Questions on Imbued Weapons / FPS / Elements

[Vesperas]

Based on the last Slormite Chronicles, we'll finally be able to imbue our weapons with an element, which is neat.

That said, I'm wondering if any progress has been regarding performance? My performance is quite solid unless one of two things happens, then my FPS begins to bomb.

1) There are a large amount of enemies on screen and I have an imbued element from a breach.

Lightning is the worst, by far (loss of 40+ FPS). Fire and Ice are about the same (loss of around 30+ FPS). Light and Shadow are third (loss of around 20+ FPS). This happens on all three characters.

2) I am playing the Fierce Huntress and have a lot of totems (portable ballistas) down with the Legacy of Pain skill. It always forces totems (even the expired ones) to do a proximity check, indicated by the little flag, and at some point, the massive number of hitscan projectiles and other calculations going on everywhere just breaks the game, rendering it unplayable.

I experienced this the most often while using the Ancestral Legacy Bow, and its Ancient and Primal Ancient versions. It became so bad with that weapon that I just gave up on it and started using something else.

Regardless, it goes without saying all of these issues are surely related and seeing as it's already a problem, I'm a little skeptical about how well imbued weapons will play out. As stated elsewhere already, it seems likely that the hitscan animation effects (clouds, lightning bolts, flames, etc) need to be toned down and made less resource intensive somehow.

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My other question is if we'll see more elemental defense and passive survival options in the Ancestral Legacy as well? As I understand it, elemental resistance only reduces damage, not effects. If you want to lessen or negate an effect, you'll need to build resistance to that specific element.

The thing is, other than a few very specific breaches (Floor Is Lava, Ice Bombs, etc), I'm not sure why the player would want those, so I'm assuming there's more to come?

The reason I'm asking if we'll see more passive survival options is because my skill bars are (usually) already maxed out on all three characters, depending on what Reaper I'm currently using, and I can only imagine it becoming worse as more legendary items and tiers of the Ancestral Legacy are added, unless there's an overhaul of the entire skill bars component of the UI.

Thanks!

[Ashmore[The Slormancer]]

Hello!

I believe I have quite a bit of room to improve performance on Imbue Skills, I just never took the time to work on it. This update seems like the perfect opportunity to do so, and I should be able to limit the FPS drop to something reasonable and hopefully barely noticeable on most PCs.
Please note that there is a "Low FX" setting in the Options menu that you can toggle on to improve your FPS (it mostly turns down Lightning effects right now and a couple of minor things).

As for your issue with Legacy of Pain, I wasn't aware of this so I'll take a look and see what I can do about it.

Both issues are not related to the main "hitscan" issue though, that I also have to take care of. But hey, one step at a time, we will eventually have something solid performance-wise.

___

We absolutely plan to add more Elemental Damage sources during development. At some point, we want to have Archers shooting Shadow Arrows while Wizards cast Ice Projectiles during a Floor is Lava effect (I really need to work on performance...).
That being said, this is all theoretical, and I'm not sure that Elemental Resistances such as Fire or Ice Resistance will be used anyway. We'll make adjustments on the way if need be.

Thanks for your feedback!

[Vesperas]

Originally posted by AshmoreThe Slormancer:

We absolutely plan to add more Elemental Damage sources during development. At some point, we want to have Archers shooting Shadow Arrows while Wizards cast Ice Projectiles during a Floor is Lava effect (I really need to work on performance...).
That being said, this is all theoretical, and I'm not sure that Elemental Resistances such as Fire or Ice Resistance will be used anyway. We'll make adjustments on the way if need be.

Hello! That sounds neat. I was curious if (or when) it would become something big enough that the player might want to take into consideration for their build or gear. I'll just wait and see what happens down the road, once more progression content and other stuff has been added.

I appreciate the response and I'm really looking forward to the next update.