With so many veteran gamers here I am kind of shocked by the lack of foresight. Ultimately there are too many builds that are specialized in too many ways to claim that one build per class will rule them all. You have history on your side in this argument. Some of these same complaints were made about GW that eventually and optimzed build would be created that would be unbeatble. As a matter of fact it was. The 55 monk in the early games was nearly unbeatble UNLESS it met a class that rips buffs (devish class most noted example). A counter class was created and various other classes had skills that allowed them to counter this build. I can understand that leveing one class and getting full access may seem like it will hurt you alting but if your a true min/max youll go by racials also to milk every last once out of the classes (thus leveing each class in each race).Additionally the fact that this will likely force most "altaholics" into classes they are not used to playing could have unforseen benefits.
If you look on the bright side this nearly completely open skill system could lead to a meta game such as the one found in guild wars where builds are traded and discussed openly including strategies and builds designed for specialized purposes (like fighting elites, tanking certain bosses, general pvp group and solo) and further more creation of strategies for an enitre party. (GW builds site http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page)
While some may look at this and say everyone will end up at the same place this is highly unlikely. For each specialzed build you find youll find another that supposedly does it better. This open system allows for complaints about being forced into a build to be minized in the mid to long run since no one player, legion master, or other can claim to have a full understanding of each and every class and tree. Even if they did claim to instead of being forced to repsec and lose your own unique build you have the capability to slot 4 builds thus leaving room to appease sed person if you desire (A big win).
I am honestly surprised that so many here failed to see the simple benefit of having this amount of complexity allowing you much more freedom in your play style indepedent of the decisions of others thats seems to plague most mmos. Giving up hours of your time redoing what you just did or a lifetime of play without a guildmaster on your ass about your build and many choices going far beyond just the classes and trees but down to each point in itself. Decisions decisions.
From the limited time I have spent with the game it didn't seem like there was a way for me to wipe the skills chosen and choose others. I could only spend my points differently with a reset within the chosen souls or pick different roles. I didn't see a choice to wipe a roll completely. This means that there will still be reason to roll more characters than 4 if you want to have more soul modifications. 4 soul rolls will not allow you to explore every combo within the 9 souls available. Everyone seems to always leave the 9th soul...PvP out since they haven't had experiance with it yet. The game is going to be released soon and this is the beginning we have to work with for character customization. We don't know if they might have other souls at endgame that might be unlockable similar to the PvP soul via a quest or reputation.
I'm a little confused about what you mean, but even if you can't try out every combination, being able to try out four will leave very little reason to want to try anything else of the same class. Characters won't be exactly the same, but I think they'll feel awfully similar.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
1. people dont need to copy other's builds, not anybody's fault but themselfs if they do.
2. they dont need to balance classes, just individual skills.
3. this design is freedom, this design is actually derived from UO school of design decision instead of Everquest, wich is refreshing. People can choose everything, no stupid forced pre-defined designs. No developer can satisfy me with scripted classes. Never.
4. the responsability is transfered to players for their choices, not to developers.
I'm someone that really likes the game but yeah I think the op has a point . Ultimatly you will only want to roll 4 alts because you can do everthing pretty much within rogue/warrior/cleric/mage in them . It the reason I did'nt like dual classes in WoW and its been taken one step further here . Its not a deal breaker as such it just could limit the longevity of the game
Just not true.
With 9 souls in each tree and 3 trees in each build there are 143 combinations of builds. This doesn't count builds with the same three souls but with points alternated between them; example 35-25-6 then using the same three souls 6-25-35 or any other combination. You are only allowed to have 4 builds per toon, so it is impossible to have every build possible.
It is just hard for me to imagine with so many combinations that there would be a "cookie-cutter" build that everyone would want to play.
I ahve been in the game since beta 2 and have found that I enjoy several different builds and feel "special" with each one. It feels like mine with my choice and that I am different from others. Unlike WOW where you ppick the FOTM build with the talents already chosen for you other than the last 5 or 6 although those maybe have a "failed at talent selection" if you pick something that reduces your min/max build by 1%.
