22 réponses à ce sujet

[KC_Prototype]

I mean I know you can only have 8 in the UI but can I use the radial menu to use my other abilities like in DAO and DA2 or are we locked at 8? 

[Poisd2Strike]

You can only use 8 abilities.  Unfortunately, there is no radial menu option in DAI.

[KC_Prototype]

You can only use 8 abilities.  Unfortunately, there is no radial menu option in DAI.

That's not what I wanted to hear but thanks. No I can't have all the cool abilities I want, now I have to pick and choose. Bioware needs to add that back! 

[JaegerBane]

It's pretty much universally acknowledged that the 8-slot hard limit on abilities was a bit of a goof - not least because the way the ability tree system means you end up with more than 8 abilities at higher levels regardless of your build. There was allegedly a design decision reason behind it sounds a bit too 'helmets can't be toggled'-mass effect 2 for most to take that seriously.

On the other hand, it's really only the mage that really suffers here and there are ways and means around it for certain spec builds (for instance, the KE doesn't actually need Barrier on its quick bar etc).

[KC_Prototype]

It's pretty much universally acknowledged that the 8-slot hard limit on abilities was a bit of a goof - not least because the way the ability tree system means you end up with more than 8 abilities at higher levels regardless of your build. There was allegedly a design decision reason behind it sounds a bit too 'helmets can't be toggled'-mass effect 2 for most to take that seriously.

On the other hand, it's really only the mage that really suffers here and there are ways and means around it for certain spec builds (for instance, the KE doesn't actually need Barrier on its quick bar etc).

Yeah, as a mage I wanted to have a plethora of mage abilities in different trees. 

[Besetment]

Its ok to have a limited skillbar if the player is allowed to pick any 8 active abilities from a pool of available skills like in Guild Wars 1. Inquisition has skill trees however, so if you want Fire Mine, you have to take either Immolate or Flashfire as a prerequisite.

 

With other classes, theres less impetus to dip into different skill trees because they have weapon specific trees. For example, if you go dual dagger rogue you will never use any skills in the archery tree.

 

Mages don't have weapon specific skill trees and there are incentives to dip into all skill trees because of synergy. For example, Flashpoint works with any damage skill provided it crits. It doesn't have to be a fire skill.

 

You end up with a tonne of pre-requisite active skills which could be useful but you will never slot them because you don't have room on your skillbar. I played a Rift Mage first go around and Veil Strike is a pre-requisite for the Restorative Veil passive. That passive is mandatory because it returns mana when you damage a weakened opponent and all the active skills in the Rift Mage tree apply weakness.

 

This is my active skill bar:

 

Barrier

Fade Step

Stonefist

Energy Barrage

Chain Lightning

Fire Mine

Pull of the Abyss

Static Cage

 

These are pre-requisite active skills I can't use:

 

Immolate (aoe, cheap and instant mana return vs weakness)

Lightning Bolt (paralysis)

Veil Strike (cheap aoe weakness and knockdown)

 

Also don't have room for Mark of the Rift (focus ability).

 

Its a shame those skills are wasted. There are times when I don't crit on Fire Mine and Chain Lightning, thus don't trigger Flashpoint and don't get a cooldown reset but I'm still sitting on full mana due to Restorative Veil. It would be nice to fall back on Lightning Bolt -> Stonefist for a Discharge combo but welp skillbar not big enough.

[Selea]

The decision has both pros and cons.

The pros is:

- You must choose which active skills are best to use for your build (or the situation at hand), you cannot have everything.

The con is:

- Certain classes (mages or certain specs) can feel less powerful than they should be given that they have more active skills to use.

Bioware decided that they wanted to have the classes choose a set of skills and not be allowed to use everything (probably on the attempt to not allow overpowered builds, or builds that can do everything at once) and one can agree with this point of view or not, but it's not an objectively bad decision in itself. The problem in DA:I is mostly that, apart in certain scenarios (as for example a Tempest rogue, or a nuking mage build) the 8 skills are more than enough anyway to do all you would like to do without issues and become overpowered at it, so in the end the limitation does really nothing of relevant apart looking as an arbitrary restriction.

