Stat that gives more skill points?

[PsychoBlonde]

Maybe it's just me, but I really feel that there ought to be a stat or perk or SOMETHING that gives you more skill points (or, conversely, fewer.)  The characters just feel absolutely STARVED of skills in the beta and there's nothing much you can do about that I could find in the beta.

 

I've always enjoyed playing heavily skill-based characters, but with static skill allotment this is basically impossible--you wind up having to play a silly game where you give each party member 2 skills for them to "cover".  You don't even get the system from Pillars 1 where you could pick between having more lower-level skills or one or two high ones--now everybody has the same amount of NOT ENOUGH SKILLS so you might as well just max a couple and call it a day.  I find this annoying.

 

What might be interesting would be to have stat thresholds that give you skill bonuses, so if you do a character with spread-out stat points, you're going to have a lot of small +1 skills that will effectively make you a much more "skilled" character than one that is heavily invested in a few stats. So, something like this:

 

Strength

10 +1 Athletics

11 +1 Intimidate
12  +2 (total) Athletics
13  +2 (total) Intimidate

Constitution
10 +1 Survival
11 +2 Survival

12 +3 Survival

13 +4 Survival

Dexterity

10 +1 Sleight of Hand
11 +1 Stealth

12 +2 Sleight of Hand
13 +2 Stealth
 

Perception

10 +1 Insight
11 +1 Alchemy
12 +2 Insight
13 +2 Alchemy

 

Intellect

10 +1 Mechanics
11 +1 Metaphysics

12 +2 Mechanics
13 +2 Metaphysics

 

Resolve

10 +1 Bluff

11 +1 Diplomacy

12 +2 Bluff

13 +2 Diplomacy

 

It might potentially make more "balanced" builds more interesting to play for role-playing purposes.

 

 

[SonicMage117]

Interesting indeed! Yes, I like

 

I think it would definitely be interesting.. to have 2 different modes for the game - 1 being skill-based characters, 2 being class-based characters. While both would give the game different experiences but keep the end result of character build flow the same.

[Wormerine]

Sorry but won’t happen. It is still very much IE style game - combat is very much a focus and stats like intelligence or perception are still crucial for combat. There is no “skill based” way to play as it was in Fallout1&2. In fact, Deadfire even made a special effort to separate “interaction skills” with “utility skills” to not have a clash between gameplay and role play.

 

Skills points are fine as they are, though as person who gravitates toward “skill based” characters in other types of RPGs as well, I understand the frustration. For Deadfire it works as it is, though.

[Aramintai]

Sorry but won’t happen. It is still very much IE style game - combat is very much a focus and stats like intelligence or perception are still crucial for combat. There is no “skill based” way to play as it was in Fallout1&2. In fact, Deadfire even made a special effort to separate “interaction skills” with “utility skills” to not have a clash between gameplay and role play.

 

Skills points are fine as they are, though as person who gravitates toward “skill based” characters in other types of RPGs as well, I understand the frustration. For Deadfire it works as it is, though.

I don't agree, skills are as important to gameplay as combat abilities. With right skills you can gain an advantage or avoid combat altogether and that's as valid alternative to progress in the game as combat. 

 

I gave similar feedback with similar idea for the previous patch and I agree with the OP - there are too many very useful skills and too few skill points. Athletics is a a musthave - it not only gives a bonus in combat, but is also a frequent skill to check in narrative interactions. Various rogue skills are also a musthave both in and out of combat - traps disarming, sneaking, pickpocketing, lock picking, bomb throwing. But I can't get even half of those to decent level because there are too few skill points to spend, so no proper rogue roleplaying for me. 

And you certainly can't raise more than one, maybe two conversation skills to sufficient level to pass most checks.

 

Companions lending a hand makes no big difference as their contributions are small or nonexistent in some situations - maybe this needs to be adjusted if devs aren't going to give us more skill points.

Or, since all classes are starved of new abilities, maybe each class should have passive abilities that give extra +something to certain skills.

 

Anyway, too bad people are not talking about this issue more and everyone just focuses on combat.

Edited December 27, 2017 by Aramintai

[Ninjamestari]

I completely agree with your assessment, butI think a better solution would be to just add +1 skill points per level for every point of intelligence above 10, and similarly -1 for every point below 10. Easy, intuitive, and it discourages people from dumping INT at the same time.

Edited December 27, 2017 by Ninjamestari

[swamp_slug]

Companions lending a hand makes no big difference as their contributions are small or nonexistent in some situations - maybe this needs to be adjusted if devs aren't going to give us more skill points.

Or, since all classes are starved of new abilities, maybe each class should have passive abilities that give extra +something to certain skills.

