But its not Dragon Age
What is Dragon Age is not set in stone, so early in the intellectual property's life.
Final Fantasy trades out and changes combat systems for every single entry in the series. Sometimes a developer just want to have this kind of combat, and next time they want this kind. In my experience you've gotta go with the flow, if you're going to stick around.
Dragon Age is a time period. Dragon Age is a setting.
are there screenshots of Templar and Rift Mage trees?
I will say this: Dragon Age Inquisition has a VERY different ability system. It's not quite merely World of Warcraft style combat + positioning like previous entries.
This game has a greater focus on less abilities that you can use more often. An 8 ability loadout asks you to weigh your decisions, and focus your strategies into specific combinations and builds that will mesh well together and allow you to overcome the obstacles you encounter.
Given that "abilities I can use in this fight" is now a resource being constrained, it makes sense logically to design your skill trees in such a way that the player is not flooded with similar options like "fireball" and "fireball harder" or "buff one person's attack" and "buff one person's defense" and "buff one person's critical chance" and other such things. Your slots are just too valuable to spread so thin as that, although there's still room for much variety.
So, abilities need to do more things to justify their spot on your bar. Suddenly, a fire spell also inflicts horror. Suddenly, a lightning bolt is fused together with crushing prison and called Static Cage. Suddenly Barrier needs to effect the whole party, and be used much more often (so it doesn't last as long to compensate) so that it's not a dead slot for a majority of combat... or it needs to seriously justify it's long cooldown, as I think a spell like Revive would.
All of this considered... there's still as not many abilities as I think this game needed. Of the 66 spells in Origins, you had a good chance of getting 17 to 21 of them. That's about 1/3rd of the options in the game. That means you don't see 2/3rds of the spells you could have grabbed on a given character, and this gives more meaning to the choices you made.
In this game, you will still get one ability point every level. Some passives stand in the way of letting you reach activated abilities in a tree.
But even then, if you get 25 ability points in this game and there are only 17 spells...
There's a good chance you could learn almost every activated ability in the game, or at least 1/2 or even 2/3rds of them. This means every mage character is more same-y then before. This directly counters a goal of customization and differentiation...
I think something like 33 active spells would have been more reasonable. Inquisition did NOT need 66 spells like Origins. That wouldn't work at all. But all the same, it needed more than it seems to have gotten.
I still think it'll be fun to play.
There are 50 options total in the four base trees. Sure only 17 of those are active spells but 17 are upgrades to those spells which could drastically alter their function or scope and then the remaining 16 are passive upgrade which also can greatly alter those spells.
I wish there were another full tree for Entropy which would bring the total up to 21 active spells, 21 upgrades and 20 passive, but alas.
There still are a lot of choices, they're just different now. I don't know if it is better or at least comparable to what we've had previously but there are choices outside just the spells themselves.
All of this considered... there's still as not many abilities as I think this game needed. Of the 66 spells in Origins, you had a good chance of getting 17 to 21 of them. That's about 1/3rd of the options in the game. That means you don't see 2/3rds of the spells you could have grabbed on a given character, and this gives more meaning to the choices you made.
How did you get 17-21? You could get as many as 35 spells.
24 max from level up (although 23 max was more likely without exploits)
3 at character creation (including the one pre-assigned)
3 After story events
1 from the desire demon
4 from tome of arcane technique
So including your specializations you could end up getting nearly half of the spells in the game. I can't say that I really felt that my choices had that much meaning for any of the classes in Origins,
Warriors and Rogues had the issue of once you made your choice of weapons you have enough talent points to get all your weapon, class and spec talents or very close to it and mages had so many spells that I simply had to take even if I didn't want them to get to a better spell or those that I felt were simply inferior to the other choices available to me.
I will say this for the passives: they're cool.
Peaceful Aura in the Spirit Tree reduces generated Threat by 50%.
That's a whole lot of protection for a squishy, squishy mage.
are there screenshots of Templar and Rift Mage trees?
I don't think so, but the Templar tree is at 1:16 in the video... I'm staring at it right now.
I don't think so, but the Templar tree is at 1:16 in the video... I'm staring at it right now.
So no crushing prison spell? i love that spell 
This is a result of the 8 ability limit. Within such a system, offering mages a greater range of active spells within their trees would actually be a negative thing, because it means more of the class is unusable at any one time. Instead they seem to have merged a lot of spell effects together. It makes sense, but it doesn't mean I have to like it. I don't like the concept of the 8 ability system.
I especially don't like staple spells like Stonefist being relegated to specialisation trees. If I want to make a druidic Dalish mage, I shouldn't be forced into a specific specialisation just for one spell. Why the overabundence of elemental trees anyway?
I have always liked playing esoteric mystical scholar type mages, who focus on the unusual trees like Spirit and Arcane. I hope that's still possible, without resorting to flashy elemental damage spells alone.
thanks.
does the Rift Mage tree look like it has any "Force Mage" spells in it?
I haven't gotten that far, sorry... people here are saying it's just Elemental, Primal, and passives... o.O It sounds more like a miscellaneous tree than a spec.
I continue to be uncertain as to how mage skills/spells are being handled in this game. I wish I had the DAI game guide right now so I could ease my mind as to what exactly the options will be for those playing mage. The specializations right now don't sound very awesome.
There are 50 options total in the four base trees. Sure only 17 of those are active spells but 21 are upgrades to those spells which could drastically alter their function or scope and then the remaining 12 are passive upgrade which also can greatly alter those spells.
