Talents & Masteries

[madmonk]

Talents & Masteries

From some original thoughts by Final Master here

The original concept:

Rather like the Chinese Martial Arts systems, skills were split up into schools. You could then as a player develop individual skill (RTL - Raw Talent Level) in a particular discipline or talent in the School or increase your Mastery (SMM - School Mastery Multiplier) in the entire school.

Each talent and Mastery of a School went up as far as you liked without limit to the number of talent levels or School multipliers.

For instance you could have an RTL of 1 in each Talent in a School. If your SMM is also 1 this would give an effective multiplier of 1. If your SMM is 2 then your multiplier would be 2 and so on. So you could have an RTL of 5 points in a particular Talent in a school, which would then be multiplied by the SMM to arrrive at your ETL (Effective Talent Level) multiplier for a particular talent.

The point being that in my original concept, you could develop School and Talent quite freely whenever you went up a level. It also meant that we would always use the ETL to show the true multiplier for any discipline.

Opening up a new school could only be done at staged intervals (I quite like the 10, 20, etc gap currently)

When an RTL description indicates that a given effect comes in to play, this effect should be granted when the RTL is achieved and not at the ETL calculation.

What is in place:

Talents have been put into place. Talents have a limit and this is very understandable, for most talents 5 levels is fine although I would argue that 10 might be better but that is one of game balance and as presently constructed it works well. Talents have associated effects which come into use at certain levels - this too is fine and I don't have a problem with it except that players are gaining effects when they should not... (See below)

Schools have been put in place. Currently running from a Mastery multiplier of 0.7 to 1.3. Again this works well in the current system, although here again I would argue that we have artificial constraints on how often we can raise the SMM.

Effects at a given level.

So how do I get a given effect? Consider the following situation we have an RTL of 4 and an SMM of 1.3 this gives an ETL of 5.2. Currently my understanding is that if you have an ETL of 5.2 you will get the given effect. I would argue that this is incorrect, it gives players the ability to only raise a talent to level 4 and with an appropriate SMM gain a given effect - this is cheap in my opinion. It also gives a considerable bonus to those schools who start with an 1.3 multiplier.

What can we do?

Adjust Schools as follows:

Group Schools into core and periferal schools
Core Schools have a starting SMM of 1.0
Periferal Schools have a starting SMM of 0.7

Leave the opening up of new schools that is currently in play alone (so you only get the new school at CL 10, 20, etc, etc). Leave also the ability to pick up new schools in other ways (quests, training etc). Remember all of these schools start as periferal.

Allow the SMM to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points there rather than in a given talent. Consideration should be given to the amount that the SMM is increased by, though I quite like the .1 increase currently in play. Have no limit on the maximum SMM...

Adjust Talents as follows:

Allow the RTL to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points in a given talent. Have no limit on the maximum RTL... Display the ETL at all levels. This means that you could have a one-shot wonder player, say an ArchMage who invests everything into Manathrust...
If an RTL indicates an effect comes in to play at a certain level, then it will be granted at the RTL point rather then the ETL point. This means that players who have Phase Door as a peripheral school talent are not penalised by having a low SMM.

This could mean that some talents may have to be adjusted (Riposte is an obvious one).

Consideration should also be given to increasing the amount of points that can be allocated by 1 point. If these proposals go into effect then we could end up severely point starved!

Thoughts?

[yufra]

So how do I get a given effect? Consider the following situation we have an RTL of 4 and an SMM of 1.3 this gives an ETL of 5.2. Currently my understanding is that if you have an ETL of 5.2 you will get the given effect. I would argue that this is incorrect, it gives players the ability to only raise a talent to level 4 and with an appropriate SMM gain a given effect - this is cheap in my opinion. It also gives a considerable bonus to those schools who start with an 1.3 multiplier.

I always thought this made sense. Someone who is naturally adept at a certain skill group would have to spend less time in it to get as good results (so higher numerical results as well as quicker access to the special abilities of a talent). I do think this should be done in a way to make the fifth RTL still useful, though.

