I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
I'd like to offer a few counterpoints for consideration...
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology, with the exception of Champions. And even their implementation was far different than the previous STO system. (Powerhouses are special regions, programmed in a different way to allow flexible respecs.) As such, any new player coming to STO is unlikely to expect that functionality as part of their Skill progression experience. In fact, the new/revamped system is far closer to being an MMO standard method.
DCUO has a confirm on spending every point... speaking from personal experience its unpleasant, primitive, and looks ridiculous in build-guide videos .
Guild Wars 2 is a change-at-will outside of combat skills system. It had forced return to re-trainers at launch but dumped that as a needless pain in the butt.
Lord of the Rings Online has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm. It can be used from anywhere in world (with full respec's costing a significant amount of in-game coin)
Marvel Heroes has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm. Respec's were a cash shop item and periodic daily log in reward but have since changed to freely available in any safe zone.
Star Trek Online has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm... and is apparently losing it in the effort to be more approachable by new players... Whu-huh?
Basically every game that does lock-in each point ends up spawning third party calculators because the process is too nerve-wracking and frustrating to work out your build from inside the client. As good as your license is, I still wouldn't want to be betting against frustration.
Now... having said all of that...
Getting PowerCart functionality into STO, as part of the new Skill system, would require a dedication of several weeks from one of our Programmers. This is time that we simply do not have right now, prior to the launch of S11.5, but is something we're still considering the possible need for at some point in the future. It's not off the table, but it's also not on the schedule.
Deadlines are deadlines. And your honesty is a credit to the whole organization. But please don't put this off after getting 11.5 into the hands of people in Vegas.
Batteries, yeah. Amplitude, good thing. But with EPS Manifold Efficiency. I need at least 5 points in Batteries for a 16.7 sec duration (iirc) to keep the uptime. Without the proper duration, the Trait will be diminished. So I hope Bort will add duration as well.
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
* The fears over 'misclicks' are at least partially mitigated by the presence of a Confirm window which appears every single time you go to purchase a Skill. It is exceedingly unlikely that you'll make a mistake by accidentally clicking the wrong Skill, unless you've also willfully chosen to disregard the Confirmation popup. I can understand making a choice that you later regret, and how that can have a detrimental effect on your enjoyment of the system. But claiming this type of mistake will happen because of misclicks or accidents... that's blowing it out of proportion.
Another problem with the current design @borticuscryptic is not only the fear of misclicking, but the fear of choosing the points that you want, and by time you reach the bottom of the skill tree, you run out of points because you picked up one too many in the tiers above.
There needs to be a way to plan out the tree before committing, just like there is on Live Holodeck now. There are a few other MMO's out there that do this, RIFT being one of them, without having to use external sources like website calculators to plan your build. Maybe this is something that you guys can work on over time and maybe release in a later patch?
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
I'd like to offer a few counterpoints for consideration...
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology, with the exception of Champions. And even their implementation was far different than the previous STO system. (Powerhouses are special regions, programmed in a different way to allow flexible respecs.) As such, any new player coming to STO is unlikely to expect that functionality as part of their Skill progression experience. In fact, the new/revamped system is far closer to being an MMO standard method.
...Star Trek Online has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm... and is apparently losing it in the effort to be more approachable by new players... Whu-huh?...
Yeah....I'm really confused by this...
Retired. I'm now in search for that perfect space anomaly.
Deadlines are deadlines. And your honesty is a credit to the whole organization. But please don't put this off after getting 11.5 into the hands of people in Vegas.
^^ This. I'm OK with it not being there on technical grounds, Bort made an excellent case for why there's simply no time and for impossibility of just re-using the old PowerCart (which was quite kludgy to begin with.)
But all those attempts to convince everyone who will miss it that it's just us Voth defending our dinosaur ways, or that it's an MMO standard or even somehow an upgrade (it kind of is for the initial leveling -- but not the respecs...) They're unlikely to convince anyone but the dev team itself. And the only thing worse than believing your own propaganda is to be the only one who believes it.
