The RPG Duelling League
RPG Debate => RPGDL Discussion => Topic started by: Dark Holy Elf on April 13, 2010, 08:48:54 PM
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Andy wanted me to make this! Ignoring Andy makes Flareon sad, and nobody wants to see something so cute so sad. Especially since Gamefreak is doing that job for us. :(
Anyway, one way or another, at a certain point we do need to go through the characters and tweak them a little. Not the easiest project in the world, but the sooner we get it done, the sooner specific battle designs can take place.
Helpful links: the list of characters (http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Untitled_IAQ_Project_Characters) as well as their projected damage (http://www.rpgdl.com/forums/index.php/topic,4584.msg101960.html#msg101960).
Things especially to hammer down include MP costs and the exact damage (multiplier, addition to ATK, whatever) of various damaging skills which are currently just listed as "high damage" or anything similarly vague. Also, the exact progression of when the character is expected to learn skills... a chapter estimate is what I'm looking for, here. Characters also need to be considered against each other: in the case of two similar characters X and Y, the choice between them should be at least reasonably competitive.
Hopefully this motivates me to do something about the magic damage formula!
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Noemi
First big note: all of Noemi's damage is 90% what is listed in the damage post, because her Str was lowered to C- from C. Apparently I have this fact in my own notes, but it's not factored into her damage at the moment, so... yeah.
She has a pretty average stat build overall. Durability is a touch on the shaky side, perhaps; high Spirit average means she's below average in that regard. She's a bit better against physicals because the Dex will prevent multiswings, although she's initially stuck at light armour without especially amazing evade (although it's there). She's fast, though, which is always good. Not amazingly so, but good enough to get the drop on some things, no doubt.
She's very much a character who blossoms as the game goes on. More weapon options help her offence a fair deal, but that's really not the most of it, because she's pretty skill-reliant.
Ifris Libra: Weird skill to balance. Basically a controllable Magic Burst.
I'm assuming that the max MP that can be used is (2*Level + 10)%.
Damage: Damage = MP consumed * 5
Accuracy: 150
Initially this does 120 damage, which isn't especially potent. Note that Noemi's physical does over 190. By the end of the game it can be used as one hell of a nasty attack (2400), but it is subject to fire resistance, and this burns every last drop of her MP, which she needs to do anything. Feels like a nice, flexible situational move. Obviously the versatility increases greatly with level. Its hit rate is such that it should typically always connect except against magical evade whores (remember, average enemy evade is probably 30-40), since whiffing with this creates so much rage that nobody would use it if its accuracy were notably lower.
Arna Evalescere: Might as well be an initial skill. Buff that raises STR and DEX which kinda rules for any fighters in the party. Big disadvantage? Noemi's own party doesn't have too many of these for quite a while! This is yet another skill that gets better as time goes on for that reason alone.
Onto the effect itself. 25% to STR/DEX, then 35%, then 50%, then vanishes. Check out what it does to Noemi herself, as an example:
432 damage with knife, base.
First turn Arna is in effect: 630, but very close to 720
Second turn: 778
Third turn: 972
(actually, all these numbers should be 90% of this, but whatever)
Overall this can lead to a lot of offensive benefit in any battle that goes on three turns. To be fair, folks who are only swinging once anyway won't see as much benefit (e.g. hammer users, most ranged weapons). Still, if cast on 3 PCs, it can easily see a net benefit of 3000 damage if the battle goes on long enough for all of them to attack 3 times, which if you remember the damage formula, is a hell of a lot for one turn. On the whole, I think I'd be happier if the buff did not get more potent as the turns go on; a 3-turn effect which raises both STR and DEX is already rather potent (about 1.5-1.8x physical damage GT rules). So I'm proposing it does just that.
MP cost: 35
Noemi's skill costs are balanced around her 10% MP regen and competent physical. 35 is enough to make it not a no-brainer to use, but low enough that it can still be used fairly often, and doesn't require a serious investment in a boss battle.
Phoenicis Cruor: Presumably a fairly early skill, given an event assumes it may be learned by Noemi 2. Full revival is cool, except it's not cool because it's only 75%, caps the target's HP there, and this only compounds if the person is revived again!
First of all, I'd like to add the same disclaimer Kasia's skill has: its hit rate is based on the max HP of the target. Initially 100%, but you don't want to keep using it. This avoids a situation such as "yes I know this person has taken so much max HP penalty that I'm just reviving him/her to a trivial amount, but that's okay since at least I'm reviving!". Basically, having to repeatedly revive someone with DISSONANCE seems like it should be of questionable effectiveness.
Second of all, MP cost. Higher than Kasia's because Noemi regens more. Perhaps 64 MP.
Nothing else to say about it, really! Straightforward enough.
Minerva Cortis: Aurel's skill. Oddly enough it lets her cover better than Aurel himself can, which is perhaps a bit strange. Of course, it's possibly balanced in practice by the fact that Noemi's stats alone make her way worse at the job.
As a move its main use is for Noemi to dex-tank against enemies who hit way too many times. Both Erastus and Kasia, who are often around Noemi, have bad Dex stats and risk being raped by such enemies, while Noemi's is high and avoids this. Otherwise, it isn't easy to see why Noemi would guard such attacks, but situationally, you never know. More importantly, though, it lets her counter a bunch, and since Noemi's physical is fairly potent (though, less so if not at full MP, see later) this is cool enough. Free damage is free damage. Feels more Mirek's style but hey. Might make sense to be learned only after seeing Mirek, too, as Noemi puts her own spin on things.
Ruling: The move is only effective against ST attacks. Feels too potent against anything else, and a bit nonsensical.
Negating one attack is also handy at worst. Can't overlook that part of it. RAR BOSS CHARGES UBER PHYSICAL ATTACK, Minerva Cortis, lulz.
Probably needs a fairly substantial cost too, given the length of its effect if not as high as the previous. Maybe 51 MP.
Callida Leanae: Noemi's hidden bitchslap move. Adding her respectable Int onto her Strength means 2.37x damage for one attack (though less if Arna has been used), and it has no real downside. It's almost certainly too good as is, since it can be used every battle, if only once. This is ignoring the fact that it cancels charged enemy attacks, which may or may not be common.
The obvious solution is just to nerf it. It's should be an excellent damage skill, since the other mains have one, and hey, it's inherited from the damage queen herself, but a recharge time would put a damper on it and would prevent the "use this use this USE THIS" tagline it currently has. I'm going to suggest a full 1-turn recharge time, which means this potent damage is definitely more of a finisher. And that's good, because it avoids the situation where you use it early in the battle to take advantage of her passive Draco Eruptus, then use other things.
When will this one be learned? I dunno. Could reasonably be very late, once Isolde and Noemi have had time to hang out. Probably should be. Post-timeskip most likely?
Draco Eruptus: The passive of the same name (by the way this is confusing <_<) is more important to Noemi overall, but the Mirek-learned active also deserves some note. Consuming all MP is quite a blow, considering what Noemi gives up, but she also regains it pretty quickly so it's okay, and it's a good way to get past a tough random.
The targetting says "6-hex cone" which I can't envision. I can see 4 or 8 easily enough! Going with the 8 hexes, which basically means everything within a 120 degree arc for range 2 (3 adjacent hexes, then the 5 behind them).
The damage is described as moderate.I'm thinking fixed at 1 swing, but that one swing is dealt at 2x ATK, meaning it overcomes defence well.
The overall damage is similar to her average physical (though does better at overcoming both Dex and Def, so it's reliable), and is a bit more effective with a heavier weapon (which makes sense to me, and gives those more of a niche for her). It doesn't have the same raw damage as Libra, but it's still quite painful and deals with swarms well. Kinda funny that she has TWO Magic Burst type moves but they do very different things, so it's fine. Note that since this move will always have the backing of MP Focus, its damage hovers around 923 GT with a greatsword (80% hit) to 583 GT with a knife.
Draco is very important to Noemi, though moreso for the passive than the active. I have it pencilled in as a good move to learn late in the pre-timeskip arc of the game, as a fake final skill. Maybe during "the attack", not sure.
Lupus Baubari: It has to be a fairly late gain, since it is Yiu-learned. Anyway, what a strange skill. Silence + Lock State eh. I'm assuming it doesn't ignore immunity though it could be read either way. It's a neat, versatile little skill which has three uses: owning enemy spellcasters, owning enemy buff strategies, and to protect one's own PCs from status and debuffs.
MP cost: 77. Not your everyday spell, and by now she's regaining MP so easily...
Accuracy: 130. Fairly accurate. Treated as ITE when used on an ally, I'd imagine, since they want to be hit by it.
If the target immunes silence, I'm imagining the entire move fails. Mechanically, the move will need to apply a second status, maybe something as simple as "quieted state", to make it clear that the status has been locked.
How does this interact with existing statuses? I imagine they persist. How does this interact with Dispel? That I'm really not sure about. Figure I'll throw this one out for design help.
Strix Bravere: It's been described as a late skill, which is making me unconformtable a bit since a lot of stuff Noemi is getting late and she seems to be getting little between her Chapter 1-2 revival and her late skills from Mirek. Well, we have a couple options here: either move one of Mirek's or Isolde's earlier, or make this one earlier. Initially I was thinking this one, but in hindsight, the healing here is so good that it should probably be gained around when Kasia leaves to soften the blow of that some.
Anyway, physical attack with MP cost, drains to some degree (75% of damage dealt). Typically speaking, Noemi's damage is such that this is only about 20% healing, but keep in mind her ways to raise this: her passive at full MP (though this only works once, presumably) which makes it ~33%, and Arna (as well as any other buffs) which again gets it up to that range. It's not amazing whoamg broken draining or anything but it's pretty nice. Probably needs a hit rate penalty, but not a large one... honestly, even 10% works. So we'll run with that.
MP cost: 40. Fine with this being used fairly often, since it's giving up +5% MP regen as well.
Whew, that took longer than I thought. Combo skills and the passives I'll look at later. And this is only one character. :( Anyway, I know it's a lot to read, but anyone who could run through my thoughts, agree/disagree, etc., would be appreciated. Especially looking at advice on when skills should be picked up, and the mechanics of Lupus.
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Noemi
First of all, this was a fun read. Far more in-depth than I was expecting, but it definitely inspired me to think on all this. Not sure I'd be able to lay another character's move list out quite as well as you have. You have a much clearer image of everyone's numerical stats/growth.
I'll go through each skill and comment though!
Ifris Libra: Weird skill to balance. Basically a controllable Magic Burst.
I'm assuming that the max MP that can be used is (2*Level + 10)%.
Damage: Damage = MP consumed * 5
Accuracy: 150
Initially this does 120 damage, which isn't especially potent. Note that Noemi's physical does over 190. By the end of the game it can be used as one hell of a nasty attack (2400), but it is subject to fire resistance, and this burns every last drop of her MP, which she needs to do anything. Feels like a nice, flexible situational move. Obviously the versatility increases greatly with level. Its hit rate is such that it should typically always connect except against magical evade whores (remember, average enemy evade is probably 30-40), since whiffing with this creates so much rage that nobody would use it if its accuracy were notably lower.
You balanced its growth far better than I had been thinking. I'm 100% behind the (2*Level+10)% usage. The accuracy is a good point, too!
Arna Evalescere: Might as well be an initial skill. Buff that raises STR and DEX which kinda rules for any fighters in the party. Big disadvantage? Noemi's own party doesn't have too many of these for quite a while! This is yet another skill that gets better as time goes on for that reason alone.
Onto the effect itself. 25% to STR/DEX, then 35%, then 50%, then vanishes. Check out what it does to Noemi herself, as an example:
432 damage with knife, base.
First turn Arna is in effect: 630, but very close to 720
Second turn: 778
Third turn: 972
(actually, all these numbers should be 90% of this, but whatever)
Overall this can lead to a lot of offensive benefit in any battle that goes on three turns. To be fair, folks who are only swinging once anyway won't see as much benefit (e.g. hammer users, most ranged weapons). Still, if cast on 3 PCs, it can easily see a net benefit of 3000 damage if the battle goes on long enough for all of them to attack 3 times, which if you remember the damage formula, is a hell of a lot for one turn. On the whole, I think I'd be happier if the buff did not get more potent as the turns go on; a 3-turn effect which raises both STR and DEX is already rather potent (about 1.5-1.8x physical damage GT rules). So I'm proposing it does just that.
MP cost: 35
Noemi's skill costs are balanced around her 10% MP regen and competent physical. 35 is enough to make it not a no-brainer to use, but low enough that it can still be used fairly often, and doesn't require a serious investment in a boss battle.
Yeah, practically an initially skill. To address the lack of skills learned from Noemi chapter 2-7, it's possible that she could pick up Ifris Libra later if she goes through battles -not- assigned to learning anyone's particular skill (thus, she's 'self-teaching').
Since it's supposed to be a -very- Resonance-y effect, I really want to keep the slow increase in effectiveness. To compensate, maybe it only increases STR or DEX?
Phoenicis Cruor: Presumably a fairly early skill, given an event assumes it may be learned by Noemi 2. Full revival is cool, except it's not cool because it's only 75%, caps the target's HP there, and this only compounds if the person is revived again!
First of all, I'd like to add the same disclaimer Kasia's skill has: its hit rate is based on the max HP of the target. Initially 100%, but you don't want to keep using it. This avoids a situation such as "yes I know this person has taken so much max HP penalty that I'm just reviving him/her to a trivial amount, but that's okay since at least I'm reviving!". Basically, having to repeatedly revive someone with DISSONANCE seems like it should be of questionable effectiveness.
Second of all, MP cost. Higher than Kasia's because Noemi regens more. Perhaps 64 MP.
Nothing else to say about it, really! Straightforward enough.
Yes, this looks right. Mirrors Kasia well, but not exactly the same.
Minerva Cortis: Aurel's skill. Oddly enough it lets her cover better than Aurel himself can, which is perhaps a bit strange. Of course, it's possibly balanced in practice by the fact that Noemi's stats alone make her way worse at the job.
As a move its main use is for Noemi to dex-tank against enemies who hit way too many times. Both Erastus and Kasia, who are often around Noemi, have bad Dex stats and risk being raped by such enemies, while Noemi's is high and avoids this. Otherwise, it isn't easy to see why Noemi would guard such attacks, but situationally, you never know. More importantly, though, it lets her counter a bunch, and since Noemi's physical is fairly potent (though, less so if not at full MP, see later) this is cool enough. Free damage is free damage. Feels more Mirek's style but hey. Might make sense to be learned only after seeing Mirek, too, as Noemi puts her own spin on things.
Ruling: The move is only effective against ST attacks. Feels too potent against anything else, and a bit nonsensical.
Negating one attack is also handy at worst. Can't overlook that part of it. RAR BOSS CHARGES UBER PHYSICAL ATTACK, Minerva Cortis, lulz.
Probably needs a fairly substantial cost too, given the length of its effect if not as high as the previous. Maybe 51 MP.
Only working on ST damage works. This one is learned before midgame by necessity... or not at all if the player never studies Aurel (this also closes Noemi off from Medium Armor~). Still, we should have a cutscene that 'recommends' that Noemi study Aurel early on (Chapter 4/5 ish?).
Callida Leanae: Noemi's hidden bitchslap move. Adding her respectable Int onto her Strength means 2.37x damage for one attack (though less if Arna has been used), and it has no real downside. It's almost certainly too good as is, since it can be used every battle, if only once. This is ignoring the fact that it cancels charged enemy attacks, which may or may not be common.
The obvious solution is just to nerf it. It should be an excellent damage skill, since the other mains have one, and hey, it's inherited from the damage queen herself, but a recharge time would put a damper on it and would prevent the "use this use this USE THIS" tagline it currently has. I'm going to suggest a full 1-turn recharge time, which means this potent damage is definitely more of a finisher. And that's good, because it avoids the situation where you use it early in the battle to take advantage of her passive Draco Eruptus, then use other things.
When will this one be learned? I dunno. Could reasonably be very late, once Isolde and Noemi have had time to hang out. Probably should be. Post-timeskip most likely?
Post timeskip is fine for timing.
Not sure what you mean by recharge here. The Cooldown on it was supposed to be fairly long anyway? If by recharge you mean 'Noemi's not doing -anything- for 1 turn'... that -does- balance it, though I'm not quite sure how to implement it.
Draco Eruptus: The passive of the same name (by the way this is confusing <_<) is more important to Noemi overall, but the Mirek-learned active also deserves some note. Consuming all MP is quite a blow, considering what Noemi gives up, but she also regains it pretty quickly so it's okay, and it's a good way to get past a tough random.
The targetting says "6-hex cone" which I can't envision. I can see 4 or 8 easily enough! Going with the 8 hexes, which basically means everything within a 120 degree arc for range 2 (3 adjacent hexes, then the 5 behind them).
I described it poorly with 'conical'... just balance it around 4-hexes.
The damage is described as moderate.I'm thinking fixed at 1 swing, but that one swing is dealt at 2x ATK, meaning it overcomes defence well.
The overall damage is similar to her average physical (though does better at overcoming both Dex and Def, so it's reliable), and is a bit more effective with a heavier weapon (which makes sense to me, and gives those more of a niche for her). It doesn't have the same raw damage as Libra, but it's still quite painful and deals with swarms well. Kinda funny that she has TWO Magic Burst type moves but they do very different things, so it's fine. Note that since this move will always have the backing of MP Focus, its damage hovers around 923 GT with a greatsword (80% hit) to 583 GT with a knife.
Noemi is big on Magic Bursting~ Besides, one is magical, one is physical+GT. She's going for a mixed magic/melee build (without being the unusual hybrid that Isolde is). The 1xSwing/2xATK thing is a good suggestion.
Draco is very important to Noemi, though moreso for the passive than the active. I have it pencilled in as a good move to learn late in the pre-timeskip arc of the game, as a fake final skill. Maybe during "the attack", not sure.
I was definitely thinking just before midgame for this, and if she hasn't learned it by the climatic battle, I was thinking of having Mirek's skill be auto-learned when he leaves during the midgame climax.
Lupus Baubari: It has to be a fairly late gain, since it is Yiu-learned. Anyway, what a strange skill. Silence + Lock State eh. I'm assuming it doesn't ignore immunity though it could be read either way. It's a neat, versatile little skill which has three uses: owning enemy spellcasters, owning enemy buff strategies, and to protect one's own PCs from status and debuffs.
MP cost: 77. Not your everyday spell, and by now she's regaining MP so easily...
Accuracy: 130. Fairly accurate. Treated as ITE when used on an ally, I'd imagine, since they want to be hit by it.
If the target immunes silence, I'm imagining the entire move fails. Mechanically, the move will need to apply a second status, maybe something as simple as "quieted state", to make it clear that the status has been locked.
How does this interact with existing statuses? I imagine they persist. How does this interact with Dispel? That I'm really not sure about. Figure I'll throw this one out for design help.
Yes, my intent was for existing status to persist. And that Dispel would remove it (both the Silence -and- the Status Lock). Figured it wouldn't take long to learn, but it relies on Yiu being available, so it's a little passed midgame.
Strix Bravere: It's been described as a late skill, which is making me unconformtable a bit since a lot of stuff Noemi is getting late and she seems to be getting little between her Chapter 1-2 revival and her late skills from Mirek. Well, we have a couple options here: either move one of Mirek's or Isolde's earlier, or make this one earlier. Initially I was thinking this one, but in hindsight, the healing here is so good that it should probably be gained around when Kasia leaves to soften the blow of that some.
Anyway, physical attack with MP cost, drains to some degree (75% of damage dealt). Typically speaking, Noemi's damage is such that this is only about 20% healing, but keep in mind her ways to raise this: her passive at full MP (though this only works once, presumably) which makes it ~33%, and Arna (as well as any other buffs) which again gets it up to that range. It's not amazing whoamg broken draining or anything but it's pretty nice. Probably needs a hit rate penalty, but not a large one... honestly, even 10% works. So we'll run with that.
MP cost: 40. Fine with this being used fairly often, since it's giving up +5% MP regen as well.
Fucking forum ate half my post... And at the important part, too. Anyway, this skill is Noemi's only healing option, and it heals all units in a Hex, so it's another good reason to gather units in one Hex. Would make an interesting defensive combo with Minerva Cortis.
As for timing, I figured that later would work better, since Erastus is around for a long time, but it can be earlier if we want.
