The whole ‘no free respec’ thing is problematic: IF you want to have players to make meaningful choices, they need to know what a choice means, e.g.: be able to either try out what concsequences the choice has, and since there is no ‘preview’ or simulation or try out period, you’re basically spending skill points blindly, and only after you’ve spent (many) of them, you start to realize what you’ve done. So the FIRST really meaningful choice is for your next character, or after you’ve paid for (punishment for ignorance) your poor choices and respecced, can you TRY another allocation of points, again, semi-blindly. This sounds more like a guessing game where you pay for each round, than anything to do with informed choices.
No wonder everyone turns to buildguides, following them blindly and without comprehension, just to save time and frustration. Following guides gives you less satisfaction (you’ve found nothing out on your own) in my opinion, but is only realistic option to ‘get somewhere’ with your character if you don’t have unlimited time on your hands. This is especially true for games with vast and complicated skill trees, like POE and like LE is shaping to be.
The only meaningful choices I can make is which class (playstyle) I want, and where I want the balance between safety (tankiness) and risk (power/ damage) to lie. The first is a nominal variable, the second a numeric one. The skill/passive tree in LE at this moment makes it possible to make many mistakes with the latter, by spending points that contradict each other in the safety-risk balance, effectively producing mediocre builds. Why this complication is there, I don’t understand, I see no legitimate reason to do this, apart from creating an (illusion) of depth by providing a meriad of choices, of which most lead to failure.
Just my 2 cents…
Another idea:
What about a respec cooldown timer
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Respec, get refund of your skillpoints. Set respec on a cooldown timer of 10/30/480/whatever minutes. Each skill.
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Make releveling duration fix. If you respec a skill at lvl 10 make it last 10 minutes to regain that 10 points. Same for when you respec the skill for the first time.
To be honest, I like @Katalaeia s idea with respec currency the most. Obtainable through target farming when you hit endgame. Make it you can’t stack them infinite. No trading allowed.
For story add these currency as quest rewards.
People are following build guides even in Diablo 3 so I don’t think this argument is valid at all.
And yet everyone plays the same Death Seal Lich.
This argument is totally valid. You will follow build guides in D3 sure, but you very soon start going way off track and making builds your own. That’s the last thing you do in this game.
I think the key is being able to pay for your respec upfront by earning the currency for it naturally. Gold or otherwise. This is important because the thing about a respec, whatever the reason, is that you want to try it out NOW when you think of it, not hours after you think about it because you have to grind all that lost XP back.
No, its not valid. Whole “I don’t have time for this shit” is stupid.
Some people are just making up what “ARPG’s are all about”. ARPGs are not all about millions of options and having them all. It’s about providing tons of options and allowing you to make personalized build, how you wanna slain tons of monsters.
People are following build guides, because they care about the build power the most. These people will follow guides no matter how will be respec system designed.
Whole respec things is subjective issue. While you can throw arguments why it would be better this way or other way, in the end it’s all about what people enjoy and no opinion is better than other.
I guess you have time for this shit? I don’t.
Opinion. I disagree.
Agree. And how I do that in an informed way? By trying out as many of my ideas as possible.
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Free respec = results in (many) personalised builds because I will try everything out.
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Painful respec = the opposite because I will try very little out and instead lazy copy a build like everyone else.
Simple ARPG math #101.
The question is therefore open to the devs: do you want people mindlessly following the few strongest flavour-of-the-month builds on youtube (in which case change nothing and welcome to Path of Exile) or do you want players thinking for themselves and trying all sorts of crazy stuff out (in which case make respecing less time consuming)? The choice is yours.
I can tell you this stone cold fact. I’ve played almost every ARPG around, and in those where respecing is painful or expensive, guess what, I follow the same top online build as every other sheep. Whereas in those where respec is easy or free, I dive dive dive deep deep deep into the creamy depths the devs added to their game. These devs have put more time than most giving us not only 15+ skills per class but 100 skill points to chose in a tree for every single skill. Hats off. That’s a hell of a lot of effort on their part. Amazing. Seems a damn shame to waste it. But sadly painful/costly respec does just that.
I’ve already stopped experimenting. I just flit back to the game occasionally now and then, and run an Arena with the builds I ended up on, then move on to other games, that’s it. That’s my total interest in the game.
Just for an instant maybe; a glint of an idea enters my head, I pause. Just maybe? Then the thought of the respec time looms into view, and I log out.
So what? I don’t have time to dedicate my life to hardcore MMORGPs, so I am not playing it.
What you think is not important. But don’t try to make up defintion of ARPGs.
You also remove meaningful decision making in the process, no thank you. Play D3.
I wont follow any build guides even with limited respec. So I guess I just countered your point.
Maybe you want say that YOU will follow build guides. Feel free to do it.
Well, I guess I am not sheep.
In D3 i could try every single build I wanted. I had all classes at max level and all item sets - but in moment i found out my decision is without weight, I stopped playing altogether and played D2, TL2 or GD. So is this point really about game itself or about you?
His opinion is just as valid as yours, or mine, or Ultraboltnovacrunch’s…
But D3 has free respecs & people still follow the flavour of the month builds, whether the game resists you changing your mind (PoE) or not (D3).
