Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Is it just me or did you say you wanted dream jack to be harder and then go on to propose what are largely just nirvana buffs? The admitted crux of your proposition lies with dream jack being weakened.
Dream jaunt seems entirely unnecessary. It's kind of out of left field, it does not have any relevance to your proposed problems or solutions. I don't even understand the intent beyond making it a supergank area for your friends (which is a terrible idea).
A lot of the ideas are fine, just wildly missing the target your yourself proposed.
What? Dreamjack being weakened and nirvana buffs are different things. Read the preamble. Dreamjack is the skill dreamjack, that pulls people into Nirvana. Nirvana and fighting in Nirvana is a separate idea. The point is to make Nirvana skills actually.. useful and strong, and dreamjack weaker/harder such that getting dreamjacked when unprepared gives the dreamweaver significant and punishing advantages... but it's pretty easy to avoid the dreamjack with the slightest bit of awareness and preparation, such that it's entirely your fault if you got dropped into Nirvana. Just have a highlight for the channel start message, drop an eye sigil, and sever the link.
Dreamjaunt would be for letting non-dreamweavers explore Nirvana and do the quest there. It's a roleplaying and utility thing. I'm also comfortable with dreamjaunt not procing the dreamrealm shield on the non-dreamweavers participating. You have to slip back to the prime plane to dreamjack anyone (which automatically brings anyone connected with you back also, just as it does for dreamjacking), and if someone gets dreamjacked in while you're dreamjaunting, it cuts the jaunt short - as can be read in my post.
As you can also read in my post, these are the changes I figured would warrant the quickest discussion - they're pretty straightforward and self explanatory, with no real changes to functionality or underlying design. The pitiful damage of blade is given purpose, some usability for druids is fixed for blade and beast, general usability/nerfs on tower, huge nerf to dreamjack and link in general etc. Those things have to be fixed before any kind of real improvement/changes can be made. The only one intended to tackle a big problem is the dreamjack/link change. Changing link can lead to more skills depending on being linked to a friend or foe, which is an interesting mechanical conceit, I think.
Gonna go get chineseseses food now. My general idea for pumping up dreamweaving is to beef up the beast and blade (and add another ability) in Nirvana, and then allowing less powerful versions to be summoned and used in corporeal body. For instance, upgrade blade to follow the target within a 5 room radius of the cast and do its damage to all three vitals (and slightly more damage) in Nirvana. The dreamweaver can summon a dream blade that only does ego damage and is only in one room (and does less damage) in corporeal body. In dreambody on the prime plane, casting it makes it follow as well, but still do reduced damage. The other skills will work similarly. This helps to condense the skillset by not having a list of skills you can only use in corporeal, a list of skills you can only use in dreambody, and a list of skills you can only use in Nirvana. Each element of the skills can be balanced separately to help boost corporeal dreamweavers in a way that won't carry over to Nirvana and vicea versa. I only really have beast and blade roughed out, and want to add at least one additional dreamweaving 'summon'. I will post thos.e details
Also, some way needs to be figured out to give guardians and wiccans some kind of fighting chance in Nirvana. I suspect that 'just let them summon their ents' is not on the table, but I'll suggest it. Other suggestions are welcome.
1) The skillset offers little in the way of corporeal utility or power. Skill-native triple sleeping has been removed, along with the most effective motes. The real draw of dreamweaving for mages has therefore been reduced to memoryloss spamming, a noted poor mechanic. Many of the effects that drew druids to dreamweaving have also been removed, with the removal of daydreaming, narcolepsy, and passive sleeping.
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Just wanted to double check, is this specific to Nirvana? I am quite sure DW has passive sleeping and a double sleep attack, so even without a beast with sleepcloud, DWs can do triple sleep.
The concept of a 1v1 arena is nice and all, but listening to the complaints and reading the comments since its release, I think that frankly speaking, this is just a bad idea given the DW kit and Lusternian combat meta. My suggestion: make Dreamjack create a 1-room, 30s to 1minute arena fight between the DW and their target, but the consequence of winning, or not winning, be a vitals malus or some other temporary debuff rather than death that will help the DW do something when they're both back in the real world. A 1 or 2 minute cooldown on the ability will prevent DWs from spamming it repeatedly to permanently remove a person from combat with multiple rounds of dreamjacking. Here's an example:
Dreamjack traps the jacker and the jacked into a random room in Nirvana for 1 minute. Whoever's health percentage is lowest at the end of the minute is the "loser" - whoever hits 0 first will automatically lose too. At the end of the minute, or when a loser is determined, both are returned to where they came from, and the loser suffers -3/-5 vitals and regeneration malus to health/mana/ego for 2 minutes (or however long the dreamjack cooldown is).
