What Level Do You Want Respec to Stop?

[Arlian]

To say it reduces replayability is a non-argument. the appeal of replaying the game, should be to replay the game, not because you have to in order to address aspects of your character that you are unhappy with.

It's amazing how you can totally miss the point without even knowing it.

It's amazing how you can leave the target in obliquity without telling them HOW they're oblivious.

It's one thing to tell them they're wrong, but you haven't done the first thing to address WHY.

[Middlemoor]

You want to argue.

I get that. That's cute.

But we've been over it.

One side feels morally justified and the other feels logically justified. I get that. We've been over it.

Look, if you really want to know then look up this 'straw-man argument" the previously addressed poster is fond of pointing at other people.

[gameqb11]

whats so hard about using a respec mod?

Isnt that like "earning" your unlimited respec? so essentially Runic has given us unlimited respec- you just have to "earn it" by downloading a mod. It takes about as much work and time as any in-game quest would be or acquiring 20k in-game gold.

[Middlemoor]

Limited respec is the game.

Unlimited respec is the mod.

Both are legit and people should stop arguein about it.

[TheBuzzSaw]

I still think the game should allow one respec per character. It's a win/win. It allows the player to respec late game (after becoming familiar with the skills) but prevents the whole "one of each character class" abuse that people are so worried about. Allowing respec up to level X is useless. It's the late game where respecs have any value.

[Daniel]

I still think the game should allow one respec per character. It's a win/win. It allows the player to respec late game (after becoming familiar with the skills) but prevents the whole "one of each character class" abuse that people are so worried about. Allowing respec up to level X is useless. It's the late game where respecs have any value.

You are correct about early respecs being useless. I think the devs, who apparently are anti-respec, know that. I'm guessing that the respec up to level X idea is intended for players new to this genre who are learning the game mechanics. That's why I keep saying that a better compromise would be to allow limited respec of recent skill points. That way you can try any skill with one point, and if you don't like it you can take your point back out of that skill. I would find that very useful myself, because often the skill descriptions do not convey how useful the skill actually is. But the reason that respeccers will not get behind that compromise is because what they really want is to be able to put points in lower tier skills as their character starts out, and then be able to remove points from those skills and put them into top tier skills later on. That will result in their characters being as powerful as possible at every stage of their character's development. As it stands now, you are forced to make a choice. You can either have a character who is powerful early on and then struggles later, or you can have a character who struggles early on (because you are saving up skill points) and is more powerful later. For some of us, being forced to make tough choices about skill allocation is an important part of the game that we enjoy. For others, it is a nuisance, and an impediment to making the optimal build. I doubt that any amount of debating will change the way people feel about it.

[DeathByVoid]

I've always thought quite the opposite. I didn't think it cheapened the experience at all, but rather made it fun to play with builds.
Thinking about it now, I see where he is coming from, however I still am hesitant to say I don't like infinite respecs.

[Arlian]

:D You want to argue.

I get that. That's cute.

I've heard the strawman argument, I've also seen this debate drag on for the better part of 12 pages.

The point I was trying to make is twofold:
1) Telling someone they've missed the point doesn't help them FIND the point. If they were oblivious to it before, telling them they were oblivious isn't going to help them.
2) There's so many points being made for and against that I'd be concerned if he was able to tackle more than a handful at a time and should he be able to snoop "the point" from a myriad of potential points that you could've probably demanded or assumed would be rather damn powerful portent. I would be impressed is what I'm saying.

I was asking for clarity of your position, instead you stated that I merely wished to argue. In truth, arguments boil down from a lack of understanding, if I "wish to argue" it's because you haven't made your point clear to me so I have no other position except for the argumentative side.

[UglyPete]

The problem with limited respecs is that abilities change with gear and nothing is going to be balanced all the way through the game. While one skill may work great and give you what you want early game it may not work as well late game with X amount of gear. The same thing goes for late game skills not working til you get X amount of gear. I hate leveling up and picking skills only to find out that my character isn't optimized because the game didn't give me enough information, and I am stuck using the guess and check method creating new characters over and over.

