That’s a playstyle thing though, isn’t it ? 
Say you had “Potion of double damage” which increases your physical-damage to non-players by 50% for 5-10 sec, or even potion of invisibility. Some might prefer to use shackles/traps, or even flamable barrels if they like… Think it’s a nice concept, but again, if playing in a party sure, auras might pay off but doubt would be more effective than things like flamable barrel or IDK, wooden barricade or scrolls of curses in a solo play 
As much as I like Grim Dawn, this precisely leads to what you describe; having a second bar full of buff skills, that you activate and forget. PoE somewhat suffers the same, although less so.
Bad design imo. Not interesting gameplay to have 10 semi-passive “skills” on a bar. It only encourages one-point wonder skills etc. Which in turn reduces build diversity, since all builds end up picking those same skills/buffs/auras.
I am not fundamentally against having an endless amount of skill bar slots (after all, I really love CRPGs where you run around juggling 50+ skils on the caster classes).
Having a limit just seems to solve way more problems than it creates.
What exactly the limit should be can be discussed, but there should definitely be a skill slot limit imo. And a fairly low one too, to prevent players from having those 10 semi-passive auras and what not.
I mean, in D2 you are still deciding how many points you want to invest in your buffs such as your summons, sages, battle crys, frozen armor, fade, etc.
In Grim Dawn I’m still investing a certain amount of points in my auras at the expense of not choosing a different place for the point.
I like war crys, summons, and buffs. I like choosing where to put my points and how strong the buffs will be vs the other places I could put my points. I don’t want them deleted cause “they are just passive buffs and not necessary”. They are popular in D2, PoE, and Grim Dawn cause there is choice there, the animations are fun and they make you look cool.
That’s true for gold or mats.
However, time is a much more egalitarian resource, and because of the way the D4 open world is built, with mounts being mandatory for travelling, it’s unlikely a powerful character will be that much faster to collect those “respec bounties”.
The 14 days freespec you’re proposing is far from enough imo. If the player wants to try something different, which he ultimately doesn’t like, he will be trapped with it. Not good, even if it were a one-day freespec. Same for the token, or the carry limit should be at least 3 instead of 1.
Now we have been talking about the skill tree only. What about the endgame system David Kim mentioned in the last QU ? It sounded like an important part of customization.
So maybe the tree should be easy to respec, with a moderate gold/mat cost even at level 40, so the player will always be able to try out skills while levelling, but the endgame system could have a more time-limited respec (that is, if this system is tied to how the skills work).
Dummies can’t let you know how a skill works in a real situation where enemies hit and use abilities you need to counter. The player needs to be allowed to test in real situations and know he/she can change it later for a limited cost.
Good idea ! I don’t think the game should force players to have one additionnal character per class just to PvP. Though I’m not sure the “automatic” change would make sense in the world, especially since I don’t think PvP should be restricted only to a few zones. ^^
It doesn’t solve anything. There is no way for the player to know he made a mistake at this point. Everybody will automatically click the accept button.
But of course, “confirm” and “cancel” buttons are mandatory to leave the tree panel if there is no freespec.
You just get too much value from spending a single point in many of them.
I’m sure a really well balanced game could hit a perfect balance, where that would not be a problem, and picking another semi-passive buff vs. adding another skill point to your ‘main’ skills would be a balanced choice. But I doubt it will happen.
Writing the above, made me thing one way to go could be:
First 3 skill you pick costs 1 skill point each, to acquire (lvl 1 skill).
4th skill costs 2 points. 5th skill costs 4 points. 6th skill costs 6 points. 7th skill costs 8 points, and each skill after that costs 10 points to get.
Lvling any skill above lvl 1, costs 1 skill per level as usual.
Maybe that could balance the “stack 10 auras” strategy, by having a high cost of picking those additional skills. Now it is suddenly a question of 1 additional skill vs. half of the lvls in one of your existing skills (rather than merely 1/20 existing skill).
I think I could be fine with such a system. But not D2s system.
It solves the mistake of clicking on something other than what you intended to take that happens from time to time.
It wont do anything about the people who just didn’t know better but that’s not really a problem that I think is worth putting a ton of effort into solving.
