Those three are all damaging affs, even if they're not great in that respect (vomiting took 31 seconds, then 50 seconds, to tick on Marcella for about 700 damage). Dizziness doesn't really fit even in that respect, though. I think rigormortis is just for the "let's drop another plague aff in there" thing.
Still, you're going to be able to clear all those affs before you get a tick. The 3 affs on fumes are dizziness (melancholic, kombu, focus), pox (liniment), vomiting (choleric). So you can sip choleric, eat kombu, apply liniment. Even healthleech is sanguine/horehound and rigormortis is marjoram, meaning you can pick and choose which aff to choose even if you have all the rebound affs on you at fumes hit, and good luck to sticking those affs to the nuke hit (because we can't give any of them from our other skills, barring poisons/beastmastery and maybe dizziness from phantasms reality if you want to rely on a hidden random aff on a random timer. Oh, and contagion for pox/rigormortis if you're a lich).
No, the main thing will just be additional passive damage/bleeding.
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
The thing with affs that do damage on a secondary tic is that the secondary tic never happens. I bet if you asked all the players what pox did, 98% of them would have no idea. I mean, sometimes you'll see a fluke masochism tic when someone is stuck in aeon or something, but these affs never see the light of day ever. I'm not exaggerating. These affs are not used by anyone willingly, in any scenario. It's just really a strange selection of really bad affs.
Maybe something for envoys to look at would be these afflictions and making them do a tic upon hit, or perhaps a delayed application so that they see some benefit? At the same time, I can see serious issues with either of those choices. I still think something can be done.
Magnum and nozzle. There's a missing skill (fuse, possibly embed) that doesn't show up because I'm not runes/dreamweaving.
Speaking of:
magnum craft
Quickly forming the bars of iron into a collection of thin tubes, you twist and stretch them into place, both interconnected and jumbled in construction. You connect the entire apparatus with additional tubing to the bottom of each of your iron tanks, forming the dreaded magnum blastworks, and allowing your ferrous, chemical and toxic fumes a path to mix at various places within the blastworks. After fashioning the necessary grips and handholds, you finally hang the magnum blastworks in its appointed place from your iron tanks.
magnum craft nozzle
Pulling and stretching the iron bars together, you fashion an oversized nozzle to direct and concentrate the flow of fumes from your magnum blastworks. Connecting a smaller tube to the side of the nozzle and attaching it to the taint fumes compartment in your iron tanks, you fit the nozzle to a lever at the tip of the magnum blastworks tubing. Testing the lever mechanism a few times, you imagine the effect the added taint fumes will have on those who stand in the way of the relentless earth.
The dreaded magnum blastworks consists of a collection of thin iron tubes which have been stretched and twisted into an interconnected and jumbled collection. Several tubes run away from what appears to be the back of the blastworks, allowing Geochemancers to attach it to their iron tanks. A sturdy, square iron handle rises from its top, so that the blastworks will lie along the lower side of its user's forearm, extending well in front of the position of the hand in order to prevent damage due to accidental explosions at the front of the blastworks. The front simply ends in a single, much larger iron tube which has been flared outward to allow the fumes to be expelled to explosive effect.
It has 250 months of usefulness left.
It is strangely weightless.
It bears the distinctive mark of Akyaevin n'Lochli.
You swing your magnum blastworks from its hook and point it at Revan, the ferrous, chemical and toxic fumes expelled from your iron tanks mixing deep within its tangled tubing. The magnum blastworks rattles ominously as an explosive plume of caustic fumes and iron shrapnel billows forward, leaving a dense and sickly haze surrounding Revan.
You flip down the nozzle on your magnum blastworks, expelling taint fumes from your iron tanks to transform and focus the caustic blast. An explosive plume of black fumes billows forward, leaving a dark haze surrounding Revan.
Viravain, Lady of the Thorns shouts, "And You would seize Me? Fool! I am the Glomdoring! I am the Wyrd, and beneath the cloak of Night, the shadows of the Silent stir!"
Lusternia is usually a theme first kinda game. I personally like that although it does usually mean there needs to be some follow up balancing.
Back to topic, with the affs having no real reliable tert sources and most of them giving secondary messages. [oh and the reason pox doesn't always give a message on tic is due to one of my reports, so you're welcome - drops mic and walks of stage]
I think tweaking the trans skill some would be more productive than trying to manage the affs. (no wonder they didn't make carillonknell asphyx!)
