Update Discussion: March 2, 2023

[Sims]

The update notes are here: https://forum.projectgorgon.com/show...s-March-2-2023

Discussion is in this thread! But please remember to report any bugs through the in-game reporting system so we can track them.

[poulter]

Max-Enchanted Recipe change:
Whilst the rationale for removing the extra mod from max-crafted items (i.e. balancing) is understood & accepted, I would highlight that crafting (& the ability to create best-in-slot items) is a major reason why I have played this game so long (since 2015). Any diminution of that aspect would reduce my enjoyment & ultimately play-time. That is, a primary reason for me to play the game would be diminished.

I would therefore request that careful consideration to the crafting 'advantage' be undertaken & that it be replaced with functionality that is more balanced, but still constructive and meaningful.

I would also express concern that with the reduced number of players at high level currently active, that forming groups to run end-game dungeons (to obtain best-in-slot loot drops), is likely to be quite constrained and lead to a further drop in high-level players. If you can't craft, or loot, the 'best' items, then that becomes a dis-incentive to play at end-game.

[Celerity]

Combat XP Changes:
Overall idea is good. Forcing people out of their comfort zone is a good idea in this case, too often you hear about the noob who's lvl 40 and still farming in eltibule, but I think it's too strict with the xp dropoffs, especially for higher level mobs.

Take the example where you go to Kur Tower at lvl 40. On the wiki and everywhere else, Kur Tower is always advertised as a lvl 40 dungeon and most of the mobs there are indeed lvl 40. But now with these new changes, you get reduced exp from the lvl 50 skeletons that are mixed in with the lvl 40 zombies. This makes no sense, you're going to a dungeon at the recommended level and yet you can get punished for killing mobs that are too high level? In fact, the only level you get full exp from both the lvl 40 and 50 mobs, is when you're exactly 45 which just doesn't make any sense. At least make it so you get full exp from mobs 10 levels above, then it can drop off from there to 0 for mobs that are more than 25 levels above you like it is now.

I haven't reached this issue yet, but it also seems like with the bonus levels counting, getting the last few levels if they're past 90 seem to be an absolute nightmare since you only get reduced exp from mobs because they're all too low level.

Channeled Ability Changes
Glad to see it's being embraced as a mechanic. I really do think it is a balance issue though; most channeled abilities would be pretty bad if you couldn't use other abilities while channeling. Solo, they're practically impossible to get off unless you have a pet tanking, but 99% of pets are single target so wouldn't be able to keep aggro on multiple mobs. Even in groups, they get cancelled very often with aoes, so they're actually quite weak overall. Only priest manages to be ok and that's because of their insane burst evasion.

Weather Witching
It seems ok, I like the fancy animations at least, but from initial impressions I just think meh overall. It's an electricity/nature damage skill, so another spring fairy set, yet unusable by most of the skills that synergise with that. I don't really feel like it has too many good pairings, except possibly fairy magic, druid or warden through butterfly. The compatible skills is broken in the JSON though and warden isn't even listed which means you can't make warden/weather witching gear. The base damage seems to be quite weak and almost half of the abilities are channeled, which sounds like a nice gimmick, but in reality just makes the skill a pain to use and kinda junk solo, for the reasons mentioned above. Additionally, when Jack has been talking about warden nerfs, which is one of the only decent pairings, I just don't feel particularly thrilled about this skill whatsoever.

Max-Enchanted Recipe Change
Saved the spiciest for last.
I don't think it's a bad idea in and of itself, but I think things have been done in the wrong order and the full effects haven't been thought out and planned for.

Firstly, please don't make this change until AT LEAST lvl 90 comes out, if not a month or so afterwards. If the change is made before, then lots of people will be throwing gear they spent millions on down the drain. If we can replace the gear with lvl 90 gear first, then at least it won't feel like a waste.

Secondly, let's just examine the immediate effect of this change. Nobody has to craft max-enchanted yellows anymore, crafting purples instead is now the BIS and this means your required crafts have just been cut probably by a factor of 10. This means demand for crafting mats goes way down, now it's up to the reader's discretion if this is a negative or not, but most games aim towards making crafting stimulate the player economy and this is basically undoing that.

