Arcen Games

General Category => Starward Rogue => : Monkooky August 23, 2016, 03:47:12 AM

: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 23, 2016, 03:47:12 AM
Obviously some things are better than others. This is not a problem.
Some things are perhaps a bit too much better than others, and make the game easy.
This is a problem.

Basically I'm gonna whine in this thread whenever I run into something I think is too far to either end of the balance spectrum.
(Note: I play on Hard or Misery, depending on how much I hate myself atm)

WITHOUT FURTHER ADO
Grenade Launcher + Make it Rain = your target can't shoot.
With high enough attack speed, the grenade launcher can kill enemy shots as they are fired. This trivializes bosses and also everything else. I'm pretty sure this is stronger than intended.

Deep Blue+Leaky Battery+ High output energy weapon=poweroverwhelming
This is not super severe- it takes some doing, and isn't too broken with most weapons.
Having said that, I got the battery and the blood avenger one Hard run.
The game became easy, albeit gratifying.

Every Shot Counts=DOUBLE ENERGY EFFICIENCY????
Pretty sure this is how it works. Sure, the lower fire rate can hurt- but DOUBLE EFFICIENCY?

Shield Drone=I don't think this is worth buying?
The shield drone just... doesn't seem reliable enough to be worth 80 credits.
I mean, it's not detrimental, and maybe I'm just not good enough at maneuvering it where it needs to be, but 90% of the time it's not going to give you an escape route when you've run out of places to dodge to.

Most Sacrifice Items=Bad on high difficulty
Maybe this is intended. Likely this is acceptable. Quite possibly I'm wrong and this is a product of playstyle.
But most of the items that you need to sacrifice your precious health for are simply not worth it on Hard, let alone Misery. I whined earlier about the skeleton key- and thinking about it, it's no worse than the majority of sacrifice items. If it doesn't let you dodge bullets better or VASTLY reduce your time to kill of enemies, it's not worth the tradeoff.


I'm sure I will find more things to whine about soon
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 23, 2016, 05:34:00 AM
Hmm... some interesting feedback here.

For something like the shield drone, that actually got toned way down quite awhile ago.

The problem originally was that having more than one of those previously made you basically invincible.  If you've played Binding of Isaac, it's very similar to what happens if you have more than one Pretty Fly.  Only contact enemies are able to damage you in that case because basically every single bullet will be deflected.  That was happening in this game.   So the things were toned down.

Not to mention, defensive items in this game aren't meant to be a constant wall for you.  That drone that clears bullets with that flare effect, for instance.  It only fires off every now and then.  However, I still think it's a good item.   In a game like this, the difference between victory and defeat can often be just one or two bullets hitting you.

This will be the case much more whenever I happen to get Misery Mode done (which I can now get back to since the Humble thing is done).  What you've got in there right now is just a placeholder, and even the upgraded bosses aren't REALLY finished (I'm likely to make them worse, except for Centrifuge since the game will explode if that thing puts out any more bullets in misery mode than it already does).  That mode, when done, is going to be more than a little brutal, making Hard mode look pretty simple.  ANY extra defensive things like the shield drone are likely to be very welcome by the player, just due to how much death the game is spraying at you.  In addition, there's going to be a few new ideas stuck in there to make things a bit more interesting.   I wont give it away (and it's not ready yet in any case) but suffice it to say, power alone wont be enough anymore.  For instance, in Normal and Hard there are ways to take down bosses really, really fast, depending on what items you have. When Misery mode is done, no item combination in the game will allow you to do this anymore, not on that difficulty.  Various enemies are likely to have some unique tricks up their sleeves too.  Just focusing on flattening everything ultra-fast works in Normal and Hard (to some degree anyway), but I intend on seeing to it that it doesn't work in Misery.  That being the way it will be, the player is going to have to look for advantages elsewhere.  Granted, that wont be easy either.  But the point is, a much more "balanced" build is likely to be necessary to have a chance at that mode.

Some of this is also going to be dependant on the player's skill level and playstyle.

As it is, I'm curious:  What kind of playstyle are you generally using here?  Are you winning the game every time or most of the time?  Which mechs are you using most?



Let's see... what else....

Grenade launcher:  Yyyyep.  That one's a problem.  Spotted that myself on a recent run.  That can be dealt with later, not a huge deal at the moment.

Deep Blue + item combo:  One way or another, in this entire genre, this is going to happen from time to time.  Big item combos that make you a bit OP.  The question isn't wether or not it's happening, but how OFTEN it's happening.   If you're seeing this sort of thing occur frequently, THAT is a problem.  This isn't Isaac, after all....

