A talent system

[Ametrine]

With the explanations given here, I look at the jobs we have per each role and think, "The devs can't even balance these."

So, no thanks.

[Jybril]

Illusion of Choice is what the term most people here are saying.
I wouldn't mind picking things just to be different but with how SE
balances things, it won't work and we're all be the same exact thing.
Something would be far more OP, useful and better in every way than the other side.

[Shurrikhan]

With the explanations given here, I look at the jobs we have per each role and think, "The devs can't even balance these."

So, no thanks.

Illusion of Choice is what the term most people here are saying.
I wouldn't mind picking things just to be different but with how SE
balances things, it won't work and we're all be the same exact thing.
Something would be far more OP, useful and better in every way than the other side.

With SE, it often extends beyond the "Illusion of Choice" into the realm of "Illusion of having done something"...

<see below>

Bet's on Zero Faith.

[Umbeliel]

Three factions:
Don't want choice
Illusion of choice
Zero faith in Squenix

Choose your fighter lmao

[Archamgel]

I'm not entirely for or against the idea, but as for the "cookie cutter" argument, it's already like that with only one optimal rotation, and most cross roles being clearly better than what's left. I would, however, like to see multiple roles of some classes, like a tank Sam or dps Drk.

[Krotoan]

I'm only gonna vote against this because of the "there can be only one" attitude that always develops with talent trees. As stated before, people will discriminate if you go with a fist weapon rogue instead of a backstab rogue or whatever. It invites divisiveness.

[Raim]

As long as they make certain ones not mandatory picks for content like what we have now with role skills. Choices like:

-Level 15: Make Unleash cost 10% less MP / Make Unleash have a larger radius / Make Unleash slow targets
-Level 30: Shield lob potency increased to 200 / Shield lob bounces to 2 nearby targets for 25% damage / shield lob has further increased enmity

[Rymm]

-Level 15: Make Unleash cost 10% less MP / Make Unleash have a larger radius / Make Unleash slow targets

Everyone would pick option 1 because more MP=more abilities before going oom=MOAR DEEPS. Maybe option 2 in certain niche situations where they have to pick up mobs spread over a wide area (though 1 would probably still be better here because they could just spam it more often while running around.) No one would probably ever use 3 as it looks pretty useless.

-Level 30: Shield lob potency increased to 200 / Shield lob bounces to 2 nearby targets for 25% damage / shield lob has further increased enmity

Everyone would pick option 1 for trials/raids because MOAR DEEPS. Option 2 would be reserved for OTs in fights with lots of adds and maybe dungeons. Option 3 would again be soundly ignored because the tank community has already pretty much decided dps>tank stats and enmity really isn't an issue for most.

I'm not trying to pick on you, Raim, or say your ideas or bad, just demonstrate how hard it actually is to create talents that are both balanced and different in meaningful ways. Especially after theorycrafters disect them. 99.9999999% of the time the "better" talent will always be the one that offers you more dps, no matter how small the increase. For 'utility' talents to actually be viable they have to be extremely niche and only viable in certain situations or overpowered enough that people would rather have them over dps talents, which would just make everyone flock to them instead.

[Shurrikhan]

As long as they make certain ones not mandatory picks for content like what we have now with role skills. Choices like:

-Level 15: Make Unleash cost 10% less MP / Make Unleash have a larger radius / Make Unleash slow targets
-Level 30: Shield lob potency increased to 200 / Shield lob bounces to 2 nearby targets for 25% damage / shield lob has further increased enmity

These would probably end up being mandatory picks, albeit perhaps on a fight-by-fight basis. Because Unleash already has a low mana cost but incredibly low potency, it shouldn't be used for more than an opening enmity grab. The larger radius can convenience this in certain fights. If you mean slow as an actual attack speed decrease, rather than a heavy effect, it'd at least double as some minor form of mitigation similar to Flash. That would be your go-to unless mobs are immune (as they so often are) or are unable to be safely (for your healer, most likely), i.e. simultaneously, grabbed without the enlarged radius.

At 120 potency base, the added 50% bounce damage (60 potency) would never outperform the added 80 potency available on single target. The former would also be wasted unless there were multiple targets. If the enmity modifier were high enough, it could see use, especially without Diversion, Shirk, and/or a Ninja. But the first is probably your go-to.

See, even if these were generally balanced these are what we might call "Legion" talents—obvious choices for particular scenarios, meant to be swapped constantly (meaning a lot of time in menus), or coordinated between party members to have sufficient capacity in various roles. My advice would be to move about as far away from that as possible. Try to go for approximately equal situations and outputs, but through different flavors. The whole purpose of these talents will be, essentially, to increase the 'strike zone' of the job. You want to grab as many people as possible; right now, some are finding a way to play it they like and others are missing it; you want to make as many people hit, find a reason they really enjoy the job, as possible. Otherwise, there's no point. Customization for customization's sake is simply a love for clicking things in UI menus. You either like the result or you don't. It doesn't matter that it's unique, or that you outsmarted someone with your unique formulation. It just needs to be satisfying. And yes, the numbers will be a part of that, which means for there to be multiple satisfying options, they need to really damn well balanced.

[Ruinfeild]

I agree that having a talent system would only cause more problems than good. From what I remember of Legion (for the month that I played it sparingly), the talent system they have now isn't as cookie cutter as it was in the early days and from what I heard it was pretty. . .fair? I still think the best talent tree system was. . .rift I believe it was but it has been far to long for me to remember.

So having something that wouldn't increase/decrease damage, mana, hp, etc, but instead be more along the lines of things like increased duration, radius, etc, would be better if they ever went this route.