Wormwood’s insight perks are underwhelming

[cameron8800]

Of all the current insight skill trees, Wormwood’s is probably the most disappointing. I know I’m late to the conversation, but I think a few alterations could make Wormwood’s skill tree much more worthwhile without being overpowered. 
 

First of all berry bush and juicy berry bush crafting should be merged into a single perk, and grass tuft crafting should be added. In addition, all plants crafted by Wormwood should not need to be fertilized, otherwise it’s practically pointless to craft plants rather than just dig them up and replant them. I just can’t imagine why I should craft any plants when I can just dig some up from around the map. Lure plants and monkey tails being the exception considering the time it takes to collect them in large numbers, but needing a ton of leafy meat and bananas means it’s not a great deal faster to craft them over collecting them naturally. 
 

The lunar cultivator skill tree needs a massive overhaul to be worth investing in considering that you have to beat the celestial champion in order to unlock it. First of all carrats should collect anything on the ground that you are holding at least one of in your inventory. Collecting logs and rocks is way more useful than collecting seeds and not even remotely overpowered. Bulbous light bugs are fine as is. They do what they’re supposed to and I can’t imagine them doing it any better aside from better path finding to avoid obstacles. Saladmanders need to be given a significant speed boost. It’s awful having to wait 45 seconds for them to catch up to help in a fight I’ve already finished. They do fine damage and have a good amount of health, so just making them walk a bit faster to keep up with Wormwood would make them actually useful. Saladmanders should also defend each other when one is attacked. 
 

Lunar guardian one is fine, but lunar guardian two should be buffed from 20% chance of spawning vines to at least 50%. However, since vines are so easily avoided by enemies I would suggest an even higher spawn rate. 
 

I know people have their gripes about the other skill trees, and I do too; however, these are the changes I consider the most necessary to creating a more viable Wormwood. 

[azazel3221]

honestly wormwood should have just gotten new unique creatures to spawn instead of re-using already existing ones

[ShadowbirdRH]

Definitely agree about merging the berry bush skills. The first skill is only usable alone if your world has juicy berry bushes, and if your world has normal berry bushes, you won't be able to produce any berry bushes until you have both associated skills. It just makes sense, plus it would make room for that grass skill, which is a lot more useful than making new saplings considering saplings never need fertilization anyway, and certainly don't turn into lizards which can easily get themselves killed and leave you with one less source of grass in the world. Changes to saladmanders make sense too; they're plainly capable of running, as seen after one loses a dual, why wouldn't they run after Wormwood if they're bound to him? But yeah though, there's a lot of room for improvement.

The mushroom branch is probably the most disappointing one. The speed-ups aren't worth appreciating, and the multiplier only brings yields up to as if you had used a spore to seed the log. If you actually do use a spore, you get no bonus from it at all. I'd be happy to strike these from my skills, but the one and only skill worth it on that list is locked behind the three garbage ones, the ability to plant moon shrooms in mushroom planters, and to produce clouds sleeping spores by eating them. I'd toss out the speed skills, upgrade the multiplier upgrade to properly improve yield of planters when planting with spores as well, rearrange the branch path, and add two new skills. Root: Mushroom Multiplier (fixed). Left branch: Fungal Fertility - mushroom planters periodically release spores when full. Left tip: Moon Shroom Cloud. Right branch: Fungal Fortitude - Full mushroom planters leave behind a planted mushroom if destroyed. Right tip: Poor Sap.

As for unique creatures, I think Hamlet's Snaptooth Seedlings would have been perfect to bring to DST via Wormwood's skill tree.

[Cassielu]

Plant Crafting was never a character ability, it was a craft station feature of Celestial Portal. Giving it to a character doesn't give that character anything. Non-Wormwood players will not play Wormwood because of this, and they will be angry that such a basic feature is limited to a dlc character. And Wormwood players are unlikely to give up the more interesting and special insight abilities for this one-off feature.

[Cheggf]

Wolfgang's skill tree has like two real perks on it how is Wormwood's the most disappointing 

[cameron8800]

10 minutes ago, Cheggf said:

Wolfgang's skill tree has like two real perks on it how is Wormwood's the most disappointing 

It’s the most disappointing because I don’t play Wolfgang.

[HowlVoid]

I just want carrats to pick up poop, Klei why did you make them so niche. It costs so many points to get to it and saying

"It balances out saladmanders" 

Is a bad take because saladmanders are hardly worth +1 point. At the very least lightbulbs (which cost more health than they are worth) need to switch spots with carrats. If you care more about farming then you don't need saladmanders anyways if you are farming so much it actually makes carrats useful (*cough* multiplayer *cough*). 

