Feedback on v0.2

[Zhuugus]

Originally posted by patch notes:

Also, we've said it in our previous Slormite Chronicles: It was never intended for players to reach Wrath 10 at this point in development.

So you want me to farm Wrath 6 not 10. Problem is - it's not fun. Legendaries don't drop, materials don't drop, no experience to lvl up slorm reapers or gain potential for items.
You tell me everything will be good again in the future. I believe you. But right now reasons to play the game are gone.
I believe these changes are being made because some people played the living ♥♥♥♥ out of the game 24\7 and are obviously overgeared. Pretty sure 90% of players haven't even reached wrath 10.

Originally posted by patch notes:

Important: An item can no longer roll the same stat multiple times. Meaning if you have +10% Max Life as a Magic Stat, it can no longer be rolled as a Base, Rare or Epic stat. That is true for both crafting and loot.

So you take away my freedom of gear stat choices. Gear is fundamental in arpg, these artificial restrictions are bad. I already can't roll some stats on some items, for example crit chance on boots or helm or chest.
Plus you gutted all good stats in half, leave me at least some freedom.

Originally posted by patch notes:

Projectiles can no longer Pierce AND Fork. A Projectile will try to trigger the highest stat first, and try to trigger the second stat only if the first has failed.

I found rebound/fork/pierce mechanics excellent. They worked great together, were fun and fit the game perfectly. Gutting stats for balance I can understand. But gutting fun mechanics?

Originally posted by patch notes:

Movement Speed now offers diminishing returns.

This is THE WORST. Tell me how walking simulator is fun. Again, you gutted ms in half. And this? Starting ms is horrible, until you get at least +50 ms you move like a cripple.
Tell me why do you want me to crawl from one room to another? Wasting half of my playing time on WALKING instead of fighting is obnoxious.

You tell me everything will be good again in the future. I believe you. But from my point of view everything was pretty good before v0.2. And after 0.2 many things will totally be not good for a long long time. Weird.

P.S.: Music in this game is FANTASTIC.

[Ashmore[The Slormancer]]

Hi there!

Originally posted by Zhuugus:

So you want me to farm Wrath 6 not 10. Problem is - it's not fun. Legendaries don't drop, materials don't drop, no experience to lvl up slorm reapers or gain potential for items.
You tell me everything will be good again in the future. I believe you. But right now reasons to play the game are gone.
I believe these changes are being made because some people played the living ♥♥♥♥ out of the game 24\7 and are obviously overgeared. Pretty sure 90% of players haven't even reached wrath 10.

First things first, Wrath does not change Material loot and Potential gain. It's actually faster on lower Wraths. Legendaries also drop at any Wrath level. You basically have less Magic Find and less Experience Find in Wrath 6 than Wrath 10, but that's it.

Originally posted by Zhuugus:

Pretty sure 90% of players haven't even reached wrath 10.

That is exactly why we are nerfing it now actually, before it becomes the norm.

Also, this update might be a problem if you got to Wrath 10 before, but we've been confirmed that Wrath 10 was still perfectly possible. You will have to manage your stuff differently and be much more careful, which is a great point if you ask us.

Originally posted by Zhuugus:

Gear is fundamental in arpg, these artificial restrictions are bad. I already can't roll some stats on some items, for example crit chance on boots or helm or chest.

Having restrictions on equipment is pretty standard on any ARPG actually, we're not doing anything out of the norm. Like in D3, you cannot roll Critical Chance on Boots or Helm, and PoE only lets you roll it on Weapons (I have to check, but I'm pretty sure that's about it).

As why we are removing the "multiple stack", it is because it actually removes a bit of creativity from the gearing process. Players just tend to stack the same stat over and over instead of figuring out how to use a stat they've ignored until then. We might see a bit more of exotic stats in the Epic slots because of that change instead of something really close to the usual "Raw Damage, Critical Strike Chance, Attack Speed" trio.

Originally posted by Zhuugus:

I found rebound/fork/pierce mechanics excellent. They worked great together, were fun and fit the game perfectly. Gutting stats for balance I can understand. But gutting fun mechanics?

Just to clarify, if you have 50% Fork and 50% Pierce, your Projectile will sometimes Fork and sometimes Pierce. It can do both. Just not at the same time.
And the Rebound mechanic hasn't changed.

That being said, they were a bit too strong together compared to their Melee counterparts. And we also want to create some sense of specialization with Projectiles where you either go Pierce OR Fork in your build and push it to 100%, or build just a little bit of both.

Just like the point above about creativity, we feel like we're actually adding a choice and depth to how players decide to build a Projectile Skill. It's no longer "everyone has 100% Pierce and 100% Fork", it's now up to personal preference and what build you can come up with.

Originally posted by Zhuugus:

This is THE WORST. Tell me how walking simulator is fun. Again, you gutted ms in half. And this? Starting ms is horrible, until you get at least +50 ms you move like a cripple.

We feel like the player reaches what feels like absurd/funky Movement speed a bit too quickly, up to a point that you just run into walls constantly. That's not the kind of experience we want to offer.
Also, since you have to move away to evade Arrows / Projectiles or Areas of Effect, we can't offer the same kind of Movement Speed you may see in other ARPGs. Movement Speed has to be considered like a strong defensive stat, not just basic movement from point A to point B.

