Slight balancing tweaks to invigorate build diversity

[Udin]

I have some suggestions regarding balance that I was hoping you all would look at. I think build diversity in the current state is a little lacking, and the 'meta' is simple. I'm sure others have noted the same.

I think these tweaks to already existing systems may inject some health and balance (and realism) into the game.

1. Armor weight should count against max weapon str requirement above some threshold (maybe 15 kg): 22 kg armor and 110 str = max weapon str limit of 88. (this is just an arbitrary example)
It should be easier to swing a heavy mace when not in full plate, and conversely, you should not be able to swing optimally when in full plate.

2. Large bow damage reduction (debuff) when wearing heavy armor.
Like point 1, extending a bow fully in heavy armor is challenging.

3. Increased health from constitution. Health pools are too low, some fights between masters take ages, sure, but the average player loses >30% hp in the first seconds of combat.
3.1. Expand this to horses and other entities

I think these points all address a shift/violation of the trifecta of tank, dps, and utility (there's something fundamental to that formula : str/dex/int). Currently, mounted archers in heavy plate dominate the combat interactions. That also means that there is very little incentive for anyone to wear medium armor. I think these nudges in rebalancing (or others in the same vein) would go a long way to alleviating it.

 

[Eventide]

Some interesting ideas. I'll give my feedback on each.

1. Far too complicated of a system. Armor weight should just slow down a character. The higher your armor weight the slower you move. Possibly have this affect swing speed over a threshold.

2. Agree that there needs to be an adjustment here. Bows are ridiculously overpowered currently because they're tied to str. I think bows first need a change so there is a str requirement for drawing the bow but have the damage scale on dex. This alone would help so str isn't governing everything aside from magic damage. On top of that, with the change you mention bows shouldn't be easy to use in heavy armor. There's a reason games usually have cloth armor for mages, light armor for average fighters, and heavy armors for the tanky fighters. You should be sacrificing things for that much protection. Currently you sacrifice nothing but some skill points which isn't a big hit for a melee. They have tons of points to throw around.

3. I agree that health pools are way too low. If someone gets the jump on you, you could be dead before you even pull out your weapons.. especially with how choppy the game loads currently. I got shot by someone the other day and killed because I only saw them naked at the time due to how the game loads. Then saw me get shot and when I tried to react the game just froze up. I had like 20% of my health by the time it fixed then I was dead. Granted I'm playing as a mage so I already have a distinct disadvantage, but I was in decent armor and this guy could hit me for nearly 80 damage with a bow I couldn't even see at first. At least give a secondary skill for like Physical Conditioning and it increases your HP while then having a primary under it. This way everyone can grow their HP a bit but then if people want even more they can spec into it.

4 (something you briefly touched on). Mounted combat needs changes. Mounted archery and mounted magery are absolutely ridiculous. With mounted magery you can be an extremely obese mage and your main downside is you can't move quickly.. but with a horse suddenly that's negated and you're just a powerhouse moving at top speed.. Mounted archery should have an aiming penalty of some kind. Mounted magery should have longer cast times, lowered damage even with the skill maxed, and possibly other changes.

Something briefly touched on in my 4th is the weight system needs changes too.. a mage shouldn't have to be massively overweight to be at their best.. being overweight doesn't make you smarter in reality.. if anything it makes you dumber.. I feel like mages should be the opposite. The skinnier the more intelligent.. as if we spent like decades locked in a tower barely eating just to study our magic.

 

[Udin]

Thank you for the feedback! I think all of your comments are reasonable. While I do agree that tweaking the numbers for point #1 could get complicated, I think the current values for stats and armor weight happen to work well, and doing some of this simple math would be less intensive that adjusting entire systems (I thought).
I considered the speed penalty and the swing speed when I wrote this, but I've heard that this has been suggested in the past and turned down because it makes combat unenjoyable (they tried it in MO1 and people hated it). If those two things cannot or will not be adjusted further then I think my suggestion is a simple patch-in to the numbers that I think will change build incentives. Together with the rest of the changes of course, since no one is even bothering to use anything other than mounted archery.

 

[Midas]

bow dmg 40%str 40%dex 20%int

 

[Eventide]

Thank you for the feedback! I think all of your comments are reasonable. While I do agree that tweaking the numbers for point #1 could get complicated, I think the current values for stats and armor weight happen to work well, and doing some of this simple math would be less intensive that adjusting entire systems (I thought).
I considered the speed penalty and the swing speed when I wrote this, but I've heard that this has been suggested in the past and turned down because it makes combat unenjoyable (they tried it in MO1 and people hated it). If those two things cannot or will not be adjusted further then I think my suggestion is a simple patch-in to the numbers that I think will change build incentives. Together with the rest of the changes of course, since no one is even bothering to use anything other than mounted archery.

I didn't mean that the first one is complicated to add into the game, that part should be relatively easy. The part that'd be complicated is players understanding it. It'd have to be shown off what their "effective strength" is because people aren't going to do math for things like that. They'll just get irritated with it. Armor weight affecting movement speed though, among the other ideas, would fix it. You shouldn't be wearing like 20kg of weight on your body and move with normal speed. That just wouldn't be realistic. It should also drain your stamina more if we're being really realistic.

No matter what the mounted archery and mounted magery need something negative. Aiming penalty, damage penalty, etc there needs to be some kind of downside. As you said, currently mounted archery/magery is all people really use. It's so easy for people to mount up, pull out a bow with their plate armor and destroy people for like 80 damage per hit while there's little they can do about it.

Build diversity really needs to be rethought and worked on. It's annoying seeing everyone be extreme meta builds and everyone so worry about it. This isn't meant to be that kind of game. I get no matter what that'll happen but there could be things in place that help at least inspire some new build ideas. I think currently the skill system and stat system (with things like weight, age, height, etc) cause most of the meta. The action skill points are too limiting. The weight, age, height, etc all try to add to build diversity but really all it does is make people want to be *exactly* what gives the most for their playstyle since hybrid builds aren't that great. So you see a ton of fat mages because for some reason fat = smart.