What Prompted Warp Effect Change?

[lucas.castro]

I recall that a while back, warp effect duration was increased to 2 rounds (from 1 round). I'm curious what prompted this change -- did players ask for it?

I find it curious that, for a game where there are basically daily complaints about how random the game is (RNG), they devs would take something that was entirely NOT in the TT game, entirely random, a sily meta-game issue (in the TT, you automatically got wyrdstone AFTER battles, whereas here you can even have a round to pickup stuff after beating your foe), and decided to double its impact.

I've hated the whole warp effect thing from day 1, despised it when it was doubled, and now am in a position where my Immaculate Flesh's effect was clearly ignored by the game (see the bug reports), and I just picked up the horrendous -2 movement effect for two turns, which should have been ignored if Immaculate Flesh had applied. Brutal.

For a game that is so insanely random, why increase it so? Having to send your guys to pick up loot instead of fighting is already an interesting (and challenging) tactical decision. Warp effects are completely unnecessary on that front. I just don't get it...

[entireleaves]

I dunno doesn't really bother me too much. It can help to have your guys who are going to do the majority of the wyrdstone looting pray at the cart to give them three rounds of a buff protecting them from the bad effects. But you often get good effects too so I feel like it balances out.

[Warlord]

Increase in the duration means that they went from largely irrelevant to something you now have to consider.

The change was good.

[Boris always Boris]

Originally posted by Warlord:

Increase in the duration means that they went from largely irrelevant to something you now have to consider.

The change was good.

Agreed ... a buff/debuff for a single turn usually had little affect on anything especially if your stone grabbing dude is nowhere near the combat. Now you have to consider the consequences of the possible debuffs.

[lucas.castro]

For sure I get that a 1 turn buff/debuff has almost no effect, so if you're committed to this approach, you might as well make it a 2 turn effect. However, my points are these:

1. Whether or not you should spread out your guys to loot (and how much you should do so) is already an interesting and challenging choice, without any buffs/debuffs;

2. In the case of loot being right next to the fight, I get that picking it up would be a no-brainer. But consider an alternate solution to this issue: if you pick up loot within X meters of an enemy, you get a debuff of -10 melee and ranged resistance for 2 turns. That now becomes an incredibly difficult (and interesting) choice;

3. This game is INCREDIBLY random as is. For things like melee, shooting, and spellcasting, there is no way around it (and heck, that's exactly how the TT was). But it's simply not necessary for looting, as highlighted by the sample alternative above.


The issue is, that luck earlier is ALWAYS better than luck later. All other things being equal, if player A gets much luckier in the first half of the game, he/she will demolish player B, even if player B gets much luckier in the second half of the game. That's because that early luck helps you down more warriors, faster, meaning that you'll have a huge advantage in the late game.

Warp effects from wyrdstone has a huge impact in the early game. If all my heroes get horrendous debuffs like -5 to all physical stats, -5 to all martial stats, and -2 to movement (before the fight is joined), and yours get +20 armour, +3 movement, etc, you'll have a massive advantage for 2 turns.

And it's simply unnecessary, as I've shown above. You can make the choice of looting incredibly challenging, without relying on randomness.

In fact, if you know for a fact that you'll be punished for looting, that choice is MORE interesting. A 20-25% chance of getting a buff (rather than a debuff) doesn't make the choice more interesting, it makes the choice a no-brainer — "Why wouldn't I pick up this wyrdstone cluster right in front of this Bloodletter? I might get an awesome buff out of it". If I know I'm getting punished, I'll still REALLY want that cluster, but I might just say forget it, and hope that I can grab it later. Now it's a tough choice.

[Warlord]

Now you're just making a chicken out of a feather...

[Paranoia]

As the person who is the one who initiated the suggestion to buff both Wyrdstone Skill- and Wyrdstone Durations to 2, here's the reasoning:

Wyrdstone Skills were next to useless.
Mutant and Verminkin Skills could not use theirs basically at all.
Sister basically had to end her Movement on the 'stones and risk getting engaged (thus unable to pick them up) to get actual practical benefit out of the Movement Buff, which, because one rarely actually ended SP use exactly on the 'Stones, was even then exactly 0 Meters distance gained.
And Sorcerer can only do Damage Spell Builds if the enemy is kind enough to stand all in a neat cluster. Which means that most players didn't bother with the rule at all.
Indeed, I had, at the time, actually forgot Verminkin had a Skill at all, it was so useless.

