Should Skill Trees be just a buffs or a way to play characters differently?

[Cheggf]

12 hours ago, Evelo said:

So Willow's magic is secondary stuff and not a now core identity of the character? Same with Wigfrid's spear, shield, and helmet. Or Wolfgang's Dumbbells, or Winona's structures portable? I would be surprised, and maybe I ought to make a poll to see, but who doesn't pick those things on those characters? They dramatically change the character that I just cannot conceive why they should be locked behind a skill tree as opposed to being baseline with the skill tree augmenting that stuff.

Willow becoming a wizard with a skill tree to turn her into a modded character is probably the single dumbest thing they have ever done to the game and I do not want to be forced to have those things on my menu. I explicitly choose to not pick those skills because I do not want them. 

[Edible Coal]

11 minutes ago, Cheggf said:

Willow becoming a wizard with a skill tree to turn her into a modded character is probably the single dumbest thing they have ever done to the game and I do not want to be forced to have those things on my menu. I explicitly choose to not pick those skills because I do not want them. 

maybe just you, most people i see adores that

[Jakepeng99]

On 4/6/2026 at 4:52 AM, Cheggf said:

Making everyone randomly thing that underwhelming mediocre characters WX-78, Wickerbottom, and Wolfgang were actually super OP meta tryhard picks that are so much better than everyone else. Also you should be insane all the time, and you should never kill bosses because they can break trees. People say these three things all the time. 

Also Wortox was the best character and p2w, and the ocean was completly useless and you should never use it.

On 4/5/2026 at 8:40 PM, Nikki Darks said:

I think it depends.

Skill trees (in mmos for example) are pathways full of buffs you get to pick from, the catch being you sacrifice certain pathways with unique buffs for the pathway you chose with unique buffs.

So skill trees SHOULD just be buffs... However.

In DST you sacrifice almost nothing for the strongest skills (look at every single skill tree). Klei makes certain pathways in their skill trees so disproportionally weaker than other ones which results in no actual, hefty sacrifices being made... You just get the best from the skill tree and that's it, lol.

This is why I think Wortox's skill tree is the best one, it locks you into a playstyle (naughty/nice) while also providing you with buffs... Something I wish they did for Willow (as an example).

It'd be so cool if they made Willow's skills way stronger, but you can ONLY put points into the Bernie path or the fire magic path.

I feel like that flaw is mainly the early skilltrees. Wormwood, Woodie, Wolfgang ect.

Recent skilltrees are fine besides a few flukes, or skills that are good but not useful to most like the Walter rope skill.

[Maxil20]

1 hour ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Recent skilltrees are fine besides a few flukes, or skills that are good but not useful to most like the Walter rope skill.

I find that skill pretty decent for one skill point. It's not going to be the most fancy of skills, but crafting a pretty commonly used crafting component for 2/3rds of its cost and at twice the speed of almost every other character adds up pretty quickly. It's a fine "extra" skill to round out a Walter build if you've got points to spare.

[Jakepeng99]

1 hour ago, Maxil20 said:

I find that skill pretty decent for one skill point. It's not going to be the most fancy of skills, but crafting a pretty commonly used crafting component for 2/3rds of its cost and at twice the speed of almost every other character adds up pretty quickly. It's a fine "extra" skill to round out a Walter build if you've got points to spare.

Yeah it’s good but normally I have no points to spare and there are better camping skills.

[Kvetevk]

3 hours ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Recent skilltrees are fine besides a few flukes, or skills that are good but not useful to most like the Walter rope skill.

I would say that this skill is mostly for newer players, making the tent inderectly cheaper.
Portable tent: from 15 grass and 4 sticks, to 12 grass and 4 sticks. Which isnt much but it also helps with all the crafts requiring rope.

Also woodie has cheaper planks, but it is needed to get his other crafts.

[Jakepeng99]

1 hour ago, Kvetevk said:

I would say that this skill is mostly for newer players, making the tent inderectly cheaper.
Portable tent: from 15 grass and 4 sticks, to 12 grass and 4 sticks. Which isnt much but it also helps with all the crafts requiring rope.

Also woodie has cheaper planks, but it is needed to get his other crafts.

