[Dox]

On top of the Cash AH, thousands of intertards are up in arms over this at the moment, so I thought I'd post this well written response by Bashiok here, for those who are interested.

Originally Posted by Bashiok

I realize there’s a lot of information spread around, I’m hoping to bring some of it to a single post and hopefully get our point across and reassure you that the changes we’re making are for the betterment of character customization options, and ultimately your long-term enjoyment of the game.

So, why did we get rid of skill points?
(Note: this is a supplementary min/max explanation. There are lots of other reasons which have been touched on in the past such as how players approach our game, supporting the idea of builds, observing how players behaved in internal testing, etc. This is just further explanation that I think will resonate with some of you.)

In Diablo III, we really want to improve the combat depth. Part of having combat depth involves having skills that are useful in different situations. In Diablo II players often used a single skill to deal with almost all situations: Blessed Hammer, Frozen Orb and Bone Spirit to name a few. Players invest 20 points into a single skill and use it as much as possible. The only reason a player would swap away from their primary spam skill is due to monster resistances/immuniti​es. If a monster was immune to your primary spam skill, you’d either skip the encounter completely or fall back on a second skill. Neither of these answers provides the player with much combat depth.

To support combat depth, skills need to have different roles. Here is a very simple example:
•Magic Missile deals 15 damage to a single enemy

•Arcane Orb deals area of effect damage for 10 damage each

With these two skills we’re beginning to develop some combat depth for the player. Use Magic Missile when you’re facing one enemy, use Arcane Orb when you’re facing multiple enemies. But you may also want to use Magic Missile if one enemy is a “high priority target” in a group, and you want it to die quickly. In this simplified example players can still defeat a horde of enemies by casting Magic Missile multiple times, or they could defeat a single large enemy by casting Arcane Orb multiple times, but that wouldn’t be as efficient as a player who uses the right skill for the right situation.

Ok so that basic layout of combat depth out of the way!

With skill point spending your skills get better as you invest points into them. The problem is that this destroys combat depth. If after pumping a bunch of points into Magic Missile it now deals 70 damage to a single enemy, assuming my enemies have any reasonable health, then Magic Missile becomes a better choice than Arcane Orb even in group situations. If after pumping a bunch of points into Arcane Orb it now deals 45 damage, then it deals more damage than Magic Missile to single targets. Now rather than using the right skill for the right situation, I’m using the skill I’ve put all my points into. Skill point spending has eroded away combat depth.

Why did we go from 7 skill choices to 6?
(Note: again, this is a supplementary explanation. We’ve gone over some of the other reasons elsewhere, but this is specifically targeted at those of you here who feel strongly that 7 means there would be more build diversity than 6)

Diablo III emphasizes build customization. We feel that 6 skill choices actually creates more build diversity than 7.

Why? Well for any given set of options, the greatest number of combinations exists when the number of choices you can make is close to half the number of options you have. Some of you may remember a high school math problem like this: There are 12 differently colored marbles in a bag. How many different color combinations can you get by choosing X marbles? Well as it turns out the solution for various values of X are:

•1 marble: 12 different color combinations

•2 marbles: 66

•3 marbles: 220

•4 marbles: 495

•5 marbles: 792

•6 marbles: 924

•7 marbles: 792

•8 marbles: 495

•9 marbles: 220

•10 marbles: 66

•11 marbles: 12

•12 marbles: 1 (there’s only 1 way to choose 12 marbles from the 12 in the bag)

The greatest number of possible combinations happens when you are choosing 6 from a possible 12.

You may be asking what 12 has to do with anything as classes all have over 20 skills available to them...

This is true in theory, but in practice players tend to (and really should) pick up skills to fill different roles so they can be effective. Categories such as single target, area of effect, auto-targeting, debuff, defensive, group buff, escape, crowd control, 2-minute ubers, pet skills, etc. etc. Players generally take at most two (and often one) skill to fill any particular role. For example, the Wizard has Ice Armor, Storm Armor and Energy Armor, but I don’t think anyone is going to take all three (though maybe somebody will take that as a challenge and prove me wrong), most players will choose one Wizard Armor spell (note that this can change dramatically with some rune effects). If we look at each class, depending on how you count, you get anywhere from 8-12 different types of skills. So we err on the high side in our category estimate (12) and that means 6 is a pretty good number to maximize build variety.