Other examples of possible effects:
-5/-10 to ego vitals, and passive 300 ego damage every 10s for 2 minutes.
Recurring amnesia every 10s for 2 minutes.
Insomnia drop every 10s for 2 minutes
Automatic paralysis every time the loser falls asleep for 2 minutes
An extra 350 ego damage every time insomnia is stripped for 2 minutes
1) The skillset offers little in the way of corporeal utility or power. Skill-native triple sleeping has been removed, along with the most effective motes. The real draw of dreamweaving for mages has therefore been reduced to memoryloss spamming, a noted poor mechanic. Many of the effects that drew druids to dreamweaving have also been removed, with the removal of daydreaming, narcolepsy, and passive sleeping.
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Just wanted to double check, is this specific to Nirvana? I am quite sure DW has passive sleeping and a double sleep attack, so even without a beast with sleepcloud, DWs can do triple sleep.
The concept of a 1v1 arena is nice and all, but listening to the complaints and reading the comments since its release, I think that frankly speaking, this is just a bad idea given the DW kit and Lusternian combat meta. My suggestion: make Dreamjack create a 1-room, 30s to 1minute arena fight between the DW and their target, but the consequence of winning, or not winning, be a vitals malus or some other temporary debuff rather than death that will help the DW do something when they're both back in the real world. A 1 or 2 minute cooldown on the ability will prevent DWs from spamming it repeatedly to permanently remove a person from combat with multiple rounds of dreamjacking. Here's an example:
Dreamjack traps the jacker and the jacked into a random room in Nirvana for 1 minute. Whoever's health percentage is lowest at the end of the minute is the "loser" - whoever hits 0 first will automatically lose too. At the end of the minute, or when a loser is determined, both are returned to where they came from, and the loser suffers -3/-5 vitals and regeneration malus to health/mana/ego for 2 minutes (or however long the dreamjack cooldown is).
Other examples of possible effects:
-5/-10 to ego vitals, and passive 300 ego damage every 10s for 2 minutes.
Recurring amnesia every 10s for 2 minutes.
Insomnia drop every 10s for 2 minutes
Automatic paralysis every time the loser falls asleep for 2 minutes
An extra 350 ego damage every time insomnia is stripped for 2 minutes
etc etc
I guess I have to ask, what's the reality of this working? Especially with the earlier comment about some users needing mobility to survive, let alone the issue that if it's just a random room in nirvana they're locked into (or a room they can't access without dreamjacking) you're most likely going to be dumping yourself into a room without a meld.
Personally, for an arena change, as mentioned before, i'd be interested in seeing a sub-realm for each of the orgs which would allow the dreamweaver to prepare it beforehand and would ensure that if the dreamweaver is prepared (which is the expectation that it would be balanced around) then you will always be dropped into an active demesne with the dreamweaver with the option to run or fight for both sides, though the dreamweaver still has the option to lock down with the tower
Of course, if we just made a dreamweaver version of the greenseeing proposal that'd be cool too :P /jokesbutalsoIreallywantthatskill
Or....this could be meant for woods/chemantics to get kills, because they don't have to stop to raise effs, all their stuff is one-room only, and they usually try to excel in 1v1s.
Not every tert has to be viable for every strat....
I guess not every primary has to be viable for every tert, now?
If making it a small multiple room arena can make it viable for melders and dreamtower maintains its effectiveness could that not mean it's useful for both?
And while yes, not every tert needs to be viable for every strategy, I think that an end goal is that every skillset (I mean combination of primary, secondary, and tertiary) should be viable in some way.
Chem/Woods are more geared for groups in my opinion than they are for 1v1. You're better of as a mage.
Also @Tremula - What's not fair is balancing around mages and making druids better 1v1 then they already are (which is really good with allergies, I'd say the best in the game 1v1).
Forcing people to fight in a room that they can't escape against afflictions that are only curable by escaping and if you don't cure them, you're a sitting duck for a saplock (being able to sleep them or not) isn't really what I call 'balanced' or 'fair'. There is a host of other issues too, such as being stuck in a meld during pollute/maelstrom/fury without any recourse to escape it.
