Wilson is bland and unenjoyable to play

[Golden Daemon]

6 hours ago, Mr.Tarunio said:

I think Wilson will always be the easy to know the game more character.

i wish he had more skills related to "know the game more".
like being able to discern more information from things when examining them (something akin to Insight or showme except less meta gamey) or remarking on events in more detail. giving information that can both provide valuable gameplay benefits for veteran players and also teach new players about things that they might have not known otherwise.

[Capybara007]

2 minutes ago, Cruvimaster said:

And the devs themselves have already said that they are dissatisfied with the old skill trees and will revise them in the future.

First rework: willow (may 2019) bernie + inmune to fire
Last rework: maxwell (nov 2022) reworked codex umbra, new spells, new craftables and gear boosts minions damage

First skill tree: wilson (march 2023) torch toss, beard storage, item transmutation, shadow and lunar affinities are just a crafting recipe
Latest skill tree: WX (may? 2026) 3 drones, chasis, alpha beta and gamma circuits, (7?) new circuits, shadow and lunar affinities are for either combat or gathering resources

First skill tree revisit: wilson (2027) torch telekinesis, beard minion follower, more transmutation recipes

Eighty fifth skill tree revisit: Wes (2099) updated lazer eyes, buffed celestial champion minion followers, added 10 new weapons that vary on the gem color, 6 new craftable nuclear bombs, increased multiverse portal cap to 10, added a new "ultra insight" skill tree with 18 total branches

Hopefully klei knows what they want to do with the characters in DSE from the beginning, unlike in DST

[Well-met]

speak for yourself and keep sleeping on his tree

[Cruvimaster]

16 minutes ago, Capybara007 said:

First skill tree revisit: wilson (2027) torch telekinesis, beard minion follower, more transmutation recipes

I don't see any possibility of revisiting next year with so many characters without skill trees. I hope Klei has the good sense to give skills to those who never had them before to revisit. In any case, let's wait.

[_sirJames]

Wilson's Transmute Icky skill is unironically really good on teams for doubling meatball output

I have nothing else to contribute, just something I observed while playing him

[YouKnowWho142]

Honestly I used to agree with this, but now I don’t really think so. Characters now are so crazy and strong that there’s a common trend with them. Look at bee queen, for instance. Before skill trees, it was very rare for a character to be combat focused so every character, including Wilson, usually dealt with bee queen the same way. Now though, every character has a unique method of killing the bee queen. That’s not a bad thing at all, I celebrate all the uniqueness in the kits, but it means that characters don’t feel forced to interact with many universal tools. Teleport characters aren’t going to care about the new portation fragments, aoe characters aren’t going to use weather panes, etc.

That’s where Wilson comes in. He’s not reliant on his unique character tools to get out of situations or gain an edge. Instead, he focuses on the tools available to everyone and putting them to their best use in order to come out on top. When I look at it that way, he really is conquering the world with the power of his mind.

Dont get me wrong, I’d still love to see his skill tree tweaked. I just hope they double down on his resourcefulness and ability to utilize tools available to everyone in his own unique way instead of giving him strong powers like everyone else. I don’t see anything wrong with a character who needs to interact with the tools the game provides instead of what their character provides. The fact that he’s the only character now who really plays this way is what makes him inherently unique to me, and it’s why I don’t really find him so bland either when I would’ve thought so before everyone else got skill trees.

Edited June 19 by YouKnowWho142

[AliceShiki]

5 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

I can say with absolute certainty that Newbies pick Wilson is a Myth.

... Why are you using anecdotal evidence to say something with "absolute certainty"?

Also... When people introduce others to the game, they also influence the first decisions those people make... Did you suggest those new players you introduced to the game to start with certain specific characters?

3 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

but you have the attitude that newbies simply start playing DST without ever having seen anything on the internet, and you don't believe that either.

I actually do believe that the vast majority of new players do not look up youtube tutorials and the like before deciding to buy a game. They might see a review or they might be recommended the game by a friend, but... I really don't believe they'll know much about the game when they first boot it up. And starting with the first character when you first boot up a game you barely know anything about is pretty standard behavior.

3 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

Without them, they have no knowledge whatsoever; they won't even know what a skill tree is

Yeah, until they play for a few days and get the Insight Pop Up... And once they do, if they're playing Wilson, they'll be getting the most newbie-friendly skill tree in the game, because it lacks complexity.