Every Shot Counts: No bloody clue.  Maybe one of the others might have something to say about this one.

Sacrifice items on Hard+:   I'm still going with "don't need big changes here".  I never play on Normal or below myself, because there wouldn't even be any effort involved.  Hard mode is easy enough as it is, frankly.   Playing on Hard, I typically *always* take two (or sometimes three) sacrifice items during any given run.  I have yet to have a run where I don't grab a couple because "Well the game isn't giving me any good options here".  And I'm hardly going to buy something that I don't find to be worth the price in some way, wether it be from a sacrifice room or from a normal shop.

Of course, those with different playstyles might not find this a good tactic.

If anyone else is looking at this, perhaps you guys might have thoughts on this based on your own experiences with the game?  If there ARE sacrifice items that just aren't all that good, it'd be nice to spot them and change them.   

Monkooky, can you think of any particular specifics that just seem really bad to you?   Aside from that '10000 energy per second until hit" one.  If that's still there it needs to be removed.

: Re: Some balance concerns
: steelwing August 23, 2016, 07:16:12 AM
Skeleton key:  Only seen it pop up in two of the past 8 runs I've played since the Humble update.  The first time it appeared, though, was on floor 1, which might be a problem.  Skeleton key should probably not be an option to seed until floor 3 or so.
Sacrifice items in general:  I'm with Misery on this one.  I tend to play on Normal (the one time I tried Hard I got crushed on floor 1), and if I'm not low on health when I get to the sacrifice shop, I almost always find something worth buying.  My play style leans heavily towards boosting my health points almost every chance I get, though, so I've usually got some to spare.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 23, 2016, 11:08:19 AM
EveryShotCounts does increase energy weapon damage by 100% (which does increase efficiency by 100% too). Is it that big of a deal? Maybe? I mean, is it that different than items that doubles your energy capacity, rewards you with energy every time you make a kill, or just give ongoing energy regeneration?

Grenade + high fire rate: That's hilarious.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 23, 2016, 03:47:35 PM
As it is, I'm curious:  What kind of playstyle are you generally using here?  Are you winning the game every time or most of the time?  Which mechs are you using most?
I don't win most of the time by any means. About half of my wins though seem to be getting some lucky combination of items.
I tend to play Deep Blue, Indigo Dipole, or Redshift.
Indigo Dipole is my most consistant mech (still a <15% winrate), and I tend to be very defensive with it. Sit behind mines and pewpew, when those are out start dodging shit and use missiles to save my bacon.
Deep Blue I do well with if I can swap out the Spine Ballista (still a <15% winrate.) This one I tend to go for killing shit fast- Ideally I get A Phasing Grace and/or Lorentz Shift and wreck everything in those first 10 seconds.
Redshift is my best mech if you discount the runs where I get cocky and die (all of them.) I play Redshift in stop motion. Take a step and shoot, take a step and shoot, take a step into an enemy bullet and die because I'm bad.


can you think of any particular specifics that just seem really bad to you?
The big deal with sacrifice items is that it puts me two or three shots from death, unless I get fairly lucky with defensive shops.
Granted, I still tend to take one or two on later floors, but never any of these ones.

Harmony: 100000 energy till hit
   Really bad unless it's really degenerate (try it with the repulsion mines sometime- still not werf early on of course)
Large and In Charge: +33% damage, +33% size -Some amount of MS
   Damage boost: fantastic.
   Inability to fit in safe spots AND less health? Nah man.
Revenge Rams: Spawn Rams on hit
   Assuming, for generosity's sake, that you have two shields and can fully heal each room; this item will spawn three rams early up to six rams later in the game.
   The rams are pretty derpy, and frequently never reach their target
   When they do reach their target, the result isn't impressive enough to warrant one less hit worth of health
Nanite Hull: Heal every room
   Attrition is almost never my problem. Not dying in particularly tough rooms/boss fights is my problem.
   This doesn't solve my problem. (Yeah this one is defs playstyle.)
Skeleton Key: Infinite keys
   So there are three problems with this one.
   First, it's only valuable in runs where I fail the bonuses i.e. runs I'm doing pretty shitty in anyways.
   Second, the +5 keys perk can more or less replace this guy, and -5 health is more than a perk's worth.
   Third, picking up the skeleton key basically guarentees no further locked chests will spawn. :P


EveryShotCounts does increase energy weapon damage by 100% (which does increase efficiency by 100% too). Is it that big of a deal? Maybe? I mean, is it that different than items that doubles your energy capacity, rewards you with energy every time you make a kill, or just give ongoing energy regeneration?
I mean, yeah it's exactly as good as a theoretical item that doubles your energy.
The closest you get is the Big Leaky Battery, an extremely good item of equal rarity. The Big Leaky Battery doesn't double other energy boosts you may gain, drains 5 energy/sec and doesn't come with a 10% damage boost.
The double damage/half fire rate- disregarding impact on energy weapons- isn't really a boon or bane and is certainly not enough of a downside to put BLB on par with ESC.

