Removal of classes, or multi class, would it work?

tunepunk

When I play my different alts, I often feel very restricted in ways I can make my builds. For example, When i play my magplar dps i dont even use any skills at all in the restoring light category, but i would love to mix in some skills from other classes. It would be interesting if you at character creation, instead of chosing a class you could choose 3 skill trees, from the different classes for example.

1. Aedric Spear (templar)
2. Storm Calling (Sorc)
3. Assasination (Nightblade)

.... or any other skill tree combination you can think of.

You could make very interesting builds if you were not restricted to the traditional classes. If skill trees were individually balanced so that combined passives etc from different trees would not overperform.

You could make very effective specialits like tanks, healers, dps but it would also open up for more experimental builds, And no one could ever complain again this class is not blanced. It would be individual skills and skill lines that would need to be balanced, not classes per say.

Anyone else think that would be fun to try?

Merkabeh

This would be awesome. And also has been discussed before. As much as I like it, I question whether it could be balanced well.

generalmyrick

who wouldn't pick the shadow skill line?

PieMaster1

generalmyrick wrote: »

who wouldn't pick the shadow skill line?

I can see it now..Everyone in Cyrodiil using the stealth line and it will be a huge three-way gankfest because all players will want to be invisible/stealthed waiting for the right moment.

Tandor

It has indeed been discussed many times before. Some games are class-based, some are skill-based. This one happens to be class-based and to change it into a skill-based game would entail pretty much the entire game having to be redesigned and recoded, not to mention extensively tested and balanced. It's not only impractical, but it's also in my view completely unnecessary. If anyone wants a skill-based game they are out there, but this isn't one of them.

tunepunk

CreamedPieYum wrote: »

generalmyrick wrote: »

who wouldn't pick the shadow skill line?

I can see it now..Everyone in Cyrodiil using the stealth line and it will be a huge three-way gankfest because all players will want to be invisible/stealthed waiting for the right moment.

So why isn't everyone playing nightblade now then? Not everyone wanna play stealth u know.

PieMaster1

tunepunk wrote: »

CreamedPieYum wrote: »

generalmyrick wrote: »

who wouldn't pick the shadow skill line?

I can see it now..Everyone in Cyrodiil using the stealth line and it will be a huge three-way gankfest because all players will want to be invisible/stealthed waiting for the right moment.

So why isn't everyone playing nightblade now then? Not everyone wanna play stealth u know.

Because they want to play with their skills in their class. If it was free choosing, everyone would have that one ability slotted somewhere in the build.

Sneak attacks do more damage no matter what weapon it is..or maybe it's just the fact that people want to be unseen at times or don't want any confrontations. There are a lot more reasons for slotting cloak, it's a very flexible utility tool that can be used for anything. I couldn't understand someone who would WANT to go out and fight zergs except for the 1v30 noobs who kill in 2 hits.

Calsifer

The problem as I see it is this, when the min/MAXers get a hold of this it will boil down to a single cookie cutter build. Use it and you might live, don't use it and you will die. Fools and idiots that believe they can be unique snowflakes in a world of number crunching parse analysts will quickly find they are out in the cold with no one to blame. . . Crept for people that don't put much thought into the original ideas posted.

DocFrost72

Would it work? Yes.

Do I want it? Yes.

Will people oppose it? This is the internet.

DeadlyRecluse

It would require a signficant rework of tons of skills. Lots of "core" class skills in PvP would need to be nerfed, and balancing potential DPS in PvE would be a nightmare.

Storm Calling+Restoring Light+Shadow would be insane. Shades, cloak, streak, breath of life, purifying ritual...and I'm sure there are more degenerate combos out there.

Iccotak

This is not a single player elder scrolls game where you get everything and become a god who can use any playstyle.
Classes are a good way for MMO players to decide at the beginning what kind of playstyle they want

Bouldercleave

I believe that it would create one meta and EVERYONE would play it

Unless they completely rework SEVERAL skill lines and individual skills, you could say flat out goodbye to diversity.

Because of that I would be against it - but on paper, I love it.

Juhasow

tunepunk wrote: »

CreamedPieYum wrote: »

generalmyrick wrote: »

who wouldn't pick the shadow skill line?