It's important to note that we’re not just talking about you and your friend having Wizards with slightly different skills, we’re talking about you and your friend having 6 skills that are different in functionally significant ways.

Closing remark! When we pull math out like this I’m sure somebody will point out that if our only objective was to maximize build combinations we’d have allowed people to also choose 6, 7 or 8 passives rather than just 3. So I’ll counter by saying maximizing build combinations is not our only objective. We also want our system to have aesthetic flavor, to be simple to understand, and to have the passives in particular feel impactful. We have many different goals that we take into account when making any design decision. In the case of active skills, we felt the increase in variety was one of many good reasons to go from 7 to 6.

So how many skill combinations are there now?

Well taking into account 6 active skills, all the rune combinations, and 3 passives we currently expect each class to have roughly 2,285,814,795,264 different build combinations. That’s not taking into account skill types for ‘ideal’ builds, but that’s always been a big part of the fun of experimenting (and longevity for Diablo II) - finding a build that shouldn’t work, and making it.

[Primex]

Well if I can get used to the change, It might work well.

[souljah]

all of these just sound bad on paper, will take till the game is actually released and we start playing before we can give our opinions. not going to let this affect my view of the game whatsover.

[Maynarde]

Good call Blizzard. Well explained.

I have faith that this game will kick ass, there has not been a Blizzard game that sucks yet. Even that side-scrolling Superman SNES game was fun.

Rest assured I along with many of you will be playing Diablo 3 until my eyeballs bleed out my nose.

[Next_rim]

I just recently finished playing Witcher 2, and this description is ringing some bells.

In Witcher 2, you have 4 skill trees. One is passive, and 3 specialization. Each specialization has 15-ish skills, each 2 levels. Some have "sockets" in them for mutagens. Mutagens give passive buffs. Passive tree has 7 skills, each as well 2 levels, and has stuff like ability to use throwing daggers, passive hp buff, constant +1 energy, etc.

I did like it, it was surprisingly diverse. Magic tree was so much different from alchemy and swordsman gameplay-wise. Mutagens were boring though, nothing beyond +x% crit, or +Y hp.

What's D3?

3 trees, each has a set of skills with no level depth, but all have sockets for runes. And you get a set of passives. If skills are diverse enough, I'm totally loving it. This model had great success in WoW too.

[Xeen]

We didn't like it when players used Skill 1 a lot and then swapped to Skill 2 when the situation fit it, so here's an example of using Skill 1 and Skill 2 in different situations! That's depth!

Yeah, no.

This entire part shows up as even less relevant when you take out the extreme examples (single-element sorcs, hammerdins, etc) and move out into the other builds players use, almost all of which have at least a primary and secondary attack with different roles - attacks that are both brought to high power using skill points. The example Bashiok is trying to bring up is only relevant with builds that focus the entire character to a single synergized skill, which is a problem with synergies and single overpowered skills, not the skill point system.

The rest of the post is pure theorycraft which won't hold up, because the number of skills isn't what creates diversity so much as the viability of builds. That big number at the bottom is cute, but irrelevant.

Not all that impressed here, standard CR blabbery.

Whether or not the system is a good idea is going to depend more on the character design and how well it suits, so I guess I'll have to wait and see on that count.

[aztecx]

I have faith blizzard is going to make this game exactly like WoW.

[dazaris]

Can see that it would make things much easier for them as far as balancing is concerned. Would mean the damage that skills would do would be completely dependent on gear and level (As they removed stat point allocation as well).

Have to say I quite like this change. In D2 I would just min/max and invest all my skill points into a specific set of skills and their synergies which led to fairly one or two dimensional characters. With this setup it seems you can broaden your available options without compromising your offensive potential. Will have to see how this plays out in the retail game however.

