Opinion: Walter needs a skill tree like Willow's

[CyberSkink]

Hi Everyone!

I have some concerns regarding Walter. I love him as a character, the boisterous and jovial young lad is a nice contrast from the other characters. I have a HUGE problem with his current abilities... I'll admit it, I want Walter's skill tree to be like Willow's because I think he is weak in contrast to the other characters. Walter being EXTREMELY weak to one of the harder bosses in the game makes him a bit of a tough sell for me, along with the slingshot's speed... it's VERY slow and other ranged weapons easily outclass it. Not only this, but Woby's large form doesn't hold a candle to what you can do with a beefalo. While some could argue that this was intentional, I find that having a mount that is weaker than a mount that other players can get seems a bit redundant and mute. This is why I think that Walter DESPERATELY needs a skill tree that is like Willow's. I also want to emphasize that I DO NOT hate Walter. I have a person who I consistently play this game with, and he LOVES Walter, by extension, I have grown to like Walter for his personality and quirky and unique playstyle. Unfortunately, this person has refrained from playing Walter because of his glaring weaknesses. This is why I am writing this, I want to see Walter get the Willow treatment and see his power skyrocket, while still keeping his downsides mostly intact. This would make him another Glass cannon character, like Wanda, but this time, with ranged weapons! I think Walter is about as powerful as Willow pre-skill tree at the moment. I would love to hear your opinions in the comments!

[Evelo]

I am going to disagree. Not because I don't think Walter needs it, it is more of Willow needed Baseline changes rather than her changes be implemented to the skillset.
New Fire spells? Sure add those... Baseline.
Bernie Buffs? Awesome... Baseline.
The Skillset I believe should be reserved for minor bumps to a character. They should not be used as a re-refresh situation.
Skillsets shouldn't give craftable items either I feel.
So over all I agree with the desire to buff up Walter but I really feel doing it baseline is the better option rather than through skillsets. Granted Klei is intent on keeping skillsets so I doubt my opinion or anyone else's who agrees with me will change anything.

[-Variant]

3 hours ago, Evelo said:

Willow needed Baseline changes rather than her changes be implemented to the skillset.

Strong agree for a good chunk of her skills, yeah. I'd been wanting a handful of her skills as changes to her base kit for a while so when her tree came it could focus on more fire related gimmicks and aspects.

If they do Walter eventually, I think he'd benefit from actually getting updated in his own regards than his perks be cleaned up with the skill tree.

[Catuna_]

(I don't think I have to express that I like Walter just look at my profile)
I think Walter and Willow are very different characters in terms of how their skill trees should be/are treated. I'm of the opinion that Walter's baseline perks are way more than good enough to just have perks that improve them. Willow was among the most barebones characters we had and her pyromania and the fires that start whenever she is around allowed for pretty big changes of how her character works with the whole new embers mechanic. Walter on the other hand already has a solid canvas of what to work on, just with poor choice of numbers when it comes to sanity loss, firing speed and Woby speed. So his skill tree should be a lot more like Woodie's lets say, improving on what he already aims to be able to do and adding perks to add new items and/or mechanics like newer crafts for new bullets as Walter really lacks variety in his ammo types, a better way of passively regaining sanity etc. 
I am really looking forward to the little man's skill tree! A lot of people are genuinely missing out on how well written Walter is, his quotes are a gold mine. It makes me a lil upset how there's a lot of people that strongly dislike him without ever giving him a chance.
(I forgot to add this before posting, but I hope that Walter gets qol changes like Willow did in her skill tree update. Auto-reload for the slingshot would be really sweet.)

Edited March 3 by Catuna_

[CyberSkink]

First off, I want to thank everyone for their feedback, whether it's critique or not. Now that I have mulled it over a bit with your help, I have come to a slightly different conclusion. While I still think that Walter is underpowered and deserves a pretty major buff, I think that maybe he isn't as frail or bland as I made him out to be, for this I apologize, I do have some trouble communicating my thoughts at times. I was basically trying to say "I wish Walter had more power behind his toolkit" I agree that Walter should have more baseline perks. However, Klei has said that the skill trees are more balance-oriented changes, thus I wanted to just use the context of the skill tree to give an idea of what I want. I'll be honest, I don't really care HOW Walter gets a buff, but more so, IF Walter gets a relatively significant buff. Walter is a VERY cool character, and I don't want him to be left in the dark. Thank you all for your feedback!

[Sesekriri]

On 3/2/2024 at 10:14 AM, CyberSkink said:

Hi Everyone!

I have some concerns regarding Walter. I love him as a character, the boisterous and jovial young lad is a nice contrast from the other characters. I have a HUGE problem with his current abilities... I'll admit it, I want Walter's skill tree to be like Willow's because I think he is weak in contrast to the other characters. Walter being EXTREMELY weak to one of the harder bosses in the game makes him a bit of a tough sell for me, along with the slingshot's speed... it's VERY slow and other ranged weapons easily outclass it. Not only this, but Woby's large form doesn't hold a candle to what you can do with a beefalo. While some could argue that this was intentional, I find that having a mount that is weaker than a mount that other players can get seems a bit redundant and mute. This is why I think that Walter DESPERATELY needs a skill tree that is like Willow's. I also want to emphasize that I DO NOT hate Walter. I have a person who I consistently play this game with, and he LOVES Walter, by extension, I have grown to like Walter for his personality and quirky and unique playstyle. Unfortunately, this person has refrained from playing Walter because of his glaring weaknesses. This is why I am writing this, I want to see Walter get the Willow treatment and see his power skyrocket, while still keeping his downsides mostly intact. This would make him another Glass cannon character, like Wanda, but this time, with ranged weapons! I think Walter is about as powerful as Willow pre-skill tree at the moment. I would love to hear your opinions in the comments!