As for Wyrdstone Effects themselves... Like Traps before them when they were 1 turns in Duration, I, and people in general, simply ignored that effects existed, because about 95% of the time the effect was gone before it was ever relevant, and 90% of the remaining time 5% of the time the effect was one or more Movement or SP Buffs and/or Debuffs while one still had SP left.
Wyrdstone Resistance was absolutely worthless.
One could blindly pick up the 'Stones whle under threath of imminent combat uncaring of the nonexistent consequences.

As for your resentment for the effects existing, one has to wonder how one possibly could resent the effects when they almost never mattered. Indeed, when only 4 of the results mattered (+-Movement and SP), that was RNG talking and just annoying.
As for not having this feature at all... the guys are picking up concentrated Warp. Apart from swallowing the stuff I can't imagine thing more likely to have an impact on a persons immediate future. And unlike with picking up a nuclear-rod, Warhammer universe has always gone for literatically more satisfying expressions of Chaos, Madness & Mutation, not death by radiation poisoning. I was mildly disappointed the guys didn't mutate permanently (mostly negative, seldom positive mutations) as time went by and they picked up more Wyrdstones! The effect not existing at all would have been lore-breakingly immersion breaking.

The change into 2 turns made the game experience much better where this feature is considered. I can, and do, still pick Wyrdstone up next to combat, but only if I can afford the potential consequences. And the one in every 10k times I get 3xMovement Buff or Debuff is hilarious! (Did you know that at Movement 1 you no longer can see where your SP point recovery spots are? I didn't before it happened!) And the Wyrdstone Skills actually matter enough to remember they exist.

EDIT: If you don't like Wyrdstone effects, take Wyrdstone Resistance.

[uddhava]

While I understand the reasoning perfectly, I do not agree that it had the desired effect. I still never think:
Oh gee, should I pick up this big lump of green stone that I need to gain more XP and money or leave it there because I might get -5 to whatever group of stats?
Wyrdstone is just way to valuable to leave on the ground if you are in a position to grab it.
The only thing that happened is that it went from a little annoying to more annoying (same as with traps). And as a consequence skills that pertain to wrdstone (resistance) are still useless comparatively.

And the fluff reasons can be discarded aswell. As Castro points out, it wasnt in the base game in any shape or form, so while I understand the reasoning here aswell, like traps they are additions to this game, but not must-have features.

We'll make do, but on the whole if these effects were magically disappeared I wouldnt mind it one bit.

[Paranoia]

Originally posted by uddhava:

leave it there because I might get -5 to whatever group of stats?

I was talking about a bit more of a situation of collecting 4+ lumps right now and risk 3-4 negative effects (which actually does start to add up into an actual hindrance) in imminent combat, or delay gathering them until a better time. Not so much not gathering them at all, unless the opponent pulls a surprise retreat (No! You weren't supposed to run away yet!).

[uddhava]

Yeah, still doesnt happen.... I just pick up whatever I can all the time. Point is: never have I felt I should take a skill to migitate these effects. Its just... a little annoying.

[Game kNight Plays]

Originally posted by uddhava:

Yeah, still doesnt happen.... I just pick up whatever I can all the time. Point is: never have I felt I should take a skill to migitate these effects. Its just... a little annoying.

Same here - even with the Witch Hunters racial abilities that enhance wyrdstone resistance I wouldn't waste a passive slot on it... but it has made me use the idol a bit more (when I remember and it is close to some stones)

You pick up the stones and live with the effect.

Personally I like the change from 1 turn to 2 turns as it now matters a bit more - I now need to think about not picking up every stone with one person...

[crimsonsun]

Originally posted by ljlinna:

As the person who is the one who initiated the suggestion to buff both Wyrdstone Skill- and Wyrdstone Durations to 2, here's the reasoning:

Wyrdstone Skills were next to useless.
Mutant and Verminkin Skills could not use theirs basically at all.
Sister basically had to end her Movement on the 'stones and risk getting engaged (thus unable to pick them up) to get actual practical benefit out of the Movement Buff, which, because one rarely actually ended SP use exactly on the 'Stones, was even then exactly 0 Meters distance gained.
And Sorcerer can only do Damage Spell Builds if the enemy is kind enough to stand all in a neat cluster. Which means that most players didn't bother with the rule at all.
Indeed, I had, at the time, actually forgot Verminkin had a Skill at all, it was so useless.

As for Wyrdstone Effects themselves... Like Traps before them when they were 1 turns in Duration, I, and people in general, simply ignored that effects existed, because about 95% of the time the effect was gone before it was ever relevant, and 90% of the remaining time 5% of the time the effect was one or more Movement or SP Buffs and/or Debuffs while one still had SP left.
Wyrdstone Resistance was absolutely worthless.
One could blindly pick up the 'Stones whle under threath of imminent combat uncaring of the nonexistent consequences.

