Grimrock

Well pretty much use this for discussion on the new skill system.

I very much like that levels now have more excitement potential. I must say the number of skills looked a little sparser than I'd hoped. Oh well, I'm a horrible demanding person.

My big question: Human skills have there own tab, yet you called them a mini-tree. How many race skills are we talking roughly? (Well, a basic estimate, I don't want a big spoiler)

Race skill trees have about 3-5 skills.

My thoughts from the blog post.

The division of the skills to racial and class-based skills is a great idea. I hope that there will be big enough a number of skills so that the player won't be able to max out all of them during a playthrough, that way the character will feel a lot more specialized, and there will be more replay value too. Also, in my opinion you should try to have as many skills as possible, to further increase potential specialization

Love the look of the new skill system. As you say, it will be nice to get 'something worthwhile' at every level and it looks like your skills will do that. I think skill trees work best when each skill upgrade gives you something significant. It does look a tad sparse in comparison to what it could be though (like you will max out the skills you want every play if you pick just a single weapon type for a fighter say)...

How about when you hit level 10-15 you could pick a specialisation for your class (Fighter could specialise as Paladin or Ranger say) and that could open a third skill tree with 4-5 new skills each with 2-3 ranks. Alternatively, the specialisations could unlock if you max out a specific branch - but you can only ever pick one. This could unlock a 3rd skill tree for each character (add a bit of magic to the Fighter or some other skills). Seeing 3 tabs of skills would be cool. Not only would this add more skills but it also gives you alternatives if you have 2 fighters in your group as well as giving you the opportunity to flesh out your world a bit more by picking specialisation options in keeping with your game lore.

JohnWordsworth wrote:Love the look of the new skill system. As you say, it will be nice to get 'something worthwhile' at every level and it looks like your skills will do that. I think skill trees work best when each skill upgrade gives you something significant. It does look a tad sparse in comparison to what it could be though (like you will max out the skills you want every play if you pick just a single weapon type for a fighter say)...

How about when you hit level 10-15 you could pick a specialisation for your class (Fighter could specialise as Paladin or Ranger say) and that could open a third skill tree with 4-5 new skills each with 2-3 ranks. Alternatively, the specialisations could unlock if you max out a specific branch - but you can only ever pick one. This could unlock a 3rd skill tree for each character (add a bit of magic to the Fighter or some other skills). Seeing 3 tabs of skills would be cool. Not only would this add more skills but it also gives you alternatives if you have 2 fighters in your group as well as giving you the opportunity to flesh out your world a bit more by picking specialisation options in keeping with your game lore.

Now THAT would be an great idea. It would solve the sparsity problem and add awesomeness.

Another way to unlock additional skills or even whole classes, races could be story based. For example, once you reach long forgotten monastery, a monk class becomes available. Once you help a master thief establish thieves guild, you can start a new party with a thief. Chose to help insectoids to save their hatchery from ogre's onslaught? You can now recruit insectoids.

Some of those could be optional and very well hidden. Something like secrets, but much more rewarding.

I really like the new skill system. This new approach is a great idea for me and do the game more playable. Now we only can wait to see skills from others classes and races.
Talking about the skill interface you show on the last post... there are a little thing i don't like. On human skills you see a human figure, seems right for me, but on fighter skills you can see... a simple head!!
I'm not sure if this icons are generic for all classes and races or are different.
For example:
- On fighter class the drawing of sword and shield.
- On mage class a wand/staff and hat like conjurers hat from LOG (tipically hat of mage)
- On rogue class a dagger and bow, or something like this.
- On race skills the figure of the race.
I know this sounds stupid, it's only a little thing i thought when i see the interface. My congratulations to AH team for the great job you are doing. And sorry for my english.

Only slight issue I see with this is having to choose between class/racial skills and unless the racial skills are extremely powerful, expending points on class skills would seem far more beneficial due to the requirements for the latter ones (probably being the best). Therefore, a low level character would want to invest in the bigger tree, clearly. Especially for mages I imagine (Assuming skill requirements for spells still exist, why would you pick racial ones?).

Would be a good idea if race/class trees got their own skill points perhaps? Such as a racial skill point being given every third level or so (Class point every level still)? This means race becomes a decent factor in building your character even if you invest in the class tree (which you would go down regardless).

99% of the time in these types of games, fun and cool perks (often associated with races) tend to be ignored if the meaty class skills need to be sacrificed in order to choose them. This may be the case here too -- at least it tends to come about.

I mean racial perks tend to be designed to be minor or secondary, so separating their allocation may be an idea. 'Tis all.

Otherwise, it looks like a great system.

You know what, this sounds like a lot of fun.

Daniel.

While this is a minor nitpick, the description shown for Ogre's Grip should be reworded: in English, the term "single handed"/"single handedly" is used to mean "without assistance from anyone else". ("He single-handedly defeated the ogre army!")

If you want to keep the description as short as possible, I'd suggest rendering it as, "Wield two-handed weapons in one hand."