Next problem, what do end game players have to aim for now? Before you would reach the max level, obtain a basic set of gear from dungeons, then probably make a purple set, farm more dungeons, make money, level your crafting skills or buy mats to give to a crafter, make a full set of max-enchanted yellows, then finally you have your BIS, and it was a long term investment. New progression; you reach max level and get a crafter to make a full set of yellows immediately. The full yellow set is now more accessible than the full purple set was before this change due to the inevitable crash in crafting mats. You could probably even just skip the basic set of dungeon gear just with the money you get from the lvl 40 - 50 casino dailies. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that a new player could reasonably achieve a full set of BIS gear the same day they hit lvl 80 now. This works for closing the gap between players sure, but now there's nothing to aim for, no cool items to farm, no way to improve your account further. Boss gauntlet arguably could still drop some upgrades, but this is a temporary event which is going away.

So how does this get solved? Well the only way to make crafting the way it was before is to rescale the rarity of purples to give it the rarity that yellows have now, and then rescale everything else accordingly, making yellows some minute chance to craft. But if this change then goes through, the same thing has to happen to dungeon farming or crafting is the most irrelevant thing in the entire game, requiring a high barrier to entry, then actual costs to craft and worst results at the end of the day.
Why would you ever pick that over running a dungeon which has lower barrier to entry, actually gives you profit and makes you money rather than costing money and then would also give a higher chance for better gear?

So then does dungeon farmed gear also get a nerf? If so then suddenly the original aim which was closing the gap between the high end players and the new players has been lost somewhere along the way, because now it's harder for the new players to gear which makes everyone weaker in the game where new players are already struggling. I've seen people take 11 man groups into WT, I know that at least most of them are level 80 and they're still wiping in there and that's with at least 1 of them having max-enchanted yellows. What happens when you downgrade everyone's gear?

But maybe it shouldn't be changed, maybe it's fine that BIS is super easy to acquire, as it will simplify the balancing problem and make it easier to now individually balance the skills. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

[Mikhaila]

I agree with a lot of what Celerity said about crafting of max enchanted gear. I keep playing and trying out new combos of skills, and then grind to make a max crafted set for that skill. Have a dozen sets. Having those become trash would be horrible. I'm not taking those skills to 90 that fast and will need that gear.

I'm depressed at the thought of the change. Once I get a yellow of that gear, why do I need two? That's just something to sell or phlog.

What if you made a change that getting a yellow MC gives another effect from a small group of treasure effects? It can be rerolled using phlog similar to an endurance mod. Call it a 'crafting mod' or whatever. +20 crafting points was mentioned, that would be awesome. You could also have other effects such as cold resistance, increased metabolism, less effect from alcohol, +1 OOC sprint, etc. Make it a quality of life mod.

[Mikhaila]

Some questions come to mind with the addition of Wwitch.

First question is on the intended compatability for Wwitch. Is it a valid combo with Warden, as a butterfly, or not? Gear can't be made with Warden and Wwitch skills, currently.

Butterfly has nothing of it's own, and a limited amount of skills to work with. Warden is probably the best thing they have going. I've run unarmed/warden and mentalism/warden with butterfly.

It would be helpful to know if this is not intended to be an allowed combination of skills, since butterfly takes a panacea to negate.

Second question: If the reason gear can't be made because you don't want that skill combo to happen, why haven't you taken away druid/warden crafting? It's been said several times that druid/warden wasn't intended to be a skill combo, but about the only thing that is a problem to make are the deer/cow shoes.

Last question: Can we shift the ability of rabbits to use Ice Magic to the same slot as butterflies use to get Wwitch? There are a lot of problems with the Tiara. No recipes to make them, limited drops of the item means low chance of ever getting a good one. Two-legs have many better options for the head slot. Just change the tiara to that slot, have the same little halo if using it, and let bunnies get the same headgear as other ice mages. If not, put in recipes to make them and give them similar stats to the two-leg masks.