Or you can get all three if you really want. It's just that carrats shouldn't be the "universal" skill connecting two options. 

It's more of a nitpick, but I do think the final iteration of the skill tree is pretty good and am ok with no further changes.

(Because getting more changes would take nothing short of a miracle)

[NoodlemanNed]

2 hours ago, Cassielu said:

Plant Crafting was never a character ability, it was a craft station feature of Celestial Portal. Giving it to a character doesn't give that character anything. Non-Wormwood players will not play Wormwood because of this, and they will be angry that such a basic feature is limited to a dlc character. And Wormwood players are unlikely to give up the more interesting and special insight abilities for this one-off feature.

not everyone enjoys minmaxing the celestial portal, please refrain from enforcing your boring meta on other users.

Thanks!

[GimplyGoose]

Frankly, I think Wormood's skill tree is just about perfect the way it is. I think it is good that some of the skills (especially the prerequisite skills) are not that powerful.

Wormwood's bramble trap and bramble husk specialist skills are both great skills that stand up on their own. The moon shroom cloud skill allows for some new and interesting strategies when fighting bosses like bee queen and toadstool.

6 hours ago, cameron8800 said:

The lunar cultivator skill tree needs a massive overhaul to be worth investing in considering that you have to beat the celestial champion in order to unlock it. First of all carrats should collect anything on the ground that you are holding at least one of in your inventory. Collecting logs and rocks is way more useful than collecting seeds and not even remotely overpowered.

If you want something that can pick up all sorts of things you could always use the lazy forager or even the Polly Roger's hat. That isn't to say the carrats don't have their place. One thing carrats help with is the process of harvesting giant crops.

[Cheggf]

1 hour ago, NoodlemanNed said:

not everyone enjoys minmaxing the celestial portal, please refrain from enforcing your boring meta on other users.

Thanks!

If you don't enjoy using the Celestial Portal you should be in enormous agreement with what he said. 

[Pomato]

9 hours ago, cameron8800 said:

Of all the current insight skill trees, Wormwood’s is probably the most disappointing. I know I’m late to the conversation, but I think a few alterations could make Wormwood’s skill tree much more worthwhile without being overpowered. 

Exactly! Let us have a character rework round three! WooHoo!!!

[Shuckster]

This seems a bit hyperbolic, especially since Wolfgang exists. I think many of his perks are fine. They do not need to be strong or useful in every situation, and many of them serve their purposes just fine and fit neatly into the kind of playstyles you're encouraged to play him like. 

He creates a ton of essentially infinite food with the berry perks, and gives you access to vice versa version of the berries your world is missing, requiring rot to fertilize them is fine. Odds are if you're going this route, you're already babysitting base anyway and are likely growing farm plants as well. 

Carrats are mostly fine IMO because again, you're likely mainly farming going left branch route. Them picking up seeds and food you hammer is pretty useful.  Also fairly useful in pig farms since they'll immediately pick up the food dropped. I also think saladmanders are fine too cause they're a decent DPS boost and they have a decent amount of health + there's two of them, so they tend to live longer than most minions in the same scenarios. The only thing I really agree with is that they really should defend each other when attacked. I know "real" saladmanders hate each other, but it just makes sense for these ones to defend one another. They're on Wormwoods team. I guess them "teleporting" near you when they're far away would also be fine (if they don't already do that.)

[Jakepeng99]

9 hours ago, cameron8800 said:

Of all the current insight skill trees, Wormwood’s is probably the most disappointing. I know I’m late to the conversation, but I think a few alterations could make Wormwood’s skill tree much more worthwhile without being overpowered. 
 

First of all berry bush and juicy berry bush crafting should be merged into a single perk, and grass tuft crafting should be added. In addition, all plants crafted by Wormwood should not need to be fertilized, otherwise it’s practically pointless to craft plants rather than just dig them up and replant them. I just can’t imagine why I should craft any plants when I can just dig some up from around the map. Lure plants and monkey tails being the exception considering the time it takes to collect them in large numbers, but needing a ton of leafy meat and bananas means it’s not a great deal faster to craft them over collecting them naturally. 
 

The lunar cultivator skill tree needs a massive overhaul to be worth investing in considering that you have to beat the celestial champion in order to unlock it. First of all carrats should collect anything on the ground that you are holding at least one of in your inventory. Collecting logs and rocks is way more useful than collecting seeds and not even remotely overpowered. Bulbous light bugs are fine as is. They do what they’re supposed to and I can’t imagine them doing it any better aside from better path finding to avoid obstacles. Saladmanders need to be given a significant speed boost. It’s awful having to wait 45 seconds for them to catch up to help in a fight I’ve already finished. They do fine damage and have a good amount of health, so just making them walk a bit faster to keep up with Wormwood would make them actually useful. Saladmanders should also defend each other when one is attacked. 
 

