Zone Transition Costs: "Tax Nodes"

A tax node is a low quality node that you don't really want, that also does not unlock anything you want once taken. Typically they're basic +10 attribute ones that go on and on and exist solely to drain away your points and make your build terrible.

They're applied very haphazardly; some transition areas have a pile full of them, some of them don't.

The Ranger-Shadow Zone



This demonstrates the "it costs six points to move to another class area" rule of thumb.

You've got three choices here: life, and block. You also have a smattering of below average (aside from the claws) damage clusters, but you have to pay extra for that.

I've been offered the "but she has lots of block!" comment as a rebuttal to my comments about the mediocrity of the support given to Melee Rangers. Is that really the case?

Note the location of the Block cluster in relation to the Ranger. It's adjacent to her bow cluster. If you're using a bow, are you using a shield?

The upshot of this, is this area isn't a Shadow/Ranger area, it's a Shadow area.

It's probably intentional that the Ranger has to spend near 10 tax points to attain this extra block.

At any rate, it's my opinion that one of the factors that holds back the Melee Ranger is the enormous cost she has to pay to get into the inner Shadow area. If only, it cost six points..

The Templar-Witch Zone



I charitably consider this the worst area in the game.

Six points to move into another class? Not here.

You know how the Ranger can plow north from Perfect Aim, unlock above average life and basic resist nodes, and plunder the +Projectile Damage at the Shadow's start? Yeah well now you have to pay nine points for that. And the life clutch is perfectly average. Hope you really wanted Inner Force.

(The two basic Intelligence nodes in the Templar's elemental side do a lot to make it even worse; no other class has tax built into a starting route.)

This is further enhanced by how this side of the Witch's tree isn't great to begin with. An aside for "decelerating returns":

As a caster, you have over +100% spell damage baked into your gear. A point spent on +6% damage is therefore a gross increase of, charitably, 2.06 / 2 = 3% more overall damage. Making it possibly intrinsically worse than equivalent +physical damage nodes, even ignoring that smaller numbers are used for them.

The backfield does much better, but the Witch has to take unattractive options to get there. (Side Note: +Charge nodes? Could these maybe be changed to only require one point to pass through if you don't want the +max charge? They're frustrating locks as it is already.)

The Witch-Shadow area is comparatively wonderful. It's a bit of a trend that many classes have one really good transition route, and one pretty blah route.

The Duelist gets kind of screwed there, beyond the stretched out routes he starts with: the Marauder Defense zone (with it's absurd +45 resist all, and not a single useless point in its path) is on the opposite side of him, all the Ranger has to offer is some Thick Skin; he has to pay a lot to expand somewhere worthwhile.

(Also the Marauder's two handed route is adjacent to the Duelist, which is extra mean since the Duelist has better one-hand support in his area.)

Duelist-Marauder



A pretty average area. I'm mentioning this to bring up the "coincidence of wants" problem more clearly.

Each point in this route unlocks in turn:

Shield Block, Axes, Reduced Cost
Dual Wield Damage
Mace, Sword, lock for more Axe Damage
Two-Hand Damage

Setting aside that much of these options are priced to be mediocre, note that many of these things are incompatible with one another.

If you're Shield Blocking, you're not Dual Wielding or using Two Hands. If you're using a Mace, you're not using an axe. Which is fine; but is it really necessary for it to cost more to get the same effect?

The answer, really, is that much of the area is just a side show. No one comes this way for +24% accuracy with axes; it's about Blood Drinker and its two 12% life nodes.

Ranger-Duelist



And to conclude, a good transition area. Why is this so good?

Movement Speed, Attack Speed
One Hand Damage, Life
Accuracy, lock for more Life/Claw Damage
Bow Accuracy, Mana, Resist

There are a lot of good choices off of every point spent, is why. Either it's something universally applicable (the defensive stuff and movement speed), something with a wide application (attack speed works for every attack build configuration, not just dual wielders or bow-usin'. Fencing applies if you're using a shield or two weapons.), has a low cost (Fencing, that free +20% bow accuracy really makes Deadeye look crap)... Every single point here offers at least three options, as opposed to its sister route to the Shadow, where you're over the moon to get one choice offered.

In short: It's good because these aren't tax nodes at all, they're unlock points.

I think this is good analysis, but I think more of it has to do with the fact that some nodes are inherently more valuable than other, either because they have "notable" or "major" passives accessible, or because the basic ones accessible are desireable.

currently, people tend to be traversing as many trees as possible to pick up as many hp nodes as possible, so I think worrying about which sections of the tree have more punishing 'tax' penalties can't be viewed in a vacuum.