[Casalia]

I don't think this recent Patch specifically targets advanced players, sure they'll have to give up a mod of their gear at some point. But the far more stupid thing is that the currently existing builds cannot be cought up with, in terms of combat proficiency. The incentive to work on new build has completely vanished. Newer folks not having already made their gear are at an unfair disadvantage. Poeple like myself, whose main endgame content consisted out of probing the combat system, and trying out different builds have probably lost interest in playing further (though I can obviously only speak for myself). I don't really think the crafting change as they've been introduced are a bad thing, they just got introduced at the entirely wrong point in time (should've come with lvl 90 when everyone would be making new gear anyhow).

I wouldn't have minded some nerfs to my builds, however NONE of the already existing builds have seen ANY nerfs what so ever ("The Nerfening™", what a joke Jack) Instead, some builds that are "500% better then others" (paraphrasing Citan, who apperantly acknowledges this issue but thinks its not a top priority) remain at their current strength. Spring fairy gear, one of the major factor in those builds saw NO CHANGE at all. Meanwhile 2 things that have been changed are: Cow stampede (and I assume other abilities that are supposed to work when stunned) now works when being hit with 10 stuns per second, and BC is supposed to have its "skinning gear" erased. While I think both those things should happen, implementing them without re- balancing these skills just further increases the gap in power of different skills. This tells me that the devs are far more concerned with "getting it right" (for whatever that entails) as opposed to creating an enjoyable gameplay experience. A direction in which I will not follow.

I have no idea what on earth this new xp-change is supposed to accomplish, but along with the changes to auto-deleveling mods (which has been attempted at a previous patch), it looks like a whole lot of effort has gone into something that will have an absolutely negligable impact on gameplay. Why was effort focused here?

Whats up with Weather Witching? Suddenly it got resurrected just to be yet another AoE / DoT / Nature / Electricity skill? Just what we needed more of...

I like the GUI changes in general. New Font looks sharp. Though I really wonder in how many places I have to see my own hp/armor/power? Maybe stop once that info is found 10x on the screen... And why are we not seeing the changes to the broken bones debuff icon on things like the stampede stacks or the bard stacks??? Again a positive change in general though.

I am somewhat sad about this. I guess all good things must come to an end. None if this is meant as a personal offence to anyone. I had a great time in the game and don't regret playing it, but it just looks as if this game has crossed the zenith. After I've seen my latest build thru, sometime next week, you will probably no longer see me in game. I will keep my eyes open for new patches and LVL 90 (should it come out) but I won't hold my hopes up for it.

repost from https://discord.com/channels/5920416...23420094795817 as a means to make it easier to find again.

[poulter]

Max-enchanted crafting change:
With all the recent emotion concerning the removal of a mod from max-crafted gear, I reviewed the anticipated impact on 3 of my most used builds.

Tank
Staff /Shield Current max mods = 62 Future max mods = 54 Current used mods = 58 (1 mod yet to be added so target is 59 mods for the complete build)
Impact: Lose 5 mods. 2 'optional' mods identified, so loss is 3 mod
Conclusion: Serious impact on tank build. Threat generation or mitigation will be reduced

Healer:
Bard /Druid Current max mods = 63 Future max mods = 54 Current used mods = 61 (build complete)
Impact: Lose 7 mods. 4 'optional' mods identified, so loss is 3 mod
Conclusion: Minor impact on healer build, due to overhealing capacity

DPS:
Fire /Priest Current max mods = 62 Future max mods = 54 Current used mods = 60 (build complete)
Impact: Lose 6 mods. 6 'optional' mods identified, so loss is 0
Conclusion: No impact on DPS output. Build will continue to deliver 12.5k to 18k damage /rotation

Summary:
The proposed change will have little to no damage reduction impact on my current builds i.e. a better balance will not be achieved.

