Does every character have to be good at everything

[Cats_On_Fire]

Okay. So I feel like we just kinda have to discuss this. Should everybody be great at everything?

Do Willow and wormwood need the aoe?

Does Wanda need half the clocks in her kit? 

Should wendy have niches outside of early game horde control? (She should have late game scalability)

Should warly have his honey spice?

Does wortox need aoe???

Should every character have a skill tree of equal power??

What needs to be made base kit??

What needs to be added to replace it?

What should the overall character power level be??

I would like you guys to post your answers? And please don't try and tunnel vision on anyone thing thank you

Catsonfire

[Evelo]

No.

Well yes because that's her entire identity.

Imo, no.

Yes. And more spices.

No.

No.

Stuff that acts more of a rework of a character rather than nice little upgrades. (Willow's Spells, item containers, Winona building packaging and remote, etc.)

Idk about add because that's klei's job, we just identify problems.

Each character has strengths and weaknesses. Wilson is the jack of all trades master of none. Wes is the jack of no trades master of literally nothing. So each character can specialize in one or two things and really suffer in other aspects. Instance: Wendy is excellent at AoE and being less affected by sanity drains. She is less good at single target sustained fights. Wolfgang is the opposite. Excellent Single target even in sustained scenarios, but suffers from drastic sanity drain. Wormwood is excellent at farming and generating nightmare fuel. But suffers in lacking the ability to heal at a low cost. Warly is excellent at providing various bonuses for himself and others but suffers as he requires specific and numerous resources for his foods, similar to Wormwood his healing is diminished compared to the majority of other characters. Strength and Weakness, each character has them, it is awesome and gives Don't Starve so much identity to each character. It is okay if we have someone who is the best at one thing, so long as no one is the best at everything. Simultaneously it is okay for people to be the worst at some thing, so long as they are not the worst at everything (except Wes)

That's my opinion.

[gaymime]

it depends on what kind of game you think dst is?

if you consider it a group game then no, not as long as at least one person can do the heavy hitting some of the time

if this is something that is only a solo venture then it depends on how good of a player you are(not like hours good, like flexibility and cleverness good). all characters can technically beat every boss but some can do it with a lot less work and brain-power so if you aren't much for problem-solving then yeah, all characters need to be the "best" or it is going to feel bad and limiting, if you are adaptable then no, you just gotta account for your particular char's limitations ahead of time

if you are a putz like me however and consider this a builder game with some extra steps then the only thing you have to be great at is object placement x''D

[xhyom]

Warly is not good at what he does, let alone everything

[Maxil20]

For me, I like when characters excel at a particular niche that might be relevant in the early game or in the endgame. I enjoy when a character is fun for early on but I also want some merits for lategame for things I personally struggle with (Ex: Lategame travel or pickup methods). I think characters in one way or another that help accomplish this in different ways are good for this purpose.

I don't think everyone should be exactly like everyone else, but they should be able to accomplish similar goals in different ways. All of the AOE examples, for instance, are entirely unique from one another. Wendy has the luxury of a follower to dish out consistent AOE, Winona can make a setup to dish out strong instances of AOE (and can be used by others for a much weaker effect), Wolfgang can use his dumbells for Niche AOE in a pinch, Willow can use fire spells for "burst" AOE, Walter primarily relies on Crowd control AOE rather than damaging AOE and Wortox functionally uses on-death effects to get practically most of his AOE outside of the shadow reaper. While they all accomplish a goal of just having AOE, the way they do it is unique enough to not feel they are stepping on each other all the time.
 

13 minutes ago, xhyom said:

Warly is not good at what he does, let alone everything

The biggest problem I have with Warly is he has no personal perks and really is just reliant on his crockpot for anything. I personally love Warly foods a lot later on as it's the closest you will ever get to buffs in this game, but Warly himself just doesn't get anything special. I really hope his skilltree focuses more on his personal perks than on his crockpot so he has a lot of merit to staying as him later on, even things like extra bufftimes/improved drops from mob kills as him would go a long way.

[Mike23Ua]

Here’s the thing, your asking all these questions because the game “mostly” goes unchanged, like you legit will not experience any new content unless you get to very late game rifts, OR you go out of your way to find this content in an obscure area of the game world.

I feel like it’s highly important that I mention this because DST has the same four basic weather seasons with the same mostly unchanged gameplay mechanics.

These things start to overtime, add up..

Like for example: Willows downside is getting cold faster & losing health, but this is a downside on a character who can now cast her own early game dwarf stars to stay warm.

And unless Klei adds new mobs and mechanics to “Winter” Then Willows survivability in that just shot way the heck up.

Ahem however… add NEW Mechanics like a strong blizzard windstorm that can blow out torches, campfires, her fancy dwarf star etc… and Willow suffers with cold again.

Same thing with Winona: Winona is now BROKEN end of story… there’s no debating it, for the Specific game mode “Lights Out”

Winona can run around in perma-darkness unbothered by it, and if that wasn’t enough.. she also has a spot light (that is now also a heat source) she can use to survive Lights Out Mode Winters with ease.