 

Anyway, too bad people are not talking about this issue more and everyone just focuses on combat.

With the exception of Stealth in the narrative encounters on Tikawara island, Intimidation vs Rongi (also needs Intellect 14) and Mechanics to shortcut Poko Kohara I don’t think I’ve seen any of the other skill checks in the beta require a bonus greater than 5 and most of them are group challenges.

In my playthroughs I’ve passed all of the alchemy, metaphysics and religion checks on the group bonus alone.

 

I would like some means of getting more skill points though as I find it really odd that if I want to max Stealth on the Rogue I have to rely on the group bonus for Mechanics and have no Sleight of Hand.

 

My personal view is that Intellect should grant more skill points per level, +1 utility skill point per odd score value and +1 interaction skill point per even score value so an Intellect of 13 would give +2 utility and +1 interaction skill point per level. With group bonuses that should be more than sufficient.

[Aramintai]

 

My personal view is that Intellect should grant more skill points per level, +1 utility skill point per odd score value and +1 interaction skill point per even score value so an Intellect of 13 would give +2 utility and +1 interaction skill point per level. With group bonuses that should be more than sufficient.

 

I don't think Intellect should be universal stat for skills, because it's not logical. How high Intellect affects Athletics, for example? I like OP's idea better where each stat give bonuses only to certain skills.

[Aramintai]

With the exception of Stealth in the narrative encounters on Tikawara island, Intimidation vs Rongi (also needs Intellect 14) and Mechanics to shortcut Poko Kohara I don’t think I’ve seen any of the other skill checks in the beta require a bonus greater than 5 and most of them are group challenges.

In my playthroughs I’ve passed all of the alchemy, metaphysics and religion checks on the group bonus alone.

 

I would like some means of getting more skill points though as I find it really odd that if I want to max Stealth on the Rogue I have to rely on the group bonus for Mechanics and have no Sleight of Hand.

My rogue failed all athletics checks and had no skill points for pickpocketing or bomb throwing. So he was stealthy, but at the same time clumsy as an oaf, had nimble enough fingers for trap disarming and lock picking, but not for picking pockets and even with 18 DEX had bad hand-eye coordination for throwing bombs 

In conversations my party succeeded in Persuasion check (it is 7 or 8 iirc) to free lagufaeth only when one character heavily invested in it from the start and others helped.

Edited December 27, 2017 by Aramintai

[Wormerine]

Why to have skill point at all, if we were to pass all the checks on all the skills? You pick two or three per character and focus on them. None of these are mandatory, but rather open new paths, just like high diplomacy or metaphysics skill. 

Tying skills point just to inteligence seems like a terrible idea, as int is already a strong stat. Trying them to stats seem bad anyway. 

The way of getting ahead is already there, and its done via character backgrounds. 

[Aramintai]

Why to have skill point at all, if we were to pass all the checks on all the skills? You pick two or three per character and focus on them. None of these are mandatory, but rather open new paths, just like high diplomacy or metaphysics skill. 

Because players like to have a well rounded party? Because seeing failure messages is demotivating in a game? Because players want to properly roleplay such popular archetypes as rogue or silvertongue?

Right now we can't have either. Either you pick some skills you want and make your whole party invest only into them to pass all the difficult checks, or spread out thin and fail all of them. So basically, if you want to have a proper rogue, your whole party have to work for said rogue when it comes to skills, without investing into any skills that may be more appropriate for their class.

Edited December 27, 2017 by Aramintai

[Ninjamestari]

Why to have skill point at all, if we were to pass all the checks on all the skills? You pick two or three per character and focus on them. None of these are mandatory, but rather open new paths, just like high diplomacy or metaphysics skill. 

 

Tying skills point just to inteligence seems like a terrible idea, as int is already a strong stat. Trying them to stats seem bad anyway. 

 

The way of getting ahead is already there, and its done via character backgrounds. 

 

These changes don't have to exist in a vacuum, you can easily take the duration bonus from INT and move it to RES, take spell damage from RES and add it to Perception and call the new stat WITS. You can't fix the stat system with singular small tweaks, you need to redesign it, every single stat.

[Wormerine]

 

Why to have skill point at all, if we were to pass all the checks on all the skills? You pick two or three per character and focus on them. None of these are mandatory, but rather open new paths, just like high diplomacy or metaphysics skill. 

Because players like to have a well rounded party? Because seeing failure messages is demotivating in a game? Because players want to properly roleplay such popular archetypes as rogue or silvertongue?