[ace1580]

The problem with limited respecs is that abilities change with gear and nothing is going to be balanced all the way through the game. While one skill may work great and give you what you want early game it may not work as well late game with X amount of gear. The same thing goes for late game skills not working til you get X amount of gear. I hate leveling up and picking skills only to find out that my character isn't optimized because the game didn't give me enough information, and I am stuck using the guess and check method creating new characters over and over.

While i'm all for respecs, this isn't a respec problem, it's a game design problem. All skills should be viable both early and late game. If you find yourself in a situation where the skill you are using just isn't cutting it, it shouldn't be because the skill is poorly designed and is not functional late in the game. I think, just judging from what I've seen in the beta, that this won't be as much of a problem, as i was using the skills i picked up at level 1 as consistent standbys and were generally just as effective as the skills i picked up at level 21.

I think the focus of higher level skills should be a.) focusing on a gameplay style, so the higher up the tree you go, the more you can tune your character to the way you like to play, and b.) dealing with more varied situations. The low level skills should be useful for general use, but you should be busting out the big guns depending on the context of your situation.

For me it's not a matter of "oh crap, all these skills i have are useless", rather, my desire to have respecs is more a "oh crap, i just don't play like i thought i would and my skills aren't complimenting my style"

[Korva]

What level? Never. I'm very firmly in the "Don't like it? Don't do it!" camp, it's no skin off my nose what any other player anywhere does or does not do in his or her game. Whether you play hardcore or softcore, Easy or Elite, modded or unmodded, with or without respecs, with or without cheats, purely SP or purely MP -- nothing makes you a more or less valuable customer, player, or goodness forbid human being.

The only way I can see respecs being bad is if the game was designed around them. If for example boss A is immune to fire and ice, boss B is immune to lightning and physical, boss C needs fast-hitting and thus almost certainly low-damage skills to kill and boss D laughs off all but the biggest hits, and everyone is (or worse: only some classes are) routinely forced to tree-hop and spec-hop to have any real hope of progressing, that would be really, really crappy and put me off the game in no time. But I cannot see Runic making that mistake.

Respeccing does not interfere with replay value, IMNSHO. If replay value is an issue, then it is an issue of tedious or annoying gameplay, especially in the low levels -- probably owing to the toxic "only 'endgame' matters" mentality that appears to be common in some (particularly MMO) circles. I'm all for unlimited respecs, and you know what? I STILL fully intend to play multiple characters of the same class, provided the game is fun for me. The growth and the journey are what it's all about.

At the very least, respecs shouldn't stop until several levels after the last tier of skills is unlocked. It would also help to have the full info for every skill level available on-demand, in-game. The more transparent the mechanics are, the better -- and no, forums and youtube aren't a replacement for having information in-game. Otherwise the vaunted decision-making is pretty much a shot in the dark or a matter of copying whatever other players have discovered. In fact, to me respeccing would make my own choices feel more meaningful because I can freely experiment and come up with something that suits me without fear of gimping myself n levels in the future. No game is perfectly balanced, much less right at release, and realizing that a skill you thought was fun early on isn't actually all that is always annoying. Then there's the potential of patches changing skills more or less significantly. Without on-demand respecs, any patch that touches skills should reset a characters' skill points so the player isn't "punished" for something beyond their control.

[Arlian]

An assumption I see floating around a lot lately is this assumption that a handful of skills are going to be the only good ones. That the game developers do not seek skill balance and skill utility. That somehow skills would be "useless" or "bad picks".

Having had experience playing TL2 as an embermage (I've played and loved them all, but I'll use EM as an example as it's the easiest to hit), prismatic bolt was my primary attack all of the way to level 21. Despite the fact that I had lev 7, 14, and 21 skills to play with. I have, and they were great assists and added some much needed utility and supplemental damage. But my primary attack was a level 1 skill. Why? Was it brokenly powerful... Well, AFTER THE PATCH, no. It was just damn useful and played well into my play style. Would I have been just as effective with flame lance or flame pillar? Of course, but the point is: even in beta, nearly every skill is viable.

With this said, the concept of respec is not "going to an OP build", if all skills are equally viable (or intended as such), then all skills are equally OP. So, theoretically, EVERY BUILD is going to be OP so it doesn't matter HOW you respec.