Right now it gives a reduction to asphyx dmp, does about 600 damage should you use the hold breathe skill and then gives a chance for the secondary effect to trigger on asphyx damage which gives ~150 bleeding and a random plague aff. These effects decrease over time, probably the dmp reduction and chance for secondary effect but not sure.
Overall tert synergy is pretty low. Might get the most from TK with throwing in choke for a second asphyx hit and dagger and forcefeed for crazy unreliable poison chance. Although, if runes can have affs hit with magnum blasts that might be something to look into. (afaik hasn't been tested yet)
It seems to me that this skillset is screaming for a BlackPlague type effect while in the same room as the geoborg, giving plague affs a chance to re-assert themselves when cured. It's pretty much the only way for plague affs to potentially mean anything, since they are otherwise cured on different balances.
That, plus replacing Dizziness with Epilepsy, could actually give the skillset some decent hindering, and a decent chance of getting off an empowered bomb.
Lusternia is usually a theme first kinda game. [...]
I'm starting to notice that and it's actually bugging the hell out of me. In a certain other IRE if I look at the three guild skills I can almost immediately tell you one or two kill strategies. Those guild skills tend to supplement each other and they are built around an affliction or damage offense (usually) - preferably even with a plan B in place.
But if I look at my current guild skills in Lusternia I see few ways in which they actually supplement each other. It generally feels... a lot more random. Of course it's harder here, with tertiary and now primary choices and such. Its just bugging me as I prefer to be challenged as a player and in finding a strategy, and not in betting my luck on an rng throw.
It seems to me that this skillset is screaming for a BlackPlague type effect while in the same room as the geoborg, giving plague affs a chance to re-assert themselves when cured. It's pretty much the only way for plague affs to potentially mean anything, since they are otherwise cured on different balances.
Unblockable blackdeath? Not a good idea.
You realize that with manabarbs and egovice 5 plague aff carillonknell can hit for upwards of 5k damage, passive, right? Which is fine because that -never- happens outside of someone being afk with their system off, in part because there aren't any guilds with unblockable blackdeath. Not to mention adding in an extra gabillion plague affs into the equation would mean mag in general would steamroll the entire basin.
That, plus replacing Dizziness with Epilepsy, could actually give the skillset some decent hindering, and a decent chance of getting off an empowered bomb.
To get an empowered bomb you need a way to give hidden affs that don't have a secondary message. Fumes are not hidden and there is only a 1/5 chance to give a hidden epi through a contagion hit. Also, epi is a plague aff so that and pox together would be a lot o' plague.
It's a tough one to balance. Adding even more plague affs then they already generate though will likely generate excessive synergy. With the ease of their curing spaming them is really the only way to go but in doing that there is a fine line between just enough and omgwtfbbq.
It might even turn out to be too much as it is. Too early to tell on that one though.
You realize that with manabarbs and egovice 5 plague aff carillonknell can hit for upwards of 5k damage, passive, right? Which is fine because that -never- happens outside of someone being afk with their system off, in part because there aren't any guilds with unblockable blackdeath. Not to mention adding in an extra gabillion plague affs into the equation would mean mag in general would steamroll the entire basin.
I'm aware; clearly you wouldn't want a full power version of BlackDeath if it was going to be unblockable; half strength (or less) would still allow the plague affs to actually be able to stick though. Otherwise, I just don't see a geoborg being able to stick anything; nearly all of it's affs (and all of it's dangerous ones) cure on different balances.I'm not suggesting that all the bomb afflictions be plague affs, that would probably stack too well, but 3/5 doesn't seem unreasonable.
To get an empowered bomb you need a way to give hidden affs that don't have a secondary message. Fumes are not hidden and there is only a 1/5 chance to give a hidden epi through a contagion hit. Also, epi is a plague aff so that and pox together would be a lot o' plague.
It's a tough one to balance. Adding even more plague affs then they already generate though will likely generate excessive synergy. With the ease of their curing spaming them is really the only way to go but in doing that there is a fine line between just enough and omgwtfbbq.
Again, aware of how the mechanics work. I think that adding a failure chance to the plague affs would bypass the need to make the afflictions hidden. As to synergy: if the big worry is that a geoborg and caco could work together to passively inflict 5k damage on a room, you're honestly worrying a hypothetical. To do so would require the bard to somehow stick manabard/egovice on multiple people at once, while still striping deafness so his song ticks on them.In small groups, it might be pretty powerful given focus fire, but no more so that a pair of warriors or TK mages.In large groups, it shouldn't be much more of a problem than the bomb skills are in general.