The other two items you alluded to are sacrifice shop items, and pretty difficult to compare. I'm gonna... just kind of ignore them unless the Big Leaky Battery isn't a sufficient argument.



: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 23, 2016, 05:43:37 PM
double damage/half fire rate items do a little more than just mess with your fire rate.

I've noticed your builds are very heavily influenced by energy, so I think you are more sensitive to players who use a primary weapon-based  (e.g., flame tank), mixed (e.g., white gloss), or sacrifice shop (e.g., white gloss) -based strategies. This doesn't invalidate your points, which I am thinking about, but does suggest you might be unduly influenced. Another point of interest is that unless your energy weapon is sufficiently powerful, it just isn't going to make an impact during boss battles, its damage contribution will be too low.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge August 23, 2016, 06:10:56 PM
Deep Blue+Leaky Battery+ High output energy weapon=poweroverwhelming
I think you've overcomplicated the formula there.
It could simply be: "Deep Blue = poweroverwhelming"  ;)

Most Sacrifice Items=Bad on high difficulty
Maybe this is intended. Likely this is acceptable. Quite possibly I'm wrong and this is a product of playstyle.
I would tend to say that most sac items are amazing on high difficulty, so you're probably right that it comes down to playstyle.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 23, 2016, 08:47:45 PM
Ah, I'd forgotten about Large & In Charge and Revenge Rams.

Those do need looking at.

For that first one, well... bullet-hell stuff + bloated hitbox is pretty much a no-no in any case.  That's an item that'd work on Normal at least, but would still make the game harder even then.

Revenge Rams is a good idea, but A: the rams don't do enough damage, and B: their pathfinding is glitchy.  Which is odd, as pathfinding in this game usually ISNT.   If those aspects could be fixed though, this could be a good item.


But that first one is just bad.


That Harmony one isn't even supposed to be there.  I thought that got pulled out of that pool.... feh.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 23, 2016, 08:52:24 PM
Deep Blue+Leaky Battery+ High output energy weapon=poweroverwhelming
I think you've overcomplicated the formula there.
It could simply be: "Deep Blue = poweroverwhelming"  ;)

Most Sacrifice Items=Bad on high difficulty
Maybe this is intended. Likely this is acceptable. Quite possibly I'm wrong and this is a product of playstyle.
I would tend to say that most sac items are amazing on high difficulty, so you're probably right that it comes down to playstyle.

I'm curious, are you guys really finding Deep Blue to be THAT good?

Mostly I say this as for me, it's the mech I use the least.  I dunno, never got along with that one very well.  I'd actually wondered a bit if it needed a boost.... now, I'm thinking that just may not be the case.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge August 23, 2016, 09:46:57 PM
I'm curious, are you guys really finding Deep Blue to be THAT good?

Mostly I say this as for me, it's the mech I use the least.  I dunno, never got along with that one very well.  I'd actually wondered a bit if it needed a boost.... now, I'm thinking that just may not be the case.
In my opinion, it's the most powerful mech in the game. By far.
I dislike his starting slow firerate and secondary, but that's nothing since his energy multiplier is so amazing.
If you focus entirely on it, things can get crazy.
Example: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=744051573 (Note the energy level and current floor)

Let's put it this way: I would argue against a buff for Deep Blue longer than I did in favor of the Acidic Maw.  :D
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 23, 2016, 10:50:24 PM
Basically what logorouge said.

You've got a fairly poor start, but once you get new weapons Deep Blue is quite strong.
I mean, double energy. Three or four energy tanks (from shops or from perks) and your energy weapon will last through the entire room/boss.
980 energy is maybe a bit more than you could conceivably need, but hey more power to you.

: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 23, 2016, 11:24:52 PM
Hmmm.... I see.

I think I'll have a few runs with this thing then and try an energy focused approach and see it for myself.

