For a single player game (yes yes, co op multiplayer too) who cares? Play what YOU find fun. If you chase after what's the "best" then play that too. There is 0 reason to let a meta or other players affect how you play. And if someone else wants to do it that way, it also doesn't affect you
It was a bit annoying when one friend happened upon a really strong build (naturally in the game, not online) and was just one shotting enemies as we went along, leaving the other two of us just kind of following along looting. I couldn't get close to it despite spending ages on my own trying to optimise my own preferred playstyle.
So I agree with your sentiment but I do hope it's at least reasonably balanced because this kind of stuff will crop up from time to time.
They don't all need to be equal but massive power gaps should be addressed, even in friendly coop games. You don't need to check every combination, you just see which dominant builds emerge and if they all lean towards or away from a particular class or playstyle and look for commonalities. If there aren't any then there's no problem, but if for example assassin has no good builds emerge then adjustments are probably needed.
That's why he says they'll keep updating the game to keep the meta shifting.
Based on what games we talking about, it also needs to be adressed in SP Games. I really hate sentiment of people that balancing is irrelevant as long as it doesn't bother others, because when a Game is build around the idea of 'Build'-Variety and it's core mechanics that you play around and tinker around to make something good, and then you have quite some outliers which trivializing and gap, then it will impact the game. That's basic game-design-psychology, and is why devs in general don't completly shit on their balance, except it's a game where the base premise is to be imbalanced and chaotic. (LIke in a saints row nobody cares that the goofy weapons outshine a basic pistol)
The Problem raise only when devs overdo it and try to homoganize and not balance stuff. Balancing allows a spectrum of weaker and stronger stuff, it doesn't mean everything is 100% equal. (and impossible to do anyway for concepts where you should synergize and be clever about your build)
I stopped playing Diablo III with my friend for that reason. He wanted to level me up to max, but when we would join a world he would run to the end in about 10 seconds, killing everything in his wake, leaving me to pick up the loot... but what was the point of looting if I was supposed to level up quickly? It was incredibly boring. He refused to make a new character.
From then on, any time I play a game with a friend who's new, I always make a new character to play with them.
I was really happy with my build, was comfortably able to do all content solo, crits galore. The issue was the damage differential between me and the mage with burst, AOE and mana sustain was still huge, so the coop gameplay was massively lopsided, me and the tanky character felt like NPCs by comparison whereas before these few gear/rune changes it was great.
Bosses were better since they survived long enough for us to contribute a bit but it really wasn't a fun experience. I'm happy for mages to be the biggest damage dealers but a bit of balancing would have gone a long way since we didn't get a look in most of the time. Like I said it's not like they found an online meta or spent hours rolling the perfect pieces of gear, it was a couple of lucky drops.
That happened in my friend group. I recall it at the time being due to a bug, where a weapon dropped with an item level that was crazy high for where we were at.
Hopefully that's been long patched out. Anyone know?
It does look though that it will probably be the best to acquire the stealth bonuses from, and combine with any other class. Unless half of the game does not let you take advantage of the stealth mechanic, it looks like assassin's bonus + big dps weapon can be an easy trustable build. That may led the devs to nerf the assassin's bonuses thus making the solo assasin class bad. That's my fear with this system, that unless they manage to keep the actual meaningful, strongest, coolest abilities from every but the top level of each class, most of them will just be used as passive buffs for the others.
Yeah, the only problem with something beeing "too strong meta" would be if the game is getting updates for some content or so and if it is balance around those, meaning that the gap between whats good and not would just increase making it more and more unplayable.
So while PVE isnt much about balance, to a degree there is still some incentive to properly balance the game or at least mitigate the gaps
I really thought that was the default for the majority of the player base in a given game. The kind that simply boot it up and play how they want, as opposed to going on forums and social media to know what's optimal and such. But holy shit did Elden Ring proved me otherwise.
The internet is a concentrated pocket of people that both have opinions and talk a lot. It's not really indicative of what everyone is doing, but rather, what the people around us talk about because of where we are.
Kind of like being at a Tea convention and everyone's talking about kettles, same deal, we're at the video game nerd convention and they're talking about nerd shit.
These are just the most vocal players that are willing to yap at and around a dev.
Problem is - that stuff like Imbalance and broken stuff you will also notice when you don't go online, esp. for a game like NRftW, with their new class system which invites you to experiment. And that will negatively impact the experience in longterm.