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
* The fears over 'misclicks' are at least partially mitigated by the presence of a Confirm window which appears every single time you go to purchase a Skill. It is exceedingly unlikely that you'll make a mistake by accidentally clicking the wrong Skill, unless you've also willfully chosen to disregard the Confirmation popup. I can understand making a choice that you later regret, and how that can have a detrimental effect on your enjoyment of the system. But claiming this type of mistake will happen because of misclicks or accidents... that's blowing it out of proportion.
Another problem with the current design @borticuscryptic is not only the fear of misclicking, but the fear of choosing the points that you want, and by time you reach the bottom of the skill tree, you run out of points because you picked up one too many in the tiers above.
There needs to be a way to plan out the tree before committing, just like there is on Live Holodeck now. There are a few other MMO's out there that do this, RIFT being one of them, without having to use external sources like website calculators to plan your build. Maybe this is something that you guys can work on over time and maybe release in a later patch?
To be fair, this is less of an issue with the new system, no variable costs, no big numbers, all the math you need to figure how many picks you have left is counting to 46... But it's still not quite as transparent as it could've been with some kind of a preview.
Deadlines are deadlines. And your honesty is a credit to the whole organization. But please don't put this off after getting 11.5 into the hands of people in Vegas.
^^ This. I'm OK with it not being there on technical grounds, Bort made an excellent case for why there's simply no time and for impossibility of just re-using the old PowerCart (which was quite kludgy to begin with.)
But all those attempts to convince everyone who will miss it that it's just us Voth defending our dinosaur ways, or that it's an MMO standard or even somehow an upgrade (it kind of is for the initial leveling -- but not the respecs...) They're unlikely to convince anyone but the dev team itself. And the only thing worse than believing your own propaganda is to be the only one who believes it.
I'm resigned to accept that we're going to be stuck with this for the time being, but I find the claim this is "standard" irritating.
Having played both WoW and Everquest II, I can tell you that both of their skill tree systems allow you to pre-set points before committing, and being that both of them are considered AAA games, I would think that would be the standard they would want to be shooting for.
"Let me guess, my theories appall you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie" - The Doctor
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" -Agatha Heterodyne
There needs to be a way to plan out the tree before committing, just like there is on Live Holodeck now. There are a few other MMO's out there that do this, RIFT being one of them, without having to use external sources like website calculators to plan your build. Maybe this is something that you guys can work on over time and maybe release in a later patch?
This is a big concern, yes. By the time players realize they have over committed at lower tier, it's already too late.
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology, with the exception of Champions. And even their implementation was far different than the previous STO system. (Powerhouses are special regions, programmed in a different way to allow flexible respecs.) As such, any new player coming to STO is unlikely to expect that functionality as part of their Skill progression experience. In fact, the new/revamped system is far closer to being an MMO standard method.
That's a fair point, but it should also be considered that STO does a very 'non standard' thing by charging money (zen) for respecs. In other games, if you don't have the power cart functionality, it's not a major deal because respecs are usually very inexpensive. In STO, they cost either cash or a couple hundred thousand dilithium per respec. This makes the lack of 'power cart' problematic.
Again, just so I'm totally clear, I like the system and have been using it quite a bit on tribble with great success. It's a good system, but my one big complaint is there is no way to plan things out in game before you buy. I honestly believe this is going to be a problem, but time will tell.
the live stream was on when other streamers was rising $ former streamer family he was to be married soon,a streamer for for sto dead at 35 of a triple by pass to the heart , even now sto saying nothing about a sto stream that die hour after his last act was to stream sto that rude. my he RIP.
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
hell, even cryptic's most recent game (neverwinter online) has 'powercarting' with their feats, which is that game's version of the skill system currently on tribble
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
I'd like to offer a few counterpoints for consideration...
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology, with the exception of Champions. And even their implementation was far different than the previous STO system. (Powerhouses are special regions, programmed in a different way to allow flexible respecs.) As such, any new player coming to STO is unlikely to expect that functionality as part of their Skill progression experience. In fact, the new/revamped system is far closer to being an MMO standard method.
It should also be noted that of the three top mmo's I play, STO is the only one that charged real world money for repecing.
