Re-balancing Urkis the tempest mage

[marvalis]

Code: Select all

	blind_immune = 1,

Change this to:
blind_immune = 0.3
stun_immune = 0.7

Reason: Blind is less powerful than freeze. Right now the player cannot use a sun infusion for a 3-turn blind (this is not overpowered), but the player can use a 7-turn freeze without any problems (or a 9-turn flame-shock or whatever). Increasing stun resistance and reducing blindness resistance will re-balance this.

Code: Select all

	resolvers.talents{
		[Talents.T_FREEZE]=4,
		[Talents.T_ICE_SHARDS]=4,
		[Talents.T_LIGHTNING]=5,
		[Talents.T_SHOCK]=4,
		[Talents.T_HURRICANE]=4,
		[Talents.T_NOVA]=4,
		[Talents.T_THUNDERSTORM]=5,
		[Talents.T_TEMPEST]=5,
	},

change this to:
[Talents.T_ICE_SHARDS]=3,
[Talents.T_FROZEN_GROUND]=3,
[Talents.T_LIGHTNING]=5,
[Talents.T_CHAIN_LIGHTNING]=5,
[Talents.T_SHOCK]=4,
[Talents.T_THUNDERSTORM]=5,
[Talents.T_TEMPEST]=5,

Reason: The combination of nova, shock and hurricane is unbalanced (in fact, the entire storm tree is unbalanced):
* Nova has 75% chance to daze for 3 turns -> you get another action
* you use shock and daze for another 3 turns -> you get a third action
* hurricane has a 50% chance to trigger whenever you daze someone, this give you a fourth free action: A 10-turn heavy damage over time skill (this talent is by itself overpowered)
* thunderstorm is a sustain that shoots a bolt each turn -> you get a fifth action

A potential stunlock worth 5 attack turns is not balanced, sorry. This will not always happen, but when all these effects trigger than the player will be dead.

* freeze is currently overpowered when the player has no stun immunity

So in my suggestion I removed one of the two daze skills (nova, 75% chance to daze). I had to remove hurricane simply because it is overpowered in combination with daze (daze is already a very strong effect by itself). I replaced freeze(4), a 6 turn freeze skill with frozen ground(3), a 4-turn immobilize.

Hopefully these change will make this fight more balanced.
Thoughts? Opinions?

[bricks]

Blind isn't necessarily less powerful than freeze. All resistances being equal, I'd rather blind an enemy, since it then means they start wildly casting spells in all directions. Freeze just knocks out healing (which most enemies don't do) and disables, not to mention that they'll take less damage. Still, no real reason why Urkis should be blind immune.

Man, you can't take Nova and Hurricane from Urkis. Beating him unlocks the Storm tree, and he is the High Tempest. Also, I think you overestimate how well Hurricane interacts with Shock and Nova. If Hurricane does land, it cancels the Daze effect. Freeze could be taken out; I don't think Urkis need more disabling spells, nor is it perfectly thematic for a Storm mage. There is undeniably an excess of bosses with freeze effects in the level 10-20 range.

Also, keep in mind that Urkis is an optional boss. He may be more difficult than other bosses in the same level range, but you need to go well out of your way to fight him, and the rewards are minimal. Plus, a staff of Ruination or gloves of Dispersion can knock out Tempest, Thunderstorm, and Hurricane, so anyone who has experience with the fight has a lot of options.

[edge2054]

Blind isn't necessarily less powerful than freeze. All resistances being equal, I'd rather blind an enemy, since it then means they start wildly casting spells in all directions. Freeze just knocks out healing (which most enemies don't do) and disables, not to mention that they'll take less damage. Still, no real reason why Urkis should be blind immune.

Man, you can't take Nova and Hurricane from Urkis. Beating him unlocks the Storm tree, and he is the High Tempest. Also, I think you overestimate how well Hurricane interacts with Shock and Nova. If Hurricane does land, it cancels the Daze effect. Freeze could be taken out; I don't think Urkis need more disabling spells, nor is it perfectly thematic for a Storm mage. There is undeniably an excess of bosses with freeze effects in the level 10-20 range.