In Final Fantasy XI, you can combine any of 20 main jobs and 19 subjobs (can't have the same job as main and sub). That's 380 possible combinations of jobs people could experiment with to find the "right" build for them.
Needless to say, all but a relative handful of those combinations were rendered "useless" (even when they were more situational than anything), and people stuck to the same limited selection of cookie-cutter builds.
You can give people thousands of options of how to build their character... same exact thing will happen.
It's not the game system. It's the people playing it.
Personally I have no problem with people following cookie-cutter builds if they wish. I personally find it more interesting to experiment and figure things out for myself... Regardless... what I don't like is when others feel they're entitled to force those cookie-cutter builds down my throat, tell me how I'm "supposed to be playing" and give me crap in a group, etc becuase of it. That's when it becomes a problem.
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
BUT Trion ruined it in the end. They gave everyone the ability to own all 8 souls per archtype at the same time. While that sounds cool it means that a player doesnt actually have to commit to anything or make any real choices.
Well, while i agree with you, I don't see what else they could do. You have to have all the souls, because the devs are never going to be able to balance them all. Flavor of the months builds will come, people will go to them, and that will be the balance.
It's still a cool system, you can play your own little fun specs on the side, but then will have to switch to the good ones wen getting down to business.Among my complaints, this one is not a big deal tbh, it's kind of to be expected from themepark games thesedays.
If anything this makes it even easier to Balance because more combos will be tried more often.
I'm one for permanent choices but I think this suits Rift really well, its not like you can try out every possible build on one class, right?
The soul system at its core is actually pretty awesome. 8 different Souls in 4 different archtypes with varying skills contained in each soul that can be mixed and matched allows a player to really build something unqiue that few others will have exactly.
BUT Trion ruined it in the end. They gave everyone the ability to own all 8 souls per archtype at the same time. While that sounds cool it means that a player doesnt actually have to commit to anything or make any real choices. Character development is a lie. To make it worse Trion also gave players the ability to save 4 builds at once that can be switched at the flick of a button. Want that FOTW build or need to drop a soul because it got nerfed? Dont worry just respec and save todays most OP build! This game screams "have your cake and eat it too."
This is basically class anarchy. Without rules and structure anything will become a mess. The negatives will always outweigh any positives. In all walks of life. IT NEVER WORKS OUT.
Its like playing a game of monopoly but throwing out the rules, letting everyone be the car, giving everyone a piece of every property, and when you pass go you get a Ecto-cooler juicebox with oreos and everyone is a winner!
The ability to create a unique class is mostly an illusion in Rift. In the end there are really only 4 classes in this game. Its going to be very apparent to everyone else soon enough once the honeymoon period ends and they realize the reality is that almost everyone is the same 4 things.
Like the old saying goes,"When everyone is special. No one is."
SWG used to have like 54 job classes, each with a set of skills. You could mix em up, be mostly a bounty hunter and carbiner with some Medic. It was fun...you could change your skills as you saw fit....and it didn't hurt the game.
Anyway, even if they didn't let you have all souls, people would just roll alts to play new soul configurations. If its the same person pushing the mouse, please tell me what the real difference is here? By all means, limit yourself to your first three souls, don't let me stop you from having 'honest character development'....just don't get pissed at me for wanting to sample all the game has to offer without having a ton of frickin alts :-)
By your line of thinking, every game should have one tank class, one healer class and thats it. Because that the end of the day, you either inflict damage, heal damage or some combination thereof....and since everyone, if given the choice, will boil down to clone-configurations, why bother with choice.
Sorry, man, but this line of thinking is whats wrong with the country....'since we know what you are going to do anyway, we are going to deprive you of coice.' Thanks, but I can think for myself and enjoy the ability to be flexible and play how I feel at any given point in time.
At the end of the day, it's just a game and it really comes down to entertainment and what that means to each person. There is NOTHING meaningful here expect that, while you play it, hopefully you are entertained. If placing arbitrary limits of choice upon yourself increases your fun-factor, go nuts, man.
However, if placing Arbitrary limits of choice on everyone else increases your fun factor...then go into politics.