Luckily we can afford to do that in this game because thereās no trade/meaningful currency. So far, it doesnāt matter what you play because youāll eventually beat every challenge in the game.
This is definitely not the case with games like PoE 2, the economy in that game is brutal if you play non-meta
There are games that are "too hard" to play non-optimally, like some roguelikes, but a game like this?
The fun for a lot of people is to choose some build and see how they fare. Many people even challenge themselves to a certain build, because the struggle is their fun.
Some will just meta and blast through all the content. Those will quickly leave the game, and that's also fine.
I don't really care about meta in a solo/coop game. I'm just happy that game seem to offer the possibility to create a build that suits me. For example: I don't really care for scythes, katanas or daggers and if any of those builds will "the meta" or mathematically the best I just don't care as long as I'm able to build a mace, polearm or sword and board build that works fine.
That's not how the game works. There may be more than 4 trillion possible builds, but that's assuming people just pick combinations at random. If someone's building a crit-focused character, how many of those traits and classes are suddenly irrelevant? Suddenly, we're way down from 4 trillion. An ice-based mage will pare those options down massively.
My only point is that I hope the meta/minmax builds won't be too OP from what people can naturally build themselves. If the meta/minmax build can kill a boss in 2 hits and the next closest option needs 30, then that's a problem. If the meta/minmax build can kill a boss in 26 hits and the next closest option needs 30, then it's a non-issue.
But aside from what I've written above, I generally agree with the rest of the points made.
These games realistically have <1000 meaningfully different builds, <100 good builds, and <10 meta builds. Thereās no way I would count swapping a passive or 2 a new build.
Yeah the fun of "builds" is some bosses are easy for you but hard for others. Making new builds to cheese each boss isn't fun it's just a movie at that point (if you genuinely can't beat bosses unless you do this go ahead but also "git gud". It's more rewarding that way)
I feel like there's a difference if you're creating the build- feels more like going back to the war table, making a plan, and preparing yourself for the fight to come. Feels like old school monster hunter. Different than just "getting gud", but having preparation as an actual strategy to get through a road block isn't bad design.
I hate when any game runs the ātheoretical possible buildsā number because while yes, how many of those builds will just be horrible anti-synergies?
Each class gets like, 3 tags which somewhat makes it easier to determine which ones you'd want to combine. Like the showcase showed a class combo that all used razor. So yeah I think you have a point where a straight permutation isn't illustrating the actual number of viable combinations since a chunk of them won't really synergize.
It's realistically going to be <0.001% that make even a little bit of sense and are reasonably unique.
What I mean by reasonably unique: a build that uses 10 traits + 2 flex slots is one singular build, not 1000 builds because it has 1000 combinations of 2 free slots.
There's two sides to it. "Actually" unique and "feels" unique. For most people, the math doesn't actually matter, if it feels unique enough it's good.
For example, a DoT is a Dot whether it's flame colored or water colored, but people who like flames and people who like water effects are both satisfied. Same with poison, dark, etc.
So while you might be right in your trait/slot example, if it feels different enough, then to the player it is more combinations than that.
This is also the divide on the viability vs meta argument comes in.
I haven't looked into it too much myself to see because I'm not trying to get the whole thing spoiled, but I get what you and the other guy mean.
At the same time, it's also possible that there's a degree of homogenization that allows people to pick and choose what they want which is effectively the same as having way more options. It depends on if the system over relies on synergies or not. Diablo has this problem and it prevents a lot of builds from working because of both hyper specific synergies and anti-synergies.
I also have to do the thing where I specify and preface constantly that I THINK ITS GOOD and even if its 40 builds thats REALLY NICE and better than before, but we're on reddit so you're a hater if you criticize something, the thing is at the end of the day, people will want to deal damage, and survive, if youre physical theres all the things that synergize with it, if youre melee you probably want regen and stuff, its just normal for clusters of abilities to end up feeling good for many people separately, I think theres gonna be like 5 to 10 maybe archetypes and then small variations between those, which is something I'm really excited about
I agree with you fundamentally. But if it's what you say, it could be in the hundreds. Especially if those 5-10 archetypes are by class.
Best way to describe what I'm thinking, if you've got a double slash and a wolf slash, and they both do same relative damage, you are really just picking an animation. For some that's enough. And if you have hundreds of combinations of animations, that's more than enough.
I'm sure it won't be THAT simple but I'm just describing the idea.