[Ranperre]

I'd like to address this from a different angle, your priorities are wrong. New players need to be carried through higher level dungeons and only four tanks have done the gauntlet in the past month (and three of us are basically with the same group and do the same thing). You have a serious problem getting players to jump from "good enough to level to 80" to "good enough to not be a worthless piece of shit in groups" and your response is... nerf everyone and raise the bar of "good enough to level to 80"?

Players trashing their way through dungeons isn't an economic problem. The fastest elite farming in the game is slower than solo money making options for the same group of people. All you're doing with these changes is decreasing the value of the only end game content we currently have.

I'm losing 15-20 million because of your impromptu max enchanted changes. That doesn't concern me as much as how out of touch you guys appear to be when it comes to group combat. The worst part of all of this, it doesn't seem like you guys even know where you want to end up and we're being used as guinea pigs (imo you lost this right when you started taking money for VIP). Whether you do or not is immaterial, appearance is enough in this situation for many people.

[Celerity]

I wanted to get a bit more specific with weather witching now that I've looked at it in more detail.

I think overall the skill isn't bad, but I still retain my initial judgement that it feels a bit meh.

The ways I would like to see it improved:

• Change channeling so that it's not cancelled unless you take a certain amount of damage
• Make the tornado summon a non-channel if you're not in combat like stun trap for warden
• Lean into the cold synergy a bit more
• Lean into the pet synergy a bit more

Now to explain these points:

1. Channeling itself is just a bit weak as I explained previously. Not only does it take longer to cast than a normal ability, but it's cancelled if you take even a "no damage" hit. I would like to see this changed so that at least no damage hits don't interrupt and further to that, I'm actually envisioning some allowance, depending on the level of the ability for how much damage you could take before it's cancelled. I think this is a better option than outright removing the channels completely and also gives an advantage to building for mitigation, even if you want to dps.

2. You pretty much always want to summon your tornado pre-combat and the channel is just unnecessary busy work for the pre-combat summon. Stun trap already does this exact mechanic very nicely to still suffer the in-combat channeling penalty, but allows you to instant cast if you're not in combat.

Just as a side note here, can we please make it so that dot effects don't keep you in combat after you have killed the caster? The kuvou ones are especially annoying as they last 1 minute and stop you from regenerating your stats, making them incredibly inefficient to farm.

3. I propose leaning into the ice magic synergy a bit more, since ice magic is the only skill with lots of cold damage, and there is only fire magic and battle chemistry with small amounts. Whereas we already have druid, bat and bard which are primarily nature, as well as cow and deer which have a bit of nature. Weather witching also has a lot of electricity, but we already have hammer, mentalism, fairy magic and warden which are heavily electric. Now I am aware that weather witching can't be paired with most of these skills, but I feel like ice magic has always been a bit lonely, with fire magic (and maybe animal handling, but not really? Fire magic actually pairs better with the cold wasp due to calefaction's cold debuff than ice magic does... but that's getting off topic.) being the only real synergy in any pairing of skills. It does seem like there was a small amount of effort to try and achieve the cold synergy with dampen and hailstorm. However, dampen is the basic attack so you want to use that as little as possible and although hailstorm is good, you actually have to give up one of it's damage mods which changes it to nature, if you want it to remain as a cold attack.

I'm not saying the skill should be changed from electricity/nature to cold entirely, but a couple more mods could be added for tsunami and deluge let's say, to change them to cold direct damage.

4. Possibly this would be a role more suited for animal handling, but I would love to see some aoe pet buffs, that make stacking pets actually useful. Storm shield sounds cool at first, with people mentioning how you could buff your animal handling pet to tank, or your cold sphere so it doesn't die instantly. But, since you already get the tornado from weather witching itself, and storm shield is single target, it doesn't really make sense to dedicate another whole skill to pets when you already have the pet to use the buff on. At best it would give a minor advantage over the tornado since the cold sphere has an aoe for example or your animal handling pet might have higher % buffs, but I feel like the advantage would be small at best. I would just like to see running multiple pets actually synergise when I consistently see people asking in discord if they can go necro/animal handling and have tons of pets out, and the answer is well yes you can, but there's 0 synergy or benefit to actually having more pets out, since there aren't any pet aoe buffs. Again though, maybe this should be a buff to animal handling rather than weather witching.

