Prodigy requirements: Why do they exist?
Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2020 1:08 am
All prodigies require at least 50 in a stat. This 50 can be gained through either levelup points or gear; this leads to the stockpiling of stat boost gear in order to get prodigies that work well with your build but that you don't have the stats for. For example, Mystical Cunning on a Poison Rogue, Armor of Shadows on an Anthoril, Ethereal Form on any class that wants Dex but not Mag. And, since stat boost gear of the magnitude you need is essentially only found on Insane, this makes certain interesting builds only viable on Insane.
Almost every prodigy already has requirements outside of stats; IIRC the only one that doesn't is Arcane Might, but I might be forgetting about one. Some of these requirements are scummable, like the requirement to deal a large amount of Darkness damage to unlock Armor of Shadows. Once you get the Shur'tul fortress training room, you can just equip something that adds darkness damage to your strikes and tape a rock to your keyboard until the prodigy unlocks. Or unlocking Cauterize by finding a lava panel and standing in it for a thousand turns with a healing ability on auto-use.
I don't see what stat-based, damage-dealt, or damage-taken requirements for prodigies add to the game besides tedium. They're easily worked around if you care to take the time and serve only to prevent interesting character builds on lower difficulties or for newer players who don't know how to scum them.
Certain prodigies require certain things simply in order to function. It makes no sense for Tricky Defenses to be available to non-antimagic characters, or for Mystical Cunning to be available for characters without poisons or traps. That is a requirement that prevents characters from taking a prodigy that is truely useless for them, and is thus justififed. Lore-based requirements like the ones for Bloodspring, Corrupted Shell, and Windtouched Speed are also justified IMO as they go towards the thematic side of character building. However, I don't believe that the stat minimums and damage dealt/taken requirements add anything interesting to prodigy choice. Almost every prodigy already has an effect that scales with a stat, so certain prodigies will still be better for certain builds than others if the stat requirements are removed. The ones that don't have a scaling stat don't have any effect where scaling is reasonable or possible.
Almost every prodigy already has requirements outside of stats; IIRC the only one that doesn't is Arcane Might, but I might be forgetting about one. Some of these requirements are scummable, like the requirement to deal a large amount of Darkness damage to unlock Armor of Shadows. Once you get the Shur'tul fortress training room, you can just equip something that adds darkness damage to your strikes and tape a rock to your keyboard until the prodigy unlocks. Or unlocking Cauterize by finding a lava panel and standing in it for a thousand turns with a healing ability on auto-use.
I don't see what stat-based, damage-dealt, or damage-taken requirements for prodigies add to the game besides tedium. They're easily worked around if you care to take the time and serve only to prevent interesting character builds on lower difficulties or for newer players who don't know how to scum them.
Certain prodigies require certain things simply in order to function. It makes no sense for Tricky Defenses to be available to non-antimagic characters, or for Mystical Cunning to be available for characters without poisons or traps. That is a requirement that prevents characters from taking a prodigy that is truely useless for them, and is thus justififed. Lore-based requirements like the ones for Bloodspring, Corrupted Shell, and Windtouched Speed are also justified IMO as they go towards the thematic side of character building. However, I don't believe that the stat minimums and damage dealt/taken requirements add anything interesting to prodigy choice. Almost every prodigy already has an effect that scales with a stat, so certain prodigies will still be better for certain builds than others if the stat requirements are removed. The ones that don't have a scaling stat don't have any effect where scaling is reasonable or possible.