especially when the system was designed to allow experimentation.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
First of all, the problem is everyone is looking at this from the D3 beta stand point where you can stand in a pack of mobs and change all your skills without a care in the world. Please do this in Nightmare and Inferno and see how successful you are. I'll bet you can change 1 skill before you die a horrible death.
Out of all the beta streams I've seen, I don't see people constantly changing skills while in combat.
The people who will follow the cookie cutter builds will be that small % of min/maxers who are the people most likely to be ridiculous about this and swap skills every fight, it will not affect everyone. Most people will settle into the 6 skills they enjoy using and works for them and rune them and stick to them.
Also, in your example above, you just prove why the current system is better. Two monks with the same Mantra's. Hell with running to town to swap them at a cost or whatever asinine idea you guys come up with to make this a hassle for players. They can just coordinate and swap to 2 different mantra's on the spot and keep on questing.
The real risk as I see it is swapping in and out long cooldown spells while they are on cooldown. If there is no restriction, there is a benefit to gain by swapping those spells out while they are on cooldown (possibly with another long cooldown spell). Imagine a barb rotating through the 3x 120 second cooldown skills in their 6th slot. They swap them between groups of mobs when its safe.
I expect when you socket a rune to a skill, it binds to that skill until you socket another one. I expect that you can swap a skill out and the rune is swapped out with it, and if you swap that skill back in the rune is swapped back in with it. It seems tedious to do it any other way. I don't think socketing a rune is going to lock that skill into your skill slot. I don't imagine that you will have to remove the rune before you can swap out the skill.
I think some people on this site are going to have to come to terms with the fact that the game has changed. Selecting one build for the life of a character is no longer the intended way to play the game. The new way to play is to swap your skills around as you go and just have fun. I'm personally looking forward to seeing how to make non-standard skill selections work (particularly battlemage with shield). Nothing is stopping you personally from picking 6 skills for the life of the character, but the game does not make that the only way to play. And I think its for the better. Chances are you'll need different gear stats for different selections of builds (ie. crit build vs a defensive build) so chances are you will not be dramatically changing your skills as you reach endgame. But you can if you want to.
Your argument is the same one as when a player dies there should be a cost. Eg. All equipment left behind, or loss of XP etc. I'm sorry but if that is your stance, I find that my impressions of your need to "pay a price" is completely based of your ego.
You example tells me you're not interested in making the game more fun, or gameplay mechanics more fun. It sounds like you're all about prestige and ego. You want people who make bad choices to be punished even if they are new to the game. You want only the elite to be in Inferno mode.
And worse of all you are really stuck in a Diablo 2 mindset. 2 Monks with the same aura should be forced to use whatever build they have chosen? Seriously?!?
Its a very narrow mindset, and is aimed only at benefiting players who have poured a ton of research into creating the BEST build. I've got news for you, its not an e-sport, and the basis of the game is to make all builds viable. I think Diablo 3 is about fun and luck of the draw (for items).
I find it more fun to kill bosses and get loot, I really don't care to compare that your build can complete the specific boss run 10 mins faster than mine. I like my builds to be fun or theme centric and as long as its viable, I'm good.
I completely agree. What kind of game would it be with can't lose mechanics, the last thing I want is Diablo to turn into a square game, I might as well watch a movie or read a book). I'm pretty annoyed at the insane amount of way points in D3 as is(there's so many, what's the ******* point of town portals, especially since you can't use them to get out of battle anyway, have one or the other, not both. atleast in D2 the way points were few, and far between, not to mention the maps were much bigger on top of that).
I would like to see him play a Rogue-like or the "old" Wizardry games, then he'll know what hard really is, which unless you play a hardcore char, Diablo doesn't even come close to the difficulty of actual hard games to begin with.
Lol@ people complaining about difficulty over monsters exploding, give me a ******* break, um It's called put some actual thought into how you fight it(from what I can see, It's not hard to avoid even if you're melee, as there is a delay before they explode. Move in, and move out, that's all you have to do).