It may be that the thing actually could use a little bit of a nerf.  Hard to say.  But then other players will pick other mechs and claim that they're the best, so maybe not.


Here's another question for you guys:  What do you think of the Green Envy mech right now?  As I said on the Steam forums, and as someone else pointed out on there before I said anything, that mech may be a bit redundant now.  It's entire focus was on getting more money to buy things.  But the Humble mech now can also focus on buying things, but ALSO has the ability to pump extra money into a very powerful attack.  So we end up having two money-focused mechs here.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Draco18s August 24, 2016, 12:01:07 AM
Green Envy I think was the weakest of the original six.  Red Shift being a close second, only due to difficulty of controlling it.

But you're right, the humble mech has definitely stolen the money generator spotlight on that, and did it better.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 24, 2016, 12:20:31 AM
Yeah, Green Envy is easily my least favorite mech. 
It really doesn't seem to have anything the Humble mech doesn't, save a highly unreliable keycard chance.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 24, 2016, 01:13:41 AM
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Chthon August 26, 2016, 07:47:02 AM
I've killed the super final boss on Normal twice now with perfect clears AFTER the revamp. I'm not entirely sure he shoots, as I haven't seen a single one of his bullets yet. Perhaps it's from me stacking far too much damage and just overwhelming him in about 5-8 seconds, but perhaps something is off here?

Maybe he should have a little bit more health, either that or make the phases unskippable. The problem though is what happens if you get there without the super high DPS that I've had. You don't want to turn it into a super grind. You also don't want the ultimate boss to be akin to a wet fart.

Edit: Another idea, make the enemy phases not tied to boss health. You walk in to the boss and he's already got the shield up. As you kill the enemies he summons new ones, until you get through however many enemy phases there are. Only then does the shield drop and you can burst him down.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 26, 2016, 10:06:52 AM
I'll be honest, none of that made sense to me, in terms of how that could be working.

I went and experimented a bit though.

I hadn't spotted it before but when the second phase starts, there's a bizarre delay after the shockwave where the player can fire, but the boss cannot.  I'd thought the unique system that gives the boss it's shield might have had a delay set on it for some baffling reason, but there isn't one.  Nor on the other systems, but there's still a delay AFTER the shockwave is completely finished.

I tried removing the shockwave to see what happens.  Now when the boss changes phases, the shield is *instant*, as is the launching of the spawner shots that summon it's two buddies.  So that's one fix... sort of.... it prevents the phase-screen-clear though, which is a problem.

However, defeating the boss without it generating any bullets should STILL be impossible.  The thing starts firing the instant the room begins, like any other boss.  And I really mean "instant" there.  You'd have to be using a weapon with 500+ damage per shot (as the first phase, which summons nothing and uses a gold and blue pattern, has 500 HP as a base, as it's meant to be a short phase) that has zero travel time or simply strikes the entire screen in order to kill it before it has a chance to fire it's first bullets.  Actually, it'd have to be more than 500 with the scaling.

Furthermore, Terminus (that's the one you mean, right?  Not the Warden, I hope) has 9600 HP as a base when all of it's phases are put together.  That's before the game inflates the value for it being in stage 7.  Much of that is in it's final two phases, each of which is 3300 HP by itself.  Again, that's just the base value.  Even if the game didn't inflate the numbers, you'd have to be doing 3300 damage instantly to clear those two phases before the boss can fire.  But with the inflation, it'd have to be quite a lot higher, as I understand it.  Basically, Terminus's last two phases have enough HP total to equal a normal 2-phase boss. 

Either way though, if you're doing damage equal to it's 9600 HP *after*  that inflation in order to take it down in under 8 seconds without ANY phase firing (and it has 7 phases), then something is definitely wrong.  Nothing should be doing damage that incredibly fast. 

I know the thing's HP values aren't perfect, but that's mostly on the enemies it summons (they're a bit too low) and something I intend on changing for the next build.  I might up the last two phases a bit as well, but not by THAT much.  Like I said, those final two phases are pretty typical for a boss in terms of HP.

If you have that level of damage, no change to the boss itself is REALLY going to fix it.  You'd have been tearing up stage 7 without even a threat of taking damage as it is.  Even the Flak Launcher, one of the strongest Fearsome types in the game and one that appears in 6/7 only has a max of 1500 HP, if I recall correctly (which is very tanky for a non-boss).  So basic enemies practically wouldn't even exist against damage like that.


I cant imagine what must be causing that.   One thing's for certain, it's not a thing I personally can fix.  As you said, the boss needs to be designed for a fight that doesn't involve the player having ultra high DPS.