His skilltree is definitely going to look like a scouts badge sash. 

[Yuuko]

I think more like Woodies.

Woodie had his forms and perks, they just weren't quite good enough.  Things like forced fullmoon changes, sanity issues, power gaps, etc made it so that while you *could* enjoy playing him it was hard to feel satisfied with it compared to other characters.

I feel Walter is the same way.  His sling shot rate of fire is a bit low, so is the damage and effect of most of his rounds.  If he got perks that improved these slightly it would do a lot to elevate his kit.  A few skills into improving Woby to either be able to eat more, or low hunger slower would be great too.

I don't think anything new needs to be added the way Willow got a whole entirely new power set.  Willow basically had no powers, and needed a whole kit.  Walter has a kit, and its a fun kit!  It just needs a little help.

Edited March 4 by Yuuko

[Clopsy627]

All i want for Walter is higher attack rate

[CyberSkink]

2 hours ago, Clopsy627 said:

All i want for Walter is higher attack rate

Agreed!

[prettynuggets]

slingshot III skill : upgradeable slingshot into:

[Mysterious box]

Rather than adding a lot I think what he has needs reworked as it stands his slingshot's damage output is bad it's not a well kept secret but another issue is that his special rounds which I'm hoping get another look considering they're not cheap to stockpile for the most part.

His freeze rounds are worse than using a ice staff I'd recommend making it fire faster or making it a aoe blast

His slowdown rounds have very few use cases when considering their cost I honestly don't know how to go about making this more worth it

His poop pellets fire too slow and only effect one target making them very niche I'd recommend making them aoe or fire faster

His cursed rounds shadow tentacle is not suited to a ranged weapon I recommend switching it's proc effect to something like Willow's shadow flames

Lastly I think something he really needs is a higher conversion rate and stack size for his crafts it feels like he puts far too much effort into making ammo compared to the time it takes for other weapons.

[Gi-Go]

On 3/2/2024 at 9:14 PM, CyberSkink said:

other ranged weapons easily outclass it. 

This is not true. If there's one thing that's constant in DS it's that every single ranged weapon must be trash.

It's been like that 10 years ago and it's still like that to this day. 

Klei are so determined to make every possible ranged weapon suck, that they even reduced hound tooth drop rate, just so that the newest late game weapon didn't had any ammo. 

[ShadowDuelist]

18 minutes ago, Gi-Go said:

Klei are so determined to make every possible ranged weapon suck, that they even reduced hound tooth drop rate, just so that the newest late game weapon didn't had any ammo. 

It’s not like you are out of hound teeth in the late game anyway. I think it’s meant to be a side weapon for some situations, but definitely not trash.

You can also make it your main weapon if you want, with any simple varg farm.

I think walter could get a simple and cheap version of pure ranged combat since the early game, that scales as the game progresses EG: being able to make an improved slingshot with sparked ark, instead of power creeping the existing pellets, simply infuse the existing ones with new effects and maybe planar.

But overall I think the slingshot should become a decent crowd control tool, both for groups of enemies (aoe?) and bosses. It currently kinda goes that way, with many pellet types (poop pellet, ice, slow, etc) but its just either too expensive, too slow, or with an underwhelming effect that is not worth using in most cases.

 

[Gi-Go]

2 minutes ago, ShadowDuelist said:

It’s not like you are out of hound teeth in the late game anyway. I think it’s meant to be a side weapon for some situations, but definitely not trash.
 

It costs 400.000 hound tooths to fire this weapon for 12 seconds. 

[CyberSkink]

12 hours ago, Gi-Go said:

It costs 400.000 hound tooths to fire this weapon for 12 seconds. 

WHO TOUCHED MY GUN?!

[kroban]

I don't think he needs something like a "skill set" like it is the case with Willow and Maxwell. Like, actual abilities.

Considering his whole design (slingshot, Woby, being a "Boy Scout") I would say he will probably get something along the lines of Wigfrid's skill tree.

For example:

- The slingshot could be upgraded just like Wigfrid's spear, for a late game improvement, and probably even a special AOE attack just like she has now.

- He needs either a bag for storing ammo, like Wigfrid's battle canister, or a bigger inventory on Woby.

- New ammo crafts, obviously something post-rifts with pure horror and brights.

- A buff on Woby as a mount, like more duration, tanking some hits, always staying max speed, etc.

- Small Woby having different versions like frost and dark Chester. Perhaps even something crazy like her being able to poop Glommer's goop by giving her Glommer's Wing (so the wings also have some utility) 

- His pioneer hat has to be buffed. Either a way to upgrade it into different versions (with badges for doing things?), OR just raw buffs. For a character that has to basically wear it at all times it wouldn't be that crazy of an idea if the hat gives ONLY to Walter things like huge insulation on Winter and Summer, and perhaps even armor.

 

Edited March 11 by kroban