skill tree thoughts

[solarflair921]

so i've played a decent bit now, beat the game a couple times, and i have a pretty good scope of the variety of weapons and the corresponding skill trees and i have some thoughts. i know every game is gonna have one weapon or class that is better than others and whatnot, but swords are like..bad, they have some of the highest cost early skills (with a required 3 expertise before you can spec any further and i think it's all 5 just to get your right click) and they have objectively the worst right click spell options in the game due to the fact that they both nerf you permanently. generally i just avoid them altogether because knowing i cant get 100% out of my gear makes playing them not feel good, which is super disappointing because they have some of the coolest weapon designs. now if there were like actual classes that all had their classic strengths and drawbacks that'd be a different story altogether but as it stands it feels out of place. i also think the attack speed side of the daggers tree should be looked at, it isn't necessarily bad but the crit/bleed route not only makes more sense for rouge type builds but after tracking my average dps specked into both its just like..way better and the weapons that support it are too(also back stab sucks and rip is a way better right click) again i know not all skills can be made the same but it just doesn't feel that rewarding to play with some. idk if that's a weapon options thing or a skill tree thing but i feel like some minor tweaks to the skill tree would really go a long way

[Kodaxmax]

they have some of the best passives though, especially defensive.

[solarflair921]

Originally posted by Kodaxmax:

they have some of the best passives though, especially defensive.

i mean sure its blocks are good, but so is the armor tree, or the axes and hammers have some decent block buffs also and you get no debuffs from them. and block has diminishing returns since it reduces your chance temporarily every time it happens

[GhostSpartan117]

Originally posted by solarflair921:

so i've played a decent bit now, beat the game a couple times, and i have a pretty good scope of the variety of weapons and the corresponding skill trees and i have some thoughts. i know every game is gonna have one weapon or class that is better than others and whatnot, but swords are like..bad, they have some of the highest cost early skills (with a required 3 expertise before you can spec any further and i think it's all 5 just to get your right click) and they have objectively the worst right click spell options in the game due to the fact that they both nerf you permanently. generally i just avoid them altogether because knowing i cant get 100% out of my gear makes playing them not feel good, which is super disappointing because they have some of the coolest weapon designs. now if there were like actual classes that all had their classic strengths and drawbacks that'd be a different story altogether but as it stands it feels out of place. i also think the attack speed side of the daggers tree should be looked at, it isn't necessarily bad but the crit/bleed route not only makes more sense for rouge type builds but after tracking my average dps specked into both its just like..way better and the weapons that support it are too(also back stab sucks and rip is a way better right click) again i know not all skills can be made the same but it just doesn't feel that rewarding to play with some. idk if that's a weapon options thing or a skill tree thing but i feel like some minor tweaks to the skill tree would really go a long way

Read through everything here, I slightly agree that swords may do a bit less damage than other weapons but that's partially by design! Swords are designed to be a jack-of-all trades but master of none that allows you to play into any play style without outright removing the need for other weapon builds!

The reduction in stats on the two different spells are because they lead to very very powerful talents after, by reducing certain stats I can let the player get really high stats in other categories allowing a certain type of playstyle/build that can't be achieved with other weapons, but doesn't make you incredibly powerful.

More tweaks and balancing to the trees are always WIP! I try to do a lot of solo testing to make sure all the weapon options preform roughly the same but still shine in the areas I want them to shine in. With so many talent, weapon, and gear combos its really hard for me to test EVERYTHING, so watching the community and seeing what they run and don't run is really the way I balance many things.

[Jesus Raves]

the only problem i have with the skill tree is the torch build. Most upgrades seem to be team oriented and I can confidently say that most or at least a lot of us dont play this with friends.. At least i dont since no friend plays this. Maybe there should be a second more solo focused skill tree for us solo players. Just a thought

[Kodaxmax]

Originally posted by Jesus Raves:

the only problem i have with the skill tree is the torch build. Most upgrades seem to be team oriented and I can confidently say that most or at least a lot of us dont play this with friends.. At least i dont since no friend plays this. Maybe there should be a second more solo focused skill tree for us solo players. Just a thought

i agree. Though rather than a whole second tree, perhaps the node just behave differently with no other players present. Perhaps applying a weakened version of the same buff to yourself or soemthing.

