Balance Polishing Mod Release 1.0

[Elric Galad]

What would you think about buffing 1-handed style a little bit ? It has its niches but feels a bit weak compared to 2-handed and dual wield. It's probably easier to buff the related talent than the main bonus.

Maybe to 25-30% hit to Crit ?

[Boeroer]

30% would be quite wild.

Since PEN is paramount and this whe style seems to scream "I can strike more precisely with thrusts and stuff" this also means you should be able to pierce into the gaps and weak spots of armor. Thus it could be fitting to give the style +1 PEN (I mean on to of the existing crit conversion. This would make it more valuable and attractive for everybody, even for non-crit builds. 

Another option would be to add 15% miss-to-graze and 15% graze-to-hit conversion maybe? This is stronger than it may sound.

[Elric Galad]

51 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

30% would be quite wild.

Since PEN is paramount and this whe style seems to scream "I can strike more precisely with thrusts and stuff" this also means you should be able to pierce into the gaps and weak spots of armor. Thus it could be fitting to give the style +1 PEN (I mean on to of the existing crit conversion. This would make it more valuable and attractive for everybody, even for non-crit builds. 

Another option would be to add 15% miss-to-graze and 15% graze-to-hit conversion maybe? This is stronger than it may sound.

One thing to consider is pistol modal. It's already a bit OP with 1-handed style.

I should consider nerfing it in addition to buffing 1-handed.

I should also consider nerfing hunters bow modal. Both are a bit OP...

[Elric Galad]

2 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Since PEN is paramount and this whe style seems to scream "I can strike more precisely with thrusts and stuff" this also means you should be able to pierce into the gaps and weak spots of armor. Thus it could be fitting to give the style +1 PEN (I mean on to of the existing crit conversion. This would make it more valuable and attractive for everybody, even for non-crit builds. 

Well, 2-handers already have +1 PEN in their base stats. Critical strike already covers this aspect quite a bit especially in the case of big PEN gaps.

2 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Another option would be to add 15% miss-to-graze and 15% graze-to-hit conversion maybe? This is stronger than it may sound.

I feel graze-to-hit a pretty boring mechanics except with high values where it indeed contributes to overall consistency.

On the other hand (pun intended), Miss-to-graze is interesting as a kind of worst case guarantee. I like it very much.
15/15/20 conversion feels weird though.
Do you think 20/20/20 conversion would be too much ? It worths something between +5/+10 acc in the general case but much more vs high def foes.

I'm also thinking about nerfing pistol and hunter's bow modals to -40% recovery (+100%->+66% attack speed). They would still be top tier modals IMHO.

[Noqn]

3 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

What would you think about buffing 1-handed style a little bit ? It has its niches but feels a bit weak compared to 2-handed and dual wield. It's probably easier to buff the related talent than the main bonus.

I'm actually using a small tweak where I changed One-Handed Style from 20% Hit-to-Crit to +10 Accuracy. Maybe bland but I like that it's equal to the old talent's effective Accuracy under perfect circumstances.

[Elric Galad]

Another topic :

Llengrath's Warding staff states about a Deflection bonus that does not exist (except with the staff modal).
Should I add one ? It was +25 Def in PoE1 (feels a bit huge of added to the modal)

Also Citzal Enchanted Armory does not offer much for a Tier 9 spell. Using 2-hander in one hand is the equivalent of a good lash and no recovery breastplate is... an action speed or stacking AR bonus ? Sort of lack an unique effect...

Edited November 8, 2020 by Elric Galad

[AndreaColombo]

+10 Deflection for the staff?

Raw lash for both weapons in Citzal’s spell? Or maybe they deal Raw damage, but lower?

[Elric Galad]

35 minutes ago, AndreaColombo said:

+10 Deflection for the staff?

Raw lash for both weapons in Citzal’s spell? Or maybe they deal Raw damage, but lower?

Maybe +12, equal to a Legendary small Shield without the talent.