Edit: I've seen people mention that storm shield actually is aoe? If so then point 4 is already covered, but I was going off the description of the skill which specifically mentions "a pet"

[Tandiril]

Personally I am still on the fence on the max-enchant change. I think it is a complex problem, considering mod slot distribution, different skills needing different amount of mods to be effective (e.g. UA vs FM), its place in the grand scheme of balance, etc. Right now this seems more like a PR problem of a maybe necessary change, but since this would require a whole wall of text on its own, I will skip it for now.

Combat XP change, agreed on the Kur Tower example of Celerity, I experienced that myself today. My suggestion: Treat a too high level enemy as if it was lower level in terms of xp gain. Not sure if this is the best approach, but I am absolutely sure that you shouldn't feel getting punished for actually managing to best the more difficult enemy. But overall a good change, mass murdering enemies 40 levels below your main skill shouldn't be more effective than actually fighting enemies on par with you.

Weather Witching being resurrected came as a total surprise, but as a good one!

3. I propose leaning into the ice magic synergy a bit more

So far I have experimented a bit with Ice Magic and WW, and I wanted to chime in on this point to name a couple of additional synergies.
- 2 mods for Tsunami that debuff targets to receive more damage from "sentient weather phenomena" -> this works for the cold sphere (tested).
- A mod for dampen that makes it deal cold damage and debuff targets further for cold damage, can even be made into a cluster aoe. Bugged right now, because all debuff stacks are lost if you get hit, which turns it into a silly/funny game of tag. Whether this is a really interesting bug or an experimental feature that slipped into production remains to be seen.
- Blizzard snare (and fear if you play the full chaos experience), Tundra Spike root/stun and Freeze solid mezz gives you the break you need to pull off channels mid combat, even solo. Ranged enemies are a bit of a problem, but that needs to be tested and overall would be ok. EDIT: Ranged enemies turned out to be a real pain, especially if there are multiple. I therefore second Melkhiresa's proposal of baking in some channel protection into e.g. Wind Ward. EDIT EDIT: I played around with ranged evasion. It does kinda do the trick, but needs a lot of gear/mod investment for only an okish result.
- Silly side note: popping Wind Ward with mod that reduces the cd of Tornado on getting hit, following up with Cryogenic Freeze enables you to get hit for 0 damage, therefore still triggering the effect without consuming the ward (roughly tested).

Overall the skill is very pretty to look at and fills my personal itch for an ice based offensive mage combo (and I can finally fly now!), even though right now it feels I am playing the "Gazluk Anarchist". That is also the issue this skill has imo: Its signature as chaos magic skill is well deserved, and can be quite a bit of fun, but is not well suited for grouping, where control is paramount. It doesn't have the tools for tanking, nor for proper supporting (calm skies doesn't cut it), instead it has solo tools and knockback pets. The former is of limited value for a primary damage dealer in a group if you have a dedicated supporter, and the latter can very well be a real problem in a dungeon. And if you remove it, you are left with your generic fairy spring dps that is probably outclassed by other skills in this regard.
So to me, at least in combination with Ice Magic, this is really more of a solo combination. And summoning tornados, and ice spheres, and rooting and fearing your opponents was very fun so far! But having your tornados knocking around enemies is not a very efficient way of defeating them. Now, imo fun beats efficiency, but it really depends on what you want from a skill.

To sum up, Weather Witching seems to be an outdoor skill ... which makes sense, given the name. And it overall looks promising. Thing is, there are lots of indoor activities in this game.

(On a different note, when I first heard of weather witching years ago, that they would be at odds with the druids, and that you were working on a weather system, I kind of expected something...mightier. Like making it actually rain in a region, screwing with the fire mages. Fingers crossed we will see something like this one day, assuming the full fledged weather system is still something worked on. Keep up the good work!)