My current proposal for timing looks like this:
Noemi P: Ifris Libra, Arna Evalescere
Noemi 1-2: Phoenecis Cruor
Noemi 2-4: Minerva Cortis
Noemi 4?-8: Iridus Falx (Shao's passive)
Noemi 6-9: Strix Bravere
Noemi 7-9: Draco Eruptus
Noemi 10-Endgame: Lupus Baubari
Noemi 11-Endgame: Callida Leanae
Noemi 5~Endgame: Fusion skills
Keep in mind that Noemi starts the game with Ifris Libra and Arna Evalescere, the two skills needed for her first Fusion skill - Arna Libra. So that can also be used to break up the earlygame lack-of-skills, I suppose?
Whew, that took longer than I thought. Combo skills and the passives I'll look at later. And this is only one character. :( Anyway, I know it's a lot to read, but anyone who could run through my thoughts, agree/disagree, etc., would be appreciated. Especially looking at advice on when skills should be picked up, and the mechanics of Lupus.
It's understandable that it might take a long while for the first character. After all, you have to get a feel for when everything is happening -and- get used to the numbers. This Noemi writeup is like a template. The rest of the cast should be easier now that you have a rough outline.
I know -I- have a much better understanding of game balance after seeing this. Thanks.
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Isolde
Level 3 always assumes L3 Dissonant Edge is in effect
Greatsword ATK - 523/598 at 95 hit
Hammer ATK- 654/747 at 90 hit
Blasting Wave Lv1 - 2-turn cooldown(usable once per three turns), but reflectable, ST, Range 2, and Isolde can't move when using it. All in all it seems as if it might be worthy of some power, especially since it's her only pure magic option until Magna Phalanx. Magic has the problem of not scaling up well across levels (while weapons help physicals stay good across the span, magic has no such help for the most part, barring equipment twinking.) Of course, Isolde has the benefits of upgrading, so her stuff doesn't stay outdated so much. 250 power. (383 damage at Level 1, would scale up to 417 were it not for upgrading). Accuracy 120. Not much stronger than a hammer attack early on. Dual Earth/Weapon element.
Blasting Wave Lv2 - Increases in range enough to hit anywhere on the field, but keeps all the other benefits. And drawbacks. Power is 2x210 (L0: 654, L50: 722)
Blasting Wave Lv3 - Is now Hex-target. Best pure magic offense Isolde will get until Magna Phalanx, which is full-field. Power is 2x275 (L0:836, L50: 904)
Steel Force - 504 Greatsword/630 hammer. Adds Delay (may change this to Cancel)
Shock Blade Lv1 - 739 Greatsword/924 hammer, plus above.
Shock Blade Lv2 - As above, plus following MP damage: 492 Greatsword/ 616 Hammer
Shock Blade Lv3 - 833 HP/555 MP Greatsword/1041 HP/694 MP Hammer. Adds Delay, Backfire status.
Barrier Crush Lv1 - 504 Greatsword/630 Hammer. Reduces target defense by 25%
Barrier Crush Lv2 - As above, but reduces target's magic defense by 25% as well.
Barrier Crush Lv3 - 598 Greatsword/747 Hammer, reduces target defense and magic defense by 30%. Dispels boosts to DEF, MDEF, VIT, and SPR, in addition to invincibility, reflect, and status-locking.
Arc Cleaver - 504 Greatsword/630 Hammer to a hex. Weapon element
Havoc Sweep Lv1 - 470 Greatsword/588 Hammer to a 3-hex arc. Hits MDEF (uses INT instead of STR for damage, SPR instead of VIT, but otherwise uses ATK and ACC normally).
Havoc Sweep Lv2 - Same, only hitting all adjacent hexes
Havoc Sweep Lv3 - Same as Lv2, but now with the following attack: Radial AoE, 3x90 power (L0: 468. L50: 579); Ice/Weapon element
Storm Blade Lv1 - 504 Greatsword/630 Hammer to a target, plus a magic attack to the hex. Magic attack: 1x255 (Lv0: 390. Lv50: 424), Ice/Weapon element.
Storm Blade Lv2 - Same, but magic attack has increased in power, and also targets the hex behind the initial one. Magic attack: 1x370 (Lv0: 551. Lv50: 585), Ice/Weapon element
Storm Blade Lv3 - 598 Greatsword/747 Hammer to a target, even stronger magic attack, targeting the initial hex and the two in a line behind it. Magic attack: 1x500 (Lv0: 733. Lv50: 767), Ice/Weapon element
Blade of Calamity: Testing current damage formula (2*(ATK*(1+X)-DEF)*((STR+INT)/VIT), where X is (level-1)/10.0). Damage is purely non-elemental.
Lv1 - 974 Greatsword/1218 Hammer, 0.5 turn recovery
Lv2 - 1141 Greatsword/1409 Hammer, 0.625 turn recovery
Lv3 - 1434 Greatsword/1755 Hammer, 0.75 turn recovery
Executioner's Curse Lv1 - 504 Greatsword/630 Hammer to a target, plus adds Bleeding status
Executioner's Curse Lv2 - As above, but also adds Misfortune
Executioner's Curse Lv3 - 598 Greatsword/747 Hammer to a target, both statii added to all targets in the hex
Oversurge Lv1 - +75% STR and INT (+135 STR, +126 INT), lose 15% mHP per turn. Self only. All for three turns.
Oversurge Lv2 - +100% STR and INT (+180 STR, +168 INT), lose 20% mHP per turn. Restriction as above
Oversurge Lv3 - +125% STR and INT (+225 STR, +210 INT), lose 25% mHP per turn. Restriction as above
Magna Phalanx - Undetermined Earth-element magic attack. Always hits all non-Isolde units on field, ignores Reflect. It's as much threat to her allies as it is to her enemies, so she can't just simply throw it out every battle (Barring crazy things like a solo run for her). Power 4x300 (L0: 1812. L50: 1948)
EDIT
Moves have been changed to share cooldown gauges. Isolde has five such groupings in particular.
1: Shock Blade/Blade of Calamity
2: Blasting Wave/Havoc Sweep/Storm Blade
3: Executioner's Curse/Barrier Crush
4: Oversurge
5: Magna Phalanx
As a corollary, Oversurge's cooldown gauge is empty at the start of each battle. As a result, Isolde must wait until her fourth turn to be able to use Oversurge for the first time in a battle.
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I'm curious what ShockBlade damage looks like with Oversurge 3.
Also, to keep with Isolde's theme of 'blurring the line between magic and physical', maybe you could give Blasting Wave one of the Physical elemental-typings (or have it use whatever Isolde's current weapon's typing is, to give her more reasons to use different weapons).
Otherwise, this looks pretty solid. Clearly we need a magic formula?
Oh, and I'm curious why Magic Counter's activation rate is so low. I guess it's an acceptable hit since Isolde's pretty brutal as is, I just thought that was one of her big niches (and her main method of actually -using- magic).
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Shockblade 3 with Oversurge 3 is...uh, nuts. Making me think that Oversurge needs a cooldown time closer to that of Magna Phalanx, the more I think about it. As for Magic Counter...25% is a rather high rate, I thought. It's not 80% or something, but when the highest weapon counter rate is 35% (Gloves), I have a hard time seeing 25% as particularly low. Others might disagree with me on the subject, but that's what this thread is for, really.
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On Noemi:
Generally agree with everything that NEB says. Per chat discussion, if Arna is going to be Resonant, it should probably be formed more as 1-2-1-0, rather than 1-2-3-0 (which is more indicative of a Dissonant buff to me). If it were to be 1-2-3-0, it should probably be 1-2-3-Penalty.
On the issue of her gaining skills late, suggested this to NEB, but simply have her learn weaker versions of some of her skills and then have them get upgraded later. Simply set a flag that has her Learn ability indicate when she can learn from someone and, once they become available again, have it pop a dialogue message or something ("Noemi has more to learn from Isolde"). Should allow her moves to spread out decently well. Or we just remember that she gains a couple weapons and an armor type or so as well and slot those in.
On Isolde:
The percentages debatably look a little high, but that all comes down to how much we want buffs/debuffs to matter, which I think will come when we see the cast on the whole. Also, does Oversurge have a cooldown?
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Oversurge does have a cooldown. 4 turns. Might want to bump it up to 6 turns, though.
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Possibly? It probably wouldn't hurt to wait until we have healing numbers available since if the damage was really a preventative, it wouldn't be a bad deal to be spammable.
Does Barrier Crush end up literally boosting all damage by 50% more?
On the counter thing... eh, I don't think its a big deal. Presuming magic attacks are somewhat common (they should be!), its still a good trick unless we want to tone her other stuff done or make the damage pretty minor.
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RE: Barrier Crush. Not...really. It only does that -if- DEF/MDEF are exactly half of ATK/MATK respectively. The functional effect of DEF/MDEF reduction is greater upon those who have higher defense values, and less upon those who have lower.
Example!
Mook A has 200 DEF, being the plate-covered pain in the ass he is. Mook B has 80. Assume average VIT, average STR, and the use of an endgame Spear (240 ATK). Assume equal DEX (and thus only one attack)
Pre-reduction damage:
Mook A: 2*(240-200)*60/60 = 80
Mook B: 2*(240-80)*60/60 = 320
Now, each of the poor bastards gets hit with a 50% DEF reduction. This leads to Mook A going to 100 DEF, while Mook B goes down to 40 DEF. Each of them gets speared again.
Post-reduction damage
Mook A: 2*(240-100)*60/60 = 280
Mook B: 2*(240-40)*60/60 = 400
Note that this is only on one swing. DEF tends to get destroyed by single high-damage attacks, though, but is highly effective against multi-swing tactics. Now, assuming before and after, Mook A also got attacked by someone with A- DEX and a Light Sword, but same STR. (endgame ATK 216, total DEX 174*1.2 =208. 208/120 = 1.74--two extra swings. But let's bump it up to three to further illustrate the example and make things look flashier). Mook B would be screwed either way, so we're ignoring him.
Pre-reduction:
5*(216-200)*60/60 = 80
Post-reduction:
5*(216-100)*60/60 = 580
[EDIT]: This is what a full crit-chain would look like for a light-weapon user, on that note. Barring luck, however, that's never guaranteed. First-hit crit: 232. Subsequent crits: 116. Long story short, crithax is another means by which light weapon users can bypass the higher defense ratings (Also, it's notable that a defense rating of 200+ is easily considered extreme, given that it makes Spears and Guardian Blades--'average' level attack--nearly tink at endgame. 300+ is the realm of those that could be considered mostly physical-immune. Of course, I digress.)
...okay, so I want to use lower percentages or revise it in some manner. Given the party Isolde's with for a large portion of the game, Barrier Crush would be LETHAL. Barrier Crush leading into a blitz rushdown with Katarine, Ilona, and likely Shao at some point, would result in, uh...yeah. I don't think I need to say it anymore.
Mind, if it hit VIT/SPR instead, it'd be a flat doubling.
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Erastus
.. and the magic formula
Stats
Erastus has two problem stats, Speed and Dex. He's a little slow on the draw (85% average or so), but nothing too bad considering the power he wields. Dex makes him vulnerable to multiswings, though unless enemies also have high Atk they'll struggle with his armour. Just be warned that a particular powerful fighter (I'm picturing some of the guardian commanders here, for instance) will carve him in two. This is just FINE because his magical durability rules face, and even his physical is decent against folks with one swing or low attack. He even has a competent physical, if forced into it. Nothing amazing, but solid enough, similar to the likes of Noemi. Only stat build complaint is that with his horrid dex, the man has basically no use for lighter axes/maces ever, but I'm fine with him having them stylistically, and uh you never know, dex buffing exists! No listed MP regen, so going with 5% (16).
Passives
Efficient Conversion: Y'know, I'm not quite sure I understand the flavour for why Erastus starts with uber MP but it doesn't grow, but instead the costs decrease. Someone should fill me in. Anyway, mechanically it's fine. Basic proposal for how it works:
Each level Erastus gains, his MP costs decrease by 5, or 20% of his current cost, rounded up, whichever is a smaller decrease. Spells bottom out at a cost of 1 MP. Basically, this means spells decrease by 5, until the hit a cost of 20 MP, after which: 20 -> 16 -> 12 -> 9 -> 7 -> 5 -> 4 -> 3 -> 2 -> 1.
Some spells are super-expensive, so at high MP costs, there's a different pattern. If spells have a cost above 100, they decrease by 10. If above 200, by 20.
Extinguished: Wouldn't make this a passive, just note that this is how summons work in general. If anything, having them persist after death would be a passive.
Whistle while you work: Simple enough: allows attacks, defends, and moves while singing. Jin should start with this, incidentally. Erastus probably should get it around Level 20 or so.
Songs
On song mechanics... one mechanic I like is to weaken their effect whenever the character is hit, by a % equal to current HP lost. Stealing this from Jin as a general effect. For Erastus, though, this isn't a big deal, because it will be automatically refreshed to full effect on his next turn.
Song of Discord: Should affect all hexes around Erastus, to be consistent with Jin. Pretty potent, half magic damage is very sexy. Should paint a bullseye on Erastus himself for enemy mages, but given his mdur, this is a price he's willing to pay. Might need to be less than a 50% reduction. ... actually, never mind, just noticed it also takes a bit out of dissonant healing. And since he's normally in the party with Kasia... heh, interesting enough balance decision. Fine with it as is for now, may revisit when I have a better sense of how good buffs are.
All offensive songs check MEva.
Song of Sorrow: Hmm, makes debuffs last longer. Well, it depends how good those are in general. Going to suggest this one has a targetting of radius 2 around Erastus, but that it's fine otherwise. Timing-wise, it introduces some issues. Does it just need to hit enemies once? Hm. Inclined to make it a status (sorrowful) and have it end instantly when the song does. Basically, if a negative effect lasts "X time", then it persists after X time if the enemy is under this status, and lasts until the song ends. The enemy needs to be hit by the song, however (although presumably only once).
Accuracy: 110
Song of Fear: Yikes. Enemies now fail at dodging, AND have bad accuracy? Crazy. Assuming this is physical only in both cases, but still. Definitely radius 1 only.
Accuracy: 100
Song of False Hope: Oh look, infinite duration stat bust to ALL STATS (I'm assuming this means core stats, but still). Nasty. Still, they can move out of the range, to keep it sane, but it makes a nice little protective bubble. Ignoring the 75% thing and making that part of the spell's accuracy. Remains to be seen how good enemy AI is to get out of this, of course. It affects more stats than Fear, but it doesn't inflict them instantly, so this is probably balanced. Same radius.
Accuracy: 100
Song of Despair: Our first run-in with the magic formula! See below. Power = 100. Range 1. 191 -> 234 damage. Erastus drains MP equal to 10% of the damage dealt. Can add up to quite a bit against multiple targets, not so great against bosses.
Accuracy: 110
Spells, and the damage formula for them
Scorch
HT damage. Range 2. Has a small added effect. All of these cry out for it being less than high-end physical damage. Still should be pretty competent, I kneejerk. So, heere goes:
Damage = (Spell Power + Int - MDef) * Int / Spi
Yes, I set K=1. It seems like it works, and is certainly the most elegant. Erastus base Int = 89. Sooo,
Spell Power = 150
Accuracy = 120
MP cost = 50. Hits 1 at Level 15.
Damage rises from 266 (Level 0, comparable to Shao physical) to 309 (Level 50, better than mage physicals but worse than fighters' and Erastus' own). Spells don't improve in damage as much as physicals do, note. This is intentional. It is always HT.
To make the spell keep up a little more, the hit rate of Scorch should be (Erastus Int)/4 %, so rises from 22% to 45%, roughly. Not that he hits endgame.
Scorch (the hex status) damage has a spell power of 30, and is sustained whenever characters start their turn or enter the hex. Probably around a ~5 turn duration. Damage = 88 to 131.
Drain Touch: Yay draining. Range 1 of course.
Spell Power = 130
Accuracy = 130
MP cost = 60. Hits 1 at Level 17.
Damage rises from 236 to 279. Basically a draining version of his physical, initially a bit better but eventually notably worse. 26% -> 15%, although Int buffing would improve it.
Emberstorm: Mm, scorch. Being able to inflict it on a large area is kinda cool, although it does mess with where the PCs can move, too. Anyawy, the spell hits one hex hard, and a few others more lightly.
Spell Power = 200 / 100
Accuracy = 100
MP cost = 120. Hits 1 at Level 27.
Damage rises from 340 (ow) to 383. Splash damage from 191 to 234. Also adds 100% scorch, which is ensured minimum damage as listed above. Basically, this is a terrific crowd control spell, even with accuracy that could be better. The MP cost is initially prohibitive (2 castings! Though it's 3 by Level 2), but comes down quickly enough.
Flame Wall: Powerful little effect, theoretically. I assume it has to target unoccupied hexes. Pick a starting hex, move the cursor wherever you want, maximum length based on level. Probably 1 + Level/10, so it's up to 5 (can make a full wall across field centre) by lateagme.
Lasts about 2 turns, then inflicts Scorch for about 5, since Erastus loves that so.
MP cost = 700. First castable at Level 19. Twice at Level 29. Thrice at Level 35. By Level 40, it costs 75, which is starting to get kinda manageable!
Immolation: Emberstorm that trades scorch for pain. Hey, lategame is comign along, and Erastus' damage is starting to look not so great! I mean, by this point, Emberstorm is below the better basic physicals for damage, though it is GT. Immolation comes along and is all "lol other people's damage". No, really. You get the feeling you don't want this guy as your enemy. "Medium damage"? Hahaha.
Spell Power = 180. 3 hits to central hex, 2 hits to surrounding hexes.
Accuracy = 120
MP cost = 800. First castable at Level 24. Twice at Level 34. Thrice at Level 40, when it costs 100 MP.
Damage rises from 930 to 1059, half that to the surrounding folks. Not much to say here, this is AoE pain extreme, and the game seriously does not like when he's able to cast it with any regularity... He leaves before it would become truly broken.
Rain of Fire: Ongoing damage to a certain area. I assume the damage kicks in when the spell is cast, and again at the start of subsequent turns Erastus gets. Given how this spell is more affordable, I'm happy with fixing it to three turns. The third such hit inflicts Scorched, we know what that does by now.
Spell Power = 200, two hits
Accuracy = Ignores Evade. Won't do this often, but eh. Ultimate spell of the most plot-badass PC, and gives it a niche.
MP cost = 900. Not castable twice until Level 39.
Damage rises from 680 to 767. Dealt three times, Scorch to anyone still there.
Main drawback to this spell is "What's keeping the enemy there?" I suppose we do have a few ways of lowering move and such, but generally speaking, enemies will get out, which makes this spell not so uber. Still, it's solid enough even if it only hits once, and makes life miserable for the enemies general. It's never an inexpeensive option, so this seems fine.
Summary of the above: Generally decent crowd control. Initially it's expensive, but by midgame he's spamming it... and before that can get old, the big moves start coming out to play. Initially they cost a hell of a lot, and even by the end they aren't cheap, but they have a serious effect on battles. Oh, and the man hates fire resistance. Like little else. Honestly, we can so easily balance him just by how much fire resistance we make.
Summons
First of all, 2 max. Apparently we have 6 as a cap, and since we can have up to 4 PCs, yeah, 2 summons on the field max. Not sure how he'll interact with Xun, thinking the cap is still there. Mumbo jumbo can't have too many summons at once. Summons don't have equipment, thinking of just pretending they have average (i.e. equivalent to a C stat, x2 for weapon) Attack, Def, and MDef. 1 DexMod. I'm also assuming all summons null fire, idly. Also, the initial summoning is range 1. I'm assuming that, like Erastus, their MP stats do not increase with level.
Ash Elemental
Gained at Level 5, then gets an extra charge every 2 levels, to a max of 20 at Level 43.
Kinda frail, same speed as Erastus.
See above for Scorch. This version is going to be fixed at 25 MP (80 max). Extrapolated endgame damages are 144 with a physical, 150 with Scorch. Not exactly impressive, but it's free burning.
Flame Lasher
Gained at Level 12, then an extra charge every 3 levels, maxing at 10 at Level 39.
Fairly fast (over a third faster than Erastus). Again, frail, even moreso than Ash. 312 damage with a physical, which I assume is range 4 given that it's an archer. Fire Thorn has Atk*0.8, but hits two random targets in a hex, and is fire elemental. Focusses. 187 damage per hit. Has enough MP to use this 4 times (cost 50 out of 200 MP).
Notably better than Ash Elemental, although does less damage against hexes of 3 or more. Otherwise, faster and generally more offence, certainly less walled by fire res.
Cinder Wolf
Gained at Level 26, then an extra charge every 2 levels, maxing at 8 at Level 40.
Slightly faster than Flame Lasher, and can kinda take hits almost! Still a little on the fragile side, but now is at least competing with PCs. Offence is competent, and the first thing about Erastus which is dex-reliant! 384 damage with a 3-swing physical against average. Its passive is nice, as any attempts to kill it heal Erastus. So... arguably quite durable indeed in practice. Hard to use this often until late, though.