Also, keep in mind that Urkis is an optional boss. He may be more difficult than other bosses in the same level range, but you need to go well out of your way to fight him, and the rewards are minimal. Plus, a staff of Ruination or gloves of Dispersion can knock out Tempest, Thunderstorm, and Hurricane, so anyone who has experience with the fight has a lot of options.

I agree with all of this. He could stand to lose Freeze and I think the fight would be a lot less dangerous without being to easy.

[marvalis]

Removing freeze is a very good and reasonable step towards balancing this boss. I am glad we agree.

@Bricks
You are relying on several equipments just to be able to do what you want:

* The player must be experienced, know exactly what to expect and how thunderstorm etc works. New players have no access to this data within the game. They cannot even read the description of these talents. They have absolutely not the slightest - clue what thunderstorm does unless they look at the game code.

* The player must have found: stun immunity items and/or staff of ruination and/or gloves of dispersion. These are all items. If you are not spoiled like I said above, how the - are you going to know that you need these items? Its not because you know the code that everyone does.

I cannot take hurricane and nova away? Sure, but then the person who made storm mages will have to balance these skills.
Hurricane simply does huge damage, no I am not overestimating the synergy between nova, hurricane and shock. These skills are clearly designed to work together in a way so the caster can chainstun a target and steamroll groups of monsters with AoE damage.

[shooth]

I like that he is big jerk. I like that he makes players cry. If you don't want/need the unlock, maybe you just want to avoid him?

[edge2054]

* The player must have found: stun immunity items and/or staff of ruination and/or gloves of dispersion.

Again no. This is wrong. But I'm glad the list is expanding

[bricks]

@Bricks
You are relying on several equipments just to be able to do what you want:

Actually, I'm relying on one of three types of equipment, or I could go Antimagic, or I could use Providence, or a Wild infusion, etc. etc. etc. Equipment is a big driving force of the game, and the player should be punished for running around naked. Believe me, I struggled with Urkis and the Shade for a while. I learned, and I got better.

I cannot take hurricane and nova away? Sure, but then the person who made storm mages will have to balance these skills.
Hurricane simply does huge damage, no I am not overestimating the synergy between nova, hurricane and shock. These skills are clearly designed to work together in a way so the caster can chainstun a target and steamroll groups of monsters with AoE damage.

Except I'm still saying that it doesn't work that way. I've playing a Storm mage to a moderate level, and the very considerable trade-off of Hurricane is that you end up doing damage instead of dazing (and reapplications of the Daze effect are still broken by Hurricane).

I think you are trying to subvert the fun of roguelikes by making encounters trivial enough that experience and preparation will amount to nothing.

[tiger_eye]

I think you are trying to subvert the fun of roguelikes by making encounters trivial enough that experience and preparation will amount to nothing.

Agreed ! What one calls unfair, I call a challenge, and challenges are what make the game fun for me. When I first began playing the game, I was extra-cautious in every new level and for every new boss, and I did just fine (for the most part). Without sufficient risk, there is no reward of gratification.

There is, of course, more room for making ToME more fair and fun, but I don't know if these recent posts are addressing the right issues. Nevertheless, suggestions are always welcome for anything, in my opinion, because discussions often generate good ideas that neither the original post or any posters would have otherwise come up with.

[marvalis]

this is just ridiculous

First you light up the beginner town with flashy laser effects drawing the player in (lightning bolts and smoke on the world map).
If the player takes the bait he has to save derth (luckily this has been slightly rebalanced, previously new players did not even stand a chance to survive this encounter).

1852 kills: gwelgoroth

Then he has to collect 10 staffs/rings/amulets (a lame and pointless quest)
If he manages to somehow figure out that he has to speak to the mage after completing the quest, then he can continue this 'beginner quest' and go to tempest peak.

2188 kills: Urkis, the High Tempest

Here the new player on his beginner quest will face Urkis.

And you are saying me that you do not want to balance this encounter because it unlocks storm mages?
You want to keep the game unbalanced because:

I like that he is big jerk. I like that he makes players cry. If you don't want/need the unlock, maybe you just want to avoid him?