Adjust Schools as follows:

Group Schools into core and periferal schools
Core Schools have a starting SMM of 1.0
Periferal Schools have a starting SMM of 0.7

I wouldn't mind this, although I think the shift is an artificial one. What matters is the difference of SMM levels and whether the extra effects are triggered on ETL or RTL.

Adjust Talents as follows:

Allow the RTL to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points in a given talent. Have no limit on the maximum RTL... Display the ETL at all levels. This means that you could have a one-shot wonder player, say an ArchMage who invests everything into Manathrust...
If an RTL indicates an effect comes in to play at a certain level, then it will be granted at the RTL point rather then the ETL point. This means that players who have Phase Door as a peripheral school talent are not penalised by having a low SMM.

This could mean that some talents may have to be adjusted (Riposte is an obvious one).

Again, I am not terribly bothered by low SMM not having access to the higher ETL effects of specific talents. I like that classes are different and even if there is some talent overlap they cannot be exactly the same.

[edge2054]

Allow the RTL to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points in a given talent. Have no limit on the maximum RTL... Display the ETL at all levels. This means that you could have a one-shot wonder player, say an ArchMage who invests everything into Manathrust...

This makes some talents impossible to balance.

Take for instance Avoid Fate (not in the game yet but it's still a perfect example).

Code: Select all

    if self:knowTalent(self.T_AVOID_FATE) then
        local af = .6 - (self:getTalentLevel(self.T_AVOID_FATE)/20)
        print ("af->", af)
        local av = self.max_life * af
        if value >= self.life and self.life >= av then
            value = self.life - 1
            game.logSeen(self, "%s has avoided a fatal blow!!", self.name:capitalize())
        end
    end

For those that can't read that if your hit points are above 55% - 10% of your maximum (at tl rank 1 and tl 10 respectfully) any single attack that takes the rest of your hit points instead takes all but one of your hit points.

If this talent somehow got pushed up to rank 12 the player would become unkillable (if they ever do go that high I'll have to rebalance the ability or add a hard cap on it).

Granted we could put a cap on it but that kinda defeats the point of being able to put infinite points into it.

Another excellent example is Manathrust. Sure pushing Manathrust up to tl 20 sounds like a decent idea but it would seriously hamper game balance. Arcane damage is generally unresistible. So.. do we make Arcane resistible so that Manathrust isn't such a great one trick pony? If we do then what happens to talents like Time Shield that rely on the fact that it's unresistible to apply a dot back on the player.

Anyway I like the structure you're proposing. It might be interesting in a module but I think the Tome module is well underway and that things work just fine as they stand. Revamping (and rebalancing) every talent in the game sounds like a massive under taking and I don't think it'd be worth the effort.

[madmonk]

[Anyway I like the structure you're proposing. It might be interesting in a module but I think the Tome module is well underway and that things work just fine as they stand. Revamping (and rebalancing) every talent in the game sounds like a massive under taking and I don't think it'd be worth the effort.

I agree, and the person I wanted to answer this has not.

Hey, FM where are you?

[Final Master]

Man... this is probably going to turn out to be quite a long post...

Okay, first things first. HURRAH! I'm not the only one that feels that the talent system is a bit skewered now with the vast amount of talent classes we have now.

I'll be quoting a lot now.

For instance you could have an RTL of 1 in each Talent in a School. If your SMM is also 1 this would give an effective multiplier of 1. If your SMM is 2 then your multiplier would be 2 and so on. So you could have an RTL of 5 points in a particular Talent in a school, which would then be multiplied by the SMM to arrrive at your ETL (Effective Talent Level) multiplier for a particular talent.

I like this as it's in the game now, and I don't think it should be changed (as you are not proposing a change to his either, yay!). Further down however, I do have some issues that should be addressed.

What is in place:
Schools have been put in place. Currently running from a Mastery multiplier of 0.7 to 1.3. Again this works well in the current system, although here again I would argue that we have artificial constraints on how often we can raise the SMM.

It actually runs up to 1.4 with the cryo/pyromancer specialty school. And, it is an artificial constraint, however a necessary one as without the constraints over all four talents, you COULD have the one shot wonder you bring up later. I'll discuss that further down.

