Topic

Mutually exclusive skill paths

I think it would be great if certain skills were mutually exclusive from other skills.  For example, if you wanted to be the very best crafter you couldn't have top skills in mining or gardening.  In other words as new skills are added and, maybe, higher levels of current skills you would have to choose which path you wanted to follow.  With a number of different kinds of specialists Ur would become a more interesting place and the kinds of interactions would multiply.  The fact that we can have every last skill and do everything for ourselves seems to run counter to the idea of promoting a variety of social interactions.  Also, this would make unlearning much more important so that you could specialize in one area until you tired of it, unlearn those skills and try out a new skill path.  Taking the skills one at a time in this way would be another way to extend the amount of playing time before you had tried everything.  But mostly I just like the idea of specializing.

Posted 11 months ago by Hawkwell Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

  • As new skills are added I think the time to learn them will force people to choose a skill a path

    When new skills, and new skill paths yet to imagined, open those with all the current skills start with a 500% penalty. So if a new Skill is introduced with say a 5 day learning time it will take me 25 days to learn it. And the next one after that will have even more of a penalty, and so on

    So it will get to the point where the learning of a new skill will take months and not days or even weeks. That will force Glitch to specialize. 

    I don't know how big the skill tree will eventually be, but judging by how much of the map is still to be released and using that as a measure of how much is still be developed with the game,  I can envisage it taking many years to actually learn all of the skills
    Posted 11 months ago by IrenicRhonda Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I've been curious about what the point was of the Unlearning skill. I like this idea.  Things are already sort of along that line ... due to limited amount of bog housing/community herb garden space, there are people who basically are required to buy their herbs/tinctures for potions at the auctions.  For others, it's almost like a "job" providing those things to the auctions.
    Posted 11 months ago by Miss Liz Lemon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I played a game like that where you had to choose the strands - at the start you needed to discuss with experienced players the strands to follow (it was team based, so it was important). 

    In Glitch however, I prefer being  a jack of all trades, and would not like to be excluded from certain strands.
    Posted 11 months ago by riscy Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't like this.  One big difference between Glitch and other MMOs is that you don't have to specialize unless it's your preferred playing style.  I like having the option to play with as many different skills as I want to learn, without artificial constraints that force me into a more traditional style that really isn't how I like to play.
    Posted 11 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't think exclusive skills are a good fit for Glitch.  One of the things they said we could expect with the new imagination system is the ability to improve specific skills for ourselves by spending imagination.  I think that sounds promising for allowing some kind of specialization without restricting people's ability to play all parts of the game.
    Posted 11 months ago by Humbabella Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't like it at all ... it would close paths; players might be tempted to have an "alt" just for the skills they can't use/get. Specialization should be a choice, not a requirement.
    It might work if there's a voluntary option, like "lock away engineering and get a 20% bonus on Croppery".
    Posted 11 months ago by Andrew the Grey Subscriber! | Permalink
  • It seems to me that Tiny Spec wants human players to have a single character.  Unlike other MMOs where it's expected that you will have alts, here it seems to be treated almost as exploiting.

    Given that, I'd say that anything that prevents doing everything on the same character is a bad idea.
    Posted 11 months ago by Janitch Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think there's a difference between mutually exclusive (ie, a hard wall between you and the upper-ranks of a given skill), and to create a painpoint for not specializing.
    Right now, you CAN specialize, and quickly, if that's what you want to do. 
    Some players want to be jacks/jills of all trades: Fine, they can spend their time leveling all those skills.
    I think the system works as it is.
    Me, I'm a generalist. I'm never going to be high on the leader boards.  But I want all those skills, and with apps like Glitch Academy, I can keep learning even when I don't play.  That works for me. If we did NOT have Glitch Academy, that would be more painful, but we do, so no big deal, at least not for me.
    I don't think specialization moves the needle.
    Posted 11 months ago by CrashTestPilot Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I really don't like this. There is nothing wrong with specialization; it's the being forced to specialize that is bad. I'm perfectly happy to not do things (by my own choice), but I would strongly dislike it if I couldn't do things.
    Posted 11 months ago by Flowerry Pott Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Not really in favor of specialization. For example, if I specialized only in mining, I would never leave the mining areas because I have nothing to do in other areas since I only have the mining skillset. I view Glitch as being designed to be discovered and discovering what you can do in various areas, then finding out which activity you like best. If I get bored with my activity, I would want to be able to easily move on to another one.
    Posted 11 months ago by roderick ordonez Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I favor organic specialization rather than enforced specialization.   The learning penalty will have people reconsidering their insistence on learning everything in the game.   What they give up can then be a matter of personal preference.  
    Posted 11 months ago by WalruZ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think our progression through the skill trees is going to be much slower after the update. Its one of the problems I saw with Glitch in the first few days I played it. I realized in a couple of months my character would be maxed.

    The fast skill progression is really nice until you run out of new things to work towards, then you find yourself with nothing to do or look forward to. I believe that the new imagination system is being created in part to solve this problem. I would imagine that it will take considerably longer to max a character after the update so specialization will just naturally happen as people realize its better to be very good at a single thing that kinda crappy at all things.

    As time progresses there will be people who eventually gain all the skills but in the mean time I think people will just naturally choose to specialize because it is beneficial to them. Of course that are those who will prefer to just to do a little bit of everything and be mediocre at it because they like the variety in play but it won't have to be forced on players either way.

    My personal guess is that it will take roughly two to three times as much effort to max a character's skills as it does currently and it will be directly linked to how much you play and how much imagination you earn.
    Posted 11 months ago by Melting Sky Subscriber! | Permalink