Spirit Stone and Walker Suggestions

[Rumors]

Spirit Stone victory is, IMO, the hardest due to the RNG nature of acquiring stones, how much of a target the walker becomes, and how easy it is to disrupt (a single Grand Heist is usually enough to end the game for most walkers). Not having to fight the King is nice, but most characters can beat him anyway by the time you have four stones. I think these will make it a little bit smoother and feel a bit better to pursue.


1. Spirit Stone appearance warning: Similar to how dungeons now emit black mist to alert players of an oncoming Bane so they can strategize around it, Spirit Circles should do the same to let people know when a stone is going to spawn that night. Have you ever been an aspiring walker, only to find that a player or a guard had a stone spawn on them nearby, removing it from play instantly, when you could have taken steps to acquire that stone had you known it was coming? I have.

With this change, both walkers and non-walkers can make reasonable steps to secure spirit stones or stop them from being taken by a wannabe walker. Right now you either have to control every Stone Circle in the game because you don't know when or where the stone is going to pop up, which is not feasible. So, your best strategy right now is play normally and play to RNGesus the stones will show in places along your route.



2. Vs Corrupted Heroes. It always felt really, really weird that the Spirit Walker had no advantage over Corrupted Heroes when they can insta-kill Banes and the King. Obviously, insta-killing players would not be good for gameplay (as satisfying as it might be) and giving them no extra dice isn't notable, since any old rotless player gets that. A few ideas on how to tackle this, all suggested on the assumption of mutual exclusivity, but can be mixed and matched if you want.

a. Spirit Walker gains the targets total Rot as extra dice. Kinda like how high Rot vs low Rot works as is, but this time the power of the Wyld is giving them a taste of their own medicine. Bonus if the extra dice glow with Wyld energy or something. (And also bonus if extra rot dice get a rot mist effect for corrupted heroes!)

b. All Rot-based items and companions used by the corrupted hero do not activate against a Spirit Walker. So powerful is the Wyld with them that even these evil, ancient artifacts become no better than a perfectly mundane version. Depending on how you want gameplay to go, could have all Rot items, period, fail to work, corrupted hero, regular hero, or Spirit Walker (it always did feel a little weird carrying 4 Spirit Stones and a Reaper's Trident), fail to activate instead.

c. Corrupted Heroes have their total dice halved, after all other calculations. Kinda more boring, but it'd work.

d. All spirit walker Swords gain Pierce and Shields gain Reflect against corrupted heroes. This might be ridiculous, and could be restricted to just burned cards to reign it in, but it would be cool and terrifying.


3. Minor suggestion: maybe Spirit Walker heals 1 HP every Dawn to to act as a foil to the infection losing HP?


4. Please let Spirit Walkers move into the space of Banes they killed. Its weird and annoying that they, for whatever reason, burn the AP and stay in place. And it makes the strategy of summoning a bane in their path actually work to slow them down, which doesn't feel right.


5. Minor, since this would take a bit of work with no gameplay gain, but cleansing does damage equal to Rot, right? What if reaching and cleansing the king when his health is still higher than his Rot total actually saves him instead of killing him? That could be cool.


But, that is all. I always felt Spirit Walker gameplay should be a little more unique than just one-shotting a King and the stray Bane, kinda like how getting Rot changes the way you have to play and plan things to at least some degree.

[Renardeau]

- You could also say that slaying the King is hard due to RNG of the dice, the game is random and that's why we love (and hate) it.
- Spirit stones can be picked up without triggering the peril, and they can be found in dungeons
- After entering the palace, all that spirit walker needs to win is 3 HP and a Hot Rot Wine
- Spirit stone spawn indication could potentially harm "aspiring walkers" as it would be possible to prevent a player with 2-3 stones to reach it, by killing/displacing him or by simply ending the turn on the spawn location... But i like the idea, would make the game less random
- Advantage against corrupted heroes would make sense, but they already take damage every dawn, so...
- If a spirit walker should move after killing a bane, so should River after making a kill with her ability

[Lucceri]

Good points. The way you describe it reminds me of how difficult it was to get a Rot victory in the early days. There weren't that many Rot cards when the game lauched so getting enough to surpass the king was already a challenge. Most of it relied heavily on luck of the draw and tactical suicide to Banes just to get Corrupted. Plus, you had to commit to going Rot early on and can't really change your strategy halfway through the game. Nowadays, it's a lot easier with the Rot treasures and introduction of the Leech spell. Anyway, back to Stones and Spirit Walkers.