I can see it now..Everyone in Cyrodiil using the stealth line and it will be a huge three-way gankfest because all players will want to be invisible/stealthed waiting for the right moment.

So why isn't everyone playing nightblade now then? Not everyone wanna play stealth u know.

Because Nb dont have shields , purges , burst heals , tankiness etc
And every player would have acces to that + stealth without classes.

Ballance = limitations

Mojmir

Finally a mag dk with an execute and I'll take sorcs dark skill too.

Malacthulhu

For lack of creativity in the classes themselves I think this would be pointless. It would be nice to have x skill points/cap to spend on whatever abilities you want then automatically be labeled/classifies according to what you pick like morrowind or oblivion (I think).

DeHei

tunepunk wrote: »

When I play my different alts, I often feel very restricted in ways I can make my builds. For example, When i play my magplar dps i dont even use any skills at all in the restoring light category, but i would love to mix in some skills from other classes. It would be interesting if you at character creation, instead of chosing a class you could choose 3 skill trees, from the different classes for example.

1. Aedric Spear (templar)
2. Storm Calling (Sorc)
3. Assasination (Nightblade)

.... or any other skill tree combination you can think of.

You could make very interesting builds if you were not restricted to the traditional classes. If skill trees were individually balanced so that combined passives etc from different trees would not overperform.

You could make very effective specialits like tanks, healers, dps but it would also open up for more experimental builds, And no one could ever complain again this class is not blanced. It would be individual skills and skill lines that would need to be balanced, not classes per say.

Anyone else think that would be fun to try?

I ask the same some months ago similar to the ground idea and the good old Morrowind game. I just earned criticism for that... but i really like the idea behind

Brrrofski

It would create far less build diversity. There are some skill lines that everyone would pick.

You could stack crazy passives and use all the strong skills.

It would be terrible.

ChuckyPayne

Pls no Multi class was in Guild Wars 1, but ANET didn't do it in GW2 because of balance problems.

Just imagine here. ZOS is still looking for his way. New DLC new BiS grind every 3 month new gear grind because of balance. Once trial sets are better, once dungeon sets, once crafted sets, once maelstrom, master weapons. They always change, they don't know what is they plan. They kill progress very often. With multi class the situation would be more painful.

Brrrofski

Every magica build would choose templar healing line and shadow from nb. Then one DPS line. 100% guarantee you. Breath of life, purify, cloak, fear, shadow passives that give minor mending, 15% all round Stam recovery, increase health. I suspect dark magic would be popular too. Frags, curse, mines. Imagine all that on a build. Waaaaay too broken.

DeHei

Brrrofski wrote: »

Every magica build would choose templar healing line and shadow from nb. Then one DPS line. 100% guarantee you. Breath of life, purify, cloak, fear, shadow passives that give minor mending, 15% all round Stam recovery, increase health. I suspect dark magic would be popular too. Frags, curse, mines. Imagine all that on a build. Waaaaay too broken.

Is it broken, when everybody can use it?

MasterSpatula

This horse is far, far outside of the barn.

tunepunk

Brrrofski wrote: »

Every magica build would choose templar healing line and shadow from nb. Then one DPS line. 100% guarantee you. Breath of life, purify, cloak, fear, shadow passives that give minor mending, 15% all round Stam recovery, increase health. I suspect dark magic would be popular too. Frags, curse, mines. Imagine all that on a build. Waaaaay too broken.

I havn't spent a single skill point in my templar healing on my magplar at the moment. None of my builds have any active heals at all. All are based on passively healing me while I'm doing damage.
I wouldn't use dark magic at all. Maybe Daedric summoning line for the damage shield or Storm calling for surge instead.

They could alter or shuffle around the passives so you wouldn't get too much benefit from combining certain lines. Just swapping around the shadow passives to another one of the nightblade skill lines would make decide whether you want to at least take 2 nightblade lines if you're only going for the passives.

I don't feel like any skill line in itself is very OP. On my stamsorc, the ONLY class skill i have slotted is Crit surge, and streak (for utility purpose). The rest of the skills i find pretty useless for stamina builds. Not even worth slotting for the passives.

TheShadowScout

tunepunk wrote: »

Removal of classes, or multi class, would it work?