Not entirely sure why it was thought to be a good idea to be able to trap someone in a demesne, but it definitely does not need to be made stronger the way things are now. There are many things to which the counter is "leave the demesne". Like, say, phantomspheres. Make a one-room demesne, get your victim into it, and the sphere will always spawn in that room. Can't get out because you're unable to move / leave. Mages / Druids are balanced on being strong in their demesne... which implies that, for balance, you need to be able to escape said demesne (even if it is difficult, some recourse must exist).
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Okay. Maybe I'm misreading or something. I thought your post was stating dreamjacking is easy and nirvana sucks, and your goal was to make it the opposite, which I'm okay with (minus inescapable demesne scenarios). I'm just taking your word on dreamjack at this point, I haven't played with it. If you're saying dreamjack isn't that easy as is, then I take back my previous comment.
As I said, most of the ideas are fine (blade changes, malus changes, etc etc), I just didn't see how they aligned with your proposal. As separate buffs, I should have said, I'm pretty on board.
Thanks for clarifying the jaunt part as well. It wasn't super clear.
I like the idea of a forced duel, it's just not practical when you are discussing melders. Melders range from unkillable (aeromancers, kinda aquas) to uncatchable (druids, geos) to crippling/attrition wins (pyros, druids), and its balanced around the premise that they are "immobile." If you choose not to engage on their terms, they just flail around helplessly.
Their niche is absolute powerhouses in group combat, what they give up for it is being garbage as solo ganking. The intent of dreamjack seems to directly address solo ganking, which really undermines the intended class weakness. I'll be honest, I don't think there is a realistic change to dreamjack/nirvana fights that is fair because of what I just stated.
The issues with @Lerad's suggestion is that you aren't going to beat a mage in the burst damage department. Pollute/maelstrom/etc. will always win that fight, so really it's just counting down the clock and timing your bursts. You also have guild specific issues like pyros and beast ignite/pyre doing 25% of current health. Not a huge deal in a straight up fight, significant when you're just trying to keep X person lower than you.
I think making dreamweavers more viable as out of phase combatants via nirvana is the cool way to go. Nirvana can be like the command center where weavers can drift to and from allies to assist in fights and recover. No sipping, but high regen. Summon temporary powers like blade and beast and bring them to a fight.
I kind of like that concept. Instead of being able to gank someone to Nirvana (and all the balance issues inherent there), instead have it be the armoury of the Dreamweavers. You can make limited use items there (disappear when you wake of course). Add the ability to teleport your dream-form from Nirvana to a mutual ally (non-lusted) who is awake and bring those dreamitems with you since you are still a dreambody. You can use them, and teleport back to Nirvana when they are low and you need to restock. You can give DWers a bit more power in actual fights by giving them things that are very limited in usage, but might pack a punch when used at the right time.
Yes, sorry if that isn't clear. Right now, dreamjacking is absurdly and unavoidably easy. Leave your body, find the target. Hit them with induce (Free, takes 3s eq). 3s after you get eq back (6 seconds total time) you do the following command: ORDER <target> SMOKE COLTSFOOT|DREAMJACK <target>. The one and only counter to this is to not have a lit coltsfoot pipe. Likewise the capacity to trap someone in a demesne is already part of the status quo. Let me repeat: All of the complaints about it being unfair to 'buff' Nirvana by making it possible to get totally stuck in a Druid demesne are off base because that's already how it is. It's just totally random. The funny thing is that if you don't spawn in one of my gank rooms, I can run to you in Nirvana, induce you... when the induce is ready, do DREAMWEAVE SLIP, DREAMWEAVE JACK <target> ad nauseum until you do spawn in one of my gank rooms. It's just so utterly random that it's unfair to everyone involved.
I agree with the comments about forcing 1v1s being either not practical or not fair, and raised the point (to Estarra) that only Druids are really kitted to be able to fight 1v1 with dreamweaving, and even then - not dreamweaving in the context of no sleep attacks (which is the case in Nirvana). Estarra said that she really wants to preserve the 1v1 duel aspect. Specifically, I asked if it's intended for DW to be bad outside of Nirvana ganks and was told basically "yes, that is the intent". I will provide a log of that convo to any Envoy who pokes me, and ask Estarra if she's okay with me just posting it - admins have been touchy about things said on Envoys in the past and I'm so done with it.
