The new skill tree needs to have multiple paths that improve individual types of kit modules (those that give crit, those that buff damage, those that add weapon effects, those that give hp, those that give shields, those that debuff enemies, those that add CC to enemies, those that give damage resistance, and maybe a few others). This would be a very easy thing to do since kit modules have 1 of these aspects to them, and would give each player a very simple skill tree
Sounds over-complicated to me. Especially when certain of those are things that are very niche for one profession, but common for another.
I don't see it as complicated at all. If you want more crits, you put points into crits. You want more damage, you put points into damage. You want more healing you put points into healing (I honestly don't know how much simpler you could get).
Also, you said that some of these things are common for one profession but not so much on others... well yeah that's kind of my point. This would maintain the class difference, which is a very important aspect of the game. If you want to spec into healing on a tac, it is not necessarily "meta" but it will buff your Motivation, Rally cry, and Vascular Regenerator (research kits frames) which will allow the tac to do more consistent damage vs. burst. You can spec is a bruiser tac, an assasin tac, a support tac, and this goes for ALL THE OTHER CLASSES. This is simple, has class diversity, and allows for multiple build paths for every role.
Except that... It creates a situation where it's an inherently bad idea for certain classes to EVER invest in some of the skills. Also... how many categories did you define? oh yeah:
those that give crit,
those that buff damage,
those that add weapon effects,
those that give hp,
those that give shields,
those that debuff enemies,
those that add CC to enemies,
those that give damage resistance,
and maybe a few others
8 + "a few".... the old system had 5 career specific things per class. This idea of yours is confusing for newbies, but more importantly actually HURTS your ability to swap modules as you have to spec for specific modules. Thus you must choose what types of modules you want to use and any others are much less effective.
You know when I said that the kit module section should be expanded that's kind of what I meant... it should be... you know... expanded? If there are 5 originally, wouldn't expanding mean add a few more, like I don't know, 3 (5+3=8)? The problem isn't the amount of things you put skills into, but how each set buffs various abilities that do random things (seriously, look at the skill tree that buffs security escorts, look at everything else it buffs and wonder how the hell it makes any sense). And no, it doesn't hurt your module swapping because of the class differences that that are maintained BY THIS SYSTEM. Even if what you said is true, it is no different than the status quo, therefore it is not a harm. Also, class kit modules already have similar mechanics built into them so that all the modules you switch to would all be buffed by the same thing. For example, the majority of science modules are either built around healing or build around caster damage. The majority of tactical modules are either build for damage or crits. The majority of engineer modules are built around summoning something or character buffing. If you're worrying this would be bad for the game and it would be confusing for people, let me ask an experienced gamer such as yourself; have you ever seen anybody build shield healing on a tactical officer? It doesn't really work out. Yes, it would be bad to spec into some things on different classes, but again that is exactly the point. It would give a clear spec path. Seriously though, how would it be MORE confusing, comparing the current system where the different skill boxes buff seeming random groups of abilities, versus a skill tree which says "HEY THIS BUFFS _______, IF YOU WANT _______ USE THIS". There still is no reason as to why this system is MORE confusing than the current system.
I would like to see your "expanded reasoning" on your argument, and after seeing your 5 lines of sentences, I think that you should make sure you type less than 8 total. You know, so that it isn't too confusing.
I could do a more detailed post, but since you want it to be short...... I'll just say that a system with inherently bad choices is a flawed system. Thus Bort is not going to consider your idea. Also, it gets worse when you consider the inequality of the number of things that fit in those categories you defined.
I'll be using 7/10 points on the available defensive passives and that's probably going to be similar for a lot of players. I know it is late, but please, consider adding +5-10 skills to the tree and giving us 5 more skill points. This new system is great, but it needs a bit of expansion to make it feel like we have a real choice on building our ground characters.
In fairness, they already did add a fair amount of skills. On live, we technically only have 6 different ground skills:
+Weapons
+Shields
+Threat
+Willpower
+Armor
+Kit Strength (in 5 different highly-unbalanced flavors)
Of those, +Threat is effectively a failure, so it's out. +Willpower doesn't compete with the rest, so it got demoted to an optional unlock.
After thinking for a bit about what they could add, or how they could change things around, I think maybe they should just scrap the idea of a ground skill tree altogether. Right now, I suspect nearly everyone is going to be selecting the same approximate build: 7-8 defensives, then at least 1 point in both +weapon damage and +kit strength. The way I see it, there's already enough options for customizing our ground experience: equipment, kit modules, rep traits, personal traits, etc. I suspect these customizations differ greatly, unlike how our skills-to-be will.
Or maybe they should limit ground to 10 skills, and let players select how they want to grow as they level up, until they've obtained all 10.
On a related note, I'd really like to see a "Threatening Stance" added for ground play. I want to be able to protect my squishy 350/700 tactical friends.
As for your assertion that 0 or no points in weapons will be as effective as current on holodeck, I see no evidence this is correct.
I moved my Tactical character to Tribble to make calculations again and noticed a small drop in my weapon damage with no skills slotted whatsoever, so I checked my main character again and you're right. I had inadvertently added one point in Weapon Efficiency on him. That one point put his damage slightly above his Holodeck build (with maxed out Weapon skill). I apologize for the confusion.
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My character Tsin'xing
+Weapons
+Shields
+Threat
+Willpower
+Armor
+Kit Strength (in 5 different highly-unbalanced flavors)
Of those, +Threat is effectively a failure, so it's out. +Willpower doesn't compete with the rest, so it got demoted to an optional unlock.
That only leaves us with:
+Weapons
+Shields
+Armor
+Kit Strength (unified)
So they added:
+Armor Penetration
+Critical Chance
+Shield Hardness
+Health
+Regen
+Kit Cooldown Reduction
After thinking for a bit about what they could add, or how they could change things around, I think maybe they should just scrap the idea of a ground skill tree altogether. Right now, I suspect nearly everyone is going to be selecting the same approximate build: 7-8 defensives, then at least 1 point in both +weapon damage and +kit strength. The way I see it, there's already enough options for customizing our ground experience: equipment, kit modules, rep traits, personal traits, etc. I suspect these customizations differ greatly, unlike how our skills-to-be will.
Or maybe they should limit ground to 10 skills, and let players select how they want to grow as they level up, until they've obtained all 10.
On a related note, I'd really like to see a "Threatening Stance" added for ground play. I want to be able to protect my squishy 350/700 tactical friends.
I moved my Tactical character to Tribble to make calculations again and noticed a small drop in my weapon damage with no skills slotted whatsoever, so I checked my main character again and you're right. I had inadvertently added one point in Weapon Efficiency on him. That one point put his damage slightly above his Holodeck build (with maxed out Weapon skill). I apologize for the confusion.
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