Playtesters needed! (1.3 Chronomancers)

[edge2054]

Manifolds is what I've been working on the last couple of days. The original draft for them was 30 turn cooldown with an 18 turn buff at 5/5. You could only have one active at a time. For longer fights it would probably be better than the current incarnation but it was still auto-use bait.

What I'd like to do is buff them enough that I can justify pulling the instant cast off of them.

Some thoughts on that.

- Fate; X% chance to gain 10% of a turn on weapon hit. Weapon Folding deals additional Wasting damage.
- Warp; X% chance to cause a random effect with a 4 turn duration. Weapon Folding deals additional Warp damage.
- Gravity; X% chance to apply 30% slow for 4 turns. Weapon Folding deals additional Gravity damage.

Brillig I'm going to change Strength of Purpose back. The argument that was made to change it was that Willpower isn't really necessary and that building Strength should be a viable strategy. I get where that argument comes from but Willpower, via high Paradox, is the only way outside of equipment TWs have of getting decent enough spellpower to land effects on harder difficulty settings.

Also thanks for the typos

As a slight aside I'd like to change Vigilance and tie it into Warden's Focus (which I also want to pull the instant use off of). Some kind of defense against the Focused target along with some passive see invis and stealth detection.

Some ideas on that.

- An X% defense increase like the marauder talent.
- Damage reduction
- Resist all

I don't know, kinda boring options. I'm open to suggestions on that

[elboyo]

Honestly, making it a non-instant cast would be a really hard idea to get behind.

This game is really built around killing things before they can get an action in, so taking an additional action to get the job done might not be such a great idea.

How about you have the skill produce the %chances to cause a status effect/damage and every time that it procs, it goes on cooldown for X turns. You could make procs on cooldown lower the cooldown by 1 each time to emphasize the multi-hitting nature of Temporal Wardens.

Perhaps you could add a bonus to damage/proc chance for this passive onto your Warden Focus ability.

[edge2054]

So something like...

Fold Fate
Passive
6 turn cooldown
X% chance to gain X% of a turn on weapon hit and deal X Wasting damage to the target. If this effect is on cooldown when it fires the cooldown will be reduced by 1.

Fold Warp
Passive
6 turn cooldown
X% chance to inflict a random status effect on the target when hit. If this effect is on cooldown when it fires the cooldown will be reduced by 1.

Fold Gravity
Passive
6 turn cooldown
X% chance to inflict X Gravity damage in a radius of X on hit. If this effect is on cooldown when it fires the cooldown will be reduced by 1.

[elboyo]

I think that would be pretty cool.

If you would prefer you could have them lower the cooldowns of the other procs, but not their own proc.

This would increase the likelihood of varied effects rather than a possibly streaky chance of one of them occurring several times in a short span.

[edge2054]

Yeah, I think the variety would be good I'll get it coded and we can play with the cooldown and proc chances until it feels right.

[elboyo]

Just throw another post up in here when you do, I've got some time today and tomorrow to playtest.

Also, was there a reason that you took away the AoE passive that boosted Weapon Folding from the Threaded Combat tree? I was having some serious fun pairing that one up with Windblade.

[edge2054]

I'm trying to accommodate a more 'generic' Temporal Combat tree for future classes and addon developers. When Frayed Threads existed Impact and Weapon Folding were in Bow-Threading and Blade-Threading respectively. So now that Impact is gone and Weapon Folding isn't in that tree it didn't feel right in Threaded Combat anymore.

I really liked it too though and I know another guy that played with it really enjoyed it. I think I'll work it into Weapon Manifolds. The cooldowns on the effects should help balance it for multi-target hits.

[edge2054]

Weapon Manifolds are up. Would love some playtesting on them and feedback. Thanks

*edit* Brillig I can't reproduce the shoot swapping issue. On TWs and Archers, shoot autobinds by default. Are you sure it wasn't bound?

[IejirIsk]

Want to say a couple things.
First, glad you are still working on this, and its looking mighty nice, even if somethings are odd. missed a few alpha/betas, so I apologize if things are convoluted.
Second, loving the new look and interface tweaks I see.
Load times are worse in some cases (probably not from this, assuming i got the branch right).

Is it only wardens ready? pm had a tree with 1 spell.
the strength of purpose. I like the idea... but damage still based on dex/str?
the chrono starting area seems easier.