(Sure, if you play soul arrangements that you simply enjoy, there will be Elites who complain that you do not have the 'perfect' build and not let you into their group....but when you are just trying to kick back and have some fun, do you really need that crap?)
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone www.spankybus.com -3d Artist & Compositor -Writer -Professional Amature
From the limited time I have spent with the game it didn't seem like there was a way for me to wipe the skills chosen and choose others. I could only spend my points differently with a reset within the chosen souls or pick different roles. I didn't see a choice to wipe a roll completely. This means that there will still be reason to roll more characters than 4 if you want to have more soul modifications. 4 soul rolls will not allow you to explore every combo within the 9 souls available. Everyone seems to always leave the 9th soul...PvP out since they haven't had experiance with it yet. The game is going to be released soon and this is the beginning we have to work with for character customization. We don't know if they might have other souls at endgame that might be unlockable similar to the PvP soul via a quest or reputation.
It's not totally clear in the tutorial part of the game, but what you do to completely re-pick a set of souls in an already established build is:
Go to your class trainer
Pick "reset my souls"
Open your soul window (N)
Before spending any points, click one of the 3 soul icons in the middle of the screen, and select a new soul for that slot, from the drop-down list.
Are you serious? Not one MMO out there makes your character feel unique. You're in the wrong genre bud.
Every game has flavor of the month. Every game has people either respeccing or re-rolling to that flavor of the month. There is no way around it when you have bunches of people who number crunch and cannot see past the decimal.
Once again, you are in the wrong genre if this kind of thing is an issue for you.
There is nothing wrong with the way the soul system allows players to change specs or have access to multiple specs within a class. All it really does is prevent a player from having to roll an alt just to experience a different version of a class.
In any game there will be the 'FOTM' builds, no matter what character building system it has. Look at ANY MMO out there. Every month there is an increase of ClassX depending on what dev love they got and a massive decrease in ClassY depending on how hard they got smacked with the nerf bat. And you will always have people rolling alts to take advantage of this fact. To say otherwise is just pure BS.
The title of the thread is even better. It comes off as though its saying "Only certain people should be allowed to be special". Screw that. This is what I love about a lot of the people here. They beg/whine/demand change. So a developer gives them something different. Once they have that 'change' they want it to all be like it was before. Basically it just shows that MMO gamers have no real idea what they want, because if they are given the same thing, they want it to be different. When given something different they want it to be like it was before. It's a vicious and comical circle....
There are 3 types of people in the world. 1.) Those who make things happen 2.) Those who watch things happen 3.) And those who wonder "What the %#*& just happened?!"
All this means is that folks will go for the flavor of the month build.
Or, the one they like playing.
Yeah, just like with any game. DAoC had choices for builds, and you had a ton of people that did their own thing anyway, the most powerful/efficient build doesn't mean it's the one someone will enjoy. You can be all different things, pure healer, crowd control/healer, dps, all kinds of things.
If you don't like it....move on, it's not constructive critisizim when it's something they clearly are not going to change. It is a key feature of the game, and content is actually made later in the game to take the changing specs into account.
People will always try to min/max, would a game that only had one class that was the same as everyone else be better? Or one with a healer/tank/dps class, so you had to be 1 of 3 classes, and everyone was the same? People preach wanting choices....well...until they have too many?!
Wow. The OP is a total 'glass is half empty' kind of person.
How do you turn the best part of Rift into such a negative?
IMO, the soul system is one of the main reasons to play Rift. I loved the open skill system in other games and I can feel the allure of trying out every single combination in Rift as well.
Soul System is no SWG badges and professions, Pre-CU. But it does offer some levels of individuality and it's interesting to note that every main class can play either straight defensive or straight offensive. So you don't pick a class and are completely dedicated from the start to being a tank, healer, etc.
When did you start playing "old school" MMO's. World Of Warcraft?
Its not the class design or the design choices of freedom that remove uniqueness. Just being an MMO removes uniqueness.
Rift provides a very refreshing taste of uniqueness. The class and skill combinations provided give a HUGE variety to choose from in your desired play style and role.
Will there be FOTM builds for specific things? Yes. But thats every game. Get over it.