I very much prefer something like Xenthos's suggestion - make Nirvana an interesting utility and preparational area for Dreamweavers , a kind of home base. I think it would be great to shift the flavor and mechanics of Dreamweaving towards crafting more than motes out of the Dream Realm and manifesting them in the corporeal (or in the near dream realm/out of phase). With some changes, there could be some really fantastically interesting utility there. For instance, what if you could look through the eyes of your tethered mutual ally from Nirvana, and potentially provide minor buffing support (regen buff?) and advice to that person? What if there were some travel utility for dreambodies through Nirvana, allowing you to use the equivalent of a dreamrealm orgbix by slipping to Nirvana and slipping back through specific points in Nirvana to show up elsewhere on prime in dreambody?
My ideas beyond the basic fixes I outlined in the previous post sort of follow that, but stay with the 1v1 business. Should I change gears? I think that we can leave in the 1v1 ganking ability, if we make it suitably difficult to pull off in combat. It's also possible to make dreamjacking do a kind of Minigame like Lerad suggested, but without the use of the user's skillsets per se. Something like a debate, but with its own rules and commands. More like a construct mecha battle than a debate. That would again remove the 'ganking to 1v1' portion.
tl;dr I agree: I don't think there is a way to make dreamjack-as-1v1-gank work and be fair. I've just been told to try and preserve it if possible.
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
edited January 2016
Xenthos's idea?!?! I claim that one!
I think Estarra can be convinced. Try talking to @Baelor about it as well. Maybe keep the 1v1 aspect just to maintain the status quo (even if a bit silly), but add additions to make it also viable as a group support style tertiary with the armory idea. Ultimately not viable as a 1v1 in dreamform, but healer-esque support skills with some offensive stuff thrown in.
Edit: Plus it's still a garbage tert for mage outside of lame refresh power scenarios like pyros have. Forcing a 1v1 against a pyro or aqua weaver mage is just going to irritate everyone involved. They won't be able to kill me in my meld, but I'm certainly not going to doing much to them either.
Dreamweaving does nothing to contribute to things like burn levels. I'm not even sure any of the mage guilds are all that viable in 1v1s with weaving. It's a really awkward scenario. Forcing mages into 1v1s where they can dictate the terrain of the fight which is supposed to be the weak point of mages, with a tertiary they can't really take advantage of.
They aren't really viable, and as it stands - neither are Druids really. In testing, with a bit of luck and non-optimal curing on the part of the victim, a DW Druid can get a kill. If the target is smart (uses metawake and does so well) and configs their system to do things like ignore non-critical affs and not raise defenses (something m&m derivatives do not do without moderate alteration/configuration) they'll die, but that's the case for anyone fighting in aeon effects. In Nirvana there are no sleep attacks and the Druid has no potential kill. That keeps getting missed so I'll say it again: DW Druids in corporeal form are viable 1v1 in most situations, but not by a massive margin. In Nirvana, without significant buffs to Nirvana DW, Dreamweaving Druids are very annoying and will not be able to kill a well outfitted and configged enemy.
There was some mention of a secondary resource pool being possible for Dreamweavers. Do you guys thing it's worth persuing something like alternate-track power costs for DW's 'summons'? In other words, not momentum but anti momentum. You get 10 points of energy that recharge x per second alongside power costs.
The other thing I want to point out vis a vis "Oooh, scary being trapppeeeddd" is that -chemancers by and large are toothless, even in a situation where you can't run. Even without dreamtower, you can't realistically run from a woodchem who doesn't want you to. -woods get free vine (which is faster web enchant), and using it and shieldstun can 100% prevent you from leaving a room without using tumble or leap already. That's just not helpful. It's another situation, however, where buffing woodchems to make their ostensible intended kills work would make them totally and absurdly op and unfun for everyone. They're at a stuck point without new mechanics.
For some reason part of the discussion is reminding me vaguely of Abathur and his "jump into an ally and be awesome mechanics" mixed with a bit of dystopias matrix.
On topic, a weird question but could sleep do something different in Nirvana? I've just noticed it not functioning there come up a few times
Well, IC you are already alseep if you are there, so it doesn't make sense you could actually sleep AGAIN while there.
Maybe have sleep there be an allergy thing?
THus eveyone get's allergies for 1v1. Then if/when druids lose allergies outside of that, it's not as big a deal(limit the stacking so that druids can't get too much of an advantage if they still have allergies outside of DW).