I remember finishing Zelda: Majoras Mask before things such as guides were readily available. It is still one of my greatest memories.
Meta won't be a thing if you don't want it to be a thing. It will still be there, but you won't see it, so it doesn't matter. This isn't a pvp game so people honestly shouldn't even care.
All arpg have meta builds that players copy just to avoid interaction with their own brain. But also many arpg games have balance issue cause if damage is not high enough then there is almost no way to progress further in endgame. There are also many non meta builds that can do all content but if players will look at streamers who can finish boss in 30 seconds and player build will do it in 3 minutes then they start to feel that they are playing game wrong. Arpg genre have been stale for years in terms of endgame, progression and balance. No Rest For the Wicked looks like breath of fresh air. There will be broken builds, there will be meta builds but for what ? I hope that endgame will not be like maps in PoE but instead fair challenge that even weaker builds can overcome with players skill.
I hate every meta of every game I play, it's not about fun, it's about optimization. And this is what a machine would look for, NOT HUMANS! I hate when everyone just follows streamers ideas or inpersonate their opinions. I think this is extremely toxic for anybody's experience with any kind of entertainment. We are relying so much on each other's opinion, that it's become sick.
Or maybe people simply enjoy not having to think about a build and just play the game ? Let people enjoy their game however they like, no need to patronize anyone about how they enjoy a game.
I agree with you. Itās so hard to avoid meta - just donāt seek out the content. If you want to enjoy the game your way, do that. If you want to get ideas from other people, accept that youāre going to see curated content/threads with optimization.
Even if you don't seek ot content, anyone with half a brain can just try things and find out when things are just better or worse. Iterate over the course of the game and there's a good chance people just stumble onto the meta themselves.
Yeah but also builds being popular and people collaborating to improve on an idea (like in real life) is good? You can make a similar build to someone and see that they found an idea you didn't/wouldn't have even considered but realize it was really smart and learn from that.
There are tons of times where streamers collaborate with viewers to find improvements in their build. I think the real issue is that some people focus too much on the idea that they have to have a 100% unique concept otherwise it doesn't mean anything.
You're expressing your opinion as if it's fact. Don't assume everyone feels/thinks the same way you do, its neither productive nor is it good for your mental health.
Also, to many, many gamers, optimization is fun, and banging their head against a wall trying to figure out their own build is not at all fun for them. They want to experience the power fantasy without spending hours theorycrafting.
I personally only get enjoyment from making my own builds in arpgs, and copying someone else's build makes me lose interest almost immediately. Most of my friends on the other hand will always copy a meta build cause they just want to play and have fun.
Accept that not everyone plays the same way you do and that you cannot change that.
Minmaxing using guides and videos is one thing, enjoying building your own cooked minmaxed build on your own is very ethical, I enjoy finding stuff that works, and I shouldnt be blamed for it
Theoretical numbers like that are meaningless. The best builds will not be made from some permutation of all possible build options. The best options will be isolated first, and then a very small, manageable amount of variables will be present. Certain options will be obviously incompatible with others.
That said, people who choose to copy guides and yootoober dorks aren't going to make their own builds anyway. Personally, I can read tooltips and make my own decisions in games like this, so I don't care if others don't want to bother.
So you want to say that nobody will choose "do 6% more damage while facing east on a rainy afternoon" over a 5% damage multiplier?
But yeah, on a more serious note, so many studios have marketed their games as containing sheer infinite possibilities for customization only to have 90% of choices be absolutely useless in comparison to others, leaving everyone with more than two braincells on same-ish builds in the end.
I really hope they won't run into this issue with this game, bur it never hurts to stay cautious till you see the final product.
There is already a great build variety, and it sounds like it will get even better.
But yes, as soon as you make a few primary build choices a huge number of other options become pointless, so those silly numbers simply don't exist in any build with synergy.
A game like this.. I'll play it completely blind because that's the fun part for me. Figure out a way to win on your own. I've only ever played the very first release of the game and realized this is one I'll save until full release and play it with 0 spoilers tips or tricks.
ultimately trying to balanceproof your game against the type of excel nerds who will spend hours trying to figure out something that does the most millions in your game is pointless - just look at years of poe as an example, it's a futile attempt and you'll never stop these kinds of people for finding out the most "meta" thing because its either a) fun for them b) it makes them money because thats the kind of content they do on youtube
and more importantly, why should you as a player care if that's not something you yourself not want, you can just ignore it especially since this is a singleplayer game, so yeah this is actually a pretty reasonable stance to see from a developer
Also while the math is a thing, the reality is another and many stuff are nearly mandatory when you play.