[tacobellwarlord42]

Originally posted by Jesus Raves:

the only problem i have with the skill tree is the torch build. Most upgrades seem to be team oriented and I can confidently say that most or at least a lot of us dont play this with friends.. At least i dont since no friend plays this. Maybe there should be a second more solo focused skill tree for us solo players. Just a thought

torch is very strong solo. With a heal that comes back every 4 hits that heals you for 3 points, it is very easy to stay alive and my health was near max for almost the entire run
The damage over time is also very strong, I don't remember how I did it but I was getting 20 damage burn ticks every second or so and solo'd the beetle boss
it's hard early game but late game its beyond busted. With the new reworks it also is a must have for groups, as you can get an instant revive if you build revive speed with trinkets and spell haste. That one expertise also gives you two full health revives per floor

[solarflair921]

Originally posted by GhostSpartan117:

Originally posted by solarflair921:

so i've played a decent bit now, beat the game a couple times, and i have a pretty good scope of the variety of weapons and the corresponding skill trees and i have some thoughts. i know every game is gonna have one weapon or class that is better than others and whatnot, but swords are like..bad, they have some of the highest cost early skills (with a required 3 expertise before you can spec any further and i think it's all 5 just to get your right click) and they have objectively the worst right click spell options in the game due to the fact that they both nerf you permanently. generally i just avoid them altogether because knowing i cant get 100% out of my gear makes playing them not feel good, which is super disappointing because they have some of the coolest weapon designs. now if there were like actual classes that all had their classic strengths and drawbacks that'd be a different story altogether but as it stands it feels out of place. i also think the attack speed side of the daggers tree should be looked at, it isn't necessarily bad but the crit/bleed route not only makes more sense for rouge type builds but after tracking my average dps specked into both its just like..way better and the weapons that support it are too(also back stab sucks and rip is a way better right click) again i know not all skills can be made the same but it just doesn't feel that rewarding to play with some. idk if that's a weapon options thing or a skill tree thing but i feel like some minor tweaks to the skill tree would really go a long way

Read through everything here, I slightly agree that swords may do a bit less damage than other weapons but that's partially by design! Swords are designed to be a jack-of-all trades but master of none that allows you to play into any play style without outright removing the need for other weapon builds!

The reduction in stats on the two different spells are because they lead to very very powerful talents after, by reducing certain stats I can let the player get really high stats in other categories allowing a certain type of playstyle/build that can't be achieved with other weapons, but doesn't make you incredibly powerful.

More tweaks and balancing to the trees are always WIP! I try to do a lot of solo testing to make sure all the weapon options preform roughly the same but still shine in the areas I want them to shine in. With so many talent, weapon, and gear combos its really hard for me to test EVERYTHING, so watching the community and seeing what they run and don't run is really the way I balance many things.

since posting this i played a few more runs with swords and the crit side is actually solid, i didnt mess too much with the right side off the tree but it doesnt feel as bad once youre into it(though i still dont love how much expertise it takes to get there) and i also saw yesterday the update improved daggers slightly which was a much needed addition. i still think that backstab is butt, however maybe adding a skill that gives temporary invisibility could add opportunities to capitalize on it more. as a food for thought about daggers, i think having either attack speed or crit type daggers although make sense kindof do the same thing. it'd be cool to see a more rouge-ish build type relying more on utility and speed/tactics with skills like the invisibility i mentioned, or like a short range night vision passive, maybe an ability that gives your dash multiple charges or a double jump/wall clinging ability or something. just a tree that plays into the more classic sneak attack/cunning theme of rouges and daggers(maybe even have that rouge-ish tree bbuild into ranged a bit also)

[Kodaxmax]

Dagger tree does seem pretty bad when its near impossible to backstab without somone else taunting