Which is part of what makes Wilson good for new players. He is not complex.

3 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

And the devs themselves have already said that they are dissatisfied with the old skill trees and will revise them in the future.

I did see that, but we currently don't know what the devs plan to do with the old skill trees when they do revisit them.

I'm personally imagining that in case of Wilson, they'll try adding more power without adding more complexity to it... Like, for example, making torch tree cost 3~5 points instead of 7 to be complete, then proceed to add a skill that buffs Spear dmg/durability or something (not saying that this would be a good addition, mind you, it's just an example to highlight my point of what's the kind of thing I expect).

I could, of course, be wrong. We don't know the devs' plans. But I do believe they'll try to keep Wilson as a very simple character to make sure he is very beginner-friendly.

[reddocc]

Wilson will never be "op" there's no need for him to be extra complicated there are tools in this game that allows him to solve any problem 

Edited June 20 by reddocc

[Mike23Ua]

1 hour ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

Honestly I used to agree with this, but now I don’t really think so. Characters now are so crazy and strong that there’s a common trend with them. Look at bee queen, for instance. Before skill trees, it was very rare for a character to be combat focused so every character, including Wilson, usually dealt with bee queen the same way. Now though, every character has a unique method of killing the bee queen. That’s not a bad thing at all, I celebrate all the uniqueness in the kits, but it means that characters don’t feel forced to interact with many universal tools. Teleport characters aren’t going to care about the new portation fragments, aoe characters aren’t going to use weather panes, etc.

That’s where Wilson comes in. He’s not reliant on his unique character tools to get out of situations or gain an edge. Instead, he focuses on the tools available to everyone and putting them to their best use in order to come out on top. When I look at it that way, he really is conquering the world with the power of his mind.

Dont get me wrong, I’d still love to see his skill tree tweaked. I just hope they double down on his resourcefulness and ability to utilize tools available to everyone in his own unique way instead of giving him strong powers like everyone else. I don’t see anything wrong with a character who needs to interact with the tools the game provides instead of what their character provides. The fact that he’s the only character now who really plays this way is what makes him inherently unique to me, and it’s why I don’t really find him so bland either when I would’ve thought so before everyone else got skill trees.

You say all this, and I counter that by saying Wilson is a SCIENTIST, at the very very least Klei could have given him the ability to create a Brightshade Hammer like weapon (which is a Pickaxe/Hammer & Weapon just barely above spear levels) I mean… 90% of the characters cast of unique “skills” are really just early game or easier access versions of gadgets you’d unlock through other means playing a different character. like Willows Fireball is just a Dwarf star but easier access to it.

Klei could have given Wilson SOMETHING.

[YouKnowWho142]

15 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

I mean… 90% of the characters cast of unique “skills” are really just early game or easier access versions of gadgets you’d unlock through other means playing a different character. like Willows Fireball is just a Dwarf star but easier access to it.

That’s literally my entire point. Wilson relies only on what the game gives him instead of what characters provide for themselves. While other characters are using fireballs, soul hops, Abigail, merms, or teletransports, Wilson is using dwarf stars, lazy explorers, weather panes, pigmen, and telelocators. It’s a layer to his gameplay that other characters completely ignore or sideline in favor of their own plots or mechanics. He has his gimmick, other characters have theirs. 

im not going to argue with you mike since you’re a master at going in circles and creating meaningless discussion.

Edited June 20 by YouKnowWho142

[Cruvimaster]

50 minutes ago, AliceShiki said:

I actually do believe that the vast majority of new player

Even if you believe it, remember that beginners don't start a world with skill points. So they'll have Wilson's standard experience. How many days will they have to play to get all 15 points?

And the whole debate here revolves around Wilson's skill tree, not a rework of the character. And Wilson's skill tree shouldn't be designed for beginner players only, but for all players. The character looks like Klei and is bad in my opinion (regarding the skill tree).

Furthermore, the devs' dissatisfaction with some older skill trees is a fact, not an opinion. If Wilson is on the devs' list, what will matter in the forum is opinions for improvement instead of saying it's perfect.