Giving freedom of choice and easy access to it provides massive benefits over its negatives. If you force players to stick with what they choose and make it difficult to change, you greatly reward time played in the game and punish casual and new players that make mistakes or dont know what they are doing.
The freedom of choice with easy access lets a new player make mistakes. Lets a casual do as they will. Lets people be ok with screwing up and redo it without rerolling. Sure it means that FOTM will be more obvious and more people will pick it. But it also means you're going to see some pretty interesting builds out there that totally suck at 95% of what they encounter but you just cant beat them or come close to them during the 5% of the time the build was designed for.
I like the system. I like the game. Basically, I'm glad somebody took the popular 3 talent tree system Blizzard basically set as standard and tweaked it into a better system.
What also pretty silly in Rift is that you can't see what class someone is (i.e. their soul choices)
The person in plate could be a tank (reaver, warlord ), could be a tank + healer (VK), could be a melee dps (champion, etc), could be a magic dps (Riftblade) or could be a pet class (beastmaster).
>---<
This is the thing I hated most about Rift, your armor or class or calling doesn't say anything about you at all. Everyone can be anything, it's silly.
Some might think this is fun, but it also makes no sense at all.
What also pretty silly in Rift is that you can't see what class someone is (i.e. their soul choices)
The person in plate could be a tank (reaver, warlord ), could be a tank + healer (VK), could be a melee dps (champion, etc), could be a magic dps (Riftblade) or could be a pet class (beastmaster).
>---<
This is the thing I hated most about Rift, your armor or class or calling doesn't say anything about you at all. Everyone can be anything, it's silly.
Some might think this is fun, but it also makes no sense at all.
Though why do you really need to know what a person is?
In PvP it makes things more interesting because you only know they wear plate - you don't really know much else untill they start nailing you with abilities. That adds a sense of danger to PvP and in my opinion makes PvP a bit more fun.
In PvE what difference does it really make?
Basically when you say it makes no sense at all, to me it makes no sense why it would really matter...
There are 3 types of people in the world. 1.) Those who make things happen 2.) Those who watch things happen 3.) And those who wonder "What the %#*& just happened?!"
All this means is that folks will go for the flavor of the month build. So everybody is basicly going to have almost the same cookie cutter build. I could see that one was going to happen.
All in all a huge mistake.
All the mediocre players will go for the "FOTM" build posted on some web site.
Great players will instead ignore such build and get their own build which will work better for them. I ve seen this happen in many games.
I am not worried at all. I ve lost count of how many times I ve been told my build is not optimal and then the parsers have shown my non-optimal build works way better than their "optimal" FOTM one.
I supposed you haven´t played Guild Wars... It feels some how as free as Guild Wars was regarding builds.
I don´t see any negative point on giving you that freedom...
I prefer that than beeing stuck on my choices... or having to pay big amounts of money to change builds...
Giving you the chance to learn all souls and save up to 4 builds is just great...you can go dungeons with out clerics for example (last time we went 2 mages choloromancers and we healed as well as we did dps),
you can solo, you can change build to go pure dps if healers are in group... the word is FREEDOM...and yes...i love it.
The Rift soul system is not about being special - at least for me. It is all about creating a character that suits my play style. Many other games force you to choose amongst their offered classes with very little in the way of customization. Rift allows me to design and play the characters that I want to play with very little limitations.
Not quite pure sandbox but close enough to suit me.
What also pretty silly in Rift is that you can't see what class someone is (i.e. their soul choices)
The person in plate could be a tank (reaver, warlord ), could be a tank + healer (VK), could be a melee dps (champion, etc), could be a magic dps (Riftblade) or could be a pet class (beastmaster).
>---<
This is the thing I hated most about Rift, your armor or class or calling doesn't say anything about you at all. Everyone can be anything, it's silly.
Some might think this is fun, but it also makes no sense at all.
I ve just been playing a bit of CO today. A game with no classes where your char can look however you want it to look and you can choose whatever powers you fancy. Our team killed a few cosmics and then we did a couple of lairs. Everybody knew who was the tank, who was the healer and who was dpsing. It was a PUG team, so we did not know each other before. I didn't need my armor or my class to dictate what my role was in the group.
