Nullpack 2019-02-21: Gravitic Infantry

[queebles]

it seems that nullpack relocks exploration deathmode, i had turtles, nullpack, and new gems on. turning off nullpack fixed it. NVM, I MUST NOT HAVE WAITED LONG ENOUGH AT MAINMENU, SORRY, YOUR ADDON IS GREAT.

[Doctornull]

Addons do slow down the game's loading screens. Sorry about that -- not sure there's much I can do to fix it.

I hope you're enjoying the pack now. Cheers!

[Doctornull]

Design notes on the Ember of Gerlyk here: http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=38865

I'll put more design notes in that thread as time permits.

[Doctornull]

v12 released -- THIS VERSION MAY BREAK OLD SAVES, if your old save used Advanced Staff Combat.

Mindstar Egos:
- Added some egos suitable for the Creep (and an upcoming class which is secret).

Striker fine-tuning:
- Cold damage instead of Darkness in Downburst.
- Gain access to Ice tree; lose access to Poison tree.

Advanced Staff Combat re-work:
- Reckless Invocation now rank 3 (was 4) talent.
- Reckless Posture now reduces the cooldown of Blunt Thrust and the 3 active talents in its own tree, in addition to granting the physical crit bonus, but it now costs 50 mana + 50 stamina to sustain. You WILL burn through your resources very quickly, so using it is ... reckless.
- Fixed annoying extra log messages when you're disarmed of your Staff.

[Doctornull]

Nullpack v13 Released

Bugfixes: if you're using v12, please update!
- Some staff damage types used with Reckless Invocation could cause a Lua error.
- Mindstar ego sets could expose a bug when used in conjunction with Psiblades.

Enhancements:
- Reckless Invocation shows explosion damage type, and shows more information in general.

[McAllister]

Early thoughts on the Creep:

* My goodness. This class is what I was most interested in, and I wanted to save the review until I got one past level 15, but I just cannot get the class off the ground. Was I struggling as a Shalore? Sure. Was I getting hammered as a Yeek? You bet. But I couldn't even get it off the ground as a Halfling, and those actually have a few hitpoints. I see that Void Hardening has the potential to be potent defensively, and the Darkness tree is great when you put about 10 points into it, but I couldn't even think about doing that before I fixed the problem that I fundamentally didn't do any damage.
* It might have been my build: maybe I need to suck it up and invest in Dagger Mastery for the first few levels until I can get up and running with Mindstar Mastery and a pair of Tier 2 mindstars, but it seemed like it was intended to be a mindstar class. Also, I heard it was supposed to have Gestures: did that fall off? Am I insane? Was it changed?
* Stamina and Hate are two resources that really dislike each other. How do you regenerate Stamina? You rest. How do you lose half your Hate? You rest. This is compounded by the fact that the class has a couple great ways to spend Stamina (I'm looking at you, Willful Combat and Momentum) and many great ways to spend Hate (Darkness, Fears, Spite), but no Stamina regeneration whatsoever and only Gloom for Hate generation. Gloom is not a good tree for Hate generation. Cursed fix this with Stalk (more swinging, more Hate and a bunch of other bonuses) and Doomed fix it with Feed (see an enemy, more Hate and a bunch of other bonuses).

So, trying to be constructive:

* I definitely don't want to step on the toes of the Doomed (Hate-based nuker) or the Striker (nukes from Stealth), but I'd love to see an early source of damage that works better than Mastery-free mindstars or daggers. Hell, with its low CD, Sloth could fit the bill, except that it will drain all your Hate. What about Punishments? Not super high damage, generally low range, and Madness only synergizes with some of the class's damage, so it's not as good as it is on a Doomed. Gestures might work, but I'm looking at a Creep right now and they don't have it. Defensively, if I killed things faster, I'm sure I'd be fine. Hell, Void Hardening might be really OP. I can tell the offense picks up when everything's working together, but you're a total wimp until that happens.
* As for resources, I know the class loves teleporting. What if it regained Hate for teleporting? I know it loves critting. What if it regained Hate for critting? What if Hate didn't decay while you're stealthed? Sure, it would make Hate look a lot more like Vim, but I think something's gotta change. As for Stamina, resting is fine... as long as there's a solid Hate generator. Slinking away to regenerate Stamina seems like a perfectly Creepy thing to do.
* Remember, I downloaded the Nullpack because this class is a great idea and I still think it's a great idea. I could be convinced that I just need to stick with it: I have almost as much trouble starting Rogues (except that I get to dive into Dagger Mastery to do damage). I'm just giving my experience so far.

[McAllister]

That said, I remember you said that the Vector is boring to play. Balderdash! I enjoy the suffering of my enemies! Die, slowly, as you're too crippled to change your fate! Wither under my disease, leak out your life as my arrows strike, struggle vainly to retaliate! Aim and Plague are a really fun combination. Sure, you're killing every enemy with some combination of arrows and blight damage, but that's already as interesting as an Archer and a Corrupter put together. It's a sweet class.

[Doctornull]

@McAllister, thank you for your feedback!

* My goodness. This class is what I was most interested in, and I wanted to save the review until I got one past level 15, but I just cannot get the class off the ground. Was I struggling as a Shalore? Sure. Was I getting hammered as a Yeek? You bet. But I couldn't even get it off the ground as a Halfling, and those actually have a few hitpoints. I see that Void Hardening has the potential to be potent defensively, and the Darkness tree is great when you put about 10 points into it, but I couldn't even think about doing that before I fixed the problem that I fundamentally didn't do any damage.