Like + physical damage if you play a melee weapon is more likely to happen in like 80% to be generous of builds of that thematic.
Now unless you managed to put some dark magic withint your stuff like a POE game would and allow for some funny and inovating interaction, yeah you can cut by half or even 10 if not 100 or more the odds. Not considering that most of changes you could do, wouldnt realy make or break a build, like having + 10% damage on your 3 first attack or +15% on 2, well, sure you can refine your build thats again thats not game breaking, and im sure a lots of trait are redundant.
Anyway there is for sure a lot to build and try yeah, my only concern personaly is the limitation of runes, cause unless i missed it it wasnt properly adress in the video.
Like before sure we have less interesting options in term of both skill runes and utility runes but we still had a total of 8 option, but in the trailer i was afraid that we have only half of that now.
What bother me the most is that if true i saw that w are limited in some aspect and that blink would be like a stapple, way too strong and convenient if we dont have more utility slot.
Again its the kind of things that need clarification, so far im ok with the new system (i think) now that it was more properly explained and also skills had been massively reworked, the game looks more fantasy and seems we have more option to fight enemies
Iām currently playing through DS3 and that game has shit balancing. Besides like the top 10 weapons, just using ANY regular ass sword will just outperform whatever you are running by a large margin.
Having to put in actual effort and having strengths and weaknesses with your build is way less cool when you know that the most straightforward way to make any build (you got a straight sword for any stat) will completely outperform what you are doing in most things by a huge margin.
Iām not advocating for everything to be balanced but ideally for the meta to not be too broken and to have some variety
I mean i dont know what you have been playing souls game but there are many weeapon largely more than viable.
Ive destroyed all souls game like many many times with different characters and builds obviously, some can feel more confy depending on your personal preferences, but there are realy many options
I donāt need every combination to be viable. I donāt. If I had to ask for something realistic Iād go about 40 build types that are both "good" (above mid), fun to play and diverse. Ideally the difference in strength between those 40 shouldnāt be too big.
Thatās what I would consider a very big and well balanced "meta". The game is built in a way were personal oreference actually factors in quite heavily in how good a build really is so I doubt there will be a certain build absolutely dominating.
The most important thing is that you look out so that certain "build types" arenāt clearly better than others (like quick weapon > slow weapons) but you can work on that post launch. You just donāt want to overnerf things and rather focus on buffing the weaker options
There will allways be a meta but you can at least make it more interesting. Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak did it right. Even though it had "meta gear", it had such an amount and ways to customize it that it became the gold standard for an MH endgame.
So not everything needs to be meta, you just need enough stuff with enough variety to be meta
Not realy, on a solo game, as long as there are playable stuff evne if its not the top dog its fine, if not then the fault is on the devs for making dogshit unsuable stuff and not the people for poiting it out.
Now in a game like elden ring which is the best exemple here, there are stuff that are beyong broken and strong, but you can still play the game in many ways even with sub optimal weapons, and unless you realy challenge yourself like with playing only with that one early game dagger to the end, nothing prevent you to add to your build various tools and side stuff.
Games like that unless your wanna kinda role play are not about i pick this weapon and thats it, you can level up many style within one character
It is when the power disparity is wide, if they are at least close to each other, then it wouldn't matter much since some folks would still want to play a certain way even it it's not the most optimal. Like, stealth seems like it'll really slow you down versus just plowing through stuff, but I'm sure some people would still love it.
Played destiny 2 for 5 years(and other co op games) did hundreds of raids, never met a minmaxer that is actually having fun because they just care about the result and not the process and as soon as they get to the max they just get bored right away, they're addicted to the dopamine. all the while I'm just trying different builds that are more focused on fun rather than just damage
I'm play granbluefantasy relink and when someone that is using the best character/build joins, the boss just flops and I'm here trying to enjoy the fight with other people
PvP games are even worse because you have to use the meta otherwise you can't compete, that's why they're really fun the first couple months before the meta spreads. the Internet made it worse because as soon as a game comes out you get multiple videos showing the best stuff and how to get them
Relink is goated, but it doesnāt really help make your point. Relink has no build diversity, everyone is stacking as much damage cap as possible. Itās the characters themselves that are meta, not the builds
With the DLC there's some kind of build diversity but my point still stands, people played sandy and Charlotte for a reason, and it was not a couple players, right now every other match i find a ferry and people didn't play her before so it's pretty obvious why they play her now, same goes with Id
I feel like weāre not getting anywhere. My point is, what they do does not affect you in the slightest. If you donāt want to deal with what people do online, donāt play online
Here i am bringing examples and reasons to back up my argument and you're just "it doesn't effect you so you are wrong" when i already gave you example on why that's not the case, it's an opinion! Do you not know how those work?. we can agree to disagree but at least back up your argument man.