Maybe call it Tiredness, or Fugue to be more sleep themed, have it not stack with regular allergies. (So druids can do one or the other but doing both is waste of time/resources).
Well, IC you are already alseep if you are there, so it doesn't make sense you could actually sleep AGAIN while there.
Maybe have sleep there be an allergy thing?
THus eveyone get's allergies for 1v1. Then if/when druids lose allergies outside of that, it's not as big a deal(limit the stacking so that druids can't get too much of an advantage if they still have allergies outside of DW).
Maybe call it Tiredness, or Fugue to be more sleep themed, have it not stack with regular allergies. (So druids can do one or the other but doing both is waste of time/resources).
Yeah, I was just thinking that because it doesn't do anything, utilizing it in new and terrifying ways in the dream could be cool.
It's mechanically not allowed. I assume because you would exist both in and outside of the arena at the same time, which might make for really wonky situations. Also, I'm pretty sure arenas count as their own plane, so you'd end up crossing planes while in dreamform. I'm told that's a no-no from a coding standpoint.
It's mechanically not allowed. I assume because you would exist both in and outside of the arena at the same time, which might make for really wonky situations. Also, I'm pretty sure arenas count as their own plane, so you'd end up crossing planes while in dreamform. I'm told that's a no-no from a coding standpoint.
Oh, I forgot I asked that question, though you were responding to my other post.
oh, also... I know it's probably a pain but can there be like a mini-nirvana for arenas? It'd be nice to be able to actually use it for like... spars and stuff to practice.
This report changes a lot around, but adds very little new functionality or skills to the skillset. What it does is create a framework for future skills to be added and balanced, while cleaning up and tying off some mechanical loose ends. There are massive numbers of really interesting non-combat utility additions that can be made to Nirvana dreamweaving, I've held myself back by making any of those suggestions here. Only two new skills are added, several are removed.
In this report, I finish the job of stripping out antiquated and unfun sleep locking mechanics. These only worked for Druids and only with some bending over backwards, and weren't really functional in group scenarios. Some of the old offensive outliers get toned down (memoryloss notably), and dreamjack is made dramatically (dramatically) more difficult. In exchange, the skillset gains more utility than it's ever had, and a potential route for any of the specs to travel towards an eternalsleep. In time, alternative effects like beast (that can't be used at the same time) that work in synergy primarily with each individual spec can be worked out.
One notable thing is that I've removed most of a dreambody's ability to affect corporeal combat directly. You can still flick motes, but sap (the damage effect) and haunt (random mental affs) have been removed. Mote flicking is a bit easier sans-puncture, but the link requirement means you can't instantly change targets and the mote limiting mechanic means you can't spam. Most of a dreambody's future involvement in combat is meant to be prototyped in the mindsoothe change listed below - as an exclusive 'aura' tied into linking to a friend or foe. You take yourself out of the direct field of combat, so you shouldn't be able to greatly affect that combat with relative impunity.
Before reading: Scratch all previous suggestions. I will repeat any that need repeating.
Dreammotes
This is the biggest and most important set of changes. It introduces a fun resource mechanic that encourages dreamweaver roleplaying and Nirvana involvement, and also provides an alternative balancing lever unique to the skillset. Like flesh, it's not intended that you ever run out of motes once you have a high skill level and spend a little time managing your mote generation. The purpose is not to prevent dramatic combos with power skills, but to institute a skillset-specific cooldown-type mechanic.
Remove precrafting and storing affliction motes.
Remove punctured aura and the puncture skill.
Casting a mote while in dreambody requires that you be linked to your target.
Dreamcatchers now allows DWs to make dreamcatchers from comms
Dreamcatchers can be set up in rooms by anyone (made stationary, like hanging a painting but without the terrain restriction). Sleeping in a room with a dreamcatcher does two things:
You recover tiredness faster (like a sleepingbag)
Each dream tick charges the dreamcatcher with up to 10 motes
Stationary dreamcatchers can be empowered according to the skill level of a dreamweaver to hold more motes.
Dreamweavers can harvest motes, move them between dreamcatchers.
Dreamweavers may focus on a dreamcatcher while in dreambody (DB) or Nirvana to generate motes. Some actions in Nirvana also generate motes (influencing, hunting, the quest).
Affliction motes (Stupidity, Memoryloss, etc.) are cast with the dreamcast syntax (as now), using up one generic mote on each cast. The dreamweaver pulls dreamstuff out of their catcher and aspects it in the fling message.