Effects at a given level:
So how do I get a given effect? Consider the following situation we have an RTL of 4 and an SMM of 1.3 this gives an ETL of 5.2. Currently my understanding is that if you have an ETL of 5.2 you will get the given effect. I would argue that this is incorrect, it gives players the ability to only raise a talent to level 4 and with an appropriate SMM gain a given effect - this is cheap in my opinion. It also gives a considerable bonus to those schools who start with an 1.3 multiplier.

I agree that this really should be changed. The idea that your overall mastery of all talents in the category directly effects the availability of any bonus abilities is wrong. School mastery levels should show the difference in the various classes abilities (flavor) in the various talents of survival. They should also solely represent the power of the individual talents. Just because you are a 'rogue' could mean you are really good at what you know, but NOT that you know absolutely every trick to your profession. Raw talent level should be used to judge the availability of bonus effects, such as the blinding benefit of Illumination at level 3.

Group Schools into core and periferal schools
Core Schools have a starting SMM of 1.0
Periferal Schools have a starting SMM of 0.7

I assume that this is referring to the currently used Class (Core) and Generic (Periferal) terms used in the game? If so, we don't need the name change I believe, and the direct reduction of mastery levels because it is a class or generic talent tree shouldn't happen. IF the talent trees were adjusted to where certain talent trees were class for them, but generic to another, THEN I can see this making more sense. The problem with a flat rate here, is the last couple of sentences in the previous section. It destroys the flavor, and kind of rocks balance a bit too hard. I also don't see altered talent trees based on class (the class for one generic for another bit) happening any time soon, if ever, so again, I wouldn't suggest a change like this.

Leave the opening up of new schools that is currently in play alone (so you only get the new school at CL 10, 20, etc, etc). Leave also the ability to pick up new schools in other ways (quests, training etc). Remember all of these schools start as periferal.

Agreed completely. This part works beautifully and I hope it stays this way and gets even more content added later.

Allow the SMM to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points there rather than in a given talent. Consideration should be given to the amount that the SMM is increased by, though I quite like the .1 increase currently in play. Have no limit on the maximum SMM...

Don't agree with at all. Raising the school mastery by using class/generic talent points (even at an increased rate) would DESTROY the 'reqirement x' bit to raising talents. If I wanted to, I could put 1 point into stone skin, strike, ect then convert all my points every level to the earth mastery. It may be a small effect compared to manually raising the talent directly, but end the end it's a bargain; raising 4 talents for the price of 1 (or 2, 3...). However, I do also like that when you use a category point that it raises the mastery by a full 0.10 points. It's a good number, keep it.

Adjust Talents as follows:
Allow the RTL to be increased every level by players choosing to spend talent points in a given talent. Have no limit on the maximum RTL... Display the ETL at all levels. This means that you could have a one-shot wonder player, say an ArchMage who invests everything into Manathrust...
If an RTL indicates an effect comes in to play at a certain level, then it will be granted at the RTL point rather then the ETL point. This means that players who have Phase Door as a peripheral school talent are not penalised by having a low SMM.

This could mean that some talents may have to be adjusted (Riposte is an obvious one).

Consideration should also be given to increasing the amount of points that can be allocated by 1 point. If these proposals go into effect then we could end up severely point starved!

Passively active talents would need serious reworking and it would be a nightmare to check all the additional math for such a feat. I wouldn't want to impose that on anyone, and I think that it isn't really needed. Of course though, if someone wants to try it, I'll support em as much as I can, because if ti COULD be implemented, it would be really cool I think.

I already think that we are a bit starved on generic and category talent points. Currently the allocation of points are: 3 Category, 61 Class, 40 Generic with a bonus of 2 class and 1 generic if you beat a certain sandy boss. I say keep a generic talent point available at the 5 level interval level ups, and still allow the 2 class points at these levels. This would give 10 more generic points (say hello weapon focus), still let class points be more dominant (and thus the class keeps in more with it's theme), and simply allow a good number of classes to really be capable of surviving well.

