Come Bitch About Skills! [Skills Rebalance Brainstorming]

Discussion in 'Modding' started by Essence, Jun 14, 2012.

  1. Turbo164

    Turbo164 Member

    Warcry is deeper but stronger, sure. Combined with the minor armor shred from On Fire, that's some very nice debuffs for a gish! [For those offended by that term: "...for a character who uses swords and/or maces and/or axes and/or staves and/or daggers and/or polearms and/or feet and some form of magic to enhance said melee, which in some places is called a Mageknight or Swordmage or Duskblade or some other nonuniversal term that can mean different things but is less offensive." :life: ]

    Hmm. Has anyone done the math to learn what the average Museum xp ends up being? I never pay attention to my total level, so I don't know the ratio of spending 2-3 levels to get 4-19 levels or whatnot.


    +27 damage when maxed? Is this to help Unarmed/Ranged compete with Duel-Wield Chests of Evil, or was this a typo? I can see making Shields a little more offensive while Master of Arms stays more defensive but this seems like overkill.


    As said in the other thread, yay to the Third Sight changes :) Also as said in the other thread by me and Bergstrom, consider splitting the scaling on lasers; causing a 3:sight: Wooden Sword to add 18 damage instead of 9 just further encourages you to lug it around and swap every cooldown.

    Affects Viking and some equipment iirc; as Megaron said will Promethean get it too? I'm not sure what all Gaslamp was planning on using this for because afaik it's only used by Egyptian right now.

    Yay!


    I don't think I've ever put more than one point here so I don't know what the old ones even did (wiki doesn't load on work computer; I know one sometimes gave :magic_power::mana_regen: when you killed stuff?) but your changes definitely sound more bloody and less ghosty :)


    Helpful! Definitely makes it more attractive when compared to Tinkering (though both is probably still a good idea, you might get away with just Archery now).


    I've purposely never gotten Transdodge because I didn't want to get stuck in a wall; letting it get itself out is a WONDERFUL idea (and the cooldown keeps it from overshadowing Mathemagic!). Extra Aikido is fun!


    Since non-OCD Fungal gives less shrooms, making the ones you do get better is nice. Making them affect more guys means you need less per zoo.


    Laudanum can soothe that irritation I'm sure ;)

    I'll post some ideas later when I'm less busy, but one quick thing that comes to mind is expanding some of the 5-levelers to 6. Character level 35+ is much more common than 42+, and I think making more "real" skills is better than the "generic war/rog/wiz" or "blank levels" ideas. It can be awkward to delay the capstone or make a cappier capstone, but some "better than nothing" stuff like the following come to mind:

    Piracy: Yaaar! +3:caddishness:
    Magic Training: Final Exam +5:haywire:
    Archeology: Don't look in the Ark! +1:trap_sense: +10:magic_resist:

    Etc. Just little bonuses for people who go deep enough without choosing enough 7 pointers etc.
     
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  2. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    I think it's more like "1 point of each, for 3 points of each total when you max the tree". So 9 bonus damage instead of 27. I can't say I like the idea of something getting all three basic damage types (due to the little issue with melee power) but whatever.
     
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  3. Essence

    Essence Will Mod for Digglebucks

    Sorry! Shields get 1of each basic damage RESISTANCE at levels 1, 3, and 5. My bad.
     
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  4. FaxCelestis

    FaxCelestis Will Mod for Digglebucks

    (Item's Star Level * Artifact Quality) * 60

    Artifact Quality is the item's base artifact quality (usually 0, but items that spawn with artifact quality range between 1 and 3, and items that always are artifacts when spawned go up fairly high: crownstar is AQ 24, for instance) plus the number of times the item has been positively kronged, minus the number of times its been negatively kronged.
     
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  5. Mr_Strange

    Mr_Strange Member

    1. I HIGHLY recommend my Archery re-work that I wrote a few months back. Link here. Biggest idea was that the 2nd skill give you a 40% proc chance for a 1-turn buff to ranged damage. It promotes firing bolts in bursts.
    2. Make Thrown Weapons a warrior skill.
    3. Add 5:reflection: to Vampirism Sparkly skill.
    4. Heal character fully on Werediggle transform!
    5. Astrology - improve blinding mine to persist, instead of disappearing (and not working, usually!)
    6. Assassination - Improve Venom Dagger. I'd double the :dmg_toxic: to start.
    7. Fungal - Allow 2 (or 3!) copies of the final summon to be out at a time.
    8. Magical Training - I think the :savvy: bonus is too low overall. I'd also like to see a bit of :stubborness:. (Funny!)
    9. BGH - add a -15:dodge: to the "Lured" debuff. (Maybe -15:block: instead, or as well?)
    10. BGH - fix "The Most Dangerous Game!" Text is inaccurate, and I have serious doubts about whether or not "Hunter's strike" works properly. I also think "Hunter's strike" should work on all creatures, not just animals.
    11. Improve Depressing Elemental Blast! Increase base damage to 30:dmg_existential:, improve magic scaling, and let it hit multiple targets more reliably.
    Tourist, Communism, and Demonologist also need some love, but those changes are outside the scope of this post...
    I would love to see a buff to summons - use the DL scalar used by the Bankster tree to scale money with DL, and apply that to summons somehow... maybe this could be a spell in the Golemancy tree, to add Synergy between Golemancy and other pet trees?
     