New Skill: Anchor (learned after control?)- The dreamweaver can anchor a dreamcatcher in Nirvana, linking that dreamcatcher to a specific spot, where a dreamcatcher installation is made (a big dreamcatcher on a tower type thing). Can only be placed in the main Nirvana area, not the citadel or narcoponatrix. They can then pour in or take out motes, and it will passively accrue them a la fleshmounds.
When traveling to Nirvana via any method, you may append ANCHOR to land at your anchor instead of a random room. If dreamjacking, your victim will come to the same room if you anchor.
Passive motes will 'pour' from the anchor into the linked dreamcatcher, if it is below cap.
New Mechanic: Materialization - Casting a 'summon' (dreamblade, tower, beast, and any others added) outside of Nirvana has a mote 'upkeep' cost. You have to commit x number of motes out of your maximum into continuing an effect. This functions similarly to psionic channels in that you must lock yourself into your choices, which preclude you from casting other abilities. If you use up your maximum weight you can't cast or use any new mote effects (including affliction motes) Costs are included in each skill and are tentative. There are no materialization costs in Nirvana.
Recap: You have a dreamcatcher that holds up to 10 motes (like power) and recharges at a slow rate (like power), but that functionally has an unlimited reserve. When you commit motes to a materalization effect, it reduces your maximum dreamcatcher motes by that much. When you decommit, your maximum goes back up and the motes regenerate from your anchor as usual. For example, you cast tower, comitting 8 motes. This means that your dreamcatcher can only hold 2 at maximum. You don't have enough motes at once to commit to a dreamblade! You dismiss the tower and your maximum returns to 10. You still need to regenerate at least one mote (up to 3) to spend and commit those three, dropping your max down to 7.
Effect Collapsing/Skillset cleanup
Dreamweaving has skills that can only be used in corporeal, or dreambody, or Nirvana. This is needlessly complex, effects can be collapsed together and the majority of non-phase-dependent-utility skills should be usable on every plane. The Nirvana advantage will not be additional skills, but reduced/eliminated costs and cooldowns.
Allow Burst to be used in corporeal against out of phase enemies (like psyblade). Delete sap. If bursting while in dreambody or Nirvana, you regain health equivalent to the current sap drain.
Add a sever syntax to Burst (like psyblade).
Remove puncture (as mentioned)
Fold Sleepsense (see anyone sleeping on your plane when cast) down into the DreamSearch (DB/Nir scent). Dreamsearching while in corporeal body takes 2-3 seconds eq, locates sleeping people on plane and any dreambodies in the area. In dreambody or nirvana, has no eq cost (As now).
Make Control passive, instead of requiring a command to raise.
Merge Tether and Link. Tether becomes an enhanced syntax of Link (LINK <person> TETHER) with the same requirements as now. TETHER WALK remains as is (instant travel and link to tethered ally)
Remove haunt for now. I think that it should be repurposed into a summon later, but for now it serves little purpose.
General Changes
Halve Memloss blackout length
Remove the sleeping tick on sleepmist.
Change Hallucinations to deal the Hallucination affliction.
Bring back the Illusion skill, for roleplaying as a dreambody
Change the regen maluses to ego in dreambody.
Remove the malus for dreamweavers in Nirvana.
Targeting a dreamweaver with a sever skill will sever any active links they have after 2-3 hits (like severing a gem).
Change Mindsoothe: Instead of being a cast, mindsoothe becomes a dreambody only effect that passively heals a random lucidity affliction from the person the DW is linked and tethered to.
Remove sleep req on eternalsleep. There is no reason for an 8p 50% ego instakill to have additional requirements anymore.
New Stuff Fixes/Additions
New Skill: Dreamjaunt - allows bringing mutually allied non-dreamweavers into Nirvana
Give a message to the DW when anyone they have dreamjaunted or dreamjacked leaves Nirvana. Alternately, add a toggle that informs the DW anytime anyone enters or leaves Nirvana.
Regularize dreamjacking duration. Suggested time is equivalent to an arena spar.
Add a syntax to escape Nirvana once dreamjacked: WAKE [FORCE]. This eats 25% of your max ego and is a channeled ability. Don't do this if the dreamweaver is engaged with you.
Allow all dream summons in corporeal via the Materialization mechanic. In Nirvana, each has an enhanced effect.
