Talent Trees - The Way To Go?

[Wednesday Boy]

Yep. And no matter how you organize it, someone gets left out. The whole point of trees is organizing and presenting opportunity costs. If those opportunity costs are not consistent with your campaign, then some character is left out.

I might be misinterpreting what you're getting at but I think you can avoid my issue by removing prerequisite talents. An alternative would be to keep prerequisites but make them more general. Instead of the Point Blank Shot Talent being a prerequisite for the Precise Shot Talent, have the prerequisite for the Precise Shot Talent be any archery talent.

 

[vagabundo]

I've been banging this drum for a while now.

Talent trees are they way to go. I can make my elf more elfy or more wizardy or more Pubcrawly...

Muticlassing gives you access to new telant trees.

Wizards have access to two school talent trees (with the options of gaining access to more somehow) So you have an illusionist who takes all the illusion talent options allows for organic specialisation. I'd even do spell slots with a talent that you can pick multiple times, maybe.

Half races get access to both talent tree or get to choose which one at character creation.


Becoming a vampire gives you access to the vamp talent tree and you lose access to your race one (but keep any existing race talents).

I think it would make for a very flexible system. You just need to make sure that talents are interesting and varied.



EDIT: Just to be clear; I'm not advocating deep trees, more a theme/siloed system. Prerequisite should be kept to a minimum. A Talent Shrubbery rather than Talent trees.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

I kind of see talent trees as being a replacement for the list of similar class powers that 4e classes get. Instead of the earlier edition approach of there being wizard spells, and then certain wizard spells being added to the spell lists of other classes, we could instead get something like:

Elemental Fire
Burning Hands
Flaming Sphere
Fireball
Fire Shield
Incendiary Cloud
Meteor Swarm

With something like Wizards and Sorcerers get access to Elemental Fire, some Clerics or Invokers and Druids get optional access. A Psion who becomes a Pyrokinetic "Prestige Class" gains access.

But there's no telling how certain classes get their spells/powers, I just want less recycling of the same things between classes.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I might be misinterpreting what you're getting at but I think you can avoid my issue by removing prerequisite talents. An alternative would be to keep prerequisites but make them more general. Instead of the Point Blank Shot Talent being a prerequisite for the Precise Shot Talent, have the prerequisite for the Precise Shot Talent be any archery talent.

Sure. But if you do that, then we aren't talking talent trees anymore, are we? That's just a list of talents.

Really, my point is that the game uses classes as packages of abilities, or it doesn't. Classes enforce niche protection by having opportunity costs. If you can have 4 levels right now, and you pick 4 levels of wizard, you can't have any levels of fighter, and the stuff that goes with them.

If a game does that, then alternative structures also have prerequisities and enforce opportunity costs, or they don't. If they do, then they are replicating what classes already do. If not, then they aren't talent trees.

Or a game could decide not to use classes, as S'mon discussed earlier, using talent trees or something like them instead. That's a valid design approach, but not one that I think will fly in a D&D game.

Basically, I think Talent Trees are (over) sold under the premise that they can replace classes, which I don't believe can happen in D&D, or sold in that they can solve the problems of classes, when I think that stacked on top of classes they provide more trouble than help.

A list of "talents" as an alternate way to handle some feat customization is another thing entirely, one that doesn't suffer under those restrictions, and thus might be useful.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I kind of see talent trees as being a replacement for the list of similar class powers that 4e classes get. Instead of the earlier edition approach of there being wizard spells, and then certain wizard spells being added to the spell lists of other classes, we could instead get something like:

Elemental Fire
Burning Hands
Flaming Sphere
Fireball
Fire Shield
Incendiary Cloud
Meteor Swarm

That's a good idea IF you want it so that those pursuing elemental fire must do so in some kind of order--not necessarily taking every spot, but required/encourage to take some of the lower level spots in order to get to the higher ones. Which means it might be a good way to organize some spells, if you didn't take that fatal step and try to shoehorn all spells into such lists. The resemblance to Rolemaster spell lists is both a positive and a caution, in this regard.

 

[El Mahdi]

I can see your concerns there, but more often than not 'too much choice' (or 'option paralysis' Smoss mentioned above) has been more of a problem than 'not enough choice' in my experience. If the TT's each have a solid theme, then there should be enough to choose from.

On the other hand, if you do not want to be limited in choice, then setting the powers/feats/talents out in the 'trees' (I prefer theme) might still be a better organisation model. You would know where to go for the 'woodsy' powers, the two-weapon powers, etc. You just wouldn't have to limit players choice - or allow greater selections.

4E tried later on to categorise Feats didn't they? I prefer things grouped myself.

Categorizing is fine, and I don't have a problem with that. But that's generally not how Talent Trees work. Talent Trees typically work by stating up front, which Talent Tree(s) are available to a specific race or character class. If an ability you want isn't in a Talent Tree that's available to you, then you're SOL. For me and many people that equates to "not fun". Having to multi-class in order to access abilities you want also generates a gamist environment and seems highly unrealistic to those who want those qualities in a game. I prefer a more organic form of character development that mirrors more how people learn things in the real world, rather than what appears to me, as an artificial construct that seems very unlike how people learn things.

Too many options can be a problem, but that's a problem the designers are addressing with different complexities of character building. Talent Trees are unecessary to address it.

I'm by no means saying that Talent Trees are bad, or that those who prefer them shouldn't. I'm only saying that Talent Trees are not a defining mechanic of D&D, and I'd hardly think they're a preference of the majority of D&D players. Making them a defacto part of the core system changes the game significantly, and isn't necessary. Having Talent Trees as an add-on makes much more sense.

