Anorithil resource system

[Red]

Sun Infusions and other abilties inflict Luminescence, I believe, not Luminosity, so the name is fine.

Donkatsu's idea would work just fine with Sun Paladin's-they've got no real tricky resource management, so I always just left Bathe In Light on autocast when enemies aren't around. Doing that automically is just making an annoying detail dissappear. However, due to effect scaling with positive energy, this would give them much better damage and defense at the start, with their ability to hurt enemies and heal themselves slowly dropping over time unless they manage to keep their Luminosity high.

And finally, you can touch the Light tree. You don't have to, since it's a cool tree as it stands, but it's not off limits. Sun Paladin's are perfectly capable of surviving through their sustains and equipment. The Light tree isn't the be-all end-all of defensive utility it is with some other classes *cough cough Bathe In Light Aegis Archmage cough* but something the class was designed with, so it offers good benefits but nothing that you couldn't work around if it somehow broke.

[donkatsu]

Well, I've played a couple of Sun Paladins and I like the way their resource works currently (minus the pointless autocast requirement). I figure in order to fix Anorithils while having the least impact on something that isn't broken, Light would keep its negative positive energy cost (this kind of confusing terminology is another reason to merge the two resources). So it would still generate Luminosity instead of consuming it, because that's how Sun Paladins work right now.

Keeping Sun Paladins the same is also the reason why the effect scaling with resources is a passive built into Twilight, not an inherent aspect of the resource itself. Sun Paladins would not get an increased effect from having high luminosity, because they don't have access to Twilight.

[Red]

Ah. Missed that detail.

Although would it be possible to give Sun Paladins a special reward from Anorithil escorts that let's them use Twilight? Might make for some interesting builds.

[sarracht]

It's actually a negative feedback loop. Darkness spells generate luminosity (negative energy cost => more positive energy => more luminosity), and are powered by having low luminosity, so they get weaker if you only use negative spells. The Sun tree consumes luminosity now, and is powered by having high luminosity, so they also get weaker if you use them exclusively. Same thing with the Coronas, they also tend you towards the center. The Light tree is the odd one out, in that it generates luminosity but is powered by high luminosity, but we can't really touch that because it'll mess up Sun Paladins, and Light spells aren't things that you spam anyway. The reason a dark- or light- focused build would still be viable is because it's easier to stack one element than it is to stack two.

Oh snap, didn't read carefully enough. Thanks for the correction!

[HousePet]

I think we should be improving the generator/finisher mechanic rather than rewriting the resources. That way we end up with a fun mechanic and a different resource, instead of just a different resource.

The two issues that I think are contributing to people putting generators on auto are:
Light damage is weaker than darkness, so people just focus on darkness.
Since people are focussing only on darkness, they need to convert energy to nuke, which makes taking out trash mobs one turn longer than it should.
(could be wrong there though, I haven't had a clear explanation of why people do it)

So to address the first point:
We need to make the basic light attacks more useful.
We also need some high level light spells to make it viable to get +light damage equipment.
Both of these things are needed regardless of any other changes, since this class is supposed to be about balancing light and dark.

To address the second point:
Instead of having the Twilight talent to convert positive energy to negative energy, we have a range of talent which convert energy as their secondary effect. Thematically these would be moon themed talents and would do either light, darkness or both.
eg. Moonlight Ray changes cost from 10 negative to 10 positive and -10 negative.
That way you can start with a Searing Light on the first creature, then blast the next one with a Moonlight Ray with no downtime between them. Also reduces the chance of you being locked out of negative energy from stun or similar. Against a boss, opening with Barrier might be a better idea, then you get straight to the blasting.

For people that really want to focus on pure light or pure darkness, I would have a way of countering the natural energy decay available with investment. (I'm currently eyeing Chants and Hymns as a place for it)

[donkatsu]

I sincerely think it would be better for you to hold off on proposed solutions until you understand the basic problem, rather than just shooting in the dark, because not only are you missing the target, you're not even shooting in the right direction. Light attacks could be made useful and it wouldn't affect a thing; you would still autocast because resting energy != ideal energy. Requiring investment for something that you can already do for free also makes no sense. Twilight already does this and it's also pretty dumb. It's not a power issue, it's just convenience and the mechanic not making any sense. Let's try a simple flow chart test that shows what it is about pos/neg energy that is contradictory, and different from every other resource.

Does resting set your resource to ideal levels?
If yes, great. Problem solved. If not, continue onto the next question.

Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost besides slowly eroding player sanity?
If no, great. Problem solved. If yes, then the question is... why??? Didn't we already establish that I'm not supposed to be able to set my resource to whatever I want it to be? If I am supposed to be able to do that, why can't I do it by resting like every other class? If I'm not supposed to be able to do that, maybe you... shouldn't let me do it?

Let's go through the other resources/mechanics real quick.

Stamina:
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes.

Combo Points:
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? No.

Quivers:
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes.

Mana:
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes.

Souls:
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? No.

Equilibrium
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes.

Positive energy
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? Yes. Why???

Negative energy
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? Yes. Why???

Vim
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? No. Used to be yes, with vim wands, but those were stupid and removed.

Bone Shield charges
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes. Used to be no, but was changed because it was obvious that it made no sense for it to be like that when you could get back all your charges by turning the sustain off and on.

Hate
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? No.

Paradox
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes. Unlike most resources, your ideal level is somewhere in between 0 and "as high as possible", so you manually set your ideal level with Spacetime Tuning.

Psi
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? Yes.

Feedback
Does resting set your resource to ideal levels? No.
Can you set your resource to ideal levels by pressing buttons outside of combat at no cost? Yes, if you have Feedback Loop. Most people don't bother unlocking the Discharge tree though, in which case the answer is No.

[HousePet]

I did mention that making light attacks viable was a semi separate issue.

