Iksar said:
Even with the system as explained WITH respecs I have serious reservations. Either players who (for example) pick warrior and put all their mastery in DPS abilities will be a massive hinderance to a group who needs a tank OR the journey/majority of the game will be relatively simple and none of it will matter. Trying to hard lock players into these (likely poor/detrimental to other players) choices seems like an even bigger mistake. Especially if you want classes to be so hard to fully master that only the most hardcore would do so before expansions happen.
This individuality you are looking for is an illusion, it does not exist in game worlds. If you want to stand out then work on being skillful.
Player permenance existed in EQ, Runescape, and Eve for mmos and likely many others. In non MMOs it is the most common thing. Kotor, diablo 2, dragon age, mass effect, deus ex, dark souls, etc.
It is on the same level as paying for a race change.
I spent 50 levels studying and mastering fire damage... oh he is resistant to fire? I have mastered the arcane! ... RIP Pyro Dan
What makes the character unique is the human that's controlling it. Don't forget that, this is a social game.
Side note: In every other game I played where characters could "specialize" there were always other players that specialized the same exact way as you, which means you weren't unique in those games either. It's impossible to be unique in game that allows choices because players will always choose the same thing as someone else who shows that it's the best option. Don't strive to be unique by your spec (which doesn't exist in this game anyway), be unique by the way you play, your reputation, your attitude, etc.
TLogan said: I have no clue what most of you are saying with there was never going to be individuality as this mastery system pretty much dismisses that opinion.
Myself and others are looking at it from a long term perspective.
Eventually all players will be able to max out everything. The only difference being the order in which you acquire the skills. Nothing about the mastery system suggests individuality.
From what we have seen VR wont be able to develop content that adds new abilities fast enough to keep some players from maxing out all of their abilities.
Hopefully this ability point system, and the other systems they are instating to extend content, are enough to last players until the next major update down the line.
philo said:Hopefully this ability point system, and the other systems they are instating to extend content, are enough to last players until the next major update down the line.
This I think is the crux of the fear I have. If you get everything quickly and are just max level with everything unlocked, then the game really lives or dies with raiding and "end game" content. If it is a long crawl where 80% of players won't have everything unlocked by the time there is an expansion then choices matter and most people will vary between the same class.
If the long term gameplay is the plan, which I hope it is, then respeccing becomes a simple meta choice where vast majority of every class is the same.
Ranarius said:It's impossible to be unique in game that allows choices because players will always choose the same thing as someone else who shows that it's the best option. Don't strive to be unique by your spec (which doesn't exist in this game anyway), be unique by the way you play, your reputation, your attitude, etc.
I find this to be a much more satisfying approach, and good reason to avoid wading in deeply to 'recreational theorycrafting' (though it's easy to slip and fall totally into it now and then)
Ranarius said:It's impossible to be unique in game that allows choices because players will always choose the same thing as someone else who shows that it's the best option.
You realize this goes directly against your message that there are no specs and is one of the big reasons why I think respeccing at all is a bad idea. Players changing their entire play history to take "the best option" is a bad mechanic. Why can't I change my race too so I can have the best option?
Bazgrim put up a video the other day where he collected a lot of information about mastery points. For anyone needing a refresher it answers a lot of the questions people are asking here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaZqEwMj6mE
Jobeson said:You realize this goes directly against your message that there are no specs and is one of the big reasons why I think respeccing at all is a bad idea. Players changing their entire play history to take "the best option" is a bad mechanic. Why can't I change my race too so I can have the best option?
Or the player history is them progressing to become a master of their class which many find a far more fulfilling class fantasy, rather than spending large (absurd even) amounts of time being some lesser sub-class within a larger whole (or just permantently being a sub-class).
Iksar said:Or the player history is them progressing to become a master of their class which many find a far more fulfilling class fantasy, rather than spending large (absurd even) amounts of time being some lesser sub-class within a larger whole (or just permantently being a sub-class).
There are a tons of mmos MMOs that give you exactly that. Change what you can do or how well you can do it on a dime. Why can't you change your race too? There are plenty of MMOs that allow race changes. I am sure "the player history is them progressing to become a master of their class" Why let you min/max your mastery rewriting the PCs growth and not also rewrite the race?
Edit: Why cant we also just retrain skill points? I worked hard getting my smithing skill up, but a man on the internet says I am not optimized without cooking. Why not let me funnel those points into cooking? It is the best tradeskill for my classes growth and I already put in work, I shouldn't have to level up a second tradeskill.