1. Randomness with when and where the Stones appear.
Quick Tip: Each stone circle will only spawn 1 Spirit Stone. So technically, you can narrow down where the next Stone is going to be. That being said, it still sucks when it appears way out of your reach. When you focus on going for a Spirit Stone victory, it's generally an uphill battle. However there are other ways Stones can pop-up (dungeons, quests, crystalize, Dig amulet) and I've had games where there were 10+ Stones and two Spirit Walkers in play. But again, the nature of getting stones is still RNG dependent... and I kinda like it that way. It's not really something you should go for unless the oppurtunity presents itself. My only gripe is that, sometimes, Stones don't start spawning until Night 2 or 3. I think the first 4 nights should guarantee a spawn if there are no stones present. It gives more incentive to chase the Spirit Walker victory condition since people only start considering it when they already have 2 stones.

2. VS Corrupted Heroes
Definitely need something against them but nothing too complex. A base [+3 Shields] or [+2 Shields with Reflect] vs Corrupted Heroes would suffice since the idea is that, as a Spirit Walker, you can protect yourself from the Rot.

3. +1 HP at Dawn
Ideal buff. It's hard enought getting 4 stones and when you do, you become a walking punching bag.

4. Moving to Banes
Haven't encountered that problem.

5. No comment :)

tl;dr
-- I like the random nature of the Spirit Stones and there are ways to tip the scales in your
favor.
-- You should really only go for Spirit Stones if the oppotunity presents it self.
-- Spirits Walkers could use buff. Either +1 HP at Dawn or extra Defence against Corrupted Heroes, but not both.

[aclyte]

Well, spirit stone could be received by
1. Circles
2. Quests
3. Ruins
4. Created by magic
5. Stolen by trickery

Actually, quite a lot of ways - it's quite common that someone get 4 stones in my games.
So, i d't think that getting stone should be easier.
+1 HP at dawn and +1-2 shields against corrupted heroes are ok, i think. But, actually, is it needed? when u get 4 stones, u just rush castle straight away, not fight other ppl.

[Tei]

Spirit stones don't need to feel better. It's less consistent than fighting the king because it's objectively better to just avoid the fight completely. A spirit stone win is the best victory condition to get because it's the only one that avoids the fight but can still win proactively unlike prestige.

For the above reason, spirit walkers don't deserve any additional advantages whether they be hp regen, more ap because they still move into a bane's tile or combat advantages against corrupted heroes. Everyone on the board is trying to do a harder victory condition than the spirit walker and that goes double for rot. Everybody has to deal with rng and other players stopping them.

I never liked the idea of telegraphing banes and I don't like the idea of telegraphing stones. Like Lucci said, you can already predict where stones will spawn because it's no completely random. Similar rules apply to the dusk bane spawns. By telling the players beforehand, they take away some need to pay attention, learn the game's mechanics and assess risk / reward. Learning the game's mechanics and applying them to make better decisions is essentially 100% of armello's gameplay because there's no mechanical skill needed in a turn-based board game.

[Rumors]

Personally, I rarely see Spirit Walkers in my game. It almost always seems like more of an accidental one you don't really consider from the start. Major exception was a singular Amber with Dig who got five Stones total (one was stolen), but had focused so much on Stones she could not break the palace perils.

Compare to Kingslayer: you're guaranteed up to three fight and two body or vice versa (quests and amulets) and the odds of not finding any combat gear from the item deck is incredibly unlikely. Additionally there's combat treasures you can pick up from quests or dungeons or thievery (not guaranteed) and combat spells and buffs you can play, like Mirror Image, Feral, and Brazenberry Ale. Also, compansions like Blacksmith. Kingslayers are often the lowest target, unless being aggressive, and have advantage in combat by, well, being good at combat.

