Perception, Resolve, and dump stats! Oh, my!

[Sensuki]

There is also another issue and that is character creation is not clear on the far reaching implications.  Yes Perception has a crappy little interrupt chance... but just how often is perception applicable in coversations?  How much of an effect does it have in game on spotting secret doors or hidden items?  Does it give bonuses to certain skills?  We don't know for sure, because Perception has a poor combat implementation we dump it even though out of combat it could be one of if not the most important stat.

While not necessarily related to attribute balance in combat, those are important concerns. I don't think there needs to be a pointer as to how much Perception will be used in dialogue, but as long as the description of the attribute states that it is used in dialogue for certain things (which I think it does, but I'm not 100% sure) then that's okay.

 

I don't think attributes intersect with skills, and I'm not 100% sure if Perception affects searching, but it should I guess?

Edited August 19, 2014 by Sensuki

[Grand_Commander13]

Having dump stats for any individual character is one thing, but right now the issue is that there are characters who get no benefit from Resolve, and the bonus from Perception isn't all that big either.

 

Resolve, I think, is easier to solve: it needs an offensive bonus of some sort. Since its current bonus is to allowing you to cast when you get hit, something related to skills wouldn't go amiss. Perhaps a percent chance to make a use of a per-rest skill count as a per-encounter instead? Or maybe give all skill users an instant-use activated ability to treat their next per-rest skill as per-encounter, and have Resolve affect the stamina cost to do it (it might cost 50 stamina per spell level, for instance, and Resolve drops the cost by 4%).

 

Perception is tougher. I really like the theory of what it's trying to do. In fact, when I was making my Ranger I was like "Interruption? Sign me up!" I guess it's just not as useful as it sounds, though. Does it only interrupt spell casts, or can attacks be interrupted as well?

[Sensuki]

an Interrupt plays a short (~500ms?) interrupt animation which interrupts character actions, and forces them to begin the animation again, and also interrupts their recovery time from ticking down.

[Answermancer]

Resolve, I think, is easier to solve: it needs an offensive bonus of some sort. Since its current bonus is to allowing you to cast when you get hit, something related to skills wouldn't go amiss. Perhaps a percent chance to make a use of a per-rest skill count as a per-encounter instead? Or maybe give all skill users an instant-use activated ability to treat their next per-rest skill as per-encounter, and have Resolve affect the stamina cost to do it (it might cost 50 stamina per spell level, for instance, and Resolve drops the cost by 4%).

 

Those sound way too fiddly, and potentially overpowered, also no other stat does anything like that.

 

I do think that Resolve either needs SOME sort of offensive use, or a more universally useful defensive one (like Con's extra health, relevant in every fight against every kind of damage) or Concentration needs to be considerably more obvious and powerful somehow.

[Answermancer]

What if Resolve passively converted Glances into Misses and Hits into Glances at the lower end? The opposite of high Accuracy I guess, an ability to "shrug off damage", or dodge it in a way. It would apply to all damage the same way Con's health bonuses do.

 

Might still be too subtle to be interesting, or alternately too powerful, but it would make it easier to play an "evasion tank" type character. I dunno.

Edited August 19, 2014 by Answermancer

[Grand_Commander13]

What if a Concentration bar was added to the character? It increments upwards based directly on the amount of Resolve the character has, and if it fills up before they're successfully interrupted then their next per-rest spell is per-encounter instead. This way, Resolve is good for front-liners (they don't want their in-the-thick-of-things skills to be interrupted) and back-liners (they want to bring the hurt) alike.

[mrmonocle]

what if they boost interrupt by making it a 2 sec stun?

[Karkarov]

what if they boost interrupt by making it a 2 sec stun?

That's not a bad idea, just make the interrupt itself more significant.

 

After thinking about this more I think Monocle's idea is good but maybe should only be like a 1 second stun.  I still think a slight bonus to deflection should go in.  Will that make a huge difference? No, but it will make it a helluva lot more attractive to melee characters.