Though, here's the question:  how many times have you actually fought the thing?  I mustn't forget just what genre we're in, after all.  It's an Isaac-inspired game, and in this type of game there's always the chance of getting an OP build with a bit of luck and careful choices put together.  I don't want to remove the chance of that happening (because it's an occaisional thing that' kinda expected with this type of game, outside of Nuclear Throne).   But it should be a RARE thing.   And even then, doing what must be 10000+ damage in 5-8 seconds is way too much even for a non-broken OP run.

What mech are you doing this with?  What sorts of items are you using, and with what weapons?  If you remember that, that'd be a big help to know.

Hoboy.  Lots of math here though.  Much of which I don't know.  I just deal with the enemy side of the game.  My job is just to cover the screen in flashy insanity and kill the player a lot, and set enemy stats, and then complain alot. Item/perk/whatever balance is all up to the others. 


Ugh, very confusing.  All I'm going to do is confuse the situation more if I keep ranting about this.  But what I do know is that while Terminus's HP could do with some tweaking... as I had already figured beforehand from my own playthroughs after the patch.... everything ELSE doesn't need changes and tanky things are tanky enough, so I cant do anything there to prevent a player-driven Armageddon in floors 6/7.


Anyone else have any thoughts on this here?  Though I'm guessing they'd probably need info about the build you were using to get a handle on what's going on.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 26, 2016, 03:30:49 PM
The lack of seeing any bullets suggest it may not be a balance issue, but some sort of bug. A test save right before entering the boss room would be ideal for comparing different experiences.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Chthon August 26, 2016, 06:48:12 PM
Yes, it was Terminus. The first time I was using the multigrenade launcher with massive damage boosts and super attack speed. The second time the Borine Shotgun with massive damage boosts. Talking about 3x Brute 2x Beast mode, +50% from the health shop which includes breaking stuff, Divine Purpose, and another % modifier on the total. Also at least 2 level ups towards 10% crit rate. Oh yeah, and homing shots both times, plus the +100% base damage module that gives spreadshots.

Yeah, I'm just pummeling him on Normal. He goes down about as fast as a normal 7th floor enemy at this point, and that's only because I have to hunt them down and find them. He's however so big and only in one place. I always walk in with the shield secondary that I can pulse and get out of a tight spot, but I never need it, because he falls over in no time flat.

He definitely has to be fixed for that.

Edit: Next time I fight him I'll make a video, and show you all of my stat ups and how quickly he dies.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Cinth August 26, 2016, 06:57:50 PM
Oh yeah, and homing shots both times

Just a quick note here, there was a homing missile weapon in beta that was removed because it was crazy OP and a no brainer to pick up.  Homing is a force multiplier that should be relatively rare and is probably why Terminus is dropping really fast.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 26, 2016, 07:06:28 PM
Yes, it was Terminus. The first time I was using the multigrenade launcher with massive damage boosts and super attack speed. The second time the Borine Shotgun with massive damage boosts. Talking about 3x Brute 2x Beast mode, +50% from the health shop which includes breaking stuff, Divine Purpose, and another % modifier on the total. Also at least 2 level ups towards 10% crit rate. Oh yeah, and homing shots both times, plus the +100% base damage module that gives spreadshots.

Yeah, I'm just pummeling him on Normal. He goes down about as fast as a normal 7th floor enemy at this point, and that's only because I have to hunt them down and find them. He's however so big and only in one place. I always walk in with the shield secondary that I can pulse and get out of a tight spot, but I never need it, because he falls over in no time flat.

He definitely has to be fixed for that.

Edit: Next time I fight him I'll make a video, and show you all of my stat ups and how quickly he dies.

Aye, there's no fix I can make for that.  That's extreme damage and cancellation... The grenade launchers are a bit broken (which is something I spotted recently myself) and with high enough attack speed will shut down any enemy in the game by simply locking out their ability to do anything; even if your damage stat was low, you'd just have to sit there and keep firing it at whatever boss it was.  I don't remember what the Boarine shotgun does.

But it sounds like your damage stat is simply so high that it ends up not mattering, which is what I cant do anything about.   The boss can use a bit of an HP boost in a couple of ways and some minor changes, but not the sorts of changes that'll make it withstand THAT.  If I did that, a low damage build wouldn't be able to kill it, period.  Not unless you wanted to sit in that room for like an hour.