Lunar guardian one is fine, but lunar guardian two should be buffed from 20% chance of spawning vines to at least 50%. However, since vines are so easily avoided by enemies I would suggest an even higher spawn rate. 
 

I know people have their gripes about the other skill trees, and I do too; however, these are the changes I consider the most necessary to creating a more viable Wormwood. 

Wormwood was the best skilltree, the only one currently without a major design flaw, like Wolfgang's 10 filler perks where half just reclaim back stolen power, and Woodie's other were form skills being really weak and made even more obselete by the moose skill being good. Wilson is fine even with some small tweaks like gem prices.

 

Though the one thing that sucks for wormwood that the blooming section has 3 skills that are kinda useless.

[Evelo]

As one of the people who fought very hard for the original design of the Wormwood Skill Tree to change I am very very very happy to have what we have now.

I still dislike that the plant crafting ones are restricted to Wormwood instead of being a new station but if it the sacrifice to have the skill set the way it is now, I will gladly take that trade.

I think Wormwood's tree is amazing compared to Wolfgang or Wilson.

[cameron8800]

I’m really glad to see all the opinions about wormwood’s skill trees! Admittedly, I’m a wormwood main so I’m super biased and I have very very little experience as Wolfgang. I’m also a solo player so some of what I’ve said I say as a solo player that doesn’t have the luxury of base sitting.

I stand by my reworked skill tree because I think it makes wormwood more useful without being op. For example, not needing to fertilize bushes is hardly game breaking, but it does add a little bit more flavor to Wormwood. 
 

I also think that the lunar cultivator tree needs the reworks I suggested because they require that you defeat the Celestial Champion which is no minor feat, thus the rewards should match the effort required to beat the game’s “final boss” (do people still think of the celestial champion this way?)

I think my suggestions maintain Wormwood’s base building tendencies while also promoting solo play without breaking the game’s balance. 

45 minutes ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Wormwood was the best skilltree, the only one currently without a major design flaw, like Wolfgang's 10 filler perks where half just reclaim back stolen power, and Woodie's other were form skills being really weak and made even more obselete by the moose skill being good.

woodie’s skill tree completely eliminates any real negative effects or consequences of playing him. He has no real downsides which personally I think is boring. I like that wormwood has negative traits that uniquely affect his gameplay and make him a more unique character with interesting challenges to be solved. 

I will agree that wormwood’s skill tree probably isn’t the most disappointing. I was using a rhetorical device as a hook. I just think a few minor tweaks would give us a fully finalized wormwood that is still the ideal farmer/basesitter while also allowing a greater degree of solo play that rewards players for beating the celestial champion. As it is I think the affinity skills are the worst in his tree and aren’t worth wasting points on. 

[arubaro]

8 hours ago, HowlVoid said:

I just want carrats to pick up poop, Klei why did you make them so niche. It costs so many points to get to it and saying

"It balances out saladmanders" 

Is a bad take because saladmanders are hardly worth +1 point. At the very least lightbulbs (which cost more health than they are worth) need to switch spots with carrats. If you care more about farming then you don't need saladmanders anyways if you are farming so much it actually makes carrats useful (*cough* multiplayer *cough*). 

Or you can get all three if you really want. It's just that carrats shouldn't be the "universal" skill connecting two options. 

It's more of a nitpick, but I do think the final iteration of the skill tree is pretty good and am ok with no further changes.

(Because getting more changes would take nothing short of a miracle)

and the light bulbs are so bad. Mot only cost more hp than is worth as you said, they barely work cuz they have fixed slow movement speed which is ironic when wormwood is one of the faster characters...

 

never used saladmanders...to much hp for a niche combat perk. The few fight they could be useful are fights that you don't need help 

[Masked Koopa]

Idk why we're acting like Wormwood is somehow uniquely having this problem when Wilson has seven perks relating to torches, and 6 slots dedicated to just growth and insulation.

With that in mind, here would be my reccomendations for changing both Wilson and Wormwood.