Agni Titan
One per field. I'm saying screw that passive, this puppy is going to be 1 charge, period. Boss-killer, obviously. Slow (just below Erastus), averagish durability.
Desert Touch is sexy, yay random scorch. Although, he'd have to get enemies to enter that hex after him. Not too big a deal, but cute. Possibly a disadvantage even, since he can scorch allies!
672 damage physical. Ouch. Immolation Rage is 3 hits at 200 power. Due to bad Int it actually gets worse as the game goes on! IT's late anyway. At Level 50, 334 damage. At Level 40, when the physical is only 605, it does 340. Still, since it's GT, this is fine. 260 MP, each of these costs 75 MP, so three uses.
Overall on the summons, they are VERY potent against bosses overall, especially late. Initially weak on offence, but they get better, and a fifth PC is a fifth PC and can always do things like claim hexes and so on. There would be various ways to keep them under the control, the biggest being a turn limit. I could even think of a cute way to do this involving them spending MP each turn, so they lose MP faster if they use specials, and they vanish at 0 MP (also means MP killing them = much love). I'll run that idea past people (i.e. what I'm doing now) and if the reaction is good, I'll balance 'em around that. General comments on how good they appear to be would be very much appreciated.
Annnd that's it! Overall, Erastus is a potent character, with some nice offence, some nice support abilities, and summons. He pretty much always has something useful to do, and very much lives up to his reputation of a legendary war hero. Speed and dex keep him from being broken, as do the MP costs and charges on his best stuff. Comments please!
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Wow, another awesome analysis post. You're too good to us, NEB, these are such fun reads.
Flavour reasoning for Efficient Conversion: Erastus is supposed to know all of his spells already, and he's supposed to have already reached his peak, so the MP isn't supposed to change. The spells come down in cost because he's slowly regaining his Flow Sense of Sight, making the spells themselves easier to do, not really increasing his own supply of magical fortitude. Also, it's what Gorth designed IIRC?
The balancing on the costs in general is excellent.
Extinguished: I added this in because Xun's Summons -do- persist after he dies for 3 turns. (It's also listed as a Passive, I just figured I'd cover my bases. We can remove this and just add it to the Summoning description.)
Songs: I would prefer it if his Songs could effect himself as well, and we can balance from there. Due to Whistle while you work, he can actually -use- the effects of some of his Songs with his basic physical.
Song of Sorrow: I think this is the only skill he has that he can't benefit from on his own? Unless it affects Scorched hexes too?
Song of Fear/False Hope: It's notable that he can Move while these Songs are in effect, bringing the AoE with him, I would assume. This makes him rather difficult to avoid. Might need to nerf the actual effects of both skills from 50%/25% to 35%/15% or so?
Spells: Particularly happy with all balancing done here. Immolation is more nuts than I was expecting. Rain of Fire is cool damage potential, especially since Erastus can compound this spell with one of his Songs or Flame Wall, trapping enemies in the scary RoF hexes.
In general, it should be noted that this is Erastus' big gimmick - trapping his enemies.
Summons: Yeah, good call on nerfing the number of charges. I guess they're mostly boss or emergency allies against tough randoms.
Cinder Wolf: For The Master's description says "50% of all damage dealt BY Cinder Wolf is absorbed by Erastus as HP". I think you misread it as all damage dealt TO Cinder Wolf heals Erastus.
Overall on the summons, they are VERY potent against bosses overall, especially late. Initially weak on offence, but they get better, and a fifth PC is a fifth PC and can always do things like claim hexes and so on. There would be various ways to keep them under the control, the biggest being a turn limit. I could even think of a cute way to do this involving them spending MP each turn, so they lose MP faster if they use specials, and they vanish at 0 MP (also means MP killing them = much love). I'll run that idea past people (i.e. what I'm doing now) and if the reaction is good, I'll balance 'em around that. General comments on how good they appear to be would be very much appreciated.
Yes. So very yes. When I was trying to turn Gorth's design into something official, I kept looking for some kind of method of nerfing the summons, and this is very elegant.
An aside: A lot of Enemy 'randoms' should get HT MP-Draining as a standard. This would seriously discourage bunching up in one hex too much. It notably balances Isolde and Fahim a bit, too.
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Cinder Wolf: For The Master's description says "50% of all damage dealt BY Cinder Wolf is absorbed by Erastus as HP". I think you misread it as all damage dealt TO Cinder Wolf heals Erastus.
I sure did! And yeah, Cinder Wolf makes more sense that way. Not sure if that's too good or not.
I would prefer it if his Songs could effect himself as well
His only defensive song is Discord. I really like it better as targetting allies only, but talking to Tal it turns out that Jin was ALSO designed to be able to self-target with his songs. Personally I think y'all are lame for that, but if that's what you want, okay. Just note that Discord will need a serious nerf if it self-targets (it might need one anyway). lol halving all magic damage to the party at no cost. No. <.<
Fear/False Hope: I chose to make them a little iffy on accuracy instead (100 misses often enough, since most enemies have something like 25 MEva). I suppose they could be made more accurate and their effect lowered, if you prefer, but I kinda like attacks that affect more enemies having lower accuracy in general.
Immolation is more nuts than I was expecting.
It might be a little too good, even with that cost. I'm not sure. The thing is that it's more of a random basher (the ST damage is nothing special for the cost) and super-expensive for one. I figured I'd err on the high side and simply hide behind "well there's always fire resistance" if there's a fight we're worried about it trivialising tooo much.
In general, it should be noted that this is Erastus' big gimmick - trapping his enemies.
Is it? Flame Wall is good at trapping things, but not so much for Erastus himself, since it takes one of his turns and it doesn't last that long. The various negative effects do encourage enemies to go to other places, but are hardly foolproof. I guess it is a general theme I hadn't noticed, but it wasn't my kneejerk for how he'd overall be played. Does become more of a factor very late.
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Overall on the summons, they are VERY potent against bosses overall, especially late. Initially weak on offence, but they get better, and a fifth PC is a fifth PC and can always do things like claim hexes and so on. There would be various ways to keep them under the control, the biggest being a turn limit. I could even think of a cute way to do this involving them spending MP each turn, so they lose MP faster if they use specials, and they vanish at 0 MP (also means MP killing them = much love). I'll run that idea past people (i.e. what I'm doing now) and if the reaction is good, I'll balance 'em around that. General comments on how good they appear to be would be very much appreciated.
That works. You can also do it by HP (have them lose HP each turn). Then even enemies that don't have MP damage can force them out of battle.
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You'd need to make them immune to healing then, but that's fine, really.
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That or they just lose the same amount of max HP from upkeep too. I think just making them immune to healing would be better anyway.
Hmm, that's pretty much how FFXIII does it, thinking about it.
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Hm. Only issue I have with the magic formula is that it utterly -BLOWS- at scaling up with time. Mind, it compensates by hitting a different defense/evasion type, and going down in cost as you level up (proportionally speaking, of course)
INT/SPR ratio isn't the problem, since that's not unlike STR/VIT. It's that with scaling MDEF, you're getting very little change in magic damage as your level goes up.
If that's what you intended, though, then don't mind me. Seems like there might need to be some benefit for the people who depend on variety over power, though, since otherwise those types will end up being outpaced by the physical powerhouses.
...unless I'm missing something.
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If we want Magic damages to keep up with Physical damages (though I'm not sure if it's such a bad tradeoff to have Magic be better earlier and slightly worse late)... then we could just have enemy MDEF increase more slowly.
Also, we could have more spells that increase their spell power in various ways. Or we could make INT-boosting equipment more common in the lategame.
I think the formula itself is a fine start, let's just balance around it?
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It's an inevitable consequence of the formula, really. Physical characters get better weapons, mages... don't. So yeah, mages need to keep getting better spells to compete, or for their old ones to upgrade. Flipside, their spells get more affordable as time went on. This worked pretty well with Erastus, I think.
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Spells never get more affordable than basic physicals.
The thing I'm worried about is someone with an earlygame damage spell that's going to be completely worthless at endgame (or too powerful earlygame is the other extreme). Erastus doesn't really have this problem, but someone else might. I don't have all the characters' spells memorized so it may not be a problem.
That said, the simplest solution is to just have spells upgrade in spell power (or in other ways) later on if needed.
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Very few PCs have just straight damage spells. Most magic is designed to have secondary effects that should allow them to continue to have a use outside of damage? I think only Fahim has straight-up damage spells like this, and he's the one who gets the INT-boosting weapon.
Rafael might have some problem with this though, since he gets more powerful spells as he gets more Sigils, making the older combinations generally inferior (except for costing less HP, and a few are MT instead of ST or something).
Faulheit, Katarine, Selena, and Xun's pets are the only other ones who Magic Damage formula off the top of my head. Well, the Item-users (Eirwen, Claire, Yiu) do, too, but they might need to run off of a different formula (Bring back the K!).
Selena joins late enough that her spell growth shouldn't be a problem. Xun's pets and Katarine's charges are limited enough that I think we can err on the side of overpowerful earlier, but more average damage at endgame. Faulheit's spells are the only other one that might merit some careful balancing, but even -those- have secondary effects if we want to lean more towards him being a low-damage mage at endgame.
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Faulheit, Katarine, Selena, and Xun's pets are the only other ones who Magic Damage formula off the top of my head. Well, the Item-users (Eirwen, Claire, Yiu) do, too, but they might need to run off of a different formula (Bring back the K!).
K was just an undetermined constant. It hasn't gone anywhere, it's just been determined.
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Faulheit has stuff that functionally unlocks as his MP goes higher (though I'm not sure now given that his regenerating MP deal was taken away. He might just unlock them when they're at a certain MP:cost ratio), though his lower-end stuff either has Delay/Cancel effects (Pressure Shot/Pressure Bomb. Pressure Shot might be upgraded to Cancel.) or works off of his weapon power (Vacuum Shot). Still half-tempted to give him one more Lightning spell, but not sure.
Hrm. Guess I should try and lay out a baseline idea of when he gets stuff, but thinking:
Start: Pressure Shot, Pressure Bomb
-Turbulence
-Vacuum Shot
-Chained Thunder
-Vortex Shot
-Tempest
-Storm Fall
-Gale Fang
...okay, so the last two might be interchangeable, pending.
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Yiu summary (not really much balancing to do with him, he's 90% status)
Okay, so Yiu is gotten at what I believe is the 50% mark of the game? I did calculations based on Level 0 (to keep with Noemi and Erastus), but I kept in mind that his damage is going to start between these figures and NEB's initial assessment values (that used L50 numbers I believe?).
Yiu's build is all about Team Synergy and gathering everyone in the same Hex, so he may not work well with some PCs (like Faulheit who should never ever move, so he can't travel around the field with the rest of a Yiu team), but certainly can work well with other PCs who have Hex-ally-boosting abilities (Noemi's DEX-tanking Cover-like skill, Minerva Cortis, and her drain-Hex-Healing move come to mind).
Physicals to average at Level 0:
Knives: 216 w/ 5 swings
Dagger: 165 w/ 4 swings
Axe: 189 w/ 2 swings
Mace: 216 w/ 2 swings
Katar: 165 w/ 4 swings
Glove: 168 w/ 6 swings
I'm presuming these roughly double at level 50?
Passive
*Comradery: Yiu's Strength and Defense are boosted 10% for every ally in his Hex, but his Speed is lowered 10% for each, as well (he gets a little distracted talking to them).
A little less Speed for a bit more Smash and Tanking value. It works out really well if Yiu -moves into- a Hex without another ally on his turn, because the STR boost kicks in for that turn, but the Speed drop doesn't affect his current turn.
The Speed drop affects Yiu's upcoming turn regardless of whether any Allies move in or out of the Hex between his turns. Similarly, the DEF boost is set based on when Yiu entered the Hex, and it doesn't refresh until Yiu's next turn.
For example, on Yiu's turn, he enters a Hex with 2 allies and attacks a nearby enemy with his physical. The physical's STR is boosted by 20%, and Yiu now has a 20% boost to DEF (not VIT as currently written, but this might need to be changed for symmetry?) that lasts until his next turn. He has also taken a 20% hit to SPD until his next turn.
Even if both allies move out of his Hex before his next turn, his SPD doesn't suddenly get faster and his DEF doesn't drop (nor his STR, in the case of Countering).
*Encouragement: Any allies in the same Hex as Yiu restore 10% mHP every turn.
This effect occurs on the allies' turns. I'm not sure if it should effect Yiu himself or not? (Self-Encouragement? Perhaps he can get an accessories that allows it?)
Actually, screw the 10% mHP thing. This effect should be directly based on his INT (he has an A after all, he may as well -use- it).
How does the Healing formula work again?
Damage = (Spell Power + Int - MDef) * Int / Spi
Do I just ignore MDef and Spi?
(P + 89 - 0) * 89/1
=(P+89)*89
Yeah, that won't work... maybe set MDEF and Spi to average based on Yiu's level?
(P+89-60)*89/60
=(P+29)*1.483~
Hmm... it could work, but that means that an INT debuff could actually negate Yiu's ability to heal... Seems wrong. We need a healing formula~
Active
*Appropriation: Collects money from any target. -Any- target. 80% accuracy. 3-turn cooldown period. Can occasionally steal Item components from certain enemies.
We haven't really discussed Money values yet, but I'm leaning towards this stealing 1/3 to 1/2 of an opponent's assigned MoneyDrop value. This wouldn't take away from the amount of money of a unit drops at the end of the battle, so there is a net gain to using this skill.
Side note: To avoid the cliche of Wildlife running around with Gold coins, we can simply make a note in the endbattle text like 'Gathered 90 Gold worth of raw materials from Angry Rabbit', implying that we simply skinned the beast and stored its meat and we'll of course be selling it in the next town. Even Disquieted Abominations' bodies can be useful if sold to enthusiastic researcher-mages.
*Coin Launcher: Select an amount of money to deal that amount of ITD damage. 60% accuracy. Cannot launch more than the hard cap of coins, (tentatively) 10% of max Money. If the coins miss, then the targets in the Hex are affected by Disoriented status. Target's Movement is randomized (picking up coins, of course), Physical and Magical Accuracy is halved. Persists for 1-2 turns.
Ah, the debated skill. Since people don't like Money-based skills breaking the game, Yiu's money skill is more about the status than the damage, though it -can- be useful as ITD damage. The reason I felt this skill was good for Yiu is that it reflects his reliance on materials to use abilities rather than magic. Even if he runs out of items, he can at least fall back on the money-resourced skill. If actual Coins as weapons still bother you, we can make them into Gold Arrows or something that has inherent monetary value, but is actually weaponized, the result still being that it takes directly from your coinpurse in the mechanics.
I'm setting the damage cap at 400, which is half of Level 0 average HP, slightly above-average damage at midgame, and definitely below-average at endgame.
For cost, I'm leaning 2 Gold = 1 point of Damage, so the cap is 800 gold, which seems like it should be a noteworthy chunk, but won't completely bankrupt the player if he wants to use it against those high-DEF, low-HP randoms, even if he misses and gets the status instead.
*Noise Trap: A Quieting-based invention. Throws a net/seal that stops the Flow in a targeted Hex and all adjacent Hexes. 100% Silence + can affect allies who move into affected area. Not immunable. OPB.
Straightforward, really. It's localized Silent Lake, which is pretty balanced considering that it keeps his teammates (who are often gathered in the same Hex as him) from using Dissonant or Resonant spells. OPB to keep it from being too broken in a Yiu+Guardians team.
NOTE: The intent is to also disable any Dissonant or Resonant Passive effects that units may have if they enter the Noise Trap area, so this can be very nasty.
Cost: 1 item of 15 carrying limit.
*Frost Bomb: An icy explosion that causes Freeze status 75% of the time. Affects all targets in a Hex, causes knockback that forces targets one Hex back from Yiu's location. Freeze status lasts 2 turns, during which the afflicted cannot act. If an afflicted is attacked physically while Frozen, their health is reduced to 0. Resonance.
Turn-1 short-term disabling status. But if someone else can get a hit on the afflicted before the duration wears off, it's 100% turn-2 ID. Knocks the opponent away from Yiu, so its allies may get a chance to move in to protect them. Also runs into Ice-resistance/immunity. And due to the magical component (Yiu himself doesn't use the magic, but the equipment has some Resonance infused into it for strengthening purposes), he can't use this under Noise Trap. Along with the item limit, that -should- balance this skill.
Cost: 1 of 15 item limit
*Torture Powder: A nasty combination of Itching Powder and Gunpowder. 100% ST Fragile status. If the afflicted takes any actions, the powder explodes, reducing their HP to 0. There may be some self-target moves that can remove this.
I'm considering making Itching Powder and Gunpowder into items that anyone can use, but they have nigh-useless effects (like 20% paralysis or 45-power Fire damage), just so that the components aren't entirely useless.
Anyway, this is awesome ID variant, since it's 100% disabling status and doesn't wear off. Basically, enemy allies would have to heal it to keep it from being 100% ID. It's also non-magical, so he can use it under Noise Trap for extra evil. Flipside? I guess a lot more enemies could immune it than Freeze? I can't imagine Golems caring about itching powder, after all.
Cost: 1 of 15 item limit
*Smokescreen: Full-field smokescreen! Using this allows every ally to swap out for any available party member. After the smoke clears, whoever are in the party are now granted a 2-turn 50% Evasion boost. Newly-swapped in party members start from 0 charge time. Party members that did not switch out retain their previous charge times. OPB. Resonance.
This alone might secure Yiu's slot in any party, since it allows him to access Party members not on the field or support slots, but -any- potential party member at the time. (And it's the only move in the game that allows it.) OPB and doesn't work under Noise Trap, though.
Cost: 1 of 15 item limit (I would consider a lower limit here)
Chemical War: Full MT Poison-type damage. Good for clearing large numbers of randoms. Requires all living party members to be in the same Hex as Yiu (he needs someone to help him activate the device). OPB. Dissonance.
Poison-type damage just means that things that immune Poison are immune to this skill (one method of keeping it from being that useful against Bosses). Alternately, I would make it Ice or Water element so that Yiu has a least a little bit of an elemental theme (Noemi's Fire, Isolde's only element is Earth, Mirek is... Iunno wind?). Ice would make sense seeing as Yiu is the poster child of 'we come from a much colder land'.
I really want this skill to be used for Randoms more than Bosses. So, it definitely does not focus against a ST. Since it is one of our few full-MT skills, I think I'd like to give it a bonus to damage based on the number of targets it hits, so you definitely want to use it to clear large numbers of randoms rather than trying to save it for a singular boss.
Proposed formula:
(SpellPower + INT - MDEF) * INT/SPI * Number of Targets/2
This ensures that he always wants to use it against at least 2 targets. Double damage at 4, 5x damage against a whole enemy team of 10 (I think that's our max enemy count?). This kind of damage boost means that even if Yiu isn't in your active party, he's worth Switching In, Gathering all your allies in one Hex, and wasting 1 of a 15-limit item to clear the whole field of 10 randoms.
SpellPower: 200
Level 0, one target: 170 (worse than his physical)
Level 0, ten targets: 1698 to each target (thank god he's not around at Level 0)
Level 50, one target: 191 (not much change)
Level 50, ten targets: 1914 to each target (still ridiculous)
Adding Ice element makes it more resistable if this seems too powerful, even with the limitations already in place like needing all allies in the same hex.
Assessment: Anyway, Yiu is a very utility character, but he's basically useless in a boss fight outside of Noise Trap, and bosses should be smart enough to not walk into that. Great for random clearing and has a competent physical and 2 flavors of ID. Very much a synergy player and needs people to gather in his hex to be his most effective.
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Notes for later:
Lv0 Faulheit MP:140
Lv50 Faulheit MP:280
Lv0 Faulheit INT:74
Lv50 Faulheit INT:149
INT/SPR multiplier: 1.23
Faulheit:(because I was asked to.)
Stats
Faulheit's stats, at first glance, look like crap. His HP and DEX are subpar, his STR is crappy, and his INT isn't impressive for a mage, nevermind that he's slow. In fact, the only two good stats of his are his Accuracy (top-tier alongside the Guardians) and Spirit (Second only to Erastus himself). However, that accuracy is put to good use in tandem with crossbows. Furthermore, he benefits from not only not needing to move around the battlefield, but actually benefitting from not moving. In addition, his MP regenerates, offsetting the at-first seemingly high costs, and his abilities have both range and area-of-effect to their advantage.
