Shroud is irrelevant

['norabseven]

The shroud should do more to your character for being inside it, and then we should have more potions/foods that reduce the effects as currently shroud is just a timer for death and almost pointless as the timer is so long, there is no fear or reason to not go into it, other than the shroud that kills you if your flame isn't high enough level that is.

What the shroud should be is a debuff to your character based on it's flame-level-entry-requirement and then each flame level should reduce these debuffs making it easier.

Could add in a increasing effect of debuffs based on time left in the shroud, so running out of time isn't just "oops your dead" and more "it's getting to high an effect to survive".

Also just remove the Shroud-Flame-Level-Gate-Death type shroud mechanic, with debuffs on shroud level vs flame level it should just debuff you into the ground but allow you to be in it, if you need to chug health pots to survive so be it, having a Shroud-Death-Area is kind of boring.

Anyway an example of how each level of shroud could affect your gameplay in some way could be:
- Damage Player once every X seconds or something, so that it's a constant threat.
- Reduce standard Health, Stamina, Mana regen, need potions/skills to regen.
- More damage taken by enemy attacks.
- Enemies constantly spawning around you. More or Harder versions depending on shroud level
- Hallucinations of enemies that chase and attack you for zero damage but look real, so constant threat when mixed in with standard enemies.
- Friendly Fire (at high shroud levels or low timer values) kind of like you or your friends are being taken over by the shroud and can no longer tell friend from foe, could be distance based, the farther you are the more enemy like they appear

If there is a constant threat in the shroud there could be benefits added also, like Shroud-Ore which when refined if 2x it's non-shroud version, better loot drops (loot is terrible but that's a different story) there is loads that can be added.

The shroud currently is just a dark area of the map, that has a timer, nothing more.

Given that the shroud is supposed to be the core thing in the game lore it's just irrelevant.

EDIT:
(I'll add one of my comments here so people don't comment "I don't want it harder" etc anymore)
I'm not bothered about it being harder or easier, I just want more agency, more something interesting about the shroud, just something.

Currently it's just a timer that when it expires you go *poof*, that is not a very engaging mechanic and I'd like to see anyone defend it as a "mechanic".

What I'm suggesting could be super easy things, things that don't need any skills or mega strategies to get around but if you're not careful or paying attention they will very much get in the way.

[Slamz]

Originally posted by Foxglovez:

How bout just accepting it for what it is? Maybe not a game that scratches your itch because what you really want is a hard mode specifically for yourself, to be perfect for you... Kind of unlikely.

It actually was an immediate red flag that the game had no customized difficulty levels. This implies (and from what I've seen so far, correctly implies) that the game is "E for Everyone". It's meant to be easy. It is, consequently, rather boring.

[Proxii]

I am all for options. I like shroud the way it is and if it was more stressfull i wouldnt even play it. I play games to relax.

That said I dont mind game having options. I think Palworld does it great with their private server options that let player modify almost all aspects.

So what this game needs in my opinion is options. options that make things harder or easier. Options that let me choose if the game world resets or not. and most important an option to turn off the ridiculous level of bloom.

[Acierocolotl]

For whatever reason, my computer struggles to render the fog well. My framerates drop quite a bit. I mean in the city, I had single-digit framerates.

I mean single digits in the city. Driver issues, whaddayagonnado? My card is apparently a bit of a potato!

So you want the shroud to be threatening? Try my video card! I promise you you'll change your tune in an instant!

NOTE: THIS POST IS A JOKE. I mean, my video card is apparently also a joke.

[EverTrek1701]

no, it's just fine. fog and corruption timer is enough.

[Urk_da_WAAAGH!]

Nah, the shroud is fine as it is

[Asherogar]

The Shroud itself is fine and I completely disagree with the idea of adding constant dot, hallucinations and debuffs. Debuffs are especially a balancing nightmare, because you either make everything outside of shroud a complete joke and only shroud is any challenge, or you go the opposite way of making outside balanced properly, but in shroud everything kills you by just farting in your general direction, while taking no damage itself.

High level Shroud (or the red fog) is doing exactly what it's supposed to do: lore-friendly "invisible wall" keeping you out of areas you're not supposed to be in yet. You encounter this fog for the first time, dip your toe, get a warning and then never approach it until you upgrade your flame. I'm exploring every nook and cranny of the map and generally upgrade my flame only when I 100% completed the current zone and I haven't encountered a situation where I would accidentally wander into a red fog or feel like I need to go here now.

The problem is the timer and that players currently have too much agency over it in the wrong places.

Starting 5 min is completely fine. The shrouded zones are fairly small, have multiple points to recharge your timer and timer itself is short enough to give some pressure, but long enough let your learn the mechanic and get used to it. The Shroud Protection Potion (SPP) gives +2 min, which is a sizeable temporary buff on a consumable item. You improve your timer for a cost.

Over time shrouded zones become bigger, places to recharge timer fewer, but you already learned the mechanic, know what to do, raised your flame to extend timer a bit and have a potion just in case, with greater SPP later on.

I don't know how effective the mage's shroud skill is, but warrior's is perfectly fine: +5 seconds if you kill an enemy. Unless you're killing infinite swarms of bugs, it's very problematic to gain infinite timer from this, it just helps recoup timer wasted on fighting enemies and in some edge cases lets you gain a bit. It's fine.

But +7 flat minutes, unconditionally and permanently is outrageous. It completely breaks the whole system. Literally doubles your timer from the maxed out flame. The worst thing is that invalidates all other options.

No wonder you think The Shroud mechanic is bad when you run around with 15 minutes timer by default, without using any consumables, equipment or anything else.

Honestly, it should be swapped to something like +5 seconds on critical hit (just make it not work when you're hitting inanimate objects, battle heal is quite silly with this). So it works in the same vein as other similar abilites, by being conditional (you need to invest in crit and you need to be in combat to get value) and instead of extending your time in shroud by default, help you to recoup time wasted on fighting.

['norabseven]

This whole thread is going around in circles and I honestly can't understand people who say they are fine with a timer.

A visible timer is a cheap unfun simplistic way of handling the players interactions, there are thousands of better ways to do it.

Take Subnautica, the entire game is underwater, its the environment it needs to be simple and it in essence it is just a timer, but it's hidden under an oxygen meter so it's got a little interesting lore reason to it, and you start to black out and things happen when you get near the end of your oxygen, you don't just die it's not JUST a timer it has meaning to the player it has agency, etc, the shroud timer means nothing to the player.

This is the kind of thing i'm talking about, something to wrap up the shroud in to make it interesting, the whole easiness and difficulty of the shroud can be exactly as it is for all I care, there should just be something more to it.

It is enSHROUDed and the shroud is a timer.. I mean honestly wtf.

[Darksynapse]

Originally posted by Slamz:

Originally posted by Foxglovez:

How bout just accepting it for what it is? Maybe not a game that scratches your itch because what you really want is a hard mode specifically for yourself, to be perfect for you... Kind of unlikely.

It actually was an immediate red flag that the game had no customized difficulty levels. This implies (and from what I've seen so far, correctly implies) that the game is "E for Everyone". It's meant to be easy. It is, consequently, rather boring.

Later mobs hit you for 75 percent of your health. Two hits and you're dead. How much "harder" is the game suppose to be? One hit kills you? maybe just have the mob look at you and your character dies, drops all your armor (which gets destroyed) and you have to refarm all of it. Heaven right?

[Damocles]

The shroud works just fine as timer to get things done quickly and planned. You cant idle there, but its not so short that it pure speedrunning.