Add unforceable dispel syntaxes for all dream summons.
Make Tower fade if the caster leaves the room - changing elevations does not count.
Dreamblade and Dreambeast should track with their target and last until dispelled. Can only track through sleepmisted rooms in corporeal, dissipate if they cannot track to the target within a tick.
Change dreamblade to affect all three vitals for 200 damage (less than now)
Tower:
Reduce cost to 3p
Change to gravity effect on room and adjacent rooms when cast outside of Nirvana. In Nirvana, it closes exits one radius out, instead of locking to a single room (locks you to current and adjacent rooms).
Dreamjack
Dreamjacking requires and commits a full 10 motes
You must be linked to the victim before dreamjacking
Dreamjacking is a 12s channel on the target, with second-person message ticks every 3 seconds in between (at cast, 3s, 6s, 9s).
An eye sigil doubles the length of remaining ticks
Changing areas during the dreamjacking interrupts it, as does the link not being present at any tick or the completion.
There are a variety of things that could be done with Beast, and I do not know what direction to take it. Random mote flinging is just not very useful, making it more reliable ticking mote flinging just makes it mote embedding x2. All in all, it plays like a worse version of phantasms - phantasm.
In general, dreamweaving will be gaining more battlefield control utility through tower and vitals pressure via sleepmist and blade, but losing the afflicting and hindering present in the sleep attacks - deepsleep is gone, void is gone, and this report removes a passive sleep tick. With that in mind, I think it would be helpful to have beast perform with some kind of hindering or afflicting. A few ideas:
On command moting - Give it a cooldown/balance, can be ORDERED to attack the target with either a chosen-at-cast mote, a random mote, or a freely chosen mote. Faster nirvana balance.
Stacking hinder - chases the target, the further they move from the casting location the higher chance the beast catches up and knocks them over. Move fail chance that off balances. Can pull target towards cast location in Nirvana.
Aurics - The beast creates an effect like egovice or manabarbs at random on the target for a few seconds out of every 10. Punishes you for losing/using vitals to help pressure ego for eternalsleep.
Reverse auric - taking health damage for a few seconds out of every 10 makes the beast attack your ego as well.
Haunt replacement - deals random affs, but from a different list than the motes.
An effect that punishes your vitals (Especially ego) depending on how many affs from a list you have, similar to Carillon Knell.
Still not a fan of forcing someone to fight in a meld as long as the only cure for allergies is leaving the meld. I think you're asking for too much.
Dreamtower will let you go to adjacent rooms (still can be forced to stay in the meld) but with a gravity effect? Phantomspheres? Alleriges? You're making this even stronger.
Dreamjacking is only prevented by leaving the area? What? This is crazy too, you shouldn't have to leave the area to avoid dreamjacking.
Leaving Nirvana is a channeled action that costs 55% ego? Didn't you try to put up a report where you claimed the biggest issue with dreamjack was that you could remove a combatant from group combat and just run around? Leaving this as the only option to leave Nirvana with this kind of cost just elevates that issue even more.
This is crazy. I can't believe you're even suggesting some of these things.
You will be forced to fight 1v1 in a tough meld if you fail to avoid dreamjacking. Luckily these changes make it trivially easy to avoid dreamjacking if you aren't utterly bad (or want to go into Nirvana for the fight). Avoid being dreamjacked.
No, dreamjacking is not only prevented by leaving the area. If you got dreamjacked, you got hit with link and stayed still for up to 24 seconds without anyone in your group (or yourself) hitting sever or leaving the initial casting area while the dreamweaver does nothing to prevent you from doing any of those things, yes. Keep in mind that skills that can sever include dreamweaving burst, psionics psyblade, low/high magic kether/violet, and transmology hands. In any kind of group scenario, you will have at least two people who have one of these skills, bam - instantly done. Because starting a dreamjack requires a commit of 10, the dreamweaver will need to wait for all of their motes to regen before they can try again - 80 seconds. You aren't meant to be trying to avoid it by leaving the area, that's just a fail safe for singleton raiders who don't have one of the aforementioned skills to escape getting dreamjacked, it's a nicety. You can only dreamjack people who declare you on prime, which means that this will only be functionally useable on the upper planes and bubbles. All of those areas are rather small and require you to have a ship present (functionally), popping onto a ship for a maximum of three seconds is so hard, I guess? That feature can totally be removed. The current status quo is that you get sucked to Nirvana no matter what you do.