I spend the last few days thinking about the game balance problems in TOME, and I am trying to come up with concrete idea's to improve that balance. Tempest peak is clearly a balance problem.

Actually, I'm relying on one of three types of equipment, or I could go Antimagic, or I could use Providence, or a Wild infusion.

As I said before in my 'remove stun/confusion/blind immunity thread': Providence is an overpowered talent that is given as an escort reward. Escort rewards should not give the player talents that have such a significant impact on the gameplay because this causes game balance problems. I do not understand why you keep insisting on defending your arguments that the game is balanced by referring to unbalanced skills.
Antimagic? Be my guest, it is pretty hard.

I've playing a Storm mage to a moderate level, and the very considerable trade-off of Hurricane is that you end up doing damage instead of dazing (and reapplications of the Daze effect are still broken by Hurricane). I think you are trying to subvert the fun of roguelikes by making encounters trivial enough that experience and preparation will amount to nothing.

This thread is about balancing a boss, not about balancing skills for the player. I do not care if thunderstorm breaks daze. Daze+daze+free attacks from thunderstorm and hurricane is unacceptable spike damage. Perhaps all these sustained effects are balanced by their mana cost for players. This is possible, but I do not care. We are talking about the application of these talents for Urkis.

[edge2054]

Removing freeze from him is a fine idea. But Marvalis you really need to get off this idea that stuns are so impossible to counter.

Spoiler Alert
Start using that plethora of spell save gear that Sus added to the game or just use a movement infusion for god's sake.

As I said in your 1 turn bad stuff thread there's many many ways to get around this stuff and if you're stuck in the mindset that your only options are stun immunity, wild infusions, and providence (which you keep claiming is so overpowered... three turns of status effect removal at the talent level the escort teaches it to you I hardly consider overpowered) then you really need to start examining your other options.

[Frumple]

this is just ridiculous

First you light up the beginner town with flashy laser effects drawing the player in (lightning bolts and smoke on the world map).
If the player takes the bait he has to save derth (luckily this has been slightly rebalanced, previously new players did not even stand a chance to survive this encounter).

Sometimes curiousity needs to be punished, honestly. Big flashy lights in fantasy land =/= good thing. Relatively early in the game is a good place to put something vicious like that, so the player will learn (or die, either way) from this bit of wisdom. T4 is not a game intended to be won on your first try, and there are parts of it that are actually trying to tempt you to do something suicidal.

1852 kills: gwelgoroth

As both me and edge have noted, these numbers aren't terribly useful. We both have given the reasons for why, and they hold here.

Then he has to collect 10 staffs/rings/amulets (a lame and pointless quest)

Or one probably-useless (Kor's Fall or Feathersteel amulet are excellent targets for this) artifact. The number of items needed for that has already decreased once. The reason for the apprentice mage doing what he's doing is explained in lore, if you manage to do the right things.

I spend the last few days thinking about the game balance problems in TOME, and I am trying to come up with concrete idea's to improve that balance. Tempest peak is clearly a balance problem.

This unfortunately does not really reply to shooth's point. Urkis is far, far from unbeatable, for all that he's a challenge for new players (and that is fine! This is a roguelike, and an incredibly forgiving one. Killing off someone not sure what they're doing is okay.). I've personally killed him more than once, without stun resistance, without lightning resistance, without good saves, without providence, any or all of those. I've won a few times, but I'm far from the best of T4 players.

As I said before in my 'remove stun/confusion/blind immunity thread': Providence is an overpowered talent that is given as an escort reward. Escort rewards should not give the player talents that have such a significant impact on the gameplay because this causes game balance problems. I do not understand why you keep insisting on defending your arguments that the game is balanced by referring to unbalanced skills.
Antimagic? Be my guest, it is pretty hard.

This ignores the other points bricks mentioned. A wild infusion or a moderate amount of lightning resist is all you need to kill Urkis easily. I've done it repeatedly with nothing but the shield rune an undead or shalore start with. Providence is not necessary, antimagic is not necessary, nothing more than a modicum of lightning resist (30-40%, which is maybe a few lightning res egos and a ring, if that.) is needed to make the fight fairly trivial. Not even that is needed to survive the fight.