Companies need to stop using these crappy accessibility tactics, you want the game to be accessible, add a in game tutorer(which there is), screw all this crap to make things easier(no skill trees, no stat relocation, infinite TPs, massive amount of WPs, exc).
They could've easily balanced skill trees, and point use if they made each skill only require 1 point(It's only when skills can be upgraded through puting more points into it, that it becomes hard to balance skills, in the skill trees. If only equipment/stats can make skills more powerful, there's no problem).
Once you are level 60 I feel like you should no longer be able to change skills like this, but I don't think there should be a gold or number of respec restriction. Going to town is still too easy though and makes it pretty much no different to how it is currently. I think that your skill bar/passives should be locked to the game as soon as you join in inferno (or maybe you can change skills until you first leave town), so if you want to change skills you have to leave the game, respec in some sort of character skill screen (or a lower difficulty game), then join/create a completely new game. This way people will actually have to think about a spec that will work if they want to get anywhere in inferno, instead of just relying on the ability to change skills whenever they want (going to town to respec is included in this statement).
VIABLE BUILDS does not been god mode. It means with the right equipment and gameplay experience you can complete the game even if you have to die a few times or a lot of times, changing your tactics and approach.
I expect the enemies and their AI to be challenging, not some ridiculous trumped up restrictions designed to penalize people for their playstyle and feed some egos. You expect to find this awesome build that will deal with every single situation and triumph over everyone else, like the hammerdin did in D2. Let's discuss this God Build that you intend to unearth, talk about entitled.
Additionally, you brought up the concept of a DM. Do you think a DM's job is to cause a total party kill (TPK)? If so that explains a lot. A DM's job is to create memorable stories for both himself and his players. That does not mean TPK's are ruled out, if a level 1 party sees an Ancient Red Great Wyrm attacking villages and wants to be heroic and rush into battle, then I think TPK is completely justified. But that's not memorable for anyone except the DM who expects at least one party death per combat. In fact its the hallmark of a lazy, inexperienced and unimaginative DM. Which is just how I feel about putting artificial restrictions on skills in D3.
I did play Wizardry and the Bard's Tale series, and I enjoyed them very much. There is progressing is such games and I love RPG's. I completed all the Bard Tales and the early Wizardry (1-3), but didn't care for the later titles.
I do not however like Rogue-like gameplay. I find it very dumb to play a game that if you die you start back at level 0 with no items. But Rogue-like games delight in causing surprise and spike damage all so some folks can bellow out I reached level 100 on my 985th playthrough. Again EGO. the gameplay usually isn't fun and the whole game is built around killing the player (more so than diablo).
PS. I do intend to do hardcode, will I reach lvl 60 on a character? Maybe. But I see absolutely no point in doing inferno on hardcode. I would prefer to login on my character occasionally and have something to show for my hundreds of hours of play rather than just a tombstone.
And by this statement, you don't get it. All the class skills in D3 are in 1 skill tree instead of creating 3 separate skill trees with lots of filler abilities. Go check the previous incarnations of the class skills. They essentially cherry picked all the skills people would naturally grvitate towards and removed the ones people were not so hot on and made some of those passives.
They have instead opted at great time & expense to introduce runes into the game for build creation, even giving every single rune skill a different animation and you're referring back to skill trees?
This is a terrible example IMHO. This is exactly the sort of situation where people are perfectly justified in wanting to switch up their skills. If you join a game with another monk that's using the same mantra, go ahead and switch to something else--that's a once-per-game kind of switch--just don't be switching every other boss fight.
During the leveling process I think the current system is a great way for people to experiment and figure out how they want to play their character in the end-game, but at level 60 in Inferno difficulty people shouldn't be changing their skills more often than the party that they are playing with changes. I'm not sure if a gold cost or repeatable quest or cooldown or some sort of rune mechanic is the best way to enforce this, but something needs to be put in place.
People should be able to match their build to the strengths and weaknesses of the rest of their party. They just shouldn't be matching their build to the strengths and weaknesses of each boss as they come to them.