I'm wondering if damage upgrades are a bit too easy to come by?  Not too powerful on their own (like they originally were, way back when...) but just too easy to get too many of them.  I mean, that's quite a ton of damage upgrades there...
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo August 26, 2016, 07:26:38 PM
That looks like a ton of stacked damage. The damage boosters have needed to be backed down a bit for quite a while. Brute 50%, Beast Mode 75% is way too much. Wipes the floor with all the other perk choices. Double damage for that module might be too much, too.  The damage boosts are just still out of control I think. Upping enemy HP any further is just going to make non-DPS runs even more unfeasible than they currently are, so we shouldn't keep pushing those numbers up.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 26, 2016, 08:24:34 PM
I've definitely skipped the minion spawns before. That should probably be fixed if nothing else.
And yeah, a lot of the DPS items are simply too strong, and act multiplicatively in too many ways. There's very little diminishing returns on DPS.

EDIT:
Empirical evidence just came in!
No grenade launcher needed, just too many DPS buffs.
I've attached a bug report save, just before Terminus. He goes down in literally 5 seconds, even if I don't get lucky with crits.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge August 26, 2016, 08:37:10 PM
I'm wondering if damage upgrades are a bit too easy to come by?  Not too powerful on their own (like they originally were, way back when...) but just too easy to get too many of them.  I mean, that's quite a ton of damage upgrades there...
Well, I wanted to wait until I came back to SR to rant about it, but I might as well do it here and now.


At the moment, there's two major things that completely throw off the balance of the game:

1- Infinite bullet-cancelling: An ability like that is so broken in a game like this. Unfortunately it's pretty easy to do right now. Rocket man (infinite missiles until hit) gives it to you on a silver platter. Especially now that we have the new rocket launchers. Couldn't that item effect be "for the current floor or until hit" instead, considering how super powerful it is? Some players might lose it a few rooms later, but some might keep it for 2-3 floors, skipping bosses entirely along the way. I think that's a bit too extreme.

Also, the grenade launcher style weapons. If those are scheduled to have their friendly fire removed, could they also have their bullet cancelling ability removed? With no ammo limit, add a few firerate upgrades and you can just cancel everything. And unlike Rocket Man, you can still get hit and keep your bullet canceller.

2- Damage upgrades: Those are all so very high, making everything else seem irrelevant in comparison. Even if, for example Brute/Beast Mode/Destruction Module, instead of 50/75/100% were just 40/60/75%, I would still pick them often, just not every single time I see them like now.

With those two problems out of the way, I'm confident that Terminus would have plenty of time to do it's thing.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 26, 2016, 08:39:50 PM
I've definitely skipped the minion spawns before. That should probably be fixed if nothing else.
And yeah, a lot of the DPS items are simply too strong, and act multiplicatively in too many ways. There's very little diminishing returns on DPS.

I can fix the minion skip bit, sort of.... well, I should say, I can fix the bit where the shield doesn't come up INSTANTLY like it's bloody supposed to.  But even that is not really a "fix" and will cause the shockwave not to occur.

It still though wouldn't make the fight last any longer.  Minions only have so much HP, and if you're doing enough damage to end the phase before they can even spawn, they'll go down as if they weren't there.  I intend on increasing minion HP, but not by much.  I'm not changing other HP values for now though.

One way or another, it sounds like this is mostly in the perks more than anything else. 

I wonder how hard this would be to fix?  I mean, the game is so much more balanced now than it was, at least....

: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 26, 2016, 08:41:28 PM
I'm wondering if damage upgrades are a bit too easy to come by?  Not too powerful on their own (like they originally were, way back when...) but just too easy to get too many of them.  I mean, that's quite a ton of damage upgrades there...
Well, I wanted to wait until I came back to SR to rant about it, but I might as well do it here and now.


At the moment, there's two major things that completely throw off the balance of the game:

1- Infinite bullet-cancelling: An ability like that is so broken in a game like this. Unfortunately it's pretty easy to do right now. Rocket man (infinite missiles until hit) gives it to you on a silver platter. Especially now that we have the new rocket launchers. Couldn't that item effect be "for the current floor or until hit" instead, considering how super powerful it is? Some players might lose it a few rooms later, but some might keep it for 2-3 floors, skipping bosses entirely along the way. I think that's a bit too extreme.

Also, the grenade launcher style weapons. If those are scheduled to have their friendly fire removed, could they also have their bullet cancelling ability removed? With no ammo limit, add a few firerate upgrades and you can just cancel everything. And unlike Rocket Man, you can still get hit and keep your bullet canceller.