Probably the thing would be different if, apart damaging skills, the game had also a plethora of utility ones so you had to choose the way your character wants to go. As it is some choices (given that they are mostly about damage) are clearly better than others and so, apart some cases as the aforementioned Tempest Rogue, 8 skills are more than enough to pick the best skills anyway.

[Besetment]

I don't buy the idea that your skillbar is limited to 8 skills so you are forced to choose which skills to use.

 

1) The whole point of skill trees is you have a limited number of points and you have to choose how far you want to go down a particular branch. How many pre-requisites is one skill worth? As good as static cage is, it cost too many points to get there for the vast majority of the game when Fire Mine does so much damage vs mana cost and cooldown, so I didn't use static cage until fairly late on.

 

This is the limiting factor in skill trees - the more points you spend reaching the end of one branch, the less points you have left to advance down other branches, in other directions. Spend too many points going down one branch, and you expose weakness in other areas. For example, I could get static cage early, by investing heavily in the Storm Tree but I would be adversely affected by lightning resistant monsters and lack cooldown/mana generation from passives in other trees + cross class combo potential.

 

2) A game like Guild Wars 1 had a massive pool consisting of several hundred skills and you could pick any 8. They do not have pre-requisites or (for the most part) class restrictions so you can combine any skills from any 2 classes in any order but you are limited to 8 skills at any given time.

 

The cost of every skill is the same (essentially 1 point) and this system is more about identifying skills that can be combined in interesting ways to do things that a single class could not ordinarily do by itself. I loved this system because if you understood the mechanics well enough, you could break the game in very unexpected ways.

 

These systems are antagonistic so pick one or the other. Don't impose a double limitation by forcing players to pick pre-requisite skills en route to the ones they want and then limit how many skills they can use at one time.

 

Bioware almost got this right because there are very few "redundant" active skills in this game. Almost every active mage skill is useful is decent for general use. The skills I couldn't fit on my skillbar are ones I was basically required to pick and which I would like to make use of but can't. Its very wasteful.

[JaegerBane]

Bioware's official reason was that it was a design decision, with the issue being that 32 abilities (across 4 characters) was the maximum the player could be used before it became unwieldly. While I don't believe that for a second (primarily because it doesn't make sense - it's not like you ever have access to all of them simultaneously), it does imply that it was about control schemes, not challenge. If it were about restricting choices, surely the level system would be the platform to be worked on.

[Selea]

I don't buy the idea that your skillbar is limited to 8 skills so you are forced to choose which skills to use.

 

1) The whole point of skill trees is you have a limited number of points and you have to choose how far you want to go down a particular branch. How many pre-requisites is one skill worth? As good as static cage is, it cost too many points to get there for the vast majority of the game when Fire Mine does so much damage vs mana cost and cooldown, so I didn't use static cage until fairly late on.

 

This is the limiting factor in skill trees - the more points you spend reaching the end of one branch, the less points you have left to advance down other branches, in other directions. Spend too many points going down one branch, and you expose weakness in other areas. For example, I could get static cage early, by investing heavily in the Storm Tree but I would be adversely affected by lightning resistant monsters and lack cooldown/mana generation from passives in other trees + cross class combo potential.

 

 

With 24 average levels, so 26 skill points (27 if human) plus 6 from amulets that means you have 33 skills to use between all the trees. You can pretty max 3 skill trees completely and still 3-4 skill points remain. That's vastly more than 8 active skills to use, and if instead of maxing a tree completely (a thing you usually don't need, apart from spec trees) but instead you pick and choose then the potential active skills to use are many more. Even pretending you don't get the max and on average you have about 24-25 skill points that's more than enough to have many more active skills than you can put in the bar by endgame, because many of the active burst skills (apart the really powerful ones) are placed in the beginning of the trees, usually (and this also demonstrates, btw, that the limitation was done intentionally and the trees built around it).

What you say is also easily proven wrong in practice. Let's consider for example a Tempest Rogue build: with 4 flasks (that, while very useful are not in themselves burst skills) it's obvious that you have to make a choice on what other skills to get because you cannot have everything. The same is true for a Rift Mage or a KE, or an Assassin Archer or a Templar S&S. There are a very limited number of builds that don't have to make serious decisions on which skills to use, and even in those cases you still have to lose something that could be quite useful (and make yourself more powerful). Just look around how many threads there are of people complaining that 8 skill slots are a limitation (isn't this thread just about this point btw?) and it's obvious that people find themselves not capable of using everything they would like, elsewhere they would not complain about the limited slots, isn't it?

