When I first played SWTOR over a year ago, and went from 1 to 50 a couple times, I felt that we received access to our keystone ability at the top of our tree at about the right time. Some classes are more defined by their keystone skills than others, such as Force Exhaustion for (somewhat mitigated lately) or the Shadow tanking keystone skill which is hugely important to them.

Now that the cap has been raised to 55, and a new tier of skills have been slipped in underneath...It feels like it takes FOREVER to achieve mastery. I think the whole flow of the levelling process is disrupted, and it's especially agonizing when many of the newly added talents (all of them passives), tend to be geared specifically towards skill I won't learn until 50+. I used to look forward to Hoth or Belsavis as around the time I was really playing with my complete tree. Now, it's just more of a grind, and it feels like I won't be 'complete' since nearly Corellia.

Anyone else feel similarly?

Yeah I agree with this. I've been leveling a carnage marauder, and losing the top tier there made a big difference.

This is a problem with many trees that have 3 abilities to unlock from. But yes carnage took already a long time to mature pre 2.0 and now it makes nearly useless pre level 45. I never understood why Ataru have to be unlocked, why can't we get it at a certain level from the Warrior skill trainer ? A simple fix to the tree would be to change one of the abilities that require two points to three points such as Execute. A number of simple fixes can be introduced.

I wonder if it could be possible to have a "floating requirement" for the top tiers. What I mean is that to unlock the top tiers of a tree only requires 30 pts at level 50, then rises one point per level to 55? That way classes can continue to get their top tier skill at the same time as they used to, but as they rise in expanded levels, aren't free to hybridize any more than they are allowed now.

This makes that system extensible for the next level cap rise, which would otherwise mean that you couldn't get your keystone ability until L50. And if the level cap goes beyond 60, then people who don't buy any expansion wouldn't be able to get them at all (unless previous level cap increases were made free---but in any case, it still changes the advanced class balancing)

This is due to the nature of how skill trees work with level expansions.

 

When you give more skill points to spend to a player, you also make it possible for them to buy more combinations of the lowest level branches of multiple skill trees. They can, for example, buy the lowest level keystone abilities for both a strong DPS character AND a tank, and make characters that are virtually impossible to balance correctly (the classic 'magetank').

 

We're not thrilled with this, of course. We'd really like for tank classes to be able to tank as quickly as possible. However, some things would need to be rethought before this can be a reality. It's definitely something that will get more thought before we ever raise the level cap again.

Thanks Damion! Very good reason and I appreciate the mention of getting players "going" (in their role) as quick as possible.

This is due to the nature of how skill trees work with level expansions.

 

When you give more skill points to spend to a player, you also make it possible for them to buy more combinations of the lowest level branches of multiple skill trees. They can, for example, buy the lowest level keystone abilities for both a strong DPS character AND a tank, and make characters that are virtually impossible to balance correctly (the classic 'magetank').

 

We're not thrilled with this, of course. We'd really like for tank classes to be able to tank as quickly as possible. However, some things would need to be rethought before this can be a reality. It's definitely something that will get more thought before we ever raise the level cap again.

This is sensible reasoning, of course, but it does require that the capstone ability be worth the extra expense. What I've found since 2.0 is that some trees (especially for PvP) just don't need their capstone more than they need the flexibility of going hybrid. For example, with the changes (nerfs) to Assault Plastique/Thermal Detonator, I have found it better for my Vanguard to just take damage boosts from early in the tanking and other DPS tree. It works, but it's ultimately unsatisfying. Getting that capstone should feel worth it. Likewise, the capstone should be important, but not required to make the spec work. Examples of that IMO are Sawbones for Scoundrels, the Shadow Tanking tree, and others.

One of the best trees in my opinion is Arsenal/Gunnery. Heatseeker/Demo Round is an awesome ability, but you don't necessarily feel useless until you get it with the boosts to unload, rail shot and tracer missile.

They can lock the other two trees until you reach a certain level in the particular tree you choose.

I think a lot of people would get upset at that. I often run as either a Healer/DPS hybrid when solo'ing with a companion, or even as a TK/Balance Sage hybrid even if I want to go full DPS.