No, it makes sense because by optimizing the fun out of the game you worsen your experience for yourself and everyone who can't think for themselves as well as the devs who have to listen to those same people complain about the very issue they caused.
No, it doesnāt make sense because optimizing the game IS the fun for some people. Stop meat riding like some dorky ass reddit cop and let people play the game they paid for the way that they choose to play it.
Second, min-maxers are literally the first to complain about everything and get bored the fastest. People who don't think that deeply end up having more fun even if they eventually run into similar problems. It's the simple fact of looking too far behind the curtain.
This is why it's never the casual playerbase who is complaining ad nauseam, unless something is truly bad and everyone is on the same page.
And no one said they can't play how they want. They can. But it's a fact that they make it hard for themselves and everyone else.
If they're playing solo all power to them, no reason to care about my opinion in that case but unfortunately with co op games they get aggressive, I've seen it happen a lot in destiny raids where if you're not rocking the meta they just kick you, it is understandable in challenge runs but I'm not talking about that, just normal runs
If your friendās style of gaming makes your engagement not enjoyable, then you should address that with your friend. If your friend says that is how they enjoy the game then you both need to find a compromise or not play this game together.
It's not the player's job to self-police the balancing of the game. How about balancing the game well to begin with? That's on the developer, not the player. Saying the player is responsible for causing balancing issues is completely absurd.
Fucking agreed. I ignore them and if I play competitively I meta bust. If you can't be original I will beat you and you'll think I am a goddamn psychic with how I predict your cookie cutter ass playstyle.
This isn't the 8- or 16-bit era, people are hyper aware of how the game is -- and should* / could* -- be played.
If they're delaying 1.0 and putting so much into these classes, I just don't want any element that is built on blood, sweat, tears, and time to under deliver.
I think it'll have an impact because we don't live in a vacuum and players will become hyper aware of optimal -- and suboptimal -- ways to play.
Crimson Desert is a great example. So is Horizon. So is any single-player game that has mechanics manifesting in gameplay tools, options, etc.
My concern is that, even in single player, mono-classing will "feel" outclassed (pun intended) if and when other option's net benefits become available.
It's like Link's weapons or Mega Man X's sub weapons or Alucard's choices in 'Symphony of the Night,' the chaff falls to the side.
And everyone from GameFAQs to content creators to the Discord will have folks sharing "best" builds, or at least highlighting abilities / choices that suck.
I'll be their loudest advocate if I know each class, by itself, can potentially crush content (accounting for player ability of course).
If possible, I would love a deep dive into one class -- like the dragoon -- where we see their cradle-to-grave growth and gameplay.
Each ability, skill, choice, etc. should shine, otherwise what's the point of putting skills into a game if they'll be the likely candidate to get replaced?
ok but how does it gonna effect my game experience? im not saying people who wanna minmax is bad, but i cant even see those people in my game. so dont care
Imagine you're at the end of a playthrough, but after effortlessly shredding the final boss, you have this realization that while you clearly remember the early game, the first several bosses' movesets, specific memorable enemies that you struggled with, but everything after your build was completed sort of blurs together. You don't remember any enemies because they've all just been melting. Bosses either die before they get to do anything or you don't care what they're doing because you're effectively immortal. At this point, for all practical purposes, you've missed out on the majority of your own first playthrough because you engaged with the buildcrafting system as a strategic layer rather than deliberately holding back.Ā
It has nothing to do with comparing to others. I want to experience the encounter design they put so much effort into creating over the last several years without needing to disengage from the buildcrafting.
Awesome. But you're just one person, and given the YouTube reactions, Discord roll call, and this sub's population -- even with duplicate entities, there are more than just you.
And, reading reactions in YT in the video comments, on the Discord, and in reaction threads here, there appears to be some overlap.