This thread is about balancing a boss, not about balancing skills for the player. I do not care if thunderstorm breaks daze. Daze+daze+free attacks from thunderstorm and hurricane is unacceptable spike damage.

If by unacceptable you mean 'easily mitigated' (seriously, just letting Urkis come around a corner is likely to prevent all of this), then yes, it's too much. I think you're overstating how powerful Urkis is.

All that said, the freeze is pretty nasty. Wouldn't mind seeing the tlvl on it drop, and/or his talents expanded to include some of the other water trees.

[marvalis]

If by unacceptable you mean 'easily mitigated' (seriously, just letting Urkis come around a corner is likely to prevent all of this), then yes, it's too much. I think you're overstating how powerful Urkis is

Recursive FOV is one of the steps towards greater game balance. Waiting behind the corner will not work anymore. Yes, Urkis can easily be killed if you know what you are doing and if you read the code. That does not mean a talent combination with a 4-5 attack turn spike is acceptable. Don't get me wrong: My post will already be a success when freeze gets fixed on him.

Euhm Edge, just for the record, I have several game winners. In the early beta's I played a lot of mages (and defeated the master several times - I think back then the game was over after defeating him). I have gone to the east many times. I have finished the game with a summoner several times. I have been to and defeated every area in the game, and I have read most of the talent/zone/effect/item code. I, personally, have absolutely not problems to survive this game. But I have a confession to make: Most recently, I have found looking at the code more interesting that playing the game. The game has become actually quite tedious and repetitive to play for me (always the same few quests, and I hate the maze and daikara for example because there are badly designed and unbalanced.). I began looking at balance recently in hopes of making the game more interesting and challenging, and I think removing things like stun/freeze/... immunity is an important step in that direction. To do this, overpowered skills/bosses will have to be fixed first obviously.

I am currently looking at the low level bosses (the ones that new players are most likely to encounter first). In hope of balancing these a bit more for those players.

Bosses in the east can 1hit KO-you for all I care right now. (Maybe just move Urkis to the east?). I just don't want to first 4-5 bosses to be the ones where you have to know everything about them in advance. Yes, stacking lightning resistance is easy (maybe to easy, but whatever I am not gonna start a fight about that now since I already have to fight over this freeze thing) *if* you know in advance that this is what you need to do.

[edge2054]

I know Marvalis but regardless of how many times you've won you still seem to have it in your head that early game players have no options for dealing with timed effects.

I also want to point out that the Derth quest was bugged. Those elementals never where suppossed to be twice the characters level and once that bug got fixed the difficulty fell back down to what Darkgod had originally intended it to be.

This once again skews the numbers you're pulling from the vault and my advice is to consider these things before taking them as the holy grail of game balance.

[marvalis]

Hey buddy, stop flaming me for those numbers, if you have better numbers give them to me, I am doing all I can to find useful information that can help us balance the game. Got better numbers? Post them! You don't? Stop complaining about them. All I have is the statistics on the webpage. I can only use what I have. I cannot pull number out of my ass.

/edit ... right erm.. It is good that you put these numbers in context by pointing out a previous bug. Just don't use this to attack me personally ok?

Oh and I am just thinking out loud, but if you want Urkis to be really bad-ass then put him in a dungeon in the east with heavy lightning damage.
Make sure that the player has time to figure out that he will need lightning resistance, by gradually increasing damage as he progresses in the dungeon.
Each level could have a passive lightning damage effect, each one more dangerous than on the previous one.
At the end you will face of with the High Tempest on his throne of lightning.

This would be good design, and pretty obvious to the player. Off-course nothing is stopping and idiot who wants to rush in without resistance gear, but he will most likely die, and that should be fairly obvious.

[edge2054]

I wasn't flaming you for those numbers. I was asking you to consider the age of those statistics and how they don't accurately reflect current game balance.

I am guilty of flaming you though about your stun immunity comments and that's because you're stubborn, rude, and your logic is flawed.