2- Damage upgrades: Those are all so very high, making everything else seem irrelevant in comparison. Even if, for example Brute/Beast Mode/Destruction Module, instead of 50/75/100% were just 40/60/75%, I would still pick them often, just not every single time I see them like now.

With those two problems out of the way, I'm confident that Terminus would have plenty of time to do it's thing.


I'll be honest here, I've been REALLY tempted to just turn the stupid grenade launchers off for quite some time.  Somehow, I didn't actually do it.  It is true, they shouldn't have the ability to cancel.  Only missiles should do this.

The idea for the infinite rockets bit sounds like a good one.  Until hit or end of floor.


: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky August 26, 2016, 08:54:45 PM
For the infinite missiles, current floor or hit sounds pretty good. Might also want to make it not spawn on floor 7.
As for grenade launchers, don't forget to hit the Torpedo Launcher while you're at it.
Might also want to make explododendron not apply to the Torpedo launcher
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Chthon August 26, 2016, 09:31:57 PM
I will agree that grenade launcher shouldn't cancel as well. As for not clearing the bullets for each wave... He is the ultimate boss, is he not? I think that would make him a bit more unique there.

Perhaps the problem for me is that I don't seem to be able to get there unless I have the huge damage output :) That very well may be the problem here. XD
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo August 26, 2016, 09:33:45 PM
I'll be honest here, I've been REALLY tempted to just turn the stupid grenade launchers off for quite some time.  Somehow, I didn't actually do it.  It is true, they shouldn't have the ability to cancel.  Only missiles should do this.

The grenade launchers could be converted to energy weapons. The cancelling wouldn't matter nearly as much then. Either that or the cancelling effect should be removed. Can't remember if that's possible in the engine, though.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Cinth August 26, 2016, 09:36:58 PM
The grenade launchers could be converted to energy weapons. The cancelling wouldn't matter nearly as much then. Either that or the cancelling effect should be removed. Can't remember if that's possible in the engine, though.

IIRC it's an attribute for the weapon, so you should be able to turn off the cancelling.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo August 26, 2016, 09:43:30 PM
The grenade launchers could be converted to energy weapons. The cancelling wouldn't matter nearly as much then. Either that or the cancelling effect should be removed. Can't remember if that's possible in the engine, though.

IIRC it's an attribute for the weapon, so you should be able to turn off the cancelling.

Nice. Easy fix on that, then. A non-cancelling launcher should be fine.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 27, 2016, 03:08:00 AM
I will agree that grenade launcher shouldn't cancel as well. As for not clearing the bullets for each wave... He is the ultimate boss, is he not? I think that would make him a bit more unique there.

Perhaps the problem for me is that I don't seem to be able to get there unless I have the huge damage output :) That very well may be the problem here. XD

Actually the reason why the shockwaves are there to begin with for any boss is to prevent patterns from mixing and generating an undodgable wall.  Which is the thing I consider to be basically the cardinal sin of the genre.  This is also why teleporters prevent anything from firing for a couple of seconds after you use them.

One way or another, it'd be nice to see this sorted out.  Not just for the damage stuffs to be lowered, but for other options to be made more attractive.  So the player doesnt feel like big damage is the only way to go.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 27, 2016, 11:48:59 AM
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge August 27, 2016, 07:04:17 PM
  • Will the Cluster Launcher and Grenade Launcher be good enough without shot removal?
Without friendly fire? Definitely. They still pack quite the punch with some nice aoe too.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Chthon August 27, 2016, 07:33:11 PM
I'm not sure I liked the "Halved damage" idea. How about this instead?

First perk of one type gives you full benefit. Second one of that type also gives full benefit IF you have no more than 3 total +damage perks. If you have more than 3 +damage perks the second gives you 50%. The 3rd and beyond give you 50% less than the previous one in that line.

If you have more than 3 + damage perks it picks the strongest 3 perks to give you it in full, and the rest are diminished. Multiplier effects are always chosen first.

I consider level up perks, boss drops, and expansion items to all be perks in this model. Health shop items are exempt from this because they cost more and more the more you get. Also I would like to see this reflected in the tooltip when you're choosing, and perhaps an overall boost on the status screen so we can keep track of how much in each stat you have. For example the tooltip might say "+50% base damage (+175%->+187.5%)"

If you do this, you don't risk upsetting the balance of the original damage perks by nerfing them too much out of the box, while you would encourage players to spread around their upgrades more.

