The weekend is almost here and we’re closing our first week of Zip-Tips out with help from our resident “designer in rock,” Jason Olander – better known to frequent MAG.com forum visitors as BenjaminBreegg. Today, Jason drops the knowledge on MAG’s skill tree system to teach you how to make a better character. As always, we’ll begin with a prep video followed by Jason’s words of wisdom:
“Hey there, this is Jason and it’s a fact that the skill tree is the heart of your character, and the place where a soldier’s identity is forged. Specialization is the name of the game here, as becoming comfortable with a particular weapon set and support role, and then spending skill points wisely to improve upon those skills will help you become an effective combatant and squad mate. Following these few tips will help you become a force to be reckoned with out on the battlefield.
- Choose your weapon. Rather than spend precious skill points across several weapon types, pick one and spend points to continually upgrade that category’s weapon selections, attachments, and skills.
- Choose your role. Electronics warfare? Combat medic? Field engineer? Explosives expert? MAG is all about teamwork, and a balanced squad is a good squad. Decide on your “support” role immediately, and just like when specializing with a weapon, continually spend skill points to improve that skill set rather than scattering points across disciplines.
- Save your skill points. Just because you leveled up and have a shiny new skill point to spend, that doesn’t mean you have to spend it “right now.” Decide first what your next ‘must have” skill is and save up for it. That new foregrip attachment for an assault rifle or the electronic sensor jammer may be worth the wait.
- Respec early and often. Your current Respec points are shown in the “Skills” tree. When you have enough points, opting for a respec will reset all purchased skills and give you all of your earned points back to spend again; it’s basically a do-over. This is a great opportunity to hone your specialty and personal play-style to a razor’s edge.
- Be prepared for an ever-changing battlefield by “packaging” new skills and equipment together as loadouts in the Armory. Use attacker and defender skill sets as a starting point, and build from there with your specialties. Packaging up gear skills into an easily selectable loadout can make all the difference when a stealthy assault on an AA Battery is called for, or when a last stand against heavy APC’s can mean the difference between victory or defeat.
In closing, the key is to maximizing the skill tree is to choose your weapon, choose your role, then work up the ranks to become effective at both, while using the respec function liberally to find that perfect combination for your play style.”
Thanks Jason, great tips. We’ll be back with additional help from other Zippers next Tuesday, as we’ll be off Monday for the President’s Day holiday. Have a great three day weekend and we’ll see you again soon.
But mag is awsome game good job zipper
i think that by the time i buy the game, i will be far behind!!!!
i’m planning on buying it for my Bday on April
lol Hell yeah, LMG maxed out, athleticism maxed out just have to go for the electronics warfare! Anyone know if the last LMG is worth it for Valor?
Really hope to see the skills and skill tree expanded upon with DLC in the future. Customization of your character is sort of the heart of this game, at least for me, and the more options the better.
I’d also like to be able to either name my loadouts or have the weapons and gear in each loadout shown on the in-game loadout selection screen so that I don’t have to either memorize how I’ve set up each one or spend forever reading over them during selection. Missing a respawn because you’re double checking your loadout is the right one kind of blows.
Some good tips. If you guys want more help, practice planning out your skills here: http://www.maggametools.com/skills
No wonder the MAG menus rock – Iron Maiden’s bass player was manager of the UI team!
*Post*
Crickets…
When are we getting updates for the game???
…respeccing early and often are both terrible ideas. Firstly the cost increases every time, secondly doing it early will mean you have very few skill points to actually redistribute.
If you want an ACTUAL tip, respec for the first time when you reach about 20-25, you’ll have plenty of skill points to try another skillset, if you’re not doing to well with the new skillset you should have more than enough points to do a second respec to either 1)try either set or 2)go back to your original set.
Why are skill points limited? I think you should be able to max out your skills when you hit 60. I mean people won’t be able to make over-powered characters because of the C limits and I really don’t want to just focus on one class… We have several loadout slots for multiple classes so I like to play them all.
ok I read all the Dev tips now its time for…
PLAYER TIP:
Make a update sooner than later…
Not a bad vid, How you distribute skill points really does define your character. I think you guys should also advise people to not go and grab EVERYTHING in one skill type, like for your guns only grab the attachments you know you’re going to use. It saves your skill points for other things like passive upgrades and support equipment.
And to the guy that’s wanting to have everything at 60, what’s the point dude? It takes all the customization out if everyone has everything and makes respecing redundant. You have different loadouts so that because you can’t carry all your stuff on one, it isn’t so you can basically have a class system.
I only wish you could have multiple characters. I don’t want to lose everything when I hit level 60. One character per PMC would be great.
thanks for the vid- i like that this game is structured nicely at the beginning to let you really get to know the game before jumping into the hectic 256 player battles..nice touch!
Such a lame limitation to force you to stick with one faction.
When I purchase a game, I want to experience a little bit of everything it has to offer. I don’t want to dedicate my life trying to level up to some silly plateau…only to start over with NOTHING if I want to try something different.
Unless you have absolutely ZERO life, who has time to do that?
i would like to see an explination of the game menus and such. what the dog tags mean and things like that.