So the basic problem is that you can generate energy outside of combat but not by resting?
Easy fix for that.

But what is 'ideal energy'? Half of the Anorithil talents can be used with no energy. So what makes maximum ideal?

[grayswandir]

Another approach would be to penalize autocasting directly. Asha, the addon class I'm working on now, accomplish that by the following:

• Most talents only generate energy if they actually hit something.
• The decay rate accelerates rapidly outside of combat. So if you spend a turn or two moving, it won't drop your resources by that much, but if you start running away, they'll rapidly dwindle to 0.

This works, but it's just hate with a different name. The "reason" we can't just have regenerating positive and negative energy is because it would be like stamina/mana, and Darkgod wants the different resources to be different.

Edit: Actually it's the way hate used to work before it was deemed unworkable and changed to its current state.

Positive/Negative is already like the current hate. Obviously, having two of them is enough of a distinction for DarkGod, or they wouldn't be in the game as is.

Could you explain how hate was made unworkable in that way? I'm not quite sure it applies, since the ways you generate hate is remarkably different from the ways you generate positive/negative.

[Red]

If you've got some kind of summon, you actually can gain souls outside of combat, Donkatsu.

Housepet, the more powerful abilties (as in all your main damage abilities from the darkness trees) require you to have energy. Various abilities can be used at no or negative cost, but the abilities you want to use require energy. It's why players auto cast outside of combat-they want to start every fight full to use certain abilities. That's what makes it optimal.

[donkatsu]

The only way your pos/neg level can restrict you is if you don't have enough of it. Therefore, your only concern resource-wise is having a lot of it, which means maximum is ideal. I'd like to point out that it doesn't matter what the ideal level is; you could change it from maximum to something else, something more interesting, and the issue still stands: resting does not get you there, but pressing buttons does.

I believe hate used to decay to 0, and after playtesting, both players and the creator of the resource determined that it was unmanageable and unfun, but you're right, that's sort of a different issue.

Right now, positive/negative pretends to be like hate but is actually more like stamina/mana/psi. You can replenish it during combat or outside of combat, which means that essentially you start every fight with full resources. The only difference is that with pos/neg you have to autocast or just manually hit buttons as you explore. Hate and vim are more distinct in that you can only replenish them during combat and you don't necessarily start combat with full resources.

My initial, no-brainer solution was to just make positive/negative energy regen instead of decay. There would be no functional difference from the way it is now. I've heard multiple times now that Darkgod didn't want to do that (last time I heard it I think it was from Shibari in in-game chat) because "that would make it the same as mana". Well, it's already like mana, but okay, if that's the primary objection, then we're going to have to completely change how the resource works, hence these complex suggestions.

[grayswandir]

To clarify, my suggestion is to make it very hard or impossible to hold onto positive/negative outside of battle. So, you always start a battle with 0 in both (or whatever the resting point is). Having talents on autocast shouldn't be able to bypass this - or it should come at a significant penalty, like having most of your talents on cooldown at the start of a battle.

[HousePet]

Or we could just make the negative costs not work when there isn't an enemy around.

Better still, make it fun to use the current system.

[Red]

Speaking as someone who suicided his Anorithil out of boredom, the only way to make the current system fun is a near total skill rewrite, Housepet. Since right now, it's boring because your main combat skills take a at least two turns to actually be used, that makes any fight at least three turns. Run into three dozen orcs? Three or more turns. Run into a single crystal rat? Unless you get good damage on your light attack, it's three turns to take it down.

It doesn't weaken the class, but it makes a lot of fights three times longer than they'd have to be. And considering how long ToME is, that adds up to a lot of wasted time.

That being said, if you do draft a talent rewrite for Anorithil instead of a resource system rewrite, I'd love to see it. It seems like a decent alternative to Sarracht's suggestion.

[sarracht]

Half of the Anorithil talents can be used with no energy.

Housepet, the more powerful abilties (as in all your main damage abilities from the darkness trees) require you to have energy. Various abilities can be used at no or negative cost, but the abilities you want to use require energy.

This is getting at one of the main issues. The positive nuke spells are terrible, but they're what allow you to use the decent spells. The class not only has terrible spells, it is powered by terrible spells.

Even if the positive nukes were good spells, there's still the problem that the "builder"/"finisher" elements are completely backwards. The builder (positive) spells are all short- or mid-range, while the finisher (negative) spells are all mid- to long-range. People autocast because it's suboptimal to start a fight at anything less than range 10.

Now, one sane option is to flip the ranges. You'd open from max range with your weaker light spells, build up positive energy, then convert to negative and start hitting harder as things close in. But even then, you'd want to keep negative energy high in case something closes quickly to melee, or if you can't start the fight at range 10.

If we buff light spells and reverse the ranges on light/dark spells, and then additionally implement grayswandir's suggestion, we end up with a far more sane system that doesn't require autocasting nonsense. But we're still stuck with positive energy being basically useless outside of Twilight. Might as well just have a "sun indicator"...using a positive spell lights it up, and if it's lit, you can use Twilight to turn it off and generate negative energy.

[donkatsu]

To clarify, my suggestion is to make it very hard or impossible to hold onto positive/negative outside of battle. So, you always start a battle with 0 in both (or whatever the resting point is). Having talents on autocast shouldn't be able to bypass this - or it should come at a significant penalty, like having most of your talents on cooldown at the start of a battle.

Mhm, and that was why I brought up the old hate which rapidly decayed to 0 outside of combat. It sounds like a good idea in theory, but something like this was tried before and scrapped in favor of the current hate system due to mechanics issues inherent in the way ToME plays. And that even fit hate thematically; it turned you into a bloodthirsty murderfreak constantly on the move for fresh meat to hunt. Doesn't even work thematically with celestials.