 

Resolve .... maybe we should give it the increased % chance to crit.  People underestimate crit percentage quite a bit and if you got even a .5% per point of resolve you should see people be a ton more willing to stat it than they are now.  Either that or you give it flat damage reduction, but again, this doesn't solve the problem of range characters still not valuing it.

 

The real problem is we have a 6 stat system just to be reminiscent of D&D, D&D invented the dump stat it is no coincidence it had 6.  As I said my initial resolution is ballsy but i still think it is the best one.  Scrap Perception and Resolve, and remake it as 1 stat.  Do that and make it stun/resist stun like Mococle suggested and you have a very strong stat that is useful to all characters.

Edited August 20, 2014 by Karkarov

[Sacred_Path]

what if they boost interrupt by making it a 2 sec stun?

 

People would bitch. And for a reason. Stun effects, especially repeating stun effects, are among the most boring/ infuriating status effects.

[Grand_Commander13]

Well you can't add crit chance to Perception, since crit chance is part of Dexterity's kit as part of accuracy (which itself plays in to both damage and duration).

 

I think that interrupts can be important to everybody, so if Perception was simply improved to 5% increase in interrupt chance per level, I can see it being more worth points for most characters. Resolve's concentration boost could be buffed to match, but that still leaves people who don't plan on taking hits not needing it. Constitution and Resolve are kind of the odd stats out in that they're purely defensive.

 

If the fights were made in such a way that the AI didn't always respect your front line it wouldn't even be a problem. You don't want the AI always rushing everyone past the fighter's engagement limit out to the back line, but there needs to be a lot less of this "just gonna pound on this heavily armored dude while the naked archer perforates my buddies." If you can't force them to sit still, they shouldn't happily oblige you anyway. Then, with interrupts and resistances to them more powerful, maybe we'll get a broader distribution of stats.

[Panteleimon]

Well you can't add crit chance to Perception, since crit chance is part of Dexterity's kit as part of accuracy (which itself plays in to both damage and duration).

 

I think that interrupts can be important to everybody, so if Perception was simply improved to 5% increase in interrupt chance per level, I can see it being more worth points for most characters. Resolve's concentration boost could be buffed to match, but that still leaves people who don't plan on taking hits not needing it. Constitution and Resolve are kind of the odd stats out in that they're purely defensive.

 

If the fights were made in such a way that the AI didn't always respect your front line it wouldn't even be a problem. You don't want the AI always rushing everyone past the fighter's engagement limit out to the back line, but there needs to be a lot less of this "just gonna pound on this heavily armored dude while the naked archer perforates my buddies." If you can't force them to sit still, they shouldn't happily oblige you anyway. Then, with interrupts and resistances to them more powerful, maybe we'll get a broader distribution of stats.

 

 

I thought that in BG enemies would prioritize the biggest damage dealers. So often when fighting, say, a boss, if your archer was doing the most damage, the boss would trot over and cave his face in. The same went for wizards. So you often had to actively surround the enemy to hold him in place.

Edited August 20, 2014 by Panteleimon

[Tartantyco]

I think crit chance should be part of perception. It makes more sense.

[Grand_Commander13]

Well now your fighters get attacks of opportunity to really hurt people who leave melee combat with them, but that only counts for targets they have "engaged". The issue is that either BB Fighter can engage a lot of guys, or the AI just attacks the first enemy it sees. Either way, the result is that any stat without an offensive component (Constitution and Resolve) are never useful on back-line party members.

 

You can either give them offensive components (I still like the idea of tying a combination of their activity and their not being hit giving them the ability to use a per-rest skill as per-encounter) or make the back line  more likely to be attacked. Or maybe both.

 

I think crit chance should be part of perception. It makes more sense.