Planks are used way more than rope

[DVGMedia]

On 4/5/2026 at 2:13 PM, Kvetevk said:

And does WX78's skill tree feels boring because he is not more powerful or doesnt have a new way to fight, or maybe because people dont like hearing the word: nerf?

If you look at wx's skill tree its actually really good but the main problem is the bonus circuit boards for free. 
I think its beneficial to have the gamma board since those feel completely different and should not combat the base boards. 

But i think we should chopp up alpha and beta boards and make wx have 10 universal slots and adjust some of the nerfs for the alpha beta buffs on the skill tree.so that way the circuits have competition against each other again. 

[Kvetevk]

11 minutes ago, DVGMedia said:

But i think we should chopp up alpha and beta boards and make wx have 10 universal slots and adjust some of the nerfs for the alpha beta buffs on the skill tree.so that way the circuits have competition against each other again. 

Having them in different categories is easier to make than giving more slots, also I think that having universally 10 slots would be a mess, 5 super Hardy circuits or 5 super acceleration circuits, nobody would use protection circuit if they could have more health with passive resistance.

Also every stat of every circuit would then have to be readjusted.

[DVGMedia]

16 minutes ago, Kvetevk said:

Having them in different categories is easier to make than giving more slots, also I think that having universally 10 slots would be a mess, 5 super Hardy circuits or 5 super acceleration circuits, nobody would use protection circuit if they could have more health with passive resistance.

Also every stat of every circuit would then have to be readjusted.

every says this about super acceleration but like that circuit already has diminishng returns for that reason. you don't go beyond 50 percent 25 15 and 10 IM sure klei can do something with that for others. Absurdity is fine and its the point Because you have to give up literally everything to do it instead of having the best of both worlds..  

Gammas should be separate as a board I feel. but the alpha and beta should not alpha and beta should still compete with each other especially now since the buff skills have been added. 

Edited April 7 by DVGMedia

[Kvetevk]

2 minutes ago, DVGMedia said:

every says this about super acceleration but like that circuit already has diminishng returns for that reason. you don't go beyond 50 percent 25 15 and 10 IM sure klei can do something with that for others. Absurdity is fine and its the point Because you have to give up literally everything to do it instead of having the best of both worlds..  

Gammas should be separate as a board I feel. but the alpha and beta should not. 

It would judt make some circuits less valuable and people would only stack health and speed.

Circuits like processing, gastrogain, beanbooster(current state), storage, moggle vision, both temperature and chorusbox would become almost worthless and would be used only in situational chassis, if you even have them unlocked.

[DVGMedia]

Just now, Kvetevk said:

It would judt make some circuits less valuable and people would only stack health and speed.

Circuits like processing, gastrogain, beanbooster(current state), storage, moggle vision, both temperature and chorusbox would become almost worthless and would be used only in situational chassis, if you even have them unlocked.

Thats what everyone is saying but no actual proof People say the proof is the original version of wx.  But with the buffs now there are definitely alot more reasons to use these other circuits. And its fine to have things be situational. Thats the point of the extra bodies and the better durability and the less charge lost.  but all that basically ends up being pointless. 

The balance of wx is that you should not be able to have everything 

[Kvetevk]

Just now, DVGMedia said:

Thats what everyone is saying but no actual proof People say the proof is the original version of wx.  But with the buffs now there are definitely alot more reasons to use these other circuits. And its fine to have things be situational. Thats the point of the extra bodies and the better durability and the less charge lost.  but all that basically ends up being pointless. 

The balance of wx is that you should not be able to have everything 

Make a poll then, if players would choose health and speed or mixed them.

Situational should be gamma circuits not also stat + utility circuits.

And also not everyone will have chassis skills (at least I won't)

[doritosdamafia]

11 minutes ago, Kvetevk said:

It would judt make some circuits less valuable and people would only stack health and speed.

Circuits like processing, gastrogain, beanbooster(current state), storage, moggle vision, both temperature and chorusbox would become almost worthless and would be used only in situational chassis, if you even have them unlocked.

wouldn't it be more ease to just give a cap? like, we now have 14 universal slots, but the same circuits will decrease the bonus to a limit of four, so if you but 5 health, only 4 will give something.

Edited April 7 by doritosdamafia

[DVGMedia]

2 minutes ago, Kvetevk said:

Make a poll then, if players would choose health and speed or mixed them.

