Fixing talent point juggling

[Crim, The Red Thunder]

Archmage can do a lot with it, by speccing into/out of an appropriate element. Some are... sub par, early game, but improve later on. Still other classes can totally respec around finding/not finding certain equipment (Wyrmic, for example).

Certain summons are WILDLY more useful early game, then late. Being able to respec out of them into others that don't really improve as much until lategame would be of enormous benefit.

Cursed have this nifty three way build set, that could wildly be altered based on choice, but this isn't quite as useful.

Rogue can benefit off traps lategame when lure, ranged traps, and all the assorted trap types are available, but early game, the points are better elsewhere.

Anything that devotes to multiple weaponsets can take brutal advantage of respec. (Temporal warden, archer respeccing from sling to bow, anything contemplating exotic mastery, rogues going twohander instead of daggers, or swapping back...)

I'm sure I can think of other ways to abuse a total respec system.

Arcane blade would also be able to bounce other spells out in favor of pure earth shards lategame, and stack the hell out of physical, but trying to avoid the other spellsets in earlygame to focus is brutally painful and difficult. This actually forces them to invest heavily in 3 instead of one, and is the equivalent of refunding 10 talent points, by itself. They can also shift from the magical to physical basis mentioned above.

[SageAcrin]

There are even more generalized setups, too.

Various physical tank classes choosing a physical oriented defensive setup up until Grushnak, then respeccing fully to AM/more useful against mages talents. Bulwark and Wyrmic are obvious candidates here.

Status heavy setups(Like Arcane Blade, again) that segue out of stacking multiple Stuns/Confuses/Blinds when resistances/heals for these become more common in the East.

Stacking up long-term unhealthy amounts of Defense to breeze through the sub-40 accuracy earlygame and then respeccing before the East is a huge damage mitigation factor early.

There's obviously tons of little things, too, like Mindslayers that respec out of physical techs when Mindlash centric play becomes more powerful, any fairly flat rate skill that scales less powerfully later being an obvious spec out of, Archers using Slings early(generally better) and then respeccing to Bows, etc.

I'm not going to say these are necessarily bad things, but it's a huge power boost.

The big issue is, does it actually relieve the tedium? Respeccing on the fly is less about the raw power it brings and more about it being increasingly tedious to abuse. I don't think making it more powerful but more annoying to reach will actually change that much.

[HousePet]

This looks like a situation where 90% of players who aren't getting unreasonable use out of the system, would be penalised by something to block the 10% of players, who can just cheat in any number of other methods anyway.

[SageAcrin]

If you mean the current system, I basically agree, and will add that it's not actually that strong.

Non-tedious abuse is actually kinda fun, but requires a level of system knowledge and spoiling that most players just don't have to make effective.

Players have a hard time using the utility options they have optimally; Knowing which you can grab one level of and juggle around for a utility effect without going insane is pretty hard.

And of course, it makes actual respeccing basically impossible, so I hope you're already good enough at the game to never, ever make mistakes.

Tedious abuse(constantly swapping every single talent to 5) is only slightly better. You get plenty of points for your common attack talents, sustains, etc. And also, it's maddeningly slow. Kinda not a big deal in practice, except for short term...which only really matters a ton on higher difficulties, which are insanely hard to start with.

Now, full respeccing in an obvious area would not be a 10% thing.

Those would be obvious, easy and user friendly system abuses. Everyone would leverage it.

[b0rsuk]

I think the proposed fix (you can only unlearn level1 talents) is the best solution I've heard. Respec was added to give people a chance to try out skills - scaling differs between skills, and some descriptions are a bit vague. Just 1 point in a skill lets you do that, the tooltip will reveal how much is gained on next levels.

But what does it solve ? People having wildcard 3 generic points. What was meant as an accessibility feature, and not really just for newbies (the game has tons of talents and it takes a lot of time to try them all. You don't want to start a new character to try a new skill) became in essence an additional inventory slot.

Saying "many builds need it" is a Texas Sharpshooter fallacy - shoot the broad side of the barn first, paint bullseyes around them. "By exploiting the virtual inventory slot, I managed to build a mindstar ghoul/temporal warden without spending any points for real". If the class or race is especially hard to play, the problem is not with respec system, but with the race or class. The race/class should be rebalanced, then it won't matter that you can only unlearn if you have 1 point in a skill.

