Roland
Moderator
I wouldn't go so far as to call the current system divine but if you want to, I'll not disagree.
PC Current state of class system
- Thread starter Shijune
- Start date
I wouldn't go so far as to call the current system divine but if you want to, I'll not disagree.
theFlu
Well-known member
Go right ahead, others will disagree and I'll just stare at the fight in disbelief ... meta-comments
Liesel Weppen
New member
I'd say you try to distract from what i'm talking about by nitpicking on slightly wrong numbers.Seems I did. I was distracted by some issue. Seriously, I don't get the point. Why is it important that it is ONE AND THE SAME skill?
I want the same skill to buff ONE aspect but for ALL weapons, because... like theFlu already explained.
Better perception gives you better headshots with ALL weapons.
Higher strength gives higher melee damage no matter you us a club or a spear.
...
I remeber a discussion some months ago, iirc with roland also taking part into, where some claimed "there are no classes in 7d2d" where i said "well, they are not called classes, but base attributes, but in practice the effect of these things are exactly what classes are suppsed to be".
Even if i consider it being classes, the design of these classes is bad. They are not a whole thing and not a half. They have wrong names for what they are. They are centered about base attributes, probably because thats where they come from historically? But they are limited to specific weapon types...
Either assemble real plausible classes like "Hunter" or "Fighter" or "Medic"... that might have benefits restricted to SOME weapons, maybe a hunter for rifles (also AK) but not short weapons. A Fighter maybe buffs for melee but almost non for ranged at all. And so on. Almost every larger mod does THIS, and they do it better than the vanilla game.
Or make it really base attributes, but then also treat it as attributes, but not "classes".
Correct me, but if your "argument" is: "But others did it also wrong", this is called whataboutism, right?
I also did never put up a "rule", nor i said it should be universal for all games. As i said, for me it looks like you are actively trying to distract from my arguements by bringing in topics that are either completely irrelevant or thing i never said.
But to pick up other games: What i have in mind is diablo. They have classes and base attributes. The class defines what skills you skill tree contains with that limits buffs to weapons that suit your class. Archer has no skills that buffs swords, knights don't have skills that buff bows, however, both can us both. The base skills on the other hand give generic buffs, independent of your class. Strength increases weapon damage, no matter you are using a bow or a sword. Even if you are an archer with points put into strength, also a sword becomes stronger. Dexterity (in 7d2d that would probably be agility?) makes both faster, still independent of class.
It still doesn't fixate how to play. If you pick knight as a class, it's still on you if you spend your points into strength for building an offensive damage dealer using a double-handed broadsword dealing slow but massive damage, or if you put your points into dexterity and build a sneaky fast attacking guerillia fighter using a shield and just a dagger.
No the next argument to come: But in 7d2d you are not fixed to one class, like in diablo... yes, you are not, but in comparision to diablo you have tied the classes and the base attributes together!!!!!111elf
If numbers are irrelevant to you, don't post them. At least two users here think if you post numbers they should be at least somewhat correct. You should realize that you are nitpicking about this correction now as much as I do about the numbers. Just accept the correction and go on.
You want attributes to be really attributes. Which they are not, they were once in A17, but now there is NOTHING "attributy" about them at all except for the name. Strength doesn not increase your strength in the least, fortitude does not increase your health the least bit, agility does not a jota to your agility, intelligence doesn't make you more intelligent. Only perception could be realistically argued as being an actual attribute that is improving your headshot damage.
If we want to be generous we could say that intelligence is actually increasing your intelligence behind the scenes because it enables you to learn the perks, but that's a rather farfetched argument.
And that is my argument. Attributes are not attributes, they are classes, pure and simple.
Exactly. In this we agree.
For me this reads as "their names are wrong and their names are wrong" although you start with "Even if I consider it being classes".
And sure they are limited to specific weapon types, class systems often do this. Really consider them as classes, ignore the names and ping, there is nothing strange about them.
Sure, madmole made an effort to put perks in classes so they often look fitting to the attribute, but nobody would ever notice that if the classes were not named after attributes.
I agree that the class system in 7D2D is far from realistic and even a lot of RPG class systems do this better, but still far from realistic. For example a one handed hammer is almost always clearly separated from a two-handed hammer in most such systems, except for bonuses from attributes. BUT, 7d2D has NO attributes at all.
A17 had a class system with for example melee clustered in one class and it wasn't well liked. If you wanted to do melee in mid or late game you had to invest into that class. I don't think that system should be adopted again.
