Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

[Grug]

Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

http://www.blizzblues.com/us/skill-trees-16903518463.html

Bashiok has spoken about the current iteration of the skill tree, as well as let slip a shocking bit of new info.

In summary: All three trees are viewed at once, and spending five points in a tier will unlock the next tier, for all trees. A wizard could spend five points in Arcane tier 1 and then spend point in Storm tier 2. Thus, the only real limit to skills is level and how fast you want to advance.

What this tree style allows for, and one reason we're pretty keen on it, is that we aren't saying "You're a 'berserker' barbarian, you can't have whirlwind". Instead, you're a barbarian!, pick the key skills that define you and your character as you want them to be.

And the bit of shocking news: Bashiok has given a hint about the implied "new systems." He said that they're working with all skills capped at five, but you can do something to raise the skill cap, up to 15. What this might mean, no one knows.

 

[Farmrush]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

Thanks, Grug. I saw this on the feed from the frontpage and I thought it was some raving noob posting nonsense, but as I can see now I was clearly mistaken. This is bizarre news indeed, while at the same time could possibly open a floodgate on new hybrid builds. I can wait to get ahold of some decent and complete skill calculators.

 

[Kiroptus]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

Um... sounds interesting because we wouldnt be bound to a skill-tree if we wanted the mid spells of another tree, Its all about overall skill points used. Makes sense and fits diablo way more than how the talent skills work on WoW.

Now how we will unlock the skills up to 15 is a mystery. Probably only certain skills will have this, maybe its a special rune that every character receives after completing a difficult which ups the limit of a skill from 5 to 15 if a character wants further especialization on a certain skill after it is asigned to it.

But overall nice news imo, I was worried of having to be stucked on a single skill tree if I wanted to progress just like the talents from WoW work.

 

[Krugar]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

Rune stacking, perhaps?
Or maybe a synergies-like system in which certain skills or rune combinations provide added benefits...

 

[peasant]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

Probably there'll be a Skill Level Rune that raises it by X levels. Also, there'll probably still be +X Level to Y skill attributes like in D2. In other words, I suspect we'll probably only be able to progress up to a certain level (5 in current build) while items can boost said level temporarily.

 

[Grug]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

It is most definitely NOT a rune that raises the skill cap. What happens if you put 5 in magic missile, then raise the cap to 6, put in another point, and remove the rune? The way Bashiok said it implied a permanent but limited change. He said "It's not possible to raise the cap on all skills to the maximum amount".

I forsee it as something you get on level up, either every level after 10 or so, or every other level. I bet it's also possible to get more "raise tokens" through quests, although these would be built into the main quest and not random, so no farming.

 

[Edairu]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

This is bizarre news indeed, while at the same time could possibly open a floodgate on new hybrid builds. I can wait to get ahold of some decent and complete skill calculators.

The bolded line gave me chills...:surprise:

I really hope they head in this direction, when they first said you had to spend 5 points in X tree to unlock Tier Two of X tree, that seemed very limiting. Forcing you to invest completely into a single skill tree. This is far far better in that it discourages point hoarding while allowing quite of a bit of freedom in character builds.

I like how Bashiok acknowledged that there will always be cookie-cutter builds no matter what skill system they implement. And that they are trying their best to balance skills so that you don't feel it necessary to follow an exact path to achieve a strong character ala Diablo 2.

 

[Brother Laz]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

There's a flaw with this. You need to put 5 points into tier 1, but given the choice between putting them into a passive that will help you later on and an attack skill that only helps you at low level, you pick the passive.

Which means you'll have no attack skills until you reach your desired attack at tier 6. Hope you like normal attack...

Those prereq arrows were annoying to many, but necessary for this reason. At least you had level 1 ice blast to shoot at monsters then.

 

[TheGarden]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

There's a flaw with this. You need to put 5 points into tier 1, but given the choice between putting them into a passive that will help you later on and an attack skill that only helps you at low level, you pick the passive.

Which means you'll have no attack skills until you reach your desired attack at tier 6. Hope you like normal attack...

Those prereq arrows were annoying to many, but necessary for this reason. At least you had level 1 ice blast to shoot at monsters then.