You can naturally not agree with the decision (I myself am not so convinced about it for the motives I've explained), but there's no way you can insist that it wasn't done intentionally since there's no other possible explanation behind it. The "console limiting" is obviously an idiocy as also on a controller you can put much more than 8 choices, and looking at the trees you can see clearly that many burst skills (that remain powerful for all the game) are placed in the beginning so that you can pick and choose without investing deeply in the tree if you don't want to. If this design was tied with unlimited slots this would have meant being able to use as many damaging skills as you want with little investment. If you consider the trees in DA:O or DA2, in fact, the thing was quite different and the majority of burst skills were placed by the end instead, just for this.

Moreover it is quite well known that in DA:O, for example, where a class as a mage had access to a lot of active skills plus unlimited slots to put them, that made the class practically capable of doing whatever they wanted and either assume whatever role they liked, from CC to damage, to buffing/debuffing and healing. One can argue on the fact that this can be good or not, but evidently Bioware decided to go on another direction trying instead to limit the options and roles a single class can have. If this was a good decision or not it's irrelevant for the matter at hand. What it matters is only if that decision was intentional or not, and it's obvious that it was.

[Besetment]

I never said it was unintentional and I'm not sure what point you are trying to make anyway. What are you arguing about exactly?

[Selea]

Sorry, I have misunderstood what you wrote.

Sometimes it happens, you know, old age and such

Anyway I will never remove the reply as it was a so good rant. So you will have to fake that you insisted that it wasn't intentional.

[JaegerBane]

I never said it was unintentional and I'm not sure what point you are trying to make anyway. What are you arguing about exactly?

I got the impression he was refuting what you said about how trees limit the number of active skills you have. They're neither here nor there - skill points would provide that restriction.

Ultimately the point appeared to be that skill points and limited slots were two seperate ways of limiting skills, and they don't make sense to have both, unintentional or not.

[KingJoshington]

Just a question for clarification: 

 

Can the AI use more than 8 skills?  For example, if I had 10 active skills and set all of their behaviors to "enabled", would the AI be able to access each of them, even if I cannot (when I take direct control)?

[Stahl33]

Just Lazy programming. 

They come up with all sorts of excuses for not adding the ability to have multiple bars with 8 slots in it.  But it is just laziness!...

 

Just like the way they said that the choices you make matter... Well they don't really.  You play through once, and it is pretty much the same on the second play through.... Maybe a few divergencies, but not that huge really.  Unfortunately DAI doesn't look to be the sort of game like skyrim where you have very good long term replayability.

Graphics are nice, and the NPC development is nice, but replayability is not.

[Farangbaa]

Just a question for clarification: 
 
Can the AI use more than 8 skills?  For example, if I had 10 active skills and set all of their behaviors to "enabled", would the AI be able to access each of them, even if I cannot (when I take direct control)?

No. They can only use the abilities you set up in their quick slots.

Its ok to have a limited skillbar if the player is allowed to pick any 8 active abilities from a pool of available skills like in Guild Wars 1. Inquisition has skill trees however, so if you want Fire Mine, you have to take either Immolate or Flashfire as a prerequisite.
 
With other classes, theres less impetus to dip into different skill trees because they have weapon specific trees. For example, if you go dual dagger rogue you will never use any skills in the archery tree.
 
Mages don't have weapon specific skill trees and there are incentives to dip into all skill trees because of synergy. For example, Flashpoint works with any damage skill provided it crits. It doesn't have to be a fire skill.
 
You end up with a tonne of pre-requisite active skills which could be useful but you will never slot them because you don't have room on your skillbar. I played a Rift Mage first go around and Veil Strike is a pre-requisite for the Restorative Veil passive. That passive is mandatory because it returns mana when you damage a weakened opponent and all the active skills in the Rift Mage tree apply weakness.
 