Eh...

Removal of classes is a moot point, they could not afford the rebalancing effort that would be needed. The game -could- have been done classless from the start, but that ship has sailed, been set fire to and sunk a very long time ago, so...

Multi-classing... could -maybe- work, within limits. More like the dual-classing idea I once had been toying with... lemme show you what I mean:

Dual Classing
What if there was a way to expand ones characters class skills by learning a different class on top of the original one, but with some limits? Like... you only get -one- skill line from another class, and you don't get to pick either, but have it determined by the classes involved? With one skill line for each class that is main-class-specific and cannot be shared as dual-classing?

The whole thing could be dependent on finding well hidden "master trainers" (possibly even appearing in different locations at different times, a bit like the vampire/werewolf infection spawns – think "wandering sage you have to track down" shtick that’s a classic in many stories...), and then completing a special "Initiation" quest before unlocking the new skill line and changing your basic class to a new "Dual Class", with a new class name to show off, new class symbol, etc. Naturally there would be one master trainer for each class, and what combination a character would get was determined which master trainer they approach for the quest, and their original class – there could also be a way to "reset" this, much like skill morphs or vampirism/lycantropy... (although at this point, I’d expect them to make that a crown store service)

I imagine something like:
• Dragonknight & Siphoning (Nightblade) = Berserker
• Dragonknight & Storm Calling (Sorceror) = Spellsword
• Dragonknight & Dawn's Wrath (Templar) = Pyromancer
• Dragonknight & Winters Embrace (Warden) = Guardian

• Nightblade & Earthen Heart (Dragonknight) = Scout
• Nightblade & Dark Magic (Sorceror) = Agent
• Nightblade & Restoring Light (Templar) = Rogue
• Nightblade & Animal Companion (Warden) = Ranger

• Sorceror & Ardent Flame (Dragonknight) = Battlemage
• Sorceror & Shadow (Nightblade) = Illusionist
• Sorceror & Restoring Light (Templar) = Sage
• Sorceror & Winters Embrace (Warden) = Cryomancer

• Templar & Ardent Flame (Dragonknight) = Crusader
• Templar & Shadow (Nightblade) = Inquisitor
• Templar & Dark Magic (Sorceror) = Witchhunter
• Templar & Animal Companion (Warden) = Pilgrim

• Warden & Earthen Heart (Dragonknight) = Barbarian
• Warden & Siphoning (Nightblade) = Cultist
• Warden & Storm Calling (Sorceror) = Shaman
• Warden & Dawn's Wrath (Templar) = Monk

(and yes, I keep coming back to as many of the old class names from earlier elder scrolls games as i can... )

...this way, classes would still keep one skill line that other characters cannot grab, be it dragonknight draconic power, nightblades assassination training, sorcerors daedric pets, templar aedric spears or wardens green balance plant magic... yet the classes could be expanded in a way, giving people way more customization options.

tunepunk

@TheShadowScout

That's a pretty interesting idea. I kind of like it, and that you tried to keep some of the classic class names.

Maybe it could work, I just feel like you're pretty limited within the class.

Maybe spellcrafting (if it ever comes) could solve that in some way. When I play some classes, i feel very restricted and missing a certain type of skill. Like - "Oh i wish this class had a good stamina ground AOE, or a better charge or a certain CC."

Even if they added a couple of more Active skill lines like mages/fighters guild it could solve a lot of problems, but if they are out of fresh skill ideas for such lines, i think multi classing, or spellcrafting would solve some of those issues.

Even magicka morphs of some stamina weapon skill, or more stamina morphs of some staff/magicka skills, could also help in some way. I just feel the game and the class/weapon abilities per say is way to restrictive in what you can do.

Maybe just more morph options is enough? 3 instead of two?

EnglishTea123

LMAO when I first heard ESO was being worked on, I thought it'd be like what OP is now suggesting. Instead, we are given classes to choose from, which I still think was a major mistake game devs made, but whatever. I personally think the game would be much better without a set class still, like in Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim. Basically like every other ES game series.