What they don't want to let people do is get the keystone ability + more than 10pts in other trees.

They can lock the other two trees until you reach a certain level in the particular tree you choose.

Gating options does not a happy playerbase make!

My suggestion is do away with the entire concept of earning points and spending them. The trees are mostly static anyway...if you want to tank, there are certain skills you are must pick up to be effective, and others that are optional. Same thing with healing. So rather than skill trees, just give us a choice of "profession". That choice of profession would automatically unlock the core buffs and skills at fixed character levels, as well as open up a small number of optional buffs and skills, again based on character level.

For the first tier of buffs/skills, just make those available to every profession. Maybe a couple of 2nd-tier talents as well, depending on what makes sense. All the 3rd-tier stuff and above, the stuff you worry about unbalancing the class, just gets locked behind the choice of the profession.

Oh, and come up with a better name than "profession". :-)

you know, you guys could have just added a new keystone skill instead. keeping old skills where they are and creating new interesting abilities to place at the top of the talent tree.

as it stands right now, the game becomes somewhat.. unpleasant for about 5 levels before evening out again. and its just not fun, especially when you are an altoholic in a game that encourages you to roll moar alts. :/

My suggestion is do away with the entire concept of earning points and spending them. The trees are mostly static anyway...if you want to tank, there are certain skills you are must pick up to be effective, and others that are optional. Same thing with healing. So rather than skill trees, just give us a choice of "profession". That choice of profession would automatically unlock the core buffs and skills at fixed character levels, as well as open up a small number of optional buffs and skills, again based on character level.

 

For the first tier of buffs/skills, just make those available to every profession. Maybe a couple of 2nd-tier talents as well, depending on what makes sense. All the 3rd-tier stuff and above, the stuff you worry about unbalancing the class, just gets locked behind the choice of the profession.

 

Oh, and come up with a better name than "profession". :-)

the way wow does it right now?

I won't claim about others, but please god, no. it would make the game less fun for me.

there's still a bit of wiggle room here and there in talents trees and you can customize your experience a fair bit, you can even chose to sacrifice certain keystone abilities for more points spent in another tree.

what you are proposing removes any possibility of hybrid builds, removes any possibility of having fun with your playstyle and just.. blah.

All of the top end talents should be stat and performance improvements IMO, except for the keystone skill.

I also think a gate lock would help, though I understand some folks would not be happy about that.

I would have suggested a complete ability tree revamp, with simplification/reduction of the specials, improvements to how those specials act, then stat and performance boosts until the very top ability.

I think very early on all classes should get the lions share of their abilities and simply improve them/change how they work slightly as they move up....instead of having three different types of the same skill with different mechanics.

Instead it should be one skill, and that skill should transform as you level up.

This was definitely a huge disappointment for me. The way they were promoting it, I naturally assumed that they were planning to expand the trees "upward" instead of outward, and replete with new capstone skills. I even thought players might be given a fourth skill tree! That was my mistake, I guess--they never said anything explicitly to that effect and if I'd known Bioware then as I do now, I'd have realized they were over-hyping the expansion as usual, including the new skill trees. A couple "10% extra critical damage on Attack Q" abilities were quite the letdown. Also, expanding "outward" just makes for more skills that I don't want, but that I have to take in order to have enough points to be able to select from the next tier of the tree.

Also, I think it is downright disgusting how they used the skill tree as another way to FORCE players to buy the expansion. As another poster pointed out, many of the new skills are for abilities that you can ONLY get if you buy the expansion.

Now, see, I'm of the opposite opinion. I like that once I have completed the tree I can put a few points into another tree. As a Sorc I chose to put some points into boosting my willpower and lowering my cast times. I had more points than usual left over because I didn't choose damage reduction which I thought was a waste of points.

This gave me a good damage boost and increased my DPS substantially, and as a healing spec it was substantial to me to increase my overall damage, giving my spec a more enjoyable solo experience. Leveling a pure healer was not fun in quite a few spots in the leveling process.

