How about "Intimidated", it explains why the are in a state that they can be taken advantage of and moves it away from confusing it with being weak to certain damage types. Only problem is that it might remind people of the D&D skill too much.
How about "Intimidated", it explains why the are in a state that they can be taken advantage of and moves it away from confusing it with being weak to certain damage types. Only problem is that it might remind people of the D&D skill too much.
This sounds like a great idea to me, too. I like the name "vulnerable" just fine, and I think the new UI makes it pretty clear that this vulnerable state is linked to abilities that damage vulnerable targets.
One thing I am still totally unclear on: How long does the vulnerable state actually last? Only as long as the icon is above the mob's head or for some period of time after that or until the mob is damaged or what? My problem is that I'm not good at processing fast flashing icons or numbers, so I tend to become aware of the vulnerable popup some time after it happened and then I'm never sure whether the mob is still going to be vulnerable when my ability comes off its cooldown in yet another couple seconds. So, having a flashing/changing icon similar to the combat refresh would help me too.
I think the name "Vulnerable" is fine, and so is "Off-guard". This change can happen any time before release I guess, if ever.
Adding some clue to icons for abilities that can affect vulnerable target is a good idea, unfortunately it's probably hard to implement when fighting several targets because only some of them would be affected.
If you plan to add to the interface a list of mobs that have you on aggro (with for instance some way to select them), then you could display vulnerable targets with a special tag and put the same tag on corresponding abilities.
What causes the Vulnerable state? The only thing it means is that abilities marked with the same give more dmg and nothing else right? I have been playing for couple years and have seen it many times, and I know there are some abilities which deal more dmg. But not once have I used any of them specifically or focused on what it actually does
I was playing around with the idea of having vulnerable mobs change colors, similar to the way that stunned ghosts turn white. However, that would probably look too weird.
I noticed last night that I have a tail ring that gives me "-5% vulnerability to psychic", so since "vulnerable" is used two different ways in the game it may be worth changing one naming convention or the other. I don't think the name is the main source of confusion here, though.
I found vulnerable really easy to understand the first time I saw a skill that had + dmg to vulnerable targets (At least for me, it did click). However, I almost never take advantage of that because there are very few abilities that guaranteed make a target vulnerable, and I'm not willing to save my one `or two + dmg when vulnerable abilities for those few times when it seems to randomly happen.
The term "Vulnerable" fits pretty much perfectly. However, I feel the resistances like what Tagamogi described should be renamed to "weakness", because he is right about it being confusing, and I'm pretty sure most games that don't say "+5% resistance to fire" would instead say "-5% weakness to fire"
Last edited by jacksin125; 02-22-2018 at 01:27 PM.
My two pennies worth is that the term vulnerable is alright.
The problem is noticing these effects, I think. When a mob goes vulnerable, it actually looks like it's angry to me to be honest, and I can't really tell the vulnerability stops, so I don't particularity make use of it so much.
This is off topic, but it took me at least 6+ weeks to work out what rage was all about and how it worked, again I sort of didn't notice this but kept getting rage..beat. I then proceeded to tell 4 - 5 other people about this important aspect because they didn't notice either, which is a shame, because I think it's a good mechanic and one I like.
The addition of a monster status icon *may* help with these things. The rage bar is there to see already, but most newer players are too busy with other things to worry about it. I found many a player that doesn't realize you get cursed by boss rage attacks.
The other thing to note is that it's hard to see how much of an affect using these things are. It takes a lot of working out; and perhaps that's part of the fun. Should one be de-raging or waiting for vulnerable mobs, or both, or stunning them or what not instead.
The only thing unclear to me was what's causing vulnerability in the first place.
Vulnerable is clear enough, I don't think there are any other words that effectively mean the same without being a mouthful. The flashing icon was never really clear enough during combat for me to pay much attention too, I'm usually looking at health/armor, skill bar. Watching for a completely random icon to popup on the actual enemy model as well will never be a mechanic I want to build around.
The mechanics of vulnerable is the main reason I completely ignore it. A completely uncontrollable rng that only is in effect for a few seconds? Yea I'm not going to waste gear mods or a skill slot just for that. Pure rng battle mechanics are simply not fun. Most of the skills I've tried have a pretty fixed rotation, in between cooldowns, heals, debuffs etc, if vulnerable pops I would not be able to do anything with it anyways. And I'm not going to sit there only hitting one skill button because I want to save the one that takes advantage of vulnerable just on the off chance it pops.
The simplest way to make it a more interesting mechanic I think would be to have more skills able to trigger it, and make it last longer. Then you could have a rotation which reliably triggers it and have other skills to exploit it, as well as it basically being a debuff that someone with the correct skills could use to help out their group. If it's rng it needs to be able to be triggered often enough to reliably know it will proc enough to use it (like crit in other games), otherwise there isn't any point in wasting rotation slots on a low proc chance.
Many of these comments already offer better suggestions than I could add. I do agree that "vulnerable" or "off-guard" sound equally good to me. Maybe some tweak to the graphic alert would help.
I happen to like the mechanic. No combat skills here above 40, partly because I like to keep trying out new skills and pairings. However, no matter which skill sets I'm using, I always keep the "extra damage to vulnerable" at the same location on my quick bars so I can hit it quickly when the opening arises. It really shortens the fight for me.