Changing Skills and Valor Stacks

[Archon_Wing]

I would support a consumeable that felt more like pay per every use, placed at an affordable cost. So maybe 5-10 minutes of skill changes. I'd prefer players still have to think a bit before changing their skills rather than getting total freedom for a minor sink. Particularly if people figure out that skill swapping, like MF swapping, is the most efficient way to play.

Well, I just arbitrarily picked an hour since I don't like busy work, but this is fine too.

I get the points that you're trying to make, but I don't buy them. NV stacks aren't a disincentive to experimentation, because you start a game with no NV stacks. If you want to experiment with a different build, start the game with the new build and see how it goes. If you change your mind and want to shift things around after you've killed an elite pack or two, that's fine, go ahead and do it. You had planned from the beginning to change things around after all. A small investment in experimenting with builds will pay off in later farming runs when you settle on a build you like.

But that's the thing. If I pick the build pre-game, it's going to be a general build and not a specific build. Even if I tailored a build to a certain area, I'd have to restart the game... and poof to the valor stacks. I'm not really being a strategist specifically in these cases.

In the end, I end up experimenting with new builds for one game occasionally and then don't bother with it again.

Similarly, I don't buy the argument that it forces players into "cookie cutter" builds. Players tend to play in "cookie cutter" no matter what, because they find the build to be the best overall or at least for their own play-style. That has nothing to do with NV stacks. If you get rid of NV stacks, you'd simply shift to the situation to one where people play cookie cutter builds that are designed for specific encounters rather than general purpose cookie cutter builds.

Honestly, I wouldn't mind if people did shift to cookie cutter for specific situations. That's more involved and at least has some variety. At least some skills would see more use.

You're never forced into a cookie cutter build, but not penalizing people for wanting to trying a little different thing for just a elite pack encounter or two helps encourage more thinking out of the box. The gameplay feels pretty restrictive atm.

One key reason for NV stacks that you didn't mention is the fact that it encourages players to stay in a game and kill a wide variety of monsters. Without NV stacks, players would most likely figure out which base monster elites are easiest to kill in an Act and keep rerolling games after killing the same boss/elite pack over and over. Welcome to Dialbo III's version of Pindle runs. No thank-you.

If they reroll games, then they have to build the stacks back up and that's a fine enough disincentive IMO. And honestly, the acts are long enough that you can deliberately ignore annoying areas. A lot of people already stick to crater/keep/fortified bunker in act 3 and avoid the areas where phase beasts, heralds of pestilence, and harpies can spawn so this kind of stuff already happens.

Besides, "pindle runs" already exist in Diablo 3. It's called Warrior's Rest.