I wish there were another full tree for Entropy which would bring the total up to 21 active spells, 25 upgrades and 16 passive, but alas.
There still are a lot of choices, they're just different now. I don't know if it is better or at least comparable to what we've had previously but there are choices outside just the spells themselves.
Indeed. Important to note that there is a CRAPTON more passive abilities in Inquisition, more then ever before by far.
I do not think this is necessarily a good thing, but there you are. The straight "increased damage and duration of spells in this tree by 10%" ones seem kind of annoyingly un-awesome to me. But others like Guardian Spirit are legitimately interesting grabs that feel worthwhile.
How did you get 17-21? You could get as many as 35 spells.
24 max from level up (although 23 max was more likely without exploits)
3 at character creation (including the one pre-assigned)
3 After story events
1 from the desire demon
4 from tome of arcane technique
So including your specializations you could end up getting nearly half of the spells in the game. I can't say that I really felt that my choices had that much meaning for any of the classes in Origins,
Warriors and Rogues had the issue of once you made your choice of weapons you have enough talent points to get all your weapon, class and spec talents or very close to it and mages had so many spells that I simply had to take even if I didn't want them to get to a better spell or those that I felt were simply inferior to the other choices available to me.
You're right, you get much more then I was thinking. The first time I completed Origins I was level 17. On my completionist playthrough (except for no evil choices) I was 22, I believe.
So, we get 30 (more of less) points in Origins. I leave out specializations and passives here, as I did for Inquisition to be fair. This is just shy of half of the abilities in the game.
How many points will we start with in Inquisition? I'm not sure. I would assume 2 is a safe guess? So if we have 2 starting abilities, and the max level is 25 to 30, and we might get a few points out of key moments in the game, and there might be one or two tomes for extra points, then you might have as much as that same 30-35 points in Inquisition. There are still merely 17 activated spells, though. So now we're looking at a possibly realistic 100% of all spells learned.
There is literally no difference between the mage Inquisitor, Vivienne, Solas, and Dorian at max level other then their specs. Is this a potential problem?
The answer, actually, is no. And the answer is no for only one reason: the 8 ability limit. The 8 ability limit is the savior to this system, because it encourages each of these mages, even if they're all out on the same team together, to load up different abilities.
Mind you, there'll be a lot of overlap with only 26 spells in the game (including specs) It's very likely in a 4 mage party that you'll have access to every single magical talent that exists.
Man, I just hope the passives we haven't seen yet are very well designed, or otherwise that many of the spells in this game are very spammable and fun to use.
I haven't gotten that far, sorry... people here are saying it's just Elemental, Primal, and passives... o.O It sounds more like a miscellaneous tree than a spec.
What is Dragon Age is not set in stone, so early in the intellectual property's life.
We have different definitions of early.
Why no misdirection/death hex against dragons?
I am really not a fan of flashy elemental spells. Is it still plausible to play a mage without any? Spirit and arcane damage? I don't want to be forced to be a Necromancer...
I am really not a fan of flashy elemental spells. Is it still plausible to play a mage without any? Spirit and arcane damage? I don't want to be forced to be a Necromancer...
You could focus on Spirit and...I suppose the least flashy of the Elemental spells. Specialize as a Knight Enchanter or Necromancer.
Otherwise, not really. Not that I can see.
I don't mind the occasional elemental spell. For example, my mage in DA:O used Cone of Cold and Blizzard, but mainly focused on things like Arcane Bolt, Crushing Prison, Walking Bomb, Mana Clash and the Glyph spells.
Oh ew...
So judging by the Weapon and Shield skill tree, this right here seems to be a warrior using the final skill you get as a Weapon and Shield Warrior, which I'm assuming is "Assault":
(skip to 6:20)
The first two strikes look ok, and the red aura is cool, but that last strike....yikes. It just looks stupid and unnatural for a trained Warrior to uppercut with both his sword and shield like that. It just looks so awkward and lame. Why would the animators do that?
so Crushing Prison is nowhere to be found?no Hex or Entropy spells either?
I am really not a fan of flashy elemental spells. Is it still plausible to play a mage without any? Spirit and arcane damage? I don't want to be forced to be a Necromancer...
Maybe focus on passives, buff spells, and staff attacks?
@Mathias : That is actually a Reaver skill I believe. The 'red aura' are dragony claw hand things. He's basically double swiping then bringing both hands up with the clawed hands coming out. And yeah I think its pretty bizar. I will probably end up just using the aura of pain and devour skills from Reaver. That red-claw thing would have to be freaky amazing for me to wanna use it.
-edit-
I should of said I 'think' it's a Reaver skill.. cause I can't be 100% sure. Also can't remember where we saw that skill originally on who and all that. Doesn't matter much though as that shaky cam footage is the old E3 build. And THAT, right there means it doesn't mean jack.
Oh ew...
So judging by the Weapon and Shield skill tree, this right here seems to be a warrior using the final skill you get as a Weapon and Shield Warrior, which I'm assuming is "Assault":
(skip to 6:20)
The first two strikes look ok, and the red aura is cool, but that last strike....yikes. It just looks stupid and unnatural for a trained Warrior to uppercut with both his sword and shield like that. It just looks so awkward and lame. Why would the animators do that?
God, they sure were big on putting the camera right up your butt in earlier builds. I like it better now.
Maybe focus on passives, buff spells, and staff attacks?
I guess. I think I'm going to be a Knight Enchanter, so buffs could work well with that.
I really like playing mysterious, scholarly mages who command power in a less overt fashion.
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