AVWW Beta 0.548, "Power Coding Round 2: New Health Subsystem," Released!

[Toll]

I would have to agree that the mobs have a bit too much health at the moment, but I attribute that to the rather massive changes (both past and planned) right now. If, at the end of the week/coding-cycle it's still this way, I'll file a mantis-issue on it, but... yeah. For instance, I fought a pair of shadow bats in the caverns for 10 minutes I think that were on the same level as me, all the while running around trying not to get hit. They still knocked me from 500% to 340%, which really makes me very afraid of lieutenants/overlords.

[Hyfrydle]

I know the game is going through some big changes but a game that involves exploration needs a good mix of frantic combat and more relaxed areas and the battles need to take alot less time and have gaps in between.

I have only tried this current patch on your server Toll which is lvl 27 so I'm going to start a brand new single player game and see how that goes. I really miss the old AVWW which although apparently flawed was for me very enjoyable.

Also to the devs don't take this the wrong way I'm only putting thoughts forward so different views can be taken into consideration.

[zebramatt]

Hyfrydle, I think you might be confusing a period of massively unintended imbalance for an indication of intended balance changes - the current upheaval is primarily about changing core game mechanics, not about establishing a new difficulty/game-style equilibrium (although that will come as a result).

Point is: now's a terrible time to judge what the game might play like in a fortnight!

[Hyfrydle]

Yes I know I think my problem was playing on Tolls server I have just started a brand new single player game and finally reached the first settlement. It was a real challenge and I actually started to enjoy it once I got used to the inability to click on Y for a health potion. My strategy was to take out the monster spawners whcih released health which then healed me as I took on the monsters.

It's a big change for players who are used to how the game used to play and I will wait and see what the future holds and yes I agree I perhaps was a bit hasty. A week from now I'm sure I'll be singing the games praises and having a blast in multiplayer the same as before with a very different kind of gaming experience.

Going to steer clear of Tolls server until things settle down it's full of rampaging ghost and monsters.

[zebramatt]

I'm on there now and yes, it's completely batguano bonkers.

[Hyfrydle]

Really having a blast now in my brand new singleplayer game just reached level 2 and felt like I deserved it. Once I started getting my head around the changes it really started coming together.

Maybe Tolls server would be better with more people to help combat the rampaging monsters in relative safety.

[keith.lamothe]

@Hyfrydle : glad to hear it's not as bleak as it seemed   Yea, things are just really in flux right now.  We'd been trying to have our balance-flux err on the side of easy but I can see why the health model change would have been harsh combined with other recent things.  For now sticking to lower-challenge stuff (lower difficulty, lower region levels) may be a good idea.  Whatever doesn't frustrate you

But the balance won't stay in batguano territory long.

[Hyfrydle]

That's good to hear I was getting stressed when I was playing which is never a good idea in a game I play for pleasure. Just tried a lvl 3 region with my lvl 2 character and got slaughtered almost immediately. The water espers seem to spam tons of projectiles making combat in an enclosed space deadly.

[Underfot]

I did try a lieutenant last night.  Warped in at 300% health and got knocked down to ~30% in three hits.  Went looking for a trash mob to restore some health and caught a long-range fireball in the back of the head.  Whew.  Definitely recommend tanking up and -not- destroying all the spawners; they've become a resource at this point.
Lightning espers - they're fantastic/frustrating.  It's like they have some kind of spastic territorial personality now.
Looking forward to more changes!

[x4000]

Underfot, what difficulty are you playing on?  Master Hero is pretty brutal these days, and if you play up in levels at all it's extremely extremely brutal, too.  There's a lot more that needs to be done balance-wise, but I was just curious for context of your comments.

[x4000]

Hyfrydle , I think you particularly will like these two changes coming in the next version:

* The action difficulty now directly affects the amount of cooldown time that enemies take.  No rate of fire was going to please everyone, because players that want a more hardcore difficulty will need more enemy shots being fired at them, while players who want an easier difficulty need fewer shots being fired.
** Featherweight: 3.5x the prior time is now taken.
** Apprentice: 2.5x the prior time is now taken.
** Hero: 1.5x the prior time is now taken.
** MasterHero: no change from the prior version.
** Apprentice: 0.8x the prior time is now taken, making it even harder than before.

* The action difficulty also now directly affects the amount of telegraphing time that enemies take, giving players more time to react on lower difficulties.
** Featherweight: 2x the prior time is now taken.
** Apprentice: 1.5x the prior time is now taken.
** Hero: 1.25x the prior time is now taken.
** MasterHero: no change from the prior version.
** Apprentice: 0.8x the prior time is now taken, making it even harder than before.


Personally I'm one who loves the fast rate between shots, and I wouldn't want to give that up.  I balance for myself at Master Hero level, same as I balance AI War for myself at difficulty 7.  But I like to support a wide variety of skill levels and playstyles other than my own, so it just takes the whole feedback process, etc.

As zebramatt said, right now is a really bad time to judge much of anything in terms of balance, but when something is grossly out of alignment we can at least take a stab at getting it a little closer while still doing our other stuff. For stuff that is only "somewhat" out of alignment there's not any point at the moment, though, because of all the many changes.  But yeah.

[Hyfrydle]

Sounds good sorry for been so quick to judge but I was just amazed at how different the game suddenly became and I like a bit of breathing space so I can plan. The new game I started was much better as long as I kept to the world level or below anything higher was a slaughter zone.

[x4000]

No worries at all, I quite understand.  And yeah, playing up even 1 region level is supposed to be an enormous spike in difficulty, although not quite as much as it perhaps was on lower action difficulty settings in the current version.  That will tie in with the tier-less items and the mission system both, as having players more restricted to just a fewer available levels of regions as they progress, and then graduating to the higher-tier regions, makes for a better curve.

[zebramatt]

I find with the current (I'm)balance on normal difficulty playing up even one level can be massively brutal; playing down three almost trivial.

[Underfot]

I'm actually playing on 'regular' difficulty - as in I haven't adjusted it at all.  I was one level above the lieutenant.  This was a fire amoeba, and it had 99% resistance to fire only - I think it dumped almost all it's additional buffs into magic damage, which is totally legit and I think will make for an interesting fight.  I'll tank up and try again tonight!