Brrrofski

tunepunk wrote: »

Brrrofski wrote: »

Every magica build would choose templar healing line and shadow from nb. Then one DPS line. 100% guarantee you. Breath of life, purify, cloak, fear, shadow passives that give minor mending, 15% all round Stam recovery, increase health. I suspect dark magic would be popular too. Frags, curse, mines. Imagine all that on a build. Waaaaay too broken.

I havn't spent a single skill point in my templar healing on my magplar at the moment. None of my builds have any active heals at all. All are based on passively healing me while I'm doing damage.
I wouldn't use dark magic at all. Maybe Daedric summoning line for the damage shield or Storm calling for surge instead.

They could alter or shuffle around the passives so you wouldn't get too much benefit from combining certain lines. Just swapping around the shadow passives to another one of the nightblade skill lines would make decide whether you want to at least take 2 nightblade lines if you're only going for the passives.

I don't feel like any skill line in itself is very OP. On my stamsorc, the ONLY class skill i have slotted is Crit surge, and streak (for utility purpose). The rest of the skills i find pretty useless for stamina builds. Not even worth slotting for the passives.

You don't use channeled focus, ritual or bol on a Templar? Why even play templar? Even if you're DPSing in Pve, you still want the first two. In PvP you want them all.

Merlin13KAGL

If you think there are major balance issues now, enable this and sit back and watch...

Each class has benefits and downsides, as it should be. This game was never set up with free building in mind (as in the standalone games), and would have to be completely overhauled to implement.

It would effectively become a completely different game.

Slick_007

what you want is called oblivion. its already been released. im sure you can find it.

idk

Would be great if we want one build to win them all. One build for PvE and if someone is not running that build, have the right skill lines they can run with the secondary group. PvP may have a couple or three builds depending on what someone wants to do, that is it.

Choice, creativity would be great for someone who is just going overland and after that, everything becomes boring since everyone is doing the same thing.

Oh, also means even fewer choices for gear since everyone serious about raids and PvP would essentially be the same and wearing the same gear.

TheShadowScout

tunepunk wrote: »

Maybe spellcrafting (if it ever comes) could solve that in some way.

Problem with Spellcrafting if done this way - everyone and their granny would end up running the same set of "super effective" skills I wager... and that would make the game pretty darn boring.

For me, the differences in the characters is what makes things fun, even though I wish they would have chosen a different system then classes (like skill line lockouts... pick the "fire magic" skill line, get denies use of the "ice magic" skill line, pick the "aedric" skill line, get denied the "daedric" skill line, pick the "shadow" skill line, get denied the "light" skill line, pick the "blood magic" skill line, get denied the "healing" skill line, etc.)
But eh. Ship, sailed, sunk, long ago. Maybe some other game.

Personally I hope that if they ever dust off the currently shelved spallcrafting idea, they might not use it to let people customize their class skills in an "want everyhting" kind of way, but instead allow people to make consumables (scrolls, perhaps?) that cast class skills equivalents instead - that way an DK could have an "Dark Cloak" scroll on their quickslot, and cast it that way, but then the scoll would be consumed, and the imbalance of cross-class abilities would be balanced by that "out of ammo" limitation...

tunepunk wrote: »

When I play some classes, i feel very restricted and missing a certain type of skill. Like - "Oh i wish this class had a good stamina ground AOE, or a better charge or a certain CC."

That's what the other options are for - weapon skills for example. Not that they couldn't give us more there as well... like...
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/259011/additional-weapon-skill-ideas/p1

tunepunk wrote: »

Maybe just more morph options is enough? 3 instead of two?

Well, there is another idea I once had... recently reworked...
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/369966/class-morph-idea-mk-ii

And yeah, I myself am somewhat vexed by lack of choices, and would want more, More, MORE choices, for each and every character, no matter if they have been played since launch or are newly made for Morrowind. Thus I keep working on ideas how to refit more choices for everyone into ESO, be it class morphs, dual classing, additional weapon skills or guilds, more races, whatever.
My wish would be that in then end, people had so many choices, -especially- "either/or" choices, that it would be very unlikely to find two characters that are exactly the same... right now, too many follow "standard builds" for my taste.

Orjix

No this would not work. If it was implement the game would be broken, and the only way that you could even achieve mediocrity is if you followed the meta, it would be even worse than the game meta is now