That’s mostly a self-correcting issue as players learn the game and look up guides. Having limited respecs is all that is really needed here.
If there is no cap on respec tokens, no matter how fast or slow you collect them, over time, hundreds or thousands of hours, you will get a lot of them. No different from gold or mats.
Not if he got a farmable token. The free respec should not be for trying different stuff, it should just be a failsafe for unviable builds.
The most basic part of the character should have the harshest respec restrictions imo. Since that is the part that defines the build the most.
Skill choices should have the highest respec cost/cooldown. “Paragon” (or whatever David Kim was talking about) can have a lower respec cost. Though I dont see the need, easier to just give all the systems the exact same respec.
Otherwise you can just pick a “paragon” setup that filts 10 different skill builds, and then you have free respeccing between those 10 builds. Without changing your paragon build. Like having a “crit fireball” build and a “crit frozen orb” build, where the crit part of the build comes from the end-game customization, while the skills are of course part of the skill tree customizastion.
No, but it can give you an idea of what you have just picked. Like, have I made a build that burns through mana too fast etc.
Though, you could also make a way more complex target dummy system too. Like an arena where you can pick a monster to fight. While you are making your build. That gives no xp or items of course.
I guess in theory it could activate the moment you were near another PvP enabled player. Or the moment another player attacks you. Though that could potentially open up for harassment or exploits. Maybe it could activate outside of PvP areas if two players agreed to dual each other etc.
TBH I kinda like the “consumables bar” for one additional reason, it’s kinda build-forgiving (somewhat) but also allows higher replayability (AND more importantly - much better extra challenges fine-tuning), for example let’s say one dungeon has the following:
You wouldn’t want to run a “whirlwind fury barb” in that kind of situation would you ? eat 10 arrows and suddenly your “warcry” (of whatever kind) is reduced down to couple of seconds left and you’re left dead in the middle trying to “lure” 1 by 1 those things lol, BUT if you scrolls of type (doubles duration of buffs and scrolls for X seconds, first 5 seconds of a buff can’t be reduced), then this suddenly sounds possible
On the other hand though - chances are you won’t have more than 2 or 3 (accumulated previously, or even able to buy in the middle of the dungeon if quite a bit expensive) of these… Then if you fail the first time and feel stuck, can reset and try with IDK 20-30 wooden Baricade charges instead, probably wouldn’t struggle much due to the super high efficiency on “spacing and coverage”, BUT chances are in order to beat the dungeon, you’d would waste like almost all of those things
See what I mean ? :), it’s also a nice “addition” to add “tags” to opponents in late game that aren’t even elite (such as Toxic => double poison/dot damage, or tough => double CC and physical damage taken reduction, and so on)… Think that “extra bar” of consumables would “reward” efficient gameplay on the longer run (if not even immediately at times) I think… Who knows, perhaps one day a speedrunner figures out how to “effectively” optimize each consumable type in which kind of situations and then see them barely win with a last charge of “double damage” or something of those lines I think
Fighting that style of gameplay is exactly what I want to accomplish through expensive/rare respecs.
You should want to go through that dungeon on your whirlwind barb. Because the game does not offer you an alternative.
Learn to live with the choices you made for your character, both the good and the bad. In some dungeons that means your build is amazing, in others it means your build suffers. That is the very purpose of making a character build.
Players should need to adapt to those changing circumstances.
And not just be like “Okay, pick build A for dungeon A, build B for dungeon B” etc.
Make it too expensive to respec for different dungeons. And reward people for not respeccing (like have a “survival bonus” that gives more MF the longer you go without dying or respeccing).
WHAT IF your “pick A for dungeon A” is a limited kind of thing though ? :), say for ex. you have exactly up to 3 attempts effectively using your “aces” (otherwise would need go back kill certain bosses 10 times or whatever to gain one more of those charges…)… By having 3 slots in the bar, there are still 2 more slots left to “figure out” how to approach/combine it, think that would add kinda nice “glad I achieved this from the 2nd (or 3rd) try” otherwise would’ve had to respec completely
I see that being a valid argument but so would this one I think… Effectively rewarding a player that knows what s/he’s doing in such a place with 1 extra “charge” of re-spec kept for “another day”
Honestly, to handle something like respec can be a bit tricky. If you make it easy and/or free to respec, then you end up with people being able to switch their gear on the fly if they so choose, which may inadvertently lead to the game being dependent on players switching their gear on the fly (in other words similar to Diablo 3).
