07-02-2003, 07:03 PM
Davcol is right; adding a digit to everything doesn't change anything. So long as things are proportionally the same, you're just changing scale.
The bottom line is that yes, synergies inherently widen the gap. However, increased DAMAGE doesn't do anything at all.
The way to take care of the 'gap' is to make those skills scale correctly so that if you dump points into them as soon as you're able, you're a bit ahead of the curve. But, with so many skills you need to pump synergistically, you can't "max out" until lvl 60, say, instead of 40. At least, that's one way to do it. Pumping a couple useless skills is no fun, so the rewards must be great. So long as you can't kill everything even with one super skill, that works out nicely. Let's say you specialized in Holy Shock, and pump everything to get eccentrically high levels of damage from synergies, etc. You still can't handle lightning immunes and you're 20-40 points less able to have a solid secondary attack that will.
Basically it CAN work, it's just a matter of how the numbers come out. There's nothing inherently wrong with the synergies system. But it will take some more careful balancing to get it right. The upside is that if done right, it could be a fantastic way of doing things that drastically increases your trade-offs and therefore the decisions you need to make that define your character.
The bottom line is that yes, synergies inherently widen the gap. However, increased DAMAGE doesn't do anything at all.
The way to take care of the 'gap' is to make those skills scale correctly so that if you dump points into them as soon as you're able, you're a bit ahead of the curve. But, with so many skills you need to pump synergistically, you can't "max out" until lvl 60, say, instead of 40. At least, that's one way to do it. Pumping a couple useless skills is no fun, so the rewards must be great. So long as you can't kill everything even with one super skill, that works out nicely. Let's say you specialized in Holy Shock, and pump everything to get eccentrically high levels of damage from synergies, etc. You still can't handle lightning immunes and you're 20-40 points less able to have a solid secondary attack that will.
Basically it CAN work, it's just a matter of how the numbers come out. There's nothing inherently wrong with the synergies system. But it will take some more careful balancing to get it right. The upside is that if done right, it could be a fantastic way of doing things that drastically increases your trade-offs and therefore the decisions you need to make that define your character.
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