Balance Polishing Mod Release 1.0

[Phenomenum]

1 hour ago, MaxQuest said:

So around 8 or 9.

Why not 6-7?

[Powerotti]

  It seems more like psychic equivalent of rogue's retaliation, so maybe %chance to trigger on every roll vs will, but without delay?

2 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

My version of Brutal Backlash has 40 base damages + scaling. For the damages part, I think it's enough.

Damage could scale with ciper's defence for 0.xx*will, so harder to hit cipher would backlash for more dmg. E.g. 100 will*0.25->25 base raw dmg modified further by might, captains banquet etc. Is that even possible?

[MaxQuest]

  

13 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

DoT damages does not feel very "brutal" to me.

And feels a bit unnecessary if the 30s delay prevents infinite reapplication.

Makes sense)

13 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

My version of Brutal Backlash has 40 base damages + scaling. For the damages part, I think it's enough. Not sure something else is needed.

The main issue for me is uselessness Vs non will attacking battles. But I guess it will be useful often enough. And probably challenging to play against.

So far ""Backlash: stuns for 10s when attacked vs Will; has 30s refresh delay" idea appeals most to me.

But a simple "40 base damage + scaling" every 30..∞ seconds for Brutal Backlash... Hmm.

I think there will be runs when I won't be taking this talent at all, since I mostly play with 5-man medium-high dps parties.

But it is easiest to implement, and is much better than we have at the moment. So it gets a pass from me)

10 hours ago, Powerotti said:

raw dmg modified further by might, captains banquet etc. 

Isn't it already affected by MIG and Captain's Banquet?

12 hours ago, Phenomenum said:

Why not 6-7?

I was thinking about Wilting Wind vs Freezing Rake.

One has lower damage and higher penetration (as raw penetrates everything); and another has higher damage but lower penetration (7).

After that I looked what are the higher Pen values across cipher/wizard/druid spells; and it looks to be 9.

And that's why I am inclined to put either 8 (average between 7 and 9); or 9 (as the upper margin). What do you think?

Edited February 22, 2021 by MaxQuest

[Elric Galad]

28 minutes ago, MaxQuest said:

  

Makes sense)

So far ""Backlash: stuns for 10s when attacked vs Will; has 30s refresh delay" idea appeals most to me.

Validated

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But a simple "40 base damage + scaling" every 30..∞ seconds for Brutal Backlash... Hmm.

I think there will be runs when I won't be taking this talent at all, since I mostly play with 5-man medium-high dps parties.

You can't take all talents for all runs.
Psychic Backlash is probably going to stay non-mandatory anyway because it is a bit situational. 
But I have to make sure it is efficient enough when used for a non-optimal-but-still-efficient builds (such a s a Frontline Soulade focusing on Cipher passives rather than picking tons of active powers).

Quote

But it is easiest to implement, and is much better than we have at the moment. So it gets a pass from me)

Also, I don't like to alter too much the original philosophy. At least when abilities have already a purpose, which is true in most cases. I prefer to tweak numbers.

Quote

Isn't it already affected by MIG and Captain's Banquet?

MIG : yes.
PL : no, but yes with my mod.
Captain's Banquet : no. Why should it be affected by Captain's Banquet ? It is not a spell. The game mechanics are already complex enough, so I would favor not introducing exceptions.

[Boeroer]

Tbh I hate cooldowns. They are a very unelegant mechanic and also potentially frustrating. Also you have to keep track which is annoying imo. One reason why I didn't like Tyranny's combat system was cooldowns. Also cooldowns are not that common in Deadfire - at least on the player's side. The only "cooldown" I remember from the top of my head is when you are switching modals - I mean besides recovery/reloading which is a sort of cooldown itself of course.

That's why I still think a non-stacking DoT is way better than a flat dmg output with cooldown. You'd achieve the same overall dmg with mechanics known to the player, it fits thematically if you view it as a hefty retaliatory migrane (and only people who never suffered from migrane would say it's not brutal - ask Gromnir).