I don't know whether mods do it better, the only mod I played in A19 was Darkness Falls and there you can train with the club until you are the god of clubs but that helps you not one bit for the sledgehammer, so there is no melee buff for every melee weapon. But DF correctly dropped any mention of attributes, even outside the DF classes there are none. What mods are you talking about and how do they do it?
If a class system is generally not acceptable to you, well, then we found the source of your problem (before you object: I talked about hundreds of systems and you practically said they all are doing it wrong. Not so serious reply to your not so serious reply) . I like class systems in any pen&paper or computer game when I want to play it more than once (or where I play a group).7D2D is exactly like diablo only there are no attributes.
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Liesel Weppen
New member
A class system is not inacceptable for me. And in this whole thread i was all the time talking about classes. So you could have noticed that i already understood that they are not considered to be attributes. But as i explained, the current state is messup between somehow classes and somehow attributes.
And i already answered to your concern, you even quoted it:
Yeah, and a motorcycle is exactly the same as a car, exept it only has 2 wheels.
You can't level up classes in Diablo, what you are leveling up are the attributes. The class is choosen once and then fixed. In 7d2d you level up the "classes"...
In Diablo WHAT perks you can choose depends on your class. IF you can "activate"/level them however depends on the state of your attributes (even multible attributes like "Requires 30str and 40dex").
As i said, in 7d2d this is somehow combined together/mixed up, and that is the problem. No matter if you call it "classes" or "attributes", WHAT they effect is half classes half attributes. It's neither a real class nor are they just attributes.
I can understand how it developed over time, but from the current state you can clearly see that perviously they have been just attributes. Now they are somehow considered to be classes, but this transition was only done half way.
I'm fine with classes, but then either make classes or make no classes. And the current "classes" are @%$#. They are mostly arbitrary grouping of perks, completely besides the absolutely wrong naming if you want it to be considered as classes. How'd you describe the purpose of the class "strength"? How does this class differ from "fortitude"? And what reasons are the differnces?
How does master chef fit into "strength"? To bring in another term: What are the "roles" of these classes or lets call it "job" of the class?
For most perks i agree a relation to their "class" can be seen. Putting "Animal Tracker" to "Perception" makes sense. But if it placed there because tracking animals requires perception... we are back to perception being an attribute! Oh, but the hunter can still not cook well? Sounds somehow strange.
The penetrator however absolutely does not fit there, it just is there, because this strange "perception class" has the sniper rifle.
For real classes i'd expect even completely separating melee and ranged fight. But this system here does the opposite. All "classes" can do melee and ranged, but only with specific weapons... WTF...
You know from language what attributes are and what are nouns? Classes are supposed to be nouns, while attributes are... well... attributes? No, im still not refering on how it is named in the game, but the reason what perks are grouped refers to being, they require a specific ATTRIBUTE!
Other way round: Replace the current names of the "classes" with nouns. How would you name them? Do still all the perks fit into that class according to its name? If you can't find suitable names or perks don't fit there anymore, it is not really a class.
Edit: "noun" is the wrong word here. "Thing" would be better. A thing is a thing. An attribute is an attribute of a thing. Not my native language but i hope you can get what i mean.
And no, i do not request it being like i just said, that are just suggestions on how it would be (much) better. Basically the current arrangement of "classes" (or whatever you call them) is the worst possible case except pure random distribution. I can absolutley not comprehend why it is like this... except there is some mixup of the understanding of classes and attributes and depending on what you are trying to explain, you either refer to an "attribute" or a "class".
And also just to make clear: I'm just argueing for my personal view. I absolutely know i can't deceide anything. And if it stays like this it will still not stop me from playing the game. But that is ... i'd even say: what annoys me most from the current version.
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A class system is not inacceptable for me. And in this whole thread i was all the time talking about classes. So you could have noticed that i already understood that they are not considered to be attributes. But as i explained, the current state is messup between somehow classes and somehow attributes.
And i already answered to your concern, you even quoted it:
Yeah, and a motorcycle is exactly the same as a car, exept it only has 2 wheels.
Let me rephrase: "7D2D' skill system is exactly like diablo only there are no attributes. "
The equivalent would be "And a motorcycles wheels are exactly the same as a car". Which isn't true, but they can be compared without making a face
Sure, even in the case of 7D2D and Diablo, "exactly" is an overstatement. You pinpoint the difference quite well:
One job of a skill system is to time or gate the progress of the player. In diablo the attributes take on that job. In 7D2D, in absence of attributes something else has to take over that job: the class. Similar to 7D2D in Pathfinder and AD&D the class does this job as well even though there are still attributes, just to point out that that is a common and successful way to do it and is NOT perceived as a fundamental problem or a generally faulty solution.
