As much as i hate Path of Exile because of the hard grind, there is no question they have a masterpiece of a skill system.
Skills should drop like a book, you learn it once and than you can fine tune it to the point of Master, every active skill should have a couple of passive of its own where you can improve: range, area of effect etc.
If a Level 1 FireBall has short range and small area of effect i want to be able to cast nukes by the end game, you have to let us the freedom of building a ridiculous Fire Mage.
What i donât like is the ideea of jack of all trades builds, you can be that if you want to but a pure build should always be faster at killing with the trade off being slow down by elite with high rezistence or even imunities.
Diablo 3 Barbarians had so varied elemental damage that elites immune to physical mean nothing to them, elite packs should be a challenge.
I agree with your idea. Player should be able to stack points to a skill and then those points could be distributed to the skill upgrades/modifiers. That being said, the skill upgrades now looks too simple and linear (of course, still in early development, the skill tree is). For most skills, there should be more âtwigsâ represent the several upgrades/ modifiers. A seperate skill tree for each skill may be an overkill, but more depth and complexity is a must.
I think this tree is drawing more questions than answers. Just would like to add , make sure that hybrid builds will be viable. And please if ya go with tree the hanging squares got to go. Squares are fine if on a wall or etch in stone but nature very rarely produces perfect squares. Make skills have softer curves like pear shape or circular to some degree. I know WIP. Just surprised it was sent out like that. As far as magic vs rare. Please understand that those +skills IAS magic weapons in D2 are extremely rare to drop. Very rare. Crating should play a part in your itemization and should bring it all together as the glue if you will.
I donât think anyone here is asking for a massive skill tree for each individual skill (though it is entirely feasible and has been done) but rather several paths/options for a skill. Could be presented in the form of a minor tree but doesnât need to be 1,000 possible variations. At least I donât think thatâs what people are asking and not what Iâm asking. People just want more meaningful choice in their talent trees. Itâs okay to be a casual player and not want to spend too much time working on a build but for a lot of people this is the main purpose of the game and the ability to be creative and have choice should be there. If you decide a build is unviable there should always be the means to reset skills in some way.
As of now the tree just has the illusion of choice. Really your only choice is between a few skills you feel like using and then thatâs it. The skill follows a linear upgrade path from there with no further thought. Of course other factors like itemisation will play into creativity and power. But relying too much on items to make or break a build is simply not as fun if Diablo 3 is any indication. So I would take talent tree depth with fairly standard itemisation over a gear-centric game any day.
But I donât really think thereâs much of a need to choose because itâs possible have both systems be meaningful and impactful. Youâre right that a lot of D2 builds also end up focusing on one or two skills and decimating mobs but item interactions with said skills made the endgame experience incredibly fun. D4 has the potential to deepen talent trees & skill usage on top of an engaging and interactive item system.
DIABLO 4 WOOT! Please bring back the best features from Diablo 1/2 as well. No auction house please, that ruined diablo 3. Bring back fast tele sorcerers, necromancers with rez dead, corpse explosion, etc, bring back the game lobby, seeing all games, bring back the fun of mephisto runs, the sets such as Sigons set, bring back set items, heroidic cube style crafting, skillsets that are not all 1 through 4 key press template, the skill system sucks in diablo 3. Make like a diablo 2 skill system, polish up many pathways/builds. I did not like how every character maps to 1 through 4 key in diablo 3 what was not fun.
DIABLO 4 WOOT! Please bring back the best features from Diablo 1/2 as well. No auction house please, that ruined diablo 3. Bring back fast tele sorcerers, necromancers with rez dead, corpse explosion, etc, bring back the game lobby, seeing all games, bring back the fun of Mephisto runs, the sets such as Sigons set, bring back set items, heroidic cube style crafting, skillsets that are not all 1 through 4 key press template, the skill system sucks in diablo 3. Make like a diablo 2 skill system, polish up many pathways/builds. I did not like how every character maps to 1 through 4 key in diablo 3 what was not funâŚ
Well, no. Look back at D3, you have acess to all skills and runes of a class, yet you have several builds, over 5 for each class, because they limit the number of active skill you can use at once.
I get that but Iâm Not sure the branch passive nodes are addressing the communityâs concern though. Instead, give each skill itâs own tiny tree as requested so many times up above. I donât think every parameter should be decided by the player though. I donât think a lightning meteor makes much sense (fire or cold for comet and thatâs it, donât like that arcane nonsense) I like that you had different skills available for different elements in d2 because it made the build more distinct⌠hybrid sorceress shouls maybe have been more readily accessible though. What I say is make a personalised tiny tree for each skills which makes sense with the skill itself, donât make everything do everything. Another important point mentioned is that we want to be able to spend more than one point on a skill. I donât know if you should sacrifice skills for branch passives⌠if you want to be able to change elements from a skill, then maybe the wizards gameplay system can play a role into that insteadâŚ
Concerning items, bring back magic finding but maybe one that is less invasive and more efficient than d2. Sometimes I feel like I dropped more stuff with 100mf than with 600
I think a dedicated tree for each skill is asking a bit much, nor is it necessary.
All they need to do is ensure that more than 1 skill point can be assigned per node, and that there are sufficient number of nodes to make the choice complex enough (and skill point cap).
Even POEâs tree doesnât allow more than 1 skillpoint per node, thatâs why their tree is so big. People think itâs complex because it spans out so large, but really itâs just the same bonuses spread out laterally.
