davebarrack
patreon
Grrl Power #945 - Upgradde with a double dose of indecision
🕑 Added 2021-05-17 10:00:04 +0000 UTCThanks so much for your support! Like, seriously, you guys.
To view the full-size version... left-click, right-click, new tab. Or left click then use the scroll wheel to zoom in and click and drag the image. I just figured that one out myself.
As suggested in the stinger, the lack of labels on these would make this upgrade process either especially agonizing or you'd just shrug and buy whatever. I think a little time spent thinking about the layout is probably a good thing, but beyond that, the best way to learn about it is probably just to start spending points and see what happens.
On a personal note, I really dislike skill trees in games that offer teeny tiny incremental upgrades. I think it's one reason I hate MMOs. You spend 4 hours grinding out a level then get to buy a 1% better chance to block at attack with a shield. Wow. That sucks. I played a lot of Diablo 2 back in the day, and I'm used to stuff like the Amazon's first level skill that gives her a 42% better chance to land a critical hit, with ANY attack. That does not suck. I've been playing a little Cyberpunk in the evenings, and honestly, my character is usually just sitting on 3-6 attribute points because every time I go look in the skill tree, I see stuff like "10% faster reload on pistols." or "Move 10% faster for 5 seconds after getting a kill." Yikes. Truly, I will have become death with powers like that.
Yeah, I know, by the time I get to level 30 and have spent 60 attribute points it all starts to add up, but the individual upgrades just aren't satisfying. And yes, I also know that a well made game should be balanced whether spending a point doubles my DPS or gives me a 3% chance to recover a mod when I break a weapon down for parts. My point is, if it doesn't matter either way, then give me a bunch of upgrades that are awesome, not lame crap like the ability to carry 1 extra flare.
I suppose what you can extrapolate from all that is the upgrades on Sydney's skilltree are for the most part, probably fairly significant. 1% extra chance to block my ass.
Okay. Somewhere along the way, my master orb skill tree file lost a skillpoint. Page 181 (the first appearance of the skilltree) shows that the PPO starts with two pips. Somehow, between then and the time Sydney panic bought the rapid-fire upgrade, I either messed up my master file or just forgot to update it, so either the PPO should have three pips, or I need to go retroactively remove the second pip and leave the PPO with two after the panic buy. I've decided that Sydney gets a free power, partially because it's less work than fixing every page with the skilltree, but mostly because I think it'd be funnier that Sydney didn't realize she has a third attack type, and the power she thought she bought was already unlocked. Also, I like Sydney, so why not give her a new toy to play with? I do need to go update the skilltree since she bought the third power though. I'm sure that will happen any day now.
I decided this after the last page went up, and didn't have any time to update the text on this page, but if you look behind her finger in panel, you can see the third pip lit up. I guess she'll realize it at the most amusing possible time, hopefully in the near future.
Comments
Jordan Brennan
There’s one on the website isn’t there?
Evgeny Sandu
On a separate page, updated every time Sydney dings!
Evgeny Sandu
Yes, it has a huge potential for additional super-useful features
Martin Drkoš
Inbefore the encapsulated nodes are cosmetic and this one enables to leave behind light trails as she flies. Also, she should upgrade the molestorb. More tentacles or higher strength would probably be useful.
akrasia
I'm gonna guess combo powers, something that requires aspects of more than one orb.
M B
Any chance of you posting a high-res copy of the skill tree by itself?
Jabber
Very special thanks for panel 8 Dave, I got a new avatar out of it!
Marc Vun Kannon
After all this time I would have expected Sydney's arms to be more muscular.
Reigys
Maybe this "stress" taxes her mind but also allows her more control over her mental state (and let's her more easily keep cool in situations) since she has "seen some shit." thus, now she's ready for another upgrade. Or something like that, I don't know.
Reigys
I'm thinking her upgrades / when she gets them has something to do with mental stress or difficult situations. So the more difficult situations or stress she encounters the better. I say this because the first time was when she was stranded on a planet being hunted by aliens and the other time was when she was basically in a hostage situation and also she had some guy all over her... in the bad way. Also both times she only got the upgrades when she calmed down a bit. (first when she was hiding and thinking of a plan, and second when she was reflecting on the time with her therapist.)
Anton Schleef
Well, I'm more partial to 20% better X and 5 points of it. Or maybe like Diablo II's Amazon's passives, where the first point gives a very pronounced bonus and it gradually has a diminishing returns effect. Then again, I'm more into precision adjusted custom character builds, but without needing 300+ levels to get enough points to accomplish something. I guess you could say that Titan Quest's 3 skill points per level were perfect for me (as well as the way that you got skills that improved your active skills instead of replacing them so it almost never felt like a point was wasted).