SWTOR - Can change my talent tree (But not advanced class) for free every few days, or costs in game credits.
Guild Wars 2 - Completely free to change and move skill points around, anywhere in the game.
STO - New system allows you to spend points anywhere in the game, but penalizes you if you spend even one point wrong costing real world money to fix..
All three games are free to play, so guess which one is the odd one out?
* The old Respec system caused you to have to stay where you were, rooted in place next to the NPC that handled the respec functionality, while you fiddled with a delicate system of adding/subtracting/replacing small allocations of points from a larger pool, in order to fine-tune your expenditures while correctly unlocking each rank of Skills. The fiddly nature of this system could be extremely frustrating for players that either did not fully understand the system, or did not feel invested in it (or both). The new Respec system offers a far simpler, cleaner and more user-friendly experience: Purchase Respec, All Skills Reset, Spend at your Leisure (now, or later).
Again, this should be a core part of STO, being able to spend skill points anywhere, but not if it doesn't have the ability to either move them around for free, or at the very least, costing in game EC!
* The gates that determine when additional ranks of Skills unlock are also far easier to understand and anticipate in the new system, whereas this was one of the main things that PowerCart functionality helped players deal with in the previous Skill Systems.
* The fears over 'misclicks' are at least partially mitigated by the presence of a Confirm window which appears every single time you go to purchase a Skill. It is exceedingly unlikely that you'll make a mistake by accidentally clicking the wrong Skill, unless you've also willfully chosen to disregard the Confirmation popup. I can understand making a choice that you later regret, and how that can have a detrimental effect on your enjoyment of the system. But claiming this type of mistake will happen because of misclicks or accidents... that's blowing it out of proportion..
But it also doesn't warn players that spending too many points early on, will seriously restrict later skill point spending!
New players will just put points into everything, and then quit when they realize it will cost them money to fix their mistake..
Getting PowerCart functionality into STO, as part of the new Skill system, would require a dedication of several weeks from one of our Programmers. This is time that we simply do not have right now, prior to the launch of S11.5, but is something we're still considering the possible need for at some point in the future. It's not off the table, but it's also not on the schedule.
In the players mind, this is a core basic function of the current skill tree, so not having it on release should have meant that you push back said release until it is a part of the update.
People are saying that this function is deliberately missing, just so you can make money of the back of player mistakes.
I don't believe this, but you have to admit it looks like you have been caught with your trousers around your ankles again, with basic design failings..
At the very least, being either a lifetime or monthly subscriber, should not cost any real world cash to respec at all!
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
I'd like to offer a few counterpoints for consideration...
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology, with the exception of Champions. And even their implementation was far different than the previous STO system. (Powerhouses are special regions, programmed in a different way to allow flexible respecs.) As such, any new player coming to STO is unlikely to expect that functionality as part of their Skill progression experience. In fact, the new/revamped system is far closer to being an MMO standard method.
It should also be noted that of the three top mmo's I play, STO is the only one that charged real world money for repecing.
SWTOR - Can change my talent tree (But not advanced class) for free every few days, or costs in game credits.
Guild Wars 2 - Completely free to change and move skill points around, anywhere in the game.
STO - New system allows you to spend points anywhere in the game, but penalizes you if you spend even one point wrong costing real world money to fix..
All three games are free to play, so guess which one is the odd one out?
* The old Respec system caused you to have to stay where you were, rooted in place next to the NPC that handled the respec functionality, while you fiddled with a delicate system of adding/subtracting/replacing small allocations of points from a larger pool, in order to fine-tune your expenditures while correctly unlocking each rank of Skills. The fiddly nature of this system could be extremely frustrating for players that either did not fully understand the system, or did not feel invested in it (or both). The new Respec system offers a far simpler, cleaner and more user-friendly experience: Purchase Respec, All Skills Reset, Spend at your Leisure (now, or later).
Again, this should be a core part of STO, being able to spend skill points anywhere, but not if it doesn't have the ability to either move them around for free, or at the very least, costing in game EC!