They'd have to rework the hit system for that to happen, so I doubt they can. Right now more accurate characters (i.e. ones with high Dexterity) will critically hit more often for their attacks and spells. Edited August 20, 2014 by Grand_Commander13

[Ganrich]

@Karkarov - I agree that there being 6 stats is a big part of the issue. However, since Might and Con increase Fortitude, Dex and Perception increase Reflex, and Int and Resolve increase Will it would throw the symmetry off in the saving throws department. It would make increasing the save governed by a single attribut far too easy to get up there and possibly cause some issues. I have been thinking about solutions that involve 5 stats, but balancing saves is the issue because the only way to fix it is to have 1 stat govern each save. That leaves 2 stats that could become dump stats as a byproduct. I would keep Resolve, but scrap Perception. Then do something like this:

 

Might - damage and healing and carrying capacity

con - health, stamina, and Fortitude

Dexterity - Accuracy and interrupt

Int - AoE size and concentration

Resolve - duration and Fortitude

 

This keeps symmetry among the saves while giving all stats except constitution some offensive capabilities. You could toss crit chance increase in there and move things around some more as well.

 

I think allowing a 1 second stun on Resolve may be too powerful. However, instead of talents increasing the engagement limit you could allow resolve the ability to increase the engagement limit. Just a quick thought. Sorry for errors. On my phone at work.

[Sensuki]

I think balanced attributes can be achieved with six of them, I also don't think the amount of attributes will be changed because of all of the dialogue design that's already been put into options based on the six attributes.

 

They're here to stay I think.

[Ganrich]

I think balanced attributes can be achieved with six of them, I also don't think the amount of attributes will be changed because of all of the dialogue design that's already been put into options based on the six attributes.

 

They're here to stay I think.

Yeah, I agree. I think we will see 6 attributes in the end for the very reasons you stated.

[Panteleimon]

 

I think balanced attributes can be achieved with six of them, I also don't think the amount of attributes will be changed because of all of the dialogue design that's already been put into options based on the six attributes.

 

They're here to stay I think.

Yeah, I agree. I think we will see 6 attributes in the end for the very reasons you stated.

 

 

 

I mean, it's in beta. It's content complete. That the attribute system is here to stay shouldn't exactly be a surprise to anyone.

[Sabotin]

Maybe they should change it to be some sort of nonlinear progression, too? Some concerns were raised that stats are too often 18s and 3s, because the differences are not really noticeable without a big disparity in a stat?

 

One thing I'm also interested to know: The INT stat increases AoE, but does it do that with the area itself or with the radius?

[Headbomb]

It would be nice to know if you get a 40% increase in area, or 40% increase in radius (or diameter). For clarity, I would suggest the devs use "radius" or "diameter" in the description of spells and effects.

[hairyscotsman2]

Resolve could increase Fort, Ref and Will because it makes you more able to resist or shake off effects. It could lower duration of negative effects or increase duration of positive ones.

Perception could increase Deflection because you see the blows coming.

 

Could change Dex to give a small bonus to accuracy and a larger one to deflection and have Per do the opposite.

[Doppelschwert]

I agree that deflection should be tied to the attributes somehow. Given the importance it has right now for combat, it is way too static.

 

On the matter of aoe increase, that was clarified by josh at some point in time. I think it was increase of the total area, not of the radius, in order to keep the increase a linear function.

[Shevek]

The solution is simple. Slightly increase the effect of these stats and slightly decrease the effect of their sister stats. These should be a pretty quick fixes that do not necessitate messing with much.

Edited August 20, 2014 by Shevek

[Sensuki]

Won't work because ranged characters don't need to opt into the Interrupt/Concentration system

[Doppelschwert]

I'm not sure about the argument concerning ranged characters. By the same logic, they don't need to opt into constitution as well, so where do you see the difference?

 

Even then, it's is imaginable that the KI later on might focus the spellcasters and ranged characters with their own ranged attackers. Wouldn't that fix the situation?

[Qiushui]

Make ranged attack accuracy based on the combined total of Dex & Resolve.