I think you're overestimating the "synergy" of plague affs in general. Most of the Mag guilds have very little, if any return on opponents afflicted with plague affs: the only real worry are the cacos. Of course, since it's not practical to maintain manabarbs/egovice on a room, at absolute worst you would be seeing a Caco be able to hit a room for less than 2k every song tick (and almost certainly not even that, if the geoborg BlackDeath was half strength or less); dangerous, but hardly gamebreaking.
Yes, theme coming before mechanics makes for very tough balancing. It's not like it's impossible to design something that is both interesting -and- useful. The newer city's mage, guardian, and even bard guilds are testament to that. I wonder what changed between then and these specs.
RE: Geochem -
Looks like this spec is the weakest city spec so far. The trans skill and bashing skills are pretty sweet though. The former is way better than crimson moss at least.
Yes, theme coming before mechanics makes for very tough balancing. It's not like it's impossible to design something that is both interesting -and- useful. The newer city's mage, guardian, and even bard guilds are testament to that. I wonder what changed between then and these specs.
RE: Geochem -
Looks like this spec is the weakest city spec so far. The trans skill and bashing skills are pretty sweet though. The former is way better than crimson moss at least.
Just gonna say that crimson moss has saved my little tree butt enough times for me to really appreciate it. It may not be the best thing ever, but when a bleed bomb hits a few people, you can certainly feel it working.
Yes, theme coming before mechanics makes for very tough balancing. It's not like it's impossible to design something that is both interesting -and- useful. The newer city's mage, guardian, and even bard guilds are testament to that. I wonder what changed between then and these specs.
RE: Geochem -
Looks like this spec is the weakest city spec so far. The trans skill and bashing skills are pretty sweet though. The former is way better than crimson moss at least.
What's important to realize is that the new city mage, guardian and bard guilds are variants of an old, tried-and-true series of mechanics that function around a basic premise that's long been a part of Lusternia (and people still complain about them!). The newer -chem and -wood specs are pretty different in terms of how they operate, however. Still, I'm sure with some time and work, we can bring the new mage venue up to snuff without abandoning the underlying mechanics and design.
If part of that means considering how plague acts behave, then maybe that's something that needs to be looked at.
What's important to realize is that the new city mage, guardian and bard guilds are variants of an old, tried-and-true series of mechanics that function around a basic premise that's long been a part of Lusternia (and people still complain about them!). The newer -chem and -wood specs are pretty different in terms of how they operate, however. Still, I'm sure with some time and work, we can bring the new mage venue up to snuff without abandoning the underlying mechanics and design.
If part of that means considering how plague acts behave, then maybe that's something that needs to be looked at.
It's just something you have to be careful with.
Giving Mag more plague affs is like giving Glom more bleeding. On its own it is really only helpful in large quantities but when put into context of inter org synergy it can lead to balance problems.
Giving geochems a fountain of plague affs just to have to turn around an nerf all of Mag is not ideal.
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
I just think there's a disconnect.
On the one side is the theme of these new skillsets (which is great and the admin of Lusty, namely Estarra, has always brought a brilliant and unique vision to Lusternia. It's truly the only stand alone IRE from my experience) and admin knowledge regarding what these afflictions do.
On the other side is the actual application of these afflictions and skills. Like bloodmoss is great flavour, but it really doesn't have any place in actual combat. When are you getting hit enough to need extra health regen WHILE doing enough bleeding damage offensively for it to matter? Kind of never. Geochem is a bit of a mish mosh of afflictions that are thematically very appropriate, and follow a cohesive theme of passive damage. The application of these affs is that they don't actually do passive damage in real time combat.
Which is why we get this pendulum of viability between the wood skills and then Aerochem. One is relegated to generic shieldstun and flailing about helplessly while the other is really powerful and viable with unique skills and affs that are universally useful. You can even just compare trans skills and see there's a huge disparity between them. Aerochem have a great passive group splitter, while Wildewoods get minor boosts form an animal and Wyrdenwood gets awkward blood healing.
I think the Wyrdenwood report needs to be pretty robust. Lots to work on and fix.
I agree with Celina: there is a major disconnect between the way the administrators think the mechanics of their game work, and the way they work in practice. This isn't really their fault; their position as admins requires a degree of separation between themselves and the progress of player strategies and systems. However, I thin it might be time to edit the long standing "no players allowed" policy in new skill development. That's not to say that skillsets should be posted on the forums to be argued over and critiqued, but the admins should consider making three or so players (preferably ones of the archetype being worked on) privvy to the mechanical design (you could easily obfuscate the fluff) before the skillset enters the coding stage, in order to point out any glaring issues (and there are always glaring issues) with the skillset before they are released to general anger/dismay. Of course, these privvy players should be sworn to secrecy until the skillset is revealed, as to preserve the surprise for the other players.