This is my active skill bar:
 
Barrier
Fade Step
Stonefist
Energy Barrage
Chain Lightning
Fire Mine
Pull of the Abyss
Static Cage
 
These are pre-requisite active skills I can't use:
 
Immolate (aoe, cheap and instant mana return vs weakness)
Lightning Bolt (paralysis)
Veil Strike (cheap aoe weakness and knockdown)
 
Also don't have room for Mark of the Rift (focus ability).
 
Its a shame those skills are wasted. There are times when I don't crit on Fire Mine and Chain Lightning, thus don't trigger Flashpoint and don't get a cooldown reset but I'm still sitting on full mana due to Restorative Veil. It would be nice to fall back on Lightning Bolt -> Stonefist for a Discharge combo but welp skillbar not big enough.

How the f?

On my level 24 Mage I only had 1 active skill I didn't use (mark of the Rift).

Do you guys skip on passives (BEASTLY IN THIS GAME) and skill upgrades or something?

[Bayonet Hipshot]

They designed the came with controllers in mind hence we have a simplistic 8 skill lock.

 

Because choices. Because 8 x 4 = 32. Because strategy. Because tactics. 

 

More like Bioware wanted to cater towards the controller demographic because profit$$$

[Farangbaa]

They designed the came with controllers in mind hence we have a simplistic 8 skill lock.
 
Because choices. Because 8 x 4 = 32. Because strategy. Because tactics. 
 
More like Bioware wanted to cater towards the controller demographic because profit$$$

Ah so that's why ME1-3, DA:O and DA2 had a skill wheel.

Blame the casuals, a controller has nothing to do with this.

[JaegerBane]

Ah so that's why ME1-3, DA:O and DA2 had a skill wheel.Blame the casuals, a controller has nothing to do with this.

Indeed, I'm not convinced controllers are entirely the reason. They had the exact same skill limit in the pc versions of every game in the mass effect trilogy, it was introduced in the pc versions. The console versions had a wheel. In the ME games the quick bar was considered an awesome upgrade.

The only reason it was fine back then is because there was an alternate way of casting and each class used far fewer abilities, with a maximum of 8 - same as the bar.

[Psyfun]

Pretty sure it's MP + Controller related, though I could be wrong. That's the only valid reason other than "questionable design decision" that I can think of.

[Aurok]

8 is what could fit into the gamepad control scheme without requiring a pause. Any other reason given is PR nonsense.

[Selea]

Its ok to have a limited skillbar if the player is allowed to pick any 8 active abilities from a pool of available skills like in Guild Wars 1. Inquisition has skill trees however, so if you want Fire Mine, you have to take either Immolate or Flashfire as a prerequisite.

 

With other classes, theres less impetus to dip into different skill trees because they have weapon specific trees. For example, if you go dual dagger rogue you will never use any skills in the archery tree.

 

Mages don't have weapon specific skill trees and there are incentives to dip into all skill trees because of synergy. For example, Flashpoint works with any damage skill provided it crits. It doesn't have to be a fire skill.

 

You end up with a tonne of pre-requisite active skills which could be useful but you will never slot them because you don't have room on your skillbar. I played a Rift Mage first go around and Veil Strike is a pre-requisite for the Restorative Veil passive. That passive is mandatory because it returns mana when you damage a weakened opponent and all the active skills in the Rift Mage tree apply weakness.

 

This is my active skill bar:

 

Barrier

Fade Step

Stonefist

Energy Barrage

Chain Lightning

Fire Mine

Pull of the Abyss

Static Cage

 

These are pre-requisite active skills I can't use:

 

Immolate (aoe, cheap and instant mana return vs weakness)

Lightning Bolt (paralysis)

Veil Strike (cheap aoe weakness and knockdown)

 

Also don't have room for Mark of the Rift (focus ability).

 

Its a shame those skills are wasted. There are times when I don't crit on Fire Mine and Chain Lightning, thus don't trigger Flashpoint and don't get a cooldown reset but I'm still sitting on full mana due to Restorative Veil. It would be nice to fall back on Lightning Bolt -> Stonefist for a Discharge combo but welp skillbar not big enough.

 

Btw in that build you can easily skip Barrier. Having both Barrier and Fade Step on a nuke mage is redundant (especially from mid game onwards). You don't really need both. I would take Immolate/Lightning Bolt instead. Veilstrike you miss nothing and as for focus skills they remove completely challenge from the game (especially at level 3).