  6. Essence

    Essence Will Mod for Digglebucks

    How do you give a buff to just ranged damage?
     
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  7. Mr_Strange

    Mr_Strange Member

    Hmmm - that is a good question. I the Archery Line grants :dmg_piercing: which affects only ranged damage (or only crossbow damage - never tested that) so I assumed it would be straight-forward to use the same bonuses in a spell effect.
     
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  8. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    It isn't that straight-forward. It's just that bonuses from weapon proficiency skill trees (Archery being one of such) only affects attacks made using these weapons.
    It is possible to work around this issue, but it wouldn't be perfect (in fact, it would be kinda insane and likely not idiot-proof at all, so I'm not going to talk about it).
     
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  9. OmniaNigrum

    OmniaNigrum Member

    Make an uber-bow? (I know of no way, but that does effectively answer the question. It also makes most reading this want to strangle me with the bow-string.)
     
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  10. FaxCelestis

    FaxCelestis Will Mod for Digglebucks

    CrossbowShotBuff trigger a damage spell.
     
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  11. Turbo164

    Turbo164 Member

    I knew the formula, just not the average total by the time you kill Dred. Like each floor usually has 0-4 Inconsequentia, 0-1 zoo, 0-2 islands, 0-4 krongs, 0-2 floor, 0-4 Lutefisk, etc, each of which are 0-floor+2 stars, etc, plus any you happen to craft. Does an average archeologist get 3 bonus levels compared to a nonarcheologist? 7?

    The main decision with archeology (well, aside from trying for Maslech!) is "am I willing to delay my *real* skills for the first 70% of the game in order to have an extra level or three by the time I reach Dredmor?", as well as "if I do cap my other 6 skills, do I mind having a 7th skill that didn't do much aside from getting me there faster, rather than a 7th skill that offers more combat/utility?"

    I think Museum at 3 is probably fine (and getting Charlemegne earlier might save your life occasionally!), I was just curious if someone had an actual number like "the average Archeologist gets 103,742 bonus xp from their 62.1 artifacts by floor 15 (46,229 by floor 10) which is enough for 4.7 (2.3) bonus levels assuming you don't repeat floors or get bonus xp from other sources like Big Game Hunter. Unarmed builds get an extra 0.293 levels from museum'ing their Chest of Evil weapons."

    Anyone mind keeping track of their total on their next Archeologist? :)

    /long
     
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  12. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    That is, if CrossbowShotBuff actually worked from within buffs. And the last time I checked it did not (though admittedly, that was a while ago).

    It depends on two factors - whether that person has crafting skills with renewable materials or not, and whether that person is patient enough to spend a lot of time grinding said materials and crafting artefacts. And the difference between these groups tends to be so high there's no point in making such calculations.
     
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  13. Mr_Strange

    Mr_Strange Member

    Next idea - how about just grant a damage buff, but then dispell it on melee attack?
     
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  14. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    It would steal add bonus to damage then, and since there are general problems with melee/ranged recognition attacks, it might not work exactly as intended.

    You know what guys, just make something like this:
    - Skill gives 100% chance to trigger an effect on a crossbow attack.
    - Effect checks for a buff; if buff present, it deals additional damage (the damage-dealing part might not work exactly as intended, but that's your best shot at doing this right now); if buff not present, nothing happens.
    - After that, there is a 40% chance to put that 1-turn (duration of 2) buff on the player.

    You aren't crazy enough guys, I tell you...
     
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  15. FaxCelestis

    FaxCelestis Will Mod for Digglebucks

    It works in skillDB.xml.
     
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  16. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    I repeat the question. Does it work from within buffs?

    I know it works in skill definitions, but in the past it did not work from within buffs. And just to make myself clear, buffs are all in "spellDB.xml".
     
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  17. Essence

    Essence Will Mod for Digglebucks

    Fax's point is that you can put in in skillDB and have it check for the existence of a buff granted in spellDB. It's a horrid workaround, but it's what we've got.
     
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  18. Kazeto

    Kazeto Member

    Isn't this exactly what I wrote one post before his...? And I was a little more detailed than "It works in skillDB.xml" so there was no way for me to think that this was what Fax was suggesting.

    But I don't care. There's no need to start a war because of our poor communication skills.
     
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  19. Essence

    Essence Will Mod for Digglebucks

    So, everyone is pretty happy with all of the skills from YHTNTEP and COTW, then?


    Also, 8 posts in a row with likes by DagglePlusPlus? What are you, the new Wisp?
     
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  20. OmniaNigrum

    OmniaNigrum Member

    No. I do not like *His* posts. :D (That is a lie. I like every post for the most part.)

    I click like rather than reply to every reply and weigh down the forum with the a cubic meter of neutronium worth of regurgitated nonsense and "I agree with this post" posts.

    *Edit* That crazy person... I never could spell that name. Wi§p...
     
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