At any rate I'd love to have 5 more points to spend, and would love to have some kind of leech ability. I am hoping, if they choose to raise it up another 5, they will allow us to just add more points in another tree and give us a new unique ability to train.

It does make a difference but I've leveled 6 toons to 55 now and I can't say it really made much of a difference except for my main that I leveled first and I managed.

What I find funny is that people think this skill is essential to level to 55 and it simply isn't. What I see is a lot of people who are poorly geared and their companions alike and then going around blaming everything except their lack of gear. Gear up, it's not that hard at level 50. You really are oblivious if you don't know how to get yourself fully geared with pruple 58 mods from the planetary vendor of Makeb. And that's just one option to gear up at 50+

This is due to the nature of how skill trees work with level expansions.

 

When you give more skill points to spend to a player, you also make it possible for them to buy more combinations of the lowest level branches of multiple skill trees. They can, for example, buy the lowest level keystone abilities for both a strong DPS character AND a tank, and make characters that are virtually impossible to balance correctly (the classic 'magetank').

 

We're not thrilled with this, of course. We'd really like for tank classes to be able to tank as quickly as possible. However, some things would need to be rethought before this can be a reality. It's definitely something that will get more thought before we ever raise the level cap again.

Hi Damon,

I know the reasoning. Believe me, I'd be much more worked out of shape if I thought it random or ill conceived. There are perfectly sound gameplay reasons behind it. But coming from someone that's leveled up under the old system, and under the new, there is definitely a five level stretch where I just feel entirely out of sorts. And in fact, I feel like the game content itself is designed in that level range, expecting me to be complete.

I definitely hope that if the level cap is raised to 60, that something will be done about this. Because if I were to have to wait to Makeb to unlock my final keystone ability, I would find it much more unpleasant. I'm sure there's some creative work-around that'll occur to someone before that point.

Perhaps the answer is a new kind of tree or place to put points after a certain stage. There's only so long you can go with stacking on new abilities or passives to what feels like to me, finished playstyles.

It does make a difference but I've leveled 6 toons to 55 now and I can't say it really made much of a difference except for my main that I leveled first and I managed.

 

What I find funny is that people think this skill is essential to level to 55 and it simply isn't. What I see is a lot of people who are poorly geared and their companions alike and then going around blaming everything except their lack of gear. Gear up, it's not that hard at level 50. You really are oblivious if you don't know how to get yourself fully geared with pruple 58 mods from the planetary vendor of Makeb. And that's just one option to gear up at 50+

I think for most people it's not so much a raw difficulty issue, as it simply feels uneven. Whether you level up in all purples, or in whites you bought off the vendor. There is a certain 'flow' to a completed tree when everything comes together and you start building on it, and really getting to feel it, and it's sad that time is delayed. I would have loved an extra 5 levels with a complete tree, whatever hurdles there was to keep people from putting in more than 10 skill points in any other tree.

The problem is not difficulty but how some classes/trees mature earlier or later than others.

I'm currently leveling a Vengeance Juggernaut, 2 of the key skills of that tree are available only at 45+, Shatter comes from the tree at 45 and Vicious Throw from the trainer at 46. You get Impale at 30 but that's the only thing you got for 15 levels to proc what gives this specialization its feel, the (almost) auto-crit on Force Scream and the cooldown reset on Ravage. You even spend points on improving Vicious Throw BEFORE you can train it.

That's one example of a tree that got all its pieces assembled quite late compared to some others. I noticed on 2 occasions people on general chat complaining about DPS Juggernauts, because of their relatively lower DPS caused by missing key skills for too long. One of the guys was even saying to remove DPS trees until 50+ for Juggernauts as he was annoyed with how slow they kill things in low level flashpoints.

This is due to the nature of how skill trees work with level expansions.

 

When you give more skill points to spend to a player, you also make it possible for them to buy more combinations of the lowest level branches of multiple skill trees. They can, for example, buy the lowest level keystone abilities for both a strong DPS character AND a tank, and make characters that are virtually impossible to balance correctly (the classic 'magetank').