And when I am building a team in Rift, same thing. When I am asking for a Tank I am asking for a Tank, and I don't give a dime about his class and his looks. As long as he can hold my agro and take a beating, that's all I need to know.
Comments
A serious reply now
With so many veteran gamers here I am kind of shocked by the lack of foresight. Ultimately there are too many builds that are specialized in too many ways to claim that one build per class will rule them all. You have history on your side in this argument. Some of these same complaints were made about GW that eventually and optimzed build would be created that would be unbeatble. As a matter of fact it was. The 55 monk in the early games was nearly unbeatble UNLESS it met a class that rips buffs (devish class most noted example). A counter class was created and various other classes had skills that allowed them to counter this build. I can understand that leveing one class and getting full access may seem like it will hurt you alting but if your a true min/max youll go by racials also to milk every last once out of the classes (thus leveing each class in each race).Additionally the fact that this will likely force most "altaholics" into classes they are not used to playing could have unforseen benefits.
If you look on the bright side this nearly completely open skill system could lead to a meta game such as the one found in guild wars where builds are traded and discussed openly including strategies and builds designed for specialized purposes (like fighting elites, tanking certain bosses, general pvp group and solo) and further more creation of strategies for an enitre party. (GW builds site http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page)
While some may look at this and say everyone will end up at the same place this is highly unlikely. For each specialzed build you find youll find another that supposedly does it better. This open system allows for complaints about being forced into a build to be minized in the mid to long run since no one player, legion master, or other can claim to have a full understanding of each and every class and tree. Even if they did claim to instead of being forced to repsec and lose your own unique build you have the capability to slot 4 builds thus leaving room to appease sed person if you desire (A big win).
I am honestly surprised that so many here failed to see the simple benefit of having this amount of complexity allowing you much more freedom in your play style indepedent of the decisions of others thats seems to plague most mmos. Giving up hours of your time redoing what you just did or a lifetime of play without a guildmaster on your ass about your build and many choices going far beyond just the classes and trees but down to each point in itself. Decisions decisions.
(Try it out for yourself and see if you can find the FOTM that rules them all http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html)
I'm a little confused about what you mean, but even if you can't try out every combination, being able to try out four will leave very little reason to want to try anything else of the same class. Characters won't be exactly the same, but I think they'll feel awfully similar.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
1. people dont need to copy other's builds, not anybody's fault but themselfs if they do.
2. they dont need to balance classes, just individual skills.
3. this design is freedom, this design is actually derived from UO school of design decision instead of Everquest, wich is refreshing. People can choose everything, no stupid forced pre-defined designs. No developer can satisfy me with scripted classes. Never.
4. the responsability is transfered to players for their choices, not to developers.
Gently caress lovely class design!
In Final Fantasy XI, you can combine any of 20 main jobs and 19 subjobs (can't have the same job as main and sub). That's 380 possible combinations of jobs people could experiment with to find the "right" build for them.
Needless to say, all but a relative handful of those combinations were rendered "useless" (even when they were more situational than anything), and people stuck to the same limited selection of cookie-cutter builds.
You can give people thousands of options of how to build their character... same exact thing will happen.
It's not the game system. It's the people playing it.
Personally I have no problem with people following cookie-cutter builds if they wish. I personally find it more interesting to experiment and figure things out for myself... Regardless... what I don't like is when others feel they're entitled to force those cookie-cutter builds down my throat, tell me how I'm "supposed to be playing" and give me crap in a group, etc becuase of it. That's when it becomes a problem.
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
If anything this makes it even easier to Balance because more combos will be tried more often.
I'm one for permanent choices but I think this suits Rift really well, its not like you can try out every possible build on one class, right?
SWG used to have like 54 job classes, each with a set of skills. You could mix em up, be mostly a bounty hunter and carbiner with some Medic. It was fun...you could change your skills as you saw fit....and it didn't hurt the game.