Rogues do start slow, and I have done very little to change that fact. But they're not intended to be actively frustrating. I'll address it in the next patch.

* It might have been my build: maybe I need to suck it up and invest in Dagger Mastery for the first few levels until I can get up and running with Mindstar Mastery and a pair of Tier 2 mindstars, but it seemed like it was intended to be a mindstar class. Also, I heard it was supposed to have Gestures: did that fall off? Am I insane? Was it changed?

Yeah, it was changed.

Originally my idea was to have a class which used Gestures + Gloom + Predator, but it turns out Predator's bonuses don't map well onto non-weapon damage, so I went back to just plain daggers.

Going for Psiblades is neat, but if you go there, you are working towards a niche build. The core build is daggers, and you can absolutely SHRED with daggers at high level.

Put the points in Dagger Mastery at least once, and see how well you can do with that.

* Stamina and Hate are two resources that really dislike each other. How do you regenerate Stamina? You rest. How do you lose half your Hate? You rest. This is compounded by the fact that the class has a couple great ways to spend Stamina (I'm looking at you, Willful Combat and Momentum) and many great ways to spend Hate (Darkness, Fears, Spite), but no Stamina regeneration whatsoever and only Gloom for Hate generation. Gloom is not a good tree for Hate generation. Cursed fix this with Stalk (more swinging, more Hate and a bunch of other bonuses) and Doomed fix it with Feed (see an enemy, more Hate and a bunch of other bonuses).

The tension between Stamina and Hate is intended, but you're totally right about Stalk, and the lack of a comparable resource regeneration talent for the Creep.

Huh, Stalk is actually a LOT of Hate over the course of a non-trivial fight.

I can fix this.

* Remember, I downloaded the Nullpack because this class is a great idea and I still think it's a great idea. I could be convinced that I just need to stick with it: I have almost as much trouble starting Rogues (except that I get to dive into Dagger Mastery to do damage). I'm just giving my experience so far.

My experience with Rogues and Shadowblades was that they are f*@#ing hard to get going, and I did nothing to change that about the Creep, because I thought that's what people generally WANTED from a Rogue... however, I totally agree that the start is frustrating, and therefore I've been generally testing in Infinite Farportal where you start at level 12-18 (depending on XP penalty).

Okay, with my fixes for this stuff, the early levels should be both fun AND unlike other Rogue-ish classes.

Just a bit more testing, then I'll upload v15.

Cheers!

[McAllister]

My hero! I'll keep the feedback coming, and look forward to more updates. I hope to get a Striker started today, if only I can put the Vector down.

[McAllister]

You really like tension in your classes, don't you? I see the Storm tree in the Striker just telling me "Well, you COULD unlock me and get that juicy Shadowstrike with Shock from a safe distance, but wouldn't it be more fun to Lightning Leap into the fray and see if you can handle the results?" Removing Air from it was definitely the right decision. It captures the shock-and-awe feeling very well: Leap in, use some high-damage melee attacks, Flash out, repeat until someone's dead.

The Creep, though... the last three talents in the Horror tree look interesting, but I'm getting an error every time I mouseover the first talent. I'll upload a screenshot.

[Doctornull]

Oh no, that must be a function from 1.0.5 (which I have in 1.0.4 because I'm using the Infinite500 addon).

I do highly recommend the Infinite500 addon for better scaling.

I'll re-do that code to use the native 1.0.4 functions, and change it back when 1.0.5 is released.

Sorry about that!

[Doctornull]

You really like tension in your classes, don't you? I see the Storm tree in the Striker just telling me "Well, you COULD unlock me and get that juicy Shadowstrike with Shock from a safe distance, but wouldn't it be more fun to Lightning Leap into the fray and see if you can handle the results?" Removing Air from it was definitely the right decision. It captures the shock-and-awe feeling very well: Leap in, use some high-damage melee attacks, Flash out, repeat until someone's dead.

Heh. Yeah, I do. I feel that the Striker's gameplay is the best of the lot so far.

The neat thing about the Storm tree is that Shock is really sub-standard as an attack, and Nova is most effective when you're in the most trouble -- just like Lightning Leap -- and that means your best options are always risky, and that you are heavily rewarded for taking risks by getting into position with Stealth instead of just sniping from around a corner.

The Ember of Gerlyk has similar gameplay tensions, in that its best moves don't "unlock" until combat starts and you have some Combo Points.

[Doctornull]

Nullpack v15 posted!

Bugfix:
- Used some scaling functions from I500 / ToME 1.0.5, so some talents didn't work in plain old 1.0.4; fixed. Everything ought to work with plain 1.0.4 and i500.

Gameplay enhancements:
- Vector relies on Steady Shot to regen Stamina; Foul Feast now provides healing, since Vector lacks healing which other Defilers get in the Blood and Vim trees.
- Creep's tier 1 talent (Sloth) is now a source of Hate; Creep's tier 3 talent (Wrath) is now a source of Stamina, Psi and Mana.

[Doctornull]

Wrote up some notes on the Creep's recent additions:
http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?p=162452#p162452

[Doctornull]

Nullpack v16 posted.

Bugfix: the Vector's new tree had a bad variable name, caused Lua popups. Yuck.

Features:
- Ember of Gerlyk now start with Iron Gauntlets in their inventory, in case you prefer damage to speed.
- Heavy now starts with a custom artifact shield which has Temporal resistance, so you can actually block spider attacks in the starting zone.