New alternative Lake Nur needs spicing up

[Velorien]

Very much not a fan of the new flooded Sher'Tul ruins. It's another level of the same lacklustre enemies from the previous level, plus an extra pain for those who haven't brought water breathing gear. So let's spice it up a bit.

Some horrors, like luminous horrors, shouldn't need to breathe. Actually, given how powerful and unnatural they are, maybe none of them do.

But we could add some aquatic horrors anyway.

- The Boiling Horror uses lots of fire DoTs - underwater - and deals damage to anyone standing next to it.
- The Deep Horror spawns tentacles that grapple its victims at range, holding them still and draining them of air, while it uses darkness attacks to kill them.
- The Armoured Horror doesn't move, but has high armour and resistall, and uses powerful ranged physical attacks. If killed, it drops a fortune in pearls.
- The Frozen Horror has dense icy armour that regenerates and must be destroyed before it can be hurt, and uses ice magic, including creating ice walls to stop its victims escaping.
- The Spawning Horror creates countless mini-horrors that aren't too dangerous in and of themselves, but get in the victim's way and stop them reaching air bubbles, while wearing them down through attrition.
- The Angling Horror has a main body which uses physical attacks and a lure which uses light attacks. The main body is invisible until the lure has been destroyed.
- The Swarming Horror comes in packs which do high numbers of weak physical attacks per turn for significant total damage.
- The Ravenous Horror imposes Blood Lock and does life drain with every attack.
- The Parasitic Horror flees if encountered alone, but loves to use Fears, Curses and Hexes on those engaged in fighting other enemies.

[SageAcrin]

Terrible idea to create massively zone-controlling horrors in a flooded area.

You essentially make water breathing gear go from suggested to massively required to most players-a problem that's already far too common, many players already have this opinion from what I've seen-and make people put off doing Nur as long as possible-a problem that's already far too common, I've seen players avoid Nur like a plague.

Oh, and you make it more of a newbie trap, as new players wander in and are ganked by drowning, a threat that most of them haven't really had to deal with before first seeing Nur...which is, again, a complaint about Nur that's all too common.

People do not enjoy dying from air loss, and can avoid it, so they will. Making Nur into a hell-spawned gimmickfest was not my idea when I suggested that idea.

Some horrors, okay, but please do not let it become full horror floors that massively control areas, with flooding as well-if this goes through as a concept, please keep them down to less than half the enemies, and keep the drowning oriented stuff more to "OH NO, THAT ONE RARE HORROR" than a general constant menace.

(To counterbalance, they could appear in the earlier flooded floor as well, in case of the barrier failing. That way you get two moderately nasty and also flooded floors instead of one really nasty floor and one flooded floor.)

[PureQuestion]

I might recommend, actually, that as an additional limiting factor, some permanent sections of air be added randomly to the level.

[jenx]

Lake Nur on nightmare mode is incredibly difficult already. So I'm against further buffing of this zone.

[AlexanderR]

Very much not a fan of the new flooded Sher'Tul ruins. It's another level of the same lacklustre enemies from the previous level, plus an extra pain for those who haven't brought water breathing gear. So let's spice it up a bit.

Sme horrors, like luminous horrors, shouldn't need to breathe. Actually, given how powerful and unnatural they are, maybe none of them do.

But we could add some aquatic horrors anyway.

- The Boiling Horror uses lots of fire DoTs - underwater - and deals damage to anyone standing next to it.
- The Deep Horror spawns tentacles that grapple its victims at range, holding them still and draining them of air, while it uses darkness attacks to kill them.
- The Armoured Horror doesn't move, but has high armour and resistall, and uses powerful ranged physical attacks. If killed, it drops a fortune in pearls.
- The Frozen Horror has dense icy armour that regenerates and must be destroyed before it can be hurt, and uses ice magic, including creating ice walls to stop its victims escaping.
- The Spawning Horror creates countless mini-horrors that aren't too dangerous in and of themselves, but get in the victim's way and stop them reaching air bubbles, while wearing them down through attrition.
- The Angling Horror has a main body which uses physical attacks and a lure which uses light attacks. The main body is invisible until the lure has been destroyed.
- The Swarming Horror comes in packs which do high numbers of weak physical attacks per turn for significant total damage.
- The Ravenous Horror imposes Blood Lock and does life drain with every attack.
- The Parasitic Horror flees if encountered alone, but loves to use Fears, Curses and Hexes on those engaged in fighting other enemies.

Great ideas, but IMO this should be limited to another optional level of lake, something like "secret" part of Trollmire (but actually hard to find).

[HousePet]

You return from the East to discover a new nightmare of horrors trying to break into the fortress?!

[Planetus]

I love these ideas, but I agree that this is a little over-powered for the first time through Lake Nur. I like the idea of an optional side area (maybe you need to find a particular artifact to unlock a door to get to it), or something that happens when you return from the East (maybe add another backup guardian with it, too). Completionists will still want to do it, but it's ok for it to be hellishly difficult for that. If someone somehow does stumble onto it, well, this is a roguelike. If you're stumbling around blindly, you're probably going to die.

I don't like the idea of all the horrors being water-breathing. It doesn't make sense, as I don't think that's a specific part of the horror theme. Some horrors (nightmare, dreaming, maybe bladed) it makes perfect sense, but others (bloated, for example) it really doesn't. Oozing horrors I see as a middle ground, I could believe it either way. If you want an area with all the horrors, maybe make it a map that has substantial non-flooded zones. I'd love to see an area that's pretty evenly mixed, and also logical (non-flooded zones are connected by non-flooded passages, flooded zones are connected by flooded passages), but I'm not sure if that would be easy with the current random generator. Maybe make it pre-made? It would be interesting to see a zone where some enemies seriously have to worry about drowning, too. It'd also be interesting to see a zone where some enemies (water-themed ones) couldn't necessarily follow you. Maybe the tentacles or light could come onto dry land, but the main body couldn't.

[Velorien]

I don't like the idea of all the horrors being water-breathing. It doesn't make sense, as I don't think that's a specific part of the horror theme.

Apparently, this is already the case.

In general, the point of this post was to suggest new ideas for the alternative second Lake Nur level, not to buff it per se. New horror types can easily be made rare in order to balance the increased difficulty, or you could just take care when coding their strength-by-level in the first place.

The point is, though, that the Lake Nur underwater area(s) are boring as-is, at least after the very first time you encounter them. It takes minimal effort to find the exit if you haven't got any water breathing gear, and the enemies are unvaried and hardly threatening as long as you have even a little mobility or range. Air bubbles, while not plentiful, are certainly sufficient for the task.

More specifically, the alternative second flooded area of Lake Nur is nowhere near as challenging or interesting as the original horror-filled ruins. That is what I feel needs to be rectified.

[HousePet]

Needs more Walrog.

[Sirioh]

I love these ideas, but I agree that this is a little over-powered for the first time through Lake Nur. I like the idea of an optional side area (maybe you need to find a particular artifact to unlock a door to get to it), or something that happens when you return from the East (maybe add another backup guardian with it, too).

Perhaps a single backup guardian that spawns all these new kinds of horrors? There is already that void horror unique thing that spawns enemies you have to killed like the mouth, perhaps something like that?

Of course, that's a lot of work for such a limited implementation. The horrors could spawn randomly as per normal horror rules, I guess (which has the added benefit - speaking selfishly - of spawning fewer luminous/radiants that cause problems for my fire archmages :-p).