An example: Fighter (Generic Talents Only)
Massive Armor - 5
Health - 5
Weapon Focus - 9
Weapon Damage - 10
Trap Detection - 5
Heightened Senses - 5
Disengage - 1

That may be how a level 50 fighter would sit right now. He's got his health, his accuracy and damage, his defense, trap awareness and a possible escape plan if stuff doesn't work out. If 10 more generic points were available, I could see points in Trap Disarming, more in Disengage, and possibly points in the Slime talent tree, maybe even the Dirty Fighting tree. This would allow for broader, better rounded builds that may not need to completely max out certain talents (weapon focus/trap detection) because they have abilities they otherwise wouldn't have the points to dump into them.


Now, the one shot wonder idea. I really think that this isn't such a good idea. For one, talent use system (aka cooldowns) would destroy the plausibility of a build around a single talent (even something like Inferno). I don't think the ability to create a character that is capable of only 1 trick should be possible or implemented because it's simply not realistic in the game lore, nor is it a realistic character type to play. Also, it would require even more changes to the system than what I and others have already proposed, on it's own. As much as I love lightning, chain lightning and thunderstorm, and the fact that I usually make my archmages uninsulated transformers on legs, I don't want to sit there and just dump everything I can into those three talents and it's mastery every level, because it wouldn't feel right, and would be unbalanced (sorry, I'm starting to let my mind wander to other things as I'm typing this now. I'll add more and better arguments later)

Alright, without reading through everything for a third time and the fact that I'm being distracted, I think I'll leave it at this for now. I'll add in my own ideas later.

Thanks for the thread, and I do actually like some of your ideas very much madmonk.

FM

[yufra]

I agree that this really should be changed. The idea that your overall mastery of all talents in the category directly effects the availability of any bonus abilities is wrong. School mastery levels should show the difference in the various classes abilities (flavor) in the various talents of survival. They should also solely represent the power of the individual talents. Just because you are a 'rogue' could mean you are really good at what you know, but NOT that you know absolutely every trick to your profession. Raw talent level should be used to judge the availability of bonus effects, such as the blinding benefit of Illumination at level 3.

I see, so you and potentially madmonk want effects to scale off of RTL because you see the masteries as more flavor (a little more damage here, a little less there) than differences in skill. Fair enough.

I assume that this is referring to the currently used Class (Core) and Generic (Periferal) terms used in the game? If so, we don't need the name change I believe, and the direct reduction of mastery levels because it is a class or generic talent tree shouldn't happen. IF the talent trees were adjusted to where certain talent trees were class for them, but generic to another, THEN I can see this making more sense. The problem with a flat rate here, is the last couple of sentences in the previous section. It destroys the flavor, and kind of rocks balance a bit too hard. I also don't see altered talent trees based on class (the class for one generic for another bit) happening any time soon, if ever, so again, I wouldn't suggest a change like this.

I think a bit of nomenclature is in order. Just as there are races (human) and sub-races (breeman or dunadan) there are classes (mage) and sub-classes (archmage, pyromancer, etc). I have assumed that class talents are limited to a specific class and the hybrids of that class, so for example the the Spell/Fire category is only available to the mage class and the hybrid arcane blade subclass. That doesn't mean that for a specific subclass a Class category could be considered peripheral and this can be reflected by a lower relative mastery. Generic categories are those categories that multiple classes have access to and use, either from birth or through escort quests. That is at least how I think about it, and appears to be supported by the distribution of generic/class trees.

Don't agree with at all. Raising the school mastery by using class/generic talent points (even at an increased rate) would DESTROY the 'reqirement x' bit to raising talents. If I wanted to, I could put 1 point into stone skin, strike, ect then convert all my points every level to the earth mastery. It may be a small effect compared to manually raising the talent directly, but end the end it's a bargain; raising 4 talents for the price of 1 (or 2, 3...). However, I do also like that when you use a category point that it raises the mastery by a full 0.10 points. It's a good number, keep it.

Agreed.

Passively active talents would need serious reworking and it would be a nightmare to check all the additional math for such a feat. I wouldn't want to impose that on anyone, and I think that it isn't really needed. Of course though, if someone wants to try it, I'll support em as much as I can, because if ti COULD be implemented, it would be really cool I think.

