Juggernaut Evolution for Bulwark v1.0.1

[nsrr]

Find it here or on the Steam Workshop.

Adds Juggernaut as a new class evolution prodigy for Bulwarks. Learning this prodigy requires 25 Strength, 25 Constitution, and having dealt 300 damage or more with a single shield hit.

As a Juggernaut, the Bulwark gains the ability to equip shields in the off hand and main hand simultaneously and Weapons Mastery will apply to shields (including steamsaws, if you are running EoR).

While equipped with two shields:

- You may use Rush while sustaining Last Stand.
- When you use Rush, you will instantly trigger Repulsion, ignoring and negating cooldown.
- For 1 turn after using Rush, you will reduce all incoming non-Mind damage by 50% of your Block value.

Numbers are a bit up in the air at the moment. The 300 damage requirement may be too restrictive at level 25 on some difficulties, and the flat damage reduction provided by the post-Rush buff is likely too high with top-tier shields. I'd be grateful for any feedback on these numbers (or anything else, for that matter). Anyone interested in testing the prodigy in dev mode that finds the damage requirement too high or too annoying can cheese it by granting the player the attribute "can_juggernaut".

Enjoy!

[visage]

The 300 damage requirement may be too restrictive at level 25 on some difficulties, and the flat damage reduction provided by the post-Rush buff is likely too high with top-tier shields. I'd be grateful for any feedback on these numbers (or anything else, for that matter).

In Insane, at least, the 300 damage requirement is trivial to meet. I've got a lvl16 Bulwark who's satisfied it when wielding a random green T3 shield.

Regarding the post-Rush flat damage -- in endgame, that's, what 300 flat damage resistance that you can keep up for as long as your stamina holds out? That's a lot of survivability, depending on what the duty cycle is.

[nsrr]

Thanks, appreciate the feedback

I'll probably end up doubling the damage for the requirement, after your feedback and some other discussion. 600 is the mark for Size Matters already, and on my own run I've nearly hit 300 at level 17 with a random T3 shield on Nightmare. If I had a bit more crit mult or some phys dam inc, I probably would have hit it already. Can I make double that in the next 8 levels? Maybe not, but it should be pretty close by then.

As for the the damage reduction, it's definitely pretty high, but I'm not sure yet how long they'll be able to sustain it. The value is definitely something I want to keep an eye on, but how long it can be kept up is definitely going to be a factor as well.

I'm not going to make any changes right away, but I'll probably up the number on the requirement with the first (inevitable) bug patch. One thing I have noticed that is not exactly a bug but not exactly ideal either, is that Repulsion will trigger from Rush even when you wouldn't normally have enough stamina to use Repulsion. I will likely add a check to make sure you have enough stamina to use Repulsion before it triggers (accounting for Adrenaline Surge, Highers Bloom, etc).

Thanks again for the feedback

[nsrr]

Someone inquired on Discord about the mastery substitution and whether it would apply to steamsaws. It would not with the original implementation, but every other part of the evolution would. So, a quick little update, and now that parts works, too

No other changes. In my nightmare run I found that I just barely hit the required 300 damage around level 20 or so, with a crit counter-strike Repulsion, and I did not repeat the feat a single time between then and taking the prodigy at level 25. Maybe 300 is 'super low' on insane or with perfect gearing, but that's not the experience most people are going to have, so I think it's fine where it is. Besides, this is just an add-on, so I don't particularly care to gate the prodigy behind a hard or even mildly difficult requirement.

Checking resources before using Repulsion is still on the list of possible changes, but as it is this will really only net you one extra use before running out of stamina, so I don't think it particularly matters too much. In my run I could Rush at most 2 or 3 times before running out of stam, so even as it is that particular part of the evo is of somewhat dubious value.


v1.0.1
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Now substitutes Weapons Mastery for steamsaws as well as normal shields.