Anyway, even if they didn't let you have all souls, people would just roll alts to play new soul configurations. If its the same person pushing the mouse, please tell me what the real difference is here? By all means, limit yourself to your first three souls, don't let me stop you from having 'honest character development'....just don't get pissed at me for wanting to sample all the game has to offer without having a ton of frickin alts :-)
By your line of thinking, every game should have one tank class, one healer class and thats it. Because that the end of the day, you either inflict damage, heal damage or some combination thereof....and since everyone, if given the choice, will boil down to clone-configurations, why bother with choice.
Sorry, man, but this line of thinking is whats wrong with the country....'since we know what you are going to do anyway, we are going to deprive you of coice.' Thanks, but I can think for myself and enjoy the ability to be flexible and play how I feel at any given point in time.
At the end of the day, it's just a game and it really comes down to entertainment and what that means to each person. There is NOTHING meaningful here expect that, while you play it, hopefully you are entertained. If placing arbitrary limits of choice upon yourself increases your fun-factor, go nuts, man.
However, if placing Arbitrary limits of choice on everyone else increases your fun factor...then go into politics.
(Sure, if you play soul arrangements that you simply enjoy, there will be Elites who complain that you do not have the 'perfect' build and not let you into their group....but when you are just trying to kick back and have some fun, do you really need that crap?)
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
It's not totally clear in the tutorial part of the game, but what you do to completely re-pick a set of souls in an already established build is:
Go to your class trainer
Pick "reset my souls"
Open your soul window (N)
Before spending any points, click one of the 3 soul icons in the middle of the screen, and select a new soul for that slot, from the drop-down list.
Spend points
Save build
Profit!
http://machineborn.guildportal.com - Now recruiting players!
this
Are you serious? Not one MMO out there makes your character feel unique. You're in the wrong genre bud.
Every game has flavor of the month. Every game has people either respeccing or re-rolling to that flavor of the month. There is no way around it when you have bunches of people who number crunch and cannot see past the decimal.
Once again, you are in the wrong genre if this kind of thing is an issue for you.
Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.
I kinda liked being able to pick all the classes, at least for beta. Not sure how I'd feel about it come release.
Or, the one they like playing.
Man, sounds like someone is special! Specially angry!
People may only have FOUR characters?!
I love threads like this.
There is nothing wrong with the way the soul system allows players to change specs or have access to multiple specs within a class. All it really does is prevent a player from having to roll an alt just to experience a different version of a class.
In any game there will be the 'FOTM' builds, no matter what character building system it has. Look at ANY MMO out there. Every month there is an increase of ClassX depending on what dev love they got and a massive decrease in ClassY depending on how hard they got smacked with the nerf bat. And you will always have people rolling alts to take advantage of this fact. To say otherwise is just pure BS.
The title of the thread is even better. It comes off as though its saying "Only certain people should be allowed to be special". Screw that. This is what I love about a lot of the people here. They beg/whine/demand change. So a developer gives them something different. Once they have that 'change' they want it to all be like it was before. Basically it just shows that MMO gamers have no real idea what they want, because if they are given the same thing, they want it to be different. When given something different they want it to be like it was before. It's a vicious and comical circle....
There are 3 types of people in the world.
1.) Those who make things happen
2.) Those who watch things happen
3.) And those who wonder "What the %#*& just happened?!"
Yeah, just like with any game. DAoC had choices for builds, and you had a ton of people that did their own thing anyway, the most powerful/efficient build doesn't mean it's the one someone will enjoy. You can be all different things, pure healer, crowd control/healer, dps, all kinds of things.
If you don't like it....move on, it's not constructive critisizim when it's something they clearly are not going to change. It is a key feature of the game, and content is actually made later in the game to take the changing specs into account.
People will always try to min/max, would a game that only had one class that was the same as everyone else be better? Or one with a healer/tank/dps class, so you had to be 1 of 3 classes, and everyone was the same? People preach wanting choices....well...until they have too many?!
Wow. The OP is a total 'glass is half empty' kind of person.
How do you turn the best part of Rift into such a negative?
IMO, the soul system is one of the main reasons to play Rift. I loved the open skill system in other games and I can feel the allure of trying out every single combination in Rift as well.