This might actually be easier than you think. Talents are generally checked with either the knowTalent, getTalentLevel or getTalentLevelRaw functions defined in engine/interface/ActorTalent.lua. Both knowTalent and getTalentLevel call getTalentLevelRaw, so it would be fairly straight-forward to put a check for canLearnTalent (the function that compares stats/level/talent prerequisites) there. For example, a getTalentLevelRawReq function could be introduced:

Code: Select all

function _M:getTalentLevelRawReq(id)
	if type(id) == "table" then id = id.id end
	local raw_level = self:getTalentLevelRaw(id)
	local offset = 0
    local t = self.talents_def[id]
	-- Keep reducing the raw talent level until the requirements are met
	while (raw_level + offset > 0) and not self:canLearnTalent(t, offset) do
	    offset = offset - 1
        end
	return raw_level + offset
end

Then change the calls to self:getTalentLevelRaw to self:getTalentLevelRawReq in the knowTalent and getTalentLevel functions (directly modifying getTalentLevelRaw introduces a stack overflow since canLearnTalent calls getTalentLevelRaw). Now talents would reduce in raw talent level to 0 based on failed requirements. I have tested this code by artificially raising strength, grabbing the heavy armour training and putting on some mail armour. Then I lower the strength, take the armour off and try to put it back on, which fails. This particular example highlights a different bug, which is what if stats/talents change while wearing an item, but I will leave that be for now. I have shown this code to DG and his concern is the effect on performance that is code will cause, so for all of those interested please modify your engine/interface/ActorTalent.lua code and report what type of performance you get. Thanks!

I already think that we are a bit starved on generic and category talent points. Currently the allocation of points are: 3 Category, 61 Class, 40 Generic with a bonus of 2 class and 1 generic if you beat a certain sandy boss. I say keep a generic talent point available at the 5 level interval level ups, and still allow the 2 class points at these levels. This would give 10 more generic points (say hello weapon focus), still let class points be more dominant (and thus the class keeps in more with it's theme), and simply allow a good number of classes to really be capable of surviving well.

That may be how a level 50 fighter would sit right now. He's got his health, his accuracy and damage, his defense, trap awareness and a possible escape plan if stuff doesn't work out. If 10 more generic points were available, I could see points in Trap Disarming, more in Disengage, and possibly points in the Slime talent tree, maybe even the Dirty Fighting tree. This would allow for broader, better rounded builds that may not need to completely max out certain talents (weapon focus/trap detection) because they have abilities they otherwise wouldn't have the points to dump into them.

I don't know, this may be a difference in preference again. I think the starvation of talent points forces lvl 50 characters to be different rather than well-rounded, and makes the game more enjoyable in designing a specific character. For example, I recently reached the end game for the first time with an archmage built on invisibility. The build was over powerful for the majority of the game, but the end game gobbled me up and spit me out. If I had more talent points I would have been able to diversify more, true, but does that result in less diversity of lvl 50 characters? I don't think characters should become more and more similar at the end of the game, even though they need to get the same things (stun immunity, elemental resistance, etc) to succeed. Thoughts?

Now, the one shot wonder idea. I really think that this isn't such a good idea. For one, talent use system (aka cooldowns) would destroy the plausibility of a build around a single talent (even something like Inferno). I don't think the ability to create a character that is capable of only 1 trick should be possible or implemented because it's simply not realistic in the game lore, nor is it a realistic character type to play. Also, it would require even more changes to the system than what I and others have already proposed, on it's own. As much as I love lightning, chain lightning and thunderstorm, and the fact that I usually make my archmages uninsulated transformers on legs, I don't want to sit there and just dump everything I can into those three talents and it's mastery every level, because it wouldn't feel right, and would be unbalanced (sorry, I'm starting to let my mind wander to other things as I'm typing this now. I'll add more and better arguments later)

I agree, and the typical balance for the one-shot wonder is encountering a tough monster that is completely resistant to your one-shot. As I think Edge pointed out earlier, arcane damage is the exception to this rule, but the archmage could theoretically be built on a maxed manathrust and targeted phase door (to effectively remove the cooldown).