Compare to Prestige: You're guaranteed up to five points per game plus you know the location of three sources of prestige at almost all times (other players). Banes are a source of prestige to compete over against Rot Walkers and can be claimed at range with spells, bounties can increase Prestige income, and there's a number of cards you can draw to increase Prestige (Bubble Tea, Game of Thorns, etc.) or remove it (...was it Slanderous Toads? Or was it Vile Official? Also, Bounty of course indirectly). There's also the Prestige amulet and Prestige treasures (Royal Banner, etc.) There's also the Bard. Prestige leader makes them a target, but not so much since they win by everyone else failing, so the easiest way to beat them is to win. Plus they can play declarations that benefit them most to retain their lead.

Compare to Rot: Banes are a source of Rot, one way or another, and offer competition against Prestige players. The King declarations can hand it out. King's perils can give Rot, and you can have an idea of which will do it (Swamps for Plague, etc.) Rot can sometimes be gained for failing a quest and one can usually find Rot cards by cycling Spells (enough that it's easier to Rot up as a caster, IMO). Items can grant it (Hot Rot Wine, Maruader's, Poisoned Gift) and Trickeries too (Plague Walkers). Spirit Stone quests give Rot if you need it once Corrupted, at the cost of losing out on other rewards. Treasures can gives loads of Rot and compansions too (Bane Blade, Warlock, Reaper's Trident). Removing Rot is rare and often temporary, so typically, ocne you have it, you have it. Rot Walker victory also stacks with most King Slayer perks. It's a bit harder to obtain, especially if multiple players are going for it, but I frequently see one Rot Walker per game. Being ahead in Rot gives you advantages over everyone else in the game who has even one point and you heal on kills. You take damage at Dawn, but all infected heroes do anyway. Rot Walker becomes a target, but has combat advntage and card advantage (playing Rot cards is risky when you're behind on Rot.)

Spirit Walker? Stones drop from quests if you beat the RNG at the cost of losing possible tresures and companions, similar to corrupted Rot quests. Unlike Rot, stones are never granted for failure. May drop from dungeons at roughly the same rate as companions and treasures, and can be boosted with Dig, but is not guaranteed. One stone appears randomly on the map with minor predictive ability and no further stones will spawn naturally until it is taken (leaving a stone on the opposite side of a map is potentially more potent against a Spirit Walker than taking it). Unlike Banes, who spawn every night regardless and can be summoned by both spells and the King. There's one card in the entire deck that can summon a stone, and only on a circle, and it costs 6 mana which is hard to reach even for caster, whereas Fight, Body, Prestige, and Rot are accessible to everyone. There's one card in the entire Trickery deck that can steal a Stone, and it's more often used against a Spirit Walker, and for them to use it requires someone else to have a Stone. And its expensive, but gold can be saved up, unlike mana. Spirit Walker has no advantages over other players and is a major target since everyone knows they can one-shot the king and knows about the HRW strategy. Meanwhile, Rot damages them directly, which can be used to kill them off.


It's just... not reliable unless RNG decress you go for it. And you become a target with no benefit.


Plus, on the telegraphing, yeah it makes things less random and more predictable, and yeah you can narrow spawn points down. But stuff like "don't stand on or next to a dungeon at night lest a Bane nuke your caster" isn't fun or great strategy. Telegraphing stones would let potential Walkers strategize around them and other players to see the opprtunity and take steps to interfere with them, leading to scuffles and skirmishes across the map more often than just around the King or when two players happen to cross.

Also, I mentioned it feeling bad of non-Walkers and guards instagibbing Spirit Stones by sheer RNG of being in the right circle, but it also sucks on the other end when someone happens to get one as a Walker by being in the right place. Worst case was when someone got one like that next to Palace, became a Walker, had first turn, broke in, HRW, and went to a victory. No opprtunity for reaction or counterplay, unless you try to secure all the unactivated Stone Circles all game, which isn't feasible.

[Lucceri]

Originally posted by Rumors:

Worst case was when someone got one like that next to Palace, became a Walker, had first turn, broke in, HRW, and went to a victory. No opprtunity for reaction or counterplay

There's really no counter play to be had against the HRW/Strategist technique if the person is well equipped. For example: high Fight, high Body Thane with 3 shield items breaks in, uses HRW to fight a 1HP King, and burns a sword during the battle. Can he still lose? Maybe. If the King rolls great or Thane Rolls poorly. Could you have done something about it? Not really, unless you saw it coming 3-6 turns ago.

