Things the devs didn't think through

[Sabatasso]

If you never put a point into your attack traits the only difference would be the length of time you spend kiting. Yes at the higher levels you reach a point where you can sort of stand toe to toe against the weaker enemies, but doing so isn't advised. It took me about 12 hours (game time not real time) to beat the game. If you took out the time I spent kiting in a 2x2 box it would probably be down to 8. Without upgrading my damage traits it just means a lot more hits.

Funny thing is that the "kiting strategy" was originally considered an exploit in DM/EOB/LoL types of games. This game rely on it as the only viable strategy, which is also why Fighter "meatshield" is a waste of space. Defensive attributes are actually somewhat a "waste" because if you master the kiting part of the game you only need enough HP to survive a few sticky situations during the game, and put the rest in attack to speed up the killing.

I'm currently running around with 4 pure damage dealers on hard difficulty, and it's going splendid. "Surrounded, you say? Just hack a path through the weakest mob!"
I must say that EOB did the actual character balance better, although you don't have much choice other than choosing a class there. I will expand on this some other day, how I think the system is awkwardly implemented. In my opinion, Rogue is the only class worth having. They outshine the others in both survival and damage, and hardly ever run out of energy.

[eternal]

I think it is obvious to us all with the current skill system and the crippling of the modding opportunities with draconian rules (sorry guys but it sucks) they intend to release new content. That may give us the points we need but in my opinion that isn't the only problem. The current system is so basic as to feel like more of an afterthought than a well thought out and implemented system. Level up, throw points in one skill, move on. BLAH!
I do think a better system would be to slightly increase either exp. gained or skill points given per level. Then you use the same skill trees but you have the lower level skills cost less and as you go higher they cost more. For instance lvl 1,2,3 skills cost 1 point, 4,5,6 cost 2 points, etc. You could easily gain a lot of lower level stuff but to reach the higher skill levels you would have to plan and conserve. This would also add a little depth to character building.
It's so simple I feel like they should be paying me for this great idea.

[Darklord]

Note: I have moved the D&D discussion comments to a new thread, discuss!

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1886

Daniel.

[seebs]

Funny thing is that the "kiting strategy" was originally considered an exploit in DM/EOB/LoL types of games.

By whom?

Seriously, given how much effort and attention FTL put into ensuring that there were 2x2 areas, and the fact that they have explicitly stated that they intended it to be possible to beat the game without ever taking a point of damage... I really don't think that can be considered an "exploit".

[krayzkrok]

Yes, it's pretty obvious that "kiting" was never an unintentional exploit in Dungeon Master. The later puzzles make it very clear indeed that FTL knew exactly how players would try and take on monsters, so they'd often restrict your options as part of the puzzles. I love the way that a lot of the monsters in Grimlock are designed to combat this strategy (eg. crabs that may walk forwards, or sideways; ogres that swing their clubs to the side quickly, that kind of thing). It's perfectly natural and a part of the game, I'm amazed that it's come under so much criticism, perhaps because it's come to be seen as an exploit in other games that perhaps didn't think it through as well. Frankly I find it a fun combat system, far more interesting than standing head-on and clicking away.

[Draken]

I dont think the game was designed to "PUT ALL 50 POINTS IN A SKILL! NOW!" then rinse and repeat for another skill... I think they designed it for you to even out your skillpoints into skills that build up your character, which is what i did: Okay this guy here is the tank, so i'll want him to carry heavy armor (puts points in armor) and have health to go around (puts points into athletics) and he should probably be able to contribute in the killing so... (puts points into swords)... ... ... ... okay, level up, on this level what was this char's worst performance? attacking? okay i'll spend a little more points into swords this level.

so many of you guys are just power-gaming the game. dont get me wrong, its not my business on how you play your game, but power-gaming an RPG is just sad...

[Zorglub]

I dont think the game was designed to "PUT ALL 50 POINTS IN A SKILL! NOW!" then rinse and repeat for another skill... I think they designed it for you to even out your skillpoints into skills that build up your character, which is what i did: Okay this guy here is the tank, so i'll want him to carry heavy armor (puts points in armor) and have health to go around (puts points into athletics) and he should probably be able to contribute in the killing so... (puts points into swords)... ... ... ... okay, level up, on this level what was this char's worst performance? attacking? okay i'll spend a little more points into swords this level.

so many of you guys are just power-gaming the game. dont get me wrong, its not my business on how you play your game, but power-gaming an RPG is just sad...

I agree with you, but it's a little frustating to see all the goodies you can't get. If the game is to be played thhat way, they should have capped the skills at 30.

When I started the game, I knew I had to make some choices, but in my mind it was - ok, I'll have one skill at 50 and one at 25, or 3 at 25. I knew I could not max out all skills, but I expected to, at leat, have the possibility to max out at leat one without gimping my character.

But the, I expected to hit level 20 by the end of the game, à la Dnd.

[Netjera]

While I think the wording of the OP is a bit inflammatory, he's actually got a fairly good point.

It's not so much that he's complaining you can't max everything, it's just that a lot of the highest level auxiliary skills actually may as well not be there at all. Why even put 50th level Spellcraft or Armors skills in the game, when a character would have to forsake practically all offensive skills in order to even hit those skills? I mean yeah you can say "well nobody is forcing you to give up all your offense" but why then even have those skills in the first place?

If the game were geared to at least allow you to say, take one skill to max (50) and another to 25 or 30, then you'd at least see SOME people maxxing out those auxiliary skills just to see what they can do without making a totally gimp character. As it is now, only a masochist or OCD completionist would opt to make a maxed out Spellcrafter (and limit themselves to a single low level offensive spell for the whole game).

(The other possibility though, is that the devs are perfectly aware of this and are just planning for expansions which would allow you to level well past the current skill limits and make those Aux skills viable again to max)

I'm just going to ask a quick question, which may have already been answered since I'm on page 1. Aren't there supposed to be more expansions coming as well as user-created content? Without the skills that are currently unreachable now, the characters would not have room to grow when the new content came out. You'd have to start a new set of toons every time.

[Netjera]

Lets go really old school. Find a place in the dungeon where you get respawns. Simply stay there for a LOOONG TIME to build up experience, then get the skills you want. That is what still gets me today, that is how you had to do it back in the day to get past some areas. I've been forever affected by it, that I still lean towards doing that in many games, but there is never that big jump up in difficulty, in fact I find by me doing it I trivialize most games. There was a paradigm switch and I missed the memo and my stubbornness has affected my judgement.

There are respawns? How do I find them? I'm stuck at the beginning of level 4 where the darned trees blow poison at you from two directions. No matter how much I move about or how many different tactics I employ, I wind up losing everyone but my fighter who is the only one with enough health to survive the slow drain when I get hit repeatedly with the gas.

[Rozy]

Actually when I look at the skills, I see foresight when it comes to some. Anyone thought that the higher skill ability's are intentionally there for ease of scaling up play? What if we got a 20 level dungeon later on? I'm sure there'd be more skill points to go around now that we're getting more xp in those extra levels. Not to mention if we get to move completed partys into harder dungeons later on somehow. That to me seems like the intention here.