For Armory, the issue is that a bit of additional DPS Can only be either OP or too weak. Concelhaut staff is a modest Tier 1 spell but with an unique draining. Ogre Form is comparable to Spiritshift but I added an unique +3 engagement to make sure it is never strictly obsolete.

Pure Raw damages would be too similar to reaping knives.

I'm thinking about rising a bit Citzal Armor AR vs elemental damages, maybe to base 10+quality (equal to Bear Form). For weapons, I'm still wondering, but it should be unique and worths a precious Tier 9 cast.

[AndreaColombo]

Every hit has a chance to increase the duration of existing hostile effects on the target by a flat +10s, kind of like a baleful version of Salvation of Time? More like Damnation of Time, am I rite?

Or a relatively high chance per hit to apply an elemental DoT, with elements shuffling periodically like with Kalakoth's Minor Blights.

[Elric Galad]

The thing is that Citzal is a very "straightforward brawns" archmage. It's hard to think about something very straightforward and unique at the same time.

I think I have a nice idea fluff-wise and game-mechanic-wise but unsure about the balance. Anyway, it's a Tier 9 25s combat buff so it has to be strong somehow :
- Both weapons would get 100% Miss to Graze (significant vs normal foes but very convenient for the strongest ones) - "unfailing weapon"
- Armor would get 100% Crit to Hit (so if your Armor Rating is above foe's PEN, not even crits would break it) - "unfailing armor". 
- Set all of them to Mythical (instead of scaling up to legendary equivalent) to reflect the unique power of Citzal Armory (and maybe compare better with Endgame weapons...)

As I said, I like the feeling of it.

It is quite very strong but I don't think it could go out of control. Even Citzal Lance has better Combo potential...

PS : there is no coded effect that extend hostile effects by a flat duration   

Edited November 8, 2020 by Elric Galad

[Boeroer]

I would give both higher base dmg if that's possible. I liked the summoned weapons in PoE a lot because they had such high base dmg.

Also give them both their respecitve modal effect (Rending Cuts = +30% dmg and Body Blows = -25 Fortitude) without the need for the proficiency and without drawback (no ACC loss and no reduced dmg). Maybe?

[AndreaColombo]

I like both ideas, tbh.

[Waski]

Citzal Armory is borked(you will lose access to spells in grimoire if you try to switch to other one), so fixing it would be nice start.

[Boeroer]

Oh, I didn't even know that. Never used the spell outside of testing stuff and making the weapons permanent (with the help of Form of the Fearsome Brute) in earlier patches. Which was kind of cool.

[Elric Galad]

11 hours ago, Boeroer said:

I would give both higher base dmg if that's possible. I liked the summoned weapons in PoE a lot because they had such high base dmg.

Technically, Citzal weapon do have higher base damage/PEN. They are 1-hander with 2-hander stats so that counts.

11 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Also give them both their respecitve modal effect (Rending Cuts = +30% dmg and Body Blows = -25 Fortitude) without the need for the proficiency and without drawback (no ACC loss and no reduced dmg). Maybe?

I would have to desactivate the actual modals by changing weapon type or something like this... It could be messy.
Also it would lead to complicated explainations on the item  

8 hours ago, Waski said:

Citzal Armory is borked(you will lose access to spells in grimoire if you try to switch to other one), so fixing it would be nice start.

I doubt this could be corrected with gamedata files. If anyone has a clue about it, I may take into account.

[Boeroer]

10 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

Technically, Citzal weapon do have higher base damage/PEN. They are 1-hander with 2-hander stats so that counts.

I mean really high.

[Elric Galad]

On 11/8/2020 at 9:53 AM, Boeroer said:

Another option would be to add 15% miss-to-graze and 15% graze-to-hit conversion maybe? This is stronger than it may sound.