Situational should be gamma circuits not also stat + utility circuits.

And also not everyone will have chassis skills (at least I won't)

Thing is i know people don't like that concept. Because they have already gotten something that they like. 
even though what they like is bad for the character they are not going to go with the suggestion im making. 

[Kvetevk]

Just now, doritosdamafia said:

would it be more ease to just give a cap? like, we now have 14 universal slots, but the same circuits will decrease the bonus to a limit of four, so if you but 5 health, only 4 will give something.

What would be the point then?

It would be the same as now but they would be above each other and you could sacrifice like sanity and hunger for like electric circuits 

[DVGMedia]

2 minutes ago, doritosdamafia said:

would it be more ease to just give a cap? like, we now have 14 universal slots, but the same circuits will decrease the bonus to a limit of four, so if you but 5 health, only 4 will give something.

alot of things do already have caps. range booster doesn't let you equip more than 4 and its buffs from skill only affects 2 
speed is capped so you don't have over 50% and thats to match original wx overcharge. 
LIke its possible but people don't see it as an option for some reason 

[Kvetevk]

1 minute ago, DVGMedia said:

Thing is i know people don't like that concept. Because they have already gotten something that they like. 
even though what they like is bad for the character they are not going to go with the suggestion im making. 

Good on paper, bad in practice I would say.

[DVGMedia]

1 minute ago, Kvetevk said:

Good on paper, bad in practice I would say.

it gives the player way more creativity and more builds than they have access too right now despite them having less slots. Whether or not a player chooses to apply it is on them not the design.
Its better to make the circuits competitive to each other instead of having them just be accessable. 

Edited April 7 by DVGMedia

[Kvetevk]

1 minute ago, DVGMedia said:

alot of things do already have caps. range booster doesn't let you equip more than 4 and its buffs from skill only affects 2 
speed is capped so you don't have over 50% and thats to match original wx overcharge. 
LIke its possible but people don't see it as an option for some reason 

14 slots

3 super hardy (6slots)

3 super acceleration (6slots)

1 electric (2slots)

 

[DVGMedia]

1 minute ago, Kvetevk said:

14 slots

3 super hardy (6slots)

3 super acceleration (6slots)

1 electric (2slots)

 

i mean i said 10 but still you made a build. That is a build but its not going to be what everyone is going to run. 
It may be what you run. But thats the point of wx. we don't know what other people like. I see alot of the upgrades and i have many different ideas of what can be done for them. 
Wx the indsutrial complex with chourus.
The Defensive bomb. 
becoming the sun.  Are they viable probably not But they are fun. 
Not everyone runs meta. there are lots of options to go beyond it.  

[Kvetevk]

1 minute ago, DVGMedia said:

it gives the player way more creativity and more builds than they have access too right now despite them having less slots. Whether or not a player chooses to apply it is on them not the design.
Its better to make the circuits competitive to each other instead of having them just be accessable. 

Yes that is true, but then some would need more nerfs, most of people I know would use only health, speed and electric, sacrificing 1 for the other.

Also if it would have a cap, it would be almost identical to the current system.

I know that this idea is not that bad and it could be accomplished, but think of the designers, having to redo the whole color system and stuff just for it to have either same or worse effect.

[YouKnowWho142]

9 minutes ago, DVGMedia said:

alot of things do already have caps. range booster doesn't let you equip more than 4 and its buffs from skill only affects 2 
speed is capped so you don't have over 50% and thats to match original wx overcharge. 
LIke its possible but people don't see it as an option for some reason 

people disagreeing with you is not their fault. this has been consistent with you.

[Kvetevk]

1 minute ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

people disagreeing with you is not their fault. this has been consistent with you.

I thought I was the only one, at least when watching their videos.

[DVGMedia]

1 minute ago, Kvetevk said:

Yes that is true, but then some would need more nerfs, most of people I know would use only health, speed and electric, sacrificing 1 for the other.

Also if it would have a cap, it would be almost identical to the current system.

I know that this idea is not that bad and it could be accomplished, but think of the designers, having to redo the whole color system and stuff just for it to have either same or worse effect.

Thats the point of balance no?
The original balance was you have to sacrifice things. 
I think its more work that they have to redo everything to fit this new system.