Honestly, ruining the surprise for a few players is way preferable to releasing six skillsets with hugely varying power levels and thoroughly problematic design.
Edit: This doesn't mean that the privvy players would or should be able to dictate the development of the skillset; they would simply see it, make observations and suggestions, then allow the admins to finish the skillset in secrecy.
...the admins should consider making three or so players (preferably ones of the archetype being worked on) privvy to the mechanical design (you could easily obfuscate the fluff) before the skillset enters the coding stage, in order to point out any glaring issues....
We've tried that before but the results were pretty horrible.
Actually, I would go further and say it should be taken all the way. Imperian starts posting new skill info pretty much on day one of design, in the beginning with little teasers about what the primary mechanic/flavor will be and later with full AB pages (generally over a month before the skill is released!). They've still had day 0 patches necessary for a few things that made it all the way to the game with big problems, but on the whole it's been a very good thing for balance; it opens a discourse between players and staff and makes sure that an idea will ultimately be viable before people dump weeks coding it and $600+ learning it out of the gate.
That said, I understand that Imperian is also "the combat IRE", and that surprise is actually more of a factor here. However, towards that end, it's entirely possible for the players who value surprise to not open the thread; it's not like they loose anything besides getting the sneak peek, and they'll still have the opportunity to voice their reactions after the skill comes out. Furthermore, knowing what the skills *do* doesn't definitively tell you where they come from plot-wise. Even knowing what they were, the release of skills in Imperian was always surprising to all of us, and in fact drummed up some very interesting RP in the space between the release on the forums and the release in-game, as everyone with the skills wanted to take part in every single event in case it was "the one".
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Pretty sure they let players design the original monks, and yes, those results were horrible. Though part of that was letting Revan design anything.
I can see why the admin would be wary of trying that again.
Comments
The magnum is their staff equivalent.
And yeah, most of the specs started with affs pulled from a thematically shaped hat.
That, plus replacing Dizziness with Epilepsy, could actually give the skillset some decent hindering, and a decent chance of getting off an empowered bomb.
That is all.
I just think there's a disconnect.
On the one side is the theme of these new skillsets (which is great and the admin of Lusty, namely Estarra, has always brought a brilliant and unique vision to Lusternia. It's truly the only stand alone IRE from my experience) and admin knowledge regarding what these afflictions do.
On the other side is the actual application of these afflictions and skills. Like bloodmoss is great flavour, but it really doesn't have any place in actual combat. When are you getting hit enough to need extra health regen WHILE doing enough bleeding damage offensively for it to matter? Kind of never. Geochem is a bit of a mish mosh of afflictions that are thematically very appropriate, and follow a cohesive theme of passive damage. The application of these affs is that they don't actually do passive damage in real time combat.
Which is why we get this pendulum of viability between the wood skills and then Aerochem. One is relegated to generic shieldstun and flailing about helplessly while the other is really powerful and viable with unique skills and affs that are universally useful. You can even just compare trans skills and see there's a huge disparity between them. Aerochem have a great passive group splitter, while Wildewoods get minor boosts form an animal and Wyrdenwood gets awkward blood healing.
I think the Wyrdenwood report needs to be pretty robust. Lots to work on and fix.
Honestly, ruining the surprise for a few players is way preferable to releasing six skillsets with hugely varying power levels and thoroughly problematic design.
Edit: This doesn't mean that the privvy players would or should be able to dictate the development of the skillset; they would simply see it, make observations and suggestions, then allow the admins to finish the skillset in secrecy.
That said, I understand that Imperian is also "the combat IRE", and that surprise is actually more of a factor here. However, towards that end, it's entirely possible for the players who value surprise to not open the thread; it's not like they loose anything besides getting the sneak peek, and they'll still have the opportunity to voice their reactions after the skill comes out. Furthermore, knowing what the skills *do* doesn't definitively tell you where they come from plot-wise. Even knowing what they were, the release of skills in Imperian was always surprising to all of us, and in fact drummed up some very interesting RP in the space between the release on the forums and the release in-game, as everyone with the skills wanted to take part in every single event in case it was "the one".
Pretty sure they let players design the original monks, and yes, those results were horrible. Though part of that was letting Revan design anything.
I can see why the admin would be wary of trying that again.