If I have a beef with the Perk system of Skyrim it's this:
Since it has replaced attributes and "class" choices-- the balance of your game is uneven.
Early on, since you have not selected a "class" archetype, you are basically a vanilla nobody. For example, let's say you want to play a Mage. You aren't any better at mage-ing than the guy next to you that wants to play a Barbarian, or the guy playing a Hunter. And neither are they better warriors or archers than you as a mage. Since the "class" effect of your choice doesn't come into effect until you can buy Perks....
You'll have to spend Perk points to start fleshing your character into the archetype you desire. And since that requires often at minimum 3 Perk trees, if not 5.... it can take you well into your 40s before your character FEELS authentic.
And by that time, the game isn't difficult anymore. It's become trivial, and at that point the Perks and archetype etc aren't important.
So by the time I can really feel like the Battle Mage I wanted...... I could just be soloing around with 1 button on my fire spell. :/
With "class" choices to begin a game, or with "specialization" choices in attributes/skills (like Oblivion), it gave you the feeling of your class early, and throughout the game. If you were playing a Barbarian, it felt like a Barbarian right from the get go. Like most standard RPGs, you chose a class and he would excel in the things he should excel in. Even from the start, so you were ROLE PLAYING the character from GO.
That is what I don't like about the Skyrim Perk system.
Also, I feel throttled into ONLY advancing the skills relating to the Perks I will need for my archetype. Say if I am a Warrior, I better not be advancing my Smithing, Alchemy, Enchanting, Pickpocketing etc... because those will level me up and now encounters with mobs will be tougher. And I won't have the necessary Perks (and their requirement skill levels) in my 1-handed, or Block, or Armor... It can make the game unbearably difficult if you didn't grasp that concept early. So you end up ignoring Smithing let's say... and find that later to level it up you end up having to spend Perk points on lower level armors (such as Dwarven or Elven) that you aren't going to be using at your level anymore, just to get to the armor you will use. Uneven, and unintuitive.
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Now, the higher game isn't so bad for us PC users. I use mods such as Wars In Skyrim, Warzones, DeadlyDragons, double arrow damage, etc to make the game more realistically difficult. There are even mods that tune the level adjuster for mobs so that they don't cap out too low for you to find any challenge post 40.
But this doesn't defend or help the console player, or the PC player that doesn't want to become well-versed in Moddery usage.
Agree 100%. Your character should feel unique from the beginning.
The prior class-based system had some flaws, since no one really wants to have to worry about how much they are using their minor skills to get +5 to three attributes. But that could have been solved without scrapping the whole system. Heck, the modders have already solved that problem for Oblivion. Their are a variety of solutions that would work.
A class-based system requires some forethought on character creation but after that you could just play and not have to worry about which "perk" to pick every level up. Your character was distinct from the beginning, you did not have to wait to level 40 to feel like you were a "mage" a "warrior" or whatever you wanted to be.
As far as the argument that some have made that in Oblivion or Morrowind every character was basically the same by the end of the game, that is only true if you leveled EVERY minor skill to 100, which very few people do. If you are playing a mage archtype in a class-based system who does not use weapon and armor skills, your character will look very different by the end of the game than a warrior archtype who uses no magic skills.
As for the argument that the system needs to be simple enough to have mass appeal, Bethesda could have made a class system simple to use for casual players by reducing the number of pre-set classes down to three and asking each player at start up if they preferred stealth, magic or combat as their primary focus. That's what they do in Kingdom Hearts, which is a PS2 game with mass appeal. It is a simple enough system to appeal to the masses who complained that Oblivion's character creation process was too complicated.
Then they have a toggle option in the Options menu to allow custom character creation. They keep that secret so only people who knew where to look would find it. If you toggle that, you get a fourth option at start up of creating your own class, and you get a complex menu to do that. Then once you have picked the class, you just play. Level-ups happen automatically, with no need for the player to do anything. Perks are associated with your level in a particular skill.
The only decisions you should have to make once you start playing are the ones your in-game character makes. That's immersive.
» Mon Jun 11, 2012 7:59 am 