The strength class I would call "The Miner". Yes, it has perks that are not really associated with a miner, but essentially this could be seen as the "Miner" class. Possibly TFP could even go further and make this a specific person, i.e. "Miner Bob" who just happens to be good at cooking. This is a method a lot of the newer fun-shooters like Overwatch employ to make a fixed character with fixed abilities.
Fortitude would be "the Brute" or "The Heavy", perception "The Sniper", agility "The Assassin", intelligence "The Tinkerer". Sure, 3 of them are called after their weapon use, 2 after their civil profession, if that is important to someone he may have to look for different archetypes.
I would rather say Animal tracker is the outlier in the sniper class.
What you suggest would probably be a lot better in terms of believability and realism. Why does animal tracker not fit the sniper class? Because realism. Yes, without doubt.
Would it be better to play? THAT is the more important question and the answer to that is rather open. Whenever you constrain your choices to better suit reality you as a designer also constrain you choices for game play. It might work, or realism and gameplay might clash.
7D2D is quite shamelessly optimized for gameplay (as TFP sees the optimum, any players mileage may vary), and realism or believability is merely an afterthought. Madmole (I assume) designed 5 classes that are supposed to deliver variability and fun for at least 5 playthroughs through suggesting class builds and because of class permeability a few more. And for me it works, in A15 and A16 I always played the same character, now I cycle through the classes. And not to forget, in co-op it works as well as it is usual that everyone picks a different class and takes over different jobs.
If the class system went your way I would fall back to a mode where I just take my prefered melee weapon and my prefered gun. Sure I still would have fun with other variable elements of the game (lets not assume the skill system is everything) but I have my suspicion that replayability would be hurt in the long run.
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Liesel Weppen
New member
Yes, massively better because i don't like predefined classes that force me into exactly 5 different playstiles. (to anticipate your answer, yes i know you can crossover classes, but the more you crossover, the more skill points need to be wasted in things you don't use)
The class tells me what weapon to use. The class tells me which ranged and melee weapon has to be combined, the class tells me what are my miscellaneous skills.
If i want to use a shotgun, i choose strength. With strength im forced to clubs for melee. I can cook and mine. But i want to use a shotgun and blades and i'm not interested in mining, i want to build.
You got the point: YOU. For me it is a massive disadvantage, because NO ONE of these 5 classes fits my playstyle. I want to choose myself what i can do and what is dispensable for me. Without being disadvantaged by combining two things that don't inflict each other but are divided to different classes, because someone else decided so. Skillpoints are limited, i can also not simply take everything, i still need to choose.
It's your personal problem if you play always the same way if nobody forces you to different playstyles. That contradicts an open game, where you are free on what to do and how to do it.
If you need to be forced to try different things, THAT is the special requirement. That should be answered with mods, but not the games default.
The massive difference is: With an open system YOU CAN still try different things, it's not the games fault if YOU don't have the neccessary willpower. But with the current restricted system I CAN NOT play, like i want to. And THAT is the game's fault.
Oh, and in multiplayer we divide also. But not because of this classes. We would divide the perks among players anyway. There is no need 3 players skill for cooking or farming. But it's the same restriction. The player that wants to be a farmer has to use automatic weapons, no matter he likes to use them or not. Or the other way round, that player that wants to use automatics, has to do the farming, if he likes it or not. Imho in multiplayer it's even worse.
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Liesel Weppen
New member
That's what i meant by try to name the classes and then see what not fits anymore. And no matter what name you choose, some of the skills do not fit anymore. And that's imho not about realism, it's about pure logic. A game doesn't need to be realistic, but i expect some logic in the mechanics. And the current logic can only be explained by the biasing between attributes and classes.I would rather say Animal tracker is the outlier in the sniper class.
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Sure I am talking about me as you are talking about you. Lots of other players are a bit like me or you, and I suspect a lot more players are rather imperfect like me.
I don't think unrestricted modes are typical for base games. Usually the base game is more limited to guide new players while advanced modes or mods remove limitations that might unbalance the game. If there are restrictions in advanced modes it is only for additional challenge and not as guidance or for balance.
There is no "can't" in this system. Did you ever calculate the perk costs? To crossover between two classes and to be able to learn any perks to 4 takes exactly as many points as learning one class up to perk level 5. And you don't want to tell me that the difference between say clubs learned to 4 or to 5 is so fundamental that playing with 4 is impossibly harder, especially when you can select the best perks of both classes as compensation. The only exception might be the turret perk where the difference between 4 and 5 is quite large.