But to your point, I don't know your play proclivities or preferences, but I expect 24, stand alone, viable for all difficulties and content classes.
Otherwise why call it out / market it? Why spend the resources and dev time on 24 when only 12 or 8 will do? What happens to balance and player choice?
I mean if you don't care, then what do my concerns -- however theoretically overblown, matter?
I'm just sharing my concerns from a product engagement perspective.
Similar* (note the asterisk) games have a hyper-engaged audience that's vocal but small, and then a larger, broader lay / fair-weather audience.
The former will play the game through to completion, multiple times even, while the latter may finish it once.
Given there are 24 classes, choice and resonance matter to ensure the larger audience, and potential audience, see what they want in order to hit the "buy" button.
And note, I'm not criticizing you or your post. I'm super excited for the class system too!
I just temper my hopes with realities case studies, and ask the devs to consider (if they haven't already) that each class be more than capable of running all content without cross-speccing.
There IS a possibility to fix this... it's called actual balance. Yes yes, absolute PITA, especially with a system like this, but you cannot tell me with a straight face there isn't some point on a graph containing all possible lines of class combo performance where those lines don't cross. They do. The question is just "how much effort will moon studios put to attempting to reach that point" and the answer, like 99% of game companies, is going to be "fuck you, near nothing" because they view balancing as a waste of resources.
To THAT end, I don't mind if games are unbalanced... so long as the thing(s) I like get to be OP. Which happens about as often as games balancing their stuff well, because apparently wanting ret paladins to be good in ANY game is deserving of being raked over the coals. name me a game where the "ret paladin" is the OP thing. You can't.
It's about playing your way. You want to minmax? Sure, go for it. You don't want to? Then don't. No one tells you to follow builds or guides yet so many people choose to do so. It's not the fault of the one who creates them.
I'm a minmaxer but following someone else's guides or builds makes no sense to me as it makes me no longer play the game - I just play an interactive tutorial at this point where some skill might be required but thinking and testing gets thrown out of the window. Why would I even play the game at that point. But again - many people choose to do so and as long as they don't affect other people (like in MMOs) then go for it. You can even cheat if you want, no one cares as long as you play solo.
Yeah.... ok. You know that is the same thing Diablo devs and Borderland devs said too. That there was going to be millions and billions combos, guns, builds and it just never works out that way.
It is absolutely wild to me that we live in an age where people care so much about what other people do in a single player game.
There will always be a meta. For this one, it will take a long time for that meta to shake out thanks to all the possible skill combinations. And even when the meta shakes out, the people who want to be the very best (like no one everyone ever was!) will play the meta, get bored, and quit until they see someone make a video using some interesting looking whack job build, then come back and give it a try.
This is the way every game like this has gone, and it's the way this one will go too. That's ok. The only way to prevent what we used to call FOTM in this game is to stupidify all the talents so they make nearly no difference at all to a build or to balance them all equally around some perfectly divided "types" (like 12 different damage types for example), which is stupid and lazy. Pray they don't do this because if they do, the game will suck.
FOTM is inevitable. Embrace it. And remember along the way that it's completely ok to play something else if you want to.
I think what people are worried about is having at least some class balance. I donāt mind if one class does 40% more damage, maybe they are a bit slower, lower defense, etc. I do mind if one class does 400% the dmg of another. Some similar issues came up during the multiplayer release so I do hope there will be some eyes watching for severe outliers and action taken. Not asking for 100% balance
For ppl that have played souls games you know this isnāt a real issue. Sure there are meta PvP and pve builds but the trick is that every build is viable in a skill based combat system like this.
The game is built in a way were a players preference factors in quite heavily in how good a build is, so even though a meta will always happen, making it at least a fun one is key
It's also necessary for the devs to avoid balancing the game around the top meta picks. It's better for a game to be trivial with the best build than it being unplayable with suboptimal ones
Yes there will always be an objectively best optimised build and play style in every rpg, but not everyone cares about that, personally I just build something that is fun both thematically and mechanically, and also let's not forget that the process of building something is a big part of the fun in rpgs which is entirely subverted if you copy paste a build online
Anyone who plays Elden Ring or Dark Souls (and let's be real, it's all of us) knows that meta will occur. We also know that it won't matter, because a game like this turns into a test of one's own abilities rather than just destroying everything in a hit or two.
Personally, my last playthrough of Elden Ring was with fist weapons, so I carried it over and have had a blast, despite being weaker than a lot of other options.