Skills - Passive
Lackadaisical: Increases damage by 25% if Faulheit has not moved on his turn. This is familiar to us already.
Suggested: Equivalent Effort: Faulheit regenerates 40% MP a turn. Necessitated by the rest of his stuff.
Skills - Active
Pressure Shot: Faulheit's basic attack spell. Single-target, wind damage, plus a Cancel effect. The way I'm seeing wind spells in general, they're bad against high MDEF, with this being no exception. As such, suggesting the following power: 3x40 (Lv0: 198, 247 without moving. Lv50: 255, 318 without moving). Accuracy...thinking 125 or 130 here.
Pressure Bomb: Pressure Shot's bigger brother, and your first taste of real AoE in Isolde's path aside from Erastus' Emberstorm. Damage is consistent throughout the AoE, and adds a Delay effect to all targets. Power: 4x25 (Lv0: 192, 240 without moving. Lv50: 268, 335 without moving). Accuracy is in the 120-125 range, likely.
Turbulence: Okay, yeah, this was going to be learned later, but then I figured that a 50% pEVA boost would be silly to make cost over 140 MP.
Vacuum Shot: Not to be confused with Pressure Shot, this one is pure physical, and can arguably get nasty. Thinking it adds INT to his ATK(making him able to penetrate defense awesomely). Single-target, weapon-elemental. (Crossbow damage, since I'm lazy and don't want to do the others right now: L0: 278, 348 when not moving. L50: 563, 704 when not moving). Standard weapon ACC
Chained Thunder: And here's Faulheit's first taste of something full-field. Somewhat. It has the chance to hit all enemies on the field, though the chances of that diminish with the number of enemies that exist on the field. It's also his first non-Wind spell, and thus deserves some special mention. Hits the first target, then jumps to other enemies randomly. If it 'jumps' to someone who's already been hit, the chaining stops. Thinking this should have better penetration than his wind-based magic. Power:2x165 (Lv0:440, 550 when not moving. Lv50: 480, 600 when not moving). Accuracy...130-135 or so
Vortex Shot: The other physical ability of Faulheit's, this hits a full linear path regardless of weapon. Multitarget physicals are a very weird thing here, especially when they hit out this far. Regardless, he's got it. Adds 2/3 of INT to ATK here. (Crossbow: Lv0: 229, 286 while not moving. Lv50: 537, 671 when not moving). Weapon accuracy, as usual.
Tempest: Full-field ahoy! In addition to hitting all enemies on the field, it repositions all mobile units randomly--a double-edged sword, mind, but useful if someone is surrounded. Being one of his Wind-based spells, of course this isn't going to be good at breaking through MDEF, but given that it cares little for SPR and shreds anyone with bad MDEF to begin with, it's rather irrelevant by comparison. Power: 6x50(468 at Lv0, 585 while not moving; 588 at Lv50, 735 while not moving). Accuracy in the 120-125 range, possibly.
Storm Fall: And here's the ABM Launcher clone. Randomly strikes hexes not occupied by allies, 24 bolts in total. Ignores reflect, thinking accuracy is going to be high (150) due to the already unpredictable nature of the attack here. Each bolt hits for power 2x145 (Lv0: 392, 490 when not moving. Lv50: 432, 540 when not moving.) Damage potential is high, but extremely finicky given the randomness.
Gale Fang: Original 'final skill' for Faulheit, this one has the rare distinction of being a wind-based spell that actually has defense penetration. Against the primary target, anyway. Two-stage attack, the secondary isn't reflectable. First hit is power 1x300 (Lv0: 387, 483 when not moving. Lv50: 408, 510 when not moving) and ST. The secondary is power 5x50 in a radius not unlike Pressure Bomb's, centered on the primary target. (L0: 390, 487 when not moving; L50: 490, 612 when not moving.)
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Healing should be linear, so we need to ignore one of the INT values in the equation (and MDef and SPI because those affecting your healing is stupid even if it makes sense).
Healing = (Power) * INT
or
Healing = (Power + INT)*K, K constant
Leaning more towards the former just so it scales well (a bit more important than damage, really). Also lets us nail down exactly how good we want the healing to be (i.e. 50% to average is easy to figure out for all levels, while it is impossible to work at all levels with the second formula).
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Voting for the first, yeah.
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Most of this is based on discussion in chat with Djinn, for the record. Definitely not all me.
I'm presuming these roughly double at level 50?
Yes.
Comradery: Fine, but it should modify Vitality, not Defence. Either modify personal stats only, or equip stats only, and modifying equip stats here seems too potent.
It's arguably too potent anyway? Two positives for one negative, and one of the positives is instantaneous. As I've ranted before, we have too much encouraging PCs to hang out in the same hex as is. Maybe lower the positives to 5% to make it more of a double-edged sword? Maybe not, thinking on it, Yiu can't really camp in a hex and take advantage of heightened hex if enemies aren't coming to him.
Encouragement: SPEAKING of ally clustering being encouraged!
Should not include Yiu. Yiu is encouraging others, he does not have 10% auto-regen, because that's silly in our low-healing setting.
Suggested healing multiplier: 0.8. This will lead to Yiu restoring 9% of an average PC's HP, more relatively to lower HP folks of course. Insert sad or possibly amused comment here about how Meilin's defensive spread makes her terrible at benefitting from Yiu's encouragement.
Appropriation: Looks good. However, he should only be able to steal from any given enemy once per battle, to avoid farming an enemy for money. Because that just makes no sense at all.
Coin Launcher: Seems all right as stated, although its exact formula will be pending the hammering down of exactly how much money the party has, what things cost, etc.
Noise Trap: Good call on OPB. A neat skill, I like it, but we need to watch out for making sure that if any enemies get totally screwed over by this (particularly bosses), that we intend that to happen. Powerful boss mages that we don't want to be spoiled will thus need other options after Yiu is available.
Frost Bomb: HT awesome status. Potentially very scary move here, but I'm fine with it. Runs into immunity, can be dodged well enough. (I'm assuming it's subject to physical evade? In which case, it just gets treated as a weapon with 60 hit, easy enough. Or even fixed 115 hit or something like that if we don't want it to be Acc-buffed, but I don't see anything wrong with Acc-buffing making it better.)
Torture Powder: Hey look, glorified ID. Anyway, drop its accuracy a little (maybe more accuate than freeze... +10 on it? So either a 70 hit weapon or 125 fixed hit, since it DOES let enemies get one more turn if they choose), and give it a duration... maybe 4 turns? But enemies can defend to speed it up. So that enemies can actually wait it out instead of being hosed utterly if there isn't a status healer around.
Smokescreen: Well, most of the game you can only make one switch. Still, a skill that allows a switch is neat enough idea. The evade boost... hmm. Don't really understand it. I guess the smoke creates it, but why do enemies not get the boost, then? Maybe make it a hex status affecting the hex Yiu is currently in and... I dunno. All adjacent hexes? Adjacent hexes currently occupied by allies? Neither besides Yiu's own? Just makes more flavour sense, mostly.
Also Smokescreen + Noise Trap = lulz. This has to be intentional. (I know that Yiu can't use Smoke under Noise, but still...) I don't really mind, it's not trivial to pull off and doesn't last forever, but yeah.
Chemical War: Yes, make it water. We need more elemental stuff! I really don't like the formula though. MT stuff is already better against more enemies, it doesn't need a nonsencial formula making it even moreso. Formula has been changed so that its multiplier is based on the square root of the number of targets. This should be rare (low cap, maybe 3-4?) since it's a very potent full MT attack and the drawback isn't really that big.
Noise Interference support: Make this subject to silence immunity.
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Suggested healing multiplier: 0.8. This will lead to Yiu restoring 9% of an average PC's HP, more relatively to lower HP folks of course. Insert sad or possibly amused comment here about how Meilin's defensive spread makes her terrible at benefitting from Yiu's encouragement.
Suggesting that the healing formula be modified so we can use integers. Just tack a /100 or /10 at the end and it should be fine (then Yiu's healing goes up to 80 or 8).
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Yeah, agreed with that. Don't care which.
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Would say 100 since it's more intuitive and also gives us more room for balancing (175 power or something!).
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Because I feel like trying to distract myself from the mood I'm currently in, I'll try running some numbers for resident 'secret' character Selena Neid.
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Selena
Fast and frail pretty effectively defines Selena. At first glance, she appears to be a character who requires protection at all times; an apparent glass cannon. Her defenses, to be frank, blow, with her best being her, frankly, average evasion. To boot, her physical damage is...laughable. Her speed is notably high, however, matching with Katarine for fastest non-Guardian, and she has one of the best INT ratings in the game. Of course, her stats are only one part of the matter...
Physical w/staff: L0: 114. L50: 228
Physical w/light sword: L0: 96. L50: 192.
...as stated, laughable. She's not built around physical use anyway, however.
Now, for reference:
Start-of-game INT: 94
Endgame INT:187
INT/SPR ratio to average SPR: 1.56
Start-of-game INT damage boost versus average: 53
End-of-game INT damage boost versus average: 104
Spell stuff to be added later as I actually have to do something for school and forgot my calculator. Goddamnit.
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Noemi continued
First of all, as per discussion, both Mirek and Isolde's skills will upgrade twice. The first versions come earlymidgame, the second probably post-timeskip.
First version of Callida Leanae only adds half of Int to Str. Still a fairly big deal, but not as nasty. Someone else can come up with two names if they'd like.
First upgrade from Mirek just gives the passive, MP Focus (probably the more important, but eh, can't give her all the awesome stuff late, and this fits more thematically), the second gives the killing move, Draco Eruptus.
Haven't commented too much on the passives directly, but I've implied plenty about MP Focus. MP regen is cool (Noemi generally does this faster than most), and the ITD effect at full MP is a nice boost to her damage which is kinda underwhelming before this. It introduces some strategies about the debate between keeping her at full MP or not.
The other passive is Shao's, Idris Falx. I have some concerns with this which may be better covered with Shao himself... the ability to choose ANY (or almost any) element seems kinda annoying when most characters are held to only one or two. I think there might be some neat ways to account for this... like certain weapons are capable of certain elements only? (Could be individual weapons or classes, here.) But otherwise, the move is pretty straightforward, set weakness-raping of choice between battles. It'd kinda suck to choose the wrong one, but Noemi does have stuff besides her physical, although most of it isn't offence... so it is a bit concerning. I'll talk about this more when I do Shao.
Couple updates.
Ifris Libra
Changing the formula slightly so that spending low amounts of MP isn't so worthless to Damage = (MP * 4 + Int), so it's effectively a spell with power equal to MP spent * 4 that ignores defence and INT/SPI. Minimum MP requirement should be set probably, arbitrarily 20. Now, at Level 1, it does 170 (still a bit less than her physical) using 10% of MP consumed, while its maximum potential damage is less than before, 2069 at endgame.
Targetting change on this: either range 1 HT, or range 3 ST.
Arna Evalescere
Proposing it now works as follows: +20% Str/Dex for one turn, then 30%, then 20%. This keeps the resonancy effect while balancing the skill a bit more. Range 2. This is my standard range for defensive stuff, if it's not obvious. Phoenicis and Lupus are also to be range 2.
Combo skills!
Arna Libra
The description says it's ST, unlike the first version? Mm okay, needs to be pretty potent then given that the first Arna is HT, and lasts an extra turn. Anyway, spend X MP = (X/8+20)% buff? Works. At maximum potential this is about a 3.5x multiplier to damage, which is fairly nasty (less for people who are well short of their second swing) seeing as it lasts two turns. But it's competing with Ifris Libra, which pumps out over 2000 damage possibly to multiple enemies, so quadrupling damage of, say, a 600 damage physical is basically needed so it does +1500 twice, but delayed, reliant on another character actually hitting, etc. More versatile, though, it's not fire, can hit weaknesses if used right, and so on. This may need to be toned down if put on some MT physical or something like that. I dunno. I don't want to nerf it too much yet. Note to self, be careful with MT physicals.
Range 2.
Leanae Falx
Oh look, it's an excuse for some normal magic damage on Noemi finally! The main physical hurts quite a bit, since it's the ever-potent Callida Leanae in disguise, and then it adds something more on top of that! Probably should only add half INT to be sane and also not totally obsolete Callida. They should probably also share a cooldown gauge. Magic damage... hmm.
Magic power = 80
Hits = 2
Damage rises from 232 at Level 0 to 266 at Level 50. This is actually 414 at full MP, as a note.
Since it's modiably elemental this skill is quite potent, but it's competing with something else that's potent, so eh.
Strix Cruor
Healing gone bad! 50% mHP damage has some clear uses, the most obvious of which is that it's a decent gravity attack. Also inflicts a status susceptibility up status, which needs a name (suggestions?). Both are pretty neat.
Range 2, Accuracy 120, MP cost 80.
Teleport
Straightforward. Relies on Noemi's physical being competent, but luckilly for her it is. I assume it doesn't need an MP cost? This is strictly a flavour concern; if we decide it gets one, it should be small.
That about wraps things up. I don't have too much more to say, I think she's balanced enough, certainly tends towards the strong side of things as time goes on but I have no issue with that. Haven't talked about her support skills, but I think they're fine too.
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Fairly significant stat rebalancing. Well, kinda.
First of all, what happened:
HP: -2 to Xun. -1 to everyone except Katarine and Eirwen
Str: -2 to Shao
Spirit: -4 to Shao, -3 to Aurel/Fahim/Kasia, -2 to Isolde, -1 to everyone else except Noemi
Speed: -4 to Aurel, -3 to Xun, -1 to Artur/Isolde/Shao
The HP and Spirit averages were both too high for my liking, especially Spirit, which needed to be much closer to Vit. So in general, I lowered everyone by a point in these. I excluded Katarine to create someone on a tier that I was otherwise unoccupied (I do this a few times here, incidentally), and Eirwen because she was already at G. I excluded Noemi from the Spirit cut because I like her Vit and Spi both being paired at perfectly average C's. I can make arbitrary judgements sometimes! I also lowered Spirit a bit more than this to get its average closer to Vit. Finally, the general speed hit was to get -that- one closer to a C average as well.
Okay. You'll notice a few characters got hit a little harder. Here's who, and why:
-Shao: Shao's average stats were crazy high. They're still pretty high, but now he has two meaningful stats below C+, at least, which he didn't before (C Spd and D Spirit). He still has some of the highest overall stats of any PC, if not the highest, so he can deal.
-Xun: Given Xun's plot and role as a summoner, his HP and speed both seemed higher than necessary. Also it meant he was no longer tied with people in his own party for both stats.
-Fahim and Kasia: Both got extra hits to Spirit because they're already dodgy to magic. Having both MEva and MDef is kinda overkill, note that in the physical version, the two are never found together.
-Isolde: She's the damage queen, so I have no problem with making players wait just a little longer for that smash (still isn't a slug, though) and taking her magical durability down a touch.
-Artur: Very small hit to speed, into an unused tier etc.
-Aurel: He's a defensive character (I intend to emphasis this even more when I go over his balance). He has no real need for speed. Also, lowered his mdur some. His mdur is still among the best in the game, but... go look at Nama's list of durabilities on page 5 of characters. He doesn't need to be THAT unkillable.
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Plot Analysis of the PCs (what, it is part of refining too, jerks)
Noemi: Stats look fine and are fitting of a prodigy. Generally above average, notable in the important categories. Has a nice, round equipment set that expands. Her skills are spread pretty nicely. My only objections are that Teleport is kinda weird in general (was there a particular reason for it?) and that its definitely not Quieting. I would also suggest see get a raq ID based Quieting skill to demonstrate the effects of uncontrolled/imperfect Quieting before getting access to Lupus. No problems with her being good as, with some years under her belt, she'd likely be a flat rival for Erastus and the like.
Erastus: Speaking of. Surprisingly durable old man, but good for the man who was once one of the best practitioners in the Empire. He was clearly a health-nut early on. Or perhaps the madness simply empowers him to keep on trucking. Who knows! I find the heavy weapons and armor kinda odd and would actually trim him back down to more medium style stuff, but it can be justified well enough. Just saying it strikes me as vaguely odd. His skills are pretty beastly, but he's also, plot-wise, probably a top tier PC who, at his prime, could go toe to toe with anyone in the empire. Vaguely disagree with the existence of Song of Discord, as that seems much more a Guardian trick and would probably be better left with them (and its a little strange as a resonant ability, frankly). He is a beast, and it is fitting.
Kasia: Noemi's buddy, and the one who can't quite keep up with her extraordinary friend. She has a fairly broad range of abilities well (and honestly, I might recommend trimming her down a bit, as Noemi's group is freakin' utility and large ms central). Overall statistically a bit worse then her friend (which makes sense). Whip is really weird and I'm not so sure about it on the whole, but I can see some use for it gameplay-wise. Otherwise, looks fine. No big objections.
Aurel: Statwise, he lives up to the title of the Immortal Swordsman of the Empire. Monstorously tanky and not bad with the weapon either. Isn't overly evasive, but a guy who can heal his own injuries instantly? Doesn't care too much. He could probably use one more offensive skill to represent that he is indeed a military guy who does hit things, but he may be good enough with just reckless strike and his basic physical. Speaking of, his abilities are all fantastic. The only thing I'd consider adding is a skill or passive that allows him to resist/immune ID effects if we have them. Otherwise, he is pretty damn styling.
Shao: Is... really oddly good in the stat category, and I'm not sure why? Nothing about him particularly sscreamed highly awesome stats, but eh. He's good in the right ones, at least. On the ability front, Prism Blade should be Dissonance. We had a brief discussion about elements and think we vaguely determined we were gonna ditch the dark type, I think? Maybe? Either way, his abilities generally look good and fit the character decently well (although healing trap is still a bit weird to me). Definitely lives up to his role and fits his characterization and position in the world.
Isolde: Another PC who is definitely a ringing endorsement for generally high stats. Fits, and all the bad ones make sense as well given her combat style and personality. Magic Counter should be Dissonance. I believe we discussed making her elementally aligned to Earth and Ice, so no issue there, just keep it in mind. Otherwise her attacks represent a nice clean fusion of melee and magic, making her an incredibly fearsome opponent. She's probably just below Erastus at his peak in terms of raw power and ability. Her abilities are pretty styling. The only one I'm really uunsure of is Counter Magic, but eh, it can be justified.
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The only one I'm really unsure of is Counter Magic, but eh, it can be justified.
Hm. If Counter Magic is to be removed, then we'll have to add another skill--active or passive--and/or rearrange the cluster compositions. Also, I'd need suggestions on what to replace it with, more than likely.
Admittedly, it was a compromise of sorts. Everyone was imagining her as Tactile. Djinn wanted her to be more Blue Mage-ish, this was rather early in production before we knew how party layout would be, I decided to compromise with the FFT-style Counter Magic. If there's issues with that, though, I'm open to suggestions on what to replace it with. (Admittedly, Counter Magic is a reason why I would say that I'm more in favor of Isolde taking a MEVA hit rather than a SPI hit)
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Continuing On
Faulheit: Lazy and useless. Makes generalized sense on the stat front, although I'm not too sure on the reasoning behind the Spirit/Intelligence? Mechanical balance, I assume. Intelligence vaguely makes sense anyway, kinda curious if there was any reasoning at all behind the Spirit, though. Nothing odd with the abilities, really. Not a tton to say, really. He works.
Katarine: She's kinda weird on the whole, in that she uses some equivilant of vancian magic. Also a little odd in that she has Dissonant healing and buffs that have no backlash effects, which really pushes them in the direction of being resonant. I think we might need to talk about her on the plot end? She needs some massaging, since she currently exists outside of a ton of the normal magic rules and... isn't really a focal enough character to really give a fair explanation about it. Which isn't bad, per se, but it was in the neighborhood of things we were trying to avert, kinda.
Ilona: Stats are consistent and sensible. No arguments here. Abilities are all good and just the sort of thing that Guardians should be rolling with. Looks competent.
Selena: Her shitty Spi/MEvade kinda confuse me, honestly. Since she specializes in techniques based around moving these things around, you'd figure she had some talent for not getting smacked in the face by them. But this is gonna be a repeated complaint later on Mirek, so its possibly ignorable and just quoatable as being a result of their skills, while, naturally, they don't deal well with it. Gespent-Barriere is weird as Resonance (redirecting Flow completely), and Gespent-Sklave is similarly weird given the skill above it is Dissonance. Hell, its weird as Resonance to begin with. >_>
Mirek: Altered a bit for plot reasons. I'll deal with him later.
Eirwen: Honestly, could do with, on the plot side, a little reduction to everything statistically. She's the most "normal" PC in the game, but might actually trump a couple folks in averages? Strikes me as off. Ability wise is pretty much fine, although Del Fuego is one of those things that vaguely strikes me as off. But its passable for gameplay reasoning, I do suppose.