Anton Schleef
But the question is what earns her 'experience points' so she can level. Does the relative difference in power between her and her foe factor into it? Or is it based purely on using her powers and pushing herself? Those can create eventual relative caps.
Foradain
A smaller version of those big foam fingers, so she can point just fine...
Daniel Schinhofen
I'd rather have less levels and better choices when dealing with skill trees. But we have a society now that wants more gratification even if it's minor, so we end up with 5% better X and 20 points of it, instead of just 1 100% better X.
Sm00thJa22
The first option can't be the case since the green orb started with that encapsulated node upgrade and she didn't know anything about it or its upgrades for the longest time. As for the second idea, she can already move all the orbs without touching them but still needs to be holding the green orb to actually use its powers. Since the green orb is the only one with an encapsulated node upgrade, and as of page #541 it's the only one shown to move into her hand *exactly when she needed it*, I think the encapslated nodes enable emergency activation of an orb, and we'll soon see Syd falling (perhaps emulating Anvil's example but not realizing that her shield doesn't protect from impact with the ground) and have the fly ball automatically summoned to her hand to keep her from becoming a stain on the pavement. And if that's the case, putting her next point into the encapsulated node for the shield (auto-shield) or the unknown orb (help figure out what it does by activating it automatically when it's needed) would be the best next step. EDIT: You edited your comment to basically say exactly what I just said RIGHT when I was posting my reply, lol
Stephen Gilberg
"These other"?
Stephen Gilberg
Yeah, I wouldn't even have spent any time thinking about which to pick.
cittran genericlastname
I can immediately think of three possibilities for those encapsulated node upgrades that would be complete gamechangers. First, as others have already mentioned, those nodes being a "Here's all the stuff this orb can do and here are the specific corresponding nodes" i.e. labeling. Second would be if those nodes allowed her to mentally control their relevant orbs *without* having to hold them. Third would be if they became semi-autonomous, basically running off some kind of user-preservation AI that acted according to the situation. This would probably be just about the most important upgrade she could possibly unlock. For literally every orb -- but especially the shield, flight, and life-support orbs. (Even though I strongly suspect that last unidentified orb is basically a Medic orb, we don't know for sure yet.) *EDIT* After reading some of the more recent comments on the previous page, I'm leaning towards that node being the "semi-autonomous mode" feature. As someone pointed out, that's what happened with the Life Support orb while she was in the pool (page 541) -- and it has exactly two nodes unlocked. One that obviously creates a life-sustaining atmosphere around the wielder. And one that's an encapsulated node -- which technically could be the atmo-gen function, but given that every orb has one of those encapsulated nodes, it seems likely that it isn't. She still had to touch the life-support orb, but she had no idea what it did, yet it performed the function automatically as soon as she was holding it. Every other orb has required her to figure out what they were, and then *intentionally engage a specific function*, as demonstrated by her Comm-ball "magic vision overlay" during the fight against Vehemence, as well as the Shield's "embiggener" function, as she put it, when they were about to show off Maxima's powers and Sydney needed to shield everyone in the crowd from the explosions ahead of time.
FeyOne
I really want to know what that "unknown" orb does.
OftenSane
I'm starting to think that it'd be really helpful to have something like the "cast" page, except instead of character bios it's a list of orbs and their known powers 🤔
Martin Pollard
Next time they’re going to have to get Sydney some mittens whilst she’s deciding on what point to upgrade.
Jacob Barboza
Maybe she didn't think it warranted a high speed grab? I mean, upgrading the flight orb is probably less potentially dangerous than say the pewpew orb, and they were talking about trying an encapsulated slot anyway.
Jeremy Matt
Linking nodes = able to use powers of both orbs while holding either? That'd be super useful.
JBomb110
How come Maxima didn’t stop Sydney with superspeed? She’s had similar reaction times in the past. She could have grabbed Syd’s hand before Syd could touch the orb.
martin leske
if you choose wrong all you have to do is grind some more its not like there is a level cap... right?
Martin Drkoš
Depends on how much autonomy they allow sidney over her powers.
akrasia
...and it turns out encapsulated points are the ones costing a bit of Syd's soul to unlock?
Anton Schleef
Errrr.......that wasn't the correct chance for the Amazon. It's only a 24% chance. I was just looking at my D2 chars last night. Still, it only took 3 points to get it up to 32%, so I know exactly what you mean there about meaningful bonuses per point spent.
Anton Schleef
The tree can only be seen when there's a point available to spend. Or at least she hasn't figured out how to display it the rest of the time.
Stan
I would've thought the next "upgrade point" would've been decided long before the need to upgrade arrived.
Damaged
Next time she gets a point, it might be a good idea to just forcibly restrain her, Max. Just sayin'.
Alenil
It would be funny and there was point that would unlock labels. And Sydney would ignore it whole time with 'this one doesn't look interesting'