Ahem… However Klei adds some new features like shadow creatures unscrewing the light bulbs from her heated spotlights, or makes her Darkness Immunity ineffective in Lights Out Mode (same as how cards that passively regenerate your health in Book of Demons are Disabled on RogueLite Mode)

THEN Winona goes right back to struggling again with the game and its challenges.

The TL:DR is that the characters and their skill trees have thrown off the entire balance and challenges of the game, and the developers need to seriously work on updating the REST of the game around those characters.

But with each developer being confirmed to be “split up” having different folks doing different things, (like current 3 skill trees)

They may not be paying enough attention to how well everything comes together as a “whole” 

If they Did… they’d fix Winona being so broken for Lights Out Mode.

[DegenerateFurry]

Should everyone be great at everything? No. 

Should we strip every character down to the bare minimum and get rid of quality-of-life features? Also no.

While I generally approve of what Klei's been doing with skill trees, I do sort of wish they'd increase the downsides of some characters to compensate. 

[Mysterious box]

1 hour ago, Evelo said:

Wilson is the jack of all trades master of none. Wes is the jack of no trades master of literally nothing.

I'm confused how Wilson is a jack of all trades I feel like that's Woodie. Also it's not good but Wes has the niche of being the master of cheap flaring of his location with his speedy balloons and boat safety due to his nearly free balloon vest.

[gaymime]

2 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

I'm confused how Wilson is a jack of all trades I feel like that's Woodie. Also it's not good but Wes has the niche of being the master of cheap flaring of his location with his speedy balloons and boat safety due to his nearly free balloon vest.

flaring?

[Mysterious box]

4 minutes ago, gaymime said:

flaring?

Letting go of a speedy balloon makes it's icon appear on the map for everyone for a short time to show your location.

[Well-met]

The problem is people expect skill trees to be filled with cool and powerful stuff.

If kleil stops themselves from using most of those expected abilities, then there will be outcries.

[ShadowDuelist]

11 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

I'm confused how Wilson is a jack of all trades I feel like that's Woodie. Also it's not good but Wes has the niche of being the master of cheap flaring of his location with his speedy balloons and boat safety due to his nearly free balloon vest.

I think Wes should eventually no longer be a really bad joke character, that probably worked in DS but in DST it's not really very engaging, instead I think he should have "luck" based rng perks and be actually good at some things, but in an unreliable way (EG: getting more/better loot, sometimes)
So if you decide to go Wes, you may have a hard time, but in the end it may pay off for you and your friends (even if your playthrough is a mess)

[Castiliano]

I feel that a large part of the skill trees also served to remove the downsides of many characters, which is good in some cases, but when exaggerated it took away a lot of the characteristics and concept of the characters, mainly with the objective of making everyone equivalent in "strength and comfort" like Maxwell and Wanda (as they already said here on the forum these days).

[Mysterious box]

30 minutes ago, ShadowDuelist said:

I think Wes should eventually no longer be a really bad joke character, that probably worked in DS but in DST it's not really very engaging, instead I think he should have "luck" based rng perks and be actually good at some things, but in an unreliable way (EG: getting more/better loot, sometimes)
So if you decide to go Wes, you may have a hard time, but in the end it may pay off for you and your friends (even if your playthrough is a mess)

I mean Wes kinda did evolve into a pretty decent support character in his refresh well by pre skill tree standards.

He had speedy balloons that doubled as a speed boost and flares if you let it go before it fully deflates.

Party balloons which allow him to store sanity as well have a hidden mechanic that makes the sanity these balloons give scale with the amount of players within the glitter it actually gives a good amount of free sanity when you make use of it with friends.

His balloon vest removes the hp penalty for drowning

His balloon hat is a free garland for the team and I believe prevents lightning strikes if I remember right.

[Evelo]

2 hours ago, Mysterious box said:

I'm confused how Wilson is a jack of all trades I feel like that's Woodie.

Well yes, but then Klei removed the downside of Woodie which was "He can only chop a certain amount before transforming" so now he has no downside at all which makes him a strictly better than wilson.

[Well-met]

everyone was always better than wilson, it's not a talking point. He's the poster boy of the franchise and has no other purpose than to learn winter with.

[Mysterious box]

Just now, Evelo said:

Well yes, but then Klei removed the downside of Woodie which was "He can only chop a certain amount before transforming" so now he has no downside at all which makes him a strictly better than wilson.

I mean even before that a jack of all trades has to specialize in multiple fields to a degree Wilson didn't he just had his beard which helped him in Winter he was always just the default in a pre skill tree world.

Also in the case of Woodie post refresh his downside changing didn't make him a jack of all trades it was his new forms alongside the beaver. 

[gaymime]

17 hours ago, Mysterious box said:

Letting go of a speedy balloon makes it's icon appear on the map for everyone for a short time to show your location.

oooooh, yeah i never made that connection at all X''D

[RozeMeteor]

14 hours ago, Well-met said:

everyone was always better than wilson, it's not a talking point. He's the poster boy of the franchise and has no other purpose than to learn winter with.