Artur: Stats fit the guy. Biggish dude who is more clever than he looks. Might want to actually lower his intelligence a bit, but I think that was done to stick him on an unused tier? Disagree with Batter and Bruise being unified type. Ironically enough, it fits cleanly as Resonance. Debatably, unless we want to stick in a little plot use of his Resonance abilities (the sight based ones) we might want to lose them. They make a lot of sense to me, though, and do a good job of explaining more about how he manages to be who he is. Worth some discussion.
Rafael: This guy's durability is odd, but justifiable. On the ability front, did we ever settle on what to do with him? Like Katarine, probably needs some talking about.
Claire: Statwise, her mediocre Spi/MEva seem odd, but it makes sense if you consider that the plantation guard are not at all trained like Guardians. She's kinda weird, on the front of being the only Guardian with a Sense ability, but if you consider that she's also not got the magical defenses, it workable. Her fruits are kinda devastating and really feel more Dissonancy on the whole. On a plot level, there is some really annoying overlap between her and Ei. Probably needs some discussion, but isn't too bad in isolation.
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Random replies/thoughts on reading Andy's comments...
Noemi: I'd be fine with seeing Teleport go myself. It's rather random on her and doesn't seem quieting-ish.
Erastus: I'd very much like to can Song of Discord, yes. Just too good + does Erastus really need to be able to do this?
Shao: Yeah I dunno what was up with his stats! Already nerfed, more might be coming, but do keep in mind his versatility isn't tooo high so there's some gameplay arguments for him being above par overall.
Faulheit: The speed is unimpressive, and I kinda figured the mdur was a bit of a compromise here. You could view it as a result of him being pretty unflappable. I'm not certain.
Rafael: I really don't like his sheer volume of abilities, idly.
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Yiu: Stats are fine as he is the group bad-ass normal. Ability-wise... I dunno. Something feels off about him. His devices need slightly better explanations (i.e. why other PCs can't just use 'em, which is easy enough). I dunno. Something about his abilities is just nagging at me. Maybe I'll be able to articulate it later. He just feels like he's missing something or is too off balance or something. Don't ask me. Also, the typing on his moves probably needs to be reexamined.
Meilin: Already brought up we need to talk about her "Guardian" status (for a couple reasons). Otherwise... stats generally look good. And why did NEB give you 900 abilities to make me look at? Why? >_> More seriously, bow and sword skills look fine. Support looks fine, too. Not much else to say.
Xun: Stats are bad, which works well. Would actually raise his Dex a bit so he's not quite so squishy and justification in that he was a competent sailor, and they are somewhat dexterous and all. Would argue resonance for his skills on the whole. I'll deal with his pets later.
Jin: Stats and numbers look good. Needs some abilities. Heard Meilin's support (minus the charm thing) were gonna get passed.
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Updated the wiki with things discussed in chat. C/P'd because I don't have time to type it all out and I know Andy's too lazy to check a watchlist himself~ (See? I've got your back, Andy!)
6 May 2010
Mirek (Changed the 100% Focus bonus to only ITD, instead of both ITD/ITE)
Claire (Rebalanced Fruit effects.)
Eirwen (Changed skill names. Again.)
Selena (Changed all skills to Dissonance.)
Katarine (Edited Resource plot relationship. Added Backlash effects to buff skills. Changed Aura Lance to Dissonance.)
Faulheit (Learning method edited.)
Isolde (Minor Counter-Magic flavour change.)
Shao (Changed Dark-type to Disquiet-type, which is now his last-gained elemental skill. Changed Prism blade to Dissonance instead of Resonance. Fixed story reasoning behind Trap Charges.)
Erastus (Removed Song of Discord. Updated story relevance of Charge-based skills.)
Noemi (Changed Teleport to an ID skill. Edited skill names to English/Latin mix.)
Fahim (Illness, See Mind balancing.)
EDIT: Things are legible now.
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Just a quick list of who has what status attacks. Subject to change, but becoming more relevant given who I am currently looking at (Shao).
Poison: Added by Fahim's Illness and Rafael's Degeneration
Bleeding: Added by Isolde's Executioner's Curse (L1-3), Kasia's Called Shot - Abdomen, and Meilin's Bloodletting Shot
Backfire: Added by Isolde's L3 Shock Blade
Burn: Added by Fahim's Exploder and Shao's Exploder
Frostbite: Added by Fahim's Frostfall and Shao's Frostfall proposing kill
Paralysis: Added by Fahim's Shocker, Shao's Shocker, and Skywhale's Playful Charge
Immobilise: Added by Kasia's Called Shot - Leg, Shao's Glue Trap, and Po's Mud Shot
Displaced: Kill this
Disoriented: Added by Fahim's Gust and Yiu's Coin Launcher
Blind: Added by Bai's Flash, Fahim's Illness, Kasia's Called Shot - Eye, and Shao's Flash Strike
Weakened: Kill this
Healblocked: Added by Kasia's Rehabilitate, Rafael's Degeneration, and Shao's Healing Trap (also Kasia/Rafael support effects)
Charm: Added by Fahim's Illness, and Meilin's Alluring Strike and Peerless Display (also Meilin support effects)
Stun: Added by Claire's Petite Madeleine, Meilin's Ringing Blow, and Xun's Old Sailor's Trick (also Artur support effect)
Misfortune: Added by Isolde's Executioner's Curse (L2-3)
Berserk: Added by Rafael's Obfuscation
Scorch (hex): Added by Erastus' Scorch, Emberstorm, Flame Wall, and Rain of Fire, and Ash Elemental's Scorch, and Agni Titan's Desert Torch
Frozen: Added by Yiu's Frost Bomb
Fragile: Added by Yiu's Torture Powder
Backlash: Added by Rafael's Reciprocation
Silence: Added by Fahim's Illness, Noemi's Lupus Howl, Shao's Void Strike, and Yiu's Noise Trap (ignores immunity)
Delay: Added by Bai's Trained Response, Faulheit's Pressure Blast and Pressure Bomb, and Isolde's Steel Force/Shock Blade
*Note: PC Healblock immunity should not exist, so we can remove the "ignores immunity" tags from the healing that causes it. I'd argue that enemy immunity to it should also be non-existent, but would settle for it being extremely rare.
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Shao
Overview: He still has excellent stats. B-/B-/B-/B/D/C/B on the relevant ones. This means he's rather physically durable (1.23ish) though a bit below average on magic. Average speed, good accuracy. Damage with his actual physical is fairly midrange. This overall probably works (much better than it did before when his physical damage was overtly good, he was fast, and both his durabilities were above average! But I digress).
Shao's main thing is hitting elemental weaknesses. His raw physical bruising isn't top tier (see: Isolde, Meilin, Artur, Mirek) but it's quite serviceable, accurate, and he can hit all three physical elements. Add elements to that and there's a fair bit of damage potential present, and he even has GT at his disposal every few turns. With some status mixed in. And then there are his traps...
Base damage at L50:
432 damage at 100 hit, spear. (2-)
461 damage at 110 hit, light sword. (3)
403 damage at 115 hit, gloves. (6-)
Cooldowns: In the interest of combining these to avoid the spamming of similar moves... well, this one is simple. Shao has three:
1. Prism Blade - 3 turns
2. ST version of his elemental skills - 1 turn
3. GT version of his elemental skills - 3 turns
Skills
Proposed Passive: Exploit Weakness - If an enemy has an elemental weakness which Shao hits, then a percentage of Shao's Int equal to the elemental affinity minus 100 divided by 2 is added to his Strength for that damage (so an enemy who takes 150% to fire adds 25% of Shao's Int). Since Shao's Int and Str are similar, this roughly turns 150% into 188% and 200% into 300%. Additionally, if Shao strikes a burned target with a fire attack, they take 150 extra damage instead of 100.
Shao really, really wants to hit weaknesses. It's what he does and what he is about.
Prism Blade - Should also be listed as an active, as well as a passive. As an active... hmm. I'd vote it have a quick recharge time (1/3 turn) but to compensate up its cooldown to 3 turns, making it moderately impractical to hit multiple elemental weaknesses directly in one battle. Its cooldown is independent from his other moves. Anyway, obviously his signature, and straightforward enough.
Flash Strike - I'm proposing this be his first skill, because we don't really have enough light damage in the game as is, and it fits symmetrically with Void Strike being the last. Adds Blind, hit rate is 30%, lasts 3 turns. Blind is potent since it affects both physicals and magic, remember. One definite use for this skill is the GT version in an attempt to control a few enemies. Also, the name made me think it should be accurate.
ST version - 1.1x Dex, 0.8x Str, +20 hit, 30% blind (3 turns)
GT version - As above, but 0.6x Str, 20% blind, hits a 4-hex cone
Initial
Exploder Fist/Blade/Spear - Burn! Burn is highly synergistic with Scorch, and this is the move's main use. It also slightly lowers enemy attack power, which isn't as good as blind obviously. I'm actually kinda opposed to burn having a poison effect, seems like that's just copying pokemon, and the added fire damage and attack penalty is enough. Simple, flat effect I'm proposing on Burn: it adds 100 to any fire damage sustained. Obviously better with Scorch, though Shao himself makes good use of it due to Prism Blade.
The skill itself emphasises a single powerful hit which will probably make it most useful with his higher-Atk weapons, i.e. spears.
ST version - 0.5x Dex, 1.75x Str, -10 hit, 50% burn (3 turns)
GT version - As above, but 1.25x Str, 33% burn, hits all hexes around Shao
Gained around Level ~8
GT version is notable for doing 360 damage assuming a spear, though 90 hit
Shocker Fist/Blade/Spear - Paralysis time. Coinflip status, you have a 50% chance of not being able to do anything, which on average means you lose 1.5 turns if you live long enough. Obviously that's rather cool, a more potent blind (because it also stops effects which don't make accuracy checks). Of course that means it's going to have a lower hit rate.
ST version - 1.5x Dex, 0.6x Str, 20% paralysis (3 turns)
GT version - As above, but 0.5x Str, 15% paralysis, hits all targets in a line
Gained around Level ~15
Sword/Martial/Spear Downpour - Displaced is the a status that is being canned. Instead I am proposing this attack inflicts Misfortune, which seems sensible enough for water to me, and is a rather cool, currently underused status. No crits/counters is fairly neat spoiling, and doubling crit rate against this enemy certainly makes for some neat twinking options. I see water being inherently weaker at damage to make up for this cool, and not unreliable effect. Helps that... it's water. It's not as inherently offensive as most of the other elements Shao has.
ST version - 1x Dex, 0.7x Str, 50% misfortune (3 turns)
GT version - As above, but 0.4x Str, 33% misfortune, hits all targets in a line
Gained around Level ~20
Sword/Martial/Spear Frostfall - With Frostbite being shown the door (hey it's a burn clone except with less synergy, zzz), this moves now inflicts Frozen instead, which is much more potent! Unfortunately it's bad at actually adding said status. Still, a nice move when you want to roll the dice. The base attack is similar to its fire cousin, but more accurate in exchange for less raw power.
ST version - 0.5x Dex, 1.6x Str, +10 hit, 10% freeze (2 turns)
GT version - As above, but 1.1x Str, 8% freeze, hits all hexes around Shao
Gained around Level ~25
Void Strike - Silence is cool, albeit spoilerful. Disquiet element is rare and freaky, dunno if this will be good or not. Its multiplier may need to be modified as such. For now I'm making it inherently superior to a physical, sort of his go-to attack. 634 damage ST with a light sword, using the usual conventions. It's a bit of an 'ultimate attack' for him after all.
ST version - 1.1x Dex, 1.1x Str, 30% silence (3 turns)
GT version - As above, but 0.8x Str, 20% silence, hits a 4-hex cone
Gained around Level ~40
Support effects
I really dislike Shao's current support effect (making ally physicals elemental) since they let the entire party use his gimmick! I really don't like that, if you want to hit weaknesses, Shao should be your man, but his support effect makes me want to use a party with him sitting on the bench. Whoops. The bonus needs to be more subtle, I think.
Honestly, this is one of the reasons I made exploit weakness. A smaller version of it makes a lot more sense to me to turn into a support effect.
Prism Aura - When PCs strike an elemental weakness, they deal 15% extra damage.
Prism Roulette - Is fine. Man does he wish he could stick around for this one.
Traps later, I need a break from this. Comments so far?
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I like what I see. The only thing that I would suggest changing is actually -increasing- the multiplier on Void Strike. Since it's supposed to be his go-to move and since I'm sort of predicting a large number of Disquiet-resistant/immune enemies near that time, it'd be nice if he does really good damage with it when he gets the chance.
Exploit Weakness and the proposed changes to the Statuses (Fahim and Xun's pets should make these same changes) are really cool.
I also approve of the change to his Support ability. Though I'd make the bonus a little more worthwhile (15%).
He ends up very synergistic with Rafael, I believe? I think Rafael has an 'add elemental weakness' skill. If I'm misremembering that, then Shao should probably pick up something like that.
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See what Djinn said, pretty much. Not sure he actually needs a higher multiplier though, as it really shouldn't be too good or its going to end up overshadowing the rest of his attacks. Being solidly better than his basic physical and adding a status that is probably pretty solid. Not sure on the Disquiet thing. I actually think its gonna be path dependent on which one is better. Like the generalized variety on his attacks, and really, his gimmick is pretty cool. Support change was quite good.
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Shao Part 2
Traps
Traps are weird. After all, why would an enemy walk into one? In effect, thus, a trap (excluding Healing Trap) works like a wall, except the enemy CAN move into it if it's really worth it. Flipside, if enemies are stupid, they may walk into them anyway, so Shao gets a free effect. I'd imagine enemy intelligence is something we can set to vary, in this regard.
All traps are limited by charges. Additionally, there is a "3 trap at a time" limit which I am extending from the description of Wall, just because I worry about battlefield clutter or potential overabuse of these otherwise. Could be argued on this one being higher, but coding-wise I feel like one should exist, at the very least.
Damage Trap
Gained at about Level 15, about (Level-14) uses
110 accuracy
On detonation, does 5 hits of 100 power (703 -> 789 damage). Takes element from Shao's weapon, works with Exploit Weakness (adding a percentage of his Int onto his base Int).
Lure in stupid enemy for massive damage (granted, could be more accurate). Wall off enemies from reaching things. Shao can litter and control the battlefield to a reasonable degree with these, but he doesn't have them in huge numbers early when they are most potent, and by endgame they're not much above Void Strike anyway.
Glue Trap
Gained at about Level 20, about (Level-19) uses
110 accuracy
On detonation, inflicts Immobilise for 3 turns, and lowers enemy speed by 25%.
"Hey, speed lowering is pretty rare in this game. As it should be, it's potent."
"How do I make Glue Trap overall better than something as damaging as a potentially weakness-hitting Damage Trap...?"
Connect the dots, ladies and gentlemen. This one is straightforward enough. Its optimum use is trapping a melee enemy then getting away from it while the party deals with other things (better yet, catch it in a hex no ally is adjacent to, though this is difficult), though even without that niche the speed down is nice. May even have some use against some bosses as a result.
Wall Trap
Gained at about Level 30, about 2*(Level-29) uses
Let's just get straight to the point, shall we? Summons a wall. Comparing it to Flame Wall... well, it's only length 1, but it's not brutally expensive. It doesn't last as long, though. I'm inclined to say that any direct attack (ST or HT) will destroy it instantly, but it will not be affected by MT or GT. So enemies need to waste a turn getting rid of it.
Instant Death Trap
Gained at about Level 35, about (Level-34) uses
Instant death is cool. Needs to be more accurate, though, since it's competing with good damage after all.
110 accuracy
Well that was simple.
Healing Trap
And now for something completely different! Obviously this is different because PCs can walk into it, and will certainly choose to. It's a little trickier to set up than normal healing, and not instant, and that's fine, because Shao is not the party's dedicated healer. Still, it's a good way to deal with things. And hey, it CAN be used as a healblock trap if needed. I guess. Maybe.
Gained at about Level 25, about (Level-23)/2 uses
Even simpler.
Comments on these? They're not really his focus, overall, but they give him a nice secondary niche so he can do something besides try for crappy statuses against elementally neutral enemies. And he synergises well with Erastus at battlefield control. Noemi's party is good at this.
I'm pretty happy with how Shao turned out overall.
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Wait wait wait... his trap statuses are all based on Accuracy now? Are you trying to turn Evasion into a god stat?
I mean, I can understand if you want Traps to be avoidable through evasion, but I figured statuses normally just percentage checks, like you did with his elemental strikes?
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Magical evasion, actually, as they're all tagged as dissonance.
It makes no sense for attacks to have random fixed percentages of hitting that isn't subject to evade. Also, I want very little ITE in general.
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So... Magical Evasion is basically how we're doing status resistance?
It makes sense to a certain degree, I just don't think that's how it commonly works.
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Plenty of games with MEvade do it. (FF6 for an obvious example.)
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Some revised numbers. Not noting things like Dex, Evasions, Armor or Passives that matter here, yet.
Pdur Rank
Aurel 1.64
Rafael 1.59
Artur 1.48
Isolde 1.29
Jin 1.25
Shao 1.25
ClaireH 1.12
Erastus 1.12
Kasia 1.06
ClaireN 1.05
Xun 1.05
Yiu 1.02
Faulheit 0.98
Noemi 0.97
ClaireL 0.94
Katarine 0.72
Eirwen 0.71
Mirek 0.68
Meilin 0.65
Fahim 0.64
Selena 0.62
Ilona 0.52
Mdur Rank
Erastus 1.53
Aurel 1.36
Rafael 1.28
Faulheit 1.22
Mirek 1.22
Jin 1.20
Isolde 1.19
Kasia 1.17
Yiu 1.08
Fahim 1.04
Noemi 0.98
Xun 0.95
Shao 0.93
Artur 0.81
ClaireL 0.79
ClaireH 0.79
ClaireN 0.79
Meilin 0.76
Katarine 0.72
Ilona 0.71
Selena 0.71
Eirwen 0.68
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Jin
The big guy of Yiu's entourage, and...he's a bard? Well, definitely a case for playing against type, to say the least, but Jin is a rather unusual character. His basic durability is pretty much the highest in Yiu's group, and he hits as hard as the physically-oriented characters on a basic. He appears like he'd be a solid fighter...
...until you look at some of his other stats. D-ranked Dexterity with light armor hurts, even with that VIT and HP. Worse is his evasion--he's not dodging anything that has a chance of hitting anyone else. On that same note, his own hitrate is utterly abysmal--the best he's getting against average is 55% with instruments. 45% with axes and hammers. Expect him to be missing. A lot. It's a rather easy trap to fall into to treat him like a heavy melee unit, since he only has half the durability of one and all the power without any of the accuracy. He's very much a support unit, and it shows.
On the plus side, he's got unrestricted limitless support use, which means that you don't have to worry about healing running out if you're willing to drag the battle on long enough. The problem is that it, like him, starts out slow.
Onto skillset:
Instrumental Talent: Nothing really wrong with this skill. Swaps STR and DEX with an instrument equipped. This has little offensive benefit, mind you, since instruments have a bad DEX mod to begin with (0.8), marginally better accuracy than hammers, and ATK that's barely better than a shortsword; furthermore, his base DEX sucks ass, meaning his damage will not matter worth shit. However, given his role as a support character, this becomes an amazingly important skill for survivability, allowing him to DEX-tank like mad and compensating for his lack of armor against light weapons. He'll still get the shit knocked out of him by heavy weapons, but that's to be expected from his bad evasion and light armor.
Healing Harmony: One of Jin's basic skills, and probably a standby; heals himself and surrounding allies for 4% mHP, increasing by a flat 2% mHP per turn (so 4%, 6%, 8%, 10%...) Positioning is a notable factor here, and while this is potentially powerful given enough turns, it does have the issue of being slow to start, and running off of Jin's bad speed; as well as competing with other songs for attention...
Resounding Rhythm: Like this one. 4% speed boost, plus 2% per turn. Speed is powerful in this system, notably, and it shows here. Unfortunately for poor Jin here, as with all percentile speed boosts, this one's effectiveness is based on the initial speed of the recipient. The higher the speed to begin with, the bigger the boost; and Jin's speed is tied with Rafael's for second-last. Can't really benefit himself too much with it, but giving Meilin and Xun a boost can't hurt (especially with Xun's summons.) Might stand to be a bit stronger, but I'll see how useful this will be for now. Really comes into use if he's put into a party with one of the speedsters (Ilona, Claire, Katarine, Selena), though.