Jobeson said:Ranarius said:It's impossible to be unique in game that allows choices because players will always choose the same thing as someone else who shows that it's the best option.
You realize this goes directly against your message that there are no specs and is one of the big reasons why I think respeccing at all is a bad idea. Players changing their entire play history to take "the best option" is a bad mechanic. Why can't I change my race too so I can have the best option?
Yes, I do, and I agree with you completely.
Iksar said:Janus said:I would rather not see this system have an end point that defeats one of the very purposes of it existing and to have a player feel their specialization isn't unique.
But their specialization wouldn't be unique regardless...I can't think of any MMOs with talent/spec systems in which a player of any given class is unique in their build. The only times you could be unique would be when purposefully (or ignorantly) poorly building your character toward any given purpose, which shouldn't even be a thing in Pantheon given the hard class roles they have always been talking about.
In Wow their are a lot of people who don't Meta build due to doing a simpler rotation, or dealing with less CDs, or simply just like one of the abilities than the one tht actually does better, it's all a preference, and to assume everyone meta builds, is simply just wrong, and honestly if the meta build is quite complex with a bunch of CDs, and do this ability before that ability, compared to a simpler rotation that is a lot less complex and they do more damage with that rotation due to its simplicity, than that would be the better build for them, even though that build specifically isn't the best for the class.
TLogan said: It seems as though some people are taking this mastery system a little too seriously? Like as if a druid will be a useless healer if he focuses mastery on snares/roots and dps? Let's not forget that the faster mob(s) die the less healing that will need to be done. So having a druid that focuses on CC/damage can still be just as efficient of a healer as one that solely stays within this role that you feel we should be locked in to. I personally am excited about LAS combined with mastery system I feel there will be some variability between like classes until of course as others have already stated we are all maxed out, which I hope is highly improbable. No to respecs!
Does the group need a healer or a dps? A focused healer or DPS class will always be better than a healer trying to be DPS for filling that slot. If you want something to die faster so the healer has to heal less then you pick a real DPS.
If a healer can "spec" their first half of mastery into DPS and still heal well then the issue is the game is not at all challenging as promised. Moreover if speccing in healing ends up just being overkill for most of the game then *healing* is actually a poor way to "spec" and is counterintuitive to the role emphasis/gameplay.
In a system without respecs and a near endless grind for mastery...well that would be quite the sight. People complain enough in games with plentiful respecs, now give them a platform to really waste hundreds of hours only to find they are less than useful or heaven forbid some balancing leaves them in the shadow of others in their class. I really don't understand this desire people have for an absolutely endless grind for points on a single character, especially for something like mastery points compared to actual player skill.
Iksar said:Does the group need a healer or a dps? A focused healer or DPS class will always be better than a healer trying to be DPS for filling that slot. If you want something to die faster so the healer has to heal less then you pick a real DPS.
If a healer can "spec" their first half of mastery into DPS and still heal well then the issue is the game is not at all challenging as promised. Moreover if speccing in healing ends up just being overkill for most of the game then *healing* is actually a poor way to "spec" and is counterintuitive to the role emphasis/gameplay.
I think there's a famous motto that most of us live by something like "there's more than one way to floss your teeth effectively". A DPS's job is to do damage a tank's job is to tank, but that doesn't mean that encounters may not or should not go smoother if these classes also utilized a little crowd control. Or a dps with a short duration damage reduction disc. (Or similar) shouldn't occasionally take aggro on one mob so that the tank doesn't die. I don't know what you have against healers that help the group clear mobs faster by adding a little dps/cc. I tell you what I had no problems keeping my group alive as a fury druid in EQ2 and yet I could add some serious dps which made the group extremely efficient. Way more so in fact than a healer that just sits and heals and keeps it at 75%+ mana with your group lulling and solo pulling a mob every 10 minutes.
Sometimes the best way to kill something is just to stun/cc/all out dps it because ANY healer wouldn't be able to keep the group up for even a minute, this is where I plan to shine.
People complain enough in games with plentiful respecs, now give them a platform to really waste hundreds of hours only to find...
This is the kind of thinking that doesn't really work in a game like this. The devs have made it clear that it's not about getting to the end, getting to the best mastery, finishing your character, getting to the best dungeon, etc. The game is about enjoying the ride, exploring the world, not rushing to the "end." If someone spends hundreds of hours playing and ever looks back and feels like it was a waste of time then I can say that they did not enjoy the ride....they missed the point.