You got a point there, in co-op the task usually get divided anyway. But in my own experience playing with 3 other players, each one of them is like me and tends to gravitate to always use the same weapons and do the same tasks.
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Because these aren’t Classes, they’re Archetypes.
Archetypes are less defined and more malleable than Classes, as they represent larger concepts, so the perks within them are going to be associated with different ideas of what those archetypes do. For example Strength could be interpreted as the miner (strong back), the berserker (unrestrained strength), or the tank (strength of resolve).
This approach is well-suited for a system that is focused on balancing mix and match with more defined playstyles, a Strength player mixing in Fortitude looks quite different than one mixing in Agility.
Additionally these archetypes are designed so that they function in every aspect of the game: gathering, crafting, surviving, fighting, building. Some are better in some regards than others and so they take a “if all you have is a hammer” approach, Perception is going to mostly rely on looting and hunting to survive, whereas Fortitude is going to focus on farming and reducing their needs, so complete mix and match would just incentivize hyper-specialization to the point of neglecting the other aspects of the game.
so yeah, Archetypes are bad at being Classes because they’re busy being Archetypes.
Archetypes are less defined and more malleable than Classes, as they represent larger concepts, so the perks within them are going to be associated with different ideas of what those archetypes do. For example Strength could be interpreted as the miner (strong back), the berserker (unrestrained strength), or the tank (strength of resolve).
This approach is well-suited for a system that is focused on balancing mix and match with more defined playstyles, a Strength player mixing in Fortitude looks quite different than one mixing in Agility.
Additionally these archetypes are designed so that they function in every aspect of the game: gathering, crafting, surviving, fighting, building. Some are better in some regards than others and so they take a “if all you have is a hammer” approach, Perception is going to mostly rely on looting and hunting to survive, whereas Fortitude is going to focus on farming and reducing their needs, so complete mix and match would just incentivize hyper-specialization to the point of neglecting the other aspects of the game.
so yeah, Archetypes are bad at being Classes because they’re busy being Archetypes.
Please show me the logic deduction that doesn't depend on facts and assumptions you know and expect from reading or hearing about real world snipers.
Liesel Weppen
New member
A Sniper can track animals better than others?
A Sniper can find better loot?
A Sniper can find burried supplies easier?
A Sniper can not be a good cook?
A Sniper can not be a better farmer?
A Sniper can not craft faster?
A Sniper can not be better insulated?
A Sniper can not have an iron gut?
Should i continue?
uncle.heavy
New member
As in, the players in your group. No generalization is possible here as one single exception kills the theory.
*raises hand* my group is an exception
We play a lot more unrestricted than I learned we should, although playing the same game - must be, I do not know, some factor other than the game, then.
What would be the point of making a bot to copy posts? I don't get what the motive would be.
None of those are inherent to being a sniper and on top of that you can still get those as a sniper.
Again, the stats are Archetypes, not Classes. Perception covers a lot more ground conceptually than Sniper.
The skill system as it stands does not have the actual limitations you are saying it does, it’s not an omni-tree yes, but you can still have a flexible build without spending a long time with low rank perks. You can get noticeable perk benefits with the main stat at 5 (which is before any cost increase) and get most maxxed by 7 in the stat, both very attainable without power-leveling.
Roland
Moderator
You're getting a bit crazy with this Liesel. A sniper won't track animals better than a..."shotgunnist?" who spends the points on Shotguns and animal tracking. It will cost more than someone who only hones their perception but the possibility is there. There is no forcing. There is only the economy of the points and what you are willing to spend. I'm sorry that you hate that it is cheaper for a sniper to be better at animal tracking than it is for a blademaster but it can be done.
Even if the game forces players into only five archetypes that they can play, that should not be considered a weakness. That is five distinct playstyles to experience at least 30 hours of gameplay a pop. Add in a 6th if you want to go broad and just do a bit from each branch (It's pretty fun actually). But the truth is that these five (or six) obvious progression paths are just the easy ones. You really can go the more expensive route with your points and mix and match for a more challenging experience.
This is the thing I appreciate most about this game. There are ways to make it more challenging than simply clicking on a setting in the top menu. So go ahead and try being a Sniper that has a rock solid iron gut. Despite your assertion it definitely is possible and the game allows you to make that choice. But if you progress those two things evenly your progress will be slower and more expensive and the game may become more challenging.
I'm not against a change to somehow make the expense of any combination of perks the player might want to choose completely equal across the board. I just doubt that Joel is going to tinker with the perks any more at this point. It would have to be a mod.