Dissonant Dirge: This is weird. It's a song that deals HP damage to all enemies, triggered on Jin's turn. His speed aside, I'm thinking this is reasonably accurate (130-135 MACC range?) just to counterbalance the fact that he has no other reliable source of damage at all. Though due to this, its currently nontyped nature, its AoE nature, and how he can still smash people while singing, it shouldn't be very high power to start. Thinking base power = 200, increment value 50, though if that goes up too slow it could be increment value 75 or 100. Given how his speed goes, it might be decent to consider the latter option.
Proposed Technique: [Unnamed Song 1]: My first of the additions fo Jin's songs, and arguably one of the more useful ones for him. Not sure what order these will be learned in, so I'm just listing them as they come up mentally. Don't mind the lack of name; I can't do the goofy alliteration thing. Anyway, this song boosts accuracy for Jin and allies in adjacent hexes, resulting in a boost of (6+3 per count) to hit-rate. Furthermore, it boosts critical rate for them as well, albeit at a smaller rate of 3+1 per count. Might be the last one learned, what with it managing to fix Jin's biggest problem.
Proposed Technique: [Unnamed Song 2]: Next is a song that boosts DEF and MDEF. This being rather powerful, functionally (again, consider the effect on heavy and antimage armor in particular), it can afford to be small. 4% + 2% per count.
Proposed Technique: [Unnamed Song 3]: A song that boosts counter rate. Nonzero counter rates under this gain a bonus of, again, 4+2 per count. A subtle boost, but one that starts showing after a couple of rounds.
Proposed Final Technique: [Unnamed]: So sue me, I'm bad with musical terms. I'm a Computer Science major, not a Music major. Anyway, this would result in doubling all currently active Song effects from Jin...at the cost of them ending on either the end of the relevant PC's next turn or Jin's next turn, whichever comes sooner. This might be either OPB or run on a cooldown, to prevent abuse. Has a bigger payoff the more he's kept buffs running, but then he'd have to start all over again. I figured this would be a halfway neat capstone ability for him, though I could just make one more song instead.
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Something to keep in mind with Jin, it was talked about that he might take over some of Meilin's old healing moves. They don't really clash with his songs too much anyway, but worth keeping in mind. (Also this should probably be formally decided one way or another.)
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I'm in favor of giving Meilin's healing abilities over to Jin, though they will have to be renamed/tailored to his resource system.
Think you could come up with something for this, Nama?
I don't think his final skill needs to be OPB or run on a cooldown. It seems like ending the buff effect immediately afterward is enough of a penalty. It also could be AoE instead of full-field if you're really worried about it being overpowered.
Buffing Acc, Crit, and Counter rates are a really neat niche and directly buffing DEF/MDEF is nice and potent. It really gives him a different niche from the other buffers, and at endgame (with the crit/acc buff), he's actually quite a competent Melee option (especially if you're anal like me and love PCs that have unlimited resources).
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I'm admittedly not in favor of giving Meilin's healing abilities over to Jin, for a couple of reasons. It could be done (I'd still go for a cooldown on those regardless), but there's a couple of other reasons I oppose this.
1: I originally put them on Meilin partially because, frankly, I wanted to not make her so one-dimensional in a way that didn't involve weapon switching (which is a pain to begin with). The problem with Focus-gauge characters is that all their skills usually go along one line (Claire's another exception, but I say this could be a good distinction for those with Focus who don't have Shrouds--they trade that off for a bit more variety), and does anyone really weapon-switch outside of a FE game to begin with?
2: I am deliberately attempting to avoid 'lynchpin support' syndrome in Yiu's group; It's notable that each group has at least one distinct 'vulnerable' member in some way that shutting down would hamper the party to some degree (Noemi's group averts this by having two revivers, of all things. Isolde's group has Katarine[though she lacks revival, her support helps the blitzing power and minimizes damage when properly used], and Mirek's group has Eirwen, with Claire as a status healer). Best way to do this? Spread the support around. And frankly, is it wrong to have one more character with a couple of healing abilities?
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Flavor-wise, Meilin shouldn't have healing spells. You can give them to one of Xun's pets if you'd prefer, but status healing and revival are really fitting with Jin. Also, Fahim has some of that stuff too, so it's not like taking it off of Meilin makes Yiu's group into 'only one person has any support stuff!'. If anything, it actually balances Yiu's group with the other groups a bit better since as is, Meilin, Fahim, Jin, Yiu, and Xun can all do healing of some type. >.>;;
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Flavorwise, I didn't imagine them as spells as much as 'field treatment'. The point about variety and weapon switching still stands, though.
[EDIT]That aside, I am willing to compromise; Give her something else that adds variety without requiring weapon switching, and I'll be fine. Even if I'm still not a fan of it being on Jin specifically
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Aurel
Aurel's stats fit what most imagine of a typical 'knight' type of character. Decent power, amazing defenses, he exists more to take damage than avoid it--which is good, because he can't dodge worth crap; his pEVA goes into the negatives when he's in any armor heavier than light, and his mEVA leaves him as statusbait. A mix of C DEX and B STR gives him decent combative ability, while he manages to be among the most physically durable thanks to his A HP, S VIT, and ability to equip heavy armor. His potential seems like it'd be more desirable on Mirek's side of the matter, as he is on Noemi's team, but it's arguable that this makes her side the clear 'easiest' to go through to start (Again, the LEAST durable person on her team there is Kasia. Noemi isn't bad on her end and can DEXtank, Shao's generally good on both fronts IIRC, and Erastus is surprisingly tanky for a mage). However, as is usual, PC tanks have the problem of being often ignored in favor of the much squishier everyone else. As such, the usual answer is to make said tank able to draw attention and attacks away from the other party members.
Damage ranges are deceptive here, as Aurel does not survive to endgame. None of these values beat average DEX, thus will assume single hit:
Physical, Hammer:273->546, 65% accuracy, 6% Critical, 5% Counter
Physical, Great Axe:234->468, 65% accuracy, 24% Critical, 5% Counter
Physical, Greatsword:218->436, 70% accuracy, 9% Critical, 10% Counter
Physical, Spear:156->312, 75% accuracy, 18% Critical, 25% Counter
Physical, Shortspear:140->280, 80% accuracy, 18% Critical, 25% Counter
Physical, Javelin:140->280, 75% accuracy, 12% Critical, 0% Counter, range 3
While he has a wide selection of weapons, it's notable that his accuracy barely beats average, and it shows. Hammers, as for everyone who has them, are the heavy offense weapon for him, though he might prefer Great Axes instead. Greatswords once again fall into a novelty class by comparison, but that's to be expected for this weapon category (to compensate, we perhaps need more 'special' weapons in this class once we get to equips). Spears and shortspears are for the evasive and for counter rate, while javelins give him a ranged option which may prove to be useful if he is stuck unable to attack (or unable to attack without massive risks).
However, attacking isn't his forte to begin with, for obvious reasons that his skillset will show. Armor-based learning is...awkward, I think. It's doable, but it -is- awkward, since it forces him to give up one of his big advantages and is otherwise counterintuitive unless we do something along the lines of staggering the availability of armor for Noemi's group.
Master of his Body: Aurel regens 10% of his HP at the start of his turn. Resonance. Starting skill.
10% HP regeneration on top of his defenses is huge. Flavor insists that this would be a starting passive for him, at the very least.
Never Say Die: Aurel's Vit and Spi increase significantly while he is below 50% health. Dissonance. Active with a Medium Armor equipped, learned after 15 battles.
Okay, as amusing as his raw tankiness after this would be, no. We don't need him to be even less killable, what with him already having Meiling-grade durability. Andy has suggested a minor STR boost instead, which lends itself to making a bit more sense and not making him literally impossible to kill without status. (If you're thinking Kasia has no other way only because of this, just consider the majority of her damage output)
Refuse to Fall: Aurel has a 25% chance of surviving a fatal attack with 1 HP remaining. Dissonance. Active with a Heavy Armor equipped, learned after 30 battles.
25% Guts activation rate. I'm a bit opposed to this working on actual ID, but fine with it working on damage. Not too much of an issue here that I can think of.
Trained Bodyguard: Aurel has a 25% chance of intercepting an attack directed at an ally in his hex. Dissonance. Active with a Light Armor equipped, learned after 30 battles.
Blocker. And, I argue, possibly one of the core, if not the core skill to his tankiness actually -working-. Light armor is something counterintuitive for him, so unless heavier armor isn't readily available, he'd have problems. In fact, I think this should be a starting skill for him, given how outright important it is for his tankiness to actually matter. It's tempting to add a corollary that if he defends, this rate doubles to 50% interception or the like while he continues to defend. Regardless, an important ability, one that he should start with if he doesn't gain it extremely early.
Brief Resurgence: When hit with an attack that would deal MP damage, all of Aurel's currently ready skills are not usable next turn, as if sent into a 1-turn recharge state. Starting skill.
Standard MP damage corollary to cooldowns.
Bolster: Recover a moderate amount of HP, but cancels his regen for several turns. 1-turn cooldown. Dissonance. Useable with a Light Armor equipped, learned after 10 battles.
3-turn regen cancellation for active self-healing. Not really much I see wrong here. Next.
Return From the Brink: Recover 100% of his HP, but takes significant penalties to his stats, decreasing all stats 33% for 4 turns. 3-turn cooldown. Dissonance. Useable with a Medium Armor equipped, learned after 25 battles.
This is his emergency healing, and it takes the everliving fuck out of him. Really, if he's alone and he has to use this, he's just plain screwed, though that plus some repositioning could save him in that battle. I don't mind it at all.
The Iron Wall of the Empire: Aurel takes 0 damage from physical and magical damage for a short time, but his Vit and Spi are dropped to G levels for 4 turns afterwards. 3-turn cooldown. Dissonance. Useable with a Heavy Armor equipped, learned after 45 battles.
One of a scant few invincibility abilities, and probably the first one in the game. I'm thinking a duration of either "half turn" or "until next turn", for which he's just plain impossible to hurt by damage. I'm tempted to say that this should auto-activate covering, since it's just a fancy way to survive a single attack otherwise and has a massive penalty. The drop needs to be in terms of a numerical value at this point, not letter ranks, and I'll suggest a flat 50% or so drop to VIT and SPR. That should suffice.
Reckless Strike: Moderate damage, but increases the damage he takes until his next turn. 1-turn cooldown. Dissonance. Useable with a Light Armor equipped, learned after 20 battles.
Hm. The name and description imply that it leaves his defenses open. I think I'm going to instead argue that this inflicts 100% immunity-ignoring Misfortune on himself until the end of his next turn--he overextends himself like hell and not only leaves his defenses open, but is in a position where he really can't mount an effective counterattack. That should probably be sufficient penalty for this.
As for the damage mod, I'm considering a simple 1.5x damage boost. His base damage isn't exactly awesome to begin with, and he's not really meant to be a powerhouse. At the same time, the short cooldown makes it relatively spammable.
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Ilona
Ilona's pretty much the FE Thief/Assassin of the game, and it shows. She's pretty much the fastest and most physically evasive character in the game, bar none--and she's no slouch on the end of magic evasion either. Good thing, too, since her defenses are straight-out abysmal; cast-worst PDUR, and tied for second-worst MDUR, light armor only. Needless to say that she doesn't like mages to begin with, despises anything accurate, and dies upon being looked at by ITE. On the offensive side, her Accuracy is solid, and her Dexterity is, once again, cast-best, boosted further thanks to her weapon selection. Her Intelligence (A-rated), incidentally, doesn't really help her at all, while she's once again hurt by her -low- Strength--tying with Eirwen and only better than Faron (who has no reason to be physically attacking, ever). She's in an odd case where she exists to kill low-VIT low-DEX enemies, with some tricks for the types who are more physically sound.
Values are against average defenses.
Physical, Knife: 145 over 7 hits->290 over 7 hits. 155% accuracy, 3% critical rate, 40% counter rate on evade
Physical, Dagger: 112 over 6 hits -> 224 over 6 hits. 155% accuracy, 15% critical rate, 60% counter rate on evade.
Physical, Guardian Blade: 134 over 4 hits->268 over 4 hits. 150% accuracy, 9% critical rate, 30% counter rate on evade.
Physical, Scythe: 111 over 2 hits->222 over 2 hits. 125% accuracy, 12% critical rate, 20% counter rate on evade.
She is, far more than any other character, intolerant to increases in DEF and VIT, and tolerant to decreases of such, with her basic physical. Criticals are likewise big for her--she gets more out of defense-halving than damage-doubling for certain, and she's unlikely to have trouble hitting enemies as she is just doing notable damage.
Equally notable is her Focus gauge: Starts at 10%, increases by 5% for every basic physical executed, plus an extra 1% for each extra hit launched. +2% focus for each attack evaded. Speed, Dexterity, and Evasion increase by 1% for every 20% focus (and thus at full Focus, she's a bit faster and dodgier than normal, not that she arguably needs it)
Anyway, onto techs. As she is a Guardian, it's natural that she has an assload of passives.
Shadow Stance: If Ilona doesn't move, grants an extra 50% chance to evade any attacks sent her way Goes away if she moves or is successfully attacked.
Basically, free Double Image when she doesn't move. I'm admittedly a bit iffy on this already, since she's -damned- hard to hit already (40% hitrate with average physical accuracy, 65% with average magic accuracy.) On the other hand...she does pretty much die horribly when getting hit. I'm on the fence about this, though it makes it rather easy to negate her evasion by forcing her to move and Isolde's group lacks forced-movement skills. This is much more a skill for defense than offense.
Fleeting Feet: If Ilona uses a basic physical or evades a physical attack, speed is increased by 10% until next turn. Stacks with itself, but wears off completely after the next turn.
Rapid Attack with a twist. I'm going to say, since it's not made clear, that the 10% is based off of her base speed, not the modified speed (so that it'd be 100, 110, 120, 130... rather than 100, 110, 121, 133, 146...). Half-tempted to say that counterattacks don't count, though if the intent was such that she'd gain 20% off of an evade into counter...eh.
Unrelenting Momentum: Each of Ilona's hits after the first in an attack gain a bonus to damage, starting from 10% and increasing by 10% each time.
Tal, I hate you. You made me have to recalculate every single goddamned basic attack damage value again and have -doubled- my time working on those. I hope you're happy. Bastard.
Opportunity: If Ilona evades an attack, she has double the chance of countering it. If Ilona does not evade the attack, she cannot counter it.
Given how often she'll be dodging attacks, that'll lead to a functional doubling of counter rate. At this point I'm against letting counterattacks count for Focus gain or Fleeting Feet.
Illusion Dance (10%): Normal physical that causes confusion.
Still needs revising. Confusion doesn't exist, Charm would be too powerful, and we have enough people who use Delay on Isolde's team as-is. I'm halfway thinking Paralysis, but that too doesn't work so well. Possibly an Evade debuff?
Target (20%): Normal physical + locks on to an enemy. If an ally attacks the enemy, Ilona will immediately attack it with a basic physical. She cannot evade or counter any other enemies' attacks. Wears off if the target moves out of melee range, Ilona is successfully attacked by an enemy, or Ilona acts on someone other than herself or the targetted enemy.
This is a deceptively good skill, and probably something she intends to use against single targets. This not only increases her damage against said single target by the number and rate of people attacking the enemy, but also increases her focus gain rate like crazy. Of course...an enemy that could get away from her in one move (either through moving through/away from her, or moving her away) will negate this trick. The mobile will negate this from her before there's a -really- good chance. Utter suicide to use against groups as well. Doesn't look too bad.
Backstab (30%): Adds half of Speed to Strength for damage and auto-crits, but only hits once regardless of Dexterity difference. Has a chance to instantly kill the target. If a knife/dagger is equipped, ignores defense and lowers target's Strength, Vitality, Dexterity, and Speed by 5%.
This, IIRC, is the big skill that's created so much debate about her. 30% focus for a single, big hit, with bonuses if she's using a knife or dagger. The damage works as such based on weapon:
Knife: 422->844. ITD.
Dagger: 409->818. ITD.
Guardian Blade: 264->528
Scythe: 396->792
Key word here: Not For Use With Sword. That aside, a sizeable chunk of damage, and for the most part cements her as a knife-user. ...except when she's up against something with low defense (in the case of Guardian Blades, less than 24 at start, 48 at end. With Scythes, less than 54, 108 at end). Synergizes with speed buffing as well as typical offense buffing. The chance of ID, I'd think would be small (10% to 15% or so? It's not the star of this move, given the heavily boosted damage). I'd argue that the stat-drops on knives are so small as to be negligible, honestly, so if you really want them on there, I don't see too much of an issue.
Flurry Rush (50%): Normal physical at 2.5x Dexterity. If a guardian blade is equipped, this increases to 3x and Ilona's speed is doubled until next turn.
Okay. This...is going to give me a headache thanks to Unrelenting Momentum. Once again, this will have to be looked at on a weapon-by-weapon basis. (Sidenote: Tal, I hate you, this number of hits is a pain in the ass to calculate mentally)
Knife:619->1238 over 21 hits.
Dagger:528->1056 over 20 hits.
Guardian Blade:823->1646 over 18 hits, Halves time until next turn
Scythe: 424->849 over 8 hits
Due to critical rate, these values are on the low side. And honestly? Remove the bonus DEX for Guardian Blades. Yes, I know they get shafted on Backstab. Quick Hit's a powerful enough effect to start with, honestly.
Enlightened State (100%): Increases counter/critical rate to 100%, doubles evasion and speed, adds 2% to the focus meter each turn. Ilona immediately gets two more actions.
Okay. This is a somewhat complex effect, so I guess I'll have to look at each portion separately. Most notably, there's no duration listed, but it's presumable that it lasts for the whole battle. If it weren't for the fact that she's NOT seeing 100% Focus outside of excessively long fights or intervention from Eirwen or Claire, I'd say "screw that shit." As it is, it's almost never coming out, so I'll let that deal slide.
Increases counter/critical rate to 100%
Change it to doubling, I'd be fine. I'm iffy about it being 100%.
doubles evasion and speed
I'll let it slide that this move was made before the stats came out. As it stands, she's only hittable by ITE and magic. I'm saying -no- to the evasion boost. Also, speed doubling results in not only the predictable effects, but also Backstab damage going up. 1.5x seems like it'd be a solid boost for speed? I'm opposed to Evade going up on the basis that she already has cast-best evade AND halves final hit-rates while standing still.
adds 2% to the focus meter each turn
Sure, why not.
Ilona immediately gets two more actions
Don't mind too much here either.
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Mirek
Stats
HP: 770/1540 (C-)
MP: n/a
Strength: 102/204 (A+)
Dexterity: 103/206 (S)
Vitality: 42/84 (F)
Intelligence: 46/91 (D)
Spirit: 75/150 (A-)
Speed: 36/72 (G)
Accuracy: 70% (A)
Evasion: 70% (A)
Magic Evasion: 20% (D-)
Move: 2
Equipment Options
Weapons - Guardian Blades
Armor - Light
Accessories - Light, Male, Guardian
Mirek is a Guardian. His skills are a microlevel version of the Unified Flow Cycle, channeled by the Focus Meter. Starts at 25% and increases by 10% every turn. Also increases by 5% whenever Mirek or an ally in his hex takes damage.
10% per turn is quite low when his cheapest ability is 15% and his speed is loltastic. However, the 5% Focus building off of damage is pretty good, especially since you should be playing him as a damage sponge due to his 100% counter rate anyway.
Skills
Passive
Guardian's Strike: Mirek can only swing once, but his damage is increased by 1.25x.
-Pretty deadly in some ways. He ruins any bosses we have that built on DEX-tanking. Well, assuming he can hit them. He's so slow that might be a bit of a feat in the first place.
Guardian's Swiftness: Mirek automatically goes first at the start of combat.
-This is really important to making him useful at all. He'll probably want to use it to position himself in front of people 9 times out of 10, just to start his counter game.
Guardian's Fury: Mirek's Guardian's Strike bonus increases by .05x for each 20% focus he has, capping at 1.5x. At 100% Focus, Mirek's attacks ignore Defense.
His main feature. He gets up to 100% and then smashes. Endgame physical damage against average is 1224 at 100% (ITD).
516 at 0%
591 at 80%
Guardian's Revenge: Mirek counters any physical attack from within his range 100% of the time with a 75%-damage basic attack.
This is kind of what makes his charging up come together as a very competent group player. He can actually get some damage in despite the speed thanks to his counters.
382.5 at 0% Focus
444 at 80% Focus
918 at 100% Focus (ITD)
Guardian's Shroud: Mirek reduces all effects from Dissonant and Disquiet sources by 10% (this effect increases as he levels, capping out at about 25%). All allies sharing a hex with him receive half the effect.