It seems from the game code that your idea was close to what was initially intended, given the name :

 

{

        "$type": "Game.GameData.StatusEffectGameData, Assembly-CSharp",

        "DebugName": "One_Handed_Style_SE_MissToGraze",

        "ID": "c5194896-0e76-4d39-855c-3459c4a9f56d",

        "Components": [{

            "$type": "Game.GameData.StatusEffectComponent, Assembly-CSharp",

            "StatusEffectType": "Bonu****ToCritChance",

            "OverrideDescriptionString": -1,

            "OverrideDescriptionStringTactical": -1,

            "UseStatusEffectValueAs": "None",

            "BaseValue": 0.2,

[Boeroer]

At release (or was it in the beta?) it didn't have hit-to-crit conversion but either miss-to-graze or graze-to-hit, don't remember. Only later did Obsidian change it to hit-to-crit after some player feedback.

[thelee]

23 hours ago, Waski said:

Citzal Armory is borked(you will lose access to spells in grimoire if you try to switch to other one), so fixing it would be nice start.

lol, i just recently ran into this and panicked pretty serverely because it was a pretty long fight. fortunately switching grimoires again restores all the missing the spells.

 

On 11/8/2020 at 12:32 PM, Elric Galad said:

The thing is that Citzal is a very "straightforward brawns" archmage. It's hard to think about something very straightforward and unique at the same time.

i'm skeptical on the idea of buffing citzal's. i think in a vacuum (e.g. if you just plopped it onto a cipher or chanter ability tree maybe) citzal's is on the underpowered side for a tier nine spell, but it works pretty well as part of a wizard package (minoletta's piercing sigil, ironskin, arcane reflection [being in punching range makes it more likely casters toss spells directly at you], self-empower to cast cloak of death as well, either of the phantoms, etc.). 

i think at most bumping them up to be fixed at spawning at mythical might be OK. as it stands though, i generally like how most of the wizard conjured gear remains competitive throughout the game, filling different niches, and already as it is citzal's has an edge, only counter-balanced by the fact that it eats up a tier nine spell cast. push it too far and i wouldn't want to use anything else, which maybe some folks are fine with for a tier nine spell, but is not quite my tastes.

[Boeroer]

Even as a melee-focused wizard I can't see how you ever want to pick the current implementation of Citzal's Enchanted Armory over for example Cloak of Death.

The armor is ok for a PL 9 spell because it has 0 recovery penalty and somewhat decent AR but the weapons, other than being one-handed two-handers, bring nothing PL-9-worthy to the table. 

I wouldn't want to give them AoE because then they would compete with Spirit Lance. That's why I suggested higher base dmg so that they work very well against single targets. 

With adding the modal without having the proficiency I basically meant "give the morning star -25 fortitude on hit and the great sword +30% dmg" as enchantment. But I forgot that this might actually stack with the real modals which would be ridiculous.

So maybe giving the Morning Star a dmg bonus that would counter the dmg loss of Body Blows and giving the Great Sword an ACC bonus that counters the malus of Rending Strikes would be nice?

OR - since those things seem to be somewhat etherical weapons: tune down their basic recovery from 4 to 3 secs?

OR - for the same reasons: let them do raw dmg instead of their normal physical one. This would make them very useful against single very high AR foes but wouldn't do a lot against normal mobs (no overpenetration). It would also fit the whole ethereal items vibe (ethereal weapons passing through armor and flesh, damaging your very essence blah blah).

I think I like the last idea best.

If nothing else then at least they should get a raw lash like Woedica's Wolverine Claws.

Edited November 10, 2020 by Boeroer

[Elric Galad]

I agree with Boeroer : the mere existence of Cloak of Death means there is only a few cases where you want Armory instead. And Balance Polishing Mod makes regenerating Tier 9 cast extremely difficult (Brilliant is limited to Tier 3, Blood Sacrifice much more tedious to use).
Casting both would cost something like an Empower and is quite committing for the benefit you get (better to keep a Cloak of Death cast for later).

The problem with some conjured weapons is the absence of niche.
This is also true for Spiritual Weapons (late game weapons making a subclass specific spell obsolete is sad). That's why I'm adding a +10 Accuracy bonus in next version (+10 accuracy bonus is inherited from PoE1 god Talents and are not easy to find on other weapons). Of course, I didn't add it to Woedica's fists cause they are strong enough as they are ; other Spiritual Weapons would be just a bit less good than Woedica's, but less significantly.