As for your resentment for the effects existing, one has to wonder how one possibly could resent the effects when they almost never mattered. Indeed, when only 4 of the results mattered (+-Movement and SP), that was RNG talking and just annoying.
As for not having this feature at all... the guys are picking up concentrated Warp. Apart from swallowing the stuff I can't imagine thing more likely to have an impact on a persons immediate future. And unlike with picking up a nuclear-rod, Warhammer universe has always gone for literatically more satisfying expressions of Chaos, Madness & Mutation, not death by radiation poisoning. I was mildly disappointed the guys didn't mutate permanently (mostly negative, seldom positive mutations) as time went by and they picked up more Wyrdstones! The effect not existing at all would have been lore-breakingly immersion breaking.

The change into 2 turns made the game experience much better where this feature is considered. I can, and do, still pick Wyrdstone up next to combat, but only if I can afford the potential consequences. And the one in every 10k times I get 3xMovement Buff or Debuff is hilarious! (Did you know that at Movement 1 you no longer can see where your SP point recovery spots are? I didn't before it happened!) And the Wyrdstone Skills actually matter enough to remember they exist.

EDIT: If you don't like Wyrdstone effects, take Wyrdstone Resistance.

I'm pretty sure I was the first one calling for the change being as I wanted to happen in early access when playing pvp games questing for the stones it became totally apparent that both the skills and the effects were meaningless in there current form. Not that this matters, and I disappeared for months being unable to play due to driver issues so no doubt it was your campaigning that brought the change about, but if someones going to be blamed I'm fairly sure it should be me.

Now do I tend to worry about these effects not as such but I do check them and if someone get royally screwed I try to hold them out of the action for a round. So its' not having a meaningful effect to my planning even if its not effecting my initial interaction choice which is exactly the desired goal.

Personally I'm happy with the changes,though I'm still finding less benefit from the skills than I'd like, they are still better than the warpstone spells as a general rule and can provide tasty buffs if the battlefield allows you to take tactical advantage of them.

[crimsonsun]

I also have a switching line of collection guys, so one group of fighters guards/fights, while a couple collect and the rest are in reserve, the collectors move to reserve the fighters switch to collecting where able and the reserves move up to fill the line. Simple effective but requires forward thinking and tactics which is a good thing/

[lucas.castro]

This issue could probably also be made into a relative non-issue, if wyrdstone resistance was improved.

Right now, everyone's resistance is pathetic, especially when you consider that, apparently, there is a -15 penalty when picking up shards, and -25 for clusters.

Here's what I'd rather see:

1. Fragments force a single warp effect roll, at +20;

2. Shards force a single warp effect roll (no modifier);

3. Clusters force two warp effect rolls (no modifier);

4. "Resist Corruption" requires only Int 6 (12 for mastery), and grants +40 (+80 for mastery) wyrdstone resistance.

While that's a MASSIVE improvement to that skill, the reality is that it's currently a wasted slot to take this skill. You'd be using a slot plus 6 skill points for what, a 40% chance to avoid a temporary effect (when picking up a cluster)? That's ridiculous.

With the improvement I'm suggesting, you could have a henchmen with a decent chance of resisting the effect (without requiring mastery), or a hero with an amazing (95%) chance to do so. Probably not something too many people will do, but you might make ONE hero who's a designated cluster getter.

[Paranoia]

Originally posted by lucas.castro:

4. "Resist Corruption" required only Int 6 (12 for mastery), and grants +40 (+80 for mastery) wyrdstone resistance.

There was a Feedback Thread by yours truly not so long ago (two weeks or such?), where I suggested that Resist Corruption and Tracker were the 3/M9 Int Passive Skills (and got a Boost) and the rest of the Int Passives got a shove upwards and bit better accordingly.
But as Kes has enlightened me, the Devs are really hesitant to swap requirements around in order not to upset established Builds of people.
The end result was that the two Skills got doubled effect to what it is now.

Not nearly an optimal solution (and I don't quite accept that one shouldn't upset established Builds by swapping requirements if the end result is better reflective of the intended use and/or strength of the Skills), and Characters who might Want Tracker (unlikely) or Resist Corruption (more likely) can't reach the Int required.
But still better than nothing and what we had before (because +10/M20 with such high requirements was simply absurd).

[lucas.castro]

As far as I know, there is nothing stopping the devs from lowering the Intelligence requirements for this skill, without raising others to take its place in the list of high-end Intelligence skills. They'd lose some symmetry with other skill lists, sure, but that's about it.

Plus the changes to the wyrdstone modifiers is something they could do now.