microchudd
Green Slime
Hey, all.. I'd like to possibly see a reduction in price when you decide to use the refund function on your skills. I decided to refund chain lightning for frost nova and had to shell out 500....
Skill refund cost...
- Thread starter microchudd
- Start date
GarlicJelly
Friendly Moderator (Formerly known as GoodStuff)
For testing skills in the beta we use the "/respec" command to refund all our skill points. I think that the price cost to refund a point is fine since it shouldn't be easy to change your skills.
Just a few days ago this was posted about a similar thing to this: http://secretsofgrindea.com/forum/index.php?threads/respecing-costs.5119/#post-14520
microchudd
Green Slime
Yeah, I wasn't aware of the /respec, heh. Late to the party lol. And you do have a valid point. I just don't want players to get discouraged by thinking they'll have to save tons of in game money to respec when the game goes live.
GarlicJelly
Friendly Moderator (Formerly known as GoodStuff)
They just have to think more about what spells/skills they want. It's pretty easy to rush through the game until you've beaten GUND4M so if you feel like your build wasn't very good I would suggest to start over with a new character.
Hyrist
Green Slime
As much as I can relate to the sentiment of "it makes them think about it", unfortunately I've seen that sort of mentality lead to less overall playtime, rather than more - which I feel replayability would be the ultimate goal here.
Respecs, if they're low return cost, will allow people to freely experiment with skills and experience more of them in a single playthrough. Testing out one skill may not be feel good for one character, but the ability to test it on the first run may interest them in making a separate run based around that skill later on.
If the refund skill is too prohibitively expensive, someone may simply stick to one 'favorite' and not feel the desire to experiment, then, they ultimately pass up on multiple play-throughs because they feel punished for playing around.
So my suggestion is to keep the cost of each individual skill point lower than it currently is and make the climb for more skill points being cashed in to be more gradual. In my view, cashing in a Silver Skill-rank Skill should not be prohibitive, it usually takes Silver to see how your skills are developing through tiers. Cashing in a gold tier spell should cost a pretty penny, however. So I would say higher costs for Gold Points than Silver points respectively.
Respecs, if they're low return cost, will allow people to freely experiment with skills and experience more of them in a single playthrough. Testing out one skill may not be feel good for one character, but the ability to test it on the first run may interest them in making a separate run based around that skill later on.
If the refund skill is too prohibitively expensive, someone may simply stick to one 'favorite' and not feel the desire to experiment, then, they ultimately pass up on multiple play-throughs because they feel punished for playing around.
So my suggestion is to keep the cost of each individual skill point lower than it currently is and make the climb for more skill points being cashed in to be more gradual. In my view, cashing in a Silver Skill-rank Skill should not be prohibitive, it usually takes Silver to see how your skills are developing through tiers. Cashing in a gold tier spell should cost a pretty penny, however. So I would say higher costs for Gold Points than Silver points respectively.
GarlicJelly
Friendly Moderator (Formerly known as GoodStuff)
Well if you can easily change out your skills then you wouldn't play the game in the same was as you do right now where it matters what skills you pick. In some fights it's better to have one skill over the other so the low cost to refund would be heavily abused which would change the gameplay. The game is more challenging in different parts because of your skills so in a way you make the game easier if you lower the cost for the refund. At first the devs didn't plan on having a refund for the skill points since all of them have a background in games like Ragnarok and love the idea of making important decissions about your character builds which I also agree with, to some extent at least. I'm not strongly against a lower cost but I would do fine with the current.
Hyrist
Green Slime
That's understandable, I suppose. But you're running into a different generation of gamers now. The sort of mentalities that we used to simply just accept and learn to enjoy are just outright refused now. What you would say promotes making thoughtful decisions may likely instead lead to rage-quitting because they don't want to either have to A - 'grind' for the gold it would take for a reset of skill points or B - start their game over again. (And having farming gold be too easy to compensate creates its own problems.)
Given the rise of Steam Refunds, the problem can result in more than just than lost playtime, that can result in a lost customer.
It took less than six hours of gameplay for me to come to that situation, recognizing both the mentality of the older school, more patient build philosophy, and now it would conflict with newer gamers who really should grow to enjoy these games, but lack the time and/or patience. Looking at the games that are most successful right now, especially among the youth, a common theme seems to push forward the freedom in experimentation over making dedicated plan decisions.
What I propose is a compromise on this. Silver seems to be a good maker for Point of No Return. It allows the early-game experimentation of skills, allowing them to shuffle their build around to find what works best for them in the first couple of dungeons, before really investigating heavily with those gold points.
Yes, you will run into situations early game when skills will be shuffled around to see works best. And always the Silver level Skills will be interchangeable, but that 'core build' game plan will sustain itself when players invest more and more into Gold skills, gradually cementing a playstyle instead of forcing the player to make one build from the start, and then being frustrated for making a 'wrong choice'.
It's just something to consider. That type of experimental playstyle may be out of their target audience range. But it just felt with such a wide variety of skills, that the current cost scaling on refunds really seems to hamper the "Build the way you want!" sales moniker on their video.
Given the rise of Steam Refunds, the problem can result in more than just than lost playtime, that can result in a lost customer.
It took less than six hours of gameplay for me to come to that situation, recognizing both the mentality of the older school, more patient build philosophy, and now it would conflict with newer gamers who really should grow to enjoy these games, but lack the time and/or patience. Looking at the games that are most successful right now, especially among the youth, a common theme seems to push forward the freedom in experimentation over making dedicated plan decisions.
What I propose is a compromise on this. Silver seems to be a good maker for Point of No Return. It allows the early-game experimentation of skills, allowing them to shuffle their build around to find what works best for them in the first couple of dungeons, before really investigating heavily with those gold points.
Yes, you will run into situations early game when skills will be shuffled around to see works best. And always the Silver level Skills will be interchangeable, but that 'core build' game plan will sustain itself when players invest more and more into Gold skills, gradually cementing a playstyle instead of forcing the player to make one build from the start, and then being frustrated for making a 'wrong choice'.
It's just something to consider. That type of experimental playstyle may be out of their target audience range. But it just felt with such a wide variety of skills, that the current cost scaling on refunds really seems to hamper the "Build the way you want!" sales moniker on their video.