On the other hand, if you make respec too difficult, tedious, and/or limiting; then you may end up with players least likely to even use respec, even for the sake of trying a new build out, as they may find it better to just make a new character instead of going through whatever hoops that is needed for respec.
All in all, I still believe that Diablo 2 had did a great job when it came to the respec system (even if it came out late). Players could freely respec their characters a few times (3 for each character), which fit the easy portion of respeccing. Afterward, characters would need to either trade for and/or farm the Token for further respec (something that would require a bit of effort and time, but nothing overly difficult or limiting). Which is why I stand by my previous statement.
I think that idea holds promise, I would change it however so that you could hold up to 3 of those per characters, and of course have them character-bound. In fact I would even say that respec could be something like:
3/3 Free Token Respec (account-wide):
2/2 Non-Free Token Respec (character-wide):
Some more can be done with this, such as allowing players to have their character transfer a non-free token respec to their alts (can only be transferred to characters within the same account), however there would need to be a cost (such as 2 non-free token respec of a single character + some gold). So if I was playing a Sorceress and had an idea for a build for my alt druid who had no token respecs; then I can choose to either wait until the game replenishes a free token for me, or pay up 2 of my sorceress’s non-free token respec in order to give my druid 1 non-free token respec.
Lastly, upon choosing to respec, the game would give you the option of choosing between using the free respec token or the non-free respec token.
Agreed. Many ways to design the details.
As long as it both allows people to respec sometimes, when they really need it, but also prevents people from respeccing ‘all the time’, no matter how “rich” they might have become in-game, then I am pretty fine with it.
A positive thing about having somthing like 3 respec token limit could also be, that Blizzard could then give 3 free respec tokens all at once on major patch days. Since it should definitely be possible to respec when Blizzard releases new patches that might change the viability of builds.
That is where we will forever disagree.
As for currency of course. But you do make billions in hours in D2 these days, 20 years later without mods. And simple gold drains help or just increase the costs to reflect this over time. % costs help too as opposed to set costs. Repairs could be 10% of cost. You could lose gold upon death. There are ways. But again, if you don’t want to run three builds and would prefer the seperate characters. Do so. Let those that prefer to experiment and do multiple things with one do so.
I agree, that’s why I’d prefer my auras to be passives/talents instead of having to activate them each time I start playing. I find that tedious in GD.
You’re right, and it’s a very common system, in PoE for instance. But that was not really what the discussion was about, and I do think respec is not a trivial matter.
If that’s just a time-consuming quest, I guess that’s ok, just annoying.
Imo, what’s important is not limiting how much respec you can do, but making sure the player doesn’t feel incited to change build for efficiency (which also goes with how the world and endgame activities are designed). This should be the goal of any respec system, not to frustrate players.
But I think your idea of limiting stored respec is interesting, as long as it’s easy to get while levelling. Also, big yes to the idea of free respec with patches ! 
Actually I find that a good reason for making it easier to change and test because this is what the player is supposed to be having fun with.
But you’re right about the risk of having a “paragon build” useful for several “skills+talents” builds, this idea doesn’t look like a wise lead.
As for the PvP build, maybe it could be activated manually but it may open exploits for PvE… or maybe a player willing to do PvP should simply just play with a PvP build all the time, the way it was in D2 ? ^^
I think allowing people to freely respec lead to them having less fun. Since it all becomes meaningless, inconsequential.
When we want to try out a new build, we can just make a new character. Or of course, respec, once in a while. In an A-RPG I’d say, making new characters is closer to what people are ‘supposed’ to be having fun with.
Changing builds will always be efficient if it is free. Otherwise it would indicate a failed combat system without diversity and challenge.
But I think the very goal of a respec system is to limit the player. Limiting their access to respecs. But no, the purpose is not to frustrate people.