I don’t think I’ve ever dived into someone else’s creamy depths before, but I am coming round to the idea of being able to farm a currency that allows you to respec without having to grind skill xp. Whether the devs implement something like that is entirely up to them. I suspect this thread has probably plumbed the creamy depths of the various viewpoints on the subject.
Oh man… So you’re defenitely missing something…
Yeah, I think I’m ok with that.
Yeah, meaningful, ill-informed and (as often as not) bad decisions.
And that point where you had everything and every build and lost interest and stopped playing? That’s where I STARTED playing. For me D3 began when I had tried and tested everything, and min-maxed everything and had my perfect build(s) and then started hitting the endless dungeons just to see how far I could go.
I believe it was you who did that (see below), I simply disagreed with your first point.
I think you missed the point. I provided general description of ARPG. But there is nowhere in definition, if respecs should be free, or not, if releveling has to take a lot of time or not etc. That’s why I said whole issue around respecing is subjective and it’s not driven by any “ARPG definition” what some people here are trying to tell us.
The reason, why I am vocal about this is very simple: I understand that many people enjoy “loadout” system what D3 has and I understand, some people find releveling annoying, I get that - and many ARPGs are providing good experience for these people, however, when I found kickstarter for Last Epoch, everything they said was really compelling to me, I saw like-minded people creating games for like-mindned players, like me, and that’s fantastic that not everything has to be like D3. So when I see strong opposition from some players against some of their designs, I don’t want them to feel, their(devs) point of view is “wrong”. I want them to know there is audience for their design choices, audience, which loves what they are doing and how they are doing it. I don’t want them to change it, because there is some “pressure” on forum. They should stick to their guns, they can’t make game for everyone, they should not try it.
I’m glad you give an explanation for your (somewhat emotional) earlier responses. Thank you for that. I don’t think you should worry too much about the dev’s changing ‘their’ game every time a (small) group of players is sharing their own preferences and ideas of what their ‘ideal arpg’ is like. It’s valiant of you to try to pretect their initial design, the one you believe is right.
These forums are all about opinions, of whomever chose to contribute / invest into this game, and everyone has the right to share their opinions and preferences as much as anyone else.
A good game designer (team) will know when to give in to ‘pressure’ from the player base, as much as when to give in to the pressure from the sales department, while maintaining their original idea’s and keeping consistency in all choices made along the way. However, the reason I put ‘their’ in quotes, is that any game (or design) made for more than yourself, is never only yours, the end users will eventually shape it as much as you do, and that’s a good thing. Devs are steering the ship, but the waves still influence where the ship will go, and if you sternly go against the flow, devs decide where the ship will strand, metaphorically speaking.
I’m not sure a simple heart/like is sufficient for such a succinctly worded rational reply to an emotive topic.
Somebody get this man a biscuit!
LOL, reminds me of my favorite podcast: “Odditorium”…
Well, it’s true that emotions can get better of me sometimes, but just to clarify few things here.
I honestly don’t care, if some people just want something different from the game. That’s fine and if someone will say “I would love to have free respec in the game”, i see thins as perfectly valid feedback and the only thing I can do is to either disagree, agree or be neutral about it, and as you said, that’s why we are here, to discuss several design issues, balance and game overall.
On the other hand - stating opinions as fact can annoy me. When this topic did not have 300+ replies, arguments were more about “you are selfish, if you want limit, how I play the game” and it took some time to explain, that having “free respec” in the game affects my enjoyment as much as it affects his, when game does not have this option - so we are both selfish. Typical argument was “but you don’t need to use it and you can pretend free respec is not here”… this has so many issues but for some reasons it’s hard to explain why this does not work. And yes, I tried.
Currently arguments switched to made up facts like - “ARPGs are all about this, so game should work like this” or “if this wont work how I said, most people will play like sheeps” etc. This is all made up.
I really wish we would use very simple and pure arguments like “I like/don’t like free respec” and just have discussion about what you like or don’t like about it, but not try to make some arguments more valid via some morale stance (you are selfish, i am not) or made up facts (it’s all about/most players will do this and that). That’s all.
True, civilized arguments are difficult. When I read forum posts like these, I always try to remember that people often omit the words “in my opinion”, or “I think/ believe/ wish”, even though almost all of the statements are in fact opinions, and, like you observed, almost never actual facts, backed up by some valid proof / facts.
Back on topic though: regardless of any definitions of an ARPG (who says LE should restrict itself to a definition or a genre?), let’s come up with creative solutions to the respeccing problem.
Here is a wild idea (not thought through, just sharing my thoughts): why not have free respec while in some ‘training area’, where you can try out new combination of skills, kill monsters and experience a playstyle. As a compendation (‘no free lunch’ logic), you do not gain any XP while in the training area, and no loot drops. Once you teleport back to town, your skills and passives are reset to where you were before. Actual respeccing can then cost time/effort, using any game mechanic you choose. How does that sound and how can this be improved?
@LastBrat @ManiaCCC all of your last few post were very well articulated. 
Seems like it’s not the golden standard for everyone to try having some meaningful discussion without trying to persuade other people about how much better the way they play/enjoy a game is.
Regarding the “trainings room enviroment/area”, i really like the idea, devs could also fit it nicely into the game with the time travel aspect.
You character can travel forwards in time, exploring his possible futures and then going back to were you started.
No character progression at all. Just “experience” for the actual (human) player.