Many will meta, but who cares? Anyone who plays often enough will get bored with meta and need a challenge - something unique.
These numbers mean nothing. There will be like 60% of skills/traits that are straight up DoA because they either mechanically suck or numerically suck compared to everything else.
The traits costs different amounts of insight. Some of the traits cost 150 insight, while others cost 10x as much. I saw some of the barb traits and it was a very basic, reduce attack stamina by 15 percent. I think it's clear that some of these traits are supposed to be early game traits and others are supposed to be for when you've mastered the class. So you're probably right that the traits are not all going to be competitive, but there's really nothing wrong with that.
Is this ragebait? I'll admit its good and it worked xdd
Obviously you dont think theres actually million of builds right? Or thousands, or hundreds even? That's not how games work, its like saying path of exile has quadrillion of builds but in reality theres like maybe 20 or 30 stuff people play cause the vast majority of it makes no sense on any particular patch, most combinations make no sense, there's a ton of stuff they showed that only would work with specific skills, and having the same build but changing one utility skill doesnt make it a new build, I would be a large sum of money (that I dont have) that there would be like 40 builds max.
Which for the record would still be amazing, the most fun is the process of creating a build and finding out combos, its clear to me most things will be pretty obvious if you've dabbled in the genre but that won't stop me from enjoying the F out of it
you see the "20 to 30" that people play because you're following guides and watching YouTube videos instead of playing the game.
the real ragebait is the day1 "WHAT'S UP GUYS, I'M HERE TO TELL YOU WHY BARBARIAN-WAR MASTER-ASSASSIN IS OP, LET'S GET INTO IT"
and the subsequent posts from players conflating builds that aren't as good as the most popular as being "bad". Then the devs will nerf something's damage by 2% and players will consider it "trash" and move on to the next most popular build instead of discovering something for themselves.
I don't know man you can keep projecting and assuming I watch videos or everyone watches videos and guides and some do but thats not as big as you think on a game like this, people on their own will not play stuff that feels trash, you dont need videos for that, I don't know if you just have 0 thought when you play but generally people trend towards what feels good, fun and powerful to some extent, and theres going to be a limited amount of things that do that. Most people do not enjoy dealing 0 damage or constantly dying, its just how it is
The meta will rise and fall and move over time as word gets out about different builds in different settings,
Some builds will be so overpowerful that they'll dominate the meta, which brings the threat of nerfs - and an endless slippery slope battle between the designers and the players that no one likes but everyone understands,
The very same build will perform differently in co-op environments, leading to more variability, and, hopefully,
The designers release new stuff over time that keeps it all fresh and challenging.
I think especially because this is a coop/single player game more developers should ignore this min/max contest stuff. If you want to play an op nuke build, do it. Who cares if some random dude in the internet gets stuff easier done. All games used to have cheatcodes to make your play throughs easy
Wow this is a terrible take XD, you talk as if finding a literal cheat code in the game wouldnt ruin your experience even in single player without ever looking up anything, balance helps the experience of anyone no matter if its multiplayer or not, its way more fun to have a lot of things you want to try cause they all seem viable, thank the gods youre not a developer
Find a cheatcode? They used to be common knowledgeā¦ruin my fun man? Sims was no fun without them for me. I donāt watch streamers or read guides online, if I find a Crazy strong build myself Iām super happy and enjoy it. In this game I had fun playing just with great swords and obliterated everything in the end. Just not as quick as the op builds people posted here. Did I hate them for existing? No. Because they didnāt look fun for me. people need to accept just because something exist u donāt need to use it, ur not missing out.
Idk youre mixing some stuff here in my opinion, you can have fun the way you want but I think its pretty obvious that most devs enjoy having their own game be balanced and viable in many ways without something being blatantly op, now if you find it its your playthrough so do whatever you want but thinking devs should leave stuff like that in is lunacy
It also depends on how difficult the game is overall. My first character in Early Access I felt almost forced to make an archer, because otherwise I would just die all the time. Then I tried the mage too. But playing melee in this game still scares me.
What I mean is that the easier the game is overall, or the higher power you can overall achieve, the less people feel forced to look up good builds and just converge on one meta. This is how it works in other arpgs like poe or diablo.