I don't want to sound like you're going to be the best player in the world and that your choices aren't important. Individual playstyle, reaction speed, timing, and pace demands are going to weigh heavily on what's perceived to be good or bad. A prisbolt EM is perfect for me, but other players may feel that the build is largely ineffective. They may pull off 60 DPS with a prisbolt mage and 110 with a magma mace mage and swear that magma mace is infinitely superior where I would have the exact opposite results netting 120 DPS with prisbolt and 50 with magma mace.

From what I've seen in TL2's beta, every skill is viable for it's own reasons. You can make a perfectly running character from any of the skills and the threat of being good early game and gimped midgame is negligible.

Assuming that skills are balanced and tweaked and a rank 15 initial spell is as viable and useful as a rank 15 lev 42 spell, then the major point of respec is less about correcting the "wrong" choice and more about making the "best" choice for your playstyle. All things considered.

The points floating here:
Player A is a perfectionist that HATES respeccing. He will go and calculate points before hand. He will make the perfect character even if it means having a crappy early game character. Eventually, he will line up his points where he deems the most valuable.

Player B is a perfectionist that ENJOYS respeccing. He will go and calculate points before hand. He will make the perfect character even if it means having a crappy early game character. Eventually, he will line up his points where he deems the most valuable.

Have you caught the difference with above? Simply one hates and one enjoys. Both players are perfectionists, both of them demand the perfect character, and both of them seek the same end goal. What's the difference? One's for and one's against. Except, the easy route is to criminalize one activity and add pejorative statements on the opponent despite their otherwise similar philosophies.

[Daniel]

The only way I can see respecs being bad is if the game was designed around them. If for example boss A is immune to fire and ice, boss B is immune to lightning and physical, boss C needs fast-hitting and thus almost certainly low-damage skills to kill and boss D laughs off all but the biggest hits, and everyone is (or worse: only some classes are) routinely forced to tree-hop and spec-hop to have any real hope of progressing, that would be really, really crappy and put me off the game in no time. But I cannot see Runic making that mistake.

I think we can safely assume that the game will not be designed around respecs. Here's the thing, though: If I am given the option of respeccing without cheating (i.e. it is part of the vanilla game) then I will not be able to resist using it. I will dump points into skills that I KNOW I am not going to want later on. Then I will respec when I get access to top-tier skills, to make my character as powerful and optimized as possible. I'm not saying that would suck, but, I would be depriving myself of the challenge of not using respecs. I would not get the satisfaction of making it through tough parts of the game with a sub-optimal build, of planning my choices and making tough decisions. And because the game is not designed around respecs, that way of playing would make it too easy. So for someone like me who is not able to ignore the option if it is right in front of his face, it actually does degrade the game experience. If that's not the case for you, then that's good for you.

It would also help to have the full info for every skill level available on-demand, in-game. The more transparent the mechanics are, the better -- and no, forums and youtube aren't a replacement for having information in-game. Otherwise the vaunted decision-making is pretty much a shot in the dark or a matter of copying whatever other players have discovered. In fact, to me respeccing would make my own choices feel more meaningful because I can freely experiment and come up with something that suits me without fear of gimping myself n levels in the future. No game is perfectly balanced, much less right at release, and realizing that a skill you thought was fun early on isn't actually all that is always annoying. Then there's the potential of patches changing skills more or less significantly. Without on-demand respecs, any patch that touches skills should reset a characters' skill points so the player isn't "punished" for something beyond their control.

You make some very good points here that everyone should be able to agree with. However, I think it falls short of supporting full respeccing. What it shows is that we need to have better information about skills before we commit to them. What I favor is being able to undo the most recent skill point allocations. This would allow us to try before we buy, so to speak. I'm not sure what can be done about patches that change skills, though.

@Arlian: It will be interesting to see whether the skills in TL2 really are balanced, as you say. I hope they are, whether we have respeccing or not, because it will increase the number of viable builds. However, isn't there something to be said for top-tier skills being more powerful than lower-tier ones? I don't mean to say that lower-tier skills should become useless, but they serve different function from top-tier skills so the optimal skill point balance between lower and upper is not something you would easily arrive at without respeccing (I know this requires more explanation, but i have to go to work now).

