Obligatory First Impressions Post With WX

[YouKnowWho142]

Circuits

+ I really liked the separation of circuits into beta and alpha, it's going to make WX extremely powerful but it should make the circuit builds somewhat more diverse. I'm curious what the gamma circuits will be for.

+ The health and beanbooster circuits are genuinely insane. It looks like the health circuits give 20% damage resistance so now WX can have 575 health and 60% damage resist which is just a massive amount of health. The beanbooster's shield on top of its previous effects are also extremely powerful, by far a better version of Wurt's wetness armor, and essentially functions almost as a weaker bone armor on top of its other many effects. Definitely competing with Wigfrid for tankiest tank, especially since they can now stack the electrification circuits with the health circuits.

- I would prefer to see exactly which circuits are affected by the skills, I have no idea what the circuit upgrades skills are actually doing to each circuit without a lot of testing.

Quality of Life Skills (Bottom Left)

- I dislike that most of these are skills at all. They need to either be heavily merged or a few of them removed and made base. There is no reason why quality of life like Right to Modify should be stuck to a skill point, and it makes WX's already massive skill tree harder to put points into.

Chassis

+ Coolest part of the skill tree for me, super versatile in how they can be used. You can create circuit loadouts, gear loadouts, or different inventories depending on the occasion. You can even just play as several different WX's around the world due to cross map body transfers, and the portable storage lets you transfer items between these bodies. I'd love to set up little mini bases across the world each with their own backup bodies to create a neat little system.

- This is more of a me thing if anything else, but I really dislike the revival based skills. I'm sure others will appreciate them more than me, at least, but the idea of putting 2 points into skills that prepare around your death for a character that should be super hard to kill with the right circuits doesn't sit right with me. 

- I don't like that their 2 skills increasing the number of backup bodies you can have do the exact same thing and nothing else, the true definition of filler skills. Maybe it can merge with the aforementioned 2 skills I didn't like very much?

Drones

+ The portable storage system looks super cool. I don't think it will be particularly overpowered especially since it competes with bundling wraps, but it's a nice bit of utility that will make resource gathering away from base less tedious (alongside his new circuit) or enable unique strategies like the one mentioned before.

- Aside from portable storage, this was the most mixed and underwhelming part of the skill tree for me. The exploration drones seem really strong, but I couldn't really get them to work in my testing so I'll have to come back to them. However, the Electric drone seems extremely underpowered. Clunky, hard to aim, weak, and slow, I couldn't really find any uses for it and I can't imagine any that it would have that isn't cheese. These could've been cool if they were like the warblers, but as a remote controlled drone they're about as useful as a boomerang (which is somehow less clunky than the drone).

Conclusion

+ I think the skill tree overall really doubles down on their robotic aspects, and overall I just thought everything was really cool. It will make them an excellent utility character with a number of unique functions, while also expanding on their versatile nature with their circuits. There were quite a few things I wasn't a fan of and I am curious to see how they will be addressed.

- My biggest concern overall, and something I hope to see addressed in the affinities, is that it does nothing to help fix WX in combat. Look, I know the entire game isn't combat, but WX is, I believe, the only character in the game to not really gain any unique combat advantages, leaving them to fight like Wilson and Wes. I think the way these characters are forced to fight in the game as it is now is extremely outdated, sluggish, and uninteresting, so for boss content WX will not be very exciting. They clearly want WX to have more of a tank role with the electrification and health circuits, but even then most other characters interact with mobs and bosses in such a unique way that it makes WX really stand out in a bad way. As we have already seen, having a high health stat doesn't do much to help a character who has no real combat strengths aside from that. I hoped the electric drone would help with this, but it definitely won't, so I'm heavily relying on the affinity skills to help them handle combat slightly better.

[Hi.]

1 minute ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

There is no reason why quality of life like Right to Modify should be stuck to a skill point,

This is one of my main problems with skill trees, QOL is locked behind skill points.

[Evelo]

9 minutes ago, Hi. said:

This is one of my main problems with skill trees, QOL is locked behind skill points.

and general "this is character defining, and borderline a complete re-refresh" also being locked behind skill points instead of being augmentations to existing abilities.

[YouKnowWho142]

Just now, Evelo said:

and general "this is character defining, and borderline a complete re-refresh" also being locked behind skill points instead of being augmentations to existing abilities.

we've seen a character who was mostly "augmentations to existing abilities", and it is one of the worst received skill trees. I know you don't like skill trees (you make it clear with every post), but at least accept the direction they're taking now. They're trying to make characters more fun and unique while also letting you customize them and I at least appreciate that even if I don't like everything about skill trees.

[Evelo]

4 minutes ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

we've seen a character who was mostly "augmentations to existing abilities", and it is one of the worst received skill trees. I know you don't like skill trees (you make it clear with every post), but at least accept the direction they're taking now. They're trying to make characters more fun and unique while also letting you customize them and I at least appreciate that even if I don't like everything about skill trees.

I'm about to make a post about this very thing (idk which one is the worst received cause i believe it is wolfgang and even he has issues with his skill tree, and it isn't because of the agumentation imo) But given some of the stuff is actually made baseline for WX is a huge boost and great and I commend Klei for this. (The extra circuits and Circuit plugin overhaul)

[Curly Bill]

I think most of the bottom skills are okay where they are at; I think being able to choose which circuits to take out is a greatly useful skill, I can understand wanting it to be basekit, but honestly so much of this skill tree seems like it will be close to power creep if the point system wasnt in place to keep stuff in check.

I feel the each extra body requiring an individual skill point also keeps things in check; I think an additional spare body is like Extremely huge in changing how you interact with the world.

I'm still pushing that the Alpha Circuits are okay, as long as all of WX's base stats get lowered a bit further. I think it's neat to have those perks/options, but only if there's a cost to ignoring the other stats. Right now I dont feel there is any cost to ignoring, like say, hunger 100% of the time.

[YouKnowWho142]

4 minutes ago, Curly Bill said:

I think most of the bottom skills are okay where they are at; I think being able to choose which circuits to take out is a greatly useful skill, I can understand wanting it to be basekit, but honestly so much of this skill tree seems like it will be close to power creep if the point system wasnt in place to keep stuff in check.

The fact that WX got an entire skill tree update to themselves is inherently power creep and they have acknowledged this. They currently look like they're going to have 27 skills and the fact that I have to choose between having fun with their unique and interesting skills or the quality of life that should have already been a part of the character doesn't sit right with me.

At the very least, I don't disagree that the extra backup bodies should be separate skills and shouldn't be merged, but they should at least have some small additional effect on top of it. This is iirc also the approach Wortox took with a few of his naughty skills and made it feel a lot less like you're just choosing the same skills over and over.

Edited March 20 by YouKnowWho142