respecing.

edit: NVM - saw the date of the OP, old post.

"

didii wrote:

I do want respec in this game, but not an entire respec. Like GGG says that people are picking skills on short term base is correct. If you are going to defeat a fire boss, you could then quickly respec your skills to an all cold damage and later on to be respeced again to something similar. This is were you lose interest in your character because of the lack in depth.

I however plead for single skill respecs. 1 or 2 free and the rest with a very rare item. This keeps the game balanced.

Also: Exploring character builds.. One of the most fun things in games is that you can keep discovering new things and most commonly those new things are items. Why not (passive) skills?

If however total respec comes in the game I would price it, since it's a free to play.

Example of 'respec for a boss' of which I think they are trying to minimize (but something I did recently).

- was in Ruthless with an AoF build, was having a hard time with a boss that was killing me with cold damage.
- Unspeced AoF
- Killed boss easily
- Respeced AoF, continued to own things w/o a care in the world

I know AoF is getting nixed in the next patch, but those types of situations shouldn't be easily dooable. Each type of build should have a counter-situation that makes things difficult. They might do very well with X type of enemy, but very poorly with Y - your choices should have benefits and consequences.

Being able to do drastic respecs on the fly removes that.

About the only thing I would argue is that at some point in Act 2, on the first difficulty only - is allowing for a full respec. It seems like for many new players by time they hit their mid/late 20s they finally have a grasp of the skill tree / how they want to spec their character, and at this point in the game they are probably not quite hooked enough to want to re-roll just yet to correct any major mistakes.

Make it so they must use the respec (if at all) before entering Act 3 (or the next difficulty as the case is now) or they lose the option to once they move on.

Two questions. Do you like killing challenging monsters in this type of game for hours on hours on end at maximum level (Or outleveling the content enough where you might as well be maximum level) looting and having a genuinely good time?

Quite frankly you need to answer yes for this type of game to be the type of game for you.

Literally, you can not be a fan of this genre without the above being true because this game would then lack replayability for you. Or you would fall into the player category of only finishing the story, and never pick up the game again.

Now for those who answered yes to the above. How many of you like to re level your character from scratch for messing up your build, or trying an entirely new build.

See this is where it gets tricky. To play the game for hundreds of hours and keep playing it long after you hit maximum level, the first question answered must always be answered yes. If you can't continue on enjoying the game at maximum level, killing baddies for hours on end, and looting, then this is not a long term game for you, and you are only lying to yourself by saying it is.

As in all of us who enjoy this genre will answer yes to the first question, we like killing the monsters at maximum level seeking loot with our chosen build. The second question however is not exclusively required to be answered yes or no to make the answer to the first question answered true or false. You have to answer yes to the first question to be a long time player of this game, you do not have to answer yes or no to the second question however to make the first answer you give any less true or false.

If to be a long time player of this type of game you must answer yes to the first one, but not the other, then tell me, why do you require players to restart from level 1 when they want to try a new build.

This game wants players who can honestly answer yes to the first question. This game wants you to play for hours on end long after you reach the maximum level. This game does not need you to restart the game, this game needs you to keep playing the game after you reach the "End Game".

So why is it people insist that restarting the game from level 1 is the only way to keep this game "replayable" because I guarantee you, if you can't answer yes to question number 1, this game is not for you.

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Ultreos wrote:

Do you like killing challenging monsters in this type of game for hours on hours on end at maximum level (Or outleveling the content enough where you might as well be maximum level) looting and having a genuinely good time?

Quite frankly you need to answer yes for this type of game to be the type of game for you.

False.

Believe it or not, some people actually do play for the journey more than the destination (you might not hear from them because they're off leveling another new character, and thus aren't in Merciless default chat yet). I happen to be one of those people.

Now, that said, they do want killing enemies at high levels to be enjoyable and challenging (the two are generally linked, at that). One's passive skill setup is part of that, and figuring out how to optimize it - or get to "good enough for cheap enough" - can be a minigame of its own.
Especially "good enough for cheap enough", at that, but you never really hear the powergamers talk about it.