* The gates that determine when additional ranks of Skills unlock are also far easier to understand and anticipate in the new system, whereas this was one of the main things that PowerCart functionality helped players deal with in the previous Skill Systems.
* The fears over 'misclicks' are at least partially mitigated by the presence of a Confirm window which appears every single time you go to purchase a Skill. It is exceedingly unlikely that you'll make a mistake by accidentally clicking the wrong Skill, unless you've also willfully chosen to disregard the Confirmation popup. I can understand making a choice that you later regret, and how that can have a detrimental effect on your enjoyment of the system. But claiming this type of mistake will happen because of misclicks or accidents... that's blowing it out of proportion..
But it also doesn't warn players that spending too many points early on, will seriously restrict later skill point spending!
New players will just put points into everything, and then quit when they realize it will cost them money to fix their mistake..
Getting PowerCart functionality into STO, as part of the new Skill system, would require a dedication of several weeks from one of our Programmers. This is time that we simply do not have right now, prior to the launch of S11.5, but is something we're still considering the possible need for at some point in the future. It's not off the table, but it's also not on the schedule.
People are saying that this function is deliberately missing, just so you can make money of the back of player mistakes.
I stated this several times myself, but since the live stream and the explanation that it would take a lot of effort to get working, I no longer feel that way, which is something I've stated in this very thread.
I hope everyone can see that the explanation borticus gave us makes a lot of sense, after all the new skill system is modeled after the spec system, which does not have "powercart" functionality coded in because your not intended to ever have more than a couple spec points available to spend at one time.
I find it really hard to understand why there isn't a grace period for first time use of the new skill system. There may be a hard technical reason why you can't confirm a spec before committing, but that should mean that Cryptic should go out of there way to rectify this, since the problem is on their end.
After using the system for a few weeks now I can assure you mistakes will be make, not just mis-clicking but people having no idea how effective some of the new skills (and some old) are. I don't think it is good enough to say, sorry guys we have a technical problem so suck it up. If you make mistakes or choose skills you are unfamiliar with you just have to buy as many respecs that is necessary to rectify the problem we created, or install 10gb of Tribble or use a third party software to plan your skill tree. Cheers have a nice day May be it's just me but that is a pretty poor response to a technical oversight.
I can understand and sympathize with a lot of the feedback you guys have regarding the lack of a "Change Everything Then Commit" function in the new Skill System (which I incorrectly referred to as "paging" at some point, but is actually called "PowerCart" functionality.)
* The fears over 'misclicks' are at least partially mitigated by the presence of a Confirm window which appears every single time you go to purchase a Skill. It is exceedingly unlikely that you'll make a mistake by accidentally clicking the wrong Skill, unless you've also willfully chosen to disregard the Confirmation popup. I can understand making a choice that you later regret, and how that can have a detrimental effect on your enjoyment of the system. But claiming this type of mistake will happen because of misclicks or accidents... that's blowing it out of proportion.
Another problem with the current design @borticuscryptic is not only the fear of misclicking, but the fear of choosing the points that you want, and by time you reach the bottom of the skill tree, you run out of points because you picked up one too many in the tiers above.
There needs to be a way to plan out the tree before committing, just like there is on Live Holodeck now. There are a few other MMO's out there that do this, RIFT being one of them, without having to use external sources like website calculators to plan your build. Maybe this is something that you guys can work on over time and maybe release in a later patch?
Just to play Devil's Advocate here, the new skill system is much easier to plan out skill point spending than the old one. Since each skill is exactly 1 point and the number of points you need to spend to unlock a new tier are clearly displayed, you will be able to anticipate where you will need to spend your skill points to unlock specific skills.
The last time I tested (admittedly not recently), the bonus bar did not clearly show how many points were required in each career to advance the bar. Also there was no clear indication of how many points you would get total at level 50, though people reading the blogs and forums could have gleaned that. (Not sure that was finalized, anyway). I think it's important to understand what the maximum number of skill points available will be going in.
If there's any angst over skill selection, it would likely be over the bonus bar and should not be over unlocking career skills if people spend any amount of time studying the skill tree before picking skills. People who don't bother to do that are going to either have to live with it or respec. I'd like unlimited free respecs just as much as anybody else, but I'm not counting on it.