[twas Brillig]

Yep. I was looking in the wrong place. Looking in the talents 'm'enu it's clear that shoot was bound to LMB, but for some reason that isn't indicated in the bind talent menu (i.e. right clicking the talent on the hotbar). With it unbound there's no issue with swapping unintentionally. Actually, there may still be a bug there. Shoot will not trigger if melee weapons are equipped, unless the enemy is in melee range. Otherwise the player will try to move toward the enemy (and generally stop after one turn, because an enemy is in sight).

Definitely a fan of the rebuffed Strength of Purpose. One option to make strength relevant could be to use the higher of strength and magic when it would be advantageous. Is the intent that the strength requirement on non-robe armor requires some building for strength (either with stat points or gear)?

I'm sort of confused by the new weapon manifold talents. What part is on a cooldown? The damage, or the debuff, or what? Just removing the line break would clarify if it was just the debuff effects. I like not needing to juggle the short cooldowns, though the early version did feel somewhat tactical choosing which debuff to apply.

I am running into some serious issues with the latest commits, though. One error in do_folds at range (which I'm guessing is some problem when the new manifold tries to proc), another when trying to open the 'p'layer menu, and also two of my talents were replaced with question mark squares and gave an error when hovered over. I think they were sheer blade and fold warp (fold gravity and fold fate both show up fine, but I don't have fold warp at all).

Manifold archery bug:

Lua Error: /data/talents/chronomancy/temporal-combat.lua:34: attempt to index local 'tt' (a nil value)
At [C]:-1 __index
At /data/talents/chronomancy/temporal-combat.lua:34 do_folds
At /data/talents/chronomancy/temporal-combat.lua:195 callTalent
At /mod/class/interface/Archery.lua:399 damtype
At /engine/interface/ActorProject.lua:396 projectDoAct
At /engine/interface/ActorProject.lua:484 projectDoStop
At /engine/Projectile.lua:228 act
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:126 tickLevel
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:62 tick
At /engine/GameTurnBased.lua:46 tick
At /mod/class/Game.lua:1247

Edit: additional detail: This save had the earlier version of weapon manifold unlocked, and the active talents all on the hotbar. The third talent broke, though the first two (fate and gravity) seem to have survived the transition to passives without issue.

Trying to display levelup menu:

Lua Error: /engine/interface/ActorTalents.lua:352: attempt to index local 't' (a nil value)
At [C]:-1 __index
At /engine/interface/ActorTalents.lua:352 numberKnownTalent
At /engine/interface/ActorTalents.lua:584 canLearnTalent
At /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:521 status
At /mod/dialogs/elements/TalentTrees.lua:261 drawItem
At /mod/dialogs/elements/TalentTrees.lua:312 redrawAllItems
At /mod/dialogs/elements/TalentTrees.lua:78 generate
At /engine/ui/Base.lua:90 init
At /mod/dialogs/elements/TalentTrees.lua:61 init
At /engine/class.lua:99 new
At /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:671 createDisplay
At /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:94 init
At /engine/class.lua:99 new
At /mod/class/Player.lua:1368 playerLevelup
At /mod/class/Game.lua:1879
At /engine/KeyBind.lua:235

I'd attach the save, but I'm not sure what the best way of getting it below the 256 KiB limit is.

And, again, are any of the locked trees more in need of feedback than the others?

[edge2054]

Want to say a couple things.
First, glad you are still working on this, and its looking mighty nice, even if somethings are odd. missed a few alpha/betas, so I apologize if things are convoluted.
Second, loving the new look and interface tweaks I see.
Load times are worse in some cases (probably not from this, assuming i got the branch right).

Is it only wardens ready? pm had a tree with 1 spell.
the strength of purpose. I like the idea... but damage still based on dex/str?
the chrono starting area seems easier.

Someone volunteered to do Matter but I haven't heard from them in almost a week. I was hoping PMs would be done last Monday.

So aside from that tree PMs are feature complete. I imagine they still need a thorough balance pass and lots of playtesting for bugs and what-not. But if you don't mind not having Matter they're playable now.

Fateweaving I'm planning to give a once over as well so Webs of Fate isn't such a one point wonder.

Aside from that I plan to rework Vigilance. Can't think of anything else I'm really planning to do before I start wrapping things up.