Maybe a good mod would be that when you spend a point on an attribute it raises all five attributes together. That would make it so all combinations of perks would be equal in cost. <shrug>
Bots are normally easy to spot because their posts almost never are relevant to the forum. So a bot that goes to an old post and copies and posts it as a new thread is going to have a greater likelihood of not being spotted. Once they have a couple posts and are "accepted" then they have better likelihood of being able to embed a link and not get caught.
Liesel Weppen
New member
Yeah, because nobody seems to understand what i'm talking about.
I do not want to make them absolutely equal.
See, nobody understands what i'm talking about. Also you.
To answer that, read my first answers in this thread again. As we begin running in circles and it's still not understood what i'm talking about, it won't help if i repeat the same another time.
Roland
Moderator
Well, you're not exactly being consistent with what you are saying. You started by saying that what you want is for an increase in agility to have an agility themed boost to ALL weapons and a strength themed boost to be given to ALL weapons whenever strength is increased-- instead of the handful of weapons that rest beneath those particular perk list headers.
But then you go on to say things like a Sniper can't be good at cooking which really really makes it sound more like you want to be able to mix and match any and all perks equally. Your first suggestion of having the attribute bonuses affecting all weapons instead the few that are assigned to them would not solve the problem you later bring up about a sniper specialist not being able to cook very well.
So excuse us for not exactly getting what you mean.
Another solution would be to remove the attribute gates from the perks so that any perk could be advanced irrespective of the attribute level. You could spend to move attributes up for those bonuses and/or you could spend to move perks up but the perks would not be dependent upon any particular level of attribute. That way you could mix and match any perk from anywhere that you would want to focus on. Removing the attribute requirements for perks would be a much easier mod to accomplish I think. You could probably change the value associated with the perks all to 1 so that once you put at least 1 point into an attribute all the perks under it would be available to advance all the way. So for two points you could advance blades and snipers or farming and snipers.
That would solve the economic problem you hate but the attribute bonuses you dislike would still remain.
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starscream
New member
i don't mind the way it is now. it forces you to make some decisions early game onto mid game. doesn't matter much late game since you'll have enough perk points to buy every perk.
and there is really no need to rush maxing out a combat skill. i've played level 150+ without maxing out a single combat skill, and it hasn't made much difference. you can raise a lot of skills to level 4 without a huge investment in perks.
and there is really no need to rush maxing out a combat skill. i've played level 150+ without maxing out a single combat skill, and it hasn't made much difference. you can raise a lot of skills to level 4 without a huge investment in perks.
Liesel Weppen
New member
*sigh*
I didn't bring up "snipers". It was meganoth that led the discussion to whether those things are attributes or classes. I in opposite said, that are also not really classes. And it was meganoth that said "perception" has to be seen as the sniper class. I argued against it, that there are perks in that "class" that do absolutely not fit to a sniper. So i still have no idea what it should be, but it is not "sniper".
Has nothing to do with my solution, that have been meganoth arguments to explain to my, why it is "good" as it is. I just tried to explain why this doesn't solve the issues i see and they can't be discussed away.
From the ongoing discussion i'd say i want to make those "things" attributes (again) instead of classes. And remove the hardcore binding of weapons to those squrbelburp. I call these things from now on squrbelburp, because there is no word existing that can describe what they really are (in a german forum i would call them "wolpertinger"). They are not classes, they are not attributes, call them whatever you want, it is wrong anyway, because they are completely arbitrary.
My problem is not that i can not cross skill. I can but it feels like wasting points, because of the design i need to spend points on squrbelburps that have absolutely no effect for me and my playstyle.
I spec into e.g. strength because i want to play a shotgun, because the squrbelburp "strength" buffs shotguns directly.
Now i want living of the land 4 and for that i need to level fortitude. The points put into fortitude for me are completely wasted. There is absolutely no effect i have from this points, because i don't use automatics, nor fists, and it doesn't effect my shotgun and my stun baton at all.
Now if fortitude (and the other 4 squrbelburps) wouldn't buff specific weapons but give generic fortitudioic buffs like... less stamina use for weapons... or reduce recoil or whatever, these points would have and effect and not feel completely wasted (because for me it's only a skill point gate).
The dead eye perk can stay under perception and also depend on the level of perception. Imho totally plausible that the perk that buffs rifles depends on perception.
It's fine that you need to skill a specific attribute to get full access to a weapon specific perk and finally max it with this perk.
And that still keeps your holy "archetypes". The trees would stay exactly the same, you can still try using only one branch like it is now if you are happier with others telling you how to play.
I really don't get what's so hard to understand with that.