I don't expect everyone to understand why we are making those changes. However, I feel like it's important to remind it: We LOVE our game, and our number one goal is to create a super fun experience. We don't destroy things or nerf things for the sake of it.
And we really feel like even with no additional content, the 0.2 version of the game requires that extra bit of creativity that makes you think twice about each stat and requires a bit more of your attention while engaging enemies or managing mana.
And we think it's for the best.

P.S: Music is not getting nerfed! So that's a thing!

[Zhuugus]

Thanks for the reply.

Originally posted by Ashmore:

We LOVE our game

I love it too.

Originally posted by Ashmore:

Movement Speed has to be considered like a strong defensive stat, not just basic movement from point A to point B.

My point is that movement from breach A to breach B is slow. If you decided to reduce speed in combat, so be it. Give me please quality of life in moving between combats.
Sometimes the layout of rooms is bad and I have to slowly slowly backtrack few empty rooms.
Suggestion: Make a perk in Attributes tree at low level so all classes could have access to it. For example, at bravery 10:
"You have +40% ms if you didn't take damage in last 5 seconds"
or
"You have +40% ms buff for 20 seconds after closing a breach. This buff is lost if you take damage"

Originally posted by Ashmore:

P.S: Music is not getting nerfed! So that's a thing!

Noice!


All in all, I believe you'll make an excellent game. Best wishes for you.

[Ravenkid9266]

I already had some concerns with the different characters and their role in how they are intended to be played, and honestly I got a bit into reading the notes on the experimental and found myself nopeing out. When I came back and gave it another once over it just confirmed that for me, the development is not something I am going to be able to follow.

Maybe once a big patch hits, or when the release patch drops, I can return and give it another shot. Overall I am not as excited for these changes, they just feel like extra steps for the sake of extra steps. That is just my gut feeling hopefully it will change, but at least in feel these changes just feel like the start of a trend that is going to be a difficult ride

[flipflopmagoo]

Originally posted by AshmoreThe Slormancer:

Just to clarify, if you have 50% Fork and 50% Pierce, your Projectile will sometimes Fork and sometimes Pierce. It can do both. Just not at the same time.
And the Rebound mechanic hasn't changed.

That being said, they were a bit too strong together compared to their Melee counterparts. And we also want to create some sense of specialization with Projectiles where you either go Pierce OR Fork in your build and push it to 100%, or build just a little bit of both.

Just like the point above about creativity, we feel like we're actually adding a choice and depth to how players decide to build a Projectile Skill. It's no longer "everyone has 100% Pierce and 100% Fork", it's now up to personal preference and what build you can come up with.

If you want players to have the option of building "a little bit of both" pierce and fork on a character I do not think this change will accomplish that. Please correct me if I am misunderstanding but here is an example that illustrates my point. Your character has about 50% pierce and 50% fork chance - imagine a slightly higher pierce chance since I am not sure how you break ties. In this scenario your projectiles will pierce 50% of the time, fork 25% of the time and do neither 25% of the time. You have invested a lot of affixes and still one out of four of your projectiles are duds. If you instead built for 100% pierce and 0% fork your projectiles would never be duds.

My suggestion would be to alter the system so that a character with 50% pierce and 50% fork chance will actually see 50% of their projectiles pierce and 50% of their projectiles fork. This would be a more intuitive system and would compensate for the fact that projectiles can no longer both pierce and fork.

[Awake]

To be honest, I stopped played after 0.2 dropped.

It just felt less fun to play.

The movement speed on higher refresh displays just feels like trudging through custard.

Love the music, UI and general gameplay but the nerfs made it unplayable for me :(

I'm holding off reviewing until final release but at the moment it's going in the wrong direction.

I get there will be a variety of opinions on the matter and obvious comparisons to other ARPGs, but the one thing they all do is offer high octane cacophony of combat as your character progresses.

The movement speed and projectile nerfs were heartbreaking tbh.

Wish you luck with the roadmap nonetheless :)

[Omega AI]

Yep also gave up on 0.2 once I tried it on PTR. Came back yesterday and somewhat modified my build so I can still play t7/t8 at a really slow pace. However I dont plan to grind again for days. Will wait for next patch / new content.

[N0S]

Would have prefer just bug fixes or new content, but finding all my gear neutered (but hopefully mostly recoverable once level cap is raised going by the given 40 vs 70 example), guess i can leave this game shelved for now.

-Quick copy/paste of patch notes comment, but after reading notes again, not even sure if any of my gear will survive since nearly every piece is double stated.

[IonDrako]

Originally posted by AshmoreThe Slormancer:

and PoE only lets you roll it on Weapons (I have to check, but I'm pretty sure that's about it).

Wanted to chime in here just as an fyi type of deal. So weapons in poe have a specific "increased critical stike chance" modifier that specifically and only affects the attack crit chance of that weapon's hits. Then there's the modifier "increased global critical strike chance" that affects anything that has a base crit chance. That second modifier can be on weapons, amulets, rings, belts, and gloves with a couple other related modifiers that either increase crit or interact with it in some way being on helmet and boots. and body armor.

(Not trying to make a point, was just letting you know since you said you weren't sure about that part of your comment)