[Xeen]

On that note I agree with dazaris, if they limit how valuable min/maxing is (it'll still exist in some form), then they can make a lot more builds viable and give players more options. Adding synergy in 1.10 fucked with that in D2 because you pretty much had to spend a ton more points to boost individual skills rather than simply... picking the skills you wanted in general.

[Octo]

I stopped playing D2 when they put in the patch that introduced synergies, so I'm liking the look of D3.

[Bugalugs McScruffin]

When I first heard that they were doing away with skill points and going for a system like this I thought it was a brilliant move. I did not realise that people could be so short sighted. This deals with the biggest problem I have always had with systems like Diablo 2, where you can either diversify your skills, and have a lot of weaker skills, or just pump all of your points into a single one to become 'all-powerful'. It always felt to me that the old system was pushing you toward pumping up a single skill and ignoring the rest.

All of a sudden I'm looking forward to Diablo 3.

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by Bugalugs McScruffin

This deals with the biggest problem I have always had with systems like Diablo 2, where you can either diversify your skills, and have a lot of weaker skills, or just pump all of your points into a single one to become 'all-powerful'.

Except that's wrong, because you could never put all your points into a single skill - it was capped at 20, which generally gave you 4-5 maxed out skills (an arbitrary number, as well) that defined the focus of your character and created the potential for diversity.

The problems were:

A) The introduction of synergies in 1.10 alongside major stat rebalances meant that to be effective at all, suddenly you had to focus on 1-2 skills and use every other point to boost them (this sort of creates the situation you mention, but it has an entirely different cause). There is a similar situation with the Mastery skills, that effectively created a 20-point sink for some classes.

B) Some skills were so ridiculously well-rounded and powerful that there was no need to diversify beyond honing a single skill to maximum power + a few support skills (Hammerdin, etc). This is a balance issue.

All I see is that rather than polish the system or fix the most glaring issues, it was scrapped altogether. Again, that's not a good or bad thing (it'll depend on how well it gets executed), but implying the skill point system was the root of all lack of diversity is short-sighted.

[dazaris]

Good breakdown by one of the designers on the skillpoint removal:

You Tube

You Tube

[Bugalugs McScruffin]

Originally Posted by Xeen

Except that's wrong, because you could never put all your points into a single skill - it was capped at 20, which generally gave you 4-5 maxed out skills (an arbitrary number, as well) that defined the focus of your character and created the potential for diversity.

The problems were:

A) The introduction of synergies in 1.10 alongside major stat rebalances meant that to be effective at all, suddenly you had to focus on 1-2 skills and use every other point to boost them (this sort of creates the situation you mention, but it has an entirely different cause). There is a similar situation with the Mastery skills, that effectively created a 20-point sink for some classes.

B) Some skills were so ridiculously well-rounded and powerful that there was no need to diversify beyond honing a single skill to maximum power + a few support skills (Hammerdin, etc). This is a balance issue.

All I see is that rather than polish the system or fix the most glaring issues, it was scrapped altogether. Again, that's not a good or bad thing (it'll depend on how well it gets executed), but implying the skill point system was the root of all lack of diversity is short-sighted.

dazaris, I'll have to check out that video once I get home.

Xeen, I should probably have prefaced my post with the fact that I have never progressed very far in either Diablo game, or games like it, such as Torchlight. It has also been a while since I have played them, so I am unsure on the specifics. A couple of points quickly though.

Firstly, synergies does sound inherently bad the way you describe them, and exacerbates the problem that I had with Diablo. I never got far enough into either of the games for this to be the main problem though.

Secondly, I do not know how the current system for Diablo 3 is intended to work. My enthusiasm is based on my gut instinct as to how it should work. As I see it, the Diablo 3 system would enable you to change builds 'on-the-fly' using any of your currently available skills. This is in stark contrast to the previous games where you would have to plan out your build at the beginning of the game. If Blizzard limit the way to can select and change the skills my enthusiasm will be short lived.