The new system could benefit from a tutorial, to help new players avoid the kind of missteps people are talking about. Tool tips showing how the UI works are good, but that doesn't give people the high-level view that explains the strategy of skill selection.
...I hope everyone can see that the explanation borticus gave us makes a lot of sense, after all the new skill system is modeled after the spec system, which does not have "powercart" functionality coded in because your not intended to ever have more than a couple spec points available to spend at one time.
You're not limited to the amount of specialization points you earn over time. Eventually you can fill entire trees as you keep earning them. Skill points are finite.
That's not what I said ... I said your not intended to have more than a couple to spend at any one time, because you can't respec them, so its expected you spend them as you get them, one at a time.
Honestly, the easiest and most effective solution to all of this is to permanently alter the cost of respecs.
What if Respecs cost 5k Dilithium? Or even 10k instead of 500 Zen? ($5 USD or about 160k DIlithium.)
Then no one would really care would they? Make a mistake? Well.. that kinda sucks, but you use one days worth of Dilithium refinement and you fix it. No big deal.
The bottom line is that this entire debate is only an issue because 500 Zen is an outrageous price to redo your characters skill points. You fix that, and you fix this without a dev having to lift a finger. Make respecs cheap enough that players are encouraged to experiment and aren't afraid to bankrupt themselves with a mistake.
Perhaps we're all attacking the wrong problem here? Is the issue really the lack of powercart? or is the real issue the cost of redoing your skill points?
That's not what I said ... I said your not intended to have more than a couple to spend at any one time, because you can't respec them, so its expected you spend them as you get them, one at a time.
So what? It doesn't matter if you can pick one at a time or respec them when you can fill the entire tree. There's less of an emphasis on "choosing wisely" when all options are available and you aren't limited in where to spend points.
if you go back and read the first post you quoted I was saying that this explains why it's so difficult for them to incorporate powercart into the new skill system, because it's built off of the spec system which never needed powercart in the first place
Honestly, the easiest and most effective solution to all of this is to permanently alter the cost of respecs.
What if Respecs cost 5k Dilithium? Or even 10k instead of 500 Zen? ($5 USD or about 160k DIlithium.)
Then no one would really care would they? Make a mistake? Well.. that kinda sucks, but you use one days worth of Dilithium refinement and you fix it. No big deal.
The bottom line is that this entire debate is only an issue because 500 Zen is an outrageous price to redo your characters skill points. You fix that, and you fix this without a dev having to lift a finger. Make respecs cheap enough that players are encouraged to experiment and aren't afraid to bankrupt themselves with a mistake.
Perhaps we're all attacking the wrong problem here? Is the issue really the lack of powercart? or is the real issue the cost of redoing your skill points?
I'm going with option B.
Definitely the cost involved.
Cryptic could do the right thing by allowing subscribers to reskill for free, instead of giving a respec every level.
Or they could do what most other free to play mmo's do by allowing us to respec for EC or Dilithium..
Either of these ideas would add value to subscribing and eliminate the current worries surrounding the new system.
Two skill slots and/or easier ability to respec... we need one or the other if they truly wanna push people away from cookie cutter builds and meta.
Think of it like this, they release a new set like the a quantum Phase Set which has some potentially awesome powers I want to test it out but I don't wanna spend $5 to respec. Therefore I ignore it without even trying to make use of it. The new Strategist specialization suits tanking builds and so the same thing applies, they want us to try new things but there's no point if it'll cost $5 to do it well.
If they want better control over the meta and modifying it they need to make respeccing skills more accessible because most of us don't roll multiple characters for every build.
That's not what I said ... I said your not intended to have more than a couple to spend at any one time, because you can't respec them, so its expected you spend them as you get them, one at a time.
So what? It doesn't matter if you can pick one at a time or respec them when you can fill the entire tree. There's less of an emphasis on "choosing wisely" when all options are available and you aren't limited in where to spend points.