Ranarius said:This is the kind of thinking that doesn't really work in a game like this. The devs have made it clear that it's not about getting to the end, getting to the best mastery, finishing your character, getting to the best dungeon, etc. The game is about enjoying the ride, exploring the world, not rushing to the "end." If someone spends hundreds of hours playing and ever looks back and feels like it was a waste of time then I can say that they did not enjoy the ride....they missed the point.
Seems like somewhat of a misrepresentation of what they mean with:
We're trying to avoid the term 'End Game' because it has evolved into something far different than what it literally means. In some games, the perception that the true game, the ‘fun’ game, doesn’t begin until the 'end game' came to exist. The reason why isn't super important and varies depending on the game but with Pantheon you won’t be compelled to rush to the final levels.
First, even if you could rush to maximum level, you would be incredibly ill-equipped to handle high-end combat. Because you found some way to rush (perhaps a bug, etc.) your character won't have what it needs to do well at the higher levels. Second, most content in Pantheon will be designed around grouping, with smaller amounts designed for soloing and raiding. Pantheon is not primarily a raiding game, though we know many in our community enjoy raiding. Same with soloing -- it is not Pantheon's focus, but some people like to solo occasionally. Also, there is no reason why we couldn't have, say, level 20 or level 30 raids. In other words, there is nothing magical or special at the final levels that somehow allows you to experience an aspect of Pantheon that was previously hidden. That is not the case. We want the game to be fun and adventurous, finding skills and items throughout your entire experience from low to max level. Lastly, we will be launching expansions frequently enough to keep ahead of most players and raising the level cap as necessary.
Paired with the following tenets, which should be applied to the entire journey:
A requirement that classes have identities. No single player should be able to do everything on their own.
An understanding that a truly challenging game is truly rewarding.
Someone even a couple hundred hours in is probably still going to be mid-game even. But none of this is about the end: it's about having challenge and strongly defined classes throughout the whole journey, not split identity sub-classes.
@TLogan If some of those alternative ways to play that you mention work, many of us will feel the devs have failed at providing challenging content.
You simply cant have a healer doing dps or a dps purposefully taking aggro if the content is difficult.
You mention eq2. Did you play 1st gen mmos heavily prior to the genre wide shift to make things easier that happened around 2002-2004? It is understandable that some of those tactics worked in eq2. I think that might be why there is a disconnect?
I think we all hope that Pantheon ends up being challenging as has been advertised. Not just with raids and boss mobs but in normal exp groups and standard content as well.
philo said:I'm pretty sure you will be able to switch your race through progeny...
I admit I am not an expert on the progeny system, but isn't it where you start a new character at level 1, but he/she is given a few specialties learned from your original character? But still starting over at level 1?
IMO, if the mastery makes it so that a player is considered "useless" because he specced "wrong", then there is a clear design mistake in the mastery system. I expect the base abilities to be the most important factor, while mastery should just makes the base abilities better. I have seen some things that I would consider questionable already. For example, turning a single target heal into a group heal through mastery. Not sure if that's a good design approach. But I guess we will be able to evaluate these things better once we can test for ourselves and know the full abilities and mastery paths.
On topic: IMO a respec is not needed, since everyone will be able to max out all masteries eventually. I like the idea I read some posts ago however, providing a respec option on certain levels (maybe once at lvl 30 and once at lvl 50?).
Ranarius said:philo said:I'm pretty sure you will be able to switch your race through progeny...
I admit I am not an expert on the progeny system, but isn't it where you start a new character at level 1, but he/she is given a few specialties learned from your original character? But still starting over at level 1?
Yes...depending on how VR implements it, we might only be able to change our class and not our race...but could be both.
Maybe your question is about it being a "new" character? In other games you simply restart your same character in order to gain benefits you can't gain any other way (but you get to keep items and sometimes abilities you have already acquired). VR has made a lore based decision to call it a progeny/offspring of your character and that has created some confusion that it is a different/new character. In essence, the way these type of systems usually play out, are that it is the same character that is going through the leveling process again and not a new character.
Maybe they will throw us a curve ball and it will be a totally new system that we haven't seeen in other games before? This is a lot of speculation/educated guess based on the little we know of progeny and how these type of systems work in other games.
I feel like only allowing a respec through progeny might be a good middle ground. Being able to keep your total number of points when you "progenize" (a word i just made up that is the act of restarting through the progeny system). That would still make it possible to respec but not as easy as just throwing gold at it. It would also encourage some people to participate in the progeny system...which we know will be optional.