Thirdly, the skill point system makes it feel, whether correct or not, that pumping a few powerful skills is the right choice. Requiring more than one skill point in a skill before advancing along a skill tree ensures that you feel that any of the 'extra' skill points put into the skill are wasted if you do not keep pumping that lower skill to it's potential. If you min-max your build you can work out the best choice and do not have to worry about this, but if you are your average player it feels like you are creating a weak character trying to go for the skills you want higher in the tree without first building up the earlier skills first.

I am going to have to go back and play Diablo again and see if I still have the same objections to the old system. I am keen to try out the new system and see what it does well.

[Next_rim]

Xeen,
Bugalgus,

idk what you or blizz is talking about, when I played trapasassin in D2, I used lots of skills. I had 2x traps, one throwing trap, mindblast, two different self-buffs to constantly switch, spamming cloak, summoning shadowmaster, dragonflight blink. Not exactly my 30+ binds as WoW mage, but still somewhat apm-intensive. Not to mention constant movement to avoid ranged and fast stuff.

And pre-synergy, I was concentrate/zerker block barb, and there were 3 self-buff shouts, 2 offensive shouts, 2 main attacks to constantly switch around, and two leaps for positioning. Add on top lots of inventory work for weapon and armor set switching.

If D3 is going to be even more action-intensive, that's disturbing. After all, for me Diablo is a blow-steam-off type slasher game.

[Dox]

Originally Posted by Next_rim

If D3 is going to be even more action-intensive, that's disturbing. After all, for me Diablo is a blow-steam-off type slasher game.

It still will be. Unless you're playing on Inferno difficulty.

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by Bugalugs McScruffin

Secondly, I do not know how the current system for Diablo 3 is intended to work. My enthusiasm is based on my gut instinct as to how it should work. As I see it, the Diablo 3 system would enable you to change builds 'on-the-fly' using any of your currently available skills. This is in stark contrast to the previous games where you would have to plan out your build at the beginning of the game. If Blizzard limit the way to can select and change the skills my enthusiasm will be short lived.

Bliz made a great choice in finally allowing respecs in D2, and their proposed system in 3 keeping this as an option is pretty handy. However, when you break it down, it shows the systems aren't all that different. In D2, you effectively picked 4-5 skills to max out (and some misc support skills to keep at lower levels) for your build, and later on could change these in town.

If the 4-5 thing is a problem, that's an arbitrary number that can be adjusted.

So far, it looks reasonable enough - as I said, it'll depend how they execute the changes and what sort of builds and gameplay it makes available. I don't generally agree with removing core gameplay aspects rather than refining them, though.

Originally Posted by Next_rim

idk what you or blizz is talking about, when I played trapasassin in D2, I used lots of skills

That's my point. With the exception of certain specifically synergized and broken builds, there was skill variety and 'combat depth' as they describe it, so the bulk of Bashiok's post is irrelevant. The problematic builds were partially an issue due to skill synergies (ie: trying to get one skill to be as effective as possible or it wouldn't be worth it) or broken skills (hammer is all you need), and not due to the skill point system in the first place.

[lxuzyl]

I will definitely play D3 for the real money auction. XD

[Meatex]

yeah Devs had "good" reasons to get rid of skill points and that kind of stuff for Deus Ex 2 and it was... meh

[ke_ivan]

Well I like the system in Diablo 1, where abilities scaled with learning. So while people had to play more to scale, they were also dependent of things like books to make them better. This randomised play styles and was more true-to-life than other skill-based system that Blizzard has used. Although D1 had very big balance issues (in the end everyone used magicians with staves and mana shields), i don't particularly think that it was the scaling that was at fault. Rather, it was the abilities themselves. I guess this move is gearing D3 towards some form of combo/mechanical play, kinda like in WoW, where melee classes have a certain set of actions that they have to perform in order to inflict the max amount of damage. I'm not sure how good this is for ranged classes, but being an ex-tank from WoW, this system certainly has benefits towards the playability of melee classes.