@valoreah you have one thing right. New players because they're new won't know how to choose exactly because they're new. Part about being a new player is learning how to do things so that when they finally reach the end of receiving space points, they can either respec if they feel they made wrong choices (if they subbed since joining the game, they have at least 6 respecs to use from leveling upg) or just go with the choices they made.
Also, look at it from this point of view. A new player once they get this system has 6 skills at the beginning of the tree: Hull Restoration, Hull Capacity, Shield Restoration, Shield Capacity, Energy Weapons Targeting and Projectile Weapons targeting. They only have 1 point to spend at level 5. You don't think one new player might spend time clicking on each one to see what they do before making their choice, knowing they only have 1 point to spend at this point?
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
hell, even cryptic's most recent game (neverwinter online) has 'powercarting' with their feats, which is that game's version of the skill system currently on tribble
But as a counter-example, you have games like Diablo 2 where the only "free" respec was to make a new character. So yeah, different games handle it different ways.
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
hell, even cryptic's most recent game (neverwinter online) has 'powercarting' with their feats, which is that game's version of the skill system currently on tribble
But as a counter-example, you have games like Diablo 2 where the only "free" respec was to make a new character. So yeah, different games handle it different ways.
actually, as of patch 1.13 akara gives you a full stat and skill reset after finishing the Den of Evil quest...it's only once per difficulty though, but it's still 3 more than you got prior to that patch
D2 also isn't an MMO, it's a singleplayer game, and singleplayer RPGs tend to never let you reset anything - there are a few that do, mainly more recent ones, but they're exceptions, not rules
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
* To my knowledge, no other MMO on the market used this technology
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
hell, even cryptic's most recent game (neverwinter online) has 'powercarting' with their feats, which is that game's version of the skill system currently on tribble
But as a counter-example, you have games like Diablo 2 where the only "free" respec was to make a new character. So yeah, different games handle it different ways.
actually, as of patch 1.13 akara gives you a full stat and skill reset after finishing the Den of Evil quest...it's only once per difficulty though, but it's still 3 more than you got prior to that patch
D2 also isn't an MMO, it's a singleplayer game, and singleplayer RPGs tend to never let you reset anything - there are a few that do, mainly more recent ones, but they're exceptions, not rules
It's a three-of quest reward though so not really "free".
D2 is more of a MOG than an MMO, but it has most of the things that an MMO has.
if it doesn't need to be paid for, it's free (especially considering DoE is one of if not the easiest quest in the game, even on hell, since it's the first)
and i don't see how D2 has 'most of the things an MMO has'...if it did, i'd be able to rearrange the HUD or see a chat box (and no, the chat bar you get on hitting Enter doesn't count)
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
Comments
DCUO has a confirm on spending every point... speaking from personal experience its unpleasant, primitive, and looks ridiculous in build-guide videos
Guild Wars 2 is a change-at-will outside of combat skills system. It had forced return to re-trainers at launch but dumped that as a needless pain in the butt.
Lord of the Rings Online has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm. It can be used from anywhere in world (with full respec's costing a significant amount of in-game coin)
Marvel Heroes has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm. Respec's were a cash shop item and periodic daily log in reward but have since changed to freely available in any safe zone.
Star Trek Online has a confirm button allowing you to spend any portion of your points before confirming or backing up to the last confirm... and is apparently losing it in the effort to be more approachable by new players... Whu-huh?
Basically every game that does lock-in each point ends up spawning third party calculators because the process is too nerve-wracking and frustrating to work out your build from inside the client. As good as your license is, I still wouldn't want to be betting against frustration.
Deadlines are deadlines. And your honesty is a credit to the whole organization. But please don't put this off after getting 11.5 into the hands of people in Vegas.
Another problem with the current design @borticuscryptic is not only the fear of misclicking, but the fear of choosing the points that you want, and by time you reach the bottom of the skill tree, you run out of points because you picked up one too many in the tiers above.
There needs to be a way to plan out the tree before committing, just like there is on Live Holodeck now. There are a few other MMO's out there that do this, RIFT being one of them, without having to use external sources like website calculators to plan your build. Maybe this is something that you guys can work on over time and maybe release in a later patch?