Perhaps you're right, except that there's a big flaw with your assumption as well. Not everyone thinks alike, there's no way to predict where players will spend their points. Since it's safe to say that most D3 players would rather hack n slash and blow up than be strategic about their play, they might definitely go for the low-level active (attack) skill.
Put it on the scales, strategising vs ice blast (example).......oops it just got awfully frosty there. Particularly while the game is still pretty fresh, why would anyone waste time pondering about the "later", when they can just attack and have a blast NOW?

Yeah later they will start to take it slow, when the excitement of the first few 100 plays wears off, but hey thanks for pointing that tidbit out anyway, vets will appreciate it and noobs might take it into account.......if they lrn2rd.

 

[nEgativezEro]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

The bolded line gave me chills...:surprise:

I really hope they head in this direction, when they first said you had to spend 5 points in X tree to unlock Tier Two of X tree, that seemed very limiting. Forcing you to invest completely into a single skill tree. This is far far better in that it discourages point hoarding while allowing quite of a bit of freedom in character builds.

I like how Bashiok acknowledged that there will always be cookie-cutter builds no matter what skill system they implement. And that they are trying their best to balance skills so that you don't feel it necessary to follow an exact path to achieve a strong character ala Diablo 2.

There's no doubt cookie cutter builds are inevitable. No matter how balanced things get, there will always be one set-up that will mathematically produce the easiest gameplay. However if they balance things well enough, it should allow for multiple highly successful variations of characters.

I really like the sound of how the new trees are set up. Granted it kind of detracts from the "separate tree" ideals, but overall I think it's better for overall gameplay and fun. As Bashiok said they are still grouped together for similarly themed skills, but you aren't limited to a single tree. With the proper balancing this could really allow for a huge number of viable variations within a single character class.

There's a flaw with this. You need to put 5 points into tier 1, but given the choice between putting them into a passive that will help you later on and an attack skill that only helps you at low level, you pick the passive.

Which means you'll have no attack skills until you reach your desired attack at tier 6. Hope you like normal attack...

Those prereq arrows were annoying to many, but necessary for this reason. At least you had level 1 ice blast to shoot at monsters then.

This is only subject to balance. With the new emphasis on multiple skills (rather than the 2-at-a-time with Diablo II) you have to figure they plan on making lower tier skills a viable option to use at the endgame builds. You figure with 3 trees available you'll have a good 5-6 choices to spend those initial 5 points in. For example, Frenzy could be initially be a tier one skill. It'll be a great starting skill to build up speed, damage, and fury level. Once the fury is built up, you could use some of the warcries and harder hitting skills from higher tiers, but building up Frenzy would still be a wise move.

If the balance things well enough, point hoarding won't be a big issue.

 

[korialstraz]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

There's a flaw with this. You need to put 5 points into tier 1, but given the choice between putting them into a passive that will help you later on and an attack skill that only helps you at low level, you pick the passive.

Which means you'll have no attack skills until you reach your desired attack at tier 6. Hope you like normal attack...

Those prereq arrows were annoying to many, but necessary for this reason. At least you had level 1 ice blast to shoot at monsters then.

Who says we don't get a starting spell like in D2? Or a staff with a skill on it. It certainly worked for the first 5-6 lvls :whistling:

 

[Es Mors]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

This sound genious. I am very impressed by the Blizzard guys' ability to constantly make the right innovative choices.

I have been looking at the Witch Doctor tree and thinking what kind of Witch Doctor I would like to play, just for fun. The problem always was that I really liked one or two skills in every tree, it was quite hard to choose what kind of "hybrid" I would want to make. Now, I can use them all! :thumbup:

Beware of my Plague of Toads/Spider Statue/Firebats/Wall of Zombies "Beastfriend" Witch Doctor!

 

[In the name of Zod]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

There's no doubt cookie cutter builds are inevitable. No matter how balanced things get, there will always be one set-up that will mathematically produce the easiest gameplay.

Which gives them something to nerf, just watch.