[AliceShiki]

1 hour ago, Cruvimaster said:

Even if you believe it, remember that beginners don't start a world with skill points. So they'll have Wilson's standard experience. How many days will they have to play to get all 15 points?

Rather than worry about the 15 points, I'd rather worry about each individual point, and you get your first point very early on.

If Wilson had complex options in the skill tree, a beginner might be unsure of what to pick because they don't know enough about the game, and they might pick something that might not help them overall.

But with the current skill tree, the options are transmute (which they'll probably skip because they dunno how useful they are), torch (immediately useful and likely to be picked) and beard (probably skipped at first, but might be picked after the beginner gets to their first winter and realizes why the beard is useful).

Which makes it a pretty good skill tree for a beginner. Torch is immediately useful and very intuitive, beard is useful as early as the first winter and becomes intuitive once said winter arrives, and transmute is there for when you know the game better.

1 hour ago, Cruvimaster said:

And Wilson's skill tree shouldn't be designed for beginner players only, but for all players. The character looks like Klei and is bad in my opinion (regarding the skill tree).

I don't think there is any problem in having certain characters designed for certain portions of the playerbase?

We have a lot of characters aimed at everyone, there is nothing wrong with having Wilson being more beginner-friendly and Wes being the challenge character.

Because like... If someone dislikes Wilson they can just... Pick any of the other characters? Why is it a bad thing for Wilson to have a specific audience in mind? I don't get it.

1 hour ago, Cruvimaster said:

Furthermore, the devs' dissatisfaction with some older skill trees is a fact, not an opinion. If Wilson is on the devs' list, what will matter in the forum is opinions for improvement instead of saying it's perfect.

I mean, yeah, the forum is for feedback, but devs probably have their own plans already by this point, especially because lots of threads were made for Wilson skill tree by this point.

Of course, more feedback never hurts, but just like you (and other people) are saying they would like Wilson to become more complex and interesting, I'm also saying that I would prefer Wilson to remain simple, even if I would be happy with more power being given to him... Both are valid feedback, and it's up to the devs to choose which feedback they wanna act on.

[Mike23Ua]

Because “Default (Wilson) & Challenge (Wes)” should be game modes or World Options, not the character you play as? 🤷🏻‍♂️

[lowercasename]

4 hours ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

That’s where Wilson comes in. He’s not reliant on his unique character tools to get out of situations or gain an edge. Instead, he focuses on the tools available to everyone and putting them to their best use in order to come out on top. When I look at it that way, he really is conquering the world with the power of his mind.

Kind of hard to agree when there are mechanics like gunpowder explosion damage soft-limit when it's probably the strongest part of Wilson that was actually unique to him with his easy access to mass nitre.
Though then also other characters can also get a lot of nitre easily thanks to boulderboughs too now.

And then there's other characters like even the "simple to play" Wolfgang with Ice Bell toss spam for cheesing certain stuff (Crab King) that are just more interesting.
Anyway, that and another post earlier mentioning spears (and condensing torch skill tree to take less skill points to max out) maybe could just have it so that Wilson's thing is throwing stuff? Throwing spears, torch, rocks, maybe even throwable explosives.

But then also there's already Walter, so hmm.

[FluffyBun]

15 hours ago, Wumpair said:

 

And I find that his skilltree has good things, it is not "objectivelly terrible": Large meat = 2 morsels permutation means 1 tall bird kill will give you enogh meat ingredients for 2 pirogies, and refresh food value. Gold <-> nitre is usefull when you have tons of one and little of other. The twigs <-> logs can be very good in a pintch where you need logs (e.i. campfire, glass cuter, general crafting) and run out of them. The gems -> iridesent gems lets you speedrun CC and sanctum golemns. Rocks <-> flint perfect for things such as couble stone crafting and you had ingredients in un-even quantities. The beard storage is efectively +3 inventory slots which is solid. And yes, the lantern exists, but torch toss has its uses, and it is so satisifying to just toss a low-percent tourch, e.i. after buring things for ashes, instead of holding it in your hand. 

 

You are going to select every Alchemy skill every single game and ignore the rest, because torch sucks.

Honestly, just buff alchemy more.