Yeah....I'm really confused by this...
But all those attempts to convince everyone who will miss it that it's just us Voth defending our dinosaur ways, or that it's an MMO standard or even somehow an upgrade (it kind of is for the initial leveling -- but not the respecs...) They're unlikely to convince anyone but the dev team itself. And the only thing worse than believing your own propaganda is to be the only one who believes it.
I'm resigned to accept that we're going to be stuck with this for the time being, but I find the claim this is "standard" irritating.
Having played both WoW and Everquest II, I can tell you that both of their skill tree systems allow you to pre-set points before committing, and being that both of them are considered AAA games, I would think that would be the standard they would want to be shooting for.
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - Agatha Heterodyne
This is a big concern, yes. By the time players realize they have over committed at lower tier, it's already too late.
That's a fair point, but it should also be considered that STO does a very 'non standard' thing by charging money (zen) for respecs. In other games, if you don't have the power cart functionality, it's not a major deal because respecs are usually very inexpensive. In STO, they cost either cash or a couple hundred thousand dilithium per respec. This makes the lack of 'power cart' problematic.
Again, just so I'm totally clear, I like the system and have been using it quite a bit on tribble with great success. It's a good system, but my one big complaint is there is no way to plan things out in game before you buy. I honestly believe this is going to be a problem, but time will tell.
http://www.stf-vanguard.com/STO-Skill-Planner/skillplanner.html
Also, seeing Borticus for the first time, I now know he used to co-host STOked and suspect he missed a few workout sessions.
Off the top of my head:
Anarchy Online does (did) that for the skills and it had an interesting way for perk respecs: One point per two hours and later implemented a free full perk reset every 24 or 48 hours
The anime style grinder Eden Eternal does that for the Knowledge Points (Don't judge me, you play what your nephews and nieces want to play).
I would assume that there are more, so looking into it or revamping the way respecs work (or how much they cost) seems to be prudent.
hell, even cryptic's most recent game (neverwinter online) has 'powercarting' with their feats, which is that game's version of the skill system currently on tribble
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
It should also be noted that of the three top mmo's I play, STO is the only one that charged real world money for repecing.
SWTOR - Can change my talent tree (But not advanced class) for free every few days, or costs in game credits.
Guild Wars 2 - Completely free to change and move skill points around, anywhere in the game.
STO - New system allows you to spend points anywhere in the game, but penalizes you if you spend even one point wrong costing real world money to fix..
All three games are free to play, so guess which one is the odd one out?
Again, this should be a core part of STO, being able to spend skill points anywhere, but not if it doesn't have the ability to either move them around for free, or at the very least, costing in game EC!
But it also doesn't warn players that spending too many points early on, will seriously restrict later skill point spending!
New players will just put points into everything, and then quit when they realize it will cost them money to fix their mistake..
In the players mind, this is a core basic function of the current skill tree, so not having it on release should have meant that you push back said release until it is a part of the update.
People are saying that this function is deliberately missing, just so you can make money of the back of player mistakes.
I don't believe this, but you have to admit it looks like you have been caught with your trousers around your ankles again, with basic design failings..
At the very least, being either a lifetime or monthly subscriber, should not cost any real world cash to respec at all!
I stated this several times myself, but since the live stream and the explanation that it would take a lot of effort to get working, I no longer feel that way, which is something I've stated in this very thread.
I hope everyone can see that the explanation borticus gave us makes a lot of sense, after all the new skill system is modeled after the spec system, which does not have "powercart" functionality coded in because your not intended to ever have more than a couple spec points available to spend at one time.
After using the system for a few weeks now I can assure you mistakes will be make, not just mis-clicking but people having no idea how effective some of the new skills (and some old) are. I don't think it is good enough to say, sorry guys we have a technical problem so suck it up. If you make mistakes or choose skills you are unfamiliar with you just have to buy as many respecs that is necessary to rectify the problem we created, or install 10gb of Tribble or use a third party software to plan your skill tree. Cheers have a nice day
Just to play Devil's Advocate here, the new skill system is much easier to plan out skill point spending than the old one. Since each skill is exactly 1 point and the number of points you need to spend to unlock a new tier are clearly displayed, you will be able to anticipate where you will need to spend your skill points to unlock specific skills.