Another way to nerf it as well would be to add more unique upgrades. Perhaps flat damage bonuses which would be better for someone with a high fire rate, or damage buffs under certain conditions (lost a shield for example) Right now I feel the upgrade system suffers from lack of variety.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth August 27, 2016, 10:32:18 PM
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery August 29, 2016, 12:21:00 AM
  • Modules aren't really aware of each other.
  • Buffs can be set to only use the largest one of a type.
  • Stacking the damage multipliers like that isn't supposed to happen. I think its because Brute Type effects show up too much in the perk trees. We need to work on that by adding more perks.
  • Making those changes should get us to a new place where we can make some more progress.


These sound like good changes to me.   
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo September 02, 2016, 05:25:34 PM
Progress report on certain bugs.

Firstly, launcher AOE shot cancelling, I haven't been able to find a workaround, but Keith says he should be able to add a flag so that we're able to switch the AOE shot destroying on or off. I'm not nagging him about it, though, considering he's probably super busy with AI War 2. We'll wait a bit. The other solution is just to convert them to energy weapons.

Humble Mech missile asteroid mining. I had a quick look but haven't found a solution yet. Anything important I'm missing? Oh, I did switch the Rocket Man thing to only last a floor, though, so that's something at least.

Oh, I've also started working on the perk overhaul.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo September 07, 2016, 01:46:46 PM
This just in courtesy of an engine thing Keith added:

"Grenade Launcher and Cluster Launcher no longer destroy enemy shots (which was super OP). "

Hurrah!
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge September 07, 2016, 05:15:53 PM
This just in courtesy of an engine thing Keith added:

"Grenade Launcher and Cluster Launcher no longer destroy enemy shots (which was super OP). "

Hurrah!
Very nice! This will definitely help keep things interesting when using those.
And thanks for the Rocket Man change too. That one had been bugging me for months.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo September 08, 2016, 10:14:56 AM
This just in courtesy of an engine thing Keith added:

"Grenade Launcher and Cluster Launcher no longer destroy enemy shots (which was super OP). "

Hurrah!
Very nice! This will definitely help keep things interesting when using those.
And thanks for the Rocket Man change too. That one had been bugging me for months.

Yeah, it's nice to get those fixed. There might also be a fix in there for those R6025 errors. I say might because we can't reliably reproduce the error to test, however Ptarth looked into it a bit and Chris put a change in based on the findings that might hopefully work. We're looking to push this build sooner rather than later, I think.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Monkooky October 14, 2016, 06:49:08 AM
I said I would whine here when I thought there were balance concerns and whine I will!
So there is an item, explodifier.
It quadruples explosive damage.
This seems to apply to the torpedo launcher secondary.
Now, I'm not absolutely certain of this, as it's possible I just had that much damage naturally (I did end up getting the quad crit thing as well).
Still, taking out half of Terminus' health in a single shot? That makes you wonder real hard.  Makes you question things, things like "Is this perhaps a bit more powerful than it ought to be?"

Attachments are, in order, start of floor save, pre-terminus save, pre-terminus screenshot, post terminus screenshot.
Take a look at time elapsed on the screenshots
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Misery October 14, 2016, 07:58:58 AM
In the version you're playing it's possible to destroy the damn thing without it even firing a shot via LOTS of possible means.

The next version should change all of that.  Even doing a completely damage-focused run myself (which previously would have erased the thing without effort) the fight in the version I'm playing was.... long.  Player damage cant go out of control anymore, and also that boss is very bloody tanky now.  There wont be any running over bosses or entire areas like a deranged lawnmower anymore.


That being said, the torpedo thing should be excluded from the Explodifier effect anyway.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: ptarth October 14, 2016, 09:56:35 AM
So amusing story, a 'missile' system is anything that uses explosive damage.

Hilarious right?

It's complicated.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Pepisolo October 14, 2016, 11:32:19 AM
It's a bit hard to say how broken the Torpedo Launcher interaction is in the current build given how much damage can get out of control by the time you reach Terminus. Explodifier has been reduced to triple damage in the latest build, though.
: Re: Some balance concerns
: Logorouge October 14, 2016, 05:43:24 PM
Honestly didn't think the Torpedo Launcher was affected by Explodifier. Multiply that by the Torpedo's already massive attack power of 200 (!) combined with a bunch of other damage boosts... I have no trouble believing that combo annihilated Terminus like that.

I've been testing different values for that weapon lately but even at half the power, it still packs a lot of punch. I definitely underestimated its firepower originally, that's for sure.