Since one doesn't want to do seperate the timings/durations for the Psychic and Brutal Backlash effects but keep it simple I suggested to downgrade the stun. Unlimited stun obviously would break the game as soon as you meet any sort of aura that targets will (chants, drake/dragon auras and the like) and also pulsing spells that target will (Venombloom for example) would crush the user of such abilites.

Even a 10-sec stun with 30 sec cooldown would be way too powerful against those enemies. With enough INT and Lingering Echoes (hello Monk/Cipher) you might be able to keep up the stun at all times.

A low DoT could be kept up without turning into OPness. And downgrading the stun to (a longer?) stagger or a daze maybe (daze is plenty good) would make sure you couldn't stunlock and you could still stagger resistant enemies. Keep in mind that this also would mean that you would clear all MIG inspirations on the enemy every time Backlash fires.

It would also be pretty simple to implement I guess?

 

 

Edited February 22, 2021 by Boeroer

[Elric Galad]

I'm not set on the cooldown value. Or possible tweaking the stun duration (also considering I added a PL scaling  ).

The reason why I think a cooldown is specifically needed in this case is that attacks vs will are often unfrequent, unless it's a fear aura/pulsating effect and suddenly happens every 3s.
So a % chances would lead to it triggering too rarely OR too often.

So it is hard to find balance otherwise in this case.

DoT won't solve the problem of the initial backlash (as you point).
Even Dazed is not very complicated to apply through Mind Plague as a Cipher. Honestly, I don't like it  (or at least I prefer cooldown solution) 
Just to confirm that changing to Dazed is not too tricky to implement though. At least easier than a cooldown.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Elric Galad

[Elric Galad]

PS : I love cooldown. They remind me of good Old Guild Wars 1 times.
They are a bit out of the place in PoE2, but I don't mind adding a couple if needed.

[Elric Galad]

On 2/19/2021 at 11:54 PM, Elric Galad said:

I can't prevent myself from thinking that the guy on the right looks like Shaved @Boeroer's Avatar.

[Boeroer]

19 minutes ago, Elric Galad said:

I'm not set on the cooldown value. Or possible tweaking the stun duration (also considering I added a PL scaling  ).

The reason why I think a cooldown is specifically needed in this case is that attacks vs will are often unfrequent, unless it's a fear aura/pulsating effect and suddenly happens every 3s.
So a % chances would lead to it triggering too rarely OR too often.

So it is hard to find balance otherwise in this case.

DoT won't solve the problem of the initial backlash (as you point).
Even Dazed is not very complicated to apply through Mind Plague as a Cipher. Honestly, I don't like it  (or at least I prefer cooldown solution) 
Just to confirm that changing to Dazed is not too tricky to implement though. At least easier than a cooldown.

If you make Backlash an auto-hit it would be valuable against high defense enemies and in that regard (i mean hitting enemies which are hard to hit) better than Mind Plague and such. Also remember that it's a passive and would cost no focus and no time while casting Mind Plague would cost both. Instead of a might affliction I would also be open to any other affliction that might fit. I would even consider a flat attribute debuff. Just no hard disable like stun because chaining/upkeeping always has the potential to break balance while a upkept daze or such wouldn't.

As I showed above a cooldown would not prevent upkeeping the stun if you stacked enough duration with PL and INT (and Lingering Echoes) - unless you make the cooldown so long that Backlash is again worthless against weaker enemies. Another reason to hate cooldowns: they don't automatically adapt to the situation and are not flexible at all unless you want to make them real complicated. They are just bad and always feel like a band-aid solituon, sorry.  

Another idea I had was giving the cipher a bit of focus with Backlash. So every time somebody attacks their Will they would gain a bit. Don't know how much would be good but this could be really great in prolong fights against Dragons and such - and it wouldn't hurt in other fights.

Yet another idea would be that they get a stacking Will defense bonus for quite some time. That would make them practically immune to something like a fear aura after some time.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Boeroer

[Phenomenum]

1 hour ago, Boeroer said:

The only "cooldown" I remember from the top of my head is when you are switching modals

And switching beast forms with shifter.