The last time I tested (admittedly not recently), the bonus bar did not clearly show how many points were required in each career to advance the bar. Also there was no clear indication of how many points you would get total at level 50, though people reading the blogs and forums could have gleaned that. (Not sure that was finalized, anyway). I think it's important to understand what the maximum number of skill points available will be going in.
If there's any angst over skill selection, it would likely be over the bonus bar and should not be over unlocking career skills if people spend any amount of time studying the skill tree before picking skills. People who don't bother to do that are going to either have to live with it or respec. I'd like unlimited free respecs just as much as anybody else, but I'm not counting on it.
The new system could benefit from a tutorial, to help new players avoid the kind of missteps people are talking about. Tool tips showing how the UI works are good, but that doesn't give people the high-level view that explains the strategy of skill selection.
That's not what I said ... I said your not intended to have more than a couple to spend at any one time, because you can't respec them, so its expected you spend them as you get them, one at a time.
What if Respecs cost 5k Dilithium? Or even 10k instead of 500 Zen? ($5 USD or about 160k DIlithium.)
Then no one would really care would they? Make a mistake? Well.. that kinda sucks, but you use one days worth of Dilithium refinement and you fix it. No big deal.
The bottom line is that this entire debate is only an issue because 500 Zen is an outrageous price to redo your characters skill points. You fix that, and you fix this without a dev having to lift a finger. Make respecs cheap enough that players are encouraged to experiment and aren't afraid to bankrupt themselves with a mistake.
Perhaps we're all attacking the wrong problem here? Is the issue really the lack of powercart? or is the real issue the cost of redoing your skill points?
I'm going with option B.
if you go back and read the first post you quoted I was saying that this explains why it's so difficult for them to incorporate powercart into the new skill system, because it's built off of the spec system which never needed powercart in the first place
Definitely the cost involved.
Cryptic could do the right thing by allowing subscribers to reskill for free, instead of giving a respec every level.
Or they could do what most other free to play mmo's do by allowing us to respec for EC or Dilithium..
Either of these ideas would add value to subscribing and eliminate the current worries surrounding the new system.
Think of it like this, they release a new set like the a quantum Phase Set which has some potentially awesome powers I want to test it out but I don't wanna spend $5 to respec. Therefore I ignore it without even trying to make use of it. The new Strategist specialization suits tanking builds and so the same thing applies, they want us to try new things but there's no point if it'll cost $5 to do it well.
If they want better control over the meta and modifying it they need to make respeccing skills more accessible because most of us don't roll multiple characters for every build.
@valoreah you have one thing right. New players because they're new won't know how to choose exactly because they're new. Part about being a new player is learning how to do things so that when they finally reach the end of receiving space points, they can either respec if they feel they made wrong choices (if they subbed since joining the game, they have at least 6 respecs to use from leveling upg) or just go with the choices they made.
Also, look at it from this point of view. A new player once they get this system has 6 skills at the beginning of the tree: Hull Restoration, Hull Capacity, Shield Restoration, Shield Capacity, Energy Weapons Targeting and Projectile Weapons targeting. They only have 1 point to spend at level 5. You don't think one new player might spend time clicking on each one to see what they do before making their choice, knowing they only have 1 point to spend at this point?
My character Tsin'xing
actually, as of patch 1.13 akara gives you a full stat and skill reset after finishing the Den of Evil quest...it's only once per difficulty though, but it's still 3 more than you got prior to that patch
D2 also isn't an MMO, it's a singleplayer game, and singleplayer RPGs tend to never let you reset anything - there are a few that do, mainly more recent ones, but they're exceptions, not rules
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
D2 is more of a MOG than an MMO, but it has most of the things that an MMO has.
My character Tsin'xing
and i don't see how D2 has 'most of the things an MMO has'...if it did, i'd be able to rearrange the HUD or see a chat box (and no, the chat bar you get on hitting Enter doesn't count)
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"