 

We're not thrilled with this, of course. We'd really like for tank classes to be able to tank as quickly as possible. However, some things would need to be rethought before this can be a reality. It's definitely something that will get more thought before we ever raise the level cap again.

Well this may sound like a really simple idea...but why not make it so you stop earning skill points at a certain level? If that is a no-go then maybe you get a skill point every other level after you hit 50. Then after you hit 55 (and pretending that the level cap is higher) you earn one skill point every three levels, and so on.

Your character will continue to get stronger as he levels, he just wont be able to earn enough points to get key skills in another tree to make him OP.

Making some skills exclusive with each other would also be some solution, and it would also allow to make trees more interesting. By that I mean that taking one skill would block one or two other, regardless of how many points in tree they need. So you still have to go fully into one spec to take skill from top, but with rebalancing of skill trees, it would be possible to put skills defining spec much much lower, while also making them exclusive with defining skills from other trees.

In some cases overpowered combination is result of mixing lvl40 skill from tree A with lvl20 skill from tree B. If those skils would be moved low enough to make them both obtainable(in theory) at max lvl, then one of 3 solutions have to be used: either make lvl20 skill(assuming exclusiveness would only tie down skills on smae tiers) in tree A better choice, but that might create balance issues. Making many other skills on tree A linked to lvl20 skill, thus making it impossible to reach 30 points in that tree wiothout taking that skill. Or simply, making that one lvl40 skill and that one lvl20 skill exclusive with each other, regardless of how deep into any tree you hve ot go to get them.

Such mechanism, aside from locking out troublesome hybrids, also allows to give players minor choices within single tree, for example, either improve some proc by making it proc more often, or by increasing damage it deals. Right now most specs wouldn't have reason not to go for both, because points allow that and skills from other trees might not be worth enough.

Make it "one or another" deal, and behold, you can have actual choices witin spec.

Depending how far BW would go with it and how (not) confusing thye want to make it, it can be (relatively) simple fix, or really really ahrd one. But nothing says it cn't be done step by step, and I think such solution has potential.

the way wow does it right now?

 

I won't claim about others, but please god, no. it would make the game less fun for me.

 

there's still a bit of wiggle room here and there in talents trees and you can customize your experience a fair bit, you can even chose to sacrifice certain keystone abilities for more points spent in another tree.

 

what you are proposing removes any possibility of hybrid builds, removes any possibility of having fun with your playstyle and just.. blah.

Exactly do this and I am gone. I hate what WoW did to their talent trees it removes choices, no thanks. I hope they never do this.

(the classic 'magetank').

Ooooh! SorcTank:eek:

Gimme!

The problem is not difficulty but how some classes/trees mature earlier or later than others.

 

I'm currently leveling a Vengeance Juggernaut, 2 of the key skills of that tree are available only at 45+, Shatter comes from the tree at 45 and Vicious Throw from the trainer at 46. You get Impale at 30 but that's the only thing you got for 15 levels to proc what gives this specialization its feel, the (almost) auto-crit on Force Scream and the cooldown reset on Ravage. You even spend points on improving Vicious Throw BEFORE you can train it.

 

That's one example of a tree that got all its pieces assembled quite late compared to some others. I noticed on 2 occasions people on general chat complaining about DPS Juggernauts, because of their relatively lower DPS caused by missing key skills for too long. One of the guys was even saying to remove DPS trees until 50+ for Juggernauts as he was annoyed with how slow they kill things in low level flashpoints.

this pretty much shows it.

to me it's especially apparent with healing classes (though that could be because I tend to favor them and play them more than any other specialization). my main is a sorc and I've been leveling sage recently - both as healers, and my experience is drastically different. its not just the top keystone skill that's been moved. its all of them. everything takes 5 extra levels to mature, and while I can compensate - it just feels awkward and less fun.

can't really change it at this point, but if/when we get another level increase I would honestly prefer it if you guys added to the top of the tree, adding another fun ability we could use, instead of making existing abilities even longer to reach. sure it doesn't affect people at max level all THAT much, but it sure makes being an altoholic more awkward.