Small uptade but gave me hope for better d4 game. Skill tree looks big enough, i wouldnât listen to people who want to have hundreds of skill variations, it would take life to try all options. Talking about new ideas and solutions for game like diablo is also stupid, itâs safe to get various good things from other games and connect it somehow. About that diablo 4 is diablo 3 reskin? I donât think itâs bad that blizzard uses 3d engine cuz it is good engine. I still hate graphic style of items in inventory but if game was good it could be consider as a small failure. Generally i still vote for totally new item art concept. Blizzard devs could go to musem and look for some real armors and weapons and see how cool they would look in game.
I dont understand why this is a problem? With more variety of choices more time you can play the game, why do you have to test all the game options to be satisfied? I dont understand this.
In my opinion, if youâve played all the gameâs content several times, the game loses its attractiveness.
A few hundred skill upgrades isnât that much when you might have 30+ skills.
It is hardly much to ask for, to expect at least 5 different skill upgrades per skill. At the absolute minimum.
Hi Blizzard. First of all, thanks a lot for sharing the news of the game with us. Always nice to read it.
I donât know exactly what is Angelic/demonic/primordial characteristics, but I would love if that would reflect the side you choose instead of just another name for intelligence/strength/dexterity. So for instance, you could be an angelic/demonic/primordial barbarian if you fight with angels/demons/nephalems.
In my mind, choosing a side have consequences on your skills and affect your power. For instance you would have a demonic/angelic/primordial tree for every class with different skills and architectures. In other words, there are three subclasses for each class. This would affect the team making and the PvP: E.g. Demonic Barbarian with Angelic Sorcerer would be stronger that Demonic Barbarian with Demonic sorcerer. (synergies between subclasses).
It would be an opportunity to multiply the possible builds without having a tree like path of exile that is so messy that you basically need a graph theory algorithm to find the optimal way to allocate the skills before playing.
Synergies between subclasses could also make team play more strategic.
Events in the end-game could be related to subclasses: war between demonic and angelic characters for ex. Special bossesâŚ
Moreover, if your choice of side would affect the campaign and the story behind, that would be nice and immersive (player need to make choices that matter on the story while playing).
Well, not only is PoEâs passive skill tree technically a grid, but its passive bonuses are not explicit to certain skills making it disassociated from the skill system entirely in the same way the Paragon system is in D3. So in that skill system the support gems are actually performing the skill augmentation youâd traditionally see from a skill tree.
Thatâs important because the depth and capacity for options/choices from PoE doesnât come from any one area of the game being overly complex. It comes from the fact that everything in the game is designed to be modular and referencing only mechanics. For example no support, passive, or item in the game says, âFireball does X% increased damage.â, or, âFireball has a bigger area of effect.â. Instead those things will reference spell damage, projectile speed, area of effect, cast speed, etc⌠and any skill that has those mechanical tags will gain those increases and effects.
This is why PoE and D3 are polar opposite game design examples. In D3 the devs design a new class, with new skills, and hundreds of new items to support those skills and the end result is a handful of builds for that class and no meaningful changes to the existing ones. In PoE the devs design a handful of new skills, supports, and items and it can literally change the entire landscape adding hundreds of new build options to the game.
Iâm glad there is a re-work for demonic/angelic/ancestral power. As it is, they just arenât in a good place.
As for the skill tree, Iâm severely underwhelmed. There still seems to be an overwhelming lack of depth to how character builds will work. Every player that wants to use Fireball will pick up all of the nodes for Fireball, done. The tree presents itself as a choice but it is nothing more than an illusion of one.
This really falls back onto the fact that, just like D3, player choice related to skills will fall to items and legendaries since those items have skill mods on them. This will fall into the same cycle of, âYou want to use fireball? Grab the fireball nodes in the tree, grab the fireball items,â mentality.
There needs to be some way to modify our skills meaningfully (i.e., that requires a choice) outside of equipping some item that modifies the skillâa couple of nodes that change a skill on the tree doesnât count. Thatâs not a choice. Not all Fireball builds should be the same. There should be half a dozen ways to build a skill, minimum. Ideally there should be even more than that.
Iâm not looking for an insane tree like POE or some nonsenseâI honestly think POEâs tree is stupid and could be simplified significantly and still retain the depth that it wants.
People have mentioned skill trees for every skill and something like that is what is desperately needed here. Something akin to a skill gem choice in POE or skill customization in Last Epoch. Something that the player chooses that alters skills outside of their items.
I look forward to seeing more. Please, err on the side of depth and choice.
Angelic/Demonic/Ancestral is the least of the problem right now, if they donât nail the core of the game, all is lost.
When i red about Diablo 3 before lunch i was getting the feeling it will flop hard, it did not fail on sales, people buyed it because of Diablo 2 succes, but got boring really fast.
Now Diablo 4 does not have that advantage, is either good or it will be forgotton like the rest of the clones.
While you are right, I think I prefer this to Path of Exile. I am a pretty experienced gamer who is hoping Diablo 4 is at minimum as complex as Diablo 2. With that said, Path of Exile is overwhelming in a way that is exhausting and loses itâs charm (for me). I like PoE and played it a lot years back, but everything is modular like you said, and it feels tacked on. Constantly tacking on new skills, areas, events, items, etc. It doesnât feel cohesive like Diablo 2.
So with that said, I am glad Diablo 4 seems to be retaining itâs Diablo identity and feel, however they definitely need to go a little further with the skill system and goa bit beyond Diablo 2, making maybe 3 trees (like Diablo 2), but with the various skill modifieries for each skill (5+ per skill in my opinion), since those buffs are basically like pouring points into the skill, except now you donât pour into the skill itself, you allocate points to buff the skill in the wa you want. Whether the buff is a damage buff, adding a projectile, increasing speed, changing the pattern it moves in, etc.
I think if they just reorganize and flesh out this tree idea a bit, it will be the best of both worlds.