Sure, I am talking end-game. While lvling, I’d be fine with completely free respecs, so you can try out new skills as you acquire them (though, as mentioned in a previous post, I’d also reward people for not respeccing, accumulating MF bonus over time, as long as you dont die or respec. Maybe not something you would use on a first playthrough, but more relevant for lvling subsequent characters, and especially in end-game).
Yeah, that is no problem for the people who want to do PvP. But it also means those who are not particularly interested in full-scale PvP, wont bother at all, since they are running around with a PvE build, so of they do try, they likely will get slaughtered. That kinda was a problem in WoW before dual spec (and later free spec, which made the whole thing pointless).
Yes, I’m not advocating for 100% freespec. But after some time playing GD, it felt refreshing to test anything while levelling my necro in D3. There must be some middle ground here, like skills being free to try but not modifiers, or something else that doesn’t require the player to make significant choices in the early levels.
Endgame is another matter, I think we’re on the same page. Or, if several builds are allowed for a single character, make sure it requires some sort of re-levelling to unlock new skills for a different build the player can switch to. That would be very similar to just having two different characters.
Well yes, if it’s their first try in PvP it’s normal to get killed by specialized PvP characters. ^^ It’s up to the player to prepare if s/he doesn’t want to die in PvP zone/mod.
So I interpreted your post as you like skill buffs but not as much as you like the convenience of not using skill buffs. GD has both passive talents (constellations), intrinsic passive skills (passive buffs or chance on attack, just a straight buff that never requires user input after using a point there) and active passive skill buffs (auras which reserve energy, summons) which is a cool way to go.
The D2 barbarian has the best audio on his war crys.
You miss out on these gold audio lines and you also lose the choice of your build if you move them to the passive tree. Look at the cool effect on the barb and how strong it is. It would be cool if there was something reminiscent of the D2 warcrys in D4. “Huuuuuuuuuarrrrrgh” “Hooooo” lol, fun to cast.
I think what’s going to be key here is just how much of a difference in performance there is for switching builds, and how much performance is needed to clear content.
Unfortunately things like talents can’t have too much of an impact otherwise it’s going to feel mandatory to switch if you can clear dungeons in half the time by switching your build around.
That is unless the idea is that you have a different character for each type of content, but that puts a lot of burden on the loot system being extremely well designed because now you need characters farming gear for other characters.
I was more specifically talking about auras since warcries still features in D4.
I just want my skillbar to be filled with skills I actually use in combat. Auras, unkillable summons or other buffs can still work the same as talents, like Galvanizing Ward in D3.
Of course, if these buffs are tied to some useful combat skills, like warcries generating Fury, no problem. For example, casting Frost Nova could also provide Frost Armor for 120 seconds.
Surely they can have that much impact. You can just solve the “mandatory to switch” issue by not allowing people to switch builds frequently.
It would be quite a shame to make the combat system less meaningful and impactful, just so people can respec for free without consequence.
No, the idea would be that you do “all” the content (at least all the content you want to do) with the same build, and have to play/live with the strengths and weaknesses of your chosen build.
Seems quite reasonable that build A might be 100% better than build B for some specific piece of content. While B might be better for some other content. You just shouldn’t be allowed to easily jump between those two.
If there is no differences between builds, then the game would seem quite pointless.
Of course the game needs to be designed in a way that rewards you for playing the stuff that is not optimal for you. Not having timed dungeons would already be a big improvement for that. For key dungeons, you should make a system where the player is better off if you complete the dungeons for the all keys you find, rather than throwing away keys for dungeons that are not great for your build.
And yeah, even a suboptimal (but viable*) build should be able to clear content (again, no idiotic timers, and no endless scaling imo!). Only a matter of how fast you can do it. So you could make a build 100% designed around speed farming overworld camps or whatever. While still using the build for pushing key dungeons too, just with low efficiency. Which would be a meaningful build choice.
*Just to say, it should be possible to make completely unviable builds of course. It would indicate a bad game design too, if it was impossible to make a really bad build.
But having a build that finishes Key dungeon A in 5 minutes and key dungeon B in 10 minutes is not unviable. Just a build with different strengths and weaknesses.
If you can freely respec, only the 5 min clear builds will really be considered viable. With everyone jumping between builds each time they enter a new dungeon or content.