[knner14]

I feel like Wilson's skill tree is definitely in the right direction but is incredibly limited for the kind of character he's supposed to be. Its fine as is, but i think he could still be a lot more interesting without disrupting his 'base gameplay' kind of style. I personally just really dont like a character thats designed to be dropped by players as soon as they get a handle on the game. And i honestly dont think he's designed to be a character solely for new players.

For someone who's characterized as very curious and experimentalist, Wilson has very few unique ways of interacting with the world and what he does have interacts with very few parts of the game. Its like his insight abilities are very limited alternatives to the kinds of things he should be able to do.

Something like the torch path becoming about using any light equipment more effectively, throwing more kinds of objects which causes different effects, different categories of equipment having another way to be used, having a crockpot-esque transmutation system, or simply being able to outright substitute some ingredients in a crafting recipe are some examples i could think of that would expand his skill tree to be a better, more interesting general survivor while still keeping him as relatively 'basic'.

His current skill tree is more thematically about simplifying some parts of the game, especially earlier parts, and making use of materials that you would otherwise not have an immediate use for, rather than seeing and inventing opportunities and reasons to interact with unfamiliar parts of the game, including very small parts of the game like niche/unpopular items. Getting abilities that are more about learning new actions and behaviors with a number of uses would make him better as a generalist and experimentalist type of "class" 

I also feel like it's inevitable that Klei will rework his base abilities and/or skill tree anyways. He was the first to get a skill tree, and im sure Klei have stewed up many of their own ideas for what a modern rework to Wilson would look like.

[Cruvimaster]

8 hours ago, AliceShiki said:

Rather than worry about the 15 points, I'd rather worry about each individual point, and you get your first point very early on.

If Wilson had complex options in the skill tree, a beginner might be unsure of what to pick because they don't know enough about the game, and they might pick something that might not help them overall.

But with the current skill tree, the options are transmute (which they'll probably skip because they dunno how useful they are), torch (immediately useful and likely to be picked) and beard (probably skipped at first, but might be picked after the beginner gets to their first winter and realizes why the beard is useful).

Which makes it a pretty good skill tree for a beginner. Torch is immediately useful and very intuitive, beard is useful as early as the first winter and becomes intuitive once said winter arrives, and transmute is there for when you know the game better.

I don't think there is any problem in having certain characters designed for certain portions of the playerbase?

We have a lot of characters aimed at everyone, there is nothing wrong with having Wilson being more beginner-friendly and Wes being the challenge character.

Because like... If someone dislikes Wilson they can just... Pick any of the other characters? Why is it a bad thing for Wilson to have a specific audience in mind? I don't get it.

I mean, yeah, the forum is for feedback, but devs probably have their own plans already by this point, especially because lots of threads were made for Wilson skill tree by this point.

Of course, more feedback never hurts, but just like you (and other people) are saying they would like Wilson to become more complex and interesting, I'm also saying that I would prefer Wilson to remain simple, even if I would be happy with more power being given to him... Both are valid feedback, and it's up to the devs to choose which feedback they wanna act on.

 

A beginner player won't have access to the skill tree. When they have full access, they will no longer be a beginner.

No one discovers the existence of DST on Steam by opening the store and miraculously seeing DST among millions of games and saying to themselves, "This game looks interesting from the cover, I'll spend my money without knowing what it is." This idealized view of a newbie is far from reality.

Any new game I buy is for two reasons: the first is because it's a franchise I know, and the second is because it has some kind of advertising that caught my attention. In the second case, I'll watch a review or a few minutes of gameplay to see if it's worth buying.

Wendy is a character much more geared towards beginners than Wilson, and I don't even need to compare their skill trees. There's nothing wrong with a character being geared towards beginners, and her name is Wendy.

Seriously, can anyone defend 7 skill points for a torch? It's incomprehensible to me that anyone tries to justify this, especially using an altruistic concern for beginner players as an argument.

Wilson has so much potential if he didn't waste so many skill points on his beard and torch. Is that what a scientist does best?

Wilson defeats all the bosses. Wes does too. The point is that Klei's balancing is for the character to be interesting and fun. And Wilson's skill tree doesn't meet those needs in my opinion.

And Wilson's standard experience has always been preserved, since activating or not activating a skill tree is a choice (which didn't happen in the rework process).

.

Wilson would be much more interesting if he had a maximum of 2 points for lighting (torch + lantern + Miner Hat + Moggles) and a maximum of two points for his beard.