 

[bert1000]

Categorizing is fine, and I don't have a problem with that. But that's generally not how Talent Trees work. Talent Trees typically work by stating up front, which Talent Tree(s) are available to a specific race or character class. If an ability you want isn't in a Talent Tree that's available to you, then you're SOL. For me and many people that equates to "not fun". Having to multi-class in order to access abilities you want also generates a gamist environment and seems highly unrealistic to those who want those qualities in a game.

I agree with you but the solution is to have a classless system where you can pick the abilities you want.

In the context of D&D, which has always been a class based system, I’m not sure how talent trees (groups) limit choices in a class based system. In fact, it seems to promote options. D&D has always had abilities that are reserved for a certain class and traditionally has been much more restrictive than a talent based system—you get no choices for your ability at level X and the only way to get a high level ability of a certain class was to take all levels of that class.

A talent based system just organizes groups of class abilities into themes and then allows the player a choice of emphasizing certain themes over others, depending on which talents (= class abilities) they choose. If there is multiclassing, then you can just take a level of another class to get access to any talent tree you want (this is also assuming the talent trees are shallow and you would only need 2-3 levels of a class to get access to top abilities). I know this can feel artificial but that is the downside of a class based system. This works ok for me if class is not an in-game world title. Class is just a game construct to build a suit of in-game abilities that tie to my in-game persona. Star Wars Saga specifically didn’t add a “senator” prestige class because there was already a “noble” class and “crimelord” prestige class that encompassed all the talent trees needed to build a senator.

 

[harpy]

Saga is likely my favorite d20 system to date. What got me so excited about 4e was that it seemed as if the SWS system would ultimately be 4e, and so I was crestfallen when that wasn't the case.

It should be noted that talent trees does make it sound like the "tree" part is that important. It's not. For the most part with Saga it is more accurate to class them "talent lists" as they were lists of four or five talents bundled up in a particular theme, and which were attached to a base class. One or two on that list might have prerequisites, but most talents didn't have a prerequisite.

Power scaling for some of the more potent talents were handled by prerequisites, but the big divider came with prestige classes. In many ways it was assumed that you might get to 10th level with base classes, and after that you'd settle into a prestige class. The prestige class talents tended to be more focused and powerful.

Overall I found the talent system worked really well. When they released new books, instead of making new base classes they just created bundled lists around a specific theme and then tied to a base class. Each of the five base classes were essentially a conceptual umbrella that separated out core archetypes. It's a great way of being able to roll out lots of different "classes" by just having a handful of rule elements that sum up that bit of reality.

There was rules bloat at the end, though at the same time the books were not really intended to be all lumped together into one gigantic soup. Different eras call upon different power scales and effects. It would be like mashing low fantasy, high fantasy and epic fantasy all together and expecting everything to be ok.

 

[El Mahdi]

I agree with you but the solution is to have a classless system where you can pick the abilities you want.

No, I don't beleive that's necessary. One can still have a classed based system that allows any character to have access to any feat, skill, or ability. Just make logical, organic, and appropriate pre-requisites for them (and not just game balance based prerequisites). And make sure that class or race provided feats, skills, and abilities are always better (higher bonus, waiving of prerequisites, etc.).

In the context of D&D, which has always been a class based system, I’m not sure how talent trees (groups) limit choices in a class based system. In fact, it seems to promote options. D&D has always had abilities that are reserved for a certain class and traditionally has been much more restrictive than a talent based system—you get no choices for your ability at level X and the only way to get a high level ability of a certain class was to take all levels of that class.

That's the limit right there, it requires a gamist solution through multi-classing, which I also don't like. I prefer the model I talked about above.

A talent based system just organizes groups of class abilities into themes and then allows the player a choice of emphasizing certain themes over others, depending on which talents (= class abilities) they choose. If there is multiclassing, then you can just take a level of another class to get access to any talent tree you want (this is also assuming the talent trees are shallow and you would only need 2-3 levels of a class to get access to top abilities). I know this can feel artificial but that is the downside of a class based system. This works ok for me if class is not an in-game world title. Class is just a game construct to build a suit of in-game abilities that tie to my in-game persona. Star Wars Saga specifically didn’t add a “senator” prestige class because there was already a “noble” class and “crimelord” prestige class that encompassed all the talent trees needed to build a senator.

No, a talent based system doesn't just organize groups of abilities, it also limits you to what groups you have access to. It's like going to a restaurant and wanting two items from column a and none from column b, and they'll only let you have one from each column.

I don't think a class based system must necessarily feel artificial. They often do, but it's not inherent to "class" mechanics. If done right, a class should feel like nothing more than a profession, with all of the most common skills of that profession available from the start. Then individual customization takes place through Feat and Skill selection.

Now pre-requisites do make sense to me, when applied properly. Obviously one can't learn advanced math without first learning some more basic math. But real world learning and education doesn't work on the concept of talent trees. Talent Trees however, in any game I've ever seen them in, very much do feel artificial to me.

 

[Zaukrie]

While I like the concept of talent trees, I'd prefer that you not be required to take a lower level power to get to a higher one.

As I said in another thread, I'd give races, characters, and themes the right to pick from groups of powers, and at each level you can take a power at that level or lower from that group, but you don't have had to taken a lower power first (with some exceptions).

Like talent trees, but not requiring you to get the lower powers to have the higher powers.

So each level I pick from my race, character, and/or theme options.