And maybe that guy in your example actually calcuted the possibility of a Stone spawning there and planned that whole sequence of events? Personally, I would've been impressed rather than mad.

Armello is RNG Mitigation the Board Game and I love every bit of it; and remember that you only need to get lucky 4 times to have the option of a Spirit Stone Victory (this has happened to me and I was a Spirit Walker by night 3)

That said, maybe LoG could include a Follower that helps with getting stones? Card Suggestion Time!

Name: Antiquarian

Type: Follower

Effect: Increased chance of finding Spirit Stones when exploring Dungeons (basically a Dig amulet)
-- OR --
Counts as 1 Spirit Stone

Text: "Finding these things isn't so hard, just look for the rocks that glow." --Lady Croft

Also, here a screencap of a game where 11+ stones are in play
A testament to how wonderfully RNG a game can be.

[Durzlla]

I personally thinkt he Spirit Walker needs to have an advantage against corrupted heroes, in addition to some other form of benefit since the way it is now the second you get 4 spirit stones you become a huge target and will just get bombarded until you either get lucky enough to roll into a teleport+ HRW to get into the castle, or the opponents don't manage to draw anything to prevent your success.

And as for everyone talking about it being so much better due to not having to fight, the King is quite frankly a joke fight for anyone who has 5 fight, like 3 health and half way decent gear as long as they wait until the last 1-3 days to attack.

[Cleanfear]

An indication of where the stones appear the day before could be nice yes.
However I dont feel that Spirit Walkers should get an advantage over Corrupted players because they already do.

Infected and Corrupted players get -1 HP every day cycle, Spirit Walkers dont. Corrupted Players cannot enter stone circles to heal, Spirit Walkers can. Also note that since Spirit Walkers have 0 rot they will never give a Corrupted creature extra dice to roll. Thats 3 advantages over a Corrupted player. You want to add 3 shields or 2 shields with reflect to that? Thats outrageous.

If anything perhaps Spirit Walkers should lower their opponents rot by 1 if they kill them in battle while they themselves survive. That matches lorewise with the ''Cleansing'' and isnt some crazy advantage some are suggesting on top of the 3 forementioned advantages.

[Rumors]

Originally posted by Lucci:

There's really no counter play to be had against the HRW/Strategist technique if the person is well equipped. For example: high Fight, high Body Thane with 3 shield items breaks in, uses HRW to fight a 1HP King, and burns a sword during the battle. Can he still lose? Maybe. If the King rolls great or Thane Rolls poorly. Could you have done something about it? Not really, unless you saw it coming 3-6 turns ago.

And maybe that guy in your example actually calcuted the possibility of a Stone spawning there and planned that whole sequence of events? Personally, I would've been impressed rather than mad.

It would be impressive, but not likely it was planned since, well, if memory serves right, that's back when I was noob and queue dodging any game with anyone above level 5. Not impossible it wasn't calculated either, since I did pull a "welp, I need to draw a Hot Rot Wine + a Teleport right now" win once, albeit out of numerous attempts at it.

But the Thane example, I mostly agree, but it's not quite the same. You see Thane going at the 1 HP King, you KNOW he's going there and going to try to kill, so you can try to pre-empt it. Someone with 3 Spirit Stones standing outside the palace in the middle of the game is someone to keep an eye on, but not someone who you think "if I don't stop them RIGHT NOW, then I lose when they get their next turn." Even in the middle of the game, you can kinda gauge their motives based on their stats and number of quests completed.

Originally posted by Cleanfear:

Infected and Corrupted players get -1 HP every day cycle, Spirit Walkers dont. Corrupted Players cannot enter stone circles to heal, Spirit Walkers can. Also note that since Spirit Walkers have 0 rot they will never give a Corrupted creature extra dice to roll. Thats 3 advantages over a Corrupted player. You want to add 3 shields or 2 shields with reflect to that? Thats outrageous.

While true, everything you said also applies to 0 Rot characters. The only difference between them is you can Infect a non-Spirit Walker with the right cards while those same cards just do direct damage to the Spirit Walker so... it kinda evens out in my book.

[Tei]

Originally posted by Rumors:

It's just... not reliable unless RNG decress you go for it. And you become a target with no benefit.