This looks like a situation where 90% of players who aren't getting unreasonable use out of the system, would be penalised by something to block the 10% of players, who can just cheat in any number of other methods anyway.

Two wrongs don't make a right. Just because there are other ways to cheese and exploit doesn't mean this one shouldn't be fixed. Then, fix the other one. It's like saying it's okay to smoke cigarettes, because a brick might fall from the roof and kill you, or that it's okay to break a window in an abandoned house because it already has some broken windows.

ToME4 has many similarities to ADOM, has many things that can be cheesed, supports startscumming, etc. It doesn't surprise me it attracts gamers that love exploits. It doesn't particularly care about players not boring themselves (you can sell to shops, interface improvements have to be unlocked).

[Crim, The Red Thunder]

But you can't SEE scaling form talent level 1. Some talents don't even reveal all there scaling on level 2, so even the preview doesn't work there. Some don't improve parts of there aspect until talent level 4. (The bulwark blocking talent extending counterstrike debuffs, for example.)

Not being able to change after 1 point is a solution, but not the right one. You are still unfairly penalizing legitimate use. Is there really a problem here at ALL other then the 5 point juggle?

[b0rsuk]

Yes, tooltips could be improved. I understand they used to be worse.

Good point about some talents not having uniform scaling - for example Ghoul Rot creates ghoul if you kill a rotting enemy, but this ability is added at 5/5 talent level. I have no clue how useful this will turn out, how strong the ghouls will be, etc.

Unlearn at level up fixes tactical juggling, but not strategic juggling (for example, put 3 points into Combat Accuracy and/or Perfect Strike prior to fighting Subject Z). Unlearn at world map only has the same issue, AND it makes unlearning for legitimate users (who just want to try something out) more annoying.

[EatThisShoe]

I think the best solution is the one which changes the current system the least for people who were not exploiting it. Things like only unlearning talents at level 1 will impact a lot of people who were perfectly happy to use the current system without exploiting it. Crim's suggestion of simply needing all talents off cooldown is not perfect, but it has basically no impact if you weren't abusing the current system, while it does quite successfully curb the most egregious abuses.

I personally don't care about people exploiting this system, it doesn't really impact me any more than save scumming or whatever else. I don't want to see the system that I like as it is, changed in a way that does impact me in order to punish some exploits that don't impact me.

[minmay]

But you can't SEE scaling form talent level 1. Some talents don't even reveal all there scaling on level 2, so even the preview doesn't work there. Some don't improve parts of there aspect until talent level 4. (The bulwark blocking talent extending counterstrike debuffs, for example.)

So unlearn the last four level 1 talents, and put them on the new talent. Now you can see the tooltip all the way up to 5.
I never suggested changing the number of unlearnable talent points.

edit: looks like you are prevented from even attempting to unlearn talents that are earlier in a tree than other known talents, so that would need to be changed, but it's an absolutely trivial change to do with no ill effects and is even more consistent with what happens with stat requirements.

[Doctornull]

I think the best solution is the one which changes the current system the least for people who were not exploiting it. Things like only unlearning talents at level 1 will impact a lot of people who were perfectly happy to use the current system without exploiting it. Crim's suggestion of simply needing all talents off cooldown is not perfect, but it has basically no impact if you weren't abusing the current system, while it does quite successfully curb the most egregious abuses.

I personally don't care about people exploiting this system, it doesn't really impact me any more than save scumming or whatever else. I don't want to see the system that I like as it is, changed in a way that does impact me in order to punish some exploits that don't impact me.

Agree, let's optimize the experience for people who aren't exploiting the system.

Maybe add an achievement ("Steady Hand" - level 10 / 20 / etc. with no juggling), so competitive people will be tempted to deliberately NOT exploit either tactical or strategic juggling.

[Atarlost]

On the full respec idea, what about allowing that from the eidolon? That automatically keeps it out of roguelike and severely limits the availability for adventurer mode.

[SageAcrin]

Well, if it required dying to reach, that cost is certainly harmless enough...

[donkatsu]

On the full respec idea, what about allowing that from the eidolon? That automatically keeps it out of roguelike and severely limits the availability for adventurer mode.

This is actually brilliant.

[Doctornull]

On the full respec idea, what about allowing that from the eidolon? That automatically keeps it out of roguelike and severely limits the availability for adventurer mode.

That is a great idea.

Spending some quality time with the Eidolon is certainly among the times when I wish I could respec.

[morganp]

Whoa. Reincarnation.

I like it.