Right now we can't have either. Either you pick some skills you want and make your whole party invest only into them to pass all the difficult checks, or spread out thin and fail all of them. So basically, if you want to have a proper rogue, your whole party have to work for said rogue when it comes to skills, without investing into any skills that may be more appropriate for their class.

and you can do both things. Its been a while since I played BG but even though rogues got exclusive access to pickpocket, move silently, walk in shadows, find&disarm traps, openlocs, you wouldn't be able to be good in all of those. So you create a rogue and choose utility rogue (mechanics, sligh of hand, stealth) and boom, you have your rogue. Focuse more on one of those three depending what you want to be super good at. 

 

Silvertongue - dyplomacy + maybe insight? Boom.

 

Maybe because I am playing with unavailable options off, but without super specializing (every character usualy picks 3 skills, 2 at least) but I am passing bunch of stat checks. Usually they are around 3points, with extreme ones going up to 6 or 7 with party assist. Seems reasonable. 

 

 

These changes don't have to exist in a vacuum, you can easily take the duration bonus from INT and move it to RES, take spell damage from RES and add it to Perception and call the new stat WITS. You can't fix the stat system with singular small tweaks, you need to redesign it, every single stat.

... and why would we made these arbitrary changes to perfectly functional system?

[Aramintai]

and you can do both things. Its been a while since I played BG but even though rogues got exclusive access to pickpocket, move silently, walk in shadows, find&disarm traps, openlocs, you wouldn't be able to be good in all of those. So you create a rogue and choose utility rogue (mechanics, sligh of hand, stealth) and boom, you have your rogue. Focuse more on one of those three depending what you want to be super good at. 

 

In BG everything was in percentages and rogues had most skill points than any other class to spend on skills. So even low, you had a chance to succeed in a task, in POE if you don't meet the threshold you're screwed. And since rogue was the most skill based class in BG it had more than enough points to be good at any rogue based task after a few level ups, especially with generously available buffs from consumables and gear (some gave a whooping 50% boost).

As for Deadfire skills - you barely scrape enough points for 2 skills for a rogue to be able to do all tasks related to them, while larger half of purely roguish skills are left behind.

 

 

Silvertongue - dyplomacy + maybe insight? Boom.

 

Silvertongue is everything persuasion related - persuasion, intimidation, bluff. Not enough points to be good at all three. As I've stated above there was one persuasion check which can only be passed if you put all points into persuasion. Insight and intellectual skills such as Religion, Metaphysics, History are left behind, not to mention Streetwise and Survival.

Edited December 27, 2017 by Aramintai

[rjshae]

There's no reason to tie attributes to more skill points. Having greater ability doesn't give you life experience or an education. It just means you'll probably be more successful at the skills you do learn.

[MortyTheGobbo]

 

and you can do both things. Its been a while since I played BG but even though rogues got exclusive access to pickpocket, move silently, walk in shadows, find&disarm traps, openlocs, you wouldn't be able to be good in all of those. So you create a rogue and choose utility rogue (mechanics, sligh of hand, stealth) and boom, you have your rogue. Focuse more on one of those three depending what you want to be super good at. 

 

In BG everything was in percentages and rogues had most skill points than any other class to spend on skills. So even low, you had a chance to succeed in a task, in POE if you don't meet the threshold you're screwed. And since rogue was the most skill based class in BG it had more than enough points to be good at any rogue based task after a few level ups, especially with generously available buffs from consumables and gear (some gave a whooping 50% boost).

As for Deadfire skills - you barely scrape enough points for 2 skills for a rogue to be able to do all tasks related to them, while larger half of purely roguish skills are left behind.

 

On the flipside, a random chance in skills means you can blow it even if you're good at it. And unlike with combat attacks and abilities, you don't usually get a redo, unless you abuse quicksaving. Maybe the game could make it work, but it'd require something completely different.

 

If Deadfire has insufficient skill points to get a good selection of non-combat skills, the answer is to increase them. Tying them down to an attribute would be more trouble than it'd be worth.

[Ninjamestari]

 

These changes don't have to exist in a vacuum, you can easily take the duration bonus from INT and move it to RES, take spell damage from RES and add it to Perception and call the new stat WITS. You can't fix the stat system with singular small tweaks, you need to redesign it, every single stat.

... and why would we made these arbitrary changes to perfectly functional system?

 

 

Because they're not arbitrary, they'd address the very specific issue you were talking about in regards of having INT provide skillpoints, and balancing the stats which everyone here seems to complain about one way or another.

[Not Hypebringer]

What would even be point of that? I mean, one of core concepts of first PoE was that there are no class-specific attributes and every class can benefit from all of them, and you can see that systems were seperated - abilities, skills and attributes don't directly interact with each other.

I guess that was develepers' idea to keep all of them seperated to allow for more interesting and diverse builds. I don't see reason to change it now, it worked pretty well.