[ace1580]

I think we can safely assume that the game will not be designed around respecs. Here's the thing, though: If I am given the option of respeccing without cheating (i.e. it is part of the vanilla game) then I will not be able to resist using it. I will dump points into skills that I KNOW I am not going to want later on. Then I will respec when I get access to top-tier skills, to make my character as powerful and optimized as possible. I'm not saying that would suck, but, I would be depriving myself of the challenge of not using respecs. I would not get the satisfaction of making it through tough parts of the game with a sub-optimal build, of planning my choices and making tough decisions. And because the game is not designed around respecs, that way of playing would make it too easy. So for someone like me who is not able to ignore the option if it is right in front of his face, it actually does degrade the game experience. If that's not the case for you, then that's good for you.

So what? If you can't resist using respecs, then use them! And if you find that you are talented enough to put together a killer character, and are able to persistently fine tune that character through respecing, then do it. And then, when you are sufficiently godly, up the difficulty. The difficulty of the game should not be based on how easy it is to screw your character up. At the level of gaming that you are talking about here, the challenge should come from how you utilize what the game gives you. You shouldn't be punished because you clicked the wrong thing when you leveled up, you should be punish for having the right tools and playing like an idiot.

[Seer]

Am I the only one that would like a supermega rare Respec potion that has a tiny little chance to drop off the high level bosses of the later acts?

It's there, hard to get, rare, but not impossible.

[Sir]

To say it reduces replayability is a non-argument. the appeal of replaying the game, should be to replay the game, not because you have to in order to address aspects of your character that you are unhappy with.

It's amazing how you can totally miss the point without even knowing it.

It's amazing how you can leave the target in obliquity without telling them HOW they're oblivious.

It's one thing to tell them they're wrong, but you haven't done the first thing to address WHY.

The point is to replay the game with the same character but with different skills, not to address things you think are wrong. It changes the whole feel of the character (cannon engineer vs two-hander engineer vs support engineer). That's the reason that respeccing shouldn't be in the game. If it is, you just change your skills as you go and pick up better weapons that don't work with your skillset, but that work with another skillset. It takes away any reason to replay.

For instance, you could respec whenever you wanted in Borderlands, so there was no reason to play through once it was figured out you could mod the game to play it through as many times as you liked at max level.

[ace1580]

The point is to replay the game with the same character but with different skills, not to address things you think are wrong. It changes the whole feel of the character (cannon engineer vs two-hander engineer vs support engineer). That's the reason that respeccing shouldn't be in the game. If it is, you just change your skills as you go and pick up better weapons that don't work with your skillset, but that work with another skillset. It takes away any reason to replay.

For instance, you could respec whenever you wanted in Borderlands, so there was no reason to play through once it was figured out you could mod the game to play it through as many times as you liked at max level.

Um, actually, I replay because the game is fun.

[Ten]

The point is to replay the game with the same character but with different skills, not to address things you think are wrong. It changes the whole feel of the character (cannon engineer vs two-hander engineer vs support engineer). That's the reason that respeccing shouldn't be in the game. If it is, you just change your skills as you go and pick up better weapons that don't work with your skillset, but that work with another skillset. It takes away any reason to replay.

For instance, you could respec whenever you wanted in Borderlands, so there was no reason to play through once it was figured out you could mod the game to play it through as many times as you liked at max level.

I'm also in the camp that likes to have different characters for different specs - the variation in the skill trees in the first torchlight almost meant we had ~6 classes instead of 3, and I love that aspect. I don't like the idea of having one character that can do anything at any time either. I don't think I've seen anyone in this thread ask for infinite, no-cost/low-cost, any-time respecs.

Try not to see everything in terms of black and white. What I would be totally ok with, for example, is a system where respecs are earned, have a serious cost (it doesn't have to be gold), and cannot be done on-the-fly. In such a way it would be completely unpractical to have one character for all specs because of the cost and time it would take to respec, but at the same time, a person that doesn't want to start over can still respec. I'd actually rather have this than a lame respec mod which makes respecs cheap/easy/quick (<- yawn).

As it is I'll be fine with the system we'll be getting as I have no problems with the currently proposed system.

[FieryBalrog]

Level 101

yup

[SkaP]

What I personally love to see as many as you want up to level 15/16. Along with this however there should be a training mode or a practice mode where you can test out all the skills of a a character before you start investing in them. You won't be able to gain experience, fame or finish any quests while in practice but you can go out to the field and kill enemies to find out what you like the best.