Regarding synergy idea's people have mentioned:
[blue=http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/bashiok-on-skill-synergies/] Synergies aren’t being planned for nor are they expected.[/blue]


There's really no way to interpret this news until we can visualise the skill tree. It's positive news in that it will make it harder for people to work out the perfect build if there are more variations imo - but thats not that I know. I don't agree with one think Bashiok said and that was

[blue=http://www.blizzblues.com/us/skill-trees-16903518463.html]You can also quickly describe your build to someone else. "Oh I'm a jugger barb with 10/10 WW[/blue]

It doesn't sound like that at all to me, it sounds like he is contradicting himself since he has already stated:

[blue=http://www.blizzblues.com/us/skill-trees-16903518463.html]We're working with a modified skill tree system now of what we showed, under heavy testing and scrutiny. It's of course not final, the ideas it proposes are something we're happy with in their direction but they could very well change. In fact I would bet on them continuing to evolve.[/blue]

How can he say you can describe your build easily while he admitted that they're still doing heavy iterations on this work and its continuing to evolve. One can't be blamed for thinking that he is trying to force his own point on the direction of the work through publication.

edit: But I agree that its moving in the right direction.

 

[Akse]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

This is good news.. we'll see so much variety in builds.

 

[stillman]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

What I don't get is why only 5-15 max per skill. D2 had 20 and I thought that was not enough. I wanted the option to go even more extreme and pump 30 skills to max something and be really weak everywhere else, but really strong in that skill.

So my problem is, what if you just want to employ let's say WW, Seismic Slam and Hammer of the Ancients. That's all you intend to use with your build. So you get to lev 90 let's say, you've got all the passives and actives maxed at 5 or 15 that will help with those 3 skills. But you've also got like 25 skill points left over that won't do jack for your 3 skills. I guess you're going to have to put a whole lot of points into something else that you never intend to use, which is the same as not even investing them. We sometimes had spare points in d2, but it seems that this problem is going to be worse in d3 where we may have way too many unused points. Why not let us invest 5-20+ per skill?

Then again, they may make it so there will always be passives that get your life up or w/e so you could dump the extra points into those. We'll see.

I'm someone who likes to max out a few skills and not spread my points across 6 active skills.

Long story short: it should not be SO easy to max something. 5-15 is too easy and we're going to have like 10 skills maxed out. Maxing something should be a sacrifice and sometimes an agonizing choice.

 

[Strills]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

The problem I see with this is that most good characters might end up the same, now that all barbs can use all the best skills in every tree etc.

One way to solve this (hope it hasn't been said) is that I saw the max was 15, and usually only five. I hope that the more skill points you spend in one tree, the higher the maximum for the skills will be in that tree. That means you could make a very strong Juggernaut, or you could mix all the best skills available for barb, but the skills overall are weaker.

What would you think of this?

 

[Krugar]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

I hope that the more skill points you spend in one tree, the higher the maximum for the skills will be in that tree.

This would make a lot of sense to me.

 

[play]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

i think maxing skills at 5-15 is better as it forces players to diversify. i found it very boring in d2 when it was best to only specialize in one skill and its synergies. specializing in only one or two skills also encouraged spamming, which is something blizz wants to avoid in d3.

by lowering the number of points needed to max a skill it will be possible to have more usefull endgame skills. less spamming and more fun!

 

[Perfecttear]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

So he says that the skill max limit is 5 and then changes to 15.
So what if the skill max limit is 5 for normal 10 for nightmare and 15 for hell. This would actually make all skills stronger lategame, and balance them.

.

 

[mouseman]

Re: Breaking News! Bashiok says One skill tree.

And why isn't this on the front page?! This is the most interesting news since the announcement!

I really like the idea of being able to mix and match between the trees. But remember that there are still some prereq's in the skills, so it's not exactly pick'n'mix either. I like the idea that tiers are universal between skill trees, but you can raise your skills further than the initial five if you spend a lot points in one tree. It's like having the best of both worlds! I also like the idea of the skill cap raising with difficulty, but what happens when you go back on difficulty?

Just imagine the possibilities with this system and skill runes!! There are literally millions of different outcomes!!

I also like that that you can easily max like support attacks. It would be so much fun to be able to actually strategize with 5-7 skills, stunning monsters, leeching life from them, doing damage, building up fury, releasing fury requiring war crie etc.. Every combat would be different depending on the situation, you wouldn't have to resolve to using 1-2 skills like in Diablo 2 after synergies.. And since you need different kind of skills, the starting skills could be awesome as well (as the skill cap would raise from the initial 5 after a while, you wouldn't be too overpowered even in the beginning). And this is just with one player, think about 2-4 different character playing together!

Just when I thought I couldn't get more excited from Diablo III! Put it on the front page already!!