It's also worth looking at the 'outside track' because that is beneficial for a lot of classes. For example, a marauder can go from its start point, pick up a ton of useful stuff, invest 5 "tax points" to hit RT, then invest 4 more and be at another high value life cluster in the templar zone.

I think it's worth examining this, but I think first GGG should examine whether 'tax points' are a desireable mechanic at all. IMO they just serve to make leveling feel unrewarding.

I would personally like to see more incentive to invest in clusters that aren't HP, along with an increased value of these 'tax' nodes. That might upset balance too much, though.

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FamousTrip wrote:

invest 5 "tax points" to hit RT, then invest 4 more and be at another high value life cluster in the templar zone.

Elemental Adaptation lowers the damage you take from elemental damage by 20%. And Skull Cracking is very solid for mace users. So it's really 3 or 4 extra points to get. Even if you ignore the progress you get toward more defense stuff.

I don't really think it's even a cost at all for getting to remove accuracy from the game. (And if you had a ton of accuracy, you still had a 5% miss chance. That's an increase of 5.2% damage if you had perfect accuracy before; more than the base +2.5% damage you get from base critical damage with maces or +3.25% crit damage with Sceptres.)

This specifically just seems to stem from how they want Marauders to be awesome; I think it comes at a price for the other classes.

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I would personally like to see more incentive to invest in clusters that aren't HP

It's unfortunately intrinsic to the design decision they made here.

If you include defense as an option, then it has to matter or no one will take it. Personally, I would have not included many defensive options in the tree personally, just to avoid duplicating the "stats for gear, rest into vit" of our predecessor.

Hailrake is a basic example. If you have 75% resist, you take 1/4th the damage. The game has to be a challenge even if you have 4 times the effective HP: therefore you melt immediately to elemental damage without any resist. Hailrake used to be a threat, when you'd meet him before you can equip resist rings.

Life% just compounds that by a factor of two or three:

Life%: .4
Block: .5
Armour: .7

.4 * .5 * .7 = .14; a modest effort toward defenses increases your durability by nearly an order of magnitude. If the game is still a challenge for that guy somehow, it has to melt the faces instantly of anyone who spent no points toward this endeavor.

It also breaks my heart a little, when you hear newbies in #Global wonder about the bandit rewards. No one bothers to explain that their base life total is 50 + 6 * Level + Strength / 2, and therefore they should choose Oak. A permanent mistake with only one solution: "Delete character, reroll."

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IMO they just serve to make leveling feel unrewarding.

Feel_the_same_way.gif.

The buff cluser between witch and templar is one of the strongest node clusters in the game and not mentioned in your "tax" discussion.

Yeah I agree with all that as well.

I also agree with Mugaaz though. The area between the Witch and Templar is actually really nice no matter which way you go about it.

The increased buff effectiveness is the only cluster in the game with that effect and it's an extremely potent effect as well. Additionally you have easy access to a very nice HP cluster with a notable passive in it.

I've written something fairly long that touches on this subject in an attempt to solve both the issue of life nodes being the end-all-be-all of stats, as well as to make all levels more rewarding by buffing the 'tax' nodes. I'll post it once I'm home.

I'm hardly saying an equivalent of ~a ring's worth of power is crap. Aura stacking is just simply a specific kind of build, and isn't appropriate in the intrinsic area of the tree; it belongs somewhere on the outskirts to be reached for.

Where it is, is just justification for an otherwise poor transition area.

Saw a guy today go inside Witch<->Templar without grabbing it, and it broke my cold uncaring heart.

The "middle" transition from witch to templar is indeed terrible and I pretty much always avoid it. However you can do a "far" transition by going up toward Divine Toughness(which is such a good passive especially now that it has a 8% chaos resist across), then you go toward templar from the furthest highway, with the ability to still take the health node on the way(hell you can even put 2 points only to grab the Toughness node and leave the 2 8% for later) and come into the Templar area from another Toughness node into body and soul+endurance or catalyse.

Using the middle road in comparison is a load of crappy stats and access to nothing useful but Inner Force which isn't really on the way, it's just there if you go grab it which you can do regardless. If you planned on taking the elemental nodes it's a decent choice but I tend to skip the elemental nodes anyway and just focus on the life in the templar area as well as the highly valued nodes like the 4pt body and soul, Prestidigitation, the 7% mana cost reduction and the AoE passive if I do use AoE or the weapon/accuracy stuff if I use that. Even if you want to get the elemntalist stuff, coming from either sides it's about the same really but if you go from outside you get access to better stuff(EE, shield nodes, flexibility on the toughness node and faster access to Elemental Adaptation/RT).

Only redeeming node for the top access is the crit one I'd say. It's really good if you plan on getting crit. But then again you could head toward the shadow area and drown in crit passives.