He justified this by stating that the original eight all "trickled down" into each other and that this change allowed players more direct control over their characters.
Hard to understand. Oblivion's system was transparent and gave direct control over shapping the character's attributes. You could end with the exact attributes profile you wish. More direct control would imply the capacity to increase the stats directly rather than computation through levelling up.
I wonder how Skyrim can give more direct control than the previous systems.
Since there are no classes in Skyrim, there are no hidden differences between two different characters with completely different play-throughs. Let's say we have three high level characters: an assassin like character, a heavy fighter and a mage (all human). Those characters may have different skill-sets, but they have the same values for speed, strength, endurance, personality, etc. They can carry the same amount of weight, move with the same speed and so on. This means there are no fundamental differences between characters and since the game gives you the ability and even encourages you to use and thus, upgrade all of the skills - like it or not - you will end up with a jack of all trades with a rather different set of perks.
Hard to say. Perks are numerous and very likely, include passive "strength", "agility" etc bonuses, transparent or disguised like perks making the player jump, run faster etc…
The Jack of trades's comment might be influenced by the fact the developpers exhibit their game and show around various abilities available in the game.
For example, the resolution of the pursue of the freed man (spoiler: his head cracked open by a bow shot) is one to exhibit the zoom ability.
From what I understood on the levelling up system, the developpers are banking on the fast reward mindset.
-Skills advance faster and faster as you progress in them, meaning you level up faster by focusing on a specific set of skills, rather than spreading out.
-Going from 20 to 21 does more for the skill efficiency than going to 11 from 10.
This two elements, if confirmed, should warrant that players do not turn their characters into a jack of all trades.
I've started to replay Oblivion (havent played it in three years) to see what could be expected from Skyrim.
Among the questions, two:
- on path finding, the terrain and the differences in physical capacities makes that it is possible for a NPC following the player to get killed in stunts (a feature I enjoyed much as I killed a lot of enemies like that)
For Skyrim, it begs the questions to know whether or not the NPCs are able to determine if a path is lethal to them, attending that physical attributes are different, and that one character can run on a path lethal to others.
Indeed, if characters can not acquire perks boosting their physical prowesses, this issue is solved: a PC can not opt for a path lethal for his pursuers as averagely, they are all the same.
The other question is about classes. Skyrim says to include companions and no matter what, a living world demands that the radiant IA system sends fighters of the fighting guild around, let hunters hunt, let heroes perform their jobs.
Will they behave as their class? If you meet a warrior, will he play like a warrior focusing on warrior skills? Will a bard buff you up?
If indeed, there is no more class, the AI could be simplified.
Questions in hold.