Strength of Purpose should be dex/magic again with the latest update.

And, again, are any of the locked trees more in need of feedba

Threaded-Combat definately. As for your save I'm not sure it can be saved easily. You can have git checkout an older copy if you want to keep your character going.

I know the new Weapon Manifolds aren't as interactive but I think the class has a lot of buttons anyway, especially if you go Bow/Blade.

I'll try to clarify the Weapon Manifold description. But the burst is also a proc. We can look at scaling the cooldowns and the chance to proc if they're feeling too weak.

[IejirIsk]

Want to say a couple things.
First, glad you are still working on this, and its looking mighty nice, even if somethings are odd. missed a few alpha/betas, so I apologize if things are convoluted.
Second, loving the new look and interface tweaks I see.
Load times are worse in some cases (probably not from this, assuming i got the branch right).

Is it only wardens ready? pm had a tree with 1 spell.
the strength of purpose. I like the idea... but damage still based on dex/str?
the chrono starting area seems easier.

Someone volunteered to do Matter but I haven't heard from them in almost a week. I was hoping PMs would be done last Monday.
So aside from that tree PMs are feature complete. I imagine they still need a thorough balance pass and lots of playtesting for bugs and what-not. But if you don't mind not having Matter they're playable now.
Fateweaving I'm planning to give a once over as well so Webs of Fate isn't such a one point wonder.
Aside from that I plan to rework Vigilance. Can't think of anything else I'm really planning to do before I start wrapping things up.
Strength of Purpose should be dex/magic again with the latest update.

sweetness... then i can play around once i wake up and go to work frustrating part is gonna be figuring out how things work. Was getting a sense of OMGWTHsomanybuttons...

[twas Brillig]

And, again, are any of the locked trees more in need of feedba

Threaded-Combat definately. As for your save I'm not sure it can be saved easily. You can have git checkout an older copy if you want to keep your character going.

Aw well, it's not like I'd gotten very far anyway. I'll start a new guy at some point and see if I can't get you some feedback on Threaded-Combat. (It's a shame there aren't any weapons that proc shadow simulacrum on hit, then you could shoot arrows that make clones that shoot arrows that make clones.)

I know the new Weapon Manifolds aren't as interactive but I think the class has a lot of buttons anyway, especially if you go Bow/Blade.

I'll try to clarify the Weapon Manifold description. But the burst is also a proc. We can look at scaling the cooldowns and the chance to proc if they're feeling too weak.

Yeah, the loss isn't big overall. I don't think anyone who hasn't played in the last few days will miss it. I am still confused about what is going on cooldown with regards to the manifold subtalents.

Actually, on the subject of scaling, what's the damage like on warp mines in the long term? It's one of TW's few cast-y effects, and the damage is definitely very good early on. It feels like the sort of talent whose damage falls off, and that's fine, but how does the teleport effect scale? Is it just spellpower against saves or what?

[edge2054]

Warp Mine damage is pretty competitive.

Code: Select all

	getDamage = function(self, t) return self:combatTalentSpellDamage(t, 20, 200, getParadoxSpellpower(self, t)) end,

vs Mana Thrust

Code: Select all

	getDamage = function(self, t) return self:combatTalentSpellDamage(t, 20, 230) end,

The teleport is just spellpower vs. saves yeah.

It can also be coupled with Dimensional Anchor which does the same damage as mana thrust per hit. So you drop anchor, drop mines, and each mine they stop on they take damage from both effects (and probably hit more than one mine). I think it's more of a psychological effect on the split damage types rather than the talent not dealing enough damage.

[twas Brillig]

That's a lot better than I was expecting. Splitting the damage is probably it--I wouldn't have guessed it was near manathrust levels, even when I was pushing magic. That's also a really cool combo.

I'm feeling pretty dense, but I'm still not sure how weapon manifold works that effects can trigger while it's on cooldown.

I promise to stop asking about strength of purpose, strength, and armor requirements if you tell me a little about what you're going for there. I honestly had never considered the weirdness of needing increasingly much strength to equip light armor, but when strength doesn't give you physical power anymore (which Strength of Purpose seems to imply) it seems like kind of a raw deal. I don't think it makes any sense to encourage heavy or massive armor, necessarily, but it's clear Wardens are intended to wear light armor.