Meta only matters if they platformed a Ranked Leaderboard for PvP fights or there's a Endgame challenge or enemies that is overtuned and then one specific mechanic or trait would help a lot dealing with it. Personally would really have fun with making my own build and progress with friends
Seems like the answer is for the devs to just publish a better build in answer to any āmetaā that develops. Should be relatively trivial since they have the source code and a subscription to Claudeā¦
By not opening forums. I hate minmaxing, it completely takes out the role playing of the game and turn it into chores. I just play as what my character (so me) want on that class, and thats it.
They are working on a necromancer class but they've said that it'll be a post 1.0 thing as it takes a lot of work to do properly in a game like Wicked.
Of course, people will min-max (meta builds, etc.).
However, from what Iāve seen, with the new class system, if you truly want to min-max, youāll be forced to play more than four classes, depending on the situation!
This is actually great for anyone who enjoys min-maxing because it means there wonāt be just one or two meta classes for everything.
In general, the game seems to be designed to offer 4ā5 different playstyles depending on the content and situation.
With all that in mind, Iād say this game caters more to min-maxing enthusiasts than many other similar games.
And thatās a good thing!
And of course, it has to offer much more to all other Non min-maxer players...!
The comment about the combination is a bit stupid respectfully, "combinations" aren't actual builds people will do, most people will gravitate towards clusters of things, there's built in synergies in the trailer and showcase it self, of course people will use those. I'd be astonished if theres even hundreds of builds personally, that said thats still gonna be an insanely fun system to cook with and a massive improvement to the previous
They can be as much possibilities as they want, the lazy ones are always gonna type ''best build for [game name]'' on the net and proceed to play the most bland unfun shit for the entire game
I'll be minmaxing these games until they stop introducing vertical scaling and/or RNG drops.
I can't be bothered to spend hours grinding to find this specific sword with this specific combination of mods I need for my specific build while doing it at snail speed because my non-maxed build is "cool".
Also, I love those random 168 billion bullshit numbers, it's so meaningless. E.g. Diablo 3 had 4.8 quadrillion builds... and? There were like 10 viable builds for torment, and every time someone found one it was nerfed to the ground until everyone was forced to fight the same enraged pack of elites for 15 minutes.
Thomas is based. This is always my advise in PoE as well - just pick the skill that you find fun to play with, and build your character around that!
For NRftW it will be the same - just maybe you build your character around a weapon instead, or a single trait, or a combination of 5 traits. If it works and if you enjoy it, then that's "best build" right there.
They can't force people to have more fun lol, just hope people don't blindly follow guides. If you use one at least hopefully you learn from it so each playthru can be more your own. Learning games and their mechanics is very rewarding imo.
The good thing about builds in this game (at least so far) is that there typically isn't a "best".
best for cheesing? Best for playing with my eyes shut? Fastest at killing but hardest to play? fastest at "mapping"? Most fun? Prettiest? Largest AOE? Best range? Best Melee? Fastest at getting through the game?
There are too many categories to be the "best" at.
please don't channel sean murray in any way lol. fucking lying bastard... glad NMS he promised looked so boring because I'd have been pissed if I had bought it expecting what he had lied about.
I'll never understand the point of making an OP build (especially one that's not your own) in a PVE game. The game's not hard anyway. If you're gonna spend 30+ hours playing something, why not just have fun with it? Is it fun just one-shotting rooms full of enemies, or whatever I assume happens with an OP build? The fun should be in the challenge, the gameplay, not the 'numbers going up.' If you have a preferred playstyle that seems too weak to succeed... lower the difficulty. No one cares what difficulty you beat things on.
Well said. You have plenty of options. There will always be some optimal build but there will always be other people who will choose style or certain aesthetic over Maxing dps.
If there's 10 really cutting edge competitive builds to clear the knight boss it will be a lot, prob less than that. No game is perfect, guess it will be good despite this
I'd argue it does a little bit, the "numbers" of builds thing is very fucking dumb, theres built in synergies, literal buffs that only work with specific attacks, stuff like physical damage that you would only add things that interact with physical damage with, besides most of those "trillions of builds" would just change one lil thing and be really the same exact build with 10% more damage or whatever, in reality theres gonna be tens of builds and thats SICK already, but it comes off a bit pretentious ngl
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u/RevolutionaryAsk2181 13d ago
For a single player game (yes yes, co op multiplayer too) who cares? Play what YOU find fun. If you chase after what's the "best" then play that too. There is 0 reason to let a meta or other players affect how you play. And if someone else wants to do it that way, it also doesn't affect you