It's because of people with that type of opnion that Wilson will never change, but Maxwell is perfectly fine right ?? Wilson is a great character, he was the one who kicked Maxwell balls and dealt with the constant headbanging his face on a wall without any unnatural abilities unlike of other characters, if anything he has more value than half of the cast for pressing foward besides the harsh situations and not being a coward even if the moment called for it, bro aparently got a miserable life yet he persisted even when everyone made fun of him, i don't think people grasp the meaning of Wilson as character at all. Applauded be the one who conquered the constant with the power of his MIND.

[Anis5240]

3 minutes ago, RozeMeteor said:

Applauded be the one who conquered the constant with the power of his MIND.

God, yes to all of this. People really seem to forget that canonically, Wilson was the one who freed Maxwell. He's the one who braved through the trials of Adventure Mode countless times and got to the end. Yes sure, that can be done with other characters too (Wicker, WX, Wolfgang being most popular to complete it), but those ain't canon "storyline-wise".

It's just so weird for me to see Klei putting him in such a weak state with that torch tree (just because he held it hur dur), and turned into a material grinding character. Like, why??????

[Mysterious box]

14 hours ago, Well-met said:

everyone was always better than wilson, it's not a talking point. He's the poster boy of the franchise and has no other purpose than to learn winter with.

 Actually excluding the dst exclusive characters canonically Wilson proved himself superior not only in having been the only one to win Maxwell's game as everyone else came first and died but he's also the one who canonically taught the survivors how to make the various crafts we use which is why certain items use Wilson's design and weird logic.

[RozeMeteor]

9 minutes ago, Anis5240 said:

God, yes to all of this. People really seem to forget that canonically, Wilson was the one who freed Maxwell. He's the one who braved through the trials of Adventure Mode countless times and got to the end. Yes sure, that can be done with other characters too (Wicker, WX, Wolfgang being most popular to complete it), but those ain't canon "storyline-wise".

It's just so weird for me to see Klei putting him in such a weak state with that torch tree (just because he held it hur dur), and turned into a material grinding character. Like, why??????

he being blank for base ds was cool because you had to your game knowledge, but nowdays everyone fares better.. if they desire him to remain being the teacher character at least extend his torch skills to lanterns since nobody with at least one week within the game will ever die to Charlie no matter what, merge them or give him a endothermic torch for summer, i'm game for anything of these.

[Anis5240]

51 minutes ago, RozeMeteor said:

he persisted even when everyone made fun of him

NGL, I shed some tears knowing that he made the Gardeneer Hat with pride and such, yet everyone ridiculed him. (The loading tip about said hat didn't help things either.) 

The things I like about him (even if it's just shorts-wise) is that he's prepared enough to deal with the chaos in the Constant. In the Forgotten Knowledge short, he's the one having a light source (A MINER HAT). In the Staying Afloat short, he's the one having supplies bundled, thus keeping it safe from being stolen by the marotters.

I want a cautious Wilson who had conquered the Constant once, and on his way to do it again, with more and better knowledge he had gained from his experiences. Again, I do like some parts of his skill tree (twig-log, meat-morsel and beefalo wool-beard hair transmutes are decent). But the sheer amount of fillers in other parts of it (THE DAMNED TORCH TREE BEING SUCH OFFENDER) and lack of variety within those nodes were just very saddening.

40 minutes ago, RozeMeteor said:

he being blank for base ds was cool because you had to your game knowledge

Also the fact that DS characters actually have some gameplay-changing downsides had made him more appealing to play. (Until Wagstaff was added, of course but even then he's just there at the corner of the cast.)

[Cats_On_Fire]

18 minutes ago, Anis5240 said:

NGL, I shed some tears knowing that he made the Gardeneer Hat with pride and such, yet everyone ridiculed him. (The loading tip about said hat didn't help things either.) 

The things I like about him (even if it's just shorts-wise) is that he's prepared enough to deal with the chaos in the Constant. In the Forgotten Knowledge short, he's the one having a light source (A MINER HAT). In the Staying Afloat short, he's the one having supplies bundled, thus keeping it safe from being stolen by the marotters.

I want a cautious Wilson who had conquered the Constant once, and on his way to do it again, with more and better knowledge he had gained from his experiences. Again, I do like some parts of his skill tree (twig-log, meat-morsel and beefalo wool-beard hair transmutes are decent). But the sheer amount of fillers in other parts of it (THE DAMNED TORCH TREE BEING SUCH OFFENDER) and lack of variety within those nodes were just very saddening.

Also the fact that DS characters actually have some gameplay-changing downsides had made him more appealing to play. (Until Wagstaff was added, of course but even then he's just there at the corner of the cast.)

And we're sidetracked. Also love the scientist but can we maybe make a dedicated post

[Anis5240]

20 minutes ago, Cats_On_Fire said:

And we're sidetracked. Also love the scientist but can we maybe make a dedicated post

No, it's not. The point what I'm trying to say is that's Wilson is considered the 'best' in DS since again, everyone else suffer from either minor (and annoying) and major downsides.

In DST, guess what? Everyone can do better things than him.