Soul System is no SWG badges and professions, Pre-CU. But it does offer some levels of individuality and it's interesting to note that every main class can play either straight defensive or straight offensive. So you don't pick a class and are completely dedicated from the start to being a tank, healer, etc.
When did you start playing "old school" MMO's. World Of Warcraft?
I made this same post a couple days ago and was shouted down, apparently I need to work on my communication skills.
The OP fails hard at his whole point.
Its not the class design or the design choices of freedom that remove uniqueness. Just being an MMO removes uniqueness.
Rift provides a very refreshing taste of uniqueness. The class and skill combinations provided give a HUGE variety to choose from in your desired play style and role.
Will there be FOTM builds for specific things? Yes. But thats every game. Get over it.
Giving freedom of choice and easy access to it provides massive benefits over its negatives. If you force players to stick with what they choose and make it difficult to change, you greatly reward time played in the game and punish casual and new players that make mistakes or dont know what they are doing.
The freedom of choice with easy access lets a new player make mistakes. Lets a casual do as they will. Lets people be ok with screwing up and redo it without rerolling. Sure it means that FOTM will be more obvious and more people will pick it. But it also means you're going to see some pretty interesting builds out there that totally suck at 95% of what they encounter but you just cant beat them or come close to them during the 5% of the time the build was designed for.
I like the system. I like the game. Basically, I'm glad somebody took the popular 3 talent tree system Blizzard basically set as standard and tweaked it into a better system.
What also pretty silly in Rift is that you can't see what class someone is (i.e. their soul choices)
The person in plate could be a tank (reaver, warlord ), could be a tank + healer (VK), could be a melee dps (champion, etc), could be a magic dps (Riftblade) or could be a pet class (beastmaster).
>---<
This is the thing I hated most about Rift, your armor or class or calling doesn't say anything about you at all. Everyone can be anything, it's silly.
Some might think this is fun, but it also makes no sense at all.
Though why do you really need to know what a person is?
In PvP it makes things more interesting because you only know they wear plate - you don't really know much else untill they start nailing you with abilities. That adds a sense of danger to PvP and in my opinion makes PvP a bit more fun.
In PvE what difference does it really make?
Basically when you say it makes no sense at all, to me it makes no sense why it would really matter...
There are 3 types of people in the world.
1.) Those who make things happen
2.) Those who watch things happen
3.) And those who wonder "What the %#*& just happened?!"
All the mediocre players will go for the "FOTM" build posted on some web site.
Great players will instead ignore such build and get their own build which will work better for them. I ve seen this happen in many games.
I am not worried at all. I ve lost count of how many times I ve been told my build is not optimal and then the parsers have shown my non-optimal build works way better than their "optimal" FOTM one.
I love the Class system in RIFT !!
I supposed you haven´t played Guild Wars... It feels some how as free as Guild Wars was regarding builds.
I don´t see any negative point on giving you that freedom...
I prefer that than beeing stuck on my choices... or having to pay big amounts of money to change builds...
Giving you the chance to learn all souls and save up to 4 builds is just great...you can go dungeons with out clerics for example (last time we went 2 mages choloromancers and we healed as well as we did dps),
you can solo, you can change build to go pure dps if healers are in group... the word is FREEDOM...and yes...i love it.
actually...im very positively impress with that.
The issue is not with the sytem, but rather it is with the people one might find themselves playing with instead.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
The Rift soul system is not about being special - at least for me. It is all about creating a character that suits my play style. Many other games force you to choose amongst their offered classes with very little in the way of customization. Rift allows me to design and play the characters that I want to play with very little limitations.
Not quite pure sandbox but close enough to suit me.
I ve just been playing a bit of CO today. A game with no classes where your char can look however you want it to look and you can choose whatever powers you fancy. Our team killed a few cosmics and then we did a couple of lairs. Everybody knew who was the tank, who was the healer and who was dpsing. It was a PUG team, so we did not know each other before. I didn't need my armor or my class to dictate what my role was in the group.
And when I am building a team in Rift, same thing. When I am asking for a Tank I am asking for a Tank, and I don't give a dime about his class and his looks. As long as he can hold my agro and take a beating, that's all I need to know.