Plus, on the telegraphing, yeah it makes things less random and more predictable, and yeah you can narrow spawn points down. But stuff like "don't stand on or next to a dungeon at night lest a Bane nuke your caster" isn't fun or great strategy. Telegraphing stones would let potential Walkers strategize around them and other players to see the opprtunity and take steps to interfere with them, leading to scuffles and skirmishes across the map more often than just around the King or when two players happen to cross.

No victory type is reliable in the face of rng besides kingslayer. You can't consistently stop 3 other players from winning on your own for prestige. Rot gain is of course random and you take on several disadvantages to pursue a victory that is pretty much mechanically identical to kingslayer. I think LoG has always repsonded by saying that discrepency between the victory types is intentional. For the most part, the discrepencies are currently fine. Rot is primarily a pentalty and cost, so making it too good would just ignoring its primary purpose. Making prestige better encourages people to stall out games. Spirit stone wins are stronger than kinglsayer; the only real disadvanatge people can think of here is that people know you're a threat.

"Don't stand on or near a dungeon or a bane can kill you" is still present in the game. All telegraphing does is remove any actual need to pay attention and understand the game to avoid that bad outcome. Also, spirit stones being telgraphed doesn't mean you can do anything about it. More often than not you don't have cards to interact with faraway players or tiles to the degree that you can stop someone from entering a specific one. Trying to force players to fight over stones is just as bad as is it is good. Stopping someone from taking a stone does nothing to advance you unless you can also get 4. It would be similar to stopping someone from rushing the palace. You're just supposed to be happy that you more than likely went out of your way to delay one enemy while the other two got closer to winning.

Originally posted by Durzlla:

And as for everyone talking about it being so much better due to not having to fight, the King is quite frankly a joke fight for anyone who has 5 fight, like 3 health and half way decent gear as long as they wait until the last 1-3 days to attack.

First, the king being hard or easy isn't the point. Winning 100% of the time when you click on the king is objectively better than winning 80% or 90% of the time. Is it objectively better to have your win condition be "in the palace and not dead" than "in the palace with x hp, certain burns / card effects, y amount of auto swords or shields and the king has z hp left." Second, waiting until the last 3 days is asking for trouble and missing the point of both combat heroes and spirit stones. Waiting that long all but guarantees that your opponents will have a card that can stop or delay you. Your opponents will also know for certain that you and everybody else has to enter the palace soon, so you just took on the only disadvantage to spirit stones. Their chances of having win condiiton cards increases the longer you wait. You're less likley to get a second attempt should you fail. Getting spirit stones and entering the palace on the last 3 turns is pretty much useless. Getting them around mid-game is very good because you avoid all that without needing to worry about how a fight with a 5hp king will play out.

[Rumors]

Slow response is slow, but... I really don't think telegraphing removes more than adds. Sure, reactive gameplay drops a little bit, but it really opens more doors for proactive gameplay and strategizing around the new information.

For example, last night, I had a Twiss game where my closest dungeon had first Bane spawn and the map layout ensured my quest could only be reached in three turns at the fastest. Thanks to telegraphing, I was able to plan around this, positioning myself next to the dungeon so that when the Bane spawned and attacked me, it'd likely push me onto a mountain and make my quest reachable in two turns. Lo and behold, that's exactly what happened. Without telegraphing, such a strategy would have been a total shot in the dark and the optimal play would have been to end on the dungeon for a shot at loot, which would have likely backfired from the RNG Bane spawn.

Sure, things aren't always in position to strategize around a telegraph, but it's still information you can use. For example, if a stone is spawning too far away and I'm confident 3-stone Sana is going to go try to grab it, I can adjust my route, delay my quest by a turn, and get in range to do at least something. Or maybe burn that Teleport to steal it I drew the last day but was saving for the the mana refresh at night rather than using it to go to my quest. Stuff like that. Right now, without telegraphing, I don't have the information to make that a good play, since the stone might spawn elsewhere or not at all, so my best move is to go for my quest and Sana may ignore the circle and walk the opposite direction. It feels bad for me if she happens moves toward it and one spawns and now I can't do anything to stop her OR it feels bad to Sana because one just spawned from the way she came and now she either ignores it or loses a lot of time backtracking.