Mostly plot power at the moment, but this should eventually be used to play around with our Field Effect system when that gets worked out.
Active
Frustration: (15%) Physical with enhanced crit rate.
Guardian Blades have a mere 9% Crit Rate. I would suggest that this has an above-average crit activation rate, since otherwise it's just a physical and it would lower the damage of his next attack for no increase in damage here. I think 80% sounds good. I think this stacks with Mirek's 100% ITD effect, and clearly would be a great damage boost at the top. Easy to refill, too. That might make it too good since Crits are double final damage. Assuming the Critical hits:
1020 at 0%
1183 at 80%
2448 at 100% (ITD)
Peace: (25%) High damage attack that ignores resistances.
It costs more than Frustration, but it has a 100% activation rate at least. Still subject to evade, so it's not a huge leap just in function. Especially since there's only one resistance type involved (Slashing) due to Mirek only using Guardian Blades. Needs a higher multiplier than a Crit to make it worth the extra 10% Focus. 2.5x is too high, but 2.25x and more reliable than Frustration makes a worthwhile move, I'd think.
1147 at 0%
1331 at 80%
2754 at 100% (ITD)
Hatred: (50%) Instant Death if the attack hits (Accuracy = Focus).
Straightforward, and not nearly as awesome as any of his other moves unless his opponent is immune to physicals or something.
Despair: (30%) Mirek preemptively counters any attacks against him from an adjacent hex for the next five rounds, and decreases the accuracy of that attack. Stacks with Guardian's Revenge.
Love: (75%) As per Despair, but applies to anyone sharing his hex.
Does this mean he double-counters for five rounds? It reads like it does. I'm going to assume that GR's 75% damage mult applies to both counters, or this is insane. Damage is including 2 hits if someone attack Mirek in his range:
765 at 0% Focus
888 at 80% Focus
1836 at 100% Focus (ITD)
Catharsis: (0%) Disables Guardian's Shroud and Mirek can no longer gain Focus while this attack is active. Mirek's stats increase by 5% and he deals Dissonant damage to all characters in his hex or nearby hexes at the start of their turn. Mirek's attacks deal extra Dissonant damage.
How long does it last? This is basically Mirek's only method of dealing pseudo-magical damage. So I'm assuming his physicals hit Magic Resistance, which isn't bad. This needs an actual magic power formula. Not really sure what seems appropriate. Any ideas?
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Random scattered notes. Sorry I haven't had much time for indepth analysis lately.
Mirek (active skillz)
-Frustration is problematic. If Mirek is hit once between his adjacent turns, he gains ongoing 2448 damage every turn due to getting enough focus back to use this every turn. lolwhat. Either this needs a focus cost increase, a way to be less broken at 100 focus, or just be not as good (e.g. only a 50% crit rate). A couple ways to make it less broken at 100 focus are to change it to "attack ignores half enemy's def", or just make the def-ignoring property of Guardian's Fury only apply to basic physicals. Peace has similar issues.
What I was thinking of was doing this.
Peace (20% focus): Attack that ignores half enemy's Def and slashing resistance, -20 hit (remember, Mirek is very accurate at base). Does ~800 endgame, depending on current focus. Note that this one doesn't benefit from the ITD property any more than a basic physical would, so we sidestep the broke at 100 focus here. It's quite a power move, especially since it mocks enemy defenses so well, though is a little more vulnerable to evade to compensate.
Frustration (40% focus): Attack at 1.5x STR that has a 50% chance to be a critical hit. For the gambling man, as an attack named frustration should be. Randomly 836/1672 (1254 average) as soon as it's available, but at 100 focus it -does- go psycho, and pretty much acts similarly to Meilin's 100-focus "someone's gonna die now" moves. Randomly 1836 (already really good...) or 3672 (zomg), averages 2454. And Mirek can get back to 100 focus and use this again much faster than Meilin can despite the speed, although the unreliability holds it in check. A little. Maybe. Given some of the buffers in the party, may need to watch out a bit here...
Hatred: Works wonderfully.
Love: Countering twice bugs me a bit. I'd say just move the counter to pre-emptive and double its damage (to 150%), which ends up with exactly the same numbers Djinn had but is more elegant. Also, since this was never quantified: "If the counter hits, accuracy of incoming attack is reduced by 40."
Despair: As above, but doesn't get the damage boost, so the counters are still 75%. It's got a much lower cost than Love, so it losing both damage and ally protection makes sense.
Awesome buffs, they give Mirek something to go for besides loldamage.
Catharsis: Needs a look, but I'm getting sleepy.
other things I mentioned in chat tonight
I'm a bit concerned about Rafael's Ruination, particularly combined with the "one big shot of awesome" Mirek can build up to. Buff from Eirwen, Frustration at 100 focus... etc. We can fix this by totally redesigning Eirwen but even then the problem is kinda temporary: Isolde, Meilin, and to a lesser degree Ilona also have ridiculous single attacks (Oversurged and 100 focus techs) which get buffed to hell by this. A general nerf to Ruination could work, but someone else may hopefully have a better idea.
Claire's Firemelon is currently useless as hell. I understand why it was nerfed, but as is it has no reason to be used ever besides some esoteric counter avoiding. 2x self-only damage buffs are useless when they also double costs; this is why Energy Charge and Power Charge and so on are more than 2x. Not sure what fix I recommend at the moment, but it's something to keep in mind.
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Hey guys, I'm baaaaaaack~
And starting things off with a massive changeup of one of the most complicated PCs here--too needlessly complicated, in fact.
Rafael
Rafael is...especially at first glance, surprisingly durable. Doubly so when you consider he's a mage. Cast-best HP, above-average VIT, and medium armor ensure he's anything but squishy to begin with, even given his terrible evasion. He's clearly a mage, though, given his subpar strength, bad Dexterity, and outright terrible speed. However, the fact is that he kicks his son's ass as far as raw durability goes, heavy armor aside. Resistant to status, though. That aside, he falters a bit on the magical durability, though thanks to his high HP, manages to do above-average on that front. At first glance, anyway; his spells have the notable drawback of being cast from his HP--and getting half-benefit from healing.
Damage ranges:
Mace: 129 -> 259, 60% accuracy, 3% critrate
Axe: 113 -> 226, 60% accuracy, 21% critrate
Staff: 102 -> 205, 65% accuracy, 3% critrate. Boosts magic accuracy.
Shield: 91 -> 183, 50% accuracy, 3% critrate. Boosts evasion.
synopsis of physicals: Mage alert.
Magic damage vs. average: (29+MATK)*1.483 -> (58+MATK)*1.483
Anyway, onto the actual skills here.
Passive: Nullification
- Reduces status hitrates by 50% and halves healing received. This skill is intended to be a bit of a downside (making it hard to let him spam with healing backup), though the upside does feel a bit too weak. Tempted to let this extend to ID and stat-downs as well, just to increase its usability.
Now, as for the big set, while I was loathe to admit it before, his skillset can use a LOT of pruning. As such, I'm removing a lot of the inverted sigil combinations:
1B: Obfuscation [Code DC] (15% mHP):As above--slower chargetime, but more accurate
1D: Obfuscation [Code DN] (27% mHP):Slower than Code DC, but perfect hitrate.
2B: Destruction [Code SC] (18% mHP): Slightly weaker than the Code CS version, but is now Hex-target. Even slower to charge.
2D: Destruction [Code SN] (35% mHP): Radius-1 hex burst AoE. Lower damage, but still fast.
4B: Degeneration [Code EC] (13% mHP):As above, only slower and more accurate.
4D: Degeneration [Code EN] (27% mHP): Slower than Code EC, but perfect hitrate
5B: Assimilation [Code SD] (7% mHP): Deals moderate ST darkness damage, absorbs 1/4 of the damage dealt as health. Slower chargetime.
6B: Corruption [Code AD] (20% mHP): As above, only hex-target and less accurate.
7B: Reciprocation [Code ED] (20% mHP): As above, only slower and more accurate.
8B: Aggravation [Code AS] (23% mHP): As above, but shorter chargetime and lower accuracy.
9B: Fragmentation [Code ES] (18% mHP): As above, but at a lower base damage, longer charge time, and Hex-targetting.
10B: Execution [Code EA] (28% mHP): Chance of instant death to all targets on a hex. Lower accuracy.
All of these are being removed for the sake of cleaning up the movelist. NEB would be proud.
Onto the actual moveset, now that that ugly mess has been cleared up somewhat.
1A: Obfuscation [Code CD] (13% mHP):Adds Confuse and Berserk to all targets in a hex.
Okay. In retrospect, the cost feels a bit too high. Drop that down to 8%. Furthermore, Confuse does not exist as-is, and Berserk is a lot more beneficial than it is in most games--usually. In this case, however, just replace Confuse with Blind, and voila. Accuracy problems that cause resource problems. Useful in a lot of cases. Thinking accuracy is somewhere between 100 and 110.
1C: Obfuscation [Code ND] (23% mHP):Greatly reduced chargetime.
Drop the cost to about 15%. Rather than make it the fast version, instead make it a radius-1 hex burst. Rafael's lack of crowd-control's a big weakness for a lot of the game, so I figure the Nihil sigil should generally cover holes in his set (somewhat). So, wide-area blind/berserk. Awesome against the right targets. Make it less accurate, though. 90 should be solid given the sheer area this hits.
2A: Destruction [Code CS] (15% mHP): Fairly heavy ST Darkness damage. Slow to charge.
First off, change element to Disquiet, obviously.
This...is a bit tricky formula-wise. I did intend Rafael's magic to remain useful throughout the game, and that does include his damage magic. Formula-wise, it's a biiiit tricky to manage, since it'd either make him a Jeigan or have this spell be phased out later, but I think I've finally figured out something. Oh, and drop the cost to 10%.
Modified formula for this spell: (INT+MATK+2*(HP spent)-MDEF)*(INT/SPR). This, plus a base MATK of 100, results in a starting damage of 464 at Level 1, and 833 at Level 50. It sounds high, but given how slow he is, and particularly the fact that this is Disquiet-element (and thus resisted and blocked by a TON of things). It can afford to be strong. Accuracy 120.
2C: Destruction [Code NS] (27% mHP): Comparable power to Code CS, now with a fast chargetime.
Drop the cost to 20%, remove the speed change, have it be hex target, and change the formula to (INT+MATK+(HP spent)-MDEF)*(INT/SPR). Keep MATK at 100, and voila, instant variation. AoE can be changed to something else if desired.
3A: Ruination [Code CA] (12% mHP):The next three instances of damage on the target are multiplied by 1.5x after all considerations (also including field effects, poison, et cetera)
This has been a giant pain in the ass to try and balance for the longest time. After all, he already has so much variety, that it's hard to really do stuff here. Then I had a thought: "What shuts Rafael down more than anything else? MEVA and Disquiet Resist!".
As such, this is changed to a MEVA-reducing spell, and the Ruination series is changed into a set of stat debuffs. Possibly the only one in the game. Reduces target's MEVA by a flat 30%. Stackable. Perfect accuracy.
3B: Ruination [Code AC] (18% mHP):The next two instances of damage are multiplied by 2x.
Drop cost to 12%. This now instead lowers the target's SPR by 30%. Accuracy 120.
3C: Ruination [Code NA] (20% mHP):The next three instances of damage on the target are multiplied by 1.75x.
Drop cost to 12%. This now instead lowers the target's MDEF by 30%. Accuracy 120.
3D: Ruination [Code AN] (25% mHP):The next instance of damage is multiplied by 3x.
Drop cost to 15%. Instead of its effect, if the target has any form of Disquiet resist/immunity/absorption, it is returned to neutral affinity.
4A: Degeneration [Code CE] (13% mHP):Adds Poison and Healblock to a 1-hex-burst radius
This is the first case of crowd control Rafael gets. This is a rather wide-area status that is probably more useful for the wide-area healblock. Not really much I can see worth changing here. Accuracy 90 to compensate for the effectiveness and area.
4C: Degeneration [Code NE] (23% mHP): Much faster as to be near-instant.
Hrm. This one's hard to figure out something for, really. Ideas would be nice here.
5A: Assimilation [Code DS] (5% mHP): Deals low ST darkness damage, absorbs half the damage dealt as health.
Next attack spell here. Meant to be lower damage but parasitic healing. Going with the same formula as Destruction, with MATK 75. Switch damage to Disquiet (again), Damage is 304 -> 496. Healing would be 152->248, but...hm. Might just let this be a 1:1 drain ratio and have it be a special case that ignores the heal-halving. Gives him some self-sufficiency for magic at least. Accuracy 120.
6A: Corruption [Code DA] (18% mHP): Reverses the effects of healing spells for the single target for one round--any healing effects cast or received now do damage.
Healing inversion. Always felt like a nasty trick to me, and a fun one to be able to use. Situational, but could be spoilerific and used as an underhanded and fun way to mess up some fights. Cut the cost down to 10%, though. Accuracy 120.
7A: Reciprocation [Code DE] (18% mHP): Adds Backlash (take damage equivalent to damage dealt) effect to target. ST.
This...is another situational, but useful status spell. If it hits the target, and they're the type that is big on MT or damage output, they can find themselves eating really high damage, fast. Deceptively powerful. I'd say for the sake of simplicity, cost can go to 15%. Accuracy 110.
8A: Aggravation [Code SA] (18% mHP): Deals ST nontyped damage to the target equal to (tmHP-tcHP). Typically does not affect bosses. Long chargetime.
Pain Doubler! Without the stupid 666 damage cap. Another situational spell (as with a lot of his stuff), but it can be used as a limit bypass against difficult normal enemies, and bosses will most usually have an immunity flag. Damage is nontyped for obvious reasons. Cost to 15%. Accuracy 110.
9A: Fragmentation [Code SE] (15% mHP): Deals heavy ST nontyped damage with a multiplier based on the number of buffs (status and stat-boosting) the target has. Multiplier starts at 0x for unaffected targets. Ignores reflect. Targets unboosted magic defense/SPR.
This is yet another situational spell (Rafael...has a lot, yeah. That's what happens when you have status mages). Spoils buffers and their beneficiaries, via doing more damage for more buffs. Yay damage!
Formula will be x*(INT+MATK-MDEF)*(INT/SPR), where x = number of individual buffs on the target at once, starting at zero, going with Spell Power 300. This would result in 487x -> 530x. Anyone who uses/has a lot of buffs will suffer horribly (Hi Janus!). Accuracy 150.
10A: Execution [Code AE] (20% mHP): Chance of instant death to a target.
Straightforward. It's single-target instant death. Accuracy 110, perhaps? Maybe 120 given the cost. Adding a flavor caveat: Does not hit anyone immune or absorbent to Disquiet.
11: Annihilation [Code CN] (0% mHP): Drops Rafael's HP to 1 in order to deliver nontyped magic damage to a single target. Has no base HP cost, but is OPB. Damage based on current HP. Does 0 if cast from 1 HP.
Yeah, it's Sacrifice. And pretty much his nuke. Power = cHP.
Level 1: 1539 at max, linearly decreases to 0 at 1 HP. Level 50: 3037 at max, linearly decreases to 0 at 1 HP. Accuracy 150.
12: Cessation [Code NC] (20% mHP): Targets in hex have their status locked. For the duration, no outside sources can add or remove statuses, statdowns, or stat-buffs to/from the targets. (Note: If Katarine has this on her, Aura Lance doesn't dispel the buffs, but inflicts 0 damage)
It's Status Lock, yeah. Drop the cost to 10%. Perfect Accuracy.
...okay, this is the first time I did it in forever. I probably got stuff wrong, but it's a LOT better than it used to be.
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Faron
Statwise, it is very clear what Faron is. He's your standard keep-in-the-back Squishy Wizard, awesome against magic and terrible against physicals, has assloads of MP and high INT to back up his variety of elemental spells. He also has no physical accuracy, paper-thin durability against anything that gets around his magic defense, and gets mocked by Reflect. (Thankfully, he is not brought in any fights against Selena) Average speed speaks in his favor unlike most other automatically-gained offensive mages (Faulheit, Erastus, and Rafael are all -slow-. Noemi and Rass are fast). He has options beyond damage, at the very least, but he does notably have problems against anything that's magic-tolerant or that can just plain blitz him. Oddly enough, his skillset's more of a mage-type of Shao.
Weapon Damages:
Staff: 22 -> 45, 40% Accuracy, 3% Critical rate, boosts spell accuracy.
Sling: 18 -> 36, 25% Accuracy, 30% Critical rate, Range 2
Boomerang: 18 -> 36, 20% Accuracy, 3% Critical rate, may have status riders, Range 2
Rings: 22 -> 45, 25% Accuracy, 100% Critical rate (already factored), boosts INT, Range 3
...needless to say, this is in the category that we would like to refer to as 'laughable'. But he's not a physical fighter anyway. Taking advantage of elemental weaknesses via magic is more of his thing, and it shows.
Magic Power: (38+Power)*1.63 -> (76+Power)*1.63
Skills:
Continuous Power - Faron can keep casting until he has a negative MP value equal to his Max MP value. However, while he has a negative MP value, Faron takes a penalty of -2 ranks to all stats except MP, and anything that refers to Faron's MP instead considers him to have 0 MP. Faron's MP can be reduced to below 0 by MP-draining.
Yeah, this one's needed fixing, honestly. Being dependent on having MP is fine and all, but it's still something that needs to be fixed to a degree. I'd say keep his MP normal; he's at more risk of getting stabbed to death than running out of MP anyway, and costs can be fixed as necessary to keep his pool seeming particularly deep. I'm in favor of just throwing this out, though if you want him to start suffering at low MP, a simple "-30% to STR/VIT/DEX/INT/SPR/SPD at 25% max MP" would suffice.
Focused Power - Faron is immune to any status that would reduce or disable Faron's spells/spellcasting ability. Not learned until Endgame. Quieting
Hm. Silence immunity would be nice if silence proves to be a problem. Not sure if you're intending Backfire to also be included in this, but that's about all I can think of here. I'll just leave it be.
Exploder - ST/AoE. Fire-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is (somewhat) Circular Hex Target, hitting all targets except self at range 1. Can add Burn status. Dissonance
Having this as initial because it cements his 'power' status, for one. For another, it sets him up as a credible threat during the times you do fight him.
Okay, Burn status is fine. I admit that I'm going to go with my own elemental biases here, so be prepared for some variation here.
Fire, I've considered to generally be the 'economy' element. Inexpensive, but you get what you pay for, so to speak. Seems like the general opinion is in favor of it being the 'power' element, however, so I'll keep the trend here as such. At least as far as it being one big hit goes.
ST: Power 1x350. Damage: 632 -> 694. 50% chance of Burn. Accuracy 110.
MT:Hits all adjacent hexes. Power 1x325. Damage: 591 -> 653. 30% chance of Burn to all adjacent hexes, Accuracy 100.
Gust - ST/AoE. Wind-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is (somewhat) Cone Hex Target, hitting all targets in direction from self at range 2. Can add Disoriented status. Dissonance.
Figure he needs something with a safer MT for the second. Wind magic, to me, has all been about hits. Lots of hits. If you doubt me, look at Faulheit's stuff. Disoriented is rather powerful as-is. Busts accuracy similar to blind AND adds randomized movement? I think the forced random movement is probably enough of a hindrance to enemies, and it can ruin meleers like no tomorrow. And then releases a game with the debug menu clearly accessible.
ST: Power 4x35. Damage: 472 -> 720 (varies with MDEF). 33% chance of Disorient. Accuracy 120
MT: Power 4x25. Damage: 408 -> 656 (Varies with MDEF). 20% chance of Disorient. Hits a range-2 cone in front (1, then 3). Accuracy 120
Downpour - ST/AoE. Water-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is a Crescent-shaped Hex Target, hitting all targets in 3 contiguous Hexes from self at range 1. Can add Displaced status. Dissonance.
Okay. Displaced has gone bye-bye, for obvious reasons, and I'll go with the same idea that NEB had for water; Misfortune. Niche status, and this spell instead compensates by being more versatile on the power-to-hits ratio. Not sure what you mean by a crescent (as you described it as different from the hemicircular AoE), so I think I'll go with my first interp: 3 contiguous hexes in an arc perpendicular to the caster. Anyway:
ST: Power 2x145. Damage: 596 -> 720. 40% chance of Misfortune. Accuracy 120
MT: Power: 2x120. Damage: 514 -> 638. 25% chance of Misfortune. Hits a 3-hex arc perpendicular to the caster within 2 hexes of the caster. Accuracy 110.