The remaining points could be used for anything creative, such as doubling the duration of the thermal stone (good for beginners?), making potions, etc.

[AliceShiki]

7 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

Seriously, can anyone defend 7 skill points for a torch? It's incomprehensible to me that anyone tries to justify this, especially using an altruistic concern for beginner players as an argument.

I don't think anyone defended that.

Personally speaking, I think Torch tree should be lowered to 3~5 points. Same thing for Beard tree.

7 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

No one discovers the existence of DST on Steam by opening the store and miraculously seeing DST among millions of games and saying to themselves, "This game looks interesting from the cover, I'll spend my money without knowing what it is." This idealized view of a newbie is far from reality.

You have 0 reason to think that this is the case.

People can absolutely look at a trailer of a game and buy it. Plenty of people do that, in fact.

And Steam has built-in ways to help people discover your games with sales, advertisement of games similar to what you own and the like. This helps getting new players to see the game.

[Mike23Ua]

I’m sorry, but I just don’t think “Base Gameplay” or “Challenge Mode Character” are the answers anymore, it feels “rewarding” when a part of the game I used to struggle with and die over and over again trying to complete (im so bad at the game that even the giant slimy tentacles in caves have managed to kill me on numerous occasion) it feels satisfying when you can return to a part of the game like that and steamroll it with your powerful new skills, for me…. One Willow Lunar Flame Blast Later and what used to be a grueling nightmare, is just over so quickly I can get back to enjoying actual NEW content that I haven’t experienced before.

In my particular case: Kamehameha blasting this large slimy tentacle and jumping in its hole took me to the Furmarole biome, an area I had never been to before, had no idea how to access.. and once I got there I wished I had brought cooling items with me to deal with the heat temperature's.

But I feel like it’s very relevant to bring up the fact that just the tentacle itself used to be a huge chore for me (and with some characters still is) but my advancing character abilities allowed me to more easily overcome this challenge.

Wilson and his entire skill tree doesn’t do that, you can transmute stuff, and the most useful thing in his entire skill tree is being able to combine gems and craft the multicolored Easter egg which lets you skip the entire full moon event you’d otherwise still need to do as any other character to create and deconstruct a moon callers staff.

The features that a NEWBIE will find useful however are brighter longer lasting torches, a beard that keeps you warm and conceals food so Bunnymen don’t murder you on sight while carrying it. 
 

But as far as gaining skills to help you progress through areas of the game, poor Wilson got worse than Wes.

And no I’m not joking… Wes has a confetti balloon that restores sanity when burst, a speedy balloon similar to walking cane, a lightning protection balloon and a life jacket like balloon. WES the CHALLENGE MODE Character who does not even have a Skill tree yet… has that.

Wilson… Wilson’s just Wilson. 😭💔

[NNOUS]

On 6/19/2026 at 5:03 PM, Draggofroot said:

Torch skill tree is useless tho imo 

it has so much filler, the whole thing should be just 1 or 2 skill point instead there is 6

I would hope they retouch it like wx78 with more intresting take on a eccentric scientist doing weird but focus on rather useless contraptions like, funny use on houndtrap that explode for example.

Edited June 21 by NNOUS

[Walrusst]

Honestly it wouldn't need much for Wilson to take off and become awesome, if there were more base kit items that strongly synergized with his transmutations and abilities, as if he could use his abundant transmutes of bizzare materials to power useful items that would be a slog for other people to use, this allows him to project awe by bringing unexpected gameplay twists when he does things that just wouldn't be worthwhile for anyone else to try. That sort of interaction.
Just pick the 3-4 least used PITA resources he can make and find great ways to put them into play.

I say this just because of how the refresh of the morning star with its improved stunning power and winowna's ability to allow her whole team charge it has added a little bit of texture to a characters kit without necessarily going back and reworking winowna. Winowna knows she can carry a battery around for a super torch thats also kinda good at hitting people, that's cool.

Kleis demonstrated an easy out here for themselves. I'm down for it. This is a tasteful way to make things interesting without unnecessarily bulldozing old content. Honestly. Its more the trees that have zero native flavor that I'm more interested in seeing a full rework of. Think, long 5 lines of just slightly increasing a number instead of actually getting to do something new.