Also, LOG seems to like the idea of telegraphing to create scuffles and strategizing around temporary objectives based on their new Merchant cards.

[[LoG] Blake]

Our ears are burning and we're watching this thread :)

Also there's a suggestion or two in this thread that's already been discussed and thrown around the team, maybe they're already up on our todo list too. Maybe....

There's going to a heap of systems "improved" on our Road to 2.0 so keep an eye out for future features ;)

Also these design debates are great, as we do appreciate the arguments, they help us all make the game better!

[Dezzmont]

Spirit stones to me always felt like the comeback victory mechanic, as it isn't realistic to stop someone from getting stones and getting stones almost never involves direct player conflict. Furthermore players contesting prestige, the main way to win, are unlikely to prioritize stones.

This is hampered by the fact Armello directly rewards you for beating on the player in last harder than anyone, but I would imagine spirit stones overall would feel better if the "prestige pinata" problem were to be solved.

[Durzlla]

Originally posted by Dezzmont:

Spirit stones to me always felt like the comeback victory mechanic, as it isn't realistic to stop someone from getting stones and getting stones almost never involves direct player conflict. Furthermore players contesting prestige, the main way to win, are unlikely to prioritize stones.

This is hampered by the fact Armello directly rewards you for beating on the player in last harder than anyone, but I would imagine spirit stones overall would feel better if the "prestige pinata" problem were to be solved.

The problem with them being a comeback mechanic is just how much focus the spirit walker gets, in most games, the second you become the spirit walker you become public enemy #1 and will be completely bombarded with trickeries and spells until they either run out and you can make it into the palace for 2 turns, or until someone else wins.

One thing they could do is to make it so killing the spirit walker actually makes you LOSE prestiege, since you’re literally killing the person trying to cure Armello.

[Dezzmont]

Originally posted by Durzlla:

Originally posted by Dezzmont:

Spirit stones to me always felt like the comeback victory mechanic, as it isn't realistic to stop someone from getting stones and getting stones almost never involves direct player conflict. Furthermore players contesting prestige, the main way to win, are unlikely to prioritize stones.

This is hampered by the fact Armello directly rewards you for beating on the player in last harder than anyone, but I would imagine spirit stones overall would feel better if the "prestige pinata" problem were to be solved.

The problem with them being a comeback mechanic is just how much focus the spirit walker gets, in most games, the second you become the spirit walker you become public enemy #1 and will be completely bombarded with trickeries and spells until they either run out and you can make it into the palace for 2 turns, or until someone else wins.

One thing they could do is to make it so killing the spirit walker actually makes you LOSE prestiege, since you’re literally killing the person trying to cure Armello.

Well once your a Spirit Walker its FAIR that your targeted. It is just becoming Spirit Walker is the most clear and easy win condition you can get if your in last. It lets you instantly rocket to second place, and suddenly people need to defend the palace from you. Any sort of punishment for killing the spirit walker would be brutually unfair because the spirit walker MUST be killed once they get it, just as you must kill River when she has palace quest done, or you have to kill any combat heavy character who is kitted out with a ton of swords and a Royal Shield. You just can't risk that Rot Wine victory vs anyone in the endgame, so in reality being Spirit Walker just puts you on even footing with anyone else gearing to kingslay, but without any heavy character or item requirements.

My issue isn't that there aren't enough benefits for being spriit walker: Your literally one peril and a Rot Wine/Strategist away from instant victory! Its already the blue turtle shell everyone in the lead is paranoid about! The issue is that no comeback mechanic will be sufficient in Armello while your rewarded so heavily for taking no risk kills camping the last place player's clan grounds, which makes accomplishing ANYTHING in last place difficult. If your a caster and your in last on prestige, you WILL be farmed as an easy kill and will not be able to reach dungeons or towns to get gold/items to defensively gear up with, let alone get to spirit stones. A better mechanic to make any sort of comeback (and again, spirit stone victories are most suited to comeback) possible would be to just make it so no one gains prestige by killing the last place player, or maybe no prestige for killing players too far behind, so killing a low prestige Amber is a tactical choice because you think they are a legitimate threat to your game, rather than the super obvious thing you do as a prestige 8 Rhane to stay ahead of a prestige 7 Magna because Magna will kill you on counter attack and Amber can't.