Wilson:
Smoosh the torch skill tree into 3 skills - Torch duration, Torch Light radius, Torch toss. Add 4 new skills that make other basic items like flint tools, log suits/fb helms, meatballs/bacon and eggs slightly better. Make him more beginner friendly, essentially

Beard insulation and growth are compressed into one skill each, with four new beard skills added - One is a small sanity gain of 1.1 sanity per min per beard level, with a max of 3.3 sanity per min (same as top hat). One gives 5% damage reduction per beard level (less than garlic powder or wigfrid). One gives 10% wetness protection per level (maxes out at 30%, enough to make a rain hat protect as much as an eyebrella)

Wormwood:

I have less concrete ideas for him, but IMO what could work well is letting him convert seeds into crop seeds somehow - unlike bushes/saplings this is something Wormwood players already tend to do, and synergises very well with his saladmander skill. Other than that, it could probably be beneficial to add special items that require crops to craft, to better justify this conversion capability. And yes, not everyone wants to farm as wormwood - but that is very much a direction his character has always had to him.

Other than that, I think it'd be good if Wormwood could sleep inside farm plots in a similar manner to how Webber can sleep in T3 spider dens - it'd make him a little more beginner friendly, and could interact with the nutrients currently in the soil.|

That having been said, I am sympathetic toward klei not really caring that much, I think even an ideal implementation would have folks end up unhappy in some facet or another. I'm happy the characters are getting a second pass, even if it ends up being somewhat hacky.

[arubaro]

8 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

Idk why we're acting like Wormwood is somehow uniquely having this problem when Wilson has seven perks relating to torches, and 6 slots dedicated to just growth and insulation.

only woodie has a almost perfect skill tree

 left half of wormwood's skill tree is bad (atleast is not horrible like in the beta with that non sense perks)

wilson skill tree makes 0 sense, has few perks because most points goes into 2 weird branches which one is dedicated to torches(?)

wolfgang.... better not talk about Wolfgang's skill tree, seems like they didnt want to make any effort. A lot of wolfgang perks could have been skill tree perks like the seafaring ones, or atleast make them stronger via it instead of just making few unispired bland perks consuming most of the insight points

[Theukon-dos]

You want to know what I want to know? What exactly was too strong about Wormwood's petal perk foe Klei?

 

Genuinely. What the hell? You actively decide to make characters stronger again after nearly 3 years of power creep, but petals are where you draw the line? Sure, they where more useful than many players gave them credit for. But they're still petals. Your best bets would be too use them to tame a beef or burn them for ash ergo healing salves. But if those are too strong for what they intended, then just what did they intend in the first place? Infinite pretty parasols?

[Valase]

14 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

You want to know what I want to know? What exactly was too strong about Wormwood's petal perk foe Klei?

By creating value out of thin air.

Petals could be made into: Rot, Manure and Ash. which means that you could easily make more compost wraps and healing salves.

You could also keep any critter in your pocket forever(as long that you were bloomed), A.K.A. lightbugs.

You could also feed beefalos.

And make garlands(for a low sanity regen).

and light campfires.

And also Lower you IRL sanity because of the sound that it made every X seconds.

During the beta I downplayed the skill quite a lot, and came to regret that, but only because that skill was really op.

[Antynomity]

9 minutes ago, Valase said:

snip

My guy, quite literally nearly every single skill in all of the skill trees in this game 'create value out of thin air', it's just that the majority of them are boring af stat increases or changes that don't require any sort of planning or possible variation to what you will do with said value.

[Horsheen]

11 hours ago, cameron8800 said:

It’s the most disappointing because I don’t play Wolfgang.

This is the funniest thing I've read in so long

[Theukon-dos]

1 hour ago, Valase said:

By creating value out of thin air.

Petals could be made into: Rot, Manure and Ash. which means that you could easily make more compost wraps and healing salves.

You could also keep any critter in your pocket forever(as long that you were bloomed), A.K.A. lightbugs.

You could also feed beefalos.

And make garlands(for a low sanity regen).

and light campfires.

And also Lower you IRL sanity because of the sound that it made every X seconds.

During the beta I downplayed the skill quite a lot, and came to regret that, but only because that skill was really op.

I fail to see the problem in this context. I'd also argue that it's not coming out of thin air, sense you needed to invest several points into the branch it was on first.

[Valase]

32 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

I fail to see the problem in this context.

Once Wormwood has access to one spoiled fish, he becomes an self fulfilling machine. So instead of going throughout his normal gameplay, you just need a one time investment and half of you character downsides are removed. As the amount of petals would surpass the need for those petals and undermine other wormwood perks(ones that still are in his skill tree).

40 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

I'd also argue that it's not coming out of thin air, sense you needed to invest several points into the branch it was on first.

you invest on quicker bloom speed and longer base bloom duration to get extra petals during said bloom duration, out of thin air.

[arubaro]

3 hours ago, Valase said:

but only because that skill was really op.

nothing you listed sounds op. It was useful but overpowered? lol