Skill tree style progress

The problem with "skill trees" is usually that their purpose is to create a modicum of balance at the expense of freedom of choice. This is more useful for a computer game than it is for a role playing game, because it is very very hard to do well, and the potential pay off to do it that way instead of relieing on the individual gaming group solving these problems as they come up is small. Often you even end up confusing the players - in the end the rules are there to support the game and not the other way around - and they end up trying to satisfy the rules instead of satisfying the plot.

You bring up WHFRPG 2e as the example of it being done well (and I agree), but remember: the game pretty much said, you can drop out of the tree and enter it somewhere else for a very small penalty. The game generally out of its way to say: "Here's cool non-static tree rules, and here's how you bend them if they're still in the way."

>>55285303
Most computer role playing games don't use the skill tree style progress that is popular in computer role playing games. Even the image you posted is from a game that has clearly defined classes with different advancement and starting positions on the shared tree. Each class also has it's own personal sub-tree it can only access, which when filled left minimal room for choice. They also bind character race and gender to the class choice with no aesthetic character customization.

Another way of looking at it is that many table top role playing games do offer skill trees but they don't explicitly draw it out. Dungeons and dragons has used profiencies, feats, ability scores, class features, alternative class features, and spells as nodes on the skill tree. Taking the node of high dex with allow you to take the node for dodge which connects to node for mobility, then spring attack and whirlwind attack. Now if you combine that with other tree nodes of skill ranks in certain skills you open up the subtree of prestige classes like weapon master.

It's fairly simple to remove classes from those games and map them out as trees instead while still preserving all the mechanics.

I've seen systems that use skill trees.

They essentially require you to either memorize the location of every option and plan your build far in advance, or to just pick randomly.

>>55285516

One of the most important things about D&D is that if you really want to, you can have a fighter with low STR, high WIS and CHA. He just won't be a very good fighter. It dropped the strict ability-score requirements from 2nd edition, and instead added implicit ability-score requirements for using abilities and the rest.

>>55285535
>They essentially require you to either memorize the location of every option and plan your build far in advance, or to just pick randomly.
BTW for anything that's not supposed to be skirmish-heavy with RP as garnish, this poses a problem: This encourages your players to treat your game as an optimization problem, where the plot really can't get into the way of your "planned build". Your character has a traumatic experience that would cause them for swear off violence? Better make sure you still get that lv7 mass murder related feat instead, or your whole optimization goes down the drain!

>>55285564
Exactly and one of the strengths of 3rd edition and Pathfinder by extension is that you can enter the pseudo-tree at any defined starting point after a "level" node can be bought. You then get a bunch of complimentary nodes for free on the pseudo-tree. You could say that the major downfall of the system was that it was too free form and allowed too much movement and access to multiple nodes.

2nd edition also had the book I think called skills and options. It gave a system for all class features to be point buy. It's essentially the same game but without classes. Yet people still talk about classless systems as different to class systems as if they're not the same thing in different packaging.

>>55285665
So you're saying the only difference between class-based and classless is that one has classes and the other doesn't?

The only interesting question in the context is why videogame-style character progression is in pen and paper at all any more.

If you value the "grind" and enjoy games that make you do a bunch of work until they reward you by letting you do cooler things, you are better of playing a videogame rpg/mmo, and if you are the type who plays role-playing games for the immersion and storytelling, "guys I killed another thing, I'm slightly better at everything now and for no reason I have more spells/sick flips" feels incredibly artificial and gamey.

>>55285303
FFG Star Wars games (Age of Rebellion, Edge of the Empire) do it in a very shitty way.

>>55285685
The difference is layout and description.

You could be a mage and take fighter for the free feats at level 1 and 2 for things like weapon focus touch attack or weapon focus ranged touch attack. Those would benefit your touch spells and you would not really lose anything especially while taking practiced spellcaster feat. So you wouldn't be the class you're dipping in to.

Just substitute "add fighter starting node" with "multiclass to fighter" they're two ways of expressing the same thing. It would probably only take a weekend at best to convert a player's handbook from class presentation to node based presentation.

>>55285303
It's really hard to visualize and use on tt; maybe have a visual interface on the PC that prints out a build you make? Still gonna be a pain in the ass.

Feats work great here (you can even use those weird variant rules where you can build a class for feats/points in 3.5), and as you've said, Warhammer fantasy's cool.

>>55285303
>So why don't more pen and paper use the skill tree style progress poplar in computer role playing games? It tends to all be either class level systerm or point buy?

GURPS basic magic system technically has a skill tree in the form of prerequisites. For instance, to cast a fire ball, first you need to know how to make fire, then you need to learn to control it, and finally you can cast fire ball.

Some skills function this way as well, invisibility art requires trained by a master, stealth at a certain level, and something else that I do not recall.