If you do not like killing monsters at the highest level, killing and looting for hours on end then you are not a long term player to this game.

Fact.

Edit: Also by saying false you are proving that you do not enjoy the full content this game has to offer, thus you are only in it for a limited time.

I also might add that even without being forced to restart your character from the ground up every time, you would be allowed to restart the characters whenever you so desire, so if you truly did only enjoy the journey it is not as though you are effected.

You have to keep in mind that GGG is selling additional character slots, so it should be obvious why they are reluctant to add a full respec option to the game (on top of the abuse issues it presents).

I think the quests that reward you with respec points should just give significantly more points on normal difficulty, three to five each instead of two. As of v9.9, that would mean upwards of fifteen respec points available in Act II, which should be plenty for even the most careless players.

They should also really add some form of integration of this site's passive skill tree planner into the game to make things a little easier. I think the devs have mentioned something about that before.

"

Ultreos wrote:

If you do not like killing monsters at the highest level, killing and looting for hours on end then you are not a long term player to this game.

Fact.

Edit: Also by saying false you are proving that you do not enjoy the full content this game has to offer, thus you are only in it for a limited time.

Again, false.

You're tacking on the "at the highest level" unnecessarily. Stop assuming players will play "no more than X characters".
Also, the "on end" part of "for hours on end" is unnecessary. I'm pretty sure this game can also be enjoyed in hour-long increments (half-hours might be pushing it at present, given the distance between waypoints).

"

Ultreos wrote:

If you do not like killing monsters at the highest level, killing and looting for hours on end then you are not a long term player to this game.

Fact.

I was playing Diablo 2 for years..many many years ...yet ..I was never into these Meph, Diablo or Baal runs ..or some uber farming..when I hit lvl 90 or so..I just rerolled new character. I played literally over hundred characters over these years..just saying

One thing I was thinking today - what about a system that lets you start a new character that is at X% of the level of your current max-level character. - Still keep the old character there.

I don't mind re-leveling characters, in fact I probably find about lvl 15-40 to be the funnest time in the game for me.

I tend to enjoy the journy more than the destination, and endless farming for incremental improvements of gear isn't much my thing. At the same time, the initial few levels I find tedius.

But say, if I could start a character that began at I dunno, 30% of the level of my current max character - by-passing those first few levels would make the re-starting for me that much more enjoyable.

Access to gear / skills / harder areas starts off at the 'fun' part for me. So at lvl 100, you could roll a new character starting at lvl 30, a character in the high 50s/low 60s - starting characters in their mid/late teens.

If I could jump-in at lvl 20 from the get go, I'd be more inclined to re-roll new characters, try odd-ball builds/etc but not compeltly throw off the balance or flow of the game.

Maybe add an option to 'Retire' a character, and start a new character at a higher level. Say the 'Mentor' - starts at 30% of the level of your max-level character, but if you retire a character - the next one you create starts at 70% of the level of the character you retire. So if you had a lvl 100 character - you could retire him, and start a new one at lvl 70 - but give up your retired one in the process.

"

ManiaCCC wrote:

"

Ultreos wrote:

If you do not like killing monsters at the highest level, killing and looting for hours on end then you are not a long term player to this game.

Fact.

I was playing Diablo 2 for years..many many years ...yet ..I was never into these Meph, Diablo or Baal runs ..or some uber farming..when I hit lvl 90 or so..I just rerolled new character. I played literally over hundred characters over these years..just saying

*brofists*

Although boss runs and Uber runs had their uniqueness about them a couple times, after running them to level a couple characters, I found it wasn't as fun as other high monster-level places, where I knew there'd be a different experience, a different ending each time.

As for respeccing, just leave it to the orbs and maybe make a couple quests that could give around 25% of the skill points back each difficulty so that by the end of Merciless, you can change your build if you so desire.