Brainstorming some shifts to cooldowns

[Terraziel]

This is probably moving slightly outside the scope of spell balance but it effects it never the less.

Having just decided to give plasma bolt a try, the first thing I notice, given that I play with cooldown decrease enchants, is that I am getting screwed out of 0.1 of a second by the global cooldown.

Is there a reason that it exists?

The best argument I could come up with for it's existence was to prevent lots of abilities going off at once and "flooding the system", but given that there a number of other cooldowns this would require said abilities to be in different colours and categories, which doesn't seem like something someone is actually likely to try.

Of course, there is a possibility that it's there specifically to make people choose which type of ability they are using at any given moment, but it seems sort of unnecessary.

[x4000]

People are very intentionally trying to trigger multiple spells at once -- when the global cooldown wasn't working properly, people abused the heck out of it.

[Terraziel]

Abused how is my point?

Is there really a situation where firing melee spells and long range spells at the same time helps? or offensive spells and logistics spells?

the only one that strikes as worth abusing is off the global cooldown anyway, which was defensive spells.

[x4000]

Ah, I see your point.  Yeah, it was their abuse of cooldowns in general not working cross-color.  In those cases it was firing a red and a green thing in the same frame, or whatever.

Your point is that the global cooldown isn't being reduced, though, is that correct?

[Terraziel]

Well yes, that was the initial concern, but I sort of assumed that was intentional. Global cooldowns are usually unaffected by such things so that you always have a base gap between spells.

But as someone who uses logistics spells a lot (light spells mainly), upon reflection it seems weird not to be able to cast ball of light and attack at the same time.

[x4000]

Originally we were doing that to prevent network flood, but that was a theoretical sort of a thing a year ago when we didn't have any good cases for networking yet.  At this point I honestly don't think it is actually needed in the same way.  Actually defensive spells don't even share in the global cooldown, just as a side note, because it was too impossible to play with them that way.  I think the movement ones also don't share in that.

So having the global one removed might not be a bad idea.  But hold that thought, this deserves its own topic.

[x4000]

One thing that I'm thinking with this is that we might want to move to a simplified cooldown system in general.  Right now, a given spell/ability can have 0-n cooldown types, each with their own cooldown length.  And global is usually, but not always, applied in the things like spells.

What if we shifted it to instead just be 0-n cooldown types, with a single cooldown length that applies to all of them?  And no global category at all.  This makes the interface a bit simpler for the players, mainly.

This would potentially be a nerf for some spells that are currently taking a longer amount of time in their color but a shorter amount of time in their category-type (long-ranged, etc).  But I think that's actually okay.  It might even be time to do away with the color-based cooldowns, too. 

That would change around the balance of "combos" pretty substantially, but it seems like a streamlining which is worthwhile to me.

Thoughts?

[zebramatt]

What about if every spell had 0-n type, each with a modifier?

Then you could say, for purposes of diversification, that all red spells had a +1 second modifier on their base cooldowns. Or all melee have a +3 second modifier. Or all 'powerful' (damage over a certain value) spells get a +5 second modifier.

So you have one cooldown per spell but modified according to its attributes?

[x4000]

One thing is certain: spells need to remain having multiple cooldown types.  Melee spells and and long-range spells and so forth need to be identified as such.

It's more probable that we simply need to get rid of the global cooldown and leave the rest the way it is, I'm now thinking.

[BobTheJanitor]

I'm not sure I'm clear on the reason for the color specific cooldown. If different colors did drastically different things, such that you can use the intra-color cooldown for balancing, I guess it would make sense, although such a system sounds pretty complex to balance properly. But as is, there doesn't seem to be enough of a difference to justify why I can't shoot a plasma bolt 2 seconds after an energy pulse, but I can shoot a fireball.  It just seems arbitrary. As the number of spells grows, this question will probably come up more and more.

[Terraziel]

To be honest I quite like the flexibility of balance provided by separate colour and attack range cooldowns,  as well as the idea implied by it that you should vary spells to best output damage.

Especially with longer cooldowns, it makes you realise the value of having both heavy and low damage spells.

for a hypothetical situation, the current system would allow you to put in a monstrously overpowered spell, and then balance it by either cutting off your access to the colour for a prolonged period, or even to the range for a prolonged period.

Edit: To address the issue of colour cooldowns existing at all, what it does is functionally provide you with coloured mana. Now as it stands no there is not a great deal to distinguish the colours but I imagine that will change as spells get added, arguably some of the current spells could even be altered to make them a bit more thematic, but it is better to have the system in place and functioning for when you need it than take it out and have to add it again later.

[x4000]

As the number of spells grows, this question will probably come up more and more.

Actually, ideally it would be coming up less and less, but that's a matter of execution rather than intent.

[BobTheJanitor]

Actually, ideally it would be coming up less and less, but that's a matter of execution rather than intent.

Hopefully so. What I'm envisioning is some new player going to a cave and getting a whole bunch of one color of gem, then coming back and filling up their bar with all of those spells, then being unhappy that they can only use one at a time effectively. But once they get deeper in the game and widen their arsenal, true, it shouldn't be too much trouble.

[Terraziel]

Except new players are automatically provided with spells from every colour, and indeed as i recall the intro mission they are essentially told to play at least two colours.

[keith.lamothe]

Except new players are automatically provided with spells from every colour, and indeed as i recall the intro mission they are essentially told to play at least two colours.

Never assume players will do what the tutorial tells them