Hi all i had just a Brainfart, and i don't know if it belongs here
What if you could rotate the Skilltree.
The possitions of the Classes and Ascendency's stay but you could rotate the tree to make let's say an INT based Duelist or an Shadow specialized for an Axe/Staff.
(maybe small changes, Attack/spell DMG just DMG / Armour/Evasion/ES to Defences / Hits witch Attacks -> Hits)
Scion would not really change but there would surely be other funny combinations people could figure out.
So that was my Idea that i had to write down.
Let me know what you think about it and which combinations just pop up in your mind.
you can try wolcen it is in here.
But poe skill isnt designed with this intent and if they wanted to do something like this they'll have to make it again from 0 which is a big work for not much in return.
To vanquish without perils is to triumph without glory.
Think they want the characters to be associated with different playstyles... but not completely restricted to them. Moving them around would counteract that design.
The rotating tree gimmick of Wolcen seemed cool at first but you never needed to actually use it. You'd always just keep it in one configuration. Wolcen's tree was pretty funny in that you'd have some damage notables that gave 0.1% more damage and some damage notables that gave 200% more damage. No one ever even tested anything they just threw random numbers into the tree and released the game live.
Years back I proposed turning PoE's 2D skill tree into a rotatable sphere, with connections between the Duelist's south and the witch's north, for example, or even with an entire, new hemisphere on the back side (and room for new classes), either form allowing circumnavigation of the whole. The skill tree was much simpler in those days, of course, but imagine if it had evolved along those lines all this time... Ah, I can dream, anyway. =^[.]^=
So this idea was kinda brought on by how people are pointing out how D4 seems to be trying to implement their own version of the PoE map system with their new Dungeon Keys. I don't mind cross-pollination of ideas from other ARPGs tbh, so I've no issues with them trying this. But what if PoE took some ideas from its competitors too. With that in mind, this idea is inspired by the rotatable passive tree used in Wolcen (but, unlike with the D4 take, it goes much further).
Wheels within Wheels
For anyone not familiar with Wolcen, its passive tree is basically a set of concentric circles. You start at the center to allocate points until you reach the next circle. However, the circles can be rotated! So the last node in your inner circle can actually connect to a variety of different nodes in different parts of the next concentric circle. You can see what it looks like here - https://wolcen.dev/ However, in Wolcen there's only one set of circles. So what if...?
Wheels across Wheels
In Wolcen, all characters start at the centre of that set of circles, albeit with a different set of initial passive nodes available to them. In PoE of course our chars actually start in different sections of the passive tree. But what if there's more than one set of concentric circles? So basically Ranger would start at the center of one set of concentric circles with a couple of initial Ranger-like passive points to reach the next. This can then be rotated to start focusing on more specific Ranger-like builds (bows, 1-handers, flasks, etc.), leading to maybe a third final one with even more variety. But once you've made your way to the outer edge of that final set of Ranger wheels, depending on where you are on the overall passive map, you can connect to other (probably smaller i.e. less circles) passive wheels as you make your way across the passive map. These circles are rotatable too, which means you have a pick of what kind of nodes you'd like to connect to, but that'd also mean you have more flexibility as to which direction across the map you want to make your way to (as you can always rotate to change direction at every wheel you reach). Eventually, just like now, you'd be able to make your way to the bigger concentric wheels of each of the other starting classes (as well as any Keystones sprinkled across the map).
This also makes Jewels really interesting, as those with a radius affecting other passives could now have a variety of different types of nodes that they could possibly affect, depending on how you rotate the wheels their influence reaches to. But keep in mind that you're still making a connected series of nodes across the passive map, so if you rotate any circles earlier in your chain such that it isn't a continuous chain of allocated nodes anymore, all nodes beyond that point will be inactivated (since they no longer connect to your starting point) - no harm done tho, just rotate it back to reactivate.
Obviously, this would completely trash any pre-4.0 passive builds, but that's inherent to any total overhaul of the passive tree. You should still be able to remake all those builds anew with the new system, as I haven't discussed actually changing any of the nodes themselves. And it should open up all sorts of new paths and potential builds as the passive tree is now even more customizable. The downside is that it's also a lot more complex, but hey isn't complex ARPG building what you're here for anyway? Anyhoo, thoughts? :)
Last edited by Exile009 on Mar 7, 2021, 1:36:34 AM
so you saw something in other game and now think that is "cool" and show it as you made that up... #facepalm
there is a reason why no one is playing wolcen anymore...
The reason why no one is playing Wolcen has nothing to do with it using a rotatable passive tree. Besides it launching as a buggy mess, wrt the passive tree the problem people pointed out is that the rotation mechanic isn't really used for anything since the majority of the nodes are basic and easily reached without any need for rotation. Obviously, no one is pushing for uninspired passive nodes or for the rotation to be irrelevant. That doesn't in any way mean that having a rotatable passive tree is inherently bad.