Edited June 21 by Walrusst

[BB Marioni]

On 6/19/2026 at 5:29 PM, Dragonboooorn said:

I disagree on Wolfgangs part. His rework was great, and his skill tree brings him up to speed with new planar mechanics. Wolfgang sticks to his "strongman" role, and you feel like playing one. And it feels great.

 

I disagree wiht you about wolfgang. His entire skill tree is just + more damage, and yet other characters can still out damage him with safer methods of combat such as catapults, merms, wx's clones, spells, etc. so when playing Wolfgang, I never felt a single benefit of using him at all. No AOE, no resource gathering, good but risky single target damage that almost all other characters also have. 

[Tigris Nano]

On 6/20/2026 at 3:47 AM, Mike23Ua said:

Wilson is a SCIENTIST,

He discovered ability to turn rot into poop just by sitting at base and eating food from fridges. Can you do same? No, you cant, because you are not gentleman scientist.

[Walrusst]

Still I think the best way to give Wilson life is just to make it so a few of the unfarmable things he can farm are things you can integrate into useful boons.
Since half of the things he can make are practically story resources or used in a single side activity. Since rain protections good but being able to farm a resource which finds its use is just making 5 seperate rain protection items is dubious if you aren't in a room of just wx's, moon rock furniture is cool but you won't really have that many uses for it prior to the endgame, meat transmutes can let you cheese the crock pot harder but someone who can just make more resources can just make more meat instead of you trying to partition it out into morsels... If setting up basket traps outside of frog ponds was actually difficult.

Maybe sweeten the meat transmutes with a monster meat to morsels path, have hair/wool have another transmutation path, and another path in the bone line, as the biological transmutes are just... Weird?

Since really a lot of wilsons tech is like "Oh yeah he can shave and stop wigfrid from needing to shave cattle." You can be an enabler, a speedrun skip manager, a ruins rusher, but the really valued skills here he is are kinda at the bottom of the list in terms of how useful he is there. Other people can use his resources well, but his uses for them tend to be dubious.
Resources can just be meaningful and fun if we want them to be.

[Mike23Ua]

I mean some things are just common sense, AND it would help a newbie GREATLY if they were items that were Base Character Kit for Wilson.

Let me explain in greater Detail Wilson Did NOT just land in the Constant yesterday, he’s been there since Solo DS he’s gone through a grand adventure in Solo DS Adventures mode and along that Journey, he’s learned how to survive through overcoming many challenges and learning. It’s like with DST Klei completely retcons this….

Let me explain further: at one point in Solo DS Adventures Mode, Wilson will be Face to Face with an angry Maxwell who’s getting frustrated at how Wilson has managed to survive for so long, and will throw poor Wilson into a world with abnormal rules such as “Two Worlds” that’s the example I’m gonna use.

Maxwell doesn’t want to just kill off Wilson, so even though the odds are stacked against him, Maxwell will have actual in-game dialogue about having spawned in nearby helpful items and resources and tells Wilson to just stay here and they’ll have a “Truce” among these items are a TENT.

Anyone who’s played DS/DST long enough probably know what a tent is, but a NEWBIE to DST more then most likely does not, nor do they have any earthly idea how to create it..

however: several characters have a little face icon in the crafting menu tab with items that they can create. And while Klei shafted the holy high heck out of poor Wilson.. and seemingly retconned DS’s entire lore story.

Since DST is a continuation of the events of Solo DS: Wilson should have been THE Beginner friendly VETERAN.

Meaning that: Because of the above mentioned “Tent” segment of Solo DS (there are several other segments but this one’s the easiest example) WILSON should know how to craft TENTS and reasonably at a discounted crafting cost then other survivors.

Other items Wilson’s adventure though solo DS should have given him knowledge about: Spears, Armors, Light Sources. etc..

Wilsons also the supposed “Creator” of the Meat Effigy & Nautopilot. These things should be BASE LINE CHARACTER KIT Items for him.

So TL:DR- Tents, Spears, Wooden Suits, Miner Hat, Meat Effigy, Nautopilot should all be items you’ll find when you click on Wilson’s Head Icon in the crafting tab to see what all items your survivor knows how to craft.

This isn’t even about giving the guy a rework or a better skill tree, it’s about giving him Justice for the torture he’s already endured.