2 hours ago, MaxQuest said:

I was thinking about Wilting Wind vs Freezing Rake.

One has lower damage and higher penetration (as raw penetrates everything); and another has higher damage but lower penetration (7).

After that I looked what are the higher Pen values across cipher/wizard/druid spells; and it looks to be 9.

And that's why I am inclined to put either 8 (average between 7 and 9); or 9 (as the upper margin). What do you think?

Make sense. After all, we buffed Five Suns Pen to 9 for a reason. So let it be 9, no questions.

[Phenomenum]

52 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Another idea I had was giving the cipher a bit of focus with Backlash.

I like this idea.

[Elric Galad]

1 hour ago, Phenomenum said:

And switching beast forms with shifter.

Spiritshifts are technically modals.
Yes, my post is useless.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Elric Galad

[Phenomenum]

Elric, i've done some KW's tests and have interesting results.

I took Aloth's armor and turned Overseeing bonus into +5 Fire PL bonus (i've added Fire KW only to "KeywordValueID" string, not in AttackFilter section). Then i modified Fireball to this construction: Ability >>> Attack >>> Status-effect with 100 Burn dmg. Here are results:

Ability - Fire KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus works for Attack & SE

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus works for Attack & SE

Ability - No KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect - Fire KW
Bonus not work

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW in "StatusEffectKeywordsIDs" string
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus not work

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW in "StatusEffectKeywordsIDs" string
Status-effect - Fire KW
Bonus not work

Then i've modified Fireball a little more: Ability>>>Attack>>>Status-effect AttackOnEvent>>>Second Attack with Burn dmg:

Ability - Fire KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - No KW
Bonus works for both attacks

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - No KW
Bonus works for both attacks

Ability - No KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - Fire KW
Bonus not work even with Fire KW in AttackFilter section of bonus status-effect

So, even with complicated constructions, keywords have strong Parent-Child system. But if Keyword added only in Second attack or status-effect, bonus will not work.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can u remind me what ability you tested, which don't receives PL bonus from Magran Axe and Chromoprismatic quarterstaff enchants?

Edited February 22, 2021 by Phenomenum

[Elric Galad]

40 minutes ago, Phenomenum said:

Elric, i've done some KW's tests and have interesting results.

I took Aloth's armor and turned Overseeing bonus into +5 Fire PL bonus (i've added Fire KW only to "KeywordValueID" string, not in AttackFilter section). Then i modified Fireball to this construction: Ability >>> Attack >>> Status-effect with 100 Burn dmg. Here are results:

Ability - Fire KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus works for Attack & SE

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus works for Attack & SE

Ability - No KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect - Fire KW
Bonus not work

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW in "StatusEffectKeywordsIDs" string
Status-effect - No KW
Bonus not work

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW in "StatusEffectKeywordsIDs" string
Status-effect - Fire KW
Bonus not work

Then i've modified Fireball a little more: Ability>>>Attack>>>Status-effect AttackOnEvent>>>Second Attack with Burn dmg:

Ability - Fire KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - No KW
Bonus works for both attacks

Ability - No KW
Attack - Fire KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - No KW
Bonus works for both attacks

Ability - No KW
Attack - No KW
Status-effect (AttackOnEvent) - No KW
Second Attack - Fire KW
Bonus not work even with Fire KW in AttackFilter section of bonus status-effect

So, even with complicated constructions, keywords have strong Parent-Child system. But if Keyword added only in Second attack or status-effect, bonus will not work.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can u remind me what ability you tested, which don't receives PL bonus from Magran Axe and Chromoprismatic quarterstaff enchants?

It's Instrument of Boundless Rage.
Its fireball is a "secondary" attack, although I don't remember how the structure exactly is.
Your results are fully consistent with it.

What would be interesting is how the immunity part works. Because for poison attack, I'm almost sure that only the status is poison-keyworded and that the whole attack got resisted.

[Phenomenum]

1 hour ago, Elric Galad said:

What would be interesting is how the immunity part works. Because for poison attack, I'm almost sure that only the status is poison-keyworded and that the whole attack got resisted.

I think KW's in status-effects works only with immunities and counters (since SE's don't receives any PL bonuses).

Can you be more specific about this part: "I'm almost sure that only the status is poison-keyworded and that the whole attack got resisted"? You mean any specific ability?

1 hour ago, Elric Galad said:

It's Instrument of Boundless Rage.
Its fireball is a "secondary" attack, although I don't remember how the structure exactly is.

Ability >>> Attack >>> Extra Attack (with Fire KW).
Extra Attacks and Attacks On Impact also don't receive bonus if main attack isn't keyworded. Even with KW in AttackFilter of +PL status-effect. Seems strange, but this is how it works.

Seems like bug, because Accuracy bonus (+100 Accuracy with Fire attacks) correctly works with all secondary/extra attacks. Problem only with PowerLevel bonus. Even vanilla game has a lot of keyworded extra attacks (Holy Radiance for example) - i doubt they shouldn't receive bonus. Bugs, bugs, bugs everywhere!

Edited February 22, 2021 by Phenomenum

[Elric Galad]

41 minutes ago, Phenomenum said:

I think KW's in status-effects works only with immunities and counters (since SE's don't receives any PL bonuses).

Can you be more specific about this part: "I'm almost sure that only the status is poison-keyworded and that the whole attack got resisted"? You mean any specific ability

I think it is the case for all abilities for which I added Poison KW or disease KW to the ability itself. You can check on BPM list on Nexus.

I made these changes based on a list made by Boeroer a long time ago about all abilities resisted by poison/disease immune.

Examples : Toxic Strike, White Wurms upgrade, a bunch of druid spells...

[Phenomenum]

1 hour ago, Elric Galad said:

I think it is the case for all abilities for which I added Poison KW or disease KW to the ability itself.

Weird thing.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Phenomenum

[Elric Galad]

10 minutes ago, Phenomenum said:

If KW added directly to ability, then yes, all attacks and ability effects will be countered.

No I really mean that KW is only on the status and the whole related attacks get countered. I only added KW to the ability later.

I know the conclusion does not feel aligned with yours but I think immunities simply work in a different way than PL.

[Phenomenum]

4 minutes ago, Elric Galad said:

No I really mean that KW is only on the status and the whole related attacks get countered. I only added KW to the ability later.

Yes, i understand. I've tested vanilla Toxic Strike and then changed my post - weird thing!

Edited February 22, 2021 by Phenomenum

[NotDumbEnough]

A suggestion regarding this mod: Heartseeker's Enfeeble should last an extremely long time, but not permanently. Making it permanent makes it extremely annoying to remove from companions if they get hit by friendly fire. If they get knocked out in combat, they won't even heal post-combat. It also can't be removed by leaving the current area, walking around on the world map, removing them from the party, etc. You HAVE to apply a constitution inspiration to remove it. A 5000 second duration would still serve much the same purpose while making it much less annoying (you could remove the effect by waiting a few hours, etc).

[Boeroer]

Huh? Shouldn't it get implemeted like Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy? So it only lasts until the end of combat?

[Elric Galad]

9 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Huh? Shouldn't it get implemeted like Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy? So it only lasts until the end of combat?

I think this is what I did. It should be cleared after combat. If not, it is a bug.

[NotDumbEnough]

It doesn't get cleared out of combat. At least I just had to craft a scroll of Prayer for the Body to heal Pallegina

[Elric Galad]

27 minutes ago, NotDumbEnough said:

It doesn't get cleared out of combat. At least I just had to craft a scroll of Prayer for the Body to heal Pallegina

Yup, it's a bug.
Will be corrected for next version.

Here is the hotfix (you may have to enter a true combat to clear preexisting status)

cl.ranger.heart_seeker.gamedatabundle

Edited February 22, 2021 by Elric Galad

[NotDumbEnough]

A bug with Avenging Storm: if you Empower it with Quick Empower, you have no recovery on ALL your subsequent weapon attacks. Basically you have Blade Cascade while Avenging Storm is active