The intent on the 55% ego thing is that you can't just leave Nirvana immediately whenever you feel like it at no risk and no cost. You done goofed if you got sucked into Nirvana (see the above), and you need to tough it out. On further thought, it may be alright (with the increased costs) to simply make it a decently long channeled command. You will have no ego regen and there won't be a sleep requirement on eternalsleep, so that might be long enough to get you down to 50% ego and kill you if you don't break the channel. I've done a little back of the napkin math, reducing that penalty to ~25% should create the scenario I just described while still allowing you ample time to break the channel and cure up if they start smacking you. Again the current status quo is that you can't escape Nirvana period. It's not a big ask to make waking up difficult, because it's not an ask period, it's a give.
This is crazy, it's like you're not even reading the post.
I edited the post some for clarity, changed numbers on WAKE FORCE, and have bumped up the dreamjacking time to 12 seconds for a nice even 4 ticks. That was bothering me.
EDIT: Hey, it was already 12 seconds. No wonder it was niggling me that it was 10 seconds, it wasn't.
EDIT2: Aetolia has a dreamjacking esque (But totally consensual) skill that works like a debate crossed with a construct mech battle. The condition for escaping is that you have to go through with a long channel while not curing any of the mana damage you're being delt by the other 'combatant'. This would work on similar principles. I could pretty easily whip up a mechanic similar to psycombat for dreamweaving, but Estarra said she wanted to keep the 1v1 idea if possible.
EDIT3: I'll actually do that now, before I go to sleep.
Comments
Also, some way needs to be figured out to give guardians and wiccans some kind of fighting chance in Nirvana. I suspect that 'just let them summon their ents' is not on the table, but I'll suggest it. Other suggestions are welcome.
Ixion tells you, "// I don't think anyone else had a clue, amazing form."
I guess I have to ask, what's the reality of this working? Especially with the earlier comment about some users needing mobility to survive, let alone the issue that if it's just a random room in nirvana they're locked into (or a room they can't access without dreamjacking) you're most likely going to be dumping yourself into a room without a meld.
Personally, for an arena change, as mentioned before, i'd be interested in seeing a sub-realm for each of the orgs which would allow the dreamweaver to prepare it beforehand and would ensure that if the dreamweaver is prepared (which is the expectation that it would be balanced around) then you will always be dropped into an active demesne with the dreamweaver with the option to run or fight for both sides, though the dreamweaver still has the option to lock down with the tower
Of course, if we just made a dreamweaver version of the greenseeing proposal that'd be cool too :P /jokesbutalsoIreallywantthatskill
And while yes, not every tert needs to be viable for every strategy, I think that an end goal is that every skillset (I mean combination of primary, secondary, and tertiary) should be viable in some way.
I agree with the comments about forcing 1v1s being either not practical or not fair, and raised the point (to Estarra) that only Druids are really kitted to be able to fight 1v1 with dreamweaving, and even then - not dreamweaving in the context of no sleep attacks (which is the case in Nirvana). Estarra said that she really wants to preserve the 1v1 duel aspect. Specifically, I asked if it's intended for DW to be bad outside of Nirvana ganks and was told basically "yes, that is the intent". I will provide a log of that convo to any Envoy who pokes me, and ask Estarra if she's okay with me just posting it - admins have been touchy about things said on Envoys in the past and I'm so done with it.
My ideas beyond the basic fixes I outlined in the previous post sort of follow that, but stay with the 1v1 business. Should I change gears? I think that we can leave in the 1v1 ganking ability, if we make it suitably difficult to pull off in combat. It's also possible to make dreamjacking do a kind of Minigame like Lerad suggested, but without the use of the user's skillsets per se. Something like a debate, but with its own rules and commands. More like a construct mecha battle than a debate. That would again remove the 'ganking to 1v1' portion.
There was some mention of a secondary resource pool being possible for Dreamweavers. Do you guys thing it's worth persuing something like alternate-track power costs for DW's 'summons'? In other words, not momentum but anti momentum. You get 10 points of energy that recharge x per second alongside power costs.
On topic, a weird question but could sleep do something different in Nirvana? I've just noticed it not functioning there come up a few times
Before reading: Scratch all previous suggestions. I will repeat any that need repeating.
Dreammotes
Effect Collapsing/Skillset cleanup
General Changes
New Stuff Fixes/Additions