Thanks for the thread, and I do actually like some of your ideas very much madmonk.

Heartily agreed, thank you both madmonk and FM. Although I don't agree with all the points you bring up, the discussion forces me to consider why I don't and that can never be a bad thing.

[madmonk]

Heartily agreed, thank you both madmonk and FM. Although I don't agree with all the points you bring up, the discussion forces me to consider why I don't and that can never be a bad thing.

Thank you, and I agree discussion is never a bad thing.

As to the one-shot wonder you mention (that I mentioned) the cooldown period takes care of that to a large extent. I usually run with 3 local one-shots and one area effect spell for an Archmage and it generally suffices - at least to the end game by which time I have more options...

For development point starvation currently I don't believe it is an issue, but IF AND ONLY IF you implement the ability to allocate points into SMM on a per level basis then due consideration should be taken to implement additional points for the player to allocate. How many extra points would be an interesting topic to explore.

You are missing an important point around allocating 1 point per talent and raising SMM, yes this would work, but you would not gain any of the extra effects, these extra effects being granted on Raw Talent Level only. So to achieve a targeted Phase Door you have to have an RTL of 5. An ETL of 5 does not work for this purpose.

Yes, nomenclature is a good thing, so Core = Specific and Peripheral - Generic, what passes for my brain had a seizure at that moment...

In the main my original idea has largely been implemented and what is humbling and gratifying is that it has worked. More importantly even this discussion has revolved around tweaking it rather than a root & branch replacement. Everyone seems to agree it is a good thing that has been done. Hats off to DG for implementing it!!!

[edge2054]

Yufra do I copy that code over something or just drop it in?

[yufra]

Yufra do I copy that code over something or just drop it in?

You need to drop that code into ActorTalents.lua and then change the calls for self:getTalentLevelRaw(id) to self:getTalentLevelRawReq(id) in ActorTalents:knowTalent and ActorTalents:getTalentLevel.

[edge2054]

Maybe I did something wrong but it's not playing well with the resource talents (stamina, positive and negative energy for example). It's not loading any of those. 12b.

[yufra]

Maybe I did something wrong but it's not playing well with the resource talents (stamina, positive and negative energy for example). It's not loading any of those. 12b.

Huh, not your fault at all, I hadn't noticed that. This apparently needs to be added to the base birth descriptor (tome/data/birth/descriptors.lua), right under the body definition for example:

Code: Select all

	talents_types = {
		["base/race"]={true, 0.0},
		["base/class"]={true, 0.0},
	},

Essentially the racial talents and stamina pools are of these talent types, and because these talents are never actually passed to ActorTalents:canLearnTalent the categories were never learned. This fixes that at birth, and if you want to test it on a character that you are already running then you can do the following in the Lua console:

Code: Select all

game.player:learnTalentType("base/race")
game.player:learnTalentType("base/class")

Thanks for catching that Edge.

[Final Master]

So, now that there has been a bit of a discussion on this and it's sort of died down a bit, is there any consensus that has been developed? Are there any direct suggestions we should bring up? I'm not too sure about what this has done.

So... ya?

[Dervis]

I have a slightly different idea regarding this matter:

Split any talent category into 5/5 points mastery:
- Apprentice 0.65
- Adept 1.0
- Expert 1.25
- Master 1.4
- Grandmaster 1.5

Make your class start with Expert, Adept, or Apprentice Level on each tree regarding your preference, add some stat requirements and flavor and it should be ready to rock. I would also limit the talents on each tree on mastery level rather than stats.

For example on the Archmage class you could have the following:
+ Cunning / Survival (apprentice 0.65) 1/5
- Spell / Arcane (Expert 1.25) 3/5
Arcane Power (class) 1/5 - requires apprentice
Manathrust (class) 0/5 - requires adept
Manaflow (class) 0/5 - requires expert
Disruption field (class) 0/5 - requires Master in this category

This would make you choose which 4th level talents you'd really want and even go for 5/5 specialization if you'd so wish. Would also make the Bree-man class bonus more useful.
You could also skip a talent in a category completely if you'd so wish.