Seriously i need help. I hate being raven. And i dont want to lose all that i worked for. Im already a veteran btw.Pretty please with a cherry on top.
Trophy system seems messed up by having three golds for a lvl 60 In each faction. And the game is all about sticking to one faction.
Ps SVER fo life!
This game rocks! bout the CE and I love the game! I saw that over a half million copies have been sold and I could not been happier! I hope many more will get this ASAP! This is more fun the MW2! It has teamwork and deeper gameplay
but balance svers maps!!! They are just soooo freaking horrible to attack. It is impossible!
I heard SVER was horribly balanced in the final game.
raven sniper all the way with a touch of field support, repairs, stealth and squad/platoon leader abilities!
This game really needs unlimited respecs up to level 8 or so, with one last respec at level 10 before the standard respec system kicks in. There’s simply not enough information to go on to make decisions about whether an unlock is worth it or not (I got one unlock that actually makes the sniper rifle WORSE).
Bad Company 2 is going to show Mag how online warfare is meant to be done.
Battlefield will always set the bar in this field, hands down.
Please release a demo :P
i had my doubts but i hear more and more ppl are picking this up. i think i will too
will you give me a free MAG if i say………..
PL0X D:
A shame there are so many squad leaders who suck, don’t use mics, don’t set objectives, don’t co-ordinate or communicate with their team. Basically you are at the mercy of idiots a lot of the time. There should be a rating system with a score given for the SL after every match so the badly scoring squad leaders lose privelages and get weeded out.
@15 – I think the dogtags show how many of your clanmates are currently online. I joined a clan and the clan name appears next to the dogtags and the number shows how many people are currently playing.
Zipper – Please let us rename our loadouts. It would make it much easier to switch loadouts and not miss the next spawn.
If you are going the medic route and respecing, don’t buy the first resuscitation. Buy improved healing instead, this will unlock improved resuscitation in the next tier. This way you will improve your med kit and first aid kit for the same 2 skill points.
@ #14 RuthlessED
(and every1 else for that matter)
every time you hit level 60 you have the choice to go Veteran. when you do this it resets your level to 1 and resets everything except you keep your xp. now when you go Veteran you may switch factions. if you are a good gamer you should be able to hit level 60 easily. i mean i have 29 hours of play and im level 45. now i havent even played for a full 2 days and im almost to level 60. so yea. i do have a life and im almost there. so dont say you have to have no life to be able to do all the stuff the game offers. think before you type you no good gamers.
oh and @ #19
SVER ftw! we have just been having the problems of noobs who dont understand how to play in aquisition and sabotage. if they would listen to a good squad leader (like me and select others) and repair the things we frago (like the AA) and stay away from the orange smoke like we say to we would win. SVER is the punk bad***es of the game and we will scrape every time in domination.
@22 umm no bfbc2 sucks it is way to boring was in the beta got bored with it in couple of hours then I delete it and went back to the MAG beta I give it anther shot with the demo got bored with it after only 2 matches delete and went back to mag while with MAG I have been playing it since the first beta and it is still allot of fun to play
Why the hell has anyone not fixed this media player the blog uses? Having to keep the mouse on the video is just stupid.
i just bought this game i was wondering if theres a way to find a good squad leader havent played much but will pretty soon thanx.
@31:
That has never been a problem. Maybe you should use a different browser? I use firefox and it works fine, infact, so does Internet Explorer on windows 7.
thank you zipper! i have wanted a game like this for years!! ever since i played battlefield 2 on pc, ialways wanted that kind of game to hit consoles. you guys have met and exceeded any desires i had for this game. well met and thanks again!
p.s. S.E.V.R rules all!!
anyone know anything about uk servers ?
always playing americans,which is fine,except for the lag,never seem to hear any brits,starting to wonder if there ARE any uk servers.
Zipper, please patch to allow a character in each faction. If not at the get-go, then one that let’s you create a second file after maxing the first, a third after maxing the second. Killing off a level 60 character to start another faction campaign is ludicrous.
LokeSTL – VALOR
Hey guys can you guys need to host a Q&A, i think most of the community what some questions answered like, Are there any DLC coming?, Do they know there imbalancment in to factions, weapons, and maps? Anyway can we get our clothing like the masks, hats and etc? You know some question like these since i would make post on there forum but its still having sign in problems.
Mr. Jeremy Dunham:
I just got a copy of MAG yesterday & like the game & the concept, however my heart lays with socom. I have loved socom from the first release & is the main reason I paid $600 for a PS3. Confrontation was a BIG let down & there have been rumors around the web about Socom 4 in development & that Zipper is back in control not Slant6. If you guys were to search the web & look at how many or your fans love & want a good Socom (mirrored off Socom 2) it may overwhelm you. Socom 2 was by far the best one you guys created the single & multi player, believe it or not but you guys pioneered how online FPS are played today. If you could please make Socom 4 like Socom 2, same game play, tighter controls & better graphics I can guarantee you my salary that you will have a fan base that far exceeds any Call of Duty or Halo game out there. Sony makes all the decisions about Socom since they brought Zipper a few years ago. Sony give Zipper the freedom it needs to make Socom the way it should be & be more active when it comes to the Socom community.
Sincerely,
YODA798907
30/M/Ga.