Shocker - ST/AoE. Lightning-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is LT Hex Target, with central origin, hitting all targets except self at range 2. Can add Paralysis status. Dissonance.
Not too much that really needs to be said here. I'm seeing Lightning as the 'accurate' element above all others, so it's going to be a bit more useful against those with good MEVA in practice. Doesn't hurt that it does have good status in Paralyze--and give its MT a bonus as the only range 3 spell.
ST: Power 2x130. Damage: 546 -> 670. 30% chance of Paralyze. Accuracy 140.
MT: Power: 2x115. Damage: 498 -> 622. Hits a line three hexes long. 20% chance of Paralyze. Accuracy 130.
Quicksand - ST/AoE. Earth-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is a Hemi-Circular Hex Target, hitting all targets except self at range 1. Can add Entrapped status. Dissonance.
Entrapped doesn't exist, but Immobilized does, and that seems to be what you're going for. Earth's felt like the real 'big hit' element to me--albeit at the cost of accuracy and a small area of effect.
ST: Power 1x425. Damage: 754 -> 816. 30% chance of Immobilize. Accuracy 105.
MT: Power 1x410. Damage: 730 -> 792. 15% chance of Immobilize. Hits a semicircle in front of Faron. Accuracy 100.
Frostfall - ST/AoE. Ice-elemental. ST focuses damage, AoE is a tri-spoke Hex Target, with a central origin, hitting all targets except self at range 1. Can add Frostbite status. Dissonance.
And this is going to be the last of the elemental spells Faron gets. The AoE version probably deserves some lesser reduction on the basis that it's a VERY tricky AoE to use for him. But potentially rewarding. Freeze in place of Frostbite, as before.
ST: Power 3x80. Damage: 576 -> 762. 10% chance of Freeze. Accuracy 120
MT: Power 3x70. Damage: 528 -> 711. 8% chance of Freeze, hits in a 2-hex line forward, and the two back diagonals. Accuracy 110.
Mind/Body Restoration - ST. Heals all status on target except Death/Unconscious. Range 3. Resonance.
Going to assume this is Range 2. And frankly, it can probably be classified as Dissonant, but I'll let it be. We don't have that much status healing anyway.
Land's Blessing - HT. Kicks in activation at a speed independent of but equivalent two Faron's second turn. All unconscious/dead characters in target Hex are revived with 1 HP. It being on the field stops battle ending/game overs, and if one side is completely depleted, its activation is instant. Range 3. Resonance.
On the one end, it's nice that he has revival of sorts. As a sort of 'safety button' no less. Given the restrictions on revival, though, this probably should be a OPB move. And Range 2.
See Mind - ST. Increases target's Vit and Spi by 10% per turn for the next six turns, before wearing off. If cast on a Hex again before wearing off, the buff level is retained with a reset timer (If Faron cast this after the buff already provided +40%, then it would provide +40% for four turns, before providing +50% and then +60%). Can only be cast on one hex on the field at a time. If cast on a different Hex, the first casting is immediately dispelled. Range 3. Resonance.
Again, Range 2. And this is a bit complicated and headache-y to work with. And you're getting a bit confused between ST and Hex here. I'd argue this is a non-stacking hex effect (meaning it can't stack with Land's Blessing, and possibly gets wiped by other hex effects as well). And the buffing feels rather high by comparison, so it's hard to say if this is good or not.
Draining - ST. Damages target's HP/MP, and heals all characters in Faron's hex by ((damage dealt * 2)/# of characters in target hex). Range 1. Dissonance/Disquiet.
Hm. Was tempted to make it MP-only and nerf the draining, but it is notably risky insofar that it is Range 1. Plotwise I'm for nerfing this. Gameplay-wise, it's decentish when Faron has someone who can cover for him. Jury's out for now.
Punish - ST. Deals non-elemental damage, auto-hits all weaknesses on targets. Ignores target defense. Not unlocked until near-endgame. Range 1. Dissonance.
Oh yeah, this screams final skill. At the same time, I'm thinking it should throw out the ITD and just go with nontype weakness-hitting. It's more of a fallback if you're not sure of an enemy weakness, than something to spam against bosses, the way I see it. Power is 3x65. Damage 501 -> 687. But make it Range 2. Accuracy 120.
Illness - HT. Adds Poison/Blind/Confusion/Charm/Doom/Sleep/Silence. Each status has a check independent of each other. Range 1. Dissonance/Disquiet.
Given that a lot of these statuses are out of date...it seems like you're basically going for a Bad Breath-esque skill. As much as he is trying to cover every base...it's not exactly the best idea. Batman Wizards are never popular. That aside: make the status cocktail something along the lines of Poison/Blind/Disoriented/Paralysis/Backfire and it should be decent. Accuracy 90 for each status. Still tempted to throw this one out, though.
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Just noting that I really like the Faron re-invisioning you have here. The only thing I would add is that his spells were all made range 1 for the specific reasoning that if he has a bunch of ranged spells, his crap durability will never actually hinder him. So he needs a reason to get in close.
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Time for another overview/retooling. This time of yet another skillset nightmare by yours truly.
Katarine
Yeah, finally doing her overview. Katarine is statistically, an oddity, and a generally frail but dodgy individual. While she doesn't quite have the raw pEVA of sorts like Mirek or Ilona, or the mEVA of Faron, she comes close in both regards, being overall dodgy and hard to land a hit (or status) on. This is fortunate because she is also generally VERY frail. Her high Dexterity and Speed scores help underline this tendency, as she will move fast and often; a benefit for both a speed-based attacker and a buffer--with an odd level of self-sufficiency and particularly high mobility. She doesn't like being tied down if she can help it, preferring an ability to dance out of range of slower melee enemies, and possibly close in on the less cooperative squishies if she has a free turn during which she can.
Weapon Damages:
Light Sword: 240 -> 480 over 4 attacks, 80% ACC, 6% Crit, 20% Counter. This JUST misses a fifth attack; if given that, damage goes up to 288->576.
Rapier: 225 -> 450 over 4 attacks, 80% ACC, 15% Crit, 30% Counter.
Throwing Knife: 144 -> 288 over 3 attacks, 70% ACC, 6% Crit, 20% Counter, Range 3.
Darts: 135 -> 270 over 4 attacks, 70% ACC, 6% Crit, 20% Counter, Range 3. Same corollary as with Light Swords. Damage jumps to 172-> 344 with a fifth attack.
Katars: 198 -> 396 over 5 attacks, 85% ACC, 30% Crit, 15% Counter. Damage is likely to fluctuate a good deal in practice due to the critrate.
Okay, so yeah. She's a solid fighter as far as things go, and can do some solid damage to those with low DEX and less than stellar armor. Katars, due to their fairly strong benefits, are a weapon type likely to be restricted in availability based on the havoc the two users can wreak, potentially.
Magic damage equation: (Power-12)*0.76 -> (Power-24)*0.75.
Given, she shares a party with Isolde. They're the suicide squad for the most part; you're pretty much needing some sort of solid offense if you want to stay up to par in there. That aside, the big deal with her is her skillset, which needs a couple of alterations; one for flavor, and one for the sake of easing up mechanics a bit.
*Conduit Leech: Katarine gains the benefits of hex-target support spells that she casts on allies. She uses this technique to split the effect of her Dissonance abilities in half to minimize the Disquiet backlash effects.
Yeah, this one's gone through enough discussion. It's the only one of her skills that starts at 'full', since it just has that one effect. This is pretty much the -core- ability for her to prevent being a weak link, given her skillset and mobility.
*Biogenesis: Hex Target spell. Adds Regeneration to targets of hex. Regeneration duration or AoE possibly increases with level. The backlash effect of this skill is that it instantly Dispels any other buffs on the target, including Katarine herself. If another buff is cast on someone with the Regen, then the Regen effect is dispelled. Dissonance.
Her only healing spell for the game, and it's a more "regen" style. This one is tricky on the basis that it resets her buffing game, but it's also the only source of healing. First thing to do, since everyone insisted on it ages ago, is to make the regen a non-percentile value. The next is to cut the number of levels down to 5, rather than 10, making it a bit less unwieldy, and easier to write a progression for.
As such, we should also be able to get into active healing equations now--since Kasia and Aurel also gain healing of this variety, and it's more important for them. It will likely be renoted as such: a*INT+b, where a is a positive value and b is a positive integer of sorts.
In Katarine's case, the skill's values will likely be as such:
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 2 3 3 4 4
Regen: 3*INT+80 4*INT+100 4*INT+140 5*INT+160 5*INT+200
Radius(Hexes): 0 0 1 1 1
In case this comes off as powerful, keep in mind that this does eat buffs in the process, and goes away if she wants to use any or all of them at some point. This means that if creatively used, she technically has a dispel--but it adds regen. Also, not discriminatory with the AoE there.
As for charges, thinking this would start at 6, eventually going up to 12 by Level 50.
*Rapid Perception: Hex Target spell. Percentile speed boost to of targets of hex. Levels increase strength or duration of boost. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance.
Aaaand here comes the speed boost. One of Katarine's initial buffs, and probably one of the notably stronger ones on the basis of what it chooses to buff. Speed's important in this game, even if it isn't calculated quadratically. Anyway, again, 5 levels, non-percentile.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 2 2 3 3 4
Boost: 0.4*INT 0.5*INT 0.5*INT 0.6*INT 0.7*INT
Charges: 4, increasing to 8 by Level 50.
*Kinetic Buffer: Hex Target spell. Grants resistance to Slash/Pierce/Impact attacks, IE: physical elements. Levels increase the resistance granted. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance
As a start, let me bring up the fact that each buffer seems to have their own means of boosting defenses, in a method seeminly befitting of themselves. Eirwen likes to buff the target's natural stats with her cooking. By comparison, Jin likes to grant small but notable buffs to DEF and MDEF with his songs. Katarine, by comparison, prefers directly cutting into the damage taken via resist-adding barriers; that's where this comes in. An -extremely- valuable spell early on for fights that the team can't quite blitz through, since it adds a degree of tankiness that is hard to deny
No duration's listed here, where most spells do. Making it a function of level, as is befitting most of her spells.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 4 4 5 6 7
Resist: 30% 35% 40% 45% 50%
Charges: 4, increasing to 9 by L50.
Alacrity: Single-target spell. +30% DEX boost to target. Levels increase the duration of the boost. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance. (Prerequisite skill to be levelled: Rapid Perception)
The first of two spells that she does not gain benefits from casting on allies, and for very good reason. DEX is one of those stats that is about on par with SPD for power. That is to say, high. Small changes can alter an opponent's durability and offense heavily--and possibly give someone like Isolde or another heavy a VERY large boost. Larger than from a percentile buff, anyway, given how bad DEX is for some of them.
Boost is changed to a flat 0.4*INT. Level alters duration only.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 2 3 4 5 6
Prerequisite: Rapid Perception Level 4.
Charges: 2, increases linearly to 6 by L50.
Energy Buffer: Hex Target spell. Grants resistance to magical elements. Levels increase the resistance granted. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance.(Prerequisite skill: Kinetic Buffer)
Not much to say here. It's pretty much the magic-element end of Katarine's defense buffing. In fact, I have no reason to really let it be any different aside from the fact that rather than buffing Slash/Impact/Pierce, it instead boosts resist to Fire/Ice/Lightning/Earth/Wind/Water/Light/Disquiet.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 4 4 5 6 7
Resist: 30% 35% 40% 45% 50%
Prerequisite: Kinetic Buffer Level 3
Charges: 4, increasing to 9 by L50.
Killing Sight: Single-target spell. Grants flat critical rate boost to target. Levels increase duration of boost. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance.(Prerequisite skill: Alacrity)
And here is the point at which we start hitting blatantly offensive buffs, and powerful ones at that. A boost to critical rate will help just about anyone who relies on physicals. Strongly, at that. Thus, the boost will be a flat 20%. Good enough to be notable, but not so much as to start being hax. Level only increases duration. Charges are few.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Duration: 2 2 3 3 4
Prerequisite: Alacrity Level 4.
Charges: Starts at 1, increases linearly to 5 by L50.
Empower: Hex Target spell. Grants percentile boost to ATK and INT for all targets in area. Levels increase duration and strength of boost. Target loses 2% mHP every turn while this status is active. Dissonance.(Prerequisite skills: Biogenesis, Kinetic Buffer)
Another fairly powerful buff, this one hitting ATK and INT. This one is notable for being the last buff she gets that powers up with level (unless you get Killing Sight later). Also the first of skills with multiple prerequisites. It's an extremely strong buff, and likely one of the last ones to be obtained, really. Also, notable that this is the only one that specifically needs to be noted, though this goes for all her buffs: Repeated castings only reset the timer. They do not reapply the effect with new stats.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Boost: 0.3*INT 0.3*INT 0.4*INT 0.4*INT 0.5*INT
Duration: 2 3 3 4 4
Prerequisites: Biogenesis L4, Kinetic Buffer L4
Charges: Starts at 2, increases to 5 by L50.
Aura Lance: Single-target non-elemental offensive spell. Deals extra damage for each stat boost or positive status that is on Katarine. Dispels all such boosts after resolution of the attack. Dissonance. Leveling increases damage and accuracy. (Prerequisite skills: Empower, Energy Buffer)
Katarine's only offensive spell--and an unusual one. It eats her buffs to release a fairly large attack on the enemy (and notably does not work with any sort of Status Locking). Tempted to take this off of Nontyped...though now that Isolde got her specialty moved off of Nontyped... <_< That aside, eh, keeping it Non-elemental, on the basis that it's a very situational spell anyway.
#hits = #boosts consumed.
Anyway, the main reason for leveling this sucker up's going to be the power boost. Katarine's magic damage SUCKS, so anything that gives her a boost is wanted.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Power: 250 275 300 325 350
To Hit: 100 110 120 130 140
Prerequisites: Empower Level 3, Energy Buffer Level 4
Charges: Starts at 2, increases to 4 at Level 50.
Ablation: Hex target spell. Targets of spell negate the next attack directed at them. Dissonance. Levelling increases the number of charges, albeit slowly.(Prerequisite skills: Kinetic Buffer, Energy Buffer, Killing Sight)
Katarine's last spell, and it's pretty much her top barrier. Kind of a scaled-down White Dragon Protect, where the next attack/attack string is flat out negated. This is a special case of "lasts until triggered" for Katarine, and as such is the only buff with infinite duration. As there's no other way to boost its effect, levels instead increase the number of charges.
Level: 1 2 3 4 5
Charge: 1 1 2 2 3
Prerequisites: Kinetic Buffer L5, Energy Buffer L5, Killing Sight L5
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Claire
Yeah, okay. Claire is, speed aside, dead average in just about everything, Speed(awesome) Intelligence(useless) and Spirit aside. She's a giant pain in the ass to consider with Role Adaptation, however, which lets her switch roles from her "Queen of average" setup to either a defensive tank or a more mobile fighter. It's...really hard to say much about her to start, really, what with her mostly-average tendencies.
Weapon Damage:
Pike: 168 -> 336, 75% Accuracy, 12% Critical, no counters, Range 2.
Guardian Blade: 120 -> 240, 100% Accuracy, 9% Critical, 15% Counter
Spear: 120 -> 240, 90% Accuracy, 18% Critical, 25% Counter
Shortspear: 108 -> 216, 95% Accuracy, 18% Critical, 25% Counter
Javelin: 108 -> 216, 90% Accuracy, 12% Critical, no counters, Range 3
So basically, special weapons aside, she's got a few options. Pikes for damage and range (thus possible counter avoidance), Guardian Blades for zomfgwtf accuracy, Spears and shortspears for counterhax, and Javelins for pure range. She's not too good on damage, though her skillset's an odd setup anyway, designed more for positioning and utility than actual power, as we'll see below.
The first matter of the deal that applies is her skill learning method. We've got nothing listed here aside from "training under Mirek". So...we'll have to figure out a simple enough mechanic. Plot learning could work, but I was thinking more along the lines of (learned after X battles in the same party). In other words, as long as Mirek and Claire are in the same active party, it counts as a battle towards this. Happens automatically for the times she's forced, but this will have to be actively done when the party selections are wider/mixed up.
Anyway, skills will be handled in this way: Passives, then Focus, then item. Because items are a pain.
Hyperactive: Claire's speed is raised by 1% for every 5% focus meter she currently has.
Eh, this is fine. I'd be worried about her capability to hyperbuff Focus for others (Meilin especially loves this) at an accelerated rate, but then I remembered that other party members can buff speed to begin with.
Role Adaptation: If equipped with only Light-class armor, gain +1 Move, raise Physical/Magical evasion to B, lower Vitality/(MDEF stat) to F. If equipped only with Heavy-class armor, lose 1 Move, lower Physical/Magical evasion to F, lower Speed to D+, raise Vitality/(MDEF stat) to B, and gain OPB Special Endure (instead of only lasting for one attack, lasts until the next party member's turn). Non-weight-type equipment do not count against this passive.
...okay, this is a fucking headache, Magic. I haven't wanted to punt someone this badly since I did an overview on Ilona--and that includes Faron's headache of a passive that was just ASKING to be thrown out. Anyway, the way I'm reading this: If she has Light-class armor and no Medium/Heavy-class accessories, she gets some boosts and penalties. Likewise, heavy-class armor and no medium/light accessories. Guardian and Female accessories do not count this. Anyway, thank god VIT, SPR, and Evade are easy enough to work with. Tempted to drop the 'endure' deal for varying reasons. Revising this to:
]Role Adaptation: If equipped with only Light-class armor and accessories, gain +1 Move, raise Physical/Magical evasion by a flat 15%, lower Vitality/Spirit by 30%. If equipped only with Heavy-class armor, lose 1 Move, lower Physical/Magical evasion by 30%, lower Speed by 33%, raise Vitality/Spirit by 15%
There. Much cleaner. Speed's not perfect, but you're dealing with something that is the approximation for 1/3, and I'm not putting repeating decimals in there. It's ugly.
Sweet Tooth: The effects of food items are doubled on Claire.
Throwing this out. Niche effect that allows a bit too much synergy with Eirwen in particular.
[EDIT] Back due to popular demand. Rewriting as such for clarification of the effect:
Sweet Tooth: The effects of Claire's food items are doubled on herself
Clarification is intended to remove excess synergistics with Eirwen, who would have been able to give her ridiculously good healing.
Proposed: Act & Move: If Claire has not moved prior to taking an action, she may take a move action afterwards.
Figured this would give her a bit more. She seems really focused on positioning and mobility, the way I see her, so this should shore things up on that end.
Focus SKills now.
Petite Madeleine: (25% Focus) Rushes into an enemy, pushing it back one hex. For each ally in the same hex, this range is increased by 1. If the enemy cannot travel back any more hexes, then it is stunned for as many turns as how many hexes it had left to travel
I'd like to say that this would be his first skill. Straightforward to use, with a clear benefit. I'd tone down the stun to always be one turn, though. Pushback makes this situationally useful as well, though.
Tarte Tatin: (20% Focus) Claire impales the enemy, flipping her to the hex on the other side of the enemy, and then pushing the enemy into the hex she was just in.
A bit finicky for positioning, but other than that I'd say it's fine. I'm actually more questioning the usefulness of this skill, honestly. It moves her up, and I guess it could be useful for getting at someone behind another enemy, but I'm...lacking ideas for it by comparison.
Mille-feuille: (50% Focus) 3-range HT. Pushes all enemies in range into the last Hex of the range.
Third skill gained. I'd assume you mean 3-hex LT here, but aside from that, the gathering and LT are useful here. Drop the focus cost to 40%
Crème Brûlée: (60% Focus) Hits all enemies in all surrounding Hexes, Range 1. All enemies hit by this skill are forced into the same hex.
I hate those damned accents. That aside, this seems like a more versatile 'gather' effect. I'd argue that the 'gather' hex is the one the primary "target" hex, so to speak. The fact that it doesn't push the enemies away does allow for easier grouping than Mille-feuille. Drop the focus cost to 50%
Profiterole: (30% Focus) Impales an enemy, and then flips the enemy right behind her, causing it one turn of stun.
Last one learned! Reliable stun and fairly easy repositioning will do that. Boost the cost to 35%.
will edit in the goddamned fruit stuff later. I need a break.
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Taking away Sweet Tooth? Man, way to suggest deleting one of the most awesome skills in the game. Gameplay + Plot connection is coooooool
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I also like Sweet Tooth, though I'll point out that based on the flavour of the move I'd been assuming it only worked on sweets, which is to say, Claire's own stuff and not Eirwen's. If it's intended to work on the latter then it definitely needs rebalancing (and it may anyway), but I'd like to see it stay in some form.