Initial Impressions

[Systern]

Heya! Thanks for the sneak peak... I'm guessing at this point you want more feedback about the system than bug reports, although I'll through in a couple as well.


I started poking around before seeing Squeak's Information pictures, and it took me a few to realize that the "Racial Core" abilities aren't "Autogrants" like they are in destinies. Live and learn.

I basically tried to convert over my existing character concept to the new system. I have a human ranger 19/Rogue 1/Epic 5 character on Lamma at the moment.

Quick Mention of a couple of bugs:
1) the Human "Fighting Styles" T2 multiple selector is broken. It starts at 0/3, and goes to 1/1 after picking Sniper (so you can never pick Sniper 2 and Sniper 3). I did not try picking a different fighting style.
2) I spent 24 AP on Human, 8 AP on Tempest, and the rest on Arcane Archer. When relogging, the Arcane Archer tree was wiped clean. I had picked stuff, applied, reset, and repicked during my initial session. (After figuring out Core Abilities aren't Autogrants).


I think the point requirements in tree are too high for the racials. I had to burn a lot of points on skills that I normally wouldn't pick for my character because I wanted to unlock the higher Healing Amp enhancement. It also makes splashing a 3rd tree more difficult, since the things in Tempest that I was kind of interested in, I didn't meet the spent AP requirement for, and would have to burn more points on skills that don't benefit the character.

I'm not sure if this is a bug or not, but the RuneBow enhancement and the Core grants and Implement bonus interact in a weird way.
Using Bow of the Silver Flame, +4 base Enhancement
Archery Mastery +5 Enhancement
Runebow +2 enhancement
Implement 18 (4 + 2 * 3.... Base + Runebow, not Mastery + Runebow)

It's kinda hard to visualize how everything interacts because all information is in a tool tip, and you don't get to see the higher tiers until you spend points on stuff. i.e. An enhancement that's 0/3, you don't get to learn what tier 3 does until you buy tier 2 and can read the tool tips side by side. You don't get to learn what Multiple Enhancement Selectors select until you go to buy it. It means you have to dig through everything actively trying to comprehend it because the information isn't readily presented to you. I'd recommend something like CTRL+Hover shows all tooltips or something.

I was glad to see that you can reset each tree individually, I was disappointed to see that resetting Tree A increases the cost for resetting Tree B.

I think 32 astral shards, no matter on how much AP is in the tree is outrageous.


As far as the AA tree goes, I like that there's a bunch of imbues in the core and selectable trees. I guess Slayer Arrows going from an imbue is how you plan on dealing with Furyshot builds. Though I do like that there's now banishing shot and smiting shot... I've had my Arti since thanksgiving and still don't have Disciplinator for smiting shot on her!

My initial reaction to seeing Heroism and GH as enhancements in the human tree made me immediately think of another undermining of my Bard's abilities... but I know I need to wait to see the bard's tree before that opinion is shown to have any merit.

[Hokiewa]

Good write up. Could you clarify one thing? Are Astral Shards the only way to reset the enhancements?

[Systern]

Nope, they have the same dialog as Fred does on Live.... 32 Shards OR (i.e.) 3k plat...

Resetting a class tree with plat increases the plat cost for resetting the racial tree.

[Hokiewa]

Thanks!

[Systern]

After spending more time on Lammania, in the devchat as well, checking out what's been done to my artificer as well, and having the rest of the night to digest things... Here's 2nd impressions!


Design:
I'm hating Points Spent in Tree. Most classes that I've seen see stats at 10 points and 20 points spent in tree. Most characters buy these enhancements when they're low-level... too small for tomes to kick in, to low for good +stat gear is when they need it most. Delaying it for them is just bad.

Cost:
Way too restrictive. For example, Endless Fusillade on live requires 11 AP for prereqs and the ability for the prestige. On Lammania, it takes 24 points to get just the clickie. The rest of the prestige has been given a 50% upgrade and called the capstone.


Artificer:
Just a mess. It's a maze of linked arrows of interdependant abilities, each with one rank, costing 2AP, split across 2 trees making it seem like the abilities of your current character is schizophrenic. I'll stipulate that most of the work on these trees probably happened months ago, and not influenced by recent discussion on the forums, but hey... All the talk about Shiradi Casters these days? That it's primarily because all the wiz and sorc spells have max caster levels that don't benefit from Arcane destinies. Sooooo, give the class that's all about eeking even more out of the magic around them SLAs that are capped at caster level 10. Not just 1 SLA, 3 SLAs that are capped at caster level 10.

Turbine got rid of the Improved UMD enhancements! NO! Bad Kobold! Back to the cave and do not come out until you put them back!

The Points Spent in Tree schism has taken my generalist support Arti and tried to make it bi-polar. I love the current capstone, but I can't take it because I hate the brain-dead dog that jellyfishes everytime it walks by a ladder. I can't even PUT enough points into the ArcanoTechnician tree to qualify for the current capstone ability. At the cost of giving up the closest thing to the current Prestige. NO HORRIBLE DESIGN. Whyfor you nerf my Arti??? If this is what you're doing to my Arti, I'm loathe to see what you did to my Bard (Which is Drow, 17/2 ftr/rogue... I won't be able to have enough trees to approximate the current character design. Lovely).

Artificers are a front-loaded, P2P class that plateau in early end-game. This is an overall nerf to their abilities because you didn't make a separate prestige-tree for them, you divided what they currently do into 2 mutually exclusive parts. Bad. Just bad.

The design of the Points in Tree system has taken the character creation out of my hands, and put it in Turbines.

Do not like.