Even Firebrand has a niche with its Burn damages and Fire Keyword.

But Armory is just stats, and not worth of a Tier 9 cast, especially for the weapons.

My idea about 100% Crit to Hit for the armor sounds powerful but in general case, but Wizards have cheaper solution to avoid crits (various Deflection self-buff, and/or holding a shield). 
100% Miss to Hit is more unique than raw damages (reaping knives cover this, and Mythic Quality also helps penetrating). Roughly equal to 20% multiplicative damages vs equal deflection, lower against low Def, much bigger vs Def monsters.
Both of these effects are an unique niche (vs stat monster foes).

Both these changes are almost working, so for now, I think I'm going to keep them unless someone points why they are OP.

Also, we're speaking about Tier 9 25s spells. Wall of draining and Salvation of Time are both nerfed in BPM too, so it's hard to keep it up for long.

So to make it short, I think the reason why this could be OP (overextending duration or regenerating Tier 9 cast easily) are IMHO not applicable in the context of BPM. And I don't care so much for a reasonable bit of Powercreeping   

Edited November 10, 2020 by Elric Galad

[thelee]

6 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

I agree with Boeroer : the mere existence of Cloak of Death means there is only a few cases where you want Armory instead.

maybe i'm missing something, but what makes cloak of death so uber that it is an easy pick over citzal's for a melee-focused wizard? when i use citzal's, minoletta's piercing sigil (plus everything else) is very good, but i do also occasionally self-empower if i also want to add cloak of death on top of everything else.

don't get me wrong, cloak of death is nice, but it doesn't seem that super uber to me.

Edited November 10, 2020 by thelee

[Elric Galad]

39 minutes ago, thelee said:

maybe i'm missing something, but what makes cloak of death so uber that it is an easy pick over citzal's for a melee-focused wizard? when i use citzal's, minoletta's piercing sigil (plus everything else) is very good, but i do also occasionally self-empower if i also want to add cloak of death on top of everything else.

don't get me wrong, cloak of death is nice, but it doesn't seem that super uber to me.

I think the added value of cloak of death is above what Citzal provides above "normal endgame weapons" (I usually use Mowdyr DPS as a comparison cause it is pretty easy to guess compared to more conditional effects) for a melee wiz indeed.
I don't compare it to other Tier 9 and I'm not saying it is super uber by itself.

My definition of a good weapon for a given build is "better than Mowdyr"  Not that it is the best weapon in the game (there is no such thing), but is arguably one of the less build-dependant.

Edited November 10, 2020 by Elric Galad

[Boeroer]

I wouldn't say Cloak of Death is "uber" - it's just a unique and good effect for a wizard who tends to get attacked in melee. It takes heat off of you through hard CC and deals considerable dmg at the same time. Piercing Sigil (PL8) and even Zandethus's Draconic Fury (PL7) do the same basically - they are also good.
Citzal's Enchanted Armory is just unimpressive. Why would I want to summon Enchanted Armory instead of Spirit Lance? It would be okay at lower PLs but not at PL9. It's cool to have a kind of "brutish" melee spell at PL9 - but it's just not good or fun enough (at least the weapons). 

 

[Powerotti]

So it needs to be:

- comparable to other pl9 spells, but not op

- unique and different to other summoned weapons

- useful, but not must have

- fun to use

 

I'm thinking about something inspired by omnipotence paradox - "immovable object" for breastplate and "irresistible force" for weapons. But if it's fantasy world, it should work mostly for magic aspects. Breastplate have barier, that blocks all spells (from both sides, that's why one can't cast) and weapon attacks can't be resisted, so:

- immovable object - can't cast spells, and gives 100% spell resist (or immunity to all afflictions, or reduction to negative effects)